The actor’s attendance and performance at the upcoming awards show was confirmed on social media last night (June 24). It will be Smith’s first time attending the awards show since 2005.
Per a report from Variety, the actor will be performing an unreleased original track, though little else is known about his performance. The 2024 BET Awards are due to take place on Sunday, June 30.
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Best know musically for ‘Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It’, ‘Men In Black’ and ‘Wild Wild West’, Will Smith has yet to release an album since 2005. His most recent solo release comes in the form of 2017’s ‘Get Lit’, while his most recent output was the 2020 Joyner Lucas cut ‘Will (Remix)’. Smith most recently joined J Balvin onstage at Coachella in April, where he performed ‘Men In Black’.
Earlier this month, singer-songwriter Teddy Swims revealed to NME that he recently recorded a song with his “hero” Will Smith. “I don’t know what’s going to happen with it and can’t confirm anything, but just being with him and learning knowledge and wisdom from someone who’s been through it all was crazy,” he said. “He’s the sweetest guy ever,” the Atlanta-born soul-pop singer-songwriter added.
In a two-star review of Bad Boys: Ride Or Die for NME, James Mottram wrote: “Martin Lawrence and Will Smith are on the beat once more with Bad Boys: Ride or Die – a noisy, unfunny fourth instalment that’s only made endurable by some raucous action scenes.”
Robert Smith has announced a Twitter listening party for the 30th anniversary of The Cure‘s ninth studio album ‘Wish’.
READ MORE: The best things we’ve learned from Tim Burgess’ Twitter ‘listening parties’
The listening party will take place on Friday November 25 at 11pm GMT under the hashtag #WishListeningParty.
Smith will lead the Tweet-along commentary of their classic album backstage following the band’s upcoming show at Amsterdam’s Ziggo Dome in the Netherlands.
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Released in 1992, the record features singles ‘Friday I’m In Love’, ‘High’ and ‘A Letter To Elise’. It reached Number One on the UK albums chart, and Number Two on the Billboard 200 in the US.
The Charlatans frontman and host Tim Burgess told NME: “I went to see The Cure in 1984 and it remains one of my favourite ever gigs. I fell in love with ‘Wish’ when it came out and still play it on a regular basis – amazing that it was released 30 years ago.
“To have Robert Smith hosting a Listening Party is a dream come true – to think that he’s doing it in their dressing room, after a show is mind-blowing.”
This summer, The Cure announced a 30th anniversary reissue of ‘Wish’, containing 24 previously-unreleased tracks.
The 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition of 'Wish' newly remastered by Robert Smith and Miles Showell at @AbbeyRoad Studios is now available to pre-order on CD, Deluxe CD & Black Vinyl. Shipping dates starting from October 7th 2022. Pre-order now at https://t.co/LgKJHS7V8k pic.twitter.com/pqwlHogWKH
— The Cure (@thecure) July 28, 2022
The band kicked off their 2022 world tour in Latvia last month, debuting new tracks ‘Alone’ and ‘Endsong’.
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The tracks were followed by further debuts including ‘And Nothing Is Forever’, ‘I Can Never Say Goodbye’ and ‘A Fragile Thing’ offering a sense of what to expect from forthcoming new album ‘Songs Of A Lost World’, which Smith said was “almost finished” back in May.
The Cure are currently on their UK and European tour – you can find remaining tour dates below and purchase remaining tickets here.
NOVEMBER 2022 14 – ARKEA ARENA, Bordeaux, France 15 – ZENITH, Nantes, France 17 – FESTHALLE, Frankfurt, Germany 18 – ZENITH, Strasbourg, France 19 – ST JAKOBSHALLE, Basel, Switzerland 21 – HANS-MARTIN-SCHLEYER-HALLE, Stuttggart, Germany 22 – LANXESS ARENA, Cologne, Germany 23 – SPORTPALEIS, Antwerp, Belgium 25 – ZIGGO DOME, Amsterdam, Netherlands 27 – STADE, Lievin, France 28 – ACCOR ARENA, Paris, France
DECEMBER 2022 01 – 3ARENA, Dublin, Ireland 02 – SSE, Belfast, Northern Ireland 04 – OVO HYDRO, Glasgow, Scotland 06 – FIRST DIRECT ARENA, Leeds, England 07 – UTILITA ARENA, Birmingham, England 08 – MOTORPOINT ARENA, Cardiff, Wales 11 – THE SSE ARENA, Wembley, London, England
Speaking about what to expecting from the forthcoming new album, Smith told NME: “Essentially it’s a 12 track album.”
He continued: “It’s there, it’s kind of half-mixed and half-finished. It’s a weird thing. It’s kind of evolved over the last two years. It hasn’t always been a good thing to have been left alone with it. You pick at it, like picking at seams, and everything falls apart.
“It’ll be worth the wait. I think it’s the best thing we’ve done, but then I would say that. I’m not doing an Oasis when I say that, ‘IT’S THE BEST FOOKIN’ ALBUM’. A lot of the songs are difficult to sing, and that’s why it’s taken me a while.”
Sam Smith has announced a pair of shows at London’s Royal Albert Hall next month, marking their first headline gigs since 2019.
Although the British pop star has appeared at numerous festivals and promotional events since 2019, their last tour concluded in Cape Town in April of that year.
READ MORE: Sam Smith – ‘Love Goes’ review: pop balladeer leans even further into heartbreak than before
Smith will perform at the iconic London venue on October 21 and 22, with a setlist featuring some of their biggest hits and previewing material from their forthcoming new album. Fans can gain access to a special ticket pre-sale by pre-ordering the star’s new album directly from their online store before 4pm BST tomorrow (September 21).
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Those who gain access will receive codes at 6pm BST, with the pre-sale opening at 9am BST on Thursday (22). Remaining tickets will then go on general sale at 9am BST on Friday (23). You can find more information and purchase tickets here.
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A title, release date, tracklist and album cover have yet to be revealed for Smith’s new album, which is expected to be officially announced soon.
Meanwhile, Smith is also set to release their new single ‘Unholy’ – the new album’s lead single – on Thursday. The track was created in collaboration with producers ILYA (Max Martin, Ariana Grande), Blake Slatkin (Lizzo), Cirkut (Nicki Minaj, The Weeknd), Omer Fender (Lil Nas X, The Kid Laroi) and Smith’s long-time collaborator Jimmy Napes.
Pop star Kim Petras will also feature on the new track and the pair began teasing the track on TikTok earlier this summer. In one video posted to the app, Petras lip-synced along to the song, while Smith twerked in the background.
Previously, Smith shared the single ‘Love Me More’ back in April, which they described at the time as “the perfect way to begin this new chapter” of their career. “It’s taken a lifetime to express this type of joy and honesty in my music. I’m so happy to have you all here with me. I hope you love it…” they continued.
Martin Scorsese’s new documentary film about the New York Dolls’ David Johansen will premiere next month, it’s been announced.
READ MORE: “There’s no end in sight”: what we learned from Martin Scorsese’s BBC short film about lockdown
The documentary film, called Personality Crisis: One Night Only, will get its first airing at the New York Film Festival.
The film focusses around a one-of-a-kind 2020 performance by New York Dolls frontman David Johansen.
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“Then and now, David’s music captures the energy and excitement of New York City,” Scorsese said in a statement about the film following its initial announcement.
The New York Dolls onstage in 1974 – CREDIT: Press
“I often see him perform, and over the years I’ve gotten to know the depth of his musical inspirations. After seeing his show… at the Café Carlyle, I knew I had to film it because it was so extraordinary to see the evolution of his life and his musical talent in such an intimate setting. For me, the show captured the true emotional potential of a live musical experience.”
Scorsese has co-directed the feature with David Tedeschi and worked with cinematographer Ellen Kuras (American Utopia) to film the gig, which took place in 2020 at New York City’s Café Carlyle.
As well as the concert, the film will feature archival interviews and more. According to Rolling Stone the new film will cover Johansen’s upbringing on Staten Island, his move to New York’s East Village as a teenager in the late 1960s and his time in the New York Dolls, as well as his work in the 1980s under the alter-ego Buster Poindeter and his time with the band The Harry Smiths.
The Cure’s Robert Smith and Simon Gallup picked up the Icon Award at tonight’s (May 19) Ivor Novello awards in London.
The frontman and the bassist have been part of the band’s lineup since 1978 and 1979 respectively, helping to turn the band into one of the UK’s most beloved and iconic indie acts.
During the ceremony at Grosvenor House tonight, Smith and Gallup were presented the Icon Award by their long-time agent, Martin Hopewell from Primary Talent. “The best part of half a century ago when I was a young whippersnapper booking agent, I was persuaded to get down to a small hotel in Crawley, of all places, to see a new and even younger band called The Cure, who were playing halfway up the bill of some sort of talent night,” Hopewell reminisced as he introduced the musicians.
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“I wish I could say it was some kind of blinding light, road to Damascus experience but nevertheless… when we met up on the street outside afterwards, I agreed to start helping them get some gigs and that makes one of very few decisions I’ve made in my life that I don’t want to go back in time and give myself a clip around the ear for making.”
The Cure’s Robert Smith and Simon Gallup CREDIT: David Wolff – Patrick/Redferns
Noting that The Cure had gone from playing “the smallest clubs and colleges to the biggest arenas and festivals”, he celebrated their “famously epic live shows and timeless songs that have inspired countless other artists and embedded themselves into the lives of millions of people”.
Hopewell continued to highlight the friendship between Smith and Gallup, while also praising The Cure as a whole for their “unique” artistry. “There’s never been any knee-jerking to changing friends or any pretence to be anything other than what they are,” he said. “It’s possibly because of that honesty that the music they make has continued to make a real connection with an ever-changing audience. Without wanting to break any trade secrets, these two icons happen to be really nice chaps, which also goes for the rest of the band.
“I’ve been a very lucky boy to be involved in Robert and Simon’s story. In fact, it’s been one of the great privileges of my life to work with them for the last four-and-a-half decades. I’m touched, chaps, that you’ve asked me to be here and more than a little bit proud to present you with the PRS For Music Icon Award.”
Collecting the award, Smith thanked the band’s agent, along with the PRS and the Ivors Academy. “It means a lot to the two of us, actually, it’s a real honour,” he added. “Thank you to all the people who’ve helped us over the years and have been involved in turning our songs into real songs. It’s been the best thing you can imagine.”
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The Cure’s Simon Gallup and Robert Smith in 1989 CREDIT: Georges De Keerle/Getty Images
Speaking to NME backstage after their win, Smith said: “It is a strange one. I was thinking about it when we were walking up to collect the award – it felt strange to be leaving the other three at the table. We got an NME Award a couple of years back for Best Festival Headliner. That meant a lot because we don’t often get recognised for that side of what we do live, but this is completely different.
“For me, it’s really lovely that Simon is up there with me. It’s criminal really, because he’s been there all the time.”
Last August, Gallup announced that he had left The Cure, citing feeling “fed up of betrayal” as his reason for leaving. However, in October, he told a fan on social media that he was still a member of the band. The bassist appeared on stage with Smith at the Ivors tonight, although he did not make an acceptance speech.
Meanwhile, The Cure have been working on new material, as Smith confirmed to NME at the BandLab NME Awards 2022 in March. “I’ve been working on two Cure albums and one of them is finished,” the frontman said. “Unfortunately, it’s the second one that’s finished. [On the other] I’ve got to do four vocals, and there are 10 songs on each album. We’re mixing next month on April 1, so I’ve got three weeks left.”
Smith also revealed the title of the new album. “I know what it’s called – it’s called ‘Songs Of A Lost World’. It’s got artwork, it’s got a running order, it’s almost done! They’re so slow because of vinyl, but it might come in September. I’d rather it just came out. I can’t stand the anticipation.”
When asked about the sound of both of the upcoming records, he replied: “Well the first Cure album is relentless doom and gloom. It’s the doomiest thing that we’ve ever done. The second one is upbeat, and my [solo] one won’t be out until next year.
“I have to keep revisiting it. It’s a thing I’ve wanted to do for so many years. I realise I’ve only got one shot at doing it, so I’ve now started to add real instruments and acoustic instruments, whereas this time two years ago it was literally just feedback – but I’ve kind of grown a bit disenchanted with it. I’d listened to it like three times and I think it’s rubbish.”
Smith gave NME an update on the new records backstage at tonight’s Ivor Novello Awards. “We walked on [stage at the Ivors today] to a bit of new music, actually,” he said. “Hopefully no one recorded it!”
The frontman continued to say that the new material would be “worth the wait”. “I think [‘Songs Of A Lost World’ is] the best thing we’ve done, but then I would say that,” he said. “I’m not doing an Oasis when I say that, ‘IT’S THE BEST FOOKIN’ ALBUM’. A lot of the songs are difficult to sing, and that’s why it’s taken me a while.”
