Siavash Amini

Caligo

Working with some of the earliest piano recordings made in Iran, Siavash Amini shatters these archival sounds, recomposing them into a startling new electronic tapestry

Caligo by Siavash Amini

I visited Tehran in April, after more than a year. Coming from a city in the UK where almost everything except pubs and restaurants closes at six, I was struck by the liveliness of the city. Late in the evening, people were strolling along Enqelab Street – known for its endless large bookstores and the university campus – groups of young girls chattering and stopping at art shops, and a few art galleries still open. People were out in fancy, artsy cafés until midnight – the likes of which I have only…

The post Siavash Amini – Caligo appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/quietus-reviews/siavash-amini-caligo/

Shane Pinnegar, author of the new book, Rocksploitation, picks out ten of the strangest marriages of movies and rock music

Ever since Bill Haley rocked around the clock in the 1955 film Blackboard Jungle, rock ‘n’ roll and movies have existed in a kind of strange symbiosis. From practically the dawn of sound film, cinema has been used to sell records and records have been marshalled into the marketing schemes of hit movies. After all, where would cinema history be without The Rutles, the Max Rebo Band, and Spinal Tap, without Winslow Leach from The Phantom of the Paradise, the Folksmen and Wyld Stallyns? Where would Survivor be without Rocky or Cannibal Corpse without Ace Venture? Where would Celine Dion’s career…

The post “This is My Happening – and it Freaks Me Out!”: 10 of the All-Time Weirdest Rock’n’Roll Movies appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/culture/books/this-is-my-happening-and-it-freaks-me-out-10-of-the-all-time-weirdest-rocknroll-movies/

The additional money will help address ‘critical public safety concerns’ that were identified in an independent review of festival

Notting Hill carnival will go ahead as planned this year after almost £1 million of funding was raised to finance extra safety and infrastructure measures for the event.

City Hall, Kensington & Chelsea Council and Westminster City Council have jointly provided £958,000 for the event after pleas from organisers last month for further financial support. It was deemed that more funding was needed after an independent review recommended several security changes be put in place to make the event safer.

The chair of the organising company, Ian Comfort, told press that the additional financial support to secure the event’s future was gained just in time.

“Although…

The post Notting Hill Carnival 2025 to Go Ahead After Securing Additional Funding appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/news/notting-hill-carnival-2025-to-go-ahead-after-securing-additional-funding/

Lyra Pramuk, Rafael Toral, Nazar and more have been added to the bill for the Braga festival

Photo by Adriano Ferreira Borges

Semibreve festival has announced a new batch of programme additions for its 15th edition

The festival will return to its usual base of Braga in Portugal for four days of programming from 23 to 26 October, covering music performances, installations, talks and workshops.

Among those newly added to the lineup this week are Dutch-Italian composer and sound designer Grand River, performing an extended version of the work on her new album Tuning The Wind, Manchester-based Angolan musician Nazar performing his acclaimed new record Demilitarize, as well as the multidisciplinary artist Lyra Pramuk making a rare appearance as a DJ, where she’ll…

The post Semibreve Reveals New Names for 2025 Edition appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/news/semibreve-reveals-new-names-for-2025-edition/

Dean Brown revisits the stoner rock giants’ flawed but rewarding swan song. Originally published 13/02/2015

A couple of initial thoughts come to mind when looking back at Kyuss’ 1995 swansong, …And The Circus Leaves Town. The first being whether the fact that the Californian four-piece split three months following the date of its release coloured opinions of the actual value of the music. Certainly the lack of promotion could easily have been a deciding factor in how the final Kyuss album ended up being less critically and commercially successful when compared to their two albums which helped birth the stoner rock movement – 1992’s Blues For The Red Sun and 1994’s Welcome To Sky Valley.

