Innehållsförteckning för May 2022 från Classic Rock

IAN MCDONALD: GETTY; GAVIN MARTIN: KEVIN CUMMINS BORN IN BELFAST and raised in Bangor, County Down, Gavin started writing about music in 1977 when he published his hand-written fanzine Alternative Ulster (which would lend its title to Stiff Little Fingers’ enduring punk classic). After working as a freelance stringer for NME for a couple of years – he first made an appearance in the paper’s letters page when he was 13, and supplied reviews while still a schoolboy at Bangor Grammar – Gavin moved to London in 1980 to become the title’s Media Editor and features writer. During a long association with the paper, he interviewed the Sex Pistols, Pogues, Joe Strummer, Pete Townshend, U2, Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, R.E.M. and a host of others. In the 90s, Gavin took…

GETTY THE WORLD OF rock music has paid tribute to Procol Harum singer and pianist player Gary Brooker, who has died of cancer. Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice was among those to pay tribute the 76-year-old, describing him as “one of the giants of English music.” Van der Graaf Generator frontman Peter Hammill described Brooker “an inspirational figure”. London-born Brooker founded Procol Harum in 1966, and a year later the group’s legacy was secured with their worldwide hit single A Whiter Shade Of Pale, with Brooker’s mournful vocals and haunting electric piano work very much to the fore. His career had begun in 1962 as a 17-year-old when he co-founded The Paramounts, along with guitarist Robin Trower. After they disbanded in 1966, the following year Brooker and lyricist Keith Reid…

JOHN MCMURTRIE How’s the album coming along? Any song titles yet? We’re about fifty per cent of the way through. The songs have just got working titles for now, taking the piss out of the fucking cabinet – Boris The Bastard, stuff like that. The Bastard Sons seem to have given you a new lease of life. After Lemmy died and Motörhead ended, did you consider packing it in? I did consider retiring. I’d been on the road for so long. Me and my boys had the band going a few years before Lemmy passed away, but it did take three or four months before I wanted to do anything musical again. But this is a really fucking tight, kick-ass rock band. I forget they’re my children, I’m just playing…

Portrait: In 1962, guitarist/singer Fancis Rossi and bassist Alan Lancaster co-founded The Scorpions, who with the addition of drummer John Coghlan and guitarist Rick Parfitt evolved into Status Quo. In Classic Rock’s first interview with Quo, in issue number two, Rossi assessed the band’s early catalogue as “a few moments of brilliance and sixtyto-seventy per cent shit”. What do you recall of the arrival of Classic Rock in the autumn of 1998? Being really honest, it just seemed to be there. I don’t remember the actual launch, but of its genre it’s the one. There are a couple of magazines in Europe that really get up themselves, but whenever I see Classic Rock I expect good quality. You can’t fault it. Did the magazine maybe serve to rally the troops…

WILL IRELAND How has the rock landscape changed since 1998? Everything’s changed with the advent of the internet. It’s taken away everything tactile and made it very clinical. Most people just go for the one obvious track on the album. But after a while the obvious track pales into the distance. The way we record with ProTools has changed everything. People don’t have to be in the same room, you can send files to each other… I’m totally against that. We get in a room where we can see the whites of each other’s eyes and make a complete racket, but it’s the racket we love, and the way it should be done. We’ve also lost a lot of individuality. I never played like Ritchie Blackmore, he never played like…

GETTY How does it feel to still be releasing albums more than fifty years into your career? Klaus: With our back catalogue we could probably go on the road for many years to come. But it was actually a good friend and a diehard fan who confronted us, saying: “Guys, if you would make a new album, think Blackout, you know? Try to put yourself all the way back in time and try to reactivate the Scorpions’ DNA. That would be really fantastic.” But so many years later, where do you start? Can you really find that special DNA, whatever that is? So we made the decision and said: “Okay, let’s go for it.” How difficult was it to go back in time? Klaus: Having Mikkey Dee in the band…

