STEVE JOHNSON relishes a celebration of the commonality of folk music and its links with the struggles of working people the world over
Phoenix by Sadie Jemmett
Nice enough but musically mundane
This thriller is a politically charged and morally complex dive into climate activism and police repression, judges JENNY FARRELL
Cat show killer, avenging the pawns, women hunt the Ripper, and running dry in the outback
The Bard reflects on sharing a bed, and why he wont go to Chelsea
MARY CONWAY applauds a new play that foresees the unscrupulous tactics of a future far-right minority government
RON JACOBS is moved to tears by an eloquent journal of heartfelt intensity and human portraiture
ROBERT OVETZ recommends a case study, from the University of Leicester, in their struggle against precarization, AI, privatisation, outsourcing, and work intensification in higher education
Sadie Jemmett
Phoenix
(TwoUpTwoDown Records)
IF YOU like MOR US artists like Mary Chapin Carpenter, Beth Nielsen Chapman and Gretchen Peters, then the new album from English singer-songwriter Sadie Jemmett will sound familiar.
A collection of Radio 2-friendly country-folk songs, she moves easily between confessional and introspective ballads and more worldly concerns. Don’t Silence Me takes on the #MeToo movement — “Take your hands off my sister/Didn’t you hear her say NO?” — while The Wilder Shores of Love deals with the refugee crisis.
On Good Friday she sounds a lot like Alanis Morissette, while Leonard’s Waltz finds her talking Brexit, David Bowie and Leonard Cohen.
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