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Tom Jones song facing rugby match ban

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Tom Jones song facing rugby match ban

Rugby bosses have been urged to stop "Delilah" from being sung at games at Cardiff's Millennium Stadium... Tom Jones has spoken out about Welsh rugby bosses being urged to ban the singing of his hit "Delilah" before matches because the lyrics "trivialise the idea of murdering a woman". Talking at the inaugural BBC Music Awards in London last night [December 11], the singer said taking the song literally "takes the fun out of it". He commented: "If it's going to be taken literally, I think it takes the fun out of it, I think it takes the spirit out of why it's being sung at a Welsh rugby match." He said the song wasn't meant to be a "political statement", explaining: "If they're looking into the lyric about a man killing a woman, it's not a political statement, it's something that happens in life. This woman was unfaithful to him and he just loses it... I wasn't thinking that I was the man that was killing the girl when I was singing the song - I was acting out the part." He add that fans singing the song at matches made him "proud to be Welsh", commenting: "I love to hear it being sung at the Welsh games. It makes me very proud to be Welsh, that they're using one of my songs to sing at a rugby match. That's important to me." It was previously reported that Dafydd Iwan, former president of Plaid Cymru, had asked fans at Cardiff's Millennium Stadium to stop singing the song before matches because of its controversial content. The track currently acts as a second anthem for Wales, with the Rugby Union displaying the lyrics on the big screen before matches. Iwan, who is also a folk singer, said: "It is a song about murder and it does tend to trivialise the idea of murdering a woman and it’s a pity these words now have been elevated to the status of a secondary national anthem. I think we should rummage around for another song instead of 'Delilah'." The song, written by Les Reed, Barry Mason and Sylvan Whittingham and recorded by Jones in 1968, is about a man who kills his former partner. Lyrics include: "At break of day when that man drove away I was waiting/I crossed the street to her house and she opened the door/She stood there laughing/I felt the knife in my hand and she laughed no more/My my my Delilah… I just couldn't take any more". The Welsh Rugby Union are yet to take any action over the song. A spokesman for the union said: "Within rugby, Delilah has gained prominence through its musicality rather than because of its lyrics. There is, however, plenty of precedent in art and literature, prominently in Shakespearean tragedies for instance, for negative aspects of life to be portrayed. "The Welsh Rugby Union condemns violence against women and has taken a lead role in police campaigns to highlight and combat the issue. "The WRU remains willing to listen to any strong public debate on the issue of censoring the use of Delilah but we have not been aware of any groundswell of opinion on this matter." Uncut is available as a digital edition! Download here on your iPad/iPhone and here on your Kindle Fire or Nook.

Rugby bosses have been urged to stop “Delilah” from being sung at games at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium…

Tom Jones has spoken out about Welsh rugby bosses being urged to ban the singing of his hit “Delilah” before matches because the lyrics “trivialise the idea of murdering a woman”.

Talking at the inaugural BBC Music Awards in London last night [December 11], the singer said taking the song literally “takes the fun out of it”. He commented: “If it’s going to be taken literally, I think it takes the fun out of it, I think it takes the spirit out of why it’s being sung at a Welsh rugby match.”

He said the song wasn’t meant to be a “political statement”, explaining: “If they’re looking into the lyric about a man killing a woman, it’s not a political statement, it’s something that happens in life. This woman was unfaithful to him and he just loses it… I wasn’t thinking that I was the man that was killing the girl when I was singing the song – I was acting out the part.” He add that fans singing the song at matches made him “proud to be Welsh”, commenting: “I love to hear it being sung at the Welsh games. It makes me very proud to be Welsh, that they’re using one of my songs to sing at a rugby match. That’s important to me.”

It was previously reported that Dafydd Iwan, former president of Plaid Cymru, had asked fans at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium to stop singing the song before matches because of its controversial content. The track currently acts as a second anthem for Wales, with the Rugby Union displaying the lyrics on the big screen before matches.

Iwan, who is also a folk singer, said: “It is a song about murder and it does tend to trivialise the idea of murdering a woman and it’s a pity these words now have been elevated to the status of a secondary national anthem. I think we should rummage around for another song instead of ‘Delilah‘.”

The song, written by Les Reed, Barry Mason and Sylvan Whittingham and recorded by Jones in 1968, is about a man who kills his former partner. Lyrics include: “At break of day when that man drove away I was waiting/I crossed the street to her house and she opened the door/She stood there laughing/I felt the knife in my hand and she laughed no more/My my my Delilah… I just couldn’t take any more”.

The Welsh Rugby Union are yet to take any action over the song. A spokesman for the union said: “Within rugby, Delilah has gained prominence through its musicality rather than because of its lyrics. There is, however, plenty of precedent in art and literature, prominently in Shakespearean tragedies for instance, for negative aspects of life to be portrayed.

“The Welsh Rugby Union condemns violence against women and has taken a lead role in police campaigns to highlight and combat the issue.

“The WRU remains willing to listen to any strong public debate on the issue of censoring the use of Delilah but we have not been aware of any groundswell of opinion on this matter.”

Uncut is available as a digital edition! Download here on your iPad/iPhone and here on your Kindle Fire or Nook.

AC/DC announce UK live shows

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AC/DC announce UK live shows

Band will headline Wembley Stadium venue on July 4... AC/DC have confirmed details of a three date UK tour next Summer. The band, who recently released new album Rock Or Bust, will play: Sun June 28 2015 - GLASGOW Hampden Park Wed July 01 2015 - DUBLIN Aviva Stadium Sat July 04 2015 - LONDON Wembley Stadium The gigs represents AC/DC's first gig in the UK since their Black Ice world tour in 2009. Tickets for the gig go on sale at 9:30am on December 17. Earlier this year it was confirmed that guitarist Malcolm Young will no longer record or play live with the band. Rock Or Bust is the first in the group's 41-year history not to feature the founding member. Stevie Young – nephew of Angus and Malcolm Young – plays rhythm guitar on the album and will accompany the band on tour. The band's drummer Phil Rudd was also recently arrested on charges of drug possession and threats to kill, although the latter charges were later dropped. His future playing live with the band remains unresolved. AC/DC recently revealed that they would be open to the idea of headlining Glastonbury festival if asked. Speaking during a recent radio interview, the Australian band were initially sceptical about the prospect. However, when informed of Metallica's headline set last year, the band appeared more keen. "If they ask... OK," Angus Young added. "If they ask I'll say he sent us, Shaun sent us." Uncut is available as a digital edition! Download here on your iPad/iPhone and here on your Kindle Fire or Nook.

Band will headline Wembley Stadium venue on July 4…

AC/DC have confirmed details of a three date UK tour next Summer.

The band, who recently released new album Rock Or Bust, will play:

Sun June 28 2015 – GLASGOW Hampden Park

Wed July 01 2015 – DUBLIN Aviva Stadium

Sat July 04 2015 – LONDON Wembley Stadium

The gigs represents AC/DC’s first gig in the UK since their Black Ice world tour in 2009. Tickets for the gig go on sale at 9:30am on December 17.

Earlier this year it was confirmed that guitarist Malcolm Young will no longer record or play live with the band. Rock Or Bust is the first in the group’s 41-year history not to feature the founding member.

Stevie Young – nephew of Angus and Malcolm Young – plays rhythm guitar on the album and will accompany the band on tour. The band’s drummer Phil Rudd was also recently arrested on charges of drug possession and threats to kill, although the latter charges were later dropped. His future playing live with the band remains unresolved.

AC/DC recently revealed that they would be open to the idea of headlining Glastonbury festival if asked. Speaking during a recent radio interview, the Australian band were initially sceptical about the prospect.

However, when informed of Metallica‘s headline set last year, the band appeared more keen. “If they ask… OK,” Angus Young added. “If they ask I’ll say he sent us, Shaun sent us.”

Uncut is available as a digital edition! Download here on your iPad/iPhone and here on your Kindle Fire or Nook.

St Vincent: “I don’t need scented candles in the studio… making a record isn’t brain surgery”

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St Vincent: “I don’t need scented candles in the studio… making a record isn’t brain surgery”
St Vincent takes us through the creation of the five albums she’s released so far, in the new issue of Uncut, dated January 2015 and out now. As well as her four full-length releases, Annie Clark explains how she wrote and recorded 2012’s Love This Giant, her collaborative album with David By...