MICK HUTSON/GETTY When CR first hit the shelves, Saxon were touring Unleash The Beast. Was that a good period for the band? Yeah, that was great time for the band. It was [guitarist] Doug Scarratt’s first album with us, a time of rebirth, so we were launching anew too in some ways. Do you recall the launch of Classic Rock? I do, yeah. For us, the important magazines were Sounds in the seventies, then Kerrang! in the eighties, and Classic Rock from the nineties onwards. We’ve had some great coverage over the years, and it’s always a good read, with really entertaining interviews. There’s good people there. I like print magazines, and I know magazines have had a hard time, so it’s great to see Classic Rock thriving. You were…

"We yearn to shine a light in the world, to uplift, connect and bring people together,” said the Chili Peppers in a collective statement heralding their latest album. “Each of the songs on our new album is a facet of us, reflecting our view of the universe. This is our life’s mission.” The Chili Peppers collective is now minus guitarist Josh Klinghoffer, who parted company amicably with the group, with John Frusciante replacing his own replacement to play with the band for the first time since 2006. Rick Rubin, meanwhile, with whom Klinghoffer did not always get along creatively, is reinstalled as producer. And, while the 17 songs of Unlimited Love do not always quite live up to the incandescence of their mission statement, there is nonetheless an undercurrent of…

PAUL HARRIES/PRESS Having risen to fame on the Britpop wave of the 90s, ever-likeable rockers Reef built a strong following before receding from the limelight in the 2000s. With guitarist Kenwyn House gone, replaced by Jessie ‘son of Ronnie’ Wood, 2018 comeback album Revelation was a compelling mishmash of hard rock, southern-fried flavours, gospel fixings, and a Sheryl Crow cameo to boot. For this follow-up, singer Gary Stringer, bassist Jack Bessant and Wood are joined by new drummer Luke Bullen (Joe Strummer/Bryan Ferry) and guitarist/producer Andy Taylor (ex-Duran Duran/Power Station). From its title to the Stonesy closer Strangelove, sixth album Shoot Me Your Ace sees the band playing to their hard-rock strengths, and finding some new ones. The opening title track is a strident rocker somewhere between Priest and Zeppelin…

RICHARD GRAY/PRESS Even Brian May admits it hasn’t always been easy being Brian May. ‘I’m going to make a little space around me,’ he sings on Space, the short, otherworldly intro to his second solo album, 1998’s Another World, sounding like the loneliest voice in the cosmos. ‘No one can come in.’ A man whose talent seemingly comes with a large side-order of sensitivity, May was going through what he calls “emotional upheavals” when he began work on Another World. Yet where his 1992 debut album Back To The Light and Queen’s bittersweet 1995 swan song Made In Heaven felt like extensions of the grieving process in the wake of his friend and bandmate Freddie Mercury’s death, Another World sounded like the work of a man embracing the world again,…

GREG SMITH/PRESS “I really like Hammersmith as a venue. It’s good to be close to West London, the band’s original stomping ground.” Formed in London’s Notting Hill in 1979, sonic terrorists Killing Joke have been cited as an influence by acts as diverse as Metallica, Nirvana, Faith No More, Ministry and Nine Inch Nails. Their current line-up features all four original members. Frontman Jaz Coleman, who was recently awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music by the University Of Gloucestershire, previews the band’s first UK tour in three years. Should we be referring to you as Doctor Jaz? You can call me Jaz [laughs]. For a guy with such an agile mind, how did you manage to stay sane in lockdown? I almost died in lockdown. I had moved to Peru…

Birmingham O2 Academy Nashville-based rockers live up to their fast-rising reputation. ★ Over the past decade, Halestorm have played stages of all sizes, from sub-500-capacity clubs to arena supports – and even headlined Download Festival’s second stage. The point being that their ascent to fame and acclaim has been hardwon, and seeing Academy-sized venues filled to bursting is surely a gratifying experience for one of the brightest young bands in rock. Lzzy Hale is seated for much of the band’s opening acoustic set, but there’s nothing languid about Halestorm’s performance. I Am The Fire, I Like It Heavy and Raise Your Horns get the audience going in footstomping, full-throated jubilation, sounding utterly gorgeous with twangs of Nashville-style Americana. Aside from a cheeky segment of Piece Of My Heart hiding in…

