FEATURE: Spotlight: SACHA

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDITS: SASHA

 

SACHA

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I am not sure she will ever read this…

but there are many reasons why I wanted to spotlight SACHA. Usually, artists with single names – unless you are Adele – are quite hard to Google and locate! Or there are others sharing that name. However, when it comes to SACHA, there is no confusing her with anyone else! With this huge confidence, amazing raw talent and this phenomenal passion, it is hard to ignore her. There is something very relatable and down to earth about her. Sacha Taylor is a former hairdresser from Scotland, but she is now one of the most in-demand and captivating voices in Dance music. Someone who says she takes inspiration from the likes of Becky Hill and Ella Henderson, It got me thinking about classic Dance and the modern scene. SACHA is undeniably striking and stunning. Tattooed and super-cool, she has this incredible combination of sides and dynamics. Unlike so many artists who are filtered on Instagram and it is all about glamour, sexy shoots and that side of things, SACHA is very much real and authentic. She is someone who has collaborated with some amazing producers and artists, though I can envisage a solo album coming from her. Before getting to an older interview and something more recent, I did want to focus on that authenticity. Unfortunately, I have recently left a comment on an Instagram page for an artist (I shall not name them). It turns out that they were A.I.-generated. It is hard to tell judging by the photos, though alarm bells were perhaps raised retrospectively considering the glossy and slightly computer-generated feel of the photos and lack of interviews. However, the song vocals didn’t sound like your typical A.I.-generation stuff. What baffles me is why A.I. artists exist and what they hope to achieve. They will never feel the range of human emotions and be able to project the realness and authenticity you get from human singers. The Guardian explored this for a feature. That the sort of grief and heart-baring music that defined 2025 can never be understood and replicated by A.I. If artists like Dave Stewart have said we need to engage with A.I., most artists are wary about A.I. and it leaving them vulnerable. Taking away their rights and leaving them exposed to being stolen from.

I don’t think that music fans will ever flock to A.I. The most powerful and popular music is that with heart. When it comes to modern Dance music and incredible vocals at the front, what defines them is this incredible soulfulness, passion, heat and energy. SACHA has this incredibly powerful and soul-stirring voice. It can perfectly bring the heat of Ibiza and get clubs bouncing and uniting. It also has this adaptability and range that means it can bring the temperature and pace down for when the light goes down and people want to chill. When I was a child in the 1990s, some of my favourite music was the Dance tracks of the time. Often produced by male artists, it would have a woman at the front. Providing these incredible vocals. Often too, the female artist was not named or talked about, and they would also sometimes write on the track but never get the credit. I loved their incredibly potent and wonderful vocals, but always felt the fact they were marginalised or anonymous was brutal. I think things have shifted a bit, though does Dance still have a way to go when it comes to gender parity? Having interviewed a few female D.J.s in the genre, they say that there has been a step back. Many of the D.J.s are making their own music because they often collaborate with male producers and artists and do not get credit, or their contributions are diminished. I think that SACHA has had some great collaborations and partnerships, though I can see her going completely solo one day and putting out these wonderful albums. When you hear her sing, she is very much the genuine article! She has been in music a little while though, over the past year, she has really stepped up a notch. Getting stronger and more astonishing with every track, I do think this year is going to be pivotal. I would love to interview her one day to hear her take on the modern Dance scene and what her experiences are. The music she listened to growing up and her plans going forward. Before closing things up, there are some chats to get to. Some features. The first takes us back a little bit, but it does give you a sense of where SACHA started and where she headed. In 2024, The Courier shone the spotlight on this hairdresser who is now one of the most essential and important voices in U.K. Dance. Someone who is primed to be a global superstar very soon:

“Last time we spoke, in 2021, she was trying out the pop thing, and when we catch up now, she’s refreshingly unabashed about her pick-and-mix of a back catalogue.

“At that point I was still experimenting sound-wise,” says Sacha thoughtfully when we speak over Zoom.

She just back from the gym, but aside from speaking at “1,000 miles a minute”, she seems every bit the put-together starlet in her matching workout set.

“I went down the pop route and then a spent a while doing sort of rock-pop. Then I went to LA and did a lot more American-sounding music there.”

Sacha had her first proper taste of commercial success in 2022 when she ventured into dance music, providing vocals on a track called Hopeless Heart by German artist Keanu Silva and Austrian DJ Toby Romeo.

But she wasn’t done cutting her teeth.

“That song streamed really well,” Sacha says, modestly downplaying the more than 50 million Spotify streams. “But then everyone was trying to push me into dance music, and at the time I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do.”

I glean, during this call, that Sacha Taylor is not a woman who is easily pushed or rushed.

“I’ve always loved dance,” she continues. “It’s the perfect soundtrack for a holiday, or getting ready to go out with the girls. So now I’m exploring the dance sphere, and that’s really where my head’s at.”

Sacha going ‘Higher’ than ever with new track

Now that her fangs are sharpened, Sacha’s finally getting a bite of the real action.

This summer has seen her soaring to success in the dance scene with hit track Higher from chart-topping UK DJs Nathan Dawe and Joel Corry, released on Atlantic Records.

The track, which was released in August 2024 has already surpassed 700k streams on Spotify, and broke into the UK Top 100.

But even more excitingly for Sacha, it got her spontaneously flown out to the massive annual dance festival Ibiza Rocks – where she performed her first ever live gig.

“It was all very last minute,” laughs Sacha.

“It was two days before I was going on holiday with my family, so I was scrambling around, messaging stylists and trying to get all my stuff ready for the live performance.”

Ibiza Rocks was first ever live performance

Turning on a dime, Sacha rallied the troops, and three of her closest friends flew out to help her get ready.

“I had 25kg worth of clothes in my suitcase, and I swear I wore them all,” she chuckles.

After a whirlwind flight and packed content shooting day in Ibiza, where the social media teams for pop stars Rita Ora and Dua Lipa filmed Sacha, it was time for the show.

And for seasoned recording artist Sacha, the pressure was on to deliver live.

“I was so excited all day, and then reality struck,” she says. “I mean, it’s quite a tough first gig. It’s a big crowd, but not a huge venue. Plus it’s broad daylight, and a little early.

“Normally later on, people have had a few drinks and there’s less pressure. So that was nerve-wracking. But it was a brilliant crowd! They were super hyped and really supportive.

“I think about halfway through, I started to relax and really enjoy it. And as soon as I came off stage, I thought: ‘Oh God, I want to go right back on and do it again!'”

Mum Charlie ‘always knew’ Sacha would succeed

However, there was one thing missing from Sacha’s live debut – her family, including her “biggest supporter”, mum Charlie.

“They wanted to come, but for the first one, I just wanted a bit less pressure,” she smiles.

Indeed, it seems the only person more sure of Sacha’s success than herself is her mother.

“I’ve had this thing recently where I’m just being completely delusional, and thinking: ‘Whatever I want to happen, I will just make it happen,” Sacha says.

“And d’you know what? I think my mum is just as delusional as I am!

“She’s like: ‘Sacha, I’ve always known you were going to be a star. It was always going to happen, it was just a matter of time!’

Bold fashion is passion for singer

Sacha’s look is part and parcel of her artistry. With her slicked-back, bleach-blonde tresses, perfectly-laminated eyebrows, armful of ink and flamboyant fashion sense, she’s bombing into the dance scene like a sultry-voiced Bratz doll.

“I’ve always loved fashion,” she gushes, beaming when the conversation turns to her style.

“If, God forbid, something terrible happened and I couldn’t do music, I would be a stylist.

“I love clothes – the bright, the colourful, feathers, sequins – anything that’s standout and a bit outrageous”.

In February 2025, LOOP wrote about how SACHA and Jack Fargo are primed to take over your playlists. Often, women in Dance and D.J.s are paired with male counterparts or not given their own articles. No offence to Jack Fargo – who is excellent -, but I am more interested in SACHA and what she has to offer. This is someone who is very much going to play some huge sets and stages:

“The London-based powerhouse, SACHA, is dropping tracks that feel like the love child of classic dance music. Inspired by legends like David Guetta, Tiësto, and Avicii, Sacha is shaping the next wave of “hands in the air” anthems.

“My main focus right now is dance music,” she says. “I’m obsessed with timeless anthems that still feel fresh today. I want to make that kind of impact.”

Her journey started in Scotland, working on lyrics and melodies with a local producer before making the move to London. Now? She’s writing four to five songs a week, stacking up bangers that are ready to set dancefloors and festivals.

“I’ve always been a melody-driven writer,” she explains. “That’s what I fell in love with first. Once you lock in the melodies, the lyrics almost write themselves. Sometimes I’ll start with a hook that just sticks in my head, and before I know it, the entire song takes shape around it.”

Her ability to connect is undeniable, and social media has been a game-changer. “After my last release with Joel Corry and Nathan Dawe, I realized just how much music can impact people,” she shares. “Seeing fans tattoo my lyrics? That’s next-level. Getting messages from people saying my song helped them through a tough time reminds me why I do this.”

And the best part? She’s just getting started. While she’s keeping details under wraps, she hints at major collaborations dropping in 2025. “I can’t say names yet, but let’s just say, these collabs are big.”

Performing live has also been a revelation for Sacha. “I performed for the first time last year in Ibiza, and it was surreal seeing people singing back the lyrics I wrote. That’s exactly why we write music, to create moments that bring people together.”

Fashion is another way Sacha expresses her artistry. “I’d say my style is loud,” she laughs. “I love turning heads and making statements. Some days, I’m all about sleek, futuristic looks; other days, I want something weird and experimental. That’s how I approach music, too—I love pushing boundaries.”

Looking ahead, she has her sights set on some of the biggest stages in the world. “A dream of mine? Performing at festivals like Coachella, Ultra, Tomorrowland. That’s the goal”.

My big desire regarding SASHA is for her to be solo. Not forever, but for a few songs or an album. So many of the Dance songs played on radio with women in are part of collaborations. SACHA is such a standout voice who I can see writing enduring tracks and putting down some incredibly distinct and personal music. She is an awesome songwriter. Hearing her life and stories laid down and her being the producer too. I think that is where she will head. However, the D.J.s and producers she has worked with have very much given the vocal spotlight to her. That being said, she is this genuine star and standout, rather than being part of a collaboration. Also, seeing her appearing in amazing videos, as she has this gravitas. Someone who is supremely watchable, cool and engaging. Like Becky Hill and artists she has shouted out, you can see SACHA collecting awards and releasing these chart-successful tracks and albums. Fellow Scottish artist and D.J. Hannah Laing is someone who many would like to see a collaboration with. Performing at Laing’s festival back in the summer, The Courier caught up with SACHA and asked about that appearance and working with an icon:

“Last weekend was a memorable one for Perth-born singer and songwriter Sacha Taylor as she took to the doof in the Park stage.

The former hairdresser told The Courier that “there’s nothing like a Scottish crowd” after performing at DJ Hannah Laing’s inaugural one-day music festival in Dundee.

Sacha, who is now based in London, performed with dance and trance icon Armin Van Buuren in front of an electric crowd at Camperdown Park on Saturday.

“That might be the biggest crowd I’ve sung to yet”, she says.

“I think you could ask any DJ in the world and they will always say the Scottish energy is unmatched.”

This was despite the decision to attend doof in the Park being made last-minute.

It was only after a concert in Ibiza with Van Buuren last week that the famous Dutch DJ and producer invited Sacha to play at the event.

“Last week I performed for the first time with Armin at Ushuaia”, she explains.

“He just goes ‘what are you doing next Saturday?’, obviously not knowing where I was from.

“He’s like ‘I’m, performing in a place called Dundee’.”

Perth-born singer collaborating with Dutch dance icon

When Sacha told Van Buuren where she was from he thought it was a “no-brainer” and a trip back to Tayside was suddenly on the cards.

Around 15,000 revellers descended on Camperdown on Saturday to watch 25 acts performing across three stages.

Sacha’s performance with Van Buuren in her “home town” comes as she embarks on a tour of Europe with the dance icon and is set to release a new single with him.

“What I thought was amazing as well is, a lot of times when you see DJs performing or people singing at venues, there’s so many phones out”, says Sacha.

“Whereas yesterday, the majority of people were just enjoying it and not stuck behind a screen, which was so nice to see.

“I’m doing some really big shows with Armin over the summer but so far that was the biggest and obviously it being Scotland was incredible.”

Van Buuren has been recognised as one of the best DJs in the world, enjoying success with hits such as ‘This Is What It Feels Like’ in 2013.

But how did they end up working on a single together and then going on tour?

“How it sort of works in the dance world is you go in the studio, write a song and then pitch it to DJs to kind of finish the song,” she explains.

“You collaborate on the finished product, and then they release it. You get to go and sing it with them.

“As soon as I’d written the upcoming single, there was a few people I had in mind.

“I felt Armin was the perfect person.”

“My manager had pitched it to his team and then we went back and forth with versions and now, it’s coming out at the end of the summer.

“I absolutely love dance music. When I go in the studio I try to make songs like Armin’s.

“Using some of his older music and then actually having the song end up with him is incredible.”

Could Sacha Taylor collaborate with Hannah Laing?

Sacha is already planning a return to Dundee as the big shows with Van Buuren become a reality.

It is also possible we could see she her collaborate with Hannah Laing.

The pair bumped into each other at Ibiza Airport after Sacha’s performance at Ushuaia, and she says what the Doof in the Park founder is doing is “inspiring”.

“The whole dance scene is somewhat unpredictable, you can’t necessarily plan”, says Sacha”.

On Instagram over the past week or two, SACHA has shared happy memories about 2025. The people she has worked with, where she has performed and all the highlights. There have been some amazing hook-ups and tracks with great D.J.s. I think his will continue but, for me, there is that hankering to see an E.P. or album. She is a brilliant songwriter and singer. Whether you brings in her own collaborators on that or goes solo, it will be exciting to see! As she is based in London, it would be great to see her perform at some point, though I am not sure what her diary is like and where she is heading. The summer is going to be a packed one for sure. A modern and distinctly brilliant artist, she also puts me in mind of the legends and greats I grew up listening to on these anthemic and timeless Dance cuts. She will play enormous European and U.S. festivals and be named among the most important queens of modern music. A supreme talent forging her own path and building this incredible career, I feel that this year…

IS going to be her year!

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Follow SACHA

FEATURE: Kate Bush’s The Kick Inside at Forty-Eight: The Nerves and the Confidence

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush’s The Kick Inside at Forty-Eight

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1978/PHOTO CREDIT: David Bailey

 

The Nerves and the Confidence

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I think I have covered…

The Kick Inside from a number of different angles throughout the years. However, Kate Bush’s debut album turns forty-eight on 17th February, so I do want to cover it again. I am going to bring in a words from Bush about the album. It was clearly something she wanted to do since she was a child. Put out an album. Looking at this resource from the Kate Bush Encyclopedia, and they collated some critical reaction to The Kick Inside. There was some bewilderment and those writing it off. In terms of the music of 1977 and early-1978, Kate Bush definitely was not like other artists. As I shall explore, The Kick Inside is this hugely confident and accomplished album. The examples of recollections and words from Kate Bush about The Kick Inside are interesting:

“Hello everyone. This is Kate Bush and I’m here with my new album The Kick Inside and I hope you enjoy it. The album is something that has not just suddenly happened. It’s been years of work because since I was a kid, I’ve always been writing songs and it was really just collecting together all the best songs that I had and putting them on the album, really years of preparation and inspiration that got it together. As a girl, really, I’ve always been into words as a form of communication. And even at school I was really into poetry and English and it just seemed to turn into music with the lyrics, that you can make poetry go with music so well. That it can actually become something more than just words; it can become something special. (Self Portrait, 1978)

There are thirteen tracks on this album. When we were getting it together, one of the most important things that was on all our mind was, that because there were so many, we wanted to try and get as much variation as we could. To a certain extent, the actual songs allowed this because of the tempo changes, but there were certain songs that had to have a funky rhythm and there were others that had to be very subtle. I was very greatly helped by my producer and arranger Andrew Powell, who really is quite incredible at tuning in to my songs. We made sure that there was one of the tracks, just me and the piano, to, again, give the variation. We’ve got a rock ‘n’ roll number in there, which again was important. And all the others there are just really the moods of the songs set with instruments, which for me is the most important thing, because you can so often get a beautiful song, but the arrangements can completely spoil it – they have to really work together. (Self Portrait, 1978)

I think it went a bit over the top [In being orientally influenced], actually. We had the kite, and as there is a song on the album by that name, and as the kite is traditionally Oriental, we painted the dragon on. But I think the lettering was just a bit too much. On the whole I was surprised at the amount of control I actually had with the album production. Though I didn’t choose the musicians. I thought they were terrific.
I was lucky to be able to express myself as much as I did, especially with this being a debut album. Andrew was really into working together, rather than pushing everyone around. I basically chose which tracks went on, put harmonies where I wanted them…
I was there throughout the entire mix. I feel that’s very important. Ideally, I would like to learn enough of the technical side of things to be able to produce my own stuff eventually. (The Blossoming Ms. Bush, 1978)”.

It must have been a strange experience. Putting together a debut album and considering everything. I have ever been keen on the cover. Not really representative of the sound and themes of The Kick Inside, it is interesting what Bush said about the production and mixing. Even though Bush did not produce the album herself (Andrew Powell produced The Kick Inside), she was truly immersed and invested. Wanting to be involved with every aspect. Reading Graeme Thomson’s Under the Ivy: The Life and Music of Kate Bush and what he says about The Kick Inside. Like with many artists, there was this dichotomy of the public and professional persona. This was not a brand-new thing for Kate Bush. She was used to recording demos and performing at her family home. She recorded her first professional songs at AIR Studios in June 1975. The Man with the Child in His Eyes and The Saxophone Song appeared on The Kick Inside but were recorded a couple of years before everything else. However, when she returned to AIR Studios in 1977, there was this combination of nerves and confidence. The songs about sex, lust, death, philosophy, ghosts and classic literature. If other artists of her generation were writing about love or very ordinary things, Bush was bringing in this material that was so deferent and bold. Maybe not confidence as such as to release a debut album like that. It was definitely brave. It could have been a commercial disaster or not understood by the public. Instead, The Kick Inside sold over a million copies and was did get a lot of positive reviews. If some were harsh towards it or did not know what to make of The Kick Inside, the music did connect with people. Debut single, Wuthering Heights, went to number one and was this audacious and brilliant introduction. In terms of the unique aspect of her lyrics and the cast of characters Bush brought into her songs, the musicians she worked with were struck by this confidence. How she was creating these incredible songs that were so strange and enchanting. Musicians like Ian Bairnson stunned. What would come next? They’d play a particular track and all of its wonders would hit them.

Then they’d record another song and it would be completely different. David Paton recalled how Bush was the first person to offer cups of tea and make sure everyone was okay. If the music suggested something that was amplified and the work of this experienced artist, that was not really the case. This special artist who knew what she wanted and was creatively comfortable and strong, this instantly assured and direct voice took many by surprise. How these songs came to life and Bush took care of everything. How she recorded these vocals and they were layered. That she would stick around for the mixes and she was truly committed. Even if she would record albums more acclaimed and better received, it was clear how important The Kick Inside was. I don’t think we talk about it enough as a truly special and hugely groundbreaking debut. For a female artist in 1978 to release an album like that. It was recalled by those who worked on the album how Bush, as a dancer, would limber up in the studio. Making sure she was physically prepared. However, she did largely stand still for the vocals. I always imagined her gesticulating and being very animated whilst recording, though it seemed she was very focused and disciplined. Not moving around and off microphone. She was also quite nervous. This was a big deal and she was working around experienced musicians. They would note this and try and diffuse and relax her with humour. Bush would smoke weed, maybe as a way to chill, and sometimes there would be a lot of that which threatened to derail sessions. However, what comes across most is this very eager and warm woman who was putting together this remarkable debut. There was no standing on ceremony More one of the lads – as she was recording entirely with male musicians -, it was not like they had to mind their language and there was this division. She was very hands-on and she would also lean on them. They could sense how she was an experienced artist but also someone very special who had this instant and natural gift.

The camaraderie and bond was incredible. The confidence was clear. Intelligent and forthright, Bush did know what she wanted and how the songs should sound. Explaining things to these experienced musicians and not being led and pushed down, that communication from her and respect of her led to this remarkable and happy recording period. However, Bush was not really revealing motives and insights into the songs. If other artists were rattling on about songs and lyrics, Bush was a bit more guarded. There was no improvisation or working on the fly. These songs were ready and honed before they were heard by the public. Something she had been working towards for years, it is also an album of contradictions and contrasts. Making the muse masculine, as Graeme Thomson notes, The Kick Inside is also “one of the most profoundly female albums ever made”. It is interesting too what Laura Snapes said in her review of The Kick Inside from 2018 for Pitchfork: “The Kick Inside was Bush’s first, the sound of a young woman getting what she wants. Despite her links to the 1970s’ ancien régime, she recognized the potential to pounce on synapses shocked into action by punk, and eschewed its nihilism to begin building something longer lasting. It is ornate music made in austere times, but unlike the pop sybarites to follow in the next decade, flaunting their wealth while Britain crumbled, Bush spun hers not from material trappings but the infinitely renewable resources of intellect and instinct: Her joyous debut measures the fullness of a woman’s life by what’s in her head”. Although the lyrics were definitely eye-opening and not what those experienced musicians were used to, there was no chit-chat about it or conversation in the canteen about what the songs were about. No doubt speculations regarding songs like Strange Phenomnea or L’Amour Looks Something Like You. However, for the most part, it was this mutual respect where Kate Bush explained the songs and have some directions and the musicians brought something out of her. Making her more confident and stable.

EMI were not really primed for the reaction to The Kick Inside. Expecting Kate Bush to become successful a few albums in and this being a slower burn, the fact her debut was a huge success and it was maybe a curse too. She did not have time or opportunity to commit to dance or catch up with family and friends. She was instantly on the treadmill of musical success and promotion. Pulled around the world and even expected to tour in the U.S. – she had no interest in this and did not want to break America; none of her post-The Kick Inside albums were released until after 1984 -, I wonder how her career would her career would have developed if The Kick Inside was a more moderate success and Bush was building and working towards something big. As she as an instant success, there was this demand and expectation. Trying to make something bigger, better and different to what went before. Bush hardly had a moment to rest through most of her career. However, what we can take from The Kick Inside is that, when it was released on 17th February, 1978, it was this astonishing and complete work. The lyrics explored throughout were not only advanced or unexpected from a teenage artist. It was unlike anything any artist was putting out. This cast of characters and tracks that went beyond the ordinary, you can feel the influence and impact The Kick Inside today. Artists like CMAT have cited the album and you can feel some of Bush’s debut album in her work. However, Bush couldn’t have imagined how it would explode. She was young and nervous. A shy and introverted person, she never wanted to be famous and wanted to write. She was promoting around the world and performing on T.V. Subjected to this whirlwind 1978, 1979 was a year when she was writing and recording, though there was no new album. She put out her second album, Lionheart, in November 1978. I think The Kick Inside is one of the greatest and most important debut albums ever. One of the most distinct too. It was the astonishing and incredibly original offering from…

A musical genius.

FEATURE: Stepping Across That Iconic Zebra Crossing… The Dream of Hiring a Prestigious Studio/Venue

FEATURE:

 

 

Stepping Across That Iconic Zebra Crossing…

 

The Dream of Hiring a Prestigious Studio/Venue

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IN November…

Abbey Road Studios turns ninety-five. This historic and hugely significant studio is where countless artists have stepped into and recorded amazing work. Made famous and synonymous by The Beatles, in years since, some true greats have recorded music here. I have stood outside the studios but never been in. I am thinking about 12th November, 1931. That is when Abbey Road Studios was opened. Although it is over five years away, I can imagine they are already thinking about that monumental anniversary. For one, remaining open and operational is a must, as the future of the studios has not always been secure and assured. There have been threats before, so we need to protect these studios forever. Given the contribution to music and culture, there is now way we can close Abbey Road Studios. What will they do in 2031? I hope that Beatles members Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr will be around to mark the century. Ringo Starr will be in his nineties by then; Paul McCartney in his late eighties. Having these two musicians step back into Abbey Road Studios to celebrate it turning one-hundred, alongside a host of celebrities, musicians and music fans would be mesmeric. Maybe they will hold a concert or this all-day celebration. I am sure a documentary will be made around that time that looks at the history of Abbey Road Studios. Mary McCartney (daughter of Paul McCartney) directed the film/documentary, If These Walls Could Sing where a host of musicians (including Celeste, Kate Bush and Elton John talked about the significance of the studios. It was released at the end of 2022 in the U.S. and January 2023 in the U.K. It gives us an insight into these sacred walls. Abbey Road - The Best Studio in the World is a brilliant book I would recommend people buy. An immersive and fascinating read.

I look forward to this November to see how Abbey Road Studios marks ninety-five years. Five years from then, one of the most important anniversaries and celebrations of our lifetime will happen. There is this endless fascination around the studio, as most of us will either never get to near to it or, like me, stand outside and dream of being inside. I guess one of the drawbacks is the high cost of hiring the space. I especially love Studio 2 – especially notable because The Beatles recorded there a lot -, but it is a large studio and can be pricey. I guess if you want to use it for entire day then it is going to cost a bit. For artists, it is a dream to work there, but maybe not feasible to record an entire album there. Studio 3 is smaller and more affordable, whereas the huge Studio 1 is the most expensive. Only right that such a prestigious studio charges what they are worth! If musicians dream of playing particular venues and I, as someone who would love to make an album, dreams of Electric Lady in New York, as a journalist, being at Abbey Road Studios is a huge desire. Maybe there would be an opportunity to do something there in 2031 if there is this massive anniversary celebration. I am very keen to do a Kate Bush celebration night. She recorded out of Abbey Road Studios and I have been looking around at venues. Being in studio 2 with fans and musicians indebted to her would be this amazing celebration. However, I am aware that the cost of everything would be in the tens of thousands. Also, the chance to interview someone like Paul McCartney out of Studio 2. Something filmed where he may well take to the piano or guitar and play some songs, again, that might be something for the one-hundredth anniversary. To me, there is something hallowed and historic that is a huge lure. Stand on the floor and look around that studio. Think about all the history. The memories bleeding into he walls and embedded in the ceiling. The visions and echoes of all the greats who have passed through there.

IN THIS PHOTO: An interior shot of The Roundhouse

It is not only Abbey Road that has that incredible pull and is a dream. I will stand outside Abbey Road Studios again and may go on a tour there if it is opened to the public sometime. However, the ambition is to film or broadcast out of there. The financial side of things is a barrier. I am not sure how to get around it. However, it would be marvellous to collaborate with them ahead of 2031 – when we mark a century of these iconic studios. Also, I have been thinking about The Roundhouse. A venue that is so iconic, it is situated near Chalk Farm tube. A short walk from there, it is one of the most sought-after venues in the country. O0riginally an engine shed in 1847, it was turned into a cultural venue in 1964. A year when The Beatles were touring, maybe there were plans for them to play there – though they never did. In 2029, they celebrate their sixty-fifth anniversary, so I wonder if they have plans there. Maybe not as huge as Abbey Road Studios, it is still going to be immense when The Roundhouse, as a venue, turns sixty-five. The sheer scale and beauty of The Roundhouse is majestic and attractive. Few venues in this country hold the same grandeur. Maybe Alexandra Palace and a few others around the U.K. have that same impact. However, the décor and warmth of The Roundhouse stands out. It is such a gorgeous and we-inspiring venue. Again, hiring the venue would be an expensive thing. Anywhere between £24,000-£30,000+ for a complete day, it is another dream to use that space one day. Rather than it being a burden of affordability, I guess the main takeaway is the importance of these venues. The Roundhouse is a dream location for so many artists. I am going to try and get there this year and see a gig as I live near there. There are venues and studios that are functional or modest. That are practical and unspectacular. One reason why The Roundhouse is my mind is because I am thinking about it as a performance space and that idea of bringing artists together. Maybe again to do with Kate Bush and celebrating her work, perhaps that ambition of hoisting an event there is out of reach. I am planning something for 2028 and thinking about budget. I do feel that Abbey Road Studios and The Roundhouse are the best studio and live venue in London. Abbey Road seems especially fascinating. I have been dreaming about being in there. Whether it will ever be realised. I cannot rule it out completely thought, for mere mortals, I think we just have to look from the outside and hope! Although I have a hope that this hope is turned into reality…

ONE day.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Smith & Liddle

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDIT: Eddy Maynard

 

Smith & Liddle

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I am not sure whether…

there are a whole load of duos out on the scene at the moment. I think we tend to think about bands and solo artists. Once was the time when there were a lot of Pop and R&B duos. Maybe in Country or Folk there are more examples. However, I think that there is something about a duo that you do not get from a band or a solo act. That dynamic, chemistry and blend. Smith & Liddle released the stunning debut album, Songs for the Desert, last October. It was hugely lauded and acclaimed for its sun-drenched West Coast sound. Some noting that their gorgeous harmonies were reminiscent of The Mamas & The Papas, Fleetwood Mac, and Doobie Brothers. I only just came across them because I was looking at BBC Introducing: North East and their tips for this year. Smith & Liddle were in the mix. And quite rightly! I do think that Songs for the Desert is worth of a Mercury Prize nomination later in the year, such is the brilliance of the album. Composed of Billy Smith (guitar and vocals) and Elizabeth Liddle (vocals and piano), you definitely need to listen to this duo! I love how they marry Soft Rock, Folk and Pop of the 1960s and 1970s. At a moment when modern Pop is ruling, there is something about what Smith & Liddle provide that is so much more evocative, long-lasting and warm. Listen to Songs for the Desert and you are transported! In terms of their aesthetics, too, they are brilliant. The album cover and promotional photos. Their music videos. They have really though about every single aspect. I do think they will release a load more albums and get some huge tour dates. I really love their music so wanted to spotlight them now. I am going to bring in some interviews with this exceptional duo. I will end with a review of Songs for the Desert, but it is important to get some insight into Smith & Liddle. A few interviews to highlight. Apologies if there is any repetition in terms of information and answers. However, as they only started releasing singles last year, there is going to be some limitations. There is no doubting the fact they are a fascinating duo.

I am going to start with a brief interview from NARC. from November. Listening to Billy Smith and Elizabeth Liddle singing together, their music gets right into the heart. I think their songs could perfectly fit into films and T.V. shows. They are so scenic and evocative. I only had to listen to a few minutes of Songs for the Desert and I was utterly invested:

“Elizabeth Liddle and Billy Smith write pristine, 70’s indebted classic and country rock: echoing the influence of Laurel Canyon and Fleetwood Mac, and more obscure West Coast rock and psych. Billy admits that is was their love of the music of the 1970s that brought them closer together- having orbited each other in other bands until they started writing together in 2023.

Eyes On You, was the impetus for the band to write more- a seam rich enough to develop over a whole record. ‘Songs For The Desert’ is a beautiful, melodically sumptuous record- elevated by glorious, harmonic songwriting influenced by The Mamas and The Papas and Crosby, Stills and Nash. Billy attributes producer Josh Ingledew’s influence on the sonic palette of the record, “the chilliest guy on the planet” who was happy to be a conduit for all of the band’s influences and ideas – “if the song needed a cheesy 80s synth or a 90 second guitar solo with a lengthy fade out, it was going to have it. Music is all about expressing who you are and we are both huge fans of everything created in the golden decades. He says ‘yes’ to crazy ideas but will also find the perfect sounds to bring your ideas to life.” Billy and Elizabeth relay that there wasn’t a “single stressful memory” in recording the album, and are grateful to the contribution of friends Robb Maynard on drums, Phil Richardson on organs, Emma Robson on some BV’s and Niles Krieger on the strings.

Eager to get the record out into the world, Smith and Liddle play shows in Germany and the Netherlands in early 2026- a year that Billy anticipated will include “a lot of driving, a lot of playing and a lot of good times”- so catch then while you can before this magnificent record finds the audience it deserves”.

I think some of the most original, interesting and promising artists are coming from the North East. I did mention the Mercury Prize earlier. Though not a new artist, Sam Fender hails from that part of the country, and he won the prize last year for People Watching. I do feel Smith & Liddle are bound for glory and huge long-terms success. NE Volume spoke with Smith & Liddle about a debut album that they are really proud of. You can see why. There are no weak moments to be heard. Everything blends perfectly. One of the most remarkable debut albums in recent memory:

“How does it feel to release your debut album, ‘Songs for the Desert’?

