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Pink Floyd: more unreleased music to come?

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Pink Floyd: more unreleased music to come?

Nick Mason thinks more archival releases a possibility... Nick Mason has revealed that its possible Pink Floyd will make more previously unreleased archival material available. Speaking to Billboard, Mason said, "There's always a sort of discussion going on about what we could do. And it tends to be one of those things that I think is probably more driven by the record company than us. But we're always open to their ideas." Mason specifically cites the band's 1977 album, Animals, as due for remastering. "I know both Roger [Waters] and David have at times mentioned they'd like to have a remix of Animals, which technically is perhaps one of our less well-recorded records," Mason notes. "I think we'd just probably clean up some of the tapes and just sort of review it and see whether it can be enhanced. And if one was doing that, one might have a look at whether there's anything else to be done on it. But no one's got that down on their work schedule at the moment." Mason went on to say, "I've spent a lot of time over the last few years putting together an archive of video and film footage, and I think it'd be an interesting thing to [release] at some time. "There's been an abundance of movies recently, or video, on bands and the history of a band. Our problem is we go back so far to the point where no one recorded things; maybe there's some Super 8 stuff and a few early television appearances and things like that, which are fun. The biggest problem is when we were touring in the '70s, we never filmed or recorded the show, which would have been really nice now to have a look at those original Dark Side shows. So there's a funny old mix of stuff, but I think there's enough to do something really entertaining, eventually, when there's time to work on it."

Nick Mason thinks more archival releases a possibility…

Nick Mason has revealed that its possible Pink Floyd will make more previously unreleased archival material available.

Speaking to Billboard, Mason said, “There’s always a sort of discussion going on about what we could do. And it tends to be one of those things that I think is probably more driven by the record company than us. But we’re always open to their ideas.”

Mason specifically cites the band’s 1977 album, Animals, as due for remastering. “I know both Roger [Waters] and David have at times mentioned they’d like to have a remix of Animals, which technically is perhaps one of our less well-recorded records,” Mason notes. “I think we’d just probably clean up some of the tapes and just sort of review it and see whether it can be enhanced. And if one was doing that, one might have a look at whether there’s anything else to be done on it. But no one’s got that down on their work schedule at the moment.”

Mason went on to say, “I’ve spent a lot of time over the last few years putting together an archive of video and film footage, and I think it’d be an interesting thing to [release] at some time.

“There’s been an abundance of movies recently, or video, on bands and the history of a band. Our problem is we go back so far to the point where no one recorded things; maybe there’s some Super 8 stuff and a few early television appearances and things like that, which are fun. The biggest problem is when we were touring in the ’70s, we never filmed or recorded the show, which would have been really nice now to have a look at those original Dark Side shows. So there’s a funny old mix of stuff, but I think there’s enough to do something really entertaining, eventually, when there’s time to work on it.”

Bob Dylan “wanted to make a slapstick comedy”

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Bob Dylan “wanted to make a slapstick comedy”

Singer was inspired by Jerry Lewis... Bob Dylan conceived a surrealist comedy series for HBO in the Nineties, according to producer/writer Larry Charles. Speaking to podcast You Made It Weird (via Rolling Stone), Charles - whose credits include Curb Your Enthusiasm and Borat - revealed Dylan had "gotten deeply into Jerry Lewis, and he wanted to make a slapstick comedy." The two men worked up a treatment which they presented to HBO's then-president, Chris Albrecht. "I probably was having a nervous breakdown and didn't realize it, but I wore pajamas everywhere I went," Charles said. "I was so comfortable. It was great. [Bob] shows up for the meeting at HBO in a black cowboy hat, a black floor-length duster, black boots. He looks like Cat Ballou or something. He looks like a Western guy who's carrying six guns.... My hair's super long, beard down to my belly button in fucking pajamas, and Bob Dylan's dressed like a cowboy from a movie." According to Charles, Albrecht presented his original tickets to Woodstock, to which Dylan said, "I didn't play Woodstock." He spent the rest of the meeting looking out of the window. Although Dylan ended up abandoning the idea, he and Charles later collaborated on the film, Masked & Anonymous. Speaking to Uncut in 2003, Charles said, "At that time," Charles reveals, "Bob had gotten very heavily into comedy. When he was touring, he'd watch a lot of comedy, got interested in that, and television. So, he decided maybe he'd do a comedy show on TV. Yeah, I know. Bob Dylan? A comedy show? On TV? But that's what he wanted to do. So he started meeting writers." Charles was originally introduced to Dylan by his friend, long-time Dylan associate, Jeff Rosen. "Jeff said, 'We've been setting up these meetings with writers, but nothing's really coming - you wouldn't consider sitting down with Bob would you?' I was like, 'Are you kidding?' "I figured, I'll have one meeting with Bob - he really insists on being called Bob, because Bob is the person; "Dylan" is your problem - and I can tell all my friends, and that would be it. But we just immediately started riffing, and it developed into this very exhilarating verbal jam session. By the end of that meeting, we were working together. He walked me to my car, and I felt like I was on a date. Cars are driving by, I'm thinking, 'Will someone please look and see - I'm with Bob Dylan!'" You can read about Bob Dylan's The Complete Basement Tapes in this month's here, in shops now

Singer was inspired by Jerry Lewis…

Bob Dylan conceived a surrealist comedy series for HBO in the Nineties, according to producer/writer Larry Charles.

Speaking to podcast You Made It Weird (via Rolling Stone), Charles – whose credits include Curb Your Enthusiasm and Borat – revealed Dylan had “gotten deeply into Jerry Lewis, and he wanted to make a slapstick comedy.”

The two men worked up a treatment which they presented to HBO‘s then-president, Chris Albrecht.

“I probably was having a nervous breakdown and didn’t realize it, but I wore pajamas everywhere I went,” Charles said. “I was so comfortable. It was great. [Bob] shows up for the meeting at HBO in a black cowboy hat, a black floor-length duster, black boots. He looks like Cat Ballou or something. He looks like a Western guy who’s carrying six guns…. My hair’s super long, beard down to my belly button in fucking pajamas, and Bob Dylan’s dressed like a cowboy from a movie.”

According to Charles, Albrecht presented his original tickets to Woodstock, to which Dylan said, “I didn’t play Woodstock.” He spent the rest of the meeting looking out of the window.

Although Dylan ended up abandoning the idea, he and Charles later collaborated on the film, Masked & Anonymous.

Speaking to Uncut in 2003, Charles said, “At that time,” Charles reveals, “Bob had gotten very heavily into comedy. When he was touring, he’d watch a lot of comedy, got interested in that, and television. So, he decided maybe he’d do a comedy show on TV. Yeah, I know. Bob Dylan? A comedy show? On TV? But that’s what he wanted to do. So he started meeting writers.”

Charles was originally introduced to Dylan by his friend, long-time Dylan associate, Jeff Rosen. “Jeff said, ‘We’ve been setting up these meetings with writers, but nothing’s really coming – you wouldn’t consider sitting down with Bob would you?’ I was like, ‘Are you kidding?’

“I figured, I’ll have one meeting with Bob – he really insists on being called Bob, because Bob is the person; “Dylan” is your problem – and I can tell all my friends, and that would be it. But we just immediately started riffing, and it developed into this very exhilarating verbal jam session. By the end of that meeting, we were working together. He walked me to my car, and I felt like I was on a date. Cars are driving by, I’m thinking, ‘Will someone please look and see – I’m with Bob Dylan!'”

You can read about Bob Dylan’s The Complete Basement Tapes in this month’s here, in shops now

Sunken Treasure: on Wilco’s 20th anniversary, Alpha Mike Foxtrot and What’s Your 20?

John Mulvey
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Sunken Treasure: on Wilco’s 20th anniversary, Alpha Mike Foxtrot and What’s Your 20?

Around the turn of the millennium, Jeff Tweedy merrily nurtured a reputation as a contrarian. How best could a man, sanctified as the archetype of what was once called alt-country, confound his fans? With antsy powerpop? Radio static? Fifteen-minute ambient noise jams? The recruitment of a fiendish avant-jazzer to take over on lead guitar? A song for a Spongebob Squarepants movie? What might look perverse at the time can, of course, be thrown into an uncannily logical light by history. So it is with Alpha Mike Foxtrot, a 4CD boxset that celebrates Wilco's 20th anniversary by telling their story through 77 tracks of marginalia. It's a clever idea, not least because Wilco have become the sort of band defined by the nuanced depths of their catalogue, one whose fans have long been encouraged to treat apparent obscurities - the 2002 singalong b-side "A Magazine Called Sunset", say - as critical parts of the canon. The tour page of Wilco's website contains a "Request a song" function for every show; a challenge to be obtuse, perhaps, that Alpha Mike Foxtrot will only exacerbate. As a result, a companion 2CD greatest hits set, What’s Your 20: Essential Tracks, is terrific but somewhat extraneous, Wilco generally attracting obsessive fans rather than casual ones (no new tracks are included on What's Your 20 to bait the completists). The hardcore might feel a little disappointed that there is no unreleased content on Alpha Mike Foxtrot, either, though even the most committed collector may have struggled to stay abreast of the various bonus discs, downloads, b-sides and tribute albums from which the tracklisting has been assembled. An oddly faithful, entirely creditable 2000 stab at Steely Dan's "Any Major Dude Will Tell You", for example, is salvaged from the soundtrack to Me, Myself & Irene. At times, in his wry sleevenotes, Tweedy seems to decry the notion of continuity. "Listening back to stuff like this, I don't know how we got from where we were to where we are. It's been a strange, strange path," he wonders, confronted with a workmanlike country-rock take on Jim Glaser's "Who Were You Thinking Of". For all the shifts in tone and lineup, however, it is Wilco's underlying consistency that is most striking - or rather, the consistency of Tweedy's hesitant, sometimes fractured, way of unravelling a song. It's a self-effacing quirk that remains charming rather than affected, even 20 years after the discreet twang of a gem like "Promising", or 18 on from the lovely "Blasting Fonda", another lost song from a movie, Feeling Minnesota. That fragile songcraft does not stand up to all the things that have been thrown at it. Tweedy sounds lost in Randy Scruggs' mainstream Nashville production of "The TB Is Killing Me" for a 1994 Red Hot + Country comp. The fraught end of Wilco's tenure with Reprise, meanwhile, results in a gimmicky radio remix of "Shot In The Arm" by the antagonistic head of A&R, David Kahne. "A dated mess," reckons Tweedy, not unreasonably, of a track clearly included for historical rather than aesthetic reasons. Other songs from the end of the '90s fare better. "The Lonely 1 (White Hen Version)", from 1997, is a precursor of the layered soundscaping that would come to full fruition on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, with the band making a field recording of their walk from the studio to buy cigarettes, then chopping it up and using it as an effective backdrop to the song. "That might be the first example of our using a process as a way to be creative," Tweedy notes. The tense, low-key experiments from the time of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot are predictably among the best songs here. One Tweedy/Jay Bennett co-write, "Cars Can't Escape", with a distorted noise solo at the death that never disrupts the restrained vibes, is especially strong. A tipping point comes, though, two-thirds of the way through Disc 3, with the arrival of the master guitarist Nels Cline and the multi-tasking Pat Sansone, and the stable lineup that has endured for the past decade. A slew of live tracks - "At Least That's What You Said", from 2004, and a rearing 2007 take on the Television-like "Impossible Germany" may be the pick - illustrate the questing virtuosity that has become Wilco's default setting. "Sort of like a small version of The Dead," reckons bassist John Stirratt in the sleevenotes. "I think we've been able to attract fans who have created their own culture around us." It's a culture manifest in Alpha Mike Foxtrot: encyclopaedic, loving, droll, emotionally candid, often adventurous, but never really as alienating or difficult as the legends might suggest. "I've got a million things that I'd rather do than play rock'n'roll for you," sings Tweedy at the start of "Let's Not Get Carried Away", a fine, refusenik take on Stones raunch from 2007. He is, though, kidding no-one these days. "These lyrics were meant to be funny, but I think people might have taken them more seriously than I meant them," he writes. "Maybe the reason it didn’t make it on any record is because the drum solo is way too short." Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey

Around the turn of the millennium, Jeff Tweedy merrily nurtured a reputation as a contrarian. How best could a man, sanctified as the archetype of what was once called alt-country, confound his fans? With antsy powerpop? Radio static? Fifteen-minute ambient noise jams? The recruitment of a fiendish avant-jazzer to take over on lead guitar? A song for a Spongebob Squarepants movie?

