David Burke
David Burke began writing about music as a staffer on local newspapers in his native Ireland, before decamping to London in 1990. He spent six years working in print, audio and television as part of the World Entertainment News Network. His features appeared in the UK's red tops and international publications such as Esquire (Japan) and Pop Rocky (Germany). David is a regular contributor to Classic Pop, Vintage Rock, Country Music and RNR magazines, and to the All About Jazz website. He has authored four books – Crisis in the Community: The African Caribbean Experience of Mental Health (Chipmunka), Heart of Darkness: Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska (Cherry Red), A Sense of Wonder: Van Morrison's Ireland (Jawbone) and Singing Out: A Folk Narrative of Maddy Prior, June Tabor and Linda Thompson (Soundcheck).
145 articles
List of articles in the library
The Fatima Mansions: Fatima Mansions: The Evil That Men Do
Interview by David Burke, Irish in Britain News, 25 October 1991
Just when you thought it was safe to turn on your radio, Fatima Mansions are back with Bertie's Brochures, a bruiser of an EP – ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2007
THE PRETENDERS and the one-trick-ponies are always found out in the end. The procession of new Dylans has been relentless – and mostly underwhelming – ...
Fionn Regan: History Lesson: Fionn Regan
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2007
THE PRETENDERS and the one-trick-ponies are always found out in the end. The procession of new Dylans has been relentless – and mostly underwhelming – ...
Ben Taylor: Sons and lovers: Ben Taylor
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, October 2007
David Burke talks to Ben Taylor about his dislike of folk music and his plans to shake it up a bit. And then there's the ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2007
AIMEE MANN reckons she could take Bob Dylan in a boxing bout. It would be a close run thing but age and height advantage would, ...
Damien Dempsey: Dublin Boy: Damien Dempsey
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2007
Damien Dempsey has a few things he wants to get off his chest and finds a willing listener in David Burke. ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2007
TOM WAITS owes it all to his wife, Kathleen Brennan. The one-time raggedy man and barfly, a sartorial amalgam of Frank Sinatra's Capitol covers, Be-Bop ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2007
THE SONG 'Bound' on Suzanne Vega's quite brilliant new album, Beauty & Crime, finds her wondering "if you might still want me". ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, 2008
The artist formally known as Mink demonstrates a direct and colourful use of language as he discusses his rich and varied career with David Burke. ...
Julie Fowlis: Gael Force: Julie Fowlis
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2008
JULIE FOWLIS spends a lot of time singing to people who, on the whole, haven't got a clue what she's singing about. But it makes ...
Joan Armatrading: Joan As Blueswoman
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2008
EARLIER THIS YEAR a new album by one of Britain's most enduring singer-songwriters debuted at the top of Billboard magazine's blues chart in the United ...
The Clancy Brothers: Liam Clancy: The Last Man Standing
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2008
JOHNNY CASH TOOK Trent Reznor's 'Hurt', a lacerating hymn about heroin addiction, and recast it as a profound meditation on his own mortality. But equally ...
Lambchop: Damage Control: Lambchop's Kurt Wagner
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2008
LAMBCHOP DEVOTEES can rest easy: despite frontman Kurt Wagner's solo tour of Europe last autumn, the Nashville collective have not made their last elegantly sombre ...
Joe Jackson: Still Looking Sharp
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2008
David Burke catches a rare sighting of pop music's invisible man. ...
American Music Club: The Golden Age of American Music Club
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2008
MARK EITZEL sounds very chipper – not at all the lugubrious character that comes across in his songs. With the release of American Music Club's ...
Bruce Springsteen: E Street shuffle: Bruce Springsteen
Retrospective by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2008
The Boss is coming to town! David Burke looks at the career and impact of the man whose been described as "the Steinbeck of rock'n'roll". ...
Pop Staples, The Staple Singers: Freedom Song
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2008
David Burke talks to the indefatigable Mavis Staples ...
Joan Osborne: Between the Covers
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2008
SOME ARTISTS are indelibly associated with one piece of work their whole lives. What once was a gift in terms of eliciting public acceptance can ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2008
MARK OLIVER EVERETT, alias E, alias Eels, is a respectful though reserved interviewee. ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2008
Singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier was something of a late starter – but once she picked up that pen she certainly had plenty to write about. Having ...
