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Music

  • Kanye West at the Grammy awards earlier this month.

    News
    Kanye West sued, dropped by talent agency and retail platform over antisemitic slurs

  • Hamish Hawk performing at New Century Hall.

    Live review
    Hamish Hawk – Jarvis Cocker-esque Scot shows why he’s at the edge of the big time

    Also channelling Elvis and Scott Walker, the charismatic singer’s character softens as he moves from bold songs from latest album A Firmer Hand to older tracks
  • Terror Danjah

    Terror Danjah was the gregarious heart of the grime scene – and its greatest producer

    Joe Muggs
  • Little Simz, who will curate this year’s Meltdown festival.

    News
    Little Simz to curate 2025 Meltdown festival

  • (L-R) Rose, Jennie, Jisoo and Lisa of K-Pop girl group Blackpink attend a pink carpet event in Seoul, South Korea, in August 2024.

    News
    Going for a song: investors flee to K-pop as safe haven amid Trump’s tariff war

  • Ichiko Aoba performing at the 2024 End of the Road festival.

    Interview
    ‘Fans say my concerts are safe spaces where they can forgive’: the cult of Ichiko Aoba

  • ‘This playlist epitomises the role music has played in my life – as a surrogate lover’ … Jeff Ingold.

    Feature
    The singles chart: my secret 75-song playlist for every man I’ve been with

Loads more stories and moves focus to first new story.

Best music of 2024

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Interviews

  • Brandi Carlile and Elton John last year.

    Pop
    ‘He smashed his iPad and headphones. My lyrics got torn up’: inside Elton John and Brandi Carlile’s explosive duets album

  • Chesney IMAGE 2

    This much I know
    Chesney Hawkes: ‘As my dad once said, don’t believe the hype’

  • Mike Scott of the Waterboys

    The reader interview
    The Waterboys’ Mike Scott: ‘I love Prince’s version of The Whole of the Moon. And Graham Norton’s’

  • Neko Case in 2018.

    Interview
    ‘Women’s rage is real. Mostly we turn it on ourselves’: Neko Case on songwriting, survival – and her mother’s faked death

Loads more stories and moves focus to first new story.

Album reviews

  • Bow down … Olly Alexander.

    Alexis Petridis's album of the week
    Olly Alexander: Polari – Hi-NRG throwback for the Radio 2 crowd

  • Xhosa Cole

    Jazz album of the month
    Xhosa Cole: On a Modern Genius (Vol 1) – young sax master unleashes his trunk of Monk

    • Jazz
      Moses Yoofee Trio: MYT – brilliantly explosive jazz

    • Rap
      Krept & Konan: Young Kingz II – filthy and poignant in equal measure

    • Pop
      Biig Piig: 11:11 – long-awaited debut hovers on the edge of clubland

    • Pop
      Nadia Reid: Enter Now Brightness – a restorative balm of folk-tinged songwriting

    • Folk album of the month
      Cynefin: Shimli – this Welsh folk music is a quietly political antidote to the modern age

    • Rap
      Mike: Showbiz! – a master rap craftsman building his own world

Loads more stories and moves focus to first new story.

Live reviews

  • Jpegmafia performing at the Roundhouse under green lighting

    Kitty Empire's artist of the week
    Jpegmafia – hip-hop gunslinger blasts away at his many targets

  • Singer Anton Newcombe

    Rock
    The Brian Jonestown Massacre – psych-rock survivors play it safe

    • Kehlani performs at the O2 Arena, London. 29/1/25

      Kitty Empire's artist of the week
      Kehlani – R&B tonic is just what the doctor ordered

    • Could be a Fellini film … Lady Blackbird performing at the Palladium.

      Soul
      Lady Blackbird – flamboyance and nuance from late-blossoming jazz-soul star

    • Birthday boy … Trivium’s Matt Heafy at the Utilita Arena, Cardiff.

      Metal
      Trivium and Bullet for My Valentine – glorious exchange of skull-crushing riffs and deafening roars

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Add to playlist

  • James Brown at Hammersmith Odeon, London, England, 23 May 1985.

    Ranked
    Soul, sermonising and wrestling Satan: James Brown’s 20 best albums – ranked!

  • Marianne Faithfull pictured in 1994.

    Tribute
    Melancholy, morphine and the Baader-Meinhof group: Marianne Faithfull’s 10 best recordings

  • Ross Kemp

    Honest playlist
    ‘I don’t care what they play at my funeral. I’m not going to be there’: Ross Kemp’s honest playlist

  • Yuri Shibuichi, Anouska Sokolow and Tim Curtis, AKA Honeyglaze.

    One to watch
    Honeyglaze

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Obituaries

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From the archive

  • The Smiths in 1987.

    Feature
    A light that never goes out: why the Smiths are eternally influential

    As Meat Is Murder turns 40, revisit our feature in which fans including Andy Burnham and Connie Constance consider how and why the band have endured
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  • Doechii with her Grammy award for best rap album.

    Feature
    ‘She really is everything!’: how Doechii became a rap icon – and bagged a Grammy

  • ‘He moved his hands over the guy’s back and the pain was almost gone’ … Presley.

    Feature
    Occult Elvis: was Presley a telepathic demigod who could heal the sick and change the weather?

    According to a lively new book, the King of Rock’n’Roll claimed to be a faith healer from Jupiter’s ninth moon – who as a boy was given a future vision of himself in a white jumpsuit by aliens. We talk to its author
  • Big hair daze … John Paul Jones, Robert Plant, John Bonham and Jimmy Page in 1969.

    Feature
    ‘Into the heart of the whirlwind’: how Led Zeppelin were sweet-talked into making a new film

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