The 1942 thriller This Gun for Hire, which opened five months after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, was closely adapted from Graham Greene’s 1936 novel A Gun for Sale by Albert Maltz and W.R. Burnett and directed for Paramount by the veteran William Tuttle. Though no masterpiece, it's a film noir landmark – an essential watch.
“Produced by Tommy LiPuma.” That phrase has appeared on just about every Diana Krall album since the summer of 1995, when the Cleveland-born mogul arrived at the GRP label – it would be his sixth and last music industry affiliation – and promptly signed the Canadian singer-pianist.
Alicia Keys is a puzzling mixture. On the one hand she’s the hyper-achieving, multi-platinum, 752-Grammy-winning America’s sweetheart, all dimply smiles, positive-thinking ultra sincerity and the kind of showbiz over-emoting and singing-technique-as-competitive-sport so beloved of talent show contestants. On the other, she’s an undeniably interesting artist on multiple levels.
"This party's over" snarls Fish on Weltschmerz, and, this time, it seems the big man really means it. After threatening retirement for many years, the ex-Marillion singer has finally called time on his recording career. His final present to the fans is a double album that looks back on his 32 years as a solo artist.
Over the decades the charismatic Scot has moved steadily from mainstream to cult status. He's dabbled in pop (e.g "State of Mind"), hard rock ("Faithhealer") and punk ("The Perception of Johnny Punter). But, of course, the Bard of East Lothian is best known as an old prog-rocker.
That's the style that dominates on Weltschmerz. But it's where Fish reminds us of his art-pop side that the album sounds best.
The tribal drums on "Man with a Stick" resonate with febrile energy, while "This Party's Over" combines early Peter Gabriel with Celtic sounds. The musical highlight is the title track, which starts off like a Muse number before the vocals take over with a blend of weariness with stirring defiance.
Thereafter, the mood becomes slower and more intense. The piano-led "Garden of Remembrance" (about Alzheimer's) moves at a crawling pace but is also undeniably poignant. "Little Man What Now?" draws on the work of a Weimar Republic-era German author to describe a man crushed by the 'system'.
These tracks, though, are bubblegum-pop compared to the big prog epics. For the album's long-form numbers Fish has opted for free-verse, with melodies that are twice as abstract. "The Rose of Damascus", the story of a Syrian refugee, has six sections, weighs in at a hefty 16 minutes, and contains a lengthy spoken-word section. "Waverley Steps" is almost as long and even more challenging.
None of this, of course, will faze the fans. The faithful will embrace the album's successes and excesses equally and will revel in its considerable length (84 minutes). Many will also be looking forward to the big man's next artistic chapter. Literally - there are rumours Fish will soon be penning his memoirs.
Overleaf: watch the video for Weltschmerz
Michael Gira, Swans’ band leader and last remaining original member, has a reputation for being an intense and difficult individual who doesn’t compromise easily. This is illustrated by the band having been home to some 35 different musicians since its 1982 beginnings in a desolate and dangerous New York City.
It's the self-portrait on the cover that gives the first hint that something's changed with Marilyn Manson. The eyes are blank, his face weary. No longer does the singer look like the Antichrist Superstar. He seems more like a middle-aged rocker in the midst of an identity crisis.
He says as much, too, on the title track. During the bridge section, Manson rasps "Am I a man or a show, or moment ?" What really strikes you, though, is not the existential questioning. It's the change of musical style.
The song's gently strummed chords usher in a strangely plaintive baritone. On the verse, Manson sounds like Nick Cave singing the tune from the Beatles' "Across the Universe", the doom-laden vocals contrasting with the wide-eyed chords. In the chorus, the mood shifts. The words "we are, sick, fucked up and complicated" are sung as a rousing anthem for the dispossessed.
And so it is throughout the album, with dark melodies and minor chords alternating with fist-pumping choruses. Manson's usual industrial elements are still there just dominated by Seventies and Eighties rock.
The new musical palette comes courtesy of producer (and country singer) Shooter Jennings, who wrote and arranged the music on the album. Jennings and Manson got together after bonding over their shared love of David Bowie.
That love of the Thin White Duke is clear on "Don't Chase the Day", which echoes Bowie's later Eno period. The album's other influences are equally obvious. "Perfume" sounds like Depeche Mode at their most gothic. The album's prettiest song, "Paint You with My Love", is pure T-Rex, right down to the lyrics - "Honky-tonk devils glitter in/Like royal rats in kitten skin'. Manson's deep vocals add a hint of Bauhaus.
The result of all this genre-blending is an album that's more tuneful and affecting than anything else he's recorded. In interviews, the singer has intimated the reason for changing his soundscape was to press reset on his career. More likely, though, he'd just tired of playing the pantomime villain. After all, who is there left to shock? The most shocking thing on WE ARE CHAOS is the revelation that as a good old-fashioned goth, Manson is so darn entertaining.
Overleaf: watch Marilyn Manson's video for "WE ARE CHAOS"
Kantemir Balagov’s second feature announces the arrival of a major new talent in arthouse cinema.
Toots Hibbert may have invented the term “reggae” with his 1968 hit “Do the Reggay” but he has never felt boxed in by the genre. During his almost 60-year singing career, he may have recorded some of the greatest ska and reggae tunes of all time, from “Monkey Man” to “Pressure Drop” and “54-46, That’s My Number”, but has also dipped his toe into soul music and even tried his hand at a version of John Denver’s “Country Roads”.
Ammar 808, named after the 1980s Roland drum machine TR-808 is the vehicle for Tunisian producer Sofyann Ben Youssef. He has been exploring, notably in Maghreb United (2018), a rich vein of resonance between the music of North Africa and electronic technology.
If Doves have a “thing”, it’s that they do “big” with impeccable intimacy. Over ten years and four albums, they consistently displayed exactly the sort of connection that bands like Coldplay and Keane pretend to have. Huge, sweeping scores and broad emotional swells that feel like an old friend putting their arm around you and telling you you're not on your own.