We were playing the new album by Fab Moretti and his other band, Little Joy, yesterday, when talk turned somewhat inevitably to The Strokes. The Reviews Ed was saying how much he liked the second Strokes album, and then we were trying to remember much about the third album: he recalled not rating it; I seemed to have fondish memories of about four tracks, but couldn’t remember a single title, let alone a tune.
Back in 1996, the last time I saw Lou Reed, I remember making a mental note at the end of the show, to remember to never go and see him again. It wasn’t so much his legendary tetchiness, although that was well to the fore, as a glowering Lou shot irritated, grouchy-headmaster daggers at the band around him while they played, and maintained a stony silence between songs, cracked only for a brief tirade about something a journalist had said to annoy him earlier.
A lot of festival activity this weekend, and Uncut's legions have reported back from T In The Park, Live Earth and Cornbury over at our Festivals Blog. Every time I switched on Live Earth, I managed to catch something worse and worse: Paolo Nutini singing "What A Wonderful World" with what sounded like most of his internal organs rattling around the back of his throat; James Blunt joylessly dying on his arse; Madonna cavorting with the prize dicks of Gogol Bordello in the manner of a geography teacher after her annual joint at Glastonbury.
Terrible weather forecast notwithstanding, I'm feeling a bit jealous of everyone heading off to Glastonbury this morning. Farah is representing for Uncut, and you should keep an eye on our festival blog, where she'll be filing reports all weekend.
Nine Inch Nails lynchpin Trent Reznor is an unlikely inclusion in Time magazine's annual list of the 25 most influential Americans. "Reznor's music is filthy, brutish stuff, oozing with aberrant sex, suicidal melancholy and violent misanthropy," claims the accompanying article, "but to the depressed, his songs proffer pop's perpetual message of hope." Other entertainment figures in the list are producer Kenneth 'Babyface' Edmonds, X-Files creator Chris Carter, movie mogul Harvey Weinstein, actress and talk show host Rosie O'Donnell, and comic strip hero Dilbert.
