Ben Thompson
Ben Thompson began writing about music in 1985, when the divide between Live Aid and the Membranes upstairs at the Chalk Farm Enterprise seemed much starker than it does today. After a special Royal-Wedding-themed edition of his fanzine The Devil's Music (in conjunction with Droitwich's Smell My Woolly Mammoth) was rejected by the printers on the grounds that it didn't take the nuptials of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson seriously enough, he forsook guerilla publishing for the mainstream media. Having had his first live review – of Big Flame at a pub in Bedford – published in Sounds at the impressionable age of 18, he went on to write for (among others) NME, New Statesman and Society, The Wire, The Independent, The Face, Blah Blah Blah, Zig-Zag, Spin, Request, the TLS, Australian Vogue, The Journal of Oral History and the Saturday Telegraph Magazine. He was rock critic of the Independent on Sunday from 1991-94 and GQ's film critic from 1997-2000, and currently contributes regularly to the FT, the Sunday Telegraph, Mojo and The Guardian online.
The London Ear on Resonance FM
189 articles
List of articles in the library
Motorhead: Corn Exchange, Cambridge
Live Review by Ben Thompson, New Musical Express, 27 October 1987
"IF WE moved in next door to you your lawn would die" Lemmy once proclaimed gleefully. To a 12-year-old HM fan like myself, Motorhead always ...
Krushed With The Reels Of Industry
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, New Musical Express, 12 December 1987
As the East Midlands house of KRUSH arrests a nation with its jack-knife beat, BEN THOMPSON meets FON's latest sampling superstars. ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, New Musical Express, 7 September 1991
The success of the visceral New Jack City has made Blaxploitation movies a thing of the past and debuting director MARIO VAN PEEBLES a hot ...
Nirvana: National Theatre, Kilburn
Live Review by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, November 1991
WHEN NIRVANA appeared at the Reading Festival earlier this summer, they were just one more obscure American underground rock trio with a good LP and ...
Live Review by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, August 1992
BY THE LAST day of the Reading Festival, the physical conditions have reverted to type. Soggy survivors cluster on little islands dotted between enormous mud ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, September 1993
ROCK AND ROLL can be cruel. One minute you are a professional misfit, happily living out a punk-rock life of misery and alienation in an ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, December 1993
BETWEEN NICK CAVE AND THE FALL maybe; or separating early Dexys from mid-peri-od Pogues; or even right back alongside Lee Hazlewood and Leonard Cohen – ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, 1994
THE VOICE of Iris DeMent is a remarkable instrument. There's a sob in it, a roll of the tongue, a fluting quality that speaks of ...
Aphex Twin: The Mozart of Techno
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, January 1994
"Is this the sound of old languages breaking up? Or of new ones forming?" ...
James Booker: The Unsung Piano Genius with Star-spangled False Teeth
Profile by Ben Thompson, MOJO, January 1994
"IF ALL AMERICAN PIANO PLAYERS LINED UP IN A ROW, each knowing the other’s abilities and talents, all would take a step back to recognise ...
Pavement: Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, March 1994
THERE WAS MUCH wailing and rending of hair throughout the land at the news that Pavement had parted ways with their crazed 40-something drummer Gary ...
Voodoo Queens: Voodod Queens: Chocolate Revenge
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, March 1994
UNREPENTANT BAD GIRLS with a taste for culinary and bibulous excess, the Voodoo Queens have cannily put their career back on track with a debut ...
Cypress Hill: Brixton Academy, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, April 1994
THERE'S A KID slumped at the top of the Brixton academy stairs, his head poised vomitatiously over a large plastic bin. All you can see ...
Nirvana: Kurt Cobain: Too Good For This World
Obituary by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, April 1994
AT MIDNIGHT on Friday, after the violence in Rwanda and before the end of the IRA ceasefire, a vaguely disdainful Radio 5 newsreader announces the ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, May 1994
FORGET EVERYTHING you know about what great music is – Bessie Smith, The Beatles, Neil Young, Al Green, all gone (not forever, just for 40 ...
Sonic Youth: Experimental Jet Set, Trash & No Star
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, June 1994
THIS IS SONIC Youth's tenth album in all, bootlegs excluded, and it finds them making a determined and ultimately successful effort not to settle into ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 21 August 1994
DON VAN VLIET lives in the small and beautifully named town of Trinidad in Northern California, up by the Oregon border, 135 ft from the ...
Massive Attack: Protection (Virgin)
Review by Ben Thompson, The Independent, September 1994
THEIR FIRST ALBUM, 1991's sumptuous Blue Lines, opened up a whole new imaginative world for British dance music, in the same way that De La ...
Essay by Ben Thompson, MOJO, September 1994
"Last night I dreamt I kissed Neil Young / If I was a boy I guess it would be fun." Sonic Youth, Creme Brulee, 1992. ...
