Music
Record Collector
"I TOLD MICKIE MOST TO SHOVE IT"
The quintessential contender, Terry Reid, who died recently, passed on Robert Plant's role in Led Zeppelin, left Deep Purple to Ian Gillan and was the vocal equal of Paul Rodgers and Steve Marriott. He also, as this \"lost interview\" confirms, was the victim of numerous career mishaps. Not that he would have done things differently, as he told Nick Hasted...
10 min |
November 2025
Record Collector
Foundation Course
Expanded edition of second album reveals how David Byrne & co. tightened their sound and made a record built to last.
4 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
Heard Ya Missed Me WELL I'M BACK!
For the UK singles chart of the week beginning 17 October 1992, the top spot went to singer-songwriter Tasmin Archer’s Sleeping Satellite, a sparkling electro-acoustic number with an addictive, shuffling backbeat.
4 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
Something In The Water
Four brash, uncompromising albums from the Thames Delta that provided more than just a shot of R&B when British pop needed change.
3 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
SCOTT...OF THE ART CHART HIT
Remember M's Pop Muzik, that striking No 2 smash from May 1979? Like Gary Numan and Flying Lizards' '79 hits, it was a sign of a synth-pop future yet to come. And now M aka Robin Scott is going back to that future, with his first album on a major label for 40 years. Southend, London, Canvey, Westcliff:
10+ min |
September 2025
Record Collector
Out With A Bang
Dance-pop heroes wave farewell, with some top-drawer guest spots sprucing up the send-off.
3 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
Connie Francis 1937-2025
The American singer and actress was one of the biggest pop stars of the 50s and early 60s.
7 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
THE ENGINE ROOM
The unsung heroes who helped forge modern music
4 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
THE HOUSE OF DUNLOP
There’s more to making a live album than meets the eye, or ear, as Will Macnab attests in a case study of soundtracking singer-songwriter Gareth Dunlop
3 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
“EVERYTHING I DO? GREAT SONG!”
Canadian singer, songwriter, photographer and purveyor of commercial rock, Bryan Adams, returns with album No 17, Roll With The Punches. It’s incredible that he still finds the time to record and tour, given everything else he does – including activism for various causes. Yet, while Joel McIver was expecting an enlightening chat about a 40-year career of playing arenas, possibly with some interesting anecdotes about Tina Turner and the Canadian honours system, he wasn't expecting to duet with Adams on a rendition of Britain’s longest-running No 1 single...
10+ min |
September 2025
Record Collector
Cutting Edge
Andrew Weatherall's dream studio team that he turned into a band thrusts again.
2 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
No Backing Down
No Backing Down Brett Anderson & co. remain in thrilling, exhilarating form as their second act hits new heights.
3 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
GREAT GIGS FROM THIS GUY
With a new live album imminent, and the critical and commercial success of Luck And Strange under his belt, David Gilmour talks with Daryl Easlea, who last interviewed him for Record Collector 23 years ago. So much has happened since then. Reflecting on his new live film and album – Live At Circus Maximus, Rome/The Luck And Strange Concerts – Gilmour assesses where he's at in his 80th year, and, energised by his 2024 tour, reflects on some other landmark performances in his career.
10+ min |
September 2025
Record Collector
Sister Act One
Behold moody rockers' ambitious, if odd-sounding, debut album in repackaged form. It's gloomy, it's grandiloquent... best not mention the other G word.
2 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
VALUE ADDED FACTS
Ian Shirley, esteemed alumnus of the Rare Record Price Guide, answers your questions
10+ min |
September 2025
Record Collector
ARRESTING DEVELOPMENT
It's a badge of honour to be one of rock's most divisive bands, and one that Cardiacs' late, great captain, Tim Smith, might have worn with pride. Jo Kendall hears from Tim's brother Jim, Cardiacs' longstanding bassist, about their ongoing legacy as they celebrate the publication of a book, a reissue of second album, On Land And In The Sea, and the long-awaited lost LP, LSD.
