The family of Radiohead drum technician Scott Johnson, who died after a stage collapse in Toronto, have set up a charity in his memory.

The Scott Johnson Bursary will fund musical equipment in Johnson’s hometown of Rotherham.

Posting on the band’s Facebook page today, Radiohead drummer Philip Selway announced the launch of the charity, writing: “Over the past couple of months, a number of people have asked if there is anything they can do in memory of Scott. Scott’s parents have now created the Scott Johnson Bursary Fund for Young Musicians. This will fund musical equipment for young people in Rotherham in the UK, where Scott grew up.”

Johnson’s parents have set up the page www.scottjohnsonbursary.com, writing: “It has been heart-warming to receive the kind wishes from you all. We have had many requests for donations in place of flowers and have set up an account that will be the Scott Johnson Bursary for Young Musicians. This will be managed by his friends locally as a fund primarily in Rotherham Schools.”

They add: “Frankly we cannot equate to the financial aspects but if it helps anyone to contribute in this way the account is established to ensure that no other fund is created in error. It may take a while, but we will keep you informed on how the money is spent in due course.”

For more information, and to donate, visit: www.scottjohnsonbursary.com.

Radiohead paid a special tribute to Johnson last month (July 10) during their first gig since his death. The band, who were performing at the Les Arenes in Nimes, France, filled the screen with photos of Johnson as they played “Reckoner“.

It was their first rescheduled show since their drum tech died during a stage collapse in Toronto last month. A further three people were injured in the incident at Downsview Park, Toronto.

The stage collapsed an hour before the gates opened to the public and queues were already forming outside the venue. The victims were all part of the team setting up equipment. Radiohead rescheduled seven shows following the tragedy after the accident also destroyed the band’s unique lightshow and parts of their backline set-up.

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Beck is set to release his brand new album in the form of individual pieces of sheet music.

Song Reader will be put out by publishers Faber and Faber in December and will consist of the notation for 20 unrecorded and unreleased songs.

The sheet music will come with full colour art works for each song as well as a hardcover carrying case. Two of the 20 songs are instrumentals. The ‘album’ features the tracks “Do We? We Do” and “Don’t Act Like Your Heart Isn’t Hard”. The idea behind the release is for fans to play the songs and “bring them to life” themselves.

Song Reader is made up of 108 pages, featuring 20 individual song booklets. The illustrations come courtesy of Marcel Dzama, Leanne Shapton, Josh Cochran, Jessica Hische and more.

Of Song Reader, Faber & Faber’s Publishing Director, Lee Brackstone said: “Beck is one of the great maverick pop stars of this, or any age, and as soon as I saw Song Reader the relevance of the concept struck me. It is thrilling to welcome Beck onto a music list at Faber that is already home to Julian Cope, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Jarvis Cocker, Nicky Wire and others. Song Reader makes a radical statement about the value and importance of performed and recorded music at a time when these very things are under threat.”

Beck’s last, more traditional album release was 2008’s Modern Guilt.

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Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan has layed into the way the music industry works, saying it “operates on a dumbing down principle”.

The singer, whose band released their new studio album Oceania in June, has said that he believes few bands get to keep their intelligence if they want to be successful, but did name Radiohead as a notable exception.

Speaking to GMA News, Corgan said: “It’s incredible to me how sophisticated people really are when you give them the opportunity to be sophisticated. The music business essentially operates on a dumbing down principle. How dumb do we have to go to sell this record to the most amount of people?”

Then asked if he knew of any exceptions to this, Corgan added: “There are very few bands who are able to keep their intelligence on record, Radiohead are a good example. They have a very high message and are still very popular. But for the most part the charts are dominated by music that’s essentially dumbed down in melody, style, tone, texture, and message because it reaches the most amount of people.”

He then added: “‘I think with where I am now I don’t want to be dumbed down. I just think that’s the worst thing for rock’n’roll.”

Oceania is the seventh album of the Smashing Pumpkins career and was released on June 18.

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MIA has described her forthcoming new album as sounding like Paul Simon “on acid”.

The singer made the comment on Twitter, after telling fans she would answer 10 questions about the follow-up to 2010’s Maya. She also explained that the record would be released in December, alongside a book, documentary and art exhibition. Some of the tweets have subsequently been deleted.

When asked how many tracks would feature on the new album, she said: “its still in the making -could be 5 it could be 15 depends on what sounds good in my bros CAR.” She added that there would be no collaborations on the record and of the LP’s unknown producers she said it will be worked on with “ones that dont act like fame whore coloniser.”