Chvrches have spoken about their new single collaboration with The Cure‘s Robert Smith, revealing that he was always their top choice among musicians alive or dead.
READ MORE: Chvrches – “Are the machines evil, or are we?”
The band, who are this week’s NME cover stars, said that the slim chance their hero would agree to sing on one of their songs was a pinch-me moment in their decade-long career.
Singer Lauren Mayberry recalled to NME that she and bandmate Martin Doherty got drunk on wine one Halloween and received an email from Smith containing his vocal recordings for what would become their collaborative track, ‘How Not To Drown’.
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She described the moment as “the most Cure-lore thing to ever happen”, since it fell on arguably the gothiest day of the year.
Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry and The Cure’s Robert Smith. CREDIT: Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images, Rick Kern/Getty Images
Doherty said that he could have been offered “a collaboration with anyone living or dead – fucking Prince, fucking Beethoven” and he “would still choose Robert Smith”.
“It’s mental!” Mayberry continued of the band’s luck securing a feature by the goth rock icon, also enthusing about her band’s 10-year longevity. “When I have to fill in my job on a form, I think about this. I never thought I would get to do this,” she said.
Doherty, meanwhile, said there are “occasional moments, like the Robert thing” or playing before New Order at Glastonbury in 2016, that “[make you] go: ‘Fucking hell! In 2012, I was so broke, I was ready to give up on being a professional musician’.”
Elsewhere in the interview Mayberry said the lyrics of the collaboration are about “the only time I ever thought about quitting the band”.
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Chvrches’ fourth album, ‘Screen Violence’, arrives on August 27 via Emi (UK)/Glassnote (US).
Chvrches have shared details of their new album ‘Screen Violence’ and released their song collaboration with The Cure‘s Robert Smith, ‘How Not To Drown’.
READ MORE: From the archive – Chvrches on the “avalanche of sound” on their new album
The Scottish trio’s fourth record arrives on August 27 via Emi (UK)/Glassnote (US) and is their first since 2018’s ‘Love Is Dead‘. ‘How Not To Drown‘ is the second single taken from the new album following April’s ‘He Said She Said‘.
As per press material, the single with one of the band’s musical heroes explores the concept of staying conscious when you drown. Listen below.
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Chvrches discuss news of the album, which you can pre-order here, and the collaboration with Smith on today’s (June 2) The Zane Lowe Show on Apple Music.
‘Screen Violence’ was originally conceived as a name for the band. The new album, which was recorded almost entirely between Glasgow and LA, will delve into screen violence in three main forms – on screen, by screens and through screens – with songs addressing feelings of loneliness, disillusionment and fear, among other emotions.
Singer Lauren Mayberry said in a statement about the record: “I think for me it was helpful to go into the process with the idea that I could write something escapist almost. That felt freeing initially, to have concepts and stories to weave your own feelings and experiences through but in the end, all the lyrics were definitely still personal.”
Bandmate Martin Doherty added: “To me, the screen aspect was a bit more literal. When we were making the record, it was like half of our lives were lived through screens. What began as a concept was now a lifeline.”
Mayberry previously said that the album has “definitely got the Chvrches DNA” but that the songs featured on it couldn’t “slot into any of the first three records”.
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As for Smith, he revealed towards the end of 2020 that he had spent the year working on both The Cure’s new album – set to be their first since 2008’s ‘4:13 Dream’ – as well as his own solo album.
Kelly Clarkson channelled her inner rock star when she performed Aerosmith‘s ‘Dream On’ as part of the Kellyoke segment on Monday night’s edition of The Kelly Clarkson Show.
The inaugural American Idol winner played with the famous falsetto bridge originally sung by Aerosmith frontman and former American Idol judge Steven Tyler, belting out a sustained high note in place of a repeated melodic bend.
Clarkson smashed the 1973 hit song out of the park, closing to rapturous applause from her in-house audience.
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Watch Clarkson’s rendition below:
It’s not the first time Clarkson has added her touch to a famous song. Last year, the ‘Since You’ve Been Gone’ singer made the news for her controversial cover of the Christmas classic ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ with John Legend. She received criticism for altering the song’s lyrics to reflect the #MeToo movement.
Upon the release of Legend and Clarkson’s version, the daughter of original singer Dean Martin, Deena, hit back saying the alterations “absolutely” offended her.
Prior to that, Clarkson’s other cover songs had been well received. She previously reimagined Lizzo‘s ‘Juice’ and has performed an acoustic version of Miley Cyrus‘ hit ‘Wrecking Ball’.
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Clarkson’s last studio albums were ‘Meaning of Life’, released in 2017, and its predecessor, 2015’s ‘Piece By Piece’.
Martin Scorsese will direct a new documentary about David Johansen, the musician best known as frontman of legendary punk band New York Dolls.
Read More: “There’s no end in sight”: what we learned from Martin Scorsese’s new BBC short film about lockdown
Showtime Documentary Films announced today (July 7) that Scorsese will co-direct with Dave Tedeschi, with whom he’s also worked on documentaries such as the Bob Dylan film No Direction Home and The Rolling Stones-focused Shine A Light.
According to Rolling Stone the new film will cover Johansen’s upbringing on Staten Island, his move to New York’s East Village as a teenager in the late 1960s and his time in the New York Dolls, as well as his work in the 1980s under the alter-ego Buster Poindeter and his time with the band The Harry Smiths.
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It will also make use of live footage Scorsese filmed earlier this year, during a performance at Café Carlyle in New York.
“I’ve known David Johansen for decades, and his music has been a touchstone ever since I listened to the Dolls when I was making Mean Streets,” Scorsese said. “Then and now, David’s music captures the energy and excitement of New York City. I often see him perform, and over the years I’ve gotten to know the depth of his musical inspirations.
“After seeing his show last year at the Café Carlyle, I knew I had to film it because it was so extraordinary to see the evolution of his life and his musical talent in such an intimate setting. For me, the show captured the true emotional potential of a live musical experience.”
In May, meanwhile, a short film by Scorsese about the coronavirus lockdown, premiered on BBC Two’s Lockdown Culture with Mary Beard show.
It's been some time since Tyra Banks has been linked to anyone on the romantic front. The top model has been linked to a number of known faces over the years of her career such as Will Smith, Seal, Jonn Singelton and more. Page Six now reports that Tyra's new man, Canadian businessman Louis Bélanger-Martin, are still going strong.
Emma McIntyre/Getty Images
According to the publication, the duo has been dating for over a year and is said to be "pretty happy." Apparently, when he isn't travelling for work, he's always by Tyra's side and even her friends are all aware of her new love since she was “very quick to introduce him as her man.” The couple was recently spotted at the TCL Chinese Theatre for the premiere of Bad Boys For Life in Hollywood.
Their first public outing together was in October of last year when they were seen having a romantic date and later after that, they were reported to have moved in together.
Tyra has one son with her ex, Erik Asla, named York and previously detailed the struggles she underwent with undergoing in vitro fertilization. "I think I'm lucky, you know, I did it for about a year and a half of IVF and some women do it for years and years and years," she said.
Over the past few years, DJ Khaled has turned himself into one of the most recognizable faces in music and he has been able to manifest his newfound fame into a plethora of different endeavors. Whether it be music, TV, or shoes, Khaled can be seen doing anything and everything. His latest venture involves something near and dear to his heart. Of course, Khaled is from Miami which has been the backdrop for the Bad Boys movies with Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. Today, Bad Boys For Life came out and Khaled got to play a pivotal role in it all.
Khaled helped curate the soundtrack for the movie and he even had a small cameo. Recently Smith went out of his way to praise Khaled saying “Fearless and relentless. Khaled is both of those, that type of energy is the energy that cuts through. You can’t be quiet about it you got to lean on it at all times.”
Khaled seemingly took great joy in those words as he took to his Instagram account and shouted out Smith before urging his fans to check out the film. The infamous record producer also showed off a behind the scenes look from the film and he seems to be quite happy as he’s interrogated by Smith’s character.
Let us know in the comments below if you saw the movie and if so, what did you think?
In a recent interview with GQ, star of Bad Boys For Life, Martin Lawrence, addressed the rumours about him and his Martin co-star, Tisha Campbell. Martin was wildly popular and aired for five seasons, so when it cane to an abrupt end, fans were confused. At the time, it was rumoured that Tisha, who played Gina, had filed a lawsuit against Martin for sexual harassment in 1997. Martin responded, indicating that, "none of that was true. It was all a lot of bullsh*t... We don't need to talk about something that just didn't happen. So I just decided to walk away from the show. I just decided to end it. People said that I got canceled, but that wasn't the case. I decided to just leave the show." However, he added, "I love Tisha. I’ve seen her then and now, now and then, always with nothing but love. I have nothing but love for her, and I always have."
It looks like the comedian was adamant that the last part of his comments about the whole ordeal was crystal clear to everyone, as he took to Instagram to further express his love for Tisha. Posting a photo of the two of them from back in their Martin days, he wrote, "Regardless of the past or any misrepresentation of it In the press, I have nothin but love for Tisha then and now. We are good and always will be! #teammartymar #yougogirl." The post received plenty of love, including a response from Tisha herself. "YOU GO BOY My fam fo life! ❤️❤️❤️," she commented, indicating that the feelings are mutual between them. Martin is currently starring in the third instalment of the Bad Boys franchise with Will Smith called Bad Boys For Life.
Tisha revealed on The Talk that she was "actually kind of shocked" by Martin's comments in the GQ interview. "I can’t go into much detail about the past because there was a confidentiality agreement, so the gag order says no," she revealed. "I hit him up. He called me within a minute … He was like, 'Don’t read into what it is, there’s a lot of people that’s trying to bring up the past, and trying to make it news today. But, you know T, we’re good. I love you and I love your family.'" Tisha repeats that she isn't "going to go into details" and wants to "respect his privacy" as well as hers. " I will say, by the end of it, it was nothing but laughter and healing," she revealed. "And I got a chance to experience that. And I’m so glad we’re in a good place right now." In the lawsuit, she accused Martin of "repeated and escalating sexual harassment, sexual battery and violent threats." Martin denied the allegations, and they ultimately settled out of court.
You better know yours 1990s sitcoms when talking to K-Dot.
Anyone who’s hoping to sit down with Kendrick Lamar better know who Martin Lawrence is or the rapper will cut the interview short. As Martin and Will Smith prepare for the release of Bad Boys for Life this Friday, the two accomplished actors have been actively hitting the press circuit. Typically, the longtime friends are featured in interviews together, but Martin recently hit up The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon solo.
While on the late-night talk show, Martin revisited some memories including his time as a boxer and how he once worked alongside Salt-N-Pepa at Sears. Fallon also picked Martin’s brain about his sitcom days and what it was like having a hit show in the 1990s. It came up in conversation that Kendrick Lamar is a big-time fan of Martin, so much so that he once walked out of an interview because the host didn’t know about the series.
Fallon played the over-seven-years-old clip for the comedian where the host asked K-Dot what he does after he finishes his live shows. “I go and watch Martin,” Kendrick said. The host asked him to repeat himself. “Martin. Watch Martin, and eat Fruity Pebbles.” She then asked him what “Martin” is and he can’t believe she doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
“Martin. Martin! Martin Lawrence,” he said while trying to jog her memory with a slight impersonation. When she said “I’m not aware, but I know Fruity Pebbles,” Kendrick wasn’t having it and just walked out of the interview. Martin couldn’t help but give a hearty laugh before he said, “That’s the end of her career!” Check out the clip below.
Will Smith and Martin Lawrence have embarked on their Bad Boys For Life press run, meaning that we’ll have several hilarious interviews from the duo over the next week. Smith and Lawrence stopped by Sway’s Universe to promote the new flick, but the host switched things up on The Fresh Prince. Smith was expecting to talk Bad Boys For Life, but Sway slyly brought up his favorite song that Will ever made, “Brand New Funk.” The 1988 single was a collaboration with DJ Jazzy Jeff and was featured on the multi-platinum album He’s The DJ, I’m The Rapper.
First, Sway starts rapping the single himself before Smith hops in and finishes the lyrics. Then, during the commercial break, Smith ends up lip-synching along to the first verse as the track plays in the background. You can see his energy going up as he continues, and it transforms into Smith rapping the entire second verse in his full Fresh Prince persona. Smith looks like he’s channeling the energy of his teenage self as he’s really enjoying the moment. Hopefully, the good moments last for him. Bad Boys For Life is set to hit theaters on January 17. Are you excited about the threequel?
During his CRWN Interview to promote "Bad Boys For Life," Will Smith revealed an interesting Biggie story from the night he was killed.
