Art Craft and Leisure news

PETER GABRIEL

Live At WOMAD 1982 (Real World)

Coming less than two months after his last live release, In The Big Room, this truly rare recording is a great contrast to that last album’s 2003 live capture. This 1982 show was pivotal in Gabriel’s career – the headline set from his inaugural WOMAD festival. What has gone on to become an institution for music performance from across the world started as all new festivals do, an experiment – in this case, one organised by Gabriel himself.

What Live At WOMAD 1982 captures so well is the energy of the band and the crowd. It’s an unusual set, deliberately avoiding promoting a particular new release; there’s a good spread of material from across his first four, self-titled albums. This performance came just a year before Gabriel’s epic Plays Live, but comprising only nine tracks it’s much tighter, and makes for a great, hits-free set, with I Go Swimming and the moving, closing Biko two particular highlights.

words JOHN-PAUL DAVIES

Live at WOMAD 1982 by Peter Gabriel

Presenters of individual awards will include Celia Imrie, Richard Osman, Jessica Gunning, Chris McCausland, Dani Dyer, Danny Dyer, Lennie James, Lenny Rush, Marisa Abela, Mel Giedroyc, Sue Perkins, Tinie Tempah, Nick Frost, Nick Mohammed, Paapa Essiedu and Rick Astley.

GUTTERSNIPE

Extinction Burst! (Night School)

Self-proclaimed XFCER (Xenofeminist crisis-energy rock) duo Guttersnipe arrive with a new racket, eight years after their debut. Guttersnipe deal in delivering maximal noise and destruction and push the boundaries on what can be achieved as a two-piece. Screeched vocals, bursts of percussion triggering synth modules pushing out possessed dialup internet memories, and ultra-processed guitar all compete to be the first to induce an anxiety attack.

If you’re easily overstimulated, this probably isn’t the album for you, but persevering and white-knuckling through delivers an experience that is the antithesis of the increasingly dreary world of AI-generated slop, endless war and bigotry we are cursed to live in. For reference, they would easily slot into the label rosters of Skin Graft or (the now-dormant) Load – so think a more druggy Ruins with a touch of Athletic Automaton and you’re halfway to getting some idea of the madness presented here.  

words GARETH MOULE

Sometimes we desperately want to believe in aliens, sometimes we think those who do believe in aliens are loonies, and sometimes we experience both at the same time. Chasing Aliens, the latest book from Orwell Prize-winning journalist Daniel Lavelle, explores our fascination with extraterrestrial beings, those who claim to have seen them, and those who desperately wish to see.

Inspired by erstwhile Blink-182 member Tom DeLonge’s commitment to proving we are not alone in the universe, Lavelle examines evidence, both for and against, and asks whether we can ever know if there are aliens among us. He also touches on the history of aliens in our collective consciousness, and the role of aliens in modern media.  

Lavelle’s writing is engaging and easy to breeze through, without losing the depth of the ideas conveyed within. While eye-witness accounts are relayed and government documents are poured through, Lavelle doesn’t treat the search for alien life as a surface-level conspiracy theory. Instead, he asks why we’re so fascinated with life on other planets, what it says about us as a species, even going so far as to ask whether believe in alien life could replace religion in modern life.    The book is a fascinating read, and offers fresh insight into an aspect of popular culture many of us know well.