Ryan Adams is streaming his new, self-titled album online ahead of its official release.
Adams will release his new album on September 8. The LP was produced by Adams at his Pax-Am Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles. It follows 2011's Ashes & Fire and will feature recent single "Gimme Something...
Ryan Adams is streaming his new, self-titled album online ahead of its official release.
Adams will release his new album on September 8. The LP was produced by Adams at his Pax-Am Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles. It follows 2011’s Ashes & Fire and will feature recent single “Gimme Something Good”. The album can be streamed in full via NPR.
Speaking to Uncut, Adams explained how smoking pot revitalised his health and his recent songwriting.
“More and more, it liberated me,” says Adams. “I made a point of smoking pot – at first it was vaporising – every day, and not getting baked at all, just taking a hit or two to bring everything down, and an hour later go into my world.
“Dude, it fuckin’ saved my ass. It reignited how fun it was to play guitar, and then those songs started to descend on me, slowly but surely.”
Later this month (September), Adams will play three UK gigs, starting at London O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire on September 19, before shows in Manchester and Glasgow.
On Sunday, Kate Bush inadvertently staged a one-woman assault on the British charts. This week, 11 records in the Official UK Albums Chart are by Bush – not bad, really, for a woman who has only really released nine new studio albums in the past 36 years.
Apart from airlifting an unusual amount of decent music into the charts, the Bush invasion was also eloquent and gratifying proof that the wider world really did care about her comeback; that the blanket coverage was not merely an indulgence of besotted and fortunate media types of a certain age. In case you missed it last week, I was one of those fortunate media types of a certain age who saw Kate Bush’s Before The Dawn spectacle at Hammersmith Apollo last week: the media focus may have moved on, but the shows continue for a few weeks yet, and we’re very interested to hear your reports – please email me at uncut_feedback@ipcmedia.com and we’ll print a few of them in the next issue of Uncut.
In the meantime, here again is my review of the second Before The Dawn show, and a couple more good Uncut reads on Bush: "This girl is very, very tough..." The untold story of Kate Bush's Hounds Of Love and Album By Album: Kate Bush's closest collaborators talk us through her greatest records. That should keep you going.
Anyhow, for the past few weeks, I’ve been very taken with an album by another female singer making an unexpected comeback. Alice Gerrard is an 80-year-old bluegrass singer based in North Carolina, and, a few months ago, I was alerted to the fact that she was back in action by MC Taylor, the busy frontman of Hiss Golden Messenger, who’s produced her next album.
"She’s a riot, man, talk about a wanderer," Taylor told me. "She’s in her 80s now, and she’s still going on tours and sleeping on people’s couches. She’s a pretty small lady, and she wears triple XL fleece sweatshirts and ripped up sweatpants and oversized Crocs. I'm like, ‘Alice, what? You’re dressed like a seven-year-old boy right now.’ She just doesn’t care. She’s an amazing person.”
In the 1960s and '70s, Gerrard and her duetting accomplice Hazel Dickens (1935-2011) made a series of stark, striking folk recordings that were compiled on the aptly-titled 1996 comp, Pioneering Women Of Bluegrass. While Dickens sang high and forlorn, Gerrard (married at the time to Mike Seeger) was a deeper, darker, more austere presence. Listen, for instance, to her take on Bill Monroe's "The One I Love Is Gone", which transcends conventional country melancholy and moves into a more spectral zone.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_0bMYj7okM
It is this atmosphere which pervades the start of Gerrard's new album, Follow The Music. The traditional "Bear Me Away" begins with a low viola drone, closer to John Cale than orthodox folk, and Gerrard incanting a dirge of unnerving potency. The intensity is sustained through the weird folk of Gerrard's own "Strange Land" but, gradually, the album becomes warmer and more relaxed, if still somewhat gothic in tone. Gillian Welch is revealed as a strong descendant, while the brackish invention of the playing (by members of the extended Hiss Golden Messenger family, mostly) sometimes recalls the instrumental flights of fellow Piedmont adventurers the Black Twig Pickers.
Follow The Music was conceived by accident, when Taylor was chatting on the phone to Tompkins Square head Josh Rosenthal, just as Gerrard was paying one of her regular visits to scan pictures in Taylor's office at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina ("She has the most insane fucking photo collection, like a photo of Clarence White backstage at a Byrds show in 1971"). Recorded in a barn, the prevailing vibes might appear homely and convivial. But it's the gravity of these songs and timbres which are most resonant and enduring - the intimations of ancient doom that led Emmylou Harris to recently note, "She is the real deal with the right stuff. She hasn't forgotten where country music came from."