St Vincent takes us through the creation of the five albums she’s released so far, in the new issue of Uncut, dated January 2015 and out now.

As well as her four full-length releases, Annie Clark explains how she wrote and recorded 2012’s Love This Giant, her collaborative album with David Byrne.

“I constantly take experiences and write about them,” Clark explains of her songwriting. “That’s just how I function, how I make sense of the universe and how I like to live.

“I just like to work,” she admits. “I don’t need scented candles and incense in the studio. I just get to work, it’s not brain surgery, you know?”

The new issue of Uncut is out now.

Uncut is now available as a digital edition! Download here on your iPad/iPhone and here on your Kindle Fire or Nook.

John Lydon: Band Aid is “full of corruption”

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John Lydon: Band Aid is “full of corruption”
John Lydon has hit out at a number of targets including Band Aid and Simon Cowell. Speaking to an audience of around 300 at Oxford University's Sheldonian Theatre on Monday evening to promote his new autobiography Anger Is An Energy, Lydon spoke out about Cowell's treatment of X Factor contestants....

John Lydon has hit out at a number of targets including Band Aid and Simon Cowell.

Speaking to an audience of around 300 at Oxford University’s Sheldonian Theatre on Monday evening to promote his new autobiography Anger Is An Energy, Lydon spoke out about Cowell’s treatment of X Factor contestants.

“Simon Cowell, that’s our worst enemy… I don’t think [the contestants] on the show are that awful, it becomes awful when they become trained into that cruise ship show band mentality, and that’s the poison of it…” he began. “[Simon Cowell] has got us all on his big cruise ship lollipop, and I ain’t licking his lollipop.”

He continued: “It’s really bad, all of them shows. How seriously the judges take themselves, and the way they judge! People, just being innocent. The brutality and the cruelty of it; that ain’t the world I live in.”

Lydon then went on to criticise Band Aid, saying that the charity initiative was “full of corruption” and that the money was eaten up by administration costs. “I never found Band-Aids work, they think they’re waterproof, get full of water and then fall off – and it’s the same with Geldof’s lot,” Lydon said. “I don’t like them because they’re open to corruption. There’s this thing called administration and that’s where all the money is eaten up. Do you remember the one with Phil Collins and they were jetting around, doing New York, London? How much fucking money? How many cans of Campbell’s do you think that one cost? And who really needs Phil Collins in two continents in two hours? Even his missus would have a no on that.”

The appearance was Lydon’s last in promotion of the book. The message of the autobiography, he told the audience, is that “self pity is for arseholes.”

The singer has recently also spoken out about a number of other subjects including Russell Brand, The Clash and Ukip. Ukip was labeled a “black hole for the ignorant to fall into” while Brand was called “arsehole number one”.

Billy Corgan slams Pearl Jam and Foo Fighters

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Billy Corgan slams Pearl Jam and Foo Fighters

Smashing Pumpkins frontman goes on the offensive during album promo... Billy Corgan has dismissed fellow rockers Pearl Jam as "derivative" and Foo Fighters as undeveloped after claiming that he "can out write" all of his generation. In an appearance on The Howard Stern Show promoting the Smashing Pumpkins' new record, Monuments To An Elegy, Corgan said Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins were in their own class among 90s alt-rockers. "I think the work speaks for itself," he said. "I know [Pearl Jam] have a tremendous fan base, and they should, they're a great band, but I'm a Beatles guy, I'm a Stones guy, I'm a Kinks guy. To me a lot of other bands don't have the work." Corgan added that it was a "mystery" how Pearl Jam have maintained their arena status "because I just don't get it." "I think if you stack my songs up, Cobain's songs up, and that band's songs, they just don’t have the songs," he said. The singer also divulged that he wasn't "particularly thrilled" by Foo Fighters' lack of evolution as a band because he holds Dave Grohl to Nirvana standards. "Dave is a great musician, a great songwriter and has done the work but to me, my criticism of the Foo Fighters, if I’m being a music critic, is that they just haven’t evolved and that’s sort of the recent wrap on them is, you know, making the same music," he said. "Obviously, I’ve put my whole life on the line for making different types music as I’ve gone along. We’ve talked last time I was here about playing old songs, evolving and it’s just my mentality. I know it’s not for everybody. Listen, [Dave’s] getting it done so it’s like, if you want to be competitive, my philosophy against his, he’s the one winning.” Corgan's remarks come after he told Time Out that most of his contemporaries "are living off fumes" or producing lesser work. "As for my generation, I feel I could take the same position I’ve always taken: I can out-write all of them and I’ll do so until the day I die." Smashing Pumpkins' new album was released this month. Corgan recently told NME he was forced to change his approach to making music with the band ahead of the album, explaining that if they didn't update what they were doing the band would be "dead in the water".

Smashing Pumpkins frontman goes on the offensive during album promo…

Billy Corgan has dismissed fellow rockers Pearl Jam as “derivative” and Foo Fighters as undeveloped after claiming that he “can out write” all of his generation.

In an appearance on The Howard Stern Show promoting the Smashing Pumpkins‘ new record, Monuments To An Elegy, Corgan said Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins were in their own class among 90s alt-rockers. “I think the work speaks for itself,” he said. “I know [Pearl Jam] have a tremendous fan base, and they should, they’re a great band, but I’m a Beatles guy, I’m a Stones guy, I’m a Kinks guy. To me a lot of other bands don’t have the work.”

Corgan added that it was a “mystery” how Pearl Jam have maintained their arena status “because I just don’t get it.” “I think if you stack my songs up, Cobain’s songs up, and that band’s songs, they just don’t have the songs,” he said.

The singer also divulged that he wasn’t “particularly thrilled” by Foo Fighters‘ lack of evolution as a band because he holds Dave Grohl to Nirvana standards. “Dave is a great musician, a great songwriter and has done the work but to me, my criticism of the Foo Fighters, if I’m being a music critic, is that they just haven’t evolved and that’s sort of the recent wrap on them is, you know, making the same music,” he said.

“Obviously, I’ve put my whole life on the line for making different types music as I’ve gone along. We’ve talked last time I was here about playing old songs, evolving and it’s just my mentality. I know it’s not for everybody. Listen, [Dave’s] getting it done so it’s like, if you want to be competitive, my philosophy against his, he’s the one winning.”

Corgan’s remarks come after he told Time Out that most of his contemporaries “are living off fumes” or producing lesser work. “As for my generation, I feel I could take the same position I’ve always taken: I can out-write all of them and I’ll do so until the day I die.”

Smashing Pumpkins’ new album was released this month. Corgan recently told NME he was forced to change his approach to making music with the band ahead of the album, explaining that if they didn’t update what they were doing the band would be “dead in the water”.

Jonny Greenwood shares unreleased Radiohead song

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Jonny Greenwood shares unreleased Radiohead song

'Spooks' now features Joanna Newsom and Supergrass's Gaz Coombes and Danny Goffey... Previously unreleased Radiohead track "Spooks", which will feature in director Paul Thomas Anderson's new film Inherent Vice, is now streaming online. Visit Stereogum to listen to the new version of the song, which features spoken word from musician and one of the film's stars, Joanna Newsom, as well as instrumentation from former Supergrass members Gaz Coombes and Danny Goffey. The song was originally unveiled during a live performance by Radiohead eight years ago, in May 2006 in Copenhagen. The new version sees Jonny Greenwood, who has composed the Inherent Vice soundtrack, at the helm. Greenwood's soundtrack also features Neil Young song "Journey Through The Past", "Vitamin C" by Can, Minnie Ripperton's "Les Fleur" and a host of original compositions from Greenwood himself. Greenwood also provided music for Anderson's last two films, There Will Be Blood and The Master. His Inherent Vice score features London's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The film stars Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Owen Wilson, Katherine Waterston, Reese Witherspoon, Benicio Del Toro, Martin Short and Jena Malone. It's due for release in the UK on January 30. This autumn Thom Yorke took to Twitter to confirm recording had been taking place at the Radiohead studio for the band's newest LP. In a series of posts, the frontman revealed that he and Stanley Donwood – creator of the band's artwork since 1994 – were going through 15 years' worth of unused images and words, and that overdubs were happening in the studio on the second day of recording. You can read our first look review of Inherent Vice Uncut - in shops now!

