Ache

A couple of days late this week, thanks to an epic proofreading job on the next Uncut Ultimate Music Guide; this one’s on the subject of Depeche Mode, and will be in UK shops on the last day of July.

Noel Scott Engel's journey from easy listening interpreter to fearless songwriter, remastered...

Brian May has become involved in the row surrounding a gorilla painted to look like Freddie Mercury. The guitarist was informed of the incident, which saw a sculpture of a gorilla painted to look like Mercury removed from Norwich city centre for breaching copyright laws, via Twitter and informed his followers that he would "look into" what was going on. Meanwhile, ITV News report that May has labelled the move, "outrageous and petty".

A sculpture of a gorilla painted to look like Freddie Mercury has been removed from Norwich city centre because it infringes copyright.

When The Rolling Stones appeared here in 1969, they played on a stage so ultimately flimsy it afterwards could have been towed away on the back of a truck or broken down on the spot and sold for scrap. Unlike the Stones, it was not built to last.

The Rolling Stones are preparing for their forthcoming Hyde Park concerts by having trees installed. Huge model oak trees have been planted on top of the stage, while bushes have been installing on the sound desk and other equipment. They want to recreate the first time they played in the Royal park in 1969.

We pay tribute to the late Ray Manzarek in the new issue of Uncut (dated August 2013, and out now) – in this archive piece from Uncut’s September 2011 issue (Take 172), Manzarek, Robby Krieger, John Densmore – the latter pair now reunited in the wake of Manzarek's death – Jac Holzman and more look back on the making of LA Woman, and the final days of Jim Morrison. “The damn thing,” says Ray Manzarek, “just rolls and rolls…” Words: David Cavanagh

Peter Gabriel has recorded a new song and score for a forthcoming film, Words With Gods. It will be Gabriel's first new material since "Down To Earth", which written for the Pixar film, WALL-E. Gabriel - who has also written scores for Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation Of Christ and Phillip Noyce's Rabbit Proof Fence - hasn't released a new album of original material since Up in 2002. His last album, 2011's New Blood, comprised orchestral reworkings of his own material.

When it's announced that The Rolling Stones are planning a free concert in Hyde Park on July 5, 1969, we decide we have to be there. There are four of us, 16-year-old school friends, music a common bond between us.

In case we need reminding, the last time Bruce Springsteen played Hard Rock Calling – at Hyde Park, last July – a curfew was broken, the PA switched off, and Springsteen and a guesting Paul McCartney were silenced mid-song. It seems unlikely there would be a repeat of such shenanigans this year.