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey
Picture Credit: Ken McKay/REX
On Sunday, Kate Bush inadvertently staged a one-woman assault on the British charts. This week, 11 records in the Official UK Albums Chart are by Bush – not bad, really, for a woman who has only really released nine new studio albums in the past 36 years.
Apart from airlifting an unusual amount of decent music into the charts, the Bush invasion was also eloquent and gratifying proof that the wider world really did care about her comeback; that the blanket coverage was not merely an indulgence of besotted and fortunate media types of a certain age. In case you missed it last week, I was one of those fortunate media types of a certain age who saw Kate Bush’s Before The Dawn spectacle at Hammersmith Apollo last week: the media focus may have moved on, but the shows continue for a few weeks yet, and we’re very interested to hear your reports – please email me at uncut_feedback@ipcmedia.com and we’ll print a few of them in the next issue of Uncut.
Anyhow, for the past few weeks, I’ve been very taken with an album by another female singer making an unexpected comeback. Alice Gerrard is an 80-year-old bluegrass singer based in North Carolina, and, a few months ago, I was alerted to the fact that she was back in action by MC Taylor, the busy frontman of Hiss Golden Messenger, who’s produced her next album.
“She’s a riot, man, talk about a wanderer,” Taylor told me. “She’s in her 80s now, and she’s still going on tours and sleeping on people’s couches. She’s a pretty small lady, and she wears triple XL fleece sweatshirts and ripped up sweatpants and oversized Crocs. I’m like, ‘Alice, what? You’re dressed like a seven-year-old boy right now.’ She just doesn’t care. She’s an amazing person.”
In the 1960s and ’70s, Gerrard and her duetting accomplice Hazel Dickens (1935-2011) made a series of stark, striking folk recordings that were compiled on the aptly-titled 1996 comp, Pioneering Women Of Bluegrass. While Dickens sang high and forlorn, Gerrard (married at the time to Mike Seeger) was a deeper, darker, more austere presence. Listen, for instance, to her take on Bill Monroe’s “The One I Love Is Gone”, which transcends conventional country melancholy and moves into a more spectral zone.
It is this atmosphere which pervades the start of Gerrard’s new album, Follow The Music. The traditional “Bear Me Away” begins with a low viola drone, closer to John Cale than orthodox folk, and Gerrard incanting a dirge of unnerving potency. The intensity is sustained through the weird folk of Gerrard’s own “Strange Land” but, gradually, the album becomes warmer and more relaxed, if still somewhat gothic in tone. Gillian Welch is revealed as a strong descendant, while the brackish invention of the playing (by members of the extended Hiss Golden Messenger family, mostly) sometimes recalls the instrumental flights of fellow Piedmont adventurers the Black Twig Pickers.
Follow The Music was conceived by accident, when Taylor was chatting on the phone to Tompkins Square head Josh Rosenthal, just as Gerrard was paying one of her regular visits to scan pictures in Taylor’s office at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina (“She has the most insane fucking photo collection, like a photo of Clarence White backstage at a Byrds show in 1971”). Recorded in a barn, the prevailing vibes might appear homely and convivial. But it’s the gravity of these songs and timbres which are most resonant and enduring – the intimations of ancient doom that led Emmylou Harris to recently note, “She is the real deal with the right stuff. She hasn’t forgotten where country music came from.”
Prince has released a song from each of the two albums he is set to release on September 29.
As previously reported, Prince will release his 34th solo LP Art Official Age on the same day his new band 3rd Eye Girl drop their first album Plectrum Electrum.
Scroll down to hear "U KNOW", taken from Ar...
Prince has released a song from each of the two albums he is set to release on September 29.
As previously reported, Prince will release his 34th solo LP Art Official Age on the same day his new band 3rd Eye Girl drop their first album Plectrum Electrum.
Scroll down to hear “U KNOW“, taken from Art Official Age and Plectrum Electrum album track “WHITECAPS“.
Over the last few weeks, Uncut has been streaming tracks from the Grateful Dead's forthcoming 23-disc boxed set.
The set commemorates the band's three week tour across North America in 1990 to celebrate their 25th anniversary.
The tour has already been partly documented in the 2012 box set, Spring 1990.
Now the band are releasing a 23-disc boxed set that covers eight complete shows, all previously unreleased, from this historic tour, titled Spring 1990 (The Other One).
