CARGO COLLECTIVE

MARTA DEL GRANDI BAS JAN DEATH PILL DAVE EVANS

SELVA
FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
A refined devotional suite of astute pop that flows
effortlessly with a Laurel Canyon sparkle, Lynchian
etherealism and dramatic Morricone scores. “Utterly
beautiful” Clash
BACK TO THE SWAMP
FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
From the London-based experimental post punk quartet,
a poignant collection of perfectly crafted pop songs
that retains their authentic indie edginess. “Beautifully
fractured art pop” MOJO
DEATH PILL (2ND EDITION)
NEW HEAVY SOUNDS LP / CD
Death Pill, are an all-female hardcore punk power trio
of considerable muscle from Ukraine, combining metal-
core, punk, thrash metal and oodles of ‘Riot Grrl’ vibe.
ELEPHANTASIA
EARTH RECORDINGS LP / CD
Newly remastered and rediscovered this legendary
super rare album was originally released on Village
Thing. For fans of Nick Drake, Bill Fay and Davy Graham.
“Cult status guaranteed” Uncut.

BONNACONS OF DOOM EMPTY COUNTRY THE MOUNTAIN GOATS BEIRUT

SIGNS
ROCKET RECORDINGS LP / CD
The mirrored masked collective return with their mighty
2nd album. Transcendent powers of heavy amplification,
psychedelic explorations & immersive electronic
repetitions combine to create an incredibly unique
listening experience.
EMPTY COUNTRY II
TOUGH LOVE LP / CD
2nd album of visceral, post-Americana indie rock from
Empty Country, the most recent outlet for Cymbals
Eat Guitars, Joseph D’Agostino. Recorded at Mitch
Easter’s studio (R.E.M.) studio with John Agnello, ECII is
an ambitious, widescreen meditation on the collapse
of America.
JENNY FROM THEBES
MERGE RECORDS LP / CD
Nine songs leading up to the day Jenny bought the
Kawasaki, two from the immediate aftermath, and one
from a distant highway down the road.
HADSEL
POMPEII RECORDS LP / CD
Zachary Condon describes “The few hours of light would
expose the unfathomable beauty of the mountains &
the fjords, & the hours-long twilights would fill me with
subdued excitement. I’d like to believe that scenery is
somehow present in the music.”

DIRT BUYER ART FEYNMAN SUNWATCHERS THE SERFS

DIRT BUYER II
BAYONET RECORDS LP / CD
Joe Sutkowski has entered a new era of Dirt Buyer,
representing the vibrancy of his red-dyed hair and
invigorating live performances. ‘Dirt Buyer II’ is a
reintroduction and an emotional, sonic blitz.
BE GOOD THE CRAZY BOYS
WESTERN VINYL LP / CD
Art Feyman’s new album stitches art pop and worldbeat
into an electric quilt of anxiety-induced mania, and
relentless grooves, while affectionately evoking
predecessors like Lizzy Mercier Descloux and
Talking Heads
MUSIC IS VICTORY OVER TIME
TROUBLE IN MIND RECORDS LP / CD
Blazing & cathartic 5th album from the Brooklyn group
Sunwatchers synergies everything great about what
they do, fusing fiery avant-spiritual jazz & mind-bending
psychedelia with a righteous punk spirit & an infectious
& freaky sense of humor.
HALF EATEN BY DOGS
TROUBLE IN MIND RECORDS LP / CD
The 3rd album from these beguiling Cincinnati, OH
synth-punks laces a post-industrial electronic pulse into
motorik punk ragers, addictive late-night floor-fillers,
& ghostly, atmospheric soundscapes. Stygian coldwave
that feels simultaneously alien & entrancing

MINT FIELD DAVID EUGENE EDWARDS HALF STACK VIDEO AGE

APRENDER A SER HYACINTH SITTING PRETTY AWAY FROM THE CASTLE
FELTE LP SARGENT HOUSE LP / CD ROYAL OAKIE CD WINSPEAR LP / CD
Mint Field channel their unique blend of avant psych Debut solo album, known for leading beloved bands Building on the dusty country and garage inflected ‘On its surface, ‘Away From the Castle’ is a document
shoegaze against complex rhythms, loud, shimmering 16 Horsepower and Wovenhand. He delivers a sound indie-rock of their past releases, “Sitting Pretty” thrums of a band having fun & rediscovering their love for
guitars, and softly sighing vocals, on this intimate uniquely his own, with a vulnerability & introspection with an expansive energy, adding optimistic songwriting making music together, but it’s also their most honest &
exploration of nostalgia and the melancholy of daily life. unheard from him before. Hyacinth puts the man’s and power-pop melodies to the mix. personal work yet. Video Age distilled to its purest form.’
voice, & sparing instrumentation into the main focus.
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 CON T EN T S
LONDON ✦ MEMPHIS ✦ DEEPCUT

DECEMBER 2023 ISSUE 361

FEATURES
28 JOE WALSH The loose
cannon-turned-Mr Dependable
talks addiction, the Eagles, VetsAid
and more. “I was really insecure. I felt
stupid all the time,” he tells Bob Mehr.

34 CARLY SIMON In a
hyper-rare interview, Simon explores
her formative first solo albums,
shares diary entries about Dylan, and
– naturally – revisits You’re So Vain.

40 THURSTON
MOORE Noise terrorist,
tastemaker and now man of letters,
Sonic Youth’s leggy blond on the
sounds that changed his world:
“Nirvana stood alone – this
charmed thing.”

46 BOB DYLAN Rare

photographs and thrilling artefacts
of Bobness, exclusively extracted
from Bob Dylan: Mixing Up The
Medicine – Dylan’s Tulsa Archive now
in book form.

54 BLACK PUMAS
Mashing soul and hip-hop with
classic songwriting, Eric Burton
and Adrian Quesada are poised to
unleash their second album. But
they don’t always see eye to eye…
“I never 58 GRAHAM PARKER
said, Sly, The new wave’s odd man out forges
on while looking back with help from
don’t do his old pals in The Rumour. “Graham
wasn’t mucking around,” they tell
drugs. He Sylvie Simmons.

would have 64 SLY STONE Joel Selvin

assembles witnesses to the utter
laughed madness of Slyworld as concocted
Fresh, his last great LP. Cue: drugs,
at me.” guns, music, drugs, drugs…

STEPHEN PALEY COVER STORY

ON SLY STONE,
P64
70 THE ROLLING
STONES As they deliver their
first album of new songs in 18 years,
MOJO grills the Stones about the
myths and reality of life inside The
World’s Greatest Rock’n’Roll Band,
Charlie, Hoagy, elder statesmanship
and a search for “the soul of The
Getty

Rolling Stones”.

MOJO 3
 This must be the place:
Talking Heads’ Stop
Making Sense returns
to the big screen, p112.
Rising stars:
art-punks
Bas Jan, p26.
THIS MONTH'S CONTRIBUTORS INCLUDE...
Mark Seliger
Mark’s iconic music portraits,
famously showcased on over 188
covers of Rolling Stone, now
include this month’s MOJO cover
photo. While immortalising art-
ists and notables for too many
magazines to list, he has directed
music videos, published books,
and is the lead singer of country
band Rusty Truck.
4 MOJO
REGULARS
9 ALL BACK TO MY PLACE
Roxy’s Andy Mackay, Jockstrap and Bunnyman
Will Sergeant dig deep into their record boxes.
114 REAL GONE Jimmy Buffett, Brendan
Croker, Richard Davis, Gary Wright, Roger
Whittaker and many more, hail and farewell.
120 ASK MOJO Just what linked The KLF
to Ukraine?
122 HELLO GOODBYE From NY’s art
underground to the stage of the Barbican,
Martin Rev recalls the glory that was Suicide.
WHAT GOES ON!
12 PETER GABRIEL In a new in-depth
interview, the polymath talks up his first new
LP in 20 years, tell us where he’s been, what’s
to come, and the prospect of living forever.
16 MICKY DOLENZ The last Monkee
has a new EP – covering the songs of R.E.M.
How did he get here, and what’s next?
18 THE STREETS Original pirate-geezer
Mike Skinner is back with noir movie/LP hybrid
The Darker The Shadow The Brighter The Light.
“It’s been horrific,” he confides: read on for why.
20 MIKE STOLLER He and songwriting
partner Jerry Leiber were there when
rock’n’roll blew up worldwide. Busy with
a new jazz project, he reflects on Elvis,
Phil Spector and Dylan.
22 MEAT PUPPETS Loved by Kurt
Cobain, rustic punk outfit Meat Puppets
vowed to “chase that Dionysian psychedelic
buzz.” Against all odds, as they tell us, they’re
Down on the
back to try again.
Bayou: Robert
Finley, Lead
Album, p82. MOJO FILTER
82 NEW ALBUMS Robert Finley
ventures deep into the swamp, plus Lol
Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee, King Gizzard,
Laura Veirs, Jeffrey Martin and more.
96 REISSUES Joni Mitchell’s Archives Vol. 3,
plus Nirvana, J.J. Cale, New Order and more.
110 BOOKS Philip Norman’s exhaustive
George Harrison biog, plus Pauline Murray,
Island Records, Ian Broudie and Glen Matlock.
112 SCREEN Same as it ever was: Jonathan
Demme’s dazzling Stop Making Sense returns.
MOJO ISSN 1351-0193 (USPS 17424) is published 12 times a year by H Bauer Publishing Ltd, Media House, Peterborough
Business Park, Lynch Wood, Peterborough PE2 6EA United Kingdom. Airfreight and mailing in the USA by agent named
World Container INC 150-15, 183rd St, Jamaica, NY 11413, USA. Periodicals Postage Paid at Brooklyn, NY 11256.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to MOJO, Air Business Ltd, c/o World Container INC 150-15, 183rd St, Jamaica, NY
11413, USA. Subscription records are maintained at Bauer Media, Subscriptions, CDS Global, Tower House, Sovereign Park,
Lathkill Street, Market Harborough, Leicester LE16 9EF, United Kingdom. Air Business Ltd is acting as our mailing agent.
© Mark Seliger, Deanne Fitzmaurice, Aurora Horwood
Danny Eccleston Joel Selvin
A stone Stones freak since discov- Joel returns to his landmark Sly
ering his parents’ copies of Let It & The Family Stone oral history –
Bleed and Rolled Gold at an recently reissued by Permuted
impressionable age, MOJO’s Sen- Press – to deliver the tall tale of
ior Editor interviewed the band Sly’s Fresh. Selvin covered pop
for this month’s cover story. He music for the San Francisco
particularly enjoyed his after- Chronicle since the early 1970s.
noon dissecting the minutiae of His biography of troubled
the Stones’ groove with Professor drummer Jim Gordon, Drums &
Steve Jordan. Demons, is due early next year.

Recorded in 1960, this is the most
recent cut on Love In Vain. But
Blind Gary Davis (usually known
as the Reverend Gary Davis) had
been playing the holy blues since
the early 20th century – he was
born in 1896 – around North
and South Carolina. By 1960,
he was a cornerstone of the folk
revival in New York, inspiration
to Dylan, the Grateful Dead and
many more.
Written by Gary Davis. First released: 1960
One story about this other
Mississippi Johnson is that it was he
who came up with the devil/soul/
crossroads fable usually attributed
to the unrelated Robert. Tommy
Johnson’s renown is often focused
on Canned Heat Blues, a paean to
drinking cooking fuel which gave
that band their name. Cool Drink Of
Water Blues comes from the same
1928 session, a showcase for his
startling, uncanny falsetto; the
unwise choice of refreshment this
time is gasoline.
Written by Tommy Johnson. First released: 1928
6 MOJO
Rolling Log Blues, in contrast, is one
of the oldest tracks here, nearly a
century old. Kimbrough (no relation
to Junior Kimbrough, as far as we
know) worked under a number of
other names, including the Kansas
City Butterball. A big-voiced
vaudeville star, she could also
harness a formidable droning
intensity, especially when she rode
the hypnotic picking of accompanist
Miles Pruitt. See also Buffy
Sainte-Marie’s cover from 1966.
Written by Kimbrough. First released: 1927
The true identity of Ruby Glaze isn’t
100 per cent certain, but evidence
suggests she was Kate McTell, at the
time wife of Blind Willie McTell;
that’s him, as ‘Hot Shot Willie’,
providing exhortations on this 1934
side. Kate McTell played on-stage
with her husband through the ’30s,
but by the end of the decade she’d
become a nurse: from 1942 to 1971,
she worked as an army nurse at Fort
Gordon, Georgia.
Written by Glaze, McTell. First released: 1934
Jackie Brenston’s Rocket 88, from
1951, is often cited as the first
rock’n’roll song, but this rollicking
boogie woogie from 1929 has a
good claim to have got there 22
years earlier. Le Moise ‘Blind
Roosevelt’ Graves and his enigmatic
brother Uaroy (who was also nearly
blind) went on to helm the
Mississippi Jook Band in the 1930s:
their Barbecue Bust is another
frantic proto-rock’n’roll banger.
Written by R Graves. First released: 1929
The three 78s Geeshie Wiley and
accompanying guitarist Elvie
Thomas released on Paramount in
1930 have such a haunting pull,
many historians and journalists,
from Mack McCormick to John
Jeremiah Sullivan, have tried and
failed to find out more about this
elusive and magnetic country blues
singer. Last Kind Words is the most
famous, and bewitching, of the six
Wiley songs extant: Robert Plant
and Alison Krauss recently covered
it on 2021’s Raise The Roof.
Written by G Wiley. First released: 1930
A key track on Harry Smith’s
Anthology Of American Folk Music,
Tennessean Sleepy John Estes is
the vocalist on this 1932 side, a
wailing foundational influence
on Robert Plant. But listen out
for Rachell (who wrote the song)
on jagged mandolin, and the
uncredited Jab Jones on barrel-
house piano. Rachell was one of
the last 1920s bluesmen active,
before he passed away in 1997.
Written by Yank Rachell. First released: 1932
Down At The Depot, with its
quicksilver fingerpicking, sounds
very much of a piece with the 1920s
and ’30s classics assembled here.
But John Lee was a generation
younger than Robert Johnson,
Charley Patton et al, and recorded
this and one other single as late as
1952. Alabaman Lee had retired by
1960, before being hunted down by
bluesologist Gayle Dean Wardlow:
an album, also titled Down At The
Depot, was recorded and released
in 1974.
Written by Charles Wernsing. First released: 1952
 OBERT JOHNSON WAS ONLY 31 YEARS DEAD WHEN
The Rolling Stones covered his Love In Vain on Let It
Bleed in 1969, but already his music felt as if it were
being broadcast from a very different, very ancient
world. “The old, weird America,” the author Greil Marcus called
it, one documented in detail on Harry Smith’s truly arcane
Anthology Of American Folk Music.
There’s always a danger of othering these country blues,
these honest expressions of grief and lust and other appetites;
to patronise Johnson and his contemporaries as somehow
supernatural forces rather than musicians trying to make a
living in arduous and racially prejudiced times. Many of the
15 tracks we’ve brought together for this month’s MOJO CD,
Love In Vain, are nearly a century old now and, so rough and
ready and mostly unmediated, were not built to last. But the
ephemeral can grow old and surprise us all, can shape the
culture in ways none of these great musicians could’ve
anticipated. Love In Vain is not a collection of historical
relics, but one of enduringly spectacular music.

No blues artist has been as
mythologised as Robert Johnson,
thanks in no small part to the tall tale
of him selling his soul to the devil at
a Mississippi crossroads. Phantas-
magorical yarns, though, can detract
from the extraordinary resonance
of his actual music. Love In Vain
Blues was the A-side of Johnson’s
final 78, in 1939, but this alternate
version didn’t surface until 1970 as,
post-Stones cover, the hunger for
more Johnson music only intensified.
Written by Robert Johnson. First released: 1939
The first of two songs that deal with
the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927.
Charley Patton’s High Water Every-
where might be more famous, but
Mattie Delaney’s Tallahatchie River
Blues is an undersung classic, one of
only two tracks she is known to have
recorded. Delaney’s life remains
shrouded in mystery: one story
suggests she ran away from Tchula,
Mississippi, to become a musician in
Memphis. Nothing is known of her
life after this 1930 session.
Written by Delaney. First released: 1930
Charley Patton’s anguished
rendering of the Mississippi Flood,
recorded in 1929, proved to be so
sprawling that it had to be split into
two halves, one on each side of a 78.
An associate of Robert Johnson,
Tommy Johnson and the young
Howlin’ Wolf, Patton was one of the
bigger stars of the early blues
scene, decades before his gritty
testifying prompted Dylan to write
High Water (For Charley Patton).
Written by Patton. First released: 1930
The murder of Billy Lyons by Lee
‘Stagger Lee’ Shelton in 1895 had
become memorialised in song by
1897, written down by 1910, and
recorded (by Waring’s Penns-
ylvanians) by 1923. This 1927 version
is by a Mississippi duo known as the
Down Home Boys. Note: Nick Cave’s
Stagger Lee is not a cover, but an
original song about the same events.
Written by Unknown. First released: 1927

Edward James ‘Son’ House Jr was

Another post-war throwback,
I Want A Slice Of Your Puddin’
was the flipside of one of the
two 78s Julius King recorded in
Nashville in 1952. Little else is
known about this Tennessean
artist, beyond his birth and death
dates (1915-1970), his penchant
for ragtime Piedmont blues in
conjunction with pudding-based
metaphors, and the kazoo skills
which lend this fine rarity a
distinct jaunty air.
Written by King. First released: 1952
If Julius King embodies the blues’
ribald spirit, few capture its
supernatural potential as well as
James, a sometime bootlegger and,
subsequently, minister who
recorded a landmark session for
Paramount in 1931: this is the flip of
his first 78, Cherry Red Blues. James
was rediscovered by John Fahey in a
Mississippi hospital in 1964. That
same year he played the Newport
Folk Festival, and recorded several
albums before his death in 1969.
Written by James. First released: 1931
another blues great rediscovered
in 1964: the Mississippi sparring
partner of Charley Patton was
working at a station in Rochester,
New York, blissfully ignorant of
the renewed interest in his music.
Clarksdale Moan was released
by Paramount in 1930, but was
unheard for decades. It was not
until 2005 that a collector finally
discovered a 78 of the song; it
made its first appearance on
a compilation in 2006.
Written by House. First released: 1930
 Jockstrap
ELECTRO-POP GEAR-SHIFTERS
What music are you currently
grooving to?
Taylor Skye: At the moment the
artists on rotation are Elysia Cramp-
ton, Hamdi, Kylie Minogue, Mahler,
Mala, Skream, Smiley, Big Thief,
Stevie Wonder, Ganzi Mdudu,
Indigo Girls and Héctor Lavoe.
Georgia Ellery: I am currently
grooving to the new Kylie Minogue,
old Lana Del Rey, Joan Baez, and
my fave, Madonna.
What, if push comes to shove,
is your all-time favourite album?
TS: It would have to be Blue by
Joni Mitchell for me.
GE: My all-time favourite is Heaven
Or Las Vegas by Cocteau Twins, a
really perfect album, but Blue by
Joni Mitchell would be my second.
What was the first record you ever
bought? And where did you buy it?
TS: Happiness by Hurts. I bought it
on iTunes on my mum and dad’s
computer in 2011.
GE: The first record I ever bought was
Avril Lavigne’s Let Go on CD from
Safeway, which is now Morrisons.
Which musician, other than your-
self, have you ever wanted to be?
TS: Elvis I think. I am currently in
America, you see.
GE: I would have to say Lady Gaga.
What do you sing in the shower?
TS: Any song from Chet Baker Sings.
I usually have baths though.
GE: I sing my scales!
What is your favourite Saturday
night record?
TS: Probably Magnetic Man by
Magnetic Man. It is a classic.
GE: Arular by M.I.A. is the best,
when you wanna get dancing.
And your Sunday morning record?
TS: Easily Waltz For Debby by the
Bill Evans Trio.
GE: Judee Sill’s Heart Food. Calming.
Jockstrap’s I<3UQTINVU – a remix of
their debut I Love You Jennifer B, is out
November 2 on Rough Trade.

A LL B AC K TO MY PL AC E
THE STARS REVEAL THE SONIC DELIGHTS GUARANTEED TO GET THEM GOING...

Will Sergeant from like nursery rhymes to total

BUNNYMAN,
GUITAR MAN
What music are you currently
grooving to?
The Lazy Eyes, these young lads
from Australia, are really good – sort
of modern, still psychedelic, verging
on prog rock. They’re great live. Also
Liz Fraser and Damon Reece’s Sun
Seeker EP, and Brian Auger & The
Trinity with Julie Driscoll – organ-
based funky jazz!
What, if push comes to shove,
is your all-time favourite album?
Pink Floyd’s The Piper At The Gates
Of Dawn. It’s so interesting and
dense, you can go anywhere with it,
Eddie Whelan, Alex Hurst
space rock. I love that line, “Lying on
an eiderdown…”
What was the first record you ever
bought? And where did you buy it?
There was a music shop on Walton
Vale, or it might’ve been County
Road, in Liverpool called Crease’s.
I got The Rolling Stones’ Gimme
Shelter, which was like, Decca trying
to cash in. I actually wanted The
Who’s Who’s Next but they’d sold
out. I would have been 13. I took it to
[neighbour] Dave Mazenko’s house
and left it by his bloody lecky fire
and warped it! It still played but you
had to put a penny on the cartridge.
Which musician, other than your-
self, have you ever wanted to be?
I don’t really want to emulate any-
body else. I’d rather go my own path.
What do you sing in the shower?
I don’t. I’d make the paint peel off
the walls, just terrible. The nearest
you’re gonna get is years ago when
me and Les [Pattinson, bass] used to
put on fake Bowie voices and sing
along to The World Of David Bowie in
the van – Rubber Band and all that.
What is your favourite Saturday
night record?
A good time, vibe-yerself-up sort of
record is Led Zeppelin IV – Rock And
Roll, Black Dog – the classics!
And your Sunday morning record?
Andy Mackay
ROXY SAX EXPLORER
What music are you currently
grooving to?
I’ve always kind of liked post-rock,
ambient music, classical, jazz…
I don’t think I groove really, and I
actually don’t like having music on
when I’m doing something. I like to
sit down and listen to it. I have this
thing that music lasts as long as it’s
being performed, and hearing it
over and over takes away the magic.
that. And I love King Curtis, he’s the
What, if push comes to shove, is
sax player I admire the most. One of
your all-time favourite album?
my favourite albums is Live At The
I’d say A Hard Day’s Night is an almost Fillmore. That’s the gig that I wish I’d
perfect collection of songs, with a
been at. He played like Aretha sang –
simplicity and sincerity that is hard
it’s about the tone and the emotion,
to get. not the notes.
What was the first record you What do you sing in the shower?
ever bought? And where did you
I’ll be humming a little bit of
buy it?
Mozart, something from Don Gio-
I didn’t start buying records until I vanni. Sounds a bit la-di-dah,
went to university in Reading: I think doesn’t it?
it was the The Velvet Underground
& Nico, a big deal, from a shop on What is your favourite Saturday
the London Road. night record?
It depends. If you’re feeling a bit riot-
Which musician, other than your-
ous you might put a Stones record
self, have you ever wanted to be?
on, if I’m on my own, maybe Live At
Loads of people. I’d listen to Charlie The Fillmore, or if you’re with friends
Parker and almost burst into tears someone will say, “have a look at this
thinking, I’d never be able to play on YouTube.”
And your Sunday morning record?
“I’d listen to I go to church and I like church

Eno’s Music For Airports, Nick Drake music. Otherwise, I like Radiohead’s
or The Wicker Man soundtrack. I’ll
take me dogs to the woods or walk
Charlie Parker Kid A, a lot. Especially if you’re
having a wet shave and there’s no
up a hill somewhere. and almost razor noise.
Will Sergeant’s Echoes: A Memoir
Continued… is published by Constable.
burst into Andy Mackay and Phil Manzanera’s
AM PM is out now on BFD/Orchard.
tears.”
ANDY MACKAY
MOJO 9
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Editor
John Mulvey A LITTLE GROGGY FROM MOJO’S 30TH
Senior Editor
Danny Eccleston
birthday celebrations last month, it’s sobering to be reminded of what longevity
Creative Director can really mean. The Rolling Stones have now existed for over twice as long as
Mark Wagstaff MOJO, and while other artists of their vintage have grappled with the ageing
Production Editor
(Entertainment) process for a good couple of decades, Messrs Jagger, Richards and Wood mostly
Simon McEwen remain impervious to such trifling distractions as mortality. “It’s a weird feeling
Associate Editor
(Reviews)
to be an elder statesman,” Keith Richards tells us, though most of us would’ve
Jenny Bulley called him as much since about 1989.
Associate Editor
(News)
Mick Jagger, meanwhile, confesses to a few “slightly tongue-in-cheek
Ian Harrison references to ageing” on Hackney Diamonds, the twenty-fourth Rolling Stones
Deputy Art Editor
Del Gentleman
album and the pretext for this month’s extensive chat with the core three, their
Picture Editor pugnacious new drummer Steve Jordan, and their young producer Andrew
Matt Turner Watt. It is, hand on heart, the best Stones feature you’ll read in years: one that’s
Senior Associate Editor
Andrew Male as strong on historic myth-busting as it is on unpicking the new record, and
Contributing Editors which – amidst a justifiable blizzard of namedropping – has a superb Hoagy
Phil Alexander,
Keith Cameron, Carmichael anecdote.
Sylvie Simmons Good yarns also proliferate on the MOJO Record Club podcast, where you
Thanks for their help with this
issue: Keith Cameron, can now binge on over 30 episodes for free and hear Peter Buck, Robert Fripp,
Chris Catchpole, Ian Whent.
This month’s contributors:
Rickie Lee Jones, Thurston Moore, Kevin Rowland and many others discuss
John Aizlewood, Martin Aston, Mike
Barnes, Mark Blake, Glyn Brown, John
their musical passions with Andrew Male. It’s a series we’re very proud of, and
Bungey, Keith Cameron, Chris
Catchpole, Stevie Chick, Andy Cowan,
one that we’re thrilled to finally share with all of you.
Grayson Haver Currin, Tom Doyle,
David Fricke, Andy Fyfe, Pat Gilbert,
David Hutcheon, Jim Irvin, David Katz,
Andrew Male, Greil Marcus, James
McNair, Bob Mehr, Lucy O’Brien, Sean
O’Hagan, Mark Paytress, Andrew
Perry, Clive Prior, Jon Savage, Victoria
Segal, Joel Selvin, David Sheppard,
Irina Shtreis, Michael Simmons, Sylvie
Simmons, Mat Snow, Ben Thompson,
Kieron Tyler, Charles Waring, Lois
JOHN MULVEY, EDITOR
Wilson, Jim Wirth.
This month’s photographers:
Cover: Mark Seliger (insets Nadav
Kander, Getty), missing credit for
That man will give us anything my first marriage ended in divorce. My then girlfriend
(now wife) thought I had a rather chilled lifestyle. She
David Attie/Getty Images on page 42
of issue 360, Ed Alexander, AJ Barratt,
we want for the rest of his life took a photo of me lying in the bath smoking a cigar,
Roberta Bayley, Dave Benett, Ed I’m taking a leisurely journey through MOJO 360 with a mug of tea, reading MOJO – it was the one with
Caraeff, Catherine Ceresole, Felix Clay, as I want to enjoy all it has to offer. May I take this
Tom Copi, Joseph Cultice, Chalkie Kraftwerk on the cover. Anyway keep up the great
Davies, James Devaney, Ian Dickson, opportunity to congratulate you on reaching this work – I can’t imagine not getting a copy land on my
Henry Diltz, Jody Domingue, Steve anniversary and maintaining all that was good about doorstep every month.
Double, Greg Giannukos, Charlie
Gillett, Bernard Gotfryd, Ross Halfin, the magazine when it was released 30 years ago. I was Steve Turner, Lichfield
Gijsbert Hanekroot, Brownie Harris, in at the start and was hooked after the first issue. By
Tom Hill, Aurora Horwood, Rene issue two I was contacted out of the blue by a market
Huemer, Jesse Lirola, Richard
research company. They asked if I would join a small
We’ve got to be ruthless.
McCaffrey, Fred W. McDarrah, Chris
Mills, Jack Mitchell, Manfred Rahs, group to discuss a new music magazine that had just Think ruthless.
Jack Robinson, Mark Sullivan, York
Tillyer, Dana Trippe, Virginia Turbett, been launched. The magazine was of course MOJO, Just a quick thank you for the past 30 years and the
David Warner Ellis. and I was already pretty much hooked. The remuner- Buried Treasures CD [MOJO 360]. I have been a
ation for attending the revue and discussion was the subscriber since the very first issue and remember the
MOJO SUBSCRIPTION HOTLINE sum of £30, free beer in the venue where the meeting pleasure in 1993 at finding a serious magazine that
was held and a selection of canapés. I was the only covered the music I liked and other genres I didn’t
0185 8438884 serious music fan there and it was easy to offer a know about, with quality journalism and high quality
For subscription or back issue queries contact
CDS Global on Bauer@subscription.co.uk glowing endorsement – I became a subscriber the production values. Thirty years later and MOJO gets
To access from outside the UK
Dial: +44 (0)185 8438884
next month and have not missed one issue. better and better! And the Buried Treasures CD! I’d
In 1995 I embarked upon a new relationship after never heard of Animals That Swim until listening to

10 MOJO
their King Beer track. I now own the three albums
they produced and their Best Of collection, all hunted
down and purchased this week! How did they not
become better known?
Simon Gillett, via e-mail
…Congratulations on producing your excellent Buried
Treasures CD [MOJO 360], a candidate for MOJO’s
all-time best free CD. Great tracks by, among others,
Animals That Swim, Creation Rebel, Joe Meek, Nic
Jones and, of course, Donnie & Joe Emerson. The
previous month’s ’80s indie CD was excellent too!
Ross Kent, via e-mail
You inhuman slime!
MOJO 358 was the perfect example of different eras
and personalities coming together perfectly – Sioux-
sie, Lydon, Simon, Mott, Volman. Loved the Suede
article – particularly the cultural as well as musical
significance of that ever-so-brief window between
grunge and Britpop. My only gripe, though: as good as
that debut album was, the story of its follow-up, Dog
Man Star, had a MOJO article written all over it. The
tension of that period in the band’s history manifested
such beautiful work – Black Or Blue, Still Life, The
2 Of Us. Only meriting a scant mention of a quarter-
century old dismissal by Bernard Butler (which he has
since recanted) really did that record a disservice.
Stephen Toal, via e-mail
What did you do,
perform an exorcism?
Have to say upfront, MOJO 359 is one of your best
ever issues for its breadth and depth, while the
famously over-written-about are kept to an absolute
minimum. I even bought it in Prague at the eye-
watering cost of nearly 500 crowns. The appearance of
Bridget St John reminds me of a glaring imbalance: the
ignoring of John Peel’s Dandelion roster of artistes,
several of whom are still alive and creating today in
spite of it.
I attended Hawkwind’s tour back then, and also
the Greasy Truckers’ Roundhouse gig that was issued
on vinyl at the time. I was also tour manager for their
late guitarist Huw Lloyd-Langton, among other bands.
Unmentioned is that among the films shown on-stage
were silent horror films that are actually still banned
on television to this day. What a hoot!
Brian R. Banks, via e-mail
…Thanks for your excellent look back at Hawkwind’s
Space Ritual tour [MOJO 359]. While doing my year
abroad from UCLA, I attended a show not mentioned
in any of the gig archives – a hastily-organised, mind-
blowing appearance at the University Of Birmingham
on February 19, 1973, a day after they’d visited the
Birmingham Odeon and before they left for Europe.
You could feel the wooden floor of the student union
positively vibrating with Lemmy’s bass lines for two
hours. A photo of the dancer Stacia, stripped to her
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knickers, was published on the front page of the student
newspaper Redbrick a few days later, no doubt shocking
administration and faculty members who had no idea
such debauchery had occurred on university grounds.
ML, via e-mail
This is gonna be with you
for the rest of your life
Just a few lines in your Real Gone section [MOJO
360] to tell me that Biff Rose had gone. Biff passed
away on July 25 and, in this day and age, it took just
about two months for the news to hit me. Never a su-
perstar and certainly in his prime some 50-odd years
ago, but to those who haven’t come across him, Biff
could write a tune and could pen the most wonderful
tongue-in-cheek or heart-on-your-sleeve lyrics: Molly,
Fill Your Heart, Ballad Of Clichés, What’s Gnawing At
Me? To Baby… Too many really great songs to men-
tion. I am fortunate that I still have his first four LPs –
played constantly over the years, and they’ll be played
for as many years as I have left.
R Neil Davies, Warninglid, West Sussex
Drop the gun and put
your hands in the air
As a longtime reader from MOJO 1, I loved The
Smiths and Gram Parsons features in MOJO 359, but
two album reviews jumped out at me as superlative
writing. The author of both pieces is Victoria Segal.
Coincidentally I was listening to The Coral’s Sea Of
Mirrors, my signed copy having arrived a few days
before, and the brilliant Sparklehorse swansong, Bird
Machine, as I was reading Victoria’s insightful reviews.
Mucho kudos to Joe Wilson for the spaghetti western
comic book portrait of The Coral to accompany the
lead LP feature. There must be something in the
aesthetic ether; Chris Condon & Jacob Phillips’ The
Enfield Gang Massacre is recreating the good ol’ west-
ern in a comic spin-off from their excellent That Texas
Blood modern-day western series that some of your
readers would enjoy. Put on Sea Of Mirrors or some
Morricone and have a read. Here’s to the next 360.
Bruce Marsh, Newbury Park
I canʼt believe this! How many
times have we been over this?
Happy Birthday and thanks, but talk of “the next 30
years” [MOJO 360] – what is that based on? Within the
next couple of decades, the baby boomers and our mu-
sic will be no more. The Beatles and just a very few oth-
ers will play out to succeeding generations, but the rest
of the music we love will, I am afraid, die with us. My
children and grandchildren grew up in a world where,
unlike my own, music was not a lone leisure possibility
but part of a world with so many more options. That
is simple fact. The best we can hope for is that our
beloved magazine rattles on as long as is feasible.
Andy Betts, Leicester
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MOJO 11
 WH AT GOE S ON!
THE HOT NEWS AND BIZARRE STORIES FROM PLANET MOJO
Amusements
Never End
Peter Gabriel talks about new LP i/o,
absence, mind-reading, Genesis, and
“raising the middle finger to death.”
P
ETER GABRIEL is used to rejection. In
fact, he welcomes it. “Sometimes failure is a cember but he’s giving most of it away, with nine
better teacher than success,” he tells MOJO, singles so far issued on the date of each full moon.
talking from a New York hotel suite the day after
performing at the KeyBank Center in Buffalo. Be- play around and have fun. There’s not a huge
sides touring the US, the solo artist, soundtrack
composer, human rights activist and ex-Genesis
frontman is poised to release i/o, his first set of
new material in more than two decades.
The album has been trailered by several singles
accompanied by images from contemporary
artists, including Anthony Micallef and Henry
Hudson. “But not everyone I wanted to work
with wanted to work with me,” Gabriel admits.
“Sometimes you have to take the road that
requires fear and courage. Going out into the art
world, I was facing rejection. But it brings out the
hustler in me.”
On Gabriel’s wish list was the Chinese docu-
mentarian and activist Ai Weiwei. “He didn’t
have a clue who I was, and it was really hard work. Laurie Anderson and I were trying to put
Firstly, I drove up to Cambridge to see him.
Then I met him again in London and he finally
signed on.”
Weiwei sent Gabriel three designs which
used his trademark motif: a middle finger raised
against authority. It suited Road To Joy, a song
which, like much of this new work, is about
what Gabriel describes as “raising the middle
finger to death.”
i/o (which stands for ‘input/output’ but is
also the name of Jupiter’s third largest moon)
has been gestating for some time. Since 2010,
Gabriel has released a covers LP, Scratch My Back,
and an orchestral reboot of
old works, New Blood. But his
last new studio album was Up
in 2002.
“Ai Weiwei
“I think you can over-
saturate people and they get
didn’t have
bored with you,” he explains.
“One of the reasons I am still
a clue who
able to make a living doing I was.”
Nadav Kander
this is that there are long
periods of absence.” PETER
During his time away,
12 MOJO
technology and streaming services have revolu-
tionised the way artists make music and how their
audience consumes it. Gabriel’s approach is an
intriguing mix of old school and very new school.
i/o will be released as a physical entity in De-
“I’m 73 now, at an age when I might as well just
income from the streaming services. Some of the
themes in this music are about connecting with
nature, so it felt appropriate to do something on
every new moon, as our ancestors used to.
“We’re storytellers and we love stories. And
there’s more of a story on an album than there
is on a single track, though,” he adds. “But the
world is moving in the direction of shorter, faster,
and when the tide goes one way it’s attractive to
go in the opposite direction. The slower, longer
thing has its place, and I’m notoriously slow.”
i/o includes contributions from Gabriel’s
daughter, vocalist Melanie Gabriel, the Soweto
Gospel Choir and tracks co-produced by fellow
musical polymath Brian Eno. “In the ’80s, Brian,
together a virtual reality experience park in
Barcelona,” recalls Gabriel fondly. “It involved
a lot of dinners, good wine and brainstorming.
I like working with Brian. He came in, critiqued
it all and did his thing on a few tracks.”
There will also be three mixes of i/o: Mark
‘Spike’ Stent’s ‘Bright Side mix’, Tchad Blake’s
‘Dark Side mix’ and Hans-Martin Buff ’s ‘Atmos
mix’. “Just to confuse things,” says Gabriel. “I
liked what Spike and Tchad both did so I thought,
Why don’t we just have both, so the nerds can
have long discussions about the merits of each.
“Most Atmos mixes at the moment are for
people with expensive head-
phones, but car manufactur-
ers are realising they can sell
more cars by putting in a good
sound system. In a few years’
time, anyone driving a car is
probably going to have an
immersive audio system.”
Gabriel has described
himself as “addicted to new
GABRIEL ideas” and his current obses-
sions have informed the ➢
“I’m notoriously slow”:
Peter Gabriel waits for the
next full moon, “as our
ancestors used to.”
 W H AT G O E S O N !
➣ Bataclan, Paris, January 10, 1973;
album, which itself is just one of several
ongoing projects. The album’s eighth single,
The Olive Tree, is about interacting with
nature and non-human species. In 2011, Ga-
briel told MOJO about visiting Georgia State
University’s language research centre where
he watched bonobo apes mimicking notes he
sang by playing them back on a piano. At the
time he talked about struggling to find backing
for what he called “the inter-species internet.”
“It wasn’t even on the table then,” he says.
“But now people are working on these inter-
faces for non-humans and you can find chimps
and dolphins using the technology. We’ll soon
be able to understand what’s going on in other
minds, and that’s exciting to me.”
T
HIS THEME of mass communication
extends to Gabriel’s next project, a
story about a piece of apparatus that
enables mind-reading. “I always used to fan-
tasise about being Superman and being able
to read people’s minds,” he explains. “That’s
happening now. I have a friend who came to
me 10 years ago with an invention that used
light to read brain patterns. Now, there’s a
researcher at [the University of California]
Berkeley, where they take MRI scans and have
volunteers watch two weeks of video, and for
every frame of video they record the corre-
sponding brain pattern. Then they ask you to
think about something, and instruct the com-
Nadav Kander, York Tillyer, Veuige/Dalle/IconicPix
puter to bring up the video which corresponds
to that brain pattern. In my story, the hero has
a helmet which allows him to connect with
other people’s thoughts.”
Meanwhile, the new song So Much uses
the theme of re-birth as a vehicle for Gabriel’s
thoughts on cell regeneration. “One of my
sons is studying biomedicine and educating
me on longevity research, which I used to
think was just a vanity project for billionaires,”
he says. “I’ve now totally reversed my opinion.
14 MOJO
Some of the most
important medical
breakthroughs are
going to come from
this research. Scientists are turning cells back
to 20 per cent of their age, and haven’t found
a cell in the human body that isn’t capable of
rejuvenation. But that raises questions like, ‘Is
it just the rich that will be able to stay young?’
These are interesting problems.”
Away from making his own music, Gabriel
co-founded WOMAD and the human rights
organisation Witness, and has performed
shows for Amnesty International. His setlist
still includes Biko, his 1980 single about the
murdered anti-apartheid campaigner,
Stephen Biko. Today, he describes himself
as a “realistic optimist”.
“There’s no point being a pessimist
because that greatly reduces your chance of
survival,” he ventures. “AI [artificial intel-
ligence] will turn our world upside down and
there are serious challenges ahead. But we are
enormously resourceful and I think it’s about
connecting people outside of politics, the el-
derly with wisdom and the young with energy
and idealism, to come together as a pincer
movement on those in power.”
Both i/o and the current tour also reflect
Gabriel’s willingness to push forward and
not just be a greatest hits act. “It makes it way
more interesting for me,” he stresses. “But
I’m at that point where I am putting my wares
“Genesis…
I wanted to
be there at
the end.”
PETER GABRIEL
Hammering it: (clockwise from
above left) Tony Levin, Peter Gabriel
and David Rhodes do their “grandad
dancing” at the Accor Arena, Paris,
May 23, 2023; getting foxy in
Genesis with (left) Mike Rutherford,
the sleeve art of new album i/0.
out there and facing rejection
again. Generally, people want
to hear what they know, and the artist wants
them to hear what they don’t know.”
Gabriel pioneered theatrical stage shows
with Genesis, famously wearing a dress and
a fox’s head on-stage, in the early ’70s. He
also brought elements of theatre to his solo
shows, singing upside down, inside a Zorb
ball and riding a bicycle on 2003’s Grow-
ing Up tour. But there was always a degree
of self-deprecation to these stunts, which
counter-balanced the serious nature of some
of the music. Gabriel and his long-serving bass
player Tony Levin and guitarist David Rhodes
are still performing some tongue-in-cheek
choreographed moves during a version of the
1986 hit Sledgehammer. “But it’s gone from
dad dancing to grandad dancing now,” laughs
Gabriel. “That’s progress for you.”
In March 2022, Gabriel attended Genesis’s
farewell show at London’s 02 Arena, where
vocalist Phil Collins performed seated due to
ongoing health issues. “Phil wasn’t in as great
a shape as he used to be, but they did a great
job,” he says. “Me going was a rite of passage,
really. I’d been part of the creation of Genesis
so I wanted to be there at the end.”
There is currently no end in sight for
Gabriel, though. “After this tour, I’m going
to be a family man for six months and then
I’ll get back to looking at the music again,” he
says. “There’s still more stuff in the can, and I
might keep releasing it on other full moons.”
The indications remain that Gabriel will
continue to favour the road less travelled, with
its many detours and diversions. “If it’s fun
and it’s interesting, I’ll do it,” he says finally.
“Who knows, I may just keep going.”
Mark Blake
i/o is released by Real World in December.
 There’s the Monkee, your
MOJO WO R K I N G adventure for today: Micky
Dolenz with (left) Christian
Nesmith and Circe Link.

FACT SHEET
Title: Dolenz Sings
R.E.M.
Due: November 3

A MONKEE SINGS R.E.M.? Songs: Shiny Happy

People/Radio Free
Losing My Religion and Man On The Moon as
favourite R.E.M. songs. “‘You don’t keep a dog
MICKY DOLENZ TALKS THE Europe/Man On
The Moon/Leaving and bark yourself.’ I’ve used that as a mantra.
I don’t micromanage, I let them get on with it.
ART OF THE COVER VERSION
New York
The Buzz: “I did not Of the few talents I might have, I’m a singer.
go back and listen So I’m going to back off and show up when

H
E’S PREVIOUSLY recorded albums of
the songs of Goffin and King, and his
late friend and Monkees bandmate
Mike Nesmith. Now Micky Dolenz turns his
attention, and wondrously un-aged vocal
chords, to R.E.M., with a new EP which
includes his versions of Shiny Happy People,
Radio Free Europe, Man On The Moon and
Leaving New York.
“It was a friend of ours [Monkees archive
keeper], Gary Strobl, who originally suggest-
ed doing Shiny Happy People to me
years ago,” says Dolenz down the line from
his Hollywood home. “And I remember
hearing that R.E.M. were big
fans of The Monkees. In fact,
there’s a clip on YouTube of
them playing Stepping Stone
“A great
when they were kids. Then
Peter Buck played guitar on our
song is kind
Christmas Party album a few
years ago… it just all came
of hard to
around full circle!”
The EP is released by the 7A
screw up.”
label, home of other Monkee- MICKY
related reissuing and 2021’s
Dolenz Sings Nesmith. The latter
was produced by Mike to the originals,
because I obviously
Nesmith’s son Christian, wanted to bring my
who’s back behind the own thing to the
desk for Dolenz Sings party. And I liked
R.E.M. “We sent a shortlist the fact we did an
EP – four really cool
to Christian,” says Dolenz. singles – instead of
“The way he’d re-envi- committing to 12,
sioned his father’s tunes 13, 14 tracks for an
was phenomenal, and he album.”
Micky Dolenz
did his own due diligence
and research, and kind of
demoed them on an acoustic guitar.”
The songs were recorded in Nesmith’s well-
appointed home studio in North Hollywood
(“I've tried ‘remote’ and
I don’t like it,” says the
singer), and were finished
in March 2023. With in-
struments by Nesmith and
drums by Christopher Al-
lis, additional vocals were
provided by Dolenz’s
sister Coco and Nesmith’s
partner Circe Link.
DOLENZ “There’s a saying I
learned in England,”
says Dolenz, who names
it’s time for me to start singing. Frankly, I think
Christian did a wonderful job.”
Dolenz Sings R.E.M. arrives in November,
when he’ll play an in-store launch gig at Wux-
try Records in Athens, Georgia, where Buck
and R.E.M. singer Michael Stipe met in 1980.
“They know about the launch,” says Dolenz,
“and they’ve been incredibly supportive.” (In-
deed, of the EP Stipe commented, “I have died
and gone to heaven”; Buck declared it “un-
real”; and bassist Mike Mills decreed it to be
“beyond awesome”). Intriguingly, there may
yet be other groups destined to be thrilled by
their songs getting a Dolenz makeover.
“I’m thinking about continuing the theme
and doing another one,” says Dolenz, whose
500-page photo book I’m Told I Had A Good
Time also arrives in December. “There have
been a lot of suggestions bouncing around,
a lot of writers, different themes… finding
great material, that’s where it starts. A great
song is, you know, kind of hard to screw up.
So I’m looking for ideas. You have any?”
Ian Harrison
Dolenz Sings R.E.M. is released by 7A on November
3. For more Micky go to mickydolenz.com

A L S O WO R K I N G
…Drummer Gary Powell
told clothes brand Oliver
Spencer there’s new
LIBERTINES (right)
activity in January.
“We’ve just recorded
our latest album. I think
we do one every 10
years or so,” he said. “So
expect the next one to
come from the grave!” …“I
have some interesting and, I
Getty (2)
pipeline,” GORDON GILTRAP said in
an online statement. He also revealed
he had been recording with
Julia ‘Woman Of The ’80s’
Fordham in Lincolnshire
…PUBLIC SERVICE
BROADCASTING will
release a new album in
2024. “I’ve written two
out of nine [songs] and
I’m struggling through
the third, so I’m just trying
not to lose my mind with it all
which is what normally happens,”
…ANOUSHKA SHANKAR releases
two mini-albums next year…
MINISTRY’s HOPIUMFORTHE-
MASSES arrives in March ’24.
Ex-Dead Kennedys singer
Jello Biafra guests on
Aryan Embarrassment.
“If I see something, I say
something. That
reflects on where each
album goes,” muses Al
Jourgensen …COMMON
has told MSNBC he’s making
an album with veteran DJ Pete
“Competing to make good music
with all the different personalities
involved today just gotten dry.
We love hip-hop and you
will know just how much”
…LANA DEL REY (left)
told the Hollywood
Reporter about her
new direction: “I think
it’ll be in an Americana
vein. The hard thing, in
your personal life or in
public, is that you can lose
the idea that passion should be

think, exciting projects in the proffers J Willgoose, Esq Rock. The latter told online followers: your true North…”

16 MOJO
 AEG Presents in association with UTA

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(all dates except london) (london only)

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 ROCK’N’ROLL
C O N F ID E N T I A L
Mike Skinner
The Streets’ UK rap auteur talks
country music, raving in your
forties and making movies.
M
IKE SKINNER is fatigued. “We were
up ’til 5am yesterday delivering the
film,” he says of new movie/album The
Darker The Shadow The Brighter The Light. The
LP’s the The Streets’ sixth since he arrived with
2002’s Original Pirate Material, a home-grown,
startling take on beats, bass and rhymes. Sub-
sequent releases, including 2004’s platinum-
shifting grot-life concept A Grand Don’t Come
For Free and ’06’s queasy celebrity autopsy The
Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living, showed
acute, focused talent unafraid to engage with
the strains of existence and matters emotional.
Having pressed pause on the project in 2011,
Skinner’s now back on The Streets in earnest.
“I bit off way more than I could chew with the
film,” he yawns. “But I’ve just swallowed it.”
Ben Cannon
You’ve made a feature film, by yourself –
hard work?
18 MOJO
One for the road:
The Streets’ Mike
Skinner – still
doing what he
always did.
There’s no gumshoe guy in it but
there kind of is, because you’re
hearing this guy making his way
through the world, trying to solve a
STREETS
KNOWLEDGE puzzle. It’s literally a film script,
Five Skinner there’s an inciting incident, a point
winners of no return, a denouement. After
1 Johnny Cash my first album, there were two
A Boy Named Sue things, really, that I became
(COLUMBIA, 1969)
obsessed with, screenwriting and
2 French The Kid
Neverland studying lyrics.
(DROPOUT, 2022)
3 Gunna Fukumean Whose lyrics did you investigate?
(300 ENTERTAINMENT, 2023)
4 King Crimson
If you do that, really, you’re studying
In The Court Of The country music, because the only cul-
Crimson King ture that has lyricists, you know, true
(ISLAND, 1969)
5 Zapp More Bounce
lyricists, is country music. You end
To The Ounce (WARNER up just getting really into it because
BROS., 1980)
you’re hearing all the best stuff, from
like outlaw country, Kris Kristof-
ferson, Johnny Cash, down to the really basic
stuff. A Boy Named Sue by Shel Silverstein is
my favourite song, just the economy of that. By
The Time I Get To Phoenix, Harper Valley P.T.A.,
Loretta Lynn’s She’s Got You… country music’s
kind of the best really.
How do you relate to club music now,
as a 45-year-old dad?
Funnily enough, I’d say I probably relate more
to it now than I ever did. In Birmingham [pre-
Original Pirate Material] we were all listening
to club music at home, or in cars, we weren’t
going to clubs, they were literally like, danger-
ous. When I finished The Streets, I was a DJ
full time, so I find it completely relaxing and
normal now, and you still relate to the music
in exactly the same way. Standing on-stage,
singing songs that you wrote 20 years ago,
you’re sort of impersonating yourself – you’re
your own karaoke artist. But I also remember
exactly what I was trying to do in, say, A Grand
Don’t Come For Free, and I’m still trying to do
exactly the same thing now, genuinely. The
goal is to get to the same place that I did then
and not because it was popular, just because I
am the same person.
Yeah, it’s been horrific. It’s the ultimate chal-
What have the decades in music
taught you?
You can turn the air conditioning up, or order
something else on Amazon to make your life
a bit more comfortable, but ultimately doing
lenge. You know, writing songs, writing a difficult things is where happiness lies. It does
book, making music videos, they’re all difficult,
but nothing is as difficult as making a movie
feel genuinely scary doing a film because the
chance for public humiliation is great, and
because it’s all of those things together. It’s public humiliation is what people are scared
a very strange experience. You basically just of the most, I think. But unfortunately it’s the
have to have faith in the script, this document only true form of happiness, doing different
that you came up with years ago – just do this difficult things.
and it will make sense. And actually, it has
Tell us something you’ve never told an
made sense.
interviewer before.
It’s been described as a
I think most of the time when
‘tripped-out noir murder
you go on eBay, and you buy
mystery,’ in clubs. “Doing something signed by
Oh, 100 per cent like noir. My
favourite book is The Big Sleep
difficult someone famous, it’s not
signed by them. You don’t
by Raymond Chandler. And things is want people to be disappoint-
films like Devil In A Blue Dress,
The Usual Suspects… Brian De
where ed, but I’ve seen a lot of signed
Streets stuff that doesn’t look
Palma’s Blow Out is absolutely happiness like how I would sign it.
incredible. Weird thrillers,
weird mysteries, with that
lies.” As told to Ian Harrison
The Darker The Shadow The
twist. A Grand Don’t Come For MIKE SKINNER Brighter The Light is out now on
Free, that’s a noir set in 679/Warner. The Streets tour the
Birmingham somewhere. UK this month.
 “Irish Rock’n’Roll is impossible to shake off ” - MOJO
“A raucous power to traditional Irish music not seen since the heyday of The Pogues.” 8/10 - UNCUT
“Like The Dubliners, The Pogues and Jinx Lennon before them, they elevate the displaced and the
downtrodden, sticking two fingers up to the establishment” - GUARDIAN

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W H AT G O E S O N !
L A ST N I G H T
A RECORD
CHANGED
SONGWRITING LEGEND MY L I F E
MIKE STOLLER CELEBRATES Brian Auger
70 YEARS IN MUSIC! The R&B/jazz/rock organ lifer

A
S IF IT WASN’T enough to be the last he stepped off the lifeboat. Neither thought bows to Donny Hathaway’s
of rock’n’roll’s founding fathers still the Elvis version was a patch on Big Mama’s, Live (Atlantic, 1972).
standing, the legendary Mike Stoller incidentally: “After it sold seven million singles Of course, I had What’s
– the tunesmith foil to lyricist Jerry Leiber I began to see some merit in it,” Stoller laughs. Going On by Marvin Gaye
from 1952 until the latter’s death in 2011 – The pair went on to write for Elvis, and for [Tamla, 1971]. All the
has unveiled a seldom suspected side to his black artists including Jimmy Witherspoon, musicians would ask each
musicality: as heir to the tradition of George The Drifters and The Coasters, many of whose other, “Have you heard the
Gershwin, Jerome Kern and Richard Rodgers. hits were covered by a new generation of rock- Bible today?” That’s what
Released in September, Brendan McCreary ers including The Beatles and Stones. Another we called it. As a British man, I didn’t
Sings The Love Songs Of Mike Stoller beauti- link to the future would be Leiber & Stoller’s know how to take some of the lyrics.
fully showcases 10 Broadway-style numbers, young apprentice, Phil Spector: “We had Then in America I realised the way things
mostly co-written with Leiber, mostly un- him signed to an exclusive contract – which actually were for the black community,
heard before on record, revealing that the pair somehow disappeared. He was sleeping in our particularly when we played in the South.
could as easily have rattled along Tin Pan Alley offices so had access,” Stoller chuckles. “A very I was shocked by that.
as kick-started the R&B revolution. talented young man – but a difficult person.” Then, around 1978, I was living on
Stoller made this throwback to a more This was all when Leiber & Stoller were Irving Street off Leicester Square. I was
in the middle of everything, man! I was
elegant era happen after a chance encounter bossing the Brill Building and mentoring such
going through the records in the W.G.
with a cousin of Cole Porter inspired him to talents as Burt Bacharach and Hal David, Ger- Stores [historic west London record
dig into his trove of songs with his old partner. ry Goffin and Carole King, and Barry Mann vendor] and I came across this live LP by
“We’d started writing a musical about and Cynthia Weil, whose memorial Stoller Donny Hathaway, who I loved. So I bought
Oscar Wilde but nothing came of it,” the recently attended: “a very special occasion, it, and when I listened, he’s doing What’s
pin-sharp and affable 90-year-old tells MOJO with such a sense of love.” No love was lost, Going On. I was just blown away by it.
via Zoom from his home in LA. “The book – alas, between Leiber and Bob Dylan, the for- The rest of the record is amazing, they
the play part – was never finished.” Another mer describing the latter as, “self-aggrandising cover Jealous Guy, You’ve Got A Friend…
musical remains unfinished too, but it may be and full of shit” in 2008. Dylan replied seven he’s singing and playing at the same
third time lucky with Stoller’s next project, years later, calling the Leiber & Stoller canon, time, which is difficult – he wasn’t
co-writing a musical with Iris Rainer Dart “Novelty songs. They weren’t saying anything playing a Fender Rhodes and I’ve never
of her novel Beaches, as filmed in 1988 with serious.” Today Stoller sighs regretfully. “I had been able to find out what it was he was
Bette Midler. nothing to do with it personally but I’m sorry playing – and the band is phenomenal,
Truly, his is a musical life crowded with to this day it all happened. I liked a lot of Bob the groove just absolutely lifts you up.
incident. No moment is more dramatic, argu- Dylan songs. They were wonderful. You can hear the people in the club
ably, than when in July 1956 I know that he trashed Leiber going crazy. It’s so soulful and inspired.
Leiber rushed to tell him that & Stoller, which of course Donny was one of those guys, man.
Alamy, Elde Stewart, Madaphotography.com

their 1953 R&B smash for
Big Mama Thornton, Hound
Dog, was selling even faster as
sung by some new kid called
Elvis Presley. Stoller hadn’t
known because he’d been
on the ocean liner SS Andrea
Doria, which had sunk off
the coast of Massachusetts;
he heard the good news as
“After it sold included me. Had I thought When I heard how he’d suffered
mentally, and what happened quite
anything negative about Bob?
seven million I didn’t think he was the soon after [Hathaway fell to his death
singles I began world’s greatest singer, but from a New York hotel in January 1979],
I was just like, Oh my god, that is such a
I thought he was a hell of a
to see some good writer.” waste of a tremendous artist. I would
merit in it.” Mat Snow have loved to have met him.
The record’s kind of followed me.
MIKE STOLLER ON Brendan McCreary Sings The Love Right now we’re kind of living through it
ELVIS’S HOUND DOG Songs Of Mike Stoller is available again in the US. Marvin Gaye is wonderful,
digitally now. but if somebody says “What’s Going On?”,
I think of Donny. I play him, you know,
once or twice a day and it still kicks me in
the backside, and gives me the spirit.
As told to Ian Harrison
The Complete Oblivion box set by Brian
Auger’s Oblivion Express is released by
Soul Bank Music.