Nirvana: Unplugged In New York
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, December 1994
IT SEEMS A PARTICULARILY VICIOUS IRONY:THAT A BAND THAT electricity seemed to flow through, a band who at their best could fling the weight of ...
Orbital: Brixton Academy, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, December 1994
THE WAY THAT ORBITAL wanted to make music, one of the Hartnoll brothers said last year in a rare theoretical moment, was like an idealised ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, December 1994
FORBIDDEN PLEASURES ARE GETTING harder to find. What price true rebel music when disco, metal, mid-'70s pop and all the grizzled outlaws of yesteryear are ...
Jon Spencer Blues Explosion: The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, December 1994
Combustible blues, not as in Delta 12-bar, but as in Beefheart, braggadocio and Mick Jagger’s dick. ...
Portishead: The Reluctant Debutante
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, 11 December 1994
IF YOU WERE the most compelling and enigmatic new group in Britain, playing your first proper gig in the sort of London club where Christine ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, 1995
THE LEAP of faith required to enunciate the unappetising name of this mighty Pembrokeshire quintet – plain, pronounceable old Gorky's to their legion of devoted ...
Ozzy Osbourne: The Ozzmosis of Ozzy Osbourne
Interview by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, 1995
IT IS THE Winter of 1980-1. Black Sabbath are playing at the Hammersmith Odeon, for the first time without Ozzy Osbourne – widely regarded as ...
The Stone Roses: Second Coming
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, February 1995
IF THE BYRDS HAD BEEN WELSH; IF Lenny Kravitz shopped at Kwik Save; if the Rolling Stones or Led Zeppelin or Wishbone Ash or Eddie ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, February 1995
RETURNING TO COLLECTIVE ACTION after last year's earth-shaking individual effort Hips N Makers, Kristin Hersh sounds happy to have some back-up noise behind her again. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, June 1995
THE BUCKFAST BEATLES, THE Belshill Beach Byrds: whatever you want to call them, the Teenage Fanclub are back. And their new album (their sixth, if ...
Russell Simmons: The Emperor Of Rap
Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, July 1995
SO WHY DO THEY CALL RUSSELL Simmons 'Rush'? The Def Jam emperor loses little time in answering this question. ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, August 1995
"IT STARTS OFF WITH A BIG CHUNK OF WOOD," says Ben Harper. And it's not Nick Nolte's acting technique he's talking about, or the history ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, August 1995
It revolves slowly and with a dignified air of formality, and when light shines on it you get a strange dappled effect. That effect, for ...
Will Oldham: Palace Music: Viva Last Blues
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, September 1995
The albums of Palace eminence Will Oldham do not take long to listen to (this one lasts just over half an hour), but there is ...
Black Grape: Shaun Ryder, Pop Star
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 1 October 1995
Once the high priest of proletarian hedonism, Shaun Ryder has traded in the low-life for a leafy London suburb. It's been a good move. The ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, 10 December 1995
Given that Lemmy of Motorhead's father was a priest, it makes a crazy kind of sense that Mick Hucknall's dad should have been a barber ...
Pet Shop Boys: An Attitude Thing
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 20 April 1996
THERE IS NO MORE embarrassing chapter in the big book of Pop Interview Ritual than the one in which you're forced to listen to music ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 8 June 1996
GEORGE CLINTON has learnt some things in five decades of music-making, and one of them is how to make an entrance. As the Clinton party ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, August 1996
BT: Listening to your debut album Fuzzy Logic, there seems to be a hint of British '60s psychedelic legends Dantalion's Chariot about it. ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 3 August 1996
Older, wiser and even smoother, Eighties teen sensations New Edition are back together. But this isn't just a nostalgia trip ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, September 1996
THE BEST INTRODUCTION TO Sebadoh comes in the form of an 11 minute cut-and-paste manifesto, tacked – without the benefit of a title – onto ...
Horace Andy, Massive Attack: Horace Andy: Put It All Down To His Quaver
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 26 September 1996
Horace Andy has fathered 16 children. He's also had a long career in reggae. ...
Nirvana: From the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah (Geffen)
Review by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, October 1996
FOR ALL THOSE who will overturn the tables like Jesus in the temple if they hear Nirvana Unplugged in another vegetarian restaurant, From the Muddy ...
Profile by Ben Thompson, The Independent, October 1996
THERE HAS ALWAYS been a place in pop for the driven outsider: the writer or performer spurred on by their own personal bob-a-job scout pack ...
Jon Spencer Blues Explosion: The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion: Now I Got Worry (Mute)
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, October 1996
• Spencer et al recently backed Holly Springs bluesman R.L. Burnside on his superb A Ass Pocket Of Whiskey — a Hooker'N'Heat for the '90s. • ...
Baby Bird: The Fledgling Has Landed
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 12 October 1996
A one-man bedroom band is suddenly topping the charts. Ben Thompson meets Baby Bird ...
