No, unfortunately “Bright Phoebus” isn’t being reissued. But what prompted me to dig it out this week was the news of Bright Phoebus Revisited, a concert tour this autumn that promises the album recreated live by every Waterson they could find, along with various guests including Jarvis Cocker and Richard Hawley. The dates are London Barbican (11), Warwick Arts Centre (12), Liverpool Philharmonic Hall (14), Brighton Dome (15) and Bristol Colston Hall (16). Could be interesting: amazing record.
Mazzy Star are set to release their first new album in 17 years, Seasons Of Your Day.
The band's fourth studio album will come out on September 24 and was recorded in California and Norway. Click below to listen to the first single from the album, "California". The album follows 1990's She Hangs Brightly, 1993's So Tonight That I Might See and 1996's Among My Swan.
God bless Rod Stewart
Not even creepy celebrity horse-whisperer Alan Yentob could wholly ruin last week’s highly entertaining BBC Arena special on Rod Stewart. His contributions were laughably witless all the same. “You look just like brothers!” he exclaimed excitedly of Rod and long-time mucker Ronnie Woods, which may have been true 40 years ago. These days they don’t even look like cousins.
When unpleasant right-wing governments seize control by one means or another, a lot of wishful thinking often goes on among radical artists. Hard times, they speculate, will encourage a new counterculture; angry political art will flourish in the face of oppression. We heard a lot of this rhetoric from dissenters trying to put a positive gloss on the election of David Cameron in 2010. But as yet, a provocative cultural revolt against the Tories, if there is one, remains too underground to register on most radar.
A couple of days late this week, thanks to an epic proofreading job on the next Uncut Ultimate Music Guide; this one’s on the subject of Depeche Mode, and will be in UK shops on the last day of July.
Brian May has become involved in the row surrounding a gorilla painted to look like Freddie Mercury.
The guitarist was informed of the incident, which saw a sculpture of a gorilla painted to look like Mercury removed from Norwich city centre for breaching copyright laws, via Twitter and informed his followers that he would "look into" what was going on. Meanwhile, ITV News report that May has labelled the move, "outrageous and petty".
