In the spring of 2020, when Covid-19 swept the globe, Mo’min Swaitat, a Palestinian actor and filmmaker based in London, found himself stuck in his birthplace of Jenin, West Bank. He was lured to the shuttered Tariq Cassettes, a music store and record label he knew from his boyhood that had closed down years ago, […]

If Chan Marshall’s 11th album included all of Cat Power’s songs in their original form, it would be a fantastic playlist. It would be genre-spanning, taking in everything from forgotten classics (country superstar Kitty Wells’ It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels) to beloved classics (Nico’s These Days), from obscure numbers by obscure artists […]

The Wurzels’ drummer died in hospital after catching Covid-19 while on tour in the United Kingdom. Following the Wurzels’ performance at Manchester Academy earlier this month, Somerset guitarist John Morgan, originally from Lydney, Gloucestershire, got sick with coronavirus and died at the age of 80 on Friday at Gloucester Royal Hospital, accompanied by his family. […]

Alvin Lucier, a composer whose investigations into the physical qualities of sound established him as a key figure in the US avant-garde, has died at the age of 90. According to the New York Times, his daughter said that difficulties after a fall were the reason. “The great Alvin Lucier has died,” his ex-wife Mary […]

In dance music, melody is sometimes seen as something you must tolerate while waiting for the rhythm to return. Take your medication with a pinch of sugar. Samantha Poulter is well aware of the situation. Her excellent Logic1000 creations bounce merrily across genres, yet never fail to provide a captivating melody. Her heart is in […]

Leo Nocentelli is impossible to pin down. When I ask how the renowned funk guitarist’s astonishing solo record Another Side came to be published after 50 years in obscurity, he gives me the whole tale in a seven-minute monologue, but I can’t confirm his age. “It’s not important,” he adds, his Louisiana accent thick as […]