Spotlights

Spotlight: Bronski Beat – The Age Of Consent

by Nick Smith

The year was 1984. Wham!, Nik Kershaw, Queen and Frankie Goes To Hollywood were everywhere, swatting away toxic masculinity with their bleached-blonde and toussled bouffants,…

Spotlight: Felt – A Decade In Music (continued)

Back in February, Cherry Red began the A Decade In Music reissue programme, releasing the first five of 10 studio albums by sainted indie-poppers Felt....

Mercury Music Prize 2018: The Nominees

This year’s Mercury Music Prize nominations have been announced, with Lily Allen, Florence + The Machine, Arctic Monkeys and Wolf Alice among the 12 artists...

Track-By-Track: Immersion – Sleepless

Wire frontman Colin Newman & Minimal Compact‘s Malka Spigel are Immersion, a project which provides an outlet for the Brighton-based duo’s ongoing fascination for crafting...

Spotlight: John Howard – Incidents Crowded With Life

musicOMH has been publishing articles about John Howard‘s music since he picked up where he’d left off with his debut album, 30 years after its...

Spotlight: Felt – A Decade In Music

“How we felt/Did you feel low?/Not at all…” – Television – Venus “Some things generate their rewards in second-hand ways” – Brian Eno, Los Angeles...

Spotlight: Remembering Jóhann Jóhannsson, 1969-2018

The work of Jóhann Jóhannsson may not have featured much in the way of voices, but it was richly emotive and deeply human in its...

Spotlight: Remembering Mark E Smith, 1957-2018

One of the most influential figures of the post-punk era, Mark E Smith died on 24 January 2018. Smith was present at the infamous Sex...

Spotlight: The Verve – Urban Hymns At 20

1997 was a year of snapshots, moments in particular days never to be forgotten. We’re not talking about the grossly over-hyped arrival of Oasis’ Be...

Spotlight: U2 – The Joshua Tree

For more recent generations, it’s difficult to view Irish megastars U2 as anything other than annoying. From arrogantly gatecrashing Apple users’ iTunes accounts with their...

Track-By-Track: Depeche Mode – Spirit

Dave Gahan, Martin Gore and Andy Fletcher return this spring with Depeche Mode‘s 14th album and second for Columbia, Spirit. Four years on from the...

Spotlight: Suede – Coming Up

Looking back, 1996 was not exactly one filled with happy, joyous events in Britain. IRA bombings sadly began again after a lengthy ceasefire and the...

Album Guide: The Early Years – II

Almost a decade on since their self-titled debut album’s release, The Early Years are back to pick up where they left off with a new work called, simply,...

Spotlight: One More Time With Feeling

Close to the end of One More Time With Feeling, Nick Cave looks at us and says “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing...

Spotlight: The Verve – A Storm In Heaven / A Northern Soul

Twenty-five years is a long time in pop music. Not many bands stay the course for a quarter of a century – and Verve, as...

Album Guide: Autoheart – I Can Build A Fire

The splendid Autoheart, comprising Jody Gadsden (voice), Simon Neilson (keys) and Barney JC (guitars), return after far too long away with their second album I...

Spotlight: Simple Minds – New Gold Dream (81-82-83-84)

It was a big year, 1982, and for Britain in particular. Two hundred and 55 military personnel would lose their lives during the Falklands War...

Album Guide: Bright Light Bright Light – Choreography

Rod Thomas is back with Choreography, Bright Light Bright Light‘s third album – this time featuring guest turns from Elton John, all of the Scissor...

Spotlight: The Death and Rebirth of LCD Soundsystem

There’s quite a few folk out there that think James Murphy’s got some front. How dare he reform a band with such a warm and...

Spotlight: What Prince Taught Us About Sexuality

Prodigious, prolific, paradoxical and perverse, it’s likely that no other artist in popular music history has produced the volume of self-penned and self-produced music that...