What might look perverse at the time can, of course, be thrown into an uncannily logical light by history. So it is with Alpha Mike Foxtrot, a 4CD boxset that celebrates Wilco’s 20th anniversary by telling their story through 77 tracks of marginalia. It’s a clever idea, not least because Wilco have become the sort of band defined by the nuanced depths of their catalogue, one whose fans have long been encouraged to treat apparent obscurities – the 2002 singalong b-side “A Magazine Called Sunset”, say – as critical parts of the canon. The tour page of Wilco’s website contains a “Request a song” function for every show; a challenge to be obtuse, perhaps, that Alpha Mike Foxtrot will only exacerbate.

As a result, a companion 2CD greatest hits set, What’s Your 20: Essential Tracks, is terrific but somewhat extraneous, Wilco generally attracting obsessive fans rather than casual ones (no new tracks are included on What’s Your 20 to bait the completists). The hardcore might feel a little disappointed that there is no unreleased content on Alpha Mike Foxtrot, either, though even the most committed collector may have struggled to stay abreast of the various bonus discs, downloads, b-sides and tribute albums from which the tracklisting has been assembled. An oddly faithful, entirely creditable 2000 stab at Steely Dan’s “Any Major Dude Will Tell You”, for example, is salvaged from the soundtrack to Me, Myself & Irene.

At times, in his wry sleevenotes, Tweedy seems to decry the notion of continuity. “Listening back to stuff like this, I don’t know how we got from where we were to where we are. It’s been a strange, strange path,” he wonders, confronted with a workmanlike country-rock take on Jim Glaser’s “Who Were You Thinking Of”.

For all the shifts in tone and lineup, however, it is Wilco’s underlying consistency that is most striking – or rather, the consistency of Tweedy’s hesitant, sometimes fractured, way of unravelling a song. It’s a self-effacing quirk that remains charming rather than affected, even 20 years after the discreet twang of a gem like “Promising”, or 18 on from the lovely “Blasting Fonda”, another lost song from a movie, Feeling Minnesota.

That fragile songcraft does not stand up to all the things that have been thrown at it. Tweedy sounds lost in Randy Scruggs’ mainstream Nashville production of “The TB Is Killing Me” for a 1994 Red Hot + Country comp. The fraught end of Wilco’s tenure with Reprise, meanwhile, results in a gimmicky radio remix of “Shot In The Arm” by the antagonistic head of A&R, David Kahne. “A dated mess,” reckons Tweedy, not unreasonably, of a track clearly included for historical rather than aesthetic reasons.

Other songs from the end of the ’90s fare better. “The Lonely 1 (White Hen Version)”, from 1997, is a precursor of the layered soundscaping that would come to full fruition on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, with the band making a field recording of their walk from the studio to buy cigarettes, then chopping it up and using it as an effective backdrop to the song. “That might be the first example of our using a process as a way to be creative,” Tweedy notes.

The tense, low-key experiments from the time of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot are predictably among the best songs here. One Tweedy/Jay Bennett co-write, “Cars Can’t Escape”, with a distorted noise solo at the death that never disrupts the restrained vibes, is especially strong. A tipping point comes, though, two-thirds of the way through Disc 3, with the arrival of the master guitarist Nels Cline and the multi-tasking Pat Sansone, and the stable lineup that has endured for the past decade. A slew of live tracks – “At Least That’s What You Said”, from 2004, and a rearing 2007 take on the Television-like “Impossible Germany” may be the pick – illustrate the questing virtuosity that has become Wilco’s default setting. “Sort of like a small version of The Dead,” reckons bassist John Stirratt in the sleevenotes. “I think we’ve been able to attract fans who have created their own culture around us.”

It’s a culture manifest in Alpha Mike Foxtrot: encyclopaedic, loving, droll, emotionally candid, often adventurous, but never really as alienating or difficult as the legends might suggest. “I’ve got a million things that I’d rather do than play rock’n’roll for you,” sings Tweedy at the start of “Let’s Not Get Carried Away”, a fine, refusenik take on Stones raunch from 2007. He is, though, kidding no-one these days. “These lyrics were meant to be funny, but I think people might have taken them more seriously than I meant them,” he writes. “Maybe the reason it didn’t make it on any record is because the drum solo is way too short.”

Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey

Fleetwood Mac announce UK and Ireland tour for 2015

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Fleetwood Mac announce UK and Ireland tour for 2015

The shows will take place during May and June 2015... Fleetwood Mac have announced a European tour for 2015, including a series of UK and Ireland dates. The band will kick things off with back-to-back shows at London's 02 Arena at the end of May, before travelling to Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Dublin and Leeds during June. Tickets go on sale this Friday (November 14) at 9am. The shows will feature Christine McVie, who recently rejoined the group and performed with the band for the first time since 1997. The band's Mick Fleetwood has denied that Fleetwood Mac will be appearing at Glastonbury in 2015. Despite Fleetwood's statement, the band have remained one of the favourites to top the bill at the event next year, though Michael Eavis has stated in recent weeks that the chances of the band headlining were looking unlikely. "One of the things that I'd like to clear up is that we're not playing Glastonbury," Fleetwood told Radio 2. "A lot of folks think that we are, so loud and clear: We love Glastonbury and all the surrounding history of such a lovely festival but we're not playing it." Fleetwood added: "No bad faith for Glastonbury because I just don't want people thinking it's us." He was then asked if this meant the band will never play Worthy Farm to which the drummer replied: "Never say never." You can check out the tour dates in full below. London O2 Arena (May 27) London O2 Arena (28) Birmingham LG Arena (June 8) Manchester Arena (12) Glasgow SSE Hydro (16) Dublin 3Arena (20) Leeds First Direct Arena (30)

The shows will take place during May and June 2015…

Fleetwood Mac have announced a European tour for 2015, including a series of UK and Ireland dates.

The band will kick things off with back-to-back shows at London’s 02 Arena at the end of May, before travelling to Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Dublin and Leeds during June.

Tickets go on sale this Friday (November 14) at 9am.

The shows will feature Christine McVie, who recently rejoined the group and performed with the band for the first time since 1997.

The band’s Mick Fleetwood has denied that Fleetwood Mac will be appearing at Glastonbury in 2015.

Despite Fleetwood’s statement, the band have remained one of the favourites to top the bill at the event next year, though Michael Eavis has stated in recent weeks that the chances of the band headlining were looking unlikely.

“One of the things that I’d like to clear up is that we’re not playing Glastonbury,” Fleetwood told Radio 2. “A lot of folks think that we are, so loud and clear: We love Glastonbury and all the surrounding history of such a lovely festival but we’re not playing it.”

Fleetwood added: “No bad faith for Glastonbury because I just don’t want people thinking it’s us.” He was then asked if this meant the band will never play Worthy Farm to which the drummer replied: “Never say never.”

You can check out the tour dates in full below.

London O2 Arena (May 27)

London O2 Arena (28)

Birmingham LG Arena (June 8)

Manchester Arena (12)

Glasgow SSE Hydro (16)

Dublin 3Arena (20)

Leeds First Direct Arena (30)

Pink Floyd – The Endless River

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Pink Floyd – The Endless River

Finally! The first new album in 20 years proves a graceful, open-hearted swansong... For a group who perhaps personify English reserve, Pink Floyd’s approach to making their first new album in 20 years seems surprisingly open-hearted. The Endless River is ostensibly a tender tribute to the late Rick Wright, whose keyboards have long provided much of the sonic identity of the band, from their days as psychedelic pipers and onwards - with the exception of The Final Cut, ostensibly a Waters solo album anyway - to the tolling of The Division Bell. The effort put into curating this 55-minute memorial, pairing hours of 21-year-old jams with newly recorded parts, appears considerable – four producers, eight keyboardists and a number of studios were enlisted during its long gestation. And compared to its chillier-named forebears, even the record’s title seems to embrace warmer, hippier ideals, perhaps a sign that this once closed-off band of passive-aggressives have learned to go with the flow and maybe even appreciate each other and what they do best. As the first of the album’s four “sides” drifts into earshot with a clear evocation of “Speak To Me” from Dark Side Of The Moon – all hushed drones and muffled speech - it certainly seems that way. Side One continues in this comforting, warmly nostalgic vein: the synth and E-bowed acoustic guitar on “It's What We Do” recall the first few minutes of “Shine On You Crazy Diamond”, even with the same dramatic chord change as the synths blossom. Soon, David Gilmour embarks on a very David Gilmour solo, all yearning melody and bent blue-notes, while Wright digs out his trademark French horn sound. It's no great departure, but it’s beautifully bittersweet, and very Floyd. It's not just the band's '70s work that is evoked throughout The Endless River, either. Side Two fades in with Wright’s Farfisa fed through a Binson Echorec, a combination which soundtracked the Barrett-era Floyd and hasn’t been heard for around 40 years. Why Wright decided to bring it back is a mystery, but it’s a perfect example of what producer Phil Manzanera has described as the “part documentary” aspect of the album. The middle sides are more experimental, and consequently more uneven, with the second marred by a stiff drum solo from Mason. On Side Three, however, the galloping blues of “Allons-y” is bisected by Wright beautifully playing the Royal Albert Hall organ in 1969, with new Gilmour parts answering his lines. It’s reminiscent of the hymnal solemnity of “A Saucerful Of Secrets”, and one of the record’s highlights. Though in truth nothing here is as inspired as “Echoes”, “Astronomy Domine” or even “Comfortably Numb”, The Endless River’s success as an immersive listening experience is all in the edit. The level of sonic detail across the four sides is staggering, a testament to the effort put into weaving these ragged offcuts and newly recorded additions into one seamless tapestry, that winds through the band’s back catalogue towards its climax. That elegiac conclusion, “Louder Than Words”, takes up half of Side Four, and when Gilmour’s vocals come floating in, it’s a surprise. “We bitch and we fight/Diss each other on sight/But this thing we do…” he sings over a stately ballad that could have been a highlight of The Division Bell. “[We could] stay by the fire/Failed by desire/Stoking the flames/But we’re here for the ride…” It's a surprisingly moving finale, and a fitting tribute to Wright. And yet, The Endless River as a whole is more than that. With its flashbacks to their past glories, it’s also a memorial to Pink Floyd as a group, a glimpse of what’s been lost and what could have been. From Polly Samson’s lyrics, and Stephen Hawking urging us to “keep talking”, to the opening clip of Wright discussing “things left unsaid”, almost every word on The Endless River is about communication, and it serves to highlight just how bad the members of Pink Floyd have been at it, historically. Why they waited until Wright's death to make another album is one of many questions that remain unanswered. Though it's the end, then, this isn’t goodbye – that already happened at Hyde Park in 2005. The Endless River is a transmission from the afterlife of the group, an echo from the past. That it far surpasses its cut-up, protracted origins, and might even be the best thing the Floyd have released for over 30 years, is a welcome surprise. So, with a grand Gilmour solo, a departing wave of ambient noise and the same synth arpeggio that kicked things off almost an hour before, the record, and Pink Floyd, bow out. As always, with a little quiet desperation, but a lot of grace. Tom Pinnock

Finally! The first new album in 20 years proves a graceful, open-hearted swansong…

For a group who perhaps personify English reserve, Pink Floyd’s approach to making their first new album in 20 years seems surprisingly open-hearted. The Endless River is ostensibly a tender tribute to the late Rick Wright, whose keyboards have long provided much of the sonic identity of the band, from their days as psychedelic pipers and onwards – with the exception of The Final Cut, ostensibly a Waters solo album anyway – to the tolling of The Division Bell.

