Michael Cragg

2 months ago | theguardian.com | Michael Cragg

Nao is trying to articulate how it feels to be on the verge of releasing a new album. When this thing that’s been yours and yours alone has to be launched into the world. “It feels really similar to being pregnant,” the 37-year-old mum of two decides. Her answer feels apt; we’re currently sitting in an east London cinema cafe hemmed in by buggies while a mum-and-baby screening of erotic thriller Babygirl plays next door.

Jan 24, 2025 | theguardian.com | Michael Cragg

While Brat summer grabbed the headlines as 2024’s defining musical movement, a straighter, more masculine, less lurid green development was rumbling in the background. Defined by American men with big voices, big emotions and big streaming numbers, it gave the world Benson Boone’s Beautiful Things (1.7bn streams on Spotify alone), Noah Kahan’s Stick Season (1.3bn) and Teddy Swims’ Lose Control (1.4bn). While the messy Brat defined a summer, the soft-alpha era is seemingly here for the long term.

Jan 17, 2025 | msn.com | Michael Cragg

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Jan 17, 2025 | theguardian.com | Michael Cragg

The last few years have proved tricky for female-fronted dance-pop, with interesting artists wasting away as guest vocalists on songs credited to male DJs with perfect teeth, or siloed into dead ends soundtracked by an efficient amalgam of drum’n’bass and sticky-floor EDM. Louder, Please artwork Photograph: Play It Again Sam/PAThank goodness, then, for London’s Rose Gray, whose sweat-soaked debut album fizzes with inventiveness.

Jan 3, 2025 | theguardian.com | Rachel Aroesti |Michael Cragg |Hannah Davies |Simran Hans |Luke Holland

TVWolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light iPlayer Period dramas are traditionally rather cosy, but from the very first scenes – a stark restaging of Anne Boleyn’s beheading – it’s clear this adaptation of the final book in Hilary Mantel’s epic Thomas Cromwell trilogy will be a bracing immersion into the gruesome reality of these well-worn Tudor tales.