Mark Owen: The Artist Formerly Known as the Pretty One
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Independent on Sunday, 1 December 1996
Once just a gorgeous torso, now a hit songwriter. Ben Thompson meets Mark Owen. ...
Review and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, 1997
Soft Machine and Matching Mole legend makes triumphant return. Sterling work from all-star supporting cast Paul Weller, Brian Eno, Evan Parker, Annie Whitehead and Phil ...
PJ Harvey, John Parish: John Parish and Polly Jean Harvey: The Fleece & Firkin, Bristol
Live Review by Ben Thompson, Spin, January 1997
POLLY JEAN Harvey first met John Parish ten years ago, when he was the neighborhood performance-art lecturer in her hometown of Yeovil. She went on ...
Bill Callahan, Smog: Bill Callahan: Communication chord
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 11 May 1997
Bill Callahan spares nobody in his songs — himself least of all. Ben Thompson talks to the American who chooses to go by the name ...
Gorky's Zygotic Mynci: Happy! Happy! Joy! Joy!
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Face, June 1997
Gorky's Zygotic Mynci (gaw'kes zy'gotik mung'ki), n. pl. (1) Young art-rockers from Wales. (2) Makers of four albums of well-wrought psychedelic pop. (3) Also called: ...
Arab Strap: The Garage, Islington, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 19 June 1997
"Best band to be named after an instrument of sado-masochistic gratification" ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, November 1997
THE RICKETY HAMMERSMITH RESIDENCE WHICH houses TFI Friday’s dressing rooms is an alarming place to find yourself, and not just because there’s a chance of ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, November 1997
Fourth album in three years from Kurt Wagner's Nashville swingers is a pithy eight tracks in duration, including an instrumental title number and three compositions ...
Jarvis Cocker, Pulp: Pulp: Sorted for Pipe and Slippers
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Telegraph Magazine, 8 November 1997
At the age of seven, Jarvis Cocker realised he was not immortal. Now the Pied Piper of his generation has decided the end is nigh. ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Seven Years Of Plenty, 1998
IT’S A humid, late-summer day in 1997. In a ramshackle northwest London recording studio, a soft breeze kisses the skin: not some cooling breath of ...
Pavement: Across the Cracks: Pavement
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Seven Years of Plenty' (Gollancz), 1998
PAVEMENT HEAVEN, steps 1-7: ...
Pulp: Inside Jarvis: A Reluctant Stardom
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Seven Years of Plenty, 1998
Autumn 1993 ...
Origin of the Spices: From Riot Grrrl to Girl Power
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Seven Years of Plenty (Victor Gollancz) , 1998
The riot grrrl/girl power liaison: from a whisper to a screen near you ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Seven Years of Plenty', 1998
DRIVING ON THE M25 in a rusty Mini. Early evening, thick drizzle. Only one windscreen wiper works because someone has snapped the end off the ...
Arab Strap: Strapping Youth: Arab Strap
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Seven Years of Plenty, 1998
IN THE MIDDLE of 1996, dynamic Falkirk duo Aidan Moffatt and Malcolm Middleton were inspired by the first big weekend of their summer to write ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Seven Years of Plenty , 1998
MIDI CIRCUS at Brixton Academy in 1992. Three men dressed in Creature From the Black Lagoon outfits are trying to eat each other, and a ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Ways of Hearing, 1998
BILL CALLAHAN HAS BEEN releasing strange and disturbing records as Smog – both on his own and with various accomplices, most notably erstwhile soulmate Cynthia ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Seven Years of Plenty, 1998
LIAM HOWLETT - soft-spoken mastermind behind The Prodigy's globe-subjugating juggernaut of organised chaos - is a very busy man. If you want some idea of ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Ways of Hearing' (Gollancz), 1998
HOTEL ROOMS ARE notoriously impervious to the characters of the people who stay in them: close proximity to a wicker basketful of complimentary toiletries has ...
Will Oldham: Viva Will Oldham: The Permutations of Palace
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Seven Years of Plenty', 1998
THE VARIOUS mutations of the Palace name are a cover for the extraordinary career of Louisville's Will Oldham. The opposite of the businessman who opens ...
Massive Attack: Looking for Identities: Massive Attack
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, May 1998
A STATELY HARPSICHORD looms up out of a gently tapping drumbeat. A piano escorts an exquisite female voice through a bass guitar archway with the ...
The Beta Band: Things can only get Beta
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 18 September 1998
Where the four-piece pop group goes to die, there lurks the Beta Band. ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Seven Years of Plenty' (Gollancz), October 1998
"A recent article in the New York Times proclaimed Newport as The New Seattle..." Caroline Sullivan, The Guardian, 13 December, 1996 ...
Lisa Germano: Happy to be Centre Stage, at Long Last
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 15 October 1998
Big stars? Glum rockers? Don't let the buggers grind you down. Lisa Germano didn't. ...
