Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2019 i UNCUT

IT’S hard to know quite where to start with this month’s issue of Uncut . Do we talk, first, about our wonderful free CD – a 17-track collection of bespoke covers of Wilco songs? Masterminded by Jeff Tweedy himself, this includes splendid reinterpretations of classic Wilco tracks, deep cuts and rarities by the likes of Low, Courtney Barnett, Cate Le Bon, Ryley Walker, Kurt Vile and Sharon Van Etten. When Tweedy first proposed this idea to us, we were understandably delighted – but I don’t think any of us who’ve watched this project develop quite expected it to turn out as astonishingly as this. Or, perhaps, we should talk about our world-exclusive interview with Jimmy Page? Those readers with long memories will hopefully remember Jon Wilde’s exhaustive career retrospective with…

WHEN David Lynch met Devo in 1977 at the director’s favourite LA diner Bob’s Big Boy, they were all there for the most experienced artist present, Peter Ivers. Devo had loved his Eraserhead song “In Heaven” and wished to cover it. Apparently crooned eerily by the film’s Radiator Lady, her androgynously high voice is in fact Ivers’ own, as he sings, with deadpan naivety: “In heaven, everything is fine/You’ve got your good thing, and I’ve got mine.” Ivers was a part-time martial artist, apocalypse-fixated yogi and industrious singer-songwriter, whose fourth and final flop album had been released in 1976, when he was 30. Though signed to Warner by Van Dyke Parks and dubbed “the finest blues harp player alive” by Muddy Waters, he’s remembered today for two things: “In Heaven”,…

1 The Forty-Ninth Parallel 2 Carrying On 3 High Holiday 4 In A Time Of Doubt 5 Intervention 6 Mom And Dad’s Waltz #2 7 Providence Place 8 The South Saskatchewan River 9 Spare Me Over One More Year 10 That Sweet Orchestra Sound Produced by: Jeff Tweedy Recorded at: The Loft, Chicago Personnel: Kacy Anderson (vocals, guitars, Therevox synth), Clayton Linthicum (vocals, guitars, piano, autoharp, wind-powered organ), Andy Beisel (bass guitar), Mike Silverman (drums, percussion), Charlie McCoy (bass harmonica on “High Holiday” and “That Sweet Orchestra Sound”), Sima Cunningham (vocals on “Mom And Dad’s Waltz #2”)…

1 You Ain’t The Problem 2 Rolling 3 I’ve Been Dazed 4 Piano Joint (This Kind of Love) Intro 5 Piano Joint (This Kind of Love) 6 Another Human Being (Interlude) 7 Living In Denial 8 Hero(intro) 9 Hero 10 Hard to Say Goodbye 11 Final Days 12 Interlude (Loving the People) 13 Solid Ground 14 Light Produced by: Danger Mouse & Inflo Personnel: Michael Kiwanuka (vocals, bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, percussion, Prophet synthesizer, Hammond organ, piano), Inflo (drums, electric guitar, piano, organ, synthesizer, programming, percussion, background vocals), Danger Mouse (electric guitar, keyboards, programming, percussion, tambourine), Kadeem Clarke (piano, synthesizer, Wurlitzer), Rosie Danvers (string arrangements), Jean Kelly (harp), Graham Godfrey (percussion), Nathan Allen (percussion), Chloe Vincent (flute on “Hard To Say Goodbye”), George Hogg (trumpet on “Hard To Say…

Radie Peat on the Lankum approach: “We’re all very intense” How do you breathe fresh life into traditional folk music? The drone notes of the uilleann pipes are indigenous to Ireland; we’re sort of hamming that up to achieve a certain sound. We all have a soft spot for krautrock and drone-heavy music too, so it’s more like we’re taking elements that exist and treating them through the filtration system of our own tastes. We’re all very intense. What prompted your alternative take on the “The Wild Rover”? We’ve all heard the clap-along, “no nay never” version, but we were inspired by the 1974 version by Pat Usher – from the Usher Family in Louth – and wanted to make people listen to it in a different way. It’s so…

Sam Shepherd “I wanted to emulate the Krautrock spirit” Crush was inspired by touring with The xx – how did that translate into a studio album? They asked me if I wanted to come on the road and warm up playing before they came on. I actually had this idea to play lots of mellow, melodic arpeggio things. But also I was listening to the Harmonia Live 197 4 album. I kind of wanted to emulate the spirit of krautrock but with more electronic drums. That’s how my live set started, using that equipment. I transposed that back into my studio, then used the live set-up as the start of making the new album. There are lots of strings and woodwind on Crush – how much of that is live…

