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Jack White performs “Seven Nation Army” with fan

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Jack White performs “Seven Nation Army” with fan
Jack White brought a lucky fan on stage to play with him and his band during a gig in Milwaukee on Monday night. White was performing at the Eagles Ballroom in Milwaukee on July 21 when he reached out to the audience for help with the White Stripes song. When the female audience member stepped up, ...

Jack White brought a lucky fan on stage to play with him and his band during a gig in Milwaukee on Monday night.

White was performing at the Eagles Ballroom in Milwaukee on July 21 when he reached out to the audience for help with the White Stripes song. When the female audience member stepped up, she got to wear White’s hat and play two of his guitars while performing the song. She later took a bow with the rest of White’s band.

Elsewhere at the gig, Jack White performed a brief excerpt of Lorde’s song “Royals”. The cover follows White playing Jay Z‘s ’99 Problems’ on many occasions during his current North American tour.

Jack White embarks on a three-date tour of the UK this November playing at:

Leeds First Direct Arena (November 17)

Glasgow SSE Hydro Arena (18)

London O2 Arena (19)

Watch Ryan Adams debut new track “Stay With Me” live

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Watch Ryan Adams debut new track “Stay With Me” live
Ryan Adams has debuted a new track entitled "Stay With Me". The singer-songwriter played the song at a gig in Portland, Maine earlier this week, alongside other new tracks, including "Kim" and "Shadows". Click below to watch footage of the performance, via Stereogum. Ryan Adams will release his 14...

Ryan Adams has debuted a new track entitled “Stay With Me”.

The singer-songwriter played the song at a gig in Portland, Maine earlier this week, alongside other new tracks, including “Kim” and “Shadows”. Click below to watch footage of the performance, via Stereogum.

Ryan Adams will release his 14th solo album, Ryan Adams, on September 8. Produced by Adams at his Pax Am Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, the album follows 2011’s Ashes & Fire, and will feature recent single “Gimme Something Good”.

Since Ashes & Fire, Adams has produced an EP for Fall Out Boy entitled PAX AM Days and started heavy metal side-project band Pornography with Make Out singer Leah Hennessy and singer-songwriter Johnny T Yerington.

The Ryan Adams tracklisting is:

‘Gimme Something Good’

‘Kim’

‘Trouble’

‘Am I Safe’

‘My Wrecking Ball’

‘Stay With Me’

‘Shadows’

‘Feels Like Fire’

‘I Just Might’

‘Tired Of Giving Up’

‘Let Go’

John Hiatt – Terms Of My Surrender

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John Hiatt – Terms Of My Surrender

The past, present and future intertwine on the veteran’s latest effort... For writer/artists of a certain age, the sands of time can be like quicksand, sucking them under as they grasp at their past achievements. John Hiatt is one of the handful of exceptions to this entropic pattern; at age 61, he’s as prolific, expressive and energetic as ever, demonstrating that a gifted songwriter who’s dialed into the process of aging can continue to find fertile subject matter.   Hiatt hasn’t allowed himself to be trapped in the shadow of his 1987 classic Bring The Family, his inspired collaboration with Ry Cooder, Nick Lowe and Jim Keltner, which could’ve been the hellhound on his tail if he’d succumbed to an ever more desperate need to try and match it, like so many of his contemporaries; instead, he’s kept plugging away as an indie artist, taking life as it comes. His postmillennial output – nine albums in 14 years, each one of them with its own distinct character and brace of memorable songs – has actually outpaced his rate of productivity on several major labels in the first quarter century of his career.   Hiatt’s recent work has yielded some particularly impressive LPs. 2003’s Beneath This Gruff Exterior, produced by the late, great Don Smith (Petty, Wilburys) finds Louisiana slide wizard Sonny Landreth letting rip. Master Of Disaster (2005), had roots legend Jim Dickinson at the console and the North Mississippi All Stars, featuring Dickinson’s sons, providing the shit-kicking vibe. On 2008’s self-produced Same Old Man, a burnished, elegiac song cycle focused on the ups and downs of a long-term relationship, leading to some of the veteran artist’s most emotionally authentic performances.   Although Hiatt has been clean since 1985, leading a quiet life with his wife and kids outside of Nashville, recollections of his wild years have continued to provide him with grist for the songwriting mill. “Mistakes are to be highlighted,” he noted in 2008. “You can’t have the light without the dark.” That duality permeates the new Terms Of My Surrender. Its songs are blues-based reflections recalling the sauntering grooves of J.J. Cale, the gritty swamp rock of Tony Joe White and Bob Dylan’s Modern Times throughout. Hiatt keeps things close to the bone, using his touring band, with guitarist Doug Lancio doubling as producer, and basing the predominantly understated performances around his lived-in voice, acoustic guitar and harmonica.   In the middle of opening track “Long Time Comin’” Lancio unleashes thunderbolts with a powerfully evocative guitar solo that emphatically amplifies the intensity of the lyric, evoking Daniel Lanois’ atmospheric eruptions on Emmylou Harris’s Wrecking Ball. Hiatt goes down to the crossroads on the 12-bar blues “Face of God” and treks to Cold Mountain on the refracted murder ballad “Wind Don’t Have to Worry”, haunted by backing vocalist Brandon Young’s androgynous soprano wail. “Baby’s Gonna Kick” stays low to the ground, set off by a smoldering Lancio solo, while Hiatt channels Howlin’ Wolf on “Nothin’ I Love”, whose dissolute narrator bemoans his weaknesses – “I drink too much, I take too many pills/Ain’t too long before my mind gets ill” – before delivering the album’s most resonant line: “Nothin’ I love is good for me but you”.   “Old People” starts out with a jokiness redolent of Randy Newman but then takes on a certain gravitas – it seems the song’s road-hogging senior citizens are in a big hurry to slow down time. The existential poignancy in the title song is palpable, as Hiatt acknowledges his failures and regrets. “When the moon is rising/And the night is still”, he sings in a world-weary baritone, “Some of my delusions have the power to kill/Scared I’ll get what I deserve/Or maybe scared I won’t”.   There’s a passage in “Long Time Comin’” that crystallizes the album and Hiatt’s latter-day body of work as a whole: “I’ve sang these songs a thousand times, ever since I was young/It’s a long time comin’ and the drummer keeps drummin’, your work is never done”. This is one old timer who’s still in his prime, doing his damnedest to keep it going till it’s all used up. Bud Scoppa  Q&A John Hiatt To what do you attribute your longevity and your undiminished productivity? You hit a point where you start to feel that time’s running out and getting more precious, and I want to do the best work I can and as much as I can before I kick the bucket. That’s pretty much what it is. If you hang around and you don’t embarrass yourself, you’re in pretty good shape. You can even embarrass yourself, actually; I’ve done that. You’ve mixed things up from album to album in recent years, but there’s a consistent thematic thread running through all of them. It’s about the adventure, and the constant is me and what I do. It’s not the idea. Fuck the idea – I got a million of them. I like trying new things, and I like good music. I don’t have a notion other than let’s put some players together with somebody who knows their way around a studio and some arrangements, and we might make some great music. Your songs, and especially your love songs, are quite different from what a young man would write, and they seem as genuine as anything you’ve ever done. It’s the endurance of love, and also how broken it gets, and how broken we are – how broken I am, anyway – and how it just seems never-ending; the pieces breaking apart and being put back together somehow. INTERVIEW: BUD SCOPPA

The past, present and future intertwine on the veteran’s latest effort…

For writer/artists of a certain age, the sands of time can be like quicksand, sucking them under as they grasp at their past achievements. John Hiatt is one of the handful of exceptions to this entropic pattern; at age 61, he’s as prolific, expressive and energetic as ever, demonstrating that a gifted songwriter who’s dialed into the process of aging can continue to find fertile subject matter.