But another argument could be that …And…

The post 30 Years On: And The Circus Leaves Town by Kyuss Revisited appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/opinion-and-essays/anniversary/30-years-on-and-the-circus-leaves-town-by-kyuss-revisited/

Darran Anderson hails the wayward ramshackle hypnotic power of The Beta Band, and hears a unique sound that benefited many other musicians but not themselves

In one of his essays – ‘The Argentine Writer And Tradition’ (1951) – Jorge Luis Borges wrote of the absence of camels in the Quran, suggesting it was a sign of the text’s authenticity. To a local of that time and place, the pack animal would have been so natural and ubiquitous as to be scarcely worth noticing or commenting upon. They would be taken for granted, and only an outsider would feel compelled to emphasise their presence. In reality, there are mentions of camels in the Quran, which Borges likely knew – ever the trickster,…

The post Reissue of the Week: The Three E.P.’s by The Beta Band appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/quietus-reviews/reissue-of-the-week/beta-band-three-eps-review/

Amina Hocine

ātamōn

Recorded in an abandoned mineshaft with a jerry-built foghorn organ, ātamōn is far from your run-of-the-mill drone record

ātamōn by Amina Hocine

ātamōn, the first full-length release from Swedish composer Amina Hocine, was born from a foghorn organ built by the composer herself, made from everyday objects taken from hardware stores. Listening to ātamōn without any context, it would not be immediately apparent that the music was made utilizing any acoustic instruments, let alone one so rudimentary. The most immediately noticeable aspect of ātamōn is how icy and synthetic its drones sound, almost feeling like a digital condensation of Harry Bertoia’s sound sculptures.

ātamōn was recorded in an abandoned iron mine in rural Sweden, a process reminiscent of Pauline Oliveros’ cistern experiments,…

The post Amina Hocine – ātamōn appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/quietus-reviews/amina-hocine-atamon-review/

Ahead of their show at this year’s Skaņu Mežs festival, Jack Barnett of These New Puritans takes Claire Biddles through an eclectic Baker’s Dozen, taking in everything from flamenco and Greek traditional music to Steely Dan and Bob Dylan

“I don’t really think about musical influences that much,” admits Jack Barnett of These New Puritans, speaking from his hometown of Southend-on-Sea. “I think I spend more time writing music than listening to it really.” Released earlier in 2025, These New Puritans’ Crooked Wing is their first studio album in six years, and it’s easy to imagine Barnett spending every single one of the intervening minutes crafting its complex kaleidoscope of sounds. 

Befitting someone whose music is difficult to categorise, Barnett’s list of favourite albums…

The post Sheer Momentum: Jack Barnett of These New Puritans’ Favourite Music appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/interviews/bakers-dozen/sheer-momentum-jack-barnett-of-these-new-puritans-favourite-music/

In this month’s subscriber podcast, John Doran and Luke Turner rev up to discuss a 1996 erotic thriller based on the writings of JG Ballard 

 In this month’s Low Culture podcast John and Luke are grasping their fuelling nozzles, lubing up the big end, and casting their eyes over the smooth chrome body of David Cronenberg’s 1996 film Crash, based on the JG Ballard novel of the same name. Incredibly 90s from the opening graphics to the styling of pubic hair, Crash was an at the time controversial erotic thriller about a film producer and his wife’s open marriage and their deepening involvement in a shadowy group of people who find sexual stimulation in auto-accidents. Is it just a compilation of sex scenes with…

The post Low Culture Podcast: David Cronenberg’s Crash appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/subscriber-area/low-culture-podcast/low-culture-podcast-david-cronenbergs-crash/

University

McCartney, It’ll be OK

Noisy youths make thrilling racket, charting a unique and rather startling course through the choppy waters of post-punk, post-hardcore and math-rock

McCartney, It'll Be OK by UNIVERSITY

University are a bunch of noisy young punks from Crewe, the nation’s most interconnected nowhere. If I understand correctly the name is sardonic: when all their friends left for higher education they stayed, putting their energy into the band. Resisting the urge to ride the rails, a degree of insularity and focus has paid off in a sharp math-punk assault with its own identity. Their debut McCartney, It’ll be OK opens with about ten seconds of distorted and enthusiastic yelling down the phone, which seems as fitting an introduction as any to…

The post University – McCartney, It’ll be OK appeared first on The Quietus.

source https://thequietus.com/quietus-reviews/university-mccartney-itll-be-ok/