9 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
The Collector
This month: Seth Lakeman
6 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
FACTORY RECORDS THE VERNONS GIRLS
The Vernons Girls (Parlophone PMC 1052, LP, mono, UK, 1958) £45
4 min |
September 2025
Record Collector
THE SUPERBAD SUPERNOVA OF SLY STONE
Fronting his livewire mixed-race, multi-gendered Family Stone, Sly Stone looked like he could have stepped out of a blaxploitation film, except that era was still to come in 1968 when he ignited his psychedelic soul inferno with Dance To The Music and changed black music overnight.
10+ min |
August 2025
Record Collector
20/20 VISIONARIES
In the space of two days in June, we lost two giants of popular music, aged 82: Brian Wilson and Sly Stone. Both were leaders of family bands, both deeply troubled, yet both created radically beautiful/brilliant music in the studio. Here, Bob Stanley pays tribute to the adored Beach Boy while on page 84, Kris Needs salutes the genius formally known as Sylvester Stewart.
10+ min |
August 2025
Record Collector
MONUMENT
Numerous rockers have been immortalised with statues. Joe Geesin surveys some star-studded memorials
4 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
"STOP TRYING TO BE CLEVER, AND JUST GO WITH THE FLOW"
A leading figure in the 60s UK folk revival, Martin Carthy always relied on a simple songwriting philosophy, through his friendship with Bob Dylan and Paul Simon to his role in moulding the folk-rock movement with Steeleye Span. Since then, his creative and romantic partnership with late partner Norma Waterson helped create the “first family” of British folk. “There have been several ‘me's’ through the years, and some of them are very interesting,” he tells Rob Hughes.
10+ min |
August 2025
Record Collector
Generation Z- the future of collecting?
BPI report spotlights music habits, interests and priorities of the Y2K-plus cohort
4 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
HITE MAN'S BLUES
Just as Canned Heat were reinventing electric blues for the Woodstock generation, their founder members were avidly collecting old records. Their leader Bob 'The Bear' Hite's death saw him leave behind a trove of 78s, 45s and old blues recordings. Tony Burke tells the story of a band of blues-obsessed record collectors
7 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
The Collector
This month: Rob Wheeler
7 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
CHILD'S PLAY
Before he became a world-conquering songwriter/ producer, Desmond Child tore up New York for one glorious year at the end of the 70s with his rock-R&B-disco fusion group, Desmond Child & Rouge. Now, the Laura Nyro-adoring 70s Scissor Sisters™ tell Charles Donovan they're coming back to finish what they started.
10+ min |
August 2025
Record Collector
AI Quality
Back in the mid-70s, when all sorts of imaginative music could be heard emanating from the city of Canterbury, Hatfield And The North ranked as one of the most interesting groups on the scene. Little wonder, when you consider they featured ex-members of Caravan, Gong, Matching Mole and Egg. It was a short, fascinating trip, with a lengthy genesis, as Hatfield's bassist and singer Richard Sinclair and keyboardist Dave Stewart tell Chris Wheatley
9 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
33½ minutes with...Skin
Skunk Anansie singer Deborah 'Skin' Dyer OBE, born in Brixton, London in 1967, was the first black British artist to headline Glastonbury in 1999. Skin once described her band's dynamic music as 'clit-rock', but she can't be confined to a single sound, as her two solo albums demonstrated in 2003 and again in 2006.
4 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
SUGAR COPPER BLUE
I bought Sugar's Copper Blue in 1992 on the back of a great review in the NME and I also got to see the band live when they toured the UK.
6 min |
August 2025
Record Collector
ROBERT FORSTER & THE GO-BETWEENS
As co-founder of The Go-Betweens, Robert Forster was one half of the greatest songwriting partnership in Australian pop, alongside the late Grant McLennan. His solo career hasn't been too shabby, either, and the latest fruit of his labours is new album Strawberries, in which he responds to more challenges in his personal life with some of his most luminous songwriting to date. He takes Johnnie Johnstone through his back catalogue.
10+ min |