Album: Maverick Sabre - Don't Forget to Look Up

★★★ MAVERICK SABRE - DON'T FORGET TO LOOK UP Understatement and introspection from the Anglo-Irish soul journeyman

Understatement and introspection from the Anglo-Irish soul journeyman

Michael Stafford aka Maverick Sabre is the definition of a modern journeyman vocalist. Since 2008 he’s released three albums and appeared on a huge range of British and Irish rap, dubstep and drum’n’bass artists’ records. He’s had several top 40 singles and streams into the tens, even hundreds of millions on tracks, but he hasn’t necessarily got the name recognition of some of his contemporaries.

The Tiger Lillies' Christmas Carol: A Victorian Gutter, Southbank Centre review - cult band get inside Scrooge's head

★★ THE TIGER LILLIES' CHRISTMAS CAROL: A VICTORIAN GUTTER, SOUTHBANK CENTRE  Melancholy musical retelling laced with wit and political venom  

The Tiger Lillies tell a familiar story in their own inimitable style

Charles Dickens and Martyn Jacques is a marriage made in heaven (well, hell I suppose): the Victorian novelist touring the rookeries of Clerkenwell the better to fire his imagination and, 150 years or so later, the post-punk maestro mining London's netherworlds for his tales of misfits and misdeeds.

The Last Five Years, Garrick Theatre review - bittersweet musical treat gets West End upgrade

★★★ THE LAST FIVE YEARS, GARRICK THEATRE Jason Robert Brown's semi-autobiographical show gets a West End upgrade 

Flaws remain, but audiences will lap up the melodies, singing and storyline

Much has happened in the five years since your reviewer braved the steep rake at The Other Palace and saw The Last Five Years (not least my now getting its “Nobody needs to know” nod in Hamilton – worth a fistful of Tonys in prestige, I guess) so it’s timely to revisit Jason Robert Brown’s musical.

Album: Gary Kemp - Insolo

Unlistenably middle-of-the-road post-prog bland-fest from Spandau Ballet songwriter

Spandau Ballet started well, their slick, slightly angular pop-funk adding a certain something to early Eighties new romantic frippery. Later, especially with the success of global schmaltz-smash “True”, they lost what teeth they had, drifting into cod-soul blandness. Kemp’s career since has focused as much on acting as music, but his recent round of gigs playing Syd Barrett to drummer Nick Mason’s early Pink Floyd tribute band, Saucerful of Secrets, was both unexpected and well-received.

1971, Apple TV+ review - rock'n'roll's golden year?

★★★★ 1971, APPLE TV+ Was this rock'n'roll's golden year?

Amazing music, incredible footage, and more amazing music: welcome to 1971

Back in the mid-Eighties, BBC television started broadcasting The Rock'n' Roll Years, one of the first rock music retrospectives. Each half-hour episode focused on a year, with news reports and music intermixed to give a revealing look at the development of rock culture against the context of current affairs.

theartsdesk on Vinyl 64: Chet Baker, Lava La Rue, Bob Mould, Krust, The Yardbirds, The Fratellis and more

THEARTSDESK ON VINYL 64 Literally the largest fresh set of vinyl reviews on the internet

Literally the largest fresh set of vinyl reviews on the internet

Things got out of hand at theartsdesk on Vinyl this month and these reviews run to 10,000 words. That's around a fifth of The Great Gatsby. It's because there's so much good music that deserves the words, from jazz to metal to pure electronic strangeness.

Album: Matt Berry – The Blue Elephant

★★★★★ MATT BERRY - THE BLUE ELEPHANT The man of many talents summons up his musical nirvana

The man of many talents summons up his musical nirvana

Well this is rather groovy! National treasure and the man with that voice, Matt Berry has been locked away in his lair, channelling the early seventies and twiddling with lots of knobs. Save for the drums, he plays every instrument (all 19 of them) on this magical mystery tour de force – that includes piano, Wurlitzer, Mellotron, Moog, Hammond, Vox and Farfisa organs.

Album: Ted Barnes - 17 Postcards

★★★★ TED BARNES - 17 POSTCARDS Devastating bulletins from a world where craft and care matter above all else

Devastating bulletins from a world where craft and care matter above all else

Ted Barnes is an outsider by design. Not in the sense of being wilfully awkward or outré – the music on his first solo album in almost 13 years years is gentle, harmonically rich, extremely accessible – but in that he has sidestepped standard career paths, and seems to be all the better for it.

theartsdesk Q&A: Daryl Hall

SINGER-SONGWRITER DARYL HALL On recording, vaccines, reaching a billion streams

Legendary singer-songwriter talks recording, vaccines and reaching a billion streams

Writing something people want to stream one billion times is inconceivable for most of us. But then, most of us aren't Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Daryl Hall. Alongside John Oates, he is behind some of the greatest pop songs of all time: "Maneater"; "She's Gone; "Out of Touch"; "Rich Girl"; "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)"; and of course, the billion-stream masterpiece that is "You Make My Dreams".

Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliche review - memorialising her mother

★★★ POLY STYRENE: I AM A CLICHE Documentary portrait of a punk legend who struggled with fame

Documentary portrait of a punk legend who struggled with fame

There was always something a little diffident about teenage Marion Elliott-Said, who created her on-stage persona Poly Styrene after putting together her band X-Ray Spex from a small ad in the back pages of the NME in 1977.