Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2017 i UNCUT

“THEY caught me at a weak moment,” laughs Louise Wener, as she explains why she’s going back onstage with Sleeper after 20 years. “I got an email and thought why not? It wasn’t planned. I’m looking forward to it. It will be a lot less competitive. It was very self-obsessed at the time, but when you get older you can leave that behind.” Sleeper, who had eight Top 40 hits before splitting in 1998, are reuniting for the Star Shaped Festival, a series of shows in London, Birmingham, Glasgow and Manchester that also feature The Bluetones, Space, Dodgy, My Life Story and Salad. They're an offshoot of the Star Shaped monthly Britpop night run by Rob Smith and Bobby Foster, where hits from Blur, Suede, Pulp and Oasis are played…

“Jim can play all of the things I pretend to know how to play. When he plays my parts it’s like looking in a mirror that reflects a more handsome version of yourself…”Jeff Tweedy WHEN, in the late ’90s, romance persuaded James Elkington to relocate from his native England to the US, he knew changes lay ahead. He’d underestimated, however, the impact it would make on his musical career. As drummer for Elevate, a London noise rock act who shared his fondness for Slint, he had largely neglected playing his guitar. His arrival in Chicago changed this. “I’d already started playing finger-style guitar,” he says, “but I was awful. I didn’t have any idea of what I wanted to do with it. It took coming to the US in my…

STEVE Earle has a busy day ahead of him. “I went to SiriusXM to interview Chris Stapleton for my radio show, then I went to the gym. Later I pick up my kids from school, then I’ve got a play tonight, so I have to be at the theatre for 6.30.” Then, with a laugh, “It keeps me out of trouble.” It seems as if Steve Earle has crammed several lifetimes worth of experience into his 62 years – and not all of it positive. Although he makes light of the (seven) divorces and has a wry take on his period as an addict, you suspect it is music that played a huge role in getting Earle through some very tough times. A troubadour in the mould of his hero,…

JUSTIN ADAMS FEATURING ANNELI DRECKER Ribbons WAYWARD 7/10 Robert Plant collaborator gets experimental with Röyksopp singer Inspired by the work of artists such as Miró and Jackson Pollock, Adams has come up with a captivating set of “sound paintings” that eschew rock dynamics in favour of slowly shifting abstract patterns in which his guitar is filtered through a polychromatic prism of Tinariwen grooves, Steve Reich pulses, gnawa trance rhythms and droning raga loops. Drecker adds texture to the canvas with wordless vocals that evoke Björk at her most audacious and draw on influences from Native American chants to Tuvan throat singing. NIGEL WILLIAMSON YAZZ AHMED LA SABOTEUSE NAIM 8/10 Young trumpeter crafts an international, modern jazz album On her second LP, Ahmed, a British-Bahraini trumpeter, flugelhorn player and bandleader, combines…

BIRDY A1. At Night A2. Floating Dogs A3. Quiet And Alone B1. Close Up (from Family Snapshot) B2. Slow Water B3. Dressing The Wound C1. Birdy’s Flight (from Not One Of Us) C2. Slow Marimbas C3. The Heat (from The Rhythm Of The Heat) D1. Sketchpad With Trumpet And Voice D2. Under Lock And Key (from Wallflower) D3. Powerhouse At The Foot Of The Mountain (from San Jacinto) PASSION A1. The Feeling Begins A2. Gethsemane A3. Of These, Hope A4. Lazarus Raised A5. Of These, Hope - Reprise B1. In Doubt B2. A Different Drum B3. Zaar B4. Troubled C1. Open C2. Before Night Falls C3. With This Love C4. Sandstorm C5. Stigmata D1. Passion D2. With This Love – Choir D3. Wall Of Breath E1. The Promise Of Shadows…

BEACH HOUSE B-Sides And Rarities BELLA UNION 7/10 An alternative “greatest hits” from the Franco-American dreampop duo Thirteen years and six albums into their career, Baltimore’s Alex Scally and Victoria Legrand have built up enough EP tracks and hard-to-find non-album oddities to merit their own compilation. Tracks here range from 2005’s “Rain In Numbers” (an early, clunky version of the hidden track at the end of their debut album) right up to two new, unreleased songs (the woozy dronerock opener “Chariot” and the St Etienne-ish “Baseball Diamond”). A spartan, drumbox-and-Bontempi version of Queen’s “Play The Game” comes from 2009’s Red Hot: Dark Was The Night AIDS charity album; 2014’s “Saturn Song” is a suitably astral, drumless waltz from another multi-artist compilation called The Space Project; while another delicious waltz, “Baby”,…