FOR MORE NEWS: WWW.CLASSIC ROCKMAGAZINE.COM cat no:#300 COPYRIGHT FUTURE 2022 1 2 3 4 5 ALL PHOTOS: ROSS HALFIN 6 7 PHOTOGRAPHER ROSS HALFIN thought he had named his book on Aerosmith guitarist Brad Whitford after a stage announcement from the band’s 1978 live album Live! Bootleg… until the words concerned turned out to have been misheard. For decades, Halfin thought Steven Tyler had announced Lord Of The Thighs with a cry of: “Listen to Whitford.” Until he was corrected by the singer, who had simply said: “Mr Whitford.” Either way, Listen To Whitford made for a great title for a collection of images of a member of the celebrated American group, a man whose profile and recognition falls short of that of Tyler or guitarist Joe Perry – the…

BETH SARAVO/PRESS The first issue of Classic Rock came out in 1998. What were you doing in 1998? I was attending school in Claverham in Somerset, probably playing a bit of football, which I didn’t really enjoy. It was always so cold, and I’d just sort of stand there with my shorts on, wanting to go home. I’ve always hated the cold, hence I moved to LA. The big noise in 1998 was nu metal. Were you a secret Limp Bizkit fan? Actually, yeah. I’ve got an older brother, and I remember him introducing me to a lot of the music that was happening in the US at the time. And of course nu metal was leaking into the UK. I mean, as a young teenager it’s hard not to…

Portrait: CLASSIC ROCK 300 Where were you in 1998? I would have been two years old. So, uh, I don’t actually remember! Fair comment. In that case, what was the first music you remember being moved by? Well, when I was really young I kind of remember early blues and folk stuff that my father used to play. He used to play around on the guitar, and also I remember really liking the harmonica. Even to this day, every time I hear a harmonica track it turns something on in my brain and this wave of nostalgia washes over me. We didn’t really get exposed to rock’n’roll properly until we were in high school. What made an impact at that stage? Cream was a really big one for us. So…

JOHN MCMURTRIE Airbourne got together in 2001. What did you want the band to be? We grew up in Warrnambool, Australia. It was a very conservative town, very antirock’n’roll, very pro-sport. When we’d rehearse, our neighbours would call the cops. So our mission was to stand up for rock’n’roll and get out of this fucking town. We’d stand on the beach, look across the ocean and say: “We’re going over there.” Nu metal was dominant back then. Were you a fan? We’d get lumped in with those bills. You’d share the amps, and we’d get up there and all the Marshalls would have the mid-ranges scooped out. For us it’d be like, middle on ten, volume, bass, treble, everything on fucking ten And our guitars always sounded better. We’d play…

WILL IRELAND Do you remember early Classic Rock? Twenty-four years ago, it seemed to be about a certain set of artists. But what I enjoy is how certain artists have come into the fold, people who’ve taken time to establish themselves. Now we’re in the same kind of gang, even though some of us are a lot older. In 1999, the Moody Blues released a comeback album, Strange Times. Strange Times was an interesting record. We were really enjoying being on the road. I wish I could say there was always an appetite for selling huge amounts of product, but what people wanted was to see the Moodies on stage. In the eighties and nineties we were able to get closer to our recorded sound on stage, because of the…

KEVIN NIXON Classic Rock was launched in the autumn of 1998. Was there a need for it? Very much so; 1998 was a barren, featureless desert for classic rock bands. It was almost non-existent. You were MC at the Classic Rock Awards in 2009. Was that a good experience? I really loved it, though one artist – and I honestly don’t recall who it was – gave a speech that went on a bit too long and I had to use the shepherd’s crook and get them off. I remember thinking this was something I really needed to learn from. Thunder have always got on well with the press. We recognised quite early on that the press has a job to do. I told them: “You have to understand we…

JOHN MCMURTRIE/PRESS Were you apprehensive about rejoining Maiden? Yes and no. When the conversation first came up it was about me possibly coming back; they definitely wanted Bruce, but already had two guitarists. Steve [Harris] was the one who suggested using three guitarists. I’d love to have been a fly on the wall for that, as it’s really left-field. We ended up going to Portugal to write, and luckily it all worked out; I took The Wicker Man and – boom – we were off. Did it seem like the grunge era had hurt Maiden’s stock at all? In hindsight the grunge era produced bands that only stuck around a few years. It wasn’t the most upbeat of trends, and people wanted a bit of anarchy and fun again: “Come…

