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The Postman Always Rings Twice

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In its 1946, Hays Code day, this adaptation of James M Cain's novel was provocative and erotic, although it was later out-raunched by the '81 Jack'n'Jessica version. This drips with textbook noir, and echoes Double Indemnity in both story and style. Femme fatale prototype Lana Turner tempts John Garfield to off her husband, but their comeuppance is inevitable. "He had to have her love?if he hung for it!"

In its 1946, Hays Code day, this adaptation of James M Cain’s novel was provocative and erotic, although it was later out-raunched by the ’81 Jack’n’Jessica version. This drips with textbook noir, and echoes Double Indemnity in both story and style. Femme fatale prototype Lana Turner tempts John Garfield to off her husband, but their comeuppance is inevitable. “He had to have her love?if he hung for it!”

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As South Africa celebrates the 10th anniversary of Mandela's election, Lee Hirsch's documentary, which won a brace of awards at the Sundance Film Festival, pays moving tribute to the central role music played in the struggle for liberation. Contributions from the giants of South African music like Hugh Masekela, Miriam Makeba and Abdullah Ibrahim are intercut with footage showing the horrors of apartheid.

As South Africa celebrates the 10th anniversary of Mandela’s election, Lee Hirsch’s documentary, which won a brace of awards at the Sundance Film Festival, pays moving tribute to the central role music played in the struggle for liberation. Contributions from the giants of South African music like Hugh Masekela, Miriam Makeba and Abdullah Ibrahim are intercut with footage showing the horrors of apartheid.

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Susan Hayward won the Oscar for committed scene-trashing in this 1958 movie, which?based on the real-life execution of Barbara Graham, a "goodtime girl" (possibly) framed for murder and sent to the gas chamber in 1955?was very much the Monster of its day. Robert Wise directs as if it were a jazz documentary, taking cues from the great score by Johnny Mandel, itself cooled to within an inch of its life by the Gerry Mulligan Quartet.

Susan Hayward won the Oscar for committed scene-trashing in this 1958 movie, which?based on the real-life execution of Barbara Graham, a “goodtime girl” (possibly) framed for murder and sent to the gas chamber in 1955?was very much the Monster of its day. Robert Wise directs as if it were a jazz documentary, taking cues from the great score by Johnny Mandel, itself cooled to within an inch of its life by the Gerry Mulligan Quartet.

Trilogy (La Trilogie) (1, 2 & 3)

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Director/star Lucas Belvaux's ambitious triptych, set in Grenoble, consists of three films in different genres, with overlapping characters featuring to varying degrees. On The Run is a jailbreak thriller, An Amazing Couple is a serious rom-com, and After Life is a neo-tragic melodrama. You can watch them in the 'wrong' order and shake the kaleidoscope yourself, but it's innately dark.

Director/star Lucas Belvaux’s ambitious triptych, set in Grenoble, consists of three films in different genres, with overlapping characters featuring to varying degrees. On The Run is a jailbreak thriller, An Amazing Couple is a serious rom-com, and After Life is a neo-tragic melodrama. You can watch them in the ‘wrong’ order and shake the kaleidoscope yourself, but it’s innately dark.

Out Of Time

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Director Carl Franklin reunites with Devil In A Blue Dress star Denzel Washington for this stylish-looking contemporary film noir. Denzel's Florida police chief, who's having an affair with nasty Dean Cain's wife, finds himself the subject of a murder investigation headed by his estranged wife. Though there's plenty of twists, the outcome isn't entirely unpredictable. Fun, though, while it lasts.

Director Carl Franklin reunites with Devil In A Blue Dress star Denzel Washington for this stylish-looking contemporary film noir. Denzel’s Florida police chief, who’s having an affair with nasty Dean Cain’s wife, finds himself the subject of a murder investigation headed by his estranged wife. Though there’s plenty of twists, the outcome isn’t entirely unpredictable. Fun, though, while it lasts.

