After years of failing to front at shows and hurling abuse at their supporters, Aussie band the Vines have channelled their raucous energy in this, their fifth album.

Isabelle Huppert has an uncanny ability to parlay her very distinctive appearance - flame-red hair, high cheekbones, a sprinkle of freckles and thin, sensuous and faintly cruel lips - into creating characters of astonishing individuality.

As the ritualistic rumblings of Spectrum escalate, so begins the latest, and one of the best, chapters in the hard, pummelling and heavy Sepultura story.

The last appearance of Texas' Okkervil River was them providing emotional support and the musical context for damaged cult figure Roky Erickson on his exceptional, moving True Love Cast Out All Evil.

Not content with just conjuring up stylish grooves and skanking reggae lounge music, the dynamically dressed duo of Rob Garza and Eric Hilton have injected more overt political and social messages into their music in recent years.

It's been 10 years since the great Australian documentarian Bob Connolly made a movie. Probably his silence has had something to do with the untimely death of his wife to cancer, just after the release of 'Facing the Music.'

Split between Britain and the USl, seven studio albums into their career and with songwriters Ian Ball and Ben Ottewell having released solo albums hardly seems to have damaged this band.

There's nothing remotely horrible or terrifying about British band the Horrors. Not any more. Now their palette blends pastels and aerated emotion to create the sort of smooth, rousing pop-rock heard around London in the 1980s.

A confession: I've never really "got" Chekhov. I have seen productions of three of the four "great" plays and all seemed remote and unapproachable.

Award-winning Sunday Times columnist Danny Danziger made the inspired decision not to write a book about British soldiers, but to let the soldiers tell their own stories.

Franz Hasenohrl's transcription of Richard Strauss' Till Eulenspiegel turned out to be a witty frolic.

Oh come on. Who really has a stag do the night before their wedding? Hugh Sundae reviews last night's feature length episode.

The orchestra's second Inspired by Bach concert on Thursday dispensed a flurry of fugues, with toccatas and chorales on the side.

Jon Toogood couldn't be more grateful for his sold-out crowd braving the bitter elements to put their faith in a brand new band.

Like the under-appreciated Tell No One in 2006, this French film is an adaptation of an American crime novel (by Harlan Coben and Douglas Kennedy respectively).

It's over, finally - and thank goodness. Exhilarating, moving and visually impressive, watching boy-wizard Harry Potter face his fate in the battle between good and evil in the climatic finale is exhausting stuff.

While it is spare and beautifully poised country music, there's a raw and pure refinement to these 10 songs - and Welch's devilishly dark words, that have a wry twist every so often, are the work of a seasoned, yarn-spinning poet.

After a faltering start with the Melody Makers, Ziggy uncoupled his music from familiar reggae rhythms and incorporated African sounds, rap, kept a political agenda and, all the while, didn't veer too far from the classic sound.

Auckland band The Vietnam War have been building momentum for a good five years, so it doesn't come as a surprise that their debut album sounds anything but amateur.

Graham Reid reviews the newest album from indie.folk duo, Rosy Tin Teacaddy.

Though there was always an inviting pop side to the Mint Chicks, what made their music most striking was the volatile and often violent outbursts that took the songs to a more intense and interesting level.

Second week of short plays bigger, brighter and better.

Is my tray table stowed and my seatback upright? Oh, what's that? I'm not on a plane. Oops, I just blacked out for a minute and woke up in a puddle of dribble when I heard "Gidday.

The 22 Spanish writers in this entertaining collection were all born in or since 1975, the year General Francisco Franco died after 36 years of repressive rule in Spain.

Once again Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Geraldine Brooks takes a simple, barely known historical fact, fattens out and brings it to life so lyrically you feel transported back in time.