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Fela Kuti – Vinyl Box Set #4

Louis Pattison
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Fela Kuti – Vinyl Box Set #4
“With Fela, it just seems to have spilled out of him,” writes Erykah Badu in the sleevenotes to this set. “We instantly get the feeling that we are connected to those tones and vibrations.” The evidence bears that out. In his lifetime, the Nigerian bandleader fronted something like 50 releas...

“With Fela, it just seems to have spilled out of him,” writes Erykah Badu in the sleevenotes to this set. “We instantly get the feeling that we are connected to those tones and vibrations.” The evidence bears that out. In his lifetime, the Nigerian bandleader fronted something like 50 releases, and pretty much none of them are bad: grab one at random and you can be fairly sure of getting two sides of scorching Afrobeat.

Still, Fela’s tireless profligacy means there are a number of routes through his catalogue, so as well as its extensive CD reissue campaign, New York’s Knitting Factory Records is preparing a number of curated vinyl boxes by some of Fela’s biggest fans. On the heels of Questlove, Ginger Baker and Brian Eno comes this box of vinyl albums selected by Erykah Badu. It’s a heavyweight set – seven remastered albums committed to seven pieces of vinyl, plus a poster from Fela artist Lemi Ghariokwu and a 20-page booklet featuring lyrics, previously unpublished photos and sleevenotes from Badu (funny, fannish) and Afrobeat scholar Chris May (dry, informative).

Badu’s picks capture Fela at his most political and personal. The title track of 1976’s Yellow Fever is a punchy funk with chiding horns and a lyric tacking poor black self-esteem and the fashion for skin bleaching; on the flip is 
“Na Poi”, a rolling groove that explains the process of lovemaking in graphic detail. (“So there is a redeemer,” writes Badu in the sleevenotes. “Where my skin is unacceptably too dark, my ass is just fat enough.”) 1980’s Coffin For Head Of State, meanwhile, might be Fela’s most charged and defiant piece: an excoriation of the ruling government that finds Fela referring to the death of his mother at the hands of General Obasanjo’s soliders, and his placing of a symbolic coffin outside the Dodan army barracks.

Elsewhere, 1977’s No Agreement and JJD and 1979’s VIP – a live album captured at the Berlin Jazz Festival – find Fela’s band Afrika 70 on immaculate form, even as they stand at the verge of disintegration (VIP would mark drummer Tony Allen’s final recording with Fela, and by the time of the recording’s official release a new ensemble, Egypt 80, had come into being). That’s the band we hear on 1985’s gently seething Army Arrangement, restored with original horn section (the original issue featured overdubbed horns by producer Bill Laswell, added while Fela languished in jail); and Fela’s final album, 1992’s Underground System – a tribute to slain revolutionary leader Thomas Sankara that restates Fela’s eternal themes of black identity and outspoken resistance against the powers that be.

It’s easy to reduce Fela to a caricature, a set of revolutionary slogans – but in this music Badu sees a path to self-betterment, a chance to grow. “Perhaps we as people are in denial of personal growth,” she wonders, “because we fear the responsibility of governing ourselves.”

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The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

A Certain Ratio announce reissues and tour dates

Michael Bonner
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A Certain Ratio announce reissues and tour dates
A Certain Ratio have announced details of the next phase of reissues on Mute, acr:mcr and I’d Like To See You Again will be released on 23 March with Good Together and Up In Downsville following on April 27. The forthcoming releases will be followed by Sextet, Mind Made Up, Change The Station and...

A Certain Ratio have announced details of the next phase of reissues on Mute, acr:mcr and I’d Like To See You Again will be released on 23 March with Good Together and Up In Downsville following on April 27.

The forthcoming releases will be followed by Sextet, Mind Made Up, Change The Station and a new compilation with recently recorded tracks plus various box sets that will include rare and previously unreleased material.

The band will also tour this spring:

16 March – Newcastle, Hoochie Coochie
17 March – Glasgow, Stereo
24 March – Bristol, Fiddlers Club w/ Sink Ya Teeth
25 March – Brighton, The Haunt w/ Sink Ya Teeth
21 April – London, Garage w/ Sink Ya Teeth
18 May – Hebden Bridge, Trades Club w/ Andrew Weatherall
25 May – Leeds, Belgrave Music Hall
26 May – Tameside, Atmosphere Festival

A Certain Ratio are supporters of Artists Against Hunger and will donate £1 for each ticket sold in 2018. For further details, please go to: http://againsthunger.uk/acr

Like us on Facebook to keep up to date with news from Uncut

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

First Aid Kit – Ruins

Graeme Thomson
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First Aid Kit – Ruins
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. In musical terms, the old maxim mostly holds firm on the fourth First Aid Kit album. The follow-up to 2014’s major-label breakthrough Stay Gold, Ruins tweaks rather than overhauls Klara and Johanna Söderberg’s brand of pop-savvy Americana – yet the tradema...

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. In musical terms, the old maxim mostly holds firm on the fourth First Aid Kit album. The follow-up to 2014’s major-label breakthrough Stay Gold, Ruins tweaks rather than overhauls Klara and Johanna Söderberg’s brand of pop-savvy Americana – yet the trademark harmonic couplings and rolling romantic surges can’t disguise a troubled undertow.

Tucker Martine, the Portland producer who has helmed records by My Morning Jacket, The Decemberists and Sufjan Stevens, takes over the reins from Bright Eyes’ Mike Mogis, and proves an empathetic foil. Front and centre, as ever, are those glorious sibling harmonies and the sisters’ keen ear for soaring, melancholic melodies, but Martine brings a meatier rhythmic kick to these 10 songs. The brass and drums, in particular, add extra punch, complemented by more pronounced electric guitar and some old-school ’80s keyboard textures. Cameos from Peter Buck, Wilco’s Glenn Kotche and Midlake’s McKenzie Smith contribute to the more varied palette, while Martine slips in some deft production touches: a psych-rock waltz interlude on “Distant Star” is a welcome structural kink; unruly flickers of feedback underscore the gravity of the sombre “Nothing Has To Be True”.

