Dream River (Drag City) If a defence of the independent record label business model had to be made, opposed to the “make a hit record or you’re dropped” major label equivalent, here’s a watertight one: if you leave someone to do their thing for long enough, maybe they’ll make a record as universally beautiful as…
Eircka Beckman‘s Hiatus is an experimental film about online interactive ‘identity’, that went by unnoticed at the 1999 Rotterdam Film Festival but recently received wide acclaim when it was included in Beckman’s two day Image Games event at Tate Modern. Sarah Baker thinks that, 14 years on, we’re now ready to travel in Beckman’s visually elaborate virtual reality…
Stanley Brinks doesn’t seem like the type for nostalgia. Since leaving Herman Düne in 2006 the artist formerly known as André has released (by my count) 22 albums, darting between calypso electronica and acoustic balladry. Playing live, he rarely revisits material more than two years old. Requests from the back catalogue are usually met with…
Just the other day, as I sat tucking into a sandwich of gigantic proportions outside a café, a young, waifish boy with grey skin and a frown that clearly spoke his contempt for the world, sauntered past with dramatic flare. My friend scoffed loudly in his direction and declared, through a mouthful of food, “He’s…
It’s difficult to imagine, from a homogenised and commodified musical present, what it would have been like to go out in mid-’60s downtown New York City and see the scene in this photograph. The Velvet Underground playing at Café Bizarre; Lou Reed singing and Edie Sedgwick dancing just a few feet from the audience, but…
Many of the themes explored in this highly graphic and sexualised show are as classically subversive and disparaging as one would anticipate, but there is undeniable substance behind the Sarah Lucas aesthetic: a subtext of far greater subtlety than a cursory look may afford. I admit, as I entered Gallery 1 at Whitechapel I had…
He may not have produced any music of genuine significance for two decades, and has lived abroad for as long, but, somehow, 54-year-old, erstwhile Smiths potentate Steven Patrick Morrissey remains a pervasive presence on the UK music scene (and beyond – the Prime Minister professes to be a fan) – a still ineffably looming, indomitable…
I was on the Northern Line reading an article in the Metro about how kissing has been banned on public transport in Vienna after a couple were caught having sex. As I started to imagine what would happen if this law was enforced in London, I was interrupted by a sudden jolt. A tall guy…
Mark Hix’s Tramshed is the closest a London restaurant has got to merging dining with contemporary art since Damien Hirst opened Pharmacy in Notting Hill. It’s no surprise that Hirst collaborated with Hix on the installation (that takes centre stage in the dining hall), as he, like many of the YBA’s, has a genuine affection for this down-to-earth…
It’s not every day you get to speak to a legend like Catalan chef Ferran Adrià, world-renowned for his scientific and groundbreaking approach to gastronomy. When you do get the chance, it’s important to try and make the conversation worthwhile. Frankly, some of the most interesting questions I asked Fernan Adrià didn’t come from me, they…