A Little Night Music

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Dennis Hopper calls it "the first truly American surrealist film". The novelists JG Ballard and Jenny Diski, speaking on the slender documentary extras that accompany this double-disc set, find parallels with Freudian Oedipal theory. Even the notoriously cryptic director appears in archive footage, attempting to half-explain the inexplicable. In 1986, David Lynch sealed his reputation forever as cinema's chief nagivator of the psychosexual subconscious. A brilliant and unsettling trawl through the nocturnal underbelly of an impossibly cheerful small American city, Blue Velvet was shot in Wilmington, North Carolina, here renamed Lumberton. Halfway through the shoot, Lynch's producers discovered there was a real Lumberton nearby, negotiating use of the name in return for shooting a small section of their movie there. Kyle MacLachlan flirts winningly with golly-gee parody as Jeffrey Beaumont, a clean-cut hero straight out of 1950s Hollywood who becomes entangled in the twisted sex games between masochistic club singer Dorothy (Isabella Rossellini) and her psycho-killer lover Frank (Dennis Hopper). Hopper actually changed his demented sex scenes, having Frank breathe amyl nitrate and nitrous oxide rather than helium. In retrospect, Hopper concedes, Lynch's initial idea would have been even more disturbing. Using motifs and themes he later revisited in Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive, Lynch assails the viewer with black humour and lurid violence. Two decades later, Blue Velvet's stylised action sometimes plods a little, and the shock value has clearly diminished. But Lynch's surreal, intoxicating masterpiece is still a darkly hypnotic movie milestone.

Dennis Hopper calls it “the first truly American surrealist film”. The novelists JG Ballard and Jenny Diski, speaking on the slender documentary extras that accompany this double-disc set, find parallels with Freudian Oedipal theory. Even the notoriously cryptic director appears in archive footage, attempting to half-explain the inexplicable.

In 1986, David Lynch sealed his reputation forever as cinema’s chief nagivator of the psychosexual subconscious. A brilliant and unsettling trawl through the nocturnal underbelly of an impossibly cheerful small American city, Blue Velvet was shot in Wilmington, North Carolina, here renamed Lumberton. Halfway through the shoot, Lynch’s producers discovered there was a real Lumberton nearby, negotiating use of the name in return for shooting a small section of their movie there.

Kyle MacLachlan flirts winningly with golly-gee parody as Jeffrey Beaumont, a clean-cut hero straight out of 1950s Hollywood who becomes entangled in the twisted sex games between masochistic club singer Dorothy (Isabella Rossellini) and her psycho-killer lover Frank (Dennis Hopper). Hopper actually changed his demented sex scenes, having Frank breathe amyl nitrate and nitrous oxide rather than helium. In retrospect, Hopper concedes, Lynch’s initial idea would have been even more disturbing.

Using motifs and themes he later revisited in Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive, Lynch assails the viewer with black humour and lurid violence. Two decades later, Blue Velvet’s stylised action sometimes plods a little, and the shock value has clearly diminished. But Lynch’s surreal, intoxicating masterpiece is still a darkly hypnotic movie milestone.

A Decade Under The Influence

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An Easy Riders, Raging Bulls companion piece, co-directed by Fisher King screenwriter Richard LaGravenese and the late Ted Demme, this is a worthwhile talking-heads-and-clips trawl through Hollywood's 1970s renaissance. It lacks any hint of critical distance but is valuable for collecting the testimony of the usual suspects, including Corman, Scorsese, Coppola, Friedkin, Altman, Bogdanovich, Hopper and Paul Schrader on pretty funny form: "The film business was a decadent, decaying, emptied whorehouse, and it had to be assaulted."

An Easy Riders, Raging Bulls companion piece, co-directed by Fisher King screenwriter Richard LaGravenese and the late Ted Demme, this is a worthwhile talking-heads-and-clips trawl through Hollywood’s 1970s renaissance. It lacks any hint of critical distance but is valuable for collecting the testimony of the usual suspects, including Corman, Scorsese, Coppola, Friedkin, Altman, Bogdanovich, Hopper and Paul Schrader on pretty funny form: “The film business was a decadent, decaying, emptied whorehouse, and it had to be assaulted.”