Bad Boys For Life is gearing up to be one of the biggest blockbuster films of year, and we're only 10 days in! While fans are sure to enjoy the action-packed blockbuster starring Martin Lawrence and Will Smith, it's what the latter leading man had to say during last night's TIDAL CRWN Talk to promote the film that had many people gasping, particularly fans of late rapper The Notorious B.I.G.
While the entire hour-long convo at the iconic Apollo Theater was amazing overall — trust us, we were there! — it was when the convo got to the subject of Hip-Hop and Biggie that things got interesting. After Martin revealed a cool tale of his time with the "Juicy" emcee on the set of his wildy popular '90s sitcom, Will took things a step further to reveal that he actually met Biggie for the very first time hours before he was slain on March 9, 1997.
Here's what Will Smith said exactly about his short-yet-memorable encounter with BIG:
"I met Biggie the night he died. I met Biggie at the Soul Train Music Awards like 4 and half hours before he died. I met Biggie, we hung out, we took a picture and all of that. I went to sleep, woke up the next morning, and he was dead."
— Will Smith
R.I.P forever, Biggie. Watch the full interview right now below by logging into your TIDAL account:
Bad Boys For Life hits theaters January 16th and so far we’ve been treated to endless teasers, behind the scenes clips and takes from the lead stars, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. “We hadn’t really done anything in [years] so there was a little concern, you know, how will it be with the chemistry?” Will previously stated when discussing their first moments on set. “But literally the first moment on stage, like, that first moment connecting, it was right back.”
Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images
We’ve learned that some new faces will be joining the franchise and one is none other than Vanessa Hudgens who stars as detective Kelly. Vanessa has come through to share a photo from the movie that sees her, Will Smith and Charles Melton seemingly raiding a home. “Well this is a dope pic lol @badboys #badboysforlife,” she captioned the image.
“She’s a new part of the ammo team, which is the new squad that gets brought on to work with Will and Martin and they’re just amazing,” Vanessa told ET of her character. “Martin is such a sweetheart. He’s always just so kind and warm and welcoming and like, tender. … So sweet.”
“And then Will is just like a burst of energy,” she added. “Like, he’s full of life. He’s full of love. They were like, sending gifts to my trailer on the weekly and I was like, this is not normal. This is just too sweet.”
The melodies of Christian music serve as guiding lights, offering solace and inspiration to weary souls. From the stirring anthems of CeCe Winans to the introspective ballads of Tenielle Neda, each song in this collection embodies the essence of faith and redemption, inviting listeners on a profound journey of spiritual exploration. Join us as we uncover the melodies that resonate with the human spirit, illuminating the enduring love of God and guiding hearts through life’s trials and triumphs.
1. CeCe Winans – “Come Jesus Come”
Cece Winans‘ song “Come Jesus Come” is a poignant appeal for divine intervention and spiritual salvation. The lyrics reflect a deep yearning for Jesus to return and transform the world, addressing personal and collective struggles. Rooted in the Christian anticipation of the Second Coming, the song calls for healing, justice, and the fulfillment of a promise of a world free from suffering. Personal lines such as “Sometimes I fall to my knees and pray” convey a sense of desperation and a need for divine strength, making the song relatable to those seeking comfort in hardship. The repeated plea “Come Jesus come” emphasizes the urgent desire for a divine presence in a troubled world, highlighting a universal longing for peace and redemption.
2. Ellie Holcomb – “All Of My Days”
Award-winning songwriter Ellie Holcomb has unveiled her new project, “All of My Days,” a Psalms-based album created to provide comfort during challenging times. This collection evolved from her “Memory Mondays” series on social media, where she paired scripture with melodies. Holcomb collaborated with her father, producer Brown Bannister, and musician Jac Thompson to craft seven songs inspired by her favorite Psalms. She aims to capture the raw authenticity and emotional depth found in these scriptures. Alongside the album release, Holcomb’s expanded devotional, “Fighting Words: Expanded Limited Edition,” is available, featuring additional devotionals and new artistic elements. Holcomb will celebrate the release with a performance at the Grand Ole Opry. For more information, visit ellieholcomb.com.
3. Sean Curran – “Led Me To You”
Sean Curran, known for his work with Bellarive and Passion, has released a new single, “Led Me To You.” This song diverges from his typical worship style, leaning more towards CCM pop, which might surprise his fans who appreciate his deeply honest and vulnerable worship music. Despite the song’s somewhat generic feel, Curran’s powerful and emotive vocals continue to stand out. Lyrically, “Led Me To You” reflects on life’s trials and how they lead to finding Jesus, though some may find the repetition and writing less impactful than his previous work. Nonetheless, Curran remains a notable artist in the worship music scene, and his future projects are highly anticipated.
4. Martin Smith – “Garment Of Praise”
Martin Smith, the influential former frontman of Delirious?, has unveiled his latest song, “Garment of Praise,” co-written with Brooke Ligertwood. Drawing inspiration from Isaiah 61, the song speaks of an intangible “garment of praise” that replaces despair with joy and salvation. Smith emphasizes the unique, priceless nature of this heavenly gift, which cannot be bought but is essential for daily spiritual renewal. Reflecting on his personal vulnerabilities and the continuous need for divine help, Smith’s new release underscores his enduring impact on modern worship music and his dedication to conveying messages of faith and hope.
5. Tasha Cobbs – “Leonard Do It Anyway”
Tasha Cobbs Leonard, Grammy Award-winning gospel artist, shares her journey of resilience and faith in her book “Do It Anyway,” with a foreword by Sarah Jakes Roberts. In this inspiring guide, Leonard reveals how embracing challenges and committing to God’s plans, even when they seem impossible, has led to her greatest breakthroughs. Through personal stories of pursuing dreams, adoption, and overcoming hardships like infertility and depression, she provides practical advice for maintaining faith and resilience. Leonard encourages readers to dream big, trust God’s guidance, remember His faithfulness, and not let fear deter them from their miracles, offering a powerful message of hope and perseverance.
6. Alexander Pappas – “A Great Awakening”
Esteemed worship leader and songwriter Alexander Pappas has unveiled his first new song in over a year and a half, titled “A Great Awakening.” This marks his debut solo worship track following his time with Young & Free and Hillsong. The song, which can be streamed and viewed with its official lyric video, is described by Pappas as evoking powerful connections to historic spiritual revivals like Azusa Street and the Jesus People Movement. Pappas, a two-time GRAMMY® nominee known for writing anthems such as “Alive” and “Echo” (Elevation Worship), aims for the song to inspire a deep longing for a new move of God.
7. Peg Luke – “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep”
Peg Luke, the Grammy and Emmy nominated artist celebrated for her enchanting flute melodies, unveils her latest musical offering with the release of “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep.” This deeply emotive single reflects Peg’s personal journey and unwavering commitment to her faith, offering listeners a transcendent experience of spirituality and introspection. With its heartfelt lyrics and captivating melodies, the song showcases Peg’s exceptional talent and profound connection with her audience. As she continues to captivate hearts around the globe, “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep” stands as proof of Peg’s enduring ability to uplift and inspire through her music.
8. Jeremy Rosado – “Nothing”
Jeremy Rosado, a kingdom-based contemporary Christian music minister and gifted songwriter, delivers a heavenly sound titled “Nothing,” marking a divine offering that resonates with believers. Emphasizing the importance of advancing the kingdom of God through spiritual music, Rosado’s song serves as a powerful tool for uplifting souls and warding off negative influences. With its captivating melody and profound message, “Nothing” encourages listeners to prioritize their faith and share their spiritual experiences with others.
9. Rebecca St. James & for KING + COUNTRY – “You Make Everything Beautiful”
Multi-Platinum and four-time GRAMMY Award-winning duo for KING + COUNTRY, comprising brothers Joel and Luke Smallbone, have unveiled their latest project, “The Inspired By Soundtrack” album, in conjunction with their new family biopic film “UNSUNG HERO,” which hit theaters nationwide via LIONSGATE/ for KING + COUNTRY ENTERTAINMENT. Among the tracks featured on the album is “You Make Everything Beautiful,” for which the official music video is now available. This captivating visual piece features their sister, Rebecca St. James, adding another layer of depth to the poignant melody.
10. Tenielle Neda – “Yet Not I but Through Christ in Me”
Tenielle Neda‘s “Yet Not I but Through Christ in Me” is a profound testament to the unyielding grace and mercy found in Jesus Christ. With each verse, the lyrics beautifully articulate the believer’s reliance on Christ for joy, righteousness, and freedom. Through moments of weakness and rejoicing, the refrain resounds with unwavering hope, affirming that it is through Christ alone that victory is secured. The song’s emotive melody and stirring refrain echo the believer’s journey from darkness to light, from fear to freedom, culminating in a resounding declaration of faith and gratitude.
Sheffield has become the latest city to make a bid for next year’s Eurovision.
READ MORE: If Sheffield’s Leadmill – the venue that helped break Arctic Monkeys – goes, we all lose something
Earlier this week, The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) confirmed that the BBC will be hosting the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest in the UK on behalf of this year’s winners, Ukraine.
Organisers revealed last month that they were in talks with the BBC to bring the event to the UK. The winning country of the annual song competition usually hosts the following year’s event and despite Ukraine’s folk-rap entry Kalush Orchestra topping the table, it was announced earlier this month that the EBU would be looking for a different country to stage the event in 2023 due to the ongoing war with Russia.
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In a lengthy statement, EBU explained the reasons why Ukraine couldn’t host the 2023 event. “The EBU fully understands the disappointment that greeted the announcement that the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest cannot be staged in Ukraine, this year’s winning country,” the statement began.
“The decision was guided by the EBU’s responsibility to ensure the conditions are met to guarantee the safety and security of everyone working and participating in the event, the planning of which needs to begin immediately in the host country.”
Now, Sheffield has become the latest in a series of cities to put a bid in to host the contest following on from Newcastle earlier this month. Up to 17 cities in total are reportedly in talks to host the event, including Leeds and Manchester.
Sheffield City Council said it wanted to host the event “in solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people”.
Councillor Martin Smith, from Sheffield City Council’s economic development and skills committee, said the city was “made for hosting Eurovision” (via the BBC).
“We have the infrastructure, the venues, the hospitality and the transport links. We also have one of the strongest creative and cultural sectors in the country,” he added.
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Sheffield has been twinned with the Ukrainian city of Donetsk since 1956. Smith said Sheffield “stands in solidarity with the people of Ukraine”.
He added: “We are putting ourselves forward to host Eurovision 2023 to do its people proud. Music runs through our blood and we put on a good show.”
Ukraine’s Kalush Orchestra with their Eurovision trophy. CREDIT: Giorgio Perottino/Getty Images
“We’re exceptionally grateful that the BBC has accepted to stage the Eurovision Song Contest in the UK in 2023,” Martin Österdahl, the Eurovision Song Contest’s Executive Supervisor, said in a statement.
“The BBC has taken on hosting duties for other winning countries on four previous occasions. Continuing in this tradition of solidarity, we know that next year’s Contest will showcase the creativity and skill of one of Europe’s most experienced public broadcasters whilst ensuring this year’s winners, Ukraine, are celebrated and represented throughout the event.”
Ukraine, as the winning country of the 2022 Eurovision Song Contest, will automatically qualify to the 2023 Grand Final.
Tim Davie, Director-General of the BBC added: “It is a matter of great regret that our colleagues and friends in Ukraine are not able to host the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest. Being asked to host the largest and most complex music competition in the world is a great privilege.
“The BBC is committed to making the event a true reflection of Ukrainian culture alongside showcasing the diversity of British music and creativity. The BBC will now begin the process to find a Host City to partner with us on delivering one of the most exciting events to come to the UK in 2023.”
The BBC previously hosted Eurovision in London in 1960, 1963, 1968 and 1977, Edinburgh in 1972, Brighton in 1974, Harrogate in 1982 and Birmingham in 1998. The host city will be chosen in the coming months following a bidding process.
In other news, Sheffield venue The Leadmill announced earlier this year that it’s facing threat of closure next year due to its landlord issuing a notice of eviction.
In March, the team behind the iconic venue announced that it would be closing next year due to its landlord issuing a notice of eviction. In the weeks that followed, it launched an official petition opposing the eviction, while stars from Sheffield and further afield have all shown support for the space.
Over the years the venue has played host to a number of artists who have gone on to have huge success, most notably the Arctic Monkeys – who helped raise over £100,000 for the venue to survive COVID closures last year by raffling off one of Alex Turner‘s guitars.
Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker is one of the numerous artists to have shown his support for the venue, sharing a piece of artwork on Instagram that includes the phrase: “You Can’t Buy The Leadmill.” The print is inspired by a teaser campaign that was used to promote Pulp’s 1995 single ‘Common People’.