Among the dates they played a show at Nassau Coliseum on March 29, 1990 where they were joined by Branford Marsalis. The show will be included in the Spring 1990 (The Other One) box set and as a stand-alone 3CD release, Wake Up To Find Out: Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY 3/29/1990.
Scroll down to hear the Dead and Marsalis play "Eyes Of The World" live from the March, 29 1990 show at Nassau Coliseum.
You can find our other exclusive Grateful Dead streams by clicking here to listen to "Bird Song" and here to listen to "The Wheel".
Both the Spring 1990 (The Other One) box set and Wake Up To Find Out: Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY 3/29/1990 will be available through Rhino Records from September 8.
You can pre-order Wake Up To Find Out: Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY 3/29/1990here.
Over the last few weeks, Uncut has been streaming tracks from the Grateful Dead‘s forthcoming 23-disc boxed set.
The set commemorates the band’s three week tour across North America in 1990 to celebrate their 25th anniversary.
The tour has already been partly documented in the 2012 box set, Spring 1990.
Now the band are releasing a 23-disc boxed set that covers eight complete shows, all previously unreleased, from this historic tour, titled Spring 1990 (The Other One).
Among the dates they played a show at Nassau Coliseum on March 29, 1990 where they were joined by Branford Marsalis. The show will be included in the Spring 1990 (The Other One) box set and as a stand-alone 3CD release, Wake Up To Find Out: Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY 3/29/1990.
Scroll down to hear the Dead and Marsalis play “Eyes Of The World” live from the March, 29 1990 show at Nassau Coliseum.
You can find our other exclusive Grateful Dead streams by clicking here to listen to “Bird Song” and here to listen to “The Wheel“.
Both the Spring 1990 (The Other One) box set and Wake Up To Find Out: Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY 3/29/1990 will be available through Rhino Records from September 8.
You can pre-order Wake Up To Find Out: Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY 3/29/1990here.
Radiohead have updated their official PolyFauna app with new music.
The app was first unveiled this February, with imagery from the band's The King Of Limbs album used throughout. However, as Rolling Stone report, as of September 1, the app features new artwork as well as new music.
Thom Yorke hin...
Radiohead have updated their official PolyFauna app with new music.
The app was first unveiled this February, with imagery from the band’s The King Of Limbs album used throughout. However, as Rolling Stone report, as of September 1, the app features new artwork as well as new music.
Thom Yorke hinted at the updates over the weekend when he posted a number of images on his Twitter account.
The new music could provide clues as to what the next Radiohead album will sound like. Guitarist Jonny Greenwood recently confirmed that the band will begin rehearsing and recording again this month, having previously said that the band are a “slow moving animal.”
“The record’s about me...”; first in six years from country songwriting legend...
Brash, feisty, and rambunctious at 75—one would expect nothing less from Outlaw Country’s prodigal son. Indeed, decades after the songwriting well’s run dry for just about all his peers, Shaver is still putting pen to paper, churning out the gems. And Long In The Tooth, in reality his first full set of secular studio originals since 2005's The Real Deal, has its share.
Old friend Willie Nelson is on board, sharing vocals, bashing contemporary country, and toying with their renegade mythology, on opener "Hard to Be an Outlaw." Leon Russell and Tony Joe White also guest, but it's Shaver's voice, in places more ragged and undisciplined than ever—spirited shall we say—and songwriting that holds the spotlight. With Nashville-style balladry sparring with swampy rockers, up-tempo bluegrass giving way to barroom bashers, ...Tooth plays like a Shaver career sampler, borrowing styles from all over the place.
The bravado of the title track might be both the most absurd and most irritating cut of his storied career; the gentle sway of "I'll Love You As Much As I Can" is its polar opposite, a soppy country/pop crooner from the hillbilly playlists of Eisenhower's America. Between these extremes lie the album’s most sublime moments. "Sunbeam Special" reminisces on his 1950s Texas childhood over a careening, amped-up banjo/fiddle arrangement. Border-ballad narrative "American Me" mixes personal romance and American arrogance to disastrous outcomes. "Music City USA" melds history and autobiography, appropriating Johnny Cash's boom-chicka-boom, shades of a long-lost Kris Kristofferson hit circa 1970.
Beyond the bluster, at the top of the heap, are songs without much to do at all with Billy Joe Shaver: "Checkers and Chess," a splendid, succinct commentary on class; and "The Git Go," melodic echoes of Mickey Newbury's "I Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)," a haunting, burning, world-weary tour de force on the ways of the world.