We’re just really proud of the entire album. We had some great musicians play on it – our drummer Robb Maynard, keyboard player Phil Richardson, and Emma Robson, a fantastic local musician. We’ve also got Niles Krieger from a band called The Often Herd, who played fiddle. We recorded it at Blank Studios in Newcastle with Josh Ingledew, and it’s out now.

Your last single was ‘Minute Ago’. What was the writing process like?

‘Minute Ago’ came out in September. It’s a song that Liz had the chorus idea for spinning around in her head for months last year. She just couldn’t find a way to finish it, so we sat down together and wrote the rest of it. It’s a bit like how Fleetwood Mac worked – Stevie Nicks would sing a song, then Lindsey Buckingham would sing a song, and then they’d write together. I guess this is Liz’s moment on the album – this is where she really shines. Our third single, ‘Eyes on You’, will be released the week before the album comes out.

What’s the story behind the album title? And how does it tie the songs together?

The story behind the title is quite funny. Basically, our drummer Robb would come into the studio while we were recording the album – which didn’t have a name at the time – and he’d forget all the song titles. He kept asking, “Is this the Camel song or the Desert song?” So we joked that we were writing songs for the desert here. Our idols came out of Laurel Canyon in ’70s California, and that whole desert sound from the era was what really inspired us. That’s why we called the album ‘Songs for the Desert’.

You’ve been releasing music videos alongside your singles, with a distinctive style. Is that something you’ll continue to develop?

Definitely. We try to capture that ’70s look in all of our videos and recreate the feel of those classic music shows where bands would come on and perform live. We’ve made videos for nearly every song.

We released ‘Piece of You’ – the first single from the album – back in May, and we filmed it in Saltburn’s Valley Gardens. We filmed ‘Minute Ago’ at the Social Room in Stockton. We’ve got two more music videos on the way, both in collaboration with Rob Irish”.

Released on Hallowe’en of last year, Songs for the Desert instantly connected with fans and the press. So much love out there for them. Just Listen to This sat down with Smith & Liddle to talk about their unforgettable debut album. I am going to try and see them play live if they are back in London again. I can imagine they are heart-stopping when you see them in the flesh. Truly, a duo that everyone needs to have in their lives:

“When did you begin songwriting?

Billy: “Both of us started writing songs from the early of 11-12. Elizabeth told me she would record her songs onto the old IPod, whereas I had an old tape recorder to use. There’s probably hundreds of songs in old books lying around in the loft.”

You have your debut album ‘Songs For The Desert’ which is released on 31st October 2025. How did you want to approach the making of the album?

Elizabeth: “We wanted to approach the album musically like our favourite 60s artists would but have a modern flavour on the production side. Everything you hear on the album is real instruments and even the synths are all analog. We just wanted to have fun with it and create something special to us. ‘Songs For The Desert’ has a collection of songs that we are so proud of.”

Where did you record the album and who produced it?

Billy: “Mostly, the album was recorded at Blank Studios in Newcastle, however we recorded different parts in other places like our bedrooms and garages. We produced this album with Josh Ingledew, whom we had many similarities to when it came to music. We spoke a lot about Todd Rundgren & The Beach Boys.”

Do you have any interesting, funny or memorable stories from the recording sessions?

Elizabeth: “In every studio session, Billy and Josh would have what I call “silly hour” where they would go off on a tangent and experiment with weird sounds that were 95% of the time never used. However, we did create the backwards guitars in ‘Piece Of You’ that sounded like seagulls and that was kept in the master track!”

Did you use any particular instruments, microphones, recording equipment to help you get a particular sound/tone for the record?

Billy: “One instrument that turned things around a lot was the Danelectro 12-string that I bought near the backend of recording. It added loads of thickness in the guitar tracks. In songs like ‘Down The Hole Again’, we took inspiration from ‘Pet Sounds’ and used lots of percussion like sleigh bells and cabasa to get that Beach Boys sound and we layered lots of vocal harmonies around a ribbon mic. I think we used the R84. In the west coasty tracks like New Day, the fender Rhodes with a phaser and the Juno were undeniable as always”

Which of your new album tracks hear you at your a) happiest, b) angriest and c) most reflective?

Elizabeth: “‘No Place’ is the last track of the album and is our happiest because its a track about where we picture ourselves in the future and the reason why we made this album in the first place. Angriest, we’ll say ‘In A Haze’, only because when we were writing the lyrics, I’d just had a tooth filling and in a lot of pain! ‘Eyes On You’ is the most reflective because it’s the first song we ever wrote together and lyrically is about reflecting.”

Where is your hometown and could you please describe it in five words?

Elizabeth: “I am from a small village in County Durham and Billy lives an hour down the road in Middlesbrough. I’ll describe my hometown as quiet, peaceful and very scenic. Billy describes his town as dark, rainy, full of life haha”

You are given the opportunity to write the score for a film adaptation of a novel that you enjoy. Which novel is it and why?

Billy: “any book written by Middlesbrough legend ‘Bob Mortimer’. If you haven’t read his autobiography, it’s hilarious. He talks about a lot of places near my house so it’s nice to read what it was like back in the day.”

Who are some of your musical influences? Do you have any recommendations?

Elizabeth: “Let us just name a lot of cool acts you might not of heard of: Barbara & Ernie, Dane Donahue, Chi Coltrane, Little Feat, Delaney & Bonnie. We’re going through an ‘America’ phase at the minute. Gerry Beckley, we want to meet you!”.

Just before I wrap things up, I do want to bring in this review from Get Ready to Rock. They were full of love and praise for the staggering Songs for the Desert. Given the beauty and quality of this album, I do hope that other sites and sources pick up on Smith & Liddle. They deserve widespread radio play and focus from some of the biggest music magazines and websites. Such an incredibly talented and close-knit pair who are so in tune with one another. You can feel the closeness between Billy Smith and Elizabeth Liddle:

“There must be something in the air at the moment, or at least this year. We’ve had excellent albums from Morganway, First Time Flyers, and now Smith & Liddle. The connecting theme is melodic classic pop rock with a rootsy/country undertow.

Smith & Liddle are Billy Smith and Elizabeth Liddle who combined forces in 2024 when Billy was looking for a vocalist.

The vibe on this album is unashamedly retro with some great songs and playing.

Opener ‘Piece Of You’ showcases the duo’s fine harmonies that could have come straight from the West Coast c.1971 replete with jangly guitars. They actually hail from the north-east coast (UK).

Several tunes are inevitably going to draw comparisons with mid-seventies Fleetwood Mac such as ‘Eyes On You’, ‘Stay A While’ and ‘Minute Ago’. In fact pretty much everything.

This might be a minor niggle: it’s an album that is a product of certain influences rather than pushing the envelope. But there’s time for that. With so much talk about AI recycling our musical heritage real life artists have surely to offer something different? In this example, and to stay period authentic, at least Smith & Liddle recorded everything using analogue techniques.

‘New Day’ reminds a little of a more jaunty Chris Rea (‘On The Beach’) whilst one of the standouts is ‘In A Haze’. Like much of the stuff on the album it seems the duo get a lot of their inspiration writing in the kitchen.

It would be a great shame if this album slipped through the cracks. Watch out for live dates and go lend your support. ****1/2”.

There is definitely this incredible pedigree in the North East of England. I recently wrote about Middlesbrough artist Loren Heat and their incredible music. They are an artist that you will also want to check out. Smith & Liddle are extraordinarily talented and make this soul-stirring music. I look forward to seeing where their careers take them. Just about to play a few dates in Germany before going to Netherlands on 21st January, let’s hope that Smith & Liddle get a lot of gigs this year. Their music should be heard by everyone! Truly one of the most wonderful and must-hear acts…

FOR 2026.

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Follow Smith & Liddle

FEATURE: Spotlight: Olive Jones

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

 

Olive Jones

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I am looking forward…

 PHOTO CREDIT: Flower Up Studio

to the release of For Mary. What is going to be a magnificent album from Olive Jones, maybe some new interviews will be published around it, as there are not too many recent ones out there. Never the less, I wanted to spotlight this incredible artist, as she is someone that you should know about. To promote the album, she has some great in-stores coming up, so go and see if you can. I might try and catch her in London. Jones is a wonderful songwriter who I have just discovered but am really interested in. There is not much in the way of intervbiew archive, so instead I am going to grab from a few articles that highlights her music. There is a 2024 interview with bringing in. For Mary is going to be a wonderful debut album. PRS for Music provide a little background and information about Olive Jones:

“London-based singer, songwriter and guitarist, Olive Jones draws on soul, jazz and folk to create her sumptuous melody driven music. Growing up singing along to the records of jazz greats; the voice and its ability to captivate and evoke emotion has always been at the forefront of her musical passion.

Her debut album, For Mary, aims to capture an essence of humanity; exploring topics of love, loss and the nuances of her observations and lived experience. Expect honey-drenched vocals, luscious production, beautiful harmony and songs that will stay with you long after you’ve listened”.

I hope there is press coverage around For Mary. Some interviews with Olive Jones. Kingdom is her latest single and it has this cool and swagger to it. Jones’s remarkable voice right at the centre. The video bathed in red. Our heroine scarfing down cake and dancing. Looking super-cool and entrancing, it is very different to a song like End of Time. That is lightly and more soulful/jazzier song. Its video sees Jones on a bicycle with headphones on.

The way she can switch styles and visuals yet retain this fascinating and distinct core. Before moving on, Band on the Wall provided some biography whilst promoting her gig there in 2024:

“Growing up singing along to the records of jazz greats and soul icons, the voice and its ability to captivate and evoke emotion has always been at the forefront of her musical passion. Her songwriting aims to capture an essence of being human; exploring topics of love, loss and communication observed through her lived experience. Expect honey-drenched vocals, luscious production, beautiful harmony and songs that will stay with you long after you’ve listened.

Olive has toured as the featured artist with Leeds soul outfit Gotts Street Park and collaborated with them on their leading album track “Tell Me Why” as featured vocalist. The single was playlisted on BBC6 Music and championed by Elton John on his Rocket Man show on Apple Music. She has supported rising star Jalen Ngonda on his 2023 and 2024 tours in UK and European cities as well as opening for the legendary Nitin Sawhney on his UK run earlier in the year”.

It would be great to hear from Olive Jones now. She has done so much since 2024. With that debut album ahead, it is the perfect time to capture new fans. I would love to see her played on some of the biggest radio stations in the country. I am not sure whether BBC Radio 6 Music have played it, but she seems tailormade for them. A phenomenal songwriter who everyone needs to connect with. The songs she put out last year were so incredible. Talk About Love is so powerful, beautiful and evocative. A song that I have come back to. Again, very different to something like Kingdom or Colour on the Wall. Such a broad palette.

I did not know that Olive Jones was once in a group. Mancunian Matters chatted with Jones in 2024 ahead of her Band on the Wall appearance. Jones discussed lyrical vulnerability, touring and her songwriting process. I do think that this year is going to provide some exciting new possibilities for Olive Jones in terms of stages she plays. International demand. In fact, in April, she does start some European dates. Taking her brilliant music beyond the U.K., I feel she will get more demand across Europe, the U.S. and beyond once For Mary arrives:

“Also known as lead vocalist in electro-soul, hip-hop outfit Noya Rao, the artist is taking her solo career further with her latest project, Three More Nights.

Moving from a career in a band to making music as an independent artist has invigorated Olive.

“It’s so exciting,” she said. “We are creating whatever sonic world we want and I think you can hear that honesty and freedom in the music.”

Revealing a softer acoustic take on soul after previous electronic singles ‘Planes’ and ‘Summer Rain’, the new EP has Olive’s same distinctive vocals and genuine lyrics. Released at the end of October, the four-song project conjures up ideas of a cosy night in with relaxing vibes rivalling Gilmore Girls.

Rich and warm single Nobody Knows from her first EP Three More Nights

Opening with title track Three More Nights, Olive uses a combination of smooth vocals and honest lyrics to create an EP which is comfortingly relatable.

It feels like a vulnerable project, as Olive explained: “I think it’s through songwriting that I process the world and my experiences of it and therefore inevitably my songs have a lot of ‘me’ in them.

“I’m a very resilient, positive character day to day and it seems my music is where I choose to channel some of my sadness, frustration and introspection, as well as joy, love and happiness.

“I would say the older I get, the easier I find it to write more vulnerable lyrics as I care less about how they reflect on me.

“I hope people will be able to find their own meanings in my words and feel comforted by my honesty and vulnerability.”

The EP brings to mind the similarly sophisticated Rosie Lowe, and lyrically delicate Billie Marten. Olive mentions La Force’s album XO Skeleton immediately as one of her biggest musical influences, alongside artists Feist and Alabama Shakes – influential both musically and in terms of production.

As you might expect from the openness of her EP, Olive described her songwriting process as both a “form of procrastination” and a “meditative practice”.

“Lyrically some songs fall out of me with ease but others require a little more patience to be articulated in the right way,” she said. “Lyrics are very important to me and I have always strived to write words that are personal yet universal.”

For this release Olive worked with producer James Wyatt, who has worked with the likes of Pixie Lott and Lianne La Havas – a process she described as “inspiring”.

“He strives to find something special from each corner of a song and his dedication to my project has been so encouraging.

“We are both so aligned with our vision and our skill sets really complement each other”.

Twistedsoul spotlighted Olive Jones back in December. Although I am a late convert to her clear brilliance, I would encourage as many people as possible to listen to her music. Go and check out For Mary when it is released on 13th March. There is so much competition and such a crowded scene with so many different artists each offering something of their own. I don’t think there is anyone quite like Olive Jones out there:

“With great enthusiasm, March 2026 will see the release of the debut full-length from London’s Olive Jones. The singer, songwriter and musician has steadily been bubbling away, cultivating a sublime catalogue of music along with a listener-base eagerly awaiting more to wrap their ears around.

Following a selection of initial standalone singles dating back to 2023, Jones’ first EP came in the form of ‘Three More Nights’ in 2024, solidifying her partnership with veteran Canadian label, Nettwerk. Boasting an incredible showcase of global talent across a variety of genres, styles and continents, Nettwerk have long held a dynamic approach to nurturing artists and helping them chart a course through an ever-evolving musical climate. And amongst an expansive line-up of Nettwerk artists covering everything from jazz to off-kilter pop, Olive Jones stands tall.

A slew of single releases after ‘Three More Nights’ has kept Jones prominent while the puzzle pieces for ‘For Mary’ have meticulously been slotting themselves into place.

There’s a natural flair to Jones’ music that places her within an alt-folk bracket but listening that little bit closer unveils an affection for authentic soul music that elevates the singer-songwriter’s aesthetic to a much more intricate plateau. The 2024 single, ‘End of Time’, would surely prove an essential port-of-call regarding any necessary introduction to Olive Jones’ music: there’s a wonderful hint of quintessential soul about the song (a sound typically synonymous with the delectable sounds of say Timmion Records or We Are Busy Bodies) which is backed by a charismatic video of Jones cycling through the park – listening to a cassette Walkman no less.

The Walkman again is such a nice touch – an affectionate quirk that affirms Jones as more than just an old soul, but one who bucks trends and carves her own path.

Hers is an intimate tone that invites warmth and sincerity throughout her music, and the yellow brick road that Jones’ music has paved lead to the 2026 release of ‘For Mary’. A debut full-length that feels like a long-time coming but a project that no doubt will be met with a rapturous reception when the complete version reaches prospective listeners”.

Her music is so fascinating. Kingdom is perhaps her most compelling track to date. Voxwave covered the track and included this in their article. Words from Olive Jones about the song’s meaning: “division in society, the search for hope, and common ground in a world that seems increasingly divided. About the song, Olive herself says “Brexit upset me enormously, and even more so the arrogance and ignorance of Britain at that time. So ‘Kingdom’ is my political anthem about the fool who made it all happen”. Switching between these intimate and touching songs to something bigger and mor politically-charged, this is an artist with great sonic, lyrical and emotional depth. If you have not discovered Olive Jones yet then do go and connect. Such a brilliant musician who is going to be making music for a very long time to come, I feel For Mary will stand alongside…

THE best debut albums of this year.

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Follow Olive Jones

FEATURE: Alright: Gaz Coombes at Fifty

FEATURE:

 

 

Alright

 

Gaz Coombes at Fifty

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THE tremendous…

IN THIS PHOTO: Supergrass (Mickey Quinn, Gaz Coombes and Danny Goffey) photographed in 1995/PHOTO CREDIT: Chris Floyd

Gaz Coombes turns fifty on  8th March. As the lead of Supergrass, Coombes has been responsible for some of the best songs of the past thirty years. Although Supergrass performed as recently as last year, I am not sure that they will record an album together. Their incredible debut album, I Should Coco, turns thirty last year, so there was that demand for them to perform. In It for the Money is thirty next year, so I wonder whether they will perform live to commemorate that. Gaz Coombes is also a brilliant solo artist, so we will get music from him at some point. To mark the fiftieth anniversary of Gaz Coombes, I am bringing in a mixtape featuring the best solo cut6s and Supergrass tracks together with some deeper cut. Before that, AllMusic provide some biography about a living legend:

“As the exuberant frontman for the boundlessly imaginative Brit-pop group Supergrass, Gaz Coombes at one point seemed to be an eternal teenager -- a man destined to never slow down. But time has a way of aging even the irrepressibly youthful, and by their second decade Supergrass had started to expand sonically; by the time he released his solo debut, Here Come the Bombs, in 2012, just two years after the disbandment of Supergrass, Coombes had eased into the role of something of a Brit-pop elder statesman: a pop songwriter who was ready to explore new territory without swearing off his allegiance to melody. Over the next decade, Coombes maintained this delicate balance on a pair of subsequent solo records -- Matador in 2015 and 2018's World's Strongest Man -- before joining his Supergrass bandmates for a reunion in the early 2020s. Once that tour came to a close in 2022, Coombes returned to his solo career with 2023's Turn the Car Around.

Melody always was Coombes' specialty, even when he was the lead singer of the Jennifers at the age of 16. He and fellow Wheatley Park School classmate Danny Goffey formed the Jennifers when they were teens, and the Oxford-based quartet got far enough to land a contract with Nude, the label best known for signing Suede. The Jennifers fell apart after releasing the "Just Got Back Today" single in 1993, but Coombes and drummer Goffey formed Supergrass with bassist Mick Quinn later that year. Supergrass' rise was quick, with their debut single, "Caught by the Fuzz," selling out its first pressing in 1994 and receiving praise from John Peel, NME, and Melody Maker. Their debut, I Should Coco, arrived in the summer of 1995, right in the thick of Brit-pop mania, and it was one of the biggest records of the year, thanks in part to its effervescent hit "Alright." With their second album, 1997's In It for the Money, Supergrass' fame spread outside of England, but like so many of their British peers, they never managed to crack the U.S. market, despite support from such American fans as Foo Fighters and Pearl Jam.

Supergrass released an eponymous album in 1999 and Life on Other Planets in 2002 -- the latter arriving the same year that Gaz's brother Rob Coombes officially joined the band as their keyboardist, but their commercial fortunes began to slide somewhat. The contemplative 2005 record Road to Rouen was followed by the glitzy Diamond Hoo Ha in 2008 and then the group fractured, the band attempting to record a seventh album provisionally titled Released the Drones in 2009 but ultimately abandoning the sessions.

In the aftermath of the band's split, Coombes and Goffey bashed out cover versions in the 2010 one-off the Hotrats, and Coombes got down to business for his solo career, recording Here Come the Bombs in his home studio. The album appeared in early summer 2012, greeted by generally positive reviews. His second self-produced album, Matador, appeared in January 2015. Coombes played the majority of the instruments on Matador, assisted on occasion by his brother Charly and Ride drummer Loz Colbert. Matador debuted at 18 on the U.K. charts and wound up earning a nomination for the Mercury Prize. Coombes returned in May 2018 with World's Strongest Man.

In September 2019, a decade after they broke up, Supergrass reunited for a performance at the annual Glastonbury Pilton Party. In December, Coombes issued his Sheldonian Live EP, which featured four songs he had performed earlier in the year at a charity concert at Oxford’s Sheldonian Theatre. Shortly after the Supergrass reunion, the career-spanning box set The Strange Ones: 1994-2008 was released in January 2020. Plans for an extensive 2020 tour were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic but they returned to the road in 2021, playing shows into 2022. Coombes resumed his solo career with the January 2023 release of Turn the Car Around”.

I am curious how Gaz Coombes’s fiftieth birthday will be marked. I do hope that there is celebration and people write about his music. Supergrass have changed so many people’s lives and let’s hope that they continue to perform together. Go and check out the Gaz Coombes/Supergrass at the bottom of this feature and…

FEEL alright.

FEATURE: So Far Away: Carole King's Tapestry at Fifty-Five

FEATURE:

 

 

So Far Away

 

Carole King's Tapestry at Fifty-Five

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THE second…

PHOTO CREDIT: Jim McCrary/Redferns/Getty Images

studio album from, Carole King, Tapestry turns fifty-five on 10th February. It is one of the greatest albums ever released. Everyone will recognise tracks from Tapestry, whether that is You’ve Got a Friend, I Feel the Earth Move or It’s Too Late. I first heard the album when I was a young child and I recall being very curious as to who Carole King was. All these years later and Tapestry still sound spine-chilling and captivating. Reaching number one in the U.S. and gaining huge critical applause, Tapestry won four GRAMMYs at the 1972 ceremony, including Album of the Year, Song of the Year, and Record of the Year. An album that changed Carole King’s life. To mark its upcoming fifty-fifth anniversary, I will spotlight a review of it. However, there are some features that are worth bringing in too. I am going to start out with this feature from Carole King’s official website. Tapestry was an album where Carole King bet on herself:

“In January 1971, Carole King, a native New Yorker recently transplanted to touchy-feely Los Angeles, entered A&M Studio on La Brea Avenue to record her first album of songs for which she'd written both music and lyrics.

With her was a family-sized crew of musicians-slash-confidants from the emerging Laurel Canyon rock scene, among them her producer, Lou Adler and James Taylor, the sexy and ruminative singer and guitarist for whom she'd played piano on tour the year before.

They worked quickly, cutting two or three tunes a day, and finished the 12-song record in three weeks. (The studio budget, according to Adler:$22,000).  By June, the LP - King called it "Tapestry" in acknowledgment of its handcrafted vibe - had reached the top of the Billboard 200, where it stayed for 15 weeks on its way to finding a permanent spot in what seemed like every home in America.

"In a funny way, it was almost like Obama's first presidential run, when he sprinted through the campaign so quickly that the Republican dirt machine didn't get him in their sights," says Taylor, whose early success alongside King would propel the two of them half a century later to performances at Biden's presidential inauguration.  "People didn't get a chance to say, 'Oh Carole, she doesn't really have a singer's voice.' Or, 'She's a mother.' Or, 'She's from Brooklyn.'

"The first thing you knew about it was, here's this incredible material, and people heard it and said, 'Yeah, that's for me.'  It was like a first-pitch home run."

"Of course, that wasn't true," Taylor adds with a laugh. "It came after a decade of work."

Indeed, for all its energy of arrival, "Tapestry" actually marked the beginning of an unlikely second act for King, who at age 28 had left behind a life and career as half of a prolific Brill Building songwriting duo with her husband, Gerry Goffin, and had moved to L.A. with her two young daughters, Louise and Sherry.  Here, nestled in the verdant hills above Hollywood, the woman who co-wrote the deathless "Up on the Roof", "The Loco-Motion" and "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" remade herself as a new kind of pop star: thoughtful, relatable, understated.  The album's iconic cover, showing wavy-haired King and her cat sitting contentedly by a window in her home on Wonderland Avenue, said it all.

And the shift went beyond her: Along with Taylor's "Sweet Baby James" and Joni Mitchell's "Blue," the latter recorded just down the hall at A&M with some of the same players, King's album helped launch the singer-songwriter movement of the 1970's, resetting pop's mood and scope in the wake of the cultural and political upheaval that defined the end of the '60s.

In the years after "Tapestry," King could seem ambivalent about the stardom she'd attained.  She continued to make records, occasionally in search of a convincing style, but she didn't tour or promote them as the pop industry requires.  Today, nine of her 10 most-streamed songs on Spotify are from "Tapestry," and her 1974 track "Jazzman," which reached No.2 on the Billboard Hot 100, may be the best known in a version by Lisa Simpson.

"She wanted to be home with her children - and to create more children," Kortchmar says. (In addition to her daughers with Goffin, King has a daughter, Molly, and a son, Levi, with Larkey.)  "And she was just seriously less interested in the fame part of the gig - the everyone-adores-me part - than in actually creating the music”.

On 10th February, 2021, to mark fifty years of Tapestry, Rolling Stone shared their thoughts on the album. They discuss how “With its masterful songcraft and backstory of personal reinvention, King's 1971 landmark remains one of pop's greatest declarations of independence”. I think Tapestry remains one of the most beautiful and affecting albums ever released:

“But sales figures, ubiquity, and Grammy Awards (Tapestry won Album of the Year and also walked away with three other awards, including Song and Record of the Year) were never the sum of what Tapestry accomplished. Within its dozen songs were any number of stories that lent it a resonance and scope rare in pop albums of the time, and some of those stories could also apply now.

As anyone who saw the Broadway show Beautiful knows, King had an entirely different life before Tapestry: living on the East Coast, married (to fellow songwriter Gerry Goffin) and having children while writing and recording demos as part of the Brill Building song factory. After breaking up with Goffin and moving to California in 1968, King transitioned into a new phase, and style of music — more Laurel Canyon and less Times Square. Tapestry told that story, slyly, by way of its remake of “Will You Love Me Tomorrow” (a Goffin-King hit for the Shirelles in 1960), which provided a connection to King’s past; the hushed, pared-down arrangement hinted at a more adult, less Top 40 sound.

Tapestry also rolled around just in time for the burgeoning women’s-rights movement. Later that year, Helen Reddy’s “I Am Woman” would become the first major, clear-cut feminist pop anthem, and 1971 also saw the arrival of not just Blue but Carly Simon’s self-titled debut. Tapestry communicated that cultural shift starting with its cover image of King, in a gray sweater, curled up near the window in her L.A. home. She was alone but looked assured, comfortable, at ease with herself. The pert hairdos and dresses seen in Sixties photos of her were now relics of the past and another life.

That newfound confidence and strength spilled out onto the record. For the first time, King wrote the bulk of the lyrics herself. The opening song, “I Feel the Earth Move,” joyfully expressed that feeling of being swept away by a new love, but King’s piano, and the back-and-forth solos between her and guitarist Danny Kortchmar, communicated strength and command. (King always knew exactly how she wanted her records to sound and always took charge of her sessions, even if Tapestry was officially produced by Lou Adler.) Similarly, the narrator of “It’s Too Late” is almost matter of fact when surveying the end of a relationship; she sounds rational, not distraught. For the 50th anniversary, an album outtake, “Out in the Cold,” has been resurrected after first appearing as a bonus track on a 1999 CD reissue. A confessional about being unfaithful to a lover and paying the price, it feels rational and adult (if not totally empowered).

With its cameos by Mitchell and James Taylor (a couple at the time), Tapestry also fit snugly into the singer-songwriter genre that was beginning to take over pop. On her “You’ve Got a Friend,” which Taylor also covered that same year, and the plaintive “Home Again,” King showed she could be as contemplative and introspective as her new peers. Her version of “(You Make Me Feel Like a) Natural Woman” — a song she’d co-written with Goffin a few years earlier — was equally stripped down and unadorned, especially after Aretha Franklin’s takeover of the song. (King was cutting spectral remakes, even of her own work, long before the indie crowd got hold of that idea.)

Yet as much as we associate the album with King’s famous friends and the balladeer-diarist style of the moment, Tapestry was above all a glorious pop record. King may have relocated and left her New York studio days behind, but she took with her a sense of hooks and craft that helped the album transcend the voice-and-guitar arrangements common at the time. “Beautiful” had a show-tune bounce, the outlaw-rebel tall tale “Smackwater Jack” was galloping R&B, and “Where You Lead” (one of several songs with lyrics by her collaborator Toni Stern) conjured the effervescent bop of the Brill Building. Singer-songwriters who tried to sound “funky” could sound wooden, but King never did”.

It is not only interesting seeing how critics and the press feel about Tapestry. For artists across the generations, Tapestry means something different to them. The Guardian spoke with various artists on Tapestry’s fiftieth to ask how this landmark and masterpiece release impacted them. It is interesting reading thew various responses and perspectives:

“James Taylor

The singer-songwriter genre was named around 1970, give or take, and was said to apply to me and, among others Joni Mitchell, Cat Stevens and Jackson Browne. Why that supposed movement didn’t begin with Bob Dylan or even Woody Guthrie or Robert Johnson beats me – maybe they were still “folk”. But, if it means anything, Carole King deserves to be thought of as its epitome. I’d been deep into her songs – Up on the Roof, Natural Woman, Crying in the Rain – for a decade before Danny Kortchmar introduced us in Los Angeles in 1970. She played piano on my Sweet Baby James album while working on the songs for her own Tapestry. Our collaboration, our extended musical conversation over the next three or four years was really something wonderful. I’ve said it before, but Carole and I found we spoke the same language. Not just that we were both musicians but as if we shared a common ear, a parallel musical/emotional path. And we brought this out in one another, I believe.

It was a big change for Carole to leave New York for LA. She left behind an established, hugely successful career as a Brill Building [era] tunesmith, with her husband and lyricist, Gerry Goffin, and went west, on her own, with two young daughters. She started writing by herself, about herself – that is to say, from her own life. It came out of her so strong, so fierce and fresh. So clearly in her own voice. And yet, so immediately accessible, so familiar: you knew these songs already. I had that experience the first time I heard Carole sing You’ve Got a Friend from the stage of the Troubadour: “Oh yeah, that one.” Incredible that this song didn’t always exist. Carole’s focus was her family: [children] Louise and Sherry, and imminently, Levi and Molly. She had no time for the stuff the rest of us in Laurel Canyon were up to. She had her family and her songs. Certainly she would have her adventures, dramatic emotional switchbacks, in years to come. But in those days, she seemed to watch the dancers with a kind, wry detachment. To me, she was a port in the storm, a good and serious person with an astonishing gift, and, of course, a friend.

Sharon Van Etten

Tapestry was one of the first records my mother and I bonded over. It was so meaningful to sing in unison with my mom to a guttural, honest account performed by a stranger to whom I felt so inexplicably connected: a friend, a sister, a mother, and somebody’s daughter, a low voice and an attitude. From that point onward, I carried her music and spirit with me.

IN THIS PHOTO: Carole King in Lou Adler’s office holding the four GRAMMYs she won for Tapestry in 1971/PHPHOTO CREDIT: Jim McCrary/Redferns

I reconnected with King’s music when I was in high school. I was about to audition for choir. I always leaned toward rock in the classical world. The three songs on my list to audition with were: You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away by the Beatles and I Feel the Earth Move and Natural Woman by Carole King. I narrowed it down to the two Carole King songs and was given the choice of show choir or madrigals.

Carole’s songs made me want to sing her melodies and her harmonies and I felt closer to her while finding my path as a singer even at that young age. In my 30s, watching her musical on Broadway, I was overwhelmed with feelings of gratitude for her story. It showed the way in which a woman can pursue her own career, have a family and achieve happiness. That is a delicate balance that I strive for in my own life every day.

Danielle Haim

When my sisters and I were growing up, Tapestry was a key record in the house. Our mum also loved James Taylor and Joni Mitchell, who played and sang on it, so it was on in the car a lot. Our mum was from Philly on the east coast, so it was always in my mind that Carole was also a Jewish east-coast girl. She’d write these amazing, emotive songs and sing them in an almost optimistic or carefree voice.

Once she left the songwriting world and started writing for herself, it got less straightforward and more personal. So Far Away is really complex. The bridge is just insane. I’ve heard that song so many times, but a few weeks ago it came on the radio when I was driving, and I was totally stunned.

When you write a song it’s almost mystical. It feels as if the words just come out and it can be months or even years later you realise: “That’s what was happening.” I’d love to know who those songs are about. I think female artists are great at just letting it all show. As artists, my sisters and I feel like having Carole always in our lives definitely inspired us.

Rufus Wainwright

Tapestry was around our house when I was growing up, but I connected with it more when I moved to California because it’s the blueprint for anybody who’s starting off in songwriting in LA. Carole King made this incredible transformation from Brill Building songwriter to performer, but she didn’t go crazy or self-destruct. She was able to remain a good parent and – especially now I’m a father – she has always been a role model for me.

