Music

When Keane burst forth on to the music scene with Hopes and Fears in 2004, they met with almost instant success. Their brand of melodic piano-drive pop found a ready audience with people drawn to beautiful emotionally-rich pop. Tom Chaplin’s voice captured anguish and heartache so perfectly you imagined he Continue Reading

Welcome to another week of barely-controlled Eurovision madness! The clock is loudly ticking down to Eurovision (with an occasional unexpected key change and the odd pyrotechnic burst from the clock face… oh and is that a Ukrainian grandmother popping out of the time keeping piece on the hour every hour, Continue Reading

You could be forgiven for thinking that Eurovision is simply a “smorgasbord of kitsch”, as Keith Lawrence’s headline so eloquently put it in an article he wrote about Eurovision on his website, and nothing more. But as the other half of his article’s headline suggests, “…and politics”, it is not Continue Reading

It’s beginning to look a lot like Eurovision… Why? Well they have already announced the opening and interval acts for this year’s Eurovision Song Contest fiesta for one thing. Traditionally these two slots give the host country a chance to strut their cultural stuff  and the music is either resolutely Continue Reading

I may be squeezing every last musical drop out of Santigold’s fantastic new album, Master of My Make-Believe at the moment as it spins on high rotation like a runaway spinning top through my iPod but that doesn’t mean I don’t have time to listen and explore and find new Continue Reading

The front cover of the deluxe version which was released today [via] I am of a certain vintage now I will admit it, and being a person of that unspecified vintage (although the Sherlockian among you should be able to hazard a reasonable accurate guess about my age simply by Continue Reading

So much music that my small and dainty ears cannot possibly accommodate it all. Or can they? I say a resounding yes and so, here is this week’s pick of the new music that has danced its way into my mind, and if I wanted to go all Hallmark syrupy Continue Reading

Yes it’s time to review this week’s crop of Eurovision hopefuls and what have I gone and done? Left my Ukrainian grandmother at home! Now she won’t be able to burst into the blog post at a completely unexpected moment and dazzle you all with her totally surplus-to-requirements writing (much Continue Reading

Ever since ABBA won the Eurovision Song Contest in 1974 with the aid of an upbeat pop song “Waterloo”, the dulcet tones of Agnetha and Annifrid, and the tightest lycra pants known to man, the contest has been widely seen by the artists who participate in it as the perfect Continue Reading