Music streaming is soon to be counted within the charts, a reflection of a major shift in the music industry. Spotify and other sites like it make access to their vaults of recordings free – if you don’t…
Dr David Glowacki is a highly-respected research fellow of the Royal Society, and expert in non-equilibrium molecular reaction dynamics – no, me neither – but is also our newest, and arguably most unlikely…
Musicians often have curious minds, and the pianist and composer Horace Silver was no exception. An often overlooked musician in the public eye, Silver wrote some of the most performed jazz standards of…
I’m quite used to receiving abuse concerning the content of this column, but in contrast my previous post (about why fans of heavy metal shouldn’t have been banned from a pub) seems to have caused some…
In the weeks leading up to the release of Jack White’s new album Lazaretto on June 10, a number of record shops around the world ran a promotional campaign that gave curious users the chance to experience…
Bloomsday has come around again, the day (June 16) in 1904 on which all the events of James Joyce’s great novel Ulysses unfold. 1904 was an auspicious year for Joyce. It may surprise some people to know…
At least one of the many confusions surrounding Bob Marley was resolved last week in the High Court of Justice in London. A company called Cayman Music failed to obtain a declaration that they, not Blue…
The headline says it all. The Chronicle, which reports all the news that is fit to print in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne in England notes that “Rock Fans Were Kicked Out Of A Newcastle Pub Because Of Their Outfits…
Pet Shop Boys are performing at Carriageworks in Sydney tonight and over the weekend as part of Vivid festival. Their live shows are described as incredible and dazzling, and after almost three decades…
Dame Vera Lynn’s latest album, National Treasure — The Ultimate Collection, has been released in the week of the 70th anniversary of the D-Day invasion. The album, filled with over 40 of her wartime hits…
Giorgio Moroder closed the Vivid festival at the Sydney Opera House last night with a Q&A and a DJ set; this followed an “electro-orchestral tribute” to his music by Britain’s 40-piece Heritage Orchestra…
It must have come as a relief to many Australian musicians that maligned guitar-pop genre tag “dolewave” met an untimely end the other week. I imagine it would have been the only relief Australian musicians…
Jazz has evolved to become one of the most inclusive genres in modern music. But how does an art form that so willingly assimilates influences from different musical styles still hold on to its essence…
Nicolas Suzor, Queensland University of Technology and Eleanor Angel, Queensland University of Technology
More than 40 years after the release of Stairway to Heaven, English rock band Led Zeppelin are facing allegations that its iconic guitar riff was stolen from Taurus, a song released in 1968 by the American…
Epic Records, in conjunction with the estate of Michael Jackson released the King of Pop Michael Jackson’s second posthumous album Xscape last week. To create the album Epic Records chairman and CEO L.A…
The classic sound many of us imagine when the word synthesiser is mentioned is the sound of the Moog – the warm, solid propulsive groove of its bass sound and the distinctive sweep of its patented lowpass…
We all know music can move us emotionally. But how does it impact on our behaviour? That relationship’s not immediately clear. A YouTube clip was doing the rounds on social media a while ago – the music…
The run up to the release of Lenny Abrahamson’s latest film, Frank, was characterised by a certain amount of perplexity. Unsurprising, given the posters emblazoned with that enormous papier-mâché mask…
Four songs in to the final of the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday night, six Icelandic men in a band called Pollapönk took to the stage dressed in fluorescent suits and declared to an ecstatic house…