 

Hiatt hasn’t allowed himself to be trapped in the shadow of his 1987 classic Bring The Family, his inspired collaboration with Ry Cooder, Nick Lowe and Jim Keltner, which could’ve been the hellhound on his tail if he’d succumbed to an ever more desperate need to try and match it, like so many of his contemporaries; instead, he’s kept plugging away as an indie artist, taking life as it comes. His postmillennial output – nine albums in 14 years, each one of them with its own distinct character and brace of memorable songs – has actually outpaced his rate of productivity on several major labels in the first quarter century of his career.

 

Hiatt’s recent work has yielded some particularly impressive LPs. 2003’s Beneath This Gruff Exterior, produced by the late, great Don Smith (Petty, Wilburys) finds Louisiana slide wizard Sonny Landreth letting rip. Master Of Disaster (2005), had roots legend Jim Dickinson at the console and the North Mississippi All Stars, featuring Dickinson’s sons, providing the shit-kicking vibe. On 2008’s self-produced Same Old Man, a burnished, elegiac song cycle focused on the ups and downs of a long-term relationship, leading to some of the veteran artist’s most emotionally authentic performances.

 

Although Hiatt has been clean since 1985, leading a quiet life with his wife and kids outside of Nashville, recollections of his wild years have continued to provide him with grist for the songwriting mill. “Mistakes are to be highlighted,” he noted in 2008. “You can’t have the light without the dark.” That duality permeates the new Terms Of My Surrender. Its songs are blues-based reflections recalling the sauntering grooves of J.J. Cale, the gritty swamp rock of Tony Joe White and Bob Dylan’s Modern Times throughout. Hiatt keeps things close to the bone, using his touring band, with guitarist Doug Lancio doubling as producer, and basing the predominantly understated performances around his lived-in voice, acoustic guitar and harmonica.

 

In the middle of opening track “Long Time Comin’” Lancio unleashes thunderbolts with a powerfully evocative guitar solo that emphatically amplifies the intensity of the lyric, evoking Daniel Lanois’ atmospheric eruptions on Emmylou Harris’s Wrecking Ball. Hiatt goes down to the crossroads on the 12-bar blues “Face of God” and treks to Cold Mountain on the refracted murder ballad “Wind Don’t Have to Worry”, haunted by backing vocalist Brandon Young’s androgynous soprano wail. “Baby’s Gonna Kick” stays low to the ground, set off by a smoldering Lancio solo, while Hiatt channels Howlin’ Wolf on “Nothin’ I Love”, whose dissolute narrator bemoans his weaknesses – “I drink too much, I take too many pills/Ain’t too long before my mind gets ill” – before delivering the album’s most resonant line: “Nothin’ I love is good for me but you”.

 

“Old People” starts out with a jokiness redolent of Randy Newman but then takes on a certain gravitas – it seems the song’s road-hogging senior citizens are in a big hurry to slow down time. The existential poignancy in the title song is palpable, as Hiatt acknowledges his failures and regrets. “When the moon is rising/And the night is still”, he sings in a world-weary baritone, “Some of my delusions have the power to kill/Scared I’ll get what I deserve/Or maybe scared I won’t”.

 

There’s a passage in “Long Time Comin’” that crystallizes the album and Hiatt’s latter-day body of work as a whole: “I’ve sang these songs a thousand times, ever since I was young/It’s a long time comin’ and the drummer keeps drummin’, your work is never done”. This is one old timer who’s still in his prime, doing his damnedest to keep it going till it’s all used up.

Bud Scoppa 

Q&A

John Hiatt

To what do you attribute your longevity and your undiminished productivity?

You hit a point where you start to feel that time’s running out and getting more precious, and I want to do the best work I can and as much as I can before I kick the bucket. That’s pretty much what it is. If you hang around and you don’t embarrass yourself, you’re in pretty good shape. You can even embarrass yourself, actually; I’ve done that.

You’ve mixed things up from album to album in recent years, but there’s a consistent thematic thread running through all of them.

It’s about the adventure, and the constant is me and what I do. It’s not the idea. Fuck the idea – I got a million of them. I like trying new things, and I like good music. I don’t have a notion other than let’s put some players together with somebody who knows their way around a studio and some arrangements, and we might make some great music.

Your songs, and especially your love songs, are quite different from what a young man would write, and they seem as genuine as anything you’ve ever done.

It’s the endurance of love, and also how broken it gets, and how broken we are – how broken I am, anyway – and how it just seems never-ending; the pieces breaking apart and being put back together somehow.

INTERVIEW: BUD SCOPPA

Courtney Love says production on Kurt Cobain biopic will begin in “next 12 months”

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Courtney Love says production on Kurt Cobain biopic will begin in “next 12 months”
Courtney Love says she hopes filming will start on a mooted Kurt Cobain biopic within the next year. As reported, a film of the late Nirvana frontman's life is set to go into production. Love set the timescale in a new interview with Inquirer Entertainment, in which she also said she won't be decid...

Courtney Love says she hopes filming will start on a mooted Kurt Cobain biopic within the next year.

As reported, a film of the late Nirvana frontman’s life is set to go into production. Love set the timescale in a new interview with Inquirer Entertainment, in which she also said she won’t be deciding who plays her late husband.

“The biopic should start within the next year or so,” said Love. “I won’t name names because I don’t want to jinx it for anyone but these are 25-year-olds who are blonde, gorgeous and the new Brad Pitts. There’s a ton of those. Some are really good actors, not just pretty faces. I don’t want to be the person who makes that decision.”

However, Love will be involved in the film, alongside Cobain’s former Nirvana bandmates. “I do have a say in it. So do Frances, and Krist (Novoselic) and Dave (Grohl), for that matter, if it touches on Nirvana — and it will. I am leading the charge because it’s time to do this.”

Love previously revealed to NME that she has ambitious plans for her late husband’s legacy, including a documentary and stage play. Love stated that it has been fans’ reactions to the possibility of a stage production involving Cobain’s story which has made it now “very likely” to happen.

Roger Daltrey to help launch model railway museum

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Roger Daltrey to help launch model railway museum
Roger Daltrey is backing plans to create an international model railway museum in Ashford, Kent. Daltrey says the proposed museum would be a way of celebrating the fact that the railways were a British invention. "We're trying to start a model railway museum down in Ashford, me and a few pals do...

Roger Daltrey is backing plans to create an international model railway museum in Ashford, Kent.

Daltrey says the proposed museum would be a way of celebrating the fact that the railways were a British invention.

“We’re trying to start a model railway museum down in Ashford, me and a few pals down in Kent,” he told Radio 2‘s Chris Evans. “Britain forgets that we invented the railway and it conquered the world. The railway was the first thing to open up the world in a big way for trade. We invented it, and we should be proud of that. The model making side of it, it’s enormous.”

The singer revealed his interest in miniature trains in a conversation about his hobbies. Daltrey said: “I hate watching the TV because there’s nothing on and I like listening to the radio. The great thing about model railways is you can be doing a bit of woodwork, a bit of painting, a bit of this, a bit of that, and having fun with your mates and you can listen to the radio.”

Kent Online reported on Tuesday (July 22) that Daltrey visited Ashford Borough Council to discuss submitting an application for the museum, which is proposed for the Klondyke Railway Works site in Ashford’s Newtown.