Message In A Battle

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It's 1876 and Nathan Algren (Tom Cruise) is a broken man. A survivor of the Indian wars and Custer's defeat at the Battle of Little Big Horn, he's seen more death and horror in his time than any man has a right to. When he's not too drunk, he's a sideshow sharp-shooter, killing time until either the whiskey or the bad dreams finish him off. His old comrade Colonel Bagley (Tony Goldwyn) appears to throw him a lifeline, offering him the opportunity to go to Yokomama and train up the Imperial Japanese army. Seems they're having trouble with one of their own?a fearsome samurai warlord, Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe), whose objections to the Westernisation of the Imperial court have angered the Emperor's more machiavellian advisors. Katsumoto, it seems, must be terminated with extreme prejudice. The first engagement with the samurai turns into a rout, most of Algren's woefully inexperienced men left for dead and Algren himself wounded and taken hostage by Katsumoto, who plans to learn what he can about his new enemy. Held prisoner in Katsumoto's mountain village during the long winter months, Algren is slowly inspired by the samurai's transcendental moral and spiritual codes, and finds his own sense of honour subsequently reawakened. In the end, he finds himself fighting alongside Katsumoto against the Imperial army and Bagley, looking for redemption on the battlefield, outgunned and outmanned but ready to die, at last, for something that he truly believes in. The idea of a soldier going native isn't new to cinema?John Milius, for instance, squeezed two screenplays out of the premise with Apocalypse Now and Farewell To The King. Here Cruise and director Ed Zwick have created a spectacular, old-fashioned epic, more concerned with narrative arcs and character development than wowing audiences with the kind of technological bombast that seems to have become the accepted norm for blockbusters in these post-Matrix times. Cruise, who's on screen for almost the whole movie, turns in a career-best performance; apart from a shaky start (he doesn't do drunk very well) you get a real sense of a disillusioned, angry man gradually recovering his self-esteem and finding meaning in his life once more. Watanabe is a charismatic and regal presence, and elsewhere Timothy Spall plays the role that used to be reserved for Robert Morley in these kind of situations. The final third is the mother of all battles, a relentless blur of swords soundtracked by the never-ending roar of artillery fire, keenly orchestrated by Zwick. It's ferocious stuff. A proper movie, in other words.

It’s 1876 and Nathan Algren (Tom Cruise) is a broken man. A survivor of the Indian wars and Custer’s defeat at the Battle of Little Big Horn, he’s seen more death and horror in his time than any man has a right to. When he’s not too drunk, he’s a sideshow sharp-shooter, killing time until either the whiskey or the bad dreams finish him off. His old comrade Colonel Bagley (Tony Goldwyn) appears to throw him a lifeline, offering him the opportunity to go to Yokomama and train up the Imperial Japanese army. Seems they’re having trouble with one of their own?a fearsome samurai warlord, Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe), whose objections to the Westernisation of the Imperial court have angered the Emperor’s more machiavellian advisors. Katsumoto, it seems, must be terminated with extreme prejudice.

The first engagement with the samurai turns into a rout, most of Algren’s woefully inexperienced men left for dead and Algren himself wounded and taken hostage by Katsumoto, who plans to learn what he can about his new enemy. Held prisoner in Katsumoto’s mountain village during the long winter months, Algren is slowly inspired by the samurai’s transcendental moral and spiritual codes, and finds his own sense of honour subsequently reawakened. In the end, he finds himself fighting alongside Katsumoto against the Imperial army and Bagley, looking for redemption on the battlefield, outgunned and outmanned but ready to die, at last, for something that he truly believes in.