This all counts as a gentle evolution, but there’s something broken here, all the same, a state implied by the album’s stark title. The theme of busted love roars through Ruins like floodwater: “I fell so hard, so blindly,” sings Klara on the opener “Rebel Heart”, establishing the album’s theme. Ruins explores the emotional fall-out of a failed relationship in forensic, almost self-flagellating detail.

Even the jaunty “Postcard” can’t shake the sickness. First Aid Kit have never hidden their country heart, but “Postcard” wears it like a shiny sheriff’s badge. 
It’s an amiable tears’n’beers bumble, 
with echoes of Caitlin Rose, scored with 
honky-tonk piano and pedal steel. Even in this laidback setting, however, the wounds remain raw: “I went and broke my own goddamn heart,” sings Söderberg. There’s more outlaw spirit on “To Live A Life”, a sweet, sad-hearted fingerpicker where the singer is “drinking cheap wine just to pass the time” while pondering a “lost cause” and the hard bargain of the itinerant musician’s life: restless, on the run, alone.

Their powerful vocal DNA and enduring love of simple, open-hearted melodies mean First Aid Kit flirt on occasion with sameness. At other times, they struggle to combat an ingrained politeness. “My Wild Sweet Love”, with its low, insistent beat and artfully understated strings, recalls the much-missed Stornoway at their most windswept. Somehow, however, the song fails to live up to its title. “Ruins”, with its mournful horns, serpentine melody and fluttering flutes, is similarly pretty without ever imposing its identity. “It’s A Shame” begins with a squeal of “Like A Rolling Stone” organ, but the somewhat stiff-legged rhythm hampers a rousing chorus.

Ruins is at its most engaging when the emotion in the words is allowed to hold sway. “Hem Of Her Dress” finds a more raucous form of expression. An accelerated waltz driven by ragged saloon-bar vocals and rattling acoustic guitars, it ends in a big, boozy singalong, horns and strings colliding in the background, like a distant cousin of Mary Hopkin’s “Those Were The Days”. The comfort, however, is short-lived, the lesson being that “some things never heal with time”. With its cool upstrokes and dreamy backing vocals, “Fireworks” is a wintery soul ballad, coming on like a refugee from Phil Spector’s Christmas album. When Klara’s voice cracks at the top of the chorus, however, the most apt comparison is Björk in full flood. “Why do I do this to myself, every time?” she cries. “I know the way it ends… I am the only one at the finish line.”

Ruins culminates with “Nothing Has To Be True”, a beautiful, broken five minutes which recalls the Ryan Adams of Heartbreaker. A stately country-soul ballad with a crushing climax, musically and emotionally it provides the album with a deeply satisfying conclusion, 
even if redemption remains out of reach. “Why do you love those who turn you into a fool?” ponders Söderberg, lost to consolation. “I feel so far away from the person I once was.”

A more reflective work than Stay Gold, Ruins lacks its immediacy but offers instead greater maturity in its themes, and a determination to reach further in terms of its musical choices. They can go further, but for now Ruins keeps First Aid Kit moving forward, empowered rather than overcome by the wrath of love.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Arctic Monkeys, Björk and Nick Cave to headline Primavera

Sam Richards
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Arctic Monkeys, Björk and Nick Cave to headline Primavera
Arctic Monkeys, Björk, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, The National, The War On Drugs, Lorde, The Breeders and Belle & Sebastian are the big names at this year's Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona, taking place from May 30 to June 2. Slowdive, Four Tet, Nils Frahm, Lift To Experience, Thunde...

Arctic Monkeys, Björk, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, The National, The War On Drugs, Lorde, The Breeders and Belle & Sebastian are the big names at this year’s Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona, taking place from May 30 to June 2.

Slowdive, Four Tet, Nils Frahm, Lift To Experience, Thundercat, Arca, Ariel Pink, Vince Staples, Ty Segall, Oumou Sangaré, Unknown Mortal Orchestra and Art Ensemble Of Chicago are among the many other enticing names on the bill.

Meanwhile Spiritualized and Jane Birkin will both perform with orchestral backing.

See the full line-up here or via the video below:

Tickets are available here.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Leonard Cohen wins posthumous Grammy for “You Want It Darker”

Sam Richards
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Leonard Cohen wins posthumous Grammy for “You Want It Darker”
Leonard Cohen has won his first ever Grammy, 14 months after his death in November 2016. His song "You Want It Darker" was declared Best Rock Performance, beating off competition from Foo Fighters and Chris Cornell. Cohen was given a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 but had never won a Grammy for...

Leonard Cohen has won his first ever Grammy, 14 months after his death in November 2016. His song “You Want It Darker” was declared Best Rock Performance, beating off competition from Foo Fighters and Chris Cornell.

Cohen was given a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 but had never won a Grammy for his own songs until now.

Other winners at the 2018 Grammys held last night in New York include:

The War On Drugs (Best Rock Album)
Kendrick Lamar (Best Rap Album)
The National (Best Alternative Album)
LCD Soundsystem (Best Dance Recording for “Tonite”)
Kraftwerk (Best Dance/Electronic Album for 3-D: The Catalogue)
Jason Isbell And The 400 Unit (Best Americana Album)
The Rolling Stones (Best Traditional Blues Album)
Aimee Mann (Best Folk Album)
Foo Fighters (Best Rock Song)
Alabama Shakes (Best American Roots Performance for “Killer Diller Blues”)

You can peruse a full list of winners and nominees at the official Grammys site.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Joan Baez on her new album: “Seeing beyond this one is hard”

Sam Richards
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Joan Baez on her new album: “Seeing beyond this one is hard”
Joan Baez has hinted that her forthcoming album, Whistle Down The Wind, may be her last. Talking exclusively in the current issue of Uncut, the 77-year-old says that, "At the moment, seeing beyond this one is hard to do. Mostly because it's gets harder and harder to sing... I can still manage it i...

Joan Baez has hinted that her forthcoming album, Whistle Down The Wind, may be her last.

