Library Rock's Backpages

John Calvert

John Calvert is a regular contributor to The Quietus.

52 articles

List of articles in the library

By date | By artist | Most recently added

The Minutemen: An Econo History Of The Minutemen

Retrospective by John Calvert, The Quietus, 11 January 2012

John Calvert throws open the doors onto the strange and frightening world of the Minutemen. ...

Xeno & Oaklander: Sets and Lights

Review by John Calvert, Drowned in Sound, 13 October 2011

UP TO NOW, the problem with coldwave has been an atmospheric one, in that the music has none. If the various players are to successfully ...

Death Grips: Relentless Raw Movement: Death Grips Interviewed

Interview by John Calvert, The Quietus, 14 July 2011

Death Grips are the single most exciting new thing we have heard in 2011. John Calvert asks Flatlander about their methodology, hip hop, Odd Future, ...

Enter Shikari: A Flash Flood of Colour

Review by John Calvert, Drowned in Sound, 9 January 2012

JESUS. WHERE DO YOU START with A Flash Flood Of Colour? Well let's try... at the start, all the way back to Korn's Jonathan Davies ...

Battles On Their "Next Level" New Album La Di Da Di

Interview by John Calvert, New Musical Express, 27 July 2015

"I DON'T KNOW… I keep coming back to the word technique…" In a pokey pizza place in Hackney, Ian Williams is failing to explain the ...

Blonde Redhead: Penny Sparkle

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 26 October 2010

ONCE UPON A TIME Blonde Redhead were beautiful. It took a decade of suspiciously designer no wave, but with 2004's Misery Is a Butterfly they ...

Tame Impala: Inside the mind of a psych-pop shaman

Interview by John Calvert, New Musical Express, 14 July 2015

"I THINK five years ago," says Kevin Parker, the man who to all intents and purposes is Tame Impala, "the thought of sitting in a ...

Beach House: Depression Cherry

Review by John Calvert, New Musical Express, 19 August 2015

"MAKING THE SIMPLE COMPLICATED is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that's creativity." Not our words but those of jazz colossus Charles Mingus, which ...

Wild Beasts: The Lexington

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 11 December 2012

John Calvert gets hot under the collar at an intimate gig at the Lexington from Wild Beasts, as they play their great album Smother and ...

The Antlers: Burst Apart

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 7 June 2011

MUCH OF THE PASSIONATE RHETORIC surrounding The Antlers' affecting Hospice featured the keyword "bleeding", not only referring to the crackling artery of distortion that flowed ...

John Foxx and the Maths: Interplay

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 4 April 2011

AFTER A RUN of relatively oblique collaborations, Interplay sees John Foxx's return to the role of pop architect, ably assisted by The Maths (aka Ben ...

Suicide: Requiem For A Scream: Suicide's 'Punk Mass'

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 16 July 2015

IN HIS PRE-SHOW ADDRESS, frothy punk minotaur Henry Rollins is telling a story, which of course he's pretty good at. A formidable, not to mention ...

Beyoncé: O2 Arena, London

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 13 May 2013

Caught up within the two-hour long human/machine synergy of Beyoncé's London performance, John Calvert reflects on its peculiar mix of sincerity and cynicism and the ...

Morrissey, The Smiths: The Cult Of Steve: Morrissey Live At Wembley Arena

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 17 March 2020

John Calvert is dragged by his lifelong Smiths fan girlfriend to Wembley — but will he finally see what all the fuss is about? ...

Future Islands: On the Water

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 26 October 2011

THE SOUNDS of a lonely dock, St Elizabeth, North Carolina. It's the sound of lapping saltwater and mooring cables knocking steadily against wet wood. Slowly, ...

Banks & Steelz: Anything But Words

Review by John Calvert, New Musical Express, 2 September 2016

THE RAP-ROCK fusion album is a hard one to get right. Examples of success in this weird little corner of music do exist — Dälek's ...

