Reviews & features: Music, David Pollock

The National - Matt Berninger interview

US band set for Edinburgh gig as part of 2011 UK tour

The National‘s Matt Berninger has a way with a tear-jerking lyric. However, as he tells David Pollock, the release of album High Violet has ushered in good times for the Ohioan band. That, and Obama getting elected.

Temper Temper: The Pain of Desire

Weimar rock ‘n’ roll from an unforgettable performer

The edges between live concert and theatrical performance bleed together in this full band show instigated by creative director Wendy Bevan. It begins as we await outside, the sound of piano flourishes being prepared echoing through the…

Music highlights from the 2011 Edinburgh Festival Fringe

Lach's Antihoot, James Blake and Withered Hand among highlights

The LuckyMe collective of artists and designers is one of Glasgow’s most successful cultural exports of recent years, and the group’s August party will once more give festivalgoers a chance to find out what they’re all about. This year, they’re having…

The Lost Fingers - Lost in the 80s

Skillful gypsy jazz paired up with an inspired choice of cover versions

‘We’re kinda known for taking cheese and making it better,’ declares one of Québécoise gypsy-folk interpretation trio The Lost Fingers (they’re named after Django Reinhardt’s disappeared digits), although not everyone might go along with their…

Chris Difford and Norman Lovett: It's All About Me!

Squeeze singer and Red Dwarf comedian in inexplicable team-up

Quite why Chris Difford of highly-successful 70s and 80s pop group Squeeze has chosen to embellish his partial spoken word life story with the presence of miserablist comedian and former Red Dwarf actor Norman Lovett is never explained here, so we can…

Amanda Palmer & Neil Gaiman bring joint live show to Edinburgh Fringe

Singing and reading from musical and literary couple

‘Amanda taught Neil to love the festival,’ speaks the Palmer/Gaiman marital unimind (in fact hallowed fantasy author Gaiman emailing on behalf of himself and his ex-Dresden Doll and Fringe mainstay spouse). ‘He used to come to Edinburgh and do the book…

Canadian pianist Chilly Gonzales prepares for first Fringe shows

The multi-talented musician is set to blend comedy, music and spoken word

‘The world that the Fringe represents is a world I’ve always been conscious of,’ says omnitalented raconteur, pianist and friend to Canada’s finest alternative musicians, Chilly Gonzales. ‘But to be honest, I’ve always chosen consciously not to go…

Example

Picture House, Edinburgh, Mon 15 Aug 2011

As Mike Skinner’s sometime protégé it’s easy to pigeonhole London rapper Elliot Gleave as the new bearer of the crown soon to be abandoned by The Streets. Yet what he does is subtly different – where both men are outright crowd pleasers, Skinner’s…

Washed Out

Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh, Sun 14 Aug 2011

Okay, we might be calling it ‘chillwave’ up above, but that’s not actually what we were hearing at this, a set which lovers of below-ground music had been hotly anticipating at this year’s Edge festival. Where Atlanta, Georgia’s Ernest Greene makes…

The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, with live score by Minima

Expressionist horror flick with live soundtrack performance

‘It’s a truly, truly amazing film,’ is the simple reason given by guitarist Alex Hogg as to why his band Minima chose to create a live score for Robert Wiene’s classic 1919 German expressionist silent horror film The Cabinet of Dr Caligari. ‘Even more…

Interview - Mike Slott, Eclair Fifi and Machinedrum of LuckyMe

Glasgow DIY label set for Edinburgh Festival clubnight

Mike Slott (producer) I met Dom [Flannigan] who runs LuckyMe in Borders Books. He was sneaking flyers into hip hop magazines. We got chatting, we liked similar music and in Glasgow if you’re into a certain kind of music, you bump into the same people…

Amjad Ali Khan to perform set of morning ragas on sarod at EIF 2011

Edinburgh 11am concert accompanied by Ravi Shankar's evening ragas

The sarod may not be as familiar an instrument to western audiences as the sitar made famous by Ravi Shankar, but virtuoso player Amjad Ali Khan is happy to establish its proper context. 'Ravi Shankar's teacher was a sarod player,' says Khan on the line…

LuckyMe decamps to Cabaret Voltaire for the Festival

David Pollock talks to the Glasgow-based record label/art collective

This has been the most important year yet in the evolution of Scottish electronic label LuckyMe, and this third annual Edinburgh Festival event featuring their friends, collaborators and signees should be the perfect showcase for local supporters and…

Mitchell Museum at the Edge Festival

Jangly, indie-pop by Weegie flatmates

Mitchell Museum, so legend has it, live, write and record together in a flat in the centre of Glasgow, Monkees-style. ‘It’s true,’ reveals their singer, Cammy MacFarlane. ‘It’s on Sauchiehall Street, just above Nice ‘n’ Sleazy. Well, above and to the…

The Juan MacLean

New York house meets rock’n’roll by way of funk and post-rock

With the temporary absence of LCD Soundsystem while James Murphy and co near the finish line of recording their third album (and not, as rumoured at one point, split up never to return), the next best alternative for fans of New York disco-punk might…

Kim Edgar

A fixture on the Edinburgh folk and acoustic scene for some time now, Kim Edgar received her big break when she won the chance to participate in the Burnsong ‘Songhouse’ retreat in 2006 alongside established songwriters like Emma Pollock, King Creosote…

Acoustic Edinburgh Festival

Phoenix nights from Cowgate ashes

Although you won’t be seeing her here, KT Tunstall provides the inspiration for this high-quality acoustic night. Tunstall’s own 2001 Acoustic Extravaganza gigs at the Gilded Saloon on the Cowgate (which would go on to share a title with one of the…

Profile - Antonio Forcione

Name Antonio Forcione Occupation ‘The Jimi Hendrix of the acoustic guitar’. What does that involve? Being unutterably talented. The rags-to-riches tale of Forcione busking in Covent Garden while unable to speak English is romantic; it was…

Retreat!

Indie magic from spanking new mini-fest

In recent years mini-festivals Planet Pop and Tigerfest have sought to showcase local artists to Fringe visitors, before eventually folding or changing date and location. Now it’s Retreat!’s turn to try and demonstrate some staying power, with a line-up…