Mali might be one of Africa’s poorest nations, but it remains a musical superpower. The centre of the medieval Mande empire has been the breeding ground for dozens of global success stories, including the likes of Toumani Diabate, Ali Farka Toure, Rokia Traore, Oumou Sangare, Fatoumata Diawara, Boubacar Traore, Afel Bocoum, Bassekou Kouyate and Amadou & Mariam – not to mention Tuareg rockers like Tinariwen, Tamikrest and Songhoy Blues.
Salif Keita might be the most famous of them all, but he was always the odd one out. Not only was he an albino in a society that regarded albinos as cursed, but he was an outcast from a minor royal family, competing with storytelling griots who tended to come from an ancestral lineage of musicians. It helped that he was blessed with an extraordinary voice. Keita can turn a jerky, conversational, arhythmic lyric into something that flows perfectly; making any amount of syllables fit into whatever space he has, improvising like a jazz singer, adding bluesy flourishes and grace notes, often leaping up an octave or more into a spine-tingling register.
It’s a voice that has worked across multiple genres. He started out in 1970, singing Afro-Cuban son and Congolese soukous with the Rail Band; a few years later he was performing rumbas, foxtrots, French ballads and Senegalese wolof songs with Les Ambassadeurs. In 1987 his breakthrough solo album Soro heralded the birth of the digital griot, setting Keita’s voice against a Peter Gabriel-ish backdrop of sampled koras and digi-drums. Since then he’s collaborated extensively – albums produced by Joe Zawinul, Vernon Reid and Wally Badarou; duets with the likes of Carlos Santana, Wayne Shorter, Grace Jones, Esperanza Spalding, Bobby McFerrin, Roots Manuva, Richard Bona and Cesaria Evora. In 2018 he released Un Autre Blanc – a heavily synthesized, elaborately orchestrated studio album featuring Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Angelique Kidjo and Alpha Blondy – and announced in interviews that, approaching his 70th birthday, it would be his last LP.
That was until 2023, when he was invited to play an unplugged set at a festival in Japan: just voice and acoustic guitar, with occasional accompaniment on the ngoni (a kind of harp-like banjo) and percussion. Keita loved the setting, realising that it brought out a side of him that had been hidden across his five-decade career, and he transformed his hotel suite into an impromptu studio to record this album.
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So Kono – which translates as “inside the chamber” in the Mande language – is Keita’s most spartan LP yet. He has always said that he feels self-conscious about his guitar playing, seeing it purely as a tool for songwriting, but here it takes centre stage – hypnotic, complex, repetitive patterns, played clawhammer style, plucked with the flesh at the tips of his fingers, like a medieval lute player, usually with a capo high on the fretboard.
Some of these songs rework older compositions. “Laban”, a piece of desert rock on his 2005 album M’Bemba, is turned into a wonderfully baroque miniature, featuring a Martin Carthy-like guitar pattern. The already quite spartan “Tu Vas Me Manquer” (‘I will miss you’) sounds even more beautifully heartbroken, while “Tassi”, a piece of bubblegum Latin pop from his 2012 LP Talé, is turned into a hypnotic meditation. Occasionally, Keita’s metrical, minimalist guitar patterns are set against the florid, tumbling ngoni flourishes of Badié Tounkara, like on the gentle minor-key waltz “Awa”, which translates as Eve, and serves as Keita’s tribute to womankind; the yearning declaration of love “Cherie”, which also features accompaniment on cello and talking drum; or “Soundiata”, a mesmeric tribute to his royal ancestors.
There are tributes to friends. “Kanté Manfila” is dedicated to a late bandmate of the same name who was in Les Ambassadeurs, while “Aboubakrin” is named after a successful politician. One is a eulogy, the other a joyful song of praise, but both have the same mood – trance-like guitar patterns and soaring vocals that sound a muezzin’s call to prayer.
Most startling of all is the final track “Proud”. Here, instead of playing acoustic guitar, Keita switches to a simbi, a Malian harp-lute, with a bulbous calabash body. He plays a metallic, jangling riff while howling the lyrics – partly in English – at the upper end of his vocal register, half ancient bluesman, half Pakistani qawaali singer. “I’m African, I’m proud,” he howls. “I’m albino, I’m proud/ I’m different, I’m proud.” It’s a fitting summation of a remarkable career.
Voting for Pope Francis’ successor is currently underway, with the first round of voting taking place yesterday (May 7). The Cardinals involved were unable to come to a consensus, meaning the election process will continue until a Pope is unanimously selected.
According to a report from Politico, a number of real-life Cardinals and Clerics watched Conclave – the hit 2024 film – ahead of their voting session, with a Cleric telling the publication that the film is seen as “remarkably accurate”, making it a “helpful research tool”. According to Politico, some Cardinals even watched the film in the cinema.
Following a period of mourning, the voting process begins to find a new Pope through a papal conclave. This is where a secret gathering of The College Of Cardinals occurs. Cardinals from around the world go through a voting process which eventually results in the anointing of a new Pope, with the belief being that those voting are driven by the Holy Spirit.
Ralph Fiennes and Stanley Tucci in ‘Conclave’. CREDIT: Black Bear
Following his death, streaming of Conclave spiked 283 per cent as word of Pope Francis’ passing spread throughout the world, according to Luminate (via Variety), which tracks viewership of streaming content. The film generated about 1.8million minutes viewed the day before (April 20) Pope Francis’ death, and by the end of April 21, that number had reached 6.9million minutes viewed.
In a four-star review of Conclave, James Mottram wrote for NME: “While Conclave isn’t a hardline take down of an institution that has been beset by scandal this century, including cover-ups of sexual abuse by priests, it does acknowledge that the Church has much to do to modernise. What results is a film that both works as a finely-tuned thriller and a meditation on the Church’s place in today’s society. More robust than similar films like The Two Popes (2019) and We Have a Pope (2011), Conclave is a perfect winter warmer.”
Following the Pope’s death, a host of celebrities expressed their sadness at his passing, including Russell Crowe and Whoopi Goldberg. Francis, who became pope in 2013 after his predecessor Benedict XVI resigned, was considered to be the most progressive pope to date, and had fans in several high-profile artists, with the likes of Martin Scorsese, Katy Perry, Orlando Bloom, Bono, Leonardo DiCaprio and Angelina Jolie attending papal audiences with him over the years.
EVERY PRINT EDITION OF THIS ISSUE OF UNCUT COMES WITH A COPY OF THE OTHER SIDE – A DOORS CD OF RARITIES, DEMOS AND LIVE CUTS
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R.E.M.: 40 years ago, R.E.M. travelled to London to make their third album, Fables Of The Reconstruction. A cryptic record, it arrived in difficult circumstances — yet played a critical role in the band’s transformation. In exclusive new interviews, MICHAEL STIPE, PETER BUCK and MIKE MILLS shine new light on their early years. “By the time we got to Fables, we were all crazy, to one degree or another…”
THE DOORS: As they celebrate their 60th anniversary, JOHN DENSMORE and ROBBER KRIEGER celebrate 10 of THE DOORS greatest songs. “We were proud to break that three-minute barrier!”
BON IVER: The journey from “man in cabin, sad bastard” to Grammy awards has not been easy for JUSTIN VERNON. But change is afoot… “This is the new era for Bon Iver!”
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SHACK: Illuminated by the psychedelic Merseybeat of brothers JOHN and MICHAEL HEAD, SHACK were waylaid by addiction, misfortune and disappointment. Now we hear how sobriety, family and chemistry have played a part in their unexpected reunion. “It’s natural, it’s beautiful.”
S.G. GOODMAN: The antique spirit of S.G. GOODMAN’s songs stays true to her Kentuckian roots but finds substance in modern, smalltown minutiae and ancient pagan practices… ”This belief is meant to have action behind it.”
JIM KELTNER: The sticksman to the stars on fast times with Joe Cocker, Bob Dylan and all four of the Beatles.
PRINCE: How a live recording at a local benefit show results in the signature tune from a career-defining album and movie.
DIRE STRAITS: The the brothers in arms conquered the world.
REVIEWED: New albums by Stereolab, Martin Carthy, Robert Forster, Suzi Be Ungerleider, The Doobie Brothers, Mark Pritchard & Thom Yorke, Ganavya; archive releases by Pete Shelley, Horslips, B-Movie, Los Jaivas and Sufjan Stevens; A Celebration Of Patti Smith and John Cale live; Lead Belly on Screen Extra and Joe Meek and Edward Tudor Pole in books.
PLUS:Clem Burke and Michael Hurley depart; Amy Winehouse unseen; Kurt Cobain‘s cardigan; Pavement: the movie; Terry Riley by Pete Townshend; Marc Ribot‘s favourite albums… and insular drone folk and ritual pop magick from Index For Working Musik.
From Uncut’s July 2023 issue, Uncut’s final interview with David Johansen, the New York Dolls frontman turned bouffant nightclub act, country-blues singer and more…
Sipping PG Tips from a dainty blue-and-white teacup, David Johansen considers the long, strange journey that has taken him from high-heeled frontman of the New York Dolls to bouffant nightclub act, country-blues singer and beyond. “There are certain phases in the history of New York, especially in my life,” he says, “that I can look back and say, ‘Yeah, that was really something.’”
This month, several of these glorious incarnations are celebrated in Martin Scorsese’s Personality Crisis: One Night Only – a documentary that covers the span of Johansen’s work, both before, during and after the Dolls. Speaking today over Zoom, Johansen very much inhabits the role of New York music’s grandee, a veteran player who’s navigated his way from downtown scenester to uptown habitué. Accompanied, off-camera, by his wife Mara, who supplies him with a steady diet of biscuits, he chooses his words carefully, rich and gravelly voiced. With his hair hanging down past his shoulders, he still cuts a distinctive, wiry figure.
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Johansen’s trajectory has been almost as profound as the transition made by New York itself since he first became an active participant in the city’s counterculture during the late ’60s. Pre-Dolls, he rubbed shoulders with the likes of Abbie Hoffman and Harry Smith in the semi-mythical avant-garde scene; post-Dolls, he performed as a solo artist, before reinventing himself as club singer Buster Poindexter, whose jump-blues repertoire of material has produced four albums and one unexpected and not entirely welcome chart hit, the calypso “Hot Hot Hot”.
In Scorsese’s film, Johansen appears in performance as Buster. As a character Poindexter could be restrictive, but in Johansen’s hands he becomes liberating, allowing the artist to have a little more fun than being simply himself. “Yes, it is [liberating],” he agrees. “Of course, it’s really David. David is Buster and Buster is David. The thing is, sometimes you can have a conceit. Most people do it, but they don’t change their name. You have this character that is like a warrior who goes into battle for you. You don’t have to censor yourself too much or whatever because it’s his fault. Almost anybody who goes on stage does that.”
The core of Scorsese’s film is a series of shows that Johansen played at New York’s Café Carlyle in January 2020, with Johansen-as-Buster performing the Johansen songbook, interspersed with new interviews filmed by his stepdaughter, Leah Hennessey. Scorsese and Johansen go way back – they both broke out in 1973, the year of Mean Streets and the Dolls’ riotous debut album. It’s a period Scorsese revisited separately in Vinyl, his short-lived series about a New York record label, whose debut episode included a replica Dolls gig at their regular haunt of the Mercer Arts Center.
“Scorsese is an old friend of mine,” confirms Johansen. “Over the years, I have done a few projects for him. I sang songs for Boardwalk Empire, old-timey songs. Stuff like that. He used the first Dolls record to rile some of the guys up on the set of Mean Streets before they had a fight scene.”
The film makes a subtle case for Johansen as representing something special about New York culture, an accessible avant-garde, one that never takes itself too seriously but isn’t content to simply play the clown. There is another side to this, of course; by letting Johansen tell his marvellous story, mostly without additional talking heads, Scorsese’s film implicitly reminds us that Johansen is the sole surviving New York Doll. He has outlived his bandmates Billy Murcia, Johnny Thunders, Jerry Nolan, Arthur Kane and Sylvain Sylvain; Murcia, Thunders and Nolan died unnaturally young – “Heroin destroyed everything for the Dolls,” Johansen has admitted. But in some respects, Johansen bears his status as last Doll standing lightly; one of the increasingly few remaining vestiges of a vanished 1970s New York – a creative spirit far too singular to be confined. “It’s not like I’m filled with trauma for the past or anything,” he says.
UNCUT: Scorsese has made documentaries about George Harrison, the Stones, The Band and Bob Dylan. You’re in illustrious company, then. DAVID JOHANSEN: I guess… or they are! I was doing this show at Café Carlyle, which is a fancy joint, an old place in the Carlyle Hotel in New York. We’d been on the road with the second version of the Dolls for eight, 10 years. We were going to do one show in London and ended up on the merry-go-round. That was winding down and I wanted to stay in New York for a while, re-establish friendships, things like that. In around 2015, 2106, I decided to put a repertoire together and called it Buster because I wasn’t doing songs I wrote, I was doing songs that I dug. It was a much more mature version of the original Buster – Buster at this age. We started playing the Carlyle twice a year, two weeks at a time. You could live in the hotel, which was kind of a dream because it’s the schlep that kills you, you know what I’m saying? Taking the elevator to work is my dream.