‘Spooks’ now features Joanna Newsom and Supergrass’s Gaz Coombes and Danny Goffey…

Previously unreleased Radiohead track “Spooks“, which will feature in director Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film Inherent Vice, is now streaming online.

Visit Stereogum to listen to the new version of the song, which features spoken word from musician and one of the film’s stars, Joanna Newsom, as well as instrumentation from former Supergrass members Gaz Coombes and Danny Goffey.

The song was originally unveiled during a live performance by Radiohead eight years ago, in May 2006 in Copenhagen. The new version sees Jonny Greenwood, who has composed the Inherent Vice soundtrack, at the helm. Greenwood’s soundtrack also features Neil Young song “Journey Through The Past”, “Vitamin C” by Can, Minnie Ripperton’s “Les Fleur” and a host of original compositions from Greenwood himself.

Greenwood also provided music for Anderson’s last two films, There Will Be Blood and The Master. His Inherent Vice score features London’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The film stars Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Owen Wilson, Katherine Waterston, Reese Witherspoon, Benicio Del Toro, Martin Short and Jena Malone. It’s due for release in the UK on January 30.

This autumn Thom Yorke took to Twitter to confirm recording had been taking place at the Radiohead studio for the band’s newest LP. In a series of posts, the frontman revealed that he and Stanley Donwood – creator of the band’s artwork since 1994 – were going through 15 years’ worth of unused images and words, and that overdubs were happening in the studio on the second day of recording.

You can read our first look review of Inherent Vice Uncut – in shops now!

Neil Young’s first 14 albums to be remastered

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Neil Young’s first 14 albums to be remastered

Pono releases due on December 23... Neil Young has revealed that his first 14 albums are due to be released on December 23, 2014 as digital downloads through the Pono Store. As reported on Thrasher's Wheat, the Neil Young Original Releases Series 1 - 14 will see the albums remastered at resolutions of either 24/176.4 or 24/192. Writing on the Pono community forum, Young said, "My first officialrelease series LPs 1-14 will all be available PONO on DEC 23, in 192 and some cases 176. Beginning with NEIL YOUNG, ending with REACTOR. Thanks, Enjoy!" Many of these albums have not been digitally remastered since the original Warner Bros CD editions issued in the 1980s. According to a further speculative post on the Steve Hoffman forum, this is the list of titles to be released and resolution: Neil Young [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere [PONO] {192kHz} {24bit} After The Gold Rush [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} Harvest [PONO] {192kHz} {24bit} Time Fades Away [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} On The Beach [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit} Tonight's The Night [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} Zuma [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} American Stars 'N Bars [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit} Comes A Time [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} Rust Never Sleeps [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} Live Rust [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit} Hawks & Doves [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit} re-ac-tor [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit} You can read about Neil Young's 2014 in the new issue of Uncut - in shops now!

Pono releases due on December 23…

Neil Young has revealed that his first 14 albums are due to be released on December 23, 2014 as digital downloads through the Pono Store.

As reported on Thrasher’s Wheat, the Neil Young Original Releases Series 1 – 14 will see the albums remastered at resolutions of either 24/176.4 or 24/192.

Writing on the Pono community forum, Young said, “My first officialrelease series LPs 1-14 will all be available PONO on DEC 23, in 192 and some cases 176. Beginning with NEIL YOUNG, ending with REACTOR. Thanks, Enjoy!”

Many of these albums have not been digitally remastered since the original Warner Bros CD editions issued in the 1980s.

According to a further speculative post on the Steve Hoffman forum, this is the list of titles to be released and resolution:

Neil Young [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere [PONO] {192kHz} {24bit}

After The Gold Rush [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

Harvest [PONO] {192kHz} {24bit}

Time Fades Away [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

On The Beach [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit}

Tonight’s The Night [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

Zuma [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

American Stars ‘N Bars [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit}

Comes A Time [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

Rust Never Sleeps [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

Live Rust [PONO] {192/176.4kHz} {24bit}

Hawks & Doves [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit}

re-ac-tor [PONO] {176.4kHz} {24bit}

You can read about Neil Young’s 2014 in the new issue of Uncut – in shops now!

Discount supermarket chain to sell record players

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Discount supermarket chain to sell record players

Lidl's Silvercrest USB Record Player is in shops now... Offering further evidence for the resurgence of interest in vinyl, the discount supermarket chain Lidl have started selling a USB Record Player. According to the operating manual, "This device is intended to be used for the playing of vinyl records, for the recep- tion of FM radio transmissions, for the playback of MP3/WMA files from USB memory devices and SD/MMC memory cards, and the playback of audio signals from external audio devices." The Silvercrest® turntable currently retails in the UK for £49.99. According to the Lidl website, the deck's key features are: Digitises and saves your LPs and 45s directly to a USB stick or as MP3s to an SD/MMC card Additional recording option via AUX-IN With pitch-level tuning and anti-skating function Remote control with batteries, tone arm weight, spindle adaptor, needle cover and felt mat included/strong> The item also comes with a 3 year manufacturer's warranty. Silvercrest® is the supermarket chain's own brand of manufactured white goods. Lidl is a German global discount supermarket chain that operates over 10,000 stores across Europe. Last month [November 2014], Uncut reported that Pink Floyd's album The Endless River, sold 6,000 copies in its first week of sales, the highest first-week sales of any vinyl LP released since 1997, and therefore the fastest-selling vinyl album this century. Pink Floyd's success comes with the news that annual sales of vinyl albums have surpassed a million for the first time since the 1990s.

Lidl’s Silvercrest USB Record Player is in shops now…

Offering further evidence for the resurgence of interest in vinyl, the discount supermarket chain Lidl have started selling a USB Record Player.

According to the operating manual, “This device is intended to be used for the playing of vinyl records, for the recep- tion of FM radio transmissions, for the playback of MP3/WMA files from USB memory devices and SD/MMC memory cards, and the playback of audio signals from external audio devices.”

The Silvercrest® turntable currently retails in the UK for £49.99. According to the Lidl website, the deck’s key features are:

Digitises and saves your LPs and 45s directly to a USB stick or as MP3s to an SD/MMC card

Additional recording option via AUX-IN

With pitch-level tuning and anti-skating function

Remote control with batteries, tone arm weight, spindle adaptor, needle cover and felt mat included/strong>

The item also comes with a 3 year manufacturer’s warranty.

Silvercrest® is the supermarket chain’s own brand of manufactured white goods. Lidl is a German global discount supermarket chain that operates over 10,000 stores across Europe.

Last month [November 2014], Uncut reported that Pink Floyd‘s album The Endless River, sold 6,000 copies in its first week of sales, the highest first-week sales of any vinyl LP released since 1997, and therefore the fastest-selling vinyl album this century.

Pink Floyd’s success comes with the news that annual sales of vinyl albums have surpassed a million for the first time since the 1990s.

Sinéad O’Connor joins Sinn Féin

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Sinéad O’Connor joins Sinn Féin

Singer calls for Sinn Féin leadership to step down... Sinéad O'Connor has announced she has joined Sinn Féin and has called on Gerry Adams and other veteran republicans to step down from the party’s leadership. The BBC reports that on December 7 O'Connor wrote on her blog: "I’m joining Sinn Fein now. If they’ll have me. Just as a regular punter who wants to learn and contribute with whatever strengths I might have or learn. I’d like to see a proper socialist Ireland. I’d like to be educated as to how ordinary people like me can help bring about the changes which would make every child equally cherished and make everyone have equal rights. I realised the best way to revolt is vote. And the only vote that’s gonna give anyone a chance of bringing to fruition paragraphs three and four of the Proclamation of 1916 is Sinn Fein, because no other party at the moment is going to honour that Proclamation. If they were inclined to honour it they’d just hand over and say lets have an election." A day later, she wrote on Facebook, "I joined Sinn Fein today. I might not even be the kind of person they want, because I'm gonna write here that I feel the elders of Sinn Fein are going to have to make 'the supreme sacrifice' and step down shortly in the same way the last Pope did. It was the smart thing for him to do because his association in people's minds with frightful things meant the church were losing bums on seats, if I may use a showbiz term. And now they have barely a seat to spare. Pure cold business. There'd be a zillion per cent increase in membership of Sinn Fein if the leadership were handed over to those born from 1983/1985 onward and no one associated in people's minds with frightful things. Frightful things belong where they are now, in the past."