The idea of a soldier going native isn’t new to cinema?John Milius, for instance, squeezed two screenplays out of the premise with Apocalypse Now and Farewell To The King. Here Cruise and director Ed Zwick have created a spectacular, old-fashioned epic, more concerned with narrative arcs and character development than wowing audiences with the kind of technological bombast that seems to have become the accepted norm for blockbusters in these post-Matrix times. Cruise, who’s on screen for almost the whole movie, turns in a career-best performance; apart from a shaky start (he doesn’t do drunk very well) you get a real sense of a disillusioned, angry man gradually recovering his self-esteem and finding meaning in his life once more. Watanabe is a charismatic and regal presence, and elsewhere Timothy Spall plays the role that used to be reserved for Robert Morley in these kind of situations.

The final third is the mother of all battles, a relentless blur of swords soundtracked by the never-ending roar of artillery fire, keenly orchestrated by Zwick. It’s ferocious stuff.

A proper movie, in other words.

Break For The Border

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DVD always runs the risk of turning into a dustbin for live shows and dodgy outtakes which seem to qualify for release solely on the grounds that they exist and they're available. Get it right, though, and the format can help to give a 360-degree view of an act that you can't always get through audi...

DVD always runs the risk of turning into a dustbin for live shows and dodgy outtakes which seem to qualify for release solely on the grounds that they exist and they’re available. Get it right, though, and the format can help to give a 360-degree view of an act that you can’t always get through audio alone.

Calexico’s first foray into the medium is something of an object lesson. The band’s nucleus, Joey Burns and John Convertino, both tend towards fastidiousness and perfectionism. Burns claims that they didn’t burden themselves with vast amounts of pre-planning before they shot this performance, but maybe he’s being too modest. In any event, it looks great. It was filmed at London’s Barbican Centre in November 2002, but the way it’s lit with subtle blues, browns and golds, the cameras homing in deftly on the instrumental or vocal action as though they’d been routining the shoot for weeks, takes you way beyond the mundane confines of the hall. The Barbican is widely regarded as an excellent venue for classical music and a little uncomfortable for rock’n’roll shows?but this footage gets you so involved in the performance that it simply isn’t an issue.

The concert followed closely on the completion of Calexico’s fourth album, Feast Of Wire, so quite naturally this shapes the bulk of the set. The acoustic guitar, accordion and pedal-steel of “Sunken Waltz” lilt along over high-stepping string bass, while “Black Heart” is all simmering blues, oozing menace. Over the brisk strum of “Not Even Stevie Nicks”, Burns daringly tries out his falsetto vocal register and pulls it off without a hitch. On the drums, Convertino deploys an armoury of nifty techniques without ever lapsing into pointless flashiness. His trick of using a drumstick with one hand while rattling a pair of shakers with the other must be the percussive equivalent of rubbing your stomach while patting your head.

The duo have rounded up an expert bunch of additional Calexicans for stage work, including the multi-instrumentalist Martin Wenk, Lambchop steel player Paul Niehaus, bassist Volker Zander and trumpeter Jacob Valenzuela. Here they’re joined by some extra guests. French singer Fran

Bob Dylan – Unplugged

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Recorded for MTV's acoustic strand in 1994, this catches the Mighty Zimm midway between the raw-boned graverobbing of World Gone Wrong and Time Out Of Mind's resurrection shuffle. A respectable, if slightly sterile flick through his back pages?"The Times They Are A-Changin'", "Knockin' On Heaven's Door" and "Like A Rolling Stone"?though he seems most fired up by newer material like "Shooting Star" and "Dignity". Not the stuff of legend, but not to be sniffed at.

Recorded for MTV’s acoustic strand in 1994, this catches the Mighty Zimm midway between the raw-boned graverobbing of World Gone Wrong and Time Out Of Mind’s resurrection shuffle. A respectable, if slightly sterile flick through his back pages?”The Times They Are A-Changin'”, “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” and “Like A Rolling Stone”?though he seems most fired up by newer material like “Shooting Star” and “Dignity”. Not the stuff of legend, but not to be sniffed at.

Carl Perkins And Friends – Blue Suede Shoes: A Rockabilly Session

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And the "friends" include Ringo Starr, George Harrison and Eric Clapton. Recorded in front of a studio audience in London in 1985, Perkins never needed six guitarists back at Sun Studios in the '50s, and producer Dave Edmunds should have booted out half of them. But Perkins is in vigorous voice, a quiffed-up George turns out to be a total rockabilly king, and when the Teds start jiving in the aisles, it's irresistible.