She went on to Tweet one of her favourite lyrics on the record:

truth is like a rotten tooth u gottu spit it out!!!

In April, MIA released “Come Walk With Me”, following the instrumental soundtrack she wrote for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange‘s TV show The World Tomorrow.

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Cat Power has announced a north American tour to coincide with the September release of her new album, Sun.

She plays:

Thursday, October 11 – Miami, Florida – Grand Central

Thursday, 08 – Los Angeles, California – Hollywood Palladium

You can watch a promo clip for Sun below.

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A remix of Kate Bush track “Running Up That Hill” which appeared on Amazon yesterday has sparked rumours that the singer may be performing at the Olympic closing ceremony.

The page on Amazon, which has since been deleted, showed a 2012 remix of the track listed for Sunday [August 12] to coincide with the Olympic closing ceremony. You can see the artwork for the track above.

‘A Symphony Of British Music: Music For The Closing Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games’, an album containing music performed on the final night, will be released digitally on August 12. A spokesperson for Kate Bush declined to comment on whether the track was part of this soundtrack.

The singer has not toured since 1979, however has recently hinted at a live return: “Maybe I will do some shows some day. I’d like to think so before I get too ancient – turn up with me Zimmer frame,” she said.

The singer released her last album, 50 Words For Snow at the end of the last year. The record was her second release of 2011, following from Director’s Cut. It is the tenth album of her career.

While the line-up for the closing ceremony is a strictly guarded secret, Muse, Ed Sheeran and George Micheal have all announced that they will be performing, with rumours also circulating that the Spice Girls, Elbow, The Who and Madness will perform.

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Bon Iver is releasing the stems of his songs for fans to remix, according to a report on music-news.com.

The Bon Iver: Stems Project will see Justin Vernon release the original instrumental stems for all ten songs on his self-titled album.

These will be available via http://www.indabamusic.com/. All you need to do is sign up to Indaba Music, download the stems, do your remix and upload them by August 29.

The remixes will be voted on by members of the Indaba Music community and the winners will then be announced in the third week of September.

The prize money is $1,000 per song.

The winning remixes will get the cash and also appear on the official Bon Iver: Stems Project remix album on Spotify.

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Composer Philip Glass – who turns 75 this year – is to be the subject of a remix album, inspired by a conversation between Glass and Beck.

The album, called Rework: Philip Glass Remixed, is due for release in October. It includes reworks of original Glass compositions from Beck himself, Tyondai Braxton (ex-Battles), Amon Tobin, Memory Tapes, Dan Deacon, and more.

Full tracklist for Rework:

Disc One

1. My Great Ghost – “Music in Twelve Parts, Part 1”

2. Tyondai Braxton – “Rubric (Remix)”

3. Nosaj Thing – “Knee 1 (Remix)”

4. Dan Deacon – “Alight Spiral Ship (Philip Glass Remix)”

5. Amon Tobin – “Warda’s Whorehouse Inside Out Version”

6. Silver Alert – “Etoile Polaire: Little Dipper”

7. Memory Tapes – “Floe ’87 (Remix)”

8. Cornelius 3 – “Opening From Glassworks”

Disc Two

1. Beck – “NYC: 73-78”

2. Jóhann Jóhannsson – “Protest (Remix)”

3. Pantha du Prince – “Mad Rush Organ (Remix)”

4. Peter Broderick – “Island (Remix)”

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The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion have unveiled the trailer for their new album Meat And Bone – watch it above.

Meat And Bone is the band’s first album of new material in eight years and will be released on September 17.

It follows 2004’s Damage – which was released under the shortened name of Blues Explosion. It features 12 tracks, and will be the band’s ninth LP. Scroll down to listen to the album’s opening track Black Mold.

Recorded at the Key Club Recording Studio in Benton Harbor, Michigan, the album was then mixed in New York. Speaking about the album previously, Jon Spencer said: We still have that psychic glue that allows us to create music together. Over the course of a year touring and writing new songs and recording, we rediscovered our shared history as a band. We circled the wagons, and went back to our roots. In a way this is almost like another first album.

The band released their debut, self-titled record in 1992.

The Meat And Bone tracklisting is:

‘Black Mold’

‘Zimgar’

The band have also announced a European tour for Autumn, playing London’s Electric Ballroom on December 3.