Talking exclusively in the current issue of Uncut, the 77-year-old says that, “At the moment, seeing beyond this one is hard to do. Mostly because it’s gets harder and harder to sing… I can still manage it in a lower range but it’s not easy.”

However, her friend and collaborator Steve Earle is sceptical: “I don’t believe her. Not for one second. She’s going to outlive all of us.”

In the same article, Baez takes about how she survived the 60s, touching on her relationship with Bob Dylan and why she never would have married him. “I was afraid of him… for a while. When things got crazy. In the beginning, we had a lot of fun.”

Baez also tells a story about the time she turned down John Lennon: “About four o’clock in the morning, John tumbled in, and it was like he felt compelled to make some sort of overture to me… I said to him, ‘John, you are probably as beat as I am. I’m not up for it, either’. He looked so relieved.”

Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with My Bloody Valentine, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including the Valentines, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai, to accompany our rundown of Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums – from Lou Reed to Ty Segall.

The new Uncut is in shops now – or you can order online now!

The 4th Uncut new music playlist of 2018

Michael Bonner
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The 4th Uncut new music playlist of 2018
Afternoon! Lots of good stuff here, I think. Please find new tracks from Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Wooden Shjips and Julian Casablancas; blues from Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite; a longish diversion into electronica courtesy of Hirotaka Shirotsubaki + Sleepland, Eric Chenaux and Fever Ray. What...

Afternoon! Lots of good stuff here, I think. Please find new tracks from Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Wooden Shjips and Julian Casablancas; blues from Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite; a longish diversion into electronica courtesy of Hirotaka Shirotsubaki + Sleepland, Eric Chenaux and Fever Ray. What else? Kali Uchis mighty hook-up with Bootsy Collins and Tyler The Creator, more Jack White and some fine post-rock from Oneida.

It also behoves me to remind you of the excellent magazines we’ve produced recently. There’s our current issue featuring My Bloody Valentine, Joan Baez and more while earlier this week we debuted our Ultimate Genre Guide to Glam. And our latest Ultimate Music Guide pays tribute to Tom Petty.

Follow me on Twitter @MichaelBonner

1.
Unknown Mortal Orchestra
“American Guilt”
(Jagjaguwar)

2.
Kali Uchis
“After The Storm” feat. Bootsy Collins and Tyler The Creator
(Virgin)

3.
Wooden Shjips
“Staring At The Sun”
(Thrill Jockey)

4.
Amaya Laucirica
“All Of Our Time”
(Opposite Number)

5.
Mélissa Laveaux
“Nan Fon Bwa”
(Nø Førmat!)

6.
JD McPherson
“Lucky Penny”
(New West Records)

7.
Virginia Wing and Xam Duo
“Person To Person”
(Fire)

8.
Fever Ray
“Part V: Wanna Slip”
(Rabid Records)

9.
Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite
“No Mercy In This Land”
(Anti-)

10.
Hirotaka Shirotsubaki + Sleepland
“at a preserve”
(Bandcamp)

11.
The Voidz
“Leave It In My Dreams”
(RCA)

12.
The Beat Escape
“Sign Of Age”
(Bella Union)

13.
Eric Chenaux
“Wild Moon”
(Constellation)

14.
Oneida
“All In Due Time”
(Joyful Noise Recordings)

15.
Jack White
“Corporation”
(Third Man)

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Suede’s self-titled debut to be reissued as a deluxe 4xCD set

Sam Richards
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Suede’s self-titled debut to be reissued as a deluxe 4xCD set
To celebrate the 25th anniversary of its release on March 30, Suede will reissue their momentous debut album as a deluxe 4xCD + DVD 'Silver Edition' bookset. The original album now comes accompanied by B-sides, demos, radio sessions and live tracks, plus a DVD featuring TV appearances and a track-b...

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of its release on March 30, Suede will reissue their momentous debut album as a deluxe 4xCD + DVD ‘Silver Edition’ bookset.

The original album now comes accompanied by B-sides, demos, radio sessions and live tracks, plus a DVD featuring TV appearances and a track-by-track dissection of the album with Brett Anderson and Bernard Butler. The package also features handwritten lyric drafts and unseen photos.

The full tracklisting is as follows:

CD 1: SUEDE

1. So Young
2. Animal Nitrate
3. She’s Not Dead
4. Moving
5. Pantomime Horse
6. The Drowners
7. Sleeping Pills
8. Breakdown
9. Metal Mickey
10. Animal Lover
11. The Next Life

CD 2: THE B-SIDES

1. My Insatiable One
2. To The Birds
3. He’s Dead
4. Where The Pigs Don’t Fly
5. Painted People
6. The Big Time
7. High Rising
8. Dolly
9. My Insatiable One [piano version]
10. Brass In Pocket

CD 3: DEMOS, MONITOR MIXES, BBC RADIO 1 SESSION

ROCKING HORSE DEMOS, October 1991
1. The Drowners
2. He’s Dead
3. Moving
4. To The Birds

ISLAND DEMOS, January 1992
5. Metal Mickey
6. Pantomime Horse
7. High Wire (My Insatiable One)*
8. The Drowners*
9. To The Birds*

EAST WEST DEMO, March 1992
10. Sleeping Pills

SINGLE MONITOR MIXES, March 1992
11. The Drowners*
12. To The Birds*
13. My Insatiable One*

BBC RADIO 1, MARK GOODIER SHOW, April 1992
14. Metal Mickey*
15. The Drowners*
16. Sleeping Pills*
17. Moving*

BONUS TRACKS
18. Diesel [instrumental] [studio outtake]
19. Stars On 45 [rehearsal room recording]
20. Sleeping Pills [strings]

CD 4: LIVE AT THE LEADMILL, February 1993 (first time on CD)

1. Metal Mickey
2. Moving
3. My Insatiable One
4. Animal Nitrate
5. Pantomime Horse
6. The Drowners
7. Painted People
8. So Young
9. Animal Lover
10. Sleeping Pills
11. To The Birds

DVD

BBC TV APPEARANCES
THE LATE SHOW [7.5.92]
1. The Drowners*

TOP OF THE POPS [24.9.92 & 27.5.93]
2. Metal Mickey*
3. So Young*

LATER WITH JOOLS HOLLAND [4.6.93]
4. So Young*
5. The Next Life / Brett in conversation with Jools*
6. My Insatiable One*

BONUS DVD FEATURE

Brett Anderson and Bernard Butler discuss Suede, track-by-track, with Pete Paphides*

*previously unreleased

You can pre-order the Suede ‘Silver Edition’ bookset here.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Neil Young plans next archive releases

Sam Richards
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Neil Young plans next archive releases
Neil Young has used the first issue of his latest online newsletter, the Neil Young Archives Times-Contrarian, to tease the upcoming release of two live albums. Roxy: Tonight's The Night Live was taped during a short run of shows at LA's Roxy venue in 1973, just after Young and his band at the time...

