Live Review: Leeds Festival 2012

It's not exactly been a vintage year for the UK's major festival circuit. Mediocre lineups, Glastonbury's absence and the odd cancellation have, truth be told, made for a rather quiet season, with no real success stories or headline grabbing antics to speak of. Reading and Leeds, the last of the summer giants can usually be relied on to liven things up, but this year even they appeared a tad underwhelming, with a pair of generic headliners topping a bill which looked average at best. This twin event's ace card, however, has always been its depth, so there was a certain inevitability in the way that the schedule became more and more attractive with each new announcement.

Live Review: Graham Coxon, The Sage Gateshead, 15/04/2012

With huge outdoor shows and the Olympics closing ceremony beckoning, no one could begrudge Blur guitarist Graham Coxon a few months off ahead of what promises to be a monumental summer. Not one to rest on his laurels, the 43-year-old is instead spending spring embarking on the latest leg of his solo career, a comparatively low-key venture which has slowly gathered steam and thus far yielded eight studio albums. The latest of those, A+E, arrived earlier this month, stimulating a fresh wave of goodwill in Coxon's direction and arguably making this current tour his most keenly observed to date. Hall Two of The Sage proved a suitably intimate - if slightly formal - setting in which to unleash his signature lo-fi clutter, the strength of which was proven beyond doubt over the course of this 90 minute set.