Craig Meighan

The 1975 are back with what they do best in their new single It’s Not Living (If It’s Not With You) : a catchy pop-rock record with some class lyrics. The intro to the song will be a breath of fresh air to fans who found the lead guitar part in the band’s first single Give Yourself A Try obnoxiously repetitive and overly harsh. This lead part, however, (unlike the one in the first single) doesn’t continue to play throughout the entirety of the song. And, while we are on the subject, is a weird artistic choice for a band who are clearly more than capable of coming up with interesting and fun guitar parts. Take their previous songs She’s American or UGH! for example. The first verse finds a desperate character “Little Danny” in search for his next hit. He notes the effects of drug addiction, in this case, heroin: “He falls asleep during conversation,” speaks to the way drug addiction erodes health to the point where someone can’t retain consciousness when in discussion. H...

The Forge is 30 years old this month  Back in the late 1980s, the Forge Shopping Centre was a phoenix rising from the ashes of what was once Scotland’s largest steelworks. At the heart of the engineering and shipbuilding conglomerate William Beardmore and Company Parkhead Forge employed over 20,000 people at its peak. But with deindustrialisation and a stint of different owners the Forge as a steelworks site closed for good in 1983. Then in 1988, the Forge Shopping Centre opened to the public. Built under the GEAR (Glasgow East Area Renewal) scheme it was intended to bring development potential to the East End under Europe’s largest urban regeneration project. At the time the Forge broke new grounds with the largest supermarket in Scotland but in recent times it has been dwarfed by the likes of Silverburn in Pollock (over 3 times the size of the Forge) and faces stiff competition from the erection of 13 newly opened stores since its inception. “It’s getting real...