Calling the tunes: (left) Mike

Stoller, Elvis and Jerry Leiber
study the music for Jailhouse
Rock, 1957; (right) Broadway-
bound: Stoller and Brendan
McCreary collaborate.
 Add to your collection

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GENUINE HOUSEROCK IN’ MUSIC SINCE 1971
 C U LT H E R O E S

NO STRINGS
No fat or gristle
– just three Pups
landmarks. In the flesh: Meat Puppets
(from left) Cris Kirkwood,
II Derrick Bostrom and Curt
(SST, 1984) Kirkwood circa 1985.
Kurt Cobain loved
the Meat

PHOENIX ROOTS Puppets’ second

so much he sang
Bostrom. “We gave Kurt a
stick to beat those industry
NOISE ROCKERS MEAT its inspired fusion
of punk and twang – in full – to
fuckers with.”
What followed were what
PUPPETS RAGE AGAIN
Courtney Love. From New Gods’
bluegrass thrash, to Lost’s wry
Bostrom calls their “lost
take on post-Nixon malaise, a years”: the drummer quit

M
EAT PUPPETS’ riot of noise, psyche-
delia, classic rock and country was al-
ways going to rile the purists of 1980s
hardcore punk. “When we first heard the
term ‘hardcore’, we thought it referred to Neil
Young – the real shit as opposed to Black Oak
Arkansas,” laughs drummer Derrick Bostrom.
“But it meant that skinhead shit. And we were
longhairs wearing overalls and smoking grass.”
This misfit status would leave them
drenched in spit when touring with Black
Flag, but albums like II and Up On The Sun
remain high-water moments of ’80s under-
ground rock. Meanwhile, their noised-up,
cosmic roots music so seduced Kurt Cobain
that he invited singer/guitarist Curt Kirkwood
and twin brother/bassist Cris to perform
three Meat Puppets songs for Nirvana’s MTV
Unplugged performance in 1993.
They formed in 1980, Stooges/Damned
disciples who “played as hard as we could,
to get that Dionysian psychedelic buzz,” says
Bostrom. They rejected punk orthodoxy
from the off: Curt was deep into “Henry Cow,
Gentle Giant, pretty much any well-played
progressive stuff ”. Signing to SST Records
– founded by Black Flag guitarist Greg Ginn
and home to landmark punks Minutemen and
Hüsker Dü – they recorded their feral debut
“We didn’t fit
Manfred Rahs, Joseph Cultice
in three acid-soaked days.
Their ragged, glorious
second album marked their
turn for twang. “We wanted
to slow things down,” says
Bostrom, “and Curt was
learning to fingerpick and
writing country-ish songs.”
II’s weird Americana – plus
lengthy live jams on the
Dead’s New Minglewood
Blues – further alienated the
skinheads, but won them
a rave in Rolling Stone.
This attention inspired II’s
painstakingly crafted, equally
impressive follow-up, Up On
The Sun. “I remember Ginn
hearing that album for the
first time, and he was clearly
thinking, ‘Shit, this is even
further out there,’” said Curt
Kirkwood. “We didn’t fit
the machismo of punk’s
boys club.”
“Up On The Sun was
the last time we had such
sternness-of-purpose,”
sighs Bostrom. Slower to
sign to a major label than
their contemporaries,
they floundered in the big
singular vision of Americana yet
to be equalled.
Up On The Sun
(SST, 1985)
Emboldened by
II’s acclaim, they
pared back the
chaos for its
follow-up, but Up
On The Sun was just as winningly
offbeat. Hypnotic instrumental
Maiden’s Milk foregrounded
fraternal psychedelic interplay,
while Animal Kingdom and
Swimming Ground were
beautifully drug-damaged pop.
Too High To Die
(LONDON, 1994)
An acoustic Lake
Of Fire suggested
piggybacking off
Nirvana’s MTV
Unplugged In New
York, but Butthole Surfer Paul
Leary’s production accentuated
the Pups’ heaviness and
weirdness, while the
bewitching acid rock of Severed
Goddess Hand and Flaming
Heart are pure peak Puppets.
in 1999 (“for my mental
health”), while Cris fell into
heroin addiction, lost his
wife to an overdose and, in
2003, was shot by a security
guard in a scuffle outside a
post office, and served jail
time. Curt kept the group
going and, miraculously, the
original line-up re-formed for
2019’s Dusty Notes, and are
overseeing a new vinyl reissues
campaign. As for future new
material, Bostrom says: “Curt
is woodshedding, and Cris is
doing good. Cris’s life is the
Meat Puppets story – how far
can you take it, and still come
back? Not everybody comes
back. But we’re still here.”
Stevie Chick
In A Car and Up On The Sun, plus
new live LP Camp Songs (1991-95),
are available now on Megaforce.

time until the Kirkwoods

the machismo of guest-starred on Nirvana’s
Unplugged episode.
punk’s boys club.” “MTV were aghast these
long-haired nobodies
CURT KIRKWOOD were special guests on
their show,” remembers Still high in ’23: (from
left) Elmo Kirkwood,
Bostrom, Curt, Cris and
Ron Stabinsky return.
22 MOJO
17 - 18 Nov

Emanuel Gat
Dance
LOVETRAIN2020

An ode to the sounds of

the 80s with the fashion
to match. Featuring songs
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DOUBLE CD features “DRONE IN B#” / DIGITAL
 MOJO R I S I N G
Allison Russell:
“there’s no way for me
to not be political.”
ALLISON RUSSELL REDRAWS
THE BOUNDARIES OF
AMERICANA separate life and politics because my
life is political. I’ve been spat at in the
A
LLISON RUSSELL is a talker. Ask her a
question and for the next 10 minutes
you’ll get an alternative history lesson
that might take in the true origins of country
music, Martin Luther King, the wild fallacy of
American ‘gun control’, or making the correct
sandwich choice. And it’s all fascinating.
Russell, whose recently released second
solo album The Returner redraws Ameri-
cana’s boundaries, is a trailblazer, fearlessly
confronting any obstacle life puts in her way.
There have been more than a few. Not only
does she face the usual pitfalls for women in
the music industry, she’s a woman of colour
in a predominantly white music sector,
identifies as queer and is married to the father
of her nine-year-old daughter. She’s even
a peacenik Canadian immigrant living in
Nashville, or as she puts it, “in the belly of the
beast” that is the often reactionary US South.
It’s an extreme intersectional identity that
radiates from both her music and magneti-
cally upbeat demeanour.
Dana Trippe
“I guess from the outside that might look
exhausting, but for me it’s galvanising,”
Russell says with characteristic gusto. “I can’t
24 MOJO
street and told to go home to Africa.
Moving through the world wearing
this skin, there’s no way for me to not
be political.”
Russell was born in Montreal
in 1982 to a Grenadian father and
teenage Scottish-Canadian mother.
After a period in foster care she
was returned to her mother and
step-father, a white supremacist
transplanted from the Southern
states. He sexually abused her from
the age of five until she left home to
live with an aunt and uncle in Van-
couver, where her musical life took
root: at first in Po’ Girl, whose line-up KEY TRACKS
included former Be Good Tanya
Trish Klein; then in the duo Birds
Of Chicago with future husband JT
Nero; and, after a maternity break,
Our Native Daughters alongside
Rhiannon Giddens.
“JT and I had an album ready to go when
the pandemic hit, so we sat on it. Eventually
he said to me, ‘You know this is really an
Allison Russell solo record?’”
“Questlove and
Chaka Khan are as
much Americana as
Hank Williams and
Emmylou Harris.”
ALLISON RUSSELL
FACT SHEET
● For fans of: Brandi
Carlile, Odetta,
Hurray For The
Riff Raff
● The first
That album was 2021’s Outside
Child, nominated for three Gram-
instrument Russell mys and winning awards in the
fell in love with was
the clarinet. “My UK and Canada. “I’m still process-
mum was obsessed
with Joni Mitchell’s
ing how completely my life has
changed. It’s 20 years since Po’
Ladies Of The Canyon.
The clarinet solo
Girl’s debut, a long time to wait for
on For Free just Outside Child to suddenly open so
electrified me.” many doors. I mean, since then I’ve
● Russell eventuallybeen on-stage with Joni Mitchell!”
confronted her step-
father in court, and
Outside Child’s follow-up, The
Returner pushes the definition of
he served three years
for sexual abuse. Americana. Incorporating funk,
● Often seen as an disco, jazzy clarinet and provoca-
album confronting
her difficult past,
tive titles such as Eve Was Black,
Russell says Outsidewe’re certainly not in Bro-country
any more. Against that diverse
Child is as much a love
letter to Montreal. background, it’s surprising how
“Even sleeping on the
gleefully Russell embraces being
streets, that city kept
me safer than I was tagged as Americana.
at home.” “When I think about Americana,
I think of the unprecedented melt-
● Demons ing pot of the Americas. It’s not
● Eve Was Black about just the lower 48 [mainland
● Requiem US states], it’s a 15,000-year story of
travel from the Pacific Islands, from
Mongolia, and the indigenous, African and
European diasporas. To me, Questlove and
Chaka Khan are as much Americana as Hank
Williams and Emmylou Harris.”
Andy Fyfe
Allison Russell’s The Returner is out now on Fantasy.
 V E RY S P E C I A L
GUESTS

MAR 15 FIRST DIRECT ARENA LEEDS

MAR 16 AO ARENA MANCHE STER
MAR 21 O2 ARENA LONDON
M A R 2 3 U T I L I TA A R E N A B I R M I N G H A M
MAR 24 MOTORPOINT ARENA NOTTINGHAM
MAR 26 INTERNATIONAL CENTRE BOURNEMOUTH
M A R 2 7 U T I L I TA A R E N A C A R D I F F
M A R 2 9 T H E OVO H Y D R O G L A S G O W
N E W DA T E A D D E D D U E TO P H E N O M E N A L D E M A N D
M A R 3 0 T H E OVO H Y D R O G L A S G O W

G I G S A N D T O U R S .C O M | T I C K E T M A S T E R .C O. U K
A N S J M C O N C E R T S P R E S E N TA T I O N I N A S S O C I A T I O N W I T H 1 3 A R T I S T S
 MOJO R I S I N G MOJO PLAYLIST

ABANDONED HARPS! PULP

CONNECTIONS! BAS JAN
TUNE IN TO THE ART-PUNK
SPIRIT OF ’79 The month’s best guitar summits,

A
S BAS JAN do their best Joy Division
poses in the Enfield, north London
branch of Pets At Home for the absurd music that is more fun or grown-up in some
low-rent video for At The Counter, singer
Serafina Steer hits a defiant little epiphany:
“I was afraid and then I knew,” she sings.
“I’ve got nothing to prove, I’ve got nothing
didn’t feel like me at that point,” she explains.
synthy prog and commune reggae.
”The band has made it possible to make
1 SLEATER-KINNEY HELL
Going deeper into greater pain, S-K return
with a song that shares the heat of their early
way. Somehow my writing specifically with
the harp was too drippy or twee for my taste. records. Ferocious, intelligent, and fore-
grounding Corin Tucker’s elemental howl.
So I stopped.”
Find it: YouTube
After two albums of Delta 5-via-A Matter

2
to lose.” Of Life And Death floor- BOB DYLAN & THE HEARTBREAKERS
Crushed but defiant, the fillers for Lost Map, Bas Jan POSITIVELY 4TH STREET
scratchy London foursome’s “The harp have been picked up by a In which Dylan – on electric guitar! – and aus-
third album, Back To The
Swamp, takes Bas Jan’s Rough
was too larger independent, Fire, for
this new LP. “It’s really nice
picious band (MVP: Benmont Tench) relocate
that thin, wild mercury sound at Farm Aid.
Trade ’79 sound into darker drippy for to have some budget for Find it: YouTube
territory, Faith-era Cure greys
muting some of the Tom
my taste. making things,” Steer says,
but brilliant ideas continue 3 DERECHO RHYTHM
SECTION IMPOSSIBLE DAY
Tom Club brights of 2018’s So I stopped.” to cost nothing, and Back In the wake of Mimi Parker’s
Yes I Jan and 2022’s Baby U SERAFINA STEER, To The Swamp has plenty of passing, Alan Sparhawk’s funky
Know. Steer’s songs of road BAS JAN those, even if Steer’s original new project with family and
signs, burned witches and mood board vision bears little friends is music as communal consolation –
unexpected financial stability resemblance to the finished and, here, like Low playing reggae.
have a slightly giddy Scritti Politti quality – record. “I had the title really early on, so I Find it: Bandcamp
sparkling but unstable, forever in danger of guess that brings to mind The Cramps, ’50s
arguing themselves out of existence – but at
their core is a quiet determination to pursue a
horror B-movies, the front cover of The Slits’
Cut album,” Steer says. “Unwillingly, it makes
4 UNDERWORLD DENVER LUNA
Rave Enya, anyone? Underworld do away
with banging techno rhythms and electron-
very individual vision. me think of Donald Trump.” ics, and instead build an enormous, swirling
“I don’t think it’s an unhappy record,” Steer Whether Bas Jan want FACT SHEET orchestra of voices using only Karl Hyde’s
tells MOJO. “I think it’s hopeful, strong, a bit to drain their personal ● For fans of: The kinetic word association.
conflicted. I guess we all come back to similar swamp is a moot point on Raincoats, Brian Find it: streaming services
themes. A lot of the time I find I’m making a record that simultane- Eno’s singing
things about change, letting go, transition,
having to make difficult decisions where
ously yearns for order and
pines for drama, though
records, Life Without
Buildings, Pulp
● Bas Jan are
5 DHANI HARRISON
DAMN THAT FREQUENCY
In Thomas Dolby mode, Dhani wrestles both
neither is necessarily ideal, juggling.” Steer would certainly named after Dutch spiritual and audible adversaries at the low-
not rule out a bit of light conceptual artist
First emerging as a singing harpist on Bas Jan Ader, most
end, protected by pop smarts and a wolf.
2007’s Cheap Demo Bad Science, Steer’s Trump-ish world domina- famous for video Find it: YouTube
second LP – 2010’s excellent Change Is Good, tion if the opportunity art which featured
Change Is Good – gained support from Pulp’s arose. “We would like to
travel the world and bring
him weeping and
falling over, and for 6 MADNESS C’EST LA VIE
Skanking in torment, the
Aurora Horwood, Hornbecker Photo

Jarvis Cocker, who produced 2013’s moody, disappearing in 1975 Mads’ Floyd-aspect manifests.
magnificent The Moths Are Real. She was about a historic shift in while sailing solo Elsewhere online, Dame Helen
seemingly set for solo cultdom at that stage, global politics,” she says across the Atlantic Mirren recites the words. From a
but took a radical swerve in convening Bas of Bas Jan’s future plans. for a work called
new LP, out in November.
Feeling the fear – a bit – In Search Of The
Jan, the current iteration featuring her on Miraculous. Find it: YouTube
bass and keyboards alongside fellow multi- but doing it anyway. ● Jarvis Cocker’s

instrumentalists Emma Smith, Charlie Stock

and Rachel Horwood.
Jim Wirth
Bas Jan’s Back To The Swamp
support has
extended into the
Bas Jan era. Steer and
7 RAZE REGAL & WHITE DENIM INC
DISLOCATION
Protean Texan jammers hook up with the
“Sitting at the harp and singing songs is out November 10 on Fire. Smith both feature in Once & Future Band’s guitarist for a hyper,
his Jarv Is… project, heady, soulful yacht rock summit.
while the latter
Swamp things: Bas Jan played guitar and Find it: streaming services
(from left) Emma Smith, violin (the Russell

8
Serafina Steer, Rachel Senior role) on the SHIRLEY HURT EMPTY HANDS
Horwood, Charlie Stock. recent Pulp reunion AKA Toronto singer-songwriter Sophia
shows. Ruby Katz, whose deep, weighted voice – a
● Steer has forlorn Aldous Harding – conveys much
latterly come to a wisdom. Dolorous clarinet and brushed
rapprochement with
her harp. “I finally
drums add to the Canadian Joan Wasser vibe.
managed to get into Find it: streaming services
a decent practice
routine after having
a kid,” she says. “It
dominated my whole
9 MATT BERRY DRIVING SEAT
Synth-mad trouper astrally
projects into Library Music with
life for so long but whorls of prog. From Novem-
in the last year or so ber’s Simplicity LP.
I started to miss it
and now we’re back Find it: streaming services
together.”
KEY TRACKS
● At The Counter
10 OMD VERUSCHKA
Art house-futurists invoke the model/
actress Veruschka von Lehndorff, trailing
● Cried A River
● Tarot Card cigarette smoke down Sunset Boulevard to
heart-slowing beats and misty synths.
Find it: streaming services
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 THE MOJO INTERVIEW

Flying high with the

Eagles, his rock’n’rolling
madness masked tragedy
and insecurity. So how did
2023’s Ringo Starr and
VetsAid stalwart get so
reliable, so responsible? “I’m
part of something now,”
says Joe Walsh.
Interview by BOB MEHR • Portrait by ROSS HALFIN

OE WALSH LEANS IN CLOSE, HIS BLUE EYES
all aglow.
“The one thing I’ve found in the music business
is that if you pretend you know what you’re doing,”
he announces, “everyone thinks you know what
you’re doing.
“And I’m here to tell you, I didn’t know what I was doing,” he
chuckles, adding a perfect Walshian twist. “Though in retrospect,
maybe I did. I just didn’t know I knew.”
It’s an early summer’s day in Hollywood, and Joe Walsh is hold-
ing court in a suite at the Sunset Marquis hotel – the kind of room
he might have systematically destroyed in a past life as a legendary
rock’n’roll wild man. Today however, at 75, he is the very picture
of decorum. Perched on a white leather couch, sipping from a Diet
Coke, his well-coiffed blond hair and sun-kissed mien reflect dec-
ades of sobriety and success – though a kind of mad energy still
flickers just beneath the surface.
Walsh and his bandmates in the Eagles are WE’RE NOT WORTHY
due to begin the first leg of what is expected to
be their farewell tour. Before then, sadly, we’ll Adam Granduciel on
learn of the death of another of their ex-band- a not-so-regular Joe.
mates, Randy Meisner (“a great guy and an un- “My first memory of Joe is
when the Eagles did Hell
Ross Halfin, Shawn Brackbill
tary support organisation he founded in 2017. It’s a deeply per-
sonal cause for Walsh, whose father, an Army Air Corps instructor,
died on active duty when he was a baby.
Born in Kansas, and raised by his mother and stepfather across
Illinois, Ohio, New York and New Jersey, Walsh was perpetually
the new boy in school. “It was good training for a performer,” he
says – training he put to use as one of rock’s great gonzo guitarists,
breaking out in the late ’60s in Midwest power trio James Gang and
scoring solo hits before joining the Eagles, helping hew their 1976
monolith, Hotel California.
Along the way, Walsh’s goofy prankster-partier persona masked
tragedy, including the loss of his infant daughter, Emma, killed in
a car accident in 1974. And when the Eagles fell apart in 1980, he
entered a bleak wilderness of substance abuse and career stasis,
turned around in the early ’90s when Don Henley and Glenn Frey
made getting clean the condition of his joining a re-formed Eagles.
Nearly 30 years on, the guitarist is living
testament to second chances. His 2008 mar-
riage to Marjorie Bach (sister-in-law of Ringo
Starr) brought a stability and peace that had
long eluded him.
“I’ve had some tragic things happen in my

forgettable voice,” Walsh will post). Between
Eagles dates, on November 12 in San Diego,
Walsh leads the seventh of his annual VetsAid
concerts – this year’s co-stars: Jeff Lynne’s
ELO, Stephen Stills, The War On Drugs, The
Flaming Lips and Lucius – benefiting the mili-
Freezes Over and he wore
that brick suit (laughs). I
was just a teenager, but
he was obviously a little
out there in the best way.
He’s an incredibly soulful guitar player,
totally connected to what he loves.
And that energy is really compelling.”
life,” he admits, “but at the same time, a fella
couldn’t have asked for more than what’s been
handed me.”
Your father, Robert Newton Fidler, died when
you were very young. Do you have any
conscious memory of him? ➢

MOJO 29
 ➣
I was a year and a half old when he passed.
(Closes eyes) Sometimes I get a weird feeling…
there’s a picture of me and him sitting on the
steps of our Quonset hut on Okinawa where
he was killed. I look at that, and I can almost
remember. That was 1949. In those days, it was
just, “Aw, that’s too bad.” There was not even,
“Thank you for your service.” So I grew up
without a father. And I really needed one.
Everybody else had a father, but I didn’t. It
was my mom and me against the world.
Your mother eventually remarried George
Walsh, whose name you took.
I was lucky. I had a stepfather who always had
my back. He was a military guy too, in Army
intelligence. He was on the second team that
went into Hiroshima after the bomb. He was a
lawyer, a brilliant lawyer. His orders after the war
were to defend some of the Japanese prison
camp commandants where our troops had
been. Those were his orders, to defend four of
them. And everybody hated him, he lost all his
friends, he got death threats. But he defended
them, and those were the only four generals
that weren’t hung. He told me that trial was
such a travesty of justice, it broke his heart. So,
he got out of the military and became a lawyer
for doctors in malpractice suits. My mom met
him in Evanston, in Chicago, and he worked
at an insurance company called Continental
Casualty. And then he got a job at Nationwide
so we went to Columbus, Ohio and those were
great years for us. Then he got a job at a private
firm in New York City, so we moved there.
It couldn’t have been a very easy way to
grow up. Were you a problem child?
In the ’50s, all the childhood conditions – atten-
tion deficit disorder, obsessive compulsive
disorder, Asperger’s, even autism – none of that
had been diagnosed yet. And I was some kind
of cocktail of all that stuff. I couldn’t complete
tasks. I could not do my homework. I was all
over the map. I acted out. I was considered
difficult. And I was. I felt different than the rest
of the kids. I just didn’t fit in, I wasn’t part of it,
and I didn’t know why. I had no self-esteem.
I was really insecure. I felt stupid all the time.
I was one of those.
But you showed an early and natural
aptitude for music. Your mother was a
pianist – was that a big influence on you?
Before she remarried, she was going to
Northwestern University [in Evanston] where
she majored in classical piano. She’d get home
from school and play. I had her and then I had
the radio which I listened to all the time. I was 5
or 6 at the birth of rock’n’roll when – wham! –
all that hit the radio at once. For me, the only
thing I knew I could do was music. I played
clarinet, tried trombone for a while. None of
that really worked. My aunt gave me a ukulele
and then when I was maybe 10, I got a Sears
Roebuck Silvertone guitar. That was the one
thing my parents didn’t make me practise. Then,
for some reason, I started to play oboe before I
realised, Wait a minute Joe. You’re not gonna
get any girls playing oboe. So that’s when I
really started paying serious attention to the
guitar. Because I would mimic what I heard on
the radio and play along with it. I could
accompany myself. You can’t accompany
yourself on oboe (laughs).
You started your first band, the G-Clefs, in
junior high school – were you a natural
performer?
Not at all. We played an assembly and that’s
where I had my first stage fright episode. We
played one and a half songs. I didn’t make it
through the second song. I was so terrified in
front of the student body. I was hyperventilat-
ing, my eyes were watering – it looked like I was
crying, and maybe I was. For a lot of people,
that’s it. That kind of experience is so traumatic,
they never get on-stage again. But I made a
mental note: if I’m going to play music, I’m
going to have to figure this out. I eventually did.
You were a teenager when The Beatles hit
America – how impactful was that?
I was in high school, washing dishes at a burger
place where the whole student body went after
football games. I heard I Want To Hold Your
Hand while I was working, and it profoundly
affected me. I didn’t know who they were, but
I’d never heard anything like it. These four guys
can play together and do that?! That was the
motivation I needed. They showed us how to do
it – all of us. Along with The Beatles, there were
all the English guitar players too: Peter Green,
Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page and Eric Clapton. And
they all talked about the blues. Because I never
was in the South, I didn’t know about the blues.
You went to college at Kent State in Ohio,
where you launched a band called The
Measles. Did that put you on the path
professionally?
Kent State was this college with 20,000 people
on campus and there were about five bars
downtown where you could hear pretty good
bands seven nights a week. I didn’t learn much
academically at Kent, but I rounded up some
other people and we started rehearsing and we
tried out for one of the clubs and got a gig three
nights a week, three sets a night. That was the
beginning of my 10,000 hours. We played
whatever the hits were on the radio. These cover
songs, after a while I’d get bored with the guitar
parts, so I’d play something else, play some-
thing different – and that’s kind of how I started
writing. I basically learned how to perform in
front of people, got my stage fright taken care
of and worked at my craft. The Measles got a
big following. In a five square mile area, I was
somebody (laughs).
Your reputation as a hotshot guitarist soon
landed you a gig with a bigger Ohio band,
James Gang.
James Gang were from Cleveland, and they had
an incredible guitar player named Glenn
Schwartz who became a great mentor of mine.

ALIFE
A LIFE IN PICTURES
PICTURES 2 3
Walsh of sound: Joe through the years

1 “Stick ’em up!”: young gun show, May 14, 2015.

7
Joe Walsh. Family guy: Walsh with

2 Good to go: the James

Gang in 1970 (from left)
Jim Fox, Dale Peters and
Joe Walsh.
(from left) brother-in-law
Ringo Starr, sister-in-law
Barbara Bach, and wife
Marjorie Bach, 2016.

3 Rocky mountain way:

Walsh on-stage at the
Bottom Line Club, New York,
8 Helping hands: with Dave
Grohl at VetsAid 2022 in
Columbus, Ohio.

9
November 21, 1976. “I didn’t know what I was

4 Flight crew: Hotel

California-era Eagles
during Day On The
doing”: Joe Walsh in
London, October 20, 1970.

Green at Oakland-
Alameda County
Coliseum, May 28, 1977,
(from left) Don Felder,
Randy Meisner, concert
promoter Bill Graham,
Joe Walsh, Eagles
manager Irving Azoff,
Courtesy of Joe Walsh, Alamy (3), Getty (5)

Don Henley, Glenn Frey.

5 Still on the long

road: Glenn Frey
and Walsh with the
Eagles at the 2008
Stagecoach Country
Music Festival.

6 Walsh with Pete

Townshend at a
Teenage Cancer Trust
1

30 MOJO 4
Glenn decided he was going to California and
got in a band out there called Pacific Gas &
Electric, kind of a one-hit wonder. Glenn had
this whole bag of wreckage that nobody knew
– he was AWOL from the military, married twice
to two different women at the same time…
Anyway, here’s the James Gang with some
big-ass shoes to fill and they asked me if I would
join the band, which was a five-piece group at
the time. I wasn’t singing or anything. I was just
playing guitar.
How did James Gang end up as a three-piece
with you singing?
Including The Who and Pete Townshend,
who became your great champion.
We opened for The Who in Pittsburgh, and Peter
Townshend decided to come early that night
and heard me play. We were both in the same
boat, we were the only guitar players, the only
melodic instruments, in our bands. Meeting
Townshend cemented my guitar playing, this
technique called lead-rhythm where you play
the whole time, going between rhythm and
lead, and nobody notices the dropouts. I
studied him and we talked a lot about the
you decided to leave the group abruptly.
What happened?
We finally got to the point where we were
headlining and then James Gang Rides Again
came out and that had Funk 49 on it and that
was a huge record. But I was painting myself
into a corner. I felt like there was more to me
than a kick-ass rock’n’roll guitarist. That there
was more I could offer as a musician, with all
this classical music in my head from my mom
and all these other influences. I heard songs
with keyboard parts, I heard songs with
someone else singing too. It got to

“One of the most

where there was not much in the
We were going to Detroit to play the group any more [musically] for me.
Grande Ballroom opening for Cream. I decided I should make a move. I left

I drove the equipment van, ’cos I lived
in it (laughs). By the time the rest of
the band got to Detroit they’d had a
big fight on the way there, and two of
the people quit, the keyboard player
and the lead singer just bailed. Here
we are, the three of us, in Detroit and
terrifying things
the James Gang and headed out into
the great unknown.
that ever happened You reset your life and moved to
Colorado, reconnecting with James
to me was that Gang producer Bill Szymczyk, and
started a new project, Barnstorm.

Keith Moon decided

we had to play, ’cos we didn’t have
gas money to get home. I said, I can
do The Pusher by Steppenwolf, I’m A
Man by Spencer Davis Group, and Mr
Fantasy by Traffic – I could sing the
first verse of those songs and then
he liked me.”
we’ll just play for a while, then I’ll sing the first
verse again, and if we just do that a few times
we’ll get paid. I told the other guys, after the
first verse, Everybody play lead. Never mind
what I’m playing, you guys play lead. We did
and we got a standing ovation.
We go back to Cleveland, and we thought, If
there’s only three of us, the pay is better. Maybe
I’ll learn a couple more verses to these songs. I
couldn’t really sing, but compared to the other
two guys, I needed to sing (laughs). I am so
grateful I was forced to sing, otherwise I never
would’ve done it. From the Grande Ballroom on,
we just had this incredible momentum as a
band. We played all through the Midwest
opening for some major headliners.
dilemma that we were both in. I got better and
better at it, and that’s how my style came
together – again, out of necessity.
Then we went and opened for The Who
when they premiered Tommy in Europe.
I got along really good with all of the English
musicians and learned how to be wild and
crazy from them. I always say, one of the most
terrifying things that ever happened to me was
that Keith Moon decided he liked me. He taught
me the fine art of chaos and hotel room
destruction and craziness.
The James Gang made three great records in
three years – Yer Album (1969), James Gang
Rides Again (1970), and Thirds (1971) – but
Bill left LA because of the 1971
[Sylmar] earthquake and went to
Colorado and he told me, “Come
on out here.” It just happened Jim
Guercio from the band Chicago had
bought a ranch [west of Boulder]
called Caribou and built a recording studio,
which became a legend in itself. We went up
there and the studio was half-done, and we
were kind of guinea pigs for the place – Oh, this
is plugged in wrong; this is wired out of phase;
this is not working – and that helped Guercio
finish the studio and we got to record for free.
That became the first Barnstorm album. But the
record pretty much got ignored. It got some
nice reviews, but there was no hit single or
anything. Barnstorm never took off. I could see I
had lost all this momentum, and I was running
out of money. Thought maybe I’d made a big
mistake leaving James Gang. I had seen people
leave big bands and start solo careers and flame
out, never to be heard from again. ➢

5 9

6 8
 “I ran with the best of them – but my buddies
pretty much all died, and I barely made it back.”
➣
The second and final Barnstorm album
featured the song Rocky Mountain Way,
which became a big hit and essentially
launched your solo career.
The last Barnstorm show was at the Whisky A Go
Go [in LA], and during the first set I went to the
dressing room there was this guy there. He said,
“You don’t remember me but I promoted some
shows for James Gang in Illinois and my name is
Irving Azoff.” He said, “I’ve followed your career
ever since and I believe in you. But it’s apparent
your affairs are in total disarray and people are
scared of booking you.” See, the James Gang’s
manager had spread the word that I was a
heroin addict. He was going around saying,
“You don’t want Walsh, you want the James
Gang.” But Irving said, “I know you’re not a
heroin addict, and you know what you’re
doing.” I told him Barnstorm had had it, but I
had another album ready, told him about Rocky
Mountain Way and he said, “That’s all I need –
Ross Halfin
let me run with it.” He started managing me,
along with the Eagles, and that was when I
decided I was relocating to Los Angeles.
32 MOJO
Did part of your decision have to do with the
loss of your daughter?
It did. My wife was taking our daughter to
school, and somebody ran a red light and wiped
my family out. My wife had a severe concussion,
broke this and that, and she was unconscious
for about four days. My daughter had major
head trauma from the crash. Didn’t have a seat
belt on. She was four years old. They worked on
her for about five hours. I flew into Boulder and
the doctor said, “She’s brain dead. If we turn the
machine off, she won’t last very long. We did all
we could.” I got a second opinion, and it was
the same. The doctor said, “Your daughter is a
candidate for organ donation. There’s a blind
kid that could use corneas, and there’s another
kid that needs kidneys… what do you think?”
I did some soul searching… I said, “OK,” and
made the call, pull the plug. And they did. They
took my daughter into Denver and the one
kid got the corneas and the other kid got the
kidneys and last time I checked they were both
fine. But that was a very hard thing in my life.
How much do you think your daughter’s
death contributed to your subsequent drug
and alcohol abuse?
I started drinking. Then I discovered cocaine at
some point. I found that alcohol took the edge
off my stage fright, and I found I had good luck
finishing songs with cocaine. And very subtly
the combination of that stuff convinced me I
couldn’t do anything without it. It was all an
attempt to self-medicate. And with the loss of
my daughter, I just decided fuck it. I was really
mad at God. I mean, to do that to this little kid.
My next album was called So What. That was
kind of where my head was at.
In 1975, you decided to leave behind your
solo career and join the Eagles. Was that,
again, about your restlessness?
There’s a lot of stuff that comes with a solo
career that’s non-musical. Hiring and firing and
calling all the shots and making decisions and
being the boss, on top of writing all the music
and telling everyone how to play it. The solo
career – it wasn’t what I thought it would be.
 a part of it. The other result of that was we
achieved an amount of success beyond all our
wildest imaginations and suddenly we could do
anything – so we did.
Did that excess doom the band? There was
the tortured and protracted making of The
Long Run (1979) and then the Eagles
break-up.
When you have that kind of success, you lose
your perspective. You forget what you were
doing that got you there. And big royalty
cheques and crazy lifestyles and your ego
all just kind of eat away at the creative part
of yourself.
Which led to your lost decade of the 1980s.
You made solo records and toured, but is it
fair to say you were mostly just falling
deeper into addiction?
The Eagles stopped in 1980 and I couldn’t
process that, so I just kept going. I became
about as alcoholic and drug dependent as
MILLIONAIRE WALSH
Joe blows on three key
long-players. By Bob Mehr.
THE RIFFING RÉSUMÉ
James Gang
★★★★
Rides Again
(MCA, 1970)
James Gang’s second LP
served as the perfect showcase
for Walsh’s guitar prowess
and shrewd songcraft. Built
on a foundation of chugging
blues rhythms – courtesy of
bassist Dale Peters and drummer Jim Fox – his
unpretentious vocal attack and razor-sharp riffs
delight on Funk 49 and Woman, while melodic
sophistication shines through on the pastoral
Garden Gate, and his classical roots show on
the baroque orchestration of closer Ashes The
Rain And I.
“My life’s been a fairy
tale with a happy THE MEGA MASTERPIECE
ending”: Joe Walsh,
happy to be 75 and Eagles
“still learning”.
★★★★★
Hotel California
(ASYLUM, 1976)
The Eagles began their musical
transition away from country
And the Eagles were such a wonderful band,
and Don and Glenn had incredible songs. rock on 1975’s One Of These
Nights with the addition of
And the vocals… I remember hearing Witchy
guitarist Don Felder and
Woman when I was still in Colorado. I said,
Walsh’s longtime producer Bill
Goddamn it, why can’t I play guitar with that
Szymczyk. But it was Walsh’s arrival that would
kind of singing?
serve as the catalyst for this globe-conquering
The other part of it was the Eagles wanted to
landmark. Walsh’s soundcheck warm-up riff
retool. They were painting themselves in the
would evolve into the era-defining Life In The
corner being a country rock band. They wanted Fast Lane, while his six-string duet with Felder
to get out of that and apply everything they on the ever-ubiquitous title track would ascend
knew and had learned. It was discussed vaguely to air guitar immortality.
that we would get together and see what
happened. Irving had a lot to do with that. SOFT ROCK SMÖRGÅSBORD
Everyone said, “Joe Walsh and the Eagles?
That’ll never work.” The one thing I had was Joe Walsh
Bill Szymczyk. Don and Glen were sick of ★★★★
[producer] Glyn Johns. They said, “Will you talk But Seriously, Folks…
to Szymczyk about producing? I did and Bill (ASYLUM, 1978)
said, “It’s not my bag.” But I told him, “Wait, man,
Though best remembered for
give it a chance.” Ultimately, what came out of the hooky and wry rock star
that [collaboration] was Hotel California.
blues of Life’s Been Good,
Walsh’s fourth solo record
Which became one of the biggest records in
has arguably more high
history. Was there something specific you
points than the Eagles’ 1979
did that made it such a phenomenon? swansong The Long Run. A mix of country
I don’t think you can make something like that rockers, glistening pop and left-field forays
happen. You can’t design that. That was just into reggae and cinematic instrumentals,
pure chemistry. That album affected so many Walsh’s effort is aided by Joe Vitale, Spirit/Jo
people on the planet. I don’t think any of us did Jo Gunne keyboardist Jay Ferguson, Bowie/
anything other than just being there and being George Harrison bassist Willie Weeks, as well
as various Eagles comrades.
somebody can be. I ran with the best of them
– but my buddies pretty much all died, and I
barely made it back. I was incredibly self-de-
structive for a long time. I saw all the warning
signs. I said to myself, You’re going to have to
do something or you’re gonna die.
What finally forced you to get sober?
In 1992, I was invited to Aspen by Irving and
Don and Glenn. I showed up and they said,
“We’re thinking about revisiting the Eagles.
We don’t feel we can do it without your
involvement, but we don’t feel like we can do
it unless you’re sober. You think you can get
sober?” I figured, well if there’s ever a chance for
me to get sober, this is it. This is the first reason
beside all the shrinks and all the doctors telling
me I had to. And that was down to Don and
Glenn. They saved my life, without a doubt. Just
by talking to me straight. They were the only
people I would’ve listened to. I owe them
the world, both of them.
You get sober in 1994 and then commence
the massive Eagles ‘Hell Freezes Over’
comeback. You’re playing stadiums for the
first time completely clean – was that a
tough thing to adjust to?
To go out in front of 30,000 people sober –
I was back in junior high school. Eyes watering,
hyperventilating, hands shaking. And I didn’t
have a shot of vodka and a big line to make that
go away. I didn’t think I could play, I didn’t think
I’d ever be funny, or write anything worthwhile
– I was convinced I couldn’t without drugs and
alcohol. But I learned to do it one day at a time.
I’m still learning.
The Eagles have continued, but obviously
you lost Glenn Frey in 2016. What did his
passing mean to you?
(Long pause) Glenn Frey… one of the coolest
people I ever met. His insight, just being around
him was special. I still ask myself, when I don’t
know what to do, what would Glenn do? He
was like a brother: he got me, I got him. I’m just
so grateful that I got to make music with him.
I miss him, though.
You seem to be in a very settled place. You
have your wife, your extended family with
your brother-in-law Ringo Starr, and the
Eagles as well…
Guess what happened? I’m part of something
now. I’m not this kid with no dad, and no
friends. You live your life and it feels like random
things smashing into each other, and forces
mutating and this happening and that
happening – and the whole time you think,
What the fuck is going on? But at 75, looking
back at it, it’s almost like somebody wrote a
finely crafted novel. My life’s been a fairy tale
with a happy ending.
For someone who lived so recklessly for
so long, did you ever think you’d get to
this point?
I never ever thought about 75. I figured I was
immortal… and then one day I realised I wasn’t.
I thought I had all the time in the world, and I
don’t. Now I’m looking at the time I have left,
going, Hey whatcha gonna do Joe? I guess the
answer is: keep going. ’Cos I don’t think I’m
done yet. I gotta make some more music. And
everything I know should be pumped into that.
One of the other reasons that I’m still alive is
that I’m sober, 29 years sober, and that is a
pretty profound thing, too. People in trouble,
young musicians especially, should know that
there is life after alcoholism and addiction and
it’s good. If anyone’s proof of that, it’s me. M
The VetsAid concert takes place on November 12 at the
North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre, San Diego.
For more about VetsAid, visit joewalsh.com/pages/
vetsaid-homepage
MOJO 33
 ARLY SIMON IS QUESTIONING MOJO
about The Crown. Will there be a new series
taking it to Charles’s coronation? What do
people think of Camilla? How does the me-
dia treat her? What would the royal family
have been like had Margaret been queen?
It figures that the TV drama would appeal to a senior
member of folk rock royalty, someone who knows what
it’s like to be hounded by paparazzi and gossip column-
ists. Besides, it’s easier to ask questions than answer
them. “I haven’t done an interview in a very long time,”
she says.
It’s been eight years since her last album, the
two-disc retrospective Songs From The Trees (2015),
compiled as a musical accompaniment to her first
memoir, Boys In The Trees. Her new release is a
retrospective double too: These Are The Good Old Days:
Ed Caraeff/Iconic Images
The Carly Simon And Jac Holzman Story (2023). But
these songs are just from the first three solo albums
she made after Holzman signed her to Elektra – Carly
Simon (1971), Anticipation (1971) and No Secrets (1972).
All three were hits, each bigger than the one before.
Though Simon continued to make albums on
Elektra before moving to Warners in 1980, these
were the only albums that had Holzman at the helm
– and that, Simon says, was important. Holzman
signed Simon as a solo artist after the other
music label patriarchs had scorned her.
“Jac,” says Simon, “saw something
the others didn’t.”
There was something
intriguing in Simon’s
voice that stood her
34 MOJO
apart from Carole King and Joni Mitchell – the stars
of 1970 – or ’60s singers such as Joan Baez, whom
Holzman wanted to sign to Elektra, and Judy Collins,
whom he did. Simon didn’t have a pure soprano like
Mitchell or a long, successful history as a songwriter
like King. Her voice was a sensual, sometimes husky,
sometimes vulnerable contralto, sometimes all
of these in the same song. She had Collins’s sense
of experimentation when it came to material. As
Holzman said, it was the way she delivered the songs.
Her originals ranged in style from her sophisticated,
Sondheim-esque debut hit single That’s The Way
I’ve Always Heard It Should Be, to the swaggering
blockbuster hit on her third album, You’re So Vain.
That was over 50 years ago. Simon is 80 now and
Holzman 92. “But my memory is good,” says Simon,
“and I’ve got my diaries, about 2,000 pages.” She leafs
through some of them for MOJO, stopping now and
then to read aloud: “Friday, June 24, 1966. Bob Dylan
called this afternoon as a birthday present…”
T’S AN EARLY AUTUMN AFTERNOON ON
Martha’s Vineyard. The island off the southern
end of Cape Cod, Massachusetts has long been a
favourite summer destination for East Coast elites,
from the Kennedys to the Obamas. But Si-
mon lives here year-round in a bohemian,
rambling farmhouse, a rustic Camelot.
There are woods and animals,
barns and a beehive – the bees
she ordered from Canada
and Maine have just
ar rived. James ➢
Tangled up in
blue: Carly Simon
in London,
March 15, 1971.
 Taylor – whose well-to-do family of-
➣
ten summered on the island – bought a
large swathe of land here with a record
deal advance and started designing and
building a house. Simon moved in with
him in 1971. They married in 1972,
raising their two children there. He left
after their divorce in 1983.
Simon first encountered Taylor on
the Vineyard when they were children,
a time of life when Simon’s being four
years Taylor’s senior made a difference.
She saw him again years later at a local
coffee house, the Moon-Cusser, where
she performed with her big sister Lucy
as half of folk duo the Simon Sisters.
There was always music in the
Simons’ New York home. Carly’s
oldest sister Joanna became a
professional opera singer. Carly
was raised on show tunes and
classical music. Her mother sang
and her father played Chopin on
the piano. Guests at their dinner
table included George Gershwin,
Richard Rodgers and Oscar
Hammerstein. “My father founded
[publishing company] Simon &
Schuster, who were doing their
biographies and autobiographies,”
she explains.
Pete Seeger was a music teacher at
her kindergarten in Greenwich Village. He
gave her some guitar lessons when she was three or
four. “He would bring his banjo and start teaching
us these little Communist-era songs. I remember
there was a whole kind of a panic about
the material he was feeding to the kids in
the school.”
Her favourite singers back then were
Odetta – “I used go to the gym where the
echo was so good and sing, ‘I don’t want
mptvimages/eyevine, Getty, Jack Mitchell/Getty Images, Ed Caraeff/Iconic Images, Jack Mitchell/Getty Images, Fiona Adams/Getty
no bald-headed woman,’ as low as I could
possibly get it” – and Peggy Lee, “the
singer’s voice I really identified with, who
I came to by way of Walt Disney because
she was Lady in Lady And The Tramp. My
uncle managed Peggy Lee so I got to go to
her concerts.”
Signed by Kapp Records in 1963,
the Simon Sisters made their TV debut on the US
variety show Hootenanny and released the first of
their three albums, Meet The Simon Sisters, in 1964.
Their single, Winkin’, Blinkin’ And Nod – Lucy’s
adaption of the children’s poem – made it to the
lower end of the Billboard charts. The pair headed
to London in ’65, the same year that folk singer
Paul Simon, no relation, was over playing the folk clubs.
“I didn’t see him but there were lots of near encounters with
The Beatles!” Simon grins – she’s a big Beatles fan. “There was the
night we went to a club called Danny La Rue’s and Ringo and his
wife were there and sat at the table right next to us. I was too shy
to talk to him.” There was another night when “Paul McCartney’s
brother came to see us.” This was the doing of their UK agent,
the writer and satirist Willy Donaldson: “the man I was going
out with and very much in love with.” Donaldson, something of a
playboy, left his girlfriend, the actress Sarah Miles, for Simon, and
the pair were engaged for a while.
After an appearance on Ready Steady Go!, Carly and Lucy
went back to the States. Looking for gigs, they dressed in peasant
36 MOJO
skirts and Mexican farm girl blouses and
hitchhiked up to Provincetown to try their
luck. “We got a job at a place called Moors
– the guy who’d been the singer there all
year had just been conscripted and was off
to Vietnam, so we got his job. We quickly
learned a few more chords on our guitars
and we were up there on-stage two nights
after we got there with our new repertoire
of songs.”
One night a friend of Lucy’s came to see
Sister act: Carly (left) them at Moors. He suggested they might
and Lucy appearing
on the Hootenanny make a good act for a TV show called From
TV show, 1963. The Bitter End, named for the club
in Greenwich Village, though the
show was actually shot at various
college campuses. After their first
appearance, Carly got a phone
call from John Court, Albert
Grossman’s associate.
“He said that they would like
to meet me because they thought
I could team up with Bob Dylan
and Bob Dylan could write some
songs for me,” Simon recalls. “So
I went over in late June of ’66 and
I met with Bob, Albert and John.”
The meeting ended with
Simon and Dylan, alone in a room.
He had his guitar with him and
sang her a song, Baby Let Me Follow
You Down – Eric Von Schmidt’s
arrangement of the traditional song.
“He had altered the words slightly and
he taught it to me,” Simon tells MOJO. “I
remember right in the middle of it Dylan
spread his arms out à la Jesus and he said,
‘That’s definitely a song you’d want to do.
There’s nothing like that song.’ Then he said,
‘You ought to go to Nashville and cut your
record down there where all the musicians
are.’ He gave me a list of everybody I should call up.”
The following day, Dylan had his motorcycle accident.
IMON DID AS DYLAN SAID AND
went through his list. Among the names
was Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde On
Blonde producer Bob Johnston, with whom she
wrote a song called Goodbye Lovin’ Man.
“I was at the studio putting down the track
and Bob Johnston made some less than stunning
propositions to me in the back room,” she
recalls. “But I was on my guard, very much the
boarding school girl still. I said something to
him almost like, How dare you! I’m not that
green that I don’t understand what you mean.”
Johnston and Grossman wanted her to
record this new song and Dylan’s rewrite of Baby Let Me Follow
You Down in New York with Robbie Robertson, Levon Helm,
Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, Paul Griffin, Al Kooper and Mike
Bloomfield. “The group was supposed to be called – and I still
don’t know why – Carly & The Deacon.”
Simon’s feelings about some of the musicians were expressed
in another page of her diary, dated June 30, 1966. “Baby Let
Me Follow You Down is going all through my head, Robbie has
been so wonderful to me and consoling and even affectionate
that I want to fall right into his arms. Mike Bloomfield, excellent
guitarist though he might be, I can live without.” (Robertson’s
2017 memoir, Testimony, mentions a liaison with Simon.)
Neither of the recordings would enjoy an official release. ➢
Simon says: (clockwise
from above left) Carly
and James Taylor at
home in New York,
October 13, 1971; in
full voice, June 1971;
collaborator Bob Dylan
in London, May 1966;
an entry from Simon’s
diary; “he’s like a flight
of angels” – Cat Stevens
in ’71; “Ta-dah!” Carly
during the photo shoot
for the No Secrets sleeve,
London, March 15, 1971;
(opposite page) Simon’s
first three albums.
 However, the Simon Sisters were still a going concern – that
➣
is, until Lucy left to get married. Reluctant to perform alone but
determined to stay in music, Carly decided she’d be a songwriter,
recording a demo tape with David Bromberg that Columbia’s
Clive Davis reportedly threw across his office.
But in 1970, Elektra’s Jac Holzman entered
the picture.
“He was very tall and aristocratic-
looking,” remembers Simon. He was also
meticulous, with strong opinions about which
songs she should record.
“The first LP, I fought hard to get two or
three of my songs on there,” says Simon.
“I think Jac largely saw me as a singer, not a
songwriter, so I spent the first album trying to
prove to him that I was.”
Simon must have been tenacious, as Carly
Simon, released in February 1971, would
include seven Simon songs or co-writes,
including Alone, whose languid, country-folk
demo appears on These Are The Good Old Days
and the Grammy-nominated That’s The Way
I’ve Always Heard It Should Be.
Meanwhile, Holzman was keen for
Simon to play live, but she wasn’t. “I
wanted to stay out of the spotlight,”
she says. Still, a plan evolved for her
to start as an opening act for Cat
Stevens in spring 1971.
“I’d been listening to Cat
Stevens’ music since the beginning
of 1970, just loving the songs so
Alamy, Jack Robinson/Condé Nast/Shutterstock, Courtesy Warner Music, Brownie Harris/Getty, Santiago Felipe/Getty Images, Don Paulsen/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
much that they had grown to be
mine,” says Simon. “I’d memorised
all his phrasing the way I used to
imitate Odetta. But I had built up
too much anticipatory fear.”
She came up with a scheme.
She agreed to play only if she could
have Russ Kunkel in her band –
knowing the drummer was on
tour with James Taylor and was
therefore unavailable. “Jac said OK
and the next day he called and said,
‘We’ve got Russ Kunkel, when do
you want to start rehearsals?’”
On opening night, at the
Troubadour in LA, Simon wore the
precious red Chelsea Cobbler boots
Holzman gave her as a gift when she
signed to Elektra. Frightened as
she was, she was comforted by the
proximity of Cat Stevens.
“If you listen to people’s voices
for a long time and you know
their songs,” she says, “there’s a
familiarity that you feel as if you’re
already friends.”
Simon and Stevens became
close. “He’s like a flight of angels.
There’s no one like him,” she says.
HERE’S A STORY
behind the song
on These Are The
Good Old Days that
wasn’t on any of the
first three LPs: Angel
From Montgomery.
Simon’s version of the John Prine song had to wait for her 1995
retrospective Clouds In My Coffee to be heard. Back in New York,
Simon was going out with Kris Kristofferson: “another of the
men in my life who I heard their voices before I met them.”
One eye in the
mirror: Simon
says You’re So
Vain “took many
little turns and
pirouettes”;
(below) was
the song about
Warren Beatty?
I HAD THAT melody for a long time. I had been asked
to write the theme song for a [1969] television special
called Who Killed Lake Erie? for NBC. They wanted to
write about the devastation through pollution of
Lake Erie and how it happened. So I wrote that
melody and they did use it for the film but I got a very
disenchanting TV review saying my Weltschmerzy
music didn’t exactly lend itself to what it was trying
to say. But I kept the melody around and then about
a year into my songwriting period, I was just starting
to play the piano and my sister and I had a party in
our apartment. The doorbell rang and my sister let
this guy in. A friend of mine was standing next to me
and said, “Look at him, he’s walking into the party like
he’s walking onto a yacht.” I thought, I’m going to
write that down, it could come in handy. Maybe a
month later I started singing a song that I thought of
as a nursery rhyme: (sings to the opening melody of
You’re So Vain) “Bless you Ben, you came in when
nobody else left off.” And that was the beginning of
You’re So Vain.
I had all of these different concepts in mind. I had
the melody for Who Killed Lake Erie?, I had a melody
for the nursery rhyme and the line from the party, so
three different things in my notebook under the same
heading. But before it was called You’re
So Vain it was called The Ballad Of The
Vain Man. It started out in maybe 1968
and was finished in 1972. It took many
little turns and pirouettes.
As for who I think it’s about, I think
I've told too many people already
(laughs). How many men have claimed
it was about them or denied it? I don’t
think anybody that’s ever been asked,
at least asked by me, has answered the
question with a straight answer. There’s
always a joke to be made about it.
Kristofferson, playing a residency
at the Bitter End, was living in
Simon’s apartment.
“At one point,” says Simon, “Kris
was at Dylan’s house and he called me
and asked if he could bring Dylan by
and have a cup of coffee? Dylan came
and I don’t remember how it was but
John [Prine] and Steve [Goodman] were
there. I think John had just written or
recorded Angel From Montgomery.”
With everyone in Simon’s kitchen,
Prine sang the song and taught her to
play it. “It was a time when there was
a lot of passing the guitar around,” she
says. “People were being generous
with the music. When people got very
famous, they weren’t so comfortable
saying, ‘Do you want to hear this?’”
James Taylor had got very, very
famous. In March, 1971, he was
on the cover of Time magazine.
He was also backstage at Simon’s
Troubadour show with Cat
Stevens, accompanied by Joni
Mitchell, his then girlfriend. But
Simon was adamant that she and
Taylor would marry, and shortly
they became a couple.
In autumn 1972, Simon was
in London recording her third
album, No Secrets, when Taylor
proposed to her.
“In a letter,” says Simon. “He
had just been to my mother to ask
for my hand.” Before leaving for
England she had suggested they
get hitched but he hadn’t felt the
need. When Simon asked him
what had changed, he said, “This
time it was my idea.”
Her finest LP, No Secrets
featured a stellar cast including
Klaus Voormann, Lowell George,
Nicky Hopkins, Jim Keltner,
Bobby Keys and, guesting on
backing vocals, Paul and Linda
McCartney and Mick Jagger.
That’s Jagger sharing the chorus,
uncredited, on the LP’s fabled
pièce de resistance, You’re So Vain.
The candour of her lyrics about
the arrogant older guy who “had
me years ago when I was still
naïve,” along with her tough and
spirited dismissal of his pathetic
vanity, speak powerfully across
the decades and the song remains
her biggest hit.
Maybe it was being betrothed,
then married to Taylor that made
her refuse to name the real-life
subject of the song, so it remained
one of those music mysteries,
like what it was that Billie Joe
 Nobody does it better: (clockwise from
right) Simon strums away, New York,
1985; performing with Kris Kristofferson
at The Bitter End, Greenwich Village, NY,
May 27, 1971; Carly in 2019, holding her
book Touched By The Sun: My Friendship
With Jackie; Elektra boss Jac Holzman –
“he saw things others didn’t.”
McAllister threw off of Tallahatchie Bridge. In 2015, decades after
Simon and Taylor’s divorce, she told People magazine that the
second verse was about Warren Beatty. Jagger’s name has come up
too, but Simon has always declined to confirm or deny.
EOPLE WERE ALWAYS TELLING CARLY SIMON HOW
much she and Mick Jagger looked alike, and there had been
an idea that she should interview the Stones singer for the
New York Times. But she didn’t encounter Jagger in the flesh until
they met at a soirée at Ahmet Ertegun’s house in Beverley Hills.
“We had a really good time at the party just getting to know
each other and talking and laughing and comparing French poets
and being otherwise obnoxious,” she laughs. “I was at the Chateau
Marmont with James [Taylor], and I got a call from Mick and
he said, ‘We’re playing in San Francisco tonight and we’ve got a
plane. Do you want to fly up with us and we can do part of the
interview on the plane?’ I wasn’t ready for that yet but I told him I
was coming to London to record and we kind of finalised that we
would do an interview there.”
She was recording in Trident Studios in Soho when Jagger,
outside in a limo, extended an offer to take her to dinner. She told
him, “Harry [Nilsson] is here. Why don’t you come up and join us?”
The three of them stood around the mike singing You’re So
Vain, “then Harry stepped away and said, ‘I don’t think the two of
you need any help, I think you’ve got this made.’”
After half an hour they took a break. Then Jagger started playing
the piano, quietly, and started singing old country ballads – Long
Black Veil, Lonesome Whistle, D-I-V-O-R-C-E – in a surprisingly
gentle voice, while Simon added harmony. “We had a big bottle
of Courvoisier on the top of the piano,” she laughs. They didn’t
know that the mike was still on. Years later, Simon got to hear the
recordings. Of their version of D-I-V-O-R-C-E she notes, “I think
it would be very great to be played over a scene in The Crown.”
E’RE BACK WHERE WE STARTED, WITH THE
Crown, and what happens when a royal couple part.
In 1972, the final year of the music on her new
compilation, divorce was the last thing on Simon’s mind. With
husband Taylor she wrote a love song, Forever My Love, which
appeared on her next album Hotcakes. The hit duet Mockingbird
followed in 1974 – the year she gave birth to their first child,
Sarah. She returned the favour, singing backup on Taylor’s albums
throughout the decade and co-writing the song Terra Nova
on JT (1977).
From the outside it looked idyllic; the once-reluctant solo
artist had found the perfect duo. But though albums and hits and
awards kept coming, there were problems, chiefly Taylor’s drug
addiction. They divorced, but Simon kept going, releasing 23
studio albums, the last in 2009, Never Been Gone. She continues
to write books and film and TV scores, and has recorded several
covers albums. Already in the Grammy Hall Of Fame and the
Songwriters Hall Of Fame, and an Oscar winner, she was finally
inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year.
Taylor, however, has never been far from her thoughts. Does he
come back to see her in the house he built?
“No,” she says. “I’m sorry to have to tell you that because I’d
love to have a friendship with him. There was something about
James that was right. Right for me and for my life. He’s a part of
my energy, he’s very much a part of my thoughts.”
She pauses.
“There’s a line in Forever My Love: ‘I’m looking forward to
looking back/From further on down the track/Together in fact
forever my love.’ Every year that I was married to James was more
amazing than the last – and because my memory is so good I have
a lot to remember.” M
MOJO 39
 LYMPIC SOUND STUDIOS, BARNES, LONDON.
June 1968. The slow, roving camera of Anthony B
Richmond pans past a series of orange, mustard
and ochre room-dividers, gradually picking out the
individual members of The Rolling Stones as they
lay down a broken, elemental, organ-heavy demo of
Sympathy For The Devil. Richmond is filming the
group for the French New Wave director Jean-Luc Godard, who is
in London making the film One Plus One, a damaged mix of in-the-
studio incantation, formal improvisation and rudimentary agitprop;
rock’n’roll repurposed as a bewildering May ’68 call to arms.
Flash forward 55 years and Thurston Moore – gangly, 65-year-old
former vocalist and guitarist with noise-rock innovators, improvisors
and revolutionaries Sonic Youth – is giving MOJO a guided tour of
said studios, currently operating as a cinema and restaurant but with
plans to reinvest in a recording space.
“I was very curious about the Godard thing,” says Moore in an Rocket man: Thurston
amiable drawl that resides somewhere between the Connecticut of his Moore on-stage with
Sonic Youth at the
youth, the New York of Sonic Youth’s heyday and an adopted London Ramones Beat On
Getty

in which he has resided for the past decade. “The car graveyard ➢ Cancer Fundraiser,
Spirit Club, New York,
October 8, 2004.

