Guardian Music — Are you a hopeless sinner? Don't worry, salvation is at hand courtesy of the curmudgeonly blues duoPain at the realisation that Randy Newman was in London this week and I managed to miss him has been alleviated by the memory and subsequent rediscover... more info

Guardian Music — Royal Festival Hall, LondonAs the interval in his two-and-a-half-hour show nears, Randy Newman encourages the audience to sing along to I'm Dead (But I Don't Know It). It paints a deeply unsympathetic portrait of a rock star long past his prime, stil... more info

Guardian Music — Take a look at the gigs our writers will be reviewing this week, and tell us about live music you've seen recentlyEach week we publish a list of concerts our writers will be covering in the next few days, and we invite you to tell us about the shows ... more info

Guardian Music — This was never going to be a year to branch out. These days the record industry's shindig has an eye for commercial successEarlier this week, a blog called Yes It's Number One spotted that an enterprising soul had uploaded the 1989 Brit Awards in the... more info

Aquarium Drunkard — Twenty-three track radio session Randy Newman cut while in New York City in August of 1971 for WPLJ FM. Stripped down, solo piano. The session serves to both highlight material culled from Newman’s first two albums (1968′s s/t and 1970′s 12 Son... more info

Guardian Music — Celtic Connections festival, GlasgowCeltic Connections, long a catalyst for unlikely collaborations, surpassed itself with this union of Cream demi-god Jack Bruce and virtuoso folk trio Lau.A dapper figure of engaging humility and wry humour ("It's ... more info

Guardian Music — Richard Williams remembers the great blues and soul singer at her absolute finestEtta James was born in Los Angeles and spent some of the key years of her professional life in San Francisco and Chicago, but there have been few more convincing interpr... more info

Totally Fuzzy — Gabriel Kahane is often compared to Sufjan Stevens and Rufus Wainwright (both of whom he's collaborated with in the past). It’s a lot to live up to, but to that already high bar I’ll add Ben Folds and Randy Newman, if only for Kahane's s... more info

Guardian Music — Abbey Road Studios has started its own talent competition – and it beats the heck out of the X Factor, reckons Chris SalmonEarly in 2011, Abbey Road Studios launched a contest for unsigned composers as part its 80th anniversary celebrations. Entran... more info

Guardian Music — It has been a bumper year for memoirs, from Shaun Ryder to Nile RodgersWhen looking back on a year of music books that themselves tend to look back, it makes sense to start with Simon Reynolds's Retromania: Pop Culture's Addiction to Its Own Past (Fa... more info