What happened next? They invited us back. I was in this mood where I didn’t want to have to learn 20 new songs, because you have to do a different show each time. So I thought I’d sing songs I wrote because I knew them already. It was a big success. We wanted to keep it going and were thinking about doing a theatre on Broadway. Mara called Marty to invite him to the show to give us some suggestions about where we could extend this thing. He wasn’t the only person we asked, but he was, I guess, the only major industrial filmmaker. He came and then he said he wanted to shoot it. Mara’s reminding me that I said no.
You said no to Martin Scorsese? I wanted to do it on stage. I felt that if you show it on TV, that’s the end of it. I was having a lot of fun and I wanted to keep it going. But eventually I acquiesced. I didn’t want to be like Charley Patton. Charley Patton didn’t want to make records because he was afraid everybody would steal his act.
Describe the show for people who haven’t seen the film… This act is pretty unique. It’s kind of a New York-centric kind of an act. I’ve tried taking it out and it doesn’t work as well. We set it up, we did like three nights, and he shot two of them I think. Then he and David Tedeschi started going through archives to put something together. I tell all these stories in the show – they wanted some stuff to go with that and enhance the movie. It doesn’t cover everything I do, but there’s a good chunk of it. When I watched it, I didn’t cringe that much. That was good. Sometimes I feel like an idiot when I see what I was capable of.
How did Buster start? Innocently enough in this little saloon in Gramercy Park called Tramps. They used to have a back room and the guy who ran Tramps, Terry Dunne, who was an Irishman, he used to bring in legendary blues singers. This was in the late ’70s and ’80s. He would have like Joe Turner, who would do a month and live in a room upstairs. He had Big Maybelle, Big Mama Thornton, all these amazing acts. I realised they didn’t have anything on a Monday. I had all these songs that I would listen to in the van on the road to tune out my travelling companions, and at that time I was really into the jump blues thing. I used to call it the pre-Hays Code rock’n’roll. I made a little show, a piano player, a guitar player. Just the three of us. Anyway, this became a big success. It was a groovy scene. People would drop by when they were in town. It did a lot for my voice. It meant I could tell jokes. I was free, I didn’t have to do anything I didn’t want to. When I did the Johansen thing – and I think about this after the fact – I came to resent it, this side of me with no shadows. Buster is more integrated.
Was there a danger of losing that freedom after breaking out of Tramps? I did lose it. I was down in Tortola or something and that Arrows song “Hot Hot Hot” was playing all the time on the radio. That period of soca, late ’70s and early ’80s, I loved and I still love. We started doing that song and people liked it, I liked it, but when we recorded it that was the end. Oh my God, don’t tell me I have to keep doing this? So that was that, and I went on to do the Harry Smiths to free myself.
Going back to ’73, was there an overlap between Mean Streets and the world of the New York Dolls? If you played that film in Duluth, people would be, “Oh, my God. What is this?” but when you grew up in it, it wasn’t anything. It was just what it was. I remember the first time I saw the movie. Syl and I were walking down the street and there used to be this arty cinema over on 5th Avenue just south of 14th Street, and we thought let’s go inside and cool off. The movie had already started and at first I thought it was a documentary. I realised after a while it was a movie of course, when I heard the music. Scorsese plays his music loud in his movies. We had a mutual appreciation. There are a lot of artists in New York who have a lot of respect for each other and can kind of joke around with each other.
Pre-Dolls, the film picks up that overlap between the hippies and punk. New York hippies had a lot of punk attitude. They didn’t have much patience for things. It was different to the West Coast. It’s greedier in New York. The Fillmore East was such an insane place. Gangs would take it over and demand certain things from Bill Graham. I remember scenes that went down there that were so crazy. It was very animated.
Debbie Harry is in the audience at the Carlyle. When did you realise the influence the Dolls had on the bands that followed? Never. I don’t take any hubristic pride in any of that. I hear it from other people but it just goes through me. There was nothing happening in 1971, early ’72. There was no place to play. The scene was still happening on the street. We, the band, sort of fell together and started looking for places we could play. They had these draconian laws that went down in the late ’60s. When I was a kid, MacDougall Street was heavenly, there were so many clubs and great bands playing. Then they passed these Cabaret Laws, and all those places closed. It was like a ghost town. We had an ambition to get something going again, which I guess we did. It was like having to go to the forest to chop down all the trees to build the stage and put up signs around town – we had to create things.
How did you get that break? I knew this guy, Eric Emerson, who was in a band called The Magic Tramps. He was an Andy Warhol movie star and he used to wear lederhosen and do the cha-cha dance. They had a gypsy violin player. It wasn’t a straight rock’n’ roll band, it was a Turkish rock’n’ roll band. He said he was playing at this place called Mercer Arts Centre, did we want to play with them? We started playing Tuesday nights at midnight. We started doing that on Tuesday nights and this scene grew up, a very groovy scene. I think about that very fondly but I don’t think of it as influencing other people.
When did things click for you, in the earliest days of the New York Dolls? When Syl came in and he was bouncing around. He had a guitar case – I said, “Can you play that thing?” and he started playing with us and I just thought, ‘We gotta have this guy in the band.’ He was very energetic. He was the right size! The guy we had before that wasn’t really blowing my skirt up, so to speak. We used to rehearse in this old bicycle store that rented old bicycles for people to go riding in Central Park. So in the wintertime, when there was no bicycle-rental going on, this guy Rusty set up a couple of broken-down amps and some drums so he could rent it out as a rehearsal space. Syl was a good size for John [Thunders], so that was one aspect of it. His personality was another aspect of it. His playing was great. And he was really funny – congenial, y’know? He looked like he would fit in, but it wasn’t like we were going to rehearse in drag.
When did that happen, then? Well, it was before we became a band. We noticed each other because of how we dressed. If you saw somebody down the street dressed like that you knew it was cool. It wasn’t like we all got together and had a meeting about it. There was a lot of that going on St Mark’s and 2nd.
It must have taken guts to dress like that? Maybe in certain neighbourhoods, but it was just another part of the scene. There was a lot of innovation going on, you know, there was fashion, film, art, poetry. There wasn’t a lot going on in terms of music, so we became the music part of that scene.
How did you write songs? I co-wrote “Trash” with Syl, so they tell me! I don’t remember exactly but I always had a notebook so I could write things down, little tidbits. So I had this idea for “Trash” and he started playing this thing: ‘dang-adang-agang, dang-adang-adang, ding-ding-ding-ding waah!’ I thought, ‘Oh that would fit this idea’, it was one of those deals. Usually the first time we play something it’s just about getting ideas and then I’ll go home and write the words. That’s how it worked then, anyway. Syl and I have done a lot of different techniques over the years. Since the reunion, we wrote a lot of songs together, it was a very creative time. Just tickling each other, laughing a lot. We were very tuned into each other as far as writing was concerned – as far as everything was concerned. There was very rarely disagreements about songs.
How critical to the band was Sylvain? If you took Syl out of that equation, I don’t think it would have been very good, because Syl could really play. He and John went back – of course Billy and him were childhood friends. To play with John… because I always say John was like Sam Andrew in Big Brother & The Holding Company, he would just go. He wasn’t thinking about fitting in with other players. But Syl knew exactly how to get under this guy and support his mania, so to speak. It was a natural thing, it just kinda clicked. I don’t know if anybody else could have done that, or would have been willing to put up with us.
Malcolm McLaren managed the Dolls towards the end but there’s no mention of him in the film – is there a reason for that? There’s no particular reason. We used to get clothes from him. Syl was friends with him from being in the rag trade, they had that in common. We used to go to these events, they were called Trunk Shows. There was this hotel on 34th St called the McAlpin and there would be certain times of the year when people who had clothes shops would rent all the rooms. Towards the end we’d go and peruse the merchandise and you could get it for a nice price. That’s when I met Malcolm.
What did you make of him? I liked him. I thought he was smart. He was political. He checked a lot of boxes for me. We’d go and see him in London. He had his store and on Saturdays these Teds would come down from Glasgow to buy brothel creepers. One time we were in there and the Teds were totally intimidated by the Dolls. We were using all kinds of language and dressed up. Malcolm was in shock because he was scared of the Teds.
That’s one end of the Dolls’ story. But at the other was your unexpected reunion for the 2004 Meltdown festival. How was it, getting the band back together? I’d done a lot of gigs. I’d done the Harry Smiths and then I was in a band with Hubert Sumlin who played guitar for Howlin’ Wolf. We had Jimmy Vivino on guitar and Levon [Helm] was the drummer. So I was already active when we got back together. I was probably conscious of easing any of their jitters. But you know, we threw that together pretty quick. We rehearsed for three days in New York and then went to London to put on that show. And then it took off. It was fun for a long time but it got tiring. We had to travel pretty rough most of the time, we didn’t have this luxurious lifestyle for gentlemen of a certain age.
By default, you and Sylvain became the custodians of the Dolls’ legacy until his death. Beyond the band, what connected you both? People loved Syl – he was a really sweet guy, really jovial, and he could get along with anybody. He would say things out of the blue that would be really mindblowing. The way he described things was so beautiful. After the Dolls, when he was still living in New York, he’d be in these living situations… You’d go over to his apartment and it would be like a sitcom – there’d be kids crawling around on the floor, there’d be a monkey loose, people cooking and talking loud, the radio would be on really loud. It was a really fun thing. He knew a million people, he got along with everybody and his take on rock’n’roll was perfect.
Do you think about being the last Doll standing? I never think of myself unless somebody like you mentions it or I read it somewhere. I don’t really like to think about it too much. It’s just the early band was so long ago, and a lot of the stuff that Johnny and Jerry were involved in was post-Dolls, but in the collective consciousness it sort of melds together. I wasn’t really observing them in that capacity after they left the Dolls and their quest for whatever it was they were looking for.
Following the release of the film, are you planning to do more Buster shows? I don’t know what happens next. I like to paint. I like to sing. We are going to put out a record of the movie soundtrack. I am thinking of other songs I can record. I’m really good with a deadline. If I need 10 songs by next week, I can do that. So we’ll see what happens.
Rocking out in the margins, Julian Cope has been on a roll in recent years. 2020’s Self Civil War was his finest record in 25 years, and 2022’s England Expectorates was almost as good (bonus points for the melodic nail-bomb of “Cunts Can Fuck Off”). Then came last year’s Robin Hood, without Cope’s name on the packaging, and now Friar Tuck, also mysteriously cloaked. It appears, as all his music has since 1997’s Rite 2, on Cope’s own Head Heritage label (a vinyl edition is on its way too, his first since 2017’s Drunken Songs): that means home recordings and low production values on one hand, but direct and fluid expression on the other. Basically, he’s free to do what he wants, with all the good and bad that entails.
Mostly, on Friar Tuck, that leads to an exhilarating 40 minutes. It doesn’t have the madcap range of 1991’s Peggy Suicide or the following year’s Jehovahkill, records on which Cope explored the rough and ready, first-take ethos he’d discovered on 1989’s Skellington and 1990’s Droolian, but these 12 songs are brimming with a breezy vitality that’s not always been present on Cope’s epic releases over the last couple of decades.
If you’ve heard any of those, you know in part what this record sounds like: distorted wah-wah guitars, DI’d electro-acoustic guitars, drum machines and Mellotrons armed with the very tapes used on Tangerine Dream’s Atem. And yet Friar Tuck also reaches out sonically to synth-string funk on “In Spungent Mansions”, chiming, Smiths-esque melancholy on “1066 & All That” and slow-burning drone-rock on the seven-and-a-half-minute “Me And The Jews”.
“The Dogshow Must Go On” is the earworm here, a sub-two-minute garage charmer that moves from a krautrock Stooges groove (reminiscent of 1995’s “Queen/Mother”) to the kind of post-punk Cope pursued on his own solo debut, World Shut Your Mouth, 40 years ago. In stupendous and hilarious Cope-ian fashion it references Crufts, the Gurteen Stones, Jesus Christ and “a new people critical of canine love”, but the overall meaning remains thrillingly slippery: is this a rallying pro-dog message from someone who’s owned miniature schnauzers named Smelvin and Iggy Pup? Or is that missing the point entirely? Cope similarly makes no attempt at accessibility on the closing miniature, “Will Sergeant’s Blues”, where he’s surely taking the piss out of Ian McCulloch’s vocal style, even as he sings about Eeyore selling off Thousand Acre Wood for fracking.