A council spokesman said: “Roger Daltrey attended a meeting at Ashford Borough Council with the leader of the council Cllr Gerry Clarkson and chief executive John Bunnett about a proposal to locate an international model railway museum in Ashford. The meeting was attended by the group working on putting together the proposals for this exciting project. This was a preliminary meeting to discuss certain aspects prior to a formal planning application being lodged in the very near future.”

“We were delighted to welcome Mr Daltrey and the other guests, who are all supporting this proposed project, and we had an excellent and productive discussion.”

Jack White, Neil Young, Willie Nelson to headline Farm Aid

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Jack White, Neil Young, Willie Nelson to headline Farm Aid
Jack White, Neil Young and Willie Nelson have been announced as this year's headliners at Farm Aid, reports Rolling Stone. Also appearing on the bill are John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews as well as Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Jamey Johnson, Delta Rae, Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real, Carle...

Jack White, Neil Young and Willie Nelson have been announced as this year’s headliners at Farm Aid, reports Rolling Stone.

Also appearing on the bill are John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews as well as Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Jamey Johnson, Delta Rae, Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real, Carlene Carter, Pegi Young & The Survivors, and Insects vs Robots.

The benefit will take place this year at Walnut Creek Ampitheater, Raleigh, North Carolina on September 13.

“In North Carolina and across the Southeast, family farmers have struggled to stay on the land, but they have also pioneered new roads to economic sustainability,” Willie Nelson said in a statement. “This region knows the value of its farmers and offers increasing opportunities for new farmers to build a strong regional food system. On the Farm Aid stage Saturday, September 13, we’ll celebrate family farmers and the healthy communities they’re growing for all of us.”

Ticket presale starts Friday, July 25 at noon EDT. You can find more information here.

The 28th Uncut Playlist Of 2014

John Mulvey
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The 28th Uncut Playlist Of 2014

There's a song on this new Purling Hiss album, playing again now, that sounds more or less like "Debaser" played by Dinosaur Jr. Along with the intensely spirited debut by Mary Timony's Ex-Hex and a comp of the pre-Beachwood Sparks, Sebadoh-indebted Further, it feels a little like College Rock revisited week. Deep late '80s/early '90s vibes, good times etc. Plenty of more meditative offerings here, including the best drone record I've heard in a while courtesy of Metabolismus (who feature Samara Lubelski), Labradford-like manoeuvres from a couple of that band's ex-members (Anjou), and Philip Corner's strong Morton Feldman-ish take on Satie. Tricky album's not bad, either… Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey 1 Bing & Ruth - Tomorrow Was The Golden Age (RVNG INTL) 2 Ex-Hex - Rips (Merge) 3 Steve Gunn – Way Out Weather (Paradise Of Bachelors) 4 Caribou -Our Love (City Slang) 5 Purling Hiss - Weirdon (Drag City) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sKVTLPUgmE 6 Tweedy - Sukierae (dBpm) 7 [REDACTED] 8 White Fence - For The Recently Found Innocent (Drag City) I reviewed this one here 9 Metabolismus - Sus (Amish) 10 Syl Johnson - Diamond In The Rough (Hi/Fat Possum) 11 The Rosebuds - Sand + Silence (Western Vinyl) 12 Tricky - Adrian Thaws (False Idols) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJ2DVq5EOC0 13 Martin Carr - The Breaks (Tapete) 14 Jack White - Icky Thump/99 Problems (Live in Louisville, 19/7/14) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1f3tSZwAxNA 15 Chris Forysth & The Solar Motel Band - Intensity Ghost (No Quarter) 16 Sleep - The Clarity (http://video.adultswim.com/music/singles-2014/) 17 Philip Corner - Satie Slowly (Unseen Worlds) 18 Further - Where Were You Then? (Bad Paintings) 19 Dustin Wong & Takako Minekawa - Savage Imagination (Thrill Jockey) 20 Tallesen - Stills Lit Through (Software) 21 Anjou - Anjou (Kranky) 22 Jennifer Castle - Pink City (No Quarter)

There’s a song on this new Purling Hiss album, playing again now, that sounds more or less like “Debaser” played by Dinosaur Jr. Along with the intensely spirited debut by Mary Timony‘s Ex-Hex and a comp of the pre-Beachwood Sparks, Sebadoh-indebted Further, it feels a little like College Rock revisited week. Deep late ’80s/early ’90s vibes, good times etc.

Plenty of more meditative offerings here, including the best drone record I’ve heard in a while courtesy of Metabolismus (who feature Samara Lubelski), Labradford-like manoeuvres from a couple of that band’s ex-members (Anjou), and Philip Corner‘s strong Morton Feldman-ish take on Satie. Tricky album’s not bad, either…

Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey

1 Bing & Ruth – Tomorrow Was The Golden Age (RVNG INTL)

2 Ex-Hex – Rips (Merge)

3 Steve Gunn – Way Out Weather (Paradise Of Bachelors)

4 Caribou -Our Love (City Slang)

5 Purling Hiss – Weirdon (Drag City)

6 Tweedy – Sukierae (dBpm)

7 [REDACTED]

8 White Fence – For The Recently Found Innocent (Drag City)

I reviewed this one here

9 Metabolismus – Sus (Amish)

10 Syl Johnson – Diamond In The Rough (Hi/Fat Possum)

11 The Rosebuds – Sand + Silence (Western Vinyl)

12 Tricky – Adrian Thaws (False Idols)

13 Martin Carr – The Breaks (Tapete)

14 Jack White – Icky Thump/99 Problems (Live in Louisville, 19/7/14)

15 Chris Forysth & The Solar Motel Band – Intensity Ghost (No Quarter)

16 Sleep – The Clarity (http://video.adultswim.com/music/singles-2014/)

17 Philip Corner – Satie Slowly (Unseen Worlds)

18 Further – Where Were You Then? (Bad Paintings)

19 Dustin Wong & Takako Minekawa – Savage Imagination (Thrill Jockey)

20 Tallesen – Stills Lit Through (Software)

21 Anjou – Anjou (Kranky)

22 Jennifer Castle – Pink City (No Quarter)

Slowdive announce two further reunion dates

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Slowdive announce two further reunion dates
Slowdive have announced two further reunion gigs for later this year. The band returned to the stage for their first gig in almost 20 years back in May, playing a surprise gig at the Sonic Cathedral label's 10th anniversary party at London's Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen. They have since been t...

Slowdive have announced two further reunion gigs for later this year.

The band returned to the stage for their first gig in almost 20 years back in May, playing a surprise gig at the Sonic Cathedral label’s 10th anniversary party at London’s Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen.

They have since been touring European festivals, including slots at Primavera Sound in Barcelona and Latitude last weekend (July 18). They will now follow this up with dates across Asia and North America, before two nights at London’s The Forum in Kentish Town on December 29 and 20.

In an interview earlier this year, the band’s frontman Neil Halstead suggested that the band may record new material. “The initial impetus [of a reunion] was the idea of doing some new music,” he said. “It seemed easier to do that because it’s not so public. But then we thought it would be good if we could raise a bit of money to make the record, and doing a couple of gigs would enable us to do that. And that’s the way it shaped up – while we’re rehearsing we can see if we’ve got another record in us.”

The Pop Group announce first ever UK tour

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The Pop Group announce first ever UK tour
The Pop Group have announced their first ever UK tour. The Bristol group - who formed in 1978 and split in 1980 before getting back together again in 2010 - will head out on a seven date tour this October, in support of the reissue in October of their 1980 album We Are Time and Cabinet Of Curiositi...

The Pop Group have announced their first ever UK tour.