Tapestry is a bundle of emotions, and she doesn’t sound like anybody else. She wasn’t necessarily the greatest singer, but she has a unique style and attack. She’s not pulling any punches: it’s a great lesson in how to be yourself and be successful. She’d worked with great songwriters and artists, and knew all the great recording engineers and session players, and was able to channel everything she’d learned in her own way. Tapestry is the ultimate in terms of doing what you want artistically and just surviving as a human being in the record business. She made this amazing milestone in music without having to sacrifice her soul to do it”.

I will finish off this anniversary feature with Pitchfork and their 2019 review for Tapestry. Awarding it a flawless ten, they commended an album that turned a “master songwriter into a music legend”. I do wonder if there will be anything new written about Tapestry on its fifty-fifth anniversary. It continues to influence artists to this day. One of the most important albums in history:

“Tapestry was King’s second album as a bandleader, primary songwriter, unvarnished singer, and tentative recording artist—an American master of melody whose introspection became a phenomenon. At 29, she had been in the music industry for over a decade, outlasting the sea change away from bubblegum music and towards the singer-songwriter. She was skeptical of stardom. (“I didn’t think of myself as a singer,” King has said, and having written for Aretha, who could blame her?) She had also divorced her lyricist. Gathering her daughters, Louise and Sherry, and her cat, Telemachus, King moved cross-country to the Hollywood Hills, where she undertook the time-honored pop-music tradition of self-reinvention by way of self-discovery. In time, she grew spiritual, becoming a follower of the artistically beloved Swami Satchidananda. Crucially, she finally began to write her own lyrics in earnest, penning more than half the songs, and all of the peaks, of Tapestry alone.

King’s lyrics are a testament to the potential of the simplest phrases when heightened by an uncluttered arrangement and an unfettered truth, the definition of classic. “You’re beautiful,” “you’ve got a friend,” “you’re so far away”—her words are conversational, economic, and nearly telepathic, as if reading our collective mind. In songs that mix girl-group longing, Broadway balladeering, blues, soul, and wonder, Tapestry used the room itself as an instrument. The producer, King’s longtime publisher Lou Adler, wanted it to sound like the understated and sought-after demos she recorded when writing for other artists, with the tactile intimacy of a woman at the piano singing straight to you. The result was precise but not overly manicured. Owing to her newfound spirituality, there is a sweet serenity to Tapestry. Here was a ’50s rock’n’roller from Brooklyn having journeyed through the ’60s to become a ’70s lady of the Canyon, making music that seemed to elude time completely.

The songs of Tapestry are like companions for navigating the doubts and disappointments of everyday life with dignity. Having composed hundreds of singles for others, King knew what they needed: raw feeling, careful phrasings, a little sparkle. She lets her voice break to show that it’s alive. The soulful “It’s Too Late”—co-written with Toni Stern, a then-unknown lyricist who King called “a quintessential California girl”—feels like a grown-up girl-group anthem, wherein the best part of breaking up is, it turns out, clarity. The gospel-tinged backing vocals of “Way Over Yonder,” sung by Merry Clayton, charge its calm with resilience, dreaming of “true peace of mind” and “a garden of wisdom.” By 1971, King was not only practicing yoga but teaching it at the Integral Yoga Institute, and an attendant sense of collectedness carries Tapestry. The Broadway-ready “Beautiful,” which came to King while riding the subway, is a loving-kindness meditation banged out to a Gershwin-like orchestra of piano chords: an appeal to the world to choose a positive outlook, to put forth what you’d like to receive.

There’s an unmistakable maternal energy to Tapestry. Throughout King’s career, she has recalled moments when her responsibilities merged, in which she’d have her baby in the playpen at the studio or be breastfeeding in between takes. Toni Stern has said that, while writing for Tapestry, King would be “playing the bass with her left hand and diapering a baby with her right.” King herself said that having kids kept her “grounded in reality,” which is audible in every loosely calibrated note of Tapestry. Her next artistic achievement was a collection of children’s music, 1975’s Really Rosie, in collaboration with author Maurice Sendak. A reworking of “Where You Lead”—rewritten, King has said, to sound less submissive—became the theme song to the mother-daughter sitcom “Gilmore Girls,” sung by King and her daughter Louise”.

On 10th February, it will be fifty-five years since Tapestry was released. Go and get the album on vinyl if you can, as this is one that everyone should own. Everyone from Amy Winehouse to Tori Amos has shouted out Tapestry and declared their love for it. In March 2016, it was announced that King would perform the album live in its entirety for the first time at the British Summer Time Festival in Hyde Park, London, on 3rd July, 2016. The performance was released the following year as Tapestry: Live at Hyde Park. Almost ten years on from that performance and the influence of Tapestry has widened and deepened. Regarding Tapestry, in my view, few other albums…

HAVE ever matched it.

FEATURE: Kate Bush: Them Heavy People: The Extraordinary Characters in Her Songs: The Lookout (There Goes a Tenner)/The Father (This Woman’s Work)

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush: Them Heavy People: The Extraordinary Characters in Her Songs

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in the There Goes a Tenner video/PHOTO CREDIT: Paul Henry

 

The Lookout (There Goes a Tenner)/The Father (This Woman’s Work)

__________

PAIRING a character…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1989/PHOTO CREDIT: Guido Harari

from The Dreaming of 1982 and one from 1989’s The Sensual World, they are both sort of anonymous but both lead to some interesting discussions and offshoots. However, that is unfair to these characters. In terms of who portrayed them in videos, it leads to some interesting places/diversions. I want to start with The Dreaming and, interestingly, a discussion about The Beatles. I have compared before the two acts when thinking about their busiest years. I will come to the song that starts this first ‘half’. However, 1967 for The Beatles and 1978 for Kate Bush were manic years! They both crammed in so much. I think both sort of turned more to the studio at a certain point. For The Beatles, it was from 1966’s Revolver when they really started to exploit the studio, technology and pushing their sound. For Bush, the first big step was for The Dreaming. Similarly, she brought in so many different sounds and genres into her albums when she was given this access to modern technology, multiple studios and a cast of musicians. The Dreaming is an example of Bush as a producer broadening her sonic palette and pushing her voice. Deeper and perhaps more character-filled than previous albums, there are so many examples of her pushing boundaries and the studio. Inspired by artists like David Bowie and Peter Gabriel, I love tracks like Sat in Your Lap and that manic percussion. Tribal. The sublime and stirring Night of the Swallow. I think you can rank the tracks on The Dreaming and There Goes a Tenner might come in bottom of the ten. Or low down. In terms of its compositions and sounds, it is jauntier and lighter than other tracks. Perhaps people think it is less deep. However, if you listen to the textures of that song and everything happening, it is so fascinating. Following the opening track of Sat in Your Lap, percussion is very much at the heart. Bigger drums, gated percussion and a more masculine energy than 1980’s Never for Ever. I think There Goes a Tenner is one of the funnier and sillier songs on The Dreaming.

Kate Bush doing a cockney accent and it being about this job that goes wrong. Perhaps trying to break into a safe and loot this place, the blood rushes and the caper goes awry. I shall come to an article that gives us information about There Goes a Tenner and Bush discussing its influence. Although other ‘characters’ are mentioned in the song – when she talks about her bank robber partners acting like actors, these lyrics are sung: “You are Bogart/He is George Raft/That leaves Cagney and me/(What about Edward G.?)” -, I think I can weave them into discussion around filmic inspiration for There Goes a Tenner. The first character that I want to focus on is The Lookout. He is someone who “has parked the car/But kept the engine running/Three beeps means trouble's coming”. I shall come to the video, as the late great Del Palmer plays the driver in the video. We lost him at the start of 2024 and, apart from being a musician and engineer who worked with Bush for most of her career, he was her boyfriend for years. Partners in crime appropriately paired in this video about a big bank job. This robbery. There are some politics edges through The Dreaming. The scenes of war and death on Pull Out the Pin. However, Bush is an artist who sprinkled in political and social commentary rather than it being the drive of her music. At the end of There Goes a Tenner, she delivers these lines: “Oh, there goes a tenner/Hey look! There's a fiver/There's a ten-shilling note/Remember them?/That's when we used to vote for him”. Maybe looking at the politicians pictured on the notes or decrying the state of modern politics. Maybe Kate Bush reacting to events like the Falklands War. Sparked by Argentina's invasion in April, which Margaret Thatcher's government successfully resolved by sending a naval task force to retake the islands. The SDP-Liberal Alliance was rising in 1982, so it was a tense, violent and charged year. I will come to Del Palmer and his importance. Whilst he appeared in quite a few Kate Bush videos, I really like his brief inclusion in There Goes a Tenner.

In terms of the characters that feature through her albums, The Dreaming has the odd names ones – such as Houdini in the song of the same name – but there are a few fairly non-descript or minor ones. Other albums feature a larger cast of characters. However, if we think of Kate Bush’s albums like films with their own feel and cast, The Dreaming is perhaps the most intriguing and diverse. It is hard to link There Goes a Tenner with Get Out of My House, All the Love or Suspended in Gaffa. All extraordinary and different songs, it shows that Bush was keen to be seen more as a diverse and experimental artist. Perhaps the media seeing her as one think and pigeonholing her. The Dreaming was her most ambitious and layered album to that point. What also marks The Dreaming out is the relative failure of its singles. There Goes a Tenner was her worst-performing single to that point. It was released as a 7″ single in the U.K. and Ireland only. It was originally intended to be Bush’s first 12″ single, but its disappointing sales performance caused plans for the 12″ to be cancelled. Even though Hot Press provided some kindness to Sat in Your Lap, 1982 was a year when many in the press piled on Kate Bush. She would win many back for 1985’s Hounds of Love. However, I think Sat in Your Lap is symbolic and ironic maybe. Bush talking about this heavy job and trying to pull off this robbery but it not going to plan. The Dreaming as this huge album that she orchestrated and was trying to pull off. EMI almost returned the album and critics were not all on board with it. In a way, I see There Goes a Tenner as this representation as Kate Bush as a producer. Record Mirror said of There Goes a Tenner: “Blackheath beauty goes all cooey cockney-gasp in a bouncy tale of the downfall of Thatcherism and the rise of mass working class solidarity… actually it’s more trivial than that”. Record Business wrote this:  “A practically formless song with odd vocal affections, and no chorus to speak of. (…) Most disappointing”. A song of these small-time players doing their first job and it going wrong. Maybe critics took relish in the fact Bush was producing alone for the first time and, in their minds, she had failed. I think of how critics viewed women in the 1980s who were experimental. If many women were following traditional Pop or were close to the mainstream, how many were producing albums like The Dreaming?! In a sexist and misogynistic landscape, I feel they were expected to be a certain thing and were criticised and dismissed if they tried anything different or unconventional.

The Dreaming is a pioneering and influential album. Songs like There Goes a Tenner do not seem so strange when you look at today’s scene. However, in a year when artists like Prince, Michael Jackson and Bruce Springsteen were at the forefront, there was far less accessibility for and visibility of female artists. Maybe Alison Moyet in Yazoo and Siouxsie And The Banshees’ Siouxsie Sioux. Madonna released her debut single in 1982 but, largely, it was a male-driven landscape. In a 1985 interview, Bush remarked the following regarding the writing of There Goes a Tenner: “They had to be phrased right and everything. That was very difficult”. However, I want to bring in this interview archive from 1982, and Kate Bush’s explanation and background on a song that is criminally underrated:

"It’s about amateur robbers who have only done small things, and this is quite a big robbery that they’ve been planning for months, and when it actually starts happening, they start freaking out. They’re really scared, and they’re so aware of the fact that something could go wrong that they just freaked out, and paranoid and want to go home. (…) It’s sort of all the films I’ve seen with robberies in, the crooks have always been incredibly in control and calm, and I always thought that if I ever did a robbery, I’d be really scared, you know, I’d be really worried. So I thought I’m sure that’s a much more human point of view.

The Dreaming interview, CBAK 4011 CD”.

I have brought in the excellent Dreams of Orgonon blog a few times for this series. They wrote about There Goes a Tenner in 2020. Though they feel it is lightweight and rudimentary rather than essential, they made interesting observations about how Kate Bush tackles class politics through a different lens for this track:

“Time for an “and yet” moment, as I have a blog post to write if I want to eat next month. Alas the “and yet” still means expounding on the flaws of “There Goes a Tenner,” but its flaws at least communicate something about a certain British attitude to class. Said attitude is toxic, problematic, and only theoretically has anything to do with poverty and the working class, but Dreams of Orgonon is fundamentally not a story of leftist or progressive values. Chronicling Kate Bush’s career entails exploring the values of the stratum of civil society which informs her work.

“There Goes a Tenner” is Bush’s most direct acknowledgement of class to date. Admittedly this isn’t saying much, since Bush adopts an offensively bad mockney accent for its duration — “OI go in/the CROIM begins.” Her evocation of a working class Londoner involves simple language, mostly descriptions of the action such as “we got the job sussed/this shop’s shut for biz-ness” and “I’m having dreams about things/not going right/let’s leave in plenty of time tonight.” A middle-class white woman equating a panto accent, simplistic articulation, and crimes with working class identity is tremendously vexed. Alongside the troubling title track and “Pull Out the Pin,” The Dreaming isn’t a great example of Bush avoiding cultural stereotypes.

Yet even with her classism, there’s some worth to her attempts here. Fundamentally, “There Goes a Tenner” channels the heist movie through a children’s panto. It treats poverty and crime with the tropes and language available to Bush through English popular culture. “Ooh, there’s a tenner/hey look, there’s a fiver” interpolates British currency onto the trope of money exploding in the middle of a robbery, as seen in such films as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. There are some hat tips to old gangster films, like when Bush observes her partners’ conduct in the middle of their robbery: “both my partners/act like actors/you are Bogart/he is George Raft/that leaves Cagney and me.” Clumsy, to be sure, but distinct in its aesthetics, and in a better song, Bush’s dive into British class politics with crime film tropes might be enlightening.

There’s something more going on here though. Bush asserted that her robbers were incompetents with limited experience: “It’s about amateur robbers who have only done small things, and this is quite a big robbery that they’ve been planning for months, and when it actually starts happening, they start freaking out.” She goes on to cite Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid as an example of hypercompetence in cinematic criminals, objecting to the composure of the genre’s heroes, observing “the crooks have always been incredibly in control and calm, and I always thought that if I ever did a robbery, I’d be really scared.”

Certainly the heist genre is populated by “chill” paragons of masculinity. It’s how you get lead actors like Paul Newman, Al Pacino, or George Clooney as top notch criminals. The genre offers the pleasures of breaking with the decorum of civil society while still keeping a layer of masculine authority in the mix, and its films tend to conclude with major punitive measures for the culprits (see Bonnie & Clyde, Dog Day Afternoon, etc)”.

Although there are cultural stereotypes through The Dreaming (especially on the title track), I do admire how Bush both draws on her love and knowledge of films – many of her songs by 1982 were influenced by film and T.V. -, yet turns cliches and tropes on their heads. Casting herself, a woman, as this robber, alongside these accomplices who are almost actors playing robbers rather than the real thing. Things descending into chaos rather than being smooth. How long until his screen narrative was changed? The idea of heists going well and these male actors being all suave and controlled? There Goes a Tenner is a refreshing skewering of that tired stereotype. I think of Bush as an actor in this song. Adopting a cockney accent and playing this role. I think the greatest cast member of There Goes a Tenner is a silent one.

The Lookout is the one who keeps an eye out for the cops and sounds the horn if trouble is coming. Del Palmer is the only one who could play that role in the video. Going back to that idea of Bush and Palmer as two in cahoots or being partners in crime. Recording The Dreaming, it was often Bush and Palmer spending long hours together to make sure everything was going smoothly. Her trusted personal and professional partner, I can imagine at times recording The Dreaming was as nervy and intense as robbing a bank! That feeling that things would go wrong. That trust between them was amazing. People do not talk about the importance of Del Palmer when it comes to Kate Bush’s career. Not only did he play bass on There Goes a Tenner and many other songs for Bush, he was also someone who engineered her albums. Right up until her most recent one, 2011’s 50 Words for Snow. Someone she could bounce ideas off and would often provide stability and rationale when she was perhaps buried in work and stressed, he was this lookout in her personal life. Someone who was this vital aprt of her life. When we heard Del Palmer died in 2024, it came as a huge shock. I think about all his musical contributions. His phenomenal engineering work. His varied and memorable video appearances (including Hounds of Love’s The Big Sky and The Whole Story’s Experiment IV) and what an immense contribution he made. A song like There Goes a Tenner very much would have had Del Palmer working tirelessly with Bush to make sure it sounded perfect. If it was not right as a single and many critics crapped over it, it is a wonderful song that I love. Bush referencing film heist and the idea of the unflappable male; class politics and divides; the ineptitude of this robbery and the players being like actors rather than skilled criminals. It is a fascinating song indeed.

Flipping over the vinyl and listening to This Woman’s Work. There are a few things to discuss when thinking about this song. I have featured it before and you will be familiar with its history. It was originally featured in the 1988 film, She’s Having a Baby, before it appeared on The Sensual World a year later. In terms of discussion points here, I wanted to look at film and comedic actors, the idea of maternity and motherly responsibility throughout’ albums, Bush exploring different subjects and themes on her final album of the 1980s, in addition to a comparison with a 1986 duet she was involved with. Before getting to The Father from This Woman’s Work. In She’s Having a Baby, director John Hughes used This Woman’s Work during the film’s dramatic climax, when Jake (Kevin Bacon) learns that the lives of his wife (Elizabeth McGovern) and their unborn child are in danger. If There Goes a Tenner was seen as weird and too out there and, as such, did not resonate with a sexist music press, why did the press react more positively for This Woman’s Work. A better song? More suitable for what was expected from a female artist in the 1980s? Greater critical awareness and reflection following Hounds of Love? However, there was more appreciation for a single that reached twenty-five in the U.K. in 1989. This is a song that Bush reworked and reapproached when she made Director’s Cut in 2011. An older artist who voice was different to what it was in 1989 gave the song new depth and a different meaning I think:

“A luscious, spiritually elevating showstopper ballad. How does anyone get that much cool into a voice? Ecstatic with wintry tragedy, undeniably beauteous.

Chris Roberts, Melody Maker, 25 November 1989

Is it possible through pop to truly represent the emotions of a young man stranded in the waiting room while his lover’s life is threatened by the birth of their baby? I think not. Unless you’re Kate Bush…

Len Brown, NME, 25 November 1989

Bush is at her most potent when she’s in her reflective late-evening mood. Her fragile delicate voice combines with sparse piano and spot-on orchestral arrangement.

David Giles, Music Week, 25 November 1989”.

Before moving on, it is worth considering what Kate Bush said about This Woman’s Work and its placement in She’s Having a Baby. An early case of her work being brought to the screen, in 2026, filmmakers and producers are still realising the potential of her music. Although This Woman’s Work has been used in films since 1988, the song has not received the same sort of popularity and success as Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) and its Stranger Things inclusion:

“She gets pregnant, and it’s all still very light and child-like until she’s just about to have the baby and the nurse comes up to him and says it’s a in a breech position and they don’t know what the situation will be. So, while she’s in the operating room, he has so sit and wait in the waiting room and it’s a very powerful piece of film where he’s just sitting, thinking; and this is actually the moment in the film where he has to grow up. He has no choice. There he is, he’s not a kid any more; you can see he’s in a very grown-up situation. And he starts, in his head, going back to the times they were together. There are clips of film of them laughing together and doing up their flat and all this kind of thing. And it was such a powerful visual: it’s one of the quickest songs I’ve ever written. It was so easy to write. We had the piece of footage on video, so we plugged it up so that I could actually watch the monitor while I was sitting at the piano and I just wrote the song to these visuals. It was almost a matter of telling the story, and it was a lovely thing to do: I really enjoyed doing it.

Roger Scott Interview, BBC Radio 1 (UK), 14 October 1989”.

The Father is someone who is not just a specific film character. Bush has written about men in a very mature and loving way. The Man with the Child in His Eyes was just that: a man with a child-like innocence inside. Men being child-like (in a good way). However, here, that is a bad thing. Interesting how Buch wrote about men and responsibility. If early in her career it was more about list, attraction and saluting the child-like qualities of men – when she was a teen and in her twenties -, now in her thirties (by 1989), there was a shift. Still not negative, maybe an artist who was thinking about family or had that in mind. The Sensual World is an album she wanted to be more feminine and womanly than the more masculine sounds of Hounds of Love and The Dreaming. Bush maybe had family at the back of her mind and that desire to settle down. Considering men in a different light and how The Father of This Woman’s Work needing to be responsible and step up. If, in 1978, Bush might have seen the fatherly figure as young and someone who did not know better, now, it was a more adult take. Interesting how this is a rare case of a film geared for a film soundtrack fitting into a studio album and taking on this new life.

I love how the character of The Father, for the music video, was played by Tim McInnery. In a video directed by Kate Bush, he plays the distraught husband/father who is grief-stricken when his wife (played by Bush) collapses and is taken to hospital. This expectant father pacing the room and being in this impossible situation he did not envisage. Not the first time comedic actors featured in her work. A fellow Blackadder cast member, Hugh Laurie (and the excellent Dawn French) in the video for Experiment IV (1986). Not comedic necessarily, but Robbie Coltrane appeared in the 2011 video for Deeper Understand (which Bush directed). Bush performed with Rowan Atkinson (Blackadder himself!) for Comic Relief and she also worked with the late Terry Jones. He voiced Professor Need for 2011’s Deeper Understanding. High Laurie’s comedy partner, Stephen Fry, was a fellow professor, Joseph Yupik for 50 Words for Snow’s title track. Bush is a big fan of comedy and this is this long and fascinating relationship with actors and comedy performers, as I have written about before. I think Tim McInnery brings this gravitas to the role of The Father. Consider his comedy work up until that point, primary in Blackadder, and many might not have associated him with drama and being able to portray this moree serious side. Bush’s connecting to paternity and motherhood is interesting. The Kick Inside’s Room for the Life about women and how they can create life and there is room inside them for two. The incestuous pregnancy of The Kick Inside’s title track and it being taboo. Mother Stands for Comfort on Hounds of Love and this mother protecting a murderous son. The pregnant woman of Breathing (from Never for Ever) and this foetus being protected by the womb as nuclear war raged outside. Bush thinking about her own mother and bringing her into songs. In the video foe Suspended in Gaffa and mentioned in Moments of Pleasure (1993’s The Red Shoes) and A Coral Room (2005’s Aerial). Bush became a mother in 1998 and I think motherhood very much at the heart of Mrs. Bartolozzi from Aerial. Bertie, also from Aerial, a paen to her young son. The way motherhood and maternal responsibility and complexities are examined. In This Woman’s Work, you might expect it to be all about the mother and her sacrifice.

Rather than the narrative being about the mother and her giving birth and her responsibility, I read the song as thoughts and feelings about the man: “I stand outside this woman’s work/This woman’s world/Ooh, it’s hard on the man/Now his part is over”. The idea of conception being about this ‘work’. A task. Something universal and fundamental. However, now that the ‘fun’ is over, there is this craft. This lifelong responsibility of being a father. Many interpreted the lyrics about the mother breaching and almost dying. All the regrets she had and things she never said. However, I think of it more about the father and keeping things bottled in. All the words he left inside and never said to his wife: “Of all the things I should’ve said/That I never said/All the things we should’ve done/That we never did/All the things I should’ve given/But I didn’t”. The idea of wanting to cry and release everything, but having to be strong and not let it show. When Bush sings “make it go away”, I always feel that is The Father not wishing away the pregnancy but wanting everything to be fine and his wife to pull through and give birth. The more intriguing lines, I feel, refer to Bush’s mindset and stage of life and also a perspective of a father maybe wanting to return to simpler times and happier normal: “Give me these moments back/Give them back to me/Give me that little kiss/Give me your hand”. Is this the expectant mother speaking or the dad? “I know you have a little life in you yet” both refers to the foetus inside the woman and the strength that she has. This emotional song was different to how Bush discussed relationships and womanhood. Whilst she did cover marriage and romance previously, this is a case of her addressing motherhood and the responsibilities of the father.

I think about This Woman’s Work and a tie with 1986’s Don’t Give Up. A Peter Gabriel single (from his album, So) that Bush performed on, this is about a husband who loses his job and is on the brink of suicide because he feels he has lost his identity and purpose. Bush, as the wife, telling him not to give up as he has friends and life in him yet. That idea of the man dealing with loss and a traumatic event and having to find strength and keep going. If Bush, on Don’t Give Up, is this show of strength and this angel on his shoulder, her role is more passive on This Woman’s Work. It is all on The Father and him having to be all grown up and realise that the woman sacrifices and it’s time that the man stepped up. That This Woman’s Work is Bush outlining what women deal with and how hard it is for them and how the man is often the one who avoids responsibility and does not understand or appreciate women and their roles. Maxwell’s 2002 version is an ode to womanhood and feminine power and importance. This article from 2012 makes some interesting observations about This Woman’s Work:

“I can understand how the song’s appropriation by a man might seem to diminish the very real ways in gender policing around women’s emotions not only devalues them, but also potentially undermines any kind of work, emotional or otherwise, that women perform as based in that devalued emotional sphere. This is old news. Nothing new to anyone who pays attention. But just because Ms. Bush is expressing something we should all already be aware of doesn’t make it any less powerful. In fact, since she is couching it in terms of gender, her own plea suggests the damage the traditional allocation of emotional work, as it applies to romantic relationships, does to everyone regardless of gender, expressing the potential for a form of emotional solitude even within the context of a relationship—an emotional solitude reinforced by patriarchal notions about the ways men and women express their feelings about each other and about their union”.

That idea of a man putting themselves in a woman’s shows and there being this better understand is an idea Bush explored in Hounds of Love’s Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). If that was about doing a divine deal so men and women could swap places and exchange the experience, This Woman’s Work is perhaps a wake-up call to men and how fatherhood is a responsibility even before the baby is born. How they are stepping into this new life and they are committed and have to be grown up now. Whether Kevin Bacon in She’s Having a Baby or Tim McInnery in The Sensual World’s video, The Father is not a child or carefree anymore. An astonishing song that has been shown on screen several times since 1988/1989, it is one of Kate Bush’s most powerful and enduring songs. Lyrics of sacrifice, responsibility, potential loss and making hard decisions that will…

CHIME with so many people.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Loren Heat

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

 

Loren Heat

__________

THIS is a sensational…

PHOTO CREDIT: Rob Irish

Middlesborough artist who has been tipped as one of BBC Introducing: North East ones to watch. Included alongside other great artists like Jenna Cole, Smith & Liddle, and Charlie Floyd, I think a lot of eyes should be on Loren Heat. They are an incredible talent who has not done too many interviews, though I feel that will change tis year. I love their music and 2009, and Belladonna were phenomenal cuts from last year. Be Ur Baby, featuring ZELA, is another phenomenal song. I am going to include a couple of features around Loren Heat. An awe-inspiring, exciting and hugely promising artist, this is what the BBC wrote in their recent spotlighting of someone we all need to follow: “Loren Heat has been building patiently with laser focus. The Teessider has got one of those personalities that lifts a room, but that lightness sits alongside a very strong sense of direction as an artist. You can hear pop influences like Dua Lipa and Lady Gaga in the delivery, but it is shaped by a personality that makes it unmistakably Loren. That balance shows in the work, and it is why things are moving with intention rather than luck”. An incredible L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ artist who has had an amazing past few years, I think 2026 will be a massive year for Loren Heat. They are an artist you need to follow. Inspired by some huge and influential Pop greats, this compelling and enormously talented queer artist released their debut single, Curiosity, in 2023. Tits Upon Tyne chatted with Loren Heat at a time when they had a relatively small following:

“Tell us about the creative process!

I tend to create the base of a song first, I’ll get the chords and the chorus down on either a Ukulele, Guitar or occasionally Piano, before writing the rest and trying to build from there. I like to write from things I’ve experienced at some point or another, they’re often like little vents or rants, so I can feel the song and think like ‘Is this what I want to represent these emotions?’

What motivates your music and what inspired this debut release ‘Curiosity’?

I’m very motivated by wanting to have my voice heard, like i mentioned earlier, my songs can often be like vents or rants and so it’s that feeling of people hearing it and relating. There’s a lot of time I feel things and I’ll tell myself I’m not allowed to, like i’ll begin to invalidate them as being over dramatic or to emotional but sometimes you just have to feel it and say it, or well in my case write it, and the thought of people hearing it and relating with it, maybe to help them validate how they feel really warms my heart and makes me want to do it. As for the inspiration behind ‘Curiosity’, I sat and tried to remember all the times I’d been in situations with a person I had feelings for where I had no idea what was going on.
I’ve been out since i was about 13/14, and I struggle to interpret tone and body language so I would never know if someone had feelings for me or was just playfully flirting like some friends do and I’d always just take it as friends being friends because I would never want to assume and then accidentally overstep a boundary. It wouldn’t then be until later down the line that person would admit they liked me but didn’t think I liked them back. Like just be straight up cos I’d never guess and this song is just that whole “be honest with how you feel” don’t try and play around because we’re both going to get hurt.

Being an LGBTQIA+ artist, how do you feel this song represents you as an artist?

Ooo this is so tricky. I feel like this song only represents a small portion of me as an artist and a queer one at that. This song was just how I was feeling at a certain moment and pulling from certain situations I’d experienced throughout my life so far. There’s so much more that I write and sing about like being in love and heartbreak and the hardships of being LGBTQIA+ and I can’t wait for you to hear them. But I write about so much more, like loss and just being happy and enjoying life, or struggling with it, that I feel like this song is only a part of who I am”.

I am going to take this to last year and more up to date. However, after a good 2023 when Loren Heat was taken the earliest steps, they had a busy 2024. Although this article states Want It All (2024) is their first single, we know that Curiosity came out in 2023. In August 2024, the Scarlett Haze E.P. came out. It contained Curiosity, Want It All and three more amazing tracks from an artist that was building their name and gaining traction. I would love to see Loren Heat perform live, as I can imagine they are a staggering and exciting artist to watch on the stage:

“Why is your single ‘Want it All’ not your typical love song?

I’d say it’s because it’s not your typical happy and whimsical feel, it’s the more gritty side, when you have this wall up the idea of falling in love is terrifying, like a free fall almost. You don’t want to, but you can’t help it. I wanted to capture that essence, being scared of the vulnerability but always wanting more.

What has been the reception to your new work so far?

It’s been really good! I showed it to my friends and family because they’re incessant when it comes to new music of mine, they want to hear it straight away and they loved it, there’s different favourites but as for the new stuff the reception has been so heartwarming. I’m very grateful!

What are you like as a live artist?

I’m not totally sure what to say without blowing my own trumpet. I’d like to say if you come to a show you can expect strong vocals, good music and a gossip session. I love to natter between tracks. I personally think if I’m just playing tracks back to back I’m not allowing myself to get to know my audience and they’re not getting to know me and I don’t want that.

Who are your biggest musical influences?

Definitely a lot of your typical “Gay Pop” artists in terms of sound, the likes of Lady Gaga, Slayyyter, Kesha, Dua Lipa etc. but I also take a lot from Billie Eilish, Renee Rapp, Lana Del Rey I think there’s so many talented artists to draw inspo from!”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Rob Irish

BabyStep Magazine provided their introduction to Loren Heat early last year. Again, committing the cardinal press sin of claiming an artist is ‘back’ when they do not release a single every few weeks, perhaps the fact 2009 was different Loren Heats previous work caught some by surprise. However, we do need to stop saying artists are ‘back’ when they do not release stuff constantly, as it is stigmatising and suggests they are dropping the ball or not putting out enough material:

“‘2009’ is such a nostalgic yet fresh track—what was it about that particular year in pop music that inspired you to write a love letter to it?

Gaga honestly. The Fame Monster came out that year and it was my first album (fitting really). Honestly I think that album shaped me as a whole, and a lot of my music is inspired by that album so when I was looking back at y2k pop, 2009 really stuck out, so many amazing songs came out that year!

You’ve said this song is about “intimacy crafted by love rather than lust”—how did you approach translating that deeper emotional connection into both the lyrics and the soundscape?

I wanted it to feel good rather than feel sexy, I wanted it to feel like a summer's day with someone you love, watching the way the little things translate into your life, the way the sun hits them, the way they move or laugh. I feel like when you’re truly in love with someone, even the innocent things can be so intimate.

There’s a clear influence from icons like Lady Gaga and Robyn in the track—how have those artists shaped your sound, and how do you make sure your voice still shines through?

