Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
There is no shame in taking it to the limit, for by admitting your love for the song, the moment in which art fuels one’s very being, it becomes the beauty in the obsession; and even if you only see that fascination come out the shadows on the very odd occasion, the only decent response is to play for all your money is worth, to take that limit and see it go beyond the stars.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
There are few typically warm, lovingly affectionate, and genuinely positive welcomes to the Philharmonic Hall stage as there is joyfully reserved for what could be said to be the elder statesmen and women of the music world. The ones to whom kick started off the whole love affair with British pop music, to the ones who found fame not once, but over the course of different bands and outings, who made the crowd sing along to the best known, and sometimes more obscure, songs, the heroes of the 60s have always held a special place in the hearts of music lovers.
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The air and atmosphere inside the Echo Arena was still, a feeling arguably of the uncertainty of time in which the overbearingly hot, sweat-filled and almost distaste of a lack of summer breeze coming off the Mersey, ran riot with the emotions of the thousands who were there, milling around, some hand in hand, others clutching the only means of cooling down they could find, a full circle reached, in a way that only Roger Waters perhaps could achieve.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
When the bell tolls, the lightning strikes and the thunder finds a way to roll across the landscape and leave the witness in awe at the sunshine and the dripping sweat of Earth that will inevitably follow afterwards, it is always good to know that your gut instincts were right, that those who follow the artist through the rain and the youthful poise, will bask in the radiance that takes them onwards, that they will become the rainbow that heralds a music dawn.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
The ashes of many a phoenix has been blown and scattered to the four winds, the dust getting in the music lover’s eye and causing the bitter sting of regret and unfulfilled potential; to many a phoenix, the fire was not enough to resurrect them, the burning flame that catches the soul and gives it new life, simply went cold, started to fade and those ashes, they became another memory of what was, a golden bird in flight.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
It is perhaps the act of melodrama, the memory of what has passed in the spaces we call, home, work and the venues we have held close to our hearts when the love of art and the artistic comes calling, but to feel the shiver of the beautiful instruction of the haunting vibe, that is perhaps a moment in which to savour, in which to pursue the past and implore it to be part of the future, that is the basis in which love takes root.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Southbound Attic Band, Constellations, Liverpool. June 2018. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
The Southbound Attic Band may have recently given the people of London a run for their money with a deserved display of Merseyside passion, they may have taken on what may seem like to be the world, its wife and those to whom have not had the pleasure of their company in the past, but where do you go from there, for the pleasure of their company and the wonderful outlook of the true-life observational lyric, it is to know that Ronnie Clark and Barry Jones will always stay humble, will always be the epitome of the honest raised eyebrow and have the wit of a thousand people chugging through their hearts.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Thom Morecroft at Liverpool Calling 2018. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
Life is busy, we have made it our mission it seems to fill the hours in such a way that to sit still for a while and take in the sound of a local great might raise a few eyebrows on the faces of those who believe we should always be expending energy; that you are not actually being productive if you not moving a muscle.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Michael Bennett at Constellations, Liverpool. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
It seems only right after all that the velvet tones of Michael Bennett should be on show at some point during this year’s Liverpool Calling, a weekend of music held across several venues and with even greater scope than perhaps had been imagined when the team behind the festival started out. What has always been a certain fact though is just how good Mr. Bennett has become over the years, the sound of velvet doesn’t come by accident, it takes dedication and hard work, the muster of any serious and patient performer.
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In the self-styled Theatre of Dreams, it is perhaps fitting that one American music legend can turn up to Old Trafford football ground, and with great artistic tongue in cheek, play to the local crowd’s hearts by performing the opening segments to the local anthem of the Stretford End faithful before hitting home with a set list that won’t be heard anywhere else in the country this year.