And the “friends” include Ringo Starr, George Harrison and Eric Clapton. Recorded in front of a studio audience in London in 1985, Perkins never needed six guitarists back at Sun Studios in the ’50s, and producer Dave Edmunds should have booted out half of them. But Perkins is in vigorous voice, a quiffed-up George turns out to be a total rockabilly king, and when the Teds start jiving in the aisles, it’s irresistible.

ABC – Absolutely ABC

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For all their recorded lushness?and was there a more pristine '80s bauble than The Lexicon Of Love??ABC never quite nailed the visuals. The Jerome K Jerome river-larks of "The Look Of Love" and cartoon capery of "How To Be A Millionaire" aside, it was disappointingly standard fare: Martin Fry doing lost and lovelorn while being cold-shouldered by aloof waifs. As the decade (and the hits) thinned out, the videos almost stopped trying altogether.

For all their recorded lushness?and was there a more pristine ’80s bauble than The Lexicon Of Love??ABC never quite nailed the visuals. The Jerome K Jerome river-larks of “The Look Of Love” and cartoon capery of “How To Be A Millionaire” aside, it was disappointingly standard fare: Martin Fry doing lost and lovelorn while being cold-shouldered by aloof waifs. As the decade (and the hits) thinned out, the videos almost stopped trying altogether.

The Fall – A Touch Sensitive: Live

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Capturing the ramshackle chaos and converse musical tautness of new millennium Fall, this professionally filmed gig in Blackburn from September 2002 is a connoisseur's delight of old faves ("Mr Pharmacist") and recent classics ("Two Librans"). A great fan souvenir, blighted only by Mark E Smith's foolish decision to allow some leery Mancoid guest singer to ruin "Big New Prinz".

Capturing the ramshackle chaos and converse musical tautness of new millennium Fall, this professionally filmed gig in Blackburn from September 2002 is a connoisseur’s delight of old faves (“Mr Pharmacist”) and recent classics (“Two Librans”). A great fan souvenir, blighted only by Mark E Smith’s foolish decision to allow some leery Mancoid guest singer to ruin “Big New Prinz”.

Cinerama – Get Up And Go

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David Gedge tunes his guitar. David Gedge drives to the garage. David Gedge buys a Ginster's sausage roll. That's about the sum of this inadvisable fly-on-the-wall tour documentary following Cinerama, Gedge's post-Wedding Present cinematic grunge-pop ensemble. A shame, since they're a good band with great songs (only last year they got a No 1 in John Peel's Festive 50), but as a visual accompaniment this is utterly depressing.

David Gedge tunes his guitar. David Gedge drives to the garage. David Gedge buys a Ginster’s sausage roll. That’s about the sum of this inadvisable fly-on-the-wall tour documentary following Cinerama, Gedge’s post-Wedding Present cinematic grunge-pop ensemble. A shame, since they’re a good band with great songs (only last year they got a No 1 in John Peel’s Festive 50), but as a visual accompaniment this is utterly depressing.

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Greatest Hits

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The cocks may no longer be in socks but the Peppers remain hyperactive kings of white-boy funk, smack survivors turned mainstream mavericks. Their blend of infantile exuberance and brooding disdain shines in these videos. There's a Busby Berkeley routine for sleazeballs ("Aeroplane"), the definitive punk-junk ballad ("Under The Bridge") and the blood-drenched "Scar Tissue". MTV regulars don't come any more cavalier, or charismatic.

The cocks may no longer be in socks but the Peppers remain hyperactive kings of white-boy funk, smack survivors turned mainstream mavericks. Their blend of infantile exuberance and brooding disdain shines in these videos. There’s a Busby Berkeley routine for sleazeballs (“Aeroplane”), the definitive punk-junk ballad (“Under The Bridge”) and the blood-drenched “Scar Tissue”. MTV regulars don’t come any more cavalier, or charismatic.