Singer calls for Sinn Féin leadership to step down…

Sinéad O’Connor has announced she has joined Sinn Féin and has called on Gerry Adams and other veteran republicans to step down from the party’s leadership.

The BBC reports that on December 7 O’Connor wrote on her blog: “I’m joining Sinn Fein now. If they’ll have me. Just as a regular punter who wants to learn and contribute with whatever strengths I might have or learn. I’d like to see a proper socialist Ireland. I’d like to be educated as to how ordinary people like me can help bring about the changes which would make every child equally cherished and make everyone have equal rights. I realised the best way to revolt is vote. And the only vote that’s gonna give anyone a chance of bringing to fruition paragraphs three and four of the Proclamation of 1916 is Sinn Fein, because no other party at the moment is going to honour that Proclamation. If they were inclined to honour it they’d just hand over and say lets have an election.”

A day later, she wrote on Facebook, “I joined Sinn Fein today. I might not even be the kind of person they want, because I’m gonna write here that I feel the elders of Sinn Fein are going to have to make ‘the supreme sacrifice’ and step down shortly in the same way the last Pope did. It was the smart thing for him to do because his association in people’s minds with frightful things meant the church were losing bums on seats, if I may use a showbiz term. And now they have barely a seat to spare. Pure cold business. There’d be a zillion per cent increase in membership of Sinn Fein if the leadership were handed over to those born from 1983/1985 onward and no one associated in people’s minds with frightful things. Frightful things belong where they are now, in the past.”

Andrew Loog Oldham criticizes David Bowie’s new material: “Old people make old music”

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Andrew Loog Oldham criticizes David Bowie’s new material: “Old people make old music”

Former Rolling Stones manager also criticises Jools Holland in outspoken interview... Andrew Loog Oldham has compared David Bowie's new material to "the worst of Scott Walker" and criticised Jools Holland in an outspoken new interview. Loog Oldham, the former manager of The Rolling Stones, spoke to The Sabotage Times in a long interview which covers subjects including the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame to his love of BBC TV drama Peaky Blinders. However, it is when asked what he thinks of modern music that he is most harsh, specifically towards Later... presenter Jools Holland. "I was watching that great music show hosted by that awful Jools Holland," he said. "They really should inject his hands with cocaine so that he cannot play piano any more. I’ve watched him walk all over Bill Medley, Amy Winehouse, Paul Weller. I'm sure he went to the Russ Conway piano school….. Anyway, Later With Jools Holland, that's the show and a very good show it is apart from Jools (who looks like Bernard Cribbins in pimp gear)." Despite his opinions on the host, one band caught Loog Oldham's eye. "There was this band from Chicago – The Orwells – very, very good apart from the drummer. But great chops and a great figure. I was getting excited. Then they came on later in the show and showed they only had one song. Not enough, kiddies, not enough." He was similarly critical of Bowie. "I just heard the new Bowie single; he seems to be cloning the worst of Scott Walker. As I’ve said old people make old music." Photo credit: David Livingston/Getty Images Entertainment

Former Rolling Stones manager also criticises Jools Holland in outspoken interview…

Andrew Loog Oldham has compared David Bowie‘s new material to “the worst of Scott Walker” and criticised Jools Holland in an outspoken new interview.

Loog Oldham, the former manager of The Rolling Stones, spoke to The Sabotage Times in a long interview which covers subjects including the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame to his love of BBC TV drama Peaky Blinders. However, it is when asked what he thinks of modern music that he is most harsh, specifically towards Later… presenter Jools Holland.

“I was watching that great music show hosted by that awful Jools Holland,” he said. “They really should inject his hands with cocaine so that he cannot play piano any more. I’ve watched him walk all over Bill Medley, Amy Winehouse, Paul Weller. I’m sure he went to the Russ Conway piano school….. Anyway, Later With Jools Holland, that’s the show and a very good show it is apart from Jools (who looks like Bernard Cribbins in pimp gear).”

Despite his opinions on the host, one band caught Loog Oldham’s eye. “There was this band from Chicago – The Orwells – very, very good apart from the drummer. But great chops and a great figure. I was getting excited. Then they came on later in the show and showed they only had one song. Not enough, kiddies, not enough.”

He was similarly critical of Bowie. “I just heard the new Bowie single; he seems to be cloning the worst of Scott Walker. As I’ve said old people make old music.”

Photo credit: David Livingston/Getty Images Entertainment

Morrissey reveals he has written new album and “hopes to record in February”

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Morrissey reveals he has written new album and “hopes to record in February”

Singer revealed news on Serbian website... Morrissey has revealed that he has written his new album and will be recording it next year. In an interview with Serbia's B92 (via Morrissey-solo), the singer said: "We wrote a new album and I hope that we will record it in February." The news follows a year beset by label issues for Morrissey. World Peace Is None Of Your Business, the singer's first studio album in five years, was released in July of this year on Harvest Records. By August, however, Morrissey claimed the label had dropped him and complained about them botching the release. Soon after, Harvest pulled the record from all digital retailers and streaming services. Earlier today, Morrissey also claimed that he turned down an invitation from Channel 4 to record this year's alternative to The Queen's annual Christmas Day message. However, a spokesperson for Channel 4 has confirmed to NME that the station has extended no such offer. "We are not aware of any approach having been made to Morrissey to deliver Channel 4’s Alternative Christmas message," the spokesperson said in a statement. Meanwhile, Morrissey's European tour has been met with further setbacks after the singer was forced to cancel dates in Greece and Turkey this week. Previously, his gig in Germany was ended shortly after a stage invasion and he walked off stage during his Poland show after being heckled by a fan.

Singer revealed news on Serbian website…

Morrissey has revealed that he has written his new album and will be recording it next year.

In an interview with Serbia’s B92 (via Morrissey-solo), the singer said: “We wrote a new album and I hope that we will record it in February.”

The news follows a year beset by label issues for Morrissey. World Peace Is None Of Your Business, the singer’s first studio album in five years, was released in July of this year on Harvest Records. By August, however, Morrissey claimed the label had dropped him and complained about them botching the release. Soon after, Harvest pulled the record from all digital retailers and streaming services.

Earlier today, Morrissey also claimed that he turned down an invitation from Channel 4 to record this year’s alternative to The Queen‘s annual Christmas Day message.

However, a spokesperson for Channel 4 has confirmed to NME that the station has extended no such offer. “We are not aware of any approach having been made to Morrissey to deliver Channel 4’s Alternative Christmas message,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Morrissey’s European tour has been met with further setbacks after the singer was forced to cancel dates in Greece and Turkey this week. Previously, his gig in Germany was ended shortly after a stage invasion and he walked off stage during his Poland show after being heckled by a fan.

Bob Dylan announces new studio album, Shadows In The Night

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Bob Dylan announces new studio album, Shadows In The Night

Ten tracks due in February 2015... Bob Dylan will release his new studio album, Shadows In The Night, on February 2, 2015. Featuring ten tracks of Frank Sinatra covers, the album is the 36th studio set from Bob Dylan and marks the first new music from the artist since 2012’s Tempest. Dylan commented, “It was a real privilege to make this album. I've wanted to do something like this for a long time but was never brave enough to approach 30-piece complicated arrangements and refine them down for a 5-piece band. That's the key to all these performances. We knew these songs extremely well. It was all done live. Maybe one or two takes. No overdubbing. No vocal booths. No headphones. No separate tracking, and, for the most part, mixed as it was recorded. I don't see myself as covering these songs in any way. They've been covered enough. Buried, as a matter a fact. What me and my band are basically doing is uncovering them. Lifting them out of the grave and bringing them into the light of day.” As Columba Records Chairman Rob Stringer explains, “There are no strings, obvious horns, background vocals or other such devices often found on albums that feature standard ballads. Instead, Bob has managed to find a way to infuse these songs with new life and contemporary relevance. It is a brilliant record and we are extremely excited to be presenting it to the world very soon.” When Dylan released his version of "Full Moon And Empty Arms" in May this year, Uncut speculated we might be in for an album of Sinatra covers. The tracklisting for Shadows In The Night is: 1. I'm A Fool To Want You 2. The Night We Called It A Day 3. Stay With Me 4. Autumn Leaves 5. Why Try to Change Me Now 6. Some Enchanted Evening 7. Full Moon And Empty Arms 8. Where Are You? 9. What'll I Do 10. That Lucky Old Sun

Ten tracks due in February 2015…

Bob Dylan will release his new studio album, Shadows In The Night, on February 2, 2015. Featuring ten tracks of Frank Sinatra covers, the album is the 36th studio set from Bob Dylan and marks the first new music from the artist since 2012’s Tempest.

