Latest news with #BombayBicycleClub
Daily Mirror
24-05-2025
- Daily Mirror
'I ditched my phone and went on an 18-mile hike instead - here's how it went'
I tested myself if I could go a day without using my phone by participating on an 18-mile hike with nothing but a bottle of water - and what I discovered about myself was unexpectedly rewarding I'm not the only one who says that I live attached to my phone and that everything I own and treasure is there. Realising that my screen time is higher than the average person's, I wanted to prove to myself that I could go a day without it. So, when I saw the opportunity to go on a hike in the middle of nowhere with zero phone service, I couldn't say no to it. I wouldn't consider myself a very sporty person, nor do I think I would have ever been interested in completing a hike by choice. With no expectations or preparations, except for a nice kit provided by Columbia Sportswear, I went for it - and let me tell you, it was so worth it. Hiking is nature's therapy Throughout the year, Columbia Hike Society hosts multiple 'Hike Fests' across the world. The whole point is to walk for miles and miles until you reach your destination, where a reward awaits you. In our case, it was an emerging duo group called Lavender Music and Bombay Bicycle Club, an English indie rock band - and of course, a beautiful beach that looked like the ones in the Almafi Coast. We walked through fields, along coastal paths and over sand dunes to an isolated area of Anglesey, located in north-western Wales. There was something so therapeutic about listening to the wind, the birds, the waves of the sea, and even the sound of the sole of the shoe touching the rocky ground. Hiking is an underrated activity that is both engaging and relaxing. I appreciated the silence and being fully present in nature for three hours without using my phone and without listening to music. It's also a social media trend called 'rawdogging', which is a slang term is used when undertaking an activity without any assistance, preparation or comfort. Living in the moment Thankfully, my friend joined the trip, which made it much more bearable, with a few laughs in between. We kept stopping to take pictures, but the insane views can't be as appreciated through the lens as much as they are through your own eyes. Being born and raised in Barcelona, and also being used to the busy London environment, I didn't think that the UK had the potential to be so beautiful! Once we arrived at the beach, we sat down to eat our lunch and enjoyed performances from Lavender and Bombay Bicycle Club as the clear blue skies and sunlight graced us. That's when I realised that I was going to wake up the next morning with a stiff body and that I was so unfit and should probably start going to the gym - but that's another story. What started at 10am, ended at 13:46pm, to be exact. During those long hours of non-stop walking, it gave me plenty of time to think about a lot of things, and I learnt to enjoy my own company without wanting to check my phone notifications. I've also learnt to live in the moment, something we sometimes forget to do because we spend most of our time focused on what's happening on social media and don't look at what's right in front of us. But the one thing that I appreciated the most about this hiking trip was the realisation of how little we actually invest into ourselves and our well-being, and although it was my first time hiking, it will definitely not be the last one.
The Guardian
19-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Post your questions for Chaka Khan
The list of people who have lined up to work with Chaka Khan is a who's who of 20th-century music history. Stevie Wonder wrote her breakout hit Tell Me Something Good and played harmonica on I Feel for You. Whitney Houston sang backing vocals on her second album. Miles Davis played on 1988's CK and likened her voice to his trumpet. She turned down Ike Turner's invite to join the Ikettes and almost appeared on Robert Palmer's Addicted to Love, before her management vetoed the collaboration. She has collaborated with Joni Mitchell, Quincy Jones, De La Soul, Mary J Blige … and even Bombay Bicycle Club and Rick Wakeman. That's not to mention her indelible hits: Ain't Nobody with her first band, 70s funk outfit Rufus; I'm Every Woman, later covered by Houston. Fans seeing Khan live at Hampton Court Palace this summer can look forward to a tour de force by the Queen of Funk – and before then, Guardian readers can ask her all about her career when she sits for the reader interview. Maybe you want to know about her befriending Fred Hampton and joining the Black Panthers as a young woman growing up in Chicago in the 60s; entering the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2023 and curating the Meltdown festival last year; her forthcoming tour with Gladys Knight, Patti LaBelle and Stephanie Mills as the Queens and her recent appearance in Questlove's Sly Stone documentary Sly Lives! Post your questions in the comments by 10am GMT on Friday 21 March and we'll publish the best answers in a future issue of Film & Music.
The Guardian
08-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
One to watch: Divorce
On the richly executed, emotionally resonant terrain of their debut album, Drive to Goldenhammer, Nottingham quartet Divorce head to a fictionalised town that, they say, is meant to symbolise the warmth and humanity they've always found within their East Midlands motherland. Goldenhammer might not be real, but the record's affectionate idiosyncrasies certainly are. These are big-hearted songs full of personal exploration and finding your feet, whether on the yearning of Lord – an ode to an inaugural queer relationship – or the tongue-in-cheek industry skewering of All My Freaks ('You and all of your toys are so deluded'). Central to Divorce's heart-on-sleeve charm is the pairing of co-vocalists Tiger Cohen-Towell and Felix Mackenzie-Barrow. Both storytellers with an ear for a pleasingly odd detail and a delivery that leaves it all on the stage, they're the endearing fulcrum at the centre of a band that musically bend all sorts of ideas – country; indie; heavy, shouty catharsis on Karen; Americana sweetness on Parachuter – to their own shape. Having recently supported Bombay Bicycle Club and Everything Everything, Divorce offer shades of both those bands' approach to the smarter corners of commercial indie: the nuanced, wide-eyed romance of the former mixed with the nerdy playfulness of the latter. But Drive to Goldenhammer displays a depth to the songwriting that feels hard-earned, exciting and entirely their own. Drive to Goldenhammer is out now via Gravity/Capitol. Divorce tour the UK until 9 April