GONG Magick Brother BYG ACTUEL, 1970 It all starts off, of course, with a gong. Across the following 10 songs,  Daevid Allen fully introduces his wonky melodic sense and out-there poetry, though the vibe is more lysergic psych-pop than spacey jam session. 8/10 GONG Camembert Electrique BYG ACTUEL, 1971 An otherworldly classic, incorporating heavy riffs (“You Can’t Kill Me”),  stoned silliness (“I’ve Bin Stoned Before”) and groovy kosmische exploration (“Fohat Digs Holes In Space”). Still completely unique. 9/10 STEVE HILLAGE Fish Rising VIRGIN, 1975 Featuring most of the classic Gong lineup, Hillage’s debut solo  album is as playful and kaleidoscopic as the Radio Gnome Trilogy. The opening “Solar Musick Suite” is a highlight. 8/10…

CARAVAN The Decca/Deram Years: An Anthology 1970–1975 UNIVERSAL 8/10 Thorough 9CD survey of the land of grey and pink As Caravan hawked their homemade demo tape around in the late 1960s, Island records’ A&R department decreed that frontman Pye Hastings had such a feeble voice that they would be better off without a singer. Weakness, though, was a strength of the archetypal Canterbury-scene band, this compendium of their big 1970s albums underscoring that gawky romanticism was as much a Caravan hallmark as fuzzed-up Hammond, crude puns and the impossible tempos of “For Richard”, their own “Dark Star”. If courtship prog-style tended toward the brutish, Caravan’s “And I Wish I Were Stoned/Don’t Worry”, “Winter Wine” and “The World Is Yours” showed that romance was still possible in 7/9 time. The line…

Dave Davies ”A lot of the ideas are bittersweet” What are your memories of recording Arthur? I remember it being enjoyable but mixed with sadness, because a lot of the ideas are bittersweet, because of Rosie and Arthur and Terry emigrating to Australia. It was a major event in Ray’s household. In a broader sense it was: what have we come to? What are we doing? Once we got the songs together, we had more scope in the studio to experiment. The Who were also doing a pop opera with Tommy. That’s a strange area of interest. Ray and Pete Townshend had a mutual friend called Barry Fantoni and I don’t know how much information went from one camp to the next. It’s too much of a coincidence. It feels…

JIMMY Page is two minutes late. His excuse though, is an impeccable one. “I never like to mess up the schedule but I just needed a minute on my guitar,” he pleads, as though excusing some borderline diagnosable peccadillo. “The thing is, I want to stay match-fit. You lose it otherwise. And, you know, I don’t intend to lose it…” Still practising his artistry at the age of 75, there are other ways Page remains true to the cause. In black leather jacket, jeans, shirt and Chelsea boots – the only colour relief comes from polka dots on a scarf and the famous white ponytailed hair – he looks every inch the raffish troubadour. Strolling the lobby of the Kensington Gore hotel, footmen nod with respect as he sprays a…

“WE met at the Bath festival, a brilliant event. He came up to me and asked me to play my instrumental, ‘Blackpool’, for him. I did and he just said, ‘Yeah, very good.’ Then walked off. The only thing I thought about him at the time was that his trousers were too short. They were white pants and the trouser legs barely came down to his ankles. He appeared later on that day with a band I hadn’t seen although I’d heard of them. They came on stage and I recognised the guitar player as the guy who’d asked me to play him ‘Blackpool’. I thought, ‘This could be interesting,’ so stayed to watch them. The first song was brilliant and I thought this was a powerhouse of a band.…

“BRIGHT Leaves” kicks off Ode To Joy abruptly, almost violently, with a loud cr’thunk bh’thoom cr’thunk bh’thoom. The rhythm is martial and steady, yet the song itself is quiet, private, concerned with lost keys and falling snow. It’s one of the first songs Wilco recorded for this project, which means it was a crucial piece in how the album sounds. “That song was a breakthrough in terms of how to approach the whole record,” says percussionist Glenn Kotche, whose drums are a lead instrument on the album. To create that particular sound, he used an arcane instrument called a marching machine. “It’s a wooden frame with a bunch of wooden dowels connected by string. When you drop it at an angle or go side to side, it sounds like soldiers…

