In 1958, Decca Records audaciously began to record Wagner’s epic, 15-hour Ring Cycle. As Phil Hebblethwaite explains, there was more at stake than art. Decca was a classical music underdog determined to land a knock-out punch on arch rival EMI
Phil Hebblethwaite invites you into Brahms’s German Requiem, one of the worst-named pieces of classical music in the canon. It has nothing to do with nationalism, or the church, and should have been called what Brahms later suggested: A Human Requiem. It couldn’t be more relevant in 2017
Squarepusher once said he has no recollection of making Ultravisitor, his “spectacle of beauty and of terror”. As the record is reissued as an expanded edition for its 20th anniversary, Siobhán Kane returns to the record’s ambiguous beauty
Wayne Gooderham explores the influence of Hubert Selby Jr's transgressive masterpiece on popular music; and on the gender sensibilities of The Smiths, Van Morrison and The Velvet Underground in particular. CW: Some may find the language quoted in this article that describes LGBTQI people & sex workers outmoded or offensive