Death Grips: Pleasure in suffering? The problem with Death Grips live

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 13 November 2012

A scholar of Death Grips, John Calvert expected to prostrate himself before the menace of MC Ride and Zach Hill. But is this the punk ...

Angel Haze: Hoxton Bar & Kitchen, London

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 11 October 2012

In the latest Calvert Report, our man John Calvert starts to feel unusual as he sees Angel Haze live at Hoxton Bar & Kitchen. ...

Washed Out: Within and Without

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 22 July 2011

AS THE chillwaver least inclined to confection, on his introductory EP — complete with genre-iconic artwork — Ernest Greene's one dimensional wares trod a precarious ...

John Maus: We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 1 July 2011

IN ACADEMIA, pop enigma John Maus comes up in discussion about where hauntology meets 'utopian theory', an area of scholarly pursuit wherein blog intelligentsia will ...

Nitzer Ebb: Industrial Complex

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 24 February 2010

WITH A quick turn on Nitzer Ebb's YouTube channel, a scroll down the comments section yields a profile of the zealots who comprise the industrial ...

Smashing Pumpkins: Siamese Dream (Reissue)

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 6 December 2011

FOR ALL its resonance amongst the youth of the day, the voice of grunge was old before its time and world-weary. Although their chagrin and ...

The Big Pink: Future This

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 5 January 2012

"WE'RE ALL made of gold!" Yay! We actually are! I can feel it. The gold, that is, IN ME! Wait, what? Are we gold? I'm ...

Summer Camp: Welcome to Condale

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 14 November 2011

GRANTED, the memory will play its tricks, but wasn't being a kid in the 80s a simple affair? ...

My Bloody Valentine: The Echo Of Youth: My Bloody Valentine live

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 30 January 2013

John Calvert takes his teenage dreams down to the Brixton Electric for a rare intimate gig by My Bloody Valentine. ...

Wu Lyf: Go Tell Fire to the Mountain

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 27 June 2011

THERE’S NO DOUBT that "blind faith" is the metier of the emphatically idealistic Wu Lyf. If as a fan you're to join them in remaining ...

OK Go: Of the Blue Colour of the Sky

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 18 January 2010

SO, YOU got the email. Treadmill ballet = instant viral penetration. Grammy award, Simpsons parody, legions of advertising 'creatives' ripping off the idea — the ...

The Weeknd: Overview Of A Vampire: A Closer Look At The Weeknd's Lyrics

Essay by John Calvert, The Quietus, 12 October 2015

John Calvert is a "guilt-ridden ultra-fan" of "misogynist" Canadian R&B star The Weeknd and here, instead of brushing the themes of his music under the ...

Die Antwoord: Ten$ion

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 16 February 2012

COMEDY RAP act or conceptual art project? Whatever your opinion on rave-rappers Die Antwoord, their new album is a rare treat — South African pop ...

Death Grips: The Money Store

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 26 April 2012

THERE’S HIGH comedy afoot on the old web-machine these days. Press attempts to answer the question "What are Death Grips?" have taken a turn for ...

Nicki Minaj: Pink Friday – Roman Reloaded

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 2 April 2012

WHO NEEDS stylistic, conceptual unity, when you have seven producers and Lil Wayne for a financier?  ...

Death Grips: Exmilitary

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 24 May 2011

"And every proton and neutron in every atom . . . swollen and throbbing, off-color, sick, with just no chance of throwing up to relieve ...

Black Francis: NonStopErotik

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 26 March 2010

HAVING SPENT over a decade pottering on the periphery with an air of janitorial resignation, Frank Black has finally turned in the greatest number of ...

Foxes: All I Need

Review by John Calvert, New Musical Express, 23 January 2016

Foxes' second album is the pop belter Britain needs ...

Tame Impala's Danceable New Album Currents: Track By Track First Listen Review

Review by John Calvert, New Musical Express, 23 June 2015

"I REALISED we'd never seen people dancing to our music," Tame Impala's Kevin Parker told NME earlier this year. ...