Badly Drawn Boy: Portrait of an Artist in the Making
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 22 October 1998
Badly Drawn Boy is challenging pop's establishment. He's that hard, is Damon. ...
Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Godspeed You Black Emperor!: The Garage, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 27 November 1998
The sound of Hank Marvin, plunging into deep space ...
Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Godspeed You Black Emperor!
Report by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 1999
A SHARP, PISTOL-LIKE report from an overloading monitor causes the already pained-looking sound engineer to wince into his levels meter. Godspeed You Black Emperor! have ...
Mercury Rev: 5 For '99: Mercury Rev
Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, January 1999
HOW MANY BANDS ARE THERE who have made their best records after losing their lead singer? Whoever said "Marillion", go and sit in the corner, ...
Music: Like islands in the stream
Report by Ben Thompson, The Independent, January 1999
So the future's wearing a scary Celine Dion mask, is it? Not necessarily. Pop is alive and well and kicking rock's behind. ...
Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Will Oldham, Smog: Bonnie "Prince" Billy & Smog: The Country Frontlash
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 12 February 1999
Bill Callahan and Will Oldham are acclaimed pioneers of alternative country, yet the former is inspired by the Wu-Tang Clan and the latter does heavy ...
Mogwai: Come On, Feel The Noise
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 19 March 1999
Mogwai play loud. (And very quiet.) And they have a few sordid myths they'd like to dispel. ...
Missy Elliott: Missy In Action: The Divine Ms. Elliott
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, May 1999
MISSY "MISDEMEANOR" Elliott is an infamously snappy dresser, so when she emerges from a discreet recess in her LA hotel room wearing nothing more elaborate ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, May 1999
WILCO MAINSTAYS Jeff Tweedy (twinkly, weatherbeaten) and Jay Bennett (burly, dreadlocked) are savouring a momentary pause between engagements. A beleagured two-man colony of battered denim ...
Pavement: Blimey! It's Pavement
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 13 May 1999
They're the masters of American underground rock. Blur kneel at their lo-fi altar. So why is Pavement's new album a homage to cricket and darts? ...
Company Flow, Mos Def: Rawkus Records: The young rap rebels
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 28 May 1999
Rupert Murdoch funds underground hip-hop? As Rawkus Records know, it's strange but true. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, July 1999
TERROR TWILIGHT'S penultimate track is a five and a half minute epic called 'The Hexx'. It begins with Stephen Malkmus taunting one of the swallows ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, October 1999
THE ATMOSPHERE of ersatz serenity that is supposed to prevail in newly-refurbished West End hotel lobbies was never going to withstand the arrival of Eminem. ...
Smog, Will Oldham: Heading For The Ditch: Smog and Will Oldham
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, February 2000
IT'S ONLY THE first week in February and already spring's sonic daffodils are poking through the boy-band mulch. Those who feared they would live their ...
Susumu Yokota: Ambient Confessions of a Japanese Technohead
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 1 March 2000
THE IDEA OF an ambient recording that stops you in your tracks might seem to be a contradiction in terms, but Susumu Yokota's Image 1983-1998 ...
Broadcast: The Noise Made By People
Review and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, April 2000
"PRAM WANNABES", "indie milksops", "poor man's Stereolab"... these are just some of the cruel insults heaped upon Broadcast's head when they first poked it above ...
Kelis: The 'I Hate You So Much Right Now' Woman: Kelis
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, April 2000
STRIDING PURPOSEFULLY down one of the seamiest streets in Soho, 20-year-old Kelis (pronounced kuh-leece) Rogers is a day-glo Amazon. ...
Brothers In Sound: The (Much) Beta Band
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 3 April 2000
You could put it down to the fact that they're in the throes of an identity crisis, but, Hanson haircuts aside, Brothers in Sound are ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, May 2000
THERE WAS ONE gig that really caught the attention of the swarming hordes of A&R men at 1998's In The City convention in Manchester. The ...
Craig David: It Started With A Boink: Craig David
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, ES, August 2000
EARLIER THIS year – around the time his first solo single made its chart debut at number one – Craig David appeared on the The ...
Underworld: And Then There Were Two: Underworld
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 25 August 2000
I SAW KARL HYDE get on a train with his baby daughter once, at Liverpool Street station. On the face of it, this was not ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, ES, September 2000
THE VIEW FROM the roof garden of Björk's penthouse suite at New York's elegant Soho Grand hotel is almost too much to take in at ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, September 2000
"WHEN YOU'RE YOUNG", explains 29-year old North London electro-soul auteur Leila Arab, "you get into these strange emotional states - either of over the top ...
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, ES, November 2000
ELVIS HAD The Ed Sullivan Show, The Sex Pistols had the Silver Jubilee boat trip. But for acid-tongued trans-Atlantic playground pop sensations Daphne and Celeste, ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Telegraph Magazine, November 2000
THE SOUND OF DISTANT laughter echoes up the corridor. As it comes closer - suffusing the chilly corporate air of Sony's West Soho HQ with ...
