Author Archive
November 26, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Megan Thee Stallion: Good News
Megan Thee Stallion Good News 300 Entertainment It’s hard to believe that this is Megan Thee Stallion’s debut album. And I mean that in purely musical terms – 2019’s “mixtape” Fever felt like an album-quality collection, and was a broad announcement; my introduction. I loved that set of songs, played it often – it gave […]
November 26, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
The Vinyl Countdown # 11
Tori Amos, Under The Pink (1994) It’s been a pretty good year for reappraising Tori Amos. I’ve been back through most of the catalogue, I talked about her live on air (RNZ), I loved her memoirand I got hooked on the old stuff all over again. Someone kindly gave me a copy of Boys For […]
November 26, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Poem: Won’t Get Fooled
The 50th Anniversary edition of The Who’s album, Who’s Next is a deluxe edition – featuring 17 versions of Won’t Get Fooled Again. That song plays again and again and again and again and again and the fools gather to listen to the next one and the one after that and they don’t see the […]
November 26, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Kodama 木: Yamabiko [EP]
Kodama 木 Yamabiko [EP] dreaming of distant worlds Yamabiko is an album of layered synth-sounds, all at once introspective and otherworldly, this is music to keep close to your chest but it also expands the mind; music that combines the ambient blueprint laid out by Brian Eno with the glitch/dissonance/disintegration ideals and ethereal soundscape patterns […]
November 26, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
George Benson: Weekend In London
George Benson Weekend In London Provogue In 1978 George Benson released Weekend In L.A. It’s one of my all-time favourite records; one of the albums of my childhood. We grew up with it in our house – and we loved both the guitar instrumentals (the title track) and the funky band workouts (On Broadway). We […]
November 25, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Poem: Billie Holiday Created Modern Jazz Singing And Also Loved Drugs, Drinking And Fucking
The official story is that Billie Holiday lived a sad life. She was abused and grew up to abuse alcohol and drugs as part of her escape. She peaked, then crumbled, then died broke and losing her voice and all well before the age of 50. But Billie used every interview to point out she’d […]
November 25, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Sweetman Podcast # 240: Lucy Roche
Welcome to episode 240 of Sweetman Podcast with support from our sponsors – T Leaf T and Yeastie Boys Now – as you probably know, as well as the usual platforms (this site, soundcloud, iTunes/Apple) you can now get to Sweetman Podcast on Spotify – follow it there and have it saved in your Spotify […]
November 25, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Billie Holiday & The Sonhouse All Stars: BILLIE – The Original Soundtrack
Billie Holiday & The Sonhouse All Stars BILLIE: The Original Soundtrack Verve The story behind the just released new Billie Holiday documentary is nearly as interesting as the film itself. BILLIE was started in 1971 by a journalist interested in the background story. Holiday had died, nearly penniless 12 years earlier. She had, for a […]
November 24, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
MXXWLL: SHEESH
MXXWLL SHEESH Rare Chords Australian-based beatmaker/producer MXXWLL operates in a post-D’Angelo world; the nu-soul groove that is on the R’n’B tip always but has notes from hip-hop, funk and sinewy digital-Prince era vibes.
November 24, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Ben Harper: Winter Is For Lovers
Ben Harper Winter Is For Lovers Anti / Epitaph If this lockdown hasn’t already recalibrated how we feel and what we know is real then I’m painfully aware of that now as I throw almost my full support behind a brand new Ben Harper album.
November 24, 2020 by Simon Sweetman
Kevin Smuts: My Octopus Teacher [Music From The Netflix Documentary]
Kevin Smuts My Octopus Teacher [Music From The Netflix Documentary] Maisie Music Publishing, LLC For me, by far and away the best thing about the recent Netflix documentary hit, My Octopus Teacher was its soundtrack.
November 24, 2020 by Simon Sweetman