Dylan commented, “It was a real privilege to make this album. I’ve wanted to do something like this for a long time but was never brave enough to approach 30-piece complicated arrangements and refine them down for a 5-piece band. That’s the key to all these performances. We knew these songs extremely well. It was all done live. Maybe one or two takes. No overdubbing. No vocal booths. No headphones. No separate tracking, and, for the most part, mixed as it was recorded. I don’t see myself as covering these songs in any way. They’ve been covered enough. Buried, as a matter a fact. What me and my band are basically doing is uncovering them. Lifting them out of the grave and bringing them into the light of day.”

As Columba Records Chairman Rob Stringer explains, “There are no strings, obvious horns, background vocals or other such devices often found on albums that feature standard ballads. Instead, Bob has managed to find a way to infuse these songs with new life and contemporary relevance. It is a brilliant record and we are extremely excited to be presenting it to the world very soon.”

When Dylan released his version of “Full Moon And Empty Arms” in May this year, Uncut speculated we might be in for an album of Sinatra covers.

The tracklisting for Shadows In The Night is:

1. I’m A Fool To Want You

2. The Night We Called It A Day

3. Stay With Me

4. Autumn Leaves

5. Why Try to Change Me Now

6. Some Enchanted Evening

7. Full Moon And Empty Arms

8. Where Are You?

9. What’ll I Do

10. That Lucky Old Sun

Joanna Newsom, Jonny Greenwood and Neil Young: Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice previewed

Michael Bonner
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Joanna Newsom, Jonny Greenwood and Neil Young: Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice previewed

Interesting news last week in the Los Angeles Times, which reported that the Los Angeles apartment occupied by Elliot Gould’s Philip Marlowe in Robert Altman's great 1973 film The Long Goodbye is now available for rent. One bedroom, one bathroom, private parking, hardwood floors and a terrace, with access via a private elevator, it can be yours for around £1,790 a month. Serendipitously, Altman’s The Long Goodbye has been rattling round my head for a few weeks now, since I saw Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film, Inherent Vice. Adapted from a Raymond Chandler novel, Altman’s The Long Goodbye highlighted the difference between the hardboiled detective genre and California in the permissive Seventies. It’s the same location and decade that Anderson lovingly recreates for Inherent Vice: a crazy, out-of-whack principality where the funky hippie vibes of the previous decade have been replaced by Nixon, Manson, Vietnam, urban riots and assassinations. Anxiety and remorse are the principal emotions. There’s a sticky, faintly claustrophobic tone to the film, with its talk of “karmic thermals” and heroin addicts, midday naps and shapeless days. As one character says in voiceover, "American life was something to be escaped from.” Incidentally, Anderson’s film is based on a Thomas Pynchon novel, and the director battles (successfully, for the most part) to do justice to the author’s fizz of ideas and twisty, often exasperating subplots. In the middle of all this is muttonchopped private eye Larry "Doc" Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), sporting what look conspicuously like a succession of Neil Young’s cast offs from the Buffalo Springfield days. Sportello is a man of professional bravado but personal confusion: befuddled by weed, his love life is in freefall. After having sat through Phoenix shouting his way through Anderson’s previous film, The Master, it’s quite pleasant to watch him mumble his way through Inherent Vice. He reminds me a little of Robert De Niro in Jackie Brown, who did great stoned acting in the background of a scene, where he spent about five minutes trying unsuccessfully to recradle a telephone receiver. Here, Phoenix has the slow, disassociative reactions of the perpetually wasted. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZfs22E7JmI Sportello is engaged by his ex girlfriend, Shasta (Katherine Waterston), who is having an affair with property developer Mickey Wolfmann (Eric Roberts); Shasta and Mickey promptly disappear; meanwhile, in a separate storyline, Sportello is engaged to find a missing husband, played by Owen Wilson who admirably out-acts Phoenix in the stoned stakes. What follows includes neo-Nazis, a shadowy cabal of dentists, anti-Communist subversives, teenage runaways and many more splendid examples of the counter culture at its strung-out and goofiest. Around Phoenix, Anderson has assembled an excellent supporting cast: Benicio Del Toro, Reece Witherspoon and Martin Short. The best work is done by Josh Brolin, modeling a spectacularly officious flattop, as Sportello’s nemesis on the LAPD - and also Joanna Newsom, who is terrific as Sortilège, a wise-owl astrologer friend of Sportello and Shasta who also deliver the film’s voiceover. It's gratifying to learn earlier today, by the way, that Newsom is at work on new material. Meanwhile, Jonny Greenwood, a regular Anderson collaborator, provides the film’s soundtrack: a beguiling mix of his own compositions (check out the loose, burbling rhythms of “Shasta Fey”) alongside Can and Neil Young. Indeed, Young’s “Journey Through The Past” is critical to the film. Anderson uses it principally to soundtrack flashbacks of Sportello and Shasta in happier times. But it also serves to articulate a deeper subtext at work in Pynchon’s novel; the sadness of lost potential. Pynchon seems to suggest that “the ancient forces of greed and fear” at work in today’s world have their roots in California during the period the film is set in. It’s one of Pynchon’s many, wonderfully digressive thoughts; using the cultural detritus generated by the era to consider bigger things. “Eggs break, chocolate melts, glass shatters,” says Del Toro’s character, a marine lawyer, as he explains the legal term that gave both the book and film its title. Namely: everything falls apart, even the times in which we live. Inherent Vice opens in the UK on January 30

Interesting news last week in the Los Angeles Times, which reported that the Los Angeles apartment occupied by Elliot Gould’s Philip Marlowe in Robert Altman’s great 1973 film The Long Goodbye is now available for rent. One bedroom, one bathroom, private parking, hardwood floors and a terrace, with access via a private elevator, it can be yours for around £1,790 a month. Serendipitously, Altman’s The Long Goodbye has been rattling round my head for a few weeks now, since I saw Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film, Inherent Vice.

Adapted from a Raymond Chandler novel, Altman’s The Long Goodbye highlighted the difference between the hardboiled detective genre and California in the permissive Seventies. It’s the same location and decade that Anderson lovingly recreates for Inherent Vice: a crazy, out-of-whack principality where the funky hippie vibes of the previous decade have been replaced by Nixon, Manson, Vietnam, urban riots and assassinations. Anxiety and remorse are the principal emotions. There’s a sticky, faintly claustrophobic tone to the film, with its talk of “karmic thermals” and heroin addicts, midday naps and shapeless days. As one character says in voiceover, “American life was something to be escaped from.” Incidentally, Anderson’s film is based on a Thomas Pynchon novel, and the director battles (successfully, for the most part) to do justice to the author’s fizz of ideas and twisty, often exasperating subplots.

In the middle of all this is muttonchopped private eye Larry “Doc” Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), sporting what look conspicuously like a succession of Neil Young’s cast offs from the Buffalo Springfield days. Sportello is a man of professional bravado but personal confusion: befuddled by weed, his love life is in freefall. After having sat through Phoenix shouting his way through Anderson’s previous film, The Master, it’s quite pleasant to watch him mumble his way through Inherent Vice. He reminds me a little of Robert De Niro in Jackie Brown, who did great stoned acting in the background of a scene, where he spent about five minutes trying unsuccessfully to recradle a telephone receiver. Here, Phoenix has the slow, disassociative reactions of the perpetually wasted.

Sportello is engaged by his ex girlfriend, Shasta (Katherine Waterston), who is having an affair with property developer Mickey Wolfmann (Eric Roberts); Shasta and Mickey promptly disappear; meanwhile, in a separate storyline, Sportello is engaged to find a missing husband, played by Owen Wilson who admirably out-acts Phoenix in the stoned stakes. What follows includes neo-Nazis, a shadowy cabal of dentists, anti-Communist subversives, teenage runaways and many more splendid examples of the counter culture at its strung-out and goofiest. Around Phoenix, Anderson has assembled an excellent supporting cast: Benicio Del Toro, Reece Witherspoon and Martin Short. The best work is done by Josh Brolin, modeling a spectacularly officious flattop, as Sportello’s nemesis on the LAPD – and also Joanna Newsom, who is terrific as Sortilège, a wise-owl astrologer friend of Sportello and Shasta who also deliver the film’s voiceover. It’s gratifying to learn earlier today, by the way, that Newsom is at work on new material. Meanwhile, Jonny Greenwood, a regular Anderson collaborator, provides the film’s soundtrack: a beguiling mix of his own compositions (check out the loose, burbling rhythms of “Shasta Fey”) alongside Can and Neil Young.