John Hiatt: Tune-up: John Hiatt
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2008
JOHN HIATT WAS a complete fuck-up. The year was 1984 and his addiction to booze and cocaine induced what he referred to as "a semi-blackout ...
Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan: Dishing the Dirt: Isobel Campbell
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, December 2008
ISOBEL CAMPBELL has just killed a bluebottle, a crime of muscacide for which she carries absolutely no remorse. ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2009
In a frank conversation, Jackie Leven recalls his difficult early years, his experience with heroin, and how he can come up with four albums a ...
Mary Black: There's something about Mary Black
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2009
MARY BLACK wouldn't class herself as a dreamer, even though she's realised a few dreams others of us have maybe harboured. Playing London's Royal Albert ...
The Handsome Family: Handsome is as Handsome does
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, August 2009
WHAT DO YOU GET when you cross the Platters with 19th century Romanticism? Why, the new album from the Handsome Family, of course. ...
Dolores O'Riordan: Travelling Light
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2009
Dolores O'Riordan, former singer with the Cranberries, tells David Burke of her journey close to the edge during those heady days of pop stardom, and ...
Sinead O'Connor: Faith and Courage
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2009
TRUTH WILL always out in the end. And the truth-sayers will be vindicated where once they were vilified. ...
Ruby Turner: The Gospel according to Ruby
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, October 2009
"THEY CAN KEEP their big record deals. Gone are the days when I'm going to be told what to do. I can go to bed ...
David Gray: "I was ready to throw off the past"
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2009
YOU'D THINK having three number one UK albums and two that charted in the US top 20, not to mention the biggest selling Irish album ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2009
DAMN THAT Lyle Lovett, he sure is one elegant gent. While this R2 writer, in a Prada or Armani suit, would look plain guilty, Lovett ...
The Blues Band, Paul Jones, Manfred Mann: Paul Jones
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2009
SELDOM HAS the descriptive shorthand "long-awaited" been more apposite than in the case of Starting All Over Again, a rare Paul Jones solo album released ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2009
THERE COMES A time in every young man or woman's life when dad mounts the pulpit and delivers a homily on the kind of music ...
Rodrigo y Gabriela: Natural Acoustics: Rodrigo y Gabriela
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2010
YOU'D THINK a pair of former thrash-metal heads from Mexico City would have the kind of backstage rider that was a hedonistic Eden. Not a ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2010
HERE'S A MAD IDEA – Sharon Shannon as Ireland's next President, replacing Mary McAleese and thus maintaining the recent tradition (established with the appointment of ...
The Chieftains: Hail to the Chief: Paddy Moloney
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2010
Paddy Moloney talks to David Burke about the band's latest album, a collection highlighting a "forgotten" chapter in the history of neighbouring Mexico and America. ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2010
WHEN Christian Koch wrote in The Guardian earlier this year that British National Party (BNP) leader Nick Griffin was a big fan of "that most ...
Fionn Regan: Shadows and light
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2010
Fionn Regan has just released his much-anticipated second album. It was something of a long haul, as he explains to David Burke. ...
Richmond Fontaine: Willy Vlautin: It's only rock'n'roll
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2010
Devotees of Richmond Fontaine can rest easy: frontman Willy Vlautin's burgeoning reputation as a novelist doesn't portend the demise of the Americana outfit – at ...
Corinne Bailey Rae : Corinne Bailey Rae: Faith, Hope And Charity
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2010
NOT EVERY do-gooding celebrity is like Bono, you know. There are those among the nouveau riche who'd rather eschew the kind of attention the U2 ...
Mary Chapin Carpenter: Modern Miracles: Mary Chapin Carpenter
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2010
Having successfully overcome a major health scare, and now with a UK tour imminent – her latest album finding favour with fans and critics alike, ...
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2010
"I ALWAYS COME off to cats like you as negative, but it's not that way. I'm just honest." Shelby Lynne's been explaining what it is ...