SCOTT DIUSSA/PRESS Ata time during the early days of Classic Rock magazine when hard rock music was not looking in the best of health, in 2004 guitarist Mark Tremonti teamed up with bassist Brian Marshall, drummer Scott Phillips – all three formerly members of the multi-platinum-selling post-grunge band Creed – and singer/guitarist frontman Myles Kennedy (previously of The Mayfield Four) to form the Floridabased Alter Bridge. They soon helped breathe some fresh air and new life into the genre. What are your first memories of Classic Rock magazine? I began to see it when we [Creed] toured in Europe. I knew right off the bat that it would become the biggest music publication in existence over there. If the scene was ailing, then you guys carried the torch and helped…

Did you have any awareness of the arrival of Classic Rock in the autumn of 1998? I knew about the first issue – I’ve probably still got it somewhere. And I was pleased to see it. Sounds went under, and I had got very, very tired of Melody Maker and NME having a monopoly. In competition with one another those two could be quite childish. But Classic Rock was grown up from the start. Why do you think we are still here while those two are out of print? Classic Rock doesn’t set out to hurt anyone. No punches are pulled, but it’s not intentionally vicious. In 1998, The Food And Drug Administration approved use of a product that’s been quite profitable for you: Viagra. Yeah, I took the shilling…

PAUL HARRIES What were you doing when Classic Rock launched? We’d put our first album out the previous year, and were young and a little bit naive. We put more effort into partying than into our professional outlook. But in 1998 we released our second album, Time Travelling Blues, and we were working out how to do things properly. We weren’t just kids let loose in a candy store. Not quite. Did you think then that we’d still be talking about Orange Goblin all these years later? No. Our initial ambitions didn’t stretch beyond doing a demo and playing a few shows around Northolt and Uxbridge. It just snowballed. Would you have put money on vinyl becoming the hippest and most lucrative music format? No. I got rid of a…

© KEVIN ESTRADA / ICONICPIX If we’d asked you back in the first issue of Classic Rock, in 1998, whether you’d still be in Mötley Crüe in 2022, what do you think would have been your answer and why? Well I mean, I think what all bands would say is: “Of course!” But all bands aren’t Mötley Crüe. So maybe the answer would be, like: “Who the hell knows?!” You won our ‘Showman’ award at the Classic Rock Awards back in 2012. What are your memories of that evening? I was doing my radio show at the time, so I was at the back and a lot of guys were coming in – Jeff Beck and Billy Gibbons, a lot of the classic-rock heroes, the Lynyrd Skynyrd guys. So that…

Bitch Queens Custom Dystopia SPAGHETTY TOWN Just when you thought we’d only be reliving decades-old glories forever, the realest of the real, the last gang in town, the dick-swinging kings of the wasteland have returned to pummel us anew. Swiss misters Bitch Queens rise from the muck every so often with a steaming plate of highimpact death-punk, and on the aptly titled Custom Dystopia they deliver perhaps their finest collection to date. The trick here is that the Queens wrap their bone-crunching riffs and barbed-wire tongues around gooey glam melodies, creating a delicious sweet-‘n’-sour sauce that’ll have you licking your fingers. Jammers such as Don’t Be That Dude and This Is How We Roll In 2020 (which is still relevant in 2022, sadly) are tongue-in-cheek odes to the apocalypse, but…

JASON JOYCE/PRESS Barely a year after the last one, we suddenly have another Thunder album, presumably thanks to the pandemic, which has screwed up all sorts of writing, recording and touring schedules. While 2021’s All The Right Noises was written and recorded pre-covid but then delayed, Dopamine was made when everything in the world had already gone pear-shaped – and it shows, particularly in Luke Morley’s lyrics, which often glow with optimism, looking forward to when things will get back to normal. Musically, the band have crafted an ambitious double album, a sprawling but cohesive 16 tracks, exploring what Thunder are and can be, as they veer from typical hard-rocking to more experimental material. Kicking off in familiar territory, opener The Western Sky celebrates the band’s annual trans-America charity motorbike…

