The release on Friday of Tunes 2011-2019, which compiles singles and EPs by British dubstep pioneer Burial, will cap an extraordinary decade by one of music's more extraordinary artists.
Tracks such as Street Halo and Subtemple are recognisably Burial – trademark hisses and crackles, tick-tock snares, edited snatches of whispered speech and soaring vocals, all swathed in melancholy synth ambience. Expanding this basic palate are more ambitious songs such as Truant, Rough Sleeper and Ashtray Wasp, which add drama, melodic dynamics and bursts of rhythmic abandon.
In other respects, it is difficult to propose anything as "recognisably Burial" without pause. As his name suggests, Burial has become a global cult star by hiding his light. Early records, on London's hyper-hip Hyperdub label, were released without any fanfare: no image of the artist, no interviews, no concerts, no public appearances, no biography whatsoever. This secrecy apparently extended into Burial's personal life. "Only about five people outside of my family know I make tunes, I think. I hope," he revealed in a rare interview.
He hoped in vain. Burial's mystique began to grow, firstly among electronic music aficionados, then more broadly after his second album Untrue was greeted like electronic music's second coming. By the time he was shortlisted for 2008's Mercury Music Prize, speculation about Burial's identity overshadowed the nominations of mega-stars such as Adele, Robert Plant and Radiohead. The prime suspects included a host of established pseudonyms such as Aphex Twin (or Richard James), Fatboy Slim (Norman Cook) and Four Tet (Kieran Hebden).
All that gossip, which assumed Burial must be famous, missed the point entirely. In 2008, The Independent revealed the artist's true identity to be Londoner William Bevan, who confirmed his "Clark Kent" identity, posted an image of himself online, thanked his fans and promptly retreated once more. "It's just the way I am," he said. "I want to be in the dark at the back of a club."
Why many celebrities actively shun the spotlight
Burial is not the only artistic hermit thrust towards the limelight in recent months. Various stories have circulated about Banksy, the art world's most elusive star. The graffiti artist's former agent, Steve Lazarides, published images showing Banksy at work, albeit without revealing his face. Sotheby's included a similarly tantalising portrait, of the back of a hooded top, in an auction of works by British photographer Chris Levine.
What Burial and Banksy prove is that evading celebrity is no bar to becoming the centre of global attention. Their respective desire for privacy is also linked by shared cultural roots. Anonymity is the raison d'etre of graffiti artists like Banksy, whose work could easily lead to the artist's arrest. Banksy's stencils, spray-painted on buildings without permission, might be art for some, but for others it is vandalism. Graffiti artists are curiously audacious and covert as a result. Signing their works with pseudonymous tags, they simultaneously shout their authorship from the rooftops and protect their identities.
Burial's rejection of the limelight owes much to the UK's rave scene that, like punk and hip-hop, enjoys close association with graffiti. One of Banksy's spray-painting heroes is 3D, who in his more famous incarnation as founder of Massive Attack has also worked with Burial.
Fear of prosecution may also explain why DJs at early raves hid their faces, such as the hazmat-suited Altern-8. But anonymity fused politics, erasing rock music's traditional hierarchy elevating artist above audience, and aesthetics: the music was everything, unmediated by the personality of subsequent superstar DJs such as Skrillex.
One ironic, if understandable, consequence of this ego erosion is its appeal to famous people. Brad Pitt paid tribute to Banksy by saying: "He does all this and he stays anonymous. I think that's great. These days everyone is trying to be famous."
Letting the work speak for itself
Electronic music’s cult of de-personality was a primary attraction for Radiohead’s Thom Yorke. Not only were artists such as Aphex Twin and Autechre the antithesis of rock music bombast, their music provided a means of defacing Radiohead’s signature sound, including Yorke’s own vocals.
For novelist Nick Hornby, the resulting Radiohead album, Kid A, lacked character. "The album is morbid proof that this sort of self-indulgence results in a weird kind of anonymity rather than something distinctive and original," he said in the New Yorker. This same sniffiness would have been music to Yorke's ears.
Almost any artist who rejects publicity invites immediate suspicion, not least from the public. "I'd rather not talk about myself as a person and let the music speak for itself,' says Aaron Jerome, aka the mask-wearing musician SBTRKT, speaking somewhat paradoxically about himself.
This cynicism is not without justification, above all the ways that willed obscurity has become a highly effective marketing tool. You wouldn't know Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter were internationally famous unless they donned the futuristic helmets they wear as Daft Punk. Masks of different sorts have been adopted by Damon Albarn's cartoon alter egos Gorillaz, RnB's singer-in-sunglasses Gabriella Wilson, better known as HER, and EDM superstar Steven Zhu, whose career took off after he capitalised on his own low profile.
Who is Abul Mogard?