You were a Television Personality for over 10 years; when did you lose contact with Dan? It was 1994. Dan was having a hard time then and the phone went quiet for a long time so I just went on to other projects. The next thing I heard was that he was imprisoned – which was a shock. Then a few years ago Dan was discovered upstairs on a bus unconscious. It turned out he had a blood clot on his brain. He was operated on and regained consciousness after being in a coma for many months. How is he now? He’s receiving care and he has somewhere comfortable to live. He has his family supporting him and visitors like me to go and cheer him up. If there’s something…

AUGUST sees the return of Adam Granduciel with the War On Drugs’ fourth album, the long-awaited A Deeper Understanding . Their recent Record Store Day release “Thinking Of A Place” suggests the vibe will be ‘Springsteen ambient’... Grizzly Bear are also back after a five-year wait with their fifth record, Painted Ruins , while Randy Newman releases Dark Matter , his first new LP since 2008’s Harps And Angels . Loretta Lynn’s Wouldn’t It Be Great , the latest from her Cash Cabin Sessions, is also out in August, while Cornelius unleashes some warped bossa nova with Mellow Waves . In the archive section, some exciting reissues are in the works, but…

“ARMS LIKE BOULDERS” The anthemic opening number from Wagonwheel Blues introduced a band who scoured the sounds of the past – folk-rock harmonica, rollicking acoustic guitars, imagery to conjure memories of staring out the window of the backseat of your parents’ car. But there’s something darker going on in “Arms Like Boulders”: a deeper and distinctive vision of America that was just beginning to reveal itself. “COME TO THE CITY” Slave Ambient is WOD’s magnificent sophomore album, and it’s a masterful sleight-of-hand. Its songs bring the band closer – with brighter melodies and cleaner production – but keep them shrouded in mystery. Its centrepiece was the smoky “Come To The City”, where the band marches forward with the momentum of Berlin-era Bowie. “I’ve been…

“IT’S BIG, BUT NOT POMPOUS, WHICH IS A TRICK I FIND HARD TO PULL OFF…”JAMES DEAN BRADFIELD ON ‘THE BENDS’ THIS summer, Radiohead are doing what once seemed the unthinkable, and delving back into their past. For a start, there’s the release of OKNOTOK, a deluxe reissue of the 20-year-old OK Computer featuring three legendary and unreleased songs (read our full review on p44). What’s more, the group are returning to the scene of one of their greatest triumphs, headlining Glastonbury for the third time. With UK shows also on the horizon, it seems a fitting time to attempt the impossible, and pick Radiohead’s 30 greatest songs – with help from the band’s close collaborators, friends, famous fans, and even some of their biggest influences. Here, then, are their finest…

ALONE IN BERLIN OPENS JUNE 30 A German couple – Brendan Gleeson and Emma Thompson – urge citizens to reject Nazism in WWII drama. DESPICABLE ME 3 OPENS JUNE 30 Those Minions are back in the first – and possibly best – of the summer’s franchise entries. RISK OPENS JUNE 30 Documentary about that embassy guy, Julian Assange. SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING OPENS JULY 5 The reboot of the reboot of the reboot. Spidey joins the Marvel Cinematic Universe. WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES OPENS JULY 9 Charlton Heston travels back through time to save humanity from more Planet Of The Apes films. CARS 3 OPENS JULY 14 There was a Cars 2 ? Owen Wilson’s veteran car takes on some new, faster…

New magazines! The History Of Rock project, rediscovering classic interviews from NME and Melody Maker , reaches 1988: REM are on the cover. Meanwhile, celebrate Paul McCartney’s 75th birthday by investing in our deluxe Ultimate Music Guide to fabbest of the Fabs. Both out now. What next for Jack White ? While word of a third solo album remains unforthcoming, a children’s book, of all things, is scheduled from Third Man on November 7. We’re Going To Be Friends is based on the lyrics of the old White Stripes song; pictures come from Elinor Blake, an animator who worked on – happy happy joy joy! - The Ren & Stimpy Show . An unlikely alliance will…

