Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
There are many names that sit like Kings of old on the throne of the nation’s favourite race horse and whatever the rights and wrongs of which there are plenty on either side of the argument, the fact that an animal is so revered is one of the great pleasures in life for many millions of people.
Satin Beige, LIPA, Liverpool. April 2015. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Relaxed, composed and only the barest hint of the immensity that resides in her fingers showing as they strain at the leash wanting to fly with the same feeling of majestic endeavour that she showed ahead of supporting Tommy Scott’s acoustic evening at Leaf in March, Satin Beige looks as if she doesn’t just want to give a performance to remember, she wants to show exactly why she is so highly regarded and so admired.
Kitty Staunton of Novacrow, LIPA, Liverpool, 2015. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
If every song needs a hook in which to guide it to the listener’s emotions then does it follow that every live performance needs something other than the music to really make it memorable? It either depends on how the sound is appreciated, a folk band for example certainly don’t need the extra polish attached their gig, neither does a solo performer serenading with almost perfect ease, and yet in some quarters, what is already rather enjoyable, even tremendous in some places has that little something extra with the visual memento mori attached.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Mairi-Claire Kennedy, Nathon Bibby, Faye Caddick, Rebecca Howard, Maria Hutchinson, Vicky Lodge, Natalie J. Romero, Mikyla Jane Durkan, Samantha Walton, Gillian Paterson-Fox, Alan Bowyer, Callum Wright, Gary Watson, Iffan Wyn James, Yahya Baggash.
It is a story that still resonates, still has the power to send tremor like Earthquakes through any who see it and simply turns established thought upside down and inverts the power of femininity and the female form. Euripides’ Medea is a tale so huge that in modern day thought, it still provokes the question that surely a woman cannot take the life of a child, especially her own child and yet as the news shows, Medea is not alone in the most brutal of acts.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Kate Winslet, Stanley Tucci, Jennifer Ehle, Alan Rickman, Helen McCrory, Matthias Schoenaerts, Steven Waddington, Danny Webb, Adrian Schiller, Adrian Scarborough, Pauline Moran, Phyllida Law, Morgan Watkins, Henry Garrett, Alistair Petrie, Adam James.
There are films in which the abundance of talent on offer simply overwhelms the story line, the procession of acting nobility so engulfing, so crushing, that the film dies a thousand scripted deaths; it never truly lives up to the dignity envisioned off screen and the grace offered in the initial stages of casting. Thankfully this is not the issue when it comes to A Little Chaos.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Raw, un-mitigating power, the abilty to drive a musical note so far down the ear canal that it pops out the other side as if hurtling round the Higgs Boson Hadron Collider, power but with controlled aggression, not to see where the origins of the Universe may lay, not to marvel at the prospect of where the place of birth is in the cosmic soup but to introduce a the great sound at the disposal of The 69 Watts.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
There is a natural tendency to see a band perform in one setting and immediately wonder how they would sound somewhere else, how they would grab the attention in a smaller venue, one on a larger, perhaps more acoustically challenging and accustomed to the rigours that come the way of a young band making inroads in the career. That natural tendency is born out wanting to see the band do well and hearing songs that made your heart flutter initially, but also the dreadful spectre of betting against yourself that surely without reasonable doubt, they cannot be as good as the first initial contact made with them.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Cast: Laura Campbell, Paul Duckworth, Andy Roberts.
Recorded Cast: Aiden Lee Brooks, Rosalind Henderson, Tom Galashan, David Llewelyn, Mike McCormack, Jade Thompson, Chris Hennessey, Adam Gilbert, Paula Simms, Patrick Dunn.
Freedom at any cost and the right to use your life how you see fit, two intrinsic, rightful, and powerful overtures to life that have been eradicated time and time again since the French Revolution. Before that it seems as if History allowed the common man the space to live and breathe his own, only asking occasionally to take part in war or be at the beck and call of the state. From The French Revolution onwards, the state has interfered more and more, to the point where even questions are asked about the most intimate details, perhaps even what would different about My Clockwork Heart.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9.5/10
Helena Johnson is going to be huge one day, all the signs are there and the performance, especially when placed in with the big band ensemble is a spectacle to behold and admire.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Paul Broughton, Michael Starke.
The humble British Shed, so loved by many, so bemusing too many more. A place where sanctuary is sought, where peace can reign and Time can be seen not to ravage but to almost stall, decay at a slower rate, to inspire growth and let thoughts take hold in a way that the outside world, almost insistent on the answers being forthcoming at the speed of knots, cannot comprehend. The shed is last refuge, be it six foot wide in all directions or built in the fashion that some might as well retire and spend their remaining days locked within and practise for the ultimate last days of potting and cutting dead leaves of a much valued plant.