Plus: Iranian electronic musicians reflect on a year of protest
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Picks of the week
A bassline and drumbeat puts everyone on the same page
Mercury prize winners Ezra Collective  
A bassline and drumbeat puts everyone on the same page
As the genre-hopping London group visit Lagos – the home of Afrobeat – ahead of a Royal Albert Hall gig, bandleader Femi Koleoso explains how music can create positive social change amid poverty and youth violence
Britney Spears  
The Woman in Me – a pop star’s stinging rebuke
‘I’ve been waiting all my life to shed light on them’  
Musicians on their unsung home-town heroes
Women, life, freedom!  
Iranian electronic musicians reflect on a year of protest
Reviews
Alexis Petridis's album of the week  
Billy Bragg: The Roaring Forty – four decades of flying the flag
Billy Bragg: The Roaring Forty – four decades of flying the flag
Ragana  
Desolation’s Flower – amazing guitar tone lights up doomy incantations
Folk album of the month  
ØXN: CYRM – Irish folk debut full of unsettling dark magic
Lost Girls  
Selvutsletter – flashes of brilliance from Jenny Hval
 

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Spotlight
The music site Bandcamp is beloved and unique. I shudder at its corporate takeover
Opinion  
The music site Bandcamp is beloved and unique. I shudder at its corporate takeover
The prospect of something so valuable becoming just another strip-mined corporate wreck inspires genuine grief
Classical
‘Music for you must only be an ornament’  
How Fanny Mendelssohn’s voice was stifled, then saved
How Fanny Mendelssohn’s voice was stifled, then saved
Schiff/Höbarth/Coin  
Schubert piano trios are a quiet delight
Schubert piano trios are a quiet delight
Mozart  
Piano Concs K238 and 503 – cool precision from Kristian Bezuidenhout on a period fortepiano
Piano Concs K238 and 503 – cool precision from Kristian Bezuidenhout on a period fortepiano
Add to playlist
Ranked!  
Barbra Streisand’s 20 greatest songs
Barbra Streisand’s 20 greatest songs
‘I went into labour at a Radiohead gig’  
Sadie Frost’s honest playlist
You may have missed
Budgie, Lol Tolhurst and Jacknife Lee on their supergroup rebirth
‘Like the Three Tenors, but with drummers’  
Budgie, Lol Tolhurst and Jacknife Lee on their supergroup rebirth
The drummers from the Banshees and the Cure joked about a collaboration until – with megaproducer Lee on board – they were soon jamming with The Edge and Bobby Gillespie. They talk pop, alcoholism and leaving the UK
Gloriously unfiltered and unfocused, Britney Spears’s memoir made me believe she’s finally free
The actions taken by Spears in response to the madness around her were, in the circumstances, only proof of her sanity, says Guardian columnist Emma Brockes
The Birthday Party  
The danger, drugs and rancour behind Nick Cave’s post-punk band
In his explosive new documentary Mutiny in Heaven, director Ian White explores the contradictions at the heart of the menacing Melbourne band destined for self-destruction
‘I’d rather be boring than mysterious’  
Bar Italia on anonymity, originality and disliking Pulp
Bar Italia were the most hyped band of lockdown – but no one had a clue who they were. Now, in one of their first interviews, they say they’re ready to reveal all
Live music this week
Overmono  
Sparkling shards of rave culture tear up the dancefloor
Sparkling shards of rave culture tear up the dancefloor
Young Fathers  
Energy and ecstasy from profound pop alchemists
Get in touch
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