LAL & MIKE WATERSON Bright Phoebus DOMINO A storied masterpiece of British folk-rock, unavailable for decades, is rescued from copyright hell. A disc of unreleased demos enriches the deluxe reissue. GRIZZLY BEAR Painted Ruins RCA Hot on the heels of their friends, Fleet Foxes, the ornate chamber-pop outfit make their own welcome return, five years on from Shields . CHRIS ROBINSON BROTHERHOOD Barefoot In The Head SILVER ARROW Third new album in two years from hippydom’s most tireless laidback bros. Sparkling acoustic folk/country vibes dominate this time out. THEE OH SEES Orc CASTLE FACE Meanwhile, John Dwyer’s own campaign for record shop ubiquity continues apace. Heavier and more manic, if anything, than last year’s 26 Oh Sees LPs. EVERYTHING IS RECORDED Close But Not Quite XL…

“… But I didn’t die/At least not yet” How The West Was Won DOMINO ALBUM OF THE MONTH 8/10 IN a career that has been brilliant and sporadic, heroic and thwarted, Peter Perrett has often sung about death. Even in his most exuberant, up moments, as on the almost hit single “Another Girl, Another Planet”, he registered a note of existential ambivalence, singing: “I always flirt with death/I look ill, but I don’t care about it.” His love songs were narcotic, so there was always a suspicion that the lover he was addressing, this intoxicating amorata, was heroin or crack, because for a time he was an enthusiastic user of both drugs, and even subsidised the early career of his band by working as a dealer. Add to that the…

A Short History Of Decay sounds even darker than The Graceless Age . How did that happen? It wasn’t intentional. When I was writing it, I thought the songs were somehow gentler and I still think the album is often quite funny. Doesn’t the best horror often come from comedic places? The greatest comedies from the most tragic? How did Michael Timmins end up as producer? I met Mike when I played in Glasgow at Celtic Connections in 2013. I used to fall asleep to Cowboy Junkies’ The Trinity Sessions , so they were literally characters from a dream. Over the next few years, we stayed in touch. Somehow we both knew we needed to make a record together. How much influence…

There seems to be something primordial about these songs… Yes, that’s very similar to the image I have in my head when I sing them. There are a lot of dark corners. I feel like a lot of it happens kind of… underwater. Is This Is The Kit now a settled band? There was a time when, wherever I played, whoever I knew in that town would become the band, but it has become more established over the years and that’s really important to me. It’s my project, my songs, and it wouldn’t exist if I didn’t exist. But I don’t think it would be anywhere near as good or sound the way it does without all their input and skills. What did John Parish bring? For a long time,…

The Gay Parade BAR/NONE, 1999 Overshadowed initially by Elf Power, Neutral Milk Hotel and fellow travellers in the Elephant Six wave of young US ’60s-pop obsessives, Barnes’ band come into their own with an unabashedly florid concept album about a personalised Pepperland stuffed silly with odd and colourful characters. But as on so many of the albums to come, the sunniness in Barnes’ Tin Pan Alley-style songsmithery belies darker undercurrents. 8/10 Satanic Panic In The Attic POLYVINYL, 2004 Barnes having jettisoned his bandmates over the course of the first decade, the sixth LP establishes Of Montreal as almost a one-man affair. Not that this is any less baroque or full of ideas than its predecessors. Yet it is also one of his most focused efforts, Barnes…

Gregg’s blues obsession may have stemmed from a life filled with death GREGG Allman committed a misdemeanor to record “Midnight Rider”, which would become his signature tune. He wrote most of the lyrics at Idlewild South, the lakefront cabin the Allman Brothers Band had rented outside of Macon, Georgia, in 1969, but was having trouble with the third verse. He enlisted roadie Kim Payne to help, and they sequestered themselves in the band’s warehouse and finished the song early in the morning. Because no-one would wake up and unlock the door at Capricorn Sound Studio, and because Allman had to get the song down immediately — there would be no waiting, no sitting on this song until the sun came up, no letting this one get away from him —…

D AVID Jones met Mark Field in June, 1964. As it transpired, both men had a lot in common: they were born the same year (1947), shared a producer Tony Visconti and, for a while, were both managed by Les Conn, which is how they met – whitewashing Conn’s Denmark Street offices. The extent of both their friendship and rivalry seems a flexible point. While Bolan’s Tyrannosaurus Rex enjoyed modest success between 1968 and 1969, Bowie was still struggling. Ray Stevenson sees Bolan’s early triumph as a motivating factor for Bowie: “He was kind of angry that Marc was selling so many records. It got him really determined.” “David was good with Marc,” says George Underwood, who designed sleeves for both. “Later on, Marc was a bit jealous of David’s…