I can struggle sometimes because I’m a bit of a perfectionist and I think so incredibly highly of them, so I’ll draw inspiration from them and then compare my work to theirs and ridicule it. I’m getting better and I think with the people around me they also keep me from running off with my comparisons. But honestly I think it's because I know how I like my voice to sound and I will always write about things that are personal or mean a lot to me and I think being able to truly feel what I’m singing allows me to make music that is still so unapologetically me.

You’ve had support from some huge tastemakers and have The Great Escape coming up—how does it feel stepping into this next chapter, and what can fans expect from your upcoming releases?

It’s honestly terrifying but in a good way! I’m so excited, I’m just prepared to give everything I have 24/7. For my upcoming releases, I’d say expect flirtatious unapologetic pop, something you can dance to and relate to in so many different ways, they’re very flirtatious but if you look deeper I think you can always find another meaning”.

I am going to end with Fame Magazine from last July. This truly wonderful artist who is always improving and building their sound, this year is going to be an exciting one. Fame Magazine spoke with Loren Heat following their double-whammy sets at “The Great Escape and BBC Introducing at The Glasshouse“. Their latest (at the time) single, Belladonna, is described as a “Pop Dagger Drenched in Lust and Voltage”. Loren Heat is rightly being tipped for great things:

“This track – released via Interval Records (EMI North/Generator) – bites as hard as it kisses—sultry, synth-laced, and soaked in obsession. It lingers like a bruise and tastes like danger.

Fueled by 2000s pop euphoria and a sharp queer edge, Loren Heat is leading a femme-pop uprising from the north—loud, lust-drunk, and unapologetically raw.

We caught up with Loren to talk about seduction as a superpower, chaotic stage energy, and why Belladonna might just be the sexiest little dagger in your playlist.

Belladonna oozes danger and desire — when did you first realize that seduction could be a superpower in your songwriting?

Ooo that’s such a good question, god. I’m gonna say when I realised it was the thing i was best at articulating, writing about passion and desire and yearning is something I can articulate best, and i’m not sure why, I think it’s cos it feels like my chest is in a vice as soon as i things such as lust.

You describe Belladonna as someone whose voice is poison — who or what inspired that toxic muse?

Ahahaha wouldn’t you like to know? Honestly, it was a mix of people I’ve interacted with that really had my heart beating fast, that idea of ‘your cockiness and confidence is the most enticing thing ever’, it’s not even necessarily toxic people, but they certainly never fail.

Pop music in 2024–25 is full of image — you’re building a persona that’s fearless and femme but with teeth. What’s the line between persona and person for you?

I really don’t have much separation between persona and person; who I am online and on stage is pretty much exactly who I am in person. There’s not much mystery there.

2009 felt like nostalgia on MDMA, and Belladonna is a full-on pop dagger — are you deliberately carving out a new wave of queer pop from the north?

Oh 1000%, the north needs more pop and it needs much more queer pop and unapologetic pop or ‘girly pop’ at that. It is shockingly sparse.

You’ve played The Great Escape and BBC Introducing at The Glasshouse — was there a moment on stage where you felt: “Yep, I’ve arrived”?

BOTH! For different reasons, id say the glasshouse because of the industry side of it all, i was like ‘ooo this is fun, this is it, like lets go fucking smash it’, but TGE was more on the performance side, the crowd, interactions, the feedback the energy, oh it was gorgeous.

You’ve talked about queerness and lust in your writing — how important is it for your music to reflect both softness and obsession?

For me, I get obsessed with the desire and the feeling of lusting, it’s like an overwhelming command on the body, yearning for the touch of someone you’re so into. But vulnerability is required to put yourself in a position of submitting to desire, and I think that’s when the softness should come in. It doesn’t have to be all cute and shit but…You know. I think it’s needed.

Looking ahead to the Belladonna drop and those stacked live dates: what’s the chaos you’re most excited to unleash next?

Get me on stage, honestly, I’m so much more confident on stage, and I’m starting to interact with the crowd so much more. I think I’m very much finding my feet and I just want to be doing it all the time”.

Looking at their official website, this part of their biography stood out: “global icons like Billie Eilish, Lady Gaga, Slayyyter, Dua Lipa and JADE, Loren is as unapologetic as their story – an exploration of queerness, identity and the raw chaos of navigating life in the North East”. I think that Heat can obtain the same sort of stature and popularity and artists they are inspired by. The press below shows there is a lot of love out there for their music:

“Translating her homemade queer-pop into a cutting-edge domination…seamlessly channels everything that pop music should be: a euphoric, danceable experience” – DIY

“Definitely one to watch” – Clash

“This is pop music at its most irresistible” – Atwood

“A rising star in the queer-pop scene” – On The Record

“That is a big, big, debut upload right there” – Shakk, BBC Introducing

“Crafting a sonic world that’s brave, defiant and unashamedly pop” – Earmilk

“Channelling the energy of Lady Gaga and Robyn, with glimmers of Kylie Minogue andScissor Sisters”– Record of the Day”.

Following the BBC Introducing: North East kudos and the possibility of lots of gig demand this year, it is going to be interesting seeing where Loren Heat heads. I wonder if they have any plans for a tour and festival dates later in the year. Last year was a huge one for Heat, though I think this year is going to be the best so far. If you do not know this Middlesborough Pop sensation, then connect on social media and listen to their music. Already so promising and having released some outstanding music, it is clear that…

A golden career awaits.

__________

Follow Loren Heat

FEATURE: Well, Just Take a Walk Down Lonely Street: Elvis Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel at Seventy

FEATURE:

 

 

Well, Just Take a Walk Down Lonely Street

Elvis Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel at Seventy

__________

PERHAPS one of…

the most groundbreaking and important songs in music history, I am spending some time shining a light on Elvis Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel. Whilst the King of Rock & Roll has a complex legacy and someone I cannot comfortably celebrate without hesitation, I have to salute how influential his music is. What a cultural impact he made in his lifetime. Whilst he released better songs than Heartbreak Hotel, there are few that are more significant. In terms of the way it was this thrilling and revolutionary record. Heartbreak Hotel was released on 27th January, 1956, and it was his first single for RCA Victor, following his contract purchase from Sun Records. Elvis Presley’s first number one hit, it sold over a million copies. Even though it was not included on his eponymous album of 1956, it is worth noting that it turns seventy on 23rd March. I will spend some time with Heartbreak Hotel. Seventy years after its release, I wanted to focus on a single that stunned listeners and was a revelation. It was like nothing else released in the mid-'50s. I want to start off with this 2016 article, that tells the strange inspiration behind one of the greatest songs ever recorded:

“A suicide note was the unlikely inspiration behind the song that became Elvis Presley’s first No. 1 hit and million-selling single.

Steel guitarist and session musician Tommy Durden read a newspaper article about a man who had killed himself, leaving behind a piece of paper with the haunting words: “I walk a lonely street.”

Durden brought the article to his friend and cowriter Mae Boren Axton. A 41-year-old high school English teacher who moonlighted as a journalist and a songwriter, Axton had notched a few hits in the early ’50s with artists such as Perry Como and Ernest Tubb. In late 1955, she took a part-time position as a public relations secretary for Elvis’ manger, Colonel Tom Parker. When Mae first met Elvis, she felt he had everything he needed to become a star except a hit song. “You need a million-seller and I’m going to write it for you,” she promised.

As Axton and Durden discussed how they could turn the newspaper article into a song, Axton suggested that there be a “heartbreak hotel” at the end of the lonely street. With that flash of inspiration, the pair was off and running. Painting a picture of a place where “broken-hearted lovers cry away their gloom” and “the desk clerk’s dressed in black,” they managed to convey in very few words a mood that was both romantically charged and funereal.

Though the duo is responsible for penning the song, Elvis’s name would appear on the finished record as a third writer. It’s common knowledge that the Colonel often insisted that his boy get cowriting credit in exchange for cutting a song. But in later years, Axton insisted that the shared credit was her promise made good to help Elvis buy a house in Florida for his parents.

Axton took a demo of the song to Elvis while he was on the road. His reaction was immediate. “Hot dog, Mae, play it again,” he said. It reminded him a little of Roy Brown’s “Hard Luck Blues.” He quickly added the song to his live repertoire, changing one line of the lyric, from “they pray to die” to “they could die.”

On January 10, 1956, two days after his 21st birthday, Elvis recorded his first five sides for the RCA label at RCA Studio B in Nashville. Among them was “Heartbreak Hotel.” The producer was Steve Sholes, with Bob Ferris engineering. The band included guitarist Scotty Moore, bassist Bill Black, drummer D.J. Fontana, plus Chet Atkins on guitar, Floyd Cramer on piano and vocal group the Jordanaires. The echoey atmosphere punctuated by Fontana’s rim shots and Moore’s tinny guitar lent a despair to the track that perfectly matched Elvis’s heart-rending vocal.

The gloomy song was markedly different from anything Elvis had done previously at Sun Records. When his former label boss Sam Phillips heard an acetate from the Nashville session, he pronounced “Heartbreak Hotel” a “morbid mess.”

Back in the RCA Records boardroom in New York, there was a similar consensus. Producer Steve Sholes recalled, “They all told me it didn’t sound like anything, it didn’t sound like his other records, and I’d better not release it. I better go back and record it again.”

Elvis was unfazed, certain that the song was the right one to catapult him into the big time.

It was released on January 27, 1956. The next day, Elvis made his network television debut, performing live on the Dorsey Brothers Stage Show. It was the first of six appearances over the next few months, and he sang “Heartbreak Hotel” on three of those. On April 3, he did the song on the Milton Berle Show. Two weeks later on April 21, thanks in large part to his exposure on the new medium of TV, Elvis had his first No. 1 pop single (it also topped the country chart and went Top 5 on the R&B chart)”.

 On 10th January, 1956, a twenty-one-year-old Elvis Presley walked into RCA's McGavock Street, Nashville and laid down the vocals of this incredible song. Although it is quite melancholic and moody, it is a masterpiece that you are utterly transfixed by. The power of Presley’s vocals. Seductive and powerful at the same time. I want to move this article, that writes however iconic Heartbreak Hotel is now, it was not an instant chart smash in 1956:

“While Heartbreak Hotel was having trouble making the Top 100 in the early months of 1956, it was not Billboard’s fault. The publication repeatedly touted Presley first record in the weeks after its release. On February 1, just a few days after the single was shipped, Billboard listed the record in its “Best Bets” section. “Elvis Presley, country singer, is a compelling stylist who tears his tunes to tatters a la Johnnie Ray,” the magazine noted. “‘Heartbreak Hotel’ is an ideal piece of material and he goes to town with the help of an excellent background. It could establish Presley in the pop picture.”

On February 11, Billboard again praised Presley's recording in its “Review Spotlight” column. “Presley’s first Victor disk might easily break in both markets. ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ is a strong blues item wrapped up in his usual powerful style and a great beat … Presley is riding high right now with network TV appearances, and this disk should benefit from all the special pluggings.”

A week later, Billboard again endorsed Heartbreak Hotel, this time on its “This Week’s Best Buys” list. “Another record that has demonstrated Presley’s major league stature,” the magazine stated. “Sales have snowballed rapidly in the past two weeks, with pop and r.&b. customers joining Presley’s hillbilly fans in demanding this disk.” In a March 3 article, Billboard reported that the Presley record was RCA’s number 2 seller, right behind Perry Como’s “Juke Box Baby.” On March 7, the magazine noted that Heartbreak Hotel had reached the 300,000 sales mark.

• Presley finally broke into Billboard’s pop chart

In those days, Billboard’s Top 100 was tabulated through a combination of record sales and disk jockey surveys. By early March 1956, DJs who had been reluctant to accept the odd sounding Presley record, could no longer hold out in the face of the record’s massive sales and Presley’s growing popularity. On March 3, 1956, Heartbreak Hotel made its first appearance in the Top 100 at #68. By the end of the month, it was in the top 10 at #9. It would take another month to fight its way to the top, but on May 5 it took over the #1 spot, displacing Les Baxter’s instrumental, “The Poor People of Paris.” (Ironically, the day his record went to #1, Elvis was laying an egg on stage at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas.)

Heartbreak Hotel then settled in at #1 for nearly two months. It wasn’t until June 23 that Gogi Grant’s “The Wayward Wind” toppled Elvis’s recording from its lofty perch. Elvis's first hit single remained on the Top 100 for another three months, finally disappearing from the list on September 8, 1956. When all was said and done, Heartbreak Hotel had spent 27 weeks on the Top 100, 14 weeks in the top 10, 11 weeks in the top 5, and 7 weeks at #1. In Presley’s long and successful recording career, only All Shook Up would top the performance of his first RCA single on the Billboard chart.

In 1956 Billboard had many other charts besides the Top 100, and Heartbreak Hotel reached #1 on many of them. On May 26, 1956, the magazine announced that Presley’s disk had set a multiple chart-topping record. “This week, for the second time,” the music journal reported, “the RCA Victor artist hit the No. 1 spot on six charts with his version of ‘Heartbreak Hotel.’ This makes E.P. the first ‘double-Triple Crown’ winner in the history of The Billboard’s record charts. He topped the retail, jockey and juke box lists in both the pop and country and western categories.”

An interesting coincidence regarding Heartbreak Hotel on the Top 100 occurred on August 25, 1956. On the chart that week, two versions of the song were listed side by side. Elvis’ version sat at #96 on its way off the chart two weeks later. One notch above it, at #95, was comedian Stan Freeberg’s novelty version. While humorous, Freeberg’s recording, during which he repeatedly asks for a “little more echo in my voice,” served as a tribute to Presley’s trendsetting hit.

• Heartbreak Hotel made Elvis an overnight success

It is probably overstating the case to suggest that Heartbreak Hotel made Elvis Presley a star. With wildly popular stage shows, network TV appearances, and the resources of RCA Victor solidly behind him, he probably was destined for stardom even if his first recording on his new label had flopped. Heartbreak Hotel’s phenomenal achievement merely accelerated his ascendancy to fame. It made him appear an overnight success, when, in fact, fame came only after two years of working tiring one-nighters across the South and honing his craft in a small recording studio in Memphis”.

I am going to include parts of this article prior to highlighting the Wikipedia page on Heartbreak Hotel where they mention the legacy of this song. It moved, among other musicians, John Lennon and George Harrison. A half of the greatest band in history (The Beatles), it is clear that Heartbreak Hotel caused quite a sensation for young and impressionable music fans in the 1950s. I still think it has the power to move seventy years later:

“While author Tony Plews in his amazing 700-page book 'Walk A Lonely Street: Elvis Presley, Country Music & The True Story of Heartbreak Hotel' comments..

'From the opening notes, sung acapella (Elvis had lifted the key from c to e), it was clear this was a song unlike any other on the charts, be it pop, country or blues; and although it was not rock ‘n’ roll music per se (you couldn’t dance to it), it carried all of the rebelliousness and inherent sexiness of that new genre. It sounded savage, primal, and it came straight from the gut. It was the most prepared he’d been with any recording since “That’s All Right”. He had worked out which syllables to stretch and which beats to accentuate. Taking his cues from “Only You”, he’d established how to mangle words and add nonsensical sounds to the lyrics, transforming “I’ll be so lonely, baby” into something like “I’ll be-kuh so lonely, bay-beh”, which added to the rhythm while making the narrative yet more mysterious. He had streamlined some of the chorus pronouns, removing the “we” from the final line, ensuring it was more radio-friendly. But the one lyric that still remained unfixed in his mind was “pray to die”, and he wondered whether it was just too deep: but on take one it was present and correct.

For such a stark, unornamented song, he’d gone to great lengths to assemble the arrangement, but this was indicative of its importance to him. Even on the early takes, he spat out the first verse with absolute and shocking conviction, the band punctuating each line with a perfectly timed double strike (slightly behind the beat in best Fats Domino style), and as he slid into the chorus, Elvis was almost naked vocally, backed purely by the double-echo and Bill’s descending bass. Aside from the “kuh” affectations, his diction was immaculate, especially on the title words'.

The second verse was equally powerful, and on the chorus D.J. (on brushes) and Scotty Moore crept in to fill out the sound. By the third chorus, Chet Atkins was strumming and Floyd Cramer had added pitter-patter keyboard figures to complete the picture. The fourth verse and chorus maintained the full band, but it was the unrehearsed pianist who came unstuck during the following instrumental passage. Scotty carried the first part of this section leaning heavily on the staccato notes Elvis had suggested (as per his conversation with Mae Axton), but Floyd couldn’t find his mojo, having literally just learned the song. For the fifth verse, Elvis had decided to repeat the second, but instructed the band to add a flourish, D.J. again using his cymbals, to accentuate the finale.

The studio was hushed as the last note tailed off. Mae smiled. Steve raised his eyebrows. Elvis asked for a playback. The sound caught him unawares: the heavy echo wasn’t necessarily what he’d heard in his head during the weeks of preparation, but he recognised that it brought something otherworldly to the recording.

Right from the beginning, the record grabbed listeners by the throat: Scotty Moore's guitar raged and rocked; Elvis' vocal swaggered, but also reached out with the longing of those lyrics. 'Heartbreak Hotel' was full of alienation, loneliness and despair.

And the kids absolutely loved it. In their millions.

If there had been a rock'n'roll hero previously, it was James Dean, who died in a car crash three months before Elvis recorded 'Heartbreak Hotel'. The actor only lived to see one of his three films released, but in the tragic aftermath of his death, the cult of James Dean had flourished.

Youngsters on both sides of the Atlantic found solace in James Dean's moody, misunderstood martyr in Rebel Without A Cause, but they knew that after ‘Giant' there would be no more Dean films. And looking around for another idol, they happened upon that record, that voice, that man... The newly identified teenagers of the 50s had, at last, found their role model”.

Let’s end this seventieth anniversary celebration of Heartbreak Hotel by considering its legacy. Not only considered one of the best songs ever released, it has influenced plenty of musicians. Who themselves have also inspired generations. This Wikipedia article includes a bit about the legacy of Heartbreak Hotel. It would not be overstating it to say this is one of the most important song ever. I hope other journalists write about Heartbreak Hotel on its seventieth anniversary:

“In a 1975 interview, John Lennon recalled his friend Don Beatty's introducing him to Presley's music. Lennon said that his family rarely had the radio on, unlike other members of the Beatles who grew up under its influence. Beatty showed Lennon a picture of Presley that appeared along with the charts on the New Musical Express, and Lennon later heard "Heartbreak Hotel" on Radio Luxembourg. Lennon has said:

When I first heard "Heartbreak Hotel", I could hardly make out what was being said. It was just the experience of hearing it and having my hair stand on end. We'd never heard American voices singing like that. They always sang like Sinatra or enunciate very well. Suddenly, there's this hillbilly hiccuping on tape echo and all this bluesy stuff going on. And we didn't know what Elvis was singing about ... It took us a long time to work what was going on. To us, it just sounded as a noise that was great.

George Harrison described "Heartbreak Hotel" as a "rock n roll epiphany" when in 1956, at age 13, he overheard it while riding his bike at a neighbor's house. Some have said that "Heartbreak Hotel" turned that well-mannered schoolboy into a guitar-crazed truant who would audition for John Lennon's Quarrymen the following year.

The Rolling Stones' guitarist Keith Richards wrote in his 2010 autobiography Life that "Heartbreak Hotel" had a huge effect on him. Beyond Presley's singing itself, it was the total effect of his sound and his silence that so totally affected Richards:

Then, "Since my baby left me"—it was just the sound ... That was the first rock and roll I heard. It was a totally different way of delivering a song, a totally different sound, stripped down, no bullshit, no violins and ladies' choruses and schmaltz, totally different. It was bare right to the roots that you had a feeling were there but hadn't yet heard. I've got to take my hat off to Elvis. The silence is your canvas, that's your frame, that's what you work on; don't try and deafen it out. That's what "Heartbreak Hotel" did to me. It was the first time I'd heard something so stark.

Led Zeppelin's lead singer Robert Plant stated that the song "changed his life". He recalled hearing it for the first time when he was 8 years old:

It was so animal, so sexual, the first musical arousal I ever had. You could see a twitch in everybody my age. All we knew about the guy was that he was cool, handsome and looked wild.

Critic Robert Cantwell wrote in his unpublished memoir Twigs of Folly:

The opening strains of "Heartbreak Hotel", which catapulted Presley's regional popularity into national hysteria, opened a fissure in the massive mile-thick wall of post-war regimentation, standardization, bureaucratization, and commercialization in American society and let come rushing through the rift a cataract from the immense waters of sheer, human pain and frustration that have been building up for ten decades behind it.

The song was mentioned in the chorus of Patty Loveless's 1988 single "Blue Side of Town" from her album Honky Tonk Angel.

President Bill Clinton performed the song on tenor saxophone during his appearance on The Arsenio Hall Show on June 3, 1992. In 2004, it was ranked number 45 on Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time",  the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame included it in its unranked list 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll and in 2005, Uncut magazine ranked the first performance of "Heartbreak Hotel" in 1956 by Presley as the second greatest and most important cultural event of the rock and roll era. Paul McCartney, who participated in Uncut's poll stated, "It's the way [Presley] sings it as if he is singing from the depths of hell. His phrasing, use of echo, it's all so beautiful. Musically, it's perfect”.

On 27th January, 1956, I wonder how those listening to Heartbreak Hotel reacted. When they heard it on the radio or bought it. Whilst there was some warm praise in the U.S., the press reaction in Britain was colder. The single was written off and seen as insufficient, poorly sung and not fit to be played. It is amazing that critics were so tin-eared in 1956. In years since, Elvis Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel is seen as a classic. Something that changed Rock & Roll. In 2025, perhaps it sounds a little dated or slow. However, you cannot deny how significant the record is and how it introduced many to Presley. In 1995, Heartbreak Hotel was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. A staggering song considering the slightly unusual and unorthodox inspiration. Heartbreak Hotel is a song that, I feel, still sounds…

UTTERLY remarkable.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Revisited: Skye Newman

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight: Revisited

 

Skye Newman

__________

ABOUT seven months…

since I spotlighted Skye Newman, I am primed to come back to her. One reason is that she was just voted the winner of Radio 1’s Sound of 2026. She also put out her E.P., SE9 Part 1, in October. For anyone curious, SE9 primarily covers the areas of Eltham, Mottingham, and New Eltham, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich, London. Skye Newman was born in south-east London, so it is a representation of her home and hearth. I am going to go back to some interviews from later last year. However, before then, this article from yesterday (9th January), from the BBC is Skye Newman reacting to being named BBC Radio 1’s Sound of 2026. We get to learn about her background, and a year where she collaborated and performed with some big artists. An exceptional young musician who has been championed by Elton John:

“Born in south-east London, Newman exploded onto the scene last year when her debut single, Hairdresser, went straight into the top 20. The follow-up, Family Matters, reached number five in June.

It was the first time a female artist had made the top 20 with their first two singles since Ella Henderson in 2014.

Family 'nightmare'

Play her music and you'll instantly hear why.

Newman's songs crackle with barely-contained emotion, as her ragged (and extraordinarily expressive) voice tears through lyrics of betrayal, loss and disorder.

"It's literally the story of my life," she says.

"It's my way of letting out any trauma and pain that I couldn't speak."

On Family Matters, external, she describes growing up in a council estate home where drug abuse and police attention were a constant presence.

At the time, she didn't know any different. It was only later that Newman realised she "comes from a broken background".

"There's a lot more of it than people realise," she says, reflecting on her experiences of violence, arguments and addiction.

"I think a lot of people have children not really understanding how big [a responsibility] it is.

"They don't have love elsewhere in their life, so they think they can get it from a child - but then you're just passing your pain and trauma on to them, and it doesn't fix anything.

"You might have someone who loves you unconditionally, but you won't be able to provide everything they should get, because you're not happy."

Despite Family Matters' scathing account of her upbringing, Newman says she's still close to her parents and five elder siblings.

"My whole family understands the same feelings, so it's like we're all kind of in it together," she previously told Apple Music, external.

"As much as we're all a nightmare, it works because we all understand."

Newman has been singing since she could talk. She gave her first performance at the age of six, singing Cyndi Lauper's notoriously tricky True Colors at a school show.

"I don't know how, but my little voice managed to do it at the time," she laughs.

Before the song had even finished, she knew she'd devote her life to music.

"It was just magical. It was [my] first time having an audience, and I felt so comfortable."

Amy Winehouse – a singer who never surrendered her vulnerability in the midst of chaos - was her first true love, but it was Newman's aunt who helped her find a path in music.

A jazz and blues singer, she'd invite her niece to concerts and recording sessions, immersing her in the world of professional musicianship.

"She was a singer-songwriter too, and she showed me how you can create magic," she says.

"I'd watch her write and build something out of nothing. It gave me a hunger to be that person, making that magic.

"I'd go home and try it out for myself, and I found I had a way with words... I've always been a chatterbox, so that probably helped!"

Sadly, her aunt died when Newman was 11. At the funeral, Newman sang the 1930s folk song (You're Gonna Miss Me) When I'm Gone, after discovering it through the film Pitch Perfect.

"I watched that film with her best friend just after she died, and [the song] just resonated with me," says Newman. "It reminded me so much of her."

Before long, the singer started uploading original songs and "really horrendous covers" – first on YouTube, then Music.ly, before it became TikTok.

She built a sizeable fanbase but, as issues at home piled up, her posts trailed off.

On reflection, Newman says she needed time to get her head straight. She didn't yet have the emotional stability to deal with the pressures of a music career, let alone fame.

All the same, writing was key to her survival.

"Crazily enough, I'm someone who struggles to talk about what I feel," she says.

"Singing is a whole different story. When I'm in the studio, I feel calm. It's my safe space."

Serenity is not a quality you'd associate with her music, though. Her stories are vivid, prickly, lived-in. An emotional whirlwind.

On her breakout single, Hairdresser, external, she sings with bitter annoyance about a one-sided friendship – depicting a girl who'll borrow her clothes and her cash, but cancels their plans at the last minute when a man comes calling.

Her latest, Lonely Girl, external, is an all-too-recognisable story of a man in his early 20s taking advantage of a younger, emotionally naïve woman.

"You're in your school uniform in his car/Don't wanna see what's in his search bar."

Newman says it's more than a cautionary tale. "Young people need advocates, but also knowledge," she explained in a press release.

"Educate these babies on how good grooming can make them feel at first. Because that's the point - to keep them there so these predators can control. It's abuse."

Even in an era of confessional pop, Newman stands out. She's not afraid to stare down injustice, or to confront her demons before they swallow her whole.

When she plays live, the singer is often moved to tears.

"Definitely, the peace is disturbed sometimes," she says. "There are days where I feel absolutely fine, then I get on stage and it just comes out. Music can really draw out feelings that you didn't know were there."

But it's not all tears and tribulations.

Playing London's famous Koko venue last September, Newman clambered up to the balcony and belted out her hit song FU&UF, surrounded by her best friends., external

"That was a moment I'll never forget. I may not be blessed in the sense of a perfect family, but I'm blessed in the sense of friends, that's for sure."

Admirably, she's kept her friends close. Her sister is part of her management team, her best friend runs her social media, and other friends are training to handle stills photography and nail art.

"I'm just trying to pull people in that I love, because this industry can be so scary," she says. "So any jobs I can get them in, I'm like, 'Guys who wants a job? Who can learn how to do it?'"

She's also getting invaluable advice from her peers, with Sheeran, Capaldi and Sir Elton taking her under their considerable wings.

"It's just insanity, when I think about it," she says of getting to open for two of the UK's biggest acts”.

I will end with a couple of reviews for SE9 Part 1. Putting her childhood postcode on the musical map, it has won acclaim for the depth and importance of its lyrics. The incredible honesty of the lyrics. I think that is what affects people most. Many artists are not vulnerable or real with their music. They can hide behind a persona or their lyrics are oblique or cliché. With Skye Neman, you get someone who is unflinching real, raw and honest. I want to move to an NME interview from November. This exciting rising artist putting out her debut E.P. There are artists that take a while to make an impression and work their way into public consciousness. Skye Newman seems fully formed and someone incredible from the off:

“Songwriting was your way to escape when you were growing up. What did you want to get away from?

“Just carnage, really. I don’t like to go too much into things because it’s not just my life, it’s my five siblings’ lives as well, and there are many emotions involved… I was aware of things that should never have been brought to light. Things that I hope no one ever has to see or go through – definitely not at the age I did. A lot of trauma, I’ll just say that.”

Do you think this vulnerable approach is why your songs have resonated so much?

“It’s a very strange feeling. I get met with such sadness, but so many good feelings too. It breaks my heart that people relate, but also kind of heals me at the same time because, at the end of the day, I’m just a little girl trying to get through life – and she’s still there. Knowing there are people that understand how I feel makes it easier, but it’s also unsettling that so many people have been through the same stuff.”

You now count Elton John, Lewis Capaldi and Ed Sheeran among your fans. How have you found the past year?

“It’s been crazy and surreal. I don’t think it’s something I’ll ever get over. Even having conversations and getting advice from these people is mental. I honestly feel like I was born to do this job. I feel really cocky when I say that, but I don’t mean it like ‘I should be here’, more that I feel so at home and peaceful when I’m on stage. That’s always been my way of getting out of the real world, so to be able to do this full-time feels surreal, and that’s down to the people that listen to me. I can’t thank the people around me enough.”

Have you felt pressure following viral success?

“I haven’t felt pressure on myself. People can try to put it on you, but it’s only what you allow to affect you. I try not to allow other opinions to put pressure on me… I just love music and making it is my outlet, so I will keep doing what I love, and if people don’t like that and it doesn’t align anymore, then that’s fine. I don’t do it for the sake of that. I would still do it if it wasn’t my job.”

What’s the story of your first project, and why did you call it ‘SE9 Part 1’?

“I think these songs best represent how I’ve got to where I am. Because a lot of them were written two years ago, they are about my journey leading up to this point. They explain the events that made me me. It’s an insight into the first part of my life.”

What is your main goal as an artist?

“To have a long career in this and know that I always have music there as my outlet and support would be priceless”.

Prior to getting to some takes on the extraordinary and utterly engrossing SE9 Part 1, I am going to include some of Rolling Stone UK’s interview with Skye Newman. If some are not fans of Ed Sheeran and Lewis Capaldi and that side of Pop, I don’t think Newman sounds like that or has that same feel. Whilst it is great she is linked to these artists, I can see her collaborate more with incredible women at the Pop forefront very soon:

“In July, Newman performed alongside Ed Sheeran, before touring with Lewis Capaldi. Acknowledging that these experiences were incredible (“My voice has grown; my confidence has grown”), she says she needs to get back into the studio to see how it impacts her next round of songwriting. For now, we’re speaking following the release of her debut EP, SE9. With polished production by Luis Navidad, it features more candid songs about the place she calls home, with Newman’s voice unfurling like smoke, leaving her sharp lyrics floating in the air. 

Newman had a difficult childhood, though she only fully understood the extent once she got a bit older. “Whatever was going on was normal to me,” she says, “Drugs, violence, all that – that was normal. I think I’m very desensitised to a lot of these things.”

The moment that sparked the desire to process her feelings through writing was the death of her auntie when Newman was 11. A jazz and blues singer, her aunt brought young Newman along to the studio, letting her observe the songwriting process along with her live performances. “I just watched her have such passion and love for something,” Newman recalls. “I think because I was so close with her, and I got to watch music be created, that’s where my love of writing and the studio come from. Anyone that’s been in a studio will understand, but it’s very magical to me personally. There’s no better experience than watching a song be created.”

Music had always been a lifeline, but songwriting became a new tool. “Music’s my therapy: it’s easy to be in a studio, write it all down and kind of get it out that way,” she says. Though she had attended BRIT Kids – the prestigious BRIT School’s weekend programme for younger children – Newman did not have success with her auditions for BRIT School as an adolescent. It was a knock, but she smiles as she reflects on it: “It just made me want it more.”

She began uploading her songs online, first on YouTube and then Music.ly (which later merged with TikTok), gradually building her following. Coming from a working-class background in an arts industry that feels increasingly skewed towards people who come from wealth, Newman recognises the power of social media for levelling out the playing field: “You have a voice, you don’t need much to get your opinion out there, and there’s power in numbers for people who don’t have much. Coming from fuck all, I love what it’s done for me.” 

At the same time, she’s very aware of the impact social media has had on the music industry (and beyond). “Numbers are great, but it doesn’t mean much compared to being live with people,” she says. “I’m always the person that would rather sit in a room full of music and live instruments and feel it, whereas that’s got lost a lot more because of social media. It’s ruined the thing of real, raw music because everyone just wants that 20-second, 30-second buzz for TikTok. If that’s what you’re looking for, you’ve got the wrong bitch – I’m someone else!” 