Indeed, Young’s “Journey Through The Past” is critical to the film. Anderson uses it principally to soundtrack flashbacks of Sportello and Shasta in happier times. But it also serves to articulate a deeper subtext at work in Pynchon’s novel; the sadness of lost potential. Pynchon seems to suggest that “the ancient forces of greed and fear” at work in today’s world have their roots in California during the period the film is set in. It’s one of Pynchon’s many, wonderfully digressive thoughts; using the cultural detritus generated by the era to consider bigger things. “Eggs break, chocolate melts, glass shatters,” says Del Toro’s character, a marine lawyer, as he explains the legal term that gave both the book and film its title. Namely: everything falls apart, even the times in which we live.

Inherent Vice opens in the UK on January 30

Sleater-Kinney – Start Together

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Sleater-Kinney – Start Together

Trio’s war against definition / explanation, compiled... After forming in 1994, Sleater-Kinney spent most of the ‘90s trying to ensure their ascendant profile remained connected to their origins. “We are coming from somewhere, we’re not just an isolated entity without a context or a background,” said Carrie Brownstein, one of their two singers and guitarists. Her counterpart Corin Tucker could pinpoint where exactly: Valentine’s Day 1991, when, aged 18, she saw Bikini Kill at Olympia, WA’s North Shore Surf Club. “It was the first time I’d seen feminism translated into an emotional language,” she told Greil Marcus. “…You had the feeling they had started the week before and that you can do it too – stand up and speak in the town square, even if you have to create the town square yourself.” But by the time Sleater-Kinney recorded what their final album, 2005’s The Woods, they were trying to smash their town square, bristling against complacency and the limiting descriptors that trailed them: ‘feminist’, ‘punk’, ‘riot grrrl’, ‘political’. Having made all but one of their previous records with John Goodmanson in Seattle, the Pacific Northwest trio (Quasi drummer Janet Weiss joined in 1997) ventured cross-country to Dave Fridmann’s New York State studio and said they wanted to halve their audience. “We’re sick of people feeling they know who we are and what we’re capable of,” Brownstein told Eddie Vedder. “I remember thinking … I’d really love to make some of our fans angry.” It was an energy they had tapped into while supporting Pearl Jam at the beginning of the Iraq war. Sleater-Kinney’s own gigs were an echo chamber for anti-Bush rhetoric. Here they met 10,000 booing patriots whose indifference spurred them on to make an earth-razing record: a flood of stinging, Zep-indebted sludge populated by desperate characters clinging to hope in a crumbling world order. Their first for Sub Pop after leaving Kill Rock Stars, The Woods was acclaimed but divisive, letting them exit as a band apart when they declared a hiatus in 2006. Eight years later, this box collects Sleater-Kinney’s seven LPs, remastered by Greg Calbi (amplifying the bottom end in the absence of a bassist) and accompanied by a photo book. No liner notes, b-sides, rarities, demos. Sleater-Kinney were constantly asked to defend the legitimacy of their voice by critics and scene forbears who thought they’d sold out. This reissue does not ask for permission, eschewing context to let their catalogue stand as its own defiant rock monolith. As it should: while they’ve no agreed-upon classic, rarely has a band released this many records without faltering. Sleater-Kinney’s success (selling 100,000 copies per record by their conclusion) was often interpreted as transcending the limitations of being “women in rock”. In reality, their triumphant existence was a direct result of their lived experience: on 1995’s savage-but-hooky self-titled debut, Tucker and Brownstein turned society’s desire to marginalise women into a threat (“I’ll show you how it feels to be dead”). By Call The Doctor the following year, they were celebrating their own presence, singing “I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone” – pop-punk-meets-‘60s girlband-isms that maligned and celebrated rock cliché while laying bare their ambition. Sleater-Kinney were chops-proud rockists, which is how they convinced traditionalists (from Jack White to Greil Marcus, who declared them America’s best rock band) that they were getting rock on their own terms. But, as Tucker explained, “You can love rock’n’roll and be enraged by it.” 1997’s Dig Me Out celebrated the genre’s transformative potential while the more downbeat The Hot Rock (produced by Roger Moutenot) castigated the major label industry that wanted to mould them. After Woodstock ’99, with its gang-rapes and resurgence of main stage meat-heads, Sleater-Kinney swore off rock’s chauvinist pantomime with 2000’s All Hands On The Bad One. Ashamed of the peers’ reluctance to criticize Bush after 9/11, 2002’s One Beat documented new mother Tucker’s terror at almost losing her premature baby while “the world [exploded] in flames”. Sleater-Kinney’s story is of a band losing faith in humankind, god, country, even music, but making it their fight. By succeeding on their own terms – never ceding control or compromising, and going out on a high – they showed up rock’s self-serving rulebook as a sham, chiselling three new faces on its Mount Rushmore. Laura Snapes

Trio’s war against definition / explanation, compiled…

After forming in 1994, Sleater-Kinney spent most of the ‘90s trying to ensure their ascendant profile remained connected to their origins. “We are coming from somewhere, we’re not just an isolated entity without a context or a background,” said Carrie Brownstein, one of their two singers and guitarists. Her counterpart Corin Tucker could pinpoint where exactly: Valentine’s Day 1991, when, aged 18, she saw Bikini Kill at Olympia, WA’s North Shore Surf Club. “It was the first time I’d seen feminism translated into an emotional language,” she told Greil Marcus. “…You had the feeling they had started the week before and that you can do it too – stand up and speak in the town square, even if you have to create the town square yourself.”

But by the time Sleater-Kinney recorded what their final album, 2005’s The Woods, they were trying to smash their town square, bristling against complacency and the limiting descriptors that trailed them: ‘feminist’, ‘punk’, ‘riot grrrl’, ‘political’. Having made all but one of their previous records with John Goodmanson in Seattle, the Pacific Northwest trio (Quasi drummer Janet Weiss joined in 1997) ventured cross-country to Dave Fridmann’s New York State studio and said they wanted to halve their audience. “We’re sick of people feeling they know who we are and what we’re capable of,” Brownstein told Eddie Vedder. “I remember thinking … I’d really love to make some of our fans angry.”

It was an energy they had tapped into while supporting Pearl Jam at the beginning of the Iraq war. Sleater-Kinney’s own gigs were an echo chamber for anti-Bush rhetoric. Here they met 10,000 booing patriots whose indifference spurred them on to make an earth-razing record: a flood of stinging, Zep-indebted sludge populated by desperate characters clinging to hope in a crumbling world order. Their first for Sub Pop after leaving Kill Rock Stars, The Woods was acclaimed but divisive, letting them exit as a band apart when they declared a hiatus in 2006.

Eight years later, this box collects Sleater-Kinney’s seven LPs, remastered by Greg Calbi (amplifying the bottom end in the absence of a bassist) and accompanied by a photo book. No liner notes, b-sides, rarities, demos. Sleater-Kinney were constantly asked to defend the legitimacy of their voice by critics and scene forbears who thought they’d sold out. This reissue does not ask for permission, eschewing context to let their catalogue stand as its own defiant rock monolith. As it should: while they’ve no agreed-upon classic, rarely has a band released this many records without faltering.

Sleater-Kinney’s success (selling 100,000 copies per record by their conclusion) was often interpreted as transcending the limitations of being “women in rock”. In reality, their triumphant existence was a direct result of their lived experience: on 1995’s savage-but-hooky self-titled debut, Tucker and Brownstein turned society’s desire to marginalise women into a threat (“I’ll show you how it feels to be dead”). By Call The Doctor the following year, they were celebrating their own presence, singing “I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone” – pop-punk-meets-‘60s girlband-isms that maligned and celebrated rock cliché while laying bare their ambition.