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Elsewhere, Cope’s drift is clearer when he looks back from the vantage point of his late sixties. “I didn’t think I’d get to live this long,” he croons on “Done Myself A Mischief”, “I’ve been so many people/And I’ve been just one.” “In Spungent Mansions” takes a look at his Liverpool punk pal Pete Burns, who he always remained fond of: “Exquisite and otherly/And each one on the dole… And I had scabies…” On the organ-driven motorik of “Four Jehovahs In A Volvo Estate” he zooms into a moment from his childhood, when a friend’s religious family moved away, ruining Cope’s Subbuteo championship. “Now I’m stuck trashing my preteen little brother,” he laments. “I hope Jehovah finds your house and causes degradation…”
Yet what of Robin Hood and Friar Tuck? What about this myth has so intrigued Cope, a man usually interested in the more rock-solid monuments of prehistory? “It’s a secret,” he tells Uncut, and clues are few and far between here. “R In The Hood”, like “Eve’s Volcano (Covered In Sin)” put through a dub echo chamber, talks of “peace” in contradictory terms before concluding “everybody wants a peace of the action”. Inside the booklet there’s a map suggesting Tuck came from the north of Scotland, journeyed to Sherwood Forest and ended up heading to the Crusades via “the Jewish Port of Mara Zion” in Cornwall.
Perhaps Cope identifies with the Merry Men’s anti-authoritarian views, as echoed in a poem, “Flibberty Gibbet On The Jibbet”, in the album’s booklet, where he seems to call for the hanging of Liz Truss (then again, Truss would no doubt agree with Hood’s libertarian drive against taxation). Whatever Cope’s motivations, just head to the poem’s opening lines and luxuriate in his continuing garbled genius: after all, no-one else is going to rhyme “Keir Starmer” with “Martin Bramah”.
Q&A
JULIAN COPE
Three albums in three years… are you on a bit of a creative roll?
No, I’m working at a speed that is very comfortable to me. But I am somewhat reborn, yes. These past 30 years, I’ve felt an obligation to make art that is Useful.
“Four Jehovahs In A Volvo Estate” – is this a recollection from your childhood?
Duncan Gray, poor kid. We’re right in the middle of the season and he has to move to the Orkneys because his knobhead parents believe bullshit. Funnily enough, their Volvo estate had screamed stability until they sodded off.
What has specifically inspired the album, musically?
I just try to replicate sonically the current state of my Melted Plastic Brain. So I like Novelty a lot and I live in a world of Intense Melody. So I like to deliver my vocal messages over a heady brew of crusty Brechtian garage rock – wah-guitars, marching drums and two Mellotron 400s filled with tape frames from Tangerine Dream’s 1973 epic Atem. Proper musical necromancy. Three sounds per frame with handwritten descriptions, too. Even have the rare black cases for all three. On Robin Hood, I alluded to them when I played the “Atem” theme during “An Oral History Of Blowjobs”.
Hedonism and angst, heartbreak and rapture, bombast and tenderness – rock music does them all with an often startling brilliance. Humour? Not so much. Randy Newman – possibly the whip-smartest, funniest songwriter who has ever lived – was once asked by this reviewer why rock’n’roll has such an under-developed funny bone. His answer was simple: rock stars take themselves far too seriously and want to be remembered for saving the world rather than playing it for laughs.
There are exceptions that prove the rule, of course – Frank Zappa managed to be a serious musician and to inject a caustic wit into the Mothers Of Invention’s early records. Yet no rock’n’roll band has ever set out with quite such an endearingly eccentric, consistent and overarching objective to make us laugh as the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band.
Over 17 CDs and three DVDs this extravaganza of countercultural hilarity is the ultimate guide to the Bonzos’ unique mix of highbrow surrealism, lowbrow smut, seaside postcard humour with a psychedelic twist, slapstick, vaudeville and mordant satire, all spiced with a delicious silliness that traces its legacy back to The Goon Show and helped to beget Monty Python’s Flying Circus. As such it represents a vast upscaling on the previously definitive Bonzos collection, the 1992 triple disc set Cornology, which was reissued in 2011 as A Dog’s Life and which compiled the five original Bonzos studio albums plus singles and a sprinkling of rarities.
The full title, We Are Normal But We Are Still Barking, was dreamt up by the band’s guitarist, co-writer and unofficial musical director Neil Innes, who passed away during the seven painstaking years it took to put the project together while masters were tracked down, rare and previously unreleased material was sourced and cleared and a court case that threatened to kibosh the entire enterprise was fought and won. Two other Bonzos, Vernon Dudley Bowhay-Nowell and Martin “Sam Spoons” Ash, were also sadly lost in action during the long haul.
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The first half of the box consists of the five original albums remastered, with the first two presented in mono and stereo iterations. Needless to say, it’s all essential stuff, but if you were forced to cram the dog’s bollocks on to a single ‘best of’ disc there are certain landmarks we can probably all agree on. From their 1967 debut Gorillayou would need “Cool Britannia”, Viv Stanshall’s unforgettable Elvis impersonation on “Death Cab For Cutie” and the mind-bendingly wonderful “The Intro And The Outro” (“and looking very relaxed, Adolf Hitler on vibes – nice!”). From the 1968 follow-up The Doughnut In Grany’s Greenhouse you’d want “Can Blue Men Sing The Whites” and the hysterically ridiculous “My Pink Half Of The Drainpipe” and from 1969’s Tadpolesit would be impossible to live without the hit single “I’m The Urban Spaceman”, produced by Paul McCartney under the pseudonym Apollo C Vermouth. When it comes to 1969’s Keynsham you’d surely take Innes’ “You Done My Brain In”, and from 1972’s posthumous Let’s Make Up And Be Friendly the nine-minute “Rawlinson End” – the first official appearance of Stanshall’s famous Sir Henry character – is a must.
After that, though, we take a deeper dive into a cornucopia of outtakes, demos, rehearsal tapes, BBC sessions and concert recordings plus vintage TV and film footage. Not included in the latter is the magnificently bonkers nightclub performance of “Death Cab For Cutie” from The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour, which was the wider world’s first exposure to the Bonzos when the film premiered on BBC 1 on Boxing Day, 1967. Never mind, for the rest of the visual content we get over three DVDs is wonderfully evocative, from an improbable performance of “Won’t You Come Home Bill Bailey” on Blue Peterin early 1966 when the Bonzos were still a trad jazz combo to appearances on ITV’s New Faces in 1967 and on BBC 2’s short-lived Colour Me Pop the following year. Perhaps best of all, though, is the disc compiling the Bonzos’ appearances on the anarchic comedy series Do Not Adjust Your Set, which launched the TV careers of future Pythons Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin.
The first episode – on which the group performed the music-hall song “Jollity Farm” – was broadcast on ITV on the same day as Magical Mystery Tourpremiered, which meant the Bonzos outdid The Beatles that Christmas by appearing on both main channels. As regulars on the weekly show, they went on to perform such favourites as “The Intro And The Outro”, “Death Cab For Cutie” andthe splendid “Harvey The High School Hermit”, which they never recorded, and which features Stanshall and Roger Ruskin Spear debating the respective merits of using cooking fat or porridge as hair gel.
The outtakes expand on the Bonzos’ love of a preposterous cover, first heard on the “Sound Of Music” piss-take on Gorilla, and include an inscrutable take on Sonny and Cher’s “Bang Bang” and a ridiculously mannered “Blue Suede Shoes”.
Among the demos are numerous songs that never saw the light of day including “The Boiled Ham Rhumba” (“Cat meat, cat meat in your tin, did you once walk around like me?”), “Boo”, a comedic ghost story with references to Macbeth and Hamlet, and the doo-wop pastiche “The Mr Hyde In Me” (“two gins will set him free”).
The concert material suggests the Bonzos’ spontaneous musical mayhem translated sometimes messily to the live stage – or as Legs Larry Smith proudly puts it, their improvs were “never knowingly over-rehearsed”.
A tendency to swap instruments and throw in gratuitously mad deconstructions of tunes such as “I’m For Ever Blowing Bubbles” and the “Dragnet” theme might have been amusing if you were there; invariably they work less well on playback. On the other hand, it’s impossible not to love a band that when supporting The Who in their post-Woodstock pomp at the Fillmore East in November 1969 dared to follow a riotous version of saxophonist Spear’s “Trouser Press” with an outrageous piss-take of “Pinball Wizard”. The Bonzos were never the sort to worry about upsetting fragile rock star egos.
Almost 60 tracks from 15 BBC Radio One sessions between 1967 and 1969 offer a better representation of their unique ability to do irony with a warm-hearted mix of affection and affectation. Peel loved them, of course, and they kept some of their best japes for his shows, including a side-splitting cover of “The Monster Mash” and the splendiferous “The Craig Torso Show” and its seasonal sequel “The Craig Torso Christmas Show”.
Needless to say, they also sent up Peel mercilessly. “The other day I was collecting shells on the seashore to stick on a coffee table that I’d made into a hamster when suddenly a Tyrannosaurus Rex attacked a woman and pulled her leg off”, Innes deadpans in a perfect imitation of the DJ’s voice by way of introducing the country spoof “I Found The Answer”, yet another song that never made its way on to a studio album.
There was simply nothing quite like the Bonzos and there’s more than enough intro here to keep you smiling all the way to the outro and beyond.
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The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars
RCA, 1972
I shared a room with my middle brother growing up, and this is one of the records that seeped through the walls of my oldest brother’s room into ours. It was just really different – it was on the edge of glam rock, I suppose, but it was also totally by itself. I had no idea what “Suffragette City” was, or “Moonage Daydream”, and Ziggy Stardust sounded like the name of a wrestler. But it was really exciting to watch it have influence over ordinary people. You could see quite hard lads in Sheffield trying to have their hair cut like Bowie and wearing these big stack heels. Some of the songs make no sense at all – I didn’t know what “Lady Stardust” meant and probably still don’t – but his voice is beautiful.
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ARETHA FRANKLIN
Aretha With The Ray Bryant Combo
COLUMBIA, 1961
The first soul record I got was called This Is Soul – there’s a song by Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, and I worked backwards from each of the artists on there. I think I’ve got about 25 different albums by Aretha, but this was one I found quite late. It’s jazzy but it’s also very gospel-y as well. There are a couple of really nice songs: “Are You Sure”, which I think is from a musical, “Today I Sing The Blues” and “Love Is The Only Thing”… It’s more uptempo than her other early stuff, and I used to like Ray Bryant anyway. It’s just a really nice album to find after you thought you’d secured most of her records.
THE LURKERS
Fulham Fallout
BEGGARS BANQUET, 1978
I was really struggling to decide which punk album to pick. I was thinking the Buzzcocks or The Clash or maybe even Siouxsie & The Banshees, but I went for The Lurkers’ first album . I wanted to be Pete Shelley, but I also wanted to be Howard Wall, the lead singer from The Lurkers. I just loved the album because it felt like it was within my grasp, in terms of musical ability. They were obviously quite an underrated band. They were really good live, but they were unassuming – they didn’t speak much, didn’t say much outrageous, which a lot of people used to go to concerts for then. So it doesn’t surprise me that they went under the radar a little bit.
OWEN GRAY
The Singles Collection 1960-1962
NOT BAD RECORDS, 2014
When punk was happening, I started pinching bluebeat records from upstairs at Beanos in Croydon – I do apologise to Beanos for this! There was one artist called Owen Gray who I absolutely loved. So a few years ago I went out and bought this compilation, which had all four of the singles I’d pinched. It was a weird era for Jamaican music, because it was before ska and reggae and everything that came after that. It’s basically blues, but with a very faint skank on it. The musicianship on those early Jamaican records, especially with the brass, was quite out-there. They weren’t like the jazz musicians of New York – they were a lot more free with the tuning, but the trombone solos were fantastic. It still sounds exciting now.
THE PERSUASIONS
Street Corner Symphony
ISLAND, 1972
Of all the a capella bands, they’re probably the most well-known – one of their songs, “Good Times”, is in an advert that’s on permanently at the moment. My Mum went to see Lou Reed in Sheffield in 1973 with The Persuasions supporting, which is pretty incredible, and she brought this record back with her. I didn’t play it until much later, but obviously The Housemartins went on to sing quite a bit of acapella vocals live, so it became quite an influence. Even before “Caravan Of Love”, we used to do a lot of quasi-religious stuff like “Joy Joy Joy” and “We Shall Not Be Moved”. So Street Corner Symphony really set that up.
SILAS HOGAN
Trouble
EXCELLO, 1971
When I was 17, I was a massive blues fan. I played this a lot when I was learning harmonica, and it’s an absolutely brilliant album. Silas Hogan was only discovered later in life, in his fifties, and you can tell it in the way he plays. It’s electric guitar instead of acoustic, a little bit like Jimmy Reed, that sort of sound. He didn’t play harmonica himself, but the guy who does, Moses Smith, is absolutely fantastic. It’s one of those records that I went out and bought on CD much later, because I needed it in my CD collection as well. I still occasionally play it, which says a lot because I don’t listen to a lot of blues at the moment.