Skye Newman is a refreshing, striking new voice on the British music scene, unafraid to put out fully formed songs full of vulnerability and bite. For those who haven’t been paying attention, such a massive breakthrough year has led to accusations of Newman being an industry plant. She laughs at the idea, once more displaying that bright and engaging honesty that has so enraptured her listeners: “I’ll take it! People think someone who’s done this before is writing my songs? Happy days! Means I’m doing it right”.

New Wave Magazine looked inside the wonderful SE9 Part 1. Skye Newman very much writing real, personal and honest music. It is not so insular or personal that it cannot be understood by listeners. She is writing about themes that many can relate to. Whilst her music is fun and there is this energy to it, there is this potency and punch that stays in the mind. Tackling issues and subjects with bravery:

“Life always feels tumultuous and turbulent when you’re young. You think everything that has happened to you, has only happened to you, and because you’re so close to it, you’re right in the middle of the storm, it’s hard sometimes to gain clarity or distance over the events that happen in your life.

And that’s what Skye Newman wrestles with in her EP, SE9 Part 1, named after the postcode of her childhood home in South East London.

The opening track, ‘FU & UF’ was first teased and then performed at her sold-out shows at KOKO London earlier this year, which was also the first time she performed there. Videos on social media platform TikTok in the balcony amongst her fans as if she wasn’t the headliner, and had simply gone to enjoy her favourite artist with her friends.

The sound of a metronome throughout the stripped-out production keeps us locked in before the visceral and expressive voice of Skye sets us off on this six-track journey.

Like much of the project, she is heated, as she shares a tale of being a victim of unreplicated effort from her partner, and explores gender politics.

Speaking about the track, she said: “I put FU & UF first because it’s good to remind whoever’s listening to be strong and to stand your ground,” says Skye. “My main message is don’t change who you are for anyone. Be true to yourself. It took me a while to realise this, but I am now living for me. And that’s the most important kind of living!”

The accompanying visual, directed by Rohan Dill, documents Skye and her friends, all females, reclaiming traditionally male-dominated and masculine spaces such as football pitches and boxing rings to showcase the importance of representation and the power of feminine energy.

Skye believes that kindness kills. The second track of the EP, Hairdresser, soulfully explores the transactional nature of relationships through a dual lens. The frustrated girlfriend vents about her man to the hairdresser, who in turn questions the validity of the friendship.

Skye sings, “Baby girl, are you listening? (Yeah) / There you go, got me questioning / If I was low, would you call me then? /If you got a man, would we still be friends?”

Combining electronic elements such as synths with upbeat drums, ‘My Addiction’ has a more alternative psychedelic influence as she likens love and desire to addiction that she cannot seem to or wants to shake.

The South Londoner longs to return to better memories on ‘Out Out’ – gentle piano chords help to provide the only quiet moment in the project. It shows Skye demonstrating introspection without losing the edge in her voice. She laments for more care, consideration and appreciation in the face of an unhappy relationship.

On ‘Family Matters’, the opening line is “You’ve never worn these shoes/Don’t mean my new balance in blue/Raised on pure dysfunction, But sleep I’ll never lose”,  is delivered with a raw honesty as she shares her perspective on her family, and embraces how adversity has shaped her.

Closing out with Smoke Rings, Skye shows she has one of the most compelling voices as she goes back to basics with a minimalistic piano instrumentation, favouring an intimate soundscape, in which her smooth voice adopts a more languid style than what we have heard so far. She does keep the power.

It’s a fitting end, cinematic even. Yearning and longing, the fire that we encountered at the start has been turned down to a simmer. It’s warm enough to be comforting, but there is an undeniable sadness in Skye’s voice as she sings about regret and heartbreak. Sometimes you only know you're past the storm until the smoke clears.

This summer just gone, Skye Newman has performed at the BBC Introducing stage at Radio 1’s Big Weekend in Liverpool, sang alongside Ed Sheeran with ain Ipswich and supported Lewis Capaldi’s UK tour. She has also had her own headline shows at Manchester’s O2 Ritz and London’s KOKO sold out”.

I will end with Broken 8 Music and their review of the unbelievable SE9 Part 1. This is an E.P. that came from one of our very best artists. I know I use those words to describe many artists. However, Skye Newman is very much the real deal. Someone who is going to have a hugely long and successful career:

“Skye Newman has had a truly nuts year. Two massive, Gold-certified singles that crashed the UK Top 20 – a first for a UK female solo artist in over a decade – should tell you all you need to know. Her performances have gone from the BBC Introducing stage to lighting up arena tours with Lewis Capaldi and Ed Sheeran. Now, with the release of her debut project, the six-track EP, 'SE9 Part 1', Newman is proving that her ascent is no fluke; she’s a generational talent rooted in the poetry and grit of South East London, after which the EP is named.

This project is a perfect snapshot of her journey so far, effortlessly blending the already iconic hits with three brand-new tracks. The established singles, 'Hairdresser', 'Family Matters', and 'Out Out', are already cornerstones of her sound: smoky, soul-infused vocals laid over surprisingly simple, yet potent, production. She manages to balance intimacy and raw honesty in a way few artists can, pulling from her influences like Amy Winehouse and Eminem to create something truly her own.

The breakthrough success of 'Family Matters' wasn’t down to chance. It’s a gut-punch of a track where she lays her life bare, singing lines like, "Raised on pure dysfunction / but sleep I’ll never lose." It’s an unflinching look at complex family life, summarised perfectly by her observation: "I can tell you about me, but you won’t understand."

The new tracks are just as compelling. The opener, 'FU & UF', is already plastered across social media thanks to pre-release snippets. It starts with a minimalist, piano-led beat that eventually swells into a pop masterpiece. It’s a classic Newman move: letting her incomparable voice carry the weight of her lyrics about a toxic lover. Then there's 'Smoke Rings', a stunning piano ballad about remembering lost passion. When she sings, "All of the smoke rings take me back there / When I did it with you," her voice and the piano move together like true partners, proving that synths and fancy instrumentation aren’t needed when you possess a voice this pure and expressive.

Newman’s strength lies in her fearless refusal to hold back, whether she's calling out a disappointing friend in 'Hairdresser' or navigating personal battles. This debut EP is a powerful statement. 'SE9 Part' 1 is more than just a collection of songs; it’s a mission statement from an artist who speaks from the heart and is already redefining what it means to be a UK chart-topper. This isn't just where she’s from; it’s a launchpad for where she’s headed”.

Next month, Skye Newman briefly visits the U.S. and has a couple of dates there. She has a run of U.K. dates in the spring. It is a shame that the London dates are sold out, as I would love to see her perform. It shows that there is huge demand and this love of her music. She plays Reading & Leeds in August. It is going to be another busy year. With the BBC Radio 1 Sound of 2026 honour under her belt and a stunning E.P. done, what comes next? I guess there will be debut album at some point, though I feel this year is going to be Newman taking to the road as much as possible and putting out some new singles. This extraordinary London songwriter was in my sights last year but, since I covered her, so much has happened. It was essential to come back…

TO this truly wonderful artist.

____________

Follow Skye Newman

FEATURE: Born This Way: Lady Gaga at Forty

FEATURE:

 

 

Born This Way

PHOTO CREDIT: Greg Swales for Rolling Stone

 

Lady Gaga at Forty

__________

I am writing this feature…

IN THIS PHOTO: Lady Gaga at the GRAMMY Awards on 2nd February, 2025/PHOTO CREDIT: Rankin for The Recording Academy

in January, but I am excited to look ahead to 28th March and the fortieth birthday of Lady Gaga. I am going to end this feature with a career-spanning playlist featuring some of Lady Gaga’s best songs and some deep cuts. I want to start out with a GRAMMY article from March 2023. Published “In celebration of Women's History Month, get a glimpse of Lady Gaga's influential career as a luminary of dance-pop and her outspoken advocacy for women's rights”:

“Born Stefani Germanotta, Lady Gaga is one of the best-selling female artists in history. Rightfully so, Gaga's years of training — from taking piano lessons at 4 years old to briefly studying at New York University's prestigious Collaborative Arts Project 21 musical theater program — prepared her to become one of the most technical pop singers of all time. With the addition of her innovative creativity to her musical skill set, Gaga forged the perfect formula to become one of the biggest stars of her generation.

Lady Gaga created music under the pen name — a reference to Queen's hit "Radio Ga Ga" — years before she finally caught the eyes of Interscope executive Vincent Herbert, who she now credits for discovering her. Eventually, Lady Gaga was introduced to award-winning songwriter and producer RedOne to make her breakthrough album, 2008's The Fame, under Interscope imprint label Cherrytree Records.

Speaking to The Independent in 2009, she recalled her struggles to get radio airplay after releasing The Fame. "They would say, 'This is too racy, too dance-oriented, too underground. It's not marketable,'" she said. "And I would say, 'My name is Lady Gaga. I've been on the music scene for years, and I'm telling you, this is what's next.'"

And right she was: the year following The Fame's premiere, Lady Gaga received her first GRAMMY nomination for "Just Dance" at the 2009 GRAMMY Awards. Over a decade later, she's won 13 GRAMMYs and counts 36 GRAMMY nominations in total.

By 2016, Lady Gaga had four No. 1 albums under her belt, from Born This Way to Joanne. In 2018, she signed on to be the lead actress in Bradley Cooper's remake of A Star Is Born, also doubling as the songwriter and producer for the soundtrack. The release was an immediate success, debuting at the top of the Billboard 200 Albums chart and making Lady Gaga the first woman with five No. 1 albums in the 2010s. In 2019, Lady Gaga became the first person in history to win a GRAMMY, Oscar, BAFTA, and Golden Globe in a single year.

As a part of GRAMMY.com's ongoing commemoration of Women's History Month, we're looking back at Lady Gaga's influential career as one of the music industry's pop legends in this episode of Run The World. Extending Lady Gaga's impressively successful career as an entertainer is her philanthropy and advocacy work as a proud, outspoken feminist.

During her 2018 ELLE Women in Hollywood event, Lady Gaga gave an inspiring speech to bring awareness to sexual assault. "For me, this is what it means to be a woman in Hollywood. It means I have a platform. I have a chance to make a change. I pray we listen, believe, and pay closer attention to those around us in need. Be a helping hand. Be a force for change," Lady Gaga concluded after courageously sharing her story as a survivor.

"I would like to dedicate this song to every woman in America. To every woman who now has to worry about her body if she gets pregnant. I pray that this country will speak up and we will not stop until its right!" - Lady Gaga talking about abortion rights at The #ChromaticaBallDC pic.twitter.com/YjwlC0rg7C

— Ryan | Lady Gaga 🏳️‍🌈 (@ryanleejohnson) August 9, 2022

She has also used her platform on stage to advocate for women. During her Chromatica Ball tour in 2022, she dedicated "The Edge of Glory" to women after the government overturned Roe v. Wade two months prior: "To every woman who now has to worry about her body if she gets pregnant, I pray this country will speak up, and we will not stop until it's right!"

Lady Gaga isn't just a musician or actress. She is a pioneer in change, a spokesperson for those whose voices might not get heard. She wants to see women, especially in entertainment, win while being able to claim their authentic femininity, as she told Glamour in 2017.

"I hope to see women thriving and happy, loving what they're doing, and being in control and powerful of what they create," she explained. "As much as we all love the fashion and the makeup and glamour, this isn't a beauty pageant. It's about the heart and the drive and the work”.

I am going to round off with extracts from a Rolling Stone interview. She released her latest, and acclaimed, album in March. MAYHEM is one of the best albums from last year. Rolling Stone published their interview in November. Lady Gaga spoke about “returning from the brink, finding love, and making one of her greatest albums”:

“As she recorded Mayhem, Gaga had dreams “of these different sides of myself.” There’s a line in the industrial confessional “Perfect Celebrity” about a “clone … asleep on the ceiling,” and the disquieting single “Disease” was narrated by Gaga’s dark side before she had a name for it: “You’re so tortured when you sleep/Plagued with all your memories.”

What Gaga doesn’t quite remember — and neither did I, until I went back to my transcripts — is that she was having similar visions as early as 2011. “I had this dream that I had something evil inside of me,” she told me that year, as we rode through Manhattan in a chauffeured car. “And there was this white wall, and in order to get the negativity and the evil out of me, I had to hit the wall, and an essence would fly out of my soul center. I was trying to get rid of it — an exorcism of some sort.”

The exorcism clearly didn’t stick back then. When it came time to make the video for “Disease,” Mayhem’s first single, the Mayhem character was born. “We started exploring with the choreography this idea of me battling myself,” she says. “That song is so deliberately about somebody that wants to harm you — and it being you.” Gaga has played with horror-movie imagery before, but the “Disease” video is a coded tour of her darkest thoughts, a remarkably uncompromising way to begin an all-important album cycle. She starts the video singing as her own corpse, mowed down by a car with Mayhem at the wheel, and it gets more nightmarish from there.

Oddly enough, the video, and all of the thematic cues the tour took from it, might not have existed without Gaga’s latest movie, last October’s instantly notorious megaflop Joker: Folie á Deux. “There was a ton of negativity around Joker,” she says. “And I think I was feeling artistically rebellious at the time.”

Gaga’s deeply felt turn, alongside Joaquin Phoenix, as a tragically delusional Harley Quinn won some of the film’s only praise. Reviews were otherwise vicious. Fans of 2019’s dour Joker were outright repelled by the new film’s daring-if-not-reckless tonal leap: The original was a faux-Scorsese urban-decay drama, and this was a … surreal semi-musical about mental illness. With a cartoon segment.

After all of Gaga’s experiences, did the wave of hatred for a movie really bother her? “I wasn’t, like, unfazed,” she says, smiling at the question. “It’s funny, I’m almost nervous to share my reaction. But the truth is, when it first started happening, I started laughing. Because it was just getting so unhinged.” Her amusement eventually faded. “When it takes a while for something to kind of dissipate, that can be a little bit more painful. Only because I put a lot of myself into it.”

The “Disease” video, then, was an answer to all of that hostility. “I put so much of that energy into that video,” she says. “I was in that place, you know, I was like, ‘I’ll show you who I am, and I’ll show you what this fight is like.’”

The resulting work of art cut a little too deep. “When we were done filming it, I went kind of into a dark place mentally,” Gaga says. “Maybe I scared myself a little bit.… For weeks I was really bothered. It was in my head a lot. I was actually trying to figure out what I was trying to say. There’s a side of me that’s scared of another side. And I think that there was a sense in me that I was not done healing.”

The Mayhem sessions were long, and often emotionally intense. “There were many times where she would sing a vocal for a song and it would bring me to tears, and then she would also be in tears,” says Watt, who credits Polansky with a crucial stabilizing role in the process. “Michael’s just so amazing because he’s so levelheaded. We could all be so eccentric and excited and jumping up and down and diving into the art. And then he would be like the great leveler. He’d be like, ‘Nah, I don’t like that song as much as I liked that other song.’ He had that all-knowing Buddha-type energy.”

From there, Gaga and her fiancé ended up working together on every aspect of the tour planning. “Imagine two best friends just moving through life, but we’re always being creative,” Gaga says.

The partnership goes both ways. There’s a skin-health research firm near Cambridge, Massachusetts, called Outer Biosciences, with 20 employees, that was secretly co-founded by one of the most famous women in the world. “It was her idea,” says Polansky. She’s officially on the board of directors, but they’ve kept her name out of it, until now. “The attention that Stefani’s involvement would bring — it wasn’t necessary. It’s not consumer-facing. It’s a research company.… My work is not public in the same way. When she talks about us being partners, it kind of looks like it all goes one direction, but she’s the most incredible support to me as well.”

They’re planning on getting married soon, either during the tour or just after. “We’re talking about it all the time,” Polansky tells me. “We have these breaks, and they’re tempting. It’s like, ‘OK, can we get married that weekend?’ We don’t want a really big wedding, but we want to enjoy it. In a lot of ways, we already feel married, so it’s not like it’s gonna change much.”

They’re clear that parenthood is next, and Polansky is inspired by Elton John and David Furnish, whose kids are Gaga’s godsons. “Their kids have turned out to be very happy. The most important thing is making it feel like this is just our family, this is what we do. Her being Lady Gaga and the art and all of it is not something that she has to compartmentalize away from her relationship with me or when she’s a mother.”

“Being a mom is the thing I want the most,” Gaga says. “And he’s gonna be a beautiful father. We’re really excited about that.”

I suddenly remember something she said to me over dinner when she was 23 years old, with a single album to her name. She’d be fully Lady Gaga forever, she vowed, “even when I have a baby one day.”

She looks me in the eyes. “I lied,” she says, and laughs so hard that the heels of her platform boots nearly leave the floor. She says it again, looking as unburdened as I’ve ever seen her. “I lied! I’ve grown up since I said that”.

This fabulous New York City-born icon turns forty on 28th March. I am not sure whether Lady Gaga has anything planned, whether there will be a load of new features and anything published around it. However, I thought it was a perfect opportunity to highlight her incredible and singular work. One of the most influential artists of her generation, she has had such a varied career. Hugely successful and acclaimed, we are going to be hearing incredible music from her for…

DEACDES more.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Jim Legxacy

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDIT: Jono White for The New York Times

 

Jim Legxacy

__________

I have not included…

the amazing Jim Legxacy on my site before. It is omission, as he was declared the runner-up in Radio 1’s Sound of 2026 poll. Skye Newman – who I have covered before – was the winner. I am going to come to some interviews with Jim Legxacy. However, before that, the BBC spoke with one of our very best young artists. His mixtape, black british music, was released last year and was met with huge acclaim:

“Legxacy (the x is silent) was born James Olaloye in Lewisham. The child of Nigerian immigrants, he paints a bleak picture of the south London borough. He once rapped about growing up "afraid of the block", where he was surrounded by "deportations, prison sentencing [and] stabbings".

Money and opportunities were scarce but there was a "a good sense of brotherhood" in his friend group, and he has fond memories of riding bikes and playing basketball.

His mum "tried hard to shelter me" and filled the house with feel-good music – gospel songs, Bob Marley, Michael Jackson.

But as a child, "I was never interested in it," he has said. "Maybe because of how intense it made me feel."

It wasn't until he was 17 that he let his guard down.

Friends at school introduced him to rap, specifically Kanye West's head-spinning The Life of Pablo, and his world opened up.

"That's the first rap album I sat through top to bottom," he told Brick The Mag, external.

"For that to be my first one is insane because a lot [of albums] have structure and organisation… But the first one that I found was the most chaotic Kanye album ever.

"It had no cohesion, and no real sense of identity outside of the fact that it's chaotic, and I think that has shaped so much of what I do."

Sensitive side

Inspired, he started making his own beats, stitching together samples and genres to create a sonic collage reflecting his tumultuous London existence.

It's an approach that was inspired by his university course in graphic design.

"My teacher would always make me make something and then she'll be like, 'All right, cool, now that you've made this, cut this up then try and make it into something completely new'," Legxacy told the New York Times, external.

Even so, the initial results weren't great.

"I started off really bad," he admitted, "but I'd send a voice note of me rapping to my boys every week and they'd critique my technique, delivery, beat selection, etc.

"After a few months I was rapping like it was second nature."

He uploaded his first song, Plethora, to TiKTok in 2019 and was "gassed" when it received 1,000 plays in a day.

But as his music took off, he found it difficult to keep up. For a period, Legxacy was homeless – the byproduct of a legal situation his father found himself in – sleeping on friends' floors and (in one case) in their office.

He addressed the situation on his debut mixtape in 2022. "No silver spoons in my hood, just empty pockets," he mused.

Yet the majority of the songs were concerned with a broken relationship, hopelessly dissecting what went wrong.

Led by the subject matter, he started singing more, his dewy-eyed timbre adding emotional depth to the fragmented, impressionistic soundscapes.

"What music in London has been missing for a long time is vulnerability, because I think a lot of us are trying so hard to come across a certain way," he told Kids Take Over.

"Everyone falls into that cycle, especially when you grow up where you grow up. But I just always try to emphasise in the music that there is a sensitive side. I'm trying to integrate as much honesty into things."

Fans hope the musician will release his first full-length album in 2026

As his reputation grew, Legxacy was invited to collaborate with Dave and Central Cee, producing their chart-dominating hit Sprinter in summer 2023. But family tragedy delayed his own music.

"Sorry the mixtape is takin soo long," he wrote on X in November 2024. "My momma had a stroke so I've spent the past couple weeks lookin after her."

When he returned, it was with the standalone single Aggressive, external. Despite its title, the track's central message was about combating negativity.

"I feel like everyone's kind of going through difficult times right now... so I wanted to make something that doesn't ignore that," he told Radio 1.

"But I think trying to be optimistic with the things that we're making is important”.

Last July, The New York Times interviewed Jim Legxacy about his new album, black British music. Although he released CITADEL in 2021 and homeless n*gga music in 2023, black British music is his crowning achievement and finest work to date. Saluting an artist who makes music that sounds like memory, The New York Times spoke with a hungry and enormously talented artist whose new mixtape is a “homage to the last two decades of Black British music”:

“Being able to bring one of England’s biggest stars to a quiet street in southeast London would suggest that Legxacy — born James Olaloye — already has capacities far beyond the circumstances of his raising.

“I truly believe in myself and I truly believe that I am doing and I will do super-incredible things — I don’t even think we were purely at the precipice of whatever I’m going to end up doing,” Legxacy said. “But that being said, that’s only going to happen if I work hard. And I just think thinking things like that might inspire complacency.”

There is no evidence of that on “Black British Music (2025),” an elegant and affecting album that’s clearly the product of an active mind and a wistful spirit, blending raw emotional vigor and easeful song construction.

“How do I make a futuristic version for the present based on what has existed in the past?” Legxacy wondered. That productive tension manifests as a unifying patina on songs that hopscotch among myriad genres, from hip-hop to folk, engaging with several recent currents in Black British music while perfecting a sound not particularly beholden to any of them. Legxacy’s true palette is history and memory, and the way that personal experience can metastasize in unexpected creative ways.

Much of the album was forged in the fire of familial crisis: He said his mother had suffered a stroke, his older brother was being treated for psychosis, and his sister died from sickle cell anemia. Though he was derailed emotionally, he took solace in knowing he had a way to process.

“I was like, it’s calm, because I get to work on this,’” Legxacy said. “There’ll be a day I’ll get to show people that they can overcome anything.”

But “Black British Music (2025)” is the product of Legxacy finding community, one in which he is quickly becoming a lighthouse. He maintains an active Discord channel full of fans and, increasingly, musical collaborators.

“I’ll start something and I’ll screen share it and be like ‘What do you think, guys?’ Send it to like four different people and they’ll send something completely different back, all of them,” he said. From those, he’ll pick a direction, then piece together a new work from the disparate options. “They would push it in a way that I wouldn’t see and I would take what I like and cut and then do the same.”

Legxacy said he’s been comfortable with online friendship going back to his teenage days playing Xbox Live. “They’re all so respectful,” he said. “I’ll be like, yeah, guys, I’ll show you a song, please no one screen record. I won’t see no leaks. I won’t see nothing on YouTube.”

By evening, he was in an Uber heading to the Catford district, where he sneaked into Tasty African Food a few minutes before closing. En route, he learned that diligent fans had discovered that Dave would be featured on the album, which had previously been a secret. Legxacy was sanguine and sympathetic to their eagerness, because he’s eager, too.

“I’ll do anything to preserve my imagination,” he said. “Even though I say a lot I’m still holding back. There’s still so much more I want to say.” Most nights, he said, he stays up until sunrise, or later, his brain racing”.

I will finish with a couple of reviews and assessments of Jim Legxacy and what he created with black British music. The Culture Crypt crowned the mixtape their album of the year 2025. They went deep with the sound and artwork of this generation’s production wiz and how he “blends brainrot, Blackness and Britishness to create a landmark sound”. This is an artist who is going to have a massive year:

“Jim's sonic palette includes brief and broken synth lead melodies, which never seem to find resolution. His mixtape (widely mistaken for the scope of an album) embodies this ontological insecurity of an identity in stasis—never quite Black, never quite British—but instead grappling constantly between the two.

In Jeffrey Boakye's book Black, Listed, this contradiction is emphasised within a rigorous history of Black dejection in Britain. Tastefully, the project's artwork for Black British Music (2025) alludes to this very book with its red spray-painted typography atop black-and-white photography.

Interpolating J Hus on Afroswing-forward track "Sun" featuring Fimiguerrero injects euphoric bursts of nostalgia. This moment on the project runs counter to the idea that we should reject the Black British mantle and inspires joyful memories of our youth's cultural contributions to the country's heritage, joy and identity. As the host exclaims on the intro of the standout earworm, "Father": "We've been making arses shake since the Windrush".

While it felt like the UK had encountered a cultural void following the heyday of Afroswing, drill and UK hip-hop, recent successes of acts like Jim as well as YT, Len, Fakemink and more have proved that they are the descendents from the veterans who established the sounds of our childhoods.

The sceptical comments on Twitter that were aimed at the UK underground during their appearances at Wireless this year prove that there is still a long way to go before the British public accepts this succession. However, co-signs from Dave, Skepta and Headie One hint that this is the new vanguard.

Jim's approach to addressing this discussion is intriguing. It builds upon the style of his 2023 release, Homeless Nigga Pop Music, which read like a palimpsest commemorating a South London upbringing filled with both imaginative awe and anxiety. While Black British Music expands its focus to a much broader terrain, it offers a less direct portrayal of its subject. It allows its production to reflect his world, while he wanders on lyrical escapades about hedonism, grief and self-betterment.

Given the amount of attention he devotes to representing Black British culture through this LP's production, rollout and art, this may be confusing. However, the opener "Context" elucidates this choice. Jim explains that this album is about escapism, losing sight of oneself and rebuilding after the tribulations he encountered while making it. The Black British soundscape is a vector for Jim's personal expression: the fractures and attempts of self-determination from Black Britain mirroring his own personal conflicts.

This joyful communication also heavily mirrors brainrot humour—a style of internet comedy characterised by reducing joy or misery into a blur of whimsical reproductions and distorted representations of contemporary culture. This sense of humour is embedded in BBM's production through the use of cultural references to the effect of satire, irony and a distinct tongue-in-cheek quality. Black British Music in particular abstracts and disrupts our perception of Black Britain, addressing it insightfully, in jest but with creativity.

This distinct style of chaotic collages, random noises and distorted presentations can be traced back to the 1930s Dadaism movement. A reaction to the horrifying aftermath of the First World War, the Dadaism movement found artists creating works that had no explicit meaning or purpose—a nihilistic response to the failure of human ideology to make the world a better place. 

The prevalence of a Black British Music summer in 2025 then—the season in which this tape stimulated the imagination of Britain's creative youth and invigorated the sounds of their leisure—was a bittersweet period of reckoning. Through dance and play, this project made its listeners rethink their position in the world, confront their beliefs and repackage them.

It's reminiscent in some ways of Charli xcx's brat, whose discombobulating, raucous and playful production connoted limitless self-indulgence. The party goes on and on and on… with very little prescience for hangovers and come-downs. Dadaism, while much more sober, similarly rejects the solemn tone of philosophy and intellectualism because humanity has gotten to where it is—a permanent state of warfare, inequality and dejection—in spite of aeons of supposed enlightened thinking.

Jim comes across equally as disassociated with the tribulations of the human experience, but he exercises more restraint in his nihilism. And rightly so. The weight of the previously acknowledged racial themes demands cultural sensitivity: Black music that bears the mantle of its people as boldly as this one does requires a tactful awareness.

Additionally, the singer-songwriter's internal battles with grief, trauma and poverty push him to search for meaning as a way to escape those ills. And so, Black British Music represents a prudent engagement with style: it carefully uses Dadaist caricature and collage to deconstruct masculinity, race and identity while acknowledging the fact that these elements exist within the tectonic turbulence of postmodernity.

This is why Jim can retell (alleged) stories of sitting in the trap on "New David Bowie"—evoking the hypermasculine imagery attached to this setting—while making himself sound tender, vulnerable and hysterical on tracks like "Issues of Trust".

I am ending with CLASH and their take on black british music. I think that runner-up spot on Radio 1’s Sound of 2026 is the start of a new chapter. It will put Jim Legxacy’s music more into the mainstream. Even if he has been around for a few years now, he is starting to release his best music and make his biggest moves right now. I feel he will grow even stronger:

“A lot of shit happened… it weren’t just her death… my mum… had two strokes. My brother had psychosis.” Jim Legxacy candidly speaks on top of pulsing euphoria, crunchy-warm guitars and MIDI synths at the opening of ‘black british music (bbm)’.

“’Candy Reign’ got taken down,” he continues, referring to his 2022 single that was subject to a copyright strike. The former confessional is a testament to the pure soul that he will pour into the 15-track album. But the latter, a sign of just how all-in he is and has been for years.

There’s more candid emotion to come. It’s given time on songs like issues of trust, which finds Jim’s voice wilting on a trellis of acoustic guitar as he contemplates being truly vulnerable. There’s the modestly flowering ‘dexters phone call’, featuring Dexterinthenewsagent, where chugging guitar and a solemn hook – “Life’s not been easy” – are lifted by chittering vocal samples and school-music-room chords turn to distorted licks.

But Jim happily fits true emotion into the more buoyant tracks, too, like the angsty single ‘3x’. He offers another reference to his late sister – a vein of melancholy running through ‘bbm’ – as heavy-hitting feature Dave reassures Jim he’s done her proud. But this candid performance plays out over infectious dancehall-adjacent beats. Grief and good times swirl together, as they often do, like the first wistful swig of drink at a get-together at the start of a long phase of sadness.

The artist offers an explanation of his ability to bring these disparate moods together on skippy phone-speaker banger ‘father’: “I was on the block listening to Mitski.”

The image of her, and a demonstrably large range of music blasting through the headphones of a young Jim in Lewisham; ‘father’s accompanying video featuring UK-centric Frutiger Aero imagery; the proliferation of Blackberry phones and crunchy 280p resolution in his visuals; indeed, the album title’s reference to the phone’s messaging platform. All of these present Jim as someone who grew up and nurtured a love for music in the late 2000s.

The dying days of playlists cobbled together from BeeMP3 rips and Bluetooth. When you’d chase your YouTube-ripped dj_boonie_whenitwasme.mp3 with the squelchy bass of T2’s ‘Heartbroken’. Where saccharine emo sat in the same file as abrasive grime instrumentals. Where Limewire offered avid music fans access to any music they wanted.

‘’06 wayne rooney’ reaches back to its titular year for a serving of emo-indie with a yearning momentum – one can almost see the FIFA 06 team select screen. Quick-step collage ‘new david bowie’, with its LG Chocolate pitched-up vocals, dives suddenly into dubby ad libs as Jim delivers trappy bars between breaths, switching his focus away from the distractions of technology for a moment: “Put my phone on DND.”

In a week where the UK vs US discourse reached a fever pitch – a debate simultaneously invigorating and fatiguing – Jim Legxacy is busy on the bus flicking through his Blackberry, assembling a sonic patchwork of disparate influences over a nucleus of Black London musicality, and imbuing each thread with an undeniable protagonist energy.

9/10”.

I was waiting a bit to feature Jim Legxacy and see what interviews were published last year. It has been a bit of a long wait, though I think it is a perfect time to spotlight this incredible artist. Someone who we will be talking about for years. One of our most important voices. Such a superb songwriter and visionary, we have not seen an artist like him for a very long time. No wonder there is so much excitement around him. I think that Jim Legxacy is an artist that we…

NEED right now.

____________

Follow Jim Legxacy

FEATURE: Groovelines: The Beach Boys – Sloop John B

FEATURE:

 

 

Groovelines

  

The Beach Boys – Sloop John B

__________

WE will celebrate…

sixty years of The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds on 16th May. It is one of the most important albums of that decade. The quality of the music and the context of Pet Sounds. A hugely influential album, it found the band pushing the studio and bringing all this innovation into their music. A step on from what they had done before. Even if bands like The Beatles were similarly inventive in the studio, you feel the two bands were pushing one another in this friendly competition. However, The Beach Boys’ compositions, production style and techniques inspired waves of artists and can be heard in modern music. I will discuss the album more fully prior to its sixtieth anniversary. However, I want to focus on the album’s second single. Released on 21st March, 1966, it is one of The Beach Boys’ most enduring songs. A standout from this masterpiece album. Recorded between 12th July and 29th December, 1965, it was produced by Brian Wilson. Sloop John B is a Bahamian Folk song from Nassau. It is fascinating how The Beach Boys took the song and adapted it. Different to previous versions and incarnation, the single reached number two in the U.S. Like God Only Knows and Wouldn’t It Be Nice, another case of Brian Wilson’s production and arranging brilliance. Perhaps less orchestral and stirring than some of Pet Sounds’ most-adored tracks, I think that Sloop John B is fascinating. I wanted to write about this track as it was a big commercial success but there is some division. This feature from last year recalled the fiftieth anniversary rendition of Sloop John B by Al Jardine (The Beach Boys members brought the song to Brian Wilson) and the late Brian Wilson. There was some debate as to whether Sloop John B fits on Pet Sounds or stands out for the wrong reasons:

“The video, directed by the band’s publicist Derek Taylor, was filmed at Brian Wilson’s LA home. Brian’s brother and bandmate, Dennis Wilson, was the cameraman. Some critics argue that “Sloop John B” should not have been included on Pet Sounds. They suggest that as a pioneering folk-rock arrangement, the track sits uneasily among the Baroque pop arrangements of what Jim Fusilli describes as reflective love songs, stark confessions, or tentative statements of independence. Others insist the track fits perfectly with the “general feeling of disorientation” that threads through Pet Sounds”.