THE Montford neighbourhood of Asheville, North Carolina feels like a secret garden. Historic homes are framed by kindly old trees, crawling ivy, blooming hostas and rustic stone. A chorus of birds flies in constant song. Walking the narrow streets, there’s a congruent sense of charm and mystery, the product of its fiercely protected antiqueness, like a fairytale hideaway from the Brothers Grimm. “That’s the house,” Angel Olsen explains, pointing across the street. “That was my dream house.” Olsen has lived in Asheville for six years, and has recently become a homeowner. But the house she gazes at is not hers. This house is a relic of a former life. Its pitched roof and gable are reminiscent of the so-called Storybook homes built throughout the 1920s, part English cottage and part…

“I’VE just learned a new word today,” marvels Roger McGuinn when Uncut catches up with him between dates on his latest tour. “Hodophile. It’s a Greek word about being in love with the road.” This is particularly fitting in McGuinn’s case. For the past couple of decades he’s been travelling the highways and byways of America and Europe, accompanied by his wife Camilla, regaling audiences with songs and tales from his storied career with The Byrds and beyond. “We’ve kind of refined the road to a very pleasant experience,” he says. “I absolutely love it.” McGuinn’s musical journey began in the early ’60s, as sideman for the likes of Bobby Darin and Judy Collins, before his Rickenbacker sound powered The Byrds through folk-rock, psychedelia, raga-pop, cosmic country and more. Factor…

GOLDEN MILES Revisiting Miles Davis’ back catalogue [October issue], I’m glad that critics are starting to reconsider his later work. Despite being aware of the early albums, I didn’t know much about Miles’ autumn years. Ever the innovator, Miles referenced pop pioneers like Prince and Green Gartside, blending different styles, resulting in some of the most unusual and eclectic forms of funk, soul and jazz that have ever been heard. P Turberville, Derbyshire Thanks for writing, and glad you enjoyed the Miles piece. I’m relatively suspicious of ‘lost albums’ like this – especially where substantial work has been done after the event. But Rubberband felt like a legitimate missing piece of Miles’ late period. (MB) ATLANTIC CROSSING Your review of Manu Chao’s re-released classic Clandestino album [October issue] brought back…

THE COMET IS COMING The Afterlife IMPULSE! Headier companion mini-LP to March’s Trust In The Life Force Of The Deep Mystery, Joshua Idehen in the Kate  Tempest role of fervid soothsayer. LANA DEL REY Norman Fucking Rockwell! POLYDOR Sharper songs, sumptuous arrangements and plenty of “24/7 Sylvia Plath” on her most gripping exploration of heroically doomed romance to date. TINDERSTICKS No Treasure But Hope CITY SLANG Veteran miseryguts find something approaching tranquility in an elegant new collection of waltzes, lullabies… and even an unconditional love song. TOM CARUANA Inner Space TEA SEA Can I kick it? Czukay and co’s antsy rhythms masterfully diced and spliced with rap a cappellas from the likes of MF Doom, Pharoahe Monch  and Run The Jewels. ITASCA Spring PARADISE OF BACHELORS Fourth album of sublime…

After The Goldrush REPRISE, 1970 Lofgren made his recording debut at the tender age of 18. He played piano and acoustic guitar on Young’s Topanga  classic: “I was the kid who tagged along!” he says now. “Tell Me Why” finds Lofgren and Young joined by Crazy Horse on backing vocals – the first time the grouping are credited together. The following year, Crazy Horse put out their solo debut – with Lofgren on board. Tonight’s The Night REPRISE, 1975 Convened after the deaths of Crazy Horse’s Danny Whitten and roadie Bruce Berry, this grouping – the Santa Monica  Flyers – featured Lofgren, Molina and Talbot. Of the sessions, Lofgren says: “We’d sit around, shoot pool, have tequila, sketch out four of five songs. Then we’d go perform. David [Briggs] and…

Like much of your work, 2020 is written in the first person. How much of what we hear here is autobiography, and how much is character sketches – real or imagined? It’s not autobiography, and it’s not sketches. The people in the songs feel very real to me. Of course I learned a lot from my own experiences and my friends and family and lots of people I’ve talked to in different situations, but - and I realise this might sound like a way of distancing or deflecting, or a symptom of strange mental weather - but to me the people in the songs are real. My experience is that music is revealed and not made.... and so it’s important to honour that and follow where they and the music…

