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Artist:
Helping Haiti
 A Happy Bunny, 2010-03-17
Nice CD delivered on time and in good order. Will come back again to shop here!
Lynn
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List Price: £4.99
Our Price: £2.19
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Artist:
Cheryl Cole
Love it!, 2010-03-12
Love this CD despite all the hate against Cheryl!
The tracks are great.. there are a few great uptempo songs on the album and amazing ballads.
My favourite songs are Parachute, Fight For This Love, Happy Hour, Stand Up, Heaven and Boy Like You :)
buy this album, you won't be dissapointed x
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List Price: £16.99
Our Price: £6.99
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Artist:
John Barrowman
Very Good, 2010-03-10
My mum bought me this CD as I am a big John Barrowman Fan and listening to it for the first time I wasn't that impressed, as I didn't recognise most of the songs. But the more I listened to them the more I fell in love with the songs and the way John Barrowman sing's the songs are absolutly stunning. The duet with Jodie Prenger was amazing she has a stunning voice.
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List Price: £15.99
Our Price: £6.90
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Artist:
Various Artists
By
BBC Audiobooks Ltd
excellent buy, 2010-03-09
my little boy loves this ! despite other reviews saying that there are only 16 songs and not the stated 25,there is 25.although the cd player will only read 16,there are sometimes 2 or 3 songs under one number.it has old favourites and new ones i didn't know and we happily sing along to them all in the car.i would heartily recommend this for babies and toddlers
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List Price: £5.00
Our Price: £0.89
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Artist:
THE XX
Music that makes you love music again., 2010-03-16
Perfect for reinvigorating that jaded palate. Everyone once in a while someone comes up with a new way of jumbling their influences. This sounds like the future. Sure, it will be old hat in a year, but right now, that mix of new wave and dubstep aches with the feel of today's pavements
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List Price: £13.99
Our Price: £6.35
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Artist:
Laura Marling
Laura Marling - On a beguiling and timeless second album a star is born, 2010-03-16
Laura Marling carries a huge weight on her young shoulders, She is still only 20 and yet following an astonishing debut album and a clutch of singles not least of all the brilliant "New Romantic" which she deliberately choose to leave off "Alas I cannot swim" the expectation around this second album is huge. In addition her personal life has become a factor (like it or not). The very public outpouring of heartbreak angst from her ex Charlie Fink of Noah and the Whale on "The First days of spring" has sealed this. Oh and just for good measure her very close chums in the album's backing band Mumford and Sons are currently as popular as Wayne Rooney at Old Trafford.
What makes her so special? The answers are vulnerability, versatility and voice. This sophomore album displays all these qualities in good measure. It is an incredibly mature set of songs continuing a number of latent classics and potentially the best female voice I have heard since the young Joni Mitchell. Sorry if you think this hyperbole but with talent like this why be measured?
Having listened to this album constantly on repeat since the Times kindly streamed it (and be assured the Amazon order is in) it confirms an enormous step forward and not least since she has avoided the obvious rerun of her debut and some of its more commercial elements. The above paper has called it a "very British album - think snow-covered England, blackberries and cold noses". This description goes someway to capturing its atmospherics of folk rock but not the lyrical depth and breadth which many of her contemporaries lack.
Overall what is noticeable are the many echoes of Dylan on this album. The powerful opener "Devils spoke" has that driving acoustic propulsion and lyrical flow that underpinned "It's alright ma (I'm only bleeding)". It is a bracing and exuberant start. A later powerful song "Hope in the air" reeks of Dylan era "Bringing it back home". "Maid by a Maid" a gentle ballad could be a riposte to Neil Young's "Man needs a Maid" and then we are into one of the real highlights "Rambling Man". Here the Joni Mitchell dimension of "Court and Spark" era kicks in. The vocal is stunning and the song charts her vulnerability when she sings
"Beaten, battered, and cold
my children will live just to grow old
but if i sit here and weep
I'll be blown over by the slightest of breeze"
The excellent "Blackberry stone" is an older song which many will have already heard. It has a swooning violin in the background and is first rate. It is followed by an matchless highlight "Alpha Shadows" a song of controlled fury and power which does have a strong Mumford's feel about it. Then comes the utterly gorgeous Goodbye England (covered in snow) forever destined to be a wintry Christmas classic. You really must have a heart of stone not to adore this and it's the one song closest to the sprit of her debut. The three remaining songs are the poignant confessional "What he wrote" where she candidly admits "I miss his smell"; the gossamer light gentility and steady growing exuberance of "Darkness Descends" and epic searing closer "I speak because I can"
Laura Marling has recorded a beguiling and timeless second album and the transition from a teenager to a major artist has been achieved in three short years. Who knows what she can deliver in the future but here we have singer where emerging comparisons to singers like Nick Drake and Joni Mitchell are already possible and where perhaps we should worry less about her private life and more about her mercurial talent.