There is not a lot written about Sloop John B. Unlike God Only Knows or Good Vibration, I guess this single is seen as a minor cut. However, the Financial Times did tell the story and background of Sloop John B in a feature from 2023. I think that it is one of the group’s best songs. Displaying the vocal supremacy and innovation of The Beach Boys:

“In 1935 the folk song collector Alan Lomax flew from Florida to Nassau in the Bahamas. There, assisted by folklorist Mary Elizabeth Barnicle, he set about recording music from the islands, hoping to capture the authentic spirit of Africa that he believed could be found in the songs, “chanteys” and dances of the islanders, particularly the sponge fishers of Cat Island. In John Szwed’s biography of Lomax, The Man Who Recorded the World, he is quoted in a US newspaper at the time as saying: “Negro songs there are probably as nearly like those in Africa as any you can find in the western hemisphere.”

After a few weeks, according to Szwed, Lomax and Barnicle were told to leave as they were suspected of being labour agitators. But they took with them dozens of songs recorded on their portable disc-cutting device. Among them was “I Bid You Goodnight”, later covered by The Grateful Dead, and “Histe Up the John B Sail”. The latter is sung by the Cleveland Simmons Group in an a cappella arrangement with overlapping harmonies, and it is instantly recognisable as the song that became a folk standard, sung by millions of American schoolchildren, and released by The Beach Boys in 1966 as “Sloop John B”.

It tells of a dissolute, ungovernable vessel where bad behaviour and drunkenness are so widespread that our narrator just wants to go home. But where did it originate? This is another of those folk mysteries.

The first mention in official records is of a song called “Hoist the John B Sails”; the sheet music for this, a “two step for piano”, was published in the US in 1903 by EW Prouty, a Massachusetts-based orchestra leader and violinist. Prouty’s band provided music for hotels owned by US oil and railway magnate Henry Flagler, including two in Nassau, which gives us a link to the Bahamas. It’s probable that Prouty arranged an existing melody.

In a 1916 edition of Harper’s Monthly Magazine, the English author and poet Richard Le Gallienne transcribed the song; he also incorporated it in his 1917 novel, Pieces of Eight, in which he writes, “We sang one of the quaint Nassau ditties.” And in his hugely popular 1927 collection of folk songs, The American Songbag, the poet Carl Sandburg included three verses and the chorus”.

The Henry Flagler connection has given rise to suspicions in folk-music circles that the “John B” song is not “authentic”, that it was created for the tourism industry. But it tells a true story. It seems there was a vessel in the 19th century named after one Captain John Bethel, who built it and sailed it until it was wrecked (some versions of the song are named “The Wreck of the John B”), though it’s not known if his boat was the scene of the revelry described”.

There are a couple of other articles to bring in before wrapping up. This interesting blog post argues how Sloop John B might be the ultimate summer song from a group almost defined at one point by their beach and summer-themed songs. You do listen to Sloop John B and are transported. At this time of year, when we all look forward to warmer weather, there is escapism listening to a Pet Sounds classic:

“The song “Sloop John B” is the ultimate Summer classic by The Beach Boys.  It was guitarist/vocalist Al Jardine’s idea resulting from the love of The Kingston Trio.  Back in the days when I thought myself hipper than I was, I considered the Trio to be comparable to the Pat Boone of folk music. I couldn’t have been less hip to what they were about.  Here’s a quick bit of history.  The first popular Folk Music period of the 1940s was rooted in the old folk tradition that included songs originally from the ‘people.’  This being the case the most authentic folk songs were the ones passed along by the oral tradition without an author. It was all about the story.

When the Folk Music Movement came to an abrupt end due to McCarthyism, the most popular group of the era, The Weavers, was banned from the concert circuit.  So, Pete Seeger, in his wisdom and desire to be heard, found he could play at public schools of all kinds including elementary, high school and colleges.   From 1953 until 1958, the folk songs championed by The Weavers were not heard except in live performances in schools around America.  Enter the Folk Music Revival of the 1950s and 60s. The Kingston Trio with Carolyn Hester, Harry Belafonte, and the second Jimmie Rodgers attracted millions of listeners as they sang songs banned from the airwaves in 1953.  The fans of the Kingston Trio included Beach Boy, Al Jardine, Steve Goodman, Marty Balin, Paul Katner of Jefferson Airplane, Timothy B Schmit of The Eagles, Jimmy Buffet, Lindsey Buckingham, Richie Furay and Stephen Stills of The Buffalo Springfield.

When Al Jardine brought “Sloop John B” to Beach Boys leader, Brian Wilson, it had been recorded by The Weavers and The Kingston Trio.  While Wilson was not a fan of folk music, Jardine helped Wilson bring the song to life with The Beach Boys’ unique arrangement including lyrical changes. Brian and Al turned the song into a Top Five hit song in the U.S. and the U.K.  It is now a classic rock song that frequently brings standing ovations and singalongs when performed by The Beach Boys over their six-decade career”.

Just prior to round up, this review is one of few I could find. Although there was critical praise in 1966, there has not been enough retrospection. It is a shame, as Sloop John B is included in Pet Sounds and is one of the standout tracks. On 21st March, it will be sixty years since The Beach Boys released the second single from their most acclaimed album. The third single, Wouldn't It Be Nice/God Only Knows was released after Pet Sounds came out:

“I picked a Beach Boys tape called ‘Summer Dreams’. It contained all the big pop hits, certainly all the cheesy ones like Help Me Rhonda, Surfin Safari, Little Deuce Coupe, Fun Fun Fun, California Girls. I loved the acapella-ness of Barbara Ann. I could tell Good Vibrations was a bit different and weird. Toward the end of the tape were songs that were a little harder to get into for such young ears because they didn’t have the immediacy and happiness of the pop hits. Songs I love now like Heroes & Villains. I used to fast-forward those, or know where they’d line up with the song on the reverse side (because fast-forwarding used up more battery on my Walkman). So, when it got to a certain point I could turn it over and listen to Surfin’ USA again on Side A.

The song that has stood the test of time for me though – is Sloop John B. Is there are better pop song on earth? Such restraint and subtlety is displayed in the first section of the song with Brian’s vocals, up until about 1.01 when the counter harmonies and Mike Love’s lead vocals come in; from there it’s an exercise in harmony building. My favourite section kicks in at 1.49 where the instrumentation falls away, giving the aural spotlight to these delicious cascading harmonies the Beach Boys made their inimitable trademark – ‘home, let me go home; hoist up the John B sails’. Sweet like (wild) honey.

Then there’s this beautiful (unexpected) double speed tempo change at 2.20, concluding with a countless-harmony-layered coda. Such a rich mere 3 minute canvas, so expertly curated, as only the Beach Boys could”.

I am going to round off in a bit. Sloop John B was backed with You’re So Good to Me. Its U.S. release date was 21st March 1966. It came out on 15th April, 1966 in the U.K. A lot of debate still exists around the purity of the song. Given its roots and how it was this Caribbean Folk track, should it have remained pure? Brian Wilson took the song and turned it into this lush Pop masterpiece with flutes, gorgeous harmonies and ambition. No other artist of that time would have seen the potential in this rather modest (but great) song and turn it into what it became. That is why I think Sloop John B warrants more attention and writing. As we lost Brian Wilson last June, it is so important that work like Pet Sounds and Sloop John B is given this new praise and inspection. I think that songs from Pet Sounds should get new videos. Other Beach Boys songs did fairly recently. Including God Only Knows and I Get Around. It would be interesting seeing what someone does with Sloop John B, as it is a song that still sounds mind-blowing…

SIXTY years later.

FEATURE: Damage, Inc.: Metallica’s Master of Puppets at Forty

FEATURE:

 

 

Damage, Inc.

 

Metallica’s Master of Puppets at Forty

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THIS is not the only…

IN THIS PHOTO: Metallica at a hotel in Tokyo, Japan in November 1986/PHOTO CREDIT: Koh Hasebe/Shinko Music/Getty Images

album from Metallica that is celebrating a big anniversary this year. The band are celebrating forty-five years together. The original line-up got together in 1981, so I wonder if Metallica will mark that. Also, Metallica, a.k.a. The Black Album – which is their response to The Beatles’ eponymous album, a.k.a. The White Album -, turns thirty-five on 12th August. The third album from the Los Angeles band (in 1986, they were comprised of James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett and Cliff Burton), Mater of Puppets, turns forty on 3rd March. I am going to get to some features and a review of this monumental album. The final album to feature the late bassist Cliff Burton, many fans argue Master of Puppets is Metallica’s finest album. It is hard to disagree! This album helped bring Thrash Metal to the mainstream and challenge genres like Heavy Metal and Rock. A classic that is often included in the list of the best albums ever, I want to go deeper with Master of Puppets. In 2021, Beneath the Surface revisited Master of Puppets on its thirty-fifth anniversary. There are some sections of t6he feature that I want to bring in here:

“In the run-up to 1986, Metallica were already beginning to create waves across the metal scene for their help in forming the Thrash genre and solidifying American Metal music throughout the industry. Yet, following the release of their second album, Ride The Lightning, the band remained a pillar of the Underground music scene rather than the commercial success and household name to which they are now known.

That is why when it came to writing their next album, Metallica saw the opportunity to prove themselves more than ever before and created an album that established Thrash as a genre worthy of both commercial success and critical acclaim.

Aiming to provide a more refined and mature approach than in their previous releases, the writing for Master of Puppets also reinvented the structure of the band and juxtaposed the reputation they had already created for themselves.

Initially nicknamed ‘Alcoholica’ by fans and critics (due to their excessive drinking and rambunctious lifestyles), Metallica’s newfound desire to break out of the Underground scene saw the members sober up and incorporate more technical dexterity into their music than many thought they were capable of.

Almost entirely written by both Hetfield and Ulrich in mid-1985, the band, for the first time, chose to conduct the recording process outside of the US. This came as a result of their new, heightened standards and dissatisfaction towards the quality and capability of American studios.

Trying to capture an increasingly refined sound and a greater sense of detail, Metallica rethought their approach to their instruments and took numerous steps to make their playing abilities the highest possible. To achieve this, Ulrich underwent drum lessons, Kirk Hammett commissioned guitar-legend, Joe Satriani, as a mentor and Hetfield attempted to commission Rush’s Geddy Lee as the producer before the members flew to Denmark to record the album.

Now, paying more attention to their technical abilities and songwriting capability, the band set their eyes upon ambitious and politically-aware lyrics- aiming to capture critical reception and establish themselves as more than an amateur, underground band.

Using Hetfield’s new controlled and melodic vocals (as opposed to the harsh, uncontrolled shouts of the first two releases), Metallica strived to represent the alienation and powerlessness of the everyday man, victimised by those who wield power– raising some of the most important issues at the time into question.

Exploring themes including the exploitation of the common man, the abuse of power by authority figures and the subconscious manipulation of televangelism, the motifs behind Master of Puppets were intentionally crafted to generate controversy and place Metallica into discussion within mainstream society.

Tracks ‘Battery’, ‘Master of Puppets’, ‘Disposable Heroes’, ‘Leper Messiah’ and ‘Damage Inc.’ all followed this premise- shedding light on the lack of personal liberty the band saw across 1980s society.

Here, the band also saw their opportunity to highlight other taboo subjects that were restricted in mainstream media. Although predominantly about the vulnerability of mankind, the lyrics also tackled issues of drug addiction, the hypocrisy of religion and the trauma of PTSD faced by those sent to war.

A world away from the initial lacklustre meanings behind their earlier tracks such as ‘Whiplash’ and ‘Motorbreath’, when Master of Puppets made its debut, critics were caught off-guard by the newfound maturity and political commentary the four-piece had produced”.

Prior to getting to some reviews, Billboard spoke with some Metal musicians and asked them how Master of Puppets, this landmark release from 1986, influenced them. Published in 2017 to coincide with the reissue of the album, I have brought in observations and remarks from a couple of musicians. For those who do not know Master of Puppets, this is an album that you have to hear. Not only helping shape Metal music after 1986, it also impacted and shaped other genres;

“For Metallica, the album was their first major vault into the mainstream lexicon, seemingly almost purely by word of mouth and all those black “Metal Up Your Ass!” t-shirts peppering public school hallways. Puppets was more than a progression of the heavy sound that captured the metal community when Kill ‘Em All came out. It was a full-blown evolution in how they approached the speed/thrash formula, especially when you hear the Julian Bream-kissed flourishes of guitarist Kirk Hammett at the beginning of opening cut “Battery” as well as Burton’s subtle shout-out to Bach’s “Come, Sweet Death” at the top of “Damage, Inc.” No other metal band in the ’80s was truer to the roots of Deep Purple and Black Sabbath than Metallica, heard across the riffage of “The Thing That Should Not Be” and “Disposable Heroes,” while the complex progressions of the beloved title track hint at a love for groups like King Crimson and Rush.

As a lyricist, frontman James Hetfield made a giant leap toward his present status as one of the great American songwriters, especially when you take into consideration a song like “Welcome Home (Sanitarium),” where he channels Randle McMurphy in Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest to capture the emotions of a man psychiatrically held against his will. For the band, it was a bittersweet triumph punctuated by the tragic and unexpected death of their beloved friend and bandmate, bassist Cliff Burton, whose brilliance as a musician was cemented with Master’s instrumental crescendo “Orion.” It was eight minutes of infinite promise and a culmination of Burton’s roots in not only Lemmy Kilmister and Phil Lynott but Paul McCartney and Stanley Clarke as well, especially in his favoring of the high strings. No disrespect to Jason Newsted nor Robert Trujillo, but there was a certain harmony between Burton and drummer Lars Ulrich as a rhythm section, and on Puppets it hit its crescendo. One could only imagine what Metallica might’ve evolved into had Cliff lived to see his 56th birthday this coming Feb. 10.

The band recently revisited the album as part of its ongoing reissue series with the most generous entry yet, expanding Puppets exponentially with rare interviews, rough mixes and demos, including Lars’ and James’ riff tapes as well as Jason Newsted’s auditions, and a veritable metric ton of live audio and video. The live stuff is plentiful, and features recordings of shows from The Meadowlands and Hampton Coliseum as well as footage from concerts at the Joe Louis Arena, the Roskilde Festival and more. To experience the delight of what this super deluxe edition has to offer, check out the video of Hetfield unboxing it here. And don’t forget about the two never-before-released cover songs: Diamond Head’s “The Prince” (later re-recorded as the b-side to “One”) and the punk group Fang’s “The Money Will Roll Right In.” This 2017 remaster of Puppets is such a powerful restoration of the original Flemming Rasmussen production, you can’t help but play it loud. The crispness and clarity of this edition is arguably on par with the Giles Martin remaster of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, released earlier this year.

As for the proper LP, its influence remains as vital as ever in the metal community. To punctuate that sentiment, Billboard asked a wide swath of names in the field to speak to us about their personal histories surrounding Master of Puppets to commemorate having this heavy metal masterpiece thrust back into our lives in the best way possible.

“The first time I heard Metallica I was backstage at the historic Monsters of Rock Festival at the L.A. Coliseum back in July 1988, when they opened for Van Halen and all the fans stormed the stage. At that moment, I immediately knew they were going to be huge. The 20-disc box set of Master Of Puppets is an incredible snapshot of the band’s career during the mid-‘80s and is still one of the favorites in my collection.” – Stuart Smith, Heaven & Earth

“Master Of Puppets was a pivotal album for me in many ways. My first experience with Metallica had been with Ride The Lightning and what had started as a sort of musical oddity for me, developed into a massive appreciation for the band. For the first time I was able to see that the ‘heaviest music’ available to me at that time could still be a vehicle for legitimate musicality. When Master was released, it was a paradigm shift for me and the people around me as the stage had been set for them to really continue their momentum and they delivered in every way. Even the tonalities they chose, intentional or otherwise, were of such a foreign and antagonistic quality that it stood alone in a sea of fantasy inspired and image-centric heavy metal. I think for myself, as well as many others in my age group, Metallica was the single defining heavy band that not only went on to legitimize the genre as a sellable art form, but also that you could inject a musicality and intention into a heavy structure that carried a profound weight. Master Of Puppets is one of those rare, iconic albums that stands alone.” – Devin Townsend”.

I will end by taking from Pitchfork’s 2017 review of the album. They were writing about the reissue of Master of Puppets, complete with demos and live takes. Before that 10/10 review, another perfect score. This one is from Classic Rock around a 2022 vinyl overhaul and reissue:

“Thirty-one years later, it’s still hard to overestimate the impact Metallica’s Master Of Puppets had on the world. Their most profound and emphatic musical statement, it would come to define them, and with the death of bass player Cliff Burton on that album’s tour, it book-ended an era for the quartet when they went from being celebrated as the most important metal band on the planet to being another infamous rock act forever marred by a gruesome fatality. To their credit, as a unit they recovered, renewed and moved on, and in last year’s Hardwired… To Self Destruct showed that even three decades later, they’re still capable of fury and angst.

For those of us still marvelling at their unparalleled and sophisticated leap from the Kill ’Em All debut to their Ride The Lightning album, Master was a whole other level of erudition. Strange to think now that there was outrage in some quarters when they introduced acoustic guitars to the audience at Hammersmith Odeon (think Bob Dylan’s ‘Judas’ debacle when he went electric, but in reverse) on the Lightning tour. Though if their audience and critics were still clinging to the past, Metallica were marching purposefully forward to the beat of their own drum (toms and double bass drums, mostly), setting the spark to the flame of a genuine musical revolution.

All that history costs. If you want this Remastered Deluxe Boxset – that’s how they’re selling it – then be prepared to dig deep. That said, this collection brings new meaning to the term ‘exacting’.

Flemming Rasmussen’s strangely thin production has been boosted and remastered so the title track now sounds and feels like someone’s driven a dumpster truck through your French windows, but aural tweaking is only the beginning. So while you revel in the original album, you can unbox three vinyl records, 10 CDs, two DVDs, one cassette, a hardcover book (Metallica are master gurners, as these exclusive photos bear out), a folder of handwritten lyrics, six badges and a Damage, Inc. lithograph.

And as alluring as all the attendant bells and whistles are, it’s the attention to detail that will have you shouting, “Take my money!” at your computer screen.

There’s something quite heartening, if tempered with a sense of unease, at hearing Cliff Burton’s lazy stoner drawl again all these years later. He and the rest of the band (Kirk Hammett sounds about fifteen – you half expect his voice to start breaking) are captured here across two of the discs in interviews with radio stations and defunct magazines like Metal Forces and Sounds. Ulrich’s voice crackling down the line to London from his home in San Francisco, trying to indicate the magnitude of the album they’d just made, is a joy to behold. It’s a real artefact, a low-rent relic and just one of the many gems to be unearthed here”.

The final thoughts are from Pitchfork from 2017. The sheer influence and impact of this album forty years later. The melodic depth and complexities, fused with those incredible riffs, challenging, deep and important lyrics and Metallica offering this incredible power, musicianship, storytelling and sophistication, I wonder how critics will reproach Master of Puppets closer to its anniversary on 3rd March:

“Puppets deals with the very nature of control, presenting the hangover of its allure. Metal is fight music for underdogs and while that is empowering and worthwhile, Puppets shows the consequences of control in the wrong hands. The title track was Hetfield warning himself about addiction, something he would become intimate with, and he wouldn’t listen until their 2004 tell-all documentary Some Kind of Monster made a tragic comedy out of Metallica’s near collapse while recording St. Anger. Through its raging rhythm and heart-wrenching valleys, where bassist Cliff Burton brought a distorted symphony of the mind, Hetfield’s pleas for sanity sure don’t sound like someone coming to grips with how fucked up he is.

This isn’t unusual for cautionary drug songs, yet “Puppets” doesn’t sound like a morality play—“Master! Master!” is servitude delivered as arena unity, where you grow stronger, not indentured, by yelling it louder and louder. “Disposable Heroes” and “Leper Messiah” explore the illusion of control through more conventional topics—“Heroes” takes on war and “Messiah” skewers televangelists as any decent ’80s metal band would—and still manage to be more powerful than most bands at their best. Metallica embraced more complex structures without diluting themselves, a rare instance where a band gets more accessible by getting more complicated.

Puppets’ fusion of beauty and savagery is best defined in its last two songs, “Orion,” an instrumental, and “Damage Inc.” Both tracks were co-written by Burton, effectively sealing his legacy that still looms over Metallica three decades later. His presence is strongest on “Orion,” making thrash move like ballet, a swelling motion that’s not just about crashing into things. The bridge takes the control motif and creates worlds with it, creating tenderness and majesty, showing what a man’s hand masquerading as divine can summon. “Orion” is celestial through meaning, not explicit text, Hawkwind’s high-mindedness combined with Lemmy’s more direct glance.

“Damage Inc.” closes how “Battery” opened the album: reckless carnage as a cleansing, necessary fire. While it’s more of a contrast than fusion, they still coexist with a purpose to elevate metal. It’s even more apocalyptic than “Fight Fire With Fire”—there’s no mention of nuclear war, just a focus on getting mowed down for someone else’s survival. “Fuck it all, fucking no regrets” proved to be such an impactful line, Hetfield reused it again in 2003, on St. Anger’s title track with a teenager’s enthusiastic clumsiness.

Nevertheless, Hetfield is, bar none, metal’s standout rhythm guitarist, handling blazing speed with a precision and heft. Metallica are so ubiquitous that this perhaps has gone under-recognized; hummable as his riffs are, and the legions of hummers massive, Hetfield’s role as frontman obscures his contributions as a guitarist. The rough mixes included in this deluxe reissue are mostly devoid of solos and vocals, and they become pantheons to Hetfield’s rhythm stature. It’s jarring to hear gaps where Hammett’s solos or Burton’s fills should be, and yet through him (and our collective memories) the songs still flow as they should. Hetfield-Hammett-Burton-Ulrich is one of the few metal lineups where every member was equally integral, where if you removed one, the band would be radically altered. Hetfield was the bond between everyone else, a ground to Burton’s ambitions and Hammett’s squalling lead work, a reason that Ulrich didn’t need to be flashy because he certainly couldn’t be.

Puppets brought Metallica to their artistic climax, but its touring cycle proved a severe challenge to such loftiness. The live recordings here are closer to the tapes that Metallica made their reputation off of than the polished productions on the 1993 box set Live Shit: Binge & Purge, the cash-out from touring all corners of the globe. As demanding of perfection they were making Puppets, live they were still more concerned with tearing through, out-of-place leads be damned. Except for a 1987 VHS Cliff ‘Em All!, there weren’t a lot of official live recordings from this era, odd given how Metallica made their name as a live band. The live tracks here are rough, unpolished, but you can basically smell the beer and sweat from the band and the crowd throughout”.

A truly stunning album that has lost none of its importance forty years later. Given the themes Master of Puppets tackles around the nature of control, corruption, warfare and senseless violence, it seems like it has a whole new influence today. In terms of learning from Metallica’s songs. How far has the world moved on since 1986? I think some critics will frame the album around modern politics and violence across the globe. In musical terms, Master of Puppets is complex and sophisticated yet it has this urgency and power. More storytelling than traditional Metal songs, you can see why it was influential and helped to change and reshape music. On 3rd March, we celebrate forty years of…

AN undeniable classic.

FEATURE: Once the Deal Is Done… Why This Year Needs to Be One for a Wider Appreciation of Kate Bush’s Catalogue

FEATURE:

 

 

Once the Deal Is Done…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1978/PHOTO CREDIT: Gered Mankowitz

 

Why This Year Needs to Be One for a Wider Appreciation of Kate Bush’s Catalogue

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I will never…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1985

begrudge any Kate Bush song getting a load of attention and love. Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) did cause tremors when it was originally released in 1985. It was a number three song in the U.K. and the lead single from her fifth studio album, Hounds of Love. The public loved it then, and its amazing video – which is essentially a beautiful dance between Kate Bush and Michael (now Misha) Hervieu, rather than the conventional Pop video of the time –, which no doubt helped the album do well in the charts. Beyond that, there was not much focus or reinspection. Apart from appearing on T.V. as a live performance and the odd bit here and there, there was not much else. It was the 1980s, so there was no social media and ways to get the song out to new people fast. It did not make it way into a film soundtrack until 1988, when it appeared on The Chocolate War. However, it did not get a huge lease of life and dominate the charts again. 2022 was a year when it did get that dominance and made it to the top of the charts. Stranger Things used the song in 2022, but it has also just appeared in the final season, meaning it has re-emerged in other charts. Kate Bush News have been charting its progress and successes. Including a high placing on the Billboard Global 200. Moby did a mash-up of Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). The success of Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) and its effectiveness helped persuade the Prince estate to allow his music to be used in Stranger Things. It has had this incredible life and has been streamed more than a billion-and-a-half times. Though I can’t imagine the song being used elsewhere soon, its work has been done and its impact cannot be denied!

As a result, there is also even more artrtenton on Hounds of Love. I am very pleased for Kate Bush and those who are discovering this song. Or knew it before and have got something special from it. However, I do think that there needs to be a line in the sand at some point. What can happen is that there is so much talk on one song that is does threaten to overshadow everything else. I recently wrote features about the artists who have been inspired by Kate Bush. Those releasing the music of today as Kate Bush fans. Where you can hear her influence in these albums. Maybe not directly connected, but Florence + The Machine’s Florence Welch was interviewed for Criterion’s Closest Picks and one of the films she picks off the shelf is The Red Shoes. Though talking about the film rather than the Kate Bush album of the same name, there is no denying that Kate Bush’s association with that film influenced Welch. How her album, Dance Fever (2022), can be compared in some ways to Kate Bush’s 1993 album. And her short film, The Line, the Cross and the Curve. There are some artists where one song stands out above the rest. Maybe because it has been used in a film or is just so strong that it is taken to heart more than the rest of their catalogue. In the case of Kate Bush, Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) has been streamed more times than the rest of her other most popular songs. I wonder whether it is more streams than all of her songs put together. Maybe not, but there is this huge gulf! I am trying to think of another artist of Kate Bush’s stature where one song has surpassed all others by such a margin. However, this is not taking anything away from all the good things that have come about following the Stranger Things use and endorsement of Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God).

What is a little heartbreaking is that there are these great albums and songs that are not being discussed. The current conversation is so focused on her modern success, what incentive is there to explore beyond the Hounds of Love classic? I have said how there are no big album anniversaries this year. That helps shine a light on an album. I have also said how Generation Alpha are discovering Kate Bush and appreciate more than Hounds of Love. However, take a look at the articles written about Bush and precious few go beyond news and success like that with Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). I try as hard as I can to extoll the virtues of all of her albums. Go as deep as I can. There is the odd podcast episodes, but there is still much Kate Bush gold out there that might be going unheard. I do think the heat around Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) will die very soon, but the impact it has made will remain forever. Moving forward, I would urge further exploration, as Kate Bush is more influential now than she has ever been. I do feel sad to think albums like Lionheart (1978), Never for Ever (1980) or 50 Words for Snow (2011) is not being talked about as much as they deserve. I think Kate Bush’s full genius and influence can only be appreciated when you consider all of her albums. I do get this worry that many might associate her with one track and album. That filmmakers will see what Stranger Things did and try and get that same sort of impact for their show or film. More than anything, in a fallow year – one where we might not see a new album or celebrate any huge anniversary -, it is a perfect opportunity for some proper appreciation. Rather than create viral moments or use a song in a film and try and get some explosion from that (even though I wondered if that could happen with Wuthering Heights, I sort of walk that back a bit), there is so much to dissect and explore. We cannot talk about Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) and its genius and legacy without talking about what comes before and arrived after. There is the odd article like this that focuses on another album or period of Kate Bush’s career.

I am really pleased by everything around Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). I cannot be annoyed at a song for having this kind of success. It has got their name out to new fans and meant that she continues to engage and realise how important her music is. However, when we consider Kate Bush a couple of decades from now, it needs to be about the full spread of her work. Or at least a greater range. Again, most legendary artists do get associated with a few albums and different points of their career. Maybe this will be the case with Kate Bush. However, I still maintain that we do really need to spend time now with the rest of her work. Given how people have taken this one song to heart, by exposing them to songs of Kate Bush they might never have heard, I do feel this will lead to continued and greater conversation about her broader career. I am excited by all these new Kate Bush fans. I guess it is hard to motivate podcasts, think-pieces and articles about certain songs and albums. Before the Dawn in 2014 and The Tour of Life in 1979. All these wonderful moments that we do not really see spotlighted. Last year was one when so much of the greatest music made was by artists who love Kate Bush’s work. Look ahead to the rest of the year, the woman who created this incredible body of work will be thinking herself what comes next. Maybe an album in 2026 will not happen and we will wait until 2027.  Will artists cover some of her lesser-known songs? Rather than see this as a negative, perhaps this is a unique cultural phenomenon. When was the last time an artist had this older song gain this fresh success?! Instead of me worrying about homogenisation or someone as varied and long-serving as Kate Bush being only associated with one song, it is worth asking other Kate Bush fans. What is the best way to keep the conversation going and move it wider? We can listen to her music and share it on social media, but what is the best way to ensure, say, Top of the City from The Red Shoes or Fullhouse from Lionheart gets some love? Obviously, nothing will have this same sort of run as Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God), but there is this rich and wonderful collection of songs and albums.

I think this year will be an interesting one. I am enjoying writing about Kate Bush and discussing characters in her songs and highlighting various times in her career. It is tempting to race to do as much as possible and pitch all these ideas. I have done that myself. Kate Bush herself is unlikely to launch anything new or take it upon herself to discuss her career or a documentary for example. I am a bit frustrated I am not talented or skilled enough to write a book. I feel anything in terms of books and magazine articles will be about Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). That is great. However, we need to keep momentum going, though through the prism of her full body of work. Who knows, maybe Bush will shock us and announce something sooner than expected. However, this year is going to be quieter than 2022-2025, as a lot of it has been dominated by this genius song and also Bush bringing out Little Shrew (Snowflake). I guess that helped get a gem from 50 Words from Snow, Snowflake, out there. However, looking at the streaming figures for the album, it did not create this knock-on effect where people investigated beyond that one song – or not as much as you’d like. The passionate and loyal Kate Bush fans on social media are discussing her and sharing photos, videos and songs. That does a lot. However, where is that big push going to come from? Will there be a new Kate Bush-related book? It seems unlikely anytime soon. I am nothing but pumped that Kate Bush is being talked about so much at the moment. That she is in the charts and the conversation continues. My greater curiosity is what occurs when Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) starts to lose some of the electricity and current focus. Thinking about the next steps and moves after…

THE deal is done.

FEATURE: Groovelines: Destiny's Child – Survivor

FEATURE:

 

 

Groovelines

 

Destiny's Child – Survivor

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NOT only am I…

writing about albums celebrating big anniversaries this year. I am also including important singles. One of which is Destiny’s Child’s Survivor. Taken from the album of the same name, the single was released on 6th March, 2001. The album came out on 25th April, 2001 and it is the third studio album from the group. Their final album of completely original material was Destiny Fulfilled of 2004. Of course, the members of the group and the line-up of Destiny’s Child shifted. From a four-piecer to a trio, Survivor is a significant single, as it was the first that featured Beyoncé Knowles, Kelly Rowland, and Michelle Williams. What many fans consider to be the best and classic line-up, you can hear the instant bond, unity and brilliance of the three artists. Also, after Destiny Fulfilled was released in 2004, the three members did have their own solo careers. Whilst Kelly Rowland had a string of solo albumns, the most recent being 2013’s Talk a Good Game – and turns forty-five the day this feature is being shared (11th February) -, maybe her best work was as part of Destiny’s Child. Michelle Williams released her most recent album, Journey to Freedom, in 2014. Of course, Beyoncé is the most consistent. Her most recent was 2024’s COWBOY CARTER. Whilst she is one of the most influential and extraordinary solo artists in the world, there is something about her being part of Destiny’s Child, and those three women coming together, that is extra special. You wonder whether we will get another album. Consider the state of U.S. politics and how women’s rights are pretty much not considered by President Trump, a trio like Destiny’s Child seem to be more important and needed. Also, they could shout out to incredible women in music and society. Collaborate with some of them on an album. The trio have performed together in the years since their final album together.