GETTY There is much weeping and gnashing of teeth these days concerning the question: which were the greatest 12 months of music in the entire history of the world, ever? Popular consensus seems to be either 1969 or 1971; I’d say it’s whatever year it was when you celebrated your fifteenth birthday. Thus, spiralling down Irwin Allen’s Time Tunnel, we tumble upon T.Rex and 1972. Basking in the success of his Electric Warrior album, released the previous year, in ’72 Marc Bolan enjoyed a brace of No.1 singles (Metal Guru and Telegram Sam); released a new LP, The Slider; headlined Wembley Empire Pool; starred in a feature film, Born To Boogie. All of which is catalogued in detail in this estimable collection. It’s just a shame that Slider, which forms…

Formed 14 years ago by British siblings Andrew and Jamie Pipe, who play guitar and keyboards respectively, The Mentulls take us to a place where prog meets blues, topped off by a generous dollop of melody. Andrew sets the scene for their new album and tour. The Mentulls started as a blues band, before absorbing progressive rock influences and adding a Toto-esque AOR outer casing. That’s quite a tug of war. The band has always been a bit of a melting pot, from the progressive rock of the 1970s to the British blues boom stuff. But when lockdown happened and we were working on our third album, those Toto and Journey influences really began to filter through. It’s a rather unusual name? There’s a bit of a nod to [Jethro]…

Rock N Roll Train by AC/DC, Life’s A Bitch by Motörhead, Soulcreek by Black Stone Cherry, God Is Dead? By Black Sabbath, Crazy Days by Tyler Bryant & The Shakedown, Madagascar by Guns N’ Roses, Lit Up by Buckcherry, My Way Soon by Greta Van Fleet, Party Hard by Andrew WK, I Gotsa Get Paid by ZZ Top, Cochise by Audioslave, Joker & The Thief by Wolfmother, Seven Nation Army by The White Stripes, Best Of You by Foo Fighters, I Believe In A Thing Called Love by The Darkness, Blackbird by Alter Bridge, Elvis In Vegas by Meat Loaf, Vincent Price by Deep Purple, Sonne by Rammstein, The Raven That Refused To Sing by Steven Wilson, How You Remind Me by Nickelback, Lionheart by Saxon, Bitchin’ by The Donnas,…

CHARLES PETERSON “SCREAMING TREES ARE just too good to be huge, to be spread thin. You can see no earthly reason why they aren’t the biggest rock band on the planet; you realise how Chris Cornell or Eddie Vedder or even James Hetfield would kill to write anything that’s played tonight,” wrote Melody Maker critic Neil Kulkarni in 1996, the year the Ellensburg, WA group released their tumultuous seventh album, Dust – the album that should have swept all before it. The band had everything: volatile chemistry; epic, sweeping rock anthems; long, flailing hair, and riffs to match; and in singer Mark Lanegan an old-school bluesman with a whisky-laced honeyed growl of a voice – and the lifestyle to go with it. Obituaries that have appeared since his recent death…

ROB BLACKHAM What were you doing in 1998? I’d started to think: “Man, I’m not sure if guitar-based rock’n’roll is where it’s gonna happen.” After years of relentlessly playing rock’n’roll, I’d got really into acts like Portishead and the Bristol scene. But it goes in cycles, like anything. One day, I picked up the guitar again, put down the Massive Attack, put on Neil Young’s Harvest, and just said: “Yeah. That’s in my soul.” What do you remember about browsing early Classic Rock? I remember thinking you did it right. For the first couple of years it was really hard to find Classic Rock over here [USA]. You had to go to a Borders and hope they had a copy. This was pre-smartphones, so it was all about saving every…