40 MOJO
Dog days: (from left) Iggy Stooge, Cincinnati Pop
Festival, June 13, 1970; Moore brings the noise
on-stage in 1982; Lester Bangs, 1976; Kim Gordon
and Moore, 1990; “An American family, Bethel,
Connecticut, 1971: my father George; mother
Eleanor; brother Gene, sister Sue, and me at 13”;
(below) Kiss’s 1975 LP Alive!.

audience and pointing at the sky and not, you

know, James Taylor in a row boat?
There is a strong sense throughout the book
of a possible alternate career for Thurston
Moore as a music journalist…
I was a voracious reader of music
journalism in the mid-’70s. Not
having the wherewithal to see or
hear music live, it was all about the
document, the literature. For me,
scenes of One Plus One were filmed in Battersea. He was also these writers had the same value
➣
as the musicians they were writing
filming around Hammersmith, Kensington, Wandsworth, Lambeth, about. Lester Bangs, Richard
Hyde Park, and through the wetlands near Barnes. He just went out Meltzer, Patti Smith, their writing
with his camera packs and improvised.” was just so liberated from
We’re here to talk about Moore’s new book, Sonic Life, a mix of everything else. And each one
autobiography and music history in which our protagonist inhabits was completely distinctive. Patti
was all lower case and celebratory.
the multiple roles of observer, cultural historian, music journalist, With Lester everything was
leading man and bystander, moving between these various guises with another excuse to get fucked up.
a fluid grace. From his teenage epiphany watching Kiss live in 1974 (he and his best friend Meltzer just didn’t make any sense whatsoever.
Harold wired on prescription-grade ‘White Cross’ Dexedrine), to his immersion in New He’d go to the horse races in the middle of his
York’s post-no wave noise/art rock scene with his band Sonic Youth, Sonic Life is, in part, a interview. These people were wild cards and I
really thought they were wilder than the
love letter to the power of music, and the totems – the 7-inchers, the LPs, the fanzines – that musicians. So I wanted to write about that. But
informed Moore’s own cultural education. when I delivered the manuscript, it was 10 times
But it’s also a document of the fiery creative lives that intersected with his own during his too long. So I spent last year scissoring. Most of
band’s 30-year existence: artists and musicians including Rhys Chatham, Richard Hell, Lydia what came out is what my editor called “the
Lunch, Glenn Branca, Black Flag, Neil Young and, significantly, Kurt Cobain, whose band, life Professor Moore stuff”.
and death indelibly influenced Moore’s own trajectory.
Begun during the pandemic with touring curtailed, and nurtured while he taught a ONIC LIFE FOLLOWS, AT A
poetry workshop at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, it’s a book as unconventional respectful distance, the 2015 mem-
as Moore’s music, rejecting the prosaic tropes of the ghost-written rock biog and the tell-all oir of Moore’s bandmate, wife and
memoir. Instead, it’s a deeply researched invocation of time, place and self as invigorating as co-parent Kim Gordon. Girl In A Band bore
anything penned by his own literary rock’n’roll heroes: Patti Smith and Lester Bangs. the scars of the pair’s 2011 split after Moore
From the author's collection, Catherine Ceresole, Getty (3)

“I wasn’t really interested in writing a memoir,” he insists. “I was more interested in
writing about the music.”
Sonic Life is very different from the average
music memoir because you don’t always
position yourself in the centre. Often you’re
a fan, an observer, a cipher.
I read a lot of biographies about people in the
music business and I’m always amazed at all
these incredibly fabulous situations they find
themselves in. Even Rod Stewart’s memoir, you
have him witnessing the very beginning of The
Rolling Stones when it’s just four lads sitting on
stools with matching sweaters. I read Rod’s
memoir and Pete Townshend’s memoir around
the same time. Rod’s is really joyful and Pete’s is
just… I fucking hate everything. They’re great to
read together. So I was thinking about my
experiences in the music world but didn’t want
it to be “My fortuitous meetings with rock stars.”
I wanted to write about what my inspirations
were, what the information was. Why did I
respond to a picture of Iggy Pop, spray-painted
silver, being held up by the hands of a Detroit
began a relationship with book editor Eva
Prinz (now Moore). Yet Moore’s book reads
nothing like a reply or a riposte. Instead,
circumnavigating opportunities for self-
justification or narcissistic navel-gazing, one
of its striking aspects is how it makes space
for others. More strikingly still, these others
are not so much his longtime Sonic Youth
co-members: bassist-singer Gordon, guitar-
ist-singer Lee Ranaldo and drummer Steve
Shelley. In fact its most vividly drawn charac-
ter – also the first to have a significant impact

42 MOJO
on Moore – is his gay friend Harold Paris,
whom he meets at Bethel High School in
Connecticut around 1973, and with whom
he starts to explore New York in 1976.
“He would sweep through the halls in
striped flares and frilled, half-buttoned
shirts, silk ascots tied around his neck,
reeking of cologne,” writes Moore. “His hair
was a silver frost with burnt-mercury hints
– all of this with a laughing husky voice and
gleaming devil eyes. He could be found arm
in arm with the most alluring, more experi-
enced older girls, the wildest ones, the ones
who had no time for any of the vanilla dudes
in the skunk zone of our high school.”
Recalling Paris today, Moore is both
thoughtful and animated, still fascinated by
his fortuitous encounter with the one other
person willing to explore the thrilling new
world of New York punk in 1976.
Why did you feel Harold Paris needed to be
central to your book?
I wanted to write about the experience of
teenage discovery, of going to see music and
how these things were completely essential to
what I wanted to do with my life. Nobody was
listening to The Stooges or the MC5 in mid-’70s
Connecticut. Harold was. There’s a bit in the
book where he runs up to me in the school
parking lot and says, “Patti Smith is playing
tonight!” That’s where we connect. We knew
of each other, we’d eyeballed each other. And I
was definitely fascinated by him. The word on
the street was he’s probably gay, but you’re so
stupid and confused at that age in terms of your
sexual identity you don’t know. But I found
myself attracted to his otherness. And he was
attracted to things I’m finding attractive such
as Iggy, Patti, and the Ramones.
You move to New York by 1978. Do you think
your friendship with Harold made you more
open to the androgyny, the queerness of the
no wave scene?
Yes. I think I was attracted to the eros of
queerness in the scene even though I knew I
was not gay. There was something intellectually
erotic about it that was made corporeal through
the New York Dolls. Harold was very attracted to
the Dolls’ downtown scene but they weren’t
exactly espousing homosexuality. They were
jumping into bed with the coolest chicks.
Harold’s presence within the book starts to
fade around 1981, once you form Sonic Youth.
When Sonic Youth begins
Harold finds his own other
world. He sees me falling into
the arms of a snarky downtown
New York scene and he’s not
having any of it. When he puts
his Sonic Youth records on our
van window with a note that
says, “Take your stupid records
and give them to your snotty
friends,” that was the end of it.
There’s a couple of moments in the ’80s where but loves music. And then there’s me straddling
he tries to reach out to me and I’m way too these two places. I think that’s what’s coming
preoccupied with my own snarky downtown across early on. This balance of control and
bullshit so I don’t get back to him. I actually chaos: “How is this even working?”
think I could have had him exist more in the
book than he does. He died in 1990 but beyond
a certain point I didn’t want to talk about my N SONIC LIFE, SONIC YOUTH’S EARLY
personal relationship with Harold. I guess I history is portrayed as protean, constantly
didn’t want to talk about relationships full stop, thrilling in its ability to reshape and self-
including my relationships with Kim, with Lee, renew. As Moore describes the group today,
with Steve.
recalling a 1981 show at the Stilwende club
Kim Gordon remains something of a mystery on West Broadway, it was “a full-on recon-
throughout your book. Someone ultimately
struction of what a rock band can be.”
unknowable to the reader.
Yet their journey through the ’80s and
I suppose so. I think I purposefully muted
certain aspects of our relationship. I didn’t want
’90s would embrace more than deconstruc-
tion and denial, and become a vehicle for al-
to give it any more value than my relationship
with the rest of the band. I wanted the book most everything significant about rock music
to be very band-centred. I didn’t want to talk and its changes in America and beyond.
about our romantic relationship. I didn’t want 1985’s Bad Moon Rising was one major
to get into the intricacies of our marriage…
step: a record that repurposed numerous
But even when you talk about her within different aspects of American iconography
the band, there is the recognition of
someone inherently…
– surf music, psychedelia, Charles Manson,
Hard to read? (laughs) There was a resistance to
Vietnam, Reagan, the dark, imagined Deep
South of Creedence Clearwater Revival, the
wanting to delve further into that. Kim or Lee or
burgeoning goth scene and the West Coast
Steve can write their own book. Kim has written
her own book and she can write more if she hardcore punk of Black Flag – and assimilat-
wishes. I really didn’t want to tell their story and ed them within a new cyclical, hypnotic way
in the case of Kim I didn’t want to be having this
narrative battle. I saw that energy as being of playing and recording.
slightly if not totally negative. Four years on, Sonic Youth’s epochal Day-
The way you write about her energy within
dream Nation album would be distributed by
the band, however, is poetic and profound. a major label, and Moore would be witness to
another watershed, a July 1989 show at Max-
I do try to acknowledge her as an artist in the
context of the band. For me, Sonic Youth was all well’s in Hoboken, New Jersey – by Nirvana.
about having the band I wanted to see live. Lee “In that first gig,” notes Moore, “I saw the
was this high technique player whereas Kim was seeds of the coming decade… It would pre-
just as raw as it can get. She just picked up the
bass on day one and her playing was all about
sent an alternative… to the corporate pan-
patterns, coming from the mind of a visual artist dering that had so far defined popular culture
who never had a music lesson in their entire life [and] that movement’s progressive, trou- ➢
MOJO 43

Stairway to heaven: (clockwise from above)
Moore offers Kurt Cobain a helping hand
during Nirvana’s show-stealing mid-after-
noon Reading Festival set, August 23, 1991;
the raucous debut of Simpson Youth, 1995;
Thurston digs deep, 2015; Sonic Youth in
2004 (from left) Steve Shelley, Lee Ranaldo,
Moore, Gordon, Jim O’Rourke; Thurston
and Eva Moore, London, 2023; Moore with
Yoko Ono at Cafe OTO, London, 2014.
bled spirit would largely reside behind
➣
the glassy blue eyes of Kurt Cobain, anointed
as if by some lost angel, an artist destined to
shine, scorched and exquisite, if only for a
fleeting moment.”
Bad Moon Rising feels like an important
milestone in the book. So much seems to
come together with that record.
Yeah, I remember the genesis of that record
being the picking figure at the intro of the track
Great Men Run. I remember bringing that
picking figure to the band and thinking it was
the next step for us, actual fingering on the fret
board as opposed to slamming an implement
against it. It was at once organic and purposeful.
It was informed by seeing The Feelies really
early on where they were this completely
raging thing with all of this intricately beautiful
mesmeric dual-guitar, linear-picking stuff.
I remember thinking, I want to do that.
You also bring in something thematic and
intellectual. You’re referencing darker
44 MOJO
elements of American
iconography.
Some of that had to do with Lydia Lunch coming
into our world. She discovered us through our
first drummer Richard Edson and we became
really close friends. Also Henry Rollins and Black
Flag were important. I was really enamoured by
American hardcore but Henry and Black Flag
had decided to push back their cultural
references to pre-’76, employing the vocabulary
of bands like Black Sabbath, growing out their
hair, confronting what they saw as the teenage
fascist uniform of the contemporary hardcore
scene. Also, the artist Raymond Pettibon, who
was working with Black Flag, was looking at ’60s
hippy culture. We were all passing around books
on Charles Manson. I started reading The Family
because it was written by Ed Sanders of the
Fugs but he wrote about it all so romantically,
all this stuff about “attack battalions of dune
buggies”. And this was when Reagan was
coming into the Presidency saying, “Let’s bring
back the good old days.” We were holding up
Manson and saying, “these good old days?” The
Creedence song, Bad Moon Rising, was all about
the negative energy of America around the time
of Vietnam and to revisit that was exciting and
subversive. It allowed us to continue our interest
in nihilism.
At a significant point in the book you move
the focus onto Kurt Cobain and Nirvana.
Did you know you were going to do that
from the start?
I felt that was the aspect of our history most
casual readers would be most interested in and I
had no issue with that. When I was putting this
book together my agent basically said, “Give me
your Kurt chapter.” It was used for finding the
right publisher. I understood the value of that.
In the process of writing the book, did you
rediscover anything about your relationship
with Kurt?
I don’t know if it elucidated anything more than
what actually happened, which was this turning
of the culture on its ear and
offering it to the rest of the
world. However, it wasn’t as if
bands like Sonic Youth, Butthole
Surfers, The Jesus Lizard or
whatever bands Kurt was
associated with were going to
become the next big thing. In
the end it was all these bands
none of us had ever worked with
on the road, like Stone Temple
Pilots or Pearl Jam – because
they were making the music
more accessible. Around this
time we had an A&R person at
Courtesy of Steve Gullick, Alamy, © Felix Clay/Eyevine, Camera Press/Steve Double, Getty (2)
Geffen saying, “You guys can be
the Pink Floyd of the underground.” I was, like,
No, we can’t. I realised that would be false.
Nirvana stood alone – just this charmed thing.
At one point, I was thinking maybe there’s too
much Kurt in this book. But I realised this is
partly because his presence in our culture was
so profound. When he dies there really is this
seismic shift.
Also, when he dies something happens to
the book – and something happens to
Sonic Youth…
It’s huge. [Sleater-Kinney’s] Carrie Brownstein
said something after Bowie died, she said,
“It’s like we lost a primary colour.” What a
great image. Something similar happened
when D Boon of the Minutemen died in 1985
but that was more of a micro-community
thing. Kurt was part of the global community.
I read the Kurt chapter aloud to my writing
workshop in Boulder, Colorado, and somebody
said to me afterwards, “That chapter is three
quarters of the way through the book. Where

does it end?” She was right.
After that point things just
became slightly disparate.
It was just record, tour,
record, tour, record, tour.
Did I want to just keep
writing about that over
and over? Not really.
After that, the world of Sonic Youth
suddenly seems spindly and wistful,
as if something vital has been removed.
Well, one thing that happens right then is my
interest goes more subterranean. I start getting
into this disparate expanding culture of
underground basement noise music that
doesn’t necessitate any branding. Bands like
Wolf Eyes or Lightning Bolt, that’s what I find
myself going towards as opposed to wanting
to compete with Red Hot Chili Peppers, which
our management would have loved.
Do you think the band would have
stayed together if Jim O’Rourke hadn’t
joined in 1999?
That’s a good question. Jim came in at a time
when it rejigged the band in a way that was very
satisfactory. He was coming out of this world of
experimental music that was really coming to
the fore in our interests and his favourite bands
are Sparks and Merzbow. So yay! That became a
great period in the band’s life but even then
there’s this sense that the currents of change
during that period aren’t that interesting. We
became somewhat muted as a lot of things in
music culture were moving forward. I suppose I
could have spent a lot of time writing about the
songwriting on those later albums but I also
thought the attention span of any reader at that
point is probably “LET’S JUST WIND THIS UP!”
Instead of the pat rock biog epilogue, there’s
something more complicated – a sense of
moving towards silence.
Or change. Right. I mention meeting Eva,
without getting too deep into the intricacies of
that. I thought about saying, This is a singular
situation that was never predicated upon any
kind of serial affairness with Kim or I. But I didn’t
feel I needed to establish that so I made it as
succinct as possible. I didn’t know how to end
the book. It was Eva’s idea. She said, “Wasn’t the
last Sonic Youth album called The Eternal? Is that
an interesting way to end, saying, ‘The last
document is The Eternal?’”
So hang on a minute. You
didn’t name The Eternal
thinking it would be the
last Sonic Youth album?
No. When we were making
that album there was
definitely a sense of extreme change on the
horizon, because things were coming to a head
as far as what was going on in the band and
our marriage falling apart. But nobody said,
This is the final record, final tour or final gig.
There was never any official announcement
of Sonic Youth stopping. We were gonna take
a break and see where life leads us. And we’re
still taking a break.
T’S TIME FOR LUNCH. AS WE’RE
packing up MOJO asks Moore what he
thinks is the most vivid moment in the
book. Not the one with the biggest historical
or social impact, but just the one that means
most to him.
“There’s a chapter where we come back
from our first tour overseas in 1983,” he
says. “We played a return gig at CBGB and
in the Village Voice it read ‘back from their
European tour’, which I thought was
this kind of really regal stance. Anyway,
after our set, Marnie Greenholz, the bass
player in Live Skull, ran over to us in the
street and she was so enamoured by how
we sounded and she was saying we
were her favourite band.
“To me, that pay-off is
as essential as anything else
that happened to us,”
Moore reflects. “I always
wanted that to be in
the book [because] no
praise from any me-
dium could ever come
close to how good that
felt, the validation
from a fellow musi-
cian. It could almost
end right there.” M
Thurston meets the Beatle when Sonic Youth
perform at Neil and Pegi Young’s Bridge School
Benefit in 2003. After the gig, McCartney, who’s
been watching Sonic Youth perform, approaches
Thurston and Jim O’Rourke to discuss their
unique approach to tuning. The duo have their
own questions: Were there any longer versions
of Revolution 9? Was it inspired by Cornelius
Cardew? And, most importantly, his production
work on brother Mike’s 1974 solo LP, McGear. “Are
you kidding me?” asks Sir Paul. “No!” gush Jim and
Thurston. “We love that record. And the Scaffold!”
“No one ever asks me about Mike,” says McCartney,
visibly surprised. “Dude!” replies Thurston. “We
know way more about Scaffold than The Beatles.”
Touring with Neil Young on 1991’s Smell The Horse
tour, the Youth incur the wrath of Shakey’s crew,
who believe their “smarty-pants noise rock” is
corrupting Neil. Later that year they’re invited
to play an ‘all acoustic’ set for the Bridge School
Benefit Concert, a fundraiser for children born
with severe motor impairment, much like Neil
and Pegi’s son, Ben. Taking to the stage the group
discover Neil’s engineer, “who suffered… our
perceived insolence all through the Smell The
Horse tour” has given the group no monitors.
They blunder through an acoustic version of New
York Dolls’ Personality Crisis before a frustrated
Kim smashes her acoustic guitar to a chorus of
boos, heckles and flying objects. Afterwards,
they apologise to Neil, Pegi and Ben. Ben says a
response: “Well what I’ve learned is that once in
a while everybody has a bad day.”
In 1998 Beck invites Thurston to perform at New
York’s Roxy nightclub for a Fluxus-style happening
in support of his grandad, artist Al Hansen.
With support from Yoko Ono, and with
Marianne Faithfull and Cat Power also
on the bill, it promises to be a special
night. Thurston decides to perform
with producer Don Fleming and pal
Jim Dunbar as synth-noise trio
FOOT. “Keeping in the Fluxus
spirit,” the trio ask a Puerto
Rican go-go dancer named
Leo to dance on-stage
with them. The audience
for this “happening” –
actors, supermodels, and
celebrities including “it-
boy Lemonheads singer
Evan Dando, Gwyneth
Paltrow, Liv Tyler, Lou Reed
and Rose McGowan” – do
not embrace FOOT’s set of
“nuclear volume wailing
noise-horror…” and hot-
pants go-go dancing.
After a brisk five-minute
performance they exit the
stage, to be met by silence but
for one celebrity who jumps
up from her front-row table
with a beaming smile, shouting
“Bravo!” Yes, it is Yoko Ono.
 TIME PASSES
SLOWLY
Outtake from New Morning
photo session, 1970.
Len Siegler’s double
exposure captures Dylan
in a reflective mood.
Mixing Up The Medicine
also includes a letter to
Dylan from Archibald
MacLeish, whose play
was to include songs Dylan
ended up using on New
Morning. “Those songs of
yours have been haunting
me,” writes MacLeish.

46 MOJO
 BY THE
HAND OF
A NEW BOOK, BOB DYLAN:
MIXING UP THE MEDICINE,
LIFTS THE LID ON THE
ARTIST’S LABYRINTHINE
TULSA ARCHIVE. RARE PICS
AND EXOTIC ARTEFACTS ARE
REVEALED – PROMPTS FOR
EXCITABLE COMMENTARY
FROM GREIL MARCUS,
MICHAEL ONDAATJE,
LEE RANALDO AND MORE.
OVER THE NEXT EIGHT
PAGES, MOJO ENJOYS AN
EXCLUSIVE PREVIEW OF
ITS TREASURES. ODDS AND
Len Siegler, all objects and photos courtesy of the Bob Dylan Archive, unless noted otherwise.

ENDS? AND THEN SOME!

Bob Dylan: Mixing Up The

Medicine – Treasures From
The Bob Dylan Center,
Tulsa, OK, written and
edited by Mark Davidson
and Parker Fishel et al,
is published by Callaway
Arts & Entertainment on
October 24, 608 pages,
in hardcover. RRP: £80.

MOJO 47
 CAST YOUR FOREVER YOUNG
DANCING SPELL Fifth Grade class portrait,
Bruce Langhorne’s Mr Dylan seated right.
Tambourine Man ‘tambourine’. Mixing Up The Medicine also features
shots of Dylan in his school Latin
Bruce Langhorne played guitar on Club and Gutter Boys bowling team.
a number of Dylan sessions. But it Here, with his hand drum and in his
was another instrument he would psychedelic shirt, he’s obviously
sometimes employ that stuck in gearing up for a life in rock’n’roll.
Dylan’s mind and inspired the title
character in his classic
1964 song. The
‘tambourine’ was
actually a 16-inch-
diameter Turkish
frame drum
called a daf.

CHORDS
OF FAME
Dylan in his band The
Bill Pagel Collection; Kenneth Ruggiano/Gilcrease Museum

Golden Chords, 1958.

The Golden Chords
rock the Winter Frolic
Talent Contest, Hibbing
Community College,
February 14, 1958.
Also pictured: Monte
Edwardson on the
guitar, and LeRoy
Hoikkala on the drums.
“Bob, he got a little
loud,” remembers
Hoikkala. “The teachers
didn’t care for that.”

48 MOJO
THE MILLION DOLLAR BASH
DYLAN-WHISPERER GREIL MARCUS
ON THE 1960 MADISON PARTY TAPE: A
DOCUMENT OF THE BARD’S BECOMING.
W
HEN BOB DYLAN LEFT MINNEAPOLIS IN THE
late fall of 1960, seeking New York City as if he didn’t
exactly know where it was, he landed in Madison, Wis-
consin, in the bohemian milieu around the university.
He has spoken often over the years of a kind of secret
society of folk music people: if you knew where to go, who to call,
where to wait, within hours you could find yourself within the con-
fines of what he called “like-minded people”, sharing songs, sharing
food, sharing tiny apartments, even if you slept on the floor – there
wasn’t room for a couch. For Madison, Dylan had a number for
Ron Radosh. Born in New York, he was from a Communist Party
background; Pete Seeger was his guitar teacher. Now he was a folkie
and a graduate student: “I was a 5-string banjo picker and guitar-
ist and wanted to be a professional folk singer,” he wrote to me
in 2021, “and gave that up when I realised my limitations.” (As a
scholar, notable among his books is, with Joyce Milton, from 1983,
The Rosenberg File, a convincing case for the guilt of [nuclear
spies] Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Radosh must have flinched when
he heard the bootlegged Julius And Ethel,
from the same year, perhaps as musically
bad and intellectually clueless as anything
Bob Dylan has ever written or recorded;
it was never released.) Radosh didn’t have
room to put Dylan up, but he had those se-
cret society connections: he sent Dylan to
Danny Kalb, then an 18-year-old freshman
and guitar player. Within hours Dylan was
meeting people, staying at different apart-
ments, part of whatever was happening.
He was playing at parties; at one Socialist
Club night, people complained that he
wouldn’t stop singing his Woody Guthrie
songs when there were serious politics that
needed talking about.
The tape that survives from one of
those nights, from November or Decem-
ber, at the house of the guitarist Jeff Chase, with
Chase and Kalb sometimes in the background,
has a different tone from party tapes made in
Minneapolis both before and after, and after
Dylan reached New York. You don’t hear mas-
tery, a scholastic command of folk song, au-
thority, an original style, or for that matter hu-
mour. You hear someone finding his way into
an attitude, where songs can take shape not as
icons to be treated with respect, but mere occa-
sions to put one foot in front of the other, trying to
find out just what it is you’re looking for. The Mem-
phis Jug Band recorded K. C. Moan in
1929; they were chasing a death-bound
train, three voices chiming in over a sto-
“PEOPLE COMPLAINED
ry that they’ve been told too many times
without ever finding an ending they can
THAT HE WOULDN’T STOP
live with. It was a masterpiece then; SINGING HIS WOODY
today it sounds unearthly, the last kind
GUTHRIE SONGS WHEN
words of people before they vanish from
the earth and memory. Quickening the
pace, Dylan, Kalb, and Chase have fun
THERE WERE SERIOUS
with it. The pace Dylan finds is jaunty. POLITICS THAT NEEDED
TALKING ABOUT.”
The rhythm pops. “Hey, hey, ho, ho,” Dylan lets out from the start
of the night to the end: this is the one time where it feels part of the
song, because it lands square on the beat. It’s an early catch of the
uncanny timing Dylan would mine for the rest of his career (I think
of the first “all right” in Sitting On A Barbed-Wire Fence): proof, as
the late Ralph J Gleason put it, that “Bob Dylan can swing.”
W
HEN DYLAN RETURNED TO MINNEAPOLIS FROM
New York in the spring of 1961, people were shocked at
the change. In Martin Scorsese’s No Direction Home,
Tony Glover recounts how it was like “Tommy Johnson, Robert
Johnson” – “like he’d gone to the crossroads,” made his deal with
the devil, came back better than anyone in town ever thought of
being. That night in Madison, it’s clear that wherever the cross-
roads might be – somewhere down in Greenwich Village, maybe
where West 4th Street crosses West 12th? – he hasn’t been there
yet. Such timeless songs as Danville Girl and East Virginia Blues
don’t begin to come off. You don’t believe the singer was ever on a
platform smoking a big cigar – the “big cigar” of the 1944 Woody
Guthrie version, making you think that even if the character tell-
ing the story is waiting for a freight to hop, any cigar has to be a big
cigar, like the plutocrats in their tuxedos resting their feet on the
necks of honest workers in cartoons in [early-century US socialist
magazine] The Masses always had it, rather than the “cheap cigar”
the song originally carried, as Dock Boggs
sang Danville Girl in 1927, with countless
people in the background before him: an
image that actually tells you something, that
from the bitter tone the word demands lets
you picture the singer. And yet the songs are
there, something to investigate, something
to test yourself against, blues chords curl-
ing around a melody: 37 years later, when
the singer on Time Out Of Mind, in Standing
In The Doorway, tells you he’s smoking a
cheap cigar, not only do you believe him,
you can see the same man doing the same
thing for 20 years, over and over, getting
nowhere every time.
It’s interesting that a 19-year-old Bob
Dylan is more convincing on Jimmie Rodg-
ers’ Let Me Be Your Sidetrack than on
Guthrie’s Hard Travelin’. By the end of 1960 he
was doing Woody Guthrie in his sleep, when
he sat down to eat, drank coffee, had a beer,
shook hands. A few steps away from that
little constructed Guthrie world, he had to
look for the song, to find out where he was
in relation to it, and homage wouldn’t do,
because he didn’t yet know the song well
enough to imitate it. He had to reach for the
song, as if it were a testament and a joke at the
same time, and so it is: Let Me Be Your Sidetrack
is closer to rock’n’roll than anything that was passing
for folk music. That’s the attitude: songs
are a way to get from one place to an-
other, in the course of the night, across
a life, and who knows what they’re really
about? Ramblin’ Railroader, a song so
folk it seems to have been composed by
the genre as an advertisement for itself,
© Greil Marcus, 2023
comes up; hidden inside of it are a few
lines from Elvis Presley’s Mystery Train.
He wasn’t at the crossroads, but you can
sense him looking for it on a map.
MOJO 49
 Ken Regan, courtesy of Camera 5/Regan Pictures, Inc.; Kenneth Ruggiano/Gilcrease Museum

50 MOJO

THE ROVING GAMBLER
On the tour bus, Telluride, Colorado,
August 2001.
Photographed by the trusty Ken Regan,
Dylan looks set to win back his band’s per
diems. From left: David Kemper, Tony Garnier,
Bob Dylan, Larry Campbell, Charlie Sexton.
His post “Love And Theft” band is often
described as one of his greatest.
Lyric by Bob Dylan copyright © Universal Tunes
WITH YOUR PENCIL
IN YOUR HAND…
Handwritten draft of Ballad Of A Thin Man, 1965.
This page of Dylan’s notes shows the second
verse mostly intact before introducing some
unused material, including the character of
an opera singer, and some put-downs, including
“You’ve read too many Time magazines.” Dig
the doodles – is one of the faces Mr Jones?

SIMPLE
TWIST OF FATE
Suit jacket worn by Bob Dylan
in Masked And Anonymous.
Dylan co-wrote and co-starred
– as Dylan-ish musician Jack
Fate – in this surreal 2003 movie
that may or may not be set in a
new American civil war. Killer
version of Cold Irons Bound,
though – and in this very jacket.

LET ME SAY IT
Letter from George
Harrison, 1968.
Postmarked December 5,
and addressed to Tiny
Montgomery (after one of
Dylan’s Basement Tapes
songs), a touching relic of a
Thanksgiving visit to the
Dylans. On a separate sheet,
Harrison scrawls the chords
Credit in here

to a song titled Thingymubob,

later to emerge as I’d Have
You Anytime.

MOJO 51
 THE RIGHT PROFILE
Original Milton Glaser poster maquette, 1967.
With the flow of new Dylan music stemmed in the
wake of the singer’s motorcycle accident, Columbia
released Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits. The initial run
included a poster featuring this now-iconic image,
inspired by a 1957 self-portrait by the artist Marcel
Duchamp, also a profile in silhouette. Milton Glaser
went on to design the famous ‘I ♥ NY’ logo.

CLEAN CUT KID

Portrait by Richard Avedon,
New York, 1963.
Just days after the final recording
session for The Times They Are
A-Changin’, Dylan posed for Richard
Avedon at 132nd Street and FDR
Drive in Harlem, on November 4.
There’s a sense that he never looked
so boyish again. This frame is a
never-before-published outtake.

Milton Glaser, courtesy of Ryder Road Foundation; Richard Avedon, © The Richard Avedon Foundation; courtesy of Oddbjørn Saltnes; William Claxton

52 MOJO
 ENDLESS
HIGHWAY
Portrait by William
Claxton, 2006.
The dearth of recent
photographs of Dylan
is the bane of MOJO’s
Picture Editors, and
one of Mixing Up The
Medicine’s attractions
is the wealth of shots
hitherto uncirculated.
2006 was a good Dylan
year, with the release
of Modern Times and
the debut of Theme
Time Radio Hour.

FOOT OF PRIDE
Dylan’s Nobel Prize diploma, awarded 2016.
Dylan is the first songwriter and only the 12th
American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature,
joining Saul Bellow, Joseph Brodsky, Pearl
Buck, T. S. Eliot, William Faulkner, Ernest
Hemingway, Sinclair Lewis, Isaac Bashevis
Singer, John Steinbeck, Toni Morrison, and
Eugene O’Neill. He received his medal and
diploma from the Swedish Academy in a
private ceremony in 2017.

IS IT ROLLING?
“Rinaldo” And Clara doodle, circa 1977.
Over 1975 and ’76, as the Rolling Thunder
Revue rolled on, Dylan accrued footage
of scenarios intended for a movie. Many
hours of ’76 and ’77 were spent editing it
into a four-hour feature, eventually released
as Renaldo And Clara in January 28, 1978.
A short run in selected cinemas followed,
to terrible reviews. M
WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED
I Threw It All Away? Quite
the contrary, discovers
Danny Eccleston.
BOB DYLAN: MIXING
UP THE MEDICINE
★★★★★
By Mark Davidson
and Parker Fishel
(Callaway, £80)
SHOWCASING SOME of the more
charismatic contents of Tulsa’s Bob
Dylan Center, the facility that
opened in May 2022 to provide
managed access to the mountain of
writings and artefacts retained by
Dylan and his associates, plus a
groovy ‘visitor experience’, Mixing
Up The Medicine is also a kind of
fragmented biography, balancing
the visceral thrill of rarely seen
pictures (the book contains over
1,100 images) with 30 original
essays tackling Dylan topics both
broad and narrow – eye candy and
brain fuel both.
Dylan fans will be most excited
by the access to their hero’s process.
Notepaper from the Waldorf Astoria
hotel in Toronto maps Dylan’s
adjustments to the epochal Chimes
Of Freedom. Nearby, a page in a
notebook offers a list of his listening
in 1964 (does “Bed Bugs” mean The
Beatles?). A photograph collects the
mind-boggling 43 pages of drafts to
Dignity, the song Dylan started at
Oh Mercy sessions and released as a
single in 1994.
Then there are peeks behind the
curtain of professional artistry.
Letters from fellow stars are
touching and personal. There’s a
note to Dylan from Johnny Cash,
recalling a visit to the Carter Family
(not yet his in-laws): “Mother
Maybelle woke me up every
morning singing Lonesome
[presumably, Restless] Farewell.
She digs you deeply.”
And insights, too. Michael’s son,
Griffin Ondaatje, in one of the new
essays, has a plausible new answer
to the question, ‘Who was Mr
Jones?’: the emaciated outlaw villain
in Joseph Conrad’s novel, Victory.
And though gaps in Dylan’s story
are hammered over with boilerplate
aimed at the non-connoisseur, they
constitute a small price to pay (of
the much larger price you’re already
paying). Unless, of course, you’re not
paying at all. Because what else is a
Christmas list for?
Cool for cats: Black Pumas’
Eric Burton (left) and
Adrian Quesada put in
some screen time, 2023.
 MOJO PRESENTS

Taking soul, gospel

and R&B into the future,
BLACK PUMAS are the odd
couple dream team with
The Rolling Stones’ stamp
of approval. Their second
album promises next-level
scenes, as long as their
clashing personalities
don’t generate too much
friction. “It’s what makes
the creative sparks fly,”
they tell ANDREW PERRY.
Photography by JODY DOMINGUE

NE LAZY AFTERNOON IN 2009, 18-YEAR-OLD ERIC BURTON DOZED OFF ON HIS

uncle’s roof in Alamogordo, New Mexico, an arid desert city one hundred miles up from the
USA’s southern border. Upon waking at dusk, the young musical-theatre student reached for
the acoustic guitar on which his uncle, Steve Harrison, a contemporary Christian recording
artist, had been teaching him to write songs.
“I only had three or four strings on there,” recalls Burton today, now 32 and the frontman
of Black Pumas, “but I was able to pick out four notes that felt really nice together, and I just
started singing to what I was seeing at the time – the colours of the beautiful New Mexico sunset.”
Burton’s grandparents were missionaries, initially based in Philadelphia, but after a period in Liberia, west
Africa, settled in California, establishing a nomadic family business of updating church musical programmes along
the West Coast.
“I was just getting into journalling my own feelings,” Burton continues, speaking to MOJO in a friend’s kitchen
in his adopted hometown of Austin, Texas. “I’d been hired by a Presbyterian church in Alamogordo to lead their
hymns. That day, I think I was trying to write my own version of a hymn – for me, from my highest self, to connect
with the people that surround me.”
Eight meandering years later, Burton’s joyful secular spiritual would become the flagship song for Black Pumas,
a soul-drenched project he’d undertaken in Austin with Adrian Quesada, the older ex-guitarist with Latin party-
starters Grupo Fantasma. Guileless and idealistic, Colors duly connected on an unimaginable global scale, a rare
Jody Domingue

crossover hit from such a rootsy band.

As well as fielding six Grammy nominations across 2020-22, in January ’21 the seven-piece Pumas touring ensem-
ble got to perform Burton’s sundown jam as part of President Joe Biden’s inauguration festivities on national TV. ➢

MOJO 55
 Black magic: Burton and
Quesada on-stage in
Montreux, Switzerland,
June, 7, 2022; (insets) the
Pumas’ first two LPs.
“I WAS PROBABLY THE
WORST BUSKER EVER,
BECAUSE I DON’T KNOW
VERY MANY SONGS THAT
AREN’T MINE.”
Eric Burton
“It was heavy Covid time,” says Quesada,
➣
“so we pre-recorded that performance in
a studio here. To be honest, it seemed like
another day at the office – until I watched
the whole inauguration. Then, I grasped
the intensity and size of the moment and,
believe me, I had tears in my eyes.”
T
HE PATRONAGE OF AMERICAN
Presidents and the admiration of the music establishment
underlines exactly where Black Pumas find themselves in
2023. Where countless retro-R&B saviours have failed to break
out beyond the revival circuit, the duo have succeeded in breathing
new life into an idiom born and defined in the ’60s. It’s in their ac-
knowledgment of the music’s legacy in modern rap and pop, and in
Burton’s lyrics, which – with their lurid imaginings of black moons
and dreamy cloud formations – transcend vintage soul tropes. But
maybe we can see a precursor to their artful mash of old and new in
a former patron of Quesada’s: Prince.
“He took Grupo Fantasma under his wing,” says Quesada,
explaining how, circa 2007, Prince installed the band in a Thursday-
night residency at his short-lived Club 3121 in Las Vegas, occasion-
ally enlisting them as his own support act, including one concert
in his legendary 21-night run at London’s O2 Arena, and even as
his backing band, at an O2 aftershow, and a pre-Superbowl party
in Miami.
Originally from Laredo, Texas, a busy town bordering Mexi-
co, Quesada moved to Austin for its rich music scene, but soon
started exploring his half-Mexican roots. In Grupo Fantasma he
fused Latin rhythms with the American musics he grew up with –
heavy rock, hip-hop and, via rap’s samples, soul and funk. The band
won a Grammy for 2010’s El Existential, but after 13 years’ ser-
vice, the economic pressure of touring a 10-piece combo and the
Rene Huemer
birth of his kids forced him to step away, and to scratch a nagging
creative itch.
“I couldn’t work out exactly what I wanted to do,” he admits,
56 MOJO
until one day he went running with
Supreme Clientele by Wu-Tang Clan rap-
per Ghostface Killah on his headphones.
“That was the ‘a-ha’ moment,” he says, “hearing soul
through the filter of that style of production, how Ghost-
face sings like he’s crying on certain songs, in between
rapping. That was when I started to work on the first
Black Pumas tracks.”
The search for the right voice to front them took
longer. Quesada “put out a world-wide call” (including
to London-based Americana maverick Shawn Lee), but
tapped out until August 2017, when a local producer
named Bryan Ray told him about Eric Burton. In the
eight years since penning Colors, Burton had drifted
back to LA, where he’d busk alone on Santa Monica Pier, earning
as much as $300 per day. “I was probably the worst busker ever,”
he laughs now, “because I don’t know very many songs that aren’t
mine. I used that time to demo out my own ideas.”
By 2015, he was in a trio touring the West Coast, but when they
journeyed to Austin for Burton’s 25th birthday, the band subse-
quently parted ways, and Burton stayed, appreciating “how accept-
ing the Austin community is of artists.” Initially he busked a spot at
the intersection of 6th Street and Congress Avenue, but Quesada
reckons “that narrative has been over-romanticised. When [Bryan]
put me onto him, Eric was already a guy playing solo gigs in clubs
around town.”
Quesada e-mailed Burton, who let him dangle for a while,
but when they started trying out together at Electric Deluxe Re-
corders, Quesada’s South Austin studio, both agree the chemistry
was instantaneous.
“I’m a big fan of the dialogue that’s always happening between
the instruments in a song,” says Quesada, “how the bass responds
to the kick drum and all that stuff, so that’s typically where I con-
tribute. Eric listened to what I was doing and, at a point where I
would hit a wall and couldn’t do anything else, he turned it into
songs. It was a perfect match.”
When Burton sent the guitarist a Soundcloud link to some dem-
os he’d recorded, which included Colors, Stay Gold and several
other keepers, Quesada was able to graft on rhythm tracks, make
some compositional tweaks for maximum impact, and their Black
Pumas debut was ready to fly.
 Diamond life: (clockwise from left)
Quesada in his Electric Deluxe Recorders
studio; Burton in playback mode; Eric
takes his dog for a walk during recording;
Black Pumas performing at the Biden-
Harris Inauguration, January 20, 2021.
W
HEN MOJO CAUGHT BLACK
Pumas at London’s Islington Assem-
bly Hall in February 2020, their live
show was finely honed from a year’s intensive
touring around their debut’s June 2019 release
and charged by Burton’s crackling magnetism
out front. As well as choice covers, including
Tracy Chapman’s busker’s favourite Fast Car,
their headline set was already fleshed out by two
embryonic big-hitters from the now-pending
second album Chronicles Of A Diamond – sub-
limely soaring opener More Than A Love Song,
and blue-collar anthem Mrs Postman. While the
pandemic delayed the album’s gestation, Black
Pumas’ momentum sustained with shows, in-
cluding a support slot with The Rolling Stones
in Minneapolis in October 2021, and ongoing
up-tempo word-of-mouth.
“When they play, they’re for real,” says Aar-
on Frazer, band leader with neo-soul combo
Durand Jones & The Indications, who toured
solo with Black Pumas in winter 2021. “You
feel an energy that you might find in a church,
and that’s because a lot of their music is hope-
ful, coming from a place of hardship but looking
towards something more optimistic. Mid-pan-
demic, I think people really needed that.”
As Quesada notes, Black Pumas “weren’t
even a band when we made the first record.”
Maybe it’s no surprise that they’re still learning
how to be one.
“Adrian knows what works – that’s the
strongest attribute he brings to the table, where-
Greg Giannukos, Jesse Lirola (2), Getty
as I don’t know the rules,” says Burton of their
odd-couple, head-versus-heart dynamic. Later,
a tad ungenerously, he likens the experience
of finding fame alongside Quesada to jumping
onto a roller coaster’s two-seater carriage with
“the random next person in line”. As he guard-
edly summarises, “It’s a business friendship-
slash-partnership that I think has been growing
PUMA
TRAINERS
Four records that
inspired Eric Burton
and Adrian Quesada’s
partnership.
THE TEMPTATIONS
Message From A Black Man
(off Puzzle People LP, Gordy, 1969)
Quesada: “I love
Norman Whitfield’s
productions in
The Temptations’
psychedelic era,
especially this one
with its fuzz guitar, the baroque style
of the harpsichord. I definitely utilised
that kind of thing on the first album.
There’s another one from Norman
Whitfield, Bobby Taylor’s version of
Eleanor Rigby, which I’d always wanted
to play, but I never knew anybody who
could sing it until I met Eric.”
to be more of a personal bond situation.”
NEIL YOUNG Talking to Burton, there are moments his
Old Man hackles rise for seemingly no good reason,
(off Harvest LP, Reprise, 1972)
times you’re glad you’re not the creative part-
Quesada: “There were
certain things Eric ner questioning his more free-spirited ideas.
mentioned early on The pair admit they sometimes clash when
that I wasn’t expecting, Quesada ‘translates’ Burton’s sketches into
like him being a big Neil
Young fan. Not because
something more concrete. These included
he is a black singer-songwriter, just Rock And Roll, with its weird beat, and the
to do with his style of singing. Then I synth-looped Hello, which Burton airily recalls
realised as I saw him play solo, like, Oh composing “on this battery-powered synthesiz-
he could definitely pick up an acoustic
guitar and hold a crowd. Our own song er while walking around Venice Beach, feeling
Old Man [on Black Pumas] was a little glorious,” and trying to resist the distraction of
nod to Neil.” “these pretty women following me while I was
PASTOR T.L. BARRETT trying to figure out the arpeggiation.”
For his part, Quesada diplomatically ex-
AND THE YOUTH FOR plains how, in the new LP’s final stages, the pair
CHRIST CHOIR took off for separate cooling-off stints, himself
Like A Ship… to Mexico City to iron out production snags,
(Without A Sail) Burton to LA for last-minute lyric-writing.
(Mt. Zion Gospel Productions, 1971) The result is a leap forward from the live-
Burton: “This is a record
that Adrian and I really
in-the-room feel of Black Pumas, with the tour-
love together, a Black ing combo, plus strings, horns and gospel cho-
Puma favourite, mainly rale harmonised with a more contemporary
for the power behind digital soundworld. As such, Chronicles Of A
the chorale. I wanted
to borrow that colour, to dress the soul Diamond feels potentially an even bigger record
behind our own music. We feel that than its predecessor – if its core creators can
our music is real, and it should feel like hold together long enough to reap the benefit.
church for anyone who wants to come.
It’s just soulful, you know?”
“We couldn’t be more different,” Quesada
calmly concedes, “but when it comes to mak-
GHOSTFACE KILLAH ing music, the yin-and-yang aspect is what
Supreme Clientele makes it special. The expectations this time
(Epic, 2000) put us both in a tense situation, and a lot of that
Quesada: “When I was definitely came out when making some of the
starting to make demos music, but I’ve studied enough music history
for this project, I’d
go on bike rides or to know that it’s that push-and-pull that makes
go running with the creative sparks fly.”
headphones on and Black Pumas themselves are an ongoing
kind of immerse myself in the kind
of music I wanted to make. I had this testament to that. M
amazing soul playlist but nothing Chronicles Of A Diamond by Black Pumas is released
was really inspiring me until one day
I started randomly listening to this
on October 27 by ATO Records.
album again, and that’s when I started
to work on the first Black Pumas tracks.”
MOJO 57
 In the mid-’ 70s Graham Parker came out of nowhere, with a
fistful of killer songs and a hell of a band. And if he never enjoyed
the fame of his flashier new wave contemporaries, he left with the
kudos and, as his new album underlines, a career. “I shouldn’t have
survived,” he tells Sylvie Simmons.“But I did.” Photo by Tom Hill.
IBLICAL THUNDERSTORMS ARE BATTERING THE
Hudson Valley. There are floods and powercuts and the heat is
off the scale. “Otherwise,” Graham Parker says, “I’m surviving.
Sitting here waiting for the next round.”
This picturesque spot in the lower end of upstate New York is
where Parker lives, though he still has the flat in London’s Maida
Vale that he bought in 1980. In recent years, he says, he’s been
spending more and more time there. “I call myself an interna-
tional man of misery,” he adds with a laugh.
Right now he’s three shows away from the end of a solo US tour and two months away from
the start of his UK tour – this time with The Goldtops, the band he made his new album Last
Chance To Learn The Twist with. But today’s a day off – “There’s a lot of days off. I like it that way.
People expect me to tour like I’m a twenty-something, which I’m decidedly not.” He’s 73.
It’s been 47 years since Parker came out of nowhere, fully-formed, with his powerful first al-
bum Howlin’ Wind (1976). Small, wiry, always in sunglasses, he looked like a hybrid of Dylan and
Springsteen and sounded somewhere between a soulful Van Morrison and a gritty Mick Jagger.
He was also a great songwriter. Backed by The Rumour, Parker delivered the kind of smouldering
anger and energy that Elvis Costello was known for – but Costello wasn’t around yet. By the time
My Aim Is True appeared, in 1977, Parker was working on his third album, Stick To Me.
For all his mainstream success in the late ’70s and early ’80s, and the sustained quality of his
output over the decades, Parker somehow bypassed becoming a household name and instead
Tom Hill/WireImage/Getty

became an artist monopolised by connoisseurs. Then, part of Parker’s appeal is that he’s never
seemed bothered by what people think of him. Behind those impenetrable shades, anything
could be going on.
“My sunglasses? In fact they are very light these days,” Parker laughs, “otherwise I’d be Sparks fly: Graham
falling off the stage.” ➢ Parker on-stage at
the Agora Ballroom,
Atlanta, May 17, 1979.

58 MOJO
 B
ORN IN 1950 IN HACKNEY, LONDON, AND
raised in Deepcut, Surrey, Parker can’t recall when he
started singing, since he was doing it all the time. There
was Cliff Richard and Lonnie Donegan – Parker and the kid next
door had a skiffle group when they were about nine. And there was
Elvis Presley and, even more to his taste, Little Richard – his mum
worked as a waitress in the officer’s mess at the nearby US mili-
tary base, and sometimes she’d inherit records from soldiers go-
ing home. But the watershed was when he was 12 and The Beatles
arrived. “And then the Stones and all the other beat groups.” In
short, Parker concedes, “It was a lucky spot to be in if you’re going
to turn out to be a singer-songwriter.”
At 12 or 13, he and two local boys dressed up in Beatle mops and
Cuban-heeled boots – “God knows how we got Cuban heels for
kids, but they were available” – and, calling themselves the Deepcut
Three, they sang Beatles songs, charging little kids threepence to see
them. “The girls would scream. It felt good. But it was a dress-up
band, not a real band.”
In his mid teens, his dad bought him an electric guitar, an old
Rosetti. He taught himself a few chords, “but I was lazy about it.”
And by that time he’d moved on to soul music.
“I’d go to clubs in Woking on a Sunday afternoon or early even-
ing midweek, and these kids, 15, 16, 17, would be dancing to ska
and Motown and soul for two hours. Incredible! It was like a cult.”
The cult required a scooter and some serious clothes, and Parker
got both. He left school at 16 – “victim of the class system; you
get thrown out pretty quick to work as a grease monkey” – and he
religiously put a bob or two of his wages aside to buy three suits
from Burton Tailoring in Aldershot.
Next came blues, then psychedelic rock: “me flying my freak
flag period.” He was 18 and living in Guernsey when the singer-
songwriters came along. “I thought, Maybe I could do that. I bought
this cheap acoustic guitar and tried to finger-pick and I was writing
a lot of songs.” He spent three months dossing in France with his
guitar, followed by the obligatory trip to Morocco. “I was writing
and writing and getting better and better – write them, dump them,
write some more.” When he ran out of money he was told to go
to Gibraltar, where he scored a job at the docks. He also made an
appearance on Gibraltar TV.
“I met these musicians and I was sitting in with them,” he
recalls. “They were all a bit psychedelic, and I was coming out of the
end of that. I wanted to have actual songs with structure, not just
navel-gazing, and an edge. But all you needed to get on television
in Gibraltar, it appeared, was you’re English and you play a guitar.
So I did three of my own songs. I’m sure that footage has long been
taped over, but all these little pieces were a chain leading up to even-
tually getting a record deal.”
1
975. THE HOPE & ANCHOR, A HANDSOME VICTORIAN
pub on Upper Street, Islington, had the best-stocked jukebox
in London. Downstairs was a smoky, black beer cellar where
pub rock and punk bands played. Upstairs was a small recording
studio, put together and presided over by one Dave Robinson.
The first time Graham Parker set foot in the pub, acoustic guitar in
hand, was to meet this putative impresario.
A year before forming Stiff Records, Robinson had, among other
jobs, tour-managed Jimi Hendrix and The Animals, and managed
Young Rascals, Van Morrison and the pub rockers Brinsley Schwarz.
Parker had, among other jobs, been a tomato-picker, ditch-digger,
pinball machine coin-collector, mouse-breeder for an animal virus
lab and, most recently, pump attendant at the petrol station down
the road from his mum and dad’s.
“I came out of nowhere, my name was nothing, I wasn’t playing
in bands, I was living back with my parents in Deepcut. That’s a
Getty (4) Chalkie Davies, Alamy
potted history for you right there.”
He was nearly 25 years old; it had taken quite a while to “knuckle
down and learn to play.” But, ready to go, he put an ad in Melo-
dy Maker in search of a band: “Something like, ‘Looking for like-
minded musicians, Stones, Dylan, Van Morrison.’” Most of the re-
plies came from suburban prog rockers. “You’ve got to realise that
60 MOJO
Genesis ruled in 1974, ’75. It wasn’t even punk then.” But there
was one person from London who answered, who had an old
Fender and played slide and dobro: “Noel Brown. He understood
what I was doing and loved the songs.”
Brown introduced him to Paul Riley, a musician likewise
untainted by prog, whose pub rock band Chilli Willi & The Red Hot
Peppers were a familiar sight in the basement at the Hope. Riley
suggested to Parker that he talk to Robinson. So he did.
Walking up the stairs at the pub, Parker’s first impression was,
“it was all a bit down-at-heel. You were allowed to walk downstairs
and pull yourself a few pints, which was handy. I think that’s how
Dave used to pay the musicians.”
Parker played Robinson one song after another. “Dave would
be saying, ‘That’s a good one. I’m keeping that. Have you got any
more?’ You could see a light bulb go on. He had the vision of this
really crack band behind me. He took me away from Noel Brown
and Paul Riley and anyone else I’d worked with loosely and brought
in musicians he knew. And through no design of mine really, he built
The Rumour around me.”
T
HE SUMMER OF ’75 WAS “A NICE SUMMER”, Brin-
sley Schwarz recalls, aside from the lingering “serious
shock to the system” of his self-named band having bro-
ken up a few months earlier. He’d bought a sax and would practise
that, or go fishing. Then out of the blue, Schwarz got a call from
Dave Robinson.
“He said he’d found a really good singer-songwriter and they
were going to be recording in his studio.” Brinsleys keyboard play-
er Bob Andrews was going to be there, guitarist Martin Belmont
from Ducks Deluxe, also recently defunct, “and two guys I didn’t
know, [bassist] Andrew Bodnar and [drummer] Steve Goulding of
Bontemps Roulez. But Dave said they were very good, and he
thought I’d enjoy it.”
So there they all were at the top of the Hope & Anchor – Parker
at the mike, Robinson at the console, and a quintet of pub rock
royalty. “I just went along with everything,” Parker says. “I was like,
What do I know?”
“I don’t know about the others but I was nervous,” says
Schwarz. “It was the first time the five of us played together, so
it was still new to us. Graham, although quiet and not saying
much, seemed to be quite angry and a little bit scary. The songs
were meaningful to him and he wasn’t mucking around. They were
great songs.”
Locking together behind Parker, the band relaxed. Afterwards
they all admitted they’d had fun, and Schwarz suggested they try
some gigs. “Martin knew the guys at Newlands Tavern in Peckham
[now The Ivy House] and they let us rehearse there. It was going
well, everyone was enjoying it. It sounded different, more urgent
than the stuff I’d been involved with before.”
But they were taking it easy. “Part of our getting-together pro-
tocol was we were not going to get hauled into being a band for five
years, which we’d all just done, and all of them had ended up a little
bit sorely. Then all hell broke loose: Graham got his record deal.”
Robinson had sent the Hope demos to Charlie Gillett at Ra-
dio London. Gillett had a show on Sunday mornings called Honky
Tonk that played roots, rock’n’roll, R&B, Cajun and country. Eve-
ryone on the pub rock scene listened to it. So did the record com-
panies. Gillett played Parker’s Between You And Me. Phonogram
called Gillett and said they were interested in signing him. The DJ
referred them to Robinson, now Parker’s manager, and Parker had
his first record deal – assigned to Vertigo at home and Mercury in
the States.
“Graham’s deal,” says Schwarz, “was nothing to do with us.”
They didn’t even play on Between You And Me –“but we were
hauled in to be his backing band.”
The five were at Newlands, rehearsing for their first gig there,
when Robinson told them the record company wanted them to be
Parker’s band and Parker said the same. “So we said, ‘Yes, OK, one
album, one tour and no more than that.’ And Dave said, ‘You need a
name,’ so we had a vote and chose The Rumour.” ➢
In the shade: Parker in reflective
mood, backstage in London, 1976;
(below right, from top) GP & The
Rumour in 1976 (from left) Andrew
Bodnar, Graham Parker, Brinsley
Schwarz, Bob Andrews, Steve
Goulding, Martin Belmont;
Parker manager and Stiff Records
impresario Dave Robinson, 1982.

