Laura Barton: As this column ends, I thought it appropriate to talk about rock's profound sense of beginning – its power and possibility, its surging promise
Laura Barton: The X Factor has sent me running back to Treme. The music it celebrates is music with texture, with splinters and whorls, black-toothed and split-lipped
Bob Log III's high-spirited set at End of the Road festival got me thinking of all those similar moments in music when an instrument sounds at its happiest
Midnight is an hour owned by rock'n'roll. It's a time of Moanin', Moving and Trains to Georgia. It's a time when love comes tumbling down, writes Laura Barton
Laura Barton: When I listen to the Buena Vista Social Club album now, I'm struck by its closeness. It is music that presses up against you, that fills the room ...
Laura Barton: 'You' is such an insignificant, pale blue dot of a word. Its significance comes from the love that we place upon it, the way that we deal with it
Laura Barton: When I think of bookishness in music, it's not of Katy Perry, but something more awkward, the type of music that stays inside on a sunny day
More than any other writer, Van Morrison seems blessed with a transformational power to bring a beautiful vision to even the most humdrum objects and events