The effort put into curating this 55-minute memorial, pairing hours of 21-year-old jams with newly recorded parts, appears considerable – four producers, eight keyboardists and a number of studios were enlisted during its long gestation. And compared to its chillier-named forebears, even the record’s title seems to embrace warmer, hippier ideals, perhaps a sign that this once closed-off band of passive-aggressives have learned to go with the flow and maybe even appreciate each other and what they do best.

As the first of the album’s four “sides” drifts into earshot with a clear evocation of “Speak To Me” from Dark Side Of The Moon – all hushed drones and muffled speech – it certainly seems that way. Side One continues in this comforting, warmly nostalgic vein: the synth and E-bowed acoustic guitar on “It’s What We Do” recall the first few minutes of “Shine On You Crazy Diamond”, even with the same dramatic chord change as the synths blossom. Soon, David Gilmour embarks on a very David Gilmour solo, all yearning melody and bent blue-notes, while Wright digs out his trademark French horn sound. It’s no great departure, but it’s beautifully bittersweet, and very Floyd.

It’s not just the band’s ’70s work that is evoked throughout The Endless River, either. Side Two fades in with Wright’s Farfisa fed through a Binson Echorec, a combination which soundtracked the Barrett-era Floyd and hasn’t been heard for around 40 years. Why Wright decided to bring it back is a mystery, but it’s a perfect example of what producer Phil Manzanera has described as the “part documentary” aspect of the album.

The middle sides are more experimental, and consequently more uneven, with the second marred by a stiff drum solo from Mason. On Side Three, however, the galloping blues of “Allons-y” is bisected by Wright beautifully playing the Royal Albert Hall organ in 1969, with new Gilmour parts answering his lines. It’s reminiscent of the hymnal solemnity of “A Saucerful Of Secrets”, and one of the record’s highlights.

Though in truth nothing here is as inspired as “Echoes”, “Astronomy Domine” or even “Comfortably Numb”, The Endless River’s success as an immersive listening experience is all in the edit. The level of sonic detail across the four sides is staggering, a testament to the effort put into weaving these ragged offcuts and newly recorded additions into one seamless tapestry, that winds through the band’s back catalogue towards its climax.

That elegiac conclusion, “Louder Than Words”, takes up half of Side Four, and when Gilmour’s vocals come floating in, it’s a surprise. “We bitch and we fight/Diss each other on sight/But this thing we do…” he sings over a stately ballad that could have been a highlight of The Division Bell. “[We could] stay by the fire/Failed by desire/Stoking the flames/But we’re here for the ride…”

It’s a surprisingly moving finale, and a fitting tribute to Wright. And yet, The Endless River as a whole is more than that. With its flashbacks to their past glories, it’s also a memorial to Pink Floyd as a group, a glimpse of what’s been lost and what could have been. From Polly Samson’s lyrics, and Stephen Hawking urging us to “keep talking”, to the opening clip of Wright discussing “things left unsaid”, almost every word on The Endless River is about communication, and it serves to highlight just how bad the members of Pink Floyd have been at it, historically. Why they waited until Wright’s death to make another album is one of many questions that remain unanswered.

Though it’s the end, then, this isn’t goodbye – that already happened at Hyde Park in 2005. The Endless River is a transmission from the afterlife of the group, an echo from the past. That it far surpasses its cut-up, protracted origins, and might even be the best thing the Floyd have released for over 30 years, is a welcome surprise.

So, with a grand Gilmour solo, a departing wave of ambient noise and the same synth arpeggio that kicked things off almost an hour before, the record, and Pink Floyd, bow out. As always, with a little quiet desperation, but a lot of grace.

Tom Pinnock

World exclusive! Watch Neil Young perform new song “Like You Used To Do” live in the studio

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World exclusive! Watch Neil Young perform new song “Like You Used To Do” live in the studio

"Like You Used To Do" appears on new album Storytone... We're delighted to be be able to host this world exclusive film of Neil Young in the studio. The footage features Young performing the track "Like You Used To Do" from his new album, Storytone. In this clip, Young - dressed in a black t-shirt and baseball cap - is accompanied by a big band. Storytone was released last week, November 3, by Reprise Records. It features 10 songs, some recorded with a 92-piece orchestra and choir and some with a 60-piece orchestra and three with a big band. A deluxe version also includes an additional studio album of solo versions of all the songs. The tracklisting for the deluxe version is: "Plastic Flowers" (Solo) "Who's Gonna Stand Up?" (Solo) "I Want To Drive My Car" (Solo) "Glimmer" (Solo) "Say Hello To Chicago" (Solo) "Tumbleweed" (Solo) "Like You Used To Do" (Solo) "I'm Glad I Found You" (Solo) "When I Watch You Sleeping" (Solo) "All Those Dreams" (Solo) "Plastic Flowers" (Orchestral) "Who's Gonna Stand Up?" (Orchestral) "I Want To Drive My Car" (Band) "Say Hello To Chicago" (Big Band) "Tumbleweed" (Orchestral) "Like You Used To Do" (Band) "I'm Glad I Found You" (Orchestral) "When I Watch You Sleeping" (Orchestral) "All Those Dreams" (Orchestral)

“Like You Used To Do” appears on new album Storytone…

We’re delighted to be be able to host this world exclusive film of Neil Young in the studio.

The footage features Young performing the track “Like You Used To Do” from his new album, Storytone. In this clip, Young – dressed in a black t-shirt and baseball cap – is accompanied by a big band.

Storytone was released last week, November 3, by Reprise Records.

It features 10 songs, some recorded with a 92-piece orchestra and choir and some with a 60-piece orchestra and three with a big band. A deluxe version also includes an additional studio album of solo versions of all the songs.

The tracklisting for the deluxe version is:

“Plastic Flowers” (Solo)

“Who’s Gonna Stand Up?” (Solo)

“I Want To Drive My Car” (Solo)

“Glimmer” (Solo)

“Say Hello To Chicago” (Solo)

“Tumbleweed” (Solo)

“Like You Used To Do” (Solo)

“I’m Glad I Found You” (Solo)

“When I Watch You Sleeping” (Solo)

“All Those Dreams” (Solo)

“Plastic Flowers” (Orchestral)

“Who’s Gonna Stand Up?” (Orchestral)

“I Want To Drive My Car” (Band)

“Say Hello To Chicago” (Big Band)

“Tumbleweed” (Orchestral)

“Like You Used To Do” (Band)

“I’m Glad I Found You” (Orchestral)

“When I Watch You Sleeping” (Orchestral)

“All Those Dreams” (Orchestral)

Jeff Lynne – Album By Album

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Jeff Lynne – Album By Album
Jeff Lynne announced this week that he’s recording a new album, after his triumphant first gig in 28 years at London’s Hyde Park in September. In this piece from the archives (May 2013 issue, Take 192), Lynne takes us through his work with Dylan, three Beatles, Roy Orbison and his own Electric L...

Jeff Lynne announced this week that he’s recording a new album, after his triumphant first gig in 28 years at London’s Hyde Park in September. In this piece from the archives (May 2013 issue, Take 192), Lynne takes us through his work with Dylan, three Beatles, Roy Orbison and his own Electric Light Orchestra… “I’m always experimenting,” he says in his undiluted Brummie drawl. “Sometimes you don’t know what you’re looking for until you find it.” Interview: Graeme Thomson

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IDLE RACE – IDLE RACE
(Liberty, 1969)
Formerly The Nightriders, who Jeff Lynne joined in 1966 as their lead guitarist. The Idle Race’s melodic whimsy fails to fly, but Lynne gains his first production credit on their eponymous second album.

Jeff Lynne: They were a pretty odd band. Quirky, that’s for sure! There was no great expectation at all, I was just glad to be a professional guitarist in Birmingham. It was beyond my wildest dreams to not have to go work every day – the best thing in the world! I never really looked any further than that for a few years. With the Idle Race I was trying to be totally different because everybody had the same sort of music out – big guitar solos, all that. This was more like George Formby, I suppose. It was just a strange way of being different more than anything else. This album was my first production. I was always interested in how records sounded. I’d got a Bang & Olufsen tape recorder and I was in the front room of my mum and dad’s house learning how to make sounds go together, how to mic things up, and how to do multi-tracking. It was really good for learning arrangements and vocal harmonies, so I was ready to produce the second album, even though I didn’t really understand the big desk. I knew what I wanted to do, and after that I knew how to do it. I was just trying to do the best I could with these funny little songs, which I still like but which are pretty unusual!

THE MOVE – MESSAGE FROM THE COUNTRY
(Harvest, 1971)
Lynne accepts an invitation from old friend Roy Wood to join The Move, on the proviso that they will also start work on the Electric Light Orchestra. The recording of The Move’s fourth album and ELO’s debut overlap.

I’d spent four years playing in the Idle Race and I joined The Move because I thought maybe it wasn’t going to happen. I joined as co-producer and co-singer, and we had quite a few hits. By then I was already into recording things in little bits, rather than in one go as a live session. The idea for the Electric Light Orchestra happened around the same time. Roy and I would go to pubs and clubs in Birmingham and keep talking about having this group with strings. We finally figured out a way of doing it, and while we were making Message From The Country we started knocking out these little tunes, just the two of us, and [Move drummer Bev Bevan] putting the drums on afterwards. It was a bit odd recording it, me and Roy playing it all ourselves with all these silly instruments: bassoons and stuff like that. It was fun and kind of wacky, a pseudo-classical pantomime horse. During that time I wrote “10538 Overture”, which started as a track for The Move, but became the first single for ELO. That was a Top 10 hit, and that changed my whole perspective. I thought, I can do this!

ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA – ON THE THIRD DAY
(Warner Bros, 1973)
Roy Wood quits shortly into the making of ELO 2, giving Lynne greater autonomy on their third album. Hit “Showdown” (one of John Lennon’s favourites at the time) shows the band’s leaner, funkier side.

Roy had left during the second ELO record. It was like, “Bloody hell, that’s a bit strange!” He never really said anything about it, but my guess is that we never collaborated, we never wrote songs together, and that might have been a problem. There were two different banks of songs that never really met in the middle. But I realised that it gave me a really good opportunity to be the songwriter and the producer of ELO, and I grasped it with both… fingers! If it’s my own music then I always like to be in charge. On The Third Day is one of my favourites, actually. It sounds so sweet, very innocent. It just has the two cellos and one violin on it, that’s all there is in the orchestral department. And “Showdown” is one of the best tracks I’ve ever done. I loved how clean it was. I remember vividly taking it into Abbey Road to have it mastered for a single, and the cutting engineer there said to me, “You know, this is bloody classy, this is!” And I said, “Fucking hell, do you think so?” I was chuffed to bits that this guy who was high up in the final part of the recording process was gushing about it.

ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA – ELDORADO
(Jet, 1974)
A fully fledged fantasy concept album, including an “Overture” and a “Finale”, about a man escaping reality via a series of dreams. This is the first ELO album to feature a full orchestra, and the massed banks of strings and voices match the lyrical ambition.

