Reviews

Miles Davis – Seven Steps: The Complete Columbia Recordings Of Miles Davis 1963-64

Seven-disc addition to Miles Davis box set series

Niceland – Accidental

Mugison's follow-up to last year's acclaimed Lonely Mountain debut is the score to a Fridrik Thor Fridriksson film, recorded in a church and in his girlfriend's mum's front room in remote Western Iceland. Fridriksson (whose last, Falcons, boasted a song by Keith Carradine) has also used Sigur Rós and Psychic TV in the past (on Angels Of The Universe), so this isn't (quite) as wilfully obscure as you might assume. It's very rough, broken and sketchy, with minimalist acoustic guitars probing spectres of melodies till they crystallise (or don't).

Cool For Cats

Virginia's insurgent country queen dazzles on first live album

Nanci Griffith – Hearts In Mind

Lashings of syrup from the selfless champion of good causes and queen of the lovesick

Apes – Tapestry Mastery

Guitar-free noise freaks barely dodge prog-rock tag for the third time

Un Chien Andalou/L’Age D’Or

Punk rock began in 1929/30, when Luis Buñuel caused riots with these erotic howls of protest, urging the human race to place love and lust above civic duty. Visually he broke the mould, with a little help from Salvador Dalí. The 17-minute Un Chien is a hymn to desire; the 63-minute L'Age D'Or is shocking and beautifully immortal.

Stroszek

"We have a truck on fire ... we can't stop the dancing chicken..."In Werner Herzog's steady but bleak 1977 gaze at American badlands, Bruno S plays a Berlin street musician who goes in search of a better life in the US with hooker girlfriend (Eva Mattes) and mad old friend (Clemens Scheitz), but finds only the despairingly drab dead-end of rural Wisconsin. The movie lan Curtis watched the night he died.

Beyond The Sea

Kevin Spacey directs and stars in music biopic

Mary J Blige – Live From Los Angeles

If Mary's never quite convinced the world she merited that "the voice of R&B's future" hype, she's godhead to believers: 5,000 funked-up fans fill the LA Amphitheatre here. Her first concert DVD, it finds her belting through I'm-so-damaged-but-the-merchandising-revenue-sure-helps material like "No More Drama" and "Your Child", and duetting, weirdly, with big-screen images of Lil' Kim and BIG. CHRIS ROBERTS

Patty Waters – You Thrill Me

Unreleased tracks by undervalued jazz vocalist, covering 1960-1979
Advertisement

Editor's Picks

Advertisement