Steve Earle: Alive and Kicking: Steve Earle
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2011
STEVE EARLE IS, as his fellow Americans are wont to say, in a good place. "I'm pretty happy. I've got a new little boy, a ...
Courtney Pine: Common Cause: Courtney Pine is making all the right connections
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2011
IF THE JAZZ police, those self-appointed protectors of a genre that's about freedom of expression (the irony is obviously lost on them), didn't know what ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2011
IF I WERE TO tell you that Alison Krauss has won more Grammy Awards than any other female artist, and is third on the all-time ...
Gillian Welch: Air Miles: A Transatlantic Conversation with Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, Fall 2011
MOBILE PHONES, don't you just hate them? I know that to most of the Earth's populace they're as essential as a limb these days, but ...
Lisa Hannigan: Companion Piece
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2012
David Burke spends a little time with Lisa Hannigan and hears how her latest solo album, Passenger, is an altogether more relaxed affair. ...
Nanci Griffith: Blue Moons and True Believers
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2012
About to make a welcome return to our concert halls and with a new album imminent, Nanci Griffith is in conversation with R2's David Burke. ...
Simone Felice: Beyond Thunderdome
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2012
Acclaimed singer-songwriter and sometime novelist Simone Felice talks life, love and near-death with fellow author – and R2 philosopher – David Burke. ...
Bonnie Raitt: Slipstream Effect: Bonnie Raitt
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, June 2012
IT'S BEEN A TOUGH seven years for Bonnie Raitt since the release of her last studio album, Souls Alike. She lost both her parents, Broadway ...
Carolina Chocolate Drops: Sweet Sounds: Rhiannon Giddens and Carolina Chocolate Drops
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, June 2012
RHIANNON GIDDENS'S birthday back in February was a bittersweet occasion. The Carolina Chocolate Drops co-founder-member's celebrations were tempered by her grief upon learning of the ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2012
His is a remarkable success story but, Seasick Steve tells David Burke, he takes nothing for granted ...
Declan Sinnott: All the right noises
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2012
Declan Sinnott's recently released solo record is cause for celebration, as David Burke reports. ...
Hurray for the Riff Raff: Protest and Survive
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2012
MUSIC AS AN instrument of change – remember that concept? It may seem a little naïve at a time when even the mighty have fallen ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, Winter 2012
THE BEATLES may have come from Liverpool, England – but they were made in Hamburg, Germany. That, at least, is the view of Allan Williams, ...
Rick Nelson: Ricky Nelson: Tragic Teen Idol And Rockabilly Tearaway
Profile by David Burke, Vintage Rock, Summer 2012
FOR SOMEONE who, in his pomp between 1957 and 1963, was almost as big as Elvis Presley, Ricky Nelson appeared neither comfortable with or conscious ...
Alabama Shakes: Shakin' All Over: Alabama Shakes
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, Summer 2012
They've already created more buzz than a swarm of angry bees and, good news, they're returning to the UK later this year. Brittany Howard of ...
Rodney Crowell, Emmylou Harris: Old Friends, New Record: Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2013
It was a long time coming but, as Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell explain to David Burke, their new album together was all a matter ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2013
HUMILITY can be a deceptive character trait. Those who profess it are not always quite as humble as they seem. Like Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, "He ...
Ron Sexsmith: A spoonful of sugar
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, September 2013
Canadian singer-songwriter Ron Sexsmith's true-life confessions are easy to swallow, says David Burke. So why isn't he more widely prescribed? ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, November 2013
"PEOPLE ALWAYS say that we broke up. We never broke up – we're a family," says Moya Brennan of Clannad's return to the studio for ...
Profile by David Burke, Vintage Rock, Winter 2013
LISTEN TO The Million Dollar Quartet Sessions, the seminal 1956 recording of Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash jamming at Sun ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, Spring 2013
WHEN HURRICANE KATRINA devastated New Orleans in 2005, resulting in the deaths of some 1,833 people and causing property damage estimated at £1,300 billion, a ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, Summer 2013
BILL HALEY was an unlikely pioneer of the rock'n'roll revolution. Even in his pomp he looked like your dad. ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2014
THE ANNALS OF rock 'n' roll are littered with tragic narratives of lives cut short in their prime, whether it be Eddie Cochran's death in ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2014
DR JOY DEGRUY coined the term Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome to describe the multi-generational trauma experienced by African Americans as a consequence of slavery. In ...