However, there is something about Destiny’s Child you do not get with any other group. Rather than it being a commercial move or tied to an anniversary, there is this love and friendship. Considering how Williams and Rowland are these philomel artists but have not put out their own albums in over a decade, it would be amazing to hear them on record with Beyoncé. Girl group and legends from the 1990s and 2000s are reuniting and touring again. New girl groups are coming through and, whilst you might think of Destiny’s Child as a band and not a girl group, there is no doubt they have influenced so many women on the scene now. Seeing these original three queens on stage or in the studio would be a dream. A destiny re-fulfilled! It would be too late to mount anything to mark twenty-five years of the Survivor album. However, something in some form this year, I know, would get a lot of excitement from fans around the world. Even though 1999’s The Writing’s on the Wall might be my favourite Destiny’s Child album, I feel Survivor is the most accomplished and confident album from Destiny’s Child. Given the personnel shift (members LaTavia Roberson and LeToya Luckett split from Knowles and Kelly Rowland. They replaced by Michelle Williams and Farrah Franklin. Franklin was also dismissed from the group). Survivor, to me, always felt like this feminist anthem. This call of strength and defiance that was for all women around the world, instead, it has different origins and inspirations. The fact the media were criticising and almost joking that the line-up of Destiny’s Child kept changing and mocking that. Knowles was inspired to turn that negativity into something positive and anthemic. I shall come to that. I know there will celebration around the twenty-fifth anniversary of Survivor in April. However, as its titular single has that anniversary on 6th March, I wanted to look ahead. It is amazing how incredible that Survivor album is. Songs like Emotions and Dangerously in Love. The first four songs are Independent Women Part I, Survivor, Bootylicious and Nasty, the trio meant business!

I want to start with this article that tells the story behind the epic Survivor. How it came to be and what its legacy is. It is not only seen as one of Destiny’s Child’s best songs. It is placed up there with the best singles of that decade. In a really tough and strange year (2001), Destiny’s Child and Survivor did give a lot of people strength:

“You all know Beyoncé-beautiful, with large eyes and a stunning smile. She has previously been described by Vogue as “wholesome and sexy at the same time.”

You also know Kelly Rowland, and if you don’t, ask Silas Nyanchwani.

Beyoncé’s mother Tina was not impressed with the name “Girl’s Tyme” and like any mom would do, she sought God’s guidance on a suitable name for the girl band. It wasn’t strange when Tina pulled the word “destiny” out of the bible for her daughter’s girl group. Her husband Mathew-Beyoncé ‘s father, added the word “child.”

And that is how Girl’s Tyme became Destiny’s Child, comprising members Beyoncé Knowles, Kelly Rowland, LaTavia Roberson, and LeToya Luckett.

In the years that followed, Destiny’s Child became known for line-up change more than for hit songs. In 1997, their lead single “No No No” from their self-titled debut album in 1997 became a success, but the group was still struggling…

In 2000, a popular reality TV show called “Survivor" was born in America. The show is a competition reality series in which a group of contestants are stranded on a deserted island and compete in challenges to win a grand prize. The contestants must work together and strategize to outwit and outlast each other, all while surviving the elements and living on limited resources.

Pundits and skeptics started comparing Destiny's Child to the show “Survivor” because of the group’s internal competition and struggles. It was a question of “who will be the last to survive.”

After 3 members left the group, according to the LA Times, some people even joked that Luckett, Roberson, and Franklin had been “voted off the island,” just like an episode of Survivor.

Beyoncé and Kelly Rowland were not happy with the comparisons and negative chatter. Michelle Williams had then joined the group.

Who was going to survive?

Instead of feeding the sceptics, Destiny’s Child wrote the song "Survivor" in response to rumors of the group's break-up and industry pressure to produce a hit single. The lyrics of the song highlight the group's strength and determination in the face of adversity. The song's message of resilience and perseverance resonated with audiences, just as the TV show "Survivor" did.

Nelson Mandela said that criticism prevents a person from becoming a demi-god; for Destiny’s Child, criticism fueled their songwriting; they also drew inspiration from the hit competition series to create the group’s most popular track to date.

The song Survivor went on to win the Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals at the 2002 Grammy Awards.

Today, Survivor is still Destiny’s Child’s second highest-debuting single and currently holds a spot on Billboard’s list of 100 Greatest Girl Group Songs of All Time”.

It’s incredible to think that Survivor got mixed critical reaction when it was released as a single. Such an emphatic and instantly memorable song, luckily critical opinion shas shifted. Maybe criticism around Destiny’s Child and line-up changes. However, take the song solely on its merits as a piece of music and it is one of the strongest songs of the 2000s. In 2016, fifteen years after the release of the Survivor album, some keys places in its creation reflected on its making and success. Near the start of the feature from Entertainment Weekly, we learn a little about the title song:

“DAN WORKMAN (Engineer): When they started Survivor, they were really in a different point in their careers. At the end of every session, I’d get a call from [Beyoncé’s father and the group’s manager] Mathew [Knowles] or someone at the label who wanted to know how it went. The expectations were very high. It wasn’t nearly as relaxed as it was before. There was a sense that the stakes were raised. When we were doing The Writing’s on the Wall it became really obvious to me that the heavy lifting was going to be done by Beyoncé and that Kelly Rowland was the closer. The other girls [who left the group] were not as talented and were not as involved in the creative process. When Michelle came, it was never directly spoken about other than like Destiny’s Child is a trio. No in-depth discussion.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Beyoncé was tired of people talking about the Destiny’s Child members changing asking, who was going to be the last one to survive? As the new member, I was being protective over the girls because I was just starting to know them. There are member changes in groups all the time. Things happen. I believe in the journey Destiny’s Child had to take to fulfill the group’s mission: to continue to empower everybody.

TONY MASERATI (Mixer): This was the beginning of pushing the limits of how hard a pop song could get. Their instructions were to make sure it would be at the forefront of the sonic footprint of what R&B and hip-hop should be. For somebody at 19 or 20 years old to hear [such] subtleties is not typical. Generally most young artists are like, “Can I be louder or can I be softer?”

J.R. ROTEM (Co-writer, “Fancy”): Beyoncé knows a lot of soul. Their sensibilities were inspired by tastes that are more sophisticated and by jazz”.

I love the singles from Destiny’s Child. Everyone has their own top five and favourites. When it comes to the best of the best, Survivor comes near the top in a lot of critical lists. In 2024, As The Writing’s on the Wall turns twenty-five, The Guardian ranked the singles. They placed Survivor ninth: “Survivor threw so much shade the way of two former Destiny’s Child members that it occasioned a lawsuit. Beyoncé, Rowland and – in an awesome middle eight – Williams sing up a ferocious storm, but its greatness isn’t really in its lyrics, rather the melody and backing to which it harnesses them: forceful and epic enough that their vitriol sounds like empowerment”. In 2014, Huffpost ranked Survivor in eighth: “Beyonce reportedly concocted the "Survivor" theme after hearing a DJ compare the band's controversy to the incipient reality series. The result is a song (and album) that drills home the perseverance motif with fist-pounding severity. It's a karaoke jam best experienced while belting the lyrics in someone's face, but is "Survivor" truly a great song? A catchy one, a canonical one -- but one without the sleekness of "Independent Women" or the restraint of "Say My Name." It's also kind of long. Still, "Survivor" is obviously a classic, and I'll join anyone who dares holler the lyrics at me in a disco-stained karaoke bar”. There are few reviews of the iconic Survivor. However, Drowned in Sound provided their take on Survivor when it arrived in 2001:

“Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…..What? I said mmmmmmmmmmmm…that is the only word which sums this track up. What? Well, urm, I’m 19 years old, same age as Beyoncé and co, and I have a fetish for sexy female vocals. I’ll admit it. What? It’s not a criminal offence y’know! I’m only mmm-ing about this ickle ditty. Cus you know my mummy taught me better than that!

I really thought I’d had enough of strings in pop songs, until this one, ‘Survivor’. The evil lil’ violins perfectly set the background for this choon, fighting against post-drum’n’bass (I’m making up genre’s again, sorry!) machine blippity bloppity tsh tsh plopping. Then there are the vocals…mmmmm! The centre of what everything else spins around. These are harmonies to tell the world about. So I am. Three layers of gospel vocals jump up’n’down and shake themselves all around, just as adoringly sweet as a freshly iced chocolate cake, still warm from the oven. Or the video, if you will...mmmmm...

Hang on! There’s some words amongst this prize winning perfect picture style. Oh baby. Putting themselves into the head of the genderless working man (and I use that term looser than an American pollution manifesto), re-interpreting the feeling of finishing another day, ready to carry on to fight another. However, this song does challenge the notion of the chauvinist values that still remain in the world around us(like many other DC songs). And what better way to get the message to those that are wrong, than through one of the sexiest video’s ever! What? What do I mean “wrong”? Think how equal the world is. How men treat women in comparison to how women treat men. Just think about it. The new women’s liberation movement will be televised. You will be watching and maybe listening too-ooh….mmmmm…I’m a survivor!”.

On 6th March, Survivor’s title song turns twenty-five. It’s brilliant lead single is played a lot today. It is one of those songs that will continue to have meaning and this potency that will go through the generations. And I do feel the world wants Destiny’s Child to get together. I know there have been discussions and plans before. However, given the state of the world, tied to the way female artists are dominating and so many are fans of Destiny’s Child, it would be great to have them here again. As Kelly Rowland is forty-five today, I wanted to publish the feature now, rather than wait until close to Survivor’s anniversary. It is a song that I really love. So do millions of others. One I think will be played and talked about…

DEACDES from now.

FEATURE: Beneath the Sleeve: Hole – Live Through This

FEATURE:

 

 

Beneath the Sleeve

 

Hole – Live Through This

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THE second studio album…

IN THIS PHOTO: Hole shot by Jeffrey Thurnher for SPIN in May 1994.

from the incredible Hole, Live Through This was released on 12th April, 1994. Perhaps more melodic, structured and less harsh than their 1991 debut, Pretty on the Inside, lead Courtney Love wanted to shock people who though the Californian band had no softer edge. Certified platinum in the U.S. in 1995, Live Through This was a massive critical and commercial success. I think Live Through This is Hole’s best album. Songs like Violet, Miss World and Doll Parts. Such a consistently brilliant album. With the majority of songs written by Courtney Love and Hole guitarist Eric Erlandson, Live Through This is considered a modern classic. It has featured high in lists of the best albums of all time. I am going to start out with an interview originally published by SPIN in April 1994 with Courtney Love. I am not bringing the entire thing in, though there are parts that I was interested in highlighting:

“Let’s get this out of the way. When Love talks about husband Kurt Cobain, which she does with some frequency, it’s with affection and slight amusement. Mostly he shows up in benign little anecdotes. Like how she keeps finding him dolled up in women’s sweaters from the ’50s. Or how, at her urging, he recently agreed to buy them a Lexus. But, after one relatively brief spin around town, and the catcalls of virtually all of their old friends, Cobain insisted they take it back. So they did. Now, they’re back to his scuzzy old Valiant. If you only knew Cobain by Love’s descriptions, you’d think he was an adorable, antic-prone young lug, more Ozzie Nelson than Ozzy Osbourne. And maybe that’s exactly who he is. Point is, her love for him, and for their daughter Frances Bean, is obvious.

I’d been forewarned by Geffen’s publicist, by friends of hers, even by the rest of Hole, that Courtney Love doesn’t trust journalists. Not since Vanity Fair‘s Lynn Hirschberg, whose infamous 1992 profile portrayed Love as little more than Cobain’s heroin-addicted, gold-digging girlfriend. The article contained a particularly scandalous quote, attributed to a “business associate.” “Courtney was pregnant and she was shooting up,” it said. What followed was an approximately yearlong trashing of the couple, chronicled rather exhaustively in Michael Azerrad’s Nirvana bio, Come As You Are.

“Yeah, Lynn,” Love sighs when the subject is broached. “I did a little private investigating on her, you know, and she has no friends. None. None!” For the next, oh, 40 minutes or so, Love’s conversation keeps veering back to Hirschberg, usually with disclaimers. As much as she may wish Hirschberg dead, Love admits she continues to read Vanity Fair. “Shit,” she says at the end of one particularly lengthy diatribe. “Why can’t I just fucking shut up about the bitch? Okay, that’s it. Zip.” She raises one hand and makes a slash across her lips. (When asked to comment, Hirschberg laughed and said, “I thought Courtney was my friend.”)

So what about the actual charges? “Innocent,” Love says, smiling mysteriously. “Isn’t that obvious?” Okay, how about claims that you punched out four people last year, including K-records-Beats Happening’s Calvin Johnson, British writer Victoria Clarke, and a young female Nirvana fan who called her “Courtney Whore” in a Seattle 7-Eleven? “There’s a lot more to those stories, but I don’t intend to go into it.” Several journalists told me they’d received threatening phone messages after criticizing her in print. “So?” When I mention Cobain’s interest in guns, she cuts me off with a glower. Bringing up last year’s legal battle to keep custody of Frances Bean (a result of the Vanity Fair drug inferences) only magnifies the glower. On a lighter note, Lydia Lunch recently accused Love of ripping off her persona. “That’s too bad, because I admire her a lot.” Well, how about the fact that a lot of people just think you’re a mean, horrible person?

“Look,” Love says. “Years ago in a certain town, my reputation had gotten so bad that every time I went to a party, I was expected to burn the place down and knock out every window. So I would go into social situations and try my best to be really graceful and quiet and aloof. But sometimes when people are bearing down on you so hard, and want you to behave in a certain way, you just do it because you know you can.

“I’m so busy these days pleading with everyone that I’m lucid, that I’m educated, that I’m middle-class,” she continues. “It’s stupid. If you ask me, why aren’t people on the cases of the real assholes of this world, like Axl Rose and Steve Albini, both of whom should be exterminated. Really, they should leave on a shuttle to the sun. They shouldn’t be on the earth. Because they’re not good for anything.”

I’d been told by a mutual friend that Love tends to feel comfortable around gay men “as long as they don’t like disco.” Hoping to warm the atmosphere a little, I drop the names of a few famous actors I bedded when younger, and sure enough she giddily spills some beans herself. She practically begs me to “out” a notoriously homophobic music producer. Sorry. We move on. She has a few less-than-flattering adjectives for Evan Dando’s physique. “I’m the one that got him to stop taking off his shirt all the time,” she says. Then there’s the sad tale of her arch-enemy Axl Rose’s rapidly receding hairline, and his crazed search for a cure. “That’s what happens when you mix Prozac and heroin.” Finally, she regales me with a long, hilarious story about how Eddie Van Halen showed up backstage at a recent Nirvana show and practically begged to join them onstage fo the encore, completely oblivious to the fact that bands like Nirvana exist partly to destroy dinosaurs like himself.

Love’s proud of the band’s early work, especially its first LP, Pretty on the Inside, co-produced by Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon, a hero of Love’s, and Gumball’s Don Fleming. Still, she says, “That record was me posing in a lot of ways. It was the truth, but it was also me catching up with all my hip peers who’d gone all indie on me, and who made fun of me for liking R.E.M. And the Smiths. I’d done the whole punk thing, sleeping on floors in piss and beer, and waking up with the guy with the fucking mohawk and the skateboards and the speed and the whole goddamned thing. But I hated it. I’d outgrown it by the time I was 17.” She pauses, grabs a glass of fizzy water, and takes a huge gulp. “But fuck people if they didn’t guess it the first time around,” she continues, eyes blurring with anger. “If they didn’t get the lucidity. If it’s one thing I am, it’s lucid. I know that’s not a very heavy word like intellectual or whatever, but still, to take away my lucidity, that pisses me off.”

Live Through This is both a scruffier and more commercial record than Pretty on the Inside. The angsty rants of yore remain, but they’re decorated with a lot more poetry. Milk (as in mother’s) is a recurring motif, as is dismemberment. Female victimization remains the overall theme, this time depersonalized into odd, accusatory mini-narratives in which a variety of female characters receive the protection of Love’s tense, manic-depressive singing. Hers is a natural songwriting talent, full of excellent instincts, and yet wildly unsophisticated. All of which makes Love, in some ways, a more intriguing figure than, say, Polly Harvey, Tanya Donelly, or Liz Phair, each of whom, idiosyncrasies aside, is a traditional talent with an inordinate knack for the pop tune. It’s not inconceivable that Love might have ended up some kind of peroxided Joni Mitchell if it weren’t for the musical gifts of the diligent, like-minded Erlandson, and her unstoppable need to fuck with rock music’s male-heavy history.

“Like I was talking to Sophie…” It’s a few minutes later, and Love’s relaxing again. “Sophie’s done a bunch of Björk videos. And Björk is seen as the Icelandic elf child-woman. But Björk wants to be seen as more erotic. And I’m like, ‘Why?’ Elf child-woman is a good job. And my job as rock’s bad girl is good, too. I should just stop trying to correct people’s impressions.”

I understand, I say, but it’s strange that you’re written off as one-dimensional and didactic when your lyrics, if anything, tend to err on the side of the abstract.

“That’s because I’m not intelligent enough to write direct narratives,” she says sarcastically. “I’ve always worked really hard on my lyrics, even when my playing was for shit. So it’s weird that when I try to work in different styles, to juxtapose ideas in a careful way that isn’t pompous and Byronic, it’s just taken as vulgar. The whole cliché of women being cathartic really pisses me off. You know, ‘Oh, this is therapy for me. I’d die if I didn’t write this.’ Eddie Vedder says shit like that. Fuck you.”

Misogyny’s been a big shock to Love. After all, her parents were ’60s quasi-liberals bent on showing their daughter life’s brightest profile. The first record she owned was Free To Be You and Me. There was a copy of Our Bodies, Our Selves sitting on the family toilet for years. She grew up thinking books and records like these were the culture’s official textbooks. And she remains an avid reader of feminist theorists like Susan Faludi, Judith Butler, Camille Paglia, and Naomi Wolf, though her face crinkles up at the mention of the latter’s newest book. “Ugh. Wimp,” she crows.

I mention a riot grrrl show she’d helped organize in London last year. Rumor had it the show was a critical and financial disaster, despite the participation of name acts like Huggy Bear, Bratmobile, and Hole. Since that fiasco, the riot grrrl phenomenon has been treated a lot less reverently in the British music papers. “Yeah, it didn’t work,” she says, echoing the opinion of other Hole members, male and female. “But then the whole riot grrrl thing is so… well, for one thing, the Women’s Studies program at Evergreen State College, Olympia, where a lot of these bands come from, is notorious for being one of the worst programs in the country. It’s man-hating, and it doesn’t produce very intelligent people in that field. So you’ve got these girls starting bands, saying, ‘Well, they printed our picture in the Melody Maker, why aren’t we getting any royalties?”.

There is a lot written about Live Through This. 1994 is perhaps the greatest ever year for music, though I don’t think Hole’s second studio album gets as much praise and respect as the biggest from that year. I want to get some background and insight into this classic. I am going to end with Pitchfork and their 10/10 review of Live Through This. You can buy this masterpiece on vinyl. I will interrupt the features with one about the woman who appears on the cover of Live Through This, as it is one of the most recognisable and eye-catching shots of the 1990s. A cover that stands with the best of them. However, there is a fascinating story behind it and the aftermath for the cover star. I want to move to this feature from last year. They write how “Courtney Love bare her soul on an alt.rock classic that still surprises”:

“Incredibly melodic but with a punk streak, Live Through This proved that Hole and its antagonistic frontwoman, Courtney Love, could deliver more than just tabloid fodder. It remains a living document of a scene, a cultural moment, and a story of survival at all costs.

Hole’s first record, 1991’s Pretty On The Inside, had earned them considerable street cred. It’s a sludgy assault on the senses with a no-wave, atonal sound that reflected the influence of the album’s producer, Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon. In the three years since its release, however, the band’s profile had been raised significantly. Love and Cobain got married, had a child, and became the poster couple for grunge; the controversial Vanity Fair profile hit (in which Love was photographed baring her pregnant belly, and the magazine asked “if the pair were the grunge John and Yoko? Or the next Sid and Nancy?”); and there was a bidding war for Hole’s next record. The group ended up signing to Nirvana’s label, Geffen, and changed their line-up to start recording their major-label debut.

Love was unabashedly ambitious and not preoccupied with such trivial 90s concerns as “selling out.” With Live Through This, she set out to make a commercial record that also proved Hole was a legitimate band to be reckoned with. After Hole’s original drummer, Caroline Rue, left, Love and co-founder Eric Erlandson recruited Patty Schemel at Cobain’s suggestion, along with and their ace in the hole, bassist Kristen Pfaff, who brought a new energy and polish to the band.

Produced by Sean Slade and Paul Q Kolderie (who’d produced Radiohead’s Pablo Honey), Live Through This captured the band’s raw primal energy while still being an impeccably structured album with codas, choruses, and plenty of hooks, coalescing around Love’s emotional ferocity. The influences were clearly there (Pixies, Joy Division) but the band progressed beyond 80s post-punk retread to create 38 minutes of anthemic punk perfection.

From its blistering opening number, “Violet,” it was clear that Love wasn’t pulling any punches. While some easily recall their favorite chorus off an album, Live Through This is remembered for its screaming chants and ferocious drumming by Patty Schemel, inviting you to pour oil on the fire that is Courtney Love. You don’t sing along, you scream along.

Initially written in 1991, “Violet” became a live trademark during the group’s touring years before it became the album opener. Like Love herself, it’s full of contradictions, calling out the sexually exploitative nature of relationships while simultaneously inviting it upon herself: “Well they get what they want, and they never want it again/Go on, take everything, take everything, I want you to.” “Violet” sets the tone for the whole album, facilitating between intimate, quiet verses to the raging chorus, just as Love easily switches from victim to aggressor to create a dramatic tension that never breaks.

On “Miss World” – and, subsequently, every other track – Love addresses the listener directly, not necessarily as the perpetrator of all these problems but as complicit participants in society’s patriarchal ills. The song starts out softly melodic until the chorus erupts, repeating itself until it becomes a kind of invocation. Even the cover of Live Through This speaks to the album’s themes (desire, degradation, celebrity, and survival), featuring a disheveled Miss World beauty queen who could be a stand-in for Love herself, realizing that a crown does not always bring glory.

Every part of Love’s presentation was an extension of her music, from her intentionally make-up-smeared face to her ragged babydoll dresses. Both the lyrics and imagery for “Doll Parts,” and its accompanying video, show Love both acknowledging how society views women as objects while equally striving to be one. Both “Violet” and “Doll Parts” were early demos that showed Love’s maturation as a songwriter and helped to break the album, along with Erlandson’s tight arrangements.

The album gets its title from a lyric in “Asking For It,” which also references the often-used retort in cases of sexual assault. While never explicitly stated, the song is said to be inspired by an incident where Love was assaulted by a crowd after stage-diving during their 1991 tour with Mudhoney. It’s songs like these that make Love’s lyrics seem more autobiographical than perhaps initially intended. The same could be said for “I Think That I Would Die,” which references her child being taken away. Which makes it all the more interesting that some of the most pointed criticism of the album comes from Hole’s fiery cover of Young Marble Giants’ “Credit In The Straight World,” which calls out their critics and indie rock snobs. It begins with a kind of Gregorian chant before launching into a dual-bass and guitar assault courtesy of Erlandson and Pfaff.

While often compared to the adjacent riot grrrl movement, Love makes it clear that she’s not part of the Washington scene led by Bikini Kill, Sleater-Kinney, and Bratmobile, singing, “Well I went to school in Olympia/Everyone’s the same/And so are you, in Olympia,” on the closing track, “Rock Star.” Love’s female peers also become the central target on “She Walks On Me,” a song that further drives Hole apart from any kind of established scene. Despite its rebellious mocking tone, “Rock Star” also includes one of the more hopeful moments on Live Through This: just as the song seems to fade out, you hear Love insist: “No, we’re not done”.

I am coming to SPIN again for this feature published in 2024 around the thirtieth anniversary of the magnus opus that is Live Through This. In it, Hole’s drummer Patty Schemel reflects “how the album continues to resonate, holding a special place in the hearts of queer and trans fans”. There might be some who have never heard Hole or Live Through This. I don’t think it is a case of having to be around in 1994. Live Through This is such an influential album, and you can hear it affecting artists today:

“The album is more than queer-coded—it has queer lineages; its feeling, sounds, and themes were driven by queer punk drummer Patty Schemel’s beats and ability to amplify Courtney Love’s words and emotion like no other drummer could do.

“When you’re a kid and don’t feel like you belong and there’s someone saying they’re weird and have so much going on and they’re angry too, we spoke to everybody with that feeling,” Schemel told me, reflecting on how queer people have found a sense of empowerment in Hole’s music and lyrics. At readings of her memoir, Hit So Hard, fans often tell her the band’s music saved them.

When Schemel went into the studio, she had no idea that the album would become so successful. She wanted to prove herself as a drummer, and Hole wanted to prove themselves as a band, not just Kurt Cobain’s wife’s band.

In August 1995, Schemel came out as a lesbian in Rolling Stone magazine while the band were promoting Live Through This, a move ahead of its time. She felt inspired by the active queer punk scene, specifically Phranc, Roddy Bottum of Faith No More, Rob Halford of Judas Priest, and zinester and bassist of Team Dresch, Donna Dresch.

“Once I came out, I was like, ‘I’m never gonna hide it again. I’m never gonna feel bad about being who I am.’ Kurt would say it was okay to be gay, just like he said in the Incesticide liner notes, and people listened to that. I didn’t want to hide and not share my true self, because up until I was 18 I felt horrible about being gay. Punk rock saved me. I found other people who were freaky like me. Playing drums, it was okay for me to consider coming out.”

Schemel’s drums are integral to the power of Live Through This. The songs were collectively written at rehearsals, where the band would work through ideas at length, finding what clicked. Love always had big stacks of lyrics, and guitarist Eric Erlandson would always record their rehearsals since Love had trouble remembering her parts. “Her guitar playing got kind of good,” Schemel remembered, “but she didn’t want to focus on that.”

Since Love always wanted to be wherever Cobain was, Schemel would often travel with the couple. Album rehearsals started at Jabberjaw in L.A. but happened mostly at the Hole rehearsal space in Seattle, and in a few out-of-town writing sessions: one in San Francisco at the Melvins’ rehearsal space and another in Rio De Janeiro, when Love and Schemel used Nirvana’s Rock in Rio rehearsal room to write “She Walks Over Me” along with fellow queer punk musician, Nirvana roadie, and ex-Exploited guitarist Big John Duncan who, according to Schemel, played bass and suggested ideas.

“When I joined the band, the songs started to become a little more shaped, with more layers and form,” Schemel remembered, remarking on how she and Pfaff became a foundation together. “She made me feel so supported. All of her ideas were really cool! For those quiet middle sections where Courtney wanted to do these pretty little REM [style] picking things, like the twinkly things on ‘I Think That I Would Die.’ Courtney always had to have the last word. [Laughs.] But I felt that we kind of became a new band.”

Live Through This was the first and last album the group with this specific lineup got to record together, due to the untimely passing of Pfaff in June 1994—just two months after the album was released.

Hole recorded Live Through This at Triclops Sound in Marietta, Georgia, recommended to them by the Smashing Pumpkins, who had just wrapped up sessions for Siamese Dream. Hole was welcomed to the studio by a fax from Amy Ray, inviting the band to hang out. “Courtney was like, ‘Patty, I think this fax must be for you! It’s the Indigo Girls!’ And I was like, ‘Of course it is.’” According to Schemel, Love was constantly checking the fax machine for messages from Cobain. Unfortunately, due to a busy recording schedule, they never got to meet up with the Indigo Girls, but they did fly to New York to see Nirvana on Saturday Night Live”.

In 2019, the photographer who shot the cover of Hole’s Live Through This, Ellen von Unwerth, shared her memories and reflections with Another Mag. Courtney Love was inspired by an infamous scene in the 1976 film, Carrie. There is so much power in that image of the woman, model Leilani Bishop, and her expression. It still resonates to this day in terms of how engaging it is. It is a cover you keep coming back to, transfixed by that image:

“Courtney Love recently posted a screenshot to her Instagram account from Rolling Stone’s website which – on that same day – released its 50 Greatest Grunge Albums. Hole’s Live Through This came in at number four and almost 68,000 fans and followers liked that image, showering her with a barrage of hearts and congratulations in the comments. Lead vocalist Love, as well as guitarist Eric Erlandson, bassist Kristen Pfaff and drummer Patty Schemel crafted a 90s era-defining masterpiece that has been canonised on virtually every top music list of that decade. The raw, unapologetic honesty of the lyrics, brought to life by Love’s sweet yet deeply sinister vocals, makes the album unforgettable. The same could be said about the spine-tingling album cover image, shot by fashion world favourite, Ellen von Unwerth.

Model Leilani Bishop – the only person on the album cover – embodied an intentionally manic, prom-queen-gone-wrong look. The smudged eye make-up, vintage-inspired feathery locks topped with a dainty tiara, and her awkward embrace of a floral bouquet meant to evoke a certain classic horror film. Speaking to AnOther, Von Unwerth recalls the days before the photo shoot in Los Angeles. “Courtney Love called me,” she says. “We were on the phone for one hour. I didn’t say much but listened, and Courtney had the idea of re-enacting the scene of the [1976] movie Carrie, which I loved, too.” Von Unwerth also reveals that she and Love managed to click from the beginning, adding, “I just met her the night before the shoot wearing her famous schoolgirl dress. We had some drinks and connected instantly.”

Unfortunately, Von Unwerth had not listened to Live Through This prior to the photo shoot. But in her eyes, that didn’t matter. “The album was still in the making, but I was a big fan of Kurt Cobain and was sure that his girls would produce something equally cool. Besides, I go with the flow. I heard the music afterwards and loved it.”

Hole’s second studio album, Live Through This was an anomaly at the time. Love and Erlandson wrote the songs and broached topics like feminism, violence against women, beauty, postpartum depression, motherhood, feelings of self-doubt and relationship woes. Love once openly admitted that she was competing with her husband, Kurt Cobain, during the making of the album. Though many critics alleged that Cobain had a hand in writing the album (he didn’t), his undeniable presence looms like a dark cloud over the album. He sang uncredited back-up vocals with Pfaff on Asking for It and Softer, Softest.

With tragic timing, DGC Records slated the release date for Live Through This on April 12, 1994, seven days after Cobain committed suicide. Three months later, Love and the band suffered another blow when bassist Pfaff died of an overdose.

Von Unwerth unknowingly captured the turbulence surrounding Live Through This in one frame. Bishop’s effusive, open-mouth expression on the cover album speaks volumes as loud as Love’s voice. Von Unwerth says, “I just had done several shoots with [Bishop] and really loved her cool rock and roll attitude.” But how did she evoke such reaction from Bishop? Von Unwerth admits, “This is what I do. It’s like being a movie director.” She also remembered being self-assured when she saw the selects after they had wrapped the shoot. “We all felt that we nailed it,” she says.

And that she did. While Von Unwerth’s diverse portfolio features art from other bands’ album covers like Bananarama, Belinda Carlisle, Janet Jackson, Dido, Britney Spears and Rihanna, somehow Live Through This stands out as a chillingly authentic, visual interpretation of Hole’s music. Von Unwerth naturally connected the band to its fans through a harmonious mix of rock and roll attitude and highly stylised photographical prowess. 25 years on, Von Unwerth declares, “I am very proud that I was part of this album, this band, and this time in music and cherish every moment of it.” And if those “best of” lists are any testament to Von Unwerth’s work, Billboard – back in 2015 – placed Live Through This at number 12 in their 50 Greatest Cover Albums of All Time”.