Sleater-Kinney were chops-proud rockists, which is how they convinced traditionalists (from Jack White to Greil Marcus, who declared them America’s best rock band) that they were getting rock on their own terms. But, as Tucker explained, “You can love rock’n’roll and be enraged by it.” 1997’s Dig Me Out celebrated the genre’s transformative potential while the more downbeat The Hot Rock (produced by Roger Moutenot) castigated the major label industry that wanted to mould them. After Woodstock ’99, with its gang-rapes and resurgence of main stage meat-heads, Sleater-Kinney swore off rock’s chauvinist pantomime with 2000’s All Hands On The Bad One. Ashamed of the peers’ reluctance to criticize Bush after 9/11, 2002’s One Beat documented new mother Tucker’s terror at almost losing her premature baby while “the world [exploded] in flames”.

Sleater-Kinney’s story is of a band losing faith in humankind, god, country, even music, but making it their fight. By succeeding on their own terms – never ceding control or compromising, and going out on a high – they showed up rock’s self-serving rulebook as a sham, chiselling three new faces on its Mount Rushmore.

Laura Snapes

Morrissey “politely declines” offer from Channel 4 to record alternative Christmas message

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Morrissey “politely declines” offer from Channel 4 to record alternative Christmas message

Frontman says Christmas Day is "not quite the time to be trading slaps"... Morrissey has claimed that he turned down an invitation from Channel 4 to record this year's alternative to The Queen's annual Christmas Day message. The frontman has made his views about the monarchy clear for many years and states in a new message on official fan site True to You that he was asked by the broadcaster to record a message which would then be broadcast at the same time as the Queen's on Christmas Day. Other figures who have done the same in previous years include whistleblower Edward Snowden and Iran's then-president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in 2008. However, the invitation was declined with Morrissey saying that December 25 is not "quite the time to be trading slaps." In fact, he believes that the annual BBC broadcast of the Queen's speech shows the nation that "she has nothing to offer and nothing to say, and she has no place in modern Britain except as a figure of repression; no independent thought required." In a statement, he wrote: "My view that the monarchy should be quietly dismantled for the good of England is reasonably well-known, but I don’t think Christmas Day is quite the time to be trading slaps." "The Queen very well might be the most powerful woman in England, but she lacks the power to make herself loved, and the phoney inflation of her family attacks all rational intellect. All over the world highly civilised peoples exist without the automatic condescension of a ‘royal’ family. England can do the same, and will find more respect for doing so." Earlier this week Morrissey was forced to cancel dates in Greece and Turkey. The singer's current European tour has been met with numerous setbacks, including an incident in which a gig in Germany had to be ended shortly after a stage invasion and departed the stage mid-show after being heckled by a fan in Poland. He also cancelled a number of European tour dates due to a "flu outbreak" amongst his crew earlier in the year. This came after a string of US dates were scrappedrevealing that he had been treated for cancer.

Frontman says Christmas Day is “not quite the time to be trading slaps”…

Morrissey has claimed that he turned down an invitation from Channel 4 to record this year’s alternative to The Queen’s annual Christmas Day message.

The frontman has made his views about the monarchy clear for many years and states in a new message on official fan site True to You that he was asked by the broadcaster to record a message which would then be broadcast at the same time as the Queen’s on Christmas Day. Other figures who have done the same in previous years include whistleblower Edward Snowden and Iran’s then-president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in 2008.

However, the invitation was declined with Morrissey saying that December 25 is not “quite the time to be trading slaps.” In fact, he believes that the annual BBC broadcast of the Queen’s speech shows the nation that “she has nothing to offer and nothing to say, and she has no place in modern Britain except as a figure of repression; no independent thought required.”

In a statement, he wrote: “My view that the monarchy should be quietly dismantled for the good of England is reasonably well-known, but I don’t think Christmas Day is quite the time to be trading slaps.”

“The Queen very well might be the most powerful woman in England, but she lacks the power to make herself loved, and the phoney inflation of her family attacks all rational intellect. All over the world highly civilised peoples exist without the automatic condescension of a ‘royal’ family. England can do the same, and will find more respect for doing so.”

Earlier this week Morrissey was forced to cancel dates in Greece and Turkey. The singer’s current European tour has been met with numerous setbacks, including an incident in which a gig in Germany had to be ended shortly after a stage invasion and departed the stage mid-show after being heckled by a fan in Poland.

He also cancelled a number of European tour dates due to a “flu outbreak” amongst his crew earlier in the year. This came after a string of US dates were scrappedrevealing that he had been treated for cancer.

Joanna Newsom confirms she is working on new material

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Joanna Newsom confirms she is working on new material

The singer released her last album, Have One On Me, in 2010... Joanna Newsom has confirmed she is working on new material, her first in five years. Speaking to Dazed, the singer-songwriter commented: "I'm working on something new – I should hopefully have a little more news soon. I've been working hard for a lot of those five years on a new idea." Joanna Newsom released her third album, Have One On Me, in 2010. It followed her acclaimed 2004 debut The Milk-Eyed Mender and 2006's Ys. In 2012 Newsom unveiled two new songs during live performances, "The Diver's Wife" and "Look And Despair". Newsom will appear in new film Inherent Vice, which will hit UK cinemas in January 2015. Discussing her part in the production, she said: "This movie was so incredibly rewarding and fun for me, and it did maybe defer some of my music work for a while, but it was totally worth it."

The singer released her last album, Have One On Me, in 2010…

Joanna Newsom has confirmed she is working on new material, her first in five years.

Speaking to Dazed, the singer-songwriter commented: “I’m working on something new – I should hopefully have a little more news soon. I’ve been working hard for a lot of those five years on a new idea.”

Joanna Newsom released her third album, Have One On Me, in 2010. It followed her acclaimed 2004 debut The Milk-Eyed Mender and 2006’s Ys. In 2012 Newsom unveiled two new songs during live performances, “The Diver’s Wife” and “Look And Despair”.

Newsom will appear in new film Inherent Vice, which will hit UK cinemas in January 2015. Discussing her part in the production, she said: “This movie was so incredibly rewarding and fun for me, and it did maybe defer some of my music work for a while, but it was totally worth it.”

New James Murphy music revealed in first trailer for While We’re Young

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New James Murphy music revealed in first trailer for While We’re Young

Beastie Boys Adam 'Ad-Rock' Horowitz also stars in new Noah Baumbach movie... The first trailer for new film While We're Young, featuring an original score from James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem, has been released. The film is directed by Noah Baumbach (The Squid And The Whale, Frances Ha) and also sees Beastie Boys' Adam 'Ad-Rock' Horowitz play a supporting role. Murphy previously worked with Baumbach on his film Greenberg. While We're Young tells the story of a middle-aged couple whose career and marriage breaks down when a younger couple come into their lives. It stars Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts in the lead roles, along with Amanda Seyfried, and Adam Driver. The trailer also features Wings song "Let 'Em In". Among his many musical projects, Murphy brought his Despacio soundsystem – a collaboration with Soulwax duo David and Stephen Dewaele – to Glastonbury Festival in June. Back in February, Murphy also revealed a brief preview of his plan to make every New York subway station have its own music, so that people will later associate each location with a specific sound. Murphy also shared two remixes of music he made using data from this year's US Open tennis tournament. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRUcm9Qw9io

Beastie Boys Adam ‘Ad-Rock’ Horowitz also stars in new Noah Baumbach movie…

The first trailer for new film While We’re Young, featuring an original score from James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem, has been released.

The film is directed by Noah Baumbach (The Squid And The Whale, Frances Ha) and also sees Beastie Boys’ Adam ‘Ad-Rock’ Horowitz play a supporting role. Murphy previously worked with Baumbach on his film Greenberg.

While We’re Young tells the story of a middle-aged couple whose career and marriage breaks down when a younger couple come into their lives. It stars Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts in the lead roles, along with Amanda Seyfried, and Adam Driver. The trailer also features Wings song “Let ‘Em In”.

Among his many musical projects, Murphy brought his Despacio soundsystem – a collaboration with Soulwax duo David and Stephen Dewaele – to Glastonbury Festival in June.

Back in February, Murphy also revealed a brief preview of his plan to make every New York subway station have its own music, so that people will later associate each location with a specific sound.

Murphy also shared two remixes of music he made using data from this year’s US Open tennis tournament.