1 The Wild Rover 2 The Young People 3 Ode To Lullaby 4 Bear Creek 5 Katie Cruel 6 The Dark Eyed Gypsy 7 The Pride Of Petravore 8 Hunting The Wren Produced by: John “Spud” Murphy and Lankum Recorded at: Meadow Studios, Delgany; Guerrilla Sounds Studio, Dublin Personnel: Ian Lynch (vocals, uilleann pipes, English concertina, tin whistle, percussion), Daragh Lynch (vocals, guitar, bowed guitar, percussion, piano), Radie Peat (vocals, bayan, concertina, harmonium, hammond organ, piano, wurlitzer, harp, Mellotron), Cormac Dermody (vocals, fiddle, viola, bowed banjo, double bass, vibraphone, piano, percussion), Alex Borwick (trombone), Adrian Crowley (Mellotron), Katie Kim (backing vocals)…

1 Falaise 2 Last Bloom 3 Anasickmodular 4 Requiem for CS70 and Strings 5 Karakul 6 LesAlpx 7 Bias 8 Environments 9 Birth 10 Sea-Watch 11 Apoptose, Pt.1 12 Apoptose, Pt 2 13 LesAlpx (Dub) Produced by: Sam Shepherd Recorded at: EMS4 and Snap Studios, London Personnel includes: Sam Shepherd (keyboards, synths, electronic instruments, voice, arrangements), Sini Simonen, Marike Kruup, Jennymay Logan, Paloma Deike (violin), Charlotte Bonneton, Amy Stanford, Rosie Tompsett (viola), Christopher Graves, Natalie Rozario (cello), Alexei Watkins (horn), Peter Cigleris (bass clarinet), Luke Newby (clarinet), Renate Sokolovska (flute)…

CD 1 : Flying Teapot - Original album Remastered 2018 CD 2: Angel’s Egg - Original album Remastered 2018 CD 3: You - Original album Remastered 2018 CD 4: Shamal - Original album Remastered 2018 CD 5: BBC Radio 1 Sessions 1973-75/ Edinburgh August 21, 1973 CD 6-7: Paris Bataclan Live, May 20, 1973, Pt 1&2 CD 8-9: Roanne – Club Arc En Ciel Live, Aug 17, 1973, Pt 1& 2 CD 10: London – Hyde Park Live, June 29, 1974 CD 11-12: London – The Marquee Club Live, Sept 9/ 10, 1975, Pt 1 & 2 DVD 1: You - Quad Surround Sound (PYE MIX) 1 Thoughts For Naught 2 A PHP’s Advice 3 Magick Mother Invocation 4 Master Builder 5 A Sprinkling Of Clouds (WESTLAKE MIX) 6 Thoughts…

Giles Martin “Some of the tracks were one take” How do you approach a task as monumental as remixing Abbey Road? It’s a bit like an archeological dig in some respects, in that you’re going back over old ground with ultimate respect for the guys who worked on the original sessions and for The Beatles themselves. It’s a bit like going through the materials they built the Taj Mahal with, and putting them all back in the right order. Were there any particular challenges working on Abbey Road? It was harder [than Sgt Pepper and the ‘White Album’] because the original album sounds really good. Abbey Road is a much more modern record than the other Beatles albums. It was recorded on eight-track tape rather than four, and they used…

Disc 1: Don’t Tell A Soul Redux (Matt Wallace Mixes) 1 Talent Show 2 I’ll Be You 3 We’ll Inherit The Earth 4 Achin’ To Be 5 Darlin’ One 6 Back To Back 7 I Won’t 8 Asking Me Lies 9 They’re Blind 10 Anywhere’s Better Than Here 11 Rock’N’Roll Ghost Disc 2: We Know The Night: Rare and Unreleased (Tracks 1-9: Bearsville Versions) 1 Portland – Alt Mix 2 Achin’ To Be 3 I’ll Be You 4 Wake Up 5 We’ll Inherit The Earth 6 Last Thing In The World 7 Rock’N’Roll Ghost 7 Darlin’ One 8 Talent Show – Demo Version 9 Dance On My Planet 10 We Know The Night – Outtake 11 Ought To Get Love – Alt Mix 12 Gudbuy T’Jane – Outtake 13 Lowdown…

Vexations LES DISQUES DU CREPUSCULE 8/10 WHILE it’s generally accepted that Brian Eno identified the ambient concept with 1975’s Discreet Music, it’s stretching things to argue that he invented it. Though his liner notes famously refer to the goal of making music “a part of the ambience of the environment”, in truth this was purely an adjustment to a notion established by composer Erik Satie in 1917. “Furniture music”, as the Frenchman defined it – though he applied the term to only five pieces – represented, he said, “a sound that should not be actively listened to, but present at the periphery of our daily lives”. Eno’s notes, it must be stressed, acknowledged his debt. Twenty years earlier still, in the mid-1890s, Satie had penned Vexations, which bears remarkable similarities…

