Music
Record Collector
TO 'ELLO, 'ELLO, 'ELLO & BACK
Formerly the biggest band on Planet Earth, The Police split almost 40 years ago. Not long before that, in 1978, they were just a trio of blond hopefuls waiting at the nation's gates with a daring hybrid of punk and reggae which seemed to catch the ear of many of the pre-punk old guard. Stewart Copeland's new book, Police Diaries, in words (his diaries circa 1976-78) and pictures (photos and illustrations), takes us back to those early days of The Police. It is, according to the drummer, \"the fun part of the Police story, the starving years when we didn't have any songs to play just crap punk songs, mostly written by me [some of them on a CD in the Signature edition of the book]. \"These formative years,\" Copeland attests, \"are the interesting part of the Police story, which is why the book focuses on the period of formation and exploration that preceded the stadium tours - it shows how three disparate individuals bonded before figuring out what music to play...\"
7 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
Survivor
Nineteen seventyeight should have been Cidny Bullens' year, until a record label acquisition brought it to a crashing halt. Now, as Charles Donovan discovers, the musician who once had to choose between Dylan and Elton is back... with a difference, a new album, and 2023's most compelling rock memoir
10 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
STUDIO WHIZZ OF THE YEAR TODD RUNDGREN
On pioneering visuals, Meat Loaf, new wave and producing Tom Robinson
3 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
MY 1978 LEO SAYER
Hail the bubblehaired balladeer
2 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
DISCO AUTEUR OF THE YEAR NILE RODGERS
A pivotal 12 months for the guitarist-writer-producer and the Chic hit factory
4 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
SYNTHPOP PIONEER OF THE YEAR GARY NUMAN
The chance discovery of a Moog synth and a total rethink of direction...
5 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
THE YEAR IN...POST-PUNK/ NEW WAVE
In 1978, the Sex Pistols were disintegrating, and punk calcifying as literalists like Sham 69 attempted to carry on in its “true”, reductionist spirit, which would eventually degenerate into Oi. John Lydon was growing weary of Sid Vicious’s glassy-eyed nihilism, of manager Malcolm McClaren’s treatment of the Pistols like pawns in his own neo-situationist game. With a parting shot of, “Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?” onstage in San Francisco at the start of the year, Lydon dropped his mic and quit the group
4 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
MY 1978 ΤΟΥΛΗ WILLCOX
A film debut is just the start of it all...
2 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
MAN OF THE YEAR JOHN LYDON
For John Lydon, 1978 was a pivotal year, leaving the Sex Pistols and forming Pil
6 min |
October 2023
Record Collector
33% minutes with...Glen Matlock
In stark contrast with the misinformation and backstabbing aimed at Glen Matlock on his departure from the Sex Pistols in 1977, their reunion in 1996 saw the bassist reinstated and his significance in the band’s history re-evaluated. After spending the late 70s and 80s in a succession of shortlived bands, and a stint with Iggy Pop, Matlock channeled the momentum from the Pistols’ 90s revival into an ongoing solo career. On his sixth album, Consequences Coming, his Pistols-era knack for a sharp tune is paired with politically charged lyrics. “It’s a word to the wise,” he tells Record Collector.
5 min |
August 2023
Record Collector
THE ENGINE ROOM
The unsung heroes who helped forge modern music
4 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
UNDER THE RADAR
Artists, bands, and labels meriting more attention
4 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
33% minutes with...Chuck D
The Public Enemy founder is Zooming Record Collector from his study at his LA home. It’s the middle of the night, which is when he works best, he says. Dressed in de rigueur black T-shirt with baseball cap, he’s sat with rows and rows of neatly filed CDs to one side and, to the other, a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf crammed with art books. He’s just become the subject of his own, Livin’ Loud, which collects over 250 of his paintings, sketches and drawings of musical and sports heroes from Gladys Knight and James Brown to basketball player Julius Irving aka Dr J. In between are political cartoons and satirical skits. Always the restless creative, he’s also just launched the cultural app, Bring The Noise, and published his first of what he calls ‘naphic grovels’ on his own Enemy Books. “I was raised with an artist’s mentality,” he says
4 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
musictovisit
Bob Stanley carries pop’s baggage everywhere Britain’s secret radio hits
3 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
MYSTERY RUSHENT RECORDING
Ian Shirley uncovers the story behind post-punk/synthpop producer Martin Rushent’s 60s group, The Nett, and meets his band-mate from way back when, Gerry Shadbolt
7 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
SACRED & ROUND
Set up by Eddie Singleton with Berry Gordy’s ex-wife Raynoma (Miss Ray) in 1964, the Shrine label, based in Washington DC, has been highly collectable for over 50 years. Shrine had no hits – in fact, they had very few sales at all. What it did have was musical talent and a business plan that ended in glorious failure – thereby making the 20 singles that were pressed sought-after by soul aficonados. As a new Ace Records compilation rounds them up in one place, Ady Croasdell gazes enviously down the list of their releases – with estimated asking prices in Mint condition
7 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
SILENT SHOUT
With an acclaimed final album on the shelves, Janis Ian was on one last lap of glory, with a lifetime achievement award and the European leg of her farewell tour to look forward to. Then everything changed. She tells Charles Donovan what happened…
10+ min |
September 2023
Record Collector
RIGHT SAID 'FRED
Paul Jones celebrates the 60th anniversary of the band formerly known as Manfred Mann, with help from Mike d’Abo and guitarist Tom McGuinness. Man in the middle: Michael Heatley
9 min |
September 2023
Record Collector
COOL VARIATIONS
At the start of the 80s Tom Waits felt trapped. Hemmed in by the persona he’d created over the previous decade, his salvation came with the album Swordfishtrombones, an artistic volte-face that celebrates its 40th birthday this month. Wesley Doyle looks at its creation – via an album-byalbum run-through of what led up to it – and reassesses the peerless work that followed
10+ min |
September 2023
Record Collector
NOT FADE AWAY 1973's IMMORTAL LIVE DEBUT LPs
‘THE 1973 LIVE LP WAS THE ALBUM ON STEROIDS’
10+ min |
September 2023
Record Collector
"We wanted to sound like Sinatra with a fairlight"
As the UK synthpop scene gathered momentum at the turn of the 80s, a bunch of ambitious modernists from South Yorkshire were thinking bigger. ABC, in a very different yet not entirely unrelated post-punk way to The Human League, Soft Cell, Haircut One Hundred et al, would create a vision of shiny, post-modern pop that endures on their finest recorded hour: The Lexicon Of Love. Leader Martin Fry remembers how, for a short, surreal period, it all went so gloriously right. Alphabet superstar:
10+ min |
August 2023
Record Collector
Wild At Heart
How the 'best new band in Britain' earned their title...