With three records lined up for release after his new double album, The Usual Suspects, Jah Wobble has a lot to look forward to – but the bassist, band leader and founding member of Public Image Ltd is always considering retirement. “I’m still enjoying it as much as ever,” he says, “but it’s healthy to be happy not to outstay your welcome as soon as you’ve dried up or the world doesn’t wanna know.” After burning most of his bridges in the late ’80s with his wild behaviour, the always-curious Wobble has reinvented himself as a learned polymath, as interested in psychogeography and modal jazz as he is in Cantonese folk music. “It’s an interesting world out there,” he marvels. “Even back in the day, I was into stuff. Eventually,…

A QUICK scan of the capacity crowd tonight, and the title of Afghan Whigs’ breakthrough album instantly assumes thunderous significance. In a room humid as a reptile house, a Congregation is precisely what has gathered, and there’s a faint whiff of revivalist triumph in the air. Not that Greg Dulli's band have had a battle to reassert their relevance since reforming five years ago. Being the black Ohio sheep of the early ’90s Sub Pop scene, the Whigs haven’t needed to recalibrate their sound so much for a new era: that meaty but tenderised, saturnine rock rooted in ’70s soul and R&B, still sounds as striking as it did when Gentlemen was released in 1993. Dulli cuts a leaner figure than many might remember – yoga practice, it seems –…

SAXA The Beat’s veteran horn man (1930-2017) AT Camden’s Electric Ballroom in October 1979, following a support slot with The Selecter, The Beat were approached by Jerry Dammers of 2 Tone Records. The Specials man offered them a label deal, providing they could cut a debut single immediately. Hastily booking time in the studio, they prepared a cover of Smokey Robinson classic “Tears Of A Clown”. “Days before we went into the studio, we found Saxa,” Ranking Roger later recalled in Daniel Rachel’s Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Music And Politics Of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone And Red Wedge. “He was this old, loud Jamaican man that just got drunk all the time and was always aggressive and cussing and swearing. There must have been a good…

“My parents tried to talk me out of rock’n’roll, but they couldn’t stop me”ROBIN LE MESURIER ALTHOUGH Robin Le Mesurier is the son of two of the UK’s most beloved comic actors – Dad’s Army’s John Le Mesurier and Carry On’s Hattie Jacques – he always wanted to tread the stage as a musician. “It was a pretty musical household,” recalls the guitarist, who has just written an autobiography. “Mum would sing when she was working at the Players’ Theatre in vaudeville and dad always said he’d rather have been a pianist than an actor. Their friends were musicians, too. Spike Milligan was a trumpet player and when he came round I’d often be woken up by them jamming downstairs.” Le Mesurier’s own eclectic career has seen him play with…

1 PETER PERRETT An Epic Story “I’ve read this book too many times/ The hero’s death is tragic every time…” A poignant opening to this month’s CD, perhaps, but the Only One’s presence here is a heartwarming testimony to how harrowing rock’n’roll myths can sometimes have happy endings. Perrett’s How The West Was Won is our Album Of The Month, and you can read his own insights on page 21. 2 JOHN MURRY Wrong Man Another auspicious survivor in the Uncut firmament, as the stealth hero of Americana fetches up in Toronto, via Kilkenny, in the company of the Cowboy Junkies’ Michael Timmins and former Pogue Cait O’Riordan. “Teems with guilt, regret, self-recrimination, a sense of personal rot and bitter fatalism,” notes Allan Jones on page 34. 3 BROKEN SOCIAL…

THE ONLY ONES The Only Ones CBS, 1978 Fine debut, quite unlike its punk peers – check the jazzy interlude of “Breaking Down”, which fixes Perrett & co as peerless pedlars of existential ennui. Includes much covered non-hit “Another Girl, Another Planet”, which radio playlisters ignored, fearing its transcendent theme was druggy. Highpoint “The Beast” justifies comparisons with Television. THE ONLY ONES Even Serpents Shine CBS, 1979 Perrett’s worldview was no less cataclysmic, but the tunes on the group’s second LP were stacked with gorgeous, world-weary melodies, and a pop sensibility that would ordinarily be out of sync with the themes of romantic disappointment, as captured on the gorgeous “Out There In The Night” and the defiant, bruising “Someone Who Cares”. THE ONLY ONES Darkness & Light – The Complete…

Broken Social Scene have gone on and off hiatus for nearly 20 years now – what pulled the gang back together this time? I just think we missed the people. Obviously as anxieties grow in the world, you pull toward what you know, which is your friends. So we just put it out there that the [ core ] five of us were gonna get into a studio and start jamming and writing and everyone else was welcome. By the time we were finished, we had everybody. We worked really hard at collecting a lot of music and then we spent a lot of time trying to organise and get on the same page with everyone’s opinions about what songs should go on the album. There’s this trustworthy,…