I’m not crazy about stuff that’s too fancy, and “concept” usually implies lots of boredom, but I think Eldorado is a bit above that. I do. I think it stands up as a good pop album. I just sat down and had this idea: the album would open with this bloke talking about a place, and then it would drift into a scenario of this daydreaming guy. That was all it was about. It came to me pretty much fully formed – a guy who keeps having dreams about different things. I wrote all these songs at my mum and dad’s house, in their front room, and the words were always last. It was a lot of fun to do but a little bit scary to do. It was a big step for me, because it was using a 30-piece string section, a choir, a 10-piece brass and woodwind section. I wasn’t really experienced enough to know how to handle it all but I got away with it. There was lots and lots of money going out, but I was left totally to my own devices. Amazing! I had total carte blanche. “Make it a nice one” – that would be the only instruction. It was all done in a matter of weeks, now it takes bloody years.

ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA – A NEW WORLD RECORD
(Jet, 1976)
The floodgates open following the commercial breakthrough of 1975’s Face The Music. Recorded at Musicland in Munich, it features “Telephone Line”, “Livin’ Thing” and a revamped version of The Move’s “Do Ya”.

We were touring Germany, and when we got to Munich one of Deep Purple mentioned we should check out Musicland. It was down in the basement of this giant hotel. It was very modern and a bit gloomy, but it really kept you working because there was nothing else to do except go for a kickabout behind the hotel or go down the old Biergarden two nights a week. The routine and atmosphere suited me well. I’d go over there for two weeks, record all the backing tracks, bring them back to England to work on the words and the arrangements, and then fly back to Germany to finish it. It made you very organised. “Do Ya” was such a good song I wanted the ELO audience to heard it. They loved it onstage so we re-recorded it in a slightly different arrangement. I think we all knew the album was a step up, in accessibility, image, everything. They might be the catchiest tunes we ever did as a set, but when you write songs you don’t suddenly think, ‘Oh, I’ve learned how to do it now!’ You never have, and you never know if you’re going to write another one. It’s always that mystery.

ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA – OUT OF THE BLUE
(Jet, 1977)
With its string of hit singles (including “Turn To Stone” and “Mr Blue Sky”), sleek commercial sound and ambitious ‘Concerto For A Rainy Day’ suite, this multi-platinum double album marks the peak of the classic ELO aesthetic and bids a mighty adieu to symphonic rock.

The boss of United Artists asked me if I would do a double live album, because Peter Frampton had just had a huge hit with his one [Frampton Comes Alive!]. I said, “Oh, I wish you’d said studio album. I’d have done that, but I don’t want to do a live album.” Later on he came back to me and said, “OK, you’re on. Studio album!” It was terrific that I got the freedom to do it. I wrote most of the album very quickly in a little chalet in Switzerland, where I’d gone with all my gear – electric piano, bass, guitar. I was there for two weeks and didn’t come up with anything. Best go down the pub then! Actually I was getting worried because I’d done nothing in a fortnight and I only had a month to write the tunes, but finally they started coming to me. One of the first ones was “Mr Blue Sky”. It had been cloudy and misty and horrible, you couldn’t see where you were, and then one day the sun came out and the mist disappeared. It was fantastic, these giant mountains appeared everywhere. So I wrote “Mr Blue Sky” – very literal! The whole ‘Concerto For A Rainy Day’ kind of came out of that. I loved the second side of Abbey Road and I thought I wouldn’t mind trying a suite like that. Because it was a double album I had so much room to work with. It was quite complex to make. I was trying out new things, like the Vocoder, which I used on “Mr Blue Sky”. The factory that had just built the prototype was in Stuttgart, which was only an hour from Munich. Talk about luck! So we sent the girlfriends off to pick it up. There was no manual, it was that new, and we spent the whole day just getting it to do something, but once we got it going it was beautiful. It’s still the best Vocoder I’ve heard. That was a treat, you always want to innovate and get ahead with technology. Touring the album was impossible, though, a proper pain in the arse, and I started to get fed up with all the strings: “Argh, fuckin’ hell, not another string session today…” It became a bit of a formula. I made a lot of electronic records after Out Of The Blue.

TRAVELING WILBURYS – TRAVELING WILBURYS VOL 1
(Warner Bros, 1988)
While working with George Harrison on 1987’s Cloud Nine, the pair hatched a plan to form a garage band with their mates, namely Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty. And lo, it came to pass…

We’d been working on Cloud Nine for about three months, and one night we were listening back to what we’d done, having a beer, and George said, “You know what? You and me should have a group.” “A group, really? Who should we have in it?” “Bob Dylan.” “Bob Dylan? Oh, yeah, of course. What about Roy Orbison?” “Yeah, great, he’ll be good!” We both liked Tom. And everyone wanted to be in it. Nobody’s commitments were above the Wilburys! George had half a song ready to go, we finished it off in Bob Dylan’s garage, recorded it there and wrote the words after dinner. That’s how it went on. We did another eight songs from scratch and in 10 days the whole album was finished. It was amazingly quick. George liked being in a band, he was really up for it, really believed in it. We joked about touring. George would say, “Right, we’re going to get an aircraft carrier and follow the sunshine. Play Hawaii, the Caribbean, all these lovely little spots.” He was really looking into it big time. “We could park in the dock and play on the deck, then hoist up the gang plank and off we’d go to the next one!” It lead to a wonderful time for me, working with Tom on Full Moon Fever and my childhood hero Roy Orbison on Mystery Girl. One week I had three albums in the Top 5. Amazing.

THE BEATLES – ANTHOLOGY 1&2
(Apple, 1995/1996)
When the three remaining Beatles reunite to work on two old Lennon demos for the Anthology project, they hire Lynne to oversee the historic but technically daunting task.

Every morning I would wake up with half dread, half exhilaration. The idea of doing it was the most thrilling thing imaginable, but messing it up would be horrible. It was George who had said, “This is the guy we should have.” I don’t know what would have happened if Paul had said, “No, let’s have my bloke”, but he was fine with it. They hadn’t been in the same room for years. At Paul’s studio it was just me and them, and I’m listening to all this amazing Liverpool folklore – Hamburg stories, the lot. There was no real tension. They would take the piss, but it was good-natured. I loved it, but it was tough. I had a few tricks to get John’s voice on the track, and Paul helped by ghosting John’s voice underneath to give it more body. I remember him giving me a big hug and saying, “Well done, you’ve done it!” There was a third song [“Now And Then”] planned but we just never got around to it. Paul always says George went off it, and I think he probably did. Later Paul asked me to produce some tracks on Flaming Pie. I’d recorded with Ringo before, so I’ve done ’em all!

ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA – ZOOM
(Epic, 2001)
The first ELO album in 15 years features only Richard Tandy from the original lineup, and comes after Bev Bevan cedes his share of the ELO name to Lynne. Sales are low and a planned tour is cancelled.

There was some [argy-bargy] over the name, but there has never been any doubt about who is ELO! There hadn’t been anything out as ELO for such a long time, but there was no real deep significance in returning to it. Really I just fancied making a record. I had six or seven songs ready to go, and it was just something I felt like doing at the time. I kept it pretty straight. There wasn’t many gimmicks in it, or odd twists and turns. I suppose it was a bit disappointing that it didn’t do better, but a lot of people like it, I get lots of nice things said about Zoom. You don’t let these disappointments weigh you down, you just have to think of something else. I feel I really stretched myself on the new album, Long Wave. I’d been doing just my own music for such a long time, I wanted to do something with these classic songs that used to frighten me to death when I was a kid. I like my versions better than the old ones because, without those fancy arrangements, suddenly these tunes sound so accessible. I brought them right up to the ’60s!

Murder plot charge against AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd dropped

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Murder plot charge against AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd dropped

But musician still faces charges of drugs possession and making threats to kill... The murder plot charge against AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd has been dropped due to a lack of evidence. It was reported yesterday (November 6) that 60-year-old Rudd had appeared in court in New Zealand to face various charges including attempting to procure a murder, making threats to kill and for possession of the drugs methamphetamine and cannabis. As the BBC reports, however, authorities have now dropped the murder plot charge after prosecuting lawyer Greg Hollister-Jones said that, after he and his office reviewed the case, they found "insufficient evidence to proceed with the charge of attempting to procure murder". According to Rudd's lawyer, Paul Mabey, the "charge alleging an attempt to procure murder should never have been laid". Mabey also said that Rudd had suffered "incalculable" damage as a result of the allegation and negative publicity, claimed that the drug charges he still faces are "minor" and insisted that his client would defend the charge of making threats to kill. Rudd is due to appear in court again on November 27. Although he no longer faces the charge of attempting to procure murder, he could receive up to a seven year prison sentence if convicted of making threats to kill. Yesterday, the other members of AC/DC released a joint statement about Rudd's arrest, and insisted that it will not have any impact on the plans for their forthcoming album Rock Or Bust. "We've only become aware of Phil's arrest as the news was breaking," they said. "We have no further comment. Phil’s absence will not affect the release of our new album Rock Or Bust and upcoming tour next year."

But musician still faces charges of drugs possession and making threats to kill…

The murder plot charge against AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd has been dropped due to a lack of evidence.

It was reported yesterday (November 6) that 60-year-old Rudd had appeared in court in New Zealand to face various charges including attempting to procure a murder, making threats to kill and for possession of the drugs methamphetamine and cannabis.

As the BBC reports, however, authorities have now dropped the murder plot charge after prosecuting lawyer Greg Hollister-Jones said that, after he and his office reviewed the case, they found “insufficient evidence to proceed with the charge of attempting to procure murder”.

According to Rudd’s lawyer, Paul Mabey, the “charge alleging an attempt to procure murder should never have been laid”. Mabey also said that Rudd had suffered “incalculable” damage as a result of the allegation and negative publicity, claimed that the drug charges he still faces are “minor” and insisted that his client would defend the charge of making threats to kill.

Rudd is due to appear in court again on November 27. Although he no longer faces the charge of attempting to procure murder, he could receive up to a seven year prison sentence if convicted of making threats to kill.

Yesterday, the other members of AC/DC released a joint statement about Rudd’s arrest, and insisted that it will not have any impact on the plans for their forthcoming album Rock Or Bust. “We’ve only become aware of Phil’s arrest as the news was breaking,” they said. “We have no further comment. Phil’s absence will not affect the release of our new album Rock Or Bust and upcoming tour next year.”

Bruce Springsteen auctions a lasagne dinner at his home in aid of US veterans

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Bruce Springsteen auctions a lasagne dinner at his home in aid of US veterans

He also sold off a guitar lesson and a ride in his motorcycle sidecar for $300,000... Bruce Springsteen has auctioned off a lasagne dinner at his own home in aid of US veterans. Springsteen also gave up an hour long guitar lesson and a ride in his motorcycle sidecar for $300,000 (£189,388) at the Stand Up For Heroes benefit in New York last night (November 5), reports Billboard. The bill for the night also included comedians John Oliver, Jon Stewart, Louis CK and Jim Gaffigan. Springsteen played: Working On The Highway Growing Up If I Should Fall Behind (with Patti Scialfa) Born In The USA Dancing In The Dark Click here to read Bruce Springsteen's 40 Greatest Songs as voted for by an all-star panel Later this month Springsteen will release a new box set of his first seven albums. Bruce Springsteen: The Album Collection Vol. 1 1973-1984 will be remastered by Bob Ludwig and Toby Scott. The LPs have been newly transferred from original analogue masters. The set will also feature a 60-page book featuring vintage press clippings, photos and other memorabilia from the first 11 years of Springsteen's recording career. It is scheduled for release on November 17. The collection will be available to purchase on CD, vinyl or digital download. None of the seven records have been remastered on vinyl before. Springsteen also releases a graphic novel this month. The book is based on the lyrics to his 2009 song Outlaw Pete, which featured on his Working On A Dream album.

He also sold off a guitar lesson and a ride in his motorcycle sidecar for $300,000…

Bruce Springsteen has auctioned off a lasagne dinner at his own home in aid of US veterans.

Springsteen also gave up an hour long guitar lesson and a ride in his motorcycle sidecar for $300,000 (£189,388) at the Stand Up For Heroes benefit in New York last night (November 5), reports Billboard.

