Rock's Backpages: Search Results

Review by Jeff Weiss, Passion of the Weiss, 9 March 2007

JAMES MURPHY is the David Eckstein of music. He's an unassuming schlubby looking guy. The sort of dude you expect to see in line in ...

Alec Empire strikes back

Report and Interview by Angus Batey, The Guardian, 28 March 2008

"I FIGHT BACK!" a grinning Alec Empire blurts, explaining why his iPod contains only three albums (by John Coltrane and Stockhausen) but has been filled ...

Little Boots is the big sound for 2009

Interview by Sophie Heawood, The Times, 10 January 2009

She's Blackpool's answer to Kylie and a fan of unhinged escapism — Little Boots is a hot prospect ...

Ladyhawke: Lady's night

Profile and Interview by John Lewis, Hotline, May 2009

Synth-pop queen Ladyhawke, aka New Zealander Pip Brown, talks to John Lewis from the back seat of a New York taxi. ...

Pet Shop Boys: Animal Instinct

Interview by Luke Turner, The Stool Pigeon, May 2009

Pet Shops Boys done good these last three decades, and they're still playing cat-and-mouse with expectation. ...

Kraftwerk at the Manchester International Festival

Report and Interview by Simon Witter, Daily Telegraph, 19 June 2009

The unlikely rock star Ralf Hütter talks about cycling and the Kraftwerk concert at Manchester. ...

La Roux: Together In Electric Dreams

Interview by Scott McLennan, Rip It Up (Australia), July 2009

ELLY JACKSON is lying under her duvet in the same bedroom she's occupied since birth, but recently something feels different. The David Bowie albums are ...

La Roux: 'Of course Lady Gaga's not my thing'

Profile and Interview by Paul Lester, The Guardian, 24 September 2009

IT IS MORNING, and 21-year-old Elly Jackson – or La Roux, arguably the biggest new pop star of the year – is on the Eurostar ...

Kraftwerk: The Elusive Kings of Digital Pop

Report and Interview by Stephen Dalton, The Times, 25 September 2009

AFTER FOUR DECADES spent standing guard over one of the most secretive and enigmatic bands on the planet, it seems that Ralf Hütter is loosening ...

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 ...

Björk: Is Björk the last great pop innovator?

Comment by Simon Reynolds, The Guardian, 4 July 2011

EARLIER THIS YEAR I interviewed Amanda Brown of cult band LA Vampires and was surprised when she announced that "every day I wake up and ...

Human League, The: The Things That Dreams Are Made Of

Retrospective and Interview by Neil Mason, electronic, July 2012

Studios with leaking roofs, trips to new romantic clubs in a little Hillman Imp, and a heavy metal single recorded between sessions. They're all part ...

Kraftwerk: Ladies und Gentlemen, the future has arrived

Retrospective by David Stubbs, The Independent, 27 January 2013

To the unenlightened (i.e. most of us), they were just naff. Now, with good reason, they are hailed as prophets. David Stubbs hails synthpop pioneers ...

Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark: From Kraftwerk to Craftsmen

Retrospective and Interview by Wyndham Wallace, Classic Pop, May 2013

They were just "two guys with a tape recorder and a name as long as the stage they were standing on", but Orchestral Manoeuvres In ...

Lykke Li: Village Underground, EC2

Live Review by Stephen Dalton, The Times, 13 May 2014

IN LYKKE LI's poetically gloomy world view, love is a dark rainbow of despair with a big pot of bitter disappointment at the end. At ...

Marc Almond: Let's Talk About Death

Interview by Simon Price, The Independent, 17 February 2015

Simon Price talks to the enigmatic singer about Soho, Soft Cell and mortality. ...

Giorgio Moroder: Dr. Love Machine

Retrospective and Interview by Dorian Lynskey, MOJO, May 2015

BETWEEN 1974 AND 1986 GIORGIO MORODER TRANSFORMED POP AND DISCO WITH A NEW KIND OF EUPHORIC MACHINE MUSIC. NOW, AFTER HIS 2013 SPOT ON DAFT ...

Ultravox, John Foxx: Q&A: John Foxx

Interview by Kieron Tyler, The Arts Desk, 2 September 2016

The leader of the original Ultravox on challenging the punk era's orthodoxies and the band as an art project ...

Depeche Mode's Dave Gahan: "Why I don't understand my own band"

Profile and Interview by Kate Mossman, New Statesman, 1 June 2017

WHEN NEIL TENNANT of the Pet Shop Boys was the assistant editor of Smash Hits, he made the following observation: ...

Saint Etienne: 10 of the best

Retrospective by Jude Rogers, The Guardian, 7 June 2017

In the early 90s, a trio from south-east England set out to fulfil pop's potential. Nearly 30 years later, they're still making bold, inventive music. ...