A soulful man with a blistering voice: Sipho, at Studio 9294, reviewed
When I were a lad — back when you could buy the entire back catalogue of the Fall for thruppence and still have change to get into a New Order show on the way home — record labels mattered. Well, a cohort of independent labels mattered, because their imprints stood for something. There was Creation, with its dedication to a twin axis of 1977 and 1967 as the only years that counted; 4AD, with its arty sleeves and its wafty, diaphanous music; there was Factory, somewhere between an elaborate practical joke and home to the most forward-thinking musicians in the country. You don’t get many labels like that any longer. The new economics of the music industry militate against the model of the record label as an aesthetic statement, rather than purveyor of vulgar commerce.