The bill for the night also included comedians John Oliver, Jon Stewart, Louis CK and Jim Gaffigan.

Springsteen played:

Working On The Highway

Growing Up

If I Should Fall Behind (with Patti Scialfa)

Born In The USA

Dancing In The Dark

Click here to read Bruce Springsteen’s 40 Greatest Songs as voted for by an all-star panel

Later this month Springsteen will release a new box set of his first seven albums. Bruce Springsteen: The Album Collection Vol. 1 1973-1984 will be remastered by Bob Ludwig and Toby Scott. The LPs have been newly transferred from original analogue masters.

The set will also feature a 60-page book featuring vintage press clippings, photos and other memorabilia from the first 11 years of Springsteen’s recording career. It is scheduled for release on November 17. The collection will be available to purchase on CD, vinyl or digital download. None of the seven records have been remastered on vinyl before.

Springsteen also releases a graphic novel this month. The book is based on the lyrics to his 2009 song Outlaw Pete, which featured on his Working On A Dream album.

Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker lead tributes at Jack Bruce’s funeral

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Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker lead tributes at Jack Bruce’s funeral

The bass player passed away last month at the age of 71... Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker were among the mourners at Jack Bruce's funeral. The service for the Cream bass player - who passed away on October 25) of liver failure at the age of 71 - took place yesterday (November 5) at Golders Green Crematorium in London. Also in attendance were Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera and Procol Harum frontman Gary Brooker. Clapton and Baker led musical tributes to Bruce, singing "Morning Has Broken", "Strawberry Fields Forever" and Bruce's own "Theme For An Imaginary Western" during the service. A musical tribute written by Clapton was also played, while Bruce's friend and co-writer Pete Brown, his widow Margrit and their children Malcolm, Natasha and Kyla all made speeches. One of Bruce's bass guitars was on display, as were floral tributes in the shape of the bass clef. Bruce died on October 25 of liver failure aged 71.

The bass player passed away last month at the age of 71…

Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker were among the mourners at Jack Bruce‘s funeral.

The service for the Cream bass player – who passed away on October 25) of liver failure at the age of 71 – took place yesterday (November 5) at Golders Green Crematorium in London. Also in attendance were Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera and Procol Harum frontman Gary Brooker.

Clapton and Baker led musical tributes to Bruce, singing “Morning Has Broken”, “Strawberry Fields Forever” and Bruce’s own “Theme For An Imaginary Western” during the service.

A musical tribute written by Clapton was also played, while Bruce’s friend and co-writer Pete Brown, his widow Margrit and their children Malcolm, Natasha and Kyla all made speeches.

One of Bruce’s bass guitars was on display, as were floral tributes in the shape of the bass clef.

Bruce died on October 25 of liver failure aged 71.

Will Oldham: “I listened to The Cranberries’ No Need To Argue for a year”

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Will Oldham: “I listened to The Cranberries’ No Need To Argue for a year”
Will Oldham reveals eight of the records that have soundtracked his life in the new issue of Uncut, dated December 2014 and out now. The singer-songwriter, also known as Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, picks songs and albums by artists including The Fall, Don Williams and The Cranberries. “In ’96...

Will Oldham reveals eight of the records that have soundtracked his life in the new issue of Uncut, dated December 2014 and out now.

The singer-songwriter, also known as Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, picks songs and albums by artists including The Fall, Don Williams and The Cranberries.

“In ’96, I went to a disco in Guadalajara, where they played The Cranberries’ ‘Zombie’,” says Oldham. “Seeing these Mexican youths dancing to an Irish, quasi-political folk-rock song… I liked it! I bought the album and listened to it for a year!

“[Singer] Dolores O’Riordan had a sense of self-importance that the producer, Stephen Street, was able to use to strong effect, a beautiful combination of naïvety and overconfidence. It helped me understand what a producer’s role could be.”

The new issue of Uncut is out now.

Neil Young bassist Rick Rosas dies aged 65

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Neil Young bassist Rick Rosas dies aged 65

Cause of death has yet to be confirmed... Rick Rosas, long-term bassist for Neil Young, has died aged 65. Rosas' professional relationship with Young stretched back to the late Eighties. They met at Farm Aid in 1987, when Rosas was playing in Joe Walsh's band. Rosas then joined Young's backing band, The Bluenotes, for the 1988 album, This Note's For You. Rosas also played on Young's Eldorado EP and Freedom album, both in 1989. Rosas reunited with Young in 2005 for Prairie Wind and a year later, for Living With War. His relationship with Young continued onto 2007's Chrome Dreams II and 2009's Fork In The Road; in 2010, Young invited Rosas to play bass on the short-lived Buffalo Springfield reunion tour. Rosas had most recently filled in on bass for Young's summer tour of Europe with Crazy Horse after the band's bass player, Billy Talbot, suffered a stroke. He was also a mainstay of Pegi Young's band, The Survivors, as well as a regular member of Neil Young's live touring bands. In Jonathan Demme's 2007 concert film, Neil Young Trunk Show, Young avidly praises Rosas' talents: "Rick can play anything!" Outside of his commitments with Young, Rosas also played with Ron Wood, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Rivers, Etta James and Joe Walsh. Rosas was born in West Los Angeles, California on September 10, 1949. The news of his death appears to have been broken by Crazy Horse drummer Ralph Molina, who wrote on his Facebook page: "This I truly hate to say.. another brother, friend, gentleman... has passed... lord... r.i.p... Rick Rosas... god bless and keep you my brother." Other early tributes have been paid to Rosas, including Blondie's Clem Burke, who wrote on Twitter: "I am in shock about the passing of my friend, Rick Rosas. A great musician & great soul. Very, very sorry to hear about this." Meanwhile, Bangles' guitarist Vicki Peterson Tweeted: "Stunned and saddened by the loss of #RickRosas tonight. Sweet soul, incredible musician--an honor to have played with you." Shonna Tucker, former bassist with Drive-By Truckers, also wrote, "I'm so sad to hear about the passing of Rick Rosas. So sweet and so much grace & wisdom in his playing. Much love to all friends & family." We'll bring you more news when we can. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSSvzCNBvlQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCjWa7ypZMc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK8PtSzl3GM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qLJk30k2Mw Credit Anthony Pidgeon/Redferns

Cause of death has yet to be confirmed…

Rick Rosas, long-term bassist for Neil Young, has died aged 65.

Rosas’ professional relationship with Young stretched back to the late Eighties. They met at Farm Aid in 1987, when Rosas was playing in Joe Walsh’s band. Rosas then joined Young’s backing band, The Bluenotes, for the 1988 album, This Note’s For You. Rosas also played on Young’s Eldorado EP and Freedom album, both in 1989.

Rosas reunited with Young in 2005 for Prairie Wind and a year later, for Living With War.

His relationship with Young continued onto 2007’s Chrome Dreams II and 2009’s Fork In The Road; in 2010, Young invited Rosas to play bass on the short-lived Buffalo Springfield reunion tour.

Rosas had most recently filled in on bass for Young’s summer tour of Europe with Crazy Horse after the band’s bass player, Billy Talbot, suffered a stroke.

He was also a mainstay of Pegi Young‘s band, The Survivors, as well as a regular member of Neil Young’s live touring bands.

In Jonathan Demme’s 2007 concert film, Neil Young Trunk Show, Young avidly praises Rosas’ talents: “Rick can play anything!”

Outside of his commitments with Young, Rosas also played with Ron Wood, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Rivers, Etta James and Joe Walsh.

Rosas was born in West Los Angeles, California on September 10, 1949. The news of his death appears to have been broken by Crazy Horse drummer Ralph Molina, who wrote on his Facebook page: “This I truly hate to say.. another brother, friend, gentleman… has passed… lord… r.i.p… Rick Rosas… god bless and keep you my brother.”

Other early tributes have been paid to Rosas, including Blondie’s Clem Burke, who wrote on Twitter: “I am in shock about the passing of my friend, Rick Rosas. A great musician & great soul. Very, very sorry to hear about this.” Meanwhile, Bangles’ guitarist Vicki Peterson Tweeted: “Stunned and saddened by the loss of #RickRosas tonight. Sweet soul, incredible musician–an honor to have played with you.” Shonna Tucker, former bassist with Drive-By Truckers, also wrote, “I’m so sad to hear about the passing of Rick Rosas. So sweet and so much grace & wisdom in his playing. Much love to all friends & family.”

We’ll bring you more news when we can.

Credit Anthony Pidgeon/Redferns

The 41st Uncut Playlist Of 2014

John Mulvey
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The 41st Uncut Playlist Of 2014

In haste this week, as we're finishing our end-of-year review issue and our next Ultimate Music Guide (on Paul McCartney, I can reveal), I've just completed writing up an interview with one of 2014's key figures, and I have a review of this 4CD Wilco retrospective to file as soon as possible. Still time for a big post-holiday pile of new music, of course, and it's been quite hard these past few days to stop dipping into the forthcoming 8CD Go-Betweens box set. Note, though, new stuff from Howlin Rain, Parquet Courts, The Knife and The Wu-Tang Clan, further love for Natalie Prass and Jessica Pratt, a great radical jazz comp from Soul Jazz, and a promising new discovery in the shape of Sheer Mag. Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey 1 The Go-Betweens - G Is For Go-Betweens (Domino) 2 [REDACTED] 3 Parkay Quarts - Content Nausea (Rough Trade) 4 Howlin Rain - Mansion Songs (Easy Sound Recording Co) 5 Savoy Motel - Later Alligator (Demo) 6 Sheer Mag - 7" (www.bandcamp.com) 7 Einsturzende Neubauten - Lament (BMG/Mute) 8 Jessica Pratt - On Your Own Love Again (Drag City) 9 Doug Paisley & Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Until I Find You (No Quarter) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVfFx9JvH4Y 10 Tinariwen - Inside/Outside EP (Wedge) 11 [REDACTED] 12 Natalie Prass - Natalie Prass (Spacebomb) 13 Xylouris Ensemble - Antipodes 2 (Σείστρον) Read my piece about Greek jams here 14 The Knife - Shaken-Up Versions (Brille) 15 Johnny Burnette & The Rock'n'Roll Trio - Johnny Burnette & The Rock'n'Roll Trio (Bear Family) 16 Songhoy Blues - Music In Exile (Transgressive) 17 Wilco - Alpha Mike Foxtrot (dBpm) 18 Various Artists - Black Fire! New Spirits! Radical And Revolutionary Jazz In The USA 1957-82 (Soul Jazz) 19 The Wu Tang Clan - Ruckus In B Minor (Parlophone) 20 Liam Hayes - Slurrup (Fat Possum) 21 Slim Twig - A Hound At The Hem (DFA) 22 Los Jaivas - Todos Juntos (Arci)

In haste this week, as we’re finishing our end-of-year review issue and our next Ultimate Music Guide (on Paul McCartney, I can reveal), I’ve just completed writing up an interview with one of 2014’s key figures, and I have a review of this 4CD Wilco retrospective to file as soon as possible.

Still time for a big post-holiday pile of new music, of course, and it’s been quite hard these past few days to stop dipping into the forthcoming 8CD Go-Betweens box set. Note, though, new stuff from Howlin Rain, Parquet Courts, The Knife and The Wu-Tang Clan, further love for Natalie Prass and Jessica Pratt, a great radical jazz comp from Soul Jazz, and a promising new discovery in the shape of Sheer Mag.

Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnRMulvey

1 The Go-Betweens – G Is For Go-Betweens (Domino)

2 [REDACTED]

3 Parkay Quarts – Content Nausea (Rough Trade)

4 Howlin Rain – Mansion Songs (Easy Sound Recording Co)

5 Savoy Motel – Later Alligator (Demo)

6 Sheer Mag – 7″ (www.bandcamp.com)

7 Einsturzende Neubauten – Lament (BMG/Mute)

8 Jessica Pratt – On Your Own Love Again (Drag City)

9 Doug Paisley & Bonnie “Prince” Billy – Until I Find You (No Quarter)

10 Tinariwen – Inside/Outside EP (Wedge)

11 [REDACTED]

12 Natalie Prass – Natalie Prass (Spacebomb)

13 Xylouris Ensemble – Antipodes 2 (Σείστρον)

Read my piece about Greek jams here

14 The Knife – Shaken-Up Versions (Brille)

15 Johnny Burnette & The Rock’n’Roll Trio – Johnny Burnette & The Rock’n’Roll Trio (Bear Family)

16 Songhoy Blues – Music In Exile (Transgressive)

17 Wilco – Alpha Mike Foxtrot (dBpm)

18 Various Artists – Black Fire! New Spirits! Radical And Revolutionary Jazz In The USA 1957-82 (Soul Jazz)

19 The Wu Tang Clan – Ruckus In B Minor (Parlophone)

20 Liam Hayes – Slurrup (Fat Possum)

21 Slim Twig – A Hound At The Hem (DFA)

22 Los Jaivas – Todos Juntos (Arci)

Leonard Cohen – Popular Problems

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Leonard Cohen – Popular Problems

As he turns 80, Cohen quietly rages against the world with his darkest record for decades... Leonard Cohen, barefoot but dapper in a gun metal gray suit, one morning in June, 1974, sat back in a chair by a window overlooking a busy London street, put his sockless feet on one of the two narrow beds that occupied most of the available space in his modest hotel room, lit a cigarette, a thoughtful scholar addressing an impression that pained him of his songs as miserable, suicidal, in every imaginable way depressing. It seemed to him that he was merely making music fit for a world in which people die and calamity is wholesale, a tough gig. “One often feels inadequate in the face of massacre, disaster and humiliation” he said, courteous, flattering, charming, serious, all of these things. “What, you think, am I doing, singing a song at a time like this? But the worse it gets,” he said, “the more often I find myself picking up a guitar and playing that song. It is, I think, a matter of tradition. You have a tradition on the one hand that says when things are bad, we should play a happy song, a merry tune. Strike up the band and dance the best we can, even if we are suffering from concussion. “And then there’s another tradition, a more Oriental or Middle Eastern tradition, which says that if things are really bad, the best thing to do is sit by the grave and wail, sit next to the disaster and lament. The notion of lamentation seemed to me the way to do it. You don’t avoid the situation. You throw yourself into it, fearlessly.” Cohen at the time had released three albums. A fourth, New Skin For The Old Ceremony, was due out in a couple of months. Over the following 40 years, there would, up to 2012’s Old Ideas, be only eight more studio albums, a modest return for such an extravagant song-writing talent compared to, say, the 21 albums recorded during the same period by Bob Dylan or the jaw-dropping 34 by Neil Young, even taking into account the five years Cohen spent in monastic retreat. While everything he has done has been touched to various extents by the notion as he explained it of lamentation, the poetic articulation of otherwise incoherent grief, there arguably hasn’t been much in his back catalogue since 1971’s Songs Of Love And Hate on which such tragic keening has been so vividly allowed as on the remarkable Popular Problems, released this month, within days of his 80th birthday, a dark new masterpiece, that on songs like “Samson In New Orleans” and “Nevermind” offer front row seats in a theatre of doom. Cohen’s last album, Old Ideas, was an elegant meditation on age, mortality, faith, as beautifully tailored as one of his suits and full of droll poignancies. It was understandably much preoccupied by waning desire, the erotic afterlife of a diminished libido, dwindling virility, noble in the face of the coming inevitable. Its air of stately resignation is largely absent on Popular Problems, however, as if its author has decided that to quietly quit this vale of tears would be somehow dishonourable when his fingers are nimble enough to strum one last song and there is breath enough in his body to sing it. Popular Problems – among which we can probably count conflagration, genocide, the murder of innocents, that kind of thing - is therefore less inward-looking, as if the mirror in front of which Old Ideas was written has been removed from a wall to reveal a window behind it, through which Cohen has lately spent much time in agonised regard of a landscape of conflict, wholesale slaughter, war on every horizon, the world the grave beside which Cohen sits and wails. “Only darkness now,” he announces, his barnacled baritone never so rough, towards the end of “Born In Chains”, which he performed on his last world tour, from which some fans may also remember the bluesy vamp, “My Oh My”, with its tough guitar licks and drawling horns (there’s no place, though, from the tour’s other new songs, for “I’ve Got A Little Secret” and “Feels So Good”, also known as “The Other Blues Song”). On reflection, Old Ideas was perhaps excessively well-groomed, its pedigree sound exquisitely wrought, but somewhat becalmed. And while on Popular Problems Cohen is reunited with former Madonna producer Patrick Leonard and members of the team who contributed to Old Ideas, including backing vocalists The Webb Sisters and Sharon Robinson, whose harmonies continue to provide a feathery counterpoint to Cohen’ sometimes sinister croon, there is more raw drama here, a prevailing starkness. The warm, autumnal glow of Old Ideas is replaced by something more wintry, cracked and menacing. Tracks are sometimes reduced to not much more than Cohen’s cadenced growl, an arterial synthesiser pulse, bluesy Hammond squalls, Bela Santelli’s mournful fiddle, occasional stabbing horn riffs, Cohen himself stirred to something approaching urgency by the sight of a burning world, the camcorder atrocities, the marauding armies, to which he responds with grim vigour and much great writing. That an album inspired by dire universal circumstance opens with a song about fucking may seem odd, even inappropriate. The simmering, pulsating “Slow”, however, celebrates sex as erotic defiance as much as carnal pleasure, Cohen perhaps reminded of a key 60s imperative: make love not war, even as the bombs are falling, all that. The abyss then opens. You probably will have already heard “Almost Like The Blues”, a catalogue of rape and murder that eerily recalls John Cale’s terrifying “Letter From Abroad” (from Hobo Sapiens), minus the Marble Index-style eruptions. “Samson In New Orleans”, like the later “Born In Chains”, has the swell and anguish of a Pentecostal hymn or an old blues spiritual, a beseeching and forlorn lament for the bereft and abandoned – “we who cried for mercy from the bottom of the pit/was our prayer so damned unworthy the sun rejected it?”- that’s perhaps a belated comment on New Orleans’ much-documented post-Katrina agonies, the city’s betrayal by central government whose downfall the song’s narrator here contrives. “A Street” is a song about betrayal and civil war delivered as a hardboiled narrative and played out as domestic farce - “You left me with the dishes and a baby in the bath, you’re tight with the militias, you wear their camouflage” – that thumps along in part like Dylan’s “Early Roman Kings” from Tempest before a haunting climax assumes a more ominous heft. “I see the ghost of culture with numbers on his wrist,” Cohen intones, gravelly, “salute some new solution that all of us have missed...” The album’s greatest curiosity follows. “Did I Ever Love You” opens as a lover’s dark plea before breaking disconcertingly into a frisky country and western hoe-down that may put you in mind of the odd friskiness of “The Captain” from 1984’s Various Positions, by some distance the jauntiest song about The Holocaust yet written. We are returned to more clearly unnerving territory via album highlight “Nevermind”, a fugitive evil on the loose in the land, a tyrant, deposed by war, on the run, a bleak inversion of the heroic French Resistance anthem “The Partisan” covered by Cohen on 1969’s Songs From A Room, whose staccato synthesiser also recalls Talking Heads’ “Life During Wartime”. The album bows out with “You Got Me Singing”, whose title makes it sound like something written for the razzle-dazzle corks-a-popping finale from the golden age of the Hollywood musical, a soundstage full of leggy hoofers kicking up a storm, when in fact its sonorous finger-picked guitar, a signature sound of his early albums, faintly recalls the balm of “Tonight Will Be Fine”, also from Songs From A Room. “You got me singing even though the news is bad,” Cohen sings. “You got me singing the only song I ever had/You got me singing even though the world is gone, you got me thinking, I’d like to carry on,” he continues, surrounded by swirling violin and diaphanous harmonies, his spirit unbroken by time or anything else and fearless to the end. Allan Jones

As he turns 80, Cohen quietly rages against the world with his darkest record for decades…

Leonard Cohen, barefoot but dapper in a gun metal gray suit, one morning in June, 1974, sat back in a chair by a window overlooking a busy London street, put his sockless feet on one of the two narrow beds that occupied most of the available space in his modest hotel room, lit a cigarette, a thoughtful scholar addressing an impression that pained him of his songs as miserable, suicidal, in every imaginable way depressing. It seemed to him that he was merely making music fit for a world in which people die and calamity is wholesale, a tough gig.

“One often feels inadequate in the face of massacre, disaster and humiliation” he said, courteous, flattering, charming, serious, all of these things. “What, you think, am I doing, singing a song at a time like this? But the worse it gets,” he said, “the more often I find myself picking up a guitar and playing that song. It is, I think, a matter of tradition. You have a tradition on the one hand that says when things are bad, we should play a happy song, a merry tune. Strike up the band and dance the best we can, even if we are suffering from concussion.

“And then there’s another tradition, a more Oriental or Middle Eastern tradition, which says that if things are really bad, the best thing to do is sit by the grave and wail, sit next to the disaster and lament. The notion of lamentation seemed to me the way to do it. You don’t avoid the situation. You throw yourself into it, fearlessly.”

Cohen at the time had released three albums. A fourth, New Skin For The Old Ceremony, was due out in a couple of months. Over the following 40 years, there would, up to 2012’s Old Ideas, be only eight more studio albums, a modest return for such an extravagant song-writing talent compared to, say, the 21 albums recorded during the same period by Bob Dylan or the jaw-dropping 34 by Neil Young, even taking into account the five years Cohen spent in monastic retreat. While everything he has done has been touched to various extents by the notion as he explained it of lamentation, the poetic articulation of otherwise incoherent grief, there arguably hasn’t been much in his back catalogue since 1971’s Songs Of Love And Hate on which such tragic keening has been so vividly allowed as on the remarkable Popular Problems, released this month, within days of his 80th birthday, a dark new masterpiece, that on songs like “Samson In New Orleans” and “Nevermind” offer front row seats in a theatre of doom.

Cohen’s last album, Old Ideas, was an elegant meditation on age, mortality, faith, as beautifully tailored as one of his suits and full of droll poignancies. It was understandably much preoccupied by waning desire, the erotic afterlife of a diminished libido, dwindling virility, noble in the face of the coming inevitable. Its air of stately resignation is largely absent on Popular Problems, however, as if its author has decided that to quietly quit this vale of tears would be somehow dishonourable when his fingers are nimble enough to strum one last song and there is breath enough in his body to sing it. Popular Problems – among which we can probably count conflagration, genocide, the murder of innocents, that kind of thing – is therefore less inward-looking, as if the mirror in front of which Old Ideas was written has been removed from a wall to reveal a window behind it, through which Cohen has lately spent much time in agonised regard of a landscape of conflict, wholesale slaughter, war on every horizon, the world the grave beside which Cohen sits and wails. “Only darkness now,” he announces, his barnacled baritone never so rough, towards the end of “Born In Chains”, which he performed on his last world tour, from which some fans may also remember the bluesy vamp, “My Oh My”, with its tough guitar licks and drawling horns (there’s no place, though, from the tour’s other new songs, for “I’ve Got A Little Secret” and “Feels So Good”, also known as “The Other Blues Song”).