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Artist:
Amy Macdonald
Words are not enough...., 2010-03-13
to do this album justice. If you thought "This is the Life" was good, you'll not be disappointed with this. If you like guitar based folk and blues rock then you'll probably love this, but there's so much more.
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List Price: £19.99
Our Price: £12.64
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Artist:
Joe Bonamassa
Another fantastic album from Bonamassa, 2010-03-16
I was initially worried with some of the comments that Joe put out about having a 'world theme/flavour' to this album, but a single play through allayed any fears that I may have had, this is a great great album. The Greek musicians give the tracks a little different twist than what many people would be expecting from a Rhythm and Blues album. I love that Joe has written as many great original tracks that stand up very well, my particular fave of his new stuff is Blue & Evil.
As for the covers, Joe as a knack of reinventing and putting his own personal twist on most of the things he does.. without ruining the track. His cover of Bird on a Wire is respectful to the legendary original by Lenoard Cohen, while being a brilliant version in its own right. Unlike other reviewers, I think the stand out track on this album is the duet with B.B. King. As far as I am concerned you can almost feel the warmth between mentor and mentee as The King has been involved in Joe's career since the beginning.
Overall, this is another brilliant Album from a guy who is clearly on top of his game, touring 240 nights a year, I just can't wait for the next instalment.
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Artist:
The Chieftains,
Ry Cooder
A Lovely and Belated CD - Excellent Well Done All,, 2010-03-11
A lovely CD and FINALLY a recognition by leading Mexican figures that they were NOT ALONE - European and North American dissenters stood should to shoulder with their ancestors.
All we need now is to recognize the German speaking members of the brigada.
A belated, beautiful and timely collection of a Mexican-Irish melodic mélange. Other reviewers have done an excellent job on the melodies.
For a Historical Synopsis:-
the Brigada San Patricio fought for Mexico against American SLAVE state expansion(1846-48) and also for their religious rights. Of the 900 men (some with experience of the Napoleonic wars in Europe, it is estimated that approximately 30% were German speaking). - see the dvd of the 'film' - 'One Man's Hero' - with : Tom Berenger, Joaquim de Almeida, director: Lance Hool ASIN: 630571889X -
BACKGROUND:-
In Europe Republican governments were replaced by the Napoleonic dictatorship followed by the restored Monarchies (1815).
Post the American war of independence, Article 5 of the Paris treaty (Nov 1782), American democrats had to guarantee the `the rights of confiscated `property' of Loyalist Americans (this included slaves and estates). Although small loyalist farmers lost out, the larger Southern plantations owned by English aristocrats remained. Less than 5% of loyalist left for Europe, Canada or the Caribbean. Little changed from the `Ancienne Regime'
Paddy is wrong in his assertion on the dominating factors.
Slave power continued to be the main economic driving forces in the southern states of the new world.
Within the slave states, non slaveholding whites were barred from important offices and opportunities. With the Missouri line `Dixiland' could only expand west or south.
The Slave States:-
The Mexican constitution's (1824) abolition of slavery, in particular the sale of slaves incensed slave traders. In 1827 President John Adams offered Mexico US$1 Million to buy Tecas, in 1829 President Andrew Jackson tried with an offer of US$5 million but was also rejected.