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2014
SHERYL CROW'S made a country album, they said. She's living down there in Nashville, hanging out with Vince Gill and Brad Paisley, going to church ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2014
LOOKING BACK often means you can no longer be arsed looking forward. That you'd much rather retrace your footprints on the road behind than make ...
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2014
HARD TO BELIEVE now, given her adulatory reputation among commentators and contemporaries alike, but when Lucinda Williams was hawking her songs around, looking for a ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, May 2014
"YOU FOLKS KEPT us alive, thank goodness. If it wasn't for you all over there, a lot of us wouldn't still be playing," says Sonny ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2014
HOLLY WILLIAMS carries her lineage lightly. Which can't be easy when your grandfather was Hank Williams Sr, the beating heart and tortured soul of country ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2014
JAKE BUGG is giving me the run around. He has already postponed our interview twice at short notice, and now here he goes again, evading ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, September 2014
IT WAS 1979. Year Zero had been and gone, though the confrontational, contrary spirit of punk was manifest in the new wave, while its emphasis ...
The Delines: Willy Vlautin's New Band
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, December 2014
ON RICHMOND FONTAINE'S last tour, Willy Vlautin used to dream about being in a country soul band with support act Amy Boone. Then one night, ...
Anne Briggs, June Tabor: June Tabor: The Art Of Singing
Book Excerpt by David Burke, 'Singing Out' (Soundcheck), 2015
An excerpt from Singing Out: A Folk Narrative of Maddy Prior, June Tabor and Linda Thompson. ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, January 2015
DOLORES KEANE has been through the mill. Conspicuous by her absence from Irish folk song this century, she spent most of those wilderness years inveterately ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, March 2015
"TO SURVIVE without a hit record for 63 years and make a good living – that's the success of Charlie Gracie," says the rock'n'roll pioneer ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2015
THE OBJECTS OF pop culture iconography never grow old. Elvis Presley is forever framed as the hip-thrusting, kiss-curled, impossibly beautiful boy king, just as Bob ...
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2015
RYAN BINGHAM'S IN a more hopeful place these days. And though his humility wouldn't countenance my or anyone else saying so, it makes you glad ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2015
DON'T TELL THE wife, but I've fallen for Buffy Sainte-Marie. She probably doesn't feel the same way about me, but then being well-versed in the ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, July 2015
THEY WERE acclaimed as pioneers of the surf sound alongside Dick Dale, Link Wray and the Ventures, but the Fireballs, who enjoyed a US chart ...
Joss Stone: Water for Joss Stone's Soul
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2015
"PEOPLE WOULD SAY, 'So, who do you think you are singing these soul music songs when you are 16 and you're white and you're from ...
Elvis Presley: Elvis and Black Music
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, October 2015
SO THE STORY goes that Elvis stole black music, exploited the influences he absorbed while growing up on the blurred edges of the coloured line ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 1 October 2015
LEGENDARY AMERICAN producer Bob Johnston once suggested of Bob Dylan that he was "filled with the holy spirit". The same could have been said of ...
Waylon Jennings: Best Friend of Mine: Waylon Jennings on Buddy Holly
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2016
HE MAY BE renowned as a pioneer of outlaw country, but Waylon Jennings had a rock'n'roll past long before he caused apoplexy among the Nashville ...
Sleeve notes by David Burke, Repertoire Records, 2016
THEY WERE Native American culture in vivid sound and colour, contemporary scions of a proud people, renewing primordial rhythms and imagery, making them new again ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, February 2016
IT'S BEEN A long hiatus, punctuated by the joy of nativity, the sorrow of bereavement and the pursuit of singular ambition, but the Corrs – ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, March 2016
THE WORD "legend" has been devalued by misappropriation in modern linguistic currency. These days it is increasingly (and stupidly) used as a synonym for "star" ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, May 2016
DONNIE FRITTS MAY be an alumnus of Muscle Shoals, the Alabama mecca of southern soul, and a renowned songwriter and recording artist in his own ...
