Black Sky Thinking
Essays, investigation and opinion on today’s cultural landscape
Black Sky Thinking
Junk Shop Classical On Anja Thauer: Music Stories Told £1 LP By £1 LP
After a gifted German cellist called Anja Thauer took her own life in 1973, her story all but disappeared. Why? While making a Radio 3 documentary, Phil Hebblethwaite discovered that it may have been intentionally kept from the history books
Black Sky Thinking
Welcome To Techno Hell: Container Has One For The Road
The first in a new series. Now that a question mark hangs over the future of live touring, we ask some of our favourite artists to tell us about some of their more eventful experiences on the road. Ren Schofield, aka Container, casts his mind back to a bumpy few days visiting Eastern Europe
Black Sky Thinking
An Outlet To Scream: On Motherhood & Music-Making
New mothers who also make music face innumerable challenges when it comes to continuing in their creative work, yet it's a rarely discussed subject. Jude Rogers called up Elizabeth Bernholz (AKA Gazelle Twin) and Becky Jones (AKA Saint Saviour) to discuss the highs and lows of juggling babies with songwriting
Black Sky Thinking
No Turbans In Rock & Roll? On Growing Up A British Sikh Punk
For years, Sym Gharial struggled reconciling his Sikh heritage with his love of rock & roll. Here he tells tQ how after years of poor mental health and recovering from addiction issues he was able to find a new sense of himself with a new musical project, Primitive Ignorant
Black Sky Thinking
Glastonbury At 50 & The Loss Of The Communal Under Coronavirus
25 years ago, Jude Rogers had her life changed somewhere in a field near Pilton. On the 50th anniversary of the first Glastonbury weekend, she reflects on the sunny days of 1995, lamenting the loss of the communal live experience in the Coronavirus summer of 2020
Black Sky Thinking
Why Monuments Are More Than Racist Symbols, By Algiers
Algiers grew up in the shadow of Stone Mountain, a giant memorial to Confederate military leaders built as late as the 1970s. Here, the group's Ryan Mahan explains how it inspired their music and why we have to look at the structures behind the symbolism of monuments
Black Sky Thinking
Build, Connect, Educate: Why The UK Needs To Examine Its Own Racism
For every George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Trayvon Martin, there's a Rashan Charles, Sean Rigg, Cynthia Jarrett or Mark Duggan. Police brutality and racism against the black community is not just a uniquely American travesty
Black Sky Thinking
Ten Things You (Possibly) Don’t Know About Kraftwerk
While doing her research for a meaty Kraftwerk retrospective in The Observer, Jude Rogers found out a fair few things that were a bit too Geek Central for the general broadsheet reader. Here follows therefore, 10 things you might not have known about Kraftwerk. Photo by Lucy Johnston
Black Sky Thinking
How The Music Industry Took On Napster And (Not Everyone) Lost
Two decades on from Metallica's infamous decision to sue Napster, Eamonn Forde looks back and explores how the rock troupe's co-belligerent Dr Dre ended up outsmarting Ulrich & co, changing tack, and laughing all the way to the bank
Black Sky Thinking
How Coronavirus Is Killing The Music You Love
With live music at a standstill, coronavirus poses an existential threat to artists, festivals, promoters - even this publication. Ed Gillet examines the implications of the pandemic and the incompetence of the British government in dealing with it
Black Sky Thinking
Cowley At The Glory Hole: The Art Of Queer Liberation
Taking a holy trinity of Patrick Cowley's sex journals, Roy Garrett's poetry and Maxx Mann's forthcoming reissue, Max Shand explores the joy and tragedy of the queer American underground, from 70s exuberance to the 80s AIDS crisis
Black Sky Thinking
We’re Free? What Are You Being Served Tells Us About Brexit
As the EU waves goodbye on Brexit Day, Alexei Monroe looks at two declining institution full of sexist attitudes and obsessed with better days that never really were and joins the dots between England and Grace Brothers' Department Store of 70s sitcom Are You Being Served