On reflection, Old Ideas was perhaps excessively well-groomed, its pedigree sound exquisitely wrought, but somewhat becalmed. And while on Popular Problems Cohen is reunited with former Madonna producer Patrick Leonard and members of the team who contributed to Old Ideas, including backing vocalists The Webb Sisters and Sharon Robinson, whose harmonies continue to provide a feathery counterpoint to Cohen’ sometimes sinister croon, there is more raw drama here, a prevailing starkness. The warm, autumnal glow of Old Ideas is replaced by something more wintry, cracked and menacing. Tracks are sometimes reduced to not much more than Cohen’s cadenced growl, an arterial synthesiser pulse, bluesy Hammond squalls, Bela Santelli’s mournful fiddle, occasional stabbing horn riffs, Cohen himself stirred to something approaching urgency by the sight of a burning world, the camcorder atrocities, the marauding armies, to which he responds with grim vigour and much great writing.

That an album inspired by dire universal circumstance opens with a song about fucking may seem odd, even inappropriate. The simmering, pulsating “Slow”, however, celebrates sex as erotic defiance as much as carnal pleasure, Cohen perhaps reminded of a key 60s imperative: make love not war, even as the bombs are falling, all that. The abyss then opens. You probably will have already heard “Almost Like The Blues”, a catalogue of rape and murder that eerily recalls John Cale’s terrifying “Letter From Abroad” (from Hobo Sapiens), minus the Marble Index-style eruptions. “Samson In New Orleans”, like the later “Born In Chains”, has the swell and anguish of a Pentecostal hymn or an old blues spiritual, a beseeching and forlorn lament for the bereft and abandoned – “we who cried for mercy from the bottom of the pit/was our prayer so damned unworthy the sun rejected it?”- that’s perhaps a belated comment on New Orleans’ much-documented post-Katrina agonies, the city’s betrayal by central government whose downfall the song’s narrator here contrives.

“A Street” is a song about betrayal and civil war delivered as a hardboiled narrative and played out as domestic farce – “You left me with the dishes and a baby in the bath, you’re tight with the militias, you wear their camouflage” – that thumps along in part like Dylan’s “Early Roman Kings” from Tempest before a haunting climax assumes a more ominous heft. “I see the ghost of culture with numbers on his wrist,” Cohen intones, gravelly, “salute some new solution that all of us have missed…” The album’s greatest curiosity follows. “Did I Ever Love You” opens as a lover’s dark plea before breaking disconcertingly into a frisky country and western hoe-down that may put you in mind of the odd friskiness of “The Captain” from 1984’s Various Positions, by some distance the jauntiest song about The Holocaust yet written. We are returned to more clearly unnerving territory via album highlight “Nevermind”, a fugitive evil on the loose in the land, a tyrant, deposed by war, on the run, a bleak inversion of the heroic French Resistance anthem “The Partisan” covered by Cohen on 1969’s Songs From A Room, whose staccato synthesiser also recalls Talking Heads’ “Life During Wartime”.

The album bows out with “You Got Me Singing”, whose title makes it sound like something written for the razzle-dazzle corks-a-popping finale from the golden age of the Hollywood musical, a soundstage full of leggy hoofers kicking up a storm, when in fact its sonorous finger-picked guitar, a signature sound of his early albums, faintly recalls the balm of “Tonight Will Be Fine”, also from Songs From A Room. “You got me singing even though the news is bad,” Cohen sings. “You got me singing the only song I ever had/You got me singing even though the world is gone, you got me thinking, I’d like to carry on,” he continues, surrounded by swirling violin and diaphanous harmonies, his spirit unbroken by time or anything else and fearless to the end.

Allan Jones

Jeff Lynne confirms he is working on a new album

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Jeff Lynne confirms he is working on a new album

He also said he will be playing Stateside shows with ELO in 2015... Electric Light Orchestra's Jeff Lynne has confirmed that he is working on a new album. Speaking at an award show in Los Angeles yesterday (November 4), where he was awarded the Outstanding Contribution to Music award, he discussed plans for forthcoming ELO gigs in North America and added: "I'm working on a new album and that'll be involved in the new times when we play." He told Billboard: "I had so much [fun] in Hyde Park with 50,000 people, where I just played in September, first time I've played in 28 years it was fantastic and I loved every minute, so I'm definitely gonna come here [the US] and play." When asked when those gigs would take place, he said: "Not too long." His manager confirmed that the shows would take place next year. Lynne performed at BBC Radio 2's Festival In A Day in Hyde Park, London, earlier this year, marking the influential pop group's return to the UK stage 28 years after their last full concert performance. During the 75-minute set, Lynne told the 50,000-strong crowd: "I'll do this again." The show saw Lynne head a band that included original ELO keyboard player Richard Tandy and the BBC Concert Orchestra, who fleshed out his compositions with record-perfect renditions. Lynne seemed overwhelmed by the reaction, sticking two thumbs up to the crowd after an opening 'All Over The World'. He said: "Wow, fantastic. It's unbelievable this really. I haven't done anything like this for so long, I can't believe it."

He also said he will be playing Stateside shows with ELO in 2015…

Electric Light Orchestra’s Jeff Lynne has confirmed that he is working on a new album.

Speaking at an award show in Los Angeles yesterday (November 4), where he was awarded the Outstanding Contribution to Music award, he discussed plans for forthcoming ELO gigs in North America and added: “I’m working on a new album and that’ll be involved in the new times when we play.”

He told Billboard: “I had so much [fun] in Hyde Park with 50,000 people, where I just played in September, first time I’ve played in 28 years it was fantastic and I loved every minute, so I’m definitely gonna come here [the US] and play.” When asked when those gigs would take place, he said: “Not too long.” His manager confirmed that the shows would take place next year.

Lynne performed at BBC Radio 2’s Festival In A Day in Hyde Park, London, earlier this year, marking the influential pop group’s return to the UK stage 28 years after their last full concert performance. During the 75-minute set, Lynne told the 50,000-strong crowd: “I’ll do this again.”

The show saw Lynne head a band that included original ELO keyboard player Richard Tandy and the BBC Concert Orchestra, who fleshed out his compositions with record-perfect renditions. Lynne seemed overwhelmed by the reaction, sticking two thumbs up to the crowd after an opening ‘All Over The World’. He said: “Wow, fantastic. It’s unbelievable this really. I haven’t done anything like this for so long, I can’t believe it.”

AC/DC issue statement regarding arrest of drummer Phil Rudd on murder plot charges

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AC/DC issue statement regarding arrest of drummer Phil Rudd on murder plot charges

Band say arrest will not affect plans for forthcoming album Rock Or Bust... AC/DC have issued a statement regarding the arrest of drummer Phil Rudd on murder plot charges. It was revealed earlier today (November 6) that 60-year-old Rudd had been charged with attempting to procure murder, as well as for making threats to kill and for possession of the drugs methamphetamine and cannabis. The other members of the band have now released a joint statement about Rudd's arrest, and have insisted that it will not have any impact on the plans for their forthcoming album Rock Or Bust. As Rolling Stone reports, the statement reads: "We've only become aware of Phil's arrest as the news was breaking. We have no further comment. Phil’s absence will not affect the release of our new album Rock Or Bust and upcoming tour next year." Rudd, who has now been released on bail after his appearance at Tauranga district court, was arrested after police received information that led them to raid his home. It is thought that the tip-off the authorities received was provided by a member of the public. The drummer, who is forbidden from contacting anyone else involved in the case as part of his bail conditions, could face a jail sentence of up to 10 years if found guilty. Although the exact details of the murder plot are yet to be revealed, The Guardian suggest that court documents detail how Rudd tried to hire one person to kill two other men. Rudd rejoined AC/DC in 1994, 11 years after he was forced out of the band in 1983. AC/DC are set to release their new album Rock Or Bust, which will be their first LP in six years, next month.

Band say arrest will not affect plans for forthcoming album Rock Or Bust…

AC/DC have issued a statement regarding the arrest of drummer Phil Rudd on murder plot charges.

It was revealed earlier today (November 6) that 60-year-old Rudd had been charged with attempting to procure murder, as well as for making threats to kill and for possession of the drugs methamphetamine and cannabis.

The other members of the band have now released a joint statement about Rudd’s arrest, and have insisted that it will not have any impact on the plans for their forthcoming album Rock Or Bust.

As Rolling Stone reports, the statement reads: “We’ve only become aware of Phil’s arrest as the news was breaking. We have no further comment. Phil’s absence will not affect the release of our new album Rock Or Bust and upcoming tour next year.”

Rudd, who has now been released on bail after his appearance at Tauranga district court, was arrested after police received information that led them to raid his home. It is thought that the tip-off the authorities received was provided by a member of the public.

The drummer, who is forbidden from contacting anyone else involved in the case as part of his bail conditions, could face a jail sentence of up to 10 years if found guilty. Although the exact details of the murder plot are yet to be revealed, The Guardian

suggest that court documents detail how Rudd tried to hire one person to kill two other men.

Rudd rejoined AC/DC in 1994, 11 years after he was forced out of the band in 1983. AC/DC are set to release their new album Rock Or Bust, which will be their first LP in six years, next month.

Bruce Springsteen lists his 28 favourite books

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Bruce Springsteen lists his 28 favourite books
Bruce Springsteen has compiled a list of his 28 favourite books. The American musician publishes his first ever children's book this week in the form of Outlaw Pete, a picture book telling "the story of a man trying to outlive and outrun his sins". It's based on Springsteen's song of the same nam...

Bruce Springsteen has compiled a list of his 28 favourite books.

The American musician publishes his first ever children’s book this week in the form of Outlaw Pete, a picture book telling “the story of a man trying to outlive and outrun his sins”. It’s based on Springsteen’s song of the same name.

Now, speaking to the New York Times ahead of that literary release, Springsteen has discussed the books that have had the most profound effects on his life. He reveals that The Wizard of Oz was the first book he ever read and that he’d invite Philip Roth, Keith Richards, Leo Tolstoy and Bob Dylan to an imaginary dinner party.

You can read a list of Springsteen’s favourite books below, via Brainpickings:

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

How To Live: Or A Life Of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer by Sarah Bakewell

Lonely Hearts Of The Cosmos: The Scientific Quest For The Secret Of The Universe by Dennis Overbye

Love In The Time Of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

Leaves Of Grass by Walt Whitman

The History Of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell

Examined Lives by Jim Miller

American Pastoral by Philip Roth

I Married A Communist by Philip Roth

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

The Sportswriter by Richard Ford

The Lay Of The Land by Richard Ford

Independence Day by Richard Ford

A Good Man Is Hard To Find And Other Stories by Flannery O’Connor

Mystery Train: Images Of America In Rock ‘n’ Roll Music by Greil Marcus

Last Train To Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley by Peter Guralnick

Chronicles by Bob Dylan

Life by Keith Richards

Sonata For Jukebox by Geoffrey O’Brien

Soul Mining: A Musical Life by Daniel Lanois

Too Big To Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin

Someplace Like America: Tales From The New Great Depression by Dale Maharidge

The Big Short by Michael Lewis

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Great Short Works by Leo Tolstoy

The Adventures Of Augie March by Saul Bellow

The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz by L Frank Baum

Gruff Rhys confirms full band tour for February 2015

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Gruff Rhys confirms full band tour for February 2015
Gruff Rhys has announced details of a UK tour to take place in February next year. The tour will see Rhys backed by a full band, including Y Niwl and drummer Kliph Scurlock (formerly of The Flaming Lips) for a series of dates starting in Salisbury on February 8. The band will then visit Exeter, B...

Gruff Rhys has announced details of a UK tour to take place in February next year.

The tour will see Rhys backed by a full band, including Y Niwl and drummer Kliph Scurlock (formerly of The Flaming Lips) for a series of dates starting in Salisbury on February 8. The band will then visit Exeter, Bath, London, Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham, Leeds and Edinburgh before ending in Glasgow at the School of Art on February 19.

Tickets go on sale at 9am on Friday (November 9), click here to buy.

