How many questions can you ask in fifteen minutes? That’s the challenge when told you’re getting a quarter hour with Prince Paul. Having so much to discuss wasn’t helped by the fact that Paul turned out to be one of the chattiest and most intelligent guys I’ve ever interviewed. Also, he takes the prize for […]

The big talk in the lead-up to the release of The Go! Team’s third full-length LP, Rolling Blackouts, was bandleader and producer Ian Parton’s new found focus on songwriting. To that end, the sampling was assigned a backseat and a bunch of esteemed guest vocalists drafted in – including Satomi Matsuzaki of Deerhoof and Best […]

It’s interesting to consider what’s been going through the collective heads of Cut Copy over the past twelve months. Their last record, “In Ghost Colours,” was a monster, the Australians arriving with the right sound at the right time to be handed the keys to the United States – a very grand dream that few […]

Mary J. Blige is one of the few constants in R&B’s recent history. While many of her contemporaries fell off after the modern iterations early 90s heyday, Blige continued to write and record at an impressive rate, merging with a new generation of artists and becoming the go-to girl for rap producers in search of […]

The Bronx’s Diggin’ in the Crates crew towered over the early to mid-90s like an SP1200-strapped colossus, and continue to have a strong pull on the New York underground. At the center of DITC is Lord Finesse. Say what you like about Finesse – ultra-smooth MC, forward thinking producer, notorious ladies man – the guy […]

Like a broken clock, Matt Shea is right at least twice a day. Not content with releasing one of the finest debuts of 2009, 5 O’Clock Shadowboxers followed it up last April with an arguably better EP. The brilliance of Broken Clocks is in the way it takes a panorama scope – with a greater […]

With Strut’s tireless recent focus on Mulatu Astatke’s rich musical past, it was almost a relief earlier this year when the label unleashed a record of new material from the Ethio-jazz master. To be honest, the guy’s written music enough for two lifetimes – it would be easy for him to coast – but as […]

When it comes to the music industry, the wrong sales records are being set. Soundscan tabulates album receipts in steady decline since their peak in 2000 — a year when close to 800 million albums were sold. In 2009, the figure dropped to just under 400 million. This year, the week of August 8-14 witnessed […]

Matt Shea owns The Fog on VHS. Few recent debuts have impressed like The Phantom Band’s Checkmate Savage. If you believed the hype in early 2009 – never advisable when it comes to the British music press – these Scots were Jesus Christ, the Queen and Archie Gemmill all rolled into one. But hindsight – […]

Today is Matt Shea’s birthday. He is now old enough to rent an orchestra.  Reading over reviews and write-ups of the Cinematic Orchestra’s Every Day, it’s litle wonder the album didn’t prove more popular. Phrases worryingly similar to ‘musical saviours’ and ‘album of the year’ were bandied about, and yet it remains a remarkably undiscovered […]