Simon Cousins, Given Songs. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Music truly is about opening yourself up, like all art it responds to how you feel on the day, what mood you have climbed out of bed in and how that period of darkness has affected you and your thoughts. For Simon Cousins, once of the Wiltshire Folk rock band Ophiuchus and Liverpool’s own The Onset, the mood he must have come to be in whilst recording the tracks on Given Songs must have been somewhere between serene and tranquil with a little nomadic aside into the realms of tender affection.

Simon Cousins, Given Songs. Album Review. full post

(468 words, estimated 1:52 mins reading time)

Little Sparrow, The Wishing Tree. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Some creatures are more observant than others, be they slight or minute, what they see and reflect upon should still be taken as evidence of their existence and their right to require a voice that should be heard.

The journey through life is full of these voices and in Little Sparrow, music lovers have the chance to fully embrace someone whose observations and musical interpretations are amongst the finest you are likely to hear. The joyful sadness, the stirring, inspirational notes that Little Sparrow brings to her songs is akin to the fruitful day time walk through the woods closest to your home and discovering the world as it should be, bountiful, full of meaning and an exercise in letting go of the despondency which growls and gnaws at the flesh.

Little Sparrow, The Wishing Tree. Album Review. full post

(387 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)

A Poet In New York, Television Review. B.B.C.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Tom Hollander, Essie Davis, Ewen Bremner, Phoebe Fox, Samantha Fox, Stuart Matthews, Shane Hart, Morfydd Clark, Lucinda O’Donnell.

What really drives a poet as an artist? Not for them perhaps the adulation bestowed upon them as other artists, the secrecy of their work arguably not given a thought by the population as whole in the same way as a those who follow music. The craft is unseen and so is their life as they squirrel away words like some hide treasure or famous paintings by old Masters. However for Dylan Thomas, he was a breed of the new poet, loved on both sides of The Atlantic after the ravages of World War Two.

A Poet In New York, Television Review. B.B.C. full post

(464 words, estimated 1:51 mins reading time)

Sin City: Booze, Broads And Bullets, Graphic Novel Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 5/10

Into every magnificent series must come a dip, a lack of form or supposed interest that makes all the other titles so far printed seem even more tantilising. In Frank Miller’s Sin City series that fall comes with the sixth in the range, Booze, Broads and Bullets.

Sin City: Booze, Broads And Bullets, Graphic Novel Review. full post

(471 words, estimated 1:53 mins reading time)

An August Bank Holiday Lark, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Barrie Rutter, Emily Butterfield, Darren Kuppan, Jack Quarton, Ben Burman, Elizabeth Eves, Sophie Hatfield, Lauryn Redding, Brett Lee Roberts, Mark Thomas, Russell Richardson.

An August Bank Holiday Lark, the chance for some men to become heroes, for some to find some meaning or importance in life away from the remote villages they may have been raised in all their lives or even the chance to be looked at differently by those they need validation or even respect from. An August Bank Holiday Lark, the hazy days of summer before Gavro Princip took a gun and assassinated one man and his wife and started the ball rolling on the first mechanised whole sale slaughter of soldiers and civilians that tore through Europe and beyond.

An August Bank Holiday Lark, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(577 words, estimated 2:18 mins reading time)

Locke, Film Review. Picturehouse@Fact, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Tom Hardy, Nqabilezitha Mhlonga, Olivia Coleman, Ruth Wilson, Andrew Scott, Ben Daniels, Tom Holland, Bill Milner, Danny Webb, Alice Lowe, Silas Carson, Lee Ross, Kirsty Dillon.

American cinema may have invented the concept of the “Road Movie”, just as they did with the beat poetry that used the idea as metaphor to describe life but surely in the hands of one film, British cinema has shown exactly what can be done with the genre. The wide open spaces that run the width of the United States is can be argued is a poor substitute to the tediousness that is inflicted upon drivers in the U.K., the road in America takes you to the place you want to be, the road in Britain takes you where you need to be. For that prospect alone makes Locke one of the finest films dealing with solitude and everyday realism that you are likely to come across.

Locke, Film Review. Picturehouse@Fact, Liverpool. full post

(490 words, estimated 1:58 mins reading time)

Liverpool Legend Ian McNabb Launches His Own Open Mic Night in Liverpool.

Ian Mcnabb is one of the great singer/songwriters to emerge from the 80’s Liverpool music scene. The founder and lead singer with chart toppers The Icicle Works, will be launching his very own ‘Open Mic’ night at Mathew Street Live on Mathew Street, Liverpool (above Eric’s) starting on Wednesday 7th May from 9pm – 1am. Entry is free.

“I’m pleased to report that I will be hosting a singer-songwriter night every Wednesday upstairs from Eric’s club starting next month. I hope to see as many of you there as possible. Come and play your music!” says Ian Mcnabb.

Liverpool Legend Ian McNabb Launches His Own Open Mic Night in Liverpool. full post

(159 words, estimated 38 secs reading time)

Doctor Who: The Crooked Man. Audio Drama Review, 3.3. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tom Baker, Louise Jameson, Sarah Smart, Robin Pearce, Richard Earl, Neil Stuke, Lizzie Roper.

Whoever said reading was good for you had never came across the fear that radiates the characters in novels that never get read, the terror that appears when The Crooked Man comes a calling.

Doctor Who: The Crooked Man. Audio Drama Review, 3.3. Big Finish. full post

(507 words, estimated 2:02 mins reading time)

Only Child, From Muddy Water To Higher Ground. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

It seems an interminable age since Alan O’ Hare put forward the cause. The imposing marriage between the personal thought and the anger that burns within at the way that the world has taken a sudden turn to an extreme position in that all has been made steadily good now comes crashing down amongst the bitterness of memories. Yet there is hope, there should always be the glimmer of optimism that makes each day worthwhile and keeps the anger tucked up inside just that little bit longer. Such is the power of Alan O’ Hare’s writing under the banner of Only Child that the latest album, From Muddy Water To Higher Ground is just that, the anticipation of seeing your loved one smile whilst raging at the past and the future in the same breathe.

Only Child, From Muddy Water To Higher Ground. Album Review. full post

(532 words, estimated 2:08 mins reading time)

Fargo, The Rooster Prince. Episode Two. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Billy Bob Thornton, Martin Freeman, Allison Tolman, Colin Hanks, Bob Odenkirk, Keith Carradine, Joshua Close, Adam Goldberg, Russell Harvard, Glenn Howerton, Brian Markinson, Tom Musgrave, Joey King, Rachel Blanchard, Peter Breitmayer, Barry Flatman, Oliver Platt, Spencer Drever, Lori Ravensborg, Gordon S. Miller, Allegra Fulton, David LeReaney, Graeme Black, James Dugan, Peter Strand Rumpel, Paul Braunstein, Sarah Elias, Mart Ronaghan, Leah Cairns, Crystal Brooke, Liam Green, Eve Harlow, Chad Stanley Martin.

Fargo, The Rooster Prince. Episode Two. Television Review. full post

(552 words, estimated 2:12 mins reading time)