The Bristol group – who formed in 1978 and split in 1980 before getting back together again in 2010 – will head out on a seven date tour this October, in support of the reissue in October of their 1980 album We Are Time and Cabinet Of Curiosities, a nine-track compilation of rarities and previously unreleased material.

The band will be performing We Are Time in full on the tour, which starts at Edinburgh Voodoo Rooms on October 20, with shows in Nottingham, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds and Brighton, finishing up at London’s Islington Assembly Hall on October 26. Tickets go on sale July 25.

The Pop Group will play:

Edinburgh Voodoo Rooms (October 20)

Nottingham Bodega Social Club (21)

Manchester Gorilla (22)

Bristol Anson Rooms (23)

Leeds Brudenell Social Club (24)

Brighton Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar (25)

London Islington Assembly Hall (26)

George Harrison memorial tree killed by infestation of beetles

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George Harrison memorial tree killed by infestation of beetles

A tree planted in memory of George Harrison has died after being infested by beetles. The pine in Los Angeles' Griffith Park was planted in 2004 as a tribute Harrison, who passed away in 2001 in the city. A plaque on the tree read: "In memory of a great humanitarian who touched the world as an artist, a musician and a gardener." It also featured a quote from Harrison: "For the forests to be green, each tree must be green." The LA Times says that Councilman Tom LaBonge has promised that a new tree will be planted to honour Harrison. Meanwhile, Ron Howard is to direct a new documentary about The Beatles' early years. The film will be produced for The Beatles' Apple Corps Ltd company with White Horse Pictures and will be made with the full cooperation of Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison. It will focus on the formative touring days of the band, from shows at Liverpool's Cavern Club and their time in Hamburg, up until their final gig – in Candlestick Park, San Francisco in 1966.

A tree planted in memory of George Harrison has died after being infested by beetles.

The pine in Los Angeles’ Griffith Park was planted in 2004 as a tribute Harrison, who passed away in 2001 in the city. A plaque on the tree read: “In memory of a great humanitarian who touched the world as an artist, a musician and a gardener.” It also featured a quote from Harrison: “For the forests to be green, each tree must be green.”

The LA Times says that Councilman Tom LaBonge has promised that a new tree will be planted to honour Harrison.

Meanwhile, Ron Howard is to direct a new documentary about The Beatles’ early years. The film will be produced for The Beatles’ Apple Corps Ltd company with White Horse Pictures and will be made with the full cooperation of Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison.

It will focus on the formative touring days of the band, from shows at Liverpool’s Cavern Club and their time in Hamburg, up until their final gig – in Candlestick Park, San Francisco in 1966.

September 2014

Ipclee
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September 2014
Robert Plant, Tom Petty, King Crimson and Bobby Womack all feature in the new issue of Uncut, dated September 2014 (Take 208) and out tomorrow (July 29). We track Plant, on the cover, from the Welsh Marches to the nightclubs of Paris to hear about bee colonies, mountain lions, altercations with Mor...

Robert Plant, Tom Petty, King Crimson and Bobby Womack all feature in the new issue of Uncut, dated September 2014 (Take 208) and out tomorrow (July 29).

We track Plant, on the cover, from the Welsh Marches to the nightclubs of Paris to hear about bee colonies, mountain lions, altercations with Moroccan traffic cops, Bron-Yr-Aur, Jimmy Page, and Plant’s extraordinary new solo album.

“I have to keep moving,” he explains. “Everybody laughs at me, my kids and everybody. ‘Jeez, why?’ And I say, ‘Because it’s there to go to it.'”

Meanwhile, at home on his Malibu estate, Tom Petty reflects on his temper, his tempestuous career with the Heartbreakers, and his urgent and essential new album, Hypnotic Eye.

Uncut also joins Robert Fripp and the latest incarnation of King Crimson in the rehearsal studio to hear about their upcoming gigs, the problems with touring and his setlist plans.

Bobby Womack’s last producer, Richard Russell, pays tribute to the late soul legend, and we revisit a fantastic interview with Womack from the archives.

Elsewhere, Richard Lester, Pattie Boyd, Phil Collins and Lionel Blair recall their time on set with The Beatles filming A Hard Day’s Night, Richard & Linda Thompson remember the tumultuous time around the creation of their classic I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight album, and Yes take us through their catalogue in our ‘album by album’ piece this month.

J Mascis answers your questions, as well as queries from famous fans, on topics including Dinosaur Jr, his guitar collection, playing with Blur and The Jesus And Mary Chain on the Rollercoaster tour in 1992, and his favourite ever guitar riff.

Josef K recall the making of their single “It’s Kinda Funny”, while ex-Rilo Kiley leader Jenny Lewis charts the records that have soundtracked her life.

In our mammoth reviews section, we take a look at new records from Spoon, Ty Segall, Sinéad O’Connor, Robyn Hitchcock and Cold Specks, among others, and archive releases from The Allman Brothers Band, Elvis Presley and Aphex Twin.

Live, we report from gigs by Jack White, Stevie Wonder and the Eagles, and review DVDs and films from Nick Cave, David Lynch and Morrissey, and the new book about Alex Chilton.

Our free CD, Ramble On!, features tracks from Wire, Spoon, Richard Thompson, J Mascis, Cold Specks, Robyn Hitchcock, David Kilgour And The Heavy Eights, James Yorkston and more.

THE NEW ISSUE IS ON SALE FROM TUESDAY 29 JULY

Uncut is now available as a digital edition, download it now

Jack White’s label launches Third Man Books

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Jack White’s label launches Third Man Books
Jack White's Third Man Records company have launched a publishing offshoot, Third Man Books. Third Man Books' first commercially available release will be Language Lessons: Volume I, which comprises a 321-page book of poetry and prose as well as two vinyl LPs of "jazz, psychdelic-punk, poetry, blue...

Jack White‘s Third Man Records company have launched a publishing offshoot, Third Man Books.

Third Man Books‘ first commercially available release will be Language Lessons: Volume I, which comprises a 321-page book of poetry and prose as well as two vinyl LPs of “jazz, psychdelic-punk, poetry, blues and pop” and five “frameable” poems. The package – which is pictured above – will be released in a hard-case clothbound sleeve and is available to buy from August 5.

The book will feature words from Dale Ray Phillips, CD Wright and Adrian Matejka, while William Tyler and Destruction Unit will feature on the LPs. The frameable poems come from CD Wright, Frank Stanford, Brian Barker, Jake Adam York and Chet Weise with artwork from former Big Boys guitartist Tim Kerr, Jim Blanchard and Butch Anthony.

On the launch of Third Man Books, Third Man has released a statement which sets out its intent for the company: “Third Man Books, like ‘Language Lessons’, will be fearless, imaginative, and eclectic. We hope to be a welcome addition to what is already a very compelling and thrilling independent American literary landscape.”