What’s the concept behind the album? Birmingham is a city with a scarred history as it pertains to race, and what I experienced growing up was certainly that legacy but also ways in which that legacy was subverted and complicated every day. The scenes in the songs were completely unpredictable moments where I, as the subject, was knocked back on my ass, and are still rattling around 25 years later and have shaped the way I see everything. They are real, and that’s important to me. Your conclusions feel optimistic. Birmingham is a place where racial terrorism was enacted, yet when I watch people, they’re full of love and respect for each other. It doesn’t mean white supremacy is over, far from it, but people like Angela Davis from Birmingham…

Following last year’s Full Circle , her first studio effort in over a decade, Loretta Lynn (right) returns in August with a second volume of Cash Cabin Sessions, Wouldn’t It Be Great . Again produced by Patsy Lynn Russell and John Carter Cash in Tennessee, the LP juxtaposes new songs – “Ruby’s Stool”, “I’m Dying For Someone To Live For”, “Ain’t No Time To Go” – with reworkings of Lynn classics like “Don’t Come Home A’ Drinkin’ (With Lovin’ On Your Mind)”. The 85-year-old is also subject of a major retrospective to salute the 50th anniversary of Nashville’s Country Music Hall Of Fame And Museum. “They best have a big space,” she says of the memorabilia exhibition, which opens in…

At what point did you realise you were making two records? I got a friend in LA, who’s an engineer, mixer and producer, that I wanted to work with, so I started going down to LA whenever I wasn’t on tour, working on the album that became Quazarz Vs The Jealous Machines . So that album was recorded over the course of seven months, and when it was finished I got a release date for it and everything was cool. But I was feeling really good, like there were a lot more songs I wanted to do, so my other bro, who moved to LA, was coming back to Seattle for a 12-day stint. I thought we’d knock out three or four tracks, but it started…

AFTER looking to WWII, Everest expeditions and the US-Soviet space race as inspiration for their previous two albums, Public Service Broadcasting have opted for a more socio-political theme on Every Valley : the heyday and subsequent decimation of the Welsh mining industry. “The deeper human aspect was the main reason for going for it,” explains J Willgoose, Esq, who constitutes one-third of PSB, alongside Wrigglesworth and JF Abraham. “There was a risk that we’d fall into this trap of just telling the same kind of story, so I wanted to try something more ambitious. Attempting to turn coal mining into an accessible and attractive subject was an interesting one to take on.” This involved recording in the old mining community of Ebbw Vale, immersing themselves fully in…

Runaway With Del Shannon BIGTOP, 1961 Nominally a concept album before such things existed, Shannon’s debut is anchored by his biggest hit and signature song. “Runaway”, emotional freefall set to falsetto vocals and a cascading melody, is both a throwback (elements of doo-wop), and futuristic (with its slashing Clavioline solo). Much of the rest, like the atmospheric “Jody” and Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman’s “Misery”, explores teen romantic angst from many angles. 8/10 The Further Adventures Of Charles Westover LIBERTY, 1968 Few artists have managed to merge creative peak with commercial nadir like this; obscurity aside, it’s among the psych era’s most dazzling sets. Shannon’s infectious melodies and harmonies remain, now subjected to weird time shifts, oddball instrumentation and strange narratives. “Gemini” is the pop gem, “Runnin’ On Back” the…

El Loco WARNER BROS, 1981 1979’s Deguello had been the first ZZ Top album after Billy Gibbons had been thrilled by the “energy event” of punk, but El Loco was the one where he tried to synthesise its influence into his own music. His claims about it – “You think you can get punky? We’re gonna get punky!” – dramatically overstate the wildness of “Groovy Little Hippy Pad” and “Party On The Patio”, but El Loco is the strangest ZZ Top album, by far. 7/10 Eliminator WARNER BROS, 1983 For the eighth ZZ Top album, Gibbons all but dispensed with Dusty Hill and Frank Beard, and immersed himself in the latest technology. Inspired by British electropop bands, he…

ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND “Dreams” (THE ALLMAN BROS BAND, 1969) A eulogy for dreams he knew he’d never realise, with his Hammond B3 adding a poignant, flickering drone. ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND “Don’t Keep Me Wonderin’” (IDLEWILD SOUNTH, 1970) This standout on the band’s second album starts as a lament for a cheating woman, but gradually Gregg reveals a more tragic situation. ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND “Melissa” (EAT A PEACH, 1972) Gregg wrote one of the band’s most popular tunes many years before they actually released it, partly because it took so long to come up with the right name. GREGG ALLMAN “These Days” (LAID BACK, 1973) Among the many covers on his solo debut, this Jackson Browne tune stands out as particularly poignant, with Gregg’s vocals making it sound like a backporch…

