The Brag

Charlotte Aitchison, AKA Charli XCX, is trudging home in the cold, taking interviews on her mobile between studio sessions; it’s 10:30 at night, and London is freezing. Much of Britain is suffering an unseasonably cold spring – head-high snowdrifts, dead puffins washing up on beaches, etc. “It’s kinda like Ice Age over here,” Aitchison laughs. She’s hoping it’s not actually a sign of impending apocalypse. “It would be such a shame if the world ended the day before my album came out and no one ever heard it.”

Posted: April 15th, 2013 under Brag 508, Music, Music - Interview.
Tags: Caitlin Welsh, True Romance, Warner

The zombie bubble must surely be close to bursting – along with BBC series In The Flesh, Warm Bodies might be the flagship film for the zombie-rehabilitation trope. R (Nicholas Hoult), a zombie who used to be a very handsome twenty-something, spends his days shuffling around an airport exchanging grunts with a ‘friend’ (Rob Corddry) and occasionally shuffling out in packs in search of delicious brains. His inner monologue is smart and self-aware, however when he spends some time with the beautiful human Julie (Teresa Palmer) – whom he rescued from an attack on her scavenging group by his own undead buddies – his language skills start to improve. As a result, the sense of humour and kindness he shows in the few syllables he can manage challenge the assumptions the human survivors have been making about the zombies for the eight years since they took over.

Posted: April 15th, 2013 under Arts, Brag 508, Film Reviews.
Tags: Caitlin Welsh, Warm Bodies

There’s a scene in Warm Bodies where our protagonist, known only as R, is trying to work out how to strike up a conversation with his new acquaintance, Julie; he hasn’t had a girl over in a while and is kind of struggling for an opening line. In voiceover, we hear him pleading with himself: “Don’t be creepy, don’t be creepy, don’t be creepy.” It’s a scene that’s relatable for anyone over 13 with a pulse – despite R’s lack of one. Talking to girls was hard enough even before the zombie apocalypse.

Posted: April 8th, 2013 under Arts, Arts - Interview, Brag 507, New.
Tags: Caitlin Welsh, Nicholas Hoult, Warm Bodies

Having squeezed as much as he can out of pop stardom, JT is determined to be seen as an Entertainer. From the orchestral flourish that opens the album Experience, to the framing device of harmony-soaked soul groove ‘That Girl’ – which introduces JT & The Tennessee Kids, his orchestra – to the suiting (Tom Ford, natch) and epic average track length (seven minutes), everything about The 20/20 Experience seems tailored to reframe Justin Timberlake as timeless, his transformation from the jheri-curled teen idol to pop innovator nearly complete.

Posted: March 25th, 2013 under Album Reviews, Brag 505, Music.
Tags: Caitlin Welsh, Justin Timberlake, RCA/Sony, The 20/20 Experience

Producer/multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Jamie Lidell’s multiple personalities are best displayed on his 2005 breakthrough second album, aptly titled Multiply – Sunday-morning soul, glitchy loop-based electronica, sly funk, and the list goes on. On each subsequent album Lidell has explored each of his musical personas in more depth. 2008’s Jim is wonderfully straightforward, spot-on piano soul; the Beck-produced Compass (2010) was a sprawling collection of dark stomp-and-glitch pop; and now comes his first self-titled record, which is packed full of witty, unselfconscious funk grooves.

Posted: March 4th, 2013 under Album Reviews, Brag 502, Music.
Tags: Caitlin Welsh, Jamie Lidell, Warp/Inertia