SING STREET takes us back to 1980s Dublin seen through the eyes of a 14-year-old boy named Conor (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo) who is looking for a break from a home strained by his parents’ relationship and money troubles, while trying to adjust to his new inner-city public school where the kids are rough and the teachers are rougher. He finds a glimmer of hope in the mysterious, über-cool and beautiful Raphina (Lucy Boynton), and with the aim of winning her heart he invites her to star in his band’s music videos. There’s only one problem: he’s not part of a band…yet. She agrees, and now Conor must deliver what he’s promised – calling himself “Cosmo” and immersing himself in the vibrant rock music trends of the decade, he forms a band with a few lads, and the group pours their heart into writing lyrics and shooting videos. Inspired by writer/director John Carney’s (ONCE, BEGIN AGAIN) life and love for music, SING STREET shows us a world where music has the power to take us away from the turmoil of everyday life and transform us into something greater.
For Triple J’s Like a Version, musician Sarah Blasko paid tribute to the late, great David Bowie with a fantastic, soul-stirring rendition of one of his all-time great songs, Life on Mars.
Benedict Cumberbatch, not only a cool actor, but a high tide for his spot-on impressions of the late Alan Rickman, did so again in a fitting tribute through an animated spot on The Simpsons. And even better, the scene was set to the David Bowie classic All the Young Dudes.
This is part 47 of an ongoing series where the kind folk of the music business reveal their favourite album of all time.
Ask people in the music industry the seemingly simple and straightforward question, “What is your favourite album of all time?” and you’ll find that it’s not always easy. After all, my industry peers listen to hundreds of albums a month – thousands of songs during that time. Because the question isn’t the best album of all time or the one that’s made them the most money in sales, or the most clicked-on review, but the one release they personally can’t live without, that one title they have two copies of in several formats, in case one breaks. It’s also about that album that for them has the best back stories and the one that has the most meaning in their lives.
Chris Phillips, Editor in Chief, Backstreets Tunnel of Love, Bruce Springsteen
Born to Run is Springsteen’s perfect rock ‘n’ roll masterpiece, and Nebraska is damn near perfect too, all the more so for being such a bold left turm at that point in his career. But Tunnel of Love is where my heart is. Some of the best writing about adult relationships outside of country music or Raymond Carver, a buoyant and brutal 12-faceted examination of love and marriage, loaded with thrills and chills. It floored me when I was 16 and it came out, and it still does, for different reasons, almost 30 years later.
Dick McGrane, “McGrane In The Morning”, Dubuque’s Super Hits 106.1 The Greatest Live Show On Earth, Jerry Lee Lewis
From Smash Records in 1964, this album was recorded at the time Jerry was still reeling from the cousin wedding stuff, out of this came as close to a hit as he got in those days, his live version of “High Heeled Sneakers”. The Killer was always a great live performer and this album came as close to capturing that feeling as you can on record.
Eddie Trunk, Editor, EddieTrunk.com Strangers In The Night, UFO
My all time favorite music is melodic hard rock with great vocals. UFO epitomizes that. Brilliant playing, amazing singing, power but yet melody. Strangers is the band at the peak of their live powers, their definitive lineup, and a great cross section of their best material up to that point supercharged with incredible performances. And it’s a rare live album that is really live!
Peter Hodgson, I Heart Guitar 1.Outside, David Bowie This is probably the least likely ‘my first Bowie album’ story ever, but this record came into my life when I read an interview with David Bowie about this record in a newspaper (remember those?). Thanks to that interview I became obsessed with this record before I’d even heard a note from it. Here was Bowie playing characters – male, female, adult, child, good, bad – and employing all sorts of wild compositional ideas thanks to Brian Eno’s Oblique Strategies. The paper happened to have a giveaway of a few copies of the album, and I was lucky enough to win one. I whipped out the booklet and pressed play.
And then my life changed.
The album was simultaneously dark and playful, expressive and intellectual. It was packed with incredible guitar playing from Reeves Gabrels, whose solo in “A Small Plot Of Land” pretty much busted my brain with its abstractness, and instantly shook me out of my Steve Vai/James Hetfield Impersonator phase. But most importantly of all it made me want to dig through Bowie’s back catalog, which led to me meeting a young lady in an internet chat room who shared my same Bowie obsession. Flash forward and we have a 9-year-old who also loves Bowie. And none of this would have happened if I hadn’t read that interview and won that album. So aside from being a brilliant musical statement that stands on its own two feet, it also has a huge significance for me because it quite literally changed my life.
David Menconi, author/critic, The News & Observer, Raleigh, NC There’s a Riot Goin’ On, Sly & the Family Stone I have been listening to this record regularly for more than four decades now, without feeling I’ve ever gotten anywhere close to the bottom of it. “Riot” is like an answer record to Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On,” but far more powerful — and for all the crude sonics, it still sounds like it could have come out yesterday.
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band kicked off “The River” North American tour Saturday night at Pittsburgh’s Consol Energy Center, and started the show not with The Ties That Bind, but “We want to take a moment to note the passing of our good friend David Bowie,” before ripping into Rebel Rebel.
One one level, the history of my love for music really began with watching Sha Na Na, introducing me to many 50s and 60s artists and their songs, as well as making my first impressions of rock and roll being fun. Having not realized they preceding Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock, I loved the entire band, and they’re still on the road, even though a few members have gone on to careers outside music, and a few more have passed away.
In the late seventies Sha Na Na landed a TV deal,.airing from 1977 to 1982 and consisted mainly of silly sketch comedy and musical numbers featuring guest stars. The video below shows the greasers dressed as a family, playing Greaser’s Fued, a Family Feud-type parody against The Ramones.
“I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” by The Beatles was written by John Lennon, and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The song closes side one on the group’s 1969 album Abbey Road, and it quite unusual song, even for them. It’s nearly eight minutes long, few lyrics (the title makes up most of the lyrics, aside from two more phrases; only 14 different words are sung), a three-minute descent through repeated guitar chords (a similar arpeggiated figure appears in another Lennon contribution to the album, “Because”), and abrupt ending. Its’s so heavy (pun intended), that Classic Rock magazine commented that “the song pre-dated Black Sabbath’s creation of doom rock by several months”.
ORGAN: Billy Preston, BASS: Paul McCartney, DRUMS: Ringo Starr
Damn. On this week’s episode of The Tonight Show, host Jimmy Fallon performed an bang-on impression of Bob Dylan performing “Hotline Bling” by Drake. Not only does he sound like him, the band is errie. They didn’t even compromise on the look and feel of the film used, too, turned things on its head making it sound and look like it’s from 1966.
Jimmy Fallon joins Sesame Street characters Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster and more to photobomb unsuspecting parents and their children taking pictures at 30 Rockefeller.