JOHN MCMURTRIE What do you remember from the first times you browsed Classic Rock? I first started reading it around 2008/2009, around when we formed the band. An exciting time for me and the lads. I bought it a few times and loved the covermount CD. It’s where I first heard Airbourne, which to us was a huge moment. I still subscribe and still love reading it. The band built a fan base with countless gig in pubs and at biker rallies, and released your first album, Fire It Up, in 2012. Also that year you won a nationwide competition to play at the Hard Rock Hell festival. Was that a turning point? That was a big moment. We rocked up at the Classic Grand in Glasgow, and we were…

Despite having released five albums in a 12-year career, Porcupine Tree were only on the music scene’s periphery when Classic Rock introduced them, in issue number four. In what turned out a rare outburst, during a debate about the boundaries of progressive rock the usually media-savvy Steven Wilson bridled at being compared with Yes, declaring their recent output “absolute fucking excrement”. His attitude, though, has always been that new ground must be broken with each creative project. And that refusal to merely give people “more of they want” has led to a stellar solo career with six albums to date. Having unexpectedly reunited, later this year Porcupine Tree release a new album, titled Closure/ Continuation – their first in more than a decade. What are your memories of Classic Rock’s…

SHEVA KAFAI/PRESS How do you see the line between your band the Dirty Knobs and your life with Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers? Well, my partner is missing, and my band of the past is on hiatus. We really can’t see carrying on without Tom. So that’s a part of my life that’s come and gone. I’ve had the Dirty Knobs for quite a while, so it’s not a new thing. I’m just continuing to do what I’ve always done, which is write and play songs that I like. You’re singing lead now. I never sang because I’m insecure and didn’t like my voice, and, well, I was in a band with Tom [laughs]. Over time I started singing more on demos, but I don’t consider myself a singer. During…

There have been so many big changes in music since 1998: file sharing, auto-tune, home studios, the vinyl comeback, streaming… How have they affected you? The first thing that pops out is the return of vinyl. That changed how I sequenced my upcoming album. I rearranged the songs so they would fit comfortably on each side without losing the sonics. It’s wonderful that folks are so interested in vinyl again, because it really does sound fantastic. I’m hoping my whole back catalogue will eventually be reissued on vinyl. Second, as someone who doesn’t write their own songs, I’m always on a song hunt. So to be able to stream obscure blues, world music and old recordings, then check out new songwriters, it helps me find little gems I might record.…

Portrait: What are some of your personal highlights from the past twenty-four years? One that really sticks out is playing The Barfly [in London] for the first time [in December 2013]. I’d never been to the UK before, and all our favourite bands had gotten huge over there before they were big in the States. We’d just put out our first record [The Cadillac Three] and The Barfly sold out in ten minutes. Neil [Mason, drums], Kelby [Ray, lap steel and bass] and I were like: “It’s happening! It’s happening!” The other moment was headlining the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville for the first time. Tell us about that. It was crazy. I grew up going there with my dad [Jerry Ray Johnston, who sadly passed away earlier this year]. He…

JONATHAN WEINER/PRESS Alice In Chains haven’t pandered to trends: is that why you’ve survived so long? You mean we didn’t release the Alice In Chains Jazz Exploration Mark II record? [Laughs] You stick to who brung ya, y’know. Our band is a really good example of that. We’ve put out acoustic EPs, really heavy records, so we have done a mix of things. Music is not a monolith. It’s a synthesis of all forms. Once you stumble onto your sound, though, that’s not really gonna change because that’s who you are. We took chances early on, though. How many times have you heard that rock is dead? They’ve been asking since it started. Hey, I’m still here. On occasion, the world’s gaze has shifted to rock music, and I was…

PAUL HARRIES It’s been nearly quarter of a century since Classic Rock launched. Can you remember what you were doing in 1998? Looking around at the state of rock’n’roll, and being thankful for bands like Nashville Pussy and The Hellacopters for keeping the flag raised for snarly rock music. You’ve been an intrinsic part of the life of Classic Rock mag - are you a magazine reader? I am indeed! You hosted the Classic Rock Awards in 2012. At the time you said: “I’m pretty honoured to have been asked to host. God, I hope I don’t fuck it up.” You absolutely didn’t. What do you remember of that evening? Telling really bad jokes, and hearing my friends there audibly groan when I’d start them. They couldn’t believe I’d be…

