Anniversary
Spotlighting the impact of cultural landmarks
Anniversary
25 Years On: Blade’s The Lion Goes From Strength To Strength Revisited
Half a lifetime ago, an Armenian exiled to London set the template for today's DIY musicians and raised a standard that British rap has rarely reached since. Angus Batey had a ring-side seat while Blade fought to make himself heard: he looks back on a landmark in the history of independent music
Anniversary
Soliloquy For Lilith: Nurse With Wound & The Vastness Of Possibility
Created 30 years ago through financial precarity, a new family and phantasmagorical feedback, Soliloquy For Lilith is too often labeled as simply ‘dark ambient’. But Nurse With Wound’s album of hallucinogenic, avant garde and intrepid spirit helped spawn a lineage that includes Aphex Twin, Sunn O))) and Klara Lewis
Anniversary
A Thousand Leaves: How Sonic Youth Chose The Wilderness
The alternative rock major label gold rush of the mid-90s didn't last long but it burned most of those involved, in one way or another. Stevie Chick examines how the New York mavericks managed to "quietly decouple" themselves from the mainstream and prepare for their final late period genius phase as he looks at A Thousand Leaves, which was released 20 years ago
Anniversary
Suede’s Debut Mapped The Wayward Sex & Glorious Failures Of Britishness
25 years on from Suede’s eponymously titled debut, Jeremy Allen rediscovers a record that shares a lineage with glam rock, music hall and Victorian burlesque and is not afraid to explore the underbelly of British sexuality. Photos courtesy of Suede/Pat Pope, John Cheeves, Phillip Williams
Anniversary
How Air’s Moon Safari Made The World Take French Pop Seriously
Change was in the air in 1998 when a duo from Versailles released an album that did better internationally than it did in France. Jeremy Allen wonders if Moon Safari by Air was the point where Anglo Saxons stopped ignoring the surreptitious delights of French pop
Anniversary
Fuck Posterity: Serge Gainsbourg, Hip Hop & His Swan Song, You’re Under Arrest
You’re Under Arrest - the final album of Serge Gainsbourg - is often cited as the one where he tried his hand at hip hop. Jeremy Allen argues that it was more a consolidation of a proto-rap master after years of innovation and petty musical larceny
Anniversary
Diamond D, Pete Rock, CL Smooth & The Birth Of The Rapper Producer
A quarter of a century ago, Diamond D and Pete Rock pioneered a new kind of artist: the rapper-producer. Angus Batey looks back on their remarkable debut LPs and wonders where it all went wrong for them, for rap, and for us
Anniversary
25 Years On: Happy Mondays’ Yes Please! Revisited
Yes Please! is the runt of the Happy Mondays’ litter, an album more likely to turn up on lists of career-ending releases and studio disasters than on playlists and radio. But as Yes Please! approaches its 25th anniversary, could this least redeemable of albums be due a critical re-think? Ben Cardew pushes for a place in history for this unique work of ageing, regret and disaster