See also `La Constitución de Apatzingán' by Ernesto de la Torre Villar ISBN 9688371777
Along with delegates Andres Quintana Roo & Carlos Bustamante (1814 - they called for popular sovereignty, republican government, abolition of slavery, equality before the law, representative government, separation of church and state.
Austin and Houston (both of Virginia) were instigators of the Tecas land grab. The addition of Texas to the Union as a SLAVE state, was blocked until the election in 1844 of president Polk.
WHY DID IT HAPPEN THEN:-
After 1815 and the restoration of the European ancienne regimes the 'White Royalist Terror' was unleashed on Republican, Radical Enlightenment, anti monarchic and anti-autocratic church elements. As a consequence many Europeans came to America seeking refuge as the United Irishmen before them - 'United Irishmen, United States' by David Wilson ISBN:0801431751.
The Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854) expanded slavery north into Kansas.
In New York slavery was abolished only in 1827 and a re-introduction was attempted again following this act.
Implementation of the `Fugitive Slave act' (1850) along with the need to fix the route of the railways finally provoked the American Civil War
WHY WAS THIS WAR IMPORTANT:-
General Zachariou Taylor (who owned more than 100 slaves in Louisiana & Mississippi) went into Mexico beyond the Neuces river (Corpus Christi).
Lincoln denounced the war in Congress. Thoreau went to jail rather than pay taxes to support it, and Ulysses Grant (who served in Mexico) described it as "the most unjust war ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation". The Catholic Hierarchy more interested in protecting Anglo interests in the period of the legalisation of the Catholic church in England, sent two priests McEvoy (GaelicSpeaker) and Rein (GermanSpeaker) to stem the flow of support for Mexico.
The war was a prelude as many later took different sides in the North American Civil War (1861-65).
Some examples of the correspondence by Grant, Lee, Sherman, Taylor, Scott, Bragg on their personal experiences of the Mexican war prior to the Northern Civil War.
In consolation to the Mexican people, it was Californian gold that allowed Lincoln to subsequently defeat the combined forces of the slavistocracy and European royalty.
The Northern states at that time were the last refuge of the 'Republic of Letters' and the light of the Enlightenment, perilously close to being extinguished.
One of the etymologies of 'Gringo' in Irish folklore is the fact that many Patricios sang the Napoleonic song 'Green grows the Lilio' as they marched thro' Mexico.
One notable United Irishman, Jemmy Hope, still on the run, was interviewed by R. Madden in the 1840's aged in his 80's. I would like to see a film based on his life.
See 'United Irishman: The Autobiography of James Hope' by John Newsinger [Merlin] 0850364965.
Yes Liam, green was also the color of Rainsborough's, the Levellers, Liliburns banner. William Drennan would be proud of you, togha fear !
Other References:-
'Los Soldados Irlandeses de Mexico' Hogan ISBN:9687846070, 'United Irishmen, United States' by David Wilson ISBN:0801431751; 'The Rogue's March' ISBN:1574887386, 'Short Killing Affair by Foos ISBN:0807854050,
'Rise of the English Empire in the American South' Gallay ISBN:0300101937, 'Irish Slave Girl' by McCafferty ISBN:014200183X,`Duffy's Cut' ISBN0275987272 &9780275987275; 'Letters on Jackson Edited by B. Leigh ISBN:0548321833 ; 'California Gold Rush and the Coming of the Civil War' by Richards ISBN:030726520X; How the Irish Became White' by Noel Ignatiev ISBN:0415918251 ;'
Colonel Despard: The Life and Death of an English/Irish Jacobin by Clifford C. Conner ISBN-10: 1580970265; Friends of Liberty - the English Democractic Movement by A Goodwin ISBN 0674323394;'United Irishman: The Autobiography of James Hope' by John Newsinger [Merlin] 0850364965.
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List Price: £16.99
Our Price: £7.98
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Artist:
Rolando Villazon
Tenor, 2010-03-15
Musical and some of the "lighter" arias by one of the top tenors of our time. Lost count of the times I listened to this CD already. Beautiful! A must-have for every Villazon-fan and for everyone with a taste for opera and musical. Don't question or hesitate, just buy it and enjoy!
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List Price: £16.99
Our Price: £8.49
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