Jon Spencer Blues Explosion will play:

Lyon Epicerie Moderne (France) (November 29)

Clermont Ferrand Le Coop De Mai (France) (30)

Nantes Stereolux (France) (December 1)

Lille Aeronef (France) (2)

Paris Le Bataclan (France) (4)

Strasbourg La Laiterie (France) (5)

La Chaux De Fonds (Switzerland) (6)

Zurich Kilbi Winter Festival (Switzerland) (7)

Prague Akropolis (Czech Republic) (8)

De Berlin Festaal (Germany) (9)

De Koln Gebaude 9 (Germany) (10)

Be Brussels Ancienne Belgique (Belgium) (11)

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After a week of speculation that he might be about to announce tour dates, Tom Waits has instead released a new video.

It’s for the track, “Hell Broke Luce“, which appears on Waits’ 2011 album, Bad As Me. It’s been directed by Matt Mahurin.

In a statement accompanying the announcement, Waits wrote:

“As most of you guessed, it’s a tour…a tour de force!

“Matt Mahurin has created an apocalyptic war dream to accompany the song ‘HELL BROKE LUCE.’ Kathleen and I envisioned it as an enlightened drill sergeant yelling the hard truths of war to a brand new batch of recruits. The video grew from the gnawing image of a soldier pulling his home, through a battlefield, at the end of a rope.

“I think you will agree, it’s uplifting and fun.”

“Hell Broke Luce” features Keith Richards on guitar, with Flea on bass.

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“Tubular Bells” composer Mike Oldfield has admitted he had never heard of Arctic Monkeys or Dizzee Rascal before he performed with them at the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games in London last week (July 27).

Speaking to NME, the musician, who performed 1973’s “Tubular Bells” alongside a fantasy scene involving famous characters from cinema, confessed that he “doesn’t know anything that’s currently happening in the music scene”.

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R.E.M. has announced the September 24th release of an expanded 25th Anniversary Edition of the band’s 1987 album, Document.

The new edition features the digitally remastered original album, plus a previously unreleased 1987 concert from R.E.M.’s “Work” tour. The commemorative release also adds new liner notes, with the 2CD package presented in a lift-top box with four postcards. On the same date, the remastered original album will be reissued by Mobile Fidelity on 180-gram vinyl.

The tracklisting for R.E.M.: Document (25th Anniversary Edition) is:

CD 1 (digitally remastered original album)

1. Finest Worksong

2. Welcome To The Occupation

3. Exhuming McCarthy

4. Disturbance At The Heron House

5. Strange

6. Its The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

7. The One I Love

8. Fireplace

9. Lightnin’ Hopkins

10. King Of Birds

11. Oddfellows Local 151

CD 2 (previously unreleased “Work” tour concert, recorded live in Utrecht, Holland – September 14, 1987)

1. Finest Worksong (4.20)

2. These Days (3.36)

3. Lightnin’ Hopkins (3.43)

4. Welcome To The Occupation (2.52)

5. Driver 8 (4.15)

6. Feeling Gravitys Pull (5.00)

7. I Believe (4.28)

8. The One I Love (4.38)

9. Exhuming McCarthy (3.23)

10. Wolves, Lower (4.23)

11. Fall On Me (3.05)

12. Just A Touch (3.12)

13. Oddfellows Local 151 (5.34)

14. Little America (2.50)

15. Its the End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine) (4.01)

16. Begin The Begin (4.32)

17. Disturbance At The Heron House (3.42)

18. Moral Kiosk (3.02)

19. Life And How To Live It (4.59)

20. So. Central Rain (5.35)

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The xx have played two new tracks from their forthcoming second album – scroll down to listen.

Titled “Sunset” and “Reunion”, they are the latest songs the band have played live from their forthcoming album Coexist, which is due for release on September 10. You can hear them both below.

Last week the band debuted a new dance-indebted track “Swept Away” at a show in LA. Previously, the band unveiled “Angels” – the first track from Coexist.

The London band have also announced a trio of intimate UK shows for September. They will take to the stage at the O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire on September 10 – the release date for Coexist, followed by gigs at The Coal Exchange in Cardiff on September 11 and Edinburgh’s Usher Hall on September 12. They will also play Bestival in the Isle of Wight on September 7.

Speaking about the making of Coexist, the band revealed that they have “gained confidence” since the release of their debut album, xx. “It’s nice not feeling cripplingly shy,” Romy Madley Croft said.

The tracklisting for ‘Coexist’ is as follows:

‘Angels’

‘Our Song’

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Dr. Dre has signed up to develop and act as an executive producer on a new crime drama series for American television network FX.

According to Deadline, the rap mogul will oversee the production of the series, which will be written by Sidney Quashie and will focus on both the music industry and the criminal underworld of Los Angeles.

