HAPPENINGS TEN YEARS TIME AGO
March 19-25
The Eagles' 1976 compilation, Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975, reaches sales of 24 million, equalling those of the previous all-time best seller, Michael Jackson's Thriller.
I don’t want to give anyone the impression that all I do all day is sit around, browsing through YouTube files and watching fantastic footage of my favourite bands – that’s Steve Sutherland’s job, after all.
There's something a little disingenuous about opening your album with a song called "Do I Disappoint You?". This is how the fifth album by Rufus Wainwright begins: with wave after wave of opulent, complex orchestral flourishes, building and building; with a multitracked Martha Wainwright screaming "CHAOS!" and "DESTRUCTION!"; and with Wainwright himself, coy in the midst of so much melodrama. It's a theatrical set-piece pretending to be an anti-climax. It's both lovely and knowingly ridiculous. And it's also rather good.