Luke Torn
“The record’s about me…”; first in six years from country songwriting legend…
Brash, feisty, and rambunctious at 75—one would expect nothing less from Outlaw Country’s prodigal son. Indeed, decades after the songwriting well’s run dry for just about all his peers, Shaver is still putting pen to paper, churning out the gems. And Long In The Tooth, in reality his first full set of secular studio originals since 2005’s The Real Deal, has its share.
Old friend Willie Nelson is on board, sharing vocals, bashing contemporary country, and toying with their renegade mythology, on opener “Hard to Be an Outlaw.” Leon Russell and Tony Joe White also guest, but it’s Shaver’s voice, in places more ragged and undisciplined than ever—spirited shall we say—and songwriting that holds the spotlight. With Nashville-style balladry sparring with swampy rockers, up-tempo bluegrass giving way to barroom bashers, …Tooth plays like a Shaver career sampler, borrowing styles from all over the place.
The bravado of the title track might be both the most absurd and most irritating cut of his storied career; the gentle sway of “I’ll Love You As Much As I Can” is its polar opposite, a soppy country/pop crooner from the hillbilly playlists of Eisenhower’s America. Between these extremes lie the album’s most sublime moments. “Sunbeam Special” reminisces on his 1950s Texas childhood over a careening, amped-up banjo/fiddle arrangement. Border-ballad narrative “American Me” mixes personal romance and American arrogance to disastrous outcomes. “Music City USA” melds history and autobiography, appropriating Johnny Cash’s boom-chicka-boom, shades of a long-lost Kris Kristofferson hit circa 1970.
Beyond the bluster, at the top of the heap, are songs without much to do at all with Billy Joe Shaver: “Checkers and Chess,” a splendid, succinct commentary on class; and “The Git Go,” melodic echoes of Mickey Newbury’s “I Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In),” a haunting, burning, world-weary tour de force on the ways of the world.
Neil Young is reportedly to release a new album, called Storytone, in November.
Photographs have recently appeared on social media indicating that Neil Young is back in the recording studio.
Now, according to a post on the official website of Chris Walden, a German-born composer and arranger linke...
Neil Young is reportedly to release a new album, called Storytone, in November.
Photographs have recently appeared on social media indicating that Neil Young is back in the recording studio.
Now, according to a post on the official website of Chris Walden, a German-born composer and arranger linked to Young’s latest sessions, the album has been given a name and release date.
Walden’s ‘Recent projects’ list:
Upcoming Neil Young album “Storytone” (out Nov.4)
There has been no official confirmation from Young’s record label.
Kate Bush has become the first female artist in UK history to have eight albums in the Top 40 at the same time.
The singer has broken the record previously held by Madonna after seeing a surge in sales as her Before The Dawn residency kicked off this week at London's Eventim Hammersmith Apollo. Ma...
Kate Bush has become the first female artist in UK history to have eight albums in the Top 40 at the same time.
The singer has broken the record previously held by Madonna after seeing a surge in sales as her Before The Dawn residency kicked off this week at London’s Eventim Hammersmith Apollo. Madonna had previously had three albums in the Top 40 in 1987.
Eight of Bush’s 11 entries in the Top 75 in this week’s Official UK Albums Chart have made it into the Top 40, including Hounds Of Love, ‘he Kick Inside, 50 Words For Snow and Lionheart, reports the Official Charts Company. The only artists to have had more records simultaneously in the Top 40 are now Elvis, who had 12 LPs in the upper echelons of the charts after his death in 1977, and The Beatles, 11 of whose 2009 reissues achieved the same feat.
You can read the Uncut review of Bush’s show on August 27 at Hammersmith Odeon here.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin & St Vincent at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flamin...
Along with his incredible guitar skills, his unique voice and his timeless songs, one of the more amazing things about Richard Thompson is his transformation from shy, downbeat young man to comfortable onstage showman in his more mature years.
During his hour-long solo set on the Garden Stage, he cracks jokes about Catholic sex, Donald Trump and beating Yes in this summer’s album charts, even inviting the audience to sing along on “Johnny’s Far Away” with the old saying “I’ve suffered for my art, now it’s your turn.”
Most of the set is taken from his recent Acoustic Classics LP, with highlights including “I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight”, a solemn “Walking On A Wire”, the more recent “Needle And Thread”, which features some mind-bending guitar work, and the crowd favourites “Beeswing” and “1952 Vincent Black Lightning”.