Kate Rusby – Live From Leeds

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Listen to Kate Rusby's records and her brand of folk revivalism suggests a rather serious and high-minded young woman. Yet in concert she's a revelation, interspersing sublime versions of traditional folk ballads with rambling but engaging introductions full of homely Yorkshire warmth and wit. Rusby makes folk music seem like fun again, and the feeling never flags throughout this 90-minute set.

Listen to Kate Rusby’s records and her brand of folk revivalism suggests a rather serious and high-minded young woman. Yet in concert she’s a revelation, interspersing sublime versions of traditional folk ballads with rambling but engaging introductions full of homely Yorkshire warmth and wit. Rusby makes folk music seem like fun again, and the feeling never flags throughout this 90-minute set.

Bringing It All Back Home: The Influence Of Irish Music

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There's a saying in the pubs of Dublin that there are only two kinds of musician?the Irish, and those who wish they were. The likes of Emmylou Harris, John Prine, Richard Thompson and the Everly Brothers prove it by lining up alongside some of Ireland's finest in 20 performances designed to showcase the global influence of Celtic music.

There’s a saying in the pubs of Dublin that there are only two kinds of musician?the Irish, and those who wish they were. The likes of Emmylou Harris, John Prine, Richard Thompson and the Everly Brothers prove it by lining up alongside some of Ireland’s finest in 20 performances designed to showcase the global influence of Celtic music.

Runting High And Low

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There are many aspects to Todd. There's the pioneering techie, the democratic defender of file-sharers' rights, the multimedia innovator, and then there's Todd the loveable gimp, a man who still can't walk past a camera without mugging fearlessly into the lens. Gurning close-ups aside, Live In Japan, recorded with an 11-piece line-up in 1990, captures a set of Todd oldies and newies that sounds like it's been rehearsed to the point of slickness and has lost more than a little of its soul in the process. More successful is the Live In San Francisco set from June 2000, which features a stripped-down power trio and plays up Todd's hard-rock side, including a blistering "Open My Eyes", a grungey "Black And White" and a montage of soundcheck rehearsals. Best of the bunch, though, is The Desktop Collection and 2nd Wind Live Recording Sessions, part state-of-the-early-'90s-art video showcase, part fly-on-the-wall glimpse into a live 1990 recording date which culminates with Todd and Bobby Womack duetting on "Want Of A Nail". None of these concerts capture Todd at the dizzying heights, but those who want to dip a toe in the water should head for the San-Fran concert for the energy, and The Desktop Collection/2nd Wind Sessions for the warmth, the wit, and the wisdom.

There are many aspects to Todd. There’s the pioneering techie, the democratic defender of file-sharers’ rights, the multimedia innovator, and then there’s Todd the loveable gimp, a man who still can’t walk past a camera without mugging fearlessly into the lens.

Gurning close-ups aside, Live In Japan, recorded with an 11-piece line-up in 1990, captures a set of Todd oldies and newies that sounds like it’s been rehearsed to the point of slickness and has lost more than a little of its soul in the process. More successful is the Live In San Francisco set from June 2000, which features a stripped-down power trio and plays up Todd’s hard-rock side, including a blistering “Open My Eyes”, a grungey “Black And White” and a montage of soundcheck rehearsals. Best of the bunch, though, is The Desktop Collection and 2nd Wind Live Recording Sessions, part state-of-the-early-’90s-art video showcase, part fly-on-the-wall glimpse into a live 1990 recording date which culminates with Todd and Bobby Womack duetting on “Want Of A Nail”.

None of these concerts capture Todd at the dizzying heights, but those who want to dip a toe in the water should head for the San-Fran concert for the energy, and The Desktop Collection/2nd Wind Sessions for the warmth, the wit, and the wisdom.

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Kraftwerk THE ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL, LONDON THURSDAY MARCH 18, 2004 The Stones, the Stooges, the Pistols, Joy Division, Public Enemy...Kraftwerk? Sure enough, Kraftwerk provide one of the great rock'n'roll 'spectacles'. Despite the immaculacy of their sound and uniform lack of on-stage motion, they...

