Author Archives: admin

The Jungle Book, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Joel Shipman as Baloo in The Jungle Book at The Unity Theatre, Liverpool. Photograph by Brian Roberts.

Cast: Fionnuala Dorrity, Asif Majid, Samuel Pérez Durán, Joe Shipman.

The tale of a lost boy raised by wolves, taught by a panther, guarded by a bear and hunted by the king of the jungle, it is story that speaks down through the last century and one that resonates with joy and charm, with meaning, still to this day. The Jungle Book, arguably one of the most loved pieces of literature of the late 19th Century has had its followers, those who bang the drum for its introduction of its well written characters into the national thought and understandably its detractors who see the book with a certain 21st Century outlook compared to its original sentiment.

The Jungle Book, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(489 words, 1 image, estimated 1:57 mins reading time)

The Spook School, Could It Be Different. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

We live thankfully in an age when being different is not only accepted, but it is celebrated as well. Culturally, aesthetically, outward looking, inward felling, to be diverse, to want to show your true self to the world is not only healthy but it is right. The rights of many have come a long way but perhaps arguably not far enough and as the songs of The Spook School’s third album heavily persuade, Could It Be Different, well we can all but hope that humanity steers itself in the right direction.

The Spook School, Could It Be Different. Album Review. full post

(416 words, 1 image, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

Midlane, The Bitter Before The Sweet. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

It is a lesson we all hope we never have to experience, but there is no denying that we all go through it at some point or another and in the end the result can be one of relief, one of tender emotion, one of the most gigantic roar, like a bowler finally displacing the wicket of a troublesome and stubborn batsman or the surgeon expanding every piece of skill in her possession in removing a tumour; it is The Bitter Before The Sweet that makes life more optimistic, more fruitful and also a finer moment in which to give back with two fingers to those who caused harsh resentment in the first place.

Midlane, The Bitter Before The Sweet. Album Review. full post

(423 words, 1 image, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)

Elijah James and The Nightmares, Live From Elevator Studios. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision * * * * *

To have it all and yet be humble, to possess the voice and heart of a lion and yet be as sensitive as a field of poppies in full bloom or as wondrous as the first sighting of a masterpiece on an artist’s easel, to see it all unfold before your own eyes, that is one of the great gifts of existence and one that the music fan rarely gets to witness or the reader of poetry and the great British novel can only guess at.

Elijah James and The Nightmares, Live From Elevator Studios. E.P. Review. full post

(417 words, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

The Words Of A Hostage.

 

I blink my eyes

a thousand times

a minute, in hope

that you recognise

the Morse Code I am sending,

don’t try to find me,

quite lost,

quite lost,

a small sudden stare

into the distance

reveals more pain

and torture to come,

the taboo to be broken,

the last vestige of my soul

quite broken,

quite broken,

beat me,

they seem to want

to always inflict more

ridicule, surprised I am

still breathing here

in this cold, unforgiving place,

The Words Of A Hostage. full post

(122 words, estimated 29 secs reading time)

Joe Satriani, What Happens Next. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

 

There may be no words needed, no sentence passed or phrase expressed in admonishment at the way the world is heading into an abyss of its own making and yet sometimes, a musical intellect will say it best when they allow the instrument of their choice, their weapon of anger in which to wield against the pseudo whizz kids and politically emotional unstable who see the world as a plaything and whose own words are destructive and callous, even when reduced to the insensibility of a hundred tweets.

Joe Satriani, What Happens Next. Album Review. full post

(457 words, 1 image, estimated 1:50 mins reading time)

Rhiannon Scutt, #9 E.P. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Rhiannon Scutt may be known as one half of the fabulous Folk couple Rita Payne but she also deserves the accolade of holding her own name in assurance with a sense of clarity to which some might find their own identity consumed by all that has gone before. Identity is important, it is the madness of our own lives that makes what we absorb so tangible, a conviction that no matter how small the chapter at that point in time is, what can emerge is one built on conviction.

Rhiannon Scutt, #9 E.P. E.P. Review. full post

(416 words, 1 image, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

Gavin Sutherland, Wireless Connection. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Once the maker of A Curious Noise, now the man to whom holds the keys to the Wireless Connection; Gavin Sutherland’s sense of musical purity knows no earthly bounds. The static that others may find on their dial as they speed through the signals and the indicators of life, the crackle and the hiss as their motion is deemed to be clumsy, heavy handed and liable to pull the control off in frustration, is simply treated with elegance and grace by the man who sees Roots and Americana as a relationship worth preserving and who sees no issue with offering it to the listening public as a link in which to enjoy together.

Gavin Sutherland, Wireless Connection. Album Review. full post

(385 words, 1 image, estimated 1:32 mins reading time)

A Million Machines. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

There is two ways to look at the way we have come to rely on machines in our daily lives, one that it has lead down a road of frightening, arts led dystopia, a nightmare vision in which every aspect of our lives has become subservient to the ghost in the shell, or we can look upon it as the only crowning glory we have truly been able to convince ourselves that was worth all the effort; Utopian hooks and creativity beyond the original human thought or a nightmare we can never awake from properly.

A Million Machines. Album Review. full post

(406 words, 1 image, estimated 1:37 mins reading time)