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The watercooler moments of the Reading Festival. If there was a watercooler, and not just a lot of beer

There's not too much that's ironic about Metallica, but the band's terrific Reading Festival performance on Sunday night illustrates that such ironies do still exist. The main one is essentially this: here is a huge band that will go to extraordinarily complex lengths to give the appearance of keeping things simple, just like a small band would.

The Last Shadow Puppets played the NME/Radio 1 stage at Reading Festival this evening (August 24), bringing with them a 16-piece orchestra.

As the Reading Festival moves into its second day, you wouldn't be wrong to expect a hint of nostalgia in the air. Yesterday, after all, there was heavy rock, and the return of old favourites Rage Against The Machine. On Sunday, there will be the return of the reassuringly sturdy Metallica, and with them, yet more heavy rock.

Until quite recently, I must admit it hadn’t occurred to me that mixing Michael Jackson’s “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough” and Bowie’s “Heroes” would be a particularly good idea. But the arrival of TV On The Radio’s fantastic new single has changed all that.

Maybe it’s all the Lindsey Buckingham and Fleetwood Mac in the office these past few weeks, but there’s a lot of “Tusk” in the air at Club Uncut tonight. The gated tribal rumbles, the lush, clenched-teeth harmonies, the general air of progressive pop.

Maybe it’s all the Lindsey Buckingham and Fleetwood Mac in the office these past few weeks, but there’s a lot of “Tusk” in the air at Club Uncut tonight. The gated tribal rumbles, the lush, clenched-teeth harmonies, the general air of progressive pop.

I received an email a while back from an Uncut writer who’d just played “Acid Tongue” for the first time. “I can reveal that on this Jenny Lewis,” they wrote, “her father gets it in the neck, in the way her mother got it in the neck last time... pretty good.”

One of my favourite pieces of music, especially on bright mornings like today, is “A Rainbow In Curved Air” by Terry Riley, a great fluttering organ-led salute to the sun that put a psychedelic spin on the new classical/electronic/minimalist music that came to the fore in the ‘60s.

A whole heap of jealousy towards the residents of Los Angeles last weekend, since the Boredoms followed up last year’s 77-drummer extravaganza in New York with 88 Boadrum there on 8/8/08. I’m sure you can guess how many drummers were involved this time round, and as soon as I manage to hunt down an MP3, I’ll try and post some links.