Report and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, June 2016
WHEN BEN HARPER reunited with his band, the Innocent Criminals, for a sold-out four-night run at San Francisco's Fillmore in March, 2015, seven years after ...
Thomas Dolby: Godfathers of Pop: Thomas Dolby
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2016
BEFORE HE EMERGED as a pioneering figure of electronic music in the 1980s, Thomas Dolby wrote Lene Lovich's single, 'New Toy', appeared on the Thompson ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2016
WHEN YOU THINK about it, email is only a truncated form of letter writing. The art of literary correspondence re-imagined. And every bit as revealing ...
Interview by David Burke, R2/Rock'n'Reel, July 2016
IF THE Haitian government wants to improve the international perception of its country, appointing Leyla McCalla as cultural ambassador with a roaming brief could be ...
Morcheeba, Skye|Ross: Skye | Ross
Profile and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, October 2016
Morcheeba, helmed by Paul Godfrey's immaculate production, Skye Edwards' ethereal vocals and Ross Godfrey's luminous guitar, mapped out their own singular sonic territory in the ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Classic Pop, December 2016
WE CAN TALK about the ephemeral magic of pop music. About the quick fix, the instant buzz, about getting off or becoming blissed out on ...
Chuck Berry in Hail! Hail! Mr Rock & Roll
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2017
CHUCK BERRY WAS "more complicated, more difficult, more diabolical" than any movie star, according to the man who directed him in Hail! Hail! Rock'n'Roll. Yet ...
Elvis Presley: Elvis & the Hustler: Colonel Tom Parker
Retrospective by David Burke, 'Vintage Rock – Elvis: A Celebration', 2017
NONE OF US will ever know if Elvis Presley would have become the king of rock'n'roll without the involvement of Colonel Tom Parker at the ...
The Beatles, Roy Orbison: Roy and the Boys: Roy Orbison and the Beatles On Tour
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2017
PICTURE THE SCENE – Roy Orbison is at the back of the bus working on 'Oh, Pretty Woman', the song that would become his biggest ...
Traveling Wilburys: Famous Five
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2017
In the last year of his life, Roy Orbison enjoyed a renaissance in both his solo career and as part of a super group that ...
Chuck Berry: You Can't Catch Me: Chuck Berry's Final Years
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2017
THE ARTIST IS immortalised in death as seldom in life. At least that's mostly the way of things. But not when it came to Chuck ...
Jim Lauderdale: Jim Changes Everything
Interview by David Burke, Country Music, February 2017
JIM LAUDERDALE knows his country music history – and he's very aware of his and his contemporaries' modest place in it compared to the iconic ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, March 2017
AMERICAN CULTURAL icon Dick Clark once described Bobby Darin as "a musical chameleon" who could effortlessly traverse a multiplicity of genres, from heavy duty rhythm ...
The Staple Singers: Working for the Lord
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, March 2017
THE STAPLE SINGERS were Americana before the term was even coined. They may have emerged from the gospel tradition, but the Chicago family – father ...
Mike + the Mechanics: Engineering a New Future
Profile and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, April 2017
It may have begun as a side project away from Genesis while Phil Collins tried to sort out his marital difficulties, but Mike + the ...
Frankie Valli: Back in the High Life Again
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, May 2017
IF IT WASN'T for music, Frankie Valli might have ended up in a life of crime – just like Rusty Millio, the character he played ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, August 2017
HE WAS A pioneer of the British soul movement of the 1990s, alongside Brand New Heavies, Young Disciples and Jamiroquai, but Omar claims the genre's ...
Soweto Kinch: A Singular Jazz Odyssey
Profile and Interview by David Burke, All About Jazz, 10 August 2017
SOWETO KINCH was a curious teenager when an encounter with Wynton Marsalis impelled him on his own jazz odyssey. An odyssey characterised by the creation ...
Stevie Wonder: Sound and Vision
Retrospective by David Burke, Classic Pop, October 2017
STEVIE WONDER had reached the summit with the wildly ambitious 1976 double album Songs in the Key of Life. It would become the best-selling and most ...
