Selfish Lovers, Gig Review. Zanzibar Club, Liverpool.

Amy Bielizna of Selfish Lovers at the Zanzibar, Liverpool. June 2014. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The close, muggy feeling of trapped heat that enveloped the city of Liverpool, heat which made normally persistent shadows perspire with sweat and groan under the Sun’s blessed fury would normally eat into the energy reserves of anybody finding themselves out and about on a June day. For some artists an understanding audience would forgive and forget if they gave a slightly subdued performance because of it, However inside the Zanzibar Club, the members of Selfish Lovers gave an altruistic performance which jumped off the stage and straight into the welcoming arms of a relieved audience.

Selfish Lovers, Gig Review. Zanzibar Club, Liverpool. full post

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

Jersey Boys, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: John Lloyd Young, Erich Bergen, Michael Lomenda, Vincent Piazza, Christopher Walken, Renée Marino, Kathrine Narducci, Lou Volpe, Freya Tingley, Grace Kelley, Elizabeth Hunter, Mike Doyle, Rob Marnell, Johnny Cannizzaro, Donnie Kehr, Jeremy Luke, Joey Russo, James Madio, Erica Piccininni, Steve Schirripa, Barry Livingston, Miles Aubrey, Kim Gatewood, Jackie Seiden, Kyli Rae, Troy Grant, Heather Ferguson Pond, John Griffin, Chaz Langley.

Jersey Boys, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool. full post

(651 words, estimated 2:36 mins reading time)

Bolshy, RADICAL. ANARCHIC. BOLSHY. SCOUSE. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Radicalism is not dead, no matter how hard some may try to bang another nail into the coffin of much needed change, the young of today keep finding a voice and it is a voice that needs urgently to be listened to. Like the music that sprang forth with the likes of the great Pauline Black and Coventry band The Selecter or The Specials, if you refuse to listen, if you lock your door and hideaway behind the thought that all is cosy in the world, then the shock of superbly interesting lyrics and great musicianship that comes out Liverpool band Bolshy and their E.P. RADICAL. ANARCHIC. BOLSHY. SCOUSE might just make you change your mind and actually listen and get your mind out of the television schedules.

Bolshy, RADICAL. ANARCHIC. BOLSHY. SCOUSE. E.P. Review. full post

(449 words, estimated 1:48 mins reading time)

F.I.F.A World Cup 2014: Match Report. Croatia V Cameroon.

Originally published by Ace Magazine, Liverpool online June 2014.

Every World Cup needs a villain, in the same way that hundreds of Pantomimes up and down the country require a Captain Hook, a wicked witch or rampaging giant or a Government finds it essential to for its people to fear another country somewhere in the world, so the football World Cup necessitates that a player must be the man that the negativity surrounds itself around. From Antonio Ubaldo Rattín in 1966, Harold Shumaker and his rather disgraceful pole axing attempt on Patrick Battiston, Diego Maradona and the scandal that surrounded 1994 and for England fans his flagrant handball in Mexico in 1986, Zinedine Zidane and his over the top reaction and even England’s own David Beckham in 1998 against Argentina, the fan always loves a villain.

F.I.F.A World Cup 2014: Match Report. Croatia V Cameroon. full post

(952 words, estimated 3:48 mins reading time)

Liverpool’s Everyman Theatre Announced As Winner In RIBA Awards.

The Everyman has been announced as a winner in the 2014 Royal Institute of British Architects Awards (RIBA) National Award, the most rigorously-judged awards for architectural excellence. The winners go forward for consideration for the Stirling Award shortlist, which will be announced on 17th July.

Since it opened in March, the Everyman has already won the RIBA North West Building of the Year at the regional round in April. RIBA states that the National Award winning buildings ‘set the standard for good architecture; these are projects that go beyond the brief and exceed the client’s expectation’.

Liverpool’s Everyman Theatre Announced As Winner In RIBA Awards. full post

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

Gods Of Dust And Clay.

The heavy Midnight air still lingers even at 4am,

it shifts and pauses, floats and stops but never moves

far from your door.

Exhaling the drag end of a cheap nasty cigar

and blowing a kiss to the tendrils of mist

that collect at your feet, numbing them ahead

of the perfect summer’s day to come,

you are reminded that

for inside every good man

there is a villain that the public

want to see emerge,

a Captain Hook for their imagination and mouth

Gods Of Dust And Clay. full post

(279 words, estimated 1:07 mins reading time)

Wonder Woman, Volume One: Blood. Graphic Novel Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

If you look at so called Big Two of American comic publishing, then Marvel for some reason has infinitely more heroines in which to glorify than those that live in the D.C. Universe. Even away from Marvel, which seems to have embraced with a lot more heart the reality of women who can hold their own against any of their male counterparts and in many ways are actually far superior to them, after all who would you rather have alongside you in a fight to the death, Susan Storm/Richards or Benjamin Grimm?

Wonder Woman, Volume One: Blood. Graphic Novel Review. full post

(557 words, estimated 2:14 mins reading time)

Liverpool Sound And Vision Special: An Interview With Ste Reid From The Mono LPs And Paula Stewart and Lee Burnitt From Tell Tale Theatre.

Music and video used to go hand in hand with each other, especially in the 1980s, where it was expected that a well-made video would give a band or artist a huge lift in sales. For anybody who was getting into music in the early part of the tandem craft, songs such as Ultravox’s Vienna, A-Ha’s Take On Me, Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Two Tribes, Marillion’s Kayleigh and Genesis’ Land of Confusion were as well remembered for their iconic videos as they were for the creative lyrics and supreme music.

Liverpool Sound And Vision Special: An Interview With Ste Reid From The Mono LPs And Paula Stewart and Lee Burnitt From Tell Tale Theatre. full post

(1819 words, estimated 7:17 mins reading time)

Venus In Fur, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.AC.T. Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Emmanuelle Seigner, Mathieu Amalric.

Foreign language films in Britain do tend to attract a niche audience but that should not deter any fan of cinema from attending a showing of Director Roman Polanski’s film Venus in Fur.

In the U.K. audiences do tend to be split in the appreciation of a good film that has travelled across the deep waters of the Channel, it is a shame but it does happen. If an exception should be made for a film in the last ten years then Venus in Fur should be top of the pile. For this highly charged, message filled, erotic and electrifying piece of cinema, the limits of enjoyment are only placed by the confines of the mind’s refusal to accept something new and something truly fascinating, even enthralling and most of all completely and wonderfully strange.

Venus In Fur, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.AC.T. Liverpool. full post

(434 words, estimated 1:44 mins reading time)

Belle, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T. Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tom Wilkinson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Emily Watson, Sam Reid, Tom Felton, James Norton, Miranda Richardson, Penelope Wilton, Sarah Gadon, Matthew Goode, Lauren Julien-Box, Natasha Williams, Alan McKenna, Timothy Walker, David Gant, Charlotte Roach, Rupert Wickham, Bethan Mary-James, Alana Ramsey, Alex Jennings, Daniel Wilde, Susan Brown, James Northcote, Andrew Woodall, Edmund Short, Christopher Middleton.

Pride meets extremism prejudice in Misan Sagay’s well written script for the film Belle.

Belle, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T. Liverpool. full post

(594 words, estimated 2:23 mins reading time)