VARIOUS ARTISTS
The Gospel At Colonus
WARNER BROS, 1984
This was something my Mum recorded off the telly. She knew I was a fan of gospel music, so she sent the video up to me. It was such a good thing to do, because it’s beautiful. It’s the story of Sophocles’ Oedipus At Colonus but it’s got The Blind Boys Of Alabama in it, and the JD Steele Singers – Jevetta Steele’s got an incredible voice – and Morgan Freeman doing the main source of speech. I think you have to watch it before buying the record which may sound daft, but it’s quite a spectacle. It’s one of the last chances to see really powerful performances by Clarence Fountain and people like that. It was a big influence on me making [2012 stage show and album] The 8th.
BILL WITHERS
Making Music
CBS, 1975
It’s not one of his famous ones, but it’s such a great example of his songwriting. “Paint Your Pretty Picture” was the song that me and my wife came out to when we got married, so it has enormous significance for me. I do think Bill Withers is a bit underrated because the modern era cuts it down to a couple of songs, “Lean On Me” and “Lovely Day”. They were great hit records, but there’s so much more to his character than that. There’s a beautiful documentary called where you can see why he’s underrated, because he’s not impressed by his own ability at all. He will not blow his own trumpet, and he’s just a very nice fella. So I was sad when he died.
Paul Heaton’s new album The Mighty Several is released by EMI on October 11; he tours the UK from November 29, see paulheaton.co.uk for the full list of dates
SEVENTEEN became the first K-pop act to headline Lollapalooza Berlin tonight (September 8), with their history-making performance also serving as singer Jeonghan’s last before his mandatory military service.
“It’s an honour I never expected,” singer Joshua told NME of headlining Lollapalooza Berlin ahead of the performance. “I never imagined we’d get to perform at Lolla Berlin, a festival we’ve only seen in the media.”
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He continued by nodding to the group’s first UK performance in June, which saw them become the first K-pop act ever to play at Glastonbury Festival. “Given how performing or meeting fans in Europe seemed almost impossible since the pandemic, playing Glastonbury was already surreal,” Joshua said.
“Now, adding a headlining set at Lolla feels amazing and makes me so proud of SEVENTEEN, the team we are,” he added. “We hope this will be another chance for audiences to see what we’re all about and want to keep performing for more people on a variety of stages moving forward.”
“Recently, most of our performances have taken place in indoor venues, so playing the wide-open outdoor stage at Glastonbury was a rare and exciting experience,” rapper Wonwoo shared of how that headline-grabbing performance was fuelling their set in Germany.
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He continued: “It was a great opportunity to showcase our music and energy in a new setting for a fresh crowd. With that still fresh in my mind, I’ll do my best to bring the same great energy and performance to Lolla Berlin.”
SEVENTEEN’s Lollapalooza Berlin headline set kicked off with their 2023 single ‘Super’ before diving into their back catalogue for the likes of the English-language ‘Darl+ing’ and the 2021 singles ‘Ready To Love’ and ‘Rock With You’. After the latter, singer Seungkwan told the crowd: “We couldn’t believe you guys could follow along to our songs so well, you’re doing amazing. I’m so touched.”
The middle portion of the performance was dedicated to unit performances, beginning with BSS – members Seungkwan, Hoshi and DK – delivering a version of their track ‘Fighting’. The vocal unit of Seungkwan, DK, Jeonghan, Joshua and Woozi and the performance unit of Hoshi, The8 and Dino both revisited their songs from April’s greatest hits album ‘SEVENTEEN Best Album ’17 Is Right Here’’ with ‘Cheers To Youth’ and ‘Spell’, respectively.
The hip-hop unit – comprised of Mingyu, S.Coups, Wonwoo and Vernon – performed ‘Fire’ before SVT Leaders (S.Coups, Hoshi and Woozi) aired their 2022 collaboration ‘Cheers’. As the unit section came to an end, the crowd began to chant SEVENTEEN’s name, with the group responding from the stage with their own chant of “Berlin”.
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“I want to thank Carats [SEVENTEEN’s fanbase name] from all over the world for supporting us,” rapper Mingyu said after rousing renditions of ‘SOS’ and ‘Hot’, referring both to the international make-up of the crowd in front of him and the fans watching online around the globe. “I love you Carats, thank you so much.”
“Thank you for coming. Let’s have fun until the end, thank you,” Jeonghan added, with the audience responding by breaking out in a chant of his name. The performance was his last prior to his enlistment for his mandatory military service, with the group’s label, PLEDIS Entertainment, confirming in August that the singer is set to miss SEVENTEEN’s upcoming world tour. The exact date of his enlistment is yet to be announced.
“Rather than doing something out of the ordinary, I just want to show myself as Jeonghan,” the star shared with NME prior to the headline set. “I’m excited to deliver a captivating performance with the members that will create another great memory for Carats to look back on.”
SEVENTEEN closed out their performance with the aptly titled ‘Headliner’, the English version of their ‘Heng:garæ’ track ‘Together’, ‘God Of Music’ and fan favourite ‘Very Nice’. During the latter, which saw the boyband repeat the refrain multiple times – a tradition known as “never-ending ‘Aju Nice’” – Seungkwan recruited fans on the barrier to help sing one of the song’s most climactic lines. “We’re making such good memories here, all thanks to you, Berlin,” Vernon told the crowd.
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The group will next turn their focus to their 2024 ‘Right Here’ world tour, which kicks off in Goyang, South Korea, on October 12 with two dates at Goyang Stadium. The tour will then visit the US in October and November before heading to Japan.
It is currently unclear if the group will visit Europe for their own headline concerts on this run. “We know how much our fans are waiting for us there,” Seungkwan told NME in June. “I can’t say for sure at this point in time, but we’re definitely talking to the company, and we want to make it happen.”
SEVENTEEN are also expected to make a comeback with their upcoming 12th mini-album later this year. Jun will miss both the ‘Right Here’ world tour and promotional activities around the record as he pursues “acting and other opportunities in China”.
Lollapalooza Berlin, meanwhile, has confirmed its dates for 2025 – the 10th anniversary of the festival’s German edition. It will return on July 12 and 13, 2025, with the line-up to be confirmed in due course.
SEVENTEEN played:
‘Super’ ‘Don Quixote’ ‘Darl+ing’ ‘Ready To Love’ ‘Rock With You’ ‘Left & Right’ ‘Fighting’ ‘Cheers To Youth’ ‘Spell’ ‘Fire’ ‘Cheers’ ‘Clap’ ‘Maestro’ ‘SOS’ ‘Hot’ ‘Headliner’ ‘Together (English ver.)’ ‘God Of Music’ ‘Very Nice’
Just like a jazz musician, any great festival like End Of The Roadneeds to be able to improvise. Sometimes the results can improve upon the original scheduling. When Militarie Gun pull out of their Big Top slot, James Holden steps into the breach with his elemental and uplifting psychedelic rave salvo. And with Mdou Moctar sadly waylaid, a saviour is quickly installed in the form of Alabaster DePlume. He may not bring the noise in quite the same way as Moctar, but his twilight Garden Stage set certainly doesn’t lack intensity.
DePlume reveals that he’s just come off a WhastApp call with a friend in the West Bank, and his whole set is charged with fury and sadness at what is happening in Palestine. Backed by drums, cello and the guitar of Rozi Plain, his music tonight often veers closer towards Godspeed-esque post-rock than jazz, topped by his own beautifully desperate saxophone howls.
It is a little tougher for him, in this context, to offer his usual rousing messages of hope of self-care. But he still manages to thank everyone “for living”, suggesting that coming together at a festival like this is the first step towards banishing fear and division. “If you find yourself unsure, reach towards someone,” he suggests. “You have my permission! Alabaster DePlume sent you!”
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House Of All are also supersubs of a sort, making no secret of the fact that they exist to keep the spirit of The Fall and Mark E Smith alive. Yet this band of prime Fall survivors are much more than a tribute act. Led by the mercurial Martin Bramah and featuring the full complement of Hanleys, their angular baselines and wild declamations are instantly familiar, while still feeling fresh and off-centre.
Bramah barks enthusiastically about being “the cuckoo in the nest” or how an “awful lot of nonsense talk” sent him over the edge, his mania perfectly offset by thundering double drums. “They sound great, don’t they? What a band.” He’s not wrong, and it’s terrific to see them all enjoying a second life.
“You beautiful weirdos, what’s the fucking craic?” yells Lankum’s Ian Lynch, before apologising if his band’s instruments go out of tune, as “they were made in a different aeon”. If we’re honest, the diabolical dirges of Lankum’s ancient machines are a big part of the appeal, and the band have correctly calculated that this is a crowd who will appreciate them at their darkest and doomiest. There is a wild cheer for “Go Dig My Grave”, a song they’d earlier revealed (in an uproarious Uncut Q&A) that the Mercury Prize ceremony had begged them not to perform. Clearly the TV people had missed the moment where the song’s desolate suicidal thrum flips, to become somehow freeing and transcendent.
Lankum finish with “The Turn”, a song they’ve “only played four times before and usually fucked up”. It’s not exactly a singalong – “the hardened lumps of charred old chunks… forsaken and bereft” – but it is utterly stunning, somehow going from four people singing tentative a capella harmonies to the sound of a thousand boulders being rolled directly at your head.
Yet for all this thrilling dissonance, the night does need a showman to wrap things up, and Baxter Dury is happy to oblige. “I don’t think you realise who I am,” he leers to an overflowing Big Top. It’s a fair point, as he cycles through his entire repertoire of ne’er-do-wells with kung-fu-kicking relish. “I’m a salamander… a turgid fucked up little goat.. I’m the sausage man!”
He’s also a slum landlord, a slum tenant, the bloke shouting at his girlfriend outside Spoons, the washed-up geezer pretending not to cry on a park bench: “Do you remember me? Do you? Dooo yaaa?” But Dury has a loved-up raver in him too, and a final “These Are My Friends” is a euphoric celebration. “See you soon, my fuckin’ little bunny rabbits!” he cackles at the end. And off we hop to bed.
Jimi Hendrix, Neil Young, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, Fontaines DC, Yes, Jack White, John Mayall, Nick Cave, Chris Bell, Thurston Moore, Mercury Rev, Cass McCombs, Lone Justice, David Crosby, Lawrence, Steve Van Zandt, Paul Heaton, Brown Horse and more all feature in Uncut‘s October 2024 issue, in UK shops from August 16 or available to buy online now.
All print copies come with a free Big Star CD featuring 10 tracks of power-pop perfection, rarities and alternate mixes!
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INSIDE THIS MONTH’S UNCUT:
JIMI HENDRIX: In June 1970, the completion of JIMI HENDRIX’s own Electric Lady Studios in downtown New York unleashed a surge of unbridled creativity. Just three months later, he was gone. As a new film and box set explore Hendrix’s final sessions, friends, bandmates and studio staff consider how Electric Lady inspired everyone who entered its softly lit sanctuary. “They were free to create,” engineer Eddie Kramer tells Peter Watts. “I never saw Jimi so happy.”
GILLIAN WELCH & DAVID RAWLINGS: After a devastating tornado strike, GILLIAN WELCH and DAVID RAWLINGS have spent four years bringing their beloved Nashville studio back to life. As a new masterpiece arrives, Uncut uncovers a tale of destruction and rebirth – and new songs to match the intensity of their near-loss.
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FONTAINES DC: With their astonishing fourth album Romance, FONTAINES DC leave behind the post-punk cobblestones for apocalyptic sci-fi stadium rock. But as they prepare to take the world by storm, they explain how the Arctic Monkeys, Mickey Rourke and “dissonance” have helped usher in their imperial phase – and how they plan to avoid the pitfalls of success.
CHRIS BELL: CHRIS BELL was McCartney to Alex Chilton’s Lennon: the other #1 songwriter in BIG STAR. But conflict, disappointment and depression threatened to diminish the power-pop visionary’s brilliance and Bell died tragically young, leaving behind only one posthumously released solo album, I Am The Cosmos.
MERCURY REV: From their base in upstate New York, MERCURY REV preside over a unique environment – full of eccentric sculpture parks, vintage recording studios and the spirits of storied musical pioneers – which has nourished their creativity for over 30 years. With a new album, Born Horses, embedded in the rich topography of the region, Jonathan Donahue and Grasshopper guide Uncut around their home turf.
BROWN HORSE: With their ragged harmonies, lap steel laments and fiery jams, valiant young upstarts BROWN HORSE are bringing country rock grit to the Badlands of Norfolk. But how do their Songs: Anglia hold up against the alt.standards that inspired them?
