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Films of the Year – These are my favourites, grouped into rough order of prefereence, for the past 12 months of cinema-going. (more…)
My last playlist of the year spans more than half a century, starting in the early 1960s with Sandra Barry and taking in tributes to those we lost in December, including Brigitte Bardot, Joe Ely, Steve Cropper and Chris Rea. In between there is folk, blues, soul, country, Eurodisco – and even a little Schumann.
Gabriella Cilmi had an instant hit at the age of 17 with Sweet About Me after moving from Melbourne to London.
Labi Siffre was a West London boy but paid tribute to a beauty spot in Staffordshire on his song Cannock Chase.
I never met Brigitte Bardot but, like half the boys I knew, I had her picture on my wall when I was at boarding school.
Shoegaze pioneers Ride were falling apart by the time they recorded their fourth album Tarantula. But the opening tune, Black Nite Crash, was a fitting finale.
The solemnity and sadness of Lisa O’Neill’s song is matched to a mournful melody that reminds me of a hymn – or a Christmas carol.
There was much more to Chris Rea than the hit singles – a multi-talented artist whose first loves were the blues, racing cars, cinema and journalism.
Massive Attack teamed up with Young Fathers for this creepy tune, with an even creepier video, from their Ritual Spirit EP.
I’m familiar with Odetta as the voice of the Civil Rights Movement back in the ’50s and ’60s and I know Martin Luther King called her the Queen of American folk music. But I’d never heard this ’til now.