Back at the very start of this year's August Edinburgh extravaganza, the Edinburgh Tattoo featured a musical tribute to the late David Bowie at Edinburgh Castle. A few nights later, Edinburgh International Festival opened with Deep Time, a spectacular audio-visual event that beamed state of art projections onto Edinburgh Castle's walls to a thundering soundtrack of work by Glasgow-based band, Mogwai. Both events were epic examples of the significance of pop and rock music to international culture, and EIF's contribution to this has already been highlighted on these pages. Elsewhere, the Edinburgh International Book Festival programme featured readings from former Fall guitarist Brix Smith-Start and ex Dr Feelgood driving force, Wilko Johnson,while live music featured prominently in the festival's late-night Unbound strand. On the Fringe, live music fused with theatre in many shows. This coming Monday, as EIF prepares for its final big bang at the Fireworks Conc...
An archive of arts writing by Neil Cooper. Effete No Obstacle.