The current issue of Uncut features our albums of the year list, compiled by the Uncut team, along with the best reissues and compilations of the year, and the best films and books.
Very taken with Africa Express' version of "In C", by Terry Riley, this week. I have a few takes on the piece (50 years old this month, incidentally), the latest being one by Portishead's Adrian Utley from a couple of years back, though I still probably default to what I think is the original recording from '68.
In this month's Uncut, I reviewed the deluxe edition of The The's Soul Mining, which has been reissued as a box set with additional material. I was fortunate enough to speak to Matt Johnson for a Q&A to run with the review. In the end, we ended up talking for about an hour, so I thought I'd post the full transcript of my interview here. I hope you enjoy it. I'll endeavour to post the review itself in the next week or so; better still, you can find it in the issue on sale now... (apologies for the shameless plug...)
“The truth is, I don’t like dangerous things and am quite normal,” Christopher Walken told Uncut in September 2006. “I was born into show business and that brings with it being a little eccentric, the way you speak, the way you approach things. This innately gives me a sense of foreignness, which can easily translate into…s-t-r-a-n-g-e.”
Everyone knows the mythical image of The Man In Black. But the truth about Johnny Cash was a whole lot more complicated. A “folk hero for the world”, and a humble man who struggled with addiction for his entire life. In this archive feature from Uncut’s February 2009 issue (Take 141), we present a revelatory new portrait of Cash’s life. We talk to many of the people who knew him best – the children, the bandmates, the managers, the peers – and discover the unexpurgated truth about this titan of American music. “He survived,” says his one-time son-in-law, “what Elvis didn’t…” Words: Alastair McKay
For me, the strangest moment during last night’s flurry of Arcade Fire activity – Bowie! two videos! world tour! – was the footage of the band stepping out of a limousine in Montreal wearing giant papier mâché heads.