“Graham seemed to be quite angry

and a little bit scary. He wasn’t
mucking around.” Brinsley Schwarz
Rumour has it: Parker in
1976, looking for like minds;
(below, left) champion DJ
Charlie Gillett; (below, right)
the Brinsley Schwarz band
take a road break (from
left) Ian Gomm, Brinsley
Schwarz, Billy Rankin,
Nick Lowe, Bob Andrews.
Searching for the
good chord: Parker
in Hollywood, 1976;
(below) Graham today.
Their Newlands gig became the first Graham Parker & The Ru-
➣
mour live show “and it all got suddenly very exciting,” says Schwarz.
“We were up and running.”
The next four or five years they didn’t stop.

W
INTER WAS CLOSING IN WHEN RECORDING
began in Eden studios, Chiswick, for Graham Parker &
The Rumour’s first album. The man Robinson chose
to produce Howlin’ Wind was Nick Lowe. “When he called me and
said, ‘Do you fancy producing Graham’s album,’ I rather jumped at
it,” says Lowe. “He paid me 300 quid, I remember, which even then
was a little bit mean, but I was grateful for it at the time.”
It was “a bit peculiar”, Lowe says, given his history with Brinsley
Schwarz. “Obviously I’d been in a band with Bob and Brinsley –
and really Martin as well, who was a sort of semi-detached member
of the group that I was in. And I had been responsible in a way for
breaking Brinsley Schwarz up; at least, I was the one who stepped
forward and said, Boys, I think our work here is done. But there I
was suddenly in a position of some authority, if the record producer
can be said to have that.”
Lowe had become aware of Parker through the Charlie Gillett
show. “I thought he was great. Lest we forget, Graham was men-
tioned in the same breath as Elvis Costello and Bruce Springsteen.
That first record I did with him was straightforward. I was never
Five essential Graham albums. Backed by his touring
band of the time, The Figgs, a knob-twiddler, I was an arm waver-arounder and a cheerleader
Parker albums, by subject matter, songs and
performances snap into focus,
really. I just did what I could with their really, really good songs.”
“What I remember,” says Schwarz, “was trying desperately hard
Mat Snow. particularly crisp and witty on
the Stones pastiche Suck’N’Blow. to please Graham, as he never said anything. He never said, ‘I like
that bit you played there.’ As I found out later, he was just taking it
Graham Parker Graham Parker all in and not believing it was happening to him.”
And The Rumour And The Rumour The album done, it was everyone in the van and on the road –
opening for Ace, Thin Lizzy, Kokomo, everyone. “I know I had 13
★★★★ ★★★★
Howlin’ Wind Three Chords Good days off that year,” Schwarz recalls. Then it was straight back in the
(Vertigo, 1976) (Primary Wave, 2012) studio for their second album of ’76, Heat Treatment, this time pro-
Rootsy pub rock Reunited on-screen duced by the more polished Mutt Lange.
had deft musicians in 2012 to cameo Says Parker, “In the first year of my career with The Rumour I
but few strong in the Judd Apatow was playing America – in a station wagon, one of those woodies, the
songwriters: enter movie This Is 40,
Graham Parker, Parker and The whole lot of us, and the two crew members were in a Ryder truck
devout Stones, Rumour also cut with a few bits of rudimentary equipment. It was down and dirty.”
Van and Dylan disciple with his their first album together in 32 Parker was getting rave reviews in the US rock press, many of
own beady edge, a proto-Costello years. Seasoned and swinging
romantic beneath the street-rat in rhyme, rhythm, blues and
them referring to his ferocity and fury and/or comparing him with
belligerence. Swinging, singalong country, they playfully set the Dylan, Springsteen and Van Morrison. Stakes raised, an 80-piece
and convivial, White Honey and Silly world to rights, while, in string orchestra was hired for Parker and The Rumour’s third
Thing anticipate Dexys Midnight Coathangers, landing blows on album, but the sessions were cursed: bad separation between tracks
Runners in this filler-free debut. the anti-abortion movement.
made their first effort unmixable and the whole thing went belly up
Graham Parker Graham Parker when the master tapes literally fell to pieces. Robinson, desperate to
have the album ready for their next US tour, corralled Nick Lowe to
And The Rumour ★★★★ record a new album and gave him a week to do it.
★★★★★ Cloud Symbols
(100%, 2018)
“The story,” says Lowe, “was that someone had taken the
Squeezing Out Sparks masters onto the tube across London and the magnetic whatever
(Vertigo, 1979) The world suffering
no shortage of in the air damaged it. I never heard the first version, but I think the
After three excellent
studio albums in
angry old men one we made was a pretty good record.”
shouting the odds, Stick To Me (1977) made the UK Top 20. So did their next
two years, a brief
Parker opted to
breather restocked
age ever more album Squeezing Out Sparks (1979), which Jack Nitzsche produced.
the songbook with
his best yet, life
self-mockingly instead. His Parker’s first US Top 40 hit, it made the best-of-year lists in Roll-
playmates The Goldtops including ing Stone and Village Voice. Parker, however, was already unhappy
experience fuelling bold artistic
a horn section and pub rock
ambition. Veteran producer Jack
veterans Geraint Watkins
with his label – fan-favourite non-album track Mercury Poisoning
Nitzsche fired up everyone for classic excoriated their faults (“their promotion’s so lame”) – and The
and Martin Belmont, this is a
results both polished and punchy,
the heart-stopping highlight being
relaxed, affable yet top-quality Up Escalator (1980), produced by Jimmy Iovine, would be his last
affair encapsulated in Every with The Rumour. “He was not enjoying the way people were con-
the abortion monologue You Can’t
Saturday Nite.
Be Too Strong. ducting his career and spending his money,” says Schwarz. “So he
wanted to stop, and see what he felt like.”
Graham Parker In 1982, Parker released his first album as a solo artist, Another
★★★★ Grey Area. Like its follow-up The Real Macaw (1983), it received a
Songs Of No warmer reception in the US than the UK. Schwarz returned to co-
Consequence produce the excellent The Mona Lisa’s Sister (1988), which made the
(Bloodshot, 2005) list of Rolling Stone’s 100 best albums of the ’80s. And so Parker
His thirties and continued into the next millennium, as a solo artist or with bands
forties frustratingly
inconsistent, the The Shot and The Figgs, a stream of very fine songs on often self-
21st century Parker produced albums, released on one different label after another.
found equanimity
as a rueful old
grouse with a string of well-crafted

“It started with Arista, who gave me
ridiculous amounts of money,” says Park-
er. “I was doing all right, having a blast,
making money, but of course if they give
you that much money you’re supposed
to sell millions.” So Arista dropped him.
“But labels still kept signing me! RCA
picked me up – but this time I said,
Don’t pay me so much. I’ll bring in a
good record for you, just leave me alone.
But record sales per se are something of
the past now. Music had changed and I
shouldn’t have survived. But I did.”
A
FTER THE DIVORCE FROM PARKER,
The Rumour carried on as a four-piece
– making three albums before splitting.
“When The Rumour broke up,” Schwarz says,
“I did exactly what I did when the Brinsleys broke
up: nothing.” He stopped playing and became a
luthier, learning to fix guitars. “It was 2010, we
had just moved house so I’d been to IKEA and
came back with wardrobes on the top of my car.
I struggled into the house and made a cup of tea
when the phone rang. It was Graham. He said
that Graham Parker and The Rumour were get-
ting back together to make an album.”
Says Parker, “I was pretty sure I would never
ever do that again. But it was 30 years later.
And it happened almost by accident.” He’d
e-mailed Steve Goulding about Steve and An-
drews playing on his next album. Goulding’s
Getty (3) Shutterstock (2)
light-hearted reply suggested he should ask the rest
of the guys, “and you’ll have a proper band”.
Parker had been busy enough, playing live, mak-
ing albums, including 2003’s From A Window, work-
ing with Kate Pierson of The B-52’s and Bill Janovitz
“My sunglasses
are very light
these days,
otherwise I’d
be falling off
the stage.”
Graham Parker
Never too late to learn: (clockwise from top left) Parker on-stage,
1977; Parker with The Rumour in the control room at Eden Studios
in Chiswick, during the recording of 1977 album Stick To Me;
Graham with his then wife Jolie in 2012, at the Hollywood premiere
of This Is 40; the reunited Graham Parker & The Rumour, 2012.
of Buffalo Tom on The Beatles songs that the Deepcut Three
loved but couldn’t really play. He’d also published several
books including short stories and a sci-fi novella. Now he
was flying The Rumour to America to make an album.
And, it turned out, to be in a Hollywood movie
with him. Director/producer Judd Apatow, a big mu-
sic fan, was writing a film called This Is 40. The story, he
explained to Parker when they met in New York,
was about a 40-year-old music nut with an indie
label who loves ’70s and ’80s bands, and signs
Graham Parker in the vain hope that he’ll rescue
their finances.
“It was a great experience, that movie,” says
Parker. “I always felt it would fall through or I’d
be dumped and they’d get someone more popu-
lar than me, but Judd said, ‘You’re the one for the
job.’ Because he wanted someone who can be self-
deprecating to play the part of this guy who ruins
record companies. I said, I am that guy!”
Parker laughs. It’s a real laugh. He seems genu-
inely happy. Whatever’s been thrown in his path, he’s
just kept going. Asked if he thought it was luck or some
decision or other that prevented him from crossing
the invisible line into the household name terri-
tory occupied by some of his peers, he says: “It
was what it was. It doesn’t occur to me now to be
compared with anyone. I’ve always felt in a field
of one anyway. I think my voice was so gruff in the
first place it wasn’t going to get radio play.
“But,” he shrugs, “that seems like the ancient
past now. I feel I’m on kind of a roll.” M
Graham Parker & The Goldtops’ new album Last Chance
To Learn The Twist is out now on Big Stir Records.
MOJO 63
 MOJO EYEWITNESS

SLY AND
THE FAMILY
STONE’S
FRESH HELL
Bringing rock, funk and soul into interracial harmony,
super-swaggering polymath Sly Stone changed the course of
popular music with 1971’s There’s A Riot Goin’ On. But,
derailed by endless dunes of cocaine, mob tactics and self-
sabotage, 1973’s Fresh was his last creative stand, given added
guignol by a doomed showbiz wedding on-stage at Madison
Square Garden. “You can’t really fathom how deep that shit was,”
remember friends and colleagues. “Sly said, ‘I have done too
much wrong, I don’t think God will take me back…’”

Interviews by JOEL SELVIN • Portrait by RICHARD McCAFFREY

Larry Graham: There comes a time when somebody leaves a family situation because
it is time to go… I was very comfortable, very satisfied with the way things were before,
naturally hoping things would stay like that. But they didn’t. It was time to go.
Edward ‘Eddie Chin’ Elliott (career criminal and husband of Sly’s sister Vet): We
heard that Larry Graham had got a hit man to do Sly. Me and Bub [Hamp ‘Bubba’ Banks]
come out of the streets and the Marine Corps. Hit man? This is getting good. We were in
the lobby. We looked up and here comes Larry and some dudes down the stairs. I got
behind the stairs, and when they came down, we worked them. We put the street on
’em. Their mouths got them in trouble.
Rusty Allen: Larry told Sly – Jerry Martini told me this – that if he ever left the group,
there is this kid he would want to take his place named Rusty. Time passed and I was
over at Big Mama’s [Alpha Stewart, Sly’s mother’s] house and Sly called on the phone.
He asked me if I could do this or I could do that. Naturally, I said yes. Next thing I know,
I am in Virginia somewhere… not in a rehearsal soundstage, on the gig. Fifteen
thousand people sitting out there. Incredible. Let me have it
all: Sly Stone in
Getty

a spin, on-stage
Stephen Paley: The Fresh album was the first under the new contract and it was ➢ in 1973.

MOJO 65

“HE JUST WANTED TO DO
COCAINE CONSTANTLY.”
Stephen Paley
called Fresh Productions. David [Kapralik,
➣
former manager] was gone and Sly was
refreshed, so to speak. Sly rarely did drugs in
front of me… I knew there was a drug problem,
but there was very little I could do about it. I
never said, Sly, don’t do drugs. He would have
laughed at me.
Robert Joyce (live sound tech): Fresh was really
his album. Sly was developing what he thought
was the next stage in music. We were leaders in
the field of what we were doing. The pressure all
fell back on him to keep it going. Keep it going.
Keep everybody paid, keep everybody going.
SP: Being friends with Sly and working with him,
you could get a call at four o’clock in the morning
and you would think nothing of that because he
had a different clock than you or I. It was funny
going over to his [New York] apartment
sometimes. He lived in the Century apartment
building on 62nd Street and Central Park West in
a converted dentist’s office on the ground floor.
It is a big twin tower, art deco building. [Manager]
Ken Roberts lived in there; I think that is why Sly
lived in there. I remember going over there at
10 o’clock in the morning, and he was wearing
jeans and a T-shirt and making corn flakes and
milk. You don’t think of Sly as being so normal
and emptying ashtrays, cleaning the place up
himself. He had that side to him. He could be
very sweet, too.
Kathleen Silva: He was always such a charming
person and made you feel so comfortable that
Getty (6)
you never really worried about the outcome of
anything until, there you are, out in the cold.
66 MOJO
Stone’s circle: (clockwise from
left) Sly with Stevie Wonder,
Madison Square Garden, NY,
March 25, 1974; easy riders: Stone
with his confidant/enforcer Bubba
Banks, San Francisco, 1973; cat in
the hat: Sly & The Family Stone
on-stage at White City Stadium,
London, July 15, 1973.
Tom Flye: We
worked in
Sausalito quite
a bit. And then,
from time to time,
we would take one of my portable rigs over to his
mother’s house over by Stonestown. He had a
Toyota station wagon that was his tape vault…
a station wagon pretty much full, I would say,
40 to a hundred reels of tape.
SP: One time, he wanted to book time in a studio
in San Francisco on Saturday at eight o’clock in
the morning… CBS had a studio on Folsom
Street. At about 11 o’clock, I went there to see
what was going on and Sly was fast asleep on the
console and the engineers were just sitting there.
I woke him up and said, “What the fuck are you
doing? I went to a lot of trouble to book this for
you… why do you have to pay three hundred
dollars an hour to sleep in the fucking control
room? This is outrageous.” He said to me
something that I have never forgot: “Kiss the
blackest part of my ass.” I had to laugh.
Pat Rizzo: I played the solo on [Fresh album track]
In Time. He would lay a rhythm track down and
then start figuring out what he was going to do
with the bass lines, guitar parts. I think he played
most of the instruments. He always put the
drums on last. He had the girls dancing in front of
Andy Newmark when he put the drums on. That’s
why it’s so difficult to understand the drum
machine and what Newmark’s doing on In Time.
We finished the album in Sausalito. I lived in the
hotel. Quite a few months, too. We were
recording just about every day, sometimes
straight through the night or a couple
of days straight. Not that I did horns
every day.
KS: A lot of things that Sly used to do
would end up in a song. People around
him would end up being his new material for
writing. It was amusement for him and I don’t
think that he meant to hurt anyone… I used to
wait for him and he would come home, be tired,
and want to go to bed because he had been
recording all night. I would be upset: I don’t like
this. He made a song up: “If you want me to stay,
I’ll be around today, I’ll be available…” [this
became If You Want Me To Stay, a US Number 12
hit in September 1973].
David Kapralik: Whenever I went to Hollywood,
I stayed with Terry Melcher in Malibu. It was
natural that when Sly came into my life, he was
meeting some of my friends, and so he met Terry.
They had a mutual interest in music. Terry invited
Sly over to the house to play music. Sly was at the
piano and Terry was standing next to him. Doris
[Day, Melcher’s mother] walked into the living
room, on her way to her bedroom, and Terry
introduced Sly to Doris. Then Sly started playing
Que Sera, Sera, and she sang along or hummed it
along with him, said goodbye, and that was it
[Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be) duly
appeared on Fresh].
Hamp ‘Bubba’ Banks: Geraldo Rivera used
to kiss my ass every day at [Sly’s apartment on]
Central Park West. He just wanted to talk to
Sly. Melvin Van Peebles, Miles Davis, we were
all in there shooting the shit. We knocked a

wall out and put a studio in there.
SP: Sly would lay down a bass part, a
guitar part, something. You never
really heard a finished song until much
later. It was almost like needlepoint…
in New York, I remember that Miles
loved Sly’s work and was hanging
around. He wouldn’t play on it, he
would just listen.
Stephani Owens (Sly’s PA): Miles
Davis or whoever was in New York that
wanted to spend time with Sly would
come by and stay up all night, doing
drugs, playing music. Miles would
come with his trumpet and they would
sit and play on top of tracks. Or they
spent time at the studio.
RA: One night, Miles came to the studio
at CBS in New York. Me and Freddie
[Stewart] went to Miles’s place first.
Then Miles came to Sly’s apartment at
Central Park West, went into the studio,
got on Sly’s organ, and started to voice
these nine-note ethereal crazy chords.
Sly was way back in the bedroom and
he came out yelling, “Who in the fuck is
doing that on my organ?” He came in
and saw. “Miles, get your motherfucking ass out,”
he said. “Don’t ever play that voodoo shit here.
Get the fuck out.” Miles left and I said, “Sly, that
was Miles Davis you was talking to. ” “I don’t give a
fuck,” he said, “playing that shit on my organ.”
Getty (10)
H’B’B: Miles didn’t care. Miles was back the
next day.
DRAMATIS
PERSONAE
● Rusty Allen
(Bassist)
● Hamp ‘Bubba’
Banks (factotum
and husband of
Sly’s sister Rose)
● Tom Flye (studio
sound engineer)
● Larry Graham
(bassist)
● David Kapralik
(Sly’s ex-manager)
● Jerry Martini
(sax player)
SP: [Sly] didn’t know what was good
and what wasn’t good any more.
He erased wonderful things and
re-recorded over them with things
● Stephen Paley that were not so good. He had a fear
(CBS Records A&R, of completion… he kept thinking
Sly’s best man) that he would make it better, but
sometimes he would make it worse.
Often he would. He lost his perspec-
tive and I think that was a direct result
of the cocaine.
● Pat Rizzo (sax TF: [Fresh] was pretty much done, but
player, relative of he wasn’t satisfied with it and [DJ and
Sinatra crony Jilly)
owner of Autumn Records] Tom
Donahue suggested that he come see
me… that week we re-recorded about
90 per cent of that record and mixed it.
He played all the parts, except for the
● Kathleen Silva horns and stuff. If somebody else
(Sly’s wife)
could play it better, he would let them
do it. If not, he just played it himself.
SP: He completely let me do the cover
[Fresh was released in June 1973]. I got
Richard Avedon to shoot it. Sly
● Freddie Stewart respected brand names and Richard
(guitar, Sly’s Avedon was a brand name and the
brother)
company was willing to pay what he
wanted, which was a lot. Rolling Stone
ran an item about the cover saying that Sly wasn’t
really jumping, he was standing on Plexiglas or
suspended by wires. That is nonsense. He was
absolutely jumping. He was taking karate. I wrote
a letter to the editor.
Another thing I had to write a letter about was
when Clive Davis got fired [in July ’73]. Some idiot
at CBS Inc., not Columbia Records, issued a
Keeping it fresh: (from left) Rusty Allen,
Stone, Cynthia Robinson and Jerry Martini
in the studio, Sausalito, San Francisco, April
3, 1973; under the rainbow: Sly & The Family
Stone, October 24, 1973; star performer:
Stone on-stage in July 1974, Los Angeles.
release that mistakenly identified an indicted
heroin trafficker, a man called Pasquale Falcone,
as Sly’s manager. Sly had enough bad press
without being involved, mistakenly, with an
indicted heroin trafficker.
RA: The gigs were happening. Every weekend,
Thursday night, early Friday morning ’til Sunday
evening, I was parking my car at the airport and
we were rolling. I mean every weekend for a year
or something. I was thinking this shit would
never end. This was when Fresh was starting to
come out. It was cool. Then stuff started going
down. I can’t really put my finger on it because
I didn’t ask many questions. I wasn’t but 19 when
I got into the band. I was just trying to make the
grade musically. I was gigging with somebody
I idolised.
SP: I just think he was a pig about it. He just
couldn’t get enough, he wanted it all. He didn’t
want to sleep. He just wanted to do cocaine
constantly. He just had no moderation. He had
taste as a musician, yet he didn’t have taste in the
way that he lived.
RA: We were in some obscure town down south
and I had a sack. It was the worst. It was garbage.
I was concerned about Sly. I went to his room and
said, “Sly, look at this shit – this shit is garbage.
I’m going to flush this shit. You don’t want this
shit, do you?” He said, “Yeah, man, let me have it.”
H’B’B: We weren’t even there when we got
evicted from [Sly’s Los Angeles base] 783 Bel Air
[in autumn 1973]. We were on the road and we
got a message that we had to move out all the
stuff. We panicked because we had a bunch ➢
MOJO 67

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dest ofoffictotas aut ipiciat
estiorpores esed mi,
“MUHAMMAD
ALI WAS SAYING
THAT SLY WAS
A SELL-OUT.”
Jerry Martini
➣
of guns and stuff that we
didn’t want them to find… if you
wasn’t next to Sly, you lived
under some buzzard conditions.
You were waiting on something
to die, so you could swoop down
on it. You never were secure, ever.
KS: He said we should get
married. He said he loved me…
he admired his mother and father
being together all those years.
SP: Sly called me up once and said
that he was playing Madison
Square Garden and he was going to get married,
too. And I said, as a joke, “Why don’t you get
married as your first act?” Sly laughed, then called
back and said he was going to do that… I didn’t
mean it for real. It is a tacky thing to get married
on-stage. Then I thought, Maybe you can [Sly
married Kathy Silva on-stage at Madison Square
Garden on June 5, 1974].
Jerry Martini: Everything was orchestrated.
Don Cornelius, Geraldo Rivera were ushers.
Andy Warhol was there. The whole New York
gang was there. The party was at the Waldorf-
Astoria. I came in there with a blonde on each
arm. Drunken fool. We wouldn’t have sold out
if Sly didn’t get married. It was an extravaganza.
I looked pretty good. I wasn’t all drugged out.
I sure was later that night. I remember being
cognisant. But it was a joke. Never in a million
years could I see that relationship happening.
RA: We must have had 20 limousines. Fashion
models were holding gold-sprayed palm leaves.
Fifteen-hundred-dollar Halston outfits for
each band member. Waldorf-Astoria. Killer.
Getty (3)
You can’t really fathom how deep that shit was.
Then he has a full house at Madison Square
68 MOJO
All that glitters…: (clockwise from
main) Stone and Kathy Silva during
their wedding reception at the
Waldorf-Astoria, NY, June 5, 1974;
getting hitched on-stage at Madison
Square Garden; “Miles loved Sly’s
work” – Davis (far right) and friends
watch on at MSG; going head to head
with Muhammad Ali, July 17, 1974;
Family man – Stone, Kathy and Sly
Jnr on the cover of ’74’s Small Talk.
Garden, saying
“I do”. I don’t know if it was a
gimmick to sell out the gig or
what. Whatever it was, it
worked.
SP: Probably the greatest
gesture he ever paid me as a
friend was asking me to be his
best man at his wedding, which
really pissed off his brother,
Freddie. His mother asked me to
say I wouldn’t do it. I said I won’t
do that. It was up to Sly… [the
wedding] reinvigorated his
career and if only he had the product to follow it
up, it would have made him a big star again, as
big as he was during the Woodstock time.
Freddie Stewart: I didn’t really look at Kathy
thinking she was going to be Mrs Stewart forever
and always. I didn’t look at it like that because I
wasn’t even true to my wife. I didn’t look at her
like she was going to be gone tomorrow, either.
I just didn’t look at it.
SP: It got every kind of publicity you could
get and the record didn’t sell one more copy
than it would have. The people that were
exposed to the publicity were not the people
that bought Sly’s records… the most that we
could do was when Sly co-hosted The Mike
Douglas Show [on July 17, 1974, with guests
including Muhammad Ali].
KS: Poor Mike Douglas tried to keep that thing:
“C’mon, let’s all get along.” Actually, Sly, I think,
handled it well. He tried to let that be a good
show and was still very humorous and kind
about it. But Muhammad was very egotistical
and rude.
JM: Muhammad Ali was downing Sly. He was
saying that Sly was a sell-out and an Uncle Tom
right before the commercial break. Sly goes,
“By the way, Muhammad, where do you live?”
The audience starts laughing and Muhammad
started freaking out because Sly got in the last
word. Ali lived in a big house in a white neigh-
bourhood in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
SP: But [1974 Fresh follow-up] Small Talk wasn’t a
good album. It was really third-grade Sly. It came
out at the same time. It sucked. The single [Time
For Livin’] was no good. It started off good. It was
the best that was on there and you make the best
with what you’ve got.
RA: [Sly] still had some of his religious values
somewhere in there. He was fucking up, like we
all were. There were some conversations about
that where he said, “I think I have done too much
shit, too much wrong, and I don’t think God will
take me back.” He didn’t say it to me, but he said it
to somebody in the group. I think he did take it
seriously. I took it seriously.
JM: I was there in the beginning and I was
dedicated all the way up to what I consider the
end… the [January 1975] Radio City thing was a
fiasco. Nobody came. Kool & The Gang was the
opening act and they did better than we did.
Only three or four hundred people were there.
Nobody believed in him any more [the group
dissolved thereafter].
FS: It is sad to say. He knows what he didn’t do. He
knows what we wish he’d done. I know he wishes
he could have done better. By me and by a lot of
other people. I think he thinks about it all the time. M
Joel Selvin’s Sly & The Family Stone: An Oral History
is published by Permuted Press (cover, above left).
Get your copy from all good online booksellers.
 Mark Seliger

70 MOJO
Crown jewels: The Rolling
Stones in New York City, 2023
(from left) Keith Richards,
Mick Jagger, Ronnie Wood.
 N JULY 2022, MICK JAGGER CO-STARRED IN MY LIFE AS A ROLLING STONE,
a four-part TV documentary that focused on each of The Rolling Stones in turn.
Filmed in time to capture a typically self-effacing interview with Charlie Watts, but
debuting nearly a year after his death in August 2021, it became a de facto memorial
for the departed drummer.
As the curtain rose on Episode 1, the Stones singer announced that he hoped it
would explode some of the more tedious myths about the group. A signal for the
doc to retread every cliché around their music and their history, ticking all the boxes
marked ‘dark’, ‘dangerous’, ‘sexy’, ‘the anti-Beatles’, ‘rock’n’roll incarnate’ et cetera.
Reminded of this in September 2023, Jagger groans and rolls his eyes theatrically.
“Well,” he protests in rubbery Dartford tones. “I didn’t edit the thing…”

So how about some myth-busting in the pages
of MOJO? What would Jagger say is the wrongest
thing ever stated about his band?
“That’s a difficult one,” he frowns. “I was so
full of it on the TV show, wasn’t I? (Pompous voice)
‘Shooting down the myths!’ Now I can’t think
of any.”
MOJO wonders if it’s a good idea to men-
tion this but does so anyway. How about the
story from 1984, where Jagger and Rich-
ards return from a carouse to their Am-
sterdam hotel in the early hours? The one where Jagger demands
“Where’s my drummer?” and insists that Charlie Watts be turfed
out of his bed? Whereupon Watts dresses in the sharpest of his
suits, marches to Jagger’s room, tells his singer never to call him his
drummer again, and drops him with a straight right to the chops?
Jagger shakes his mousy mane.
“Didn’t happen. No, not at all. Keith invented that story. Now,
Charlie was annoyed,” Jagger concedes, “and he was very drunk,
as was Keith. And he was a bit wound up. But there were so many
people there, so many people between me and Charlie, and it never
came to blows.”
There’s an embellishment that MOJO read, where Watts knocks
Jagger onto a table of smoked salmon and the singer nearly slides
out of an open window to his doom. Jagger thinks this is hilarious.
“A table full of smoked salmon!” he hoots. “That’s a good one.
How about we go one better? I turned into a smoked salmon and
dived out the window? Yeah, that’s what really happened.”
Getty (2), New York Times/Redux/Eyevine, Alamy
NTHRONED IN A PLUSH KNIGHTSBRIDGE HOTEL
suite, dressed in a thin white chemise with paintbrushy black
swooshes, surrounded by cameras, boom mikes, PRs and
other evidence of the world’s fascination, Jagger is doing what he’s
been doing very successfully since 1962: selling The Rolling Stones.
Down the corridor, in separate suites, Keith Richards and Ronnie
Wood are busy adding their own more freeform variations.
Yesterday, the trio sashayed into east London’s Hackney Em-
pire for a glitzy (for Hackney) launch event for Hackney Diamonds,
the first album of new Rolling Stones songs since 2005’s A Bigger
Bang – an eon in the lifespan of ordinary bands. Housing material
from as far back as 2019 – two tracks feature Watts on drums – it
mostly hails from late 2022 sessions in New York’s Electric Lady
(September-October) and LA’s Henson studios (November), the
latter helmed by 32-year-old hotshot producer Andrew Watt.
But why Hackney Diamonds? And why Hackney? “Because we’re
a London band,” announced Richards at the launch. “Says a guy
who lives in Connecticut!” laughs Jagger today. “Who never comes
here! Still, it sounds good. I’m glad he still feels it.”
Perhaps because MOJO’s mostly-music agenda represents
a breather from the socio-political fixations of other interlocu-
tors – for instance, the “French bloke, all good-looking and chicly
done up, who showed me ancient pictures of me and Françoise
Hardy in, like, 1964. Hilarious” – Jagger seems unusually relaxed,
flopping around on his chair, scrunching his face into frequent
laughter, comfortable with off-piste lines of questioning. It’s a
cliché as boring as any he failed to explode in My Life As A Rolling
Stone that Jagger doesn’t look 80. Close up, he looks, sounds and

Too good to be true? It’s a scenario that endorses the most cher-
ished stereotypes of the Stones: the camply imperious Jagger; the
noble, dapper Watts; and – peddling gossip from the most prob-
lematic period in his relationship with the singer – the anarchic,
Jagger-baiting Keith Richards. Has the story ever bothered Jagger?
Or is it just grist to the mill of the Stones legend – part of their
armour, even?
“Yeah, I don’t really care,” chuckles Jagger. “You won’t find me get-
ting all (blustery Rumpole voice) ‘That never happened! I must object!’ I
mean, it’s nonsense. But if that’s what Keith wants to believe…”
acts almost ridiculously not-80.
Today’s looseness, you suspect, is born of confidence in a record,
with its pop hooks, story-friendly celebrity contributions (Paul
McCartney, Elton John, Stevie Wonder, Lady Gaga and Bill Wyman
all guest) and au courant producer, that ticks all the Mick Jagger
boxes, while featuring moments – the languid, live-sounding
Dreamy Skies – that evoke the raw, unvarnished band of legend.
“The way we intended it to be was that it would have the soul
of The Rolling Stones,” says Jagger, forcefully. “But nevertheless,
sonically, if you put it next to something we recorded in the ’70s ➢

72 MOJO
 Down by the jetty: the Stones
at Chelsea Wharf, 1963 (from
left) Jagger, Richards, Brian
Jones, Bill Wyman, Charlie
Watts; (insets below, from left)
1964’s self-titled debut; 2005’s
A Bigger Bang; sleeve art for
new LP Hackney Diamonds.

East end noise: launching Hackney

Diamonds at Hackney Empire with host
Jimmy Fallon, September 6, 2023; (opposite
page) Diamonds’ lights (from left) Paul
McCartney with Keith and Brian, 1964;
Elton John with Bill, 1975; Stevie Wonder
and Mick, 1974; Lady Gaga and Mick, 2012.
 Imperial majesty,
then…: (from left)
Jagger in 1972;
Richards in 1978;
Wood in 1982.
or ’80s, it’s not going to sound the same.”
➣
There are plenty of Rolling Stones fans, of
course, and maybe one or two Rolling Stones, who
wouldn’t mind an album that sounded more like it
was recorded in the ’70s, but not Jagger.
“His objective,” says drummer Steve Jordan,
Watts’ replacement on-stage and now in the stu-
dio, “was, I guess, to be competitive or relevant,
relevant to a new generation of people. And also, as
Mick said to me, it would be nice to have a couple
of hits on the thing.”
There was another imperative. After 18 years,
one death, several health scares – notably Jagger’s
heart surgery in 2019, and Wood’s brushes with
cancer in 2018 and 2021 – and a reported accu-
mulation of 80-plus songs, half-songs and demos,
Jagger decided they had to get a move on.
“My plan was just to have a lot of songs and then
not have people think about them too much,” he
says. “Just play them. Because you don’t want to
be thinking, Is this any good? Do I like it? Does it
sound like something else I’ve done? Don’t worry
if you don’t think it’s the best thing since sliced
eggs, Ronnie, just play it.”
Jagger put it more bluntly to Steve Jordan:
“‘I don’t want this to be a posthumous album.’”
OWN THE CORRIDOR, IN A ROOM THAT
seems somehow more disreputable, if only
Heilemann/Camera Press, Robert Matheu/Camera Press, Denis O'Regan
through the powerful emanations of its occupant, lurks a man
who’s flirted more than once with posthumousness. Keith Rich-
ards, 79 – in dark brown trilby, brown shirt and black jacket – fixes
MOJO with a gimlet eye and gives his version of why we have a new
Rolling Stones album.
“If the lead singer wants to record, you get him while the
mood’s on, knowwhatimean?” he gurgles. “Because you can have
some good stuff, but if he don’t feel like singing it or he’s not in the
mood… I mean, that is the power of a lead singer. He can dangle
that in front of me.”
Jagger’s response? “I didn’t realise it was that easy! All I have to
say is, ‘I want to make a record,’ and everyone gets behind me and
works their fucking arses off? Great!”
In fact, as multiple band members and Andrew Watt will
attest, Richards really did work his fucking arse off on Hackney
74 MOJO
Diamonds, ending with a week of overdub boot
camp with Watt. Wood and Jagger both salute
the young producer’s energy and enthusiasm –
qualities that bubble over when Watt speaks on the
phone with MOJO – and Richards also gives the
young man his due.
“He brought exactly what Mick and I needed
to make this record,” he says. “A lot of freshness, a
lot of knowhow about how records are made these
days. Because, I mean, there’s not little spools
going around and around – I wish there were.
And he’s a great musician himself, which is very
important with producers. Jimmy Miller was a
great drummer, Don Was is a great bass player. And
Andrew, he’s a piece of work, you know.”
He seems like quite a character, MOJO notes.
“Oh yeah.”
Richards emits a slow, somewhat mirthless
laugh, his eyes glittering in a way that reminds
you of the Richards who once bristled with weap-
onry. What can it mean? He indicates that he will
not elaborate.
Watt’s connection with the Stones goes back
to 2019, when Don Was, perhaps sealing his own
fate, suggested he try a mix of a track from that
session. Subsequently Watt maintained communi-
cations with Jagger, all the while accruing garlands
for work with Ozzy Osbourne and Elton John,
burnishing a reputation made in the pop realm on
records for Justin Bieber and Miley Cyrus. Ronnie Wood remem-
bers Watt’s name coming up over lunch with Paul McCartney.
“I was telling Paul we needed someone to kick us up the fucking
arse,” says Wood, “and he said, ‘I’m working with this young boy,
he’s got a lot of front. We’re doing some really adventurous tracks
together. You try him.’”
Jagger was already unconvinced by much of the music they had
last recorded with Was (“I didn’t feel like it was really happening”).
Then, says Wood, Was cancelled sessions and the Stones were “left
hanging”. In September 2022, time was booked at New York’s
Electric Lady and Watt invited to attend.
“Mick asked if the kid could come in, which I really wasn’t into
in the beginning,” says Steve Jordan. “I don’t need someone in
there while I’m writing a freakin’ tune. But I agreed.”
Jordan will candidly admit to a not-so-hidden agenda.

…and now: today’s
diamond geezers.
“Quite frankly, I’d said from the very beginning that the
Glimmer Twins could have produced the record and I coulda
helped them,” he says, “but I don’t think Mick wanted to work that
hard. There’s a certain amount of nuance that you have to know
how to capture. And I’ll just leave it at that.”
Jordan’s focus in New York had been to make “certain things
sound edgier. Some of the tunes were a little too poppy in my view.” ALREADY A veteran of slick
The Hackney Diamonds track that cleaves closest to his vision is and successful albums by Ozzy
Osbourne, Eddie Vedder, Elton John
Dreamy Skies, a languid beauty recorded in Electric Lady that feels and Iggy Pop, despite his relatively
like a dusty side-road off the album’s broad commercial highway. tender years, Andrew Watt was
At the very least, says Jordan, “Ronnie played the best slide he ever nevertheless pinching himself.
It was the day before one of The
played in his freakin’ life. Rolling Stones’ Hyde Park shows of
“Once we cut it,” continues the drummer, “I immediately said, 2022 and here was the 31-year-old
That’s The Rolling Stones. That is what I signed up for. That thing Long Islander “sitting in fucking
that happened – that will never happen again. I was very vocal about Mick Jagger’s house, having tea.”
The pair chatted about
it. And I was relieved.” Watt’s ongoing projects and the
Stones’ stalled album. A week
HEN SESSIONS MOVED TO LA, UNDER WATT’S or so later Jagger was on the
phone, explaining that,
aegis, Hackney Diamonds took on the shape it largely re- serendipitously, Ronnie
tains today. For Jordan it is a compromise, but perhaps Wood had talked with
a necessary one. Meanwhile, some of Watt’s ideas were a recent Watt client,
just really good ideas – like hooking McCartney in to Paul McCartney, and
that the young man
play fuzz bass on the snarling Bite My Head Off (“Macca was now in the
wanted to put the dirt on it,” says Richards, “and we frame to produce
were like, OK”) or having Elton John play piano on Live the Stones.
“This is Mick
By The Sword. “The idea was to keep it real Jerry Lee Jagger telling me
and Nicky Hopkins,” explains Watt, “because who’s a a story about Paul
better rock’n’roll piano player alive than Elton John?” McCartney talking
to Ronnie Wood about
While the guest spots look superfluous, perhaps even me,” raps Watt a mile-a-
distracting, on paper (“Because the Stones are enough star minute. “Like, I can’t fathom
power, right?” says Jordan), one of the record’s best tracks is a how this is actually real…”
veritable pile-on. Sweet Sounds Of Heaven is an epic gospel blow- Invited to New York to sit in on
sessions at Electric Lady, Watt was
out, with Stevie Wonder – another Watt connection – playing pi- aware of the risks. He listened, kept
ano and Moog. The pièce de résistance is the response vocal to Jag- quiet and wrote his thoughts in a
ger’s call, performed by Lady Gaga. This time the intervention was journal, “because I didn’t want to be
the new guy saying, Hey, why don't
serendipitous – Gaga was recording next door. you try this out? They would have
“I thought she would just be watching in the control room,” shown me the door, right?”
recalls Jagger, “but she walked in the live room, starts looking at me It must have been the right
and I think I know what she wants to do. So we give her the head- approach because Watt got the
job (“the fucking greatest feeling
phones and the iPad with the lyric sheet and she started singing.” ever”) helming November sessions
“She’s such a fucking badass,” declares Watt. “I watched her fol- in Henson Recording Studios in LA.
low Mick’s phrasing. It’s such a natural thing. It wasn’t like, OK, sec- But there was little initial talk about
approaches or intentions. “It was
ond verse – here’s the feature. She joined the band on that song. She’s more seat of the pants,” says Watt,
almost embodying [Gimme Shelter’s] Merry Clayton.” ➢ “informed by the sounds coming
out of the speakers, and the songs.”
It was Watt’s idea to draft
founding bassist Bill Wyman on
Electric warrior:
Stones producer
Andrew Watt on-
stage with Iggy
Pop, April 27, 2023.
Live By The Sword – one of the two
Hackney Diamonds songs that
feature Charlie Watts – “so that
there could be, for the fans, the
original Rolling Stones rhythm
section reconvened.” Elton John
was another Watt suggestion, and
it was Watt’s call to Stevie Wonder
that led to the soul genius joining
the band on the dramatic Sweet
Sounds Of Heaven (“I cannot believe
I got to witness that”).
But it was the work of Jagger and
Richards that really blew him away.
“How many Stones shows have you
seen?” Watt asks MOJO. “Keith plays
the same song different every night,
right? Well, it’s the same with takes.
He’s very primal and very emotional,
but he’s also unbelievably melodic.”
Watt insisted that all Richards’
parts were finished before Jagger
added vocals. “Because if you put
Mick around Keith, it’s gonna sound
like the Stones. You’re not fitting
Keith in – fuck that.” It was part of an
evolving plan to make a “modern”-
sounding record that preserved
the unique live sound of the Stones,
tracking in a room.
“I hope what makes it fresh and
modern comes down to the way it’s
mixed, with focus on low end and
making sure the drums are big,”
says Watt. “But the record is
recorded like a Stones album.
There’s no click tracks. There’s no
gridding. There’s no computer
editing. This shit is performed live
and it speeds up and slows down.
It’s made to the fucking heartbeat
connection of Mick Jagger, Keith
Richards, Ronnie Wood and Steve
Jordan. And Charlie, when Charlie’s
on it.”
And what does he hope fans
will hear?
“They’ll hear their favourite
band in the world playing raw and
un-fucked-with, because that’s
what it is. It’s the raw shit.”
Danny Eccleston
 Better move on: the Stones strolling
through London’s Soho on January 17,
1964, two weeks into their first UK tour
(from left) Richards, Wyman, Watts,
Jagger, Jones; (opposite page, clockwise
from main) still moving in 2023; Keith
Richards & The X-Pensive Winos, 1988,
with (centre) current Stones drummer
Steve Jordan; Charlie Watts, 1975.
One line from Sweet Sounds Of Heaven’s lyric goes, “Let the
➣
old still believe that they’re young…” Is that part of the Stones’
job? Jagger laughs.
“I guess so… now. It wasn’t always our job of course. I’ve heard
people who come to the shows saying, ‘It takes me back to my
youth…’ (Unimpressed) ‘Yeah great, so my job is to take you back to
your youth… (Brightens) But I’ll buy it! Whatever makes you happy.
You’re payin’ to get in. I’m just doin’ what I do. But I suppose I did
make some of those references on this album – slightly tongue-in-
cheek references to ageing.”
While they were making it, were they at any point thinking, This
could be the last Rolling Stones album?
“It always can be,” says Jagger. “But listen, you don’t really think
like that. We could both walk across the road and have a drink and
fall under a bus. But that’s not how I think. We’ve got so much
material in the can, this can’t be the last Rolling Stones record…”
Terry O’Neill/Iconic Images, Mark Seliger, Michael Brennan/Iconic Images, Paul Natkin/Getty
HE SHADOW THROWN ACROSS HACKNEY DIAMONDS
is not so much its possible finality, but the absence of Charlie
Watts, so long the band’s motor and their anchor. The Stones
were rehearsing in Boston when they heard that he passed. Ronnie
Wood had seen him in London not long before.
“I happened to be in the hospital for check-ups,” says Wood,
reflective where he is normally effusive. “They weren’t really letting
anyone in – visitors or nothing. But they said that Charlie was in,
and they let me see him.
“So I’m sat with him in his room watching the racing, we’re
watching Frankie Dettori on the telly, and he’s going, ‘I’m so pissed
off, I wanna get out of here.’ But he did mention to me, he said,
‘Until I get better, you’ve got to use Steve Jordan. He’s the only one
I trust to keep it going.’ I said, ‘Don’t worry Charlie, we’ve got it
covered.’ And that’s the last time I saw him.”
Two years before, June 21, 2019, Steve Jordan was watching The
Rolling Stones perform at Soldier Field, Chicago. Showing MOJO
film on his phone of Watts power the band through Midnight
Rambler that night, he shakes his head in disbelief.
76 MOJO
“I mean, Midnight Rambler is the essence of the Stones,” Jordan
says, “where you see the creativity, the improvisation happen. And
here’s this guy, 78 years old, just cracking the whip. Now it’s true
that Charlie’s heroes – guys like Roy Haynes, Elvin Jones – they
were playing brilliantly in their seventies, but that’s jazz. They’re
playing clubs to people who are listening. Charlie is playing to
80,000 people and he’s making them move their ass.”
Jordan grins widely, then leans forward, his face deadly serious.
“This was not my dream,” he says. “I wish Charlie Watts was still
alive. I did have a dream about playing with the Stones where I was
like [Sympathy For The Devil percussionist] Rocky Dzidzornu. But
I never ever, ever, ever, ever thought about this.”
Jordan is spoken of by all of the Stones as Watts’ personally-
anointed successor. It helps everyone feel better that the group
are sailing on without him but it also appears to be true. Jordan
first encountered the Stones in October 1978 at the first show of
the fourth season of NBC’s Saturday Night Live. Jordan was the
drummer in the house band. That day, the Stones performed Shat-
tered – still one of his favourite songs. Backstage, he found himself
watching baseball with Charlie Watts.
“Here I am, 19 years old, and I’m explaining baseball to Charlie
Watts! He was just so unassuming. And I said to him, Could you do
me a favour? Could you get me an autograph? And he went out and
came back with autographs from the entire band.”
In 1985, Jordan was working in Paris with Duran Duran
offshoot Arcadia, while across town the Stones were wading
through Dirty Work. He sent a ‘hi’ message to Watts and received
an invite to drop by. Turfed out of a cab in the vague vicinity of
Pathé Marconi studio, he wondered what he’d let himself in for.
“It’s freezing cold,” he says. “There’s no reason for me to be in
this neighbourhood close to midnight. It looks like I’m gonna rob
somebody’s house or something. I’m screwed.”
Jordan actually hears the Stones before he sees the studio en-
trance, and as he’s let in he beholds something wondrous.
“They’re playing like they’re set up on a stage to play live,” he
says. “And then I realise that I’d never seen a Rolling Stones gig
before! So this is my first gig and it was like a private gig. It’s me,
some engineers, [Ronnie’s then wife] Jo Wood and Keith’s dad sit-
ting on a couch. And this is like so surreal, the whole thing.”
Jordan remembers exactly what Watts was wearing that night
– an olive-green corduroy suit with cordovan loafers – and that he
wasn’t in the best of shape: “It was his turn, the one time he wasn’t
the rock for the rest of the band.” And for the rest of the week,
whenever Stones pianist and tour manager Ian Stewart summoned
him, after he knocked off with Arcadia, he would turn up at Pathé
Marconi and help out. It was the beginning of an open relationship
with multiple Stones – sessions for Jagger’s solo theme for the 1986
film Ruthless People; a stint with Wood on a Fats Domino TV spe-
cial in the same year; Hail! Hail! Rock ’N’ Roll in 1987 with Rich-
ards and a notoriously recalcitrant Chuck Berry (“That thing wore
my ass out”) and subsequently, Richards’ X-Pensive Winos band.
Jordan’s current status in the Stones, he admits, is “tricky”. He
honours Watts in what he plays, but he also has his own style.
“I’m not like, a tribute band drummer,” he says. “That’s not my
goal here. Where Charlie would do his interpretation of a [Chuck
Berry/Chess records drummer] Fred Below thing I do full Fred
Below, because I know where Charlie was coming from, what his in-
tent was. I’m pushing the band a little bit more. Charlie’s relation-
ship with Keith was almost, he waited for Keith. Counterpunching,
kinda. But I’m not waiting for Keith. My version of playing with
Keith is, I gotta drive.”
TEVE JORDAN REGARDS HIMSELF AS THE GUY “WHO
knows what The Rolling Stones should sound like.” Since his
incorporation into the touring band in 2021, some of his work
has been akin to restoration.
“Why is Honky Tonk Women so funky?” he asks MOJO. “It’s
the space. The guitar, the cowbell… the arrangement is brilliant.”
But, he notes, the Stones hadn’t played that arrangement for years.
“They’d evolved into a thing where by the second verse, every-
body’s playing, and all of a sudden, it sounds like a freaking bar
band. It doesn’t sound like The Rolling Stones.”
Jordan wanted to spring clean
other staples of the Stones’ set too.
“…Like the stomp beat in Satis-
faction. Fifteen to 20 years ago Charlie stopped playing the stomp
beat; he just played back beat. And I can see why – it can take every-
thing out of you. But as a fan I wanna hear BAM BAM BAM BAM!”
He pauses. He knows he’s coming on a little strong. “Look, I
know there’s a danger of, You just got here and this is not your role,
guy, so calm down,” he concedes. “I’m very cognisant of all that.”
The irony is that, in some respects, The Rolling Stones’ Jordan-
era shows are more faithful to Rolling Stones records than latter-era
Watts. Besides which, Jordan’s extra power applied boot to rear at
just the point when his seventysomething bandmates most needed
it. Witnesses of the group’s London Hyde Park shows in July 2022
rank the performances among the best they’ve seen. But beyond
the beat, there was a new-found intensity shared by all the band.
Wood, for instance, stowed the clowning and found a focus that was
evident every time the screens showed his face.
“He was focused, yeah,” agrees Jagger. “Some of that’s got to do
with it being London, and a home crowd. Your kids are there and
mates you’ve known for 30 years. And I think that’s when you’ve got
to do your best job. Whereas, when you’re in Düsseldorf…”
Wood thinks there’s another reason, apart from almost constant
guitar playing, for his current performance levels.
“My ‘newfound sobriety’ is now, like, 13 years old,” he says,
“and it’s changing all the time. So my concentration span is better,
and I have another angle at looking on things. You get a lot of work
done, when you’re seeing things clearly.”
NE OF MOJO’S FAVOURITE ROLLING STONES-
related artefacts, we tell Keith Richards, is A Stone Alone –
a bootleg of solo Keith recordings, some taped in Toronto
in 1977 while Richards waited on his sentence for possession of
heroin with intent to traffic. The guitarist is hopeless yearning
personified on Merle Haggard’s Sing Me Back Home and Johnny
Paycheck’s Apartment Number 9. ➢
MOJO 77

