Features

A recording of Kraftwerk’s “Trans-Europe Express” night at the Tate Modern seems to have fallen off the back of the internet this morning: genuinely not sure where one of my colleagues found it, before you ask.

It’s an odd week to release a film, I guess, as no one’s entirely paying attention. The usual brouhaha surrounding this coming Sunday’s Oscars ceremony has been chewing up a lot of film content in magazines and on websites, while elsewhere the internet seems preoccupied with Star Wars spin-offs, Star Trek and Sin City posters and whether or not Sam Mendes will direct the next Bond film.

Until very recently, any mention of Bell Laboratories in conjunction with electronic music would’ve made me think of Laurie Spiegel, who worked at Bell Labs research centre in New Jersey while she was creating much of her extraordinary cosmic music in the 1970s.

As part of our Mick Ronson feature from the issue of Uncut dated February 2013, Morrissey kindly agreed to answer our questions about working with Ronson on his 1992 album, Your Arsenal. Here, then, is the complete transcript of that interview.

Lots going on here, not least the fact that I have to write a long review of the mostly amazing Kraftwerk show that I saw next door at the Tate Modern the other night.

Since Judd Apatow inherited the mantle of Hollywood’s king of comedy, one of the criticisms most frequently levied at him involves his willingness to promote those closest to him.

Nick Cave and Mick Harvey discuss their career from the Birthday Party “crossover” of From Her To Eternity onwards...

An unintended consequence of the My Bloody Valentine release: plenty of plays this week for “Straight Outta Compton”, following directly after “m b v” in my iTunes library. As you can see, though, it’s been an amazing few days for new music, and consequently I’ve added plenty of links so you can hear Mikal Cronin, Library Of Sands (to recap: Naynay Shineywater from Brightblack Morning Light), Jennie O (produced by Jonathan Wilson), and Retribution Gospel Choir’s amazing “Seven” (featuring Nels Cline, and especially recommended to fans of “Psychedelic Pill”).

This primal blast of sexual energy – penned by Chip Taylor and later hijacked by Jimi Hendrix – would prove an immediate ’66 hit for Reg Presley and his ‘proto-punk’ beat boys... Reg, manager Larry Page, writer Chip Taylor and more explain how the iconic song was made. From Uncut’s April 2009 issue (Take 143)… ___________________

Just before starting to write this morning, I spent a while digging around for the old office ghettoblaster, computer-connecting technology having failed us in our attempts to play a new EP that turned up yesterday in cassette form. The EP forms part of the capricious launch strategy of Library Of Sands, a new project from a mesa-dwelling outlier called Naynay Shineywater, who used to front Brightblack Morning Light.