Meanwhile, Gruff Rhys is among the nominees for this year’s Welsh Music Prize. The annual award, now in its fourth year, celebrates the finest Welsh music of the year as well as music made by Welsh people around the world. Created by Radio 1 DJ Huw Stephens in 2011, Rhys previously won the award for his album ‘Hotel Shampoo’.

Gruff Rhys will play:

Salisbury Arts Centre (February 8)

Exeter Phoenix (9)

Bath Komedia (10)

London Koko (11)

Manchester Academy 2 (13)

Birmingham Hare and Hounds (14)

Nottingham Rescue Rooms (16)

Leeds Brudenell Social Club (17)

Edinburgh Caves (18)

Glasgow Art School (19)

Photo: Chris McAndrew

The Cure to play two Christmas gigs in London this December

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The Cure to play two Christmas gigs in London this December
The Cure have announced details of two Christmas gigs to take place in London this December. The band will perform for two and a half hours on the nights of December 21 and 22 at Hammersmith's Eventim Apollo. Also The Trees will support the band on both nights. Earlier this year The Cure frontma...

The Cure have announced details of two Christmas gigs to take place in London this December.

The band will perform for two and a half hours on the nights of December 21 and 22 at Hammersmith’s Eventim Apollo. Also The Trees will support the band on both nights.

Earlier this year The Cure frontman Robert Smith revealed to NME that the group’s next album will be a mix of brand new material and unused material from 2008’s 4:13 Dream, their most recent record. Smith said that he wanted that album to be a double, but a single album was eventually released.

The Cure will play:

London, Eventim Apollo (December 21/ 22)

Tickets are available from 9am on Friday morning (November 7) with no more than four per household available. Click here now.

Lucinda Williams – Down Where The Spirit Meets The Bone

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Lucinda Williams – Down Where The Spirit Meets The Bone

Straight outta Memphis: a soul-drenched renaissance... With her distinctive Louisiana drawl and penchant for, well, being as likely to pull out an artefact from Memphis Minnie’s catalogue as pen her own take on country rock, Lucinda Williams is a singular figure. She’s a late-bloomer, a deeply personal writer drenched in the blues, whose innate grasp of American roots — country, soul, folk, R&B, pop, and the impulses that have driven them - reveal her as a crucial link in rock'n'roll’s chain. Down Where The Spirit Meets The Bone, a provocative, and ambitious double album, is Williams’ sixth studio effort since her 1998 masterpiece, Car Wheels on A Gravel Road, and her first release as a free agent following the collapse of her longtime label, Lost Highway. In a break from her usual recording process, a small army of stellar musicians—guitarists Tony Joe White and Bill Frisell, Faces keyboardist Ian McLagan, multi-instrumental wizard Greg Leisz, Elvis Costello's rhythm section Pete Thomas and Davey Faragher among them—have guided her sound into fresh yet familiar musical terrain, a place where Bradley’s Barn meets Muscle Shoals, and Stax/Volt bumps up against the Brill Building. A gritty undertow informs the bulk of the songs — all but two written by Williams — offset by occasional strong-willed flights of fancy, like “Stand Right By Each Other” and “Walk On,” the latter an instant pop anthem. The thematic (if not musical) tone is set at the start, Williams’ first-ever musical interpretation of a poem by her father, Miller Williams. “Compassion” is played solo against a gently drifting acoustic guitar, a meditation on the motivations of human existence. The one-two punch from the muted “Compassion” into the wailing, bluesy, dual-guitar groove of “Protection” (“I need protection from the enemies of rock‘n’roll,” she howls), makes for a transcendent segue into the album proper. Pointed critiques of a society immersed in self-serving spin (“Everything But The Truth”), endless fear-mongering (the sinewy, hypnotic “Foolishness,” sung with frightful force), and a vanishing capacity for empathy (“East Side Of Town”) follow, with such relentlessness that Williams' tales of romance gone terribly wrong end up providing stark relief. The straight country balladry of “This Old Heartache,” Leisz on mournful pedal steel, might as well be a lost early ‘60s Harlan Howard classic. More often, though, Spirit merges those hillbilly strands with atmospheric southern gothic, hard blues and Memphis R&B — echoes of the country soul once practiced by artists from Dusty Springfield to Joe Tex. “Big Mess,” for instance, with its glistening Duane Eddy-like guitars and steady vamp of a rhythm, owes a bit to Smokey Robinson’s timeless “You’ve Really Got a Hold on Me,” though here the sentiments are anything but tender. “You can go straight to hell/That’s alright with me,” she growls at her lying ex-lover. “Stowaway In Your Heart”, upbeat and snappy, is its emotional obverse — personal peace of mind at last — with infectious, stinging Steve Cropper-esque guitars holding forth. Country-soul spills over into gospel glory on the album’s most affecting piece, “Temporary Nature (of Any Precious Thing).” Reeling in McLagen’s ethereal organ fills, it's “be-thankful for-what-you’ve-got” with a vengeance, and Williams leans into its gospel lilt with a dead-serious, “Believe-me,-I’ve-lived-it” gusto. Throughout, Williams ranges from open-hearted generosity to a kind of gnarled insularity, much like the blues singers she was brought up on; the overall mixture of anger and longing, fierceness and calm, is breathtaking. “Everything But the Truth,” with its big, midnight-in-Memphis riff and a righteous Lucinda vocal, stands as the album’s moral centre. But the record’s mesmerizing finale is a 10-minute dreamwalk through J.J. Cale’s “Magnolia,” the band gliding out on a feathery mix of guitars and keyboards. A groove, for the ages. Luke Torn Q&A Lucinda Williams What’s country soul to you? Bobbie Gentry was a real big influence on me, “Ode To Billie Joe”. That’s what I call country soul, like Bobbie Gentry, Tony Joe White, Dusty in Memphis. I’ve always loved that kinda stuff. There’s a little thread of that running through this album. Recording for your own label now, I sense some newfound freedom? Now we have full, complete creative freedom. We own our own masters. The main difference, in terms of freedom, is that we were able to do a double album. I actually recorded enough for three albums. There’s a third part of it, which will come out later. Your father’s poem, “Compassion”, seems like a jumping off point of sorts... Well, ironically enough, I finished that song at the very last, at the 11th hour. We had already cut everything. It’s something I have been I’ve been trying with my dad’s poems for years. It’s very challenging. We already knew what we wanted to call the album. We wanted to use the line from that poem. At first, I kinda wanted to make it into sort of a Nick Drake, kind of a beautiful lush kind of a thing. But everybody said no, leave it like this. How did you come to J.J Cale’s “Magnolia”? It was all very spontaneous and organic. And we all sat in amazement listening after we put that down. I used to do that song, years and years ago, back in the ‘70s. That was one I always loved. Of course, after JJ Cale’s passing, he was on my mind, so we did that as a tribute to him. INTERVIEW: LUKE TORN Photo credit: Michael Wilson

Straight outta Memphis: a soul-drenched renaissance…

With her distinctive Louisiana drawl and penchant for, well, being as likely to pull out an artefact from Memphis Minnie’s catalogue as pen her own take on country rock, Lucinda Williams is a singular figure. She’s a late-bloomer, a deeply personal writer drenched in the blues, whose innate grasp of American roots — country, soul, folk, R&B, pop, and the impulses that have driven them – reveal her as a crucial link in rock’n’roll’s chain.

Down Where The Spirit Meets The Bone, a provocative, and ambitious double album, is Williams’ sixth studio effort since her 1998 masterpiece, Car Wheels on A Gravel Road, and her first release as a free agent following the collapse of her longtime label, Lost Highway. In a break from her usual recording process, a small army of stellar musicians—guitarists Tony Joe White and Bill Frisell, Faces keyboardist Ian McLagan, multi-instrumental wizard Greg Leisz, Elvis Costello’s rhythm section Pete Thomas and Davey Faragher among them—have guided her sound into fresh yet familiar musical terrain, a place where Bradley’s Barn meets Muscle Shoals, and Stax/Volt bumps up against the Brill Building.

A gritty undertow informs the bulk of the songs — all but two written by Williams — offset by occasional strong-willed flights of fancy, like “Stand Right By Each Other” and “Walk On,” the latter an instant pop anthem. The thematic (if not musical) tone is set at the start, Williams’ first-ever musical interpretation of a poem by her father, Miller Williams. “Compassion” is played solo against a gently drifting acoustic guitar, a meditation on the motivations of human existence.

The one-two punch from the muted “Compassion” into the wailing, bluesy, dual-guitar groove of “Protection” (“I need protection from the enemies of rock‘n’roll,” she howls), makes for a transcendent segue into the album proper. Pointed critiques of a society immersed in self-serving spin (“Everything But The Truth”), endless fear-mongering (the sinewy, hypnotic “Foolishness,” sung with frightful force), and a vanishing capacity for empathy (“East Side Of Town”) follow, with such relentlessness that Williams’ tales of romance gone terribly wrong end up providing stark relief.

The straight country balladry of “This Old Heartache,” Leisz on mournful pedal steel, might as well be a lost early ‘60s Harlan Howard classic. More often, though, Spirit merges those hillbilly strands with atmospheric southern gothic, hard blues and Memphis R&B — echoes of the country soul once practiced by artists from Dusty Springfield to Joe Tex. “Big Mess,” for instance, with its glistening Duane Eddy-like guitars and steady vamp of a rhythm, owes a bit to Smokey Robinson’s timeless “You’ve Really Got a Hold on Me,” though here the sentiments are anything but tender. “You can go straight to hell/That’s alright with me,” she growls at her lying ex-lover. “Stowaway In Your Heart”, upbeat and snappy, is its emotional obverse — personal peace of mind at last — with infectious, stinging Steve Cropper-esque guitars holding forth.

Country-soul spills over into gospel glory on the album’s most affecting piece, “Temporary Nature (of Any Precious Thing).” Reeling in McLagen’s ethereal organ fills, it’s “be-thankful for-what-you’ve-got” with a vengeance, and Williams leans into its gospel lilt with a dead-serious, “Believe-me,-I’ve-lived-it” gusto.

Throughout, Williams ranges from open-hearted generosity to a kind of gnarled insularity, much like the blues singers she was brought up on; the overall mixture of anger and longing, fierceness and calm, is breathtaking. “Everything But the Truth,” with its big, midnight-in-Memphis riff and a righteous Lucinda vocal, stands as the album’s moral centre. But the record’s mesmerizing finale is a 10-minute dreamwalk through J.J. Cale’s “Magnolia,” the band gliding out on a feathery mix of guitars and keyboards. A groove, for the ages.

Luke Torn

Q&A

Lucinda Williams

What’s country soul to you?

Bobbie Gentry was a real big influence on me, “Ode To Billie Joe”. That’s what I call country soul, like Bobbie Gentry, Tony Joe White, Dusty in Memphis. I’ve always loved that kinda stuff. There’s a little thread of that running through this album.

Recording for your own label now, I sense some newfound freedom?

Now we have full, complete creative freedom. We own our own masters. The main difference, in terms of freedom, is that we were able to do a double album. I actually recorded enough for three albums. There’s a third part of it, which will come out later.

Your father’s poem, “Compassion”, seems like a jumping off point of sorts…

Well, ironically enough, I finished that song at the very last, at the 11th hour. We had already cut everything. It’s something I have been I’ve been trying with my dad’s poems for years. It’s very challenging. We already knew what we wanted to call the album. We wanted to use the line from that poem. At first, I kinda wanted to make it into sort of a Nick Drake, kind of a beautiful lush kind of a thing. But everybody said no, leave it like this.

How did you come to J.J Cale’s “Magnolia”?

It was all very spontaneous and organic. And we all sat in amazement listening after we put that down. I used to do that song, years and years ago, back in the ‘70s. That was one I always loved. Of course, after JJ Cale’s passing, he was on my mind, so we did that as a tribute to him.

INTERVIEW: LUKE TORN

Photo credit: Michael Wilson

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