Jack White embarks on a three-date tour of the UK this November playing at:

Leeds First Direct Arena (November 17)

Glasgow SSE Hydro Arena (18)

London O2 Arena (19)

The The – Soul Mining 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition

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The The – Soul Mining 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition

The '80s angst classic reissued as a vinyl boxset... Visitors to this year’s Chelsea Flower Show may have encountered an unusual specimen stirring in the Carnivorous Plants section. Sarracenia ‘Matt Johnson’, a new hybrid plant named after the founder of The The, made its public debut last month at RHS Wisley with Johnson present. Johnson’s appearance amid the brightness and colour of Chelsea, posing for photographers with his botanical namesake, might have come as a surprise to those who remember him best as the earnest young mastermind behind his band’s early masterpiece, 1983’s Soul Mining. In fact, Johnson had already written four albums by the time he came to Soul Mining. While other boys his age skulked in their teenage bedrooms, Johnson refined his songwriting: there were two unreleased albums (See Without Being Seen and Spirits) before he finally released his bona fide debut album, Burning Blue Soul, on 4AD. His intended follow-up was called The Pornography Of Despair, which should give you an idea where his head was at. Instead he made Soul Mining. Released between post-punk and synth pop, and reflecting both, Soul Mining thrums with ideas, tension, and dread. Johnson’s enduring lyrical concerns – social alienation, political disillusionment and troubles of the heart – are all present and correct, but unlike the industrial/psychedelic adventuring of Burning Blue Soul, they are here given a glossier sheen. Johnson signed to CBS on the strength of early demos he recorded in New York – including a version of future single, “Uncertain Smile” – which suggested major-label confidence in Johnson’s growing abilities as a songwriter. Certainly, for an album of heavy themes, Soul Mining is musically surprisingly light. Despite its gloomy lyrical disposition (“My aspirations have shrivelled in the sun”, he tells us on the album’s opening track, “I’ve Been Waitin’ For Tomorrow (All My Life)”), the songs themselves are lush and cinematic, dressed in richly textured arrangements. Johnson’s key influences around this time were Cabaret Voltaire, Wire and This Heat; but he had been raised on John Lennon and Tim Buckley. Johnson’s vision for Soul Mining was to recast these classic, enduring antecedents in a new and experimental framework. The songs themselves oscillate between the political and the personal. Despite its surprisingly jaunty backing, “The Sinking Feeling” bristles with social injustice – “I’m just a symptom of the moral decay/That’s gnawing at the heart of the country”. Elsewhere, against keyboard stabs, “The Twilight Hour” pushes into relationship paranoia: “It’s now way past the hour she usually phones”. A welcome balance is provided by “This Is The Day” and “Uncertain Smile”, an uplifting number worth the price of admission alone: here a loveless, late-night brooding is disguised by a crisp guitar melody and gilded by Jools Holland’s sparkling piano solo. Although at this point, The The was essentially a one-man show, Johnson roped in several accomplices to help bring his vision to life: Holland, Orange Juice’s Zeke Manyika, synth pioneer Thomas Leer and Foetus’ JG Thirlwell (credited here as Frank Wants). Manyika’s African polyrhythms dominate “Giant”, but arguably the most critical collaborators here are Leer and Thirlwell, whose involvement explicitly connected Johnson’s songwriting craft to more leftfield sonic explorations. Although Soul Mining only peaked at 27 in the charts, the album nevertheless marked the start of a prolific period for The The. 1986’s follow-up, Infected, found Johnson further exploring a more leftfield musical agenda; it wasn’t until subsequent albums that he began to loosen up a little. He even formed a proper band with Johnny Marr for 1989’s Mind Bomb and Dusk (1992) and found himself, briefly, in the unlikely position of enjoying a Top 20 hit single. But Soul Mining is arguably Johnson’s defining work: ambitious, strange, exciting. And, 30-odd years on, remarkably fresh. Michael Bonner EXTRAS: Accompanied by Johnson’s sleeve notes and a remastered pressing of the album, the boxset also includes a second 12” of alternative versions and remixes. Of most interest are the original ‘New York’ mixes from the Mike Thorne sessions: “Uncertain Smile” is chunkier than the album version and features a sax solo rather than Holland’s piano, not forgetting “Perfect”, featuring David Johansen on harmonica. It’s rounded off by 12” remixes of “This Is The Day”, “Perfect” and “I’ve Been Waitin’ For Tomorrow (All Of My Life)”. "Somewhere between pure euphoria and terrible insecurity": An interview with The The's Matt Johnson

The ’80s angst classic reissued as a vinyl boxset…

Visitors to this year’s Chelsea Flower Show may have encountered an unusual specimen stirring in the Carnivorous Plants section. Sarracenia ‘Matt Johnson’, a new hybrid plant named after the founder of The The, made its public debut last month at RHS Wisley with Johnson present. Johnson’s appearance amid the brightness and colour of Chelsea, posing for photographers with his botanical namesake, might have come as a surprise to those who remember him best as the earnest young mastermind behind his band’s early masterpiece, 1983’s Soul Mining.

In fact, Johnson had already written four albums by the time he came to Soul Mining. While other boys his age skulked in their teenage bedrooms, Johnson refined his songwriting: there were two unreleased albums (See Without Being Seen and Spirits) before he finally released his bona fide debut album, Burning Blue Soul, on 4AD. His intended follow-up was called The Pornography Of Despair, which should give you an idea where his head was at.

Instead he made Soul Mining. Released between post-punk and synth pop, and reflecting both, Soul Mining thrums with ideas, tension, and dread. Johnson’s enduring lyrical concerns – social alienation, political disillusionment and troubles of the heart – are all present and correct, but unlike the industrial/psychedelic adventuring of Burning Blue Soul, they are here given a glossier sheen. Johnson signed to CBS on the strength of early demos he recorded in New York – including a version of future single, “Uncertain Smile” – which suggested major-label confidence in Johnson’s growing abilities as a songwriter.

Certainly, for an album of heavy themes, Soul Mining is musically surprisingly light. Despite its gloomy lyrical disposition (“My aspirations have shrivelled in the sun”, he tells us on the album’s opening track, “I’ve Been Waitin’ For Tomorrow (All My Life)”), the songs themselves are lush and cinematic, dressed in richly textured arrangements. Johnson’s key influences around this time were Cabaret Voltaire, Wire and This Heat; but he had been raised on John Lennon and Tim Buckley. Johnson’s vision for Soul Mining was to recast these classic, enduring antecedents in a new and experimental framework.

The songs themselves oscillate between the political and the personal. Despite its surprisingly jaunty backing, “The Sinking Feeling” bristles with social injustice – “I’m just a symptom of the moral decay/That’s gnawing at the heart of the country”. Elsewhere, against keyboard stabs, “The Twilight Hour” pushes into relationship paranoia: “It’s now way past the hour she usually phones”.

A welcome balance is provided by “This Is The Day” and “Uncertain Smile”, an uplifting number worth the price of admission alone: here a loveless, late-night brooding is disguised by a crisp guitar melody and gilded by Jools Holland’s sparkling piano solo. Although at this point, The The was essentially a one-man show, Johnson roped in several accomplices to help bring his vision to life: Holland, Orange Juice’s Zeke Manyika, synth pioneer Thomas Leer and Foetus’ JG Thirlwell (credited here as Frank Wants). Manyika’s African polyrhythms dominate “Giant”, but arguably the most critical collaborators here are Leer and Thirlwell, whose involvement explicitly connected Johnson’s songwriting craft to more leftfield sonic explorations.

Although Soul Mining only peaked at 27 in the charts, the album nevertheless marked the start of a prolific period for The The. 1986’s follow-up, Infected, found Johnson further exploring a more leftfield musical agenda; it wasn’t until subsequent albums that he began to loosen up a little. He even formed a proper band with Johnny Marr for 1989’s Mind Bomb and Dusk (1992) and found himself, briefly, in the unlikely position of enjoying a Top 20 hit single. But Soul Mining is arguably Johnson’s defining work: ambitious, strange, exciting. And, 30-odd years on, remarkably fresh.

Michael Bonner

EXTRAS: Accompanied by Johnson’s sleeve notes and a remastered pressing of the album, the boxset also includes a second 12” of alternative versions and remixes. Of most interest are the original ‘New York’ mixes from the Mike Thorne sessions: “Uncertain Smile” is chunkier than the album version and features a sax solo rather than Holland’s piano, not forgetting “Perfect”, featuring David Johansen on harmonica. It’s rounded off by 12” remixes of “This Is The Day”, “Perfect” and “I’ve Been Waitin’ For Tomorrow (All Of My Life)”.

