by Ed Biggs Emerging from the hotbed that was the Bristol scene nearly a quarter of a century ago, Massive Attack were responsible for at least two of the greatest British albums of the ‘90s, maybe even three depending on how favourably you view Protection. 1991’s sublime Blue Lines, celebrating its 25th anniversary later this year, belongs among the all-time greats, filtering jazz, dub, reggae and rap into quintessentially British mixture
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by Ed Biggs Although they’re one of the most iconic and important guitar bands of all time, Ramones sold way more shirts than they ever did records. As Stereogum pointed out in 2015, if everyone who owns a Ramones T-shirt had instead bought one of their albums, they’d be one of the biggest bands in history.
by Ed Biggs Behind the production desk, Steve Albini is one of the most celebrated creative forces in alternative music, with a reputation for helping craft music as harsh and uncompromising as his own attitudes towards what he regards as bullshit, or too mainstream. As a man who has repeatedly turned down major labels and artists unless he shares some kind of artistic simpatico with them, Nirvana’s In Utero and PJ
by Ed Biggs As one of the many artists that made 2013 such an unusually strong year for good comeback records, Suede’s first album in 11 years, Bloodsports, at last provided the appropriate full stop to their legacy that their output in the ‘90s deserved, and which 2002’s dire A New Morning singularly failed to provide. Having cleansed our palates from that sour aftertaste, Brett Anderson and his gang must now
by Ed Biggs The vast majority of albums need a sort of cooling-off period before being considered as a classic, but for Arctic Monkeys’ debut that status was conferred instantly, and with good justification. Not since Definitely Maybe had so many breathless superlatives been uttered about a British guitar debut album, and neither had such massive sales figures been delivered on the back of such hype. This was a band that
by Ed Biggs Station To Station is noteworthy in Bowie’s discography in as much that it serves to represent a transition between eras, from the Ziggy Stardust… / plastic soul of the early 1970s to the experimental electronica of his so-called ‘Berlin Trilogy’ of 1977-1979. We therefore catch a glimpse of the inner workings of Bowie’s psyche and creative process, and it makes for fascinating listening.
by Ed Biggs Given that their 1970 swansong Bridge Over Troubled Water is one of the biggest selling albums of all time, Simon & Garfunkel’s career started inauspiciously to say the least. Having started life as the squeaky clean teen harmony duo Tom & Jerry, their 1964 debut under their own names, Wednesday Morning, 3 AM, disappeared without trace.
by Ed Biggs The passing of David Bowie, who succumbed to liver cancer at the age of 69 on January 10th, felt very much more momentous than the average passing of a rock legend. Bowie’s death feels like one of the most significant losses, not just for pop music, but for the totality of Western popular culture. Truly, no artistic voice has been heard like his since, or so fearlessly fought
by Ed Biggs For nearly fifty years, David Bowie has made a career from leaving his past behind him and forging a path for the future, for music as well as himself, making some of the most forward-thinking and celebrated and varied pop in the history of the genre and inspiring countless hundreds of other innovative artists. Truly, his is one of the most totemic reputations in all of popular culture,
by Ed Biggs Though Bob Dylan’s reputation and power is inextricably bound up with the 1960s, the middle of the next decade saw him briefly recapture his peak form with back-to-back classics. 1975’s Blood On The Tracks is regarded by more than a few Dylan fans as his very best album, but that record’s reputation often overshadows that of its successor. While neither as special nor as iconic as …Tracks, Desire