Neil Young has used the first issue of his latest online newsletter, the Neil Young Archives Times-Contrarian, to tease the upcoming release of two live albums.

Roxy: Tonight’s The Night Live was taped during a short run of shows at LA’s Roxy venue in 1973, just after Young and his band at the time (Billy Talbot, Nils Lofgren, Ralph Molina and Ben Keith AKA The Santa Monica Flyers) had recorded Tonight’s The Night.

“We really knew the Tonight’s The Night songs after playing them for a month,” writes Young, “so we just played them again, the album, top to bottom, without the added songs, two sets a night, for a few days. We had a great time.”

Alchemy is a Crazy Horse live album and video of the band’s 2012/3 world tour.

“For me, Alchemy harkens back to the best of Live Rust and Weld, beginning to look like a circle… but not totally joined,” writes Young. “Time shows us what we can do and when we can do it. Crazy Horse moves with the wind.”

He adds that Alchemy‘s release is “imminent” while Roxy: Tonight’s The Night Live “should be ready in time for a March release”, with a track streaming on the Neil Young Archives site soon.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Mark E Smith 1957-2018

John Robinson
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Mark E Smith 1957-2018
It is some point in the autumn of 1997, and my interview with Mark E Smith seems to be veering off track. This meeting has been arranged so the NME can discuss with Mark The Fall’s new single but also – covertly – to cue him up, if anyone didn’t already know him as such, as a person of Godli...

It is some point in the autumn of 1997, and my interview with Mark E Smith seems to be veering off track. This meeting has been arranged so the NME can discuss with Mark The Fall’s new single but also – covertly – to cue him up, if anyone didn’t already know him as such, as a person of Godlike Genius – a title which he will shortly be awarded at an NME awards ceremony.

After some introductory chat about the new record, I clearly feel emboldened enough to try and steer Mark to speak about some of his classic work, and his reputation. He drills his bands hard, records prolifically, and tours relentlessly. I therefore put it to him that he is the hardest working man in showbusiness, which is not as it turns out, the smartest move.

“Don’t think you’re talking to Paul Weller or somebody,” he says suddenly. “You’re not talking to…” He looks for the correct pejorative. “…Paul Heaton.” He also makes a couple of remarks about what I look like and what I’m wearing, which at the time possibly obscures for me the point he’s trying to make.

Namely, that it would be a grave mistake to consider him a caricature, someone who – as he sees it, like Weller and Heaton – is imprisoned by how they are perceived.

At that time, it would possibly have been easier to try and report on the received opinion of Mark Smith. The one who would without fail ask you if you were “courting” at present. That, though, would have been to miss the point completely. His leadership of The Fall created genuinely visionary music, the work of someone going completely their own way. Mark E Smith and The Fall were always moving on – the past had less interest for him even than it did for David Bowie.

Their work yielded intermittent moments of genius afterwards, but for ten years between 1980 and 1990 The Fall reliably delivered everything from psychedelic sound art to shiny social reportage, recognizable as the work of one group solely because of the unifying power of Smith’s vernacular prose.

That day I asked him for an exegesis of “My New House”, a Fall number from their mighty 1985 album This Nation’s Saving Grace. Mark touched his nose conspiratorially – that was something he would be keeping to himself.

That vaguely enigmatic fog somehow felt key to what Smith and The Fall did. His best work didn’t deal in fantasies, but effortlessly processed the world to leave it with the magic of an espionage story – codes and aliases, locked doors, missing pieces.

He encouraged the same curiosity in his listeners that he had for the world around him. You uncovered meanings and references, and entered a multi-layered world of altered perceptions. Drugs at one time were involved, but so equally were ghosts, music concrete, soul and German rock.

Talking with fellow NME people about The Fall at the time, it proved tough to pinpoint the definitive Fall album, but there was some consensus on how you could encapsulate the genius of Smith and the Fall in one verse. If you needed to make a point, you could direct someone to innocent, disorientating delight of this, from 1983’s “Wings”: “Purchased a pair of flabby wings/Took to doing some hovering/This is a list of incorrect things…”

I don’t think that the mission to extract thoughts and reminiscences on the genius of The Fall went especially well that afternoon, the interview not so much ending as blurring into a more informal chat as other Fall members came and went.

What emerged instead was a picture of someone who, whether out of wit, perversity, erudition, politeness or boredom simply effortlessly evaded every format. Mark didn’t talk about the past, but mentioned that he wrote short stories in the vein of Edgar Allen Poe. When the photographer apologized for turning up late due to problems at Waterloo, he slyly asked, “What? In Belgium?”. When after this chat we met in a pub weeks later, he remembered my name.

I spoke with Mark on a few other occasions, and little about this capacity to surprise had changed. The last time we met was for an Uncut interview where he was set to answer reader/celebrity questions. We met in the bar of a swanky hotel in the centre of Manchester. After answering a question from Peter Hook, he went briefly missing.

When he turned up, he signed a record for my friend, and we went to a nearby pub for an hour before my train left. Unlike any other person I’ve ever interviewed, he asked me questions about myself, as if he were not Mark E Smith at all, and was happier to shift the focus.

As we finished our drinks, a couple of 30something locals approached our table and introduced themselves. They thanked him for all the music.