Paul McCartney: Mark Chapman was “the jerk of jerks”

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Paul McCartney: Mark Chapman was “the jerk of jerks”

Mark Chapman shot Lennon in New York in December 1980... Paul McCartney has described Mark Chapman, the man who killed John Lennon in 1980, as "the jerk of jerks." Speaking to Jonathan Ross in an interview broadcast by ITV on December 6, McCartney was asked about his relationship with his Beatles bandmate at the time of his murder. While acknowledging that things ended badly for the group, the singer said that their relationship had healed prior to his death. "There was acrimony in The Beatles", McCartney said (via The Mirror). "But when he got killed we were friends. We used to call each other up and swap bread recipes." "I was at home when he died. I got a phone call. It was so horrific. I could not take it in that he was gone. It was a very big shock. I was so sad that I was not going to see him again. And the guy who did it was the jerk of jerks. He was not politically motivated." Meanwhile, McCartney recently announced details of a new single, "Hope For The Future" – his first song to be specifically written for a video game. The track, due to be released with a variety of different mixes on December 8, was recorded for the soundtrack of the hit video game Destiny. Paul McCartney: The Ultimate Musis Guide is in shops now

Mark Chapman shot Lennon in New York in December 1980…

Paul McCartney has described Mark Chapman, the man who killed John Lennon in 1980, as “the jerk of jerks.”

Speaking to Jonathan Ross in an interview broadcast by ITV on December 6, McCartney was asked about his relationship with his Beatles bandmate at the time of his murder. While acknowledging that things ended badly for the group, the singer said that their relationship had healed prior to his death.

“There was acrimony in The Beatles“, McCartney said (via The Mirror). “But when he got killed we were friends. We used to call each other up and swap bread recipes.”

“I was at home when he died. I got a phone call. It was so horrific. I could not take it in that he was gone. It was a very big shock. I was so sad that I was not going to see him again. And the guy who did it was the jerk of jerks. He was not politically motivated.”

Meanwhile, McCartney recently announced details of a new single, “Hope For The Future” – his first song to be specifically written for a video game. The track, due to be released with a variety of different mixes on December 8, was recorded for the soundtrack of the hit video game Destiny.

Paul McCartney: The Ultimate Musis Guide is in shops now

David Bowie announces “Young Americans” 40th anniversary 7″ picture disc

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David Bowie announces “Young Americans” 40th anniversary 7″ picture disc

2007 Tony Visconti's 2007 mix is coming soon... David Bowie has announced the latest in his ongoing 7" anniversary picture disc series. He will release a 40th anniversary edition of "Young Americans" on February 23, 2015. Originally released in Spring 1975 and taken from the album of the same name, this 2007 Tony Visconti single mix is making its vinyl debut. The AA-side, which runs at 33 1/3 r.p.m, "It's Gonna Be Me (with strings)" is an alternate version of an outtake from the 1974 Sigma Sound sessions in Philadelphia. It was first released on the Young Americans album special edition in 2007 and is also making it first appearance on vinyl. The tracklisting is: A-Side Young Americans (2007 Tony Visconti mix single edit) (David Bowie) Produced & mixed by Tony Visconti 2007 Mix by Tony Visconti. Pro-Tools engineer Mario McNulty Mixed at Looking Glass Studio, Studio B. With thanks to Dave d'Arcy AA-Side (33 1/3 r.p.m) It's Gonna Be Me (with strings) (David Bowie) Produced & mixed by Tony Visconti Pro-Tools engineer Mario McNulty Mixed at Looking Glass Studio, Studio B. String arrangements by Tony Visconti Vocal arrangements by David Bowie & Luther Vandross Recorded at Sigma Sound, Philadelphia, PA.

2007 Tony Visconti’s 2007 mix is coming soon…

David Bowie has announced the latest in his ongoing 7″ anniversary picture disc series.

He will release a 40th anniversary edition of “Young Americans” on February 23, 2015.

Originally released in Spring 1975 and taken from the album of the same name, this 2007 Tony Visconti single mix is making its vinyl debut.

The AA-side, which runs at 33 1/3 r.p.m, “It’s Gonna Be Me (with strings)” is an alternate version of an outtake from the 1974 Sigma Sound sessions in Philadelphia. It was first released on the Young Americans album special edition in 2007 and is also making it first appearance on vinyl.

The tracklisting is:

A-Side

Young Americans (2007 Tony Visconti mix single edit)

(David Bowie)

Produced & mixed by Tony Visconti

2007 Mix by Tony Visconti.

Pro-Tools engineer Mario McNulty

Mixed at Looking Glass Studio, Studio B. With thanks to Dave d’Arcy

AA-Side (33 1/3 r.p.m)

It’s Gonna Be Me (with strings)

(David Bowie)

Produced & mixed by Tony Visconti

Pro-Tools engineer Mario McNulty

Mixed at Looking Glass Studio, Studio B.

String arrangements by Tony Visconti

Vocal arrangements by David Bowie & Luther Vandross

Recorded at Sigma Sound, Philadelphia, PA.

Sid Griffin – The Trick is To Breathe

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Sid Griffin – The Trick is To Breathe

Former Long Rider takes a short trip home... Since the demise of The Long Ryders at the beginning of the ’90s, Kentucky native Griffin has made London his musical base, cutting records mostly with his band The Coal Porters, while carving out a dual career as a journalist and broadcaster. For his first solo album in a decade, however, he returned to his homeland, laying down these 12 tracks over an economical four-day period in Nashville. Griffin says the brevity of the sessions was inspired by Dylan’s Nashville Skyline and Billy Bragg’s Joe Henry-produced Tooth & Nail, and it’s the latter’s laconic mood that most informs these songs. Assembling a crack squad of Nashville’s finest, including members of Ricky Skaggs’ band, Griffin immerses himself in the myths of Americana, often dabbling in intriguingly novel reportage. “Ode To Bobbie Gentry” chronicles the country star’s rise to fame and subsequent retirement (“Christmas night in ’78 was my last gig/It was walk away softly, or stay until I flipped my wig”), and Griffin also adopts a first-person narrative for “Elvis Presley Calls His Mother After The Ed Sullivan Show” (“In pink, white and black/I’m like a heart attack”). Other songs are, understandably, less specific in their subject matter, but Sid’s scholarly approach to the hues and history of a nation’s patchwork of musical styles reaps rewards throughout. The bluegrass canter of “I’ll Forget You Very Well” waves a mandolin pick in the direction of Bill Monroe, “Between The General And The Grave” is a First World War saga that could have come from the pen of Kristofferson, while the sparse “Circle Bar” (written for a Long Ryders reunion but never recorded) addresses the death of a peer. Beyond the spontaneity and freshness of the arrangements, it’s Griffin’s innate skill as a storyteller that marks the album out as a high-water mark in a career that has always celebrated traditional American music with eloquence and boundless enthusiasm. Terry Staunton

Former Long Rider takes a short trip home…

Since the demise of The Long Ryders at the beginning of the ’90s, Kentucky native Griffin has made London his musical base, cutting records mostly with his band The Coal Porters, while carving out a dual career as a journalist and broadcaster. For his first solo album in a decade, however, he returned to his homeland, laying down these 12 tracks over an economical four-day period in Nashville.

Griffin says the brevity of the sessions was inspired by Dylan’s Nashville Skyline and Billy Bragg’s Joe Henry-produced Tooth & Nail, and it’s the latter’s laconic mood that most informs these songs. Assembling a crack squad of Nashville’s finest, including members of Ricky Skaggs’ band, Griffin immerses himself in the myths of Americana, often dabbling in intriguingly novel reportage.

“Ode To Bobbie Gentry” chronicles the country star’s rise to fame and subsequent retirement (“Christmas night in ’78 was my last gig/It was walk away softly, or stay until I flipped my wig”), and Griffin also adopts a first-person narrative for “Elvis Presley Calls His Mother After The Ed Sullivan Show” (“In pink, white and black/I’m like a heart attack”). Other songs are, understandably, less specific in their subject matter, but Sid’s scholarly approach to the hues and history of a nation’s patchwork of musical styles reaps rewards throughout. The bluegrass canter of “I’ll Forget You Very Well” waves a mandolin pick in the direction of Bill Monroe, “Between The General And The Grave” is a First World War saga that could have come from the pen of Kristofferson, while the sparse “Circle Bar” (written for a Long Ryders reunion but never recorded) addresses the death of a peer.

Beyond the spontaneity and freshness of the arrangements, it’s Griffin’s innate skill as a storyteller that marks the album out as a high-water mark in a career that has always celebrated traditional American music with eloquence and boundless enthusiasm.

Terry Staunton

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