GOVAN Town Hall is dead; long may it remain so. With Mayfest's bogey
venue laid to rest, rock and related new musics return to where they are
most at home, the heart of the city. Two female performers head a
middling-sized bill of above-average quality.
Nina Simone will be smouldering with the righteous fires of gospel r&b
at the Theatre Royal, while K. D. Lang will be pressing her justifiable
claim to Patsy Cline's golden mantle at the King's Theatre.
Zimbabwe's Thomas Mapfumo (two nights at the Pavilion) heads a packed
week-long programme of frontline African agit-pop which mostly takes
place at the Tramway. Political-conscience-of-a-generation Billy Bragg
has his own Pavilion show, as well as liaising with some of the African
artists for one night on the Renfrew Ferry. Additionally, the ferry will
play host to most of the African bands for five late-night shows.
Elsewhere we can recommend the disco dissent of Parkhead favourite Gil
Scott-Heron (Pavilion), the laidback Sly-Stoneisms of Lenny Kravitz
(Mayfair), and the New Age post-modernism of both the Penguin Cafe
Orchestra (City Halls), and Steve Martland with Sarah Jane Morris (Third
Eye Centre).
Last year's Soviet theme is repeated in appearances from the wondrous
Avia (two nights at the King's) along with a show by a Georgian ensemble
called the Journalists, who -- surprise, surprise -- actually are
journalists. Their programme of traditional folk songs, canticles and
ballads at the Renfrew Ferry will doubtless disprove the myth that whose
who can't, teach, and those who can't do either end up as newspaper
scribblers.
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