thefreethinkingmovementSappho’s Journey Summer 2008. I’m heading to that bastion of middle class attitudes in the woods, with music, comedy, sheep and beer: Latitude. A wonderful line up had caught my interest, with headliners including Sigur Ros, and other acts including Elbow, Seasick Steve, The Aliens, Beth Orton and Blondie. Good times ahead. This was my […]
Today has been ‘an Elbow day’. A day at home, listening to a Guy Garvey narrated radio documentary about Manchester (more specifically, the influence and importance of rain in Manchester). With genuine feelings of pride and affection for Manchester, there was only one way to follow the programme. No band captures their love for a […]
Some songs come from a dark place. Sometimes the true depth and darkness of a song is obscured behind a sheen. ‘Every Breath You Take’? Dark. Any couple sharing a dancefloor to this at a wedding really should reconsider. Everything. Sometimes the meaning is fairly unambiguous. Lyrically and musically, the pain and suffering are apparent. […]
Can it be nearly five months since we started this? freethinking nyc, volume 1 took place in May. We’ve seen the summer through, and are about to kick into the full splendour of Autumn in New York. We’ve had some great nights, and the blog posts have been well received. We’ve brought you unheard tracks […]
My love of BBC 6 Music is no secret. I practically punched the sky when news of the stay of execution broke earlier in the year. It’s a radio station which I feel is almost designed for me. A breakfast show which will play A Certain Ratio, Stevie Wonder, The Who and Led Zeppelin? Yes, […]
That’s it. Let me introduce you to your new favourite band. Delphic 2.0 (or New Order 3.0). They are Everything Everything. And they are quite special. DJing is great fun. It forces you to search through your collection, and to dig out tracks that you’d overlooked. You listen to albums that you bought on a […]
In a recent post I talked about having music recommendations that I would love to make to my 16 year old self now. Case #1: Pharoah Sanders. It would have scared the crap out of me. I won’t go into a potted history of Pharoah – wikipedia is there for you if you need this. […]
I’m like a walking anachronism. Consider the evidence: I wear a suit to work – more often than not with a tie. Yes, kids – a tie. I prefer to buy my music in the physical form. Yes, CDs, and that. I can write the sentence ‘they’re like a breath of fresh air, blending guitar-driven […]
For a short while, while I was around 16, there was a flurry of great concerts in my home town, Stoke-on-Trent. To be more precise, there was a flurry of great concerts at the Victoria Hall in Hanley. Old, small, and frankly off the beaten track of the gig circuit for quite a while, suddenly […]
‘The stage reeks of Manchester’. A great line, and one for which I can take no credit. As Doves walked onto the stage, in Hammersmith, it felt like the stage was suddenly a part of The North. It was an outpost of the Mancunian Republic. This, despite not a note being played, or a word […]
There are certain artists who you just depend on. Rarely going fully out of your way to acknowledge how good they are, but they’re there, on your playlist. Artists who are just not that popular, but whose influence transcends their lack of public acknowledgement. A case in point: The Durutti Column. The Durutti Column is […]
Name a Canadian band. Go on, name one. Chances are, that in the majority of cases, the first band to come to mind is Arcade Fire. In fairness, off the back of a run of outstanding albums, jaw-dropping live shows, and that HTML5 interactive video, Arcade Fire are an example of that rarest of phenomena: […]