Simon Maltman Blogs

  Here are some of my favourite books, music and screen from this year. Yes 2020 has been rather rubbish- but at least we had these...  Books The Last Crossing- Brian McGilloway Blacktop Wasteland- SA Cosby  Dead Girl Blues- Lawrence Block  Our Little Cruelties- Liz Nugent  Sing Backwards and Weep- Mark Lanegan Screen The Boys The Walking Dead  The Comey Rule  Borat 2 The Mandolorian  Cobra Kai  Music  Mark Lanegan- Straight Songs of  Sorrow  Paul McCartney- 3 Therapy?- Live Best of Nick Cave- Live- Alexandra Palace  See my books here -  Books  

This week in the bunker- a chat about the awesome Scandi-Noir author - Jo Nesbo Watch on UTV  HERE Buy The Mark  HERE

The next few episodes I’m going to focus on the greats of American Crime Fiction- this week one of my all time favourites,  Richard Stark (Donald E Westlake) Watch on UTV  HERE Order  HERE

Wanna go for a ride? You sure will. New Album sees Dulli in fine form Gentlemen, Black Love, 1965 . Any fan knows that these are indeed the holy trinity. The comeback album- Do to the Beast splits opinion a little more. Personally, I think it's just alright. I'd take most of Dulli's non-Afghan albums over it. But, the new album,  In Spades is a very satisfying listen. From the opening track's largely string arrangement, it is clear that Dulli is not just making a 'Twilights plus John Curley' album. Other examples of really great song writing include  Demon in Profile and Toy Automatic . The final track- Into the Floor is a great one- almost Pink Floydy- with a very addictive melody hook. Dulli can be guilty of using the same patterns and progressions a bit too much, but even though there's some repetition here, it's still a really good collection of songs. He's mixed things up well- some classic Afghan scratchy guitar, a bit of clavinet...