Michael Awosoga-Samuel

Michael Awosoga-Samuel is a former Readings bookseller

Review — 26 Jun 2016

Case/Lang/Veirs by Neko Case, k.d. lang & Laura Veirs

I greeted this album with such excitement; here three musicians that I have admired for some time have made a record together. The story goes that k.d. lang called both…

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Review — 26 Jun 2016

Three-Martini Lunch by Suzanne Rindell

I must admit that I was very excited to read a story about publishing in New York City in the late 1950s, and especially one voiced by three very different…

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Review — 25 Apr 2016

Seven Sonnets And A Song by Paul Kelly

To mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, the great wordsmith is honoured by one of Australia’s great songwriters, Paul Kelly, with this collaboration. In Seven Sonnets & A Song

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Review — 22 Apr 2014

The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden by Jonas Jonasson

Jonas Jonasson’s first book, The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, was published to critical and commercial success in 2009, and his new book adopts a…

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Review — 24 Nov 2013

Disconnected In New York City by Los Lobos

Los Lobos celebrate 40 years together with this live album, Disconnected, recorded at the City Winery in New York City in December 2012. I am only just beginning to…

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Review — 3 Nov 2013

Reflektor by Arcade Fire

At the time of their first album release, Funeral, there was a huge critical hype around Arcade Fire being the next ‘big thing’. Though at that time, in the mid-noughties…

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Blog post — 25 Jul 2013

An Album That Changed My Life: Swordfishtrombones by Tom Waits

I was 15 and growing up in London at a time in the early 80s when your attire was a direct indication of the music you were listening to. I…

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Review — 7 Apr 2013

Om Suite Ohm by Harry Manx

Slide guitarist and musical innovator Harry Manx is something of a globetrotting musical explorer. Stints in Japan and India, where he learnt the 20-string Mohan Veena under the tutelage of…

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Review — 7 Apr 2013

Machines of Love and Grace by Martha Tilston

British folk singer Martha Tilston first came to my attention with the release of 2007’s Of Milkmaids & Architects, about the same time that I began listening to The…

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Review — 7 Apr 2013

Lonesome Dreams by Lord Huron

Musician and artist Ben Schneider first conceived of Lord Huron as a solo project after his move to LA (the name is taken from Lake Huron in Michigan, where Ben…

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