Luciano Viti/Getty, Erica Echenberg/Getty, Courtesy Alan Clayton from the personal collection of Stash Klossowski de Rola
HE MID-’80S spat between Mick Jagger
and Keith Richards is the stuff of Stones
legend. After the torrid 1981-2 Tattoo
You tour, the rift widened circa ’84-85,
when Jagger cut his first solo album,
She’s The Boss, but less widely remembered
is that while Mick swanned about in the
Bahamas on that project, Richards and Ronnie
Wood were contributing to an album by a
rough-and-ready band at the opposite end of
rock’s pecking order.
The Dirty Strangers were a ramalama
rock’n’roll unit playing in west London pubs,
fronted by a charismatic ducker-and-diver
named Alan Clayton, who was then dividing
his time, he says today, between “building and
decorating, security work and doing the band.
I was a 48-hours-a-day man.”
Clayton first met Wood via the Stone’s
monitor man, and The Dirty Strangers played
at Ronnie’s wedding to Jo Karslake in Janu-
ary ’85. The introduction to Richards came
through Clayton’s multi-tasking as a bouncer.
“This man-mountain I was working with,
Joe Seabrook, became Keith’s bodyguard and
thought we’d get on, so he took me up to see
him at the Carlton Tower in Knightsbridge,
and he was absolutely right.”
Two days later, Richards had Clayton ferry
a guitar and, bafflingly, a sword stick to Paris,
78 MOJO
The filth and the fury: (clockwise
from left) Keith keeps his bottle,
Rome, 1984; Richards jamming
with Alan Clayton, Long Island,
1985; The Dirty Strangers, 1982.
lost his eldest son Barrie to cancer, aged
22, the superstar guitarist took his grieving
amigo under his wing.
“He had me over to stay at Redlands, to
help him while he was recording A Bigger
Bang. I went down there when the sun was
and the friendship continued over the ensu- shining and came home when the Christmas
ing year or two. When Clayton mentioned decorations were up. That’s what happened
that he planned to record more songs he’d when you went to Redlands in those days.”
written, “it just happened that Keith was go- Richards soon took Clayton off on tour
ing to be in London, and he went, ‘Can I play for two years-plus, where he’d line-check
on them?’ I wasn’t gonna turn him down.” Jagger’s microphone every afternoon (“he
With Richards’ buddy Prince was great with me, never rude”), and
Stanislas Klossowski de Rola with Alan’s “mojo restored”, ’09’s
(AKA Stash) ‘producing’, third Dirty Strangers record was
recording took place in Ham- recorded at Redlands. Suitably
mersmith on the cheaper entitled West 12 To Witter-
graveyard shift, “which was ing, it featured Richards on
OK ’cos Keith didn’t get up piano on four tracks, such
’til two in the morning”. as the co-authored She’s A
Richards later bankrolled Real Botticelli – a title the pair
some remixing, and played admiringly nicked from a Just
on six tracks, best of all the William story.
Clayton-penned, heart-on- Tellingly, Clayton appears
sleeve ballad, Diamonds. as early as page 23 of
Jagger fumed at his Richards’ autobiography,
compadres ‘slumming it’, Life, loitering with him
especially when press in outside a Sussex sweet
some territories reported shop with the munchies
that Wood and Richards after an all-night bender,
had quit the Stones to join but Clayton is ambivalent
‘Dirty Al’’s combo, but whether their friendship
the self-titled album ran has advanced his
into legal problems, when music career.
its Stateside distributors “But I’ve known him
blatantly stickered the for 40 years now, so we’re
sleeve with the two Stones’ like family,” he reasons.
names. With Richards “Keith has been there for
himself about to drop a solo us in ways he probably
record, Talk Is Cheap, his label Virgin forced wouldn’t want people to know about. The
the album to be withdrawn. things he does might seem extraordinary
The friendship endured, however. Richards from the outside, but from the inside… It’s
co-wrote one track on 1993’s follow-up, Burn quite normal, isn’t it, to help?”
The Bubble, and in the early ’00s after Clayton The Dirty Strangers’ album, Hunter’s Moon, is out now.
 “It was the stuff that I’d been playing with Gram Parsons be-
➣
fore Gram upped and croaked on me – damn him,” says Richards
rheumily. “I thought I was going to jail. I didn’t see how… But I
also saw that I definitely was not as guilty as they thought I was.
Although I can’t say I was squeaky clean (low chuckle).
“Having that hang over you,” he continues, “it makes you grow
up. And, whoa, decide to learn how to deal with society. I’ve got
kids. I’ve got the judges on my ass. Yeah, it was a moment of intro-
spection. Time to straighten up, boy.”
The other songs on A Stone Alone are from 1981, recorded
on Longview Farm, Massachusetts after rehearsals for the Stones’
Tattoo You tour. We mention Richards’ beautiful version of Hoagy
Carmichael’s The Nearness Of You – an oc-
casional solo spot at Stones shows passim –
and Richards insists on shaking hands.
“He called me on that, you know,
Hoagy,” says Richards. “My lawyer at the
time, Peter Parcher, was also Sammy Cahn’s
lawyer. And he was playing it in his office
and Sammy Cahn was there. And Sammy
called Hoagy. Me and Patti were down in
Bermuda – no, Barbados – and I get, ‘Mr
Richards, there’s a phone call for you. A Mr
Carmichael.’ I’m thinking, There’s only one
Carmichael I know of and it can’t be him,
but sure enough…”
Carmichael told Richards how much the
Stone’s version had touched him, but may have
had an ulterior motive…
“He reeled off a litany of other songs and I’m
like, I know them all, Hoagy! He was giving me
the songwriters’ spiel! Then he said, ‘Where are
you?’ and I said, Barbados. And he said, ‘Go down
to the bar and ask for a corn’n’oil.’ I’m like, Yes
sir! I go to the bar and sure enough, corn’n’oil is
rum and falernum sweetener, an old famous Bar-
bados drink…”
A nostalgic mist swims in front of Richards’
eyes. He looks like he can taste it now.
“So I got that tip from Hoagy. And all he’d
heard was what you’ve heard… ‘It ain’t the pale
moon…’ and my terrible piano playing!”
The Rolling Stones and their ’60s peers are
often seen as a rupture in the pop culture, but
as we put more distance between ourselves and
the late ’60s, their revolution looks less clear-cut.
The musicians they admired as teenagers – the
tunesmiths, bluesmen, early rock’n’rollers – were
already long into adulthood. Some, like Hoagy
Carmichael, who would be dead within six
months of his call to Richards, were decades past
their supposed heyday. The Stones were torch-
bearers, not always barnburners.
“Y’know, our music has had far more influence
than I ever dreamt of or expected,” says Richards.
“I can’t really project into the future. But it is a
weird feeling… to be an elder statesman. You
know, I’m not really built for that. I didn’t expect
to get this far, man.
“Getting old is new territory,” he adds. “As
long as I can hang and play, personally I feel like
I’m 40 or 50. But let’s not push our luck, right?
Mick and I are both very physically strong. But I
don’t want to make a big deal of it. I’d feel differ-
ently about my age if I woke up in the morning,
and my leg fell off. Whoops! Something’s wrong
Ken Regan/Camera 5
here! Otherwise, it’s not something that’s on
my mind.”
You suspect being a Rolling Stone makes more
sense at 79 than at 40. Their generation of rockers
found mid-life music-making a challenge. In the 1980s, they looked
like they didn’t know what to do with themselves…
“A lot didn’t know what to do with themselves in the first place!”
guffaws Richards. “They just hit the lucky spot until it ran out.
That’s pop music. You shouldn’t be surprised when a lot of people
jump on a wagon that the wagon falls over. Stones ain’t like that…”
You’ve never seemed to go in for questioning yourselves much.
“Questioning?!” Richards reels theatrically. “I mean, what kind
of question would I ask myself? Sounds like a recipe for disaster! I
mean, I think we’ve always felt that we’ve got this little spark going
on, this energy, and you don’t really want to intellectualise or ques-
tion it too much. Basically, you know, you’re hanging on by the skin
of your teeth and saying, So far, so good.”
Coming down T’S ONLY ROCK’N’ROLL? IS
again: (left) the
A Stone Alone
that all that sustains the Stones’
solo bootleg; status? Surely it’s also one of the shib-
(below) Keith boleths of late-20th century social history
hits the right
notes, 1972. that the band were one of the motors of
change. Jagger revisits that period in the
lyric of Hackney Diamonds’ Whole Wide World, a
punky ramalam with the singer imagining himself
assailed by multiple outside forces, all in an exag-
gerated London accent. Is this his first cockney
vocal on record?
“Well, I kinda did London on Mother’s Lit-
tle Helper,” he muses. “But the song’s kind of
British punk so I thought, Not too Americanised
on this one, no Southernisms. And with the lyric I
was thinking, It’s about when the chips are down
– why not use some of your old experiences? It’s
obviously not exact. I mention the ‘filthy flat Ful-
ham’ – which was actually obviously in Chelsea,
but doesn’t alliterate (laughs).”
Then you mention being in jail – revisiting the
aftermath of the February 1967 Redlands bust.
“Well, yeah, so I’d covered the difficult stu-
dent years. Which weren’t that difficult, really, but
they weren’t that great either. And then I thought,
Being in jail – that was pretty awful. I mean, I
wasn’t there long but I mean, not nice.”
Jagger won’t wallow in the timeworn Stones
Versus The Establishment narrative. He has
previously noted that it was the establishment
that got Richards and himself out of prison. Today
he returns to that theme: support for the Stones
from unexpected corners of the press.
“I’m not sure how I came across this stuff,”
he says, “but I found an old piece in the Evening
Standard. They compared our sentences with a
sentence that was given the week before to some-
one that possessed two ounces of cannabis. He
was given a warning and a fine of 50 quid. So they
were saying it wasn’t a level playing field. And that
it was overkill for a first offence. There were quite
a lot of objections on that level.”
So did The Rolling Stones change the world,
or didn’t they?
“(Poo-pooing voice) Well… ‘changed the world’
is a bit of an exaggeration. It’s got to do a lot with
economics. So there’s this huge jump in disposa-
ble income. You’ve got young people having mon-
ey for the first time, a target market for clothes,
cars, motorbikes, whatever. So your market is
not just a middle-class couple. It’s a much big-
ger market. And that fuels this upheaval in values.
And pop culture is just the most visible bit. Every-
one can see a miniskirt, everyone wants to take a
picture of it. Everyone wants to take a picture of
The Beatles or The Rolling Stones…” ➢
MOJO 79
Back down the road:
ready to roll in ’23;
(below) Mick and Keith
at the Rock and Roll
Circus, 1968; original
sinner Robert Johnson.
➣ one day, looking at the famous picture of Johnson with
In 1967, the year Jagger and Richards were jailed and released,
the Stones recorded Their Satanic Majesties’ Request. In other UK
news that year, the Family Planning Act made contraception readily
available through the NHS. And the Sexual Offences Act…
“Which endorsed the Wolfenden Report,” Jagger interjects.
…permitted homosexual acts between consenting adults over
21. It’s all going on…
“Yeah, it’s all going on. And a lot of it has got nothing to do with
pop culture. The Wolfenden Report [delivered to Parliament in
1960] had been an undercurrent for a long time. So nothing to do
with pop culture. But the change in sexual mores and the gender
stuff we’re dealing with now, started then.”
ICK JAGGER IS SOMETHING OF AN ALL-COURT
sceptic. It’s evident in his refusal to embrace received ver-
sions of his own history – his refusal to publically embrace
very much, it must be said, outside of the Stones, his family, and
cricket. Since his appearance at the Grosvenor Square anti-Vietnam
demonstration of October ’68 he has not gone out of his way to
espouse causes or make pronouncements. And over the years it’s
been easy to turn himself and Richards into the allegorical poles of
Mark Seliger, Alamy (2)
the Stones: the pragmatist versus the romantic, the head versus the
heart. Mick is this. Keith is that. And never the twain… Jagger nods.
“Yeah exactly… It’s always very convenient in journalism, as
you know, being a journalist… It’s an easy story to write. And then
the more you say it, the more it catches on and becomes accepted.”
80 MOJO
OK then, in what way isn’t it true?
“I don’t know how we’re gonna…”
Mick’s the pop one, who wants to sell records and…
“…likes business…”
And Keith’s away with the faeries, conjuring music
from the ether…
“(Laughs) Yeah, it never works like that… Like,
originally, Keith was the pop person, really. I mean, I used
to just write the lyrics to his pop tunes. And he wrote all
these pop tunes, because he listened to The Beatles all
the time, drove me crazy listening to The Beatles when
we shared a flat together. Keith sort of left that behind in
a way, but he wrote Ruby Tuesday, Let’s Spend The Night
Together – these were all Keith’s songs. But yeah, people
will say, ‘Keith was the one that liked the blues.’ I mean,
there is a difference. I really like pop music now, listen to
it all the time. Keith doesn’t. I still like blues. But I like
dance music and Keith doesn’t really like it.”
Despite their differences, the phoney war between the
two – maintained for whatever reason throughout the
’80s and the ’90s, doubtless with a performative compo-
nent – has been over for a while.
“I know how it looks – ‘Oh Mick and Keith have had a
fight,’” says Richards, “but there’s 15 years since the last
fight. Say you and your brother decided to disagree about
something? I mean, how many times in your lifetime?
But of course when Mick and I have a disagreement, it’s
all over the place, ya know? And really, it’s just two nor-
mal brothers having spats and making up. We wouldn’t
still be doing this if we didn’t have that capability and that
respect for each other. I love the silly sod.”
HE LAST TRACK ON HACKNEY DIAMONDS IS
I’m A Rolling Stone, a cover of the Muddy Waters
song which gave the band their name.
It was Andrew Watt’s idea that Jagger and Richards
should end the album on their own, playing a blues. He
even provided the 1930 Gibson L-4 guitar – similar to a
guitar once favoured by doomed bluesman Robert John-
son – that Richards used on the track. Or rather, eventu-
ally used, as both Richards and Watt struggled with the
instrument’s unforgiving neck and string tension until
a cigarette dangling from his mouth, they realised from the posi-
tion of the capo on the second fret of his guitar, that Johnson must
have tuned down a full step, relaxing the string tension. Thus em-
powered, Richards and the L-4 joined Jagger around a single mike,
Jagger singing and playing harmonica, and the tune was nailed in six
takes, the pair moving closer together as they played.
“It was almost like Keith was having a conversation with Robert
Johnson,” says Watt. But the more immediate conversation is with
Jagger, whose harmonica playing is spine-tingling.
“For years I would whisper to Keith,” says Steve Jordan, “When
Mick plays the harp, he’s like a different guy. It’s like his alter ego
comes in and swoops in and takes him over. It’s the real stuff.”
If it’s to be the last Rolling Stones song on the last Rolling Stones
album it would be apt. But for now at least, the Stones are talking up
the fight, including the prospect of taking some of their new songs
on the road.
“One of the points of this is to be a… bastion!” declares
Richards, majestically. “Everything these days is synthesised and
artificial. These words are not particularly good words. We needed
some real, so we got as real as we could get. This is The Rolling
Stones. This is what they can do.”
And will fans have to wait another 18 years for another Stones
LP? Or will they soon be able to hear some of this cornucopia of
tracks we’re told are in the can?
“Maybe!” laughs Richards, gaily, as MOJO is ushered from his
presence. “I ain’t Nostradamus.” M
 MOJO F ILT E R
YOUR GUIDE TO THE MONTH'S BEST MUSIC
EDITED BY JENNY BULLEY jenny.bulley@bauermedia.co.uk

CONTENTS
82 ALBUMS
• Put on your swamp boots, we’re riding
with bluesman Robert Finley
• Lol Tolhurst, Budgie and Jacknife Lee form
darkside supergroup
• King Gizzard turn synth-Wizard Lizards
• Thandi Ntuli and Carlos Niño: South African
pianist meets cosmic jazz
• Van Morrison: he’s come back to rock’n’roll
• Plus, Laura Veirs, Duff McKagan, The Streets,
Cat Power, Simple Minds, Stephen Marley,
Black Pumas, The Rolling Stones and more.

96 REISSUES
• Joni Mitchell reaches her imperial phase
• Billy Bragg: he’s your main man (not THE man)
• Prince on the rocks with Diamonds And Pearls
• J.J. Cale: don’t go changing that Tulsa Sound
• Hit The Bongo! File Under does the boogaloo
• Plus, Nancy Sinatra, Libyan reggae, Nirvana,
Chicago blues, Tricky, Superchunk and more.

110 BOOKS
• George Harrison: Philip Norman recounts
(and recants)
• Plus, John McLaughlin, Pauline Murray,
David Remnick, Island Records and more.

112 SCREEN
• Stop Making Sense: Jonathan Demme takes
us on-stage with Talking Heads.

INDEX
“There’s a battle Abstract Concrete 93
Almond, Marc 101
Green Day
Hansard, Glen
98
92
David
ØXN
100
92

for something Anderson, Emma

Arkbro, Ellen
Atwood-Ferguson,
92
89
Hesnawi, Ibrahim 105
Holmes, David
Hotline TNT
92
93
Prince
Rani, Hania
105
88
Reed, Eli ‘Paperboy’ 101
close to the Miguel
Beirut
89
88
Christone ‘Kingfish’
Ingram 89
Reed, Mike
Rival Sons
89
90

human soul Bixiga 70

Black Pumas
Blom, Pip
89
84
90
Isaacs, Gregory
J.J. Cale
Kalevi, Jaakko Eino 90
98
99
Rolling Stones, The 84
Sampha
Simple Minds
90
84
unfolding here.” Blue Orchids
Bragg, Billy
88
101
Kills, The
King Creosote
87
92
Sinatra, Nancy
Spearmint
105
87
Candidate 88 King Gizzard & The Streets, The 86
VICTORIA SEGAL Carlton Melton 92 Wizard Lizard 87 Superchunk 105
MAKING SENSE OF Cat Power 92 Kourtesis, Sofia 90 Tedeschi, Susan 98
Channel One Sound Lattimore, Mary 93 Togo All Stars 86
TALKING HEADS IN 4K. System 105 LeBlanc, Dylan 91 Tolhurst, Lol x
SCREEN P112. Chills, The 100 Manzanera/Mackay 89 Budgie x Jacknife Lee 85
Cropper, Steve 100 Marley, Stephen 84 Tricky 98
Crosses 88 Marr, Johnny 99 VA: Down Home
Dire Straits 100 Martin, Jeffrey 88 Blues Vol 3 98
DJ Shadow 90 McKagan, Duff 86 VA: London A To Z 99
Dreyblatt, Arnold 93 Meat Puppets 98 VA: Parchman Prison
Duran Duran 86 Mitchell, Joni 96 Prayer 84
Earth 99 Morrison, Van 86 VA: The Sublime
East Village 100 Nash, Israel 93 Sound Of Yuji Ohno 100
Eggleston, William 91 New Order 100 VA: Tribute To Michael
Egyptian Blue 88 Nirvana 98 Chapman 87
Finley, Robert 82 Ntuli, Thandi With VA: Victor Axelrod
Flat Worms 87 Niño, Carlos 91 Productions 101
Flynn, Ethan P 93 Oldfield Youth Club 90 VA: Yacht Soul 2 101
Forest Swords 91 OMD 91 Veirs, Laura 86
Gaslight Anthem, The 86 Orb, The & Gilmour, White, Clarence 99

MO O 83
MOJJO 81
 F I LT E R A L B UM S

Later, alligator
The Louisianan was born on the bayou and still lives there, but does his fourth album
offer any chance of escape? By David Hutcheon. Illustration by Andy Bourne.

Robert Finley The thread running through all four albums –

Sharecropper’s Son followed in 2021 – is deep
★★★★★ Southern soul: the funk of B.B. King, the hybrid
gospel/R&B of Bobby Bland, and the straight-razor-
Black Bayou totin’ tales of Tony Joe White (a fellow Louisianan).
EASY EYE SOUND. CD/DL/LP
Black Bayou is a far tougher, angrier-sounding set,
however, for which Finley should tip his Stetson in

G
ET HIP to this kindly tip: if you ever plan to the direction of R. L. Burnside veterans Kenny Brown
motor east on the I-20 from Shreveport, (guitar) and Eric Deaton (bass). Drums are handled
Louisiana, bypass Dubberly, Arcadia and by Auerbach’s Black Keys compadre Patrick Carney
Grambling – a warm welcome awaits you in and Jeffrey Clemens (of G. Love & Special Sauce,
Monroe. According to the US Fish & Wildlife Service, and an alumnus of Sharecropper’s Son), but it’s
the town’s Black Bayou showcases “the stereotypical “Musically, Brown’s solos that sear themselves into your
Louisiana of swamps and bald cypress… [sheltering]
a variety of species and providing a variety of Black Bayou is memory on What Goes Around (Comes Around)
and Livin’ Out A Suitcase – even if the latter fades
recreational opportunities”, including fishing a deliberately out way too early.
and canoeing. Among those species are alligators Musically, then, it’s a deliberately unpolished
and crocodiles. Choose your pastime wisely, unpolished gem that never departs too far from the template:
however, because, as Robert Finley acknowledges: gem that Sneakin’ Around reinvigorates Booker T & The
“A lotta kids got ate that way.”
With that one macabre morsel, almost casually never departs M.G.’s’ Hip Hug-Her; What Goes Around is purest
Credence Clearwater Revival boogie. But then we
tossed away on the closing track Alligator Bait, too far come to the storytelling, and in writing about what
the veteran bluesman embarks on a slow cruise
through a landscape populated by Flannery
from the he knows, Finley leaves Fogerty et al looking like
Hollywood dilettantes. Gospel Blues is a battle
O’Connor scenarios and escapees from the untamed template.” between a man with his heart set on entering Heaven
ecosystems of Tom Waits’s imagination. This is and “hanging out with the great Jehovah”; the rest
Southern Gothic expressed through soul music. of his body, meanwhile, is craving a little whiskey
Finley and O’Connor, the literary queen of that particular and a shot of wine. “You worry about your soul and salvation and
underworld, would both argue that the Almighty determines let me worry about mine.”
their paths, but Black Bayou suggests life there is anything Miss Kitty is a simple song of desire, Waste Of Time bemoans
but predestined and that human frailties lead even the the lack of opportunity that comes the way of folks in the South;
best-intentioned astray. both arrive with anxiety-inducing levels of intensity. Nobody Wants
In contrast to O’Connor, whose stories To Be Lonely reels in the excitement and finds Finley visiting a friend
were shaped by a debilitating terminal illness in a nursing home, where the elderly have been dumped and
(she died aged 39) that conjured up fates forgotten by their children; halfway through, the singer remembers
beyond the foresight of her protagonists, his age and how precarious his own situation has become. You Got It
Finley – now registered blind – has turned (And I Need It) is darker still. The “you” may be his baby, but she is
inward, bringing out truths from his portrayed by Finley’s falsetto, turning the song into a duet between a
childhood, from a life already well lived. gritty male voice and a sweet female… if you thought Nancy and Lee
BACK STORY: Though he turns 70 in February, his solo were an odd couple, this pair of Robert Finleys bring Norman Bates
SWAMP LIFE recording career stretches back a mere seven and his mother to mind.
● Born in Bernice, And then there’s Alligator Bait. “Put on your swamp boots, baby,
Louisiana, in 1954, years, and if you know his earlier albums,
Finley was a you’ll be aware there is much ground, we going for a ride.” If the way Finley stretches “log” out over several
sharecropper’s son, and a lot of swamp, still to be investigated. syllables doesn’t set off alarm bells, you may be tempted to go on
living an almost-feudal,
Discovered by the Music Maker Relief this date to the Black Bayou, but best put your affairs in order before
Jim Crow way of life
until he enlisted in Foundation in 2015, Finley released his you do. This is where Finley’s grandfather took him as a small boy,
the military as a debut, Age Don’t Mean A Thing , in 2016. using his grandson to entice one of Louisiana’s official state reptiles
teenager, becoming a
From the off, you could tell something out of the water. The boy vows never to return, but… well, you
helicopter engineer
and leading an army special was afoot, but it was clear the author would, wouldn’t you? If only to prove that surviving the first
soul band in Europe. hadn’t needed to push himself too hard and time was no fluke.
Demobbed, he worked
the lyrics were well-worn and familiar: Black Bayou is surely the album Finley was put on Earth to create,
as a carpenter until filled with stories only he could tell. Here is a good man trying to
glaucoma left him blind. women cheat, snakes are always dirty. By his
Having grown up on second outing, his first with Dan Auerbach do his best yet trapped between Heaven and the hellish reality of
sacred music, he formed a cruel world, juggling love and lust, and fearsome yet fearful in a
Brother Finley And The producing, Finley had learnt how to dig deep landscape determinedly resistant to the genteel encroachments of
Gospel Singers, and to find the kind of swagger the title, Goin’ civilisation. “Once I get to Heaven, all my troubles will be over,” he
frequently appeared on Platinum!, deserved. Some of his lines, many
religious TV shows, but declares optimistically, but you know he is aware that, even at 70,
it wasn’t until 2015 that of the images, were worthy of Dylan (“I fixed there are still many obstacles in his way. Pray that he is man enough
he was spotted by a the chain on your rusty swing, I might even to overcome them.
charity dedicated to
assisting little-known
teach your bird to sing” on Honey, Let Me Coincidentally, the Black Bayou is 66.6 miles long. Make of that
musicians. Four years Stay The Night; “I been a king so long, and I what you will.
later, Finley made the always draw first blood” on Three Jumpers),
semi-finals of America’s
and the grooves were straight out of the
Got Talent.
Stones playbook. ROBERT SPEAKS! FINLEY ON SWAMPS, CHILDHOOD
MEMORIES AND EATING ALLIGATOR.

82 MOJO
 The Rolling
Stones
★★★★
Hackney Diamonds
UNIVERSAL. CD/DL/LP
Their first all-originals
album since 2005’s
A Bigger Bang.
Despite its
ungainly
launch (glitchy
website;
vacuous Jimmy
Fallon junket),
Hackney Diamonds houses far
more jewels than paste. The
dove-tailing guitars on Get
Close, Keef’s instinct-led ballad
Tell Me Straight and the
Exile-ish country honk of
Dreamy Skies are 24-carat
Stones, while producer
Andrew Watt (who wore a
different Stones T-shirt to
each session) proves an able
facilitator/cheerleader on
Sweet Sounds Of Heaven,
wherein Stevie Wonder and
Lady Gaga aid majestic gospel
vibes. Elton John tickles
ivories, Paul McCartney plays
Born on the Bayou:
Robert Finley shines
fuzz bass on Bite My Head Off,
Bill Wyman re-teams with
a spotlight on the
Charlie Watts on Live By
community.
The Sword (one of two
posthumous Charlie
appearances), and Mick and
Keef close out proceedings
“Alligators don’t with an earthy take on Muddy
Waters’ Rollin’ Stone. Hackney
care who they eat.” Diamonds feels like a
self-aware, historically mindful
party, Jagger’s remarkable
David Hutcheon speaks to Robert Finley. vocal thrust utterly
unimpaired.
Do you still call the Black Bayou home? James McNair
“Yeah, that’s in Louisiana. The picture on the cover was taken at
the farm where I was baptised, where I learnt to swim, all that kind
of stuff. So I grew up in that neighbourhood and I tried to go back Black Pumas
and recapture bits of it and put a spotlight on the community.” ★★★★
Are the people in the songs real, then? Chronicles Of
“Pretty much. Nobody Wants To Be Lonely, that’s a true song A Diamond
about people in the old folks’ home that have been forgotten. ATO. CD/DL/LP
If somebody has elderly parents in a home, maybe they will think Eric Burton’s falsetto
twice and go see them. I go to the nursing home from time to and Adrian Quesada’s
time, take my guitar and perform, and so many people living there production outstrip the
haven’t seen or heard from anybody.” sophomore slump.
What about the Miss Kitty who blew your mind? Despite the
revolutionary
“Oh yeah, that’s my fiancée. I wrote that because I’m gone all the whiff of their
time, and I did it as a tribute to her. She takes care of everything for name and their
me while I’m out on the road. This album was a good chance for formidable
me to express something special. When we did Sharecropper’s Son feline
[2021], nobody could tell that story but me. The songs are about iconography, Black Pumas
my life so they weren’t something I had to write, all I had to do was have never suggested actual
think back. And if I’m thinking about my childhood, then nobody upheaval, a rewritten order
knows it better than me, but I try to write about things that of any sort. Their 2019 debut
everyday people can relate to.” instead became a star-making
smash because it offered a sort
The song Alligator Bait, where your grandfather lets you of retrospective modernism,
step on the back of one, makes it sound like you had a gently pulling threads of Stax
terrifying childhood. and Muscle Shoals into this
(Laughs) “I don’t really know what made me want to do that song sing-song century. (A strong
like I did. I never met any of my grandparents, but that was a story narrative – busking and a
my dad and my uncles used to tell about their childhoods while trans-genre/generational
sitting round the fire. I guess you could say a lot of it was my partnership – didn’t hurt.) Four
imagination, but it was just to try to put some joy and laughter years later, the Pumas’ return
both seals the deal and
into the album. A bit of comedy.”
expands its terms, showing
Did you know any children who were eaten by alligators? not only that their suave
“That part is true! That’s a real thing in the swamp if you’re not psychedelic soul was no
one-off but also that it can
careful. They don’t care who they eat, they’re just looking for a
harbour new ideas. The
meal. I eat alligator, so I just hope I wouldn’t be as good to him
boom-bap backbone of Mrs
as he is to me… But there have been some weird accidents Postman, the gothic cathedral
and stuff like that. A friend of mine’s father had a heart attack expanse of Angel, the
in the pig pen and I guess he had feed on him because the hogs synth-swirl charm of Hello:
pretty much ate him.” these 10 tracks embellish Black
Pumas’ bona fides without
84 MOJO
trying too hard, affirming the
effortless cool of their start.
The production ideas and
songs, however smart, won’t
change the world; they will,
however, prompt large
swathes to sing along.
Grayson Haver Currin
Stephen Marley
★★★
Old Soul
TUFF GONG COLLECTIVE/UME.
CD/DL/LP
Stephen’s heartfelt
lockdown project, with
stellar guests.
Arguably the
most talented
of Bob’s
offspring,
Stephen
Marley is a
gifted singer-songwriter and
producer largely unafraid of
taking his own path. His first
album in seven years, the
semi-acoustic Old Soul mixes
earnest originals with unusual
adaptations, delivered with
candid sincerity and
tongue-in-cheek humour.
Let The Children Play attacks
inequality with quiet grace,
and Don’t You Believe warns
against falsehoods; the
radio-friendly title track relates
childhood memories, and he
turns in decent covers of Don’t
Let Me Down and Georgia On
My Mind. Younger brother
Junior Gong and Buju Banton
supply contemporary
dancehall flavours to Cast The
First Stone and Thanks We Get,
and Bob Weir, Jack Johnson
and Don Was add pleasing
layers to Winding Roads,
though Eric Clapton’s guitar
can’t save an average take on
I Shot The Sheriff, the only
under-par number on an
otherwise sterling set.
David Katz
Simple Minds
★★★
New Gold Dream –
Live From Paisley
Abbey
BMG. CD/DL/LP
Priory engagement: band
congregate for one-off
performance of 1982 album.
Asked to revisit
New Gold
Dream
(81-82-83-84)
for Sky Arts
show Greatest
Soul mining:
Stephen Marley
takes his own path.
Albums Live, Simple Minds
chose to take their crashing
beats and fantasy to Paisley
Abbey, a venue that was
both close to their Glasgow
hometown and able to provide
a backdrop of suitable
grandeur. This recording
captures their ardent
performance – audience-free,
as Jim Kerr says in the film, to
remind them of the way the
young band created the record
alone in an empty rehearsal
room. Yet there’s no lack of
atmosphere as a result, Kerr,
guitarist Charlie Burchill and
newer members (drummer
Cherisse Osei and backing
singer Sarah Brown among
them) drawing out the
stained-glass pop colours of
Promised You A Miracle and
New Gold Dream (81-82-83-84)
and revelling in the art-rock
shadows of Big Sleep and
Hunter And The Hunted.
Preaching to the converted,
but still blazing with
conviction.
Victoria Segal
Various
★★★★
Parchman Prison
Prayer – Some
Mississippi Sunday
Morning
GLITTERBEAT. CD/DL/LP
Raw, undiluted gospel
recorded live at Parchman
Farm.
This February
5, the producer
Ian Brennan
went to
Parchman Farm
maximum
security prison in Mississippi
to record a specially convened
Sunday morning service in the
chapel. It took three years to
arrange but makes good on
the wait; the resulting live
album, comprising both
traditional and newly penned
spirituals voiced by inmates
aged 28 to 73, stirs the soul.
An a cappella take on Tasha
Cobbs’ 2013 US hit Break Every
Chain is startling in its purity of
spirit and sincerity; a rousing
Jesus, Every Day Your Name Is
The Same (originally by Shirley
Caesar) captures radiant voices
rejoicing in the freedom of
creative expression; the full
band reading of Lay My
Burden Down unleashes a
torrent of emotion with
whooping and hollering and
cries of “I’m going home”.
Lois Wilson
Stephen Lashbrook

Tom-tom club
Post-punk drummers assemble
for dark-side supergroup.
By Victoria Segal.
Lol Tolhurst x
Budgie x Jacknife Lee
★★★★
Los Angeles
PLAY IT AGAIN SAM. CD/DL/LP
A LOT OF DEEP dark water has passed under
the gothic bridge since Budgie and Lol Tolhurst
first met, the drummers initially bonding when
the original three-piece Cure opened for Sioux-
sie And The Banshees in 1979. It’s taken four
decades for circumstances to allow a creative
union, however, the pair finally joining hands
with Irish producer Jacknife Lee to push the
hell-in-a-handcart rhythms of Los Angeles out
from the city’s murky concrete spillways and
into the half-light.
Originally conceived as an instrumental
album – Tolhurst and Budgie on synths and
drums, Lee in charge of guitars and attendant
distortions – Los Angeles
became a grander col-
laborative project when
Tolhurst contacted LCD
Soundsystem’s James Murphy to see if he would
be interested in contributing vocals, a no-
brainer for an Anglophile of Murphy’s gloomy,
rain-lashed tastes. Other guests followed:
Bobby Gillespie, maybe scenting a chance to
use the phrase “suicide mystics” unchecked;
Lonnie Holley and Mary Lattimore, and The
Edge, whose treated guitar runs through Noche
Obscura’s Bowery Electric cityscape and the
LA-Dusseldorf of Train With No Station.
There are times, mainly when Gillespie is
rhyming “my addiction” with “crucifixion”,
that Los Angeles sounds exactly how you might
expect: Primal Scream’s XTRMNTR, Death
In Vegas’s The Contino Sessions, The Cure and
The Creatures prominent on its monochrome
mood-board. At moments – We Got To Move,
featuring Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock, for
example – it feels like brutalist big beat, the
kind of music pumping out of the sound-system
of a customised hearse, plastic skulls on the
dashboard, Day-Glo paint on the fins.
F I LT E R A L B UM S
LA consequential:
(from left) Jacknife
Lee, Budgie and Lol
Tolhurst conjure a
visceral impact.
Yet even at its most bla-
tant, Los Angeles lands with a
visceral impact, rich texturing
and smart distortions add-
ing a destabilising wobble.
The Suicide churn of the
title track is pushed over the
edge by Murphy’s feverish
state-of-the-nation yelp: “Los Angeles eats its
children!/Los Angeles eats its young!” Uh Oh,
meanwhile, featuring Starcrawler’s Arrow De
Wilde and Mark Bowen of Idles, is a grinding
industrial hoe-down, apparently dredged from
the bottom of a roadside oil-can. Scrambling
the dystopian lexicon further is the brilliant
under-the-skin unease of Bodies, sinkhole beats
under Lonnie Holley’s urgent vocals, Mary
Lattimore’s harp opening up an uncanny urban
hinterland in the closing seconds.
“We’ve got a way to go,” sings an oddly
Anohni-like Murphy on the junkyard clank of
Skins, Echo And The Bunnymen’s Nocturnal
Me stripped down for scrap. Despite its state-
of-the-dystopian-nation restlessness, however,
Los Angeles already feels like a destination
record, Lee, Tolhurst and Budgie putting their
decades of world-building expertise to excel-
lent use. If the world they have built is on the
brink of collapse, it only adds to the thrill.
MOJO 85
 F I LT E R A L B UM S
The Gaslight
Anthem
★★★
History Books
RICH MAHOGANY RECORDINGS/
THIRTY TIGERS. CD/DL/LP
New Jersey four-piece
reignite their “soulful
breed of punk.”
Reconvening
for 2018
live shows
commemo-
rating the 10th
anniversary of
their breakthrough LP The ’59
Sound, TGA’s Brian Fallon said
he had no new TGA songs in
him. Life’s experiences kept
coming, though, and the
band’s first LP since 2014’s Get
Hurt has plenty to say. With
long-term cheerleader Bruce
Springsteen guesting on the
gung-ho title track, these
all-American tales of quiet
desperation explore Fallon’s
struggle with mental illness
(Positive Change), evanescent
beauty (Autumn), and draw
inspiration from Jeffrey
Eugenides’ novel The Virgin
Suicides on Michigan, 1975,
the LP’s chiming, hypnotic
stand-out. Variously evoking a
gnarlier early R.E.M., The Hold
Steady, and, yes, Springsteen,
other songs here occasionally
suffer from over-telegraphed
choruses, but Fallon’s fervour
and gift for an apposite
metaphor – “I’m a weatherman
watching the skies, trying to
read you” – are evident.
James McNair
86 MOJO
Memo to self:
Laura Veirs gets
archival on her
latest LP.
The Streets
★★★★
The Darker The
Shadow, The Brighter
The Light
679/WARNER MUSIC. CD/DL/LP
Years of clubland travails
bleed into Mike Skinner’s
first ‘proper’ Streets LP
in 12 years.
Accompanied by a self-
directed feature film, set in
London nightlife, The Streets’
comeback proper often feels
like blearily shuffling through
a superclub’s different rooms.
From the queasy, squelchy
synths of Too Much Yayo to
the nagging bass figure Not A
Good Idea and reggae swing
of Something To Hide, its mix
of road-tested beats, easy
hooks and DIY sonics taps
back into Mike Skinner’s
original Streets blueprint.
A uniquely British laureate of
the dispossessed, Skinner’s
grown-up musings are more
twisty and cryptic than his
rascally early work (see the
fractured repetitions of Walk
Of Shame or Blinded By The
Laura Veirs
★★★★
Phone Orphans
RAVEN MARCHING BAND. CD/DL/LP
Oregon singer-songwriter
collects fragments to make
wholly lovely album.
IT’S NOT AS if there has been
a shortage of intimacy in Laura
Veirs’ songwriting over the past
24 years – her last LP alone,
2022’s Found Light, was a
delicately nuanced survey of the
post-divorce mid-life landscape
– but this album promises a dif-
ferent closeness. Phone Orphans
is compiled from songs nearly
lost in the digital wasteland of the
voice memo, each one recorded
over the last eight years in Veirs’
living room with just voice, guitar
and – on one track – piano. You
can only rejoice that her archivist
tendencies kicked in, given the
quality of Next One, Maybe, a
playful flirtation touched with
resignation, or heartfelt ancestral
tribute Valentine. Rocks Of Time
or a wintery high-alti-
tude version of Rosalie
Sorrel’s Up Is A Nice
Place To Be don’t feel
like remnants: they are
spare but complete,
as rich as old letters
or photographs.
A good save.
Victoria Segal
Lights-styled confessional
Troubled Waters), but no less
Fallen Ones are like Faces
ballads where the band are
incisive or well-wrought. sober and fit for purpose. The
Inimitable, humane, flawed,
it’s good to have him back.
beloved bassist emerges as an
unforeseen voice of reason,
Andy Cowan and in great voice too.
Andrew Perry
Duff McKagan
★★★★ Van Morrison
Lighthouse ★★★
BFD/ORCHARD/SONY. CD/DL/LP Accentuate The Positive
EXILE. CD/DL/LP
Third lone venture from Guns
N’Roses’ good-guy bassist. Van’s 45th LP, revisiting the
rock songs of his youth.
McKagan first
flew solo in Following on
1993 just as from his LP of
GN’R were skiffle covers,
falling apart at Morrison now
their peak. tackles the
After rejoining in 2016, he filled full-blooded
the group’s ongoing studio rock’n’roll and R&B of the
silence with 2019’s Shooter post-war era. He grew up
Jennings-produced Tenderness, listening to his father’s superb
whose artist’s-journey anthem collection of American records,
Chip Away earnt him props so it’s no surprise to hear songs
from Bob Dylan, no less. like Louis Jordan’s I Want A
Doubtless buoyed, Duff’s back Roof Over My Head, or the title
already with this sequel, just as track, an excellent cover of
his main band finally appear Bing Crosby & The Andrews
poised to follow up 2008’s Sisters’ 1945 hit. Van’s singing
Chinese Democracy. Recorded throughout is top class, heard
at his Seattle home, its 11 to particularly good effect
tracks establish this on the stripped-down,
long-since-detoxed lifer’s brushes-and-upright-bass
home turf as Replacements-y treatment of Don Gibson’s
punk rock’n’roll (see 1961 country weeper, Sea Of
Longfeather or Just Another Heartbreak – indeed, the
Shakedown), dispensed with a quieter moments work best,
precision that always eluded like the moody, organ-led
the raggedy ’Mats themselves, reworking of Shakin’ All Over,
with lyrics swiping at which lesser bands have
unspecified political evils, thrashed into the ground over
and the occasional Slash solo. the years, but really shines
Similarly, Fallen Down and here. An enjoyable exploration
of the musical strands which
eventually saw him take the
stage at Belfast’s Maritime
Hotel with Them in 1964.
Max Décharné
Duran Duran
★★★
Danse Macabre
TAPE MODERN/BMG. CD/DL/LP/MC
Old songs revisited, plus
new ones, covers and the
return of both Andy Taylor
and Warren Cuccurullo.
A hundred
million album
sales later,
Duran are short
of worlds to
conquer, so
they’ve invented a new one:
the Halloween album. It
struggles as a concept (The
Specials’ Ghost Town wasn’t
about actual ghosts), but they
saunter through the covers
with more elan than on 1995’s
Thank You and add new
nuance to Billie Eilish’s Bury
A Friend. Meanwhile, Super
Lonely Freak is a stylish
merging of their own Lonely
In Your Nightmare and Rick
James’s Super Freak; Nile
Rodgers brings some funk to
Black Moonlight, and old boys
Andy Taylor and Warren
Cuccurullo chip in. No hits are
exhumed, but ’80s LP tracks
Night Boat and Secret Oktober
(now Secret Oktober 31st) are
rejigged and four new songs,
especially the Chauffeur-esque
Confession In The Afterlife, fit
snugly in the canon. No new
ground is broken, but
everyone emerges unscathed.
John Aizlewood
Togo All Stars
★★★★
Spirits
EXCELSIOR. CD/DL/LP
Afrobeat meets highlife
in a vodou funk.
“I hate singing
Mama Africa,”
states vocalist
Dodji Oshe,
“I hate singing
We Are The
World. We need to go further
and deeper.” It’s that sense of
spiritual mission that powers
the second LP of 2023 (10
months after Fa) by the west
African collective whose
home, Lomo, sits within the
footprints of the radio stations
that transmit the latest sounds
from Ghana and Nigeria. The
resulting 11 tracks rarely stray
far from the Kuti template
(with the brevity of Femi and
Seun rather than Fela), with
great brass and insistent
rhythm guitar over a pair of
percussionists laying down
a variety of vodou beats in
tribute to the gods. There are
nods towards New Orleans
jazz, South African folk, and
Stateside funk, which the
group no doubt think of as
their scattered children,
plus Mick Taylor-like soloing.
Further and deeper indeed.
David Hutcheon
 King Gizzard & The
Lizard Wizard: still in
pursuit of the next high.

Flat Worms off, a pleasingly huggy tribute.

★★★
Witness Marks
GOD?. CD/DL/LP/MC
Well-connected LA
retro-punk at their gnarliest.
This rowdy
Californian trio
feature both
Osees bassist
Tim Hellman
and, on this
third LP, Ty Segall on
production, while last time out,
on 2020’s Antarctica, Steve
Albini helmed. Unlike all those
affiliates, Flat Worms don’t
regard exploring outside the
punk rock box as particularly
within their purview: tracks
here like Time Warp In Exile,
Sigalert and Orion’s Belt all
thunder along inescapably
à la post-hardcore’s nastier
exponents – think Scratch
Acid, Albini’s Big Black and the
many miscreants housed at
Amphetamine Reptile – while
SSRT and Suburban Swans
slow up the tempo to bust out
Wire-y choppy riffing. Where
Jim Wirth
Spearmint
★★★★
This Candle Is For You
HITBACK! DL/LP
London indie lifers; still
minty fresh.
Established in
the mid-’90s,
the quirky,
inquisitive
Spearmint, led
by the elusive
Shirley Lee, build on 2021’s
joyous Holland Park with This
Candle Is For You, their tenth LP.
Seasoned ’Mint listeners will be
delighted to know that all
standards are firmly in place.
Songs are sung about John
Gavin, the man who was
almost James Bond after
George Lazenby, the
relationship between Prince
and Joni Mitchell, and catching
night buses from Tottenham
Court Road to Camden in 1999,

these three deviate from
standard issue, however, is
in their predilection for a
gonzo chorus, such as the
unforgettable “I’m not all right!
I’m not all right!/Since – you’ve
– been – gone!” which propels
16 Days into the upper
echelons of this decade’s
loser anthem chart. At such
moments, ironically, Flat
Worms are transformed into
unrestrainable winners.
Andrew Perry
Various
★★★
I Thought I Told You:
A Yorkshire Tribute
To Michael Chapman
TOMPKINS SQUARE. CD/DL/LP
White Rose garland for folk/
blues prince of darkness.
Having spent
the bulk of his
professional
career living in
the remote
wilds of north
Cumbria, the late Michael
Chapman was not an artist
who seemingly sought out
allies, his latter-day rediscovery
as a pioneer of ‘loner folk’
and improv guitar evidently
somewhat mystifying for the
Hunslet-born blues-hound,
who died aged 80 in 2021.
Part of Tompkins Square’s
Imaginational Anthem series
focusing on primitive guitar
aces, this collection curated by
fellow Yorkshireman Henry
Parker channels some of
Chapman’s surly charm; Chris
Brain’s wistful Among The
Trees and Katie Spencer’s You
Say scratch at the one-time art
teacher’s sensitive side, while
Hawthorn’s creepy take on
Kodak Ghosts and Andrew DR
Abbott’s slide-feast (Some)
Trains fathom the grim, sludgy
gloom that gave early-’70s
works like Rainmaker and
Fully Qualified Survivor their
abiding appeal. For a man who
always seemed quite hands
all set against their sweet
soul-Mod-country hybrid.
As ever, it is cut through with
reality and sadness – Flowers
On The Bandstand examines
the reaction to Sarah Everard’s
death; the track’s extended
flute and guitar fade-out is
deeply moving. It is a delight to
think there may be a Spearmint
album every two years for the
rest of our lives.
Daryl Easlea
The Kills
★★★★
God Games
DOMINO. CD/DL/LP
Following 2016’s Ash & Ice,
an LP of “godless spirituals”.
The
transatlantic
pairing of
Alison
Mosshart and
Jamie Hince
have been working miracles
with minimal kit since 2003’s
blues-inspired Keep On Your
Mean Side, progressively
amping up their beatbox with
contemporary hip-hop
production. Following Hince’s
move to LA, the guitarist
kickstarted a side-project
writing on keyboards and
trumpets, until it morphed into
the sun-scorched Californian
jams that fill this sixth Kills LP.
There’s a suspended-animation
heat about opener New York,
Mosshart’s love letter to the Big
Apple, whose riff eventually
clanks in like a malfunctioning
robot, while on 103, about the
singer’s cross-country drives
from Nashville, the six-string
hovers threateningly before
erupting forth in deranged
blasts. Compton Kidz Club
Choir materialise twice to make
explicit the notion of secular
gospel, and Blank invokes the
Angeleno tradition of Tom
Waits’ Blue Valentine, with
Mosshart crooning a
beat-poetic take on Broadway
romance over tickled ivories.
Andrew Perry
Cool threads
Inscrutable Aussies change
lanes on their 25th album in
13 years. By James McNair.
King Gizzard & The
Lizard Wizard
★★★
The Silver Cord
KGLW. CD/DL/LP
JUST AS MANY 10-year-olds enjoy the
addictive taxonomy of Pokémon cards,
so too one can get lost in the Gizzverse,
an ever-expanding galaxy of genres and
moods spread across a dauntingly prolific
discography. Discursive with lyrics too,
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard have
written about environmental apocalypse,
the Christchurch Mosque shootings, and
Han-Tyumi, a human-envying cyborg of
their own creation. Loveable wildcards,
they’ve tapped psych, Krautrock, micro-
tonal Anatolian music, rap, electronica and
more with nary a thought for fan confusion
or over-saturation. Indeed, 2017 alone
brought five new LPs.
One imagines job satisfaction chez Giz-
zard is high, then, each subsequent album
an unfolding adventure made by tight-knit
pals seeking fresh thrills. In a world thus-
governed, June 2023’s PetroDragonic
Apocalypse was never going to be bland.
Instead, Gizzard’s 24th studio album
was a breathless thrash metal assault
exploring “humankind…
witches, dragons and shit”,
the kind of sonic dare we’ve
come to expect.
Quicksilver messengers,
the Aussie sextet change tack
again on The Silver Cord. Its
cover depicts them behind banks of
synthesizers, influences this time out
seemingly including Georgio Moroder, Jon
& Vangelis gone trance, Harold Faltermeyer,
and maybe a hint of Beastie Boys circa
Intergalactic. We also get Simmons
electronic drums, abrasive synth-leads
redolent of the theme tune from kids TV
animation Roobarb, vocoder, mellotron,
and esoteric lyrics about ancient myths and
astral travelling. As KG&TWL smell all of
this in their cauldron and levitate, you
wonder if they’ll ever come back down.
Daringly – perhaps too daringly – The
Silver Cord comes in two incarnations.
There’s a long-form, more challenging
version wherein “cyborg jams run free”,
and a much more succinct version which
sees the songs distilled to their (sometimes)
poppy hooks. This means we get a
three-minute version of buoyant opener
Theia and a 20-minute version; the
amuse-bouche incarnation of The Silver Cord
and the full-extended-mix banquet (which,
thanks to the whooshing trance of the title
track and Chang’e [sic] feels like a fairly
accurate simulacrum of an Escape To
Samsara club night at The Fridge in Brixton,
London circa 1995).
“It’s liberating to terrify yourself,”
Gizzard frontman/producer Stu Mackenzie
has said of his band’s latest sorcery, while
the long mix of Theia reports “like a dog
on a freeway I commit my life to end it my
way”. It could be a metaphor for the stylis-
tic, flying-by-the-seat-of-their-pants risks
upon which KG&TWL
seem to thrive. Ultimately,
the thrills on The Silver Cord
are intermittent, but you
have to admire Gizzard’s
relentless pursuit of the
next high.

MOJO 87
 F I LT E R A L B UM S
Blue Orchids
★★★★
Magpie Heights
TINY GLOBAL. CD/DL/LP
Hip Priest’s top kamerad
discovers more gold.
Mark E Smith’s most influential
lieutenant in the Live At The
Witch Trials days, Martin
Bramah has been front and
centre in Fall veterans act
House Of All of late, but
remains most himself with
the Blue Orchids, who he has
fronted on-and-off since 1979.
Exploring – as Bramah put it –
“the very frontiers of the
human psychedelic experience
in music”, Blue Orchids’
ecstatic realism shines through
on Magpie Heights, head-shop
poetry clattering into rough
Prestwich language in typical
fashion on Need Woke Her
(“it’s an arsehole of a place,”
Bramah sings unexpectedly
at one point). Pleasingly
rudimentary Taking Tiger
Mountain-style melodies
underpin the 66-year-old’s
cosmic Piers Plowman
Sprechgesang On Your Honour
Now, while Dark Dame and
the grunge-baiting Rocket To
Stardom are noble additions
to the Orchids’ magic garden.
Imagine ? And The Mysterians
fronted by David Thewlis’s
88 MOJO
Eden project: Jeffrey
Martin’s debut is
a remarkable
understatement.
character in Naked, and
prepare to be transformed.
Jim Wirth
Beirut
★★★★
Hadsel
POMPEII. CD/DL/LP
Some men are an island:
Zach Condon finds
consolation in isolation.
For Beirut’s
sixth album,
Beirut’s
frontman
Zach Condon
headed alone
to the Norwegian island that
gives this album its name,
finding inspiration in the
mountains, water and snow,
but also the pump organ of an
old wooden church. Previous
Beirut albums have sometimes
sounded a little diffuse, light
and shade blurring, but
Hadsel’s fogginess – generated
by Condon on organ, French
horn, drum machines and
synth percussion – often
breaks out into the light,
the title track’s ecclesiastical
reveille or the uphill march of
January 18th hinting at sudden
elevation. Condon’s lyrics
largely come over as pure
sound, but his voice – a
reclusive mountain-man
Rufus Wainwright – deepens
Spillhaugen’s electronic wash,
or adds another mournful note
to Süddeutsches Ton-Bild-
Studio, the Hidden Cameras
bundled in Nordic knitwear.
“It’s not too late to find where
you are,” he sings on The Tern;
Hadsel seems to tremble on
the brink of that revelation.
Victoria Segal
Jeffrey Martin
★★★★
Thank God We
Left The Garden Candidate
LOOSE. CD/DL/LP ★★★★
Portland singer-songwriter’s Point Clear
intense, profound UK debut. CORDUROY PUNK. CD/DL/LP
Brit-folk modernists’ first
HAS ANYONE ever commis- album in 16 years.
sioned a study into whether the sons Since releasing
and daughters of preachers make the Candidate’s
best music? The list is a long one, and Oxengate in
just got longer with Jeffrey Martin. 2007, brothers
Joel and Alex
Thank God We Left The Garden (he’s Morris’s
talking about the garden, Eden) is a obsession with British myth
remarkable understatement: recorded and eccentricity has seen them
trade poignant folk for comedy,
as demos in Martin’s shed before he including provincial newspaper
decided the magic was already there, parody The Framley Examiner
and the addition of almost impercepti- and the travel guide Bollocks
To Alton Towers. Finally
ble electric guitar to a handful of tracks returning to music, they have
aside, it’s just the singer and his acous- also revisited their childhood
tic. The songs swing between the inti- patch, Essex’s Thames estuary,
alongside concrete wartime
mate and philosophical, trying to find defences and rural neglect. No
our place in both God’s cosmos and jokes, then; not even stories,
alongside our closest neighbours and just impressionistic lyrics
steeped in weary alienation
lovers, particularly on the world-to- and misty regret. Yet, ironically,
rights Paper Crowns: “All the answers this is a more robust, less
of the modern age/Are like skipping moribund folk Candidate here,
particularly on Saturation’s
to the last page”. Reminiscent of early Beatles/indie-pop pile-up. On
Nathaniel Rateliff and John Moreland, a record filled with uncanny
and prime John Prine, there’s no rea- images, Point Clear’s parting
son here to doubt Martin might one day words (from Stop) might be the
best: “One day this will end/
eclipse them all. And we will count the bodies in
Andy Fyfe the streets/And arm ourselves
again/With Armalites and
needles, tits and teeth.”
Martin Aston
Hania Rani
★★★★
Ghosts Egyptian Blue
GONDWANA. CD/DL/LP
Polish new classical
★★★
composer unveils more A Living Commodity
cosmic strings to her bow. YALA! RECORDS. CD/DL/LP
Recorded in an old sanatorium Punchy debut from the
in the Swiss mountains at the Brighton-based collective.
same time as her spacious At first listen, A Living
soundtrack for On Giacometti,
Hania Rani’s latest is a
Crosses Commodity has a similar
sensibility to indie label Fast
sustained leap on from the Nils ★★★ Product. Consumerism, as a
Frahm-like piano movements Goodnight, God Bless, metaphor for life and theme
of her past. With synths to the for the LP, is juxtaposed with
fore, guests such as Canadian I Love U, Delete guitar-driven vigour and
singer-songwriter Patrick WARNER RECORDS. CD/DL/LP
angular riffs suggesting
Watson and Icelandic loop Darkness meets light on Entertainment!-era Gang Of
builder Ólafur Arnalds cast synthwave outing by Four. Still, lyrically, personal
complementary spells on the Deftones’ Chino Moreno and matters outweigh politics. On
hushed, hymnal Dancing With Far producer Shaun Lopez. opener Matador, the quartet’s
Ghosts and the ethereally As surprise B-side covers and songwriter Andy Buss is not
edged Whispering House, his Palms and Team Sleep short of a simile: “I’m just a
Rani’s ever-mutable voice a projects attest, Chino Moreno matador with a convoy/I’m just
delicate yet forthright meld enjoys a varied cultural life a suit of lights on the stone”.
of Kate Bush and Stina away from Deftones. Now sans Despite the prevailing sonic
Nordenstam. Elsewhere, bassist Chuck Doom, Moreno’s intensity, there are moments of
slowly unfolding, swelling latest hook-up with childhood vulnerability. Apparent Cause
instrumentals The Boat and friend Shaun Lopez dials down is a grower, its down-strums
Komeda come with a cineaste’s the sense of impending widening out like ripples on
sensibility, jazzy undertows despair that riddled 2014’s water. Too often their
and an overt love of mid-’70s debut. Marrying choppy, directness borders on bluster,
Pink Floyd. Even the title feels old-school drum samples losing all subtlety. Hard rocking
appropriate, Rani ghosting and discordant bass with a riffs on Geisha somewhat
through musical worlds on an bright, unabashed pop edge, smear the song’s sophisticated
album of subtle contrasts and Found and Invisible Hand time signatures and hazy allure.
seamless juxtapositions. push Moreno’s crooning Maybe on purpose.
Andy Cowan vocals centre stage, shade Irina Shtreis
arriving via Big Youth’s
high-energy collaboration
with Run The Jewels rapper
El-P and the heavily NIN/
Numan-esque Pleasure.
Although partially undone
by some samey filler, Crosses’
opaque longing peaks on
Girls Float † Boys Cry, a sombre
ode to loneliness with The
Cure’s Robert Smith sharing
chorus duties.
Andy Cowan