(British) Sea Power: Naval Gazing For Beginners: British Sea Power
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, November 2000
DESPITE ITS GRANDIOSE name, North London indie refuge The Monarch is the sort of venue which often struggles for mythological significance. Yet when British Sea ...
So Solid Crew: So Solid: The Crew's All Here
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, ES, November 2000
WITH MEMBERSHIP currently standing at twenty plus, Battersea's upsurgent underground garage crew So Solid seem to be trying to overwhelm the opposition by sheer weight ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, November 2000
"AND THE LIGHT it burns your skin," Low's Alan Sparhawk intones tenderly, his voice flickering like a candle by a sash window, "In a language ...
Robert Wyatt: A-Shleep at the Wheel: Robert Wyatt
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Ways of Hearing', 2001
ROBERT WYATT lives on an isolated estuary in the misty North-East of England, where he sometimes likes to sit in quiet contemplation with his wife ...
Brian Eno: An Uncle, A Celebrity, A Masturbator
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Ways of Hearing' , 2001
ON THE BACK cover of A Year with Swollen Appendices, Brian Eno's diary of 1995, he supplies a handy guide to some of the things ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, 'Ways of Hearing', 2001
NOT SINCE Joy Division turned into New Order has a band coped as well as Mercury Rev with losing its lead singer. But given that ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Ways Of Hearing, 2001
"They had brought this music with them when they were born, these bandmen, in their hearts and their muscles, their blood and their bones".Jay Allison ...
Book Excerpt by Ben Thompson, Ways Of Hearing, 2001
IT'S A GREY weekday lunchtime in glamorous East Anglia. Cambridge town centre is brought to a resentful standstill as a series of huge pantechnicons disgorge ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 24 February 2001
In the high-voltage world of alternative rock, American singer Stephen Malkmus has always preferred a more relaxed path. ...
Stephen Malkmus: Stephen Malkmus
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, March 2001
Solo debut from ex-Pavement mainman and urbane resident of Portland, Oregon. Think Pavement, but with longer hair. ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, May 2001
A DISEMBODIED VOICE with a slight hint of helium in it intoning the words "I taught myself to survive a four storey fall wearing a ...
Essay by Ben Thompson, The Independent, May 2001
IN HENRY JAMES' 1873 short story ‘The Madonna of the Future’, the American protagonist visits the city of Florence, where he encounters a strange and ...
David Axelrod: Swinging with The Ax: David Axelrod
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, June 2001
"LET ME straighten something out first," rasps living Los Angeles legend David Axelrod; crooking a bony finger at the heavy sunglasses he wears even though ...
Turin Brakes and the New Acoustica
Essay by Ben Thompson, The Independent, June 2001
IN 1971, LESTER BANGS wrote an article for the American magazine Who Put The Bomp (reprinted in the Serpent's Tail anthology Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor ...
Usher: Rise of the House of Usher
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Telegraph Magazine, July 2001
APPEARING ON Channel 4's Richard Blackwood Show during his last visit to Britain, clean-cut US R&B star Usher Raymond IV startled the crowd with the ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, July 2001
ON ENCOUNTERING a would-be interviewer who'd just been robbed of all his pound coins by a renegade parking meter, the Beta Band of a couple ...
N.E.R.D.: The Search Is Over: N*E*R*D
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, August 2001
THEIR NAMES MIGHT not be familiar, but you'll know Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo by the sounds they make. As multi-million selling production team the ...
Pulp: Jarvis Cocker: Sorted For Trees and Weeds
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, October 2001
AMID THE RUMPLED grandeur of West London's Cobden Club, the familiar angular figure of Jarvis Cocker stands out like a sore index finger. His ...
So Solid Crew: They Do Know: So Solid Crew
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, October 2001
SIFTING THROUGH a pile of So Solid Crew fanmail might be a disturbing experience for anyone worried about the state of the nation's spelling, but ...
Lisa Lopes: Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes: Supernova (Arista)
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, November 2001
Long-awaited solo foray by erstwhile TLC pocket battleship. ...
Jim O'Rourke: Catching Jim O'Rourke's Drift
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, January 2002
THE CARDIGAN-clad figure of Jim O' Rourke looks up from his Holiday Inn coffee. "I'm a nightmare," he warns, pointing with a smile to a ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 7 February 2002
Kurt Wagner, songwriter and former floor-layer, has stripped down the sound of his 13-strong band for their latest and finest album. He tells Ben Thompson ...
Cornershop: Back In Business: Cornershop
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 9 February 2002
Four years after a tribute to Bollywood chanteuse Asha Bhosle gave them 1998's most unlikely number one single, Ben Thompson welcomes the return of Cornershop. ...
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 23 February 2002
THERE'S a special sense of occasion that only a face-to-face meeting with a band who wear surgical masks on stage can generate. Surely Clinic's cheeks ...