In 2018, Pitchfork revisited Hole’s Live Through This. Awarding it a perfect score, it is an album of depth, righteous anger and some of the most important music ofg the '90s. Nearly thirty-two years after its release and Hole’s second studio album still sounds like nothing else. This distinct work, you can hear its influence adopted and adapted by so many artists:

“Try to imagine a famous woman who screams for a living today. Not alternative, punk-magazine famous, but American monoculture famous, platinum-selling-album famous, so famous her drug mishaps make headlines in Mexican newspapers, so famous rumors and conspiracies about her celebrity marriage hound her for decades. This woman doesn’t let out sing-screams or tinny emo yelps, but raw, diaphragmatic bellows—or, as David Fricke put it in his Rolling Stone review of Hole’s 1994 album, Live Through This, a “corrosive, lunatic wail.”

He was wrong on the second point: There’s no lunacy on Hole’s records. But there is anger, female anger, which, to a man’s ear, historically scans as madness. Lead singer Courtney Love often told reporters that she named her band after a line in Euripides’ Medea. “There’s a hole that pierces right through me,” it supposedly goes, though you won’t find it in any common translation of the ancient play. It’s apocryphal, or misremembered, or Love made it up to complicate the name’s obvious double entendre—either way, it makes a great myth. A band foregrounding female rage takes its name from the angriest woman in the Western canon, a woman so angry at her husband’s betrayal she kills their children just so he will feel her pain in his bones.

Like all female revenge fantasies written by men, Medea carries a grain of neurosis about how women might retaliate for their subjugation. It is easier, still, for men to express these anxieties by way of violent fantasy than it is for women to communicate their anger at all. In a 1996 New York magazine cover story on women alternative singers entitled “Feminism Rocks,” Kim France, the founding editor of Lucky who also worked as New York’s deputy editor, paraphrased feminist journalist and author Susan Faludi: “While our culture admires the angry young man, who is perceived as heroic and sexy, it can’t find anything but scorn for the angry young woman, who is seen as emasculating and bitter.” This was true for Love, who watched grunge break through to the mainstream only to find that the freedom and rebellion it promised was reserved for her male counterparts. In grunge, men could be scruffy and rude and defy gender norms—they could be rawer than the men modeled in synth-pop music videos or hair metal concerts a few years prior. Women, for all the space afforded them in the subculture’s spotlight moment, might as well have been Lilith.

Hole’s second album, Live Through This, famously came out four days after Love’s husband, Kurt Cobain, was found dead at their home in Seattle. The sudden tragedy threatened to swallow the music, to say nothing of the genre and social movement in which it was encased. Here was a dead rock god, and here was the woman who survived him. Even the album’s title alluded to Love’s endurance through a ground-shaking trauma, though of course she had written the title about surviving her fame, surviving her fraught association with the most beloved man in rock, surviving her pregnancy with their child, surviving the tabloid rumors that would—and still do—swarm her as a result.

“I sometimes feel that no one’s taken the time to write about certain things in rock, that there’s a certain female point of view that’s never been given space,” Love told Sidelines in 1991, the same year Hole released their first album, Pretty on the Inside. While there were plenty of rock songs written by men about hounding and abusing women, there were few about being hounded and abused. The rock canon, like all the others, fiercely guarded its male subjectivity, and Love wanted to break through its ranks.

Love wrote about sexual violence with a snarl, too, but a heavier, more knowing one. “Was she asking for it?/Was she asking nice?” she poses on the seething “Asking for It.” “If she was asking for it/Did she ask you twice?” The song, she’s said, was inspired by a stage dive that took a wrong turn. She leapt into the audience to crowd-surf during a show, and found the crowd ready to devour her. “Suddenly, it was like my dress was being torn off me, my underwear was being torn off me, people were putting their fingers inside of me and grabbing my breasts really hard, screaming things in my ears like ‘pussy-whore-cunt,’” she said. Whatever covenant binds fan and artist, whatever gives the latter power over the former, didn’t apply to Hole—not in totality, at least; not to the extent that it would keep a singer who was also a woman from being molested by her audience in public.

Live Through This refers to autobiographical traumas, but it is not a confessional record. “The whole cliché of women being cathartic really pisses me off,” Love said in a 1994 Spin cover story. “You know, ‘Oh, this is therapy for me. I’d die if I didn’t write this.’ Eddie Vedder says shit like that. Fuck you.” Her lyrics don’t hit like spleen-venting. They’re analytical, no matter how viscerally she howls them, and their insight transcends their origins. Throughout the record, Love speaks to the atomization of the female form that takes place in the eye of the misogynist. To the ogler, a woman is never whole. She’s shards: lips, hair, tits, ass, whatever can be grabbed without consequence, whatever can be bought and sold. Love would know, having stripped for a living before the band broke big, having made a career of, among other things, being looked at. She sings of “pieces of Jennifer’s body.” On “Doll Parts,” against halting guitar chords, she sings about how she’s “doll eyes, doll mouth, doll legs.” Her multiplicity is underscored by backing harmonies from Hole bassist Kristen Pfaff and guest vocalist Dana Kletter, who chime in with the indelible line: “I want to be the girl with the most cake.”

As much as it concerns trauma and misogyny, Live Through This, like all great rock records, quakes with desire. Love deciphers what it means to be an object of desire, but she also plays a woman who wants ravenously. Her wanting, at the time, was a terror; she inspired so much vitriol in part because she refused to be passive, refused to accommodate a man’s hunger without indulging her own. She would not be a vessel or a muse. Her husband did not cast her in the drama of his life. She wanted him and chased him down, and then she wanted their child, and she believed that her desire mattered, that it had substance. “I went through all the shit and pain and inconvenience of being pregnant for nine whole fucking months because I wanted some of his beautiful genes in there, in that child,” Love told Melody Maker, in a profile that called her “a one-woman spite factory” in its tagline, in February of 1994. “I wanted his babies. I saw something I wanted, and I got it. What’s wrong with that?”.

I wanted to dig deep for this Beneath the Sleeve. Hole’s Live Through This is one of the greatest albums ever, and it is one I remember from the 1990s. A fan of Nirvana, I discovered Hole through them. Considering the trauma Courtey Love faced in the wake of Kurt Cobain’s death, she showed so much strength, dignity and bravery. Also, to be able to promote an album like Live Through This and deal with questions around Cobain. In an America that has a misogynistic, transphobic, hateful President who puts women’s rights bottom of his agenda and has split a country, you feel Live Through This is more important needed than ever! This 1994-released album is…

A staggering work.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Smerz

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDIT: Alva Le Febvre

  

Smerz

__________

I have spotlighted…

a few duos already this year. I think most people are highlighting bands or solo artists, but duos are less common and less commonly discussed. Smerz are a Norwegian duo of Catharina Stoltenberg and Henriette Motzfeldt. Smerz hail from Oslo and make music that can be described as Experimental Pop/Electronic. I will finish ff with a review of the duo’s 2025 album, Big city life. I am starting with Vogue and their interview. Chatting with Smerz and their off-kilter Pop music for the ages, there are some sections of the interview I was keen to highlight:

“There’s certainly a mysterious, open-ended quality to Smerz’s music, although given the remarkable precision of their songwriting and production, “vague” isn’t necessarily the word I would use. On Big City Life, the duo flit deftly between genres—dream pop, glitchy electro, power ballads, shoegaze, even shades of trip-hop on album closer “Easy”—whipping up all these textures into a sonic soufflé that is uniquely their own. And where their previous records have erred towards the cryptic (at least lyrically), on Big City Life, they’re making room for big, overwhelming feelings: take the brazenly sensual yearning captured on the twinkling “Big Dreams,” or the woozy rush of being head-over-heels in love so beautifully captured on lead single “You Got Time and I Got Money,” the melody of which you could just as easily imagine being sung in a smoky 1920s Paris jazz club as at an underground club night in 2020s Berlin.

“We had a period of listening to cabaret music, and more traditional songwriting, quite a lot, which I guess stitches together the last album and this one somehow,” says Motzfeldt. And the emotional maturity, for lack of a better term, that courses through the album—despite the fizzy, bratty fun of “Feisty,” there’s an air of hard-earned, melancholic wisdom that colors tracks like “Street Style” and album highlight “A Thousand Lies”—can also be explained by the pair having grown up a little. “We started making music in a sort of club music environment, and at some point, that disappeared, and we didn’t find ourselves inside those clubs that often,” says Stoltenberg, discussing the album’s more straightforward lyrics.

Stoltenberg and Motzfeldt’s friendship was first sparked while at high school in Oslo; then, in the early 2010s, they moved to Copenhagen together for university, Stoltenberg to study math and statistics, Motzfeldt to study music composition at the city’s prestigious Rhythmic Music Conservatory. The close-knit community of experimental musicians that orbited the latter—other recent graduates include Erika de Casier, ML Buch, and Astrid Sonne, all artists with a similar interest in the porous outer regions of pop—encouraged them to form Smerz, the name being an abbreviated form of the German word Herzschmerz, meaning heartache.

Given its clever production and Stoltenberg’s consciously dispassionate vocals, Big City Life could easily come across as forbiddingly cool. But there’s a sincerity and a wide-eyed romance to so many of the songs—as well as, on tracks like “Feisty,” a playfulness and winking humor—that lends the project a whole lot of heart instead. Both Stoltenberg and Motzfeldt note that much of the album came from dark nights of the soul they experienced over the past few years. “I guess we have both moved in and out of some different relationships, and we've also moved cities, from Copenhagen to Oslo, and a bit back again,” says Stoltenberg. “The beginning of the writing of this album was the beginning of a lot of shifts in our personal lives”.

I realise several of my Spotlight features concern artists that are not brand new. Smerz have been releasing music since 2017, they are a duo that I think everyone needs to know about. I must admit I have not included an artist who has been making music for that long, but I have seen others spotlight Smerz for success this year. Though not a new or rising duo, they are one that are going to help shape and define Pop music this year. Before getting to a review of their most recent album, there are two more interviews I am including. PAPER spoke with Smerz back in the summer. A duo living their own big city life, I have been following them, I think since 2022, and maybe their fanbase is not quite as large as it should be. However, with every album and year that passes, they recruit new fans around the world:

“Big city life is a continued conversation between the Smerz duo, who have already created a thematically and musically varied set of works since 2017 via a debut EP, a full-length album, and a number of collaborations and compositional projects. On this new album, they've pared down the scale of their artistic wanderings, choosing to create a poignant portrait of life in their (relatively small) home city of Oslo.

Highlights include “Roll the dice,” which finds the duo delivering a self-affirmation before a night out on the town. “You’re a girl in the city and you shouldn’t think twice/ You take two steps forward, keep your eyes on the prize,” they hum over a beat that features an almost slapstick piano line, atonal and coy. Or look at the smashing fun of “Feisty,” which is the album at its most uptempo. A clanging 707 hi hat melds with a set of strings that could be ripped from aVanessa Cartlon cut. Meanwhile the duo hum about the small, innocuous details of a night of drinking and flirting (“He likes to seem mysterious but really he's just dumb/ It's crowded at the toilet, I check my makeup and my bum”).

Smerz’s renewed focus on local tedium was spurred by a major move. They started their career in Copenhagen, a central part of its alt pop scene, which includes fellow artists Erika de Casier, ML Buch, Astrid Sonne and Fine Glindvad (Motzfeldt went to school with many of them at the important Rhythmic Music Conservatory in Copenhagen).

“We developed our whole musical life in Copenhagen. Everyone we know and everywhere we go has some connection to music,” says Stoltenberg. Collectively, their crew of Copenhagen colleagues became a global musical force, receiving an upsurge of interest in 2023 when Smerz, de Casier and Glindvad all contributed to K-pop stars NewJeans’ EP Get Up (Smerz produced EP closer “ASAP”).

It was time, though, for a change. They moved back to their hometown during COVID. Both were coming out of relationships and thus re-entering single life just as the world was fluctuating between various levels of lockdowns and reopenings. There, in Oslo, they could linger in the specificities of home: its culture, its rhythm, its “grey and green” landscape. And there, they could document their everyday experience in Oslo through surprising, instinctual works of pop reportage.

It’s hard not to connect their deep hometown connection to Stoltenberg’s own exceptional tie to the country. Her father, Jens Stoltenberg, was Prime Minister of the small EU nation twice between 2000 and 2013. Stoltenberg doesn’t speak publicly about her family’s political ties, but her ability to largely avoid the topic speaks to Norway’s vastly different social system: where wealth disparity is minimized by a social safety net and the general social code revolves around janteloven, “disdainful attitude to extraordinary achievements … [or] the Nordic trait of placing the value of equality above all else.”

On Big city life, Smerz streamlined everything, comparing its musical creation to a “band jamming.” They assembled a “library” of a few core sounds: a drum machine, software pianos, synthy strings which sound like they’re plucked out of a ‘90s TV documentary’s score. “These songs were made quite fast, with a focus on the songwriting, and less focus on the sounds and the textures,” Stoltenberg shares. “By working a bit more quickly and not focusing as much on the production, you can capture some spontaneous mood or feeling of whatever state you're in”.

Actually I think I will end now with a review. Not a new duo or breaking through, I think it is a perfect time to feature Smerz, as they had a brilliant year las year. Big city life was hugely acclaimed. This is what The Line of Best Fit about one of the strongest offerings from 2025. I do think that Big city life took their music to a new audience. Never resting on their laurels or repeating what went before, I think we will see Smerz releasing music for a very long time to come:

“Catharina Soltenberg and Henriette Motzfeldt, known as the Norwegian art pop duo Smerz, have bottled the events of a night out with its ecstasy and fleetingness and gloom through 2021’s experimental odyssey Believer or last year’s fictional pop star Allina, but on Big city life, they head straight to the party.

Their ability to make music about the club and not necessarily in it is strange and unwavering. “Roll the dice”, with its stilted delivery and jabby piano, shouldn’t be a peppy number, but its lyrics point in that direction: “You’re a girl in the streets / And you shouldn’t think twice… / Let the city lights surround you / Make it shimmer, make it bright." It has all the feel of a first night out in a new place, feeling the buzz of concrete and metal pulse. On the record’s mesmerizing opening track, too, they marvel at “The freedom of a big city,” one that can stifle as well as open yourself up to new possibilities. Everything is available, which makes everything daunting.

Nowhere is this better demonstrated than on the album’s beguiling and wonderful centerpiece, “Feisty”. It’s an oddly simple, deadpanned-approach to the club where every line is delivered in accordance with the physics of the night, no dressing or metaphor. Rather, simple descriptions abound: “Makeup on my mind, these shoes so far down / Little red skirt and a blouse my mother found,” like an anthropologist taking notes for those who couldn’t make it. Their writing is complex in its simplicity – further on, they groan at an art school gang who shows up, “and they’re always plenty.” Why “plenty”? There are hundreds of adjectives that would better give focus to the group, but instead, they note the size of the crowd, like a foggy, dense, outline of what’s happening. Whether this is a language kerfuffle or a genuine literary moment, it’s a mind-snagging line that barely says anything. Maybe they’re taking a cue from the gang themselves: “They don’t say much, use their art to show compassion.”

Smerz isn’t always at the club though, and Big city life benefits from periods of downtime. On the refreshingly sincere trip-hop “You got time and I got money”, they slowdance around simple affectations: “I like these clean t-shirts on you / I like the restaurants you choose.” On the swanky spoken-word “Imagine this”, they recount a first date, the boy’s desire at the girl’s surprising cleverness. But they go their separate ways even though the connection was strong: “And as the city turns quiet / You both have to admit / That this isn’t now / But this could’ve been it.”

Similar to Charli xcx, Smerz’ downtempo songs might be more revealing than their anthems. They cry and second-guess before the party on “But I do”, and a zap of realization comes on “A thousand lies”, where they bleakly sing, “I’m realizing lately that I won’t feel like this again.” The anxiety creeps in on “Easy”, the closing track, where their Tirzah-esque voices cut across the haze, daydreaming about closeness that might be harder to achieve. “I’ll be the one you know,” they assure, “We’ll talk about the things you don’t talk about with your friends,” matching a drunk promise that you know you won’t keep. Or maybe the person on the other side just isn’t into you, and there’s nothing you can do. The trip ends with the record’s most brilliant line, succinctly summarizing the whirlwind of a night out before the comedown of realization: “Have I said too much?”.

Catharina Stoltenberg and Henriette Motzfeldt create amazing music together. With Smerz, they have this incredible power and sound. The duo head to New Zealand and Australia soon before going to Ireland and Europe for some tour dates. There might not be much time to release new singles for a while. However, I am sure that we will hear something from them a bit later in the year. If this is the first time that you have heard of Smerz, then make sure that they are firmly…

IN your life.

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Follow Smerz

FEATURE: Needle Drops and Scores to Settle: Scene Seven: The truth, no matter what it is, isn’t that frightening: Drive My Car (2021)

FEATURE:

 

 

Needle Drops and Scores to Settle

 

Scene Seven: The truth, no matter what it is, isn’t that frightening: Drive My Car (2021)

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THE second time…

IN THIS PHOTO: Eiko Ishibashi/PHOTO CREDIT: Bas Bogaerts

I am spotlighting a film score rather than a soundtrack, this is also the most recent inclusion, year-wise. Eiko Ishibashi’s amazing score for Drive My Car. I will come to some reviews of the score and an interview with its composer. I am starting out The Guardian and their review of a marvellous 2021 film. An adaptation of a Haruki Murakami work (Drive My Car is a celebrated short story by Haruki Murakami, featured in his 2014 collection Men Without Women, which explores themes of grief, connection, and loneliness through a widowed actor who hires a young female chauffeur), this film might have fallen under the radar, as the pandemic meant that people could not get to the cinema as much as they would have liked:

“Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s mysterious and beautiful new film is inspired by Haruki Murakami’s short story of the same name – and that title, like Murakami’s Norwegian Wood, is designed to tease us with the shiny wistfulness of a Beatles lyric. Hamaguchi’s previous pictures Asako I and II and Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy were about the enigma of identity, the theatrical role play involved in all social interaction and the erotic rapture of intimacy. Drive My Car is about all this and more; where once Hamaguchi’s film-making language had seemed to me at the level of jeu d’esprit, now it ascends to something with passion and even a kind of grandeur. It is a film about the link between confession, creativity and sexuality and the unending mystery of other people’s lives and secrets.

Yûsuke (Hidetoshi Nishijima) is a successful actor and theatre director who specialises in experimental multilingual productions with surtitles – he is currently working on Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and is preparing to play the lead in Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya. He has a complex relationship with his wife Oto (Reika Kirishima), a successful writer and TV dramatist who has a habit of murmuring aloud ideas for erotic short stories, trance-like, while she is astride Yûsuke having sex, including a potent vignette about a teenage girl who breaks into the house of the boy with whom she is obsessed.

The couple learn that Yûsuke is in danger of losing the sight in one eye – he later learns with a shock that this has changed the short story that she was working on – but this perhaps makes it easier for him to accept that he will need a driver for his trusty Saab 900 when he later directs a new revival of his Vanya production at an arts festival in Hiroshima, a city that is photographed with crisp unsentimentality. Things are complicated by a devastating event in Oto’s life, and Yûsuke being confronted with proof that she had been having an affair with a handsome and disreputable young actor and celebrity called Kôji (Masaki Okada). For complex reasons, he casts this same bumptious Kôji in the lead role for Vanya for his revival, assuring the actor calmly that makeup will cover the age difference, and responds readily but with cool reserve when Kôji keeps saying he wants to talk to him over a drink after rehearsals. This strange duel between the two men is happening alongside Yûsuke’s growing relationship with his driver Misaki (Tôko Miura) whose professional reticence evolves into something else when he starts confessing his anguish to her – prompted by the fact that he likes to play a certain cassette in the car: the voice of his wife running his lines for Vanya.

As Yûsuke, Nishijima has a certain severity, inscrutability and the almost martial self-discipline of someone who is accustomed to leadership and to giving orders to actors while seeming open to their suggestions. (Oddly, when he is in makeup for Vanya, he reminded me of Yasujirō Ozu’s veteran player Chishû Ryû.) Miura’s performance has a reserve of its own, as his confessor and fellow smoker. Chekhov’s play, with all its desperation and regret for missed life chances, has become a touchstone for Yûsuke, and almost a separate character in the movie. What if … Kôji was playing Vanya, not him? What if Kôji was his wife’s partner, not him? What if he had been able to master his feelings, swallow his pride and actively confront his wife with what he knew about her secret erotic life and how much he had been hurt by it? Would this blaze of attempted honesty have saved their relationship? Or destroyed it?

And all the time, Misaki is growing in importance, and in the film’s extraordinary final section, her story is told; a story that need not thematically dovetail with everything that has gone before, other than to show us once again, that other people’s lives are complicated and withheld, and that we are being arrogant if we think that we know everything there is to know about the people that we meet.

Drive My Car is an expansion of a short story, and perhaps it’s true to say that Hamaguchi’s storytelling aesthetic here, as in his other films, is a mosaic or choreography of short stories, an archipelago of lives. Yûsuke, Oto, Kôji and Misaki are living their own stories, and the drama superimposes and overlaps them like a Venn diagram. And there is something very moving when we close in on one particular tale, one life. It is an engrossing and exalting experience”.

Eiko Ishibashi is a composer that is quite new to me. Her score for Drive My Car is extraordinary. I was completely immersed and engrossed when I heard the album. I wanted to discover more about a score for one of the best films of 2021. In celebrating modern-day great composers, women are often overlooked. It is important that composers like Eiko Ishibashi are celebrated and spotlighted more. In 2022, when the soundtrack/score was reworked for the EFG London Jazz festival at Kings Place, London (The Guardian provided their take), Variety spoke with Eiko Ishibashi about crafting and creating Drive My Car’s emotional and stunning score:

“Enter Eiko Ishibashi, an experimental Japanese multi-instrumentalist whose 2018 “The Dream My Bones Dream” was a turning point in an already decade-long career of scores for theater and short films.

Ishibashi’s 2018 album of haunting soundscapes and its electro-acoustic mix of noise, oddball pop, improvisational jazz and minimalist, modern classical music made her a cinematic force equal to Hamaguchi. The more textural and sweeping aspects of Ishibashi’s bittersweet melodies were an elegant match for Hamaguchi’s vision.

After being known for crafting blunt, short films since 2001, Japanese director Hamaguchi’s romantic “Asako I & II” of 2018 signaled an aesthetic shift, a turn toward sweeping narratives with shadowy, but tactile, atmospheres. Such expanse was necessary for 2021’s “Drive My Car,” a tale of a theater director reckoning with the finality of death while working on a stage production of “Uncle Vanya” during long car rides.

To that end, Ishibashi’s contemplative song-score for “Drive My Car,” re-released in February on major streaming services with bonus tracks, is as distant and off-putting as it is intimate and readily engaging.

“Typically, I don’t use a lot of music in my films, but hearing the music Ishibashi made was the first time I thought ‘this could work for the film,’” says director Hamaguchi, who was introduced to her music by “Drive My Car” producer Teruhisa Yamamoto as filming was set to commence. “Hearing her work, I was struck by how wonderful her talent and technique was. It reminded me of a band I enjoyed in my 20s, Tortoise. It had a similar feel that really matched with my taste, so I was very happy to work with Eiko.”

The director says he and Ishibashi share similar backgrounds, generationally, as well as a shared career trajectory. “I think that comes from listening to the same things around the same time. We also share similar tastes in film. She watches a lot of movies and loves John Cassavetes, Douglas Sirk, Rainer Werner Fassbinder and all these filmmakers who I really enjoy. Our film language was very similar.”

Hamaguchi and Ishibashi both agree that making the music of “Drive My Car” in spurts — before and after the pandemic shutdown, as well as during the shoot itself — was a huge help in making her compositions for his cinematic vision their own living, breathing entity.

“Working on it step-by-step with director Hamaguchi while he was filming was very gratifying for me,” says Ishibashi.

The director continues: “We shot the first 40 minutes of ‘Drive My Car’ in its first chunk, around mid-2020, but had to stop because of COVID. We had Ishibashi work on that chunk first — she would send us motifs of different moments, and we would add those pieces into the edit as we went. That process of combining the edit and the music worked really well. Based on those motifs she came up with, I would give notes and she would record a final version after more back-and-forth. It wasn’t this abstract way of communicating an idea of what I wanted … it was visual to begin with. That went very smoothly and I will use that way of working with a composer in the future”.

I will end with a Pitchfork review for a mesmeric score. One of the best of the past decade. Before that, The Guardian spoke with a composer whose amazing score helped Drive My Car to Oscar success (it won the award for Best International Feature Film). Not a one off, “the Japanese musician has reunited with its director for a collaboration unlike any other”.  Her latest work was an E.P. released last year that was a collaboration with Jim O’Rourke. Pareiodlia is a stunning work. This is an astonishing composer who summons something dark, eerie and strangely beautiful. Such evocative and image-provoking, Drive My Car is perhaps more graceful, romantic and tender. Though it does have these turns and unexpected sonic moments:

“Whether it’s Hitchcock and Herrmann, Spielberg and Williams or latterly Villeneuve and Zimmer, film directors often get into a glorious feedback loop with a preferred composer – and the latest is a burgeoning collaboration between Ryûsuke Hamaguchi and Eiko Ishibashi. Her jazz-pop theme for Drive My Car in 2021 was an instant classic – wistful, generous of spirit, even a little Gallic with its touch of accordion – and her score helped to carry the Japanese film to glory at Cannes and beyond, including a best picture nomination and best international feature film award at the Oscars in 2022.

“There was a big awards rush, festivals, and I think Hamaguchi was ultimately quite fatigued from the whole experience,” Ishibashi says, elegantly wrapped up in her cold-looking recording studio in the Yatsugatake mountains west of Tokyo, speaking via interpeter over a video call. “So I think he wanted to do something that was more experimental next. And myself, I’m interested in experimenting with what kinds of work I can do along with images.”

The result is a pair of astonishing new films in which the bond between director and composer is even more tightly fused: the drama Evil Does Not Exist and a short film, Gift, which is silent and designed to be paired with live performance by Ishibashi. Hamaguchi has described the two films, which use different takes, shots and narrative details from the same shoot, as a “small multiverse”.

Gift was the initial idea, after Ishibashi asked Hamaguchi for concert visuals and sent him demo pieces for inspiration. Hamaguchi went big, travelling to film near where Ishibashi lives, and even developing a script that wouldn’t be heard but would guide the actors in the silent film. “Hearing them on set saying these lines, he realised they had wonderful voices; the acting was wonderful,” Ishibashi explains.

So Hamaguchi expanded the film on the fly to make Evil Does Not Exist, a parable about the schism between urban and rural, between capitalism and its muffled opposite, as a glamping company arrogantly rocks up with plans to site a development in a peaceful village. The camera lovingly and languorously settles on feathers, leaves and brooks, and Ishibashi’s music is often beautiful to match. But violence and discord throb in the film’s bones, from the faraway gunshots of deer hunters to the way Hamaguchi will suddenly cut an Ishibashi piece down in its prime, leaving sudden silence.

“I felt an anger that I hadn’t felt in his past films,” she says. “Anger that felt directed towards the way humans work, the unfairness of this whole world.” Watching the raw footage, she says she drew on that feeling to create the film’s central musical theme: long, gorgeous overlapping chords for strings that take left turns into darkness.

In the past decade, three superb albums – Imitation of Life, Car and Freezer, and The Dreams My Bones Dream – were released by US label Drag City, and made her better known to American and European audiences. The latter is a reflection on Manchuria, an area of China named by its colonising Japanese forces – her late father was once based with the military there. Once again, it’s beautiful music laced with disquiet.

“My father carried a lot of scars from the war, but he never talked about his experiences,” Ishibashi says. “That led me to want to learn the history between Manchuria and Japan; the genocides that happened there. I realised there’s very little writing around this, and that led me to think about how perhaps victims can’t necessarily talk about it.

“There is a sense of Japan tending to close off from things that have happened – perhaps it has something to do with the fact that it’s an island country. It tends to also hide away certain facts and history, and carry on as if nothing had happened. In textbooks we don’t learn about Japan and its history as an oppressor, a coloniser, especially after the first world war. There’s a sense that it’s OK to not be learning about these things”.

I want to wrap things up with a review for the Drive My Car score. Reviewing it in 2022, Pitchfork lauded an album that “possesses a cool remove, mirroring the film’s glacial profundity with organic nuance and contemplative improvisation”. In terms of the versions and date order, initial formats like C.D. and cassette appearing in late 2021 in Japan, followed by wider digital/streaming release and vinyl in early 2022. That is why I have listed the release date as 2021, as that is when it first came out:

“Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car is a staggering exploration of grief, betrayal, and acceptance. The loose adaptation of a Haruki Murakami short-story follows Yusuke Kafuku (Hidetoshi Nishijima), a stage actor and director, as he mourns the deaths of his young daughter and his screenwriter wife, Oto (Reika Kirishima). Two years after Oto’s death, Yusuke relocates to Hiroshima where he will direct a production of Anton Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya.” Upon arrival, he is assigned a quiet female driver named Misaki (Toko Miura). Throughout many long drives in Yusuke’s vintage Red Saab, the two gradually open up about their individual sorrow.

Now nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best International Film, Drive My Car is a profound masterpiece made all the more entrancing by its score, written by Eiko Ishibashi. The Japanese multi-instrumentalist and composer is best known for her experimental solo work, which ranges from jazz fusion to the imaginative dream pop heard on a recent tribute to a Law & Order character. Like the film’s protagonist, Ishibashi’s score possesses a cool remove and, alongside an ensemble that includes her frequent collaborator Jim O’Rourke, Ishibashi creates a soundtrack that is as moving as the film itself.

Bottom of Form

In the film, Yusuke’s theatrical method requires his cast to internalize the play’s text by running through the script without emotion before they are allowed to begin acting. (Yusuke rehearses his own lines by driving in his car and listening to cassettes of Oto reciting the other characters’ dialogue.) This emphasis on close listening and organic nuance is reflected in Ishibashi’s score, which is structured around variations of two themes, “Drive My Car” and “We’ll Live Through the Long, Long Days, and Through the Long Nights.” The eponymous core theme is set in motion by an opening burst of percussion and tumbling keys imbued with a certain thoughtfulness. This soon evolves into an upbeat and idyllic melody featuring yearning strings and the synthetic squawk of a melodion. However, this whimsical track is not the first piece of music heard by the audience. That would be “We’ll Live Through the Long, Long Days… (Oto),” a ghostly ambient track that abandons the score’s melodicism in favor of stillness, the falling of rain, and the muffled whooshing of passing cars.

In the same way that Yusuke suggests that a good driver allows their passenger to relax, Ishibashi’s score, even removed from the context of the film, allows the listener to sit back and enjoy the ride. Some of Ishibashi’s contributions suggest the transportive effect of driving in a concrete way. “Drive My Car (Cassette)” opens with a tape being inserted in a deck and the sounds of ambient traffic before it drifts into a pensive piano reverie. Meanwhile, Yusuke’s theme, “Drive My Car (Kafuku),” opens with the squeak of a seat being lowered before spiraling into rumination. “Drive My Car (Misaki)” also begins with an automobile sound as the titular character opens the Saab’s creaky front door and turns on the Saab’s ignition. This interpretation of the theme incorporates tumbling piano notes, brushed drums, and the steady thump of an electric bass; that such a reserved character is bestowed a warm theme underlines the idea that her wall of ice will someday melt, given the correct conditions.

Drive My Car’s second theme, “We’ll Live Through the Long, Long Days, and Through the Long Nights,” is more contemplative than its companion. There is an initial melancholy inflicted by strings so sorrowful that each note wavers like a dying breath. The “... (Saab 900)” version of the theme is the closest the score gets to a car crash: Percussionist Tatsuhisa Yamamoto’s fast and furious playing is layered atop the original theme’s piano melody with interjections of droning electric guitar and crashing cymbals. The arrangement is dusted, again, by vehicular ambience: the beep of a locked car, the slam of a door, and the click of a seatbelt. If the score’s other tracks capture a character or existential statement, “... (Saab 900)” is the titular car’s inner monologue as it drifts, and at one point, narrowly avoids getting side-swiped. “…(And When Our Last Hour Comes We’ll Go Quietly),” whose title is pulled from a soliloquy that arrives at the end of “Uncle Vanya,” features guitar work from O’Rourke that changes lanes from downcast meditation to hypnotic climax smoothly, as if there’s not a single bump in the road. And in its last moments, after a few final piano notes, Ishibashi’s glorious Drive My Car score goes quiet”.

You can find the Drive My Car soundtrack/score on Bandcamp. Even though it was released over four years ago now, I listen to it now and it moves me. If you can see the film it scores, I would recommend it. It is a beautiful award-winning and acclaimed film. The score adds these layers and emotions to the scenes. One of the most powerful pairings of music and visuals in recent cinema. That is why I wanted to highlight this masterpiece…

FROM Eiko Ishibashi.