Mark stood up and changed the subject. “All right then, lads,” he said, shaking hands with them. “Where are you off to, then?”

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Mark E Smith’s final Uncut interview: “The Fall is like a Nazi organisation…”

Tom Pinnock
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Mark E Smith’s final Uncut interview: “The Fall is like a Nazi organisation…”
A quiet drink with MARK E SMITH in his favourite Manchester pub. There are lengthy ruminations on the current Fall lineup’s excellence, and even lengthier ones on the incompetence of their predecessors. Also: the Vorticists, the BBC, Jane Austen, and the problems with Welsh people… “Come on, M...

A quiet drink with MARK E SMITH in his favourite Manchester pub. There are lengthy ruminations on the current Fall lineup’s excellence, and even lengthier ones on the incompetence of their predecessors. Also: the Vorticists, the BBC, Jane Austen, and the problems with Welsh people… “Come on, Mark,” asks a tenacious TOM PINNOCK, “are you really that horrible?”

Originally published in Uncut’s September 2017 issue

_____________________________

“There are some fucking weird people around, aren’t there?” says Mark E Smith, taking a sip of his double Jameson’s in Manchester’s Crown & Kettle public house. He’s talking about musicians, a group of people he famously detests. “I suppose you meet a lot of ’em. I’m not one to talk, but a lot of them can’t give it up, can they?”

As he admits, few artists have doggedly pursued such a singular, and lengthy, mission as that of the only constant member of The Fall. With the departure of synth player – and former Mrs Smith – Elena Poulou, The Fall have been reduced to their core of guitarist Pete Greenway, drummer Kieron Melling and bassist Dave Spurr; they’ve been with Smith for over a decade, and, in the world of The Fall, that’s a lifetime.

“The group are very well, actually,” insists Smith. “Never been better. That’s why I wanna crack on a bit [with another new album]. They’re really fucking excellent. The great thing about my lads is the rhythm section, Dave and Kieron, they were brought up from 15, 16, playing ’70s and ’80s hits as a duo. So they can play. They can play ‘Paranoid’. They can play ‘In The Year 2525’. No, really!”

On one hand, Mark E Smith in 2017 is surprisingly mellow and friendly – during Uncut’s afternoon in the Crown & Kettle, he drinks less than his reputation might suggest (he chooses a Welsh IPA to go with his double whiskey, before moving on to Duvel), and is often strikingly funny, whether discussing artist Wyndham Lewis or Jools Holland. After the interview, Smith even takes Uncut out to another pub for a few more rounds. Like the Lancashire weather, however, Smith’s mood can turn suddenly: he’ll talk about the past, but only on his own terms, and will happily lambast all manner of subjects, from the BBC and the destruction of Victorian latticework to today’s young groups.

“My dad thought I was fucking mentally ill,” he says, remembering when he first formed The Fall in Prestwich in 1976. “[But now] they’ve been to rock college, and you can see it in the way they play. You used to send your son into the army or the clergy, now you send them into a rock group. If I go and see bands now, there’s more members of the group than there is audience. It’s all their aunties and their sisters, who’ve asked me to come down. You wish them well, but it’s quite weird.”

As the band’s 60-odd former members would likely attest, Smith remains a man it would be wise not to cross, with his memory as sharp as his tongue, and his deepest wrath reserved for ex-Fall musicians and their ‘tell-all’ memoirs.

“If you get my curse, man, it doesn’t fucking come back,” he mutters, finishing his whiskey. “There’s summat about The Fall, it just destroys…”

____________________

This month, 41 years into a career of sublime turmoil, Smith’s group release their 32nd studio album, New Facts Emerge, a storming set of heavy grooves, with their leader growling impressionistically over a barrage of guitar. Uncut tells Smith that it’s perhaps the strongest Fall record since 2010’s Your Future Our Clutter. “Do you like it? Ah, I’m glad,” he says. “I haven’t heard it complete yet, I got a bit fed up with it. I had so many arguments with the cutting engineer and all that. But I know when it’s right, I’ve had it in my head for so long. I’ve got ideas for another half an LP now.”

The centrepiece of New Facts… is the nine-minute “Couples Vs Jobless Mid-30s”, an unhinged multi-part suite that veers from lumbering rock grooves complete with manic laughter to sections of chanting and detuned Mellotron. “We went to a studio in Castleford, Yorkshire,” says Smith, explaining the song’s creation, “which funnily enough is where we did Your Future Our Clutter. It’s a big, fuck-off heavy metal studio. I left them in there for a week or so.”

You just left the group there and went away?
No, not off on holiday! Stuff like “Couples…”, that’s them having fun. So we got about seven songs out of it [at Castleford]. “Couples…” is like three or four of their tunes savaged! They were trying to do something about Eagles Of Death Metal, and about heavy metal groups. I said, “That’s not on”, because they were the group in Paris, weren’t they? So I changed it to all this. I enjoy it. It fucks your head up. The more annoyed the engineers get, I tend to carry on. Especially with all this technology now, engineers always fiddle about with the filters and that, make it a bit tamer. But with something like [closer] “Nine Out Of Ten”, the fucking best version is obviously the most earache one.

The version I’ve heard is pretty earachey.
Good, good. It’s the right one, then! I love shit like that, when it’s a bit painful.

Are Cherry Red good to work with?
Yeah, they’re all right, if you’re not dead [laughs].

What was that “Masquerade” single they put out for Record Store Day?
Fucking yeah, it was weird – and don’t think they didn’t get told about that. The fucking horrible Fall net – this bunch of old fucking fellas who harp on about the old days – they got a test pressing of it, and I didn’t even know it was coming out! So I had a fucking word with them about that.

The title of [New Facts’] “Victoria Train Station Massacre” has proved quite controversial after the Manchester bombing. Was it like “Powder Keg”, a kind of precog thing? [MES claims “Powder Keg”, released on June 10, 1996, was about the Arndale Centre bombing, which took place five days later].
Probably, I don’t know. I’m actually very fond of the architecture of Victoria Station, but it’s all been trashed to fuck, and that’s what the song’s about. You know all that beautiful Victorian latticework, like they have at Paddington? They ripped it all off. And you know why? Because the students coming to Manchester wanted to have access to north Manchester [pauses]. We don’t want ’em here [laughs]! So they put this big canvas canopy up, and about six months ago it fell on all the passengers in the rush hour. There’s summat wrong with Manchester, they can’t leave anything fucking alone.