Portrait: In 1998, Clutch had just released album number three, The Elephant Riders. The band had changed quite a bit from its beginnings; we were much more of a hardcore band coming out of high school. We had diehard fans but we weren’t doing festivals. And we toured a lot. None of us were married, there were no kids yet. So we were able to live in a bus, or van, or RV for months and months and months. Did you think you’d still be fronting Clutch twenty-four years lager? No [laughs]. It was hammered into my head at a young age that that was not a viable option. You were supposed to get a job that made you miserable. In 2008 you set up Weathermaker Records. Should more bands…

JOHN MCMURTRIE When Von Hertzen Brothers began, back in 2000, what were your ambitions? My brother Kie was still playing in Don Huonot, which was the biggest band in Finland at that time, so it was supposed to be a one-off thing. But suddenly Kie was not in that band any more, we had new songs. From the second album onwards we started really doing this as a true band. All your albums since then have hit the Top 5 in Finland, and three were Number Ones. When we came out in 2006 with [single] Let Thy Will Be Done, which was this awkward riff going into a weird beat – the time signature is seveneight – it sounded so different from everything at the time, and it got radio…

JIM HEAL/PRESS Dom Martin A Savage Life SELF-RELEASED With a certain glib inevitability, Dom Martin has been billed as “the new Rory Gallagher”. Let’s not; the Belfast guitarist is a sprawling talent who deserves investigation on his own merits. On feedback-whistling opener Unsatisfied and the feral 12 Gauge – the product of a blackout drinking session – he sounds as threatening as the shirtless and tattooed figure on the sleeve looks. But there are more sensitive gearshifts deeper into this second album. Echoes is a hypnotic finger-style stunner, like Bron-Yr-Aur-meets-The End. Same goes for the acoustic weave of Addict, and even more so The Parting Glass, a 300-year-old traditional Scottish lament, here rendered spacey and impossibly sad (Martin recorded it following a friend’s cremation). Written in tribute to the same…

GETTY Forty years old, yet still yesterdayfresh. When it was first released in 1981, Rush fans knew eighth album Moving Pictures was special. The previous year’s Permanent Waves took a bold step forward, but its follow-up marked a sea change. Hindsight suggests the perceived epoch-ending Exit… Stage Left double live album came one studio work too late. Fourth record 2112 will always be the cult favourite, but Moving Pictures is Rush’s masterwork – and their biggest seller. Its seven tracks are so perfectly rendered and sequenced that it plays as a suite. Each track is so good, it’s easier to suggest a weakest than a strongest. But even that’s like deciding which eye to blind. Is it Witch Hunt, or the equally stunning Vital Signs? It certainly isn’t Camera Eye,…

ADRIAN BOOT/PRESS John McGeoch, says Paul Morley in the introduction to this biography, was not just a guitarist, but a “truth seeker”, using his instrument to play but also to make sense of the world. He speaks of the vividness of his playing: “ravishing little bursts of consciousness, dream fragments, battle wounds, electric charges”. First-time author Rory Sullivan-Burke doesn’t write with Morley’s flair, but The Light Pours Out Of Me is a thorough, dogged volume, shot through with enormous enthusiasm for McGeoch, born in Greenock, Scotland, who in his time played with Magazine, Visage, Siouxsie & The Banshees, the Armoury Show and Public Image Ltd. McGeoch emerges as a great guitar talent in a post-punk era when players were expected to at least affect limited competence on their instruments. His…

PAUL HARRIES/PRESS “What I love is music and that whole feeling of getting lost in being part of a rock’n’roll band.” One the eve of a 12-date tour, Reef singer Gary Stringer explains why the longrunning Glastonbury rockers teamed up with former Duran Duran and Power Station guitarist Andy Taylor for their sixth album, Shoot Me Your Ace. For the most part, Reef’s new album was assembled before lockdown, largely without a drummer. Yeah, we had been missing that last piece of the jigsaw, and sparks flew when we met Luke [Bullen]. The album was basically done in forty-eight hours, pretty much live in the room, though we did do a very small amount of overdubbing. So many of my favourite records had been made that way; it has a…