“I FIRST met Kim when we opened for Big Black at Maxwell’s, our first New York area show, and Kim and Thurston were there. I guess this was the Bad Moon Rising era. Kim was nice, they were all nice to us – we were really hated where we lived, we couldn’t get a gig, so it was refreshing that people seemed positive about us when we played in New York. That’s where we ended up playing because no-one liked us anywhere else when we played. Kim and Thurston and the New York scene kind of adopted us. On our first tour, we opened for them. We were driving around in Lee’s parents’ station wagon – that was our best tour ever, I would say. They really helped us a…

TÉNÉRÉ (EMI, 1993) Credited to “Groupe Tinarwen” and recorded in the Ivory Coast, the band views this cassette-only release as their debut album. The title means simply “Desert”. THE RADIO TISDAS SESSIONS (WAYWARD, 2001) The band’s first official release – co-produced by Robert Plant collaborator Justin Adams –recorded at the local Tuareg station in Kidal, Mali. The first time the wider world heard the band’s spare, dust-beaten music. AMASSAKOUL (IRL, 2004) Augmented by new members, this second album has a more produced, intricate sound than it’s predecessor – there is Tamashek rap – but the loose rhythms remain. AMAN IMAN: WATER IS LIFE (INDEPENDIENTE, 2007) Incorporating more conventional rock tropes – there are wah-wah pedals and distortion – but the essentials stay the same. There’s grit and fire – but…

STRIPED BLAZER (above) “That’s taken in 1960 and I’m 16 and touring with Red E Lewis & The Redcaps. Rock’n’roll was fun and riotous, but you can still see the need for conformity in the uniform. Within 10 years the idea of a smart candy-stripe blazer would be pretty laughable.” FROCK COAT “I wore this ex-navy frockcoat a lot when I was in The Yardbirds with Jeff. The photo is from 1966. I felt dapper in that coat but retired it once Jeff left the band as I felt the fashion was changing.” PINSTRIPE JACKET FROM THE OUTRIDER ALBUM COVER “I came full circle. I’m feeling the need to be smart. Pinstripes and conformity isn’t something people associate with me, but I like the look. In The Yardbirds, I’d wear…

WELCOME to this month’s free 17-track CD, featuring brand-new covers of Wilco tunes. The band has always emphasised collaboration and cooperation, so they requested tracks from friends, associates, collaborators, even some of their kids’ friends. A few of these artists have played in the Tweedy band, others have toured with Wilco, and almost all of them have played the biannual Solid Sound festival in Massachusetts. “One of the things I’ve learned in the past eight or nine years,” says Jeff Tweedy, “is what to do with a certain amount of celebrity. I’ve never been comfortable using it to get a table at a restaurant, but I did figure out that you can reach out to other artists, make friends, and tell them that you love what they’re doing.” 1…

STRANGE CACTI 2010 Olsen’s first mini-album, originally self-released on cassette and then reissued by Asheville’s Bathetic Records, is a self-recorded suite of guitar and voice  that recalls the feeling of dropping the needle on a rare 78 of a lost jazz singer. Her captivating and unusual vocal delivery portends the more fleshed-out folk songs to come. HALF WAY HOME 2012 Recorded while Olsen was a touring member of Will Oldham’s band, and produced with fellow Oldham collaborator Emmet Kelly in Chicago.  It’s her first full-length, a folk album that incorporates lo-fi, countrified instrumentation for a more robust sound that retains an intimate quality, placing her extraordinary voice front and centre. “The Tiniest Seed”, in particular, is a devastating masterpiece. BURN YOUR FIRE FOR NO WITNESS 2014 Olsen’s consummate folk-rock masterpiece…

Belle & Sebastian host a buoyant indie cruise across the Mediterranean BACK in the late ’90s, Belle & Sebastian investigated the idea of staging a festival aboard a P&O ferry sailing around the UK. Logistical concerns forced them to abandon the seagoing element and settle for a landlubbing affair at Camber Sands Pontins, with 1999’s Bowlie Weekender – essentially Hi-De-Hi with jangly guitars – setting the template for holiday-camp festivals for years to come. But the band kept their nautical dream alive, and for Bowlie’s 20th anniversary they’ve finally managed to replicate the whole shebang – complete with band-name bingo, indie disco and tenpin bowling, not to mention several of the original bands – on a swanky cruise ship crossing the Mediterranean from Barcelona to Cagliari. Inevitably the high cost…