Bixiga 70
★★★★
Vapor
GLITTERBEAT. CD/DL/LP
Never mind the Tropicália,
here’s the axé-piseiro-
tecnobregistas.
Last seen and
heard before
Covid which hit
their native
Brazil very
hard, São
Paulo’s brass-powered big
band Bixiga 70 roar back with
fresh members, renewed
purpose and seven new tunes,
all adding up to a turbo-
charged 33 minutes surpassing
even its terrific predecessor,
Quebra Cabeça. With nine
regulars plus guests such as
the veteran percussionist
Simone Sou to draw on, the
quality of melody, groove,
arrangement and performance
never lets up. From the Sou
co-penned ear worm opener
Malungu to the exquisite
chillout of Loa Lua, banger
follows banger, with none
more banging than the visceral
thrill of Marginal Elevado
Radial. Synthesising multiple
Afro-Brazilian genres like axé,
piseiro and tecnobrega
(roughly, “cheesy techno”),
musical intricacy and nuanced
brass voicings blend brilliantly
in the service of an
unstoppable drive,
atmospherically evoking the
modern megalopolis in all its
edgily exciting glamour.
Mat Snow
Miguel Atwood-
Ferguson
★★★
Les Jardins Mystiques
Vol 1
BRAINFEEDER. CD/DL/LP
A 210-minute jazz/classical/
ambient overload.
Twelve years
in the making,
with 52 tracks
over 3-CDs, and
two more
equally hefty
volumes to come, solo debut
LPs are rarely as ostentatious as
this one by violinist, arranger
and cosmically-inclined LA
sessioner Atwood-Ferguson.
Twelve years might also
be how long it’ll take to
adequately appreciate the
depth of music here, sprawling
Bixiga 70: serving
up banger
after banger.
as it does between expansive
jazz workouts (Kamasi
Washington, who guests, is a
decent reference point), New
Age études, lush classical
scores and much more.
Prog-synth voluntaries like
Znaniya (Falkor) can jar, but the
highlights foreground Atwood-
Ferguson as a widescreen
visionary in the David Axelrod
and Charles Stepney tradition,
with a Rolodex of jazz hitters to
call on. Start explorations with
the superb Kairos (Amor Fati),
where Stephen ‘Thundercat’
Bruner’s bass navigates a
path through rococo horn
charts and the conservatoire
funk of Atwood-Ferguson’s
own strings.
John Mulvey
Christone
‘Kingfish’ Ingram
★★★
Live In London
ALLIGATOR. CD/LP
A leading new voice of the
blues, live at London’s
Garage on June 6, 2023.
Ingram has long wanted to
make a live album, and “finally
felt the time was right,”
now that he has “a deeper
catalogue of music to choose
from.” As an admirer, I
respectfully disagree. Of the 17
tracks on this 2-CD, just three
are new. The standout is the
slow blues instrumental
Mississippi Night, an
overwhelming display of
virtuosity and feeling. All the
other songs come from his two
previous albums. She Calls Me
Kingfish, Something In The
Dirt, Outside Of This Town,
662: good pieces all, but here
simply doubled in length, or,
like Long Distance Woman,
quadrupled, with an
interminable keyboard intro
mystifyingly inappropriate to
the spirit of Ingram’s music. He
himself performs his socks off,
but it’s time he reduced his
reliance on the songs that
brought him this far.
Tony Russell
Ellen Arkbro
★★★★
Sounds While Waiting
SUPERIOR VIADUCT. CD/DL/LP
Swedish composer returns
to her work for pipe organ.
Last year Ellen
Arkbro made
an unlikely
album.
Primarily
known for her
work in just intonation and her
compositions for pipe organ,
Arkbro released an album of
actual songs. Assembled with
Swedish pianist Johan Graden,
I Get Along Without You Very
Well was a set of small, sparse
ballads suspended in an
ephemeral place between
pop, folk and chamber jazz.
Now, with this, her fifth
release, she returns to organ
composition. However,
hearing Sounds While Waiting
within the context of I Get
Along… reveals the melodic
vocal qualities that exist within
her work. Recorded in a
centuries-old church in
Unnaryd, Sweden in June
2020, these epic, resonant
textures of hum and drone
breathe with a subtle, almost
human sadness, intervals
of an unsaid absence that
possess the emotive power
of a poem, a prayer or a small,
sparse ballad.
Andrew Male
Manzanera
Mackay
★★★
AM.PM
BFD/THE ORCHARD. CD/DL/LP
Roxy Music’s Phil and Andy
take the instrumental route.
Roxy Music’s
guitarist and
saxophonist
have been
intermittently
collaborating
outside the mothership since
Phil Manzanera’s 1975 solo
album Diamond Head. They
were Explorers together in
the mid-’80s, before releasing
a couple of albums as
Manzanera & Mackay later that
decade. This time around –
with Roxy drummer Paul
Thompson lurking in the
shadows, barely credited –
they’ve taken a detour into
what is initially a jagged,
clattering instrumental
ambience, where Andy
Mackay’s saxophones and
Manzanera’s guitars jostle for
supremacy on the Laughing
Clowns-style opener Blue
Skies. Not so much
uncommercial as anti-
commercial, the lengthy Yazz
veers on atonal, while EGM
is propelled by incessant
percussion and Mackay at his
most staccato. Things take a
gentler turn towards the end,
so Mackay is glacially mournful
on both Newanna and CC,
while Manzanera’s gentle
touch on Ambulante doesn’t
disguise his wizardry.
John Aizlewood
JA ZZ
B Y A N DY C O WA N
Mike Reed
★★★★
The Separatist Party
WE JAZZ/ASTRAL SPIRITS. CD/DL/LP
Chicago drummer/composer tackles isolation alongside
Marvin Tate, Ben LaMar Gay and Bitchin Bajas.
The first in an ambitious three-album cycle, The Separatist Party
finds Mike Reed in his compositional element, having spent much
of his career paying homage to Chicago’s rich jazz heritage on
his own distinct terms. A veteran of AACM and the Artifacts
collective, Reed’s barrier-free approach is matched by his sextet.
Ex-poetry slam champion Marvin Tate is in powerful effect
throughout, whether declaring “Your soul is a moshpit” over the
opener’s contrasting bass lines and tapping pulses, or intersecting
Cooper Crain’s taut guitar figure on One Of Us, as street poetry
meets free bop surges. Engaging and invested, A Low Frequency
Nightmare and a cover of Ari Brown’s Roland Kirk tribute Rahsaan
In The Serengeti bring out his other guests’ best qualities on a
multi-layered, groove-oriented celebration of communion.
ALSO RELEASED
Harper Trio Titanic
★★★★ ★★★★
Passing By Vidrio
LITTLE YELLOW MAN. CD/DL/LP UNHEARD OF HOPE. DL/LP
There’s a refreshing Stalwarts of
looseness to the Mexico City’s
way electric harpist improvisational
Maria-Christina scene, Guatemalan
Harper’s slow cellist Mabe Fratti
humming drones and and Venezuelan pianist/guitarist
bittersweet melodies contrast Hector Tosta easily evoke the
with Josephine Davies’ capital’s dusty ebb and flow.
understated Sonny Rollins-like While Fratti’s plaintive voice and
sax turns and Evan Jenkins’ cultured bow are central to their
creative beats on this Hastings modern jazz hybrids, it’s
trio’s deep, contemplative debut. Tosta’s piano repetitions that
The longing vistas of Standing underscore Cielo Falso’s swelling
Alone and weaving waves of East enchantment and Jarrett
Hill Meditation best capture their Gilgore’s misbehaving sax that
gentle, introspective chemistry drives Balanza’s dirty bebop.
on a yielding suite with lasting A playful, exploratory union,
spiritual heft. Vidrio divines beauty from
austere materials.
Bex Burch
★★★★ Angelica Sanchez
There Is Only Love ★★★★
And Fear Nighttime Creatures
INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM. CD/DL/LP PYROCLASTIC. CD/DL
Six years in the
Known for her
making, this
Ghanaian gyil work
with Flock, Vula Viel expansive suite of
and Boing!, Burch’s night songs finds
solo debut finds her pianist Sanchez
interacting with Dan Bitney playing with an all-star nonet.
(Tortoise), Rob Frye (Bitchin Her repetitions act as anchors,
Bajas) and Ben LaMar Gay in allowing freedom to roam
Chicago. Sometimes tense and in-between, on slightly
enveloping, sometimes loose discordant, horn-led standout
and free, its rhythmic rattles, C.B. The Time Traveller (a
homage to Carla Bley) and a
handmade xylophones, bells
and textural scratches are every rousing chamber take on Duke
Ellington’s Lady Of The Lavender
bit as inventive, compelling and
Mist, as she expands the big
surprising as Steve Reich’s Six
Marimbas. band palette without losing
individual nuance. AC
MOJO 89
 F I LT E R A L B UM S
Oldfield Youth
Club
★★★★
The Hanworth
Are Coming
TINY GLOBAL. DL/LP
Bitter Springs eternal: the
lighter side of indie lifer.
Field Of Dreams-style, master
of the bittersweet Simon
Rivers has been pursuing a
“make it and they will come”
long game since the
mid-1980s, undeterred by the
lack of recognition accorded to
his many records with The Last
Party and The Bitter Springs.
An ex-west London postman
and Subway Sect cohort,
Rivers hit a pinnacle with
2022’s Like Yer Wounds Too,
a meditation on death and
dementia recorded as Poor
Performer. However, he has
promptly made another
cheery swerve into obscurity
with a first album under a new
name. An unexpected dose of
Chameleons-via-Madness
optimism, The Hanworth Are
Coming celebrates open-
mindedness on Lightbulb
Moments, 1970s teen discos
Dan Medhurst
on (Theme From) Oldfield
Youth Club and Rivers’ father’s
gold-tinted memories of
chauffeuring one of the stars
90 MOJO
Woman in black:
Sofia Kourtesis
dials up the
quirkiness.
of On The Buses on the
unmissable When Bob Grant
Ruled The World. Funny,
poignant, doomed; just how
we like it.
Jim Wirth
Sampha
★★★★
Lahai
YOUNG TURKS. CD/DL/LP
Optimism streaks through
UK singer-songwriter/
producer’s time-travelling
second.
A step on from the meditative,
grief-flecked ballads of 2017’s
moving debut Process,
haunted by his parents’ loss,
Sampha’s sequel does its best
to let the happiness in. Angels
and ghosts are supplanted by
dreams of flight and the search
for a higher meaning amid
the on-point beat science of
Stereo Colour Cloud and
complex confessional What
If You Hypnotise Me?, his
relatable blend of yearning
reflection and sparing
musicianship peaking amid
Spirit 2.0’s hiccupping, hooky
chorus. While he returns to his
most sturdy confidante, the
piano, for Inclination Compass,
Lahai is less introspective and
Sofia Kourtesis
★★★★
Madres
NINJA TUNE. CD/DL/LP messy interstellar journey.
Stephen Worthy
Skewed, intimate, modern house
music that pulses with vitality.
THERE CAN’T be too many DJ Shadow
songs dedicated to neurosurgeons ★★★
– let alone ones set to clattering two-step
Action Adventure
– but that’s what Sofia Kourtesis presents MASS APPEAL/LIQUID AMBER.
on Madres. The Berlin-based Peruvian CD/DL/LP
appealed to a leading specialist, Peter Bay Area hip-hop innovator
Vajkoczy, to help prolong her mother’s looks inwards and eschews
collaborators on challenging
life, offering to name a song after him. It eighth LP.
piqued Vajkoczy’s interest, who success- A master of
fully treated Kourtesis Sr – an outcome resurrecting
that informs this hopeful, celebratory al- buried
treasure, DJ
bum, soundtracked by elegant dancefloor Shadow has
rhythms and breathy Spanish-language refused the
vocals. Like other practitioners of cerebral temptation to coast on the
house – see DJ Koze, Caribou and Kornél awed reputation of 1996’s
landmark Endtroducing. But
Kovács – Madres dials up the quirkiness, unlike The Outsider’s alt-rock/
offering much intrigue. Like the way an hyphy hybrids or The
echo-drenched male voice instantly steers Mountain Will Fall’s Ableton
experiments, Action
the twinkling Funkhaus in a darker direc- Adventure’s dystopian synth
tion, or how cut-up vocals add an extra whirrs and edgy atmospheres
percussive element to Estación Esperanza most recall the instrumental
and its Afrobeats underpinnings. Kourtesis half of 2019’s Our Pathetic Age,
although the stargazing Time
also proves her mastery when adopting a And Space, electro-throwback
more traditional house aesthetic – the an- All My and polyphonic ’80s
themic Si Te Portas Bonito shimmers like synths of Ozone Scraper come
barbed with better hooks.
August sun on salt flats. This is an intimate While Shadow’s at his dark
portrait painted in bold strokes. best amid The Prophecy’s slow
Stephen Worthy choral dread, sole vocal track
You Played Me – an obscure
’80s R&B a cappella appended
far from lonely, its persuasive Is This Love?. In places the to an electro bass line and
positivity carried by a synth pulse gets samey but, heavy drums – supplies an
contained riot of euphoric mostly, it works. energetic peak. Even when
synths, swelling violins, Glyn Brown further adrift from the lost
Chic guitars and skittering funk sampledelia that
percussion. It casts Sampha as made his name, Shadow’s
a 21st century Stevie Wonder,
hurtling skywards, eyes wide
Jaakko Eino production brilliance
shines through.
open, searching for Kalevi Andy Cowan
transcendence.
Andy Cowan
★★★
Chaos Magic
WEIRD WORLD. CD/DL/LP Rival Sons
★★★
Pip Blom Athens-based Finn’s sonic
travels to a world of wonky
★★★ Lightbringer
synth-pop.
LOW COUNTRY SOUND/ATLANTIC.
Bobbie Jaakko Eino CD/DL/LP
HEAVENLY. CD/DL/LP Kalevi’s California quartet’s second
idiosyncratic album of 2023.
Amsterdam indie quartet
stoned grooves
change their tune. They’re usually
have
Previously, earmarked him a Top 20 act in
Britain, but for
when lead as a reliable purveyor of
singer Pip Blom twisted loungecore and wonky all that they
roared her riot pop. On the follow-up to embrace a
grrrl lyrics, they 2019’s Dissolution, Kalevi strand of
had a snarling, launches his sonic fusillades American rock that’s as
“tell me what you need and I’ll ever deeper into the efficient as Foreigner, yet as
think about it” contempt. No stratosphere, deploying a gritty as Black Stone Cherry,
longer. Starting anew, on this varied arsenal in doing so, Rival Sons struggle to break
third album the band ditch including cosmic disco, avant the Top 100 at home in the
guitars for dark, pulsing synths pop and even a spot of freaky US. Undaunted, they’re more
and a lust-soaked hedonism reggae. Delivered with a prolific than ever, so following
where Blom will do anything characteristically unflappable June’s Darkfighter comes
required: “Tell me what you sangfroid, classic French pop the not wholly dissimilar
need and I can be just like her.” and ’80s Brit new wave remain Lightbringer, a brisk six-track
If that sounds questionable, it distinct influences. Pitted with affair still in thrall to Led
works because it’s kitschy with raunchy bass squelches, The Zeppelin above all, hence
tongue-in-cheek theatrics – Chamber Of Love is a distant the initial acoustic swagger of
“I’m the tiger you dream relative of Wham!’s Everything the confusingly titled opener
about,” warns Blom, with an She Wants, albeit suffused Darkfighter, before it explodes
Alison Goldfrapp wink. Kiss Me with Kalevi’s best Bryan Ferry like the second half of Ten
By The Candlelight has her impression. On the shuddering Years Gone. With singer Jay
interweaving husky vocals Galactic Romance, the guiding Buchanan both subtle and
with IRL partner Willem Smit spirit of Giorgio Moroder is powerful, they’re best when
from fellow Dutch band summoned, while in one of they take chances, so the
Personal Trainer, the whole Kalevi’s periodic displays of finger-clicking backdrop to
thing drenched in Moloko- chutzpah, the raygun pulses the quieter parts of Mercy
style electronica, while Franz of Cyborg are tethered to an takes them to a new level and
Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos electro-reggae skank. As you Mosaic may yet become their
sounds truly debauched on may have worked out by now, career-defining epic.
the urgent, vocodered disco of Chaos Magic is a deliciously John Aizlewood
 Thandi Ntuli:
succeeding
through
intimacy and
freshness.

Dylan LeBlanc William

★★★★
Coyote
ATO. CD/DL/LP
Anyone for a Mexican drug
cartel concept album?
The
Shreveport,
Louisiana
native’s fifth
album tells a
story of the
titular Coyote, a man who
willingly steps into a world
of crime only to find himself
trapped in a world of drug
cartels, but maybe just finds
escape and redemption
through love. That 33-year-old
LeBlanc also describes the LP
as semi-autobiographical
leaves eyebrows raised and
Eggleston
★★★★
512
SECRETLY CANADIAN. CD/DL/LP
Wherein Eno and Leo drop in
on the esteemed
octogenarian photographer.
Released just
shy of his 80th
birthday, 2017’s
Musik made for
a truly shocking
debut from
iconic Southern photographer
William Eggleston, whose
uncanny colour images of
everyday life proffered a major
development in the way we
behold our surroundings. His
lurid synth vamps on Bach or
Gilbert & Sullivan summoned

many, many questions
unanswered, but what isn’t in
doubt is his way with a tune
and story-telling lyric. From
the lush, foreboding strings of
the opening title track itself,
through the Jason Isbell-like
country rock of No Promises
Broken, the cavernous twang
on Telluride and closer The
Outside’s dark ’70s FM pop, the
story arc LeBlanc has stitched
into the songs never gets in
the way of sheer enjoyment of
the tunes he’s created. Grand
concepts are a tricky move for
any artist, but LeBlanc pulls it
off with aplomb.
Andy Fyfe
OMD
★★★★
Bauhaus Staircase
100%. CD/DL/LP
Art-house synth-pop
veterans sustain 45-year
plan in style.
“Conception/
Maturation/
Reproduc-
tion…
Extinction”
lectures a
professorial voice on the
lab-coated vocoder pop of
Evolution Of Species, and four
albums into their reunion,
Andy McCluskey and Paul
Humphreys have proved OMD
to be an impressively hardy
lifeform. Bauhaus Staircase,
the follow-up to 2017’s The
Punishment Of Luxury, is
preoccupied with built-in
obsolescence, but it remains
playfully alive to possibility.
The title track opens the
record with a pleasing
giddiness – “I want to kiss
on a Bauhaus staircase,” sings
McCluskey, cravat rakishly
askew – while Kleptocracy
shows them at full-protest
song stretch. It’s not always
subtle – Anthropocene,
ominous statistics to a disco
beat, is like being trapped in
a hip interactive exhibit at
the Natural History Museum,
while delightful pop
ouroboros Slow Train sounds
like Goldfrapp covering Atomic
Kitten – and it’s not a wild
mutation, but Bauhaus
Andile Buka
surprising in-the-camera
surrealism. 512 was recorded
a year later by producer Tom
Lunt during a series of sessions
in Eggleston’s Memphis home,
with subsequent tweaks by
the versatile Leo Abrahams.
These six tracks are much less
transgressive, with Eggleston
at the relatively genteel piano
alongside collaborators like
Brian Eno, Matana Roberts and
Sam Amidon. With Amidon on
fiddle, Eggleston is both
thunderhead and peaceful
clearing on Over The Rainbow.
Roberts’ wistful sax offers the
haze around his variations for
Smoke Gets In Your Eyes, while
Eno helps him summon Music
For Airports at take-off. It is a
beautiful and lived-in affair,
Eggleston’s observational
experience engrained inside
every conversational note.
Grayson Haver Currin
Forest Swords
★★★★
Bolted
NINJA TUNE. CD/DL/LP
Rich, experimental
electronica from polyglot.
Recorded in a
factory space in
his hometown
of Liverpool,
it’s easy to
characterise
the bludgeoning beats and
skirls of noise summoned up
by Forest Swords’ Matthew
Barnes on his fourth LP as a
post-industrial lament. And
yet, untrammelled beauty also
meanders through. Using a
dense mix of instruments,
Barnes displays his knack for
building and releasing tension
– of shaping musical narratives.
Butterfly Effect, which uses an
unheard Neneh Cherry sample,
jolts and pivots with mournful,
metallic intensity, while Night
Sculpture spirals through the
titular dark void. Balancing this
shade with light, Caged takes a
looped oboe and shuddering
bass drums to create an almost
mediaeval mood, before the LP
bids farewell, poignantly, with
Lee Perry eulogising – “Hello
Liverpool!” – about grief. A
masterclass in sound design,
Flying colours
South African pianist reclaims
‘rainbow nation’ via improvs
with California’s cosmic jazz
force. By Andy Cowan.
Thandi Ntuli With
Carlos Niño
★★★★
Rainbow Revisited
INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM. CD/DL/LP
THE CONCEPT of post-apartheid South
Africa as a ‘rainbow nation’ is hard to
reconcile with the reality. Thirty years
since Archbishop Desmond Tutu coined
the term, crime is abundant and racial
disparities are still rife, with millions
of South Africans still lacking access to
food, clean water, proper healthcare or
adequate housing. Johannesburg-based
pianist Thandi Ntuli expressed her
discontent with Rainbow (Skit) on 2019’s
second album Exiled, an all-too-brief
explosion of chants, organ and piano that
chimed with the LP’s themes of identity
and womanhood. It became the starting
point for improvisational sessions with
Carlos Niño, California’s go-to doyen of
New Age spirituality and cosmic jazz.
Of the many versions of Rainbow they
attempted, the take that makes this album
strips the track back to its core elements.
Ntuli transforms its trenchant low notes
into a cascade of busy fingers and ornate
harmonics, replacing the terse, pointed
lyrics from her 2019 Live At Jazzwerkstatt
version with a potent brand of wordless
vocalese and impassioned repetitions.
Compelling from the first note,
its spiralling meditative
themes echo Bheki Mseleku
in his prime.
Further proof that a
voice can run the emotional
gamut without discernible
pieces Sunrise (In California) and Sunset
(In California). Dramatic, layered
compositions that betray Ntuli’s classical
background but sparkle with the darting
free-improv flair of Keith Jarrett and
McCoy Tyner’s mix of melody and
abandon, Niño titivates both with
discreet percussion tweaks and cymbal
symphonics. Elsewhere the bright,
swirling figure of Piano Edit (Original
Mix) bursts with vigour and beatitude,
its busy inner rhythms recalling Oumou
Sangaré. The textured repetitions and
frenetic keys of detailed two-parter The
One evoke something far deeper: the
rhythms of life.
A shadowy, guiding presence, Niño’s
influence is most overt in the miniaturist
worlds of Breath And Synth Experiment
and Voice And Tongo Experiment.
These are necessary album spacers that
bring his trademark susurrating waves
and birdsong into the mix (if not the
‘plants’ he’s also credited with). A gentler
ambience also pervades the rhapsodic
Nomayoyo (Ingoma Ka Mkhulu), a
nursery rhyme-like song written by her
grandfather that Ntuli plays with subtle
force, and throughout cleansing spiritual
coda Lihlanzekile.
While Ntuli has previously held her
own in collaborations with Thandiswa
Mazwai, Shabaka & The Ancestors and
Wynton Marsalis, she ceded far too much
space to her ensemble on old-school-
sounding predecessors The Offering and
Exiled. Rainbow Revisited reverses that,
succeeding through intimacy
and freshness. A brave,
stand-alone release that
lays her talent bare, it’s
a beautifully unreal
entrancement you’ll find
hard to stop listening to

Staircase shows OMD thriving Bolted creeps up slowly then

as much as surviving. engulfs you. lyrics comes in companion again and again.
Victoria Segal Stephen Worthy

MOJO 91
 F I LT E R A L B UM S

ØXN’s colossal black-noise

ØXN
★★★★
Cyrm
CLADDAGH. CD/DL/LP
Bøllseye: Lankum singer
Radie Peat’s killer
side-hustle.
Hardly seeking light relief after
the success of the Mercury
Prize-nominated False Lankum,
Radie Peat’s new “experimental
doom folk” project – with
singer-songwriter Katie Kim,
Percolator’s Eleanor Myler and
Lankum producer John ‘Spud’
Murphy – aspires towards
something even more
oppressive and bleak on their
debut LP. One of the most
remarkable voices in modern
anything (a mix of gamine
Morrissey and hairdryer-
treatment Sandy Denny),
Peat puts in an elemental
performance on a clattering
rendition of the traditional The
Cruel Mother and elegantly
undersells the drama of Maija
Sofia’s tempestuous The Wife
Of Michael Cleary. Kim,
meanwhile, recasts Dransfields
favourite The Trees They Do
Grow High into a laudanum-
heavy Victorian parlour song
(P.J. Harvey’s White Chalk, but
whiter and chalkier), and stars
amid the hellmouth sludge of
Glen Hansard
★★★★
vivisection of Scott Walker’s
Farmer In The City. A
refreshingly mighty racket.
Jim Wirth
King Creosote
★★★★
I DES
DOMINO. CD/DL/LP
Fife singer-songwriter
tangles with mortality on
first record for seven years.
“I’m thinking
that maybe
dying’s just
not for me,”
sings Kenny
Anderson on
Burial Bleak, one of the grand
meditations on life and death
marbling the ominously
anagrammatic I DES. As the
clouds of existential angst
shed by Dust emphasise,
however, that’s not a hook
anyone gets to wriggle off,
leaving Blue Marbled Elm Trees
or It’s Sin That’s Got Its Hold
Upon Us to tremble between
wonder and unbearable
poignancy. There are moments
of hectic euphoria – Susie
Mullen is potato-printed
kindergarten Neu! – but the
soft clay of Walter De La
Nightmare crumbles into
memory and melancholy,
while the 15-minute Please
Come Back I Will Listen, I Will
Behave, I Will Toe The Line and
the twice-as-long Drone In B#
holds space for deep
kosmische thought. If life’s
what you make it, here
Anderson makes it sound very
beautiful indeed.
Victoria Segal
David Holmes
★★★★
Blind On A
Galloping Horse
HEAVENLY. CD/DL/LP
Belfast DJ’s extraordinary
synth-pop protest album.
After
producing
Sinéad
O’Connor’s
final sessions,
and
soundtracking BBC TV’s Killing
Eve via his post-millennial
’60s-pop group Unloved,
indefatigable dreamer Holmes
here sets about documenting
the terrifying unease and
rudderlessness of the
post-Trump/Johnson age.
Many musicians who grew up
idolising The Clash would go
agit-punk at this juncture, but
Holmes instead couches his
fiercely polemical statement
within a synthesized opulence
whose mood is often brooding
and exploratory yet also joyful
and uplifting, topped with
insouciant voicing from Raven
Violet. Each track is unusual,
thought-provoking:
Emotionally Clear, which
lambasts our justice system’s
human-rights infringements,
feels almost Christmas-y in its
warm electro-glow. Songs
about community (the Paris
’68-evoking Hope Is The Last
Thing To Die) and artistic
valour (Necessary Genius’s
heroic roll-call, Sinéad and
Andrew Weatherall included)
are stirring and persuasive. It’s
a wonderfully imaginative
response to these toxic times;
consider the faith kept.
Andrew Perry
Carlton Melton
★★★
Turn To Earth
AGITATED. CD/DL/LP
Space rock trio expand ranks
and minds on tenth LP.
Carlton Melton’s line-up has
grown; White Manna’s Anthony
Taibi bringing extra guitars and
synths to aid their mission of
burrowing to our planet’s core
via crackling acid-fried noise.
Taibi hasn’t hugely modified
CM’s approach – they still
wilfully oscillate between
molten riffage and glacial
ambient – but Turn To Earth is a
louder, deeper experience for
his presence. The brooding
synthscapes are the Melton’s
boldest yet: Cosmicity a
13-minute workout conjuring
whispers and reverberations on
some faraway star, while the
title track suggests primal
space-rock as performed by
the apes from 2001: A Space
Odyssey. The marvellously
brutish Cloudstorming and
Vanquished’s amp-smoking
squall, meanwhile, fuse
Sabbath’s doomy weight to
kosmische Can-esque jamming.
While unlikely to seduce the
uninitiated, this slow-burning
epic is CM at their best.
Stevie Chick
Cat Power
★★★★
Cat Power Sings Dylan:
The 1966 Royal Albert
Hall Concert
DOMINO. CD/DL/LP
Historical recreation takes
on life of its own on
ambitious live album.
Speaking to
MOJO in 2021,
Chan Marshall
slipped into
Bob Dylan’s
speaking voice
as she recalled meeting him in
Paris (“You got the same name
as Charlie Parker’s wife”). If she
is skilled at impersonation,
though, her deeper gift is for
interpretation, exhibited on
her three covers LPs and now
this audacious communion
with the past. Recorded at
the Royal Albert Hall last
November, Marshall and band
play the whole of Dylan’s May
1966 set at Manchester’s Free
Trade Hall (wrongly labelled
with the London venue on
bootlegs). If the crackle of
original Dylan electrifies
Marshall’s voice, she finds her
own phrasing, both robust and
reverent, as she ringmasters
Ballad Of A Thin Man’s mystic
forces, or brings a limpid
empathy to Like A Rolling
Stone. There’s even a cry of
“Judas!” from a committed
audience member, but with
this magical performance,
Marshall has betrayed nothing.
Victoria Segal
Emma Anderson
★★★
Pearlies
SONIC CATHEDRAL. CD/DL/LP
Lush guitarist’s reluctant
but triumphant solo debut.

All That Is East Is West Band reunions

often provide
Of Me Now closure. For
Anderson,
ANTI-. CD/DL/LP however,
Fifth – and best – solo album from the abrupt
Frames frontman. curtailment of Lush’s 2016
reactivation left her in limbo,
CROWD-TESTED over many nights playing in clutching song ideas she’d
a Dublin backroom bar for sometimes indiffer- been stockpiling which
suddenly had no obvious
ent audiences who barely recognised him, Glen home. Even after acquiring
Hansard took his time whittling and shaping this collaborators in cellist-arranger
first solo album in four years. Although only nine Audrey Riley, then Cocteau
Twins’ Robin Guthrie, it took all
tracks, it’s a sprawling affair revisiting just about their persuasion to coax the
every road he’s previously travelled, but some- shy guitarist to complete and
how tying them all together for the first time. front the tunes for this solo
There’s the cranked urgency of six-and-a-half debut. While shoegaze-aligned
keyboard wiz James Chapman,
minute Down On Our Knees, the most ‘rock’ AKA Maps, thereafter presided
thing Hansard’s recorded, the Leonard Cohen- as producer, Pearlies has more
esque contemplation of Sure As The Rain, swell- the feel of a wistful autumnal
folk record than any kind of
ing piano ballad Ghost and the super positivity ’90s throwback. It’s tempting
of There’s No Mountain’s lyrics: “There ain’t no to read themes of
mountain you can’t move or you can’t climb”, impermanence (Willow And
questioning throughout how our past Mallow) and blame (Taste The
Air) as painful reflections on
both sabotages and assists our future. 2016, but the LP’s narrative
A chart-topping household name in ultimately arrives on For A
Stephan VanFleteren

Ireland, it’s amazing that someone as Moment’s forward-looking

resolve and on closer Clusters,
thoughtful and nuanced as Hansard is Glen Hansard: skilfully
a catchy indie-disco romp,
still so underrated in the UK. navigating his many
different roads. which surely points towards
Andy Fyfe upbeat outings to come.
Andrew Perry

92 MOJO

Mary Lattimore
★★★★
Goodbye,
Hotel Arkada
GHOSTLY INTERNATIONAL. CD/DL/LP
US harpist’s kosmische-
inclined fifth reflects on
impermanence.
The Hotel
Arkada is in the
Croatia island
resort of
Hvar, a place
surrounded by
medieval walls. When Mary
Lattimore went there, she
discovered the hotel – all
ballrooms, chandeliers, and
grandeur – was about to be
soullessly restored in crisp,
cookie-cutter fashion. The loss
of such splendour inspired the
Los Angeles-based harpist’s
fifth album. While elegiac,
Goodbye, Hotel Arkada floats,
glistens and conjures thoughts
of Popol Vuh at their most
abstracted; this could
substitute for their soundtrack
to Werner Herzog’s Herz
aus Glas. There is also a
vaporousness paralleling the
third LP by Slowdive, whose
Rachel Goswell fittingly
appears on beautiful album
closer Yesterday’s Parties.
Other guests include former
Espers singer and long-time
Lattimore associate Meg Baird,
and Cure founder member
Lol Tolhurst. All blend
in seamlessly with the
waking-dream ambience.
A lovely deliberation on
lingering memories of
the ephemeral.
Kieron Tyler
Abstract Concrete
★★★★
Abstract Concrete
STATE 51 CONSPIRACY. CD/DL/LP
London avant-rock legend
Charles Hayward’s latest
adventure.
Following This
Heat and
Camberwell
Now – post-
punk’s most
daring proto
post-rock factions – drummer/
vocalist Charles Hayward
spent 30 years focused on
improvisation until 2016
project This Is Not This Heat,
which has in turn inspired
this new band. Spontaneity
remains key to Abstract
Jens Ziehe, RP Cassells
The inn sound:
Mary Lattimore
creates a
waking-dream
ambience.
Concrete: Hayward asked
violinist Agathe Max to learn
viola, Otto Willberg to switch
from double bass to bass
guitar, likewise Yoni Silver from
clarinet to keyboards, and
guitarist Roberto Sassi had to
“undermine his instrument”.
The result is surprisingly prog,
like a gnarlier version of the
Canterbury sound, reinforced
by Hayward’s lamenting
echoes of Robert Wyatt.
Almost Touch and This Echo
are concise and immediate;
Ventriloquist/Dummy is more
agitated and jagged before the
15-minute The Day The Earth
Stood Still: an anguished ballad
dissolving into eerie kosmische
before speeding up and
peaking in freeform delirium.
Into his eighth decade of
unblinkered creativity,
Hayward continues to thrill.
Martin Aston
Ethan P Flynn
★★★★
Abandon All Hope
YOUNG/XL. CD/DL/LP
Yorkshireman’s
extraordinary singer-
songwriterly debut.
At 24, Menwith
Hill-raised
Flynn has
amassed rare
previous
experience:
a wildcard collaboration
with David Byrne on 2018’s
American Utopia, co-writing
with Florence + The Machine
and FKA Twigs, then
indie-releasing his own coyly
titled B-Sides & Rarities Vol 1.
This debut proper comes
trailed by its title track, a
robustly riffing tale of a
modern-day highwayman
which presents him as a
chorus-rich alt-rocker of the
Jeff Tweedy stripe. It’s
something of a red herring, as
Abandon All Hope is otherwise
driven by a labyrinthine, linear
compositional impulse, subtly
coloured with brass, cellos,
mandola and girlfriend Ava
Gore’s folksy voicing. With
Flynn’s words of romantic
dysfunction (In Silence) and
existential despair (Leaving
The Boys Behind) crackling
with intense energy, the
nearest recent reference
might be Bill Callahan’s Reality.
The unguessable questing
climaxes on Crude Oil, a
16-minute odyssey with
sufficient cinematic
cross-fades and unrepeated
ideas to underpin a dozen
lesser records.
Andrew Perry
Hotline TNT
★★★
Cartwheel
THIRD MAN. CD/DL/LP
Wisconsin’s shoegaze
renaissance man’s second LP.
As the linchpin
of Weed, Will
Anderson
patented what
he called
“sentimental
dream-grunge”. On his own,
Hotline TNT is unadulterated
shoegaze. Several songs on
Cartwheel – the opening
Protocol for starters – make
almost too plain his idolatrous
feelings toward My Bloody
Valentine’s warped noise, but
Anderson has more strings to
his tremolo’d bow. Beauty
Filter’s army of overdubbed
guitar is aligned to a more
conventional kind of rush,
closer to Sugar; the stripped
back Stump feels almost
Byrdsian; That Was My Life
laces luminous ambience with
spoken-word babble. Though
Anderson buries his voice and
words in the maelstrom, his
declared (if not immediately
apparent) theme of a
constantly thwarted search
for “true love” seems right
at home in shoegazing’s
characteristic marriage of bliss
and anxiety.
Martin Aston
Israel Nash
★★★★
Ozarker
LOOSE. CD/DL/LP
Fifth album strips psychedelic
excesses, ramps up reality.
Few things are
as loud as an
Israel Nash gig.
Live, Texas-
based Nash’s
band can pin
the audience to a wall, but on
record, for all his booming
guitars and bellowing vocals,
the man is delicate and
thoughtful. Ozarker tells stories
of his Missouri upbringing,
from the migrant worker
grandfather who married the
orchard owner’s daughter on
the title track, to Shadowland,
which deals with wider
problems of the cyclic drug
abuse that continue to blight
The Show-Me State’s rural
communities. Much of Ozarker
was intentionally recorded like
demos that were only subtly
enhanced later, giving the
tracks a more immediate
blue-collar rock feel than, say,
the psychedelic grandeur of
2021’s Topaz. More heartland
Bob Seger, less Americana-
fried Pink Floyd, Ozarker is both
sentimental and hard-nosed,
nostalgic about a past without
ignoring the modern world’s
gritty reality.
Andy Fyfe
UNDERGROUND
B Y J O H N M U LV E Y
Arnold Dreyblatt &
The Orchestra Of
Excited Strings
★★★★
Resolve
DRAG CITY. DL/LP
Double bass bangers from an unsung hero of minimalism.
The Orchestra Of Excited Strings would be a pretty handy way of
describing any number of rock bands these past few decades –
Sonic Youth spring to mind, for a start. Arnold Dreyblatt was
around the New York downtown scene in the 1980s, too, and you
can hear definite similarities between his thrumming, clanging
approach to minimalism and the incantatory noise grids of Sonic
Youth, Glenn Branca and many more. But while most of those
artists foreground electric guitars, Dreyblatt drives his music
with a double bass that’s been strung with piano wire, for a crisp,
super-dry sound, complemented here by a new Berlin iteration
of the Orchestra including MOJO Underground regular, Oren
Ambarchi. Ambarchi’s terrific Shebang, from 2022, is another good
reference point for Resolve: radical ideas streamlined into bouncy,
relentless grooves that are anything but austere. Start with
Shuffle Effect, as much glam boogie as avant-garde symposium.
ALSO RELEASED
Jeffrey Alexander virtuosity, as a kind of gorgeous,
& The Heavy blasted serenity comes to the
fore on Present Moment.
Lidders
★★★ Jeremiah Chiu
★★★★
New Earth Seed
In Electric Time
ARROWHAWK. DL/LP
Extremely high- INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM. DL/MC
grade psych Chiu’s last album,
courtesy of in a duo with Marta
Philly-based Sofia Honer, was a
Alexander and site-specific project
a starry configuration of his located in the Åland
Heavy Lidders. Notable guests Islands, near Sweden. The artist’s
include Animal Collective’s destination this time is closer to
Geologist and a rare sighting of home, but no less inspirational:
Movietone’s Kate Wright. And LA’s Vintage Synthesizer
while Alexander’s vocals can be Museum, for a two-day session
a bit tepid, this one’s really all of bubbly analogue electronica.
about the leisurely lava flow
Retro-futurist Utopianism to file
of the guitars, as he, kindred alongside Bitchin Bajas’ equally
spirit Chris Forsyth (who also fun Switched On Ra in your
produces) and Elkhorn’s Drew geodesic dome.
Gardner lean elegantly, but
heavily, into the jams. Laura Cannell
Edsel Axle ★★★
★★★ Bow & Creak
BRAWL. CD/DL
Variable Happiness The prolific Suffolk
WORRIED SONGS. DL/LP violinist’s latest is
Rosali Middleman’s a response to the
solo albums have longest piece of
showcased calm music extant:
songcraft with Jem Finer’s 1,000-year-long
sometimes fried evolving composition playing in
backing; 2021’s fine No Medium a lighthouse on Bow Creek, East
had distinct Crazy Horse vibes. London. Cannell keeps to a pithy
Now as Edsel Axle, the North 30 minutes, but there’s a world
Carolinan privileges her of detail in her bowed violin
freer instincts on six electric variations: Tony Conrad’s the
guitar improvisations in the obvious reference point, but
wheelhouse of Charalambides’ ghost tones of British drone
Tom Carter, perhaps Bill Orcutt. folk, even Indian raga, hang
Hold tight through initial gnarly in the air, too. JM
MOJO 93
 F I LT E R A L B UM S E X T R A
Chris Abrahams/
Oren Ambarchi/
Robbie Avenaim
★★★★
Placelessness
IDEOLOGIC ORGAN. CD/DL/LP
Australian avant-garde face-off
on two longform meditations for
piano/guitar/drums. Abrahams is
most dominant: his rippling note
clusters steer the sound closest
to his day band, The Necks. JM
Lucidvox
★★★
That’s What Remained
GLITTERBEAT. CD/DL/LP/MC
The women who make up this
heavy psych quartet fled their
native Moscow after their 2020
debut. As such, these dense,
metallic timbres seem newly
freighted with vibrant emotion;
electronics and brass bolstering
their guitars on shivery, gothic
folk standout, Naidiya. JB
Margo Price
Strays II
As a songwriter, Margo Price isn’t
one for hiding much, least of all that
Strays II was mostly written during
the same six-day psychedelic trip
that birthed her acclaimed Strays
album. Strays II is a further nine
songs, posted online in batches of
three before making up the second
disc for the forthcoming reissue of
Strays as a double album. The title
track digs into the origins of Price’s
relationship with her co-writer
husband Jeremy Ivey, Heartbreak-
ers guitarist Mike Campbell pops
up on Malibu, Black Wolf Blues
is an exquisite ballad, and Burn
Whatever’s Left (possibly) a love
song to resetting your ego through
psilocybin. The most staggering
takeaway from Strays
II is that if Price had
released it first, it
would still have
received the
accolades heaped on
the original album.
Who says the drugs
don’t work?
Andy Fyfe
94 MOJO
Alborosie
★★★★
Destiny
VP. CD/DL/LP
Kingston-based Sicilian reggae
star expands on the ’80s
dancehall of 2021’s For The
Culture, with herb song
Rastazeneka, ballad I Got You
and social survey Nah Good
Again all referencing mid-’70s
Wailers. Highlight: Give It To
Them with Burro Banton. DK
New Age Doom
& Tuvaband
★★★★
There Is No End
WE ARE BUSY BODIES. DL/LP
Bookended by brooding
symphonies, the Vancouver
heavies’ melodic tryst with
Norway’s dream-popper adds
gravitas to their mix of dark folk,
drone, deep dub and free jazz.
Played with Swans-like intensity,
a multi-layered triumph. AC
EXTENDED PLAY
Desert storm:
Margo Price keeps
on burning.
Amor Muere
★★★★
A Time To Love,
A Time To Die
SCRAWL. DL/LP
Art pop meets the avant-garde
on Mexico City quartet’s debut.
Dreamy swirls of looped notes
merge with cellist Mabe Fratti’s
low figures and Camille
Mandoki’s haunting voice amid
LA’s heady atmos and Violeta y
Malvas’ pulsing mystery. AC
Shake Stew
★★★
Lila
TRAUMTON/INDIGO. CD/DL/LP
Half studio/half live, the Austrian
jazz septet’s sixth LP confirms
their mastery of the hypnotic
groove. Dallying with spoken
word artist Precious Nnebedum
(Not Water But Rest), reining it in
(Lila) or trancing out (Shake), the
double bass/drums core anchors
some dream-like free soloing. AC
Bar Italia
★★★
The Twits
MATADOR. CD/DL/LP
London trio’s uptight, lo-fi sound
ventures further on their second
LP of 2023. Recorded over eight
weeks in Mallorca, a queasy
heat seeps into the Sonic Youth
hiss and clang of My Little Tony,
Jelsy’s Bad Seeds metallic
thrum and Shoo’s slow, high
plains drift. JB
Cleo Sol
★★★★
Heaven
FOREVER LIVING ORIGINALS. DL/LP
No Sault album thus far in 2023,
but this third solo album by the
London collective’s singer is an
absolute keeper: a smoked,
minimalist nu-soul gem (start
with Golden Child (Jealous)) that
would sit neatly between Erykah
Badu’s Baduizm and Solange’s A
Seat At The Table. JM
Mayssa Jallad
★★★★
Marjaa: The Battle
Of The Hotels
SIX OF SWORDS. DL/LP
Historical trauma, strings,
drones, metallophones and
buzuks wrap around powerful
stories and gossamer vocals on
Lebanese singer’s tender,
intimate debut. With shades of
Nico, Jarboe and Elizabeth Fraser,
’80s’ 4AD fans will rejoice. AC
Storm Franklin
★★★★
Loneliness In The
Modern World
AGRICULTURAL AUDIO. CD/DL/LP
Gale force debut from producer
Ben Hillier and Howling Bells’
Juanita Stein, a spindrift
presence on hummable yet
mysterious single Hush Now.
Equally potent: Y.O.U.R.A.S.T.A.R’s
percussive hand-jive and the
Velvets crush of Lourdes. JB
John P. Strohm
★★★★
Something To Look
Forward To
PROPELLER SOUND RECORDINGS.
CD/DL/LP
Former Lemonhead pays elegant
tribute to a lost friend, finding
fertile emotional ground where
wired indie meets sepia ’70s
singer-songwriter (think Nada
Surf with George Harrison).
Guests include Aaron Lee Tasjan
and Courtney Marie Andrews. JB
Moses Yoofee Trio
★★★★
Ocean
LEITER. DL/LP
German jazz pianist showcases
a fluid band capable of darting
from sophisticated smoothness
to agitated itchiness in a blink,
as bassist Roman Klobe-Barangă
Alysse Gafkjen
and drummer Noah Fürbringer
summon looping progressions
for his incantatory keys. Fans of
The Necks will approve. AC
The ultimate collection
of pop-music trivia

OUT
NOW
IN HARDBACK

Listen to the Don’t

Stop the Music playlist
on Spotify here
 F I LT E R R E I S SU E S

Love in a cold climate

Mitchell’s rarities series reaches her prolific years at David Geffen’s Asylum label,
beginning in a stone cabin in British Columbia. By David Fricke.

Joni Mitchell junkie’s nightmare Cold Blue Steel And Sweet Fire.
“Sometimes I sat on a rock and tuned my guitar” –
★★★★ an outdoor exercise that produced the heartbroken
physics in Electricity.
Archives – Volume 3: Compared to the eternities now taken between
albums by many artists, For The Roses was a race
The Asylum Years to closure, written in the wake of Mitchell’s
(1972-1975) devastating break-up with James Taylor and out by
November, 1972. Yet she spends all of discs one
RHINO. CD/DL/LP
and two in this set seeking the album’s delicate

O
N AUGUST 26, 1973, Joni Mitchell dropped negotiation of agony and tender assurance,
by S.I.R., a rehearsal facility in Los Ange- often set in the fleeting pleasures and inevitable
les, where her friend and fellow Canadian
Neil Young was recording his legendary Irish wake,
“Volume 3 is disappointment of the tourbus and after-show flings.
Half of For The Roses is in the setlist, solo and
Tonight’s The Night. Taking a break from that racket, an exhilarating acoustic, at Carnegie Hall in February 1972, next
Young and the Santa Monica Flyers backed Mitchell
on one of her new songs, Raised On Robbery, a frisky
helter-skelter to the wistful idealism in Blue’s For Free and the
already nostalgic Woodstock.
boogie about love and larceny. She was “like a kid in of paths tested Taylor actually shows up at an April ’72 studio
a candy store,” Nils Lofgren, one of the Flyers, told and inspirations date, playing guitar (with no small irony) in a test
MOJO in 2021 of that jubilantly unruly take, first
issued in Young’s Archives II and now the sole refined… with run of Electricity. And it’s fascinating to hear
Mitchell’s instinctive certainty at work as she lays
previously issued track in Mitchell’s latest box of an emphasis on down a wordless guide vocal in Cold Blue Steel,
rarities. “She kept saying, ‘I’ve never played electric
guitar with a band before.’” experiment and mapping the tone and feel for Tom Scott’s eventual
soprano sax solo.
In fact, as this 5-CD bounty reveals, the day before process.” Scott, in turn, was a pivot to Court And Spark
that S.I.R. lark, Mitchell had a rousing bash at the song when he invited Mitchell to see his group the L.A.
– ultimately cut with more pop decorum on 1974’s Express in 1973, during their weekly residency
Court And Spark – in San Francisco, robustly strumming jangly electric at a jazz room called the Baked Potato. She hired the Express en
guitar (or a rudely amplified acoustic) with ex-paramour Graham masse for the record and subsequent touring (also falling hard for
Nash and the rhythm section from his solo album, Wild Tales. And the drummer John Guerin). But where the first two Archives sets
year before, working on demos for 1972’s charted Mitchell’s formative passage as a singer and writer, from
For The Roses, Mitchell taped a version of public domain ingénue to a “premier explorer [of] the tension
that LP’s playful seduction You Turn Me On, between love and freedom” (Loraine Alterman, the New York
I’m A Radio with Young and his Harvest Times, 1974), Volume 3 is an exhilarating helter-skelter of paths
band the Stray Gators, jumping back and tested (the ruckus with Young) and inspirations refined, like
forth in dreamy come-hither and jolting, Mitchell’s overheated vocal rapture at the end of a solo demo of
bluesy lust. “Just looking for the clarity of Help Me, wisely dropped for the Top 10 single.
things,” Mitchell claims in the linernotes The most remarkable find is a Piano Suite from the same ’73
BACK STORY: of her three different passes at the song here
THE ROAD TO session that has Mitchell binding three songs for Court And Spark
– live and studio – before she found its final, – Down To You, the title tune and Car On The Hill – in a solitary
JERICHO
● Live curiosities on
breezy poise. medley of wounds and warning that could have been a brilliant,
Volume 3 include It’s a mantra she might well have chanted contrary highlight of the album, a literal affirmation of the war
Mitchell’s all-star choir every day on her way to – and through – the on loneliness inside its mainstream charms.
on The Circle Game at imperial peak covered in this instalment of
Carnegie Hall ’72 (you The emphasis on experiment and process means there are
can hear her calling for Mitchell’s Archives. For The Roses (sparingly fewer newly-excavated compositions – Like Veils Said Lorraine,
Neil Young and Asylum detailed folk rock), Court And Spark (lush
Records boss David pop with jazz contours) and 1975’s The a For The Roses orphan; the modal guitar reveries Sunshine Raga
Geffen); a London
Hissing Of Summer Lawns (emotional and Bonderia, the former with tabla and free-form trilling – but
unveiling that spring of no less in the way of surprises. Mitchell had the swinging nugget
Mitchell’s meditation on turbulence in fusion dynamics) remain
Beethoven, Judgement her only Top 10 albums in America. But Twisted, a 1960 smash for Lambert, Hendricks & Ross and the finale
Of The Moon And Stars;
Mitchell was in no rush to get there, of Court And Spark, on deck for …Roses, going a cappella over
and a solo, embryonic
Jericho, again in London preferring a voluntary exile from the road drummer Russ Kunkel’s brush-stick sizzle. A March ’74 concert
during an April ’74 show and record business clockwork – to a with the L.A. Express opens with Blue’s This Flight Tonight taking
taped for BBC Television. off in Nazareth-fusion gear. And even in a relatively quick sprint
“This one needs another stone cabin on the Pacific coast of British
lyrical verse,” she tells Columbia – after the profoundly confessional through the genesis of Hissing…, there is The Jungle Line au naturel
the crowd, “so I have to triumph of 1971’s Blue. (no Moog or Burundi percussion) and a long, look forward to Don
repeat the first one at Juan’s Reckless Daughter in solo and pop-wise stabs at that 1977
the end.” That August, “It made me quite prolific,” she tells
Mitchell recorded a Cameron Crowe in the booklet, part of their double-LP’s samba-school incantation Dreamland.
finished Jericho live ongoing conversation in this series. “I was “I don’t recall ever thinking, What’s next?” Mitchell says,
with the L.A. Express summing up the era for Crowe. “It’s just not how my brain works.
for Miles Of Aisles, then now alone and collaborating with nature” – a
Getty/Henry Diltz

in definitive studio bond she cites in the opening lines of For The I just kind of go with the flow. Everything takes care of itself.” Mitchell
form three years later Roses (“I heard it in the wind last night/It sang it this way on Court And Spark: “You can crawl, you can fly too…
for Don Juan’s Reckless
Daughter. sounded like applause”), featured in a first- It all comes down to you.” She is always looking for the higher road
step reading from December 1971 with the here – and getting there, step by step.