I see The Fall are off to America in September, for a New York residency.
I’m looking forward to it. We’ve got a massive fanbase there, but we haven’t been for a bit. It’s more fanatical than it ever was, the fanbase – those New York shows sold out, 10 dates. They’re loyal, American fans. It’s a long time since we’ve been, last time was with the Dudes, the American group for [2007 album] Reformation Post TLC.

Are you still in touch with the Dudes?
Yeah. Tim [Presley]’s lost in Wales, int’he? I warned him. I bet they fuckin’ ate him or summat. I saw him at the Green Man festival and he says, “I’m off to Cardiff for two weeks.” I said, “Don’t fucking go. The women are like fucking demons.” And he was like, “Oh, Mark…” ’Cos I’m always filling them with these horror stories about Britain, but they never believe me. You can’t warn guitarists, though.

I bet your American fans are younger than the ones over here?
Yeah, they’re all from this century. They’re all from Reformation time, it’s very strange.

That album does feel like a watershed, in some ways.
Well, thank God, yeah. I’d like to think that. I was playing it a bit back and it sounds fucking great. There are bits where it gets divisive, even for me.

Mark E. Smith dies aged 60

Michael Bonner
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Mark E. Smith dies aged 60
Mark E. Smith has died aged 60. The Fall's manager confirmed the news in a statement. "It is with deep regret that we announce the passing of Mark E. Smith. He passed this morning (24th January) at home. A more detailed statement will follow in the next few days. In the meantime, Pam & Mark’s fa...

Mark E. Smith has died aged 60.

The Fall‘s manager confirmed the news in a statement.

“It is with deep regret that we announce the passing of Mark E. Smith. He passed this morning (24th January) at home. A more detailed statement will follow in the next few days. In the meantime, Pam & Mark’s family request privacy at this sad time.

“Pam Vander
The Fall – manager”

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Hear Wooden Shjips’ new single, Staring At The Sun

Sam Richards
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Hear Wooden Shjips’ new single, Staring At The Sun
Psych-rock quartet Wooden Shjips have released a new single, entitled "Staring At The Sun". The shimmering eight-minute track was informed by the wildfires that ravaged America's Pacific Northwest last summer. Hear it below: https://open.spotify.com/track/3XtFDis6KnAOopdjnUmI1k Wooden Shjips' fi...

Psych-rock quartet Wooden Shjips have released a new single, entitled “Staring At The Sun”.

The shimmering eight-minute track was informed by the wildfires that ravaged America’s Pacific Northwest last summer. Hear it below:

Wooden Shjips‘ fifth album, aptly titled V, will be released by Thrill Jockey on May 25. The tracklisting is as follows:

1. Eclipse
2. In The Fall
3. Red Line
4. Already Gone
5. Staring At The Sun
6. Golden Flower
7. Ride On

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Led Zeppelin to reissue How The West Was Won

Sam Richards
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Led Zeppelin to reissue How The West Was Won
Led Zeppelin's triple live album How The West Was Won - recorded in 1972 and originally released in 2003 - is getting the deluxe reissue treatment. The album will be reissued on multiple formats, including its first appearances on vinyl and Blu-Ray, on March 23. Comprising songs from the band's ...

Led Zeppelin‘s triple live album How The West Was Won – recorded in 1972 and originally released in 2003 – is getting the deluxe reissue treatment.

The album will be reissued on multiple formats, including its first appearances on vinyl and Blu-Ray, on March 23.

Comprising songs from the band’s concerts at Los Angeles Forum and Long Beach Arena in June 1972, How The West Was Won has been completely remastered under the supervision of Jimmy Page.

It will be available on 3xCD, 4xLP, Blu-Ray and digital formats. Additionally, there’s a Super Deluxe edition which includes the album on CD, LP and DVD (Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and PCM Stereo) formats, plus a high-def download, a book filled with rare and previously unpublished photos of the band, and a high-quality print of the original album cover, the first 30,000 of which will be individually numbered.

Details of additional Led Zeppelin 50th anniversary releases and events will be announced later this year.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Bob Dylan’s “Girl From The North Country” has died

Sam Richards
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Bob Dylan’s “Girl From The North Country” has died
Bob Dylan's high school girlfriend Echo Casey, née Helstrom, has died in California aged 75, according to the Star Tribune. She was believed to be the inspiration for his song "Girl From The North Country", from his breakthrough 1963 album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. Dylan dated Casey from 1957 to...

Bob Dylan‘s high school girlfriend Echo Casey, née Helstrom, has died in California aged 75, according to the Star Tribune. She was believed to be the inspiration for his song “Girl From The North Country”, from his breakthrough 1963 album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan.

Dylan dated Casey from 1957 to 1958 when they both attended Hibbing High School in Minnesota. Her independent spirit and love of music left a strong impression on Dylan, who later compared her to Brigitte Bardot in his memoir Chronicles: Volume One.

There remains speculation about the identity of the “Girl From The North Country”, with some believing the song to be about Dylan’s later girlfriends Bonnie Beecher or Suze Rotolo (who appears with him on the cover of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan). However, the lyrics about freezing rivers and winds that “hit heavy on the borderline” would seem to point to northern Minnesota.

Casey lived in Minneapolis for a while before eventually moving to Los Angeles in the 1970s, where she worked as a secretary on movie sets.

“Girl From The North Country” became the title for Conor McPherson‘s Bob Dylan musical, currently showing at London’s Noel Coward Theatre. Tickets are available here.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Introducing The Ultimate Genre Guide: Glam

Michael Bonner
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Introducing The Ultimate Genre Guide: Glam
In the current issue of Uncut, Phil Manzanera looks back at the early days of Roxy Music. Among many things, he considers the slick visual presentation deployed by Roxy around the time of their debut album - cricket jumpers, diamanté-studded fly sunglasses, feather boas and all. "Prog was the anti...