“Somewhere between pure euphoria and terrible insecurity”: An interview with The The’s Matt Johnson

Hotel named after Bob Dylan opens in Woodstock

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Hotel named after Bob Dylan opens in Woodstock

A hotel named after Bob Dylan has opened in Woodstock, New York. The Hotel Dylan is located Route 28, just southwest of the town where Dylan and The Band recorded and not far from where the festival took place in 1969. It has been designed by owner Paul Covello and architects Cortney and Robert Novogratz. The establishment, which Covello told the No Depression has a "bohemian sophistication", also features rooms named in tribute to musicians other than Dylan who are associated with the area and the Woodstock festival, including 'The Jimi,' and 'The Band Suite'. Elliot Landy's famous photographs of The Band, from the Music From The Big Pink shoot, are on the walls. Every room in the hotel has its own turntable and records. Plans for a gastropub are also in the pipeline, where Covello says there will be a music venue for "intimate, unplugged concerts". Meanwhile, a total of 149 'lost' Bob Dylan acetate records were found in a New York cupboard earlier this month. The never-heard-before versions of songs that would eventually feature on the iconic singer-songwriter's Nashville Skyline, Self Portrait and New Morning albums were found in a closet in a building at 124 W Houston Street in Manhattan, which was once home to a studio Dylan worked in from 1969 to 1972.

A hotel named after Bob Dylan has opened in Woodstock, New York.

The Hotel Dylan is located Route 28, just southwest of the town where Dylan and The Band recorded and not far from where the festival took place in 1969. It has been designed by owner Paul Covello and architects Cortney and Robert Novogratz.

The establishment, which Covello told the No Depression has a “bohemian sophistication”, also features rooms named in tribute to musicians other than Dylan who are associated with the area and the Woodstock festival, including ‘The Jimi,’ and ‘The Band Suite’. Elliot Landy’s famous photographs of The Band, from the Music From The Big Pink shoot, are on the walls.

Every room in the hotel has its own turntable and records. Plans for a gastropub are also in the pipeline, where Covello says there will be a music venue for “intimate, unplugged concerts”.

Meanwhile, a total of 149 ‘lost’ Bob Dylan acetate records were found in a New York cupboard earlier this month. The never-heard-before versions of songs that would eventually feature on the iconic singer-songwriter’s Nashville Skyline, Self Portrait and New Morning albums were found in a closet in a building at 124 W Houston Street in Manhattan, which was once home to a studio Dylan worked in from 1969 to 1972.

Neil Young & Crazy Horse perform unreleased track at Italy show

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Neil Young & Crazy Horse perform unreleased track at Italy show
Neil Young & Crazy Horse played an unreleased track dating from 2001 during their show at Piazza Colbert, Barolo, Italy last night [July 21]. "Standing In The Light Of Love" was debuted on June 9, 2001 at the Sheffield Arena and played a further 26 times during the band's European and Japanese ...

Neil Young & Crazy Horse played an unreleased track dating from 2001 during their show at Piazza Colbert, Barolo, Italy last night [July 21].

“Standing In The Light Of Love” was debuted on June 9, 2001 at the Sheffield Arena and played a further 26 times during the band’s European and Japanese shows that year.

It was last played on July 28, 2001 at the Fuji Rock Festival, Japan.

Young and Crazy Horse have already aired a number of deep rare cuts during their current European tour.

At their Reykjavík show on July 7, they performed “Separate Ways“, from the Homegrown sessions, which hasn’t had a live airing since 2008, and “Days That Used To Be” from Ragged Glory, which the band hadn’t played live since 1991.

At the July 20 show at Ulm in Germany, they played “Name Of Love“, from CSNY’s 1988 album, American Dream. The song has only had 19 live performances: prior to the Ulm show, it was last played live in November, 1988.

At Ulm, they also performed the CSNY song, “Living With War“, which hasn’t been played live since September 2006 and has never been performed live by Crazy Horse before.

They have also debuted a new song during this tour: you can watch them perform “Who’s Gonna Stand Up And Save The Earth?” here.

You can read our review of the Neil Young & Crazy Horse show on July 12 at Hyde Park here.

Neil Young & Crazy Horse set list for Collisioni Festival, Piazza Colbert, Barolo, Italy, July 21, 2014:

Love And Only Love

Standing In The Light Of Love

Goin’ Home

Days That Used To Be

Living With War

Love To Burn

Name Of Love

Blowin’ In The Wind

Heart Of Gold

Barstool Blues

Psychedelic Pill

Cortez The Killer

Rockin’ In The Free World

Encore

Who’s Gonna Stand Up And Save The Earth?

White Fence, OOIOO, Ty Segall, other stuff…

John Mulvey
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White Fence, OOIOO, Ty Segall, other stuff…

One of the many privileges and occasional disorientations of working for a monthly music mag is that we hear some music so far ahead of release that it can be easy to forget when the albums actually come out. So while the world of Ty Segall-related projects might have moved on here to the monstrous Wand album (out on Segall's God imprint in late August), it's instructive to remember that Segall's own "Manipulator", which we've had for a while, isn't out 'til then, either. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPzVmgTaAS0 "Manipulator" is a sprawling, though never lethargic or indulgent, round-up of sorts, breathlessly cycling through Segall's various garage/glam/psych/grunge/Lennonish/hard rock modes. The more records he makes, though, the more I start to suspect that his hook-up with White Fence, "Hair" (which I wrote about here), might be his best, or at least my personal favourite. To wander back to my original point, a new White Fence album, "To The Recently Found Innocent", actually came out yesterday. A potent LA psych maven, Tim Presley is also one of the few musicians to have passed through The Fall and sustained a visible career afterwards. Recording at home as White Fence, Presley’s ad hoc, lo-fi approach has produced seven albums in the past four years, plus "Hair". Segall produces this time, in what constitutes the most hi-fidelity recording Presley has made since his time fronting Darker My Love, a terrific and slightly more orthodox bunch of janglers whose 2010 album, "Alive As You Are", I can especially recommend. Compared with those previous White Fence albums, there's a degree less fuzz, but Presley’s grasp of Nuggets beat, Paisley jangle and English psych arcana remains staggering - a reference to a “powdered wig” in “Sandra” is typically whimsical, and his remit now focuses more on early Who (“Like That”) and Kinks (“Arrow Man”). A risk of pastiche is never far away, but Presley staves it off with energy, songcraft, cunning and a renewed, relatively streamlined focus. Here's "Like That"… While I'm here today, another album I've liked a lot this summer has been the seventh joyous set from OOIOO. Ten years on from the Dionysian frenzy of their last proper album, "Seadrum/House Of Sun", the recording future of Japanese psych overlords the Boredoms remains unclear. And five years after OOIOO’s most recent release, it had started looking like drummer Yoshimi P-We’s side project was dormant, too. "Gamel", though, is an ecstatic return; a ritual jam in which the band’s post-punk angles take second place to their trance imperative. The ringing intensity of Javanese gamelan underpins Yoshimi’s manoeuvres this time out, though the nimbleness with which her band flit from one hypno-musical state to another – fleetingly, “Gamel Uma Umo” resembles Konono No 1 – is more impressive than ever. Their best, perhaps, since 2000’s "Gold And Green". A quick reminder at this point that the new issue of Uncut is out a week today, with a world exclusive cover story. More on that any day now, but inside I've written about Jack White, The Aphex Twin, Bitchin Bajas, Richard Thompson, The Grateful Dead & John Oswald, David Kilgour & The Heavy Eights, Noura Mint Seymali, Plastikman, Wolfgang Voigt, Girma Yifrashewa, Michael Chapman and Louis Armstrong. Busy… Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey

One of the many privileges and occasional disorientations of working for a monthly music mag is that we hear some music so far ahead of release that it can be easy to forget when the albums actually come out. So while the world of Ty Segall-related projects might have moved on here to the monstrous Wand album (out on Segall’s God imprint in late August), it’s instructive to remember that Segall’s own “Manipulator”, which we’ve had for a while, isn’t out ’til then, either.