SINCE the release of Lost In The Dream , Adam Granduciel has become acquainted with the joys of E Street Radio, the Sirius XM channel dedicated to the music of Bruce Springsteen. For casual fans, the station is a perfect gateway into his catalogue. But for a music scholar like Granduciel, it’s a master’s level course to take you to even deeper levels of obsessions. “I remembered ‘The River’ from high school classic rock radio,” he says, “But little things about it started blowing my mind – like the fact that the snare doesn’t really drop until, like, the fifth verse.” This is the language of someone who’s spent many a long drive letting the wind blow back their hair. Springsteen’s catalogue is not as weird as…

IN 1967, Bowie read Heinrich Harrer’s memoir, Seven Years In Tibet – “I became an overnight Buddhist,” he admitted years later. “David talked about wanting to travel the world and take in as many cultures as he could,” says Beatstalkers bassist Alan Mair, who spent time with Bowie in the late 1960s. “Tibet came up quite a lot in conversations. We’d all read about Tibetan monks living in caves. Tibet was a mystical place at that age.” “He had been studying Buddhism quite seriously for a couple of years before he met me,” adds Lindsay Kemp, his former mime teacher. “He was planning on going up to a Buddhist monastery, Samye Ling, and becoming a Tibetan monk.” “He’d been to Samye Ling, the Tibetan Buddhist Centre in Scotland,” says Mary…

IN July, 2000, David Bowie began work on his first new album of the 21st century. Only it wasn’t entirely new. The bulk of the album, called Toy, consisted of songs Bowie originally cut for Deram in the 1960s – including “Liza Jane”, “The London Boys”, “In The Heat Of The Morning”, “Conversation Piece”, “Let Me Sleep Beside You”, “You’ve Got A Habit Of Leaving” and “Silly Boy Blue”. The LP was slated for the fourth quarter of 2000, but gradually slipped back. Unconfirmed rumours suggested Bowie’s then-label Virgin/ EMI wanted the easier sell of a new greatest hits compilation. Eventually, Toy was quietly shelved, though several songs later made their way onto B-sides and bonus tracks. A version of Toy eventually leaked online in 2011. Here, Mark Plati –…

MEMPHIS’ Lorraine Motel is infamous as the place where Martin Luther King was shot on April 4, 1968. Before the tragedy, however, the motel was the birthplace of a host of classic songs on the city’s Stax label. “A lot of times I would try to get the bridal suite to write in,” remembers Eddie Floyd. “It was there in the middle, where Dr King [was assassinated in 1968]. We actually wrote quite a few songs, Steve Cropper and I, in almost every room of the motel.” One of the songs the pair wrote at Lorraine was “Knock On Wood”; inspired by storms and superstitions, it was recorded just hours after being written, with help on the arrangement from top musicians such as drummer Al Jackson Jr and piano player…

“Skiffle was the first music for teenagers by teenagers” “THEY call me a madman, but compared to Pete Way I’m out of my league,” says Ozzy Osbourne in A Fast Ride Out Of Here , the up-to-11, none-more-black autobiography of the former bass player in ’70s rock band UFO. Written with Paul Rees, it’s an eye-popping tale of maxed-up misadventure and profound personal waste, recounted with a matey flourish that makes Rod Stewart’s autobiography seem positively introverted. “Joanna had the distinction of being the first doctor to pose for Playboy magazine,” runs one not untypical line. Married five times, addicted to heroin, alcohol, sex and catch-all catastrophe, Way’s life progresses like a runaway train careening over a cliff. He’s 13 when he…

THE BEATLES THE BEATLES 1968 My parents were big Beatles fans. Things were starting to get weird with Sgt Pepper; it was like they were creating a world. But on ‘The White Album’ it was like they were creating a universe. It’s funny, so many genres of music I was exposed to first through ‘The White Album’ – before I heard American country music I heard “Rocky Raccoon”! This record felt almost like a soundtrack to the very weird early ’70s, with the Manson murders and Patty Hearst. It’s also the album I skip the most songs on… “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?”, even as a kid I knew that was nasty. VARIOUS ARTISTS ANTHOLOGY OF AMERICAN FOLK MUSIC 1952 I went to the public library when…