culture
music
music August 1, 2020
The take on a 1998 Europop hit by three artists highlights a contemporary desire to find comfort in nostalgia and the innocence of a bygone age.
music July 18, 2020
The artists formerly known as Dixie Chicks are back with a long-awaited album that eschews their usual truth-speaking on politics and power for much more personal, and poppy, reflection.
music July 11, 2020
Jarvis Cocker pops the questions
More than 40 years after starting the iconic band Pulp, Jarvis Cocker continues to evolve as an artist. He speaks about the raves of the late ’80s, his concerns about the growing costs of humanities degrees, and his latest album, Beyond the Pale.
music June 20, 2020
Powerful messages in Australian music
We know the power of music to provide comfort and healing. But we also know it can act as a force for change. Here, three releases that have powerful messages in the current cultural moment.
music May 30, 2020
Since releasing her first album, Gordi has experienced three years of emotional upheaval, which she has channelled into a new record, Our Two Skins. She speaks to Nick Buckley about losing her grandmother, falling in love over the phone and creating music in self-enforced isolation. “That’s when I feel most creative, when I don’t have everything at my disposal. You know, how I might make one sound if I don’t have that thing. It’s like creating unique moments out of nothing.”
music May 23, 2020
Charli XCX’s how i’m feeling now
Conceived and executed in isolation, Charli XCX’s latest album, how i’m feeling now, fearlessly charts new terrain while capturing the complex emotions of a stable relationship and the sadness of life away from friends.
music May 16, 2020
Singer-songwriter Moses Sumney
During his early career, the music industry was intent on fitting Moses Sumney into boxes. But as his latest album, græ, attests, he is an artist determined to seek his own truths beyond the confines of expectation and identity. “I’m really interested in the collapse of identity politics, increasingly. I want us to get to a place where we can seek equality for ourselves without having to define as anything that’s simple. It feels really petrifying, the idea that you explain yourself to someone in order to gain their respect [and that] in doing that, you’re kind of solidifying your identity in a way that feels quite limiting.”
dance May 9, 2020
With the Covid-19 lockdown forcing Sydney arts precinct Carriageworks into voluntary administration, the embattled cultural sector is bracing for worse to come.
music May 9, 2020
Forgoing depth and complexity for cheap nostalgia, Beastie Boys Story has little of the vitality that characterised the band’s music.
music April 18, 2020
Fiona Apple’s Fetch the Bolt Cutters
Singer-songwriter Fiona Apple’s impressive fifth album, Fetch the Bolt Cutters, is the culmination of her decades-long quest to ‘feel everything’.
music April 11, 2020
I Feel Alive, the fourth album from Montreal band TOPS, captures their trademark lush soft rock sound while, in a stroke of timeliness, delving into tender explorations of love and loneliness.
