WHERE: Picturehouse Central
WHEN: 12/10
WHEN OUT: 14/10
Louis Theroux is best known for his TV documentaries but together with producer Simon Chinn is speaking about the first to receive a cinema release, My Scientology Movie, which premieres at the London Film Festival on 14/10.
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
WHERE: King’s Cross Theatre
WHEN: 9/10 (matinee), press night 13/10, runs to 3/1
This musical won four Tonys, had its UK premiere at the Southwark Playhouse last year and returns in 2015 with a mix of old cast and new including former Sugababe and Eurovision star Jade Ewen.
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
OUT: 9/10
Tracklist: Intro; Grey Tickles, Black Pressure; Snug Slacks; Guess How I Know; You and Him; Down Here; Voodoo Doll; Global Warming; Magma Arrives; Black Blizzard; Disappointing; No More Tangles; Geraldine; Outro.
John Grant’s third album is not out until Friday but we’ve had a sneak preview and can give you the lowdown here.
WORTH A LOOK?: ***
WHERE: Donmar Warehouse
WHEN: 5/10, press night 7/10 runs to 5/12
Gay suicides in US universities are a sensitive subject and one that receives no easy answers or solutions despite a great deal of exploration from all angles here.
Hurts’ third album Surrender is out 9/10 and includes singles Lights (YouTube clip above, and Hurts’ best single since Wonderful Life) and Some Kind Of Heaven. We’ve also heard tracks Rolling Stone, Slow, Nothing Will Be Bigger Than Us, Weight Of The World and the title track and saw the band for the tenth time at their last UK gig at the Scala in June. We’d imagine this album would be their best because it’s the most pop. They play Brixton Academy in February. Tickets here.
WHERE: BFI
WHEN: 17/9
We are about to watch the opening episode in the 6th and final season of Downton Abbey when ITV director of television Peter Fincham leaps on stage unexpectedly to tell us this is the beginning rather than the end.
Suede have released the 66-second trailer (above) for 7th studio album Night Thoughts as well as details of the two-night LP plus film launch at Camden Roundhouse.
5. X Factor debut
16 years old and singing a very personal song she wrote herself, the Lincolnshire chanteuse announced herself to the world in X Factor’s class of 2012. Missed would later appear on her 2014 chart-topping UK debut album. Even Cher tweeted her approval of Ella’s cover of her Believe in a later audition. That acoustic cover appears on the deluxe version of Chapter One.
WORTH A LOOK: ***
WHERE: Old Vic
WHEN: 5/9, previews to 10/9, runs to 3/10
The story at the heart of Future Conditional has similarities to the life of Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai.
Does anyone have a better taste in female duet partners? We saw Grant three times last year: Glastonbury, Royal Festival Hall and duetting with Alison Goldfrapp at the Albert Hall. Sinead O’Connor appeared on last proper album Pale Green Ghosts and here former Everything But The Girl star Thorn is duetting (see YouTube clip above) on gorgeous lines like: ‘Francis Bacon, the Dolomites, ballet dancers with or without tights, Central Park on an autumn day, always stunning and never cliche.’ And if that sounds too Vogue Madonna, the chorus reverts to type (‘All these things, they’re just Disappointing …’) until the O’Connor-esque payoff (‘… compared to you.’) Musically, it’s a return to the jauntier elements of breakthrough Queen of Denmark album.