Denys Baptiste, John Coltrane: Denys Baptiste: Making the Late Trane Accessible
Profile and Interview by David Burke, All About Jazz, 10 October 2017
EVEN THE MOST avowed John Coltrane disciples among us would admit to grappling with some of the albums he released in the couple of years ...
Herbie Hancock, Omar, Courtney Pine: Courtney Pine
Profile and Interview by David Burke, All About Jazz, 16 October 2017
COURTNEY PINE didn't pick up his beloved tenor saxophone for more than a decade, until an album exploring the black British experience demanded it. The ...
Big Mama Thornton: Big Mama's Blues
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, November 2017
BIG MAMA THORNTON – alias Willie Mae Thornton – knew how it worked. Like her black R&B contemporaries, male and female (but especially female), she ...
Debbie Gibson: All-American Girl
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, November 2017
DEBBIE GIBSON feels as though she's in a Tina Turner moment at this stage of her career, on the precipice of a midlife renaissance. ...
Luke Haines: Godfathers of Pop: Luke Haines
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, November 2017
LUKE HAINES has fronted the Auteurs, Baader Meinhof and Black Box Recorder, released 13 albums under his own name, composed the soundtrack for Paul Tickell's ...
Profile and Interview by David Burke, Country Music Legends, Summer 2017
SHE'S SOLD MORE than 100 million albums, chalked up twenty six number ones on the Billboard country charts, won nine Grammys and received the U.S. ...
Cliff Richard: Arise, Sir Cliff
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2018
FOR SOMEONE who'd enjoyed a consistent run of success, not to mention the adulation of the public since 'Move It'launched him as Britain's answer to ...
Little Richard: Great Gosh A'Mighty
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2018
THE FIRST SIGN appeared on a flight from Melbourne to Sydney in 1957. Little Richard was travelling up country as part of a touring bill ...
Echo & the Bunnymen: Shooting from the Lip
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, January 2018
STEVE EARLE ONCE said he'd stand on Bob Dylan's coffee table and declare his mentor Townes Van Zandt the best songwriter he'd ever heard. ...
Michael McDonald: The Godfather of Pop — Michael McDonald
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, January 2018
In a career spanning more than 40 years, Michael McDonald has been a member of Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers, sang with Ray Charles, ...
Zara McFarlane: Embodying the Spirit of Jamaica
Profile and Interview by David Burke, All About Jazz, 13 January 2018
ZARA MCFARLANE may have been made in Britain, but she belongs to Jamaica. The land of her mother and father is written in her soul ...
Alexander O'Neal: The Resurrection of Alexander O'Neal
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, February 2018
He was sacked by Prince, only to find fame and lose it all in an orgy of decadence. Now adopted Mancunian Alexander O'Neal is back. ...
Kim Wilde — Close Encounters of the Wilde Kind
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, March 2018
"I always figured that the music world and my voice were connected and that was my destiny," says Kim Wilde. And she wasn't wrong. Now ...
Sister Rosetta Tharpe: Hymn to Her
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, May 2018
THE GODMOTHER of Rock'n'Roll, the Original Soul Sister, the First Lady of Rock are just some of the epithets posthumously bestowed on Sister Rosetta Tharpe ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2018
IT WAS A PARTY staged to express solidarity with the world's most famous political prisoner, while concurrently expressing vehement opposition to an overtly racist system ...
The Special AKA: When Pop Went Political: Nelson Mandela's 70th Birthday Tribute Concert
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2018
IT WAS A party staged to express solidarity with the world's most famous political prisoner, while concurrently expressing vehement opposition to an overtly racist system ...
Swing Out Sister: Pledging Their Allegiance
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, July 2018
They broke the Top 10 on both sides of the Atlantic with 'Breakout' in 1986, recorded with Jimmy Webb and made it big Japan. Now ...
Dannii Minogue: Stepping Out of the Shadow
Profile and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, August 2018
Fifteen years ago, Dannii Minogue reinvented herself as a dance icon with Neon Nights, a classic of the genre which bears favourable comparison with big ...
David Byrne: Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Live Review by David Burke, Classic Pop, August 2018
ALL THE SUPERLATIVES you've heard or read about David Byrne's American Utopia tour are true. ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, September 2018
Level 42 embark on a 19-date Eternity tour of the UK this autumn. But don't expect to hear anything new. "I'm as dry as granny's ...