Later on the same stage, and again featuring some mercurial guitar lines, Tinariwen return to End Of The Road, having played a more acoustic set on the larger Woods Stage in 2011. The picturesque intimacy of the Garden Stage suits them better, the trees surrounding the area illuminated in the dark with hues of green and purple.
Tonight’s electric set is also better suited to a festival set, with the sinuous lead lines and bass guitar sparking dancing and clapping (even if some of the rhythms are a bit tricky for those of us untrained in African music). It’s particularly fantastic to see the shorter of the group’s two singers, effectively a kind of Tuareg hype man, shimmying up to the crowd and throwing shapes.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin & St Vincent at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flamin...
End Of The Road festival-goers were today (Sunday) treated to two very different sets by Hoboken’s finest, Yo La Tengo, currently celebrating their 30th anniversary.
In the afternoon, Ira, Georgia and James commandeered the ornate 1895 Singing Theatre at Larmer Tree Gardens to stage their Freewheeling Yo La Tengo set, a quiet performance that featured Q&As from the crowd and some surprising covers.
So, as well as answering questions about the band’s favourite subjects at school (Georgia: “the rest period”), the best group ever (The Clean, according to Ira) and their happiest memories (James went for hour 14 of a massive Simpsons marathon), we got versions of Donovan’s “Season Of The Witch” and a Half Japanese track, along with minimal, hushed versions of their own “Autumn Sweater” and “Little Eyes”.
Less hushed and minimal is the group’s afternoon set on the Woods Stage, which features far less chat and far more feedback.
Aside from “Tom Courtenay”, the band skirt their more recognisable songs in favour of some deeper cuts, many showing off their noisier side. “Ohm” is laced with feedback, Ira Kaplan whirling his Jazzmaster around his head, and their customary cover of The Beach Boys’ “Little Honda” tonight lasts for nearly 10 minutes if you include its free noise middle section.
Some of Yo La Tengo’s quieter side is again shown, though, with tender renditions of “I’ll Be Around”, “The Summer”, a new arrangement of “Big Day Coming”, this time in a jauntier folk style, and the closing “Our Way To Fall”.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin & St Vincent at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Yo La Teng...
As far as spectacles go, The Flaming Lips still go that extra mile. Their headline set on the Woods Stage at End Of The Road tonight (Saturday) is the most colourful and psychedelic I’ve ever seen at the festival, perhaps ever seen full-stop.
We’re talking a veritable vomiting of colour, in the harshest and most pixellated manner. Super-bright screens filled with exploding neon colours. People dressed in giant inflatable alien suits, with one as a giant star. Confetti cannons. Wayne Coyne on a huge platform surrounded on three sides by screens, or Wayne Coyne in his famous ball, scampering out over the audience.
With such a lot of visual elements, it’s not surprising that some of the songs pass by without leaving much impression. Of course, “She Don’t Use Jelly”, “A Spoonful Weighs A Ton”, “Race For The Prize” and “The WAND” are fantastic, strange anthems that would still work if played in a basement lit by a single bulb, but others don’t fare so well.
“Look… The Sun Is Rising” and their cover of “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” wouldn’t have been missed, while stone-cold classics “Yoshimi…” and “Do You Realize??” are played in slightly different arrangements – the band probably think they’re more anthemic and emotional, but the quieter intros and greater dynamics leave them a little flat.
Still, despite their shortcomings, Coyne and co really do know how to put on a senses-stunning celebration.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin & St Vincent at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flaming Lips at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Yo L...
Earlier this afternoon, Gruff Rhys introduced his American Interior film in the Cinema tent at End Of The Road – “I don’t really know what I’m supposed to be doing,” his speech began, endearingly.
But luckily, the sometime Super Furry Animal knows exactly what he’s up to during his musical set on the Garden Stage a couple of hours later.
I can’t remember ever seeing a festival set where half of it consists of the artist telling a historically accurate, well-researched story – in this case, about John Evans, who single-handedly headed from Wales to America in the 1790s to search for Welsh-speaking First Nation tribes (he eventually concluded there weren’t any) – accompanied by slides.
It’s also hard to remember a festival set which went down better than Gruff’s American Interior set does today, the large crowd silent throughout his between-song run-throughs of Evans’ eventful travels.
This being Evans’ story, much of American Interior the album gets played, but there’s still time for older solo tracks such as “Shark Ridden Waters” and “Gyrru Gyrru Gyrru”.
