This was a special gig. Tété is a French musician, of Senegalese extraction, who has had a few hits in French-speaking countries with his clever and catchy acoustic pop songs. He has four or five albums under his belt and is currently working on a new one. As a means of trying out some ideas…Continue readingTété – La Datcha – 05.02.2016
Category: Other Music Stuff
John Spillane has, on the strength of this one concert, become one of my favourite songwriters. Before last Saturday I was familiar with him mostly by name and reputation, with Christy Moore’s very nice version of Magic Nights In The Lobby Bar being the only song of his that I could name. I had a…Continue readingJohn Spillane – Collège des Coudriers – 05.12.2015
(I usually try to get these little reviews published in the days immediately following a gig but last week was a busy one. Got to keep up the habit though!) This was not an easy gig to sit through. I had fallen out of touch with Sufjan Stevens’ music over the past few years, but…Continue readingSufjan Stevens – Théâtre du Léman – 20.09.2015
This was, I think, the fourth time I’ve seen Andrew Bird play live. Every performance has been amazing, but this was the best. He was totally in the zone, giving it everything and playing with a precision that I think was missing when I last saw him, in Amsterdam in 2011. (His head may have…Continue readingAndrew Bird – Les Docks, Lausanne – 01.07.2015
It’s just under three years since I first saw Of Monsters and Men in concert, a gig that I enjoyed hugely. They had six musicians on stage for that gig in Amsterdam, so they must be doing okay for themselves given that they were up to nine for this tour (including a couple of brass…Continue readingOf Monsters and Men – Les Docks, Lausanne – 30.06.2015
Poking through a drawer at home recently I stumbled upon a minidisc containing a radio documentary that I produced in 1997 about the legendary Irish folk singer Christy Moore. The documentary – titled Welcome to the Cabaret – and a written report about it together formed the thesis that I had to submit for my…Continue readingMe and Christy Moore
James Taylor has a reputation for being one of the music industry’s genuinely nice guys. He’s been around since the late sixties (signed by the Beatles to their Apple label in 1968) and is most famous for singing songs that he wrote more than forty years ago, so he could easily be a bit tired…Continue readingJames Taylor – 07.03.2015 – Théâtre du Léman, Geneva
I’d been waiting for an opportunity to catch The Decemberists live for almost ten years now. I thought maybe we’d missed the boat since leaving Amsterdam, so when I saw they’d be passing through Zurich on the current tour I jumped at the chance. They were well worth the wait! It was the second last…Continue readingThe Decemberists – Kaufleuten, Zurich – 28.02.2015
A visit to Ireland last weekend meant that I missed out on Luka Bloom’s return visit to Geneva; but it also meant that I had a chance to catch his big brother in concert in Dublin. Christy Moore is nothing less than a – perhaps the – living legend of Irish folk music. At his gig…Continue readingChristy Moore and friends – Vicar Street – 12.10.2014
When I was in my teens I listened to a lot of radio. I was forever entering competitions, responding to questions and generally doing anything I could to be “on” the radio. I loved hearing my name called out for whatever reason, and did end up speaking – or even singing – on air now…Continue readingAndrew Bird, Guy Garvey, and the thrill of hearing your name on the radio