Everything: The Real Thing Story, BBC Four review - brilliant but long overdue

★★★★★ EVERYTHING: THE REAL THING STORY, BBC FOUR The breakthrough Liverpudlian band's story told lovingly and not before time

The breakthrough Liverpudlian band's story told lovingly and not before time

This documentary is bittersweet viewing on quite a number of levels. First, it’s got all the glory and tragedy of the most compelling music stories: a Liverpool band struggling from humble beginnings, trying to find an identity, fraternity and fallings-out, coping with huge success and its aftermath – not to mention sex, drugs, mental illness and death.

Album: Dua Lipa - Future Nostalgia

Lipa frees her inner disco diva, and the world is a better place for it

Dua Lipa's self-titled debut was unmistakably the sound of a musician feeling their way. It had all the flavours of trap, tropical house, autotune and Lana Del Ray-ish triphop introspection you'd expect on a 2017 pop record. The multi-billion-stream single “New Rules” was the most transatlantic-sounding thing there, and it must have been tempting to try and repeat its success by following current generic templates.

Album: Baxter Dury - The Night Chancers

★★★★ BAXTER DURY - THE NIGHT CHANCERS Skilfully drawn vignettes

The singer turns storyteller with a collection of skilfully drawn vignettes

“I’m not your fucking friend,” intones Baxter Dury as recent single “I’m Not Your Dog” begins. As opening salvos go, it’s right up there with the best of them, full of sneering hostility and fiery intent. As an introduction, it’s a writer’s hook – pushing us away while drawing us in.

Album: Sink Ya Teeth - Two

★★★★ SINK YA TEETH - TWO Norfolk post-punkers push their sound toward a dancefloor-friendly second album

Norfolk post-punkers successfully push their sound forward on a dancefloor-friendly second album

Norwich is not the first place most people think of as a hub of riveting music but it’s where female duo Sink Ya Teeth hail from. Consisting of bassist Gemma Cullingford and singer Maria Uzor - with both throwing synth into the pot where necessary – the pair have proved themselves a vital presence in the live arena.

theartsdesk on Vinyl 56: Kreator, Lee "Scratch" Perry, Disney, Twin Atlantic, Elton John, Buddy Rich and more

THEARTSDESK ON VINYL 56 The widest-ranging monthly record reviews in this universe

The widest-ranging monthly record reviews in this universe

Welcome to the biggest plastic reviews party on earth. Now that vinyl is steadily successful as niche musical medium, some have rightly been considering its environmental impact. Perhaps the best overview is given by Kyle Devine’s feature in the Guardian, which is well worth checking (please come back if you do!).

Album: La Roux - Supervision

Key 21st century British synth-pop doyen investigates frothy electro-disco to disappointing effect

10 years ago, a wave of exciting femme-pop was cresting, women taking the reins with singular visions; the results were shiny, personally honest, inventive and ebullient, from Gaga to Adele and beyond. A leading light was La Roux, a duo fronted by the androgynous Elly Jackson.

Madonna, London Palladium review - a fiesta of the surreal and the fiercely fabulous

★★★★ MADONNA, PALLADIUM A fiesta of the surreal and the fiercely fabulous

An intimate evening of surreal new sounds and fado fun - family and friends invited

The first time I heard Madonna, I was 8 years old at a school disco. Horrified parents, who came to pick us up as we jumped up and down yelling along to “Like A Virgin” in a fluorescent flurry of topknots, puffer skirts and lace gloves, subsequently lodged a formal complaint (it was a Catholic junior school) and thus, the spirit of Madonna, was borne into my story.

theartsdesk on Vinyl 52: Yardbirds, Fad Gadget, Spoon, Cate le Bon, Cabaret Voltaire and more

THE ARTS DESK ON VINYL Yardbirds, Fad Gadget, Spoon, Cate le Bon, Cabaret Voltaire & more

Possibly the most extensive monthly vinyl reviews in the world

Welcome to the latest edition of theartsdesk on Vinyl, the monthly online musical resource that knows no genre boundaries as it treks through every release on plastic that it can find. This time round we’ve everything from death metal to obscure jazz to electropop, sounds for almost every musical taste. Dive in!

Nile Rodgers and Chic, Royal Festival Hall review – great band, shame about the sound

★★★ NILE RODGERS AND CHIC, RFH Great band, shame about the sound

A life-affirming celebration of a brilliant career

There is every reason to celebrate Nile Rodgers. For his contribution to music as arranger, producer and performer over more than four decades. And also not least because he’s still around and still performing: he has, after all, pulled through after two bouts of serious cancer in 2010 and 2017.

CD: Fujiya & Miyagi – Flashback

Brighton's motorik genre hoppers make great strides forward by looking back

Over the past two decades, Brighton’s Fujiya & Miyagi have managed, without fanfare or fuss, to amass an enviable back catalogue of linear, krautrock driven grooves dresses in slinky, drop-shouldered pop melodies. 

It’s a formula that has served them well and has proved elastic enough for them to grow without it ever seeming to give at the seams. This is, in part, due to an admirable sense of simplicity that reached a peak on 2017’s self-titled near-masterpiece (in fact a compilation of three EPs).