JOKER Directed by Todd Phillips Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Robert De Niro Opens Oct 4 Cert TBC 9/10 THE DAY SHALL COME Directed by Chris Morris Starring Marchánt Davis, Anna Kendrick Opens Oct 11 Cert 15 7/10 THE GOLDFINCH Directed by John Crowley Starring Ansel Elgort, Oakes Fegley Opens Sep 27 Cert 15 6/10 AD ASTRA Directed by James Gray Starring Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones Opens Oct 4 Cert TBC 7/10 HITSVILLE: THE MAKING OF MOTOWN Directed by Benjamin Turner, Gabe Turner Starring Berry Gordy, Smokey Robinson Opens Oct 4 Cert TBC 8/10…

NIRVANA IN UTERO GEFFEN, 1993 This is one of the first rock records I ever heard. I was a huge fan at 10 years old. Although I couldn’t really personally connect to the lyrics when I was that young, there was something about it. The energy of it, the emotional dynamics… just aggressive, loud, joyous rock, and then some really sad moody songs too. It’s always been one of my favourite albums. I probably steal some of the quiet/loud dynamic shifts! I think, subconsciously, deep down, it’s all really rooted in Nirvana. BLAZE FOLEY SITTIN’ BY THE ROAD LOST ART, 2010 He’s an outlaw country kind of guy, a Townes Van Zandt contemporary, but he never really got his proper due. He had a crazy life – I discovered him…

It’s a very, very, very fine mag: Uncut’s latest Ultimate Music Guide, in UK shops now, celebrates 50 turbulent, harmonious years of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Expect classic archive interviews and deep new appreciations of their recorded work, both together and apart… Following on September 27 is the latest in our Ultimate Record Collection series, this time covering 1975-79. Wisdom from Lee “Scratch” Perry! In the studio with Wire! And of course, nods to over 600 essential albums… The 63rd BFI London Film Festival on October 2–13 boasts an impressive lineup of music docs, including Miles Davis: Birth Of The Cool, My Friend Fela, Ronnie Wood’s Somebody Up There Likes Me and Mystify, about Michael Hutchence. There’s also Springsteen’s Western Stars and This Is Not Berlin, a coming-of-age feature…

“I’ve never been the vehicle for your stroll down memory lane” SITTING in his hotel room in Denver, Bruce Hornsby is wryly pondering his current predicament. His latest album, Absolute Zero , has re-established him as a creative force – inspired by Don DeLillo and Steve Reich, it artfully combines the resonant, piano-led heartland rock of his 1980s heyday with spry neoclassical arrangements, jazz-funk and avant-garde flourishes, sometimes ending up not a million miles from the rousing, deconstructed anthems of his famous disciple Justin Vernon (who also guests on two tracks). Yet Hornsby is still being booked to play the kind of civic festivals where vintage rockers are expected to boost the profits of local breweries by smiling politely and playing the hits. “Who knows what they’re gonna think when…

ALLAH LAS Lahs MEXICAN SUMMER 7/10 Not as far from home as they hoped, but no matter The stated aim of Lahs was to gaze outward from Allah Las’ base of Los Angeles, which they had profitably mined on three fine previous albums. Measured by that intention, Lahs must be considered something of a dud. It could not have come from anywhere but LA, clearly being a record by native speakers of the dialect of The Doors, The Byrds and Love. But even if Lahs isn’t quite the album Allah-Las believed they were making, it’s still a minor marvel. There’s a glorious stoned languor to “Spaced” and “Polar Onion”, and “Prazer Em Te Conhecer” is Bakersfield country via Brazilian samba-pop. An album for which sunglasses feel strangely necessary. ANDREW MUELLER…

What’s your relationship with Jeff Tweedy like? He’s a busy man in high demand so it’s encouraging to have him in the room focusing intently on our songs and performances. There’s no ego coming from Jeff at all and the people around him possess the same modest nature. The environment at The Loft is so dialled in you can’t not want to make your best music with and for your friends. The LP has a sadness that stems from belonging to a place/community… Yes, but I think we’ve always written songs in that way. I’m a sentimental person and as a child I grieved people I’d never met because the stories about them were so well told. I was 12 when I wrote a song about an old cowboy who…