96 MOJO
“I just kind of go with
the flow”: Joni Mitchell
outside A&M Studios,
Los Angeles, 1974.

Winging it: Kurt
Cobain – far from
spent – performing in
Seattle for Nirvana’s
MTV Live And Loud,
December 13, 1993.
Nirvana
★★★★
In Utero
GEFFEN/UME. CD/DL/LP
Five-disc 30th anniversary release
with two unreleased live shows.
THE STUDIO recordings of this
complex, brutal classic have already
been reissued – the outtakes including
I Hate Myself And I Want To Die, orig-
inally scheduled for inclusion before
All Apologies. This iteration omits the
Various
★★★★
The Special Stuff:
Down Home Blues
– Chicago Volume 3
WIENERWORLD. CD
Four-CD set of downhome
and uptown blues spanning
1941–1966.
The last chapter of
Weinerworld’s Chicago blues
survey, following Fine Boogie
and Sweet Home Chicago,
similarly explores the
interaction of the old guard
and the younger men and
women who would unseat
them. Established figures from
pre-World War II jukeboxes –
Jazz Gillum, Big Maceo,
Big Joe Williams, Sonny
Boy Williamson I, Robert
Lockwood, singer-songwriter
St Louis Jimmy Oden – share
city space and CD space with
recent émigrés from
downhome: Muddy Waters
and Little Walter, Magic Sam
and Junior Wells, Chuck and
Bo. Some of what they play
here will be familiar to
longtime collectors, and
several “previously unissued”
tracks have circulated
surreptitiously before, but still
there are goldmine moments,
Getty
like singer-pianist Mata Roy’s
98 MOJO
demos from the 20th
anniversary release and
adds four further CDs
of two live shows, played
close to each other: the
Great Western Forum in
Inglewood, Los Angeles,
December 30, 1993 and
the Seattle Centre Arena on Janu-
ary 8, 1994. The Los Angeles show
is quite astonishing: the cumulative
impact of 17 songs, taken pretty much
equally from Nevermind and In Utero
– including Smells Like Teen Spirit –
chirpy gazetteer of boogie-
woogie cross-dressing, Pete’s
Shuffle Boogie Pts 1 & 2. The
110 tracks were assembled,
from labels major and minor,
by the late Pete Moody and
are skilfully annotated by
Chris Bentley.
Tony Russell
Tricky
★★★★
Maxinquaye
(Super Deluxe)
ISLAND. CD/DL/LP
His trip-hop-inventing 1994
LP, plus sessions, remixes
and six new ‘self-covers’.
British hip-hop
was a marginal
concern until
Tricky gave it a
unique, slo-mo
vernacular on
Maxinquaye. Named after the
rapper-producer’s mother,
who took her own life when
he was four, its subject matter
was intense and often
transgressive, and when
it became an unlikely hit,
its creator couldn’t cope,
retreating to the shadows
via brutally uncommercial
follow-ups. Even on 2012’s
Maxinquaye-in-full tour, he
refused to play any of it, so it’s
something of a miracle that
Island persuaded him to
engage here, eliciting six
newly ‘reincarnated’ tracks.
Mostly voiced by Marta
Zlakowska, his current ‘new
Martina’, these, somewhat
Dylanishly, build new music
around selected lyrics from
Aftermath et al in the
extra-sparse, ghostly idiom of
his latterday !K7 records. Also
reminds you how many
great songs Nirvana
had. The second show
has an almost identical
setlist, only adding Milk
It. The six extras add a
welcome version of Very
Ape and concludes with
Tourette’s. Price is bumped by memo-
rabilia, but the music still rings out
loud and clear: a stinging corrective to
any idea that the group were spent by
this stage.
Jon Savage
noteworthy are a 1995 BBC bonus disc of Ranglin
radio session executed with his at-the-controls numbers,
ace touring band, some wildly including the gorgeous JA soul
experimental ‘rough monitor’ of Everyday It’s Just The Same
mixes and many unheard Kind Of Thing and My Island by
reworkings, including Paulette Williams.
Leftfield’s tilt at Brand New Lois Wilson
You’re Retro.
Andrew Perry
Meat Puppets
Gregory Isaacs ★★★★★
★★★★ Up On The Sun
MEGAFORCE. LP
In Person Arizonan hardcore oddballs’
DOCTOR BIRD. CD
country-punk weirdness at
The Cool Ruler’s 1974 debut its most succinct.
plus bonus disc of G.G. With the
Ranglin productions of protean genre
Heptones, Shorty, Perry et al. cross-
Produced by Alvin ‘G.G.’ pollinations of
Ranglin and picked up on by their second
Trojan in the UK, Isaacs’ In
album in the
Person is a potent mesh of rearview, Meat Puppets
conscious roots and lovers finessed their mind-bending
rock that showcases a rare fusion of feral punk and weird
talent; a crooner with Americana on their third LP.
languorous, honeyed tones Drummer Derrick Bostrom
who, on tracks such as the now keeps the tempo steady,
classic Love Is Overdue and If ceding the foreground to
You’re In Love, seduces and the delicious back-and-forth
charms but who can also, with between guitarist and bassist
the sufferer’s cry, bring fire and Curt and Cris Kirkwood, the
brimstone to reality anthems twin brothers channelling the
such as Financial Indorsement hypnotic meandering of the
and Sweeter The Victory. It’s Grateful Dead, the choppy
reissued here for the first time choogle of Creedence and the
on CD outside of Japan with a joyful chime of African high
life. This unbridled, unfussy
musicality suggests a
thrash-punk Allman Brothers.
And while their eccentricities
are subtler here than on II, the
playful, bewitching songcraft
of Hot Pink and Away’s
country-funk strut – not to
mention the instrumental
Maiden’s Milk, where
trancelike psychedelia meets
backyard bluegrass – could
only be the work of the Meat
Puppets. Four decades on,
their radical rewrite of
Americana remains as vital
as ever.
Stevie Chick
Susan Tedeschi
★★★★
Just Won’t Burn (25th
Anniversary Edition)
FANTASY. CD/DL/LP
1998 debut recorded with
producer Tom Hambridge
and featuring the late
guitarist Sean Costello.
It’s 25 years
since Boston
singer and
guitarist
Tedeschi
debuted with
this self-assured set of blues
rockers and ballads. The album
drew inevitable comparisons
to Janis Joplin and Bonnie Raitt
– Tedeschi even covers J
ohn Prine’s Angel From
Montgomery, a Raitt live
staple. But Tedeschi, who
studied composition at Berklee
College of Music, had her own
distinct style from the outset,
with the LP built around her
raw, lived-in holler (devastating
on It Hurt So Bad) and guitar-
driven rock’n’roll roar (see Rock
Me Right). The bonuses here
are impressive too with
previously unissued outtakes
including a swaggering
Voodoo Woman, originally by
Koko Taylor, and an immersive
2022 NYC concert performance
by Tedeschi Trucks Band, the
group led by Tedeschi and her
husband Derek Trucks.
Lois Wilson
Green Day
★★★★
Dookie
RHINO. CD/DL/LP
Bay Area punks’
breakthrough gets deluxe
30th anniversary treatment.
Despite its
excrementi-
tious title,
Dookie marked
Green Day’s
graduation
from snotty underground
insurgents to still-snotty major
label superstars. Thirty years
on, it endures as a riotous listen,
with She and Basket Case’s
pop sensibilities every bit as
super-charged as their power
chords. Where this 6-LP edition
distinguishes itself is the
deluge of extras. The previously
unreleased Live In Barcelona
1994 set is wonderfully
brash, but it’s the previously
unreleased 4-track demos
that steal the show. Even in
embryonic, tape hiss-covered
form, Dookie was primed to
rewire mainstream tastes.
Which, of course, it did – the LP
later clearing 20 million sales
in a post-Nirvana world. Green
Day would eventually realise
grander musical ambitions, but
it was Dookie that recast punk
in their own image.
George Garner
 J.J .Cale: he
feels no fret.
F I LT E R R E I S SU E S

Johnny Marr masterpiece only diminishes its

original groaning power.
★★★★ Andrew Male
Spirit Power:
The Best Of…
BMG. CD/DL/LP Clarence White
Smiths guitarist’s 10-year
abundance of solo bangers,
★★★★
plus two new songs.
The Lost Masters:
In the wake of
1963-1973
LIBERATION HALL. CD/DL
his post-Smiths
passage Rarities from the bluegrass
through and country rock virtuoso.
fleeting band The late
memberships guitarist
(Pretenders, The The, Modest Clarence White
Mouse), dream-team-ups revolutionised
(Electronic) and one abortive every music he
frontman venture (The tackled. As an
Healers), Marr’s transformation acoustic flatpicker, notably
into an all-singing songsmith with bluegrass mavericks The
has been miraculous in its Kentucky Colonels, his blinding
completeness. In this fast licks rivalled the banjo’s
whistle-stop tour of his four

LPs since 2013’s The Messenger,
newcomers will be amazed to
hear how Smiths-y this avowed
forward-mover gets at times,
from New Town Velocity’s
immaculate chord progression
through to Hi Hello, which all
but morphs into There Is A
Light…, with Marr crooning in
a remarkably Moz-like fashion.
Elsewhere, his six-string caress
takes a turn for the kerranging
(a rocking tilt at Depeche
Mode’s I Feel You), while two
newbies – Somewhere and The
Answer – inspired by recent
arena touring with Blondie, are
high-paced and melody-rich.
The 19-song format allows a
handful of fillers (see Maxine
Peake-spoken The Priest).
Otherwise: powerful,
throughout.
Andrew Perry
Earth
★★★★★
Earth 2: Special Low
Frequency Version
SUB POP. DL/LP
30th anniversary reissue for
this slow-crawl ambient
drone metal masterpiece.
Last year
Chantal
Akerman’s 1975
epic Jeanne
Dielman… was
voted Greatest
Film Ever in Sight And Sound’s
critics poll. An overdue blow
against the male canon, the 3.5
hour film’s victory was also a
vote against modern atomised
culture. Slow down, it said.
Find beauty and tension in
repetition. Maybe this reissue
should be regarded similarly.
Applying the ideas of US
minimalist composer La Monte
Young to the classic metal riff
by slowing it to a deathly crawl,
guitarist Dylan Carlson and
bassist Dave Harwell located a
vast ravaged beauty within its
heavy overtones and distorted
drones. The LP created its own
sub-genre (Sunn0))), Sleep etc)
and influenced artists such as
Godflesh’s Justin Broadrick and
The Bug’s Kevin Martin. Both
contribute to the new remix
LP (available as separate DL
and limited vinyl) but it’s to
Carlson’s credit that to add or
Getty
speed, influencing young
guitarists from Tony Rice to
Jerry Garcia. As an electric
country rocker with Roger
McGuinn and The Byrds from
1967 through 1973, he helped
create instrumental templates
for Cosmic American Music,
while his pal Gram Parsons
wrote and sang its songs. Like
all artistic iconoclasts, he
ignored rules and sought out
new sounds, helping develop
the StringBender device that
allowed a guitar to mimic a
pedal steel. This collection
highlights Kentucky Colonels
and Byrds selections, including
the latter’s Yesterday’s Train,
featuring White’s gorgeous
vocals. His copious session
work is also here, from I’m On
The Way Home Again with
The Everly Brothers to dobro
master Tut Taylor’s (Now And
Then There’s) A Fool Such As I.
Michael Simmons
Various
★★★★
Bob Stanley Presents
London A To Z
1962-1973
ACE. CD/DL
Tribute to the London A-Z
street atlas/guide first
published in 1936.
From the cool
jazz vibes of
John Barry
Seven &
Orchestra’s
1962
instrumental Cutty Sark to the
1973 heavy soul of Humble
Pie’s Beckton Dumps, compiler
Bob Stanley’s soundtrack to
London’s streets is utterly
compelling. Weaving through
folk, pop, prog, psychedelia,
soul and more, there’s a real
breadth and depth, but what
could so easily be a hotchpotch
is instead united by feel; a
bright lights big city sense of
romance and wonder prevails
throughout. Even Nick Drake
sounds uplifted on Mayfair,
one of many highpoints here.
Others include Richmond, a
haunting ballad by Shelagh
McDonald, and Hampstead
Way, a kind of Supremes-sing-
folk by the exquisite-voiced
Linda Lewis.
Okie computer
The laid-back maestro’s first
eight albums, remastered.
By John Mulvey.
J.J. Cale
★★★★
Tulsa Sound
UMR. DL/LP
WE ROUTINELY praise artists for their
ambition and diversity, for their inexhaust-
ible questing spirits, but sometimes it just
pays to stay in your lane. “My records all
sound the same,” J.J. Cale is quoted as
saying in the sleevenotes to this materially
hefty, musically featherlight box set of his
first eight albums. “I could probably hire
God to produce it and it would still sound
like my records.”
A singer, songwriter and guitarist for
whom Mike Love’s “Don’t fuck with the
formula” could’ve been an unusually
positive credo, Cale’s music has lost none
of its languid charm in the 52 years since
his debut album, Naturally, was released.
Tulsa Sound catalogues an idiosyncratic but
streamlined hybrid of American roots mu-
sics; the most effortless choogles imaginable.
“I’ve always been the kind of guy who likes
to work on a carburetor, you know,” Cale
says elsewhere in Tulsa Sound’s notes, and
over these eight brief albums he elevates the
mechanics of record-making to a master-
class of self-effacement. Once the key is in
the ignition, this stuff seems to run by itself.
Initially, though, Cale’s career didn’t
go so smoothly. Tulsa Sound includes a
bonus EP of mid-’60s singles, recorded in
Los Angeles after Cale had moved there
to join a cabal of Tulsa session men led
by Leon Russell. A nov-
elty 7-inch from 1965, Dick
Tracy/It’s A Go-Go Place, is
goofy – not a quality usually
associated with Cale. A year
later, though, he was blazing
through his first signature
tune, After Midnight; Eric Clapton’s 1970
cover, equally speedy, precipitated the start
of Cale’s solo career proper, in 1971.
The re-recording of After Midnight on
Naturally is slower, more lugubrious, and
entirely representative of what Cale would
do until his death in 2013. The vibe is
unostentatious, companionable; the sound
is on point, but rough and ready, with a
drum machine often backing Cale’s mellow
imprecations; the songs (Call Me The
Breeze, Magnolia, Bringing It Back) are
uniformly superb. After Naturally, the
recordings become incrementally a little
slicker, but the auspicious sessioneers
– James Burton, Jim Keltner, Carol Kane
and so on – dial back the fanciness, never
detracting from Cale’s preferred atmos-
phere; keep it casual.
There are, in fairness, a few stylistic
expansions. Reggae makes a serendipitous
appearance on Crying, from 1974’s Okie;
Does Your Mama Like To Reggae, from
1982’s Grasshopper, is less enthusiastically
recommended. While the influence of
Mose Allison quietly percolated away in the
background of Cale’s music from the start,
jazz becomes more prominent on Grasshop-
per: Dr Jive is ostensibly a vibraphone solo,
accelerating Cale’s usual shuffle. Shades,
from 1981, could at times (Deep Dark
Dungeon, Pack My Jack) pass for a 21st-
century Dylan album, given the preponder-
ance of louche roadhouse blues.
By the time of 1983’s 8, Cale called
home a California trailer park, the acclaim
of his peers – Mark Knopfler, who contrib-
utes to Tulsa Sound’s sleevenotes, being one
obvious acolyte – hardly affecting his
low-key way of life. 8, though, was the
first Cale solo album that didn’t register
on the US charts, and in its
wake he would walk away,
disillusioned, from the music
business for six years. Taking
it easy was harder work, evi-
dently, than this consummate
slacker ever made it seem.

subtract anything from this Lois Wilson

MOJO 99

New Order
★★★★
Substance 1987
WARNERS. CD/DL/LP
Greatest hits (again), now with 1987
live rendition and bonus mixes.
ORIGINALLY PUT together by
Factory’s Tony Wilson alongside a
similarly titled Joy Division compila-
tion so he could listen to his label’s
proudest recorded achievements on
The Orb &
David Gilmour
★★★★
Metallic Spheres
In Colour
SONY. CD/DL/LP
The LP conceived as Wish
You Were Here meets Blade
Runner OST, re-imagined.
In 2010 The Orb ran into
David Gilmour through their
contributions to a benefit
album for British computer
hacker Gary McKinnon, and
being fans, they invited him to
collaborate. The Floyd guitarist
packed his guitars and EMS
guitar synth – as used on On
The Run on The Dark Side Of
The Moon – and in an intense
session recorded all manner
of stylistically diverse material
to be woven into The Orb’s
multifaceted beats, found
sounds and electronic
textures. Gilmour’s trademark
spacey hanging chords
open The Round Side, and
contributes electronically
treated guitar sounds, even
some groovy acoustic figures.
Initial producer Youth has
completely remixed the album
and has edited Part 2 AKA The
100 MOJO
for 20 synthesizers, shows.
A fascinating portrait of an
unsung music master.
Charles Waring
East Village
★★★★
Drop Out
HEAVENLY. CD/LP
British cult classic’s 30th
anniversary, with extra
tracks.
Reissued every
10 years since
it bombed in
1993, the Bob
Stanley-
financed Drop
Out was already out of date
Keeping the …Faith:
first time around, for the
New Order roll out
the singles. Buckinghamshire band
formerly trading as Episode
Four had long disintegrated.
They jangled like a British
CD in his car, Substance
1987 endures as one
on-stage run-through
of Substance 1987’s
Go-Betweens, with hints of
The Lilac Time and The Byrds,
of the ’80s’ finest singles comps. The big-hitter disc, captured the month but the joint guitar muscle
of John Wood and Paul Kelly
two-disc assembly of 12-inch A-sides
and choice B-sides is here augmented
after release in San Bernardino,
California. After being introduced by
made them less winsome and
more durable. Even with that
with a further disc of vintage remixes, Wilson as “the greatest pop group in muscle, Shipwrecked is
including the original Temptation and the world”, New Order perform per- impossibly romantic and, for
Confusion (which were recut for the suasively to that effect (in the rain!),
all its chiming, What Kind Of
Friend Is This is bereft, but
1987 package), plus three Shep Pet- wondrously enacting their metamor- there’s real heft on Silver Train
tibone overhauls (including a majestic phosis from doom-riffing Ceremony and Black Autumn. This new
vinyl retread includes the
10:44 dub of True Faith) – all are to stately, ‘extraordinary’ True Faith. Japanese compilation, Hot Rod
on previous compilations. The fresh Miraculous, still. Hotel, while the CD version
component here is CD4’s complete Andrew Perry features a second 14-track disc
of early singles and alternative
versions, most rewardingly the
Flat Side. The mood is similar drilled versatility shines captures in its gliding melody catchy Back Between Places,
to the original Metallic Spheres on Alchemy’s previously both ’80s atmosphere and which could have graced any
album, of course, but it’s unreleased Portobello Belle, today’s boosted intensity. Felt album.
sonically brighter, more vivid a “London song” tapping Lucy O’Brien John Aizlewood
and with added breadth and Celtic-flavoured calypso.
depth. It has certainly buffed James McNair
up nicely.
Mike Barnes Various Steve Cropper
The Chills ★★★★ ★★★★
★★★★ Touch: The Sublime With A Little Help
Dire Straits Brave Words Sound Of Yuji Ohno From My Friends
★★★★ (Expanded & WEWANTSOUNDS. CD/LP OMNIVORE. CD/LP
Dire Straits: Cool celebration of a prolific 1969 debut solo album
Remastered) Japanese producer and originally on Volt; sleeve
Live 1978-1992 FIRE RECORDS. CD/DL/LP arranger. notes by Memphis expert
UMC/MERCURY. CD/DL/LP
Extended 18-track edition of A self-taught
Robert Gordon.
Showcasing The Knopf’s their 1987 debut, a keystone jazz pianist, Some of
part-parlando live of Flying Nun. these 11
Ohno rose
adventures. instrumentals
In the 1980s to fame as a
Certified road Brave Words composer of were recorded
with the M.G.’s
hounds, Dire was a anime movie
at Stax; some in
Straits played stand-out soundtracks in the 1970s. By
LA at Leon Russell’s house with
248 dates in a release from distilling his influences – which
year circa New Zealand’s ranged from the cool blues of Buddy Miles; some feature
Brothers In Flying Nun label, fully Quincy Jones to Lalo Schifrin’s Jim Keltner, members of The
Arms, and other Straits LPs establishing that chiming cinematic jazz-funk aesthetic Bar-Kays and quite possibly
were toured almost as hard. Dunedin sound. With this and the svelte elegance of Delaney & Bonnie but
Unsurprising, then, that there’s remastered 2-CD reissue, lead Michel Legrand – Ohno personnel details are sketchy.
a wealth of career-spanning singer/songwriter Martin established a unique sonic All feature Cropper’s guitar of
live recordings to plunder. Phillipps has toned down the signature that won him course – his trusty Telecaster
Driven by the singular sonic reverb of Mayo Thompson’s admirers across the world. The – but few feature his
chemistry of Mark Knopfler’s original production to create nine gems mined from Ohno’s trademark ‘less is more’
deft touch – all fingers; one a mix that emphasises the back catalogue in this highly approach. Instead, he’s mainly
thumb – this 8-CD, 12-LP box driving staccato guitar riffs, entertaining compendium out front with his fuzz tone
set remasters and expands the charged vocals and rollicking reveal how skilled and versatile pedal. The title cut, taken from
tracklisting of landmark live piano. This works particularly he was. Sounding like a Love the Joe Cocker version, and
albums Alchemy (1984) and On well for the baroque beauty Unlimited Orchestra outtake, 99½, which Cropper wrote
The Night (1993) and finds DS of the song Ghosts, and Silhouette by You & The with Eddie Floyd and Wilson
Live At The BBC in 1978. Most compulsive opener Push, Explosion Band shows that Pickett for the latter, are
covetable for completists is and it suits Phillipps’ lyrical Ohno was a deft disco acid-soaked blues; covers of
a previously unreleased Live material – songs that battle arranger, while singer Mieko Land Of A Thousand Dances
From The Rainbow Theatre set self-doubt or tussle between Hirota’s bebop-inflected I and Funky Broadway are given
from 1979’s Communiqué tour, romance and realism. But Want To Be Happy reflects the the club soul treatment, the
wherein Thin Lizzy’s Phil in the process some of that arranger’s affinity for his first former becoming frantic
Anton Corbijn
Lynott duets on a four-song melancholy DIY feel is lost. The love, jazz. He was also an early floor-shaking go-go. Crop
rock’n’roll medley, and Once extra tracks, however, include electronic music pioneer, as Dustin’, sampled by Jay-Z,
Upon A Time In The West nuggets like House With A The Soaring Seagull, Ohno’s meanwhile, is proto jazz-funk.
grooves mightily. Dire Straits’ Hundred Rooms, a song that mind-blowing arrangement Lois Wilson
 Billy Bragg: transcending
the didactic and stirring
the soul for 40 years.
F I LT E R R E I S SU E S

Various Marc Almond

★★★★
If You Ask Me To…
Victor Axelrod
Productions For
Daptone Records
DAPTONE. CD/DL/LP
Daptone got reggae:
Axelrod’s ska, rocksteady,
roots remakes of the
Brooklyn label’s catalogue.
Producer and
multi-
instrumentalist
Victor Axelrod
co-founded
groups the
Dap-Kings and Antibalas,
and also brought reggae to
Brooklyn soul imprint Daptone
when he remade Sharon
Jones’s How Long Do I Have To
Wait For You as rocksteady in
2007. Jones’s expressive shout
set against bubbling organ
and easy-going rhythms is a
thing of uncanny wonder,
evoking the spirit of late-’60s
JA. It kickstarted a series of
reggae treatments by Axelrod
(AKA Ticklah), the best of
which are collected here,
★★★
Tenement Symphony
(Expanded And
Remastered)
CHERRY RED. CD/DL/LP
Lavish 6-CD edition of
Almond’s ambitious
1991 album.
Almond’s
seventh studio
album,
featuring a
song suite
produced with
customary gusto by Trevor
Horn, showcased a diva
persona he wasn’t entirely sure
about. “I felt my vocal was too
mannered and West End,”
Marc Almond said later, and
although his camp version of
Brel’s Jacky now sounds frantic
and OTT, his reading of David
McWilliams’ The Days Of Pearly
Spencer has a moving pathos
that doesn’t date. He sounds
more comfortable working
with Soft Cell partner Dave Ball
on the hard-edged cabaret
of tracks like I’ve Never Seen
Your Face, and with Willing
Sinner Billy McGee on shivery

including two previously
unissued cuts: Lover Like Me
by Jones’s erstwhile MC Binky
Griptite, and Sugar Minott’s
One Step Ahead. The former
re-imagines the original’s
dynamite funk as intensified
ska; the latter, one of Minott’s
last recordings, is a gorgeous
lovers rock rendition of the
Aretha ballad with The
Inversions on backing.
Lois Wilson
Eli ‘Paperboy’
Reed
★★★★
Hits And Misses:
The Singles
YEP ROC. DL/LP
2009-2020 rarities
compilation from the R&B
screamer who learned his
craft at Mitty Collier’s
Chicago church.
Hits & Misses
collects 11
tracks from the
US soul belter
that were
previously only
available to buy as 45s from his
merchandise table at shows.
Eight are covers: Motörhead’s
Ace Of Spades, re-imagined
as Memphis greasy groove,
frames his scorched earth
holler with blaring horns and
the hum-and-growl of church
organ; renditions of Steal Away
and I Don’t Know (What The
World Is Coming To) recorded
live at Muscle Shoals’ Fame
studios with original
Swampers David Hood, Jimmy
Johnson and Spooner Oldham
are imbued with stirring
gospel spirit (“That boy can
really sing,” Oldham told
MOJO at the time); Steely Dan’s
Do It Again becomes spooked
blues. Meanwhile the best of
the originals, IDKWYCTD (I
Came To Play), ain’t nothing
but a house party.
Getty
torch song Beautiful Brutal
Thing. McGee’s sensual
techno is the perfect foil for
Almond’s dark imaginings,
part of a sumptuous reissue
that includes quirky rarities
and demos as well as the
original album.
Lucy O’Brien
Various
★★★★
Yacht Soul 2:
The Cover Versions
HOW DO YOU ARE?. CD/DL/LP
No archness here, just an
exquisite collection of
soulful pop covers.
When, in 2015,
the first Too
Slow To Disco
collection
sailed in on
yacht rock’s
swell (“a compilation series
of late-’70s West Coast
Yacht-pop you can almost
dance to”), it seemed the
apogee of archness, hipsters
sniggering at blow-waved
nonsense, rehabilitating
Rupert Holmes and Ned
Doheny in the process.
However, far beyond the raised
eyebrow, it was clear that
Berlin-based curator DJ
Supermarkt – Marcus
Liesenfeld – loved the music
and his enthusiasm rubbed off.
Others clearly thought so as
here, the eleventh edition of
the series takes a second dig
into R&B artists covering
contemporary pop songbooks.
Among the 15 covers, Dionne
Warwick sings The Doobie
Brothers’ Dedicate This Heart,
Billy Paul majestically takes
on Carole King’s It’s Too Late,
and Richie Havens makes
Fleetwood Mac’s Dreams his
own. It is impossible not to get
carried away with it all; frankly,
it’s ship-shape.
Worker’s playtime
Celebrating 40 years
of graft and great song-
writing. By Mat Snow.
Billy Bragg
★★★★
The Roaring Forty
COOKING VINYL. CD/DL/LP
BORN JUST months apart and releasing
their debut albums within weeks 40 years
ago, is Billy Bragg the anti-Madonna? Yet
her brother-in-law Joe Henry has worked
with both. Nor is that all. Both are driven,
working-class musicians with Marmite
visions of wider empowerment. Both broke
through only after years of hustle honed
their entrepreneurial nous. And both have
sustained careers of interest and variety
despite creaky singing voices.
Being no Maria Callas mattered not to
post-punks as long as you could sell your
song, usually either sarcastically (Rotten
onwards) or sincerely (school of Strum-
mer). Bragg is a Strummerista, authenti-
cally himself though with considerable
presentational wit and ingenuity. That
authenticity was at first demonstrated in
pub-standard voice, busker guitar and
demo-quality records that defined him as
both punkily DIY and a new kind of electric
skiffling folkie. This honest but plain sound
undersold some excellent songs ruminat-
ing romantically as New
Man dawned, his delight in
humdrum detail painting a
bigger picture – “With the
money from her accident,
she bought herself a mobile
home/So at least she could
get some enjoyment out of being alone”
(Levi Stubbs’ Tears) – aligning him slightly
closer with Ray Davies than the obviously
influential early Costello at his snappiest
and least convoluted – “For the girl with
the hourglass figure/Time runs out very
fast” (Valentine’s Day Is Over).
In this career retrospective available in
three different sizes, from single LP primer
to 14-CD completist box set, among the
40 pieces of memorabilia pictured in the
booklet is Bragg’s Smokey Robinson And
The Miracles Fan Club membership card,
and among several covers here is Smokey’s
Tracks Of My Tears, whose elegant double
helix of mutually reinforcing words and
music is what the Barking Bard’s inner clas-
sicist aims for in his own work.
When his sturdy tunes do hit the jackpot,
one wonders why Kirsty MacColl’s hit with
A New England is such a rare cover. Adele
for one should clock 2021’s I Believe In You
and I Will Be Your Shield, songs whose full-
fat band originals are far easier on the ear
than the early one-man band approach.
Perhaps he’s overlooked by being
pigeonholed as a political songwriter. The
inspirational Woody Guthrie is indeed a
constant, and, with Wilco, the Mermaid
Avenue trilogy set previously unheard lyrics
to new music. Like all political songsmiths,
Bragg seeks to transcend the didactic
and stir the blood, and largely succeeds.
Unusual and all the more resonant is
2002’s confession of the
disheartened campaigner,
Some Days I See The Point.
Making the political personal,
it poignantly embodies Bragg
the idealist. Madonna seldom
drops her guard like that.

Lois Wilson Daryl Easlea

MOJO 101
 Hits from the …Bongo!:
(from left) Tito Puente
and La Lupe shake a leg;
(right) vocal powerhouse
Celia Cruz.
F I L E U N D E R ...
Big bang theory
Pop records fronted by
percussionists gave Latin
soul label Tico a distinctive
drive. By Jim Irvin.
A
MONG THE FIRST to press Latin
music in New York when the mambo
craze blew into town was George
Goldner, who founded Tico Records in 1948
to release records by the scene’s front-
runners, Tito Puente, Tito Rodríguez and
Joe Loco, all of them percussion specialists.
Goldner possessed shrewd ears – he’d go on
to launch doo wop labels Gone and End, pop
label Roulette and Leiber & Stoller’s outlet
Red Bird – but also possessed a treacherous
gambling habit. Sooner or later all his com-
panies ended up in the hands of shady music
boss Morris Levy, who’d called in Goldner’s
debts. With Goldner gone, Levy employed
some excellent A&R staff and maintained Tico
as an energetic hub for Latin pop right up until
1975 when he sold all the label’s recordings
to Jerry Masucci, boss of then dominant Latin
label Fania.
From their vault comes a terrific new
double-vinyl compilation (by Joe McEwan)
of the label’s liveliest period, 1962-1972.
Hit The Bongo! The Latin Soul Of Tico Re-
cords (Craft) ★★★★ gathers 26 steaming
sides from Tico’s finest, across various Latin
crazes, among them puchanga, a modernised
cha-cha-cha born in Cuba and developed in
the Bronx, and boogaloo – the hybrid style
Getty (2)
popular with second generation kids and
often sung in English.
102 MOJO
always highly infectious. The band’s enthusi-
asm is palpable on Bobo’s instrumental singles
Do That Thing! (1963) and Be’s That Way
(1964). He’d soon be snapped up by the
Band leader and timbale tickler Tito Verve label.
Puente, one of the original Mambo Kings, Bongo champ Ray Barretto, who’d make
apparently had his glory days behind him. his name on Fania, fronted two key Tico
He’d left Tico in the 1950s and gone to RCA, releases in 1963, the charanga template El
but returned in 1962 with the infectious Watusi and the weirdly surf-friendly Babalu,
Oye Como Va (later reworked as a smash for a revived version of the Latin standard associ-
Santana, of course). Similarly bold singles Fat ated with Desi Arnaz.
Mama, Shing A Ling and the much-fancied From 1965, conga player Joe Cuba’s Sextet
track that gives this collection its title, Hit were prime movers in the popularity of booga-
The Bongo, all proved that the old dog had loo, their tracks packed with crowd-pleasing
mastered some new tricks. On Steak-O-Lean call and response hooks. Included here: de-
he’s joined by the mike-melting singer La finitive boogaloo smash Bang! Bang!, El Pito,
Lupe, a force of nature supposedly thrown out Psychedelic Baby, Oh Yeah, Sock It To Me and
of Cuba for her wild performances. Also here, Do You Feel It, all of them hard to sit still to.
her gutsy English language version of Peggy By 1969, Latin soul was thoroughly
Lee’s Fever (she’d also done established when another
it in Spanish), all rolled ‘r’s alumnus of Puente’s crew
(“Grrrrrrooovy baby”) and of the 1940s, Al Escobar,
her trademark filthy laugh, made a surprise comeback
like a lecherous woodpecker. with an album of revamped
Another vocal powerhouse instrumental hits. His ar-
of the period, Celia Cruz, rangements of Archie Bell’s
offers up a Spanish cover of Tighten Up and Jesse James’
Aquarius, from Hair, that’s The Horse are itchily effec-
spine-tingling. tive floor-fillers.
Another brilliant timbale Sporting a smart design
player, Willie Bobo, protégé and the venerable Dean Rud-
of Mongo Santamaria (often land’s informative notes, it all
credited with kicking off the A marvellous adds up to a marvellous entry
Latin soul sound with his hit
reworking of Herbie Han-
entry point to point to the Latin soul sound,
the perfect companion to It’s
cock’s Watermelon Man in the Latin soul A Good Good Feeling, a similar
1963), was an early adopter
of Latin soul. Many of his
sound. Fania collection from 2021,
and to Rudland’s own lively
recordings have a distinctive Let’s Do The Boogaloo comp
energy to them, his grooves from 2017. A total treat.

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Channel One Ibrahim Hesnawi

Sound System ★★★★
★★★★ The Father Of
Down In The Libyan Reggae
Dub Vaults HABIBI FUNK. CD/DL/LP

GREENSLEEVES. CD/DL/LP Uncovered: the self-

Roots anthems and their dub
counterparts, curated by
esteemed selector.
Known as
the ‘Roots
Defenders of
the Notting Hill
Carnival’,
Channel One
Sound System made their
name playing the hardest
Jamaican reggae and dub,
alongside compelling roots cut
in England. For Down In The
Dub Vaults, selector Mikey
Dread has trawled the
Greensleeves archives to
gather a mix of familiar and
obscure, with 10 danceable
vocals followed by hefty dub
versions. The compilation
proclaimed founder of
reggae in the Arab world.
Given the
pan-African
popularity of
Alpha Blondy
and Tiken Jah
Fakoly, and
the status of Bob Marley
throughout the continent, it
shouldn’t really be a surprise
that a young Libyan in Tripoli
could discover reggae (via a
friend who worked in
electronics), fall for a rhythm
familiar to that part of the
world and be struck by lyrics Pearly king: Prince
in search of peace, unity and – less adventurous
a new golden age for Africa. and heading for the
Recorded in Italy, the six-track mainstream in 1991.
Hesnawi And Peace appears

naturally favours the sound
of the Roots Radics working
at the Hoo-Kim brothers’
Channel One studio, as heard
on the Wailing Souls’ Kingdom
Rise Kingdom Fall, Michael
Prophet’s Just Talking, Triston
Palma’s Joker Smoker and
Linval Thompson’s One More
Chance, their delay-heavy
dubs ably mixed by Scientist.
Elsewhere, Hugh Mundell
disses an ex on Can’t Pop No
Style, Reggae Regular blast
politicians on Black Star Liner,
and Tetrack relates a slavery
narrative on Trappers.
David Katz
Nancy Sinatra
★★★
Keep Walkin’: Singles,
Demos & Rarities
1965-1978
LIGHT IN THE ATTIC. CD/DL/LP
A very different journey
along Boots’ back roads.
Although she
now seems
almost a
missing link
between the
eras of her
father Frank’s hard-boiled,
Rat Pack misogyny and the
(slightly) more enlightened
’60s, it’s easy to see why Nancy
Sinatra was originally viewed
as more kitsch than
counterculture. This collection
of rarities, oddities and B-sides
to the major hits nicely travels
down a less-known road, from
the brilliance of The Last Of
The Secret Agents – thrown
away as the B-side of How
Does That Grab You, Darlin’?
– to slightly twee covers of Bill
Withers’ Ain’t No Sunshine,
Neil Diamond’s Glory Road,
and Elvis hit I Just Can’t Help
Believing, a previously
unreleased duet with Lee
Hazlewood. And while some of
the then emancipation songs
today sound naively demure,
Shades and Love Eyes suggest
she could have been a serious
country contender if she’d had
first crack at a song like Harper
Valley PTA.
Andy Fyfe
to have been the first Arabic
reggae album – it was also
Hesnawi’s sole vinyl release
prior to this compilation, with
more than a dozen more
albums appearing on cassette
in the 40 years since. There are,
unsurprisingly, strong Middle
Eastern overtones: Tendme is
not dissimilar to The Clash’s
version of Armagideon Time;
Kesati sounds like a big
influence on Rachid Taha.
David Hutcheon
Superchunk
★★★★
Misfits & Mistakes
MERGE. CD/DL/LP
North Carolina powerpop
royalty’s fourth ‘Singles
B-sides & Strays’ set: 50
tracks spanning 2007-2023.
Any band that
can do songs
by The Cure,
Destiny’s Child,
Minutemen,
Tom Robinson
Band, Go-Go’s, Circle Jerks,
The Sisters Of Mercy et al, and
respectfully assimilate each
into their own aesthetic,
has both inclusive taste
and enviable flexibility.
Superchunk’s 30-year lifespan
attests to these qualities, plus
unerring tuneage and the zeal
to create more music than a
regular album cycle can
sustain, meaning even keen
fans can miss gems along the
road. Like 2012 standalone
single This Summer, for
instance, a raw-toned
Petty-patented blacktop
burner. Or three transformative
acoustic treatments of songs
from 2017’s punkoid What A
Time To Be Alive, effectively
Superchunk covering
themselves. Speaking of
covers, there’s also John Cale’s
Child’s Christmas In Wales,
recorded for MOJO 207’s
festive covermount CD,
while the collection’s title
acknowledges the scary
presence of three Misfits
songs. As for ‘Mistakes’,
however, there really are none.
Keith Cameron
Semi precious
Prince’s uneven 13th LP gets
the super-deluxe box set
treatment. By Tom Doyle.
Prince & The New
Power Generation
★★★
Diamonds And Pearls
WMG. CD/DL/LP
THE DAWN of the ’90s found Prince in a
precarious position. Having poured a lot
of money into a Purple Rain film sequel,
Graffiti Bridge, that proved both a com-
mercial and critical flop, his superstar glow
was beginning to fade. Albums-wise, while
its accompanying soundtrack record and
1989 movie tie-in Batman both had their
moments, there was a general sense that
Prince’s purple patch was (literally) over.
In approaching his next record, for
the first time he allowed himself to be
A&R’d, by Warner Brothers’ Mo Ostin
and Lenny Waronker (whose combined
credits included Jimi Hendrix, R.E.M. and
Madonna). Made with his recently assem-
bled band, The New Power Generation,
Diamonds And Pearls was to return Prince to
multi-platinum status, albeit with a sound
that was notably less adventurous and way
more mainstream. At the same time, he was
playing catch-up with prevailing musical
trends (hip-hop, swingbeat), becoming a
follower rather than a leader.
The result was a polished if uneven of-
fering. Cream rewrote 1986’s Girls & Boys
with a T.Rex-y swagger. The wan title track
employed Delfonics-styled
smoothness but lacked soul
magic. In its worst moments
Diamonds And Pearls com-
mitted the sin of sounding
ordinary, particularly through
Prince’s use of the tinny, computer-
programmed beats that were in vogue,
as opposed to the brilliantly wonky Linn
LM-1 drum machine rhythms (its sounds
detuned and fed through guitar FX pedals)
that made his records so sonically unique
in the ’80s.
Not all was lost. The aggressive groove
and siren blasts of Gett Off were clearly
indebted to Public Enemy, while Daddy
Pop recast Sly And The Family Stone
for the hip-hop age. The standout,
meanwhile, was Money Don’t Matter 2
Night, with its Steely Dan vibe and
beautiful, soulful vocal. Inspired by the
beginning of the 1990s global recession,
it was also written at a time when Prince
himself was in financial peril, underscoring
its heartfelt authenticity.
As with previous super-deluxe Prince
reissues, this new box set offers a ton of
unreleased tracks (47 in total). Ranging
from the ropey – Schoolyard sees him at
the age of 32 singing about losing his
virginity at 16 to, erk, a 14-year-old girl;
Horny Pony features a toe-curling rap –
to the bafflingly binned, they nonetheless
provide real insight into Prince’s creative
mind. Highlights include ghetto chronicle
The Voice, jazz instrumental tribute
Letter 4 Miles (recorded two days after
his friend Davis’s death) and, best of all,
the gently trippy Alice Through The
Looking Glass, with Prince’s Camille-styled
falsetto and disorientating semitonal
chorus vocal shifts.
As history records, even post-resurgent
success, Prince’s war against Warners was
to quickly follow. Meanwhile, in the here
and now, the modern-day lis-
tener can have fun attempting
to compile from its outtakes a
stronger and more satisfy-
ing album than the original
Diamonds And Pearls.

MOJO 105
 B U R I E D T R E A SU R E CREDITS
Tracks: Trilby’s
Couch/Just Talk/
There’s A Scent Of
Rain In The Air/Our
Dust/So Soon/Give “I still didn’t have musical ambitions,”
Me/To Sleep/Looks she maintains. “I thought I was a visual art-
Like/Sometime/One
Of Our Girls (Has ist – film was my main interest – but that
Gone Missing) fed into the music.”
Personnel: Angela It would be another six years before
Conway (vocals,
A.C. Marias returned with Just Talk, an air-
bass, synths), Bruce
ier, rhythmic creation that Mute founder
Gilbert (guitar, bass,
synths) (and Gilbert/Lewis collaborator) Daniel
Producers: Paul Miller offered to release. “I’m unsure why
Kendall, John Fryer,
we started again,” Conway says. “But then
Bruce Gilbert, Gareth
Jones Daniel asked if we’d make an album. That
Released: 1989 was a bit daunting.”
Recorded: Two more years passed before a third
Worldwide Studios
and Blackwing single: an unexpected cover of Canned
Studios, London Heat’s Time Was, featuring bassist Barry
Current Adamson and Birthday Party guitarist
availability:
streaming services
Rowland S. Howard. Back to the core duo,
Conway and Gilbert hunkered down to
make an album, which covered an experi-
mental, broad spectrum: suspenseful ballads
(Trilby’s Couch), crepuscular ambience
(There’s A Scent Of Rain In The Air), discord
(Give Me) and ethereal pop (the title track,
and A.C. Marias’ third single). One online
fan’s comment is worth repeating: “I’m pretty
sure that David Lynch had listened to A.C.
Missing in action: A.C. Marias quite a bit in the late ’80s.”
Marias’ Angela Conway – “It all happened organically, out of my
“I got to do what I wanted.” head,” says Conway. “But also, because Bruce
is a great guitarist.” She points to the influence

Vanishing Point
of Eno-affiliated kosmische duo Cluster’s
album Grosses Wasser (“I listened to it over and
over”) and Can keyboardist Irmin Schmidt’s
film music, and adds, “I also had a penchant
This month’s rescuee from intuitive approach to sound and Gilbert’s for teenage girl pop, often derided at the time.
music’s dead letter office: equally unrestricted facility on guitar. Aptly for Songs developed because of the lyrics.” The
its title, it vanished into the ether. album title, “arrived early on, after something
proto dream-pop for spies. The day MOJO calls, Conway is in her I’d overheard. I was reading a lot of [espio-
London studio, where she might paint, draw, nage grandmaster] John Le Carré at the time,
A.C. Marias write, or return to the film short she has been but the [title] track has no narrative, though
One Of Our Girls developing for 10 years. “It’s about a woman people kept giving it one, which is a good way
(Has Gone Missing) in a shopping mall,” she says. “It’s not a spoof, to respond.”
more a take on Dante’s Inferno. I’m just play- The title song closed the album, depart-
MUTE, 1989
ing, like most art that comes into being. As ing with a repeated echo of “She’s gone!” It’s

I
N 1975, at Watford College of Art & Design
in Hertfordshire, 18-year-old foundation
course student Angela Conway attended a
lecture given by guest speaker Brian Eno, for-
mer Roxy Music synth sage turned self-gen-
erated alt-pop star and imminent godfather
of ambient music. “The part I took on board
most,” she now recalls, “was Eno saying, ‘I’m
not a musician. And you don’t need to be a
musician to make music, to make sound.’”
Armed with this reassurance, and find-
ing herself amongst a group of friends that
included fellow student Colin Newman and
the college’s audiovisual aids technician Bruce
Gilbert – soon to become the respective singer
and guitarist of punk outliers Wire – Conway
embarked on a path that would eventually lead
to a debut album recorded with Gilbert, under
the name A.C. Marias, pairing the initials from
her first and last names with the Latin spelling
of her middle name, Maria.
Released by Mute in 1989, One Of Our Girls
(Has Gone Missing) is as enigmatic and allur-
ing as its title; a haunted, filmic, post-punk
brand of dream-pop just before that genre was
recognised, steeped in equal parts beauty and
Mute Records
A.C. Marias was.”
Growing up in Hertfordshire 12 miles
down the road from Watford, Conway admits Having directed all A.C. Marias’ videos, she
“music was all around” (Bowie
was her primary love), and
she could “pick out tunes on a
piano, but my musicality came
out more in dance. I never
considered myself a musician;
I was just doing my version.”
Gilbert was already
experimenting with tape
loops, whilst Conway “fiddled
around” with the analogue
equipment at hand, including
the Eno-approved EMS VCS 3
synthesizer. After Wire’s initial
run of albums, Gilbert and
Wire bassist Graham Lewis
turned left together, creating
primitive electronica under
various names (Cupol, Dome,
P’o, Duet Emmo) that oc-
casionally featured Conway’s
suitably angelic vocal. In 1980,
Gilbert and Lewis’s label
a sentiment that Conway took literally, given
she has never released another piece of music.
worked as a video director,
(with over 70 commissions,
including Erasure, Smashing
Pumpkins, Maria McKee,
Nick Cave and Wire),
affirming her self-image as
a visual artist.
“There was talk about a
second record, but it didn’t
happen,” Conway says. “I have
no regrets. I never wanted
to play live, and I think more
“I was music would have entailed
that. And better one good re-
reading a lot cord than two or three not so
of John Le good. The internet has given
the record its own afterlife,
Carré at and there is agency there: I got
the time.” to do what I wanted – with
credit to Bruce and to Mute
ANGELA CONWAY
– in my own way and my own
voice, which harks back to the
18-year-old me at art school.

tension. The album still doesn’t sound quite Dome released A.C. Marias’ And One Of Our Girls… was
like any other record of its era, or even since, debut single, the sombre elec- my moment.”
which is arguably down to singer Conway’s tronic madrigal of Drop. Martin Aston

106 MOJO
Entertainment
Memorabilia
Live Auction
Over 190 pieces of iconic
music memorabilia
London Nov. 10, 2023

George Michael
“I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)” Music
Video Screen-Matched La Rocka Jacket

est. £ 30,000 - £60,000

 10 Tackhead
Tackhead
Tape Time
NETTWERK, 1987
You say: “Extraordinary.
Industrial hip-hop, dub and
rock all going on at once
in a Burroughs cut-up.”
@DweedleTum, via Twitter
Disillusioned with reggae after
the murder of his friend Prince
Far I in 1983, Sherwood hooked
up with ex-Sugarhill house
band (Doug Wimbish bass, Skip
McDonald guitar, Keith Leblanc
drums) to form industrial-funk-
hip-hop-dub outfit Tackhead.
Their first LP, featuring Bristo-
lian toaster/former bricklayer
Gary Clail on dystopian chant
duties, is essentially a comp
of new versions of Tackhead’s
best early work. A sonic assault
of jackhammer beats, repeti-
tive vocal samples (Thatcher,
news reels about the arms race,
etc) and plenty of “is my hi-fi
broken?” moments, TTT is not
Sherwood at the controls: for the faint-hearted. Though
On-U Sound’s dub CAST YOUR perhaps not as revolutionary
maestro turns mixology VOTES… sounding as it was on release,
into an art form. This month you it still punches hard.
chose your Top 10
Adrian Sherwood

Adrian Sherwood
productions. Next
month we want
your Sparks Top 10.
Send selections via
Twitter, Facebook,
Instagram or
The Godfather of UK bass culture’s sonic – cavernous bass, syncopated e-mail to mojo@
bauermedia.co.uk
finest productions. By Simon McEwen. rhythms, mind-melting effects,
with the subject
sampled voices, electronic textures –

W
‘How To Buy Sparks’
HERE TO START?! So vast and unwieldy evolved from studying the mixing- and we’ll print the
desk wizardry of his dub pioneering best comments.
is Adrian Sherwood’s back catalogue of
productions and remixes, spanning 40-plus heroes Scratch and King Tubby. But
years, that any attempt to distil it down for the purposes by the mid-’80s, Sherwood had found his “own sound”
of this month’s How To Buy can only scratch the surface and become a professor of echo chamber science in his
4 Dub Syndicate
Tunes From The
Missing Channel
of such an extensive, innovative body of work. With the own right. This led to a slew of remix duties for such ON-U SOUND, 1985
uncompromisingly independent On-U Sound label he diverse acts as Sinéad O’Connor, Depeche Mode, You say: “Sherwood’s early
started in 1981, aged 23, Sherwood has explored the Simply Red, Einstürzende Neubauten and Coldcut, post-punk dub experiments
shake the speakers.”
outer reaches of dub, reggae and beyond with an array while fellow sonic adventurers Trevor Jackson (Play- P Vesty, via e-mail
of talent including such On-U stalwarts as Lee ‘Scratch’ group), Paul Epworth (Adele, Florence + The Machine)
Sherwood’s third LP with ex-
Perry, Bim Sherman, Prince Far I, Mark Stewart, Tack- and the late DJ Andrew Weatherall have all cited Roots Radics drummer Lincoln
head, African Head Charge, Creation Rebel, Dub Syndi- Sherwood as a key influence. ‘Style’ Scott under the Dub
cate and New Age Steppers (featuring The Slits’ Ari Up). Operating out of his “On-U Soundcastle” home Syndicate moniker indulged
the producer’s twin passions:
This inter-racial family of singers and players has always studio in Ramsgate, Kent since 2010, Sherwood is as rhythm and noise. With access
operated within its own universe – most often with prolific as ever. Recent remix LPs for Spoon and Panda to new technology at London’s
a healthy disregard for genre boundaries, Sherwood Bear & Sonic Boom are up there with his best work, Southern Studios, Sherwood
corralled a crack team of
deconstructing post-punk, roots reggae, industrial, while the latest run of outstanding productions for Lee musicians and singers (PiL’s Jah
electro and blues, then filtering it Perry (who sadly passed in 2021), Wobble and Keith Levene, The
through the prism of dub. Horace Andy, African Head Charge Congos’ Ashanti Roy, Bim Sher-
“Right from the beginning, I was “Sherwood is and Creation Rebel suggest Adrian man, plus members of Creation
Rebel/AHC) to forge – what
trying to find my own sound,” he a professor of Sherwood is still very much searching is called now – a ‘new roots’
told me in 2021, “because there was for something people haven’t heard genre. But that bland label does
no point copying the Jamaicans – we echo chamber before. Hopefully the listener will be a disservice to Tunes’ thrilling
couldn’t anyway, because we didn’t science.” serviced in that department with this
cut’n’paste approach to Jamai-
can reggae, where disjointed
Alamy, RR Creamer

have their studios or musicianship. Top 10. Failing that, you can at least be beats, machine-triggered vocal
I just always want the sonic to be assured – in the words of On-U poet samples and found sounds coa-
lesce to form a post-punk-digi-
interesting, something people haven’t Andy Fairley – your head will become dub extravaganza. Tunes is still
heard before.” Sherwood’s trademark a crazy, bulbous punchbag of sound… one of On-U’s best-selling LPs.

108 MOJO
 H OW T O B U Y

Learning To Cope 8 & Players

9WithMark Stewart

Cowardice
Singers

Staggering Heights
7 Creation Rebel
Starship Africa 6 Primal Scream
Echo Dek 5 Horace Andy
Midnight Scorchers
4D RHYTHMS, 1980 CREATION, 1997 ON-U SOUND, 2022

ON-U SOUND, 1983
You say: “Cowardice still
sounds disorientating and
disturbing 40 years on.”
Lloyd Mahoney, via e-mail
After the death this year of his
friend and collaborator Mark
Stewart, Sherwood described
him as “the biggest musical
influence in my life and our ex-
tended family.” Stewart joined
On-U’s New Age Steppers after
Bristol post-punk agitators The
Pop Group split in 1981, before
making this solo debut with
Sherwood and members of
Creation Rebel. Less abrasive
and more dub-orientated than
his previous band, Cowardice
is nonetheless a distinct sonic
statement, Stewart’s tortured
vocal railing against the ero-
sion of democracy and state-
induced paranoia over Sher-
wood’s jagged rhythmscapes.
Most extraordinary is Stewart’s
take on Blake’s Jerusalem, here
recast as an alternative post-
punk-dub national anthem.
ON-U SOUND, 1983
You say: “Possibly the
greatest ever reggae album
– certainly from the ’80s.”
@davepostpunk, via Twitter
All five Singers & Players – a
loose collective of On-U regu-
lars Prince Far I, Bim Sherman,
Congo Ashanti Roy backed by
Roots Radics/Dub Syndicate –
LPs are worth seeking out, but
especially Staggering Heights,
with its spongy rhythms and
heavy undercurrent of dread
(thanks in part to Clash-asso-
ciate Mikey Dread on School
Days). Other stone cold classics
include ‘Voice Of Thunder’ Far
I’s “true story” Bedward The
Flying Preacher, Ashanti Roy’s
Police & Thieves-adjacent
Snipers In The Streets and Sher-
man’s sweet lament A Matter Of
Time. Throughout, Sherwood
explores his trademark sound:
a mutation of Jamaican reg-
gae infused with post-punk
abstraction. This was the real
punky reggae party.
You say: “Starship Africa is a
deep, dubbed-out journey
into space and beyond.”
@JimmyJean, via Twitter
One of Sherwood’s more out-
there productions showcasing
his self-described “designer
dub” aesthetic in full effect.
Originally recorded in 1978
with Creation Rebel plus Misty
In Roots bassist Tony Henry,
Starship Africa was shelved
for a couple of years until the
producer decided to remix and
re-record with drummer Style
Scott playing over Eskimo Fox’s
original rhythms. The result
is a deep exploration of dub’s
negative spaces, Sherwood
triggering backward tapes,
percolating sci-fi synths and
clattering percussion over
valley-deep bass lines to create
a reverb/echo-drenched,
otherworldly soundscape. It’s
only a shame the Don Letts
film about ‘alien dreads from
out of space’ it was mooted to
soundtrack never got made.
You say: “Vanishing Point
dubbed out by the master.
A great gateway into
experimental territory.”
@topcat_365, via Twitter
Sherwood has remixed many
alternative rock/electronic acts,
including Depeche Mode, Nine
Inch Nails and Cabaret Voltaire,
but this dub overhaul of the
Scream’s fifth LP Vanishing Point
(Bobby Gillespie’s imagined
soundtrack to the 1971 speed-
freak road movie) is perhaps the
most adventurous. Echo Dek
finds the producer stretching
and squeezing the original
tracks’ Krautrock grooves and
ambient-dub textures into
new, smoked-out psychedelic
vistas, where Far I’s “Selassie I”
chants pop up on the thunder-
ous Wiseblood and hypnotic,
Ethiopiques-style sax weaves
through Living Dub. Also check
Sherwood’s recent Reset In Dub
by Panda Bear & Sonic Boom –
both records prime examples of
mixology as art form.
You say: “The aural
equivalent of watching a top
chef turn simple ingredients
into a delicious meal.”
@Ellis_Eve123, via Twitter
On a white-hot creative streak
after Rainford, Sherwood stuck
with the formula for reggae
legend/Massive Attack col-
laborator Horace Andy’s 2022
comeback LP, Midnight Rocker.
But companion dub set Scorch-
ers was more than just a version
excursion, Sherwood opting in-
stead for a full-on, psychedelic
sound-system overhaul replete
with MC interjections from
Daddy Freddy and Lone Ranger.
Standout Midnight Scorcher is
a dancehall-style reworking of
Massive’s Safe From Harm, with
Andy’s yearning vocal floating
above ribcage-rattling bass and
spiralling synths. While the qui-
eter moments – Sleepy’s Night
Cap is adorned with weeping
cello and mournful melodica
– serve as breathers from the
potent rub-a-dub-adelica.

NOW DIG THIS

3SongsAfrican
Charge
Head

Of Praise
2 Bim Sherman
Miracle
ON-U SOUND, 1990
You say: “Songs… is a virtual
showcase for traditional
music from all over.”
@SantistaEscocia, via Twitter
If 1981 African Head Charge
debut My Life In A Hole In The
Ground (fun fact: a slowed-
MANTRA RECORDINGS, 1996
The Pay It All Back label sam-
pler volumes (from 1985’s Vol.
1 to last year’s Vol. 8) are all
essential one-stop shops for
You say: “A more subtle, current releases, alternate
string-soaked production mixes and unreleased tracks.
emphasises Bim Sherman’s For deep dives into individual
soulful spirituality.” acts, these 5-CD anthology
Tim Whittle, via e-mail box sets are excellent VFM:
Sherwood’s favourite Jamaican The New Age Steppers: Step-
ping Into A New Age (1980-
singer, Bim Sherman cut a
series of excellent JA 45s in the 2012); African Head Charge:
Drumming Is A Language

down version of Far Away Chant
soundtracked an unsettling
scene in David Lynch’s Wild At
Heart) set the sonic template
for Sherwood and Jamaican
percussionist Bonjo Iyabinghi
Noah’s experimental psyche-
delic dub, then Songs Of Praise
refined it and expanded it
almost a decade later. Over hyp-
notic polyrhythms and shud-
dering low-end bass, Sherwood
layers a succession of stirring
religious chants – interspersed
with Skip McDonald’s searing
guitar – to conjure an affecting,
joyful noise. SOP is an ethnomu-
sicologist’s dream (Alan Lomax
gets a sleeve credit as if to prove
it), and a masterclass in the
synergy of bass and drum.
late 1970s before relocating
to England in the early ’80s
to join the On-U family. Sher-
man’s emotive roots crooning
featured on a bunch of Singers
& Players albums, but none cap-
tured it quite so magnificently
than on this top-drawer collec-
tion of reworked near-acoustic
songs. Co-produced with Skip
‘Little Axe’ McDonald and tabla
player Talvin Singh, Sherwood
sets Sherman’s hauntingly
beautiful vocal against a
backdrop of sumptuous
Bollywood strings, rumbling
percussion and ever-so-subtle
bass vibrations. The results
are mesmerising, and unlike
any ‘reggae’ album you’ve
ever heard.
1Lee
‘Scratch’ Perry (1990-2011); Dub Syndicate:
Ambience In Dub (1982-1985).
Rainford/Heavy Rain For forthcoming releases,
ON-U SOUND, 2019 Sherwood’s friend Steve
Barker regularly airs choice
You say: “On Rainford Sherwood perfectly locates both
Scratch’s mischievous and mystical spirit.” A Jones, via e-mail On-U cuts on his weekly
Mixcloud radio show On The
Sherwood and Perry’s first collaboration, 1987’s Time Boom X De Wire (fan fact #2: Steve says
Devil Dead, resurrected Scratch’s career after he torched his Black one of his favourite On-U sets
Ark studio in 1983. For Rainford, Sherwood changed tack, adopting is “the neglected Hustling
a similar pared-back production MO as Rick Rubin to bring out Ability [1995] by 2 Badcard,
the then 83-year-old Perry’s reflective side, resulting in his most not just because I named
intimate record. There’s righteous fire in his belly too on stand-out both the band and the LP!”)
Autobiography Of The Upsetter, Scratch the “black angel” visiting Elsewhere, the monthly On-U
Earth to create a “godly din”, while elsewhere he word-associates Sound Sunday Roast on
about punching the Pope in his arse and inviting the Queen to his Widgeon Airwaves, hosted
“black magic party”. On the dub set, Heavy Rain, Sherwood emphati- by David Asher, is On-U’s offi-
cally pushes the needle into the red, most notably on the monster cial online radio programme
Brazilian-voodoo groove of Here Come The Warm Dreads (with Eno which broadcasts rare, classic
on keyboards and “right channel”). Best taken together, both LPs are and exclusive mixes.
late-career masterpieces from the “Dali of Dub” and his successor.

MOJO 109
 By George!: Harrison
in Plymouth, Devon,
during the filming of
Magical Mystery Tour,
September 12, 1967.

WHAT WE’VE
LEARNT
● The Eric
Idle-directed video
for Harrison’s 1976
single Crackerbox
Palace (Number 19
in the States; a flop
in Britain) is
essentially a tour
around Friar Park,
replete with the
singer’s friends in
Python-esque garb.
● Harrison was a
big fan of motor
racing, likening it
to “noisy rock’n’roll
really. The drivers
are like rock’n’roll
musicians. They
live for now and
don’t really care
too much about
everything else…”
● Harrison wasn’t
a fan of Oasis (who

It’s all too much

freely pilfered
Boyd romantic tangle. titles from him,
including
“Those two were so tight,” Wonderwall and Be
Boyd notes. “I was just the Here Now),
one in the middle.” deeming them “not
Skewed views on The Quiet Harrison’s personality: eg, being someone More pertinent
very interesting”.
Liam Gallagher
One from voluminous author. “who, paradoxically, became more moody and perhaps is Harrison’s responded by
uptight after he learned to meditate”. More
By Tom Doyle. than 300 of those pages retell The Beatles’
often unsung role as a film calling Harrison “a
fucking nipple”.
producer (for a total of 23 ● Not long before
story, though curiously with no real attempt to films including The Long
George Harrison: view the tale from the guitarist’s perspective, Good Friday and Withnail
his death, Lennon
was irked by
The Reluctant Beatle which might have been the most obvious tack. And I) and how it nearly Harrison’s 1980
memoir, I Me Mine.
Certain insights are however forthcoming: the bankrupted him, just in
★★★ clean lines and precision of Harrison’s playing time for the Anthology
“[John] was
annoyed with me
Philip Norman are linked to his schooldays interest in project to replenish the because I didn’t say
he wrote one line
SIMON & SCHUSTER. £25 architecture; The Beatles sardined into one coffers. Then, graphically of Taxman,”

N
OW 80, Philip Norman has been
writing about The Beatles for nigh on
six decades. Famously the author of
bestselling 1981 band bio, Shout!: The Beatles
In Their Generation (which was so pro-John
and anti-Paul that Macca labelled it “Shite!”),
he has since delivered weighty individual life
stories of Lennon and McCartney, and now,
turns to Harrison.
Sometimes, it’s hard to fathom exactly why
he keeps returning to the subject, since he
seems deeply ambivalent about the Fabs. Much
like the recanting in his McCartney book, here
he’s forced to messily reverse out of the cul-
de-sac that was his nasty 2001 Sunday Times
Harrison obituary, in which he painted the sec-
ond Beatle to die as “a serial philanderer” and
“miserable git”. (Norman here acknowledges
that the piece was “unremittingly negative, in
places crudely insulting.”)
And so to this 500-plus pager, angled
Getty
room at the Bambi Kino in Hamburg in 1960 and horrifyingly, Harri- Harrison revealed.
were essentially living like people-trafficked “But I also didn’t
son’s attack by an intruder say how I wrote
illegal immigrants. at Friar Park in 1999 is two lines of Come
Occasionally, Norman’s Beatles-era as- depicted as the attempted Together…”
sessments are baffling (he dismisses The White murder that it was (he was
Album’s hypnotically dreamy Long, Long, stabbed more than 40 times), which along
Long as “bland”), but the narrative properly with his treatment for throat cancer two years
gets going post-split when Harrison retreats earlier, fatally weakened him, resulting in his
to his Henley pile, Friar Park, resurfacing for death, aged 58, from lung cancer in 2001.
the Concert For Bangladesh or the ill-fated In the end, it seems from Norman’s ac-
’74 Dark Horse (or press-nicknamed “Dark count, having lived a life of such intensity,
Hoarse”) US tour during which he was suffer- Harrison was as fatalistic as he was spiritual.
ing from laryngitis. His long-time friend since the
En route, the author hasn’t ’70s, Monty Python’s Eric Idle
finished with this “serial “Norman remembers “he was always
philanderer”, delighting in saying: ‘Don’t forget you’re
telling a tale involving George, seems going to die.’ From about
a ukulele and an LA sex worker deeply the time I knew him, he was
named “Tiffany”, and
particularly enjoying picking ambivalent preparing to die.”
“‘Just make sure,’” Idle
through the details of the ’70s about the recalls Harrison telling him,
rock star soap opera that was Fabs.” “‘you live life to the fullest

towards highlighting the contradictions in the Harrison/Clapton/Pattie every moment.’”