In the current issue of Uncut, Phil Manzanera looks back at the early days of Roxy Music. Among many things, he considers the slick visual presentation deployed by Roxy around the time of their debut album – cricket jumpers, diamanté-studded fly sunglasses, feather boas and all.

“Prog was the antithesis of showing off and dressing up,” he explains. “Getting to 1972, there was that period when all that came to 
a grinding end because of drugs – heroin killed everything, and everything became grey. And there was no showbiz element, which there had been with Tamla Motown and The Beatles, so with Bowie and with us it was going into colour and being flamboyant and having fun, but with some decent music. We never thought we were glam rock. Marc Bolan and Bowie had started quite a few years earlier and had been trying to find their thing; we came out of nowhere with an already-formed thing.”

It’s a useful, insider take on the context around which Roxy, Bowie, Bolan and many more besides evolved during the early Seventies, where “being flamboyant and having fun” seemed as critical to the creative process as it did a reaction against the more studied, unapologetic complexities of prog. Roxy’s splendid debut album is about to be released as a super deluxe box set – and, by timely coincidence, Uncut celebrates glam rock in the first of our new series, The Ultimate Genre Guide, which goes on sale this Thursday in the UK and is available to pre-order from our online store.

Here’s John Robinson, who edited this one, to explain more…

“As you will discover when you read this stomping new publication, there were many ways to be glam. Conceptual, like Roxy or Bowie. Flashy, and made for colour television, like Slade. Theatrical, like Alice Cooper, or chaotic like the New York Dolls. For our cover star Marc Bolan it was the fulfilment of childhood dreams of stardom – and fuel for the dreams of others.

“Perhaps more than anything else, it could be a key to reinvention and self-discovery. Roy Wood was a joint-passing hippy before he became the glitter-bearded star of Wizzard. Mott The Hoople were longtime triers about to quit, given another shot when they performed Bowie’s ‘All The Young Dudes’ – essentially glam’s national anthem. Elton John began the 1970s as an earnest balladeer, and was possibly more a glam rocker from expediency than anything else. Still, it allowed him to access elements of his showmanship, sexuality and general high spirits than he had previously managed.

“As the 1974 meeting with NME’s Charles Shaar Murray included here makes plain, Elton in some ways embodies glam’s improbable hotline connection between pure showbusiness and the man in the street. Having once changed his birth name from Reginald Dwight, he tells Murray that he’s now giving thought to a new middle name: Hercules (although he ‘could have called myself Fiona, I suppose. Elton Fiona John. Or Dalmatian.’) Stephen Dalton’s commentary details not only Elton’s glam recordings but also recounts several gossipy years of cattiness and fallings-out.

“There was no one way to be glam. There were some recognisable features – the intersection of ambiguous sexuality and hard, often 1950s-inspired rock; an emphasis on performance, posing and showmanship; great singles – but this was no straitjacket.

“Some artists – like Lou Reed or Iggy Pop – drifted into glam, took what they wanted and moved on. The lesser talents had their brief moment basking in its reflective glow. All round, it offered freedom, not confinement. (Unless you were The Sweet, of course – for whom the whole experience turned into a struggle for independence from their production team.)

“As David Cavanagh points out here in his writing about glam singles, not everyone could be as talented as David Bowie. Glam offered both the sublime and the ridiculous, whether that was the stellar run of albums Bowie made between 1970 and 1974, or a one-off exploitation single by one-hit wonders we’d now find filed under ‘junk shop glam’.

“You can read about all versions of the glam experience here, in a range of hilarious archive features – just who were Hair, Nose & Teeth? – and insightful new commentary. There are thoughts on glam film, glam art and glam’s legacy. You’ll read how our artists – from Bowie, Bolan and Slade through to Queen and Sparks (by 2018, glam’s only real survivors) – made, and were remade, by glam rock.

“So catch a bright star and place it on your forehead… and there you go.”

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Hear Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s new song, American Guilt

Sam Richards
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Hear Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s new song, American Guilt
New Zealand psych-funk-rockers Unknown Mortal Orchestra have released a new single. Hear "American Guilt" below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFFa440Mo0I As part of a lengthy world tour, the band have announced four UK dates in May: May 24 - London, Roundhouse May 25 - Bristol, SWX May 26 - ...

New Zealand psych-funk-rockers Unknown Mortal Orchestra have released a new single. Hear “American Guilt” below:

As part of a lengthy world tour, the band have announced four UK dates in May:

May 24 – London, Roundhouse
May 25 – Bristol, SWX
May 26 – Manchester, Strange Waves festival
May 27 – Leeds, World Island festival

Tickets go on sale on Friday January 26 via the band’s own site.

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Hear the new single by Julian Casablancas & The Voidz

Sam Richards
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Hear the new single by Julian Casablancas & The Voidz
The Strokes' frontman Julian Casablancas has released a new single with his other band, The Voidz. Hear "Leave It In My Dreams" below: https://open.spotify.com/album/68AD3dLFUewEL8Tym17gqS Now simply called The Voidz (as opposed to Julian Casablancas & The Voidz), the band are readying the fol...

The Strokes‘ frontman Julian Casablancas has released a new single with his other band, The Voidz. Hear “Leave It In My Dreams” below:

Now simply called The Voidz (as opposed to Julian Casablancas & The Voidz), the band are readying the follow-up to their 2014 album Tyranny. Watch a droll, B-movie-style trailer for the album below:

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

Hugh Masekela dies aged 78

Sam Richards
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Hugh Masekela dies aged 78
South African jazz trumpeter and prominent anti-apartheid campaigner Hugh Masekela has died aged 78. He passed away peacefully in Johannesburg after a long battle with prostate cancer. Masekela rose to global prominence in the late 60s with the hits "Up, Up And Away" and "Grazing In The Grass", pe...

South African jazz trumpeter and prominent anti-apartheid campaigner Hugh Masekela has died aged 78.