“Manipulator” is a sprawling, though never lethargic or indulgent, round-up of sorts, breathlessly cycling through Segall’s various garage/glam/psych/grunge/Lennonish/hard rock modes. The more records he makes, though, the more I start to suspect that his hook-up with White Fence, “Hair” (which I wrote about here), might be his best, or at least my personal favourite.

To wander back to my original point, a new White Fence album, “To The Recently Found Innocent”, actually came out yesterday. A potent LA psych maven, Tim Presley is also one of the few musicians to have passed through The Fall and sustained a visible career afterwards. Recording at home as White Fence, Presley’s ad hoc, lo-fi approach has produced seven albums in the past four years, plus “Hair”.

Segall produces this time, in what constitutes the most hi-fidelity recording Presley has made since his time fronting Darker My Love, a terrific and slightly more orthodox bunch of janglers whose 2010 album, “Alive As You Are”, I can especially recommend. Compared with those previous White Fence albums, there’s a degree less fuzz, but Presley’s grasp of Nuggets beat, Paisley jangle and English psych arcana remains staggering – a reference to a “powdered wig” in “Sandra” is typically whimsical, and his remit now focuses more on early Who (“Like That”) and Kinks (“Arrow Man”). A risk of pastiche is never far away, but Presley staves it off with energy, songcraft, cunning and a renewed, relatively streamlined focus. Here’s “Like That”…

While I’m here today, another album I’ve liked a lot this summer has been the seventh joyous set from OOIOO. Ten years on from the Dionysian frenzy of their last proper album, “Seadrum/House Of Sun”, the recording future of Japanese psych overlords the Boredoms remains unclear. And five years after OOIOO’s most recent release, it had started looking like drummer Yoshimi P-We’s side project was dormant, too.

“Gamel”, though, is an ecstatic return; a ritual jam in which the band’s post-punk angles take second place to their trance imperative. The ringing intensity of Javanese gamelan underpins Yoshimi’s manoeuvres this time out, though the nimbleness with which her band flit from one hypno-musical state to another – fleetingly, “Gamel Uma Umo” resembles Konono No 1 – is more impressive than ever. Their best, perhaps, since 2000’s “Gold And Green”.

A quick reminder at this point that the new issue of Uncut is out a week today, with a world exclusive cover story. More on that any day now, but inside I’ve written about Jack White, The Aphex Twin, Bitchin Bajas, Richard Thompson, The Grateful Dead & John Oswald, David Kilgour & The Heavy Eights, Noura Mint Seymali, Plastikman, Wolfgang Voigt, Girma Yifrashewa, Michael Chapman and Louis Armstrong. Busy…

Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey

10 Music Films Still To Come In 2014…

Michael Bonner
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10 Music Films Still To Come In 2014…

After an otherwise mediocre start to the year, the second half of 2014 looks set to be more promising for aficionados of music films. For a start, fans of Big Star who’ve been waiting for Nothing Can Hurt Me to arrive on UK screens will finally have their patience rewarded when Drew DeNicola and Olivia Mori’s film about Alex Chilton and co finally gets a UK release next month. There’s also the excellent Nick Cave 'documentary', 20,000 Days On Earth, plus biopics just round the corner on James Brown and Jimi Hendrix. And let's not overlook docs on Fela Kuti, Dexys and Roland Kirk, while an enterprising pair of filmmakers set out to document American roots music in homage to Alan Lomax. I've assembled a list of 10 below; my choice being cunningly predicated on the existence of a trailer for each film. I can't guarantee that come December we're going to find them all in our Films Of The Year - I've already got my suspicions about a couple, but I won't say which ones - but it at least gives a taste of what to expect as the next six months unfolds... Big Star: Nothing Can Hurt Me (Opens August 1) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxAbkqRGxqY Thwarted expectations ahoy in this well-intentioned chronicle of the Memphis quartet’s story. Lack of substantial archive footage a drawback, however. God Help The Girl (Opens August 22) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jc2gHpNbyc Big screen debut from Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch, who writes and directs this whimsical musical comedy about love and hairgrips in Glasgow. Finding Fela (opens September 5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=937SQ8-6RV4 Comprehensive account of the Afrobeat pioneer’s colourful life and times, mixing amazing archive footage and first-hand testimonials. 20,000 Days On Earth (Opens September 19) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ap0_y5EGttk Fact and fiction blurs in this purported ‘day in the life of Nick Cave’. Warren Ellis, Blixa Bargeld, Kylie and Ray Winstone join in the fun. Get On Up (Opens September 26) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0AZnuymNAw The first of two James Brown projects, this Mick Jagger produced biopic arrives ahead of Alex (Finding Fela) Gibney’s doc about Brown’s early years. Nowhere Is Home (Opens October) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8m7m3WGwNI4 Part concert film, part doc, Paul Kelly’s film was shot around Dexys nine-night residency at London’s Duke Of York’s theatre in spring 2013. Jimi: All Is By My Side (opens October 10) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-KPOxqMazI Or Hendrix: The London Years. Andre 3000 is Hendrix circa 1966/7 in John (12 Years A Slave) Ridley’s biopic. Hustlers Convention (release date to be confirmed) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg7JbPowTDs Documentary about the 1973 album by Jalal Nuriddin of the Last Poets: a lost classic, due for reassessment. The 78 Project (release date to be confirmed) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00qJFGopmBY On a road trip round America inspired by Alan Lomax Taking their cue from Alan Lomax, Alex Steyermark and Lavinia Jones Wright traveled America recording record today’s musicians on 1930s technology. The Case Of The Three Sided Dream (release date to be confirmed) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8T4a5rIZS7c Film about Rohsaan Rolankd Kirk, the incendiary jazz horn player, captured in super-8 home movies and TV footage.

After an otherwise mediocre start to the year, the second half of 2014 looks set to be more promising for aficionados of music films. For a start, fans of Big Star who’ve been waiting for Nothing Can Hurt Me to arrive on UK screens will finally have their patience rewarded when Drew DeNicola and Olivia Mori’s film about Alex Chilton and co finally gets a UK release next month.

There’s also the excellent Nick Cave ‘documentary’, 20,000 Days On Earth, plus biopics just round the corner on James Brown and Jimi Hendrix. And let’s not overlook docs on Fela Kuti, Dexys and Roland Kirk, while an enterprising pair of filmmakers set out to document American roots music in homage to Alan Lomax.

I’ve assembled a list of 10 below; my choice being cunningly predicated on the existence of a trailer for each film. I can’t guarantee that come December we’re going to find them all in our Films Of The Year – I’ve already got my suspicions about a couple, but I won’t say which ones – but it at least gives a taste of what to expect as the next six months unfolds…

Big Star: Nothing Can Hurt Me

(Opens August 1)

Thwarted expectations ahoy in this well-intentioned chronicle of the Memphis quartet’s story. Lack of substantial archive footage a drawback, however.

God Help The Girl

(Opens August 22)

Big screen debut from Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch, who writes and directs this whimsical musical comedy about love and hairgrips in Glasgow.