AN AUDIENCE WITH… THURSTON MOORE: The Sonic Youth soothsayer talks free jazz, feminism and Tom Verlaine’s paper-plate poetry.
THE MAKING OF “ROUNDABOUT” BY YES: Interminable touring sows the seeds of a prog rock classic.
ALBUM BY ALBUM WITH CASS McCOMBS: The enigmatic singer-songwriter looks back on a restless career.
MY LIFE IN MUSIC WITH PAUL HEATON: The Housemartins and Beautiful South singer on his happiest hours by the stereo: “It still sounds exciting now.”
REVIEWED: Nick Cave, Jack White, BASIC, Manu Chao, Willie Watson, Nala Sinephro, The The, Neil Young, Harold Budd and the Cocteau Twins, Kimbo District, Oasis, Black Artist Group, Patti Smith, Anohni and the Johnsons, Steve Van Zandt, Lawrence, The Jesus And Mary Chain and more.
PLUS: Farewell John Mayall, David Crosby by Mike Scott, Lone Justice, Plantoid and… introducing Thee Sacred Souls.
If traditional music from Dublin seems to be having its moment in the spotlight – most notably as a result of Lankum’s recent critical and commercial success – it’s only because the world is starting to pay attention. Lily Power, Méabh Meir, Ruth Clinton and Sinéad Lynch have been performing together as Landless for more than a decade, their paths crossing in college, through Dublin’s Sacred Harp traditional singing community and in the clubs that hosted the likes of Lankum and Lisa O’Neill in the early 2010s.
In 2018, they released their debut album Bleaching Bones, an extraordinary, entirely unaccompanied collection of traditional songs, helmed by False Lankum producer John “Spud” Murphy (you may have heard their stunning version of “The Well Below The Valley” on the recent Uncut covermount CD, The Planet That You’re On). Forthcoming follow-up Lúireach, again produced by Murphy, is no less extraordinary, with its careful use of instruments – pump organ, shruti box, fiddle and banjo from Lankum’s Cormac MacDiarmada, plus Alex Borwick’s trombone on album opener “The Newry Highwayman” – augmenting the four-part harmonies that remain the heart of the work.
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“We recorded Bleaching Bones in churches and other interesting spaces, so we chose to leave it like that so that you could hear those acoustics,” says contralto singer Meir. “This one was recorded in the studio, and using other instruments gave it the depth those spaces gave the first album.”
“We’ve found ourselves singing in churches a lot over the years, because it really suits the music,” adds Clinton. “And if there’s an organ there, because I’m a pipe organist, it’s hard to resist playing it.” She uses the instrument to haunting effect on “Death And The Lady”, a supernatural 17th century folk song popularised by Norma Waterson and Martin Carthy.
Another evolution in the quartet’s sound comes from the inclusion of more recent commissions alongside more traditional fare. Of these, “Lúireach Bhríde” (“St Brigid’s Breastplate”) stands out: the lyrics, set to music by Clinton, come from a poem by the Donegal poet Annemarie Ní Churreáin, which was commissioned for the inaugural RTÉ Folk Awards in 2018 and is dedicated to the children born at the Bon Secours Mother And Baby Home for unmarried mothers at Tuam, Galway “The invitation was to reflect on 100 years since women had gotten the vote in Ireland, and the poem is about Brigid and her various powers of healing, smithcraft and poetry,” says Clinton. “The word lúireach by itself can also mean a protective song, or hymn, so it also worked as a standalone album title.”
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“We’ve all been singing different traditional songs for a long time, and sometimes what we’ll do is bring one of those to Landless and write harmonies for it,” continues Meir. “‘My Lagan Love’ is one of those for me – a really well-known song I’ve been singing since I was a child, that sounds so different with the harmonies added.”
A particular favourite of the band is another song based on a poem, “The Wounded Hussar” by 18th century Scottish poet Thomas Campbell. “It’s what we call a ‘big’ song in traditional music, it has everything you want from a folk song,” says Power. “We first heard it performed by Rita Gallagher, who’s a big influence on us, and it’s one of the first songs I ever heard Maeve sing.”
Having recorded the album in February 2020 – with babies, house moves and the small matter of a global pandemic getting in the way of their original release plans – the band are taking some time to figure out their next steps after signing to world music label Glitterbeat (Gaye Su Akyol, Altın Gün). “Those guys are super cool,” says Lynch, “and we’re really excited to see what might come up outside of Ireland.”
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The second season of Game of Thrones prequel series House of the Dragon is up and running – but what happened to Jaehaerys and Jaehaera in last night’s big premiere?
The first episode of season two aired on HBO in the US on June 17, with UK viewers able to watch concurrently via Sky Atlantic and streaming service NOW.
Last month, a trailer for the second season was released, which built upon the tension that highlighted season one’s end, when Alicent (Olivia Cooke) and Otto Hightower (Rhys Ifans) conspired to put Alicent’s son Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) on the throne after King Viserys (Paddy Considine) snuffed it.
Viserys had originally designated daughter Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) as his heir – but a death-bed change-of-mind (conveniently only heard by Alicent) changed all that. Cue a Targaryen civil war, otherwise known as the ‘Dance Of The Dragons’ by readers of George R.R. Martin’s source books.
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The trailer sees The Blacks, led by Rhaenyra and Daemon (Matt Smith), plan an invasion of King’s Landing to claim the Iron Throne from the Greens, led by Aegon. Over the course of the intense trailer, we get several glimpses of the bloody and fiery conflict to come, along with a trip to The Wall.
Which child was killed in House Of The Dragon season 2 episode 1 – Jaehaerys or Jaehaera?
In an action-packed episode one, we witness both sides of the royal feud making moves to gain the upper hand. Rhaenyra, in particular, is keen for revenge following Aemond’s (Viserys’ second son with Alicent) murder of her son Lucerys in the season one finale.
Daemon chooses to act on behalf of his wife, commissioning one of Aegon’s royal ratcatchers and another heavy to sneak into the palace at King’s Landing and murder Aemond while he sleeps. Instead, they encounter Aegon’s wife (and younger sister) Helaena in her chambers with their two young children Jaehaerys and Jaehaera, who are sleeping.
Desperate to fulfil Daemon’s instruction, and as the alarm is raised, the two accomplices panic and decide to kill a different male of the Targaryen household. At knifepoint, they demand Helaena reveal which of her children is the boy (they resemble each other so closely). Helaena gives an answer, which the two follow (despite initially deciding she is lying to protect the king’s male heir). Jaehaerys is beheaded in his bed. Helaena escapes with Jaehaera in her arms. The episode ends.
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Despite it being slightly unclear whether Helaena was misleading the attackers as to her children’s identity, NME can confirm it was Jaehaerys who was murdered (and not Jaehaera). There was no double-cross – and Aegon’s only heir is no more. Will he seek retribution in episode two?
It is, the internet tells me, shortly after Christmas 1987, and a few friends and I are huddled in a chilly corner of a pub in London’s Soho. We are here for various reasons. For one, we know that they serve pints of bitter even to self-evidently underage customers like us. For another, hard rock lore suggests that this is a spot we might run into Lemmy – surely an encounter to delight all parties equally. The main reason we’re there, though, is to find consolation after grave disappointment. We have failed to phone ahead before travelling from the provinces, and so have only within the last hour learned that the Black Sabbath show at Hammersmith Odeon we hoped to witness this evening has been cancelled.
As you’ll read in this new 148-page deluxe edition of our Ultimate Music Guide to Black Sabbath, we certainly weren’t the only people to have been wrongfooted by Black Sabbath in the 1980s. In a new interview for the magazine, Tony Iommi launches a new box set which attempts to find some continuity in this era of the band, and explains some of what was going on in an era which was confusingly both post-Ozzy and post-Dio, but also post-Gillan, pre-Dio and pre-Ozzy.
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Tony shares humbling tales of advertising in the local paper for a frontman, of regrouping with known heavy Midlands associates, and of playing in Russia to a crowd of rabid fans, but also to a decorously-seated collection of Soviet-era dignitaries. Much like my teenage Sabbath fan self, Tony Iommi was confident in the material and in what we didn’t then call the Black Sabbath brand. He also believed in his new singer: Tony Martin. “If you have a factory and someone leaves,” Iommi tells Peter Watts, “you don’t close the factory, you hire someone new.”
There’s a lot to unpack in Iommi’s analogy of Sabbath to a factory. But Sabbath certainly was for many years a leading British heavy industry; the awesome swing of the band given a engaging character in the person of Ozzy Osbourne, a soulboy and a Beatles fan transformed into a prince of darkness during a formative Cumbrian tour. Geezer Butler told me a few months ago how impressed he was and remains with Ozzy’s musicianship. As you read Ozzy’s own vivid intro to the magazine, or enjoy his interviews in these pages, you’ll salute that and much more besides.
He certainly knows what’s what in Black Sabbath. “We’ve been friends, we’ve been enemies, said all sorts of things about each other,” he tells us, “but no-one can come up with them riffs like Tony Iommi. I don’t know how he does it. It’s scary, like “What?” Sometimes he would come in and say, “Ah, I’ve got nothing.” Then he’d be tuning up and this amazing fucking riff would come out. “Well, that sounded like something, Tone…”
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Enjoy the magazine. You can get it in shops next week, or pre-order here now.
The last couple of years have seen a huge rise in browser-based puzzle games, tasking players with working out a certain kind of answer using limited guesses. Framed is one of the newest, following in the footsteps of Wordle, but offering a slightly different twist. You’ll still need to work out the answer using limited information and only six tries, but it’ll be movies that you’ll be guessing.
You see, Framed focuses on individual frames, or stills, of an ever-changing roster of movies. Some show a fair amount of action at the start, while others will take careful analysis and decent trivia knowledge to crack. With each wrong guess, a new still is revealed, hopefully adding enough extra information and context for you to guess the correct movie title.
With only six guesses at your disposal, you may need a little help guessing today’s Framed answer. To give you a hint, we’ve included some clues that will tease the title of the movie picked as today’s puzzle. If you’ve already failed today’s puzzle, or would just like to know the answer, we’ve detailed that as well.
Framed hint for today
Today’s puzzle is an American psychological film.
Released in 1991
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Stars Robert De Niro, Nick Nolte, Jessica Lange
Framed answer for today (May 1)
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The answer for Framed today is Cape Fear. This is the answer for May 1 with a brand new puzzle tomorrow. Check back in if you need any help!
How to play Framed
To play Framed you just need to follow these steps, in your browser of choice. Note that any Framed versions you find elsewhere on app stores or other storefronts are likely to be fakes.
Make a guess, if it’s correct, you will see the rewards screen
If incorrect, you have five more chances, each showing a new still.
Previous Framed answers
Sometimes, when trying to solve the Framed puzzle of the day, it can be extremely advantageous to know previous answers. Here are the answers from the last few days.
Kick-Ass
Kingsman: The Secret Service
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
From Russia With Love
Fatal Attraction
The Intern
Crash
Thor
Total Recall
Collateral Beauty
Boyhood
Apocalypto
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Tucker And Dale vs Evil
Wall Street
Tag
Banshees of Inisherin
Before We Go
Sleeping Beauty
Wonka
Hustle
The Infiltrator
BlackBerry
Avengers: Age Of Ultron
Toy Story 4
War Horse
Venom: Let There Be Carnage
There’s Something About Mary
The Nice Guys
Molly’s Game
What We Do In The Shadows
Iron Man 2
The Blair Witch Project
Black Adam
The Rock
Sherlock Holmes
The Switch
Tron Legacy
Wonder Woman
Don’t Look Up
Killing Them Softly
Dead Ringers
Alice Through The Looking Glass
The Wolverine
Bottle Rocket
The Dictator
J. Edgar
Inside Man
Oliver!
Next Friday
Southpaw
American Splendor
A Man Called Otto
The Wicker Man
House Of Gucci
Chicken Run
Marcel the Shell with Shoes On
West Side Story
The Whale
We Need To Talk About Kevin
Gandhi
The Mask Of Zorro
Frenzy
Dolemite Is My Name
Friday Night Lights
The Devil Wears Prada
Raising Arizona
Burn After Reading
True Grit
A Serious Man
Rear Window
The Love Bug
Jumper
Brooklyn
Gran Turismo
Source Code
Matchstick Men
Last Vegas
Animal House
Jennifer’s Body
Heathers
Bride Of Frankenstein
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
The Flash
Desperado
Alice In Wonderland
Patton
The Super Mario Bros. Movie
Steve Jobs
This Is Spinal Tap
Ingrid Goes West
Heavenly Creatures
Allegiant
The King
Lethal Weapon
Kramer vs Kramer
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
Saltburn
Escape From New York
Yesterday
500 Days Of Summer
Air
Carlito’s Way
Cowboys & