Small Worlds, the second novel from Caleb Azumah Nelson, is a delight: a book with a real feeling for sound and dance, and a sense of place from London to Ghana and back again. It’s a story of a first romance, the intricacies of family life, the importance of music, and the difficulties still faced by people of colour in the UK today. While it may not seem like it will set the world on fire, it’s a beautifully observed picture of the twists and turns of life and of love.

VINYL OF THE MONTH

Rahill Flowers at Your Feet (Big Dada)

Brighton is writhing with music biz sorts. The Great Escape is here, the multi-venue festival that’s taken place here for over a decade-and-a-half, presenting bands from all over the world, most of them little known, at least in the UK. It takes place over four days, Wednesday to Saturday, although not much happens on Wednesday, so the real Day One is Thursday, and here we are.

Four trombones, four trumpets and five saxophones, six percussionists – this Afro-Cuban inspired band packs an irresistible punch and it’s loud!  This is a big band sound that revives the glory days of Tito Puente and Dizzy Gillespie, a 1940s fusion of Latin and jazz, as incendiary as it comes. A true wonder that London should produce music of this power and vibrancy, but the New Regency Orchestra (NRO) do just that, keeping the energy going for the full length of a 90-minute set.

There’s a moment in the opening stretch of Giles Terera’s The Meaning of Zong where you think the former Hamilton star has written a piece about slavery that’s in much the same idiom as the hit musical. 

Welcome to the first theartsdesk on Vinyl of 2023 and it’s another whopper, over 8000 words and a range of musical styles that defies genre or categorization, from the most cutting edge sounds to boxsets of golden vintage pop. Dive in!

VINYL OF THE MONTH

Jimmy Edgar Liquids Heaven (Innovative Leisure)

Welcome to the final theartsdesk on Vinyl of 2022 which is topped off by two Vinyl of the Months, one there for seasonal jollies and the other for musical adventurousness. As ever, the rest runs the gamut from reissues of albums from decades ago to the most contemporary, cutting edge music around. Dive in!

CHRISTMAS VINYL OF THE MONTH

Various The Muppet Christmas Carol (Walt Disney)

It’s Friday night and I’ve finally arrived at 43-year-old French music festival institution Trans Musicales. Due to some dreadful nonsense, it’s taken a 12-hour train journey, two baguettes, one short Stephen King novel, six large beers, a tumbler of Bourbon, and one shuttlebus to place me at the Parc Expo, a series of giant airport hangars that house the majority of musical activity (although there’s a smattering of earlier events in Rennes itself).

As bio-musicals continue to have their heyday, it makes sense for the Young Vic to throw its hat in the ring and champion a work about the hugely influential Nelson Mandela. But this new musical about the South African anti-apartheid activist and statesman is such a baffling hodgepodge that it actually risks being a disservice to Mandela’s legacy.

Justin Adams has been exploring music that produces trance or near-trance states for a number of years. Along with being Robert Plant’s lead guitarist for a long while, he has followed his own path, seeking out what he had dubbed the secret heart of rock’n’roll.