Few contemporary musicians inhabit the grey area between song and singer with more spectral grace than Abul Mogard, another mystery artist enjoying a successful year. If the name doesn't ring any bells, that is probably because Mogard's avant-garde drones exist on mainstream music's outermost edges. Kimberlin, his soundtrack for Duncan Whitely's experimental film of the same name, creates desolate swells of noise using a modular synthesiser and Farfisa organ. On first acquaintance, these can approximate to a vacuum cleaner preparing for take-off inside your brain.
As well as making some of the decade's most entrancing music, Mogard has created one of its more enchanting myths. He is, so the story goes, a retired Serbian metal worker who began experimenting with synthesisers because he missed "the clunk, clatter and rhythm of the sounds that punctuated his day".
Accompanying this biography on website Bandcamp is an image of a balding man doing a fair impersonation of a retired Serbian metalworker. It has been revealed as a fiction (probably), but not before "Mogard" gave several interviews in character and journalist Alec Hillyer wrote a gushing and seemingly sincere appreciation of the man under the headline "The Calloused Hands of Abul Mogard".
Speculation is already rife on obscure music chat rooms about Mogard's "true" identity. While this is sometimes decried as an invasion of privacy – see the regular attempts to unmask the famously slippery novelists Thomas Pynchon and Elena Ferrante – it is also inevitable: curiosity is perhaps the flipside of obfuscation.
Why do we care so much about true identities?
Aside from raising ethical concerns, these investigations also ask: how much do fans really need to know about the artists they love? How much candour do artists owe their audience? Does it matter, in either case, if the answer is nothing or even a fiction?
In the decade since Burial was disinterred, so to speak, his capacity to fascinate people has only deepened. This is partly because his reticence now seems like a sign of personal integrity and creative commitment. He was also not so enamoured with his own mystique that he couldn't post an occasional image or offer the odd interview.
The mystery surrounding Burial now seems subordinate to the intimate intensity of the music itself, much as Banksy’s outlaw persona chimes with his outsider art or Mogard’s (forged) CV reflects his dehumanised industrial thrums.
In 2011, scene-setting DJ Mary Anne Hobbs played Burial's collaboration with Massive Attack for the first time, before commenting on Burial's self-imposed isolation. "I think it's his solitude that contributes to his purity, his innocence, his great beauty," she said.
Burial himself once expressed a similar thought, albeit in less melodramatic terms. "It's like the lost art of keeping a secret, but it keeps my tunes closer to me and other people."
THE BIO
Born: Mukalla, Yemen, 1979
Education: UAE University, Al Ain
Family: Married with two daughters: Asayel, 7, and Sara, 6
Favourite piece of music: Horse Dance by Naseer Shamma
Favourite book: Science and geology
Favourite place to travel to: Washington DC
Best advice you’ve ever been given: If you have a dream, you have to believe it, then you will see it.
MATCH INFO
Rajasthan Royals 158-8 (20 ovs)
Kings XI Punjab 143/7 (20 ovs)
Rajasthan Royals won by 15 runs
FA CUP FINAL
Chelsea 1
Hazard (22' pen)
Manchester United 0
Man of the match: Eden Hazard (Chelsea)
Another way to earn air miles
In addition to the Emirates and Etihad programmes, there is the Air Miles Middle East card, which offers members the ability to choose any airline, has no black-out dates and no restrictions on seat availability. Air Miles is linked up to HSBC credit cards and can also be earned through retail partners such as Spinneys, Sharaf DG and The Toy Store.
An Emirates Dubai-London round-trip ticket costs 180,000 miles on the Air Miles website. But customers earn these ‘miles’ at a much faster rate than airline miles. Adidas offers two air miles per Dh1 spent. Air Miles has partnerships with websites as well, so booking.com and agoda.com offer three miles per Dh1 spent.
“If you use your HSBC credit card when shopping at our partners, you are able to earn Air Miles twice which will mean you can get that flight reward faster and for less spend,” says Paul Lacey, the managing director for Europe, Middle East and India for Aimia, which owns and operates Air Miles Middle East.
How much do leading UAE’s UK curriculum schools charge for Year 6?
