Getting it together in the suburbs seems to be a peculiarly middle class rite of passage – the moment when city living is no longer tenable and a migration in pursuit of wider spaces, cleaner living and better schools is required. Such considerations are behind the decision taken by Nathaniel and Julia Noailles, who with their young, Aspergersy son Copley exchange their life in Boston for a more spacious existence in Dolores Woods, a large development on the outskirts of an un-named Midwestern city, in Patrick Flanery’s tremendous new novel, Fallen Land.
For this week’s archive feature, we delve back into Uncut’s July 2011 issue (Take 170) – just before the release of Bon Iver’s second album – to find Vernon sunning himself in California, consorting with Kanye and shaping up as “the Neil Young of our generation”. What happened? “For Emma… is the past,” he says. “This is the present, and it’s more colourful and inviting.” Words: Alastair McKay
I would have bought the issue of Melody Maker in which I first read about Bruce Springsteen on my way into the art school in Newport, where in March 1973 I was in my last term, only a few months away from moving to London and not long after that fetching up on MM as a junior reporter/feature writer, a turn of events that was wholly unexpected and still seems somewhat unreal. Anyway, that was all to come. That Thursday morning, as ever in those days, I picked up a copy of MM at the paper shop at the top of Stow Hill, then eagerly devoured it on the bus into town.
ARE WE ROLLING?
Before meeting him for the first time recently for the feature in this month's issue, I read a lot of interviews with Tame Impala's Kevin Parker in which he was variously cast as a brooding outsider, a sullen introvert, generally moody, an outcast, someone on the edge of things, inclined to solitary misery.
AC/DC have backed plans which call for a monument to be erected in honour of former singer Bon Scott in his hometown.
The campaign to pay tribute to Scott, who died aged 33 in 1980, by building a statue in Kirriemuir, Scotland started last year when DD8 Music, who are also behind the annual Bon Scott music festival in the town, approached sculptor John McKenna to design a tribute.
Bruce Springsteen has recorded a track with Dropkick Murphys to raise funds for victims of the recent bombing in Boston.
The Boston band were approached by Springsteen following the recent Boston marathon bombings and have re-recorded a new version of the band's song "Rose Tattoo" for inclusion on an EP released on iTunes today (May 15). The three song release will also include live acoustic versions of the songs "Jimmy Collins's Wake" and "Don't Tear Us Apart" by Dropkick Murphys.
Former US president Bill Clinton has revealed that he tried and failed to get Led Zeppelin to reform in 2012.
According to a CBS, David Saltzman of the Robin Hood Foundation, which organised the Hurricane Sandy benefit concert in New York, said that he and the film executive Harvey Weinstein had flown to Washington DC to enlist Clinton's help in getting Led Zeppelin on the concert bill alongside The Who, Eric Clapton and The Rolling Stones.
A rare guitar played by John Lennon and George Harrison has arrived in London before it goes up for sale at auction.
The custom-made prototype VOX guitar will go on public display at The Stafford London Hotel in London from Thursday (May 9) to Saturday (May 11) before it goes up for sale in New York on May 18 at Julien's Auctions. It was played by Harrison and Lennon during the 1967 Magical Mystery Tour period.