110 MOJO

Tomorrow’s
Here Today
★★★
Ian Broudie
NINE EIGHT. £20
Liverpudlian’s musings on
“Lightning Seeds, Football
and Cosmic Post-Punk.”
At best a fleeting
presence in
accounts of ’80s
post-punk and
’90s Britpop,
Broudie was in
the thick of both
and, though not the raciest
raconteur, here dishes
sufficient intrigue from his
producer/artist experiences to
offset ample philosophising
on studio obsessiveness/biz
protocol/general life.
Dark-overcoat readers will
enjoy Ian McCulloch directing
him to play guitar “like a
scythe” on Echo & The
Bunnymen’s The Cutter (while
Warners try to substitute him
with Robert Plant!), and Mark E
Smith heartily approving of an
engineer threatening him with
a kitchen knife circa Hey!
Luciani. In the ensuing decade,
he names and shames
Zombies guitarist-turned-MCA
bigwig Paul Atkinson for
dropping him, in a deal that
would’ve included a subsid
label carrying both Pulp and
Oasis, but Euro ’96 anthem
Three Lions soon defines him,
its mega-success ultimately
casting an inescapable
shadow. Time-wise,
Tomorrow’s Here Today
meanders confusingly, but will
nevertheless occupy many a
music fan’s Boxing Day
morning.
Andrew Perry
Life’s A Gamble
★★★★
Pauline Murray
OMNIBUS. £25
One of the underappreciated
female pioneers of punk
redresses the balance.
Directly
inspired by
the Sex
Pistols in
spring 1976,
Pauline
Murray put
inspiration into practice with
Penetration, in their early days
one of the purest and most
thoughtful of punk groups. The
balance is addressed with this
well illustrated memoir, which
takes her from her beginnings
in a now erased mining village,
Waterhouses, through the
mainstream music industry
and beyond. Her teenage years
as a pop fan – seeing every
group that passed through the
North-east – led up to seeing
the Sex Pistols at the age of 18
at Sayers nightclub in
Northallerton. Fired up,
she and some cohorts start
Getty/Virginia Turbett
Penetration. Initially, she saw
nothing unusual in a “young
woman fronting a punk band”,
but by 1979 the end was nigh:
“I couldn’t see any way
forward”. Subsequent
adventures with Martin
Hannett and the Invisible
Girls and her continuing
involvement with NE music are
well described in a rounded,
reflective book.
Jon Savage
John McLaughlin:
From Miles
And Mahavishnu
To The 4th
Dimension
★★★★
Matt Phillips
ROWMAN & LITTLEMAN. £30
The story of the UK’s premier
jazz-rock guitar slinger
brought up to date.
Guitar master,
world music
pioneer, spiritual
seeker and
probably the
UK’s most potent
contributor to the
history of jazz… no wonder
a clutch of writers have
documented the Yorkshire-
born musician’s exploits
with Miles Davis and the
Mahavishnu Orchestra. What
Matt Phillips’ scrupulously
researched account does is
bring the John McLaughlin
story up to date (he’s a grand
old 81). For anyone who’s felt
the guitarist’s later electric
bands were a pale shadow
of the first Mahavishnu
Orchestra’s frenzied virtuosity,
Phillips’ analysis spotlights the
gems amid the slew of releases
in the half-century since the
break-up. Phillips writes as a
fan, who first saw McLaughlin
in 1984, and can be a little too
kind about, say, the bloated
misfire that was 1974’s
Apocalypse. Nonetheless, this
is a fluent career overview of a
guitarist prepared to explore
far further than his blues-rock
peers of the 1960s.
John Bungey
Down Home
Music: The
Stories And
Photographs Of
Chris Strachwitz
★★★★★
Joel Selvin with Chris
Strachwitz
CHRONICLE. £30
The glory years of Arhoolie
Records, America’s premier
roots music label
The 100-plus
photographs
are prefaced
by a detailed
account of
Arhoolie’s most
momentous
years. Strachwitz, Selvin notes,
had “rummag[ed] through the
dusty corners of American
music” since his teens, but in
1959-60 his life was changed:
he met Lightnin’ Hopkins,
travelled with blues writer Paul
Oliver and released Arhoolie’s
first LP, by Texas Mance
Lipscomb. Over the next 25
years, Strachwitz turned an
international audience onto
blues, Cajun, zydeco, TexMex
and more, as he crisscrossed
the South with tape recorder
and camera to record Clifton
Chenier, Fred McDowell, Cajun
accordionist Marc Savoy and
many others. What makes
Strachwitz’s images so
compelling is his sense of
context. Impatient with
conventional shots of
musicians on-stage, he shows
us the response to them:
people dancing, eating, flirting,
learning (Flaco Jiménez
teaching accordion to Ry
Cooder) or simply being there,
in the music’s community
of pleasure.
Tony Russell
Holding The
Note
★★★
David Remnick
ALFRED A. KNOPF/PICADOR. £20
The esteemed magazine
editor looks for long arcs in
the careers of aging icons.
As the editor of
The New Yorker for
a quarter-century,
David Remnick
wields both a
robust Rolodex
and the view from
his perch atop the States’ most
prestigious magazine. So when
he profiles Leonard Cohen
months before his 2016 death,
Bob Dylan himself offers
chord-structure insight; when
he tails Aretha Franklin two
years before her passing,
Barack Obama explains that
her voice encapsulates the
ambit of American history.
Remnick is a tenacious and
expansive researcher, too, able
to ask Paul McCartney about
John Lennon’s tiniest slights or
summon both Baudelaire and
Raw power:
Pauline Murray,
punk pioneer.
Billie Holiday when passing
paternalistic judgement on
Keith Richards’ pharmacopeia,
Life. Indeed, the compulsion to
pack the history of everything
into deep-access profiles
or prolix reviews often
hamstrings Remnick,
giving readers less room to
understand the drives and
desires of his epoch-making
subjects than their career
contexts. However rich and
diligent these pieces are,
they frequently drift afield,
ironically in need of an editor’s
focus and pull.
Grayson Haver Currin
The Island Book
Of Records
Volume 1:
1959-1968
★★★★
Edited by Neil Storey
MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS. £85
Island’s ex-head of press
delivers a definitive
insider’s view of the label,
in LP-sized book.
“People who
were there
must tell
their story,”
scribbled Neil
Storey in his
notebook
back in 2007. And 16 years later
this first volume dedicated to
the history of Chris Blackwell’s
label more than delivers on
that promise. Storey’s very
personal intro suggests he was
almost born to work for Island,
and the affection he has for
the label is writ large on every
page as he chronicles its
evolution from championing
Caribbean music and black R&B
to becoming the home of
some of the most progressive
acts of the 1960s. Eyewitness
accounts underpin a vault-load
of memorabilia across 390
F I LT E R B O O K S
elegant pages where the
footnotes are as fascinating
as major events in what is an
exemplary piece of musical
archaeology. Roll on Volume 2
next October, spanning the
‘pink label’ period (’69 to ’70).
Phil Alexander
Triggers:
A Life In Music
★★★★
Glen Matlock
NINE EIGHT. £22
The Pistols and beyond: the
bassist/songwriter’s tale.
Having given a
briefer account of
his life in music
with 2012’s
ghosted memoir
I Was A Teenage
Sex Pistol, Glen
Matlock returns with this
self-written book to finish
the job far more satisfyingly.
Comprising 43 chapters
themed around songs that
were landmarks on his journey,
Triggers takes Matlock from his
early Faces inspirations
through his Saturday job at
McLaren and Westwood’s Let It
Rock shop and vivid memories
as a teenager living in a Soho
populated by the likes of
Jeffrey Bernard and Francis
Bacon. Given the later hostility
between the author and John
Lydon, it’s surprising to learn
how close they once were
– cackling together while
writing Submission and
ignoring McLaren’s original,
pervy brief. Even if the singer
and Sid Vicious represent for
him a “hostile corporate
takeover” that ends up with
him out of the band, his
subsequent life as a Rich Kid,
and bassist for hire by Iggy
and Blondie produces a
page-turner filled with
colourful, illuminating tales.
Tom Doyle
 F I LT E R SC R E E N Perfect Sense: David Byrne
dazzles in his “big suit”;
(left, from top) Jerry
Harrison (front) and Chris
Frantz; the band line up for
This Must Be The Place’s
lamp-dance; the essential
Lynn Mabry and Ednah Holt.

WHAT WE’VE
LEARNT
● If anything
proves this film’s
miraculous power,
it’s that the
re-release united
all four Talking

What a day that was

Heads under Spike
Lee’s watchful eye
at September’s
Toronto
International Film
Festival – the first
Talking Heads’ radiant 1984 patch of light, empty until the shadow of a gui- deepen the feeling there’s time they had
concert film returns to cinemas. tar moves over it, animating it. Byrne’s white a battle for something appeared together
sneakers appear as he heads to the front of an close to the human soul since their 2002
By Victoria Segal. empty stage; there’s a boom-box, a micro- unfolding here. Rock and Roll Hall
of Fame induction.
phone. “I’ve got a tape I want to play,” he says, Yet the intimacy is largely
Stop Making Sense the mild-mannered janitor, before launching generated by the sheer en-
● Director
Jonathan Demme,
★★★★★ into Psycho Killer. It ignites everything that ergy and pleasure crackling who died in 2017,
follows – the crew building up the set around described himself
from the stage, essential
Dir: Jonathan Demme him, the musicians bringing more heat, vocalists Ednah Holt and
as a “fanatical
rock’n’roller”. He
A24. C more noise, more movement. It’s cosmic Lynn Mabry in charismatic also directed music

W
chemistry, a big (if tightly syncopated) bang. sync with Byrne; Wey- videos and concert
HEN BASSIST Tina Weymouth With self-declared “fanatical rock’n’roller” mouth smiling with her
films for artists
including Bruce
initially heard David Byrne’s plans Demme working with Blade Runner cinema- own secrets; percussionist Springsteen, New
for the Talking Heads live shows tographer Jordan Cronenweth, Stop Making Steve Scales exuberantly Order and Robyn
around their fifth album, Speaking In Tongues, Sense is a phenomenal document of people drawing focus. Demme Hitchcock.
● It’s not a stretch
she wasn’t happy. That the singer would come expanding into the space around them, wanted to avoid multiple to see the influence
on-stage alone, gradually joined by the ex- making something wonderful from nothing. shots of the audience of Stop Making
tended band (among them P-Funk keyboard- And there was light. having a good time – that Sense – especially
ist Bernie Worrell and guitarist Alex Weir), Beverly Emmons’
It is fabulously calculated, as illustrated by “having fun?” nudge in the lighting design
unnerved her; she worried it was an attempt to the famous set-pieces – Byrne’s visual catch- ribs for film viewers – and and the Robert
rewrite history by portraying Byrne as origina- phrase ‘big suit’ appearing before Girlfriend Is only a few appear during Wilson-inspired
tor, waking the others to dance to his tune. Better; the Fred Astaire-inspired dance with a captions (“Onions”)
the closing Crosseyed And – on R.E.M.’s
He has since said that wasn’t the concept standard lamp during the euphoric This Must Painless (not least a child Tourfilm, U2’s Zoo
– that the set instead traced the development Be The Place (Naïve Melody); his Pentecostal with a stuffed unicorn). TV-era visuals and
of a repressed man liberated by music, com- fire-starting on Once In A Lifetime. There Byrne’s own adored
The viewer, instead, is American Utopia
munity and joy. Yet watching are fourth-wall-smashing on-stage with the band, shows.
this 4K ultra-high-definition moments – the singer staring the camera’s companion
version of director Jonathan “It’s cosmic at the camera as he dances as it avidly records Chris Frantz immersed
Demme’s 1984 concert during Psycho Killer feels like
film – so close and vivid it chemistry, a a foreshadowing of unnerv-
behind his drums, or Byrne, Holt and
Mabry hanging in spectacular suspended
might well be a portal to Los big (if tightly ing scenes from Demme’s animation during Once In A Lifetime.
Angeles’ Pantages Theatre for
those three December nights syncopated) 1991 film The Silence Of The
Lambs – while sequences of
ABBA chose holograms to revisit their past;
Stop Making Sense somehow feels even
in 1983 – it does feel like the bang.” stark lighting and info-over- more futuristic, collapsing 40 years down
stuff of creation myth. load captioning (“Videogame/ to nothing. It’s pure transport, a divine spark
It begins with a formless Sandwich/ Diamonds”) still casting a rare light.

112 MOJO
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LOVE HER
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RE AL GONE
Island life: Jimmy Buffett
– an under-told master of
American storytelling.

THE LEGACY
The Album: Jimmy
Buffett – Boats,
Beaches, Bars &
Ballads (MCA/
Margaritaville, 1992)
The Sound: Buffett
was rarely one to
deny his crowds
the good times

Exile In
on the sea or near its salt
line. There was romance,
mystery, danger, and
humour there, and he
they wanted, so his
reputation rightfully
hinged on the first
three Bs in this
alliterative 72-song
box set. Good times

Margaritaville
distilled it into records like
A1A and Changes In
Latitudes, Changes In
Attitudes. A natural
storyteller and showman,
Florida bard Jimmy Buffett ballads had booked his own farewell. he was ready-made for
Born in Mississippi but raised just east stages, too. After building
left us on September 1. along the shore of Alabama, Buffett was his Coral Reefer Band in
abound. But it’s that
fourth category, the
ballads, that always
captured some of
his most poignant
writing, prompting
serious consideration
as an incisive
storyteller, smiling
through sadness.

“D
ON’T TRY to describe the ocean if
you’ve never seen it,” Jimmy
Buffett sang in the chorus of
Mañana, a love song for the tropics,
loneliness and honesty. “Don’t ever forget
that you just may wind up being wrong.”
Buffett, of course, had seen the ocean, and
he got it right. Over exactly
half a century, Buffett turned
an aquatic ambit of pirates “…an aquatic
and pretty people, escape
artists and adult adolescents, ambit of
myths and mixed drinks into a pirates
homemade empire of wistful
songs with underrated and pretty
charms, perennial tours for
endless escapism, and
people,
merchandising wings full of escape
cheeseburgers in paradise.
Buffett died at 76 at the start of
artists
an extended American holiday and adult
weekend that marks summer’s
adolescents,
Jim Shea
indeed the son of a son of a sailor, the
enthralled descendant of a grandfather who
prowled the seas for decades. But it wasn’t
until Buffett stumbled into Florida’s
southernmost outpost of outlaws, Key West,
alongside Jerry Jeff Walker, that he found the
spiritual, artistic and chemical awakenings
that made him an under-told
master of American
storytelling. By then, he’d
dropped out of college,
dropped out of marriage, and
tried and failed to make it as a
folk singer in Nashville with a
sharp debut, Down To Earth.
Juxtaposing those
disappointments with the ease
and esprit of Key West? That
was his, well, boat fuel.
Rarely a chart-topper or
award winner, Buffett first built
his legion of Parrot Heads with
the mid-’70s, Buffett, not
unlike fans Bob Dylan or Willie Nelson, began
a travelling carnival that paused but never
truly ended, amassing a legion of obsessive
revellers to rival the Grateful Dead. He was a
true American itinerant, and his audience
revelled vicariously in those quests.
During the last 40 years, Buffett’s anthem
Margaritaville became his merchandising
cudgel, the brand name that bound a
restaurant chain, resorts, bicycles, board
shirts and liquor. Combined with the
Boomers Gone Wild infamy of his concerts
and his imprint on modern country’s
Bacchanalian turn, Buffett became an easy
punchline for cynical talk of selling out. But
behind the near-billionaire was a set of
wistful songs that perfectly twinkled – Come
Monday, A Pirate Looks At Forty, He Went To
Paris, Margaritaville itself – like navigational
markers, guiding those who’d never really
seen the ocean quite like Buffett somewhere

last hurrah. It was as if the pied a decade-long run of LPs that else, at least for a few minutes.
piper of trop-rock and beach myths chronicled his misadventures Grayson Haver Currin
and mixed
114 MOJO drinks…”
 Richard Davis
Astral bassist
BORN 1930
HE WAS a double bassist because as
a shy young man he gravitated to
the background. Yet few can have
played on so many great recordings
as Richard Davis. Most famously,
in 1968 he was the de facto
bandleader on Van Morrison’s Astral
Weeks, voted silver between Pet
Sounds and Revolver in MOJO’s 1995
writers’ poll of the greatest albums
of all time. It was just one of 16 LPs
he played on released that year,
following his first rock session,
The Rascals’ Once Upon A Dream.
He subsequently did many more,
including albums by Laura Nyro,
the McGarrigles, Bo Diddley, Bonnie
Raitt, Don Henley and, most
successfully, Paul Simon (There
Goes Rhymin’ Simon) and Bruce
Springsteen (Greetings From
Asbury Park, NJ and Born To Run).
Though he later played under
the batons of Igor Stravinsky and
Leonard Bernstein, racism blocked
his early ambitions. “I was 18 years
old and could play any and all
European classical music,” he said
in 2005, “but you weren’t allowed
to participate in the symphony
orchestra because there were racial
issues and prejudices.”
Cutting his professional teeth
with Sonny Blount (AKA Sun Ra),
Ahmad Jamal and Don Shirley, five
years accompanying Sarah Vaughan
inspired a bowing technique which
Alamy, Getty (3)
imitated her singing voice. Among
over 600 album credits, including 30
as leader or co-leader, a highlight of
highlights is Eric Dolphy’s 1964
classic Out To Lunch!, though his
voice as a bassist is perhaps most
expansive accompanying pianist
John Hicks on 2001’s The Bassist:
Homage To Diversity and
vibraphonist Walt Dickerson on
Divine Gemini and Tenderness,
both recorded in 1977. Forever
grateful for his own youthful
musical education, as a professor
of music and music history at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison
he inspired new generations with
his knowledge not just of music,
but of life.
Mat Snow
Brendan
Croker
Country & Northern
talent
BORN 1953
WELL VERSED in American roots
forms, it was surely destiny that led
Bradford-born Brendan Croker to
work on the railways before music
called full time. Combining
roughness and tenderness, he
began playing on the pub rock
scene, and from 1985 to 1989
fronted live favourites The 5
O’Clock Shadows. Likened to a
British Ry Cooder by fan and DJ
Andy Kershaw, in 1990 he formed
The Notting Hillbillies with Dire
Bass is the place:
Richard Davis, low-end
provider for Van
Morrison, Springsteen
and many more.
Brendan Croker:
a Notting Hillbilly
and “true artist”.
Straits’ Mark Knopfler: an on-off live
concern until 2002, the group’s sole
LP Missing… Presumed Having A
Good Time hit UK Number 2. Croker
also worked with The Mekons, Eric
Clapton, Kevin Coyne, Chet Atkins,
John Mayall and Tanita Tikaram,
recorded solo into the ’90s and,
easily bored, was loathe to play
the success game (he noted with
amusement that a German folk
periodical once called him “one of
the most pleasant musicians to
come out of England”). For his 70th
birthday in August, he shared a
video of himself singing his Notting
Hillbillies song That’s Where I
Belong. Knopfler hailed him as “a
true artist in every way… positive,
brave and generous to a fault.”
Ian Harrison
John Marshall
British drumming legend
BORN 1941
JOHN MARSHALL
studied
psychology at
Reading University,
where he met
Arthur Brown and
drummed on the
God Of Hellfire’s
1968 debut, The Crazy World Of
Arthur Brown. Marshall later
recorded sessions with artists
including Jack Bruce, Ralph McTell
and Linda Hoyle, and from the late
’60s became a major figure in UK
jazz and jazz rock, playing with
Mike Westbrook, Centipede and
“Marshall
had great
technique,
formidable
power and
a flowing,
rhythmic feel.”
THEO TRAVIS
Nucleus. He was a member of Soft
Machine from 1972 to ’81 and
drummed in Soft Machine Legacy
and its various appellations from
the early 2000s. Soft Machine
saxophonist and flautist Theo
Travis hailed Marshall’s “great
technique, formidable power and
a rounded, flowing rhythmic feel,
but these don’t begin to describe
the magic that he could bring.”
Despite ongoing health issues,
Marshall last appeared with Soft
Machine at Ronnie Scott’s in 2022,
while his drumming on 2023’s
Other Doors was typically incisive.
Mike Barnes
Gary Wright
Dream weaver
BORN 1943
LIKE SEVERAL of
his R&B-fired peers
of the late ’60s,
Gary Wright would
peak with a more
tempered AOR
blueprint;
synth-drenched
ballads Dream Weaver and Love Is
Alive were US Number 2 singles in
1975. From New Jersey, the singer
and Hammond organ specialist got
his first break in Britain, after an
introduction to Island label
founder Chris Blackwell led to the
rowdy gang that became Spooky
Tooth, acclaimed purveyors of
soulful hard rock. As co-lead singer,
Wright soared and hollered
through their first two incarnations,
momentarily leaving in 1970 to
launch an initially unsuccessful solo
career. Less known is his spiritual
kinship with George Harrison:
Wright played on the latter’s ’70s
albums, plus sessions for Ringo
and Nilsson. He later wrote for the
screen (he re-recorded Dream
Weaver for 1992’s Wayne’s World),
continued to play live and, in 2014,
published a memoir.
Martin Aston
MOJO 115
 UK TOUR 2024
LIVE in 2024 FRI
SAT
03
04
MAY
MAY
FIRST DIRECT ARENA
UTILITA ARENA
LEEDSª
BIRMINGHAMª
Special Guests SUN 05 MAY MANCHESTER CO-OP LIVE MANCHESTERª
TUE 07 MAY SOLD OUT INTERNATIONAL CENTRE BOURNEMOUTHª
WED 08 MAY SOLD OUT UTILITA ARENA CARDIFFª
Wednesday 05 June Saturday 08 June Friday 14 June FRI 10 MAY SOLD OUT THE O2 LONDONª
NEWCASTLE UTILITA ARENA LEEDS FIRST DIRECT ARENA MANCHESTER CO-OP LIVE EXTRA DATE ADDED DUE TO EXCEPTIONAL DEMAND
Friday 07 June Tuesday 11 June Saturday 15 June
SAT 11 MAY THE O2 LONDON
GLASGOW OVO HYDRO CARDIFF UTILITA ARENA LONDON THE O2
Wednesday 12 June WITH SPECIAL GUESTS
BIRMINGHAM UTILITA ARENA

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C’EST LA VIE
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 RE AL GONE

Terry Kirkman left the band in 1972, returned from

Association associate
BORN 1939
HE PLAYED in a
beatnik duo with
Frank Zappa and
shared stages with
David Crosby,
Mama Cass Elliot
and Doug Dillard in
“fiasco” folk rockers
The Inner Tubes/The Men in
early-’60s LA. But it was after
co-founding sunshine harmonists
The Association with guitarist Jules
Alexander, as 1964 turned into ’65,
that Terry Kirkman made his mark
on pop. As well as playing wind
instruments, Kirkman wrote and
sang 1966’s Curt Boettcher-
produced US Number 1 Cherish,
and weeks after the band opened
Monterey Pop, co-led on 1967
Number 2 hit Never My Love. He
also wrote Everything That
Touches You, the group’s last Top
10 success, in 1968. Burnt out, he
1979 until 1984, and made further
appearances over the decades.
A self-described “civil rights
activist from Kansas”, he also
worked as an addictions counsellor
and wrote for TV shows including
Name That Tune.
Ian Harrison
Len Chandler
Folk revival believer
BORN 1935
AKRON, OHIO-BORN Len Chandler
discovered Bukka White, Furry
Lewis and Lead Belly while studying
Music at Columbia University. He Folk hero Len
took up guitar and, fusing folk with Chandler: “brilliant
classical music, performed at the and full of goodwill,”
Gaslight in Greenwich Village, according to Dylan.
impressing Bob Dylan in 1961. “He
didn’t suffer fools, and no one could Beans In My Ears, as covered by Pete Pasadena’s KRLA radio’s current
get in his way… Len was brilliant Seeger, and Keep On Keepin’ On, affairs show The Credibility Gap.
and full of goodwill,” wrote Dylan in a favourite of Martin Luther King Chandler later set up the LA
Chronicles Volume 1. Alongside Jr.’s. As well as recording two solo Songwriters Showcase to help
Dylan, he sang at the 1963 March LPs, between 1968 and ’70 he wrote young artists including Stevie Nicks.
On Washington and in ’64 wrote some 1,000 freedom songs for Lois Wilson

THEY ALSO SERVED

ACTOR DAVID
McCALLUM (below,
b.1933) was known for TV
programmes including The
Man From U.N.C.L.E., Colditz,
Sapphire & Steel and NCIS.
The son of musical parents,
he also released four
instrumental pop/jazz LPs
produced by David
Axelrod in 1966
and 1967: tracks
The Edge and
House Of
Mirrors were
sampled by
hip-hoppers
including Dr
Dre, DJ Shadow
and Kendrick Lamar.
FREE JAZZ saxophonist
CHARLES GAYLE
(b.1939) was homeless for
almost two decades, and
played his music on the
streets of New York. In 1988
he released the first of more
than 30 albums of intense,
often religiously inspired
music. He also played piano,
appeared in the red-nosed
guise of Streets The Clown,
and collaborated with Henry
Rollins, Cecil Taylor and
Sunny Murray.
BELGIAN singer LOU
DEPRIJCK (b.1946)
co-wrote and sang 1978 UK
Courtesy Probe Plus Records, Alamy (2), Getty (2)
BRITISH-KENYAN singer and
whistler ROGER
WHITTAKER (b.1936) had
a worldwide hit with 1971’s
The Last Farewell, having
already enjoyed British
success with poignant
easy-listeners Durham Town
(The Leavin’), I Don’t Believe
In If Anymore and
New World In The
Morning. His
period of
hitmaking was
brief, but he
continued
to perform
until 2011,
enjoying
particular loyalty
from his German fans.
BASSIST DAVE ROE
(b.1952) was raised in Hawaii.
After playing R&B in the ’60s
and ’70s, he moved to
Nashville and played with Mel
Tillis, Charlie Louvin and
others: he later joined Johnny
Cash’s band for 11 years. He
also played with Loretta
Lynn, Merle Haggard, Kris
Kristofferson, Ian Hunter,
Joe Ely, Dan Auerbach,
Cee-Lo Green, Dwight
Yoakam and others, and
ran Nashville’s Seven Deadly
Sins studio.
MARVELETTES co-founder
Number 1, in 1961), Playboy
(1962) and Don’t Mess With
Bill (1966), plus four more Top
40 US singles chart entries.
After the group split she
briefly worked as a writer for
Motown, before leaving
music in 1972.
CHRISTIAN rocker MYLON
LEFEVRE (b.1944), a scion
of Mississippi gospel family
The LeFevres, wrote his first
song Without Him in 1961; its
many interpreters included
Elvis. A singer and guitarist, he
later pioneered the ‘Jesus
Rock’ format and led his band
Mylon & The Broken
Heart: he also played with
Alvin Lee, Brian Auger,
Earl Scruggs, The Rolling
Stones and on the 1975
Tommy OST.
SMASH MOUTH singer
STEVE HARWELL
(b.1967) was a rapper before
joining the California
pop-rockers in 1994. The
band’s hits included Walkin’
On The Sun (1997) and All Star
(1999); suffering from a drink
problem, Harwell retired from
the band in 2021.
ARRANGER and pianist
FRANK OWENS (b.1933)
was musical director for
names including Petula
Clark, Johnny Mathis,
NBC’s Showtime At The
Apollo and David Letterman’s
original daytime show.
DRUMMER KENT STAX
(b.1962) joined Washington,
DC hardcore punks Scream
shortly after their formation
in 1981. He departed soon
after their third LP, Banging
The Drum, in 1986, and was
replaced by a young Dave
Grohl. Stax rejoined the
band in 1996 and again in
2009, after which they
recorded 2011’s Complete
Control Recording Sessions
mini-LP at Grohl’s studio, and
toured internationally. Stax
will posthumously appear on
the band’s impending new
album, DC Special.
INDEPENDENT-minded
manifestor GEOFF
DAVIES (below, b.1943) quit
carpet retail to open
Liverpool’s storied record
shop Probe in 1971 and, 10
years later, the Probe Plus
label, who gave the world Half
Man Half Biscuit, and
much more besides.
Frankly-
spoken yet
warmhearted,
and possessed
of exquisite
taste, he
passed away
Nebula in 2004, after
working as their guitar tech.
He played on all the group’s
LPs from 2006’s Apollo to
2022’s Transmission From
Mothership Earth, with a
seven-year hiatus in between.
He also played with The
Freeks, Immense and
Orange Goblin.
SINGER JOE FAGIN (b.1940)
played The Cavern with his
group The Strangers in the
Merseybeat boom. Later, after
singing advertising jingles
and joining Joe Brown’s group
Brown’s Home Brew, he
found UK chart success in
1984 with That’s Livin’ Alright,
the theme to comedy-drama
Auf Wiedersehen, Pet. He also
sang with chart-topping
charity supergroup The
Crowd in 1985 and, for the
2006 World Cup, re-recorded
his most famous song for the
English football team as That’s
England Alright.
TROMBONIST and singer
CURTIS
FOWLKES
(b.1950) played in
The Lounge
Lizards before
co-founding
NY “goofballs”
The Jazz
Passengers

hit Ça Plane Pour Moi, and
later met its credited
performer Plastic Bertrand,
alias Roger Jouret, in court
(the song’s backing track was
also used for Elton Motello’s
Jet Boy, Jet Girl). A huge star in
Belgium, Deprijck’s other
vehicles included Two Man
Sound, Lou & The
Hollywood Bananas and
Viktor Lazlo.
KATHERINE John Denver, Connie two weeks after with Roy
ANDERSON (below, Francis and Lena Horne. His the death of Nathanson in 1987.
b.1944) was the soprano other credits included ex-wife and former The group, whose
voice with the Motown sessions for Sinatra, Louis Probe business partner guest singers included Jeff
hitmakers, who formed at Armstrong and Bob Dylan, Annie. In tribute, HMHB’s Buckley, Elvis Costello and
Inkster High School in when he played piano Nigel Blackwell commented, Debbie Harry, released their
Michigan. She on sessions for “suddenly life seems less last LP Still Life With Trouble in
appeared on big Highway 61 sweet, death less bitter.” 2017. He also played with Lou
hits including Revisited. He BASSIST TOM DAVIES Reed, Bill Frisell and Sheryl
Please Mr was also (b.1975) grew up in Crow, and released his solo
Postman musical Wimbledon and joined album Reflect in 1999.
(Motown’s first director for California desert stoners Ian Harrison

MOJO 117
T IM E M AC HIN E
NOVEMBER 1971
…Kevin Ayers meets Gong, uptown
It was a month of
NOVEMBER 4 mighty albums: Led
Zeppelin IV, Sly & The Family Stone’s There’s
A Riot Goin’ On, The Kinks’ Muswell Hillbillies,
Yes’s Fragile, ELP’s Pictures At An Exhibition
and Nursery Cryme by Genesis.
Deeper underground, however, were
psychedelic jazz rockers Gong. Their
Camembert Electrique LP had just come out,
and tonight they began a series of British
gigs at Aberdeen University. Beside Gong
frontman Daevid Allen, on guitar and voice
was Kevin Ayers – whose third album
Whatevershebringswesing was soon to hit
the shelves courtesy of major label Harvest.
Being a solo artist and a member of a band?
Normal for Ayers.
He and Allen had been members of
underground trailblazers Soft Machine from
1966 to ’67, when the latter, an Australian,
wound up in France due to visa hassles. After
Ayers went solo in 1968, the two reacquainted
in the Balearics. In November 6’s Melody
Maker, Allen explained that Ayers had got
involved in summer ’71. “We decided to
incorporate [Ayers] in the band… he’d
Getty (4), Alamy (4)
decided to stay in France ’cos he was sick
of England.” Also around was former Softs
vocalist/drummer Robert Wyatt, who’d play
with Gong at a Hammersmith Town Hall date
118 MOJO
on November 11. To add to the confusion,
the current line-up of Soft Machine were
also playing British dates this month.
“We either play horribly or great,”
continued Allen of the Ayers/Gong
conglomeration, who recorded a
freewheeling session for John Peel on
November 9. “With us, the music either
falls flat on its face or takes off.”
For Ayers, there was also the small matter
of Whatevershebringswesing. Its creation
followed the dissolution of Ayers’ band The
Whole World in spring ’71: “I think Kevin just
wanted to change the whole style of the
band,” sax player Lol Coxhill told Sounds
earlier in the year. “I’m glad to be out of it
really.” That band’s wunderkind bassist/
guitarist Mike Oldfield and keyboardist/
arranger David Bedford would contribute to
sessions for a new Ayers LP at Abbey Road
from March to August, however. In his 2007
memoir Changeling, Oldfield recalled sitting
“I can’t write
songs unless
I am in love.”
KEVIN AYERS
In vino veritas: (clockwise from main
pic) Kevin Ayers outside Abbey Road;
on-stage with Mike Oldfield (right);
Gong live with Daevid Allen on guitar;
(insets) Whetevershebringswesing
and Camembert Electrique.
in Studio 2 waiting for everyone to arrive, and
then making a song on his own. “Eventually
Kevin rolled in,” he wrote. “He was a bit put
out, I think, that I had taken over his studio
time… he did keep it as a backing track: he
put some different words on it and it was put
on the album.”
The song was Champagne Cowboy Blues,
a clip-clopping, typically Ayers-ian tale of free
love and crazy wine. Elsewhere, there was the
epic orchestral rock spontaneity of There Is
Loving/Among Us/There Is Loving, menacing
semi-confessional Song From The Bottom
Of A Well, and blissful songs for Ayers’
girlfriend Margaret, who is pictured with
him skinny-dipping in a lake on the gatefold
sleeve. “I can’t write songs unless I am in love,”
Ayers explained to The Word magazine in
2008. “If I am not in love, nothing is
meaningful to me. I have no energy.”
It seemed the love power was flowing.
The album was simultaneously whimsical
and substantial, with the Wyatt-harmonising,
elegiac title song counselling, “You won’t find
the answer/Even when the wind blows.”
Whatevershebringswesing was arguably Ayers’
finest, but disappointingly it, and subversive
45 Stranger In Blue Suede Shoes, failed to
break through. Soon after, Ayers would
depart Gong after a gig in Louvain, Belgium,
 ALSO ON! TOP TEN
NORWAY
in January ’72. “I’ve split from Gong as SINGLES
completely as I ever joined them,” he told NOVEMBER
Sounds in February. “It ended up that I was
13
actually paying to play with them, so that
was out.” 1THEOCEAN PUT
YOUR HAND IN
HAND KAMA
Still, he considered his third LP a success, SUTRA
telling Richard Williams in early ’72 that he
was now getting “two or three” fan letters a EXPRESSO 2 MIDDLE OF
THE ROAD
CHIRPY CHIRPY
day. He also indicated that his next record RAINBOW CHEEP CHEEP RCA
would feature an orchestra, as heard on a
4Rainbow
Formerly the Finsbury Park
Odeon, north London’s
VICTOR
January ’72 Radio 1 Live In Concert
broadcast. In the event, 1973’s Feathered friends:
theatre opens with a
show by The Who (above). It’s
3BANGLA
GEORGE
HARRISON
DESH
approachable Bananamour employed an Paul and Linda envisaged as Britain’s answer APPLE
orchestra on one song only. But such was
Ayers’ supremely relaxed attitude to most
launch Wings, 1971. to the Fillmore East.
GET A MOTEL 4 JOËL DAYDÉ
MAMY BLUE

Macca spreads 10
RIVIERA
things, not least fame. “I like singing at Starring Ringo, Frank
parties best, where there’s plenty of wine Zappa’s 200 Motels
5DOGLOBO ME AND
YOU AND A
Wings
movie is released. In NME, NAMED BOO
and people playing bottles and spoons and estranged co-writer/director PHILIPS
things,” he’d told Williams in 1970. “I’d like to Tony Palmer calls it “the worst
make my gigs like that.”
NOVEMBER 8 Paul and Linda
McCartney’s new
film in the history of western
cinema”. On November 27,
6 POP-TOPS
MAMY BLUE
Until his death in 2013, he continued Zappa tells the paper his next
METRONOME

on his singular trajectory of drollery,

dreaminess and douleur, with highs and
band Wings are launched at Leicester
Square’s Empire Ballroom. Macca’s
film will be called Billy The
Mountain.
7 SWEET CO-CO
RCA VICTOR

lows, lengthy periods of Mediterranean hand-written invitations include a raffle

number for each guest. In between songs
ROCKING AND
LOATHING
8EATPAUL & LINDA
McCARTNEY
AT HOME
lotus-eating, and an output that continues APPLE

to inspire devotion. His last LP was 2007’s

triumphant The Unfairground, where he
by the Ray McVay Dance Band, selections
from Wings’ debut Wild Life are played.
was joined by admirers including Bridget In November 20’s Melody Maker, Macca
St John and members of Roxy Music, Soft
Machine and Teenage Fanclub. “I think you
re-emphasises that he wants to legally
dissolve The Beatles, adding that he didn’t
have to have a bit missing upstairs, or just play George Harrison’s recent Concert For
be hungry for fame and money, to play the Bangladesh because “the world’s press
industry game,” would scream that The Beatles had got
back together… [manager Allen] Klein
he mused to
The Guardian would have taken the credit.” In the paper
in 2003. “I’m on December 4, John Lennon writes a
not very good letter of reply and asks his old bandmate,
at it.” “have you ever thought that you might
Ian Harrison POSSIBLY be wrong about something?”
11 The first instalment of
Hunter S. Thompson’s
“gonzo journalism” novel Fear
9MARIE
BUFFY
SAINTE-
SOLDIER
And Loathing In Las Vegas BLUE VANGUARD
is serialised in Rolling Stone
magazine. Illustrated by 10 MIDDLE OF
THE ROAD
TWEEDLE DEE
Ralph Steadman, its musical
references include the Stones, TWEEDLE DUM RCA
VICTOR
Dylan and Jefferson Airplane.
YULE BE SORRY
12fromWith only Moe Tucker
and Doug Yule remaining
the line-up, The Velvet
Underground play Friars in
Aylesbury as part of a UK tour.
This month the group’s LPs are
re-promoted in the UK on ads
that invite you to ‘Make Your
Dream Kitchen Come True’.
GOODBYE JUNIOR
18brainBluesman Junior Parker
dies during surgery for a
tumour. In 1953 he wrote Cheep thrills:
and recorded Mystery Train Middle Of The
for Sun: it was later covered by Road.
Elvis, Dylan and Jerry Garcia.

AD ARCHIVE 1971

Cats that won’t cop

out: Isaac Hayes
and (right) Shaft
actor Richard
Roundtree; (inset)
the Number 1 OST.

SHAFT RULES THE US Isaac Hayes’ Theme
NOVEMBER 20 From Shaft is at
Number 1 on America’s Billboard singles
chart. “When it hit so big,” he tells MOJO in
1995, “I was in severe disbelief.” This month
he receives his fourth platinum disc for the
Shaft OST, which recently topped the LP
charts. In between dates in New York, Detroit
and Philadelphia, he appears alongside Carla
Thomas and The Bar-Kays on national TV
special Rufus Thomas Presents on November
16 in Memphis. Theme From Shaft will enter
the UK Top 20 on November 28. Hayes’
new album Black Moses was released on
November 1: after an unnamed DJ was
offered $300,000 for his promo copy, the Stax Depressed by your shoes? Try Dexter’s Alan
label employs ex-FBI agents to keep tabs on Aldridge/Milton Glaser/Peter Max-inspired
vision instead (illustration by Joe Veno).
known counterfeiters.

MOJO 119
A S K MOJO
What is The
KLF’s Ukraine
connection?
Let us answer your rock-related
questions and solve other
related conundrums.
I rewatched the Bunnymen’s 1984 A Crystal Day
documentary and noticed that the opening shots
include a yellow and blue Ukrainian flag, while
later, yellow and blue balloons are released. At
The KLF’s Welcome To The Dark Ages event in
Liverpool in 2017, the group arrived in an ice
cream van featuring Ukrainian script; their book
2023: A Trilogy features an imaginary female
group from Soviet Ukraine also called The KLF.
Why has Bill Drummond been planting notions
of Ukraine in his work?
D. Williams, via e-mail
MOJO says: In his semi-memoir 45,
Bill Drummond said the balloon
colour scheme actually referenced
“the label on the Bunnymen’s
first single (Pictures On My
Wall).” As for The KLF’s
Ukrainian allusions, MOJO
asked Jimmy Cauty about them
earlier this year: he said the
notion actually dates back to
the fall of the USSR in 1991. “We’d
read some stuff about Ukrainian
raves, which sounded really mad,
and because of the whole Eastern
Bloc collapsing, we thought it’d be a
really great backdrop for something a bit more
gritty than what the UK version of events had
been with acid house,” he said. Regarding the
female Ukrainian KLF story, he said they initially
envisaged a film. “We were quite a long way down
the road with that. I re-did all our record covers
and posters in Ukrainian, which was a massive
amount of work, and we were going to re-record
all the singles – which you could do now with
Getty (3)
AI – but for whatever reason, it just fell by the
wayside. Some things got left behind, like the
120 MOJO
ice cream van and a film that we showed. It was
just a weird, weird thing, a path that we went
down.” On Spotify, at press time, The KLF’s
pyramid/ghetto blaster logo still featured
Ukrainian script.
WHO TWEAKED
THEIR NAME?
I read about Dionne Warwick adding an ‘e’ to her
name in 1971 on the advice of her astrologer.
Who else has tweaked their name by a letter,
short of changing it completely?
John Gormley, via e-mail
MOJO says: If you insist! We cite Keith Richard/
Richards; Sam Cook/Cooke; Lana Del Ray/Del Rey;
Jim James/Yim Yames; Arthur Lee/Arthurly;
Marvin Gay/Gaye; Connie/Connee
Boswell; Santogold/Santigold and
Rezillos/Revillos. All very necessary,
of course! Now we can feel a
‘favourite manglings of names
on misprinted record labels’
discussion coming on…
RIGHT SONG,
WRONG SPEED
Re: Ask MOJO 358, regarding
songs that sound better at the
wrong speed. Flip The Tornados’
Telstar to play B-side Jungle
Fever at 33rpm. An up-beat, novelty
safari is transformed into a hypnotic,
mysterious piece of exotica. One imagines
Lux and Ivy of The Cramps would approve.
Jay Hedblade, Chicago
MOJO says: Thanks Jay! Other wrong-speed
suggestions in the 45s-at-33 rpm corner include
Jolene by Dolly Parton, Heaven 17’s We Live So Fast
12-inch (“sounds like a goth anthem,” promises
David Myriad), Don’t Go by Yazoo (“as if a young
Peter Steele auditions for Laibach,” says Dennis
Ewald) and Midnight by T. Rex (“a really heavy
Eastern Bloc party: (clockwise from top
left) The KLF’s Jimmy Cauty (left) and Bill
Drummond in their ice cream van (note
Ukrainian script above Mu Mu Land sign);
‘e’s are good for Dionne Warwick; Denzil’s
sole LP, Pub; (below) ZZ Top can boogie at
both 33 and 45rpm.
atmospheric tone,” argues Martin Kibler),
while Geert Stichelbaut suggests playing
the Beastie Boys’ Licensed To Ill at 45rpm
(“vocals sound hilarious”). Ludo
Wiegerinck, meanwhile, contributes Manic
Mechanic from ZZ Top’s Degüello, which “was
recorded to be played at both 33 and 45rpm.
Difficult to say which one is better.”
WHO ARE DENZIL BAND?
Pub by Denzil (Giant Records, 1994) is such a great
Kinks-meet-Smiths LP. Pithy songwriting and
great hooks. Who the hell were they?
Mark Sasaki-Prather, via e-mail
MOJO says: Led by singer Denzil Thomas,
Bournemouth’s Denzil’s sole LP presented
poetic real-life vignettes – Thomas told Interview
magazine that he got his material from listening in
to conversations at his local, the Richmond Arms.
It got some glowing reviews, with Billboard
calling their track Useless a slacker anthem-in-
waiting, but despite high hopes and US tours,
plus business problems, it was lost in the shuffle.
The group ended a few years later. There’s a web
suggestion of a new LP from 2008, but now
Thomas is busy as a “renowned branded music
specialist in advertising.”
HELP MOJO
Two teenage boys are immortalised in Bowie
video footage… the young guy in the tank top
dancing behind Bowie and Ronno on Starman on
TOTP, and the plucky lad who ran on-stage at the
end of the Ziggy at Hammersmith ‘farewell’ show
and gave the great man a hug. Have they ever
been traced to tell their sides of the story?
Wonder how many other kids have been
captured in their exuberant ‘musical youth’
in the film footage of rock legends?
Steve Taylor, Worksop
CONTACT MOJO
Have you got a challenging musical question for the MOJO
Brains Trust? E-mail askmojo@bauermedia.co.uk and
we’ll help untangle your trickiest puzzles.
 MOJO C OM PE T I T I O N

ANSWERS ACROSS
1 See photoclue A (4, 8)
MOJO 359 8 Siggi Loch’s German jazz label (3)
9 No Doubt demand silence (4,5)
Across: 1 Jarvis
Cocker, 8 Boo, 10 Zen 10 Flute-type instrument tootled on The
Arcade, 11 Relax, 12 Troggs’ Wild Thing (7)
Manitoba, 14 Hope 11 Elvis Costello’s country covers set (6, 4)
Sandoval, 16 Del, 17 13 The Cyrkle light up in ’67 (4)
Birthday, 18 Aurora, 15 Duran Duran’s smash LP of ’82 (3)
19 Odeon, 21 FON, 16 Phil Lynott’s post-Thin Lizzy band,
23 UT, 24 Popeye, 26 ----- Slam (5)
Decagon, 28 Alto, 29 17 Steve Ellis sang this 1970 film theme (4)
Derrick, 30 Nag, 32
18 Kelis takes charge in 2006? (5)
Man-Erg, 34 No, 35
Assassing, 37 Ego, 38 19 Alec Empire’s noisemakers (1,1,1)
Glad, 39 Gaucho, 40 20 Edwin Starr’s peace anthem (3)
VD, 41 Avalanche, 42 21 James Brown/Fred Wesley side-project
Ugly, 44 Adverts, 46 which covered Wilson Pickett (8)
Layla, 47 Gravity, 48 22 Hamburg rockers fronted by Inga
Iowa, 49 CTI, 51 One, Rumpf (6)
52 PMR, 53 Ono, 54 23 Elton John’s self-importance in ’78 (3)
Canticle, 56 Sherbet, 24 Trent Reznor’s band, abbreviated (1,1,1)
58 AC, 59 Voila, 60
25 The Flying Burrito Brothers built a
Chemist, 63 Whistler,
64 Chas Smash. Gilded Palace of this (3)
27 Sisters Of Mercy have mastery in ’88 (8)
Down: 1 Jazz Is The 29 London fusionists whose Rafi’s Revenge
Teacher, 2 Ron Wood,
was a hit in ’98 (1,1,1)

Take It To The Stage

3 I’m Ready For Love,
4 Crash Landing, 5 31 US gospel voice behind Don’t Break and
Cheap Trick, 6 Earl Forever (5,3)
Scruggs, 7 Goa, 8 32 Santana’s Black Magic ----- (5)
Blind, 9 Oxford Bags, 33 The Fabs take aim with this 1966 LP (8)
Win! MACH 20 dual-driver system, with one drive handling
the bass and the other handling the mids
13 Amigo, 15 Lento,
20 Out On The Tiles,
35 Madonna apologises in ’06 (5)
36 Bury St Edmunds’ venerable British
in-ear monitors from and treble – ideal for playing live and 22 Anna, 24 Pom,
25 Edge Of Time, 27
reissue label (3)
Westone Audio. listening for pleasure alike.
A pair are worth £400, and we have
Ecology, 31 A Seat At
39 Ed Kuepper’s were Laughing (6)
40 Montrose’s ornery farewell (4)

F
The, 33 Abaddon, 36
OR CLOSE TO four decades, Westone some to give away. Get in the game by Slang, 42 UA, 43 LL 42 California punks whose mascot is called
Audio has been at the forefront of completing the crossword, sending a Cool J, 45 Sorrows, 46 Milo (11)
scan of it to mojo@bauermedia.co.uk, LA, 50 ICA, 52 Phish, 44 The Bromley Contingent’s Miss
in-ear audio innovation, creating Catwoman (3)
making sure to type CROSSWORD 361 53 Oto, 55 Accra, 57
custom stage monitors which have been Evil, 61 Múm, 62 Toh. 45 Monster, Freak or Bitch ------ (6)
used by Rush, Def Leppard and many more. in the subject line. Entries without that
Winner: 46 Half Man Half Biscuit’s was for Offal (4)
Their MACH series of in-ear monitors is subject line will not be considered. 47 Check the timetables for The Hollies’
Bob Latcham of
technologically one of the most advanced Please include your home address, e-mail Hockley, Essex 1966 hit (3,4)
on the market, with every aspect designed and phone number. The closing date for wins a set of Primo 48 The Fatback Band’s was Spanish,
for both superior comfort and sound on- entries is December 2. For the rules of FiiO FT3 headphones Hi-Tension’s was British (6)
and off-stage. With a large and powerful the quiz, see www.mojo4music.com. and a FiiO R7 desktop 52 Can climbing on Delay 1968 (6)
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low, the MACH 20 features a proprietary For more info: www.westoneaudio.eu/
54 The Monkees’ cult film of 1968 (4)
1A 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 7 8
56 ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of
B Dead’s ninth (2)
58 P.J. Harvey in need of a drink? (3)
11 10 8 59 Dick Dale And His Del-Tones’
instrumental classic of ’62 (8)
9 12 60 Terry Hall and Lightning Seeds felt it in
’92 (5)
13 10 13 14 61 Jammers from Methyr Tydfil (3)
DOWN
11 12 17 18 13 14 1 Black Box hit which sampled Loleatta
Holloway (4,2,4)
18 19 20 15 16 20 2 Sound system named for the late
Osbourne Ruddock (4, 6)
17 18 22 19 23 3 Middle of the road music genre (4, 9)
4 Chaka Khan’s first solo hit (2,5,5)
5 Bluesman who wrote Milk Cow Blues (6,6)
29 30 20 21
6 Jimmy Smith, going back to jazz in ’65
(5,7,5)
22 23 24 30 31 7 Paul Simon’s car trouble in 1978 (8,2,1,9)
8 Eric Burdon’s band The ------- (7)
32 25 26 30 27 28 12 See photoclue B (4,7)
14 Tricky re-purposes Massive Attack’s
29 30 35 31 38
Karmacoma (8)
26 Redman’s beastly boast from ’92 (2,1,3)
28 See photoclue C (5,7)
39 32 40 33 34 30 Orbison, Wood or Ayers (3)
32 New Jack Swingers ------ -N-Effect (6)
35 41 36 37 44 38 44 46 34 Spiritualized song incorporating
J.J. Cale and the Velvets (3)
47 48 48 44 39 47 40 41 37 Catch this music book publishers from
47 across? (7)
38 His biggest hit was Little Green Apples
42 43 44
in 1968 (1,1,5)
41 Mann-Weill song recorded by Gene
55 55 45 52 46 Pitney, P.J. Proby and Scott Walker (8)
42 Music played by 2 down (3)
47 60 43 The Offspring’s guitarist (7)
48 AKA ‘The American Tribal Love-Rock
62 48 49 50 51 52 Musical’ (4)
50 Gary Moore’s Clones, with Ozzy (3)
51 Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith pins back her
53 54 55 56
lug’oles? (4)
53 Romford-born Motown producer ---
66 57 58 56 Sawyer (3)
55 First label home of pre-Bon Iver band
Getty (3)

59 68 60 61 DeYarmond Edison (3)

C 57 NY disco punks KONK say hello in ’83 (2)

MOJO 121
H E L L O G O O D BY E
Martin Rev and Suicide
A chance encounter in cold NY
bohemia lit the fuse; 45 years later
they said so long in London.
HELLO EARLY 1970
I’d done an audition [with his group Reverend
B] for London Records in New York. We didn’t
get signed. It was around the corner from
Museum [AKA the Project Of Living Artists
on Broadway], where I’d played one gig with
Reverend B. It was kind of winter out, so I
thought, Maybe I’ll see if anybody’s at the
Museum. Usually those kind of buildings
close and you can’t get in, but I tried and sure
enough, the elevator went up and I could
hear random feedback noises growing more
and more strong.
It was a loft space, about 1,000 square feet,
with freshly painted white walls and shiny
wood floors. I walked in and I saw someone
stooped over with a 2-track recorder, trying
to make it feed back, and a guitarist playing
noise guitar. At some point I found a couple
of large industrial spring-like
things, and like, drummed
[with them]. We did that for
about half an hour and
when they finished Alan
[Vega, singer] must have
gotten up and turned
around and we met.
Soon after that we’d find
ourselves in the Museum at
night, sometimes with a
couple of other artists. He
Roberta Bayley/Getty, Simon Fernandez
and I were always the last to
go. Alan was already a very
dedicated artist. He was “I could hear
going through a heavy
transition – he’d left his
random
home life and he was living feedback
at the Museum. Soon we
just kind of figured we’d noises growing
put something together more and
ourselves.
more strong.”
MARTIN REV
122 MOJO
Everything took a little time to develop.
The first gigs, I was playing drums. Paul
[Liebegott], who we called Cool P, he was
playing total noise guitar. Alan would blow
a free trumpet and scream into the mike.
They were just wall of sound, electronically
generated, not really songs. Alan started to
write lyrics – Mephedrine Mary, Junkie Jesus
– and maybe about six months into it, I
thought, Let me bring down my Wurlitzer
electric keyboard. Soon after he started
concentrating on the mike. I was still looking
for a way in which this could work in terms of
rock’n’roll, my native music, and one night in
one of these little practice cubicles with like a
Steinway upright piano at New York
University – again, you could just walk right
in – I started playing two notes way down on
the bottom, and as soon as I did, I knew that
was it. The earliest [songs] were Rocket USA
and Ghost Rider.
Alan read a lot of comic books and got a
lot of ideas from them. I got to the Museum
one night, he said, “Hey, what do you think
about this name Suicide?”
I said, “Perfect!” He’d been
reading a comic book called
Satan’s Suicide and some
anonymous person,
probably getting high,
said, “Man, just call it
Suicide.” Whoever that
was, takes credit.
GOODBYE 2015
We came from absolutely
no reception at all, except
usually an antagonistic one.
The whole thing was just
an adventure in nowhere
land, as far as anything
commercial went. But we
never split up. We had
periods where we were
very inactive and we
Deadly combination:
Suicide’s Alan Vega (left)
and Martin Rev on their
“adventure in nowhere
land”, New York, 1976.
concentrated more on solo things. Then time
would go by and we’d be brought together
again. In the mid ’80s [manager] Marty [Thau]
felt we should go back to Europe because
people were talking about us. It happened
again in the ’90s and the 2000s. Every time
there was a new like scene/trend, like Soft Cell
or electroclash, apparently, they were talking
about us. There was a demand.
The last time I saw Alan was the last gig
we did, at the Barbican in London [on July 9,
2015]. We did solo sets, and then we did a
Suicide set. Henry Rollins jumped in on Ghost
Rider and several people wanted to do Dream
Baby Dream with us at the end. It was received
really well. I saw Alan when he got into his car
when we left that night. We said goodbye,
just very briefly, and went our own way.
We had two prospective festivals coming
up in summer 2016, one in Joshua Tree and
one in Sweden. The most we’d ever been paid.
Alan just didn’t make it that far. He passed
[on July 16, 2016], and that was how it ended.
I’m not saying it doesn’t stay with me, but
the reality for me is creating stuff. You got to
do this every day, man. Wake up, go back to
that shit I was working on yesterday, because
every day is a new blank canvas.
As told to Ian Harrison
Martin Rev’s The Sum Of Our Wounds (Cassette
Recordings 1973-1985) is out now on Bureau B.
The last stand: Rev and
Vega on-stage at the
Barbican, London, 2015;
(left) Martin today.
 yl records and CDs
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Out 27th October