Gruff’s group is excellent, too, with stalwart Alun Tan Lan on guitar and former Flaming Lip Kliph Scurlock on drums, notably.
“We’ve got six minutes,” says Gruff after Evans’ story is done. “We’re gonna play some pop songs really fast.” He only manages to fit in “Sensations In The Dark”, but no matter – it’s an exemplary set, anyway.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flaming Lips at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Yo La Tengo at End Of The Road 2014 ...
One of the highlights of Saturday so far is Cate Le Bon, performing with her three-piece band on the Garden Stage. The vast majority of the set is taken from last year’s excellent Mug Museum, and that album’s brittle, angular cuts like “I Can’t Help You” are the most exciting of the show.
“Sisters” in particular is a frenzy of aggressive guitar playing from Cate, mangling storms of harsh treble from her black Telecaster as H Hawkline provides the song’s organ riff (though it was strangely inaudible in the mix today). Moving further away from her subdued, folky beginnings, there’s even a thrashing motorik jam partway through the set.
Perfume Genius guests on vocals for Mug Museum’s duet, “I Think I Knew”, before the droning “Cuckoo Through The Walls” casts off those Nico comparisons while sounding very Velvets indeed. Still, Le Bon is steadily developing a sound very much her own, mixing, yet divorced from, folk, garage, pop and psychedelia.
Sam Lee draws a huge and devoted crowd to the Uncut Tipi Tent just after, performing his hand-collected traditional folk songs with a five-piece band. As anyone who has heard Sam will already know, however, this is no ordinary trad-folk set.
There’s no guitar or accordion; instead, Lee is accompanied by violin, cello, trumpet, assorted global percussion, Jew’s harp, a Japanese koto, and his own very lithe dancing, to the delight of the crowd.
“George Collins”, a Hampshire tale concerning a sexually transmitted disease, is surprisingly the best-received song of the set, greeted by whoops from the excitable audience, who Lee dubs “wild but obedient… You’re a very English crowd, you know!”
At the time of writing, this very modern folk hero is still being mobbed by fans at the side of the stage.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flaming Lips at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Yo La Tengo at End Of The ...
As some of the stages draw to a close, I catch Swedish singer-songwriter Alice Boman over at the Uncut Tipi Tent. Joined by three other musicians, including a very subtle brass player, Boman charms the crowd with her extremely mellow, piano-based pieces.
Preferring to attack rather than sooth is Woods Stage headliner St Vincent, whose set is beginning to reach its climax as I arrive. It’s certainly a disorientating spectacle – at one point, Annie Clark leaves the stage, bathed in the kind of flashing lights better suited to reactors nearing meltdown, while her drummer and keyboardist perform a sort of atonal, freeform jam which melts into the closing sections of “Your Lips Are Red”.
After the tumult a sleepier balance is needed, more than provided by the very somnolent Connan Mockasin.
His music has always been dreamy, suggesting altered states and fever visions, but tonight the New Zealander is even groggier-sounding than usual. Guitars are lathered in his usual chorus effects, but tempos are painfully slow, not ideal for a crowd at half 11 at night after a hard day at a festival.
Early tracks like “It’s Choade My Dear” and “Faking Jazz Together” cut through the haze with their Barrett-esque mix of wonder and menace, though most of the funkier slow-jams from last year’s Caramel LP are just too gloopy and smooth for their own good.
Mockasin gets a lot of laughs early on when he says he hopes the set is halfway between “exciting” and “not as exciting”. By the end, though, it seems likely there was no joking involved.
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin & St Vincent at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flaming Lips at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Yo La Tengo...
End Of The Road must cause a bit of a problem for British Sea Power – when you normally deck your stages out with leafy branches, what do you do when you play a festival which surrounds all its stages with lush foliage? You bring along even more foliage, of course, and cover it all in streams of fairy lights.
The rolling countryside is a natural home for the Kendal-via-Brighton troupe, and tonight they really stand out in front of a large crowd, the devoted holding branches aloft.
The set is very much a festival one, featuring their best-known tracks such as “Remember Me”, “No Lucifer” and “Waving Flags”, but there’s still time for riotous oldie “The Spirit Of St Louis”, majestic instrumental “The Great Skua” and fan favourite “Oh Larsen B”.