Quashie will executive produce alongside Dr Dre, with Daniel Schnider from the producer’s company Crucial TV and Brad Bertner also signed up executive produce the show. A one-hour pilot has initially been commissioned.

Dre is still working on his long-awaited new album Detox, which his first album since his 1999 LP 2001, and the rapper has previously indicated it will be his last full studio record.

Two singles have been released so far: “Kush” in November 2010 and “I Need A Doctor”, which featured Eminem and Skylar Grey, in February 2011. There is no confirmed tracklisting or release date as yet.

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The Stone Roses hailed Team GB’s gold medal winning athletes Jessica Ennis and Bradley Wiggins at their intimate London show last night (August 6), calling the pair – who were both in attendance – “the real King and Queen of England”.

The band played a surprise tiny gig at the Adidas Underground in support of the London 2012 Olympic Games, playing an hour-long set in front of an audience that also included rower Pete Reed, Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, John Simm, Example, Wretch 32 and bassist Mani’s former Primal Scream bandmate Bobby Gillespie. Cycling champ Bradley Wiggins also partied with Paul Weller after the gig – thus realising a long-held ambition for the confirmed mod and Weller fan.

Before taking the stage just before midnight at the intimate east London venue, just miles away from the Olympic Park, Ian Brown joked: “Sorry we’re late, we were having a shoot out backstage!”

The band, who were supported by rising star Jake Bugg, played a 11-song, hit-filled set which includes the likes of “I Wanna Be Adored”, “Fools Gold”, “This Is The One”, “She Bangs The Drums” and the closing “I Am The Resurrection”.

The Stone Roses will headline next month’s V Festival in Chelmsford and Stafforshire as well as Northern Ireland’s Tennent’s Vital Festival.

The Stone Roses played:

‘I Wanna Be Adored’

‘I Am The Resurrection’

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Hi there. I hope you all had good weekends. Were you, like me, glued to the BBC for the duration of the athletics?

Incredible stuff. In fact, the whole Olympics has been brilliant – whatever that sourpuss Morrissey says. Even simple things have been a blessing, like being able to get to work without too much disruption, despite the dire warnings issued by the authorities and Boris’ awful tannoy announcements. We had a family friend in the boxing – Josh Taylor – and we were fortunate enough to grab tickets when they first went on sale to go and see him fight at the ExCel. It was a tremendous experience, and we’re already saving now for Rio 2016.

It’s been an equally incredible few days for music, too. We’re waiting with baited breath for Tom Waits to announce, well, something later on today. They might be tour dates – although judging by the picture of Waits with an eye patch and cutlass that’s on his website, it might simply be that he’s signed up to play Johnny Depp’s uncle in another Pirates Of The Caribbean movie. Towards the end of last week, we got our first official taste of Bob Dylan’s new album, Tempest, when the track “Early Roman Kings” appeared on the trailer for an American TV series. Over the weekend, Neil Young decided to kick off his 2012 tour with Crazy Horse by working six new songs into the set list. One of these new songs – an acoustic track called “Twisted Road” – is about the first time Neil heard “Like A Rolling Stone”: “Poetry rolling off his tongue like Hank Williams Jr bubblegum, asking me, ‘How does it feel?'” You can watch Neil play it at the bottom of the page. Incidentally, there’s a strong rumour Twisted Road will be the name of the new album he’s recorded with Crazy Horse, as discussed in our recent cover story.

Shows closer to home this week include two shows at Antony’s Meltdown series at London’s South Bank, just down the road from the Uncut offices. Tonight, I’m off to see former Cocteau Twin Liz Fraser (I’ll blog about that show tomorrow), while on Friday, Allan and I will be at Lou Reed. Very different shows, but I’m looking forward to both of them.

Finally, I’ve just got time to say our current issue of Uncut is on sale, if you’ve not already got a copy. There’s Joe Strummer on the cover and lots of great stuff inside – including Captain Beefheart, Mark Knopfler, the Chris Robinson Brotherhood, Animal Collective, Wayne Coyne, MAARS and more.

Enjoy the rest of your week.

Cheers!

.

Mad Men star Jessica Paré, who plays Megan Draper, joined the Jesus And Mary Chain in Buffalo, New York and Toronto last week.

Paré sang “Just Like Honey” with the band on August 2 in Buffalo and then joined them for “Just Like Honey” and “Sometimes Always” the next day in Toronto.

Scroll down to watch Paré sing “Just Like Honey” with the Jesus And Mary Chain, who include Uncut’s picture researcher Phil King in the line-up.

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