Plus: How the wildfires decimated LA’s music scene
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Sleeve Notes
Picks of the week
Why is one Danish school producing nearly every cool alt-pop star?
‘Rethink it all!’  
Why is one Danish school producing nearly every cool alt-pop star?
Copenhagen’s Rhythmic Music Conservatory finds common ground between Ella Fitzgerald and Charli xcx – and its free-thinking alumni are thriving. We go on a tour to see what’s in the water there (aside from shipwrecks)
That’s me in the spotlight  
Michael Shannon on swapping Hollywood for an REM covers band
‘It’s a northern sound, it gives you hope that it can happen to you’  
How bassline bounced back
‘It’ll be solemn, enshrining his ashes’  
Statue of Lemmy to be unveiled in his home town of Stoke-on-Trent
‘People think I’ve gone crazy’  
Indie sensation Cameron Winter on leaving crowds in tears with his wild lyrics and supernatural voice
Drug runs for the Stones, a love triangle with Joni Mitchell  
Has Chris O’Dell had the music industry’s wildest career?
Reviews
Alexis Petridis's album of the week  
PinkPantheress: Fancy That – sharp-minded bops hop across pop’s past and present
PinkPantheress: Fancy That – sharp-minded bops hop across pop’s past and present
Global album of the month  
Lido Pimienta: La Belleza – Gregorian chant meets dembow rhythm in a work of remarkable depth
Album review  
Billy Woods: Golliwog – one of the most engrossing, unnerving records you’ll hear this year
FIlm review  
Desire: The Carl Craig Story – goatee-stroking homage to a techno legend
Art review  
Robbie Williams: Radical Honesty – ‘Tone deaf, self-important, incredibly bad art’
Spotlight
How the wildfires decimated LA’s music scene
‘Everything we built – gone’  
How the wildfires decimated LA’s music scene
January’s blazes in California have devastated the livelihoods of performers, technicians and other music industry pros. They reveal what they lost – and how they’re rebuilding
Classical
Classical album of the week  
Brahms: Complete Symphonies – period-instrument plushness with modern-instrument refinement
Brahms: Complete Symphonies – period-instrument plushness with modern-instrument refinement
Feature  
Mini masterpieces: why Mahler’s songs are marvels to rank alongside his symphonies
Mini masterpieces: why Mahler’s songs are marvels to rank alongside his symphonies
Concert review  
The Excursions of Mr Brouček – Simon Rattle embraces Janáček’s baffling but beautiful opera
The Excursions of Mr Brouček – Simon Rattle embraces Janáček’s baffling but beautiful opera
Album review  
Grisey: Vortex Temporum – bold, assertive interpretation of a masterly score
Grisey: Vortex Temporum – bold, assertive interpretation of a masterly score
Concert review  
BBCNOW/MacMillan/Childs – James MacMillan’s nostalgic celebration of the euphonium
BBCNOW/MacMillan/Childs – James MacMillan’s nostalgic celebration of the euphonium
Opera review  
Pimpinone – hot-to-trot comic opera from the underperformed Telemann
Pimpinone – hot-to-trot comic opera from the underperformed Telemann
Add to playlist
Add to playlist  
Merseyside rapper EsDeeKid and the week’s best new tracks
Merseyside rapper EsDeeKid and the week’s best new tracks
Ranked  
Ready or not, here she comes: Lauryn Hill’s 20 best songs – ranked!
Anoushka Shankar’s honest playlist  
I was the only person who didn’t know the words to Coldplay
You may have missed
There’s no sympathy for octogenarians
Eccentric musician Swamp Dogg at 82  
There’s no sympathy for octogenarians
The genre-bending cult singer is the subject of an offbeat new documentary where he invites people into a long life filled with ups, downs and LSD
‘I’m burping? At least I didn’t fart!’  
Ten things I’ve learned about ageing rockers
From Gene Simmons discussing lowgrade meatballs to Shaun Ryder comparing himself to Uncle Fester, Kate Mossman has spent her life interviewing rock stars of a certain age. What has she learned?
Who is behind the great rock’n’roll ripoff?  
How Ticketmaster swallowed the live entertainment scene
From grassroots gigs to stadium shows, there’s no escaping the ticketing giant, making billions from hiking up prices (and whacking on fees)
‘I’ve met people with tattoos of it’  
Andy Vella on shooting the Cure’s Boys Don’t Cry cover
‘The guitar, the hair, the mystery – I think I captured who the Cure are with this picture. When I showed it to Robert Smith and the band’s manager, they jumped up and down’
How we made  
Kula Shaker on making Govinda: ‘Crowds would sing the lyrics as, “Go cash your giro giro”’
‘It was great to get a song that’s entirely in Sanskrit on Radio 1. It has a power that’s beyond us. We’re just the vessels’
‘A safe haven from racial violence’  
Sinners shows the importance of juke joints
Ryan Coogler’s smash hit horror focuses on the opening of a juke joint, a one-time mainstay in Black southern culture
Live music this week
Djo  
Joe Keery mixes genres in an endearing, if uneven, Brooklyn set
Joe Keery mixes genres in an endearing, if uneven, Brooklyn set
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