There are plenty of theatrics to distract from the few specks of rain that occasionally fall, whether it’s Yan repeatedly throwing his guitar into the air and catching it at the close of “Carrion” (he does the same with a tambourine during “St Louis” but doesn’t fare so well) or two giant bears, one Brown, one Polar, invading the crowd for a dance like the end of Grandaddy’s “The Crystal Lake” video come to life.
British Sea Power at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Connan Mockasin & St Vincent at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Cate Le Bon & Sam Lee at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Gruff Rhys at End Of The Road 2014 - review
The Flaming Lips at End Of The Road 2014 - review
Yo La Tengo at End Of The...
Welcome to our coverage of this year’s End Of The Road Festival! We love it here at the Larmer Tree Gardens in Dorset, and even more now we have, for a second year, our own stage, the fantastic Tipi Tent.
The usually weather-charmed site might be experiencing a little light rain this Friday afternoon and evening, with wellies de rigueur, but the forecast is promising for the rest of the weekend, and there are some great acts on the bill, as always.
First of all, Stephen Malkmus and his Jicks, playing the festival’s largest area, the Woods Stage, who give a particularly upbeat introduction to this year’s bash.
“Welcome to End Of The Road 2014,” says Malkmus, kneeling down on the stage to adjust his pedals. “I’ll be your personal host.”
While he doesn’t take us on a tour of the site, or show us the woodland disco or the karaoke shower cubicle (which coincidentally includes Pavement’s “Cut Your Hair” among its six selections), Malkmus delves into the far corners of his own back catalogue, from his self-titled debut’s “Jenny And The Ess Dog” and Real Emotional Trash’s “Out Of Reaches” to “Lariat” and “Shibboleth” from this year’s excellent Wig Out At Jagbags.
Malkmus and his group seem to be having a great time onstage – a heartening change from when I saw him at Shepherds Bush Empire a few years ago, when he seemed unhappy and awkward in the limelight, or even during the Pavement reunion – joking about how “fancy” the Dorset/Wiltshire border is compared to Nottingham, or egging on a heckler to name every song he’s written “so I can tell you whether we’re gonna play them”.
Bruce Springsteen is set to release a graphic novel.
The book is based on the lyrics to his 2009 song 'Outlaw Pete', which featured on his 'Working on a Dream' album and was itself inspired by the 1950 children's book 'Brave Cowboy Bill'. 'Outlaw Pete' will be released on November 4 and features w...
Bruce Springsteen is set to release a graphic novel.
The book is based on the lyrics to his 2009 song ‘Outlaw Pete’, which featured on his ‘Working on a Dream’ album and was itself inspired by the 1950 children’s book ‘Brave Cowboy Bill’. ‘Outlaw Pete’ will be released on November 4 and features words by Springsteen and illustrations by Frank Caruso. A press release for the book says it is “based on the celebrated song about a bank-robbing baby whose exploits become a meditation on sin, fate, and free will.” Springsteen himself has commented: “‘Outlaw Pete’ is essentially the story of a man trying to outlive and outrun his sins.”
Caruso has said of the project, which will be published by Simon & Schuster: “When Bruce wrote ‘Outlaw Pete’ he didn’t just write a great song, he created a great character. The first time I heard the song this book played out in my head. Like Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn, Dorothy Gale and for me, even Popeye, Outlaw Pete cuts deep into the folklore of our country and weaves its way into the fabric of great American literary characters.”
Springsteen’s last album was ‘High Hopes’. It was his 18th LP and was released in January of this year. It comprised of a mixture of out-takes, covers and reworked old songs taken from his extensive back catalogue and went on to become his tenth UK Number One album.
The Kinks have denied reports that they will reunite without band member Dave Davies.
In an interview with Mojo magazine, Ray Davies is quoted as saying that the band could reform without his brother Dave, with whom he has had a notoriously fractious relationship.
"Dave’s invited to the party,...
The Kinks have denied reports that they will reunite without band member Dave Davies.
In an interview with Mojo magazine, Ray Davies is quoted as saying that the band could reform without his brother Dave, with whom he has had a notoriously fractious relationship.
“Dave’s invited to the party, but if he doesn’t want to do it [the reunion] will happen anyway,” the singer is quoted as saying. “He’s very welcome to turn up if he wants. I’d much rather work with him than without him.”
Asked if the band would still be the The Kinks without his brother, Ray Davies reportedly replied: “Yes, it would. I think it’s all down to the music. If somebody can’t or won’t play, there are other players out there. Mick and I want to do it.”