- Nord Anglia International School (Dubai) – Dh85,032
- Kings School Al Barsha (Dubai) – Dh71,905
- Brighton College Abu Dhabi - Dh68,560
- Jumeirah English Speaking School (Dubai) – Dh59,728
- Gems Wellington International School – Dubai Branch – Dh58,488
- The British School Al Khubairat (Abu Dhabi) - Dh54,170
- Dubai English Speaking School – Dh51,269
*Annual tuition fees covering the 2024/2025 academic year
THE CLOWN OF GAZA
Director: Abdulrahman Sabbah
Starring: Alaa Meqdad
Rating: 4/5
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
Recent winners
2002 Giselle Khoury (Colombia)
2004 Nathalie Nasralla (France)
2005 Catherine Abboud (Oceania)
2007 Grace Bijjani (Mexico)
2008 Carina El-Keddissi (Brazil)
2009 Sara Mansour (Brazil)
2010 Daniella Rahme (Australia)
2011 Maria Farah (Canada)
2012 Cynthia Moukarzel (Kuwait)
2013 Layla Yarak (Australia)
2014 Lia Saad (UAE)
2015 Cynthia Farah (Australia)
2016 Yosmely Massaad (Venezuela)
2017 Dima Safi (Ivory Coast)
2018 Rachel Younan (Australia)
The specs
Engine: Dual 180kW and 300kW front and rear motors
Power: 480kW
Torque: 850Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh359,900 ($98,000)
On sale: Now
Scorecard
Scotland 220
K Coetzer 95, J Siddique 3-49, R Mustafa 3-35
UAE 224-3 in 43,5 overs
C Suri 67, B Hameed 63 not out
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Profile of VoucherSkout
Date of launch: November 2016
Founder: David Tobias
Based: Jumeirah Lake Towers
Sector: Technology
Size: 18 employees
Stage: Embarking on a Series A round to raise $5 million in the first quarter of 2019 with a 20 per cent stake
Investors: Seed round was self-funded with “millions of dollars”
At Eternity’s Gate
Director: Julian Schnabel
Starring: Willem Dafoe, Oscar Isaacs, Mads Mikkelsen
Three stars
JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH
Directed by: Shaka King
Starring: Daniel Kaluuya, Lakeith Stanfield, Jesse Plemons
Four stars
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
The years Ramadan fell in May
Moon Music
Artist: Coldplay
Label: Parlophone/Atlantic
Number of tracks: 10
Rating: 3/5
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KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
What's in the deal?
Agreement aims to boost trade by £25.5bn a year in the long run, compared with a total of £42.6bn in 2024
India will slash levies on medical devices, machinery, cosmetics, soft drinks and lamb.
India will also cut automotive tariffs to 10% under a quota from over 100% currently.
Indian employees in the UK will receive three years exemption from social security payments
India expects 99% of exports to benefit from zero duty, raising opportunities for textiles, marine products, footwear and jewellery
Mia Man’s tips for fermentation
- Start with a simple recipe such as yogurt or sauerkraut
- Keep your hands and kitchen tools clean. Sanitize knives, cutting boards, tongs and storage jars with boiling water before you start.
- Mold is bad: the colour pink is a sign of mold. If yogurt turns pink as it ferments, you need to discard it and start again. For kraut, if you remove the top leaves and see any sign of mold, you should discard the batch.
- Always use clean, closed, airtight lids and containers such as mason jars when fermenting yogurt and kraut. Keep the lid closed to prevent insects and contaminants from getting in.
What can victims do?
Always use only regulated platforms
Stop all transactions and communication on suspicion
Save all evidence (screenshots, chat logs, transaction IDs)
Report to local authorities
Warn others to prevent further harm
Courtesy: Crystal Intelligence
ELIO
Starring: Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldana, Brad Garrett
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, Adrian Molina
Rating: 4/5
Tips to stay safe during hot weather
- Stay hydrated: Drink plenty of fluids, especially water. Avoid alcohol and caffeine, which can increase dehydration.
- Seek cool environments: Use air conditioning, fans, or visit community spaces with climate control.
- Limit outdoor activities: Avoid strenuous activity during peak heat. If outside, seek shade and wear a wide-brimmed hat.
- Dress appropriately: Wear lightweight, loose and light-coloured clothing to facilitate heat loss.
- Check on vulnerable people: Regularly check in on elderly neighbours, young children and those with health conditions.
- Home adaptations: Use blinds or curtains to block sunlight, avoid using ovens or stoves, and ventilate living spaces during cooler hours.
- Recognise heat illness: Learn the signs of heat exhaustion and heat stroke (dizziness, confusion, rapid pulse, nausea), and seek medical attention if symptoms occur.
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How to watch Ireland v Pakistan in UAE
When: The one-off Test starts on Friday, May 11
What time: Each day’s play is scheduled to start at 2pm UAE time.
TV: The match will be broadcast on OSN Sports Cricket HD. Subscribers to the channel can also stream the action live on OSN Play.
Squid Game season two
Director: Hwang Dong-hyuk
Stars: Lee Jung-jae, Wi Ha-joon and Lee Byung-hun
Rating: 4.5/5
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
War
Director: Siddharth Anand
Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Tiger Shroff, Ashutosh Rana, Vaani Kapoor
Rating: Two out of five stars
Results
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Jigra
Starring: Alia Bhatt, Vedang Raina, Manoj Pahwa, Harsh Singh
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