Much admired by fellow Canadians Ron Sexsmith and Doug Paisley, kindred spirit Jerry Leger returns in November with Time Out For Tomorrow, produced by Cowboy Junkies’ Michael Timmins. It’s the third consecutive album that Timmins has overseen for Leger, backed by regular band The Situation, on the Junkies’ own Latent label. Occupying a space between folk grooves and rootsy blues, coloured by pithy lyrical observations, Leger’s two somewhat unlikely touchstones were Lou Reed’s Coney Island Baby and Nick Lowe’s The Impossible Bird. Later that month, a whole cadre of names pay tribute to Tom Waits on Come On Up To The House: Women Sing Waits DUALTONE. Rosanne Cash, Aimee Mann, Patty Griffin,  Phoebe Bridgers, Corinne Bailey Rae and Courtney Marie Andrews are among those involved. Producer Warren Zanes says that…

Michael Kiwanuka “Racial inequality, self-acceptance and self-care are huge topics on this album for me” How does the new album resemble Love & Hate , and how does it differ? This album definitely carries on from where I left off. The sonic palette I’m still influenced by [includes] emotive string sessions and expansive textures, and I still love fuzzed-out, buzzy guitar lines. For me, the difference between this album and the last one is the lyrical content and [a desire] to go deeper in creating a vivid world sonically and musically. Racial inequality, self-acceptance and self-care are huge topics on this album for me. What do your collaborators contribute? Brian and Inflo bring so much creativity and expertise to the projects, musically and conceptually. They really guide me through the…

3CD+BLU-RAY SUPER DELUXE EDITION Disc 1 (CD) : 2019 Stereo Mix Disc 2 (CD): Sessions 1 I Want You (She’s So Heavy) (Trident Recording Session & Reduction Mix) 2 Goodbye (Home Demo) 3 Something (Studio Demo) 4 The Ballad Of John And Yoko (Take 7) 5 Old Brown Shoe (Take 2) 6 Oh! Darling (Take 4) 7 Octopus’s Garden (Take 9) 8 You Never Give Me Your Money (Take 36) 9 Her Majesty (Takes 1-3) 10 Golden Slumbers/ Carry That Weight (Takes 1-3/Medley) 11 Here Comes The Sun (Take 9) 12 Maxwell’s Silver Hammer (Take 12) Disc 3 (CD): Sessions 1 Come Together (Take 5) 2 The End (Take 3) 3 Come And Get It (Studio Demo) 4 Sun King (Take 20) 5 Mean Mr Mustard (Take 20) 6 Polythene…

Tragic Songs Of Life CAPITOL, 1956 Forsaking the gospel hues of their Capitol singles, the  Louvins’ long-playing debut for the label trained the spotlight on the bleaker side of the secular world. They found a signature tune in the murder ballad “Knoxville Girl” (later revived by Nick Cave), and the trad paean to convicts digging coal “In The Pines” is another highlight. 7/10 Satan Is Real CAPITOL, 1959 The distinctive cover shot has taken on a life of its own, and the album  itself is remarkable as a showcase for Charlie and Ira as eloquent writers (six of the record’s 12 tracks are self-penned). It’s unashamedly Bible-thumping, but there’s an especially nuanced articulacy to “Are You Afraid To Die?” and “The Angels Rejoiced Last Night”. 8/10 My Baby’s Gone CAPITOL,…

CICCONE YOUTH THE WHITEY ALBUM ENIGMA/BLAST FIRST, 1989 Improvised in the studio, this side-project from Sonic Youth and Mike Watt paid fuzzy tribute to Madonna and ’80s hip-hop, demonstrating that Gordon has always taken notice of pop music. FREE KITTEN NICE ASS KILL ROCK STARS, 1995 Gordon teamed up with Pussy Galore’s Julie Cafritz, Boredoms’ Yoshimi P-We and Pavement’s Mark Ibold for this scratchy debut. “Harvest Spoon” alludes to Sonic Youth’s time touring with Neil Young, while “Scratch The DJ” demonstrates Gordon’s love of hip-hop: “Find the room and the DJ asshole/Grab the mic, freestyle out cold…” SONIC YOUTH A THOUSAND LEAVES GEFFEN, 1998 The opening “Contre Le Sexisme”, a poetic drift of hushed noise, laid the groundwork for some of No Home Record, while Gordon, as on 1995’s Washing…

1960 Widespread decolonisation in former French colonial Africa. Mali achieves independence on June 20. Modibo Keïta is elected the first President of Mali. 1963 Oppressed by the Keïta regime and seeking their own state – Azawad – the First Tuareg Rebellion, known as the Alfellega, is violently repressed by government troops. 1968 Keïta is overthrown in a military coup led by ex-soldier Moussa Traoré. 1972 The first of two devastating droughts (the second: 1984– 85) in the Tuareg homelands. 1980 Ibraham and other young Tuaregs head to Libya to enrol in Gaddafi’s Islamic Legion training camps. 1990 Returning veterans from Gadaffi’s camps – including founding members of Tinariwen – participate in the Second Tuareg Rebellion. 1991 Traoré replaced by Alpha Ourmar Konaré in Mali’s first democratic elections. 1996 Flame Of…

“I WAS encouraged to make a solo record (‘She Just Satisfies’, 1965) – that was a learning curve! It wasn’t bad – but I didn’t have to be told that singing wasn’t a God-given talent. I am happy to say that over 60 years, I have played with a range of truly phenomenal vocalists. “As a session player, I was in the booth to hear everyone from Petula Clark [‘Downtown’] to Val Doonican [‘Walk Tall’] do their stuff. “When Shirley Bassey unleashes on ‘Goldfinger’, you could hear the foundations shake, she had such power. But in terms of a voice that was also an instrument in its own right, Robert had a richness and expression that was just superb. Once he was writing his own lyrics for the band, that…

MAVIS STAPLES YOU ARE NOT ALONE (ANTI-, 2010) Tweedy has made several albums with the gospel legend and fellow Chicagoan, including one based on Pops Staples’ unfinished recordings. But the best remains their first, a collection of spiritually generous and musically adventurous songs showcasing Mavis’s mighty vocals. 9/10 LOW THE INVISIBLE WAY (SUB POP, 2013) This venerable band has been around almost  as long as Tweedy has been active, releasing their debut just months before Wilco unleashed AM. Nearly 20 years later, they paired up for this set of intimate tunes that highlights some of the rootsier elements in Low’s signature sound. 8/10 RICHARD THOMPSON STILL (NEW WEST, 2015) Thompson approached Tweedy looking to shake  up his record-making process, and the result is an album that accentuates the precision of…

“ZELDA Fitzgerald burned in a mental institution just down the street,” Olsen explains, sitting on the steps that cut through Montford Park, an agrestic pocket of the historic neighbourhood just north of downtown Asheville. “F Scott Fitzgerald used to stay at The Grove Park Inn when he visited her,” she adds. The tragedy Olsen speaks of endures as a dark and, nevertheless, gripping chapter in the history of Asheville. It’s true that Zelda Fitzgerald met her fate in the same neighbourhood Olsen now calls home, when she died in a fire at the Highland Hospital, where she had been admitted for psychiatric care. The literary and artistic pedigree of Montford abounds. Included on the National Register of Historic Places, most of the homes in Montford were built between 1890 and…

Two British indie institutions come together for a thunderous double-header THREE songs into their set, Johnny Marr and his band are forced to leave the stage owing to a heavy electrical storm. It’s been a dismal week for outdoor happenings across the UK – severe weather has led to several cancellations – but tonight Edinburgh gets off with nothing more serious than some diverting drama. After a 15-minute delay, Marr strolls back onstage, grabs a guitar and launches into “This Charming Man”. Thunder? Lighting? Pah! He’s “Johnny, Johnny, Johnny Fucking Marr” as the crowd chant throughout his set, and a fair chunk of Primal Scream’s as well. Despite such lively endorsements, Marr only conclusively made the transition from sideman to frontman relatively recently. He has always looked the part –…

TAKING a brief break from his narcissistic swandive into heroin addiction one hazy mid-’90s night, Brett Anderson formed a mean-spirited imaginary “blokes’ band” with his friends. Bruiser’s putative hits (“Kisses for My Missus”, “Santa Ain’t A Wanker”) sardonically mimicked the Britpop school of Blur and Oasis, who had piggybacked to glory on the back of Suede’s impoverished bohemianism. As Anderson puts it in Afternoons With The Blinds Drawn, the second volume of his memoirs, “bands who waved flags and dropped their aitches and painted a social tourist’s cartoon of British life: patronising, jingoistic and crass”. To his eternal annoyance, Suede’s high camp in low places opened the door for this torrent of ersatz working-class pop. The follow-up to his elegiac Coal Black Mornings starts with the lithe aesthetes subsisting on…

I’D known David since September of 1985. We met in Charlottesville in our first year at the University Of Virginia, when we were both 18. I got a little job posting handbills for cool gigs from a local promoter. David came to plenty of the gigs and had noticed I was doing the dormitory advertising. We soon became fast friends, a friendship built around our record collections. After college, we lived together in Jersey City and Hoboken, starting in 1989. Stephen [Malkmus] moved in with us soon after. Their friendship really started then, though they’d known each other at university. We depended on each other a lot. We were outsiders. We had so much fun running around New York in those days. I drove a bus and David and Stephen…