Finding Fela

(opens September 5)

Comprehensive account of the Afrobeat pioneer’s colourful life and times, mixing amazing archive footage and first-hand testimonials.

20,000 Days On Earth

(Opens September 19)

Fact and fiction blurs in this purported ‘day in the life of Nick Cave’. Warren Ellis, Blixa Bargeld, Kylie and Ray Winstone join in the fun.

Get On Up

(Opens September 26)

The first of two James Brown projects, this Mick Jagger produced biopic arrives ahead of Alex (Finding Fela) Gibney’s doc about Brown’s early years.

Nowhere Is Home

(Opens October)

Part concert film, part doc, Paul Kelly’s film was shot around Dexys nine-night residency at London’s Duke Of York’s theatre in spring 2013.

Jimi: All Is By My Side

(opens October 10)

Or Hendrix: The London Years. Andre 3000 is Hendrix circa 1966/7 in John (12 Years A Slave) Ridley’s biopic.

Hustlers Convention

(release date to be confirmed)

Documentary about the 1973 album by Jalal Nuriddin of the Last Poets: a lost classic, due for reassessment.

The 78 Project

(release date to be confirmed)

On a road trip round America inspired by Alan Lomax

Taking their cue from Alan Lomax, Alex Steyermark and Lavinia Jones Wright traveled America recording record today’s musicians on 1930s technology.

The Case Of The Three Sided Dream

(release date to be confirmed)

Film about Rohsaan Rolankd Kirk, the incendiary jazz horn player, captured in super-8 home movies and TV footage.

Johnny Marr announces new album, Playland

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Johnny Marr announces new album, Playland
Johnny Marr has announced details of his second solo album, Playland. The follow-up to 2013's solo debut The Messenger will be released on October 6. Speaking exclusively to NME, the former Smiths guitarist said it was a continuation of his last album, written while on the road in the past two ye...

Johnny Marr has announced details of his second solo album, Playland.

The follow-up to 2013’s solo debut The Messenger will be released on October 6.

Speaking exclusively to NME, the former Smiths guitarist said it was a continuation of his last album, written while on the road in the past two years. Unlike its predecessor, which was made between Berlin, New York and Manchester, Playland was recorded in London at Tritone Studios near Tower Bridge and will come out on the same day as lead single “Easy Money”.

“It was deliberate to work in London,” said Marr. “Where you work definitely affects how it sounds and seeps into the music, and I’ve developed a really good feeling for London in the past couple of years, I like the frenetic atmosphere.”

The title was inspired by “Homo Ludens”, by Dutch historian and cultural theorist Johan Huizinga. ‘Homo Ludens’ translates as ‘Man The Player’, or ‘Playing Man’. As with ‘The Messenger’, it was produced by Marr and his co-producer/band member Doviak, mixed by Claudius Mittendorfer in New York and mastered at Abbey Road by Frank Arkwright, who has in the past worked with Arcade Fire, The Smiths, New Order, Joy Division, Coldplay, Oasis and Primal Scream.

“The album’s main themes are the atmosphere of the city, and the preoccupations of the people who live in them; those preoccupations being consumerism, sex and anxiety, or distraction and transcendence from those things,” he says.

Of the autobiographical songs on the album, Marr says “25 Hours” is about the realisation he had as a child of having to do something to escape the life that was laid out in front of him, and features the lyric “Being chased by the priests and the freaks who are hunting me down with attitude/The heat and the bricks are falling on me like doom”.

He says: “I was immersed in the Catholic school system and an oppressive upbringing, looking at a life of having to consort with people that I didn’t want to be around. I realised you need to find some escape to break out of that, and that’s when I realised art was a way of escaping, in my case the music I was making or wanted to make. I would’ve been eight or nine, and I knew I just needed to escape the life that I was in. I got a sense of what might be my destiny if I didn’t do that.”

He describes “Dynamo” as a “love affair with a building”, inspired by his ongoing interest in psychogeography, the study of an environment’s effect on the behaviour of the humans within it.

“It might happen when you look up at a building, modern or old, on a clear summer day, big blue sky behind it filled with jet streams, and not being able to help think of stories that go with it all. I’ve been interested in the city and the people in it since I was a kid, it has this romantic attraction I just clicked with. Then when I was older I started reading more about it and got into the philosophy behind it. Of course, when you’re writing about something like that, it often works out that you’re writing about a person too.”

“The Trap“, meanwhile, is about “how we try to hide what we’re really communicating with each other”, and “Easy Money” is about greed, “which is everywhere, but you see so much more in the city”.

The Playland tracklisting is:

‘Back In The Box’

‘Easy Money’

‘Dynamo’

‘Candidate’

’25 Hours’

‘The Trap’

‘Playland’

‘Speak Out Reach Out’

‘Boys Get Straight’

‘This Tension’

‘Little King’

Johnny Marr tours throughout October. He will play:

Lincoln The Engine Shed (October 13)

Southend Cliffs Pavillion (14)

Bexhill De La Warr (15)

Wolverhampton Civic Hall (17)

Cardiff Great Hall (18)

Bournemouth O2 Academy (20)

Cambridge Corn Exchange (21)

London O2 Academy Brixton (23)

Bath Pavilion (24)

Manchester O2 Apollo (25)

Glasgow O2 Academy (27)

Newcastle O2 Academy (28)

Leeds O2 Academy (29)

Hear new Vashti Bunyan song, “Across The Water”

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Hear new Vashti Bunyan song, “Across The Water”
Vashti Bunyan has shared a new song, entitled "Across The Water". Listen to the track below, which comes from the artist's new album Heartleap, which is released on October 6 via FatCat. The LP follows her 1970 debut Just Another Diamond Day and 2005's comeback album Lookaftering. The new album was...

Vashti Bunyan has shared a new song, entitled “Across The Water”.

Listen to the track below, which comes from the artist’s new album Heartleap, which is released on October 6 via FatCat. The LP follows her 1970 debut Just Another Diamond Day and 2005’s comeback album Lookaftering. The new album was produced by Bunyan herself and was primarily recorded in her own studio.

The release of the album will be supported by a UK tour, which starts at Birmingham MAC on October 7, with two shows at London St Pancras Church (8-9), Farndale The Band Room (11) and Manchester St Philip’s Church (12).

Vashti Bunyan plays:

Birmingham MAC (October 7)

London St. Pancras Church (8-9)

Farndale (11)

Manchester St. Philip’s Church (12)

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers unveil new song, “Forgotten Man”

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Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers unveil new song, “Forgotten Man”
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have unveiled a new song, "Forgotten Man". The song can be found on their website here. The interactive site is modelled after an old car radio; turn it on and use your mouse to flip through the stations. "Forgotten Man" can be found between 104 and 100. The song a...

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have unveiled a new song, “Forgotten Man”.

The song can be found on their website here.

The interactive site is modelled after an old car radio; turn it on and use your mouse to flip through the stations. “Forgotten Man” can be found between 104 and 100.

The song appears on their new album, Hypnotic Eye, which is released on July 29 via Reprise Records.

You can also find four other previously released songs from the album on the website.

“U Get Me High” starts between 300 and 280 on the dial, “Red River” is between 260 and 240, “American Dream Plan B” can be found between 240 and 220 and “Fault Lines” plays on 220.

The tracklisting for Hypotic Eye is:

American Dream Plan B

Fault Lines

Red River

Full Grown Boy

All You Can Carry

Power Drunk

Forgotten Man

Son of My Youth

U Get Me High

Burnt Out Town

Shadow People

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