He passed away peacefully in Johannesburg after a long battle with prostate cancer.

Masekela rose to global prominence in the late 60s with the hits “Up, Up And Away” and “Grazing In The Grass”, performing at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival and guesting with The Byrds and Paul Simon.

Written during a long period of exile from his homeland, his 1977 song “Soweto Blues” (sung by his former wife Miriam Makeba) became an anthem of the struggle against apartheid, as did 1987’s “Bring Him Back Home”, written for Nelson Mandela.

Masekela was hailed by current South African President Jacob Zuma, who said: “His contribution to the struggle for liberation will never be forgotten.”

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

The Durutti Column – The Guitar And Other Machines

Stephen Troussé
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The Durutti Column – The Guitar And Other Machines
“Vini Reilly, by the way, is way overdue a revival,” says God, appearing to Tony Wilson in a hash-haze vision towards the end of 24 Hour Party People. “You might want to think about a greatest hits.” It’s played for laughs, but there’s an important truth here: in many ways, Wilson’s pe...

“Vini Reilly, by the way, is way overdue a revival,” says God, appearing to Tony Wilson in a hash-haze vision towards the end of 24 Hour Party People. “You might want to think about a greatest hits.” It’s played for laughs, but there’s an important truth here: in many ways, Wilson’s persistent attempts to usher the guitarist into the spotlight of popular acclaim was the secret driver of the whole quixotic Factory escapade.

The Factory club was first founded in 1978, after all, expressly to promote the “neo-psychedelia” of the Column’s first misfiring incarnation, and Factory Records formed in 1979 to release the group’s music (the fledgling Joy Division at this time being almost an afterthought). You could even see Factory Classical, one of the most noble fiascos of the entire enterprise, as an attempt to conjure a context for Reilly’s quasi-classical meanderings – notably Without Mercy (1984), part of Wilson’s campaign to cultivate Reilly as Withington’s answer to Bohuslav Martinů.

1985 seemed to mark another change of tack, with Wilson stuffing Reilly’s Christmas stocking with sequencers and electronic paraphernalia. Although it was never expressly stated, you get the feeling that Wilson might have been pushing Reilly towards soundtrack work. And it’s maybe not that great a stretch to think of a possible world where Reilly developed as a kind of post-punk Mark Knopfler, plangently scoring wistful widescreen accounts of post-industrial decay.

On 1986’s Circuses And Bread, with tracks like “Dance 1”, Reilly was evidently still getting to grips with the technology (Melody Maker compared it to testcard music), but for The Guitar And Other Machines (Nov 1987), things were falling into place. Producer Stephen Street was brought in (paving the way for Reilly’s crucial role on Morrissey’s Viva Hate), and synthetic elements were grafted into the Durutti soundworld more seamlessly.

“Arpeggiator” is a stunningly bold statement of intent – it’s like the hitherto frail, musical Durutti corpus has been augmented into some six-million-dollar bionic body. Longtime Durutti Columnist John Metcalfe’s viola, plucked and bowed, swoops over a scintillating torrent of synths, before the track erupts into powerchords and molten lead guitar.

“What Is It To Me (Woman)” is a more characteristic Durutti excursion, but played out on a wider screen, the decaying reverbed guitar lines intertwined with desolate piano and washed over with wailing harmonica. Wilson had often despaired of Reilly’s reluctance to spend more than a couple of days in the studio, but Stephen Street seems to have persuaded him of the virtues of a more diligent approach – it’s like the home movies or chamber pieces of the early albums have suddenly been recast in cinemascope. “Red Shoes”, then, is an appropriate title, conjuring associations with Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s Technicolor fantasia. Sensing the way the marketplace was changing, Factory ensured …Other Machines was the first LP to be released on DAT – Wilson once again vainly trying to steer the nascent yuppie audiophile market away from Brothers In Arms to more esoteric in-car entertainments.

This exemplary reissue augments the original LP with a number of fugitive pieces from the Durutti discography: notably the “Greetings Three” EP, originally released in Italy in 1986, plus a handful of tracks cut in LA and released as the “City Of Our Lady” EP in August ’87 – remarkable for a barmy cover of “White Rabbit”.

The third disc, meanwhile, unearths a live recording from the conclusion of the US tour, at the Bottom Line club in New York, previously available only on cassette. It’s hard to say the live set adds much to the studio incarnation of the …Other Machines material – “Arpeggiator” feels like it’s been diminished from IMAX to church hall, an undoubtedly sublime guitarist playing along with some MIDI backing tracks. It’s only on tracks like “Jacqueline”, where Reilly really locks into a groove with drummer Bruce Mitchell, that the music comes alive and you sense the magic that still eludes the machines.

Q&A
Bruce Mitchell, Durutti Column drummer 
and manager
Did Vini listen to the album again for this reissue?
Vini doesn’t really listen to his old stuff now. He likes the artefacts, though, the finished products. He puts them on his wall.

A lot of the album feels like it might be auditioning for soundtracks – was that a conscious intention?
Vini has only ever made music for himself. Tony Wilson always thought the music would come to film, but it’s only in the last couple of years that it has started showing up on soundtracks [and on Jerry Maguire, 1996].

It was sad to hear about Vini’s ongoing health problems – how’s he doing now?
He’s going to be playing in March. After the strokes it was hard for him. We bought him a special instrument with a narrow neck, but when we went to see him he had his old Strat set up and was roaring away! He frequently rediscovers his mojo. We’ve got an LP all ready to be released, but he’s having a bit of a dispute with the producer. Vini has his ups and downs, you know, but he’s still functioning in his unique way. STEPHEN TROUSSÉ

The March 2018 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – with My Bloody Valentine and Rock’s 50 Most Extreme Albums on the cover. Elsewhere in the issue, there are new interviews with Joan Baez, Stick In The Wheel, Gary Numan, Jethro Tull and many more and we also look back on the rise of progressive country in 70s’ Austin, Texas. Our free 15 track-CD features 15 classic tracks from the edge of sound, including My Bloody Valentine, Cabaret Voltaire, Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band, Flying Saucer Attack and Mogwai.

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