Kraftwerk

THE ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL, LONDON

THURSDAY MARCH 18, 2004

The Stones, the Stooges, the Pistols, Joy Division, Public Enemy…Kraftwerk? Sure enough, Kraftwerk provide one of the great rock’n’roll ‘spectacles’. Despite the immaculacy of their sound and uniform lack of on-stage motion, they astonish with their stunning visuals and digital overload. Don’t be fooled by the serene lack of drama, the order and symmetry, the graceful flow of their hi-tech pulse. The excitement here is all in the ideas and their execution, in the playfulness of the presentation, not in some ersatz notion of edge.

But what is the point of Kraftwerk in 2004? Are they a mere cipher of “cyber”? They were fully integrated into pop’s circuitry by the analogue synth revolution of The Human League and their ilk. By 1982 and Afrika Bambaataa’s Soul Sonic Force, their work was done. By 1983’s “Tour De France” Kraftwerk?whisper it?were dated. When they last undertook a major European tour, in 1991, in the aftermath of aciiid, house, rave and the rest, they were touted as outrageously predictive. They were more than just strikingly relevant; they were the machine men who invented the modern dance. Now, however, with dance officially dead, Kraftwerk no longer bestride the contemporary scene like robot colossi because, well, there is no contemporary scene.

With this in mind, their techno tone poems, these electronic folk songs, assume an even more wistful quality than before. What these four silver-haired and/or bald fiftysomething relic replicants from D

Patti Smith – ULU, London

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The greatest living rock performer? It's hard to think of any of her peers who've managed to keep their live shows both physically thrilling and smart. Or of any rising combo who wouldn't pale beside her. When other legends (say, Lou Reed) recite poetry mid-set, it's embarrassing and hubristic. When...

The greatest living rock performer? It’s hard to think of any of her peers who’ve managed to keep their live shows both physically thrilling and smart. Or of any rising combo who wouldn’t pale beside her. When other legends (say, Lou Reed) recite poetry mid-set, it’s embarrassing and hubristic. When Patti does it, it’s as electric as the best guitar riff. Others spout ideological platitudes, Patti makes you volunteer to assassinate Bush right now. And if the newer American bands might one day add reckless passion to their studied cool, will they ever fuse the two as seamlessly as Smith does?

This is supposed to be a low-key warm-up for her:still, almost accidentally, it’s close to apocalyptic. This is a pre-release try-out for new material from the Trampin’album. “It’s a tradition,” she says, “that when we have a new album we first mess it up real bad like this to a select audience in New York and London.” They don’t mess it up, and I’m with the majority saying Trampin’is her best since 1988’s Dream Of Life. Not that this becomes a showcase:the premieres, like “Jubilee” and “Stride Of The Mind”, are surrounded by what Lenny Kaye might call nuggets, with a stirring opening of “Privilege (Set Me Free)” and “Break It Up”. As she roars “I’m so young, so goddam young” within five minutes of the off, you get that tingle that tells you a gig’s going to be special. Actually, the words “Patti Smith” on the ticket kind of gave that away anyway.

Racing then through “Free Money” and “Because The Night”, soaring through “Pissing In A River” and “Beneath The Southern Cross”, getting sunny on “Redondo Beach”, this provides the hoped-for heated career overview while still denying those who holler for “Ask The Angels”. “She’s not a fuckin’jukebox, let her play what she wants,” yells a wise punter. “I most surely will,” she smiles, pausing only to play her clarinet, read Blake, lose her thread, crack jokes and pay lip service to St Paddy’s Day: “Don’t drink green beer. Just brown beer. Then water.”

After a spot-on, considered rant (Smith is one of the few people who can rant with composure) against war-hungry corporations, the band, with Kaye and Jay Dee Daugherty making noises as nimble and sharp as their reputations, fire into a climax of “People Have The Power” and “Gloria”, which is, of course, irresistible. Is it a clich

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