However, the band have since denied the quotes, writing on their Facebook page: “Mojo is wrong. There will be NO Kinks reunion without BOTH Ray and Dave Davies. Ray Davies claims to have never said this.”
Earlier this year, the band revealed that they had put their animosity behind them and were now working on new material. Ray Davies said that he and his brother had finally met in person to talk about the possibility of playing together again.
The pair, who have not performed together since 1996, apparently began to build bridges over the new Kinks musical Sunny Afternoon, which opened earlier this year. Ray Davies helped with the script and the music for the show, which Dave saw and reportedly liked.
Johnny Marr has spoken about the famous riff in The Smiths' 'How Soon Is Now', saying that his bandmates were at the pub when he came up with it, adding that if he was with them it might never have been written.
Talking on the XFM Breakfast Show this morning (August 28), the guitarist and solo art...
Johnny Marr has spoken about the famous riff in The Smiths‘ ‘How Soon Is Now’, saying that his bandmates were at the pub when he came up with it, adding that if he was with them it might never have been written.
Talking on the XFM Breakfast Show this morning (August 28), the guitarist and solo artist commented: “Picasso had a saying that inspiration does exist, but it has to find you working. And I think that’s very true. My mates, the band, were out, doing something on a Bank Holiday weekend, and I was stuck indoors ‘cos I gotta write the track. If I’d have been hanging out at the pub, it wouldn’t have happened. Much like if Picasso had been hanging out the pub… I’m not comparing myself to Picasso!”
Johnny Marr will release his second solo album, ‘Playland’ on October 6. The record follows last year’s ‘The Messenger’ and he will also tour in support of the record.
Such has been the drooling media focus on Kate Bush this week, it might be tough to imagine British music journalists listening to anything else these past few days. I'm not, in fairness, exempt from the hysteria: here's my review of the second Before The Dawn show, in case you missed it (or avoided it) yesterday.
Still, though, life goes on. Special attention this week to the first tracks to emerge from the forthcoming Kevin Morby and Nathan Bowles albums. Bob Dylan pretty good, too…
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey
1 Chris Thile & Edgar Meyer - Bass & Mandolin (Nonesuch)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udikFO1r3Is
2 Ariel Kalma - An Evolutionary Music: Original Recordings 1972-1979 (RVNG INTL)
3 Lutine - White Flowers (Front & Follow)
4 Laeticia Sadier - Something Shines (Drag City)
5 Tony Allen - Film Of Life (Jazz Village)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZ0xRiRLbbc
6 Tarwater - Adrift (Bureau B)
7 Bob Dylan - Odds And Ends (Alternate Version) (Columbia)
8 Kate Bush - Aerial (EMI)
9 Kevin Morby - Still Life (Woodsist)
10 Dream Police - Hypnotized (Sacred Bones)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwymU0Kv7M8
11 Vladislav Delay - Visa (Ripatti)
12 Kate Bush - Hounds Of Love (EMI)
13 [REDACTED]
14 Cave - Release (Drag City)
15 [REDACTED]
16 Nathan Bowles - Nansemond (www.soundcloud.com/paradise-of-bachelors/4-chuckatuck)
17 Prince Rupert's Drops - Dangerous Death Ray (Beyond Beyond Is Beyond)
18 Khun Narin Electric Phin Band - Khun Narin Electric Phin Band (Innovative Leisure)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfrvkRgctoI
19 Hiss Golden Messenger - Lateness Of Dancers (Merge)
20 Little Milton - Sings Big Soul (Kent)
21 The Budos Band - Burnt Offering (Daptone)
Such has been the drooling media focus on Kate Bush this week, it might be tough to imagine British music journalists listening to anything else these past few days. I’m not, in fairness, exempt from the hysteria: here’s my review of the second Before The Dawn show, in case you missed it (or avoided it) yesterday.
Still, though, life goes on. Special attention this week to the first tracks to emerge from the forthcoming Kevin Morby and Nathan Bowles albums. Bob Dylan pretty good, too…
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey
1 Chris Thile & Edgar Meyer – Bass & Mandolin (Nonesuch)
2 Ariel Kalma – An Evolutionary Music: Original Recordings 1972-1979 (RVNG INTL)
3 Lutine – White Flowers (Front & Follow)
4 Laeticia Sadier – Something Shines (Drag City)
5 Tony Allen – Film Of Life (Jazz Village)
6 Tarwater – Adrift (Bureau B)
7 Bob Dylan – Odds And Ends (Alternate Version) (Columbia)