Candi Staton: The Godmother of Pop: Candi Staton
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, September 2018
CANDI STATON is set to release Unstoppable, her 30th album of a 50-year career, and hoping to score a sixth hit in as many decades. ...
Toyah Willcox: Toyah: Forever Free
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, September 2018
1977 and all that may have come and gone, but Toyah brought the punk aesthetic into '80s pop music with her radical sense of style ...
Martin Stephenson & The Daintees: The Godfather of Pop: Martin Stephenson
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, October 2018
THE NOW-DEFUNCT Sounds magazine reckoned Martin Stephenson "one of the finest and grossly underrated singer-songwriters this country has given birth to". ...
Dionne Warwick: Birmingham Symphony Hall
Live Review by David Burke, Classic Pop, November 2018
THE VOICE MAY have withered with age – the range not so extensive, the lung capacity not so voluminous – but Dionne Warwick remains a ...
Johnny Hates Jazz: Clark Datchler: The Jazz Singer
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, December 2018
"I SHOULD HAVE been more patient, but I just wanted to get on with the next thing," is how an older, wiser Clark Datchler reflects ...
Howard Jones: Breaking Down Barriers
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, December 2018
MUSIC HAS always been a tribal thing, and the music press – Classic Pop excepted, of course – has always derived a certain sadistic pleasure ...
Screamin' Jay Hawkins: Spellbound
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, Summer 2018
FOR SOMEONE whose live performances involved climbing out of a coffin, it came as no surprise that Screamin' Jay Hawkins resurrected his career in the ...
Jerry Lee Lewis: Lights, Camera, Action!
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, 2019
THE YEAR WAS 1957, when Jerry Lee Lewis' parents finally caught up with much of America and bought a TV set. According to Rick Bragg, ...
Joe Jackson: Don't Look Back in Anger
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, February 2019
JOE JACKSON doesn't strike you as someone who's all that bothered about anniversaries, preferring to remain in the present rather than return to the past. ...
Bronski Beat: The Godfather of Pop: Steve Bronski
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2019
SEMINAL SYNTHPOP outfit Bronski Beat – Steve Bronski, Jimmy Somerville and Larry Steinbachek – unwittingly became a mouthpiece for gay issues with their 1984 debut ...
Junior Giscombe: The Godfathers of Pop: Junior Giscombe
Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2019
JUNIOR GISCOMBE cut his teeth as a backing vocalist with Linx before enjoying success as a solo artist with 'Mama Used to Say', a 1982 ...
Men at Work: Unfinished Business: Men Back At Work
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2019
Fronted by a Scottish native who relocated down under in his teens, Men At Work glimpsed greatness before it all became a bit Spinal Tap. ...
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, June 2019
Reggae may have been born in Jamaica, but it grew up in '80s Britain at a time of evolving multiculturalism, finding an unlikely ally in ...
Five Star: And Then There Was One…
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Classic Pop, October 2019
At their '80s peak Five Star lived the high life in a Berkshire mansion and drove a fleet of supercars. But then the hits dried ...
Hank Ballard and the Midnighters: Hank Ballard: A Simple Twist of Fate
Retrospective and Interview by David Burke, Vintage Rock, November 2019
Chubby Checker may have become synonymous with 'The Twist', but that didn't bother the song's composer. "It was a blessing for me," said Hank Ballard ...
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock, December 2019
America was riven by racial conflict when rock'n'roll breached the colour line, uniting black and white youth in a precursor to the hard-won equalities of ...
Gary Crosby: The Ultimate Warrior: Gary Crosby
Book Excerpt by David Burke, Giant Steps (Desert Hearts), 2021
(Excerpt from Giant Steps: Diverse Journeys in British Jazz, published by Desert Hearts 2021) ...
The Beatles, The Quarrymen: The Quarrymen — A Legend is Born
Retrospective by David Burke, Vintage Rock Presents The Beatles: The Early Years, 2022
"EVERYBODY WAS in a skiffle group," said George Harrison of the hep new craze that swept through Britain in 1956. ...
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