The Streets: Computers and Blues

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 9 February 2011

YOU'LL HAVE TO meet us halfway on this, but Mike Skinner's swansong plays like a cracking old wake – Skinner's of course. ...

Gorillaz: The Singles Collection 2001-2011

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 23 December 2011

WHAT THE HELL were Gorillaz? A pop curio, maybe? Hindsight suggests they were crucial in determining the shape of British pop in the millennium. Gorillaz ...

Swans: 
My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To The Sky

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 29 October 2010

SWANS WILL ALWAYS be a draw for life's spiritual derelicts, a certain constituency in peaceful agreement that the world is cruel, human nature is animal, ...

Field Music: Measure

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 19 February 2010

THE BROTHERS BREWIS are natural Situationists, far too clever to take life overly seriously. This is no doubt what made Field Music's first two albums ...

The Maccabees: Given To The Wild

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 17 January 2012

EVER SINCE THE bottom fell out of reedy-post-punk mid-last decade, fundamentally lightweight indie acts have taken to making grand statements. The efforts of say, Foals, ...

TV On The Radio As Soundtrack To Bush & Obama's America 


Essay by John Calvert, The Quietus, 3 August 2011

Don't Let The Devil In: John Calvert takes a look at the work of TV On The Radio through the prism of a turbulent decade ...

Kendrick Lamar: Bottled Lightning: Kendrick Lamar: Hammersmith Apollo, London

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 23 January 2013

John Calvert heads to a cold Hammersmith to be blown away by Kendrick Lamar — "A private epiphany, the rest is history" ...

Amy Winehouse: Lioness – Hidden Treasures

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 14 December 2011

LIONESS: Hidden Treasures is an appropriately muted set, with Mark Ronson and Salaam Remi producing an honourable and moving tribute to the Amy Winehouse. In ...

Janelle Monáe: A New Pioneer Of Afrofuturism

Comment by John Calvert, The Quietus, 2 September 2010

Against a pop climate beset by fraudulent marketing plans on two shiny legs, John Calvert argues that Janelle Monáe brandishes the acetylene torch for radical ...

Lana Del Rey: Born To Die

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 30 January 2012

ALL THAT FUSS over one song? You'd think there'd been a murder at the White House. ...

Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All: Odd Future: Youth and Young Manhood

Guide by John Calvert, The Quietus, 8 March 2011

After Tyler The Creator signed to XL recently, John Calvert decided to sift through hundreds and hundreds of tracks to bring you the best — ...

The Klaxons: Klaxons: Surfing The Void (Polydor)

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 3 September 2010

WE AREN'T going to bore you with revelations that Myths Of The Near Future wasn't rave. There was such a thing as a nu rave ...

Frank Ocean: The Future's Bright: Frank Ocean's Channel Orange Track-by-Track

Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 3 July 2012

John Calvert heads along to a London studio for a first listen to the forthcoming album (much anticipated round these parts) from Frank Ocean ...

Lana Del Rey: Original Sin

Interview by John Calvert, The Quietus, 4 October 2011

Even though her song 'Video Games' emerged a couple of months back, Lana Del Rey has already experienced equal parts adulation and suspicion. Here, John ...

Lady Gaga: This Megalith Reality: Lady Gaga Live

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 11 September 2012

I KNOW IT'S COMING, but when it finally does it's different to how I expected. It's far worse. Less than real.  ...

Skrillex: 100% Shock & Awe: Skrillex Blasts Tiny Venue

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 29 August 2012

THE SCENE IN the Shacklewell Arms is fairly typical of any gentrified boozer in the Hackney precinct, come Sunday night.  ...

Lana Del Rey: An American Nightmare: Lana Del Rey Live

Live Review by John Calvert, The Quietus, 27 September 2012

I MET HER last year. She talked about loneliness and how she never had any time for religion, until she got into some trouble in ...

back to LIBRARY

COPYRIGHT NOTICE