5 min |
August 2023
Record Collector
The Collector
This month: musician/ producer Chasms
5 min |
August 2023
Record Collector
CANDID CANDI
The Southern soul, disco and gospel queen tells Ian Shirley about her acclaimed Fame recordings and how real-life pain helped her deliver those heartrending vocals
10+ min |
August 2023
Record Collector
Divine Intervention
Having conceded that “addiction took years off me” and spent much of the late 20th century in a personal and artistic limbo, Kevin Rowland is now making up for lost time with a revitalised Dexys. As they prepare to release their new album, The Feminine Divine, this soon-to-be-septuagenarian is keen to express an older, wiser worldview and put the finishing touches to a back catalogue he can be proud of. “We haven’t done that much, really,” he tells Rob Hughes.
10+ min |
August 2023
Record Collector
THUNDER BIRD
While the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal spawned plenty of globe-straddling rock superstars, some of its less high-profile names still made their mark, even if more in influence than record sales. Tyneside terrors Raven were one such pack of unsung heroes, but their reputation has been rightly rehabilitated since their reformation at the turn of the millennium, and as a new album is released they sound revitalised as they come off a triumphant anniversary tour. Murder of crows: Rich Davenport
10+ min |
August 2023
Record Collector
RENAISSANCE MAN
Keyboard supremo Lonnie Liston Smith is one of jazz’s pre-eminent sidemen, playing with Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Pharoah Sanders and Miles Davis. But it was as a leader that he came into his own, trailblazing a style that blended improvisation with soul and funk grooves. Spreading messages of peace and tranquility through positivist lyrics, albums such as Expansions, Visions Of A New World, Reflections Of A Golden Dream, and Renaissance proved crossover hits. Diversions into boogie followed before his renown among the rap generation led to his involvement in Guru’s groundbreaking project, Jazzmatazz. Tempted back into the studio by producers Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad, the keyboardist’s first new album in 25 years rekindles the magic of his 70s recordings. He talks Paul Bowler through some of the key albums of his remarkable career.
10 min |
August 2023
Record Collector
HIGH FLYING BIRD
As the forbidding figure behind New York post-punk noise provocateurs Swans, Michael Gira spent the bulk of the 80s as the sworn enemy of conventional melody, until new creative partners and an unsatisfactory spell with a major label saw new influences come into play. More recently he has ventured back down that original avant-garde road armed with a bigger, more ambitious sound. “I write because I have to,” he tells
10+ min |
August 2023
Record Collector
SO NOIR SO GOOD
With The Cure’s US dates being hailed as the tour of the summer, Siouxsie cutting an imperiously witchy figure at festivals, everyone from Bauhaus to The Mission still active, various releases including a box set, a slew of books, and newspaper articles, Goth seems destined to outlive all other subcultures. The polymorphously perverse post-punk movement that began in a club in London has since seeped into all corners of modern life, from Batman movies to Billie Eilish – even Eurovision 2023 seemed inundated with goth sonics/imagery. Jeremy Allen casts a kohl eye over its origin story and speaks to goth prime movers.
10+ min |
August 2023
Record Collector
The Flaming Lips – "We like Sex Pistols and Pink Floyd"
Across four decades and countless madcap ideas, The Flaming Lips have evolved from indie noiseniks to purveyors of Disneyesque symphonia to multi-media art ensemble, each new album expanding the group's sonic world and conceptual ambitions. Accidental hits (She Don't Use Jelly; Do You Realize??) have pulled them into the mainstream on occasion, and yet the Lips have consistently refused to court commercial success and often seemed to actively shun it, with a string of extra-curricular projects, including a homemade sci-fi movie and a line in deconstructive covers albums, defying even the most hardened Lips fan to make sense of it all. Frontman Wayne Coyne tells Jason Draper why the extreme-embracing unit will always remain a "weirdo studio band".
10+ min |