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The Lovecraft Investigations: The Shadow Over Innsmouth. Audio Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Barnaby Kay, Jana Carpenter, Kyle Soller, Steven Mackintosh, Mark Bazeley, Samuel Barnett, Nicola Walker, Karla Crome, Jennifer Armour, Ferdinand Kingsley, David Calder, Walles Hamonde, Michael Maloney, Phoebe Fox.

One of the most interesting and intense dramas to have found its way to the listener’s appreciation of late is the adaption of H.P. Lovecraft’s dark and frequently disturbing tales that were set in and around his native New England. Julian Simpson’s superb reading and amendments to bring it to a more British viewpoint and understanding of how such a sense of enormity and mystery could begin and take hold in the country.

The Lovecraft Investigations: The Shadow Over Innsmouth. Audio Drama Review. full post

(521 words, estimated 2:05 mins reading time)

Spencer Leigh. Little Richard: Send Me Some Lovin’. Music Biography Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

To have the arrogance of self-belief that you are the number one, the top dog in your field must at times surely mean you court controversy with a willing heart.

There is no point being a showman on stage, a diva on the boards, if you don’t have the confidence to be even more outrageous in real life, for the states of being go hand in hand, they are the heights we reach for when we have something to say and are driven by a beating heart that has a measure of ego spurring it on.

Spencer Leigh. Little Richard: Send Me Some Lovin’. Music Biography Review. full post

(665 words, estimated 2:40 mins reading time)

Doctor Who: 2023 60th Anniversary Specials. The Star Beast/Wild Blue Yonder/ The Giggle Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9.5/10

Cast: David Tennant, Catherine Tate, Neil Patrick Harris, Ncuti Gatwa, Bernard Cribbins, Jemma Redgrave, Bonnie Langford, John Mackay, Jacqueline King, Yasmin Finney, Karl Collins, Ruth Madeley, Miriam Margolyes, Indira Varma, Matt Green, Jamie Cho, Dara Lall, Ronak Patani, Ned Porteous, Archie Backhouse, John Hopkinson, Matt Green, Jamie Cho, Charlie de Melo, Alexander Devrient.

There have been fine speeches, tales of intrigue, moments of forgotten lore, and new ways to divide the fandom in the years since David Tennant looked into the camera lens and uttered the heartbreaking words, “I don’t want to go”.

Doctor Who: 2023 60th Anniversary Specials. The Star Beast/Wild Blue Yonder/ The Giggle Television Review. full post

(570 words, estimated 2:17 mins reading time)

Frasier (2023). Series One. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Kelsey Grammer, Jack Cutmore-Scott, Nicholas Lyndhurst, Toks Olagundoye, Jess Salgueiro, Anders Keith, Jimmy Dunn, Kevin Daniels, Renee Pezzotta, Parvesh Cheena, Cheyenne Perez, Owen Lloyd, Amy L. Workman, John Bucy, Bebe Neuwirth, Peri Gilpin.

There are few actors that can so embody a character that they are capable of being that beloved person for more than one generation of television or film lovers; just a picture of them will place the viewer’s mind as one whose figure is nothing but the persona that they closely associate with, and nothing else they have done will frame the expression of laughter or dramatic role more.

Frasier (2023). Series One. Television Review. full post

(518 words, estimated 2:04 mins reading time)

Decommissioned Forests: Chemistry. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Even those who decided early in school that the science lab was not for them will always appreciate that Chemistry is a human emotion worth savouring as well as a means to solving complex problems that plague humanity on a daily basis. Chemistry is what gives us meaning, the connection between worlds, of understanding, and admiring what makes the mind, the soul, and the heart such an unstoppable force when it fuses all the beliefs and dreams, they are capable of unleashing on the universe.

Decommissioned Forests: Chemistry. Album Review. full post

(380 words, estimated 1:31 mins reading time)

Shetland (Series Eight). Television Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Ashley Jensen, Alison O’Donnell, Steven Robertson, Jamie Sives,  Nina Tousaint-White, Dawn Steele, Phyllis Logan, Lorraine McIntosh, Maisie Norma Seaton, Natasha Cottriall, Joseph Thompson, Joe Bolland, Arnas Fedaravicius, Karl Collins, Don Gilet, Annie Louise Ross, Lewis Howden, Ian Bustard, Conor McCarry, Eubha Akilade, Tibu Fortes, Jakub Bednarcyyk, Barry O’Connor, Russ Bain, Neil Pendelton, Ross Allan, Gemma Laurie, Ian Dunnett Jnr, Simon Tait, Francesco Piacentini-Smith, Jo Cameron-Brown, Steven Miller, Sandy Grierson, Sean Brown, Kevan Mackenzie, Anne Kidd, Manjinder Virk. 

Shetland (Series Eight). Television Drama Review. full post

(516 words, estimated 2:04 mins reading time)

The Couple Next Door. Television Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Sam Heughan, Eleanor Tomlinson, Jessica De Gouw, Alfred Enoch, Hugh Dennis, Kate Robbins, Joel Morris, Janine Duvitski, Ionna Kimbrook, Daniel Bell, Deirdre Mullins, Mark Frost, Andrew Woodall, Anastasia Hille, Katie-Clarkson-Hill, Noah Holdsworth, Stephanie Street, Clare Burt, Ellie Lucia Mcardle, James Doherty, Aimé Claeys, Ali Ariaie, Dario Coates, Paul Dunphy, Geoffrey Breton, Lauren Douglin, Teli Jalloh, James Burrows, Kate Anthony, Sarah Gallagher, Leila Mimmack, Robert Whitelock, Emma Moortgat, Henry Regan, Helene Maksoud, Elise van Lil, Jade Greyul, Andrew Sheridan, Rob Oldfield, Ace Bhatti.

The Couple Next Door. Television Drama Review. full post

(500 words, estimated 2:00 mins reading time)

Steely Dan: Gaucho. Album Reissue (2023) Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

As the albums are re-released for the modern era, with a greater sense of occasion and fierce debate attached to them, it is to be delighted to witness the return of Steely Dan to the conscious of the older listener and be appreciated by a younger crowd who weren’t aware of just how ahead of their time they were.

Steely Dan: Gaucho. Album Reissue (2023) Review. full post

(442 words, estimated 1:46 mins reading time)

Kate Rusby: Light Years. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

The complexity of Christmas is such that it can cause inner conflict and turmoil to those who see the endless commercialism as an assault on their ability to not be downed in the saccharine and the overblown. To many the best part of the year is reserved not for the hype, but the beauty of the human experience of simple pleasures.

Kate Rusby: Light Years. Album Review. full post

(414 words, estimated 1:39 mins reading time)

Peter Gabriel: i/o. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

It could be speculated that to take two decades to release a new original album might see the artist in question expect to undergo a series of tough and rigorous demands and interrogations on the journey, on the distance, and how the new release might see them remain prevalent to a new generation of music listeners; especially in a period of time in which the extreme nature of art is as disposable as honour and understanding.

Peter Gabriel: i/o. Album Review. full post

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