Wilco: Taking Control in a Crisis
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 28 March 2002
ROCK AND ROLL is not the first place you would look for a new form of patriotism. Yet Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, the latest album by ...
Maher Shalal Hash Baz: Mad in Japan
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 12 April 2002
They're Japanese; their group's name is in Hebrew; their music defies definition. Ben Thompson meets the exotic Maher Shalal Hash Baz ...
System of a Down: Messiahs of metal
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 11 July 2002
System of a Down look set to be the first band to break out of the hard-rocking nu-metal ghetto, says Ben Thompson ...
MC Romeo, So Solid Crew: MC Romeo: Alpha Romeo
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, August 2002
IN THE TOP floor of the London bus that is taking me to interview fast-talking UK garage heartthrob MC Romeo, an effervescent group of black ...
Double Figures: Ten Years Of The Domino Effect
Press Release by Ben Thompson, Domino Records, July 2003
CAPTAIN'S LOG, stardate 1993: John Major's village-cricket-and-warm-beer based moral crusade inspires a parallel "back-to-basics" drift in UK rock 'n' roll (with Justine Frischmann as its ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 9 August 2003
LISA MAFFIA'S former fiancé — So Solid Crew co-founder Jason "G-Man" Phillips — was recently sentenced to four years in prison for firearms offences. In ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 21 September 2003
THREE HOURS before I am left alone in a press-office antechamber with Britain's only copy of Room on Fire, something very important happens on the ...
Missy Elliott: This is Not a Test
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 16 November 2003
WAY BACK IN 1997, when Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott launched her debut album Supa Dupa Fly with the touching dedication "To my mom... I would not ...
Dizzee Rascal: Boy In Da Corner
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 2004
PRECOCIOUS BOW roughneck Dylan Mills knocked up his first single (scabrous teen pregnancy shocker 'I Luv You') in downtime from his school music class at ...
Lambchop: Aw C'mon/No You C'mon
Review by Ben Thompson, Observer Music Monthly, 1 February 2004
LIKE OUTKAST'S Speakerboxx/ The Love Below, the eighth album by Nashville's premier artisan country/ soul collective is a double-disc set designed to prompt endless speculation ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 22 February 2004
FIRST THINGS FIRST. The 15 songs that Louisville Kentucky singer-songwriter Will Oldham has chosen to reinterpret here (originally featured on three albums, an EP, a ...
N.E.R.D.: N*E*R*D: Fly or Die (Virgin)****
Review by Ben Thompson, Observer Music Monthly, 21 March 2004
IF ITS ILLUSTRIOUS predecessor – 2001's visionary soft-porn psychedelic soul masterpiece In Search of... – was anything to go by, the release of a new ...
The Streets: Dead Cert: The Streets
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 25 April 2004
'I LOVE THE NAME "The Streets",' muses 24 year-old Mike Skinner - at once the mercurial creative-director, canny CEO and flaky spokesmodel of that thriving ...
Sufjan Stevens: The 50 States of Rock: Sufjan Stevens
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 8 June 2004
THERE HAVE BEEN MANY extra-curricular activities traditionally associated with the life of the travelling rock'n'roller. Teaching knitting to the blind is not one of them. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Observer Music Monthly, 20 June 2004
FROM THE METROPOLITAN angst of 'Safe from Harm' - "If you hurt what's mine, I'll sure as hell retaliate" - to the insistent shaken bottle-top ...
The Beastie Boys: Beastie Boys: To The 5 Boroughs
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, July 2004
THERE WAS NO mistaking the rush of pleasure induced by early radio plays of this album's first single. As the delirious turntable stabs of 'Check ...
Girls Aloud, Sugababes: Xenomania: Heart Of The Country, Home Of The Hits
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 18 July 2004
In rural Kent, the future of British pop is being shaped by Brian Higgins – a Phil Spector for the 21st century. Ben Thompson meets ...
Elvis Costello and the Imposters: The Delivery Man
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 20 September 2004
RECORDED AT Sweet Tea Studios in Oxford, Mississippi, with guest appearances by Emmylou Harris and Lucinda Williams, The Delivery Man initially looks like a bold ...
Dizzee Rascal: Lovable Rogue: Dizzee Rascal: Showtime (XL) *****
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, October 2004
Deft and ultimately devastating follow up to 2003's Mercury Prize-winning debut. ...
Kings of Leon: A-Ha Shake Heartbreak
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 17 October 2004
AS WITH SO many of the best second albums - from Roxy Music's For Your Pleasure to Dizzee Rascal's Showtime - the first time you ...
Lady Sovereign, M.I.A.: M.I.A. and Lady Sovereign: A Far Cry From North-West London
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Sunday Telegraph, 30 January 2005
Two of this year's most eagerly anticipated records come from young women with some striking similarities. Ben Thompson talks to M.I.A. and Lady Sovereign. ...
Queens of the Stone Age: Lullabies to Paralyze
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 20 February 2005
CANNED HEAT without the weight problem, ZZ Top without the tacky '80s gloss, Nirvana if Nevermind hadn't grown so big it blocked the road to ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 24 April 2005
Dizzee's ex-grime crew discover pop. Ben Thompson is pleased ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 7 May 2005
AFTER A COUPLE of well-received but not exactly life-changing albums, this bookish Brooklyn-based quintet have achieved a kind of breakthrough with their third full-length release. ...
The Magic Numbers: The Magic Numbers
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, July 2005
Two pairs of siblings. One great album. Ben Thompson salutes a melodic, soft-pop masterpiece. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 21 August 2005
A ROBE-FREE polyphonic spree, a depoliticised Godspeed! You Black Emperor, a less unforgivably insipid Talk Talk, Mogwai with the heavy metal taken out, the Cocteau ...
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 22 August 2005
Their accent may be regional but their success is global. Ben Thompson meets three new bands from pop music's latest hotspot ...
Animal Collective: Feels (FatCat) ****
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 16 October 2005
Ben Thompson admires the furry friends who refuse to operate in a confined area ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 6 November 2005
Ben Thompson reviews an album of two halves ...
Jamie Lidell: King's Cross Scala, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 13 November 2005
JAMIE LIDELL'S live show at the King's Cross Scala offers a number of delightfully incongruous spectacles. Looming large among them is the sight of a ...
Young Knives: Everyone likes a village fête
Profile and Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 19 August 2006
The Young Knives dress like farmers and celebrate rural life. Ben Thompson welcomes the sound of agrarian post-punk ...
Courtney Love: Dirty Blonde: The Diaries of Courtney Love
Book Review by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 12 November 2006
Make tea, get nose fixed ASAP ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 21 January 2007
Damon Albarn could have fallen flat on his face here. But this love letter to the capital might be his finest hour, writes Ben Thompson ...
The Good Bad & The Queen: The Good, the Bad & the Queen: The Good, the Bad & the Queen
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 21 January 2007
WHAT IS IT ABOUT the clunky phrase "the good, the bad & the queen" that made Damon Albarn want to use it as both the ...
Kings of Leon: Because of the Times *****
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 18 March 2007
It's not all their own work, but the lank-haired rockers' third set does more than merely ape their influences, raves Ben Thompson ...
Interview by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 22 April 2007
Dizzee Rascal is not proud of everything in his past, he tells Ben Thompson in a remarkably frank interview. But he's more than happy with ...
The Fall, Mouse On Mars, Von Südenfed: Von Südenfed: Tromatic Reflexxions
Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 20 May 2007
THE NAME VON SÜDENFED suggests a German First World War flying ace who went on to build a global pharmaceutical dynasty around a popular headache remedy. ...
The White Stripes: Detroit Spinners
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 9 June 2007
SON HOUSE WAS one of the greatest of all blues singers. Born on a Mississippi cotton plantation in 1902, he died 86 years later – ...
Book Review by Ben Thompson, The Independent, 16 December 2007
HOW BETTER to salve the pangs of remorse induced by a season of over-indulgence than by voraciously consuming the reminiscences of those whose lifestyles make ...
Hot Chip: Made in the Dark ****
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 20 January 2008
You might know them as pop nerds, but Ben Thompson just loves their power ballads ...
Baby Dee: The Torch-Singing Tree Surgeon Branches Out
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 2 February 2008
"SOMETIMES I WORRY that I've become addicted to upheaval," says Baby Dee, torch singer, native of Cleveland, Ohio, and former harpist for Mercury Prize-winner Antony ...
50 Cent: Always The Lion In The Room
Interview by Ben Thompson, Financial Times, 8 February 2008
ON MEETING the rapper and business mogul 50 Cent, the first thing you notice is that he's a lot smaller than he looks onstage. In ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 20 April 2008
Thanks to her henchmen, writes Ben Thompson, the shameless idol still has much to give ...
Report and Interview by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 15 June 2008
Suddenly indie rockers are embracing African sounds. Could the long years of a cultural apartheid be coming to a close, asks Ben Thompson ...
Tricky: Return Of The Bristol Rover
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 21 June 2008
After exploding on to the trip-hop scene with Massive Attack and as a solo artist, Tricky decamped to America to go through what some see ...
Leila: Postcards from the planet Leila
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 5 July 2008
Leila Arab fled Iran in 1979 and is now one of the most distinctive forces in pop. Ben Thompson met her. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 13 July 2008
ALL THE GREAT British writer/producers of the past two decades have found their own trademark equilibrium between guest vocals and backing tracks. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 6 September 2008
ROUGHLY ONCE every seven years, a band that former Creation Records boss Alan McGee tips for the top actually gets there. ...
Kings of Leon: Only By The Night (RCA)
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 17 September 2008
WITH THE White Stripes facing an uncertain future, and The Strokes fragmenting into underwhelming solo careers, Kings of Leon are the sole survivors of America's ...
Amadou & Mariam: Welcome to Mali
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 9 November 2008
IF YOU HADN'T EVER HEARD A RECORD by this Malian husband and wife duo, but had only read of their initial meeting at Bamako's Institut ...
Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 14 June 2009
THE GENRE that was once called "college rock" is currently drifting in a distinctly post-graduate direction. But for those who find 2009's US indie vanguard ...
Chipmunk, Dizzee Rascal, N-Dubz, Taio Cruz, Tinchy Stryder: N-Dubz and The Second Coming of Brit Pop
Overview by Ben Thompson, Observer Music Monthly, 1 November 2009
It has been a long, rocky road for homegrown urban music in the UK, but this year N-Dubz and a close-knit group of stars have ...
Four Tet: There is Love in You (Domino)
Review by Ben Thompson, The Observer, 24 January 2010
Kieran Hebden's latest captures all that was special about dance music's mid-90s heyday ...
Brian Eno: 'Lady Gaga's Meat Dress? I Did It First'
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 22 November 2010
Fashion disasters, electronic music, even the Lib-Con coalition...The super-producer and former Roxy Music wizard saw it all coming ...
Maggoty Lamb goes behind the barricades in Rock Writers' Class War
Comment by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 23 February 2011
Journalists would have us believe it's public-school leavers v the salt of the earth in the battle of the charts. Is that really the case? ...
Live Review by Ben Thompson, Sunday Telegraph, 6 March 2011
ON THE LEFT of the Limehouse Troxy stage stands PJ Harvey – enrobed in one of her Belgian fashion confederate Ann Demeulemeester's trademark pristine, shroud-like ...
The Vaccines are a shot in the arm of pop
Report by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 28 March 2011
THE OPENING slot on the NME Awards Tour has often been a gateway to great things, with Coldplay and Franz Ferdinand among those who have ...
Beyoncé Is Too Good For Glastonbury
Comment by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 17 June 2011
Glastonbury's complacent Pyramid Stage crowd just doesn't deserve the great Beyoncé ...
Lambchop: Elegy for a friend and mentor, bathed in Sinatra strings
Interview by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 23 February 2012
IF YOU'RE GOING TO TRY SOMETHING NEW, you might as well learn from the best. There aren't many records categorised by iTunes as indie rock ...
Nicki Minaj: Hammersmith Apollo, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, Seven, 29 June 2012
THERE ARE two contrasting sides to rapper Nicki Minaj's musical identity — both were fighting for attention at the Hammersmith Apollo. ...
Jake Bugg: Bringing Back a Blue-Collar Perspective
Profile by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 1 February 2013
Can this 18-year-old from a Nottingham housing estate put some proletarian grit back into British guitar pop? ...
Kraftwerk: Is Kraftwerk still a functioning pop group?
Comment by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 6 February 2013
On the eve of Kraftwerk's eight sell-out concerts at Tate Modern, Ben Thompson tries to give comfort to the ticketless. ...
Review and Interview by Ben Thompson, MOJO, March 2013
Thom Yorke's laptop-generated super-group turns out have a human heart. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 30 April 2013
As she embarks on a UK tour, Birmingham's Laura Mvula seems intent on taking R&B vocals in an exploratory new direction, says Ben Thompson. ...
Björk: Still underestimated after all these years
Comment by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 3 September 2013
Ben Thompson salutes the maverick Icelander's cunning, as she prepares to play her most recent album, Biophilia, in London for the first time. ...
Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 20 February 2014
Don't be fooled by the endless perfume ads and narcissistic documentaries — with her upcoming tour dates, fortress Britain will fall once again to Beyoncé, ...
Kim Gordon, Sonic Youth: Girl in a Band by Kim Gordon (Faber & Faber)
Book Review by Ben Thompson, Daily Telegraph, 19 February 2015
Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon reflects on the break-up of her marriage and the loss of New York's netherworld ...
Young Fathers: White Men Are Black Men Too
Review by Ben Thompson, MOJO, May 2015
A vivacious follow-up to 2014's Mercury-winning Dead heralds the Edinburgh trio's arrival as global citizens. ...
Mica Levi: Bold Tendencies, London
Live Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 2 August 2015
IF ARTISTS ARE, as Grayson Perry has astutely noted, "the shock troops of gentrification", then musicians aren't too far behind them. Roosting on the art-installation-bedecked ...
Live Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 16 January 2016
EYES FLASHING IN THE SHADOW of her pristine white baseball cap with its breaking black heart motif — the brim seems to have been extended ...
Wolf Alice: Folkestone Leas Cliff Hall
Live Review by Ben Thompson, The Guardian, 26 March 2016
A CROSSWORD COMPILER'S CLUE for the genre of Brit- and Grammy-nominated, north London quartet Wolf Alice might read as follows: "Compound musical form, first half ...
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