Johnny Marr has spoken about the famous riff in The Smiths' 'How Soon Is Now', saying that his bandmates were at the pub when he came up with it, adding that if he was with them it might never have been written.
Such has been the drooling media focus on Kate Bush this week, it might be tough to imagine British music journalists listening to anything else these past few days. I'm not, in fairness, exempt from the hysteria: here's my review of the second Before The Dawn show, in case you missed it (or avoided it) yesterday.
As The Felice Brothers tour the UK and perform at End Of The Road festival this weekend, it seems a good time to battle through the Uncut archives and see how the group were doing back in August 2009 (Take 147). Marc Spitz heads out to upstate New York to see how these self-mythologising drifters created a glorious new take on roots rock from the comfort of a chicken coop. Just don’t, whatever you do, mention Bob Dylan and The Band...
Arcade Fire covered iconic blues artist Bo Diddley during their gig in Chicago on August 26.
Diddley - who passed away in 2008 - was synonymous with the Chicago blues scene, and Arcade Fire paid tribute to the legend by playing his 1957 song 'Who Do You Love?' during the first of two shows at the city's United Center. Click below to watch fan-shot footage of the cover version, which is the latest in a long line of similar performances during Arcade Fire's 'Reflektor' tour, seeing the band covering artists in their hometowns.
Echo And The Bunnymen have announced details of UK tour dates in November and December as well as a one-off gig in Liverpool in 2015.
The band released new album 'Meteorites' in May and will start their tour in Brighton on November 25 before gigs in Sheffield, Glasgow, Nottingham, Cambridge, Cardiff, Holmfirth, Newcastle and Birmingham.
Following the dates this year, the band will then play a homecoming show at Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall on February 20.
Paul McCartney's re-releases of Wings albums 'Venus And Mars' and 'At The Speed of Sound' have been delayed by six weeks.
The reissues were originally supposed to come out on September 22 as part of the Paul McCartney Archive Collection, following similar reissues of 'Band On The Run', 'McCartney', 'McCartney II', 'Ram' and 'Wings Over America'. However, the records will now be released on November 3 "due to production issues". No further information about the delay has been released.
There is a song on "Aerial", Kate Bush's eighth and possibly best album, called "Bertie". "Here comes the sunshine," it begins, "Here comes that son of mine/Here comes the everything/Here's a song and a song for him." Nine years later, here, perhaps is a show for him: an unexpected comeback; a ravishing absurdity; a launchpad for his theatrical aspirations. Our pleasure may, to some degree, be collateral.
The real Nick Drake is revealed in the fascinating cover story of the new Uncut – not as a tragic, meek figure as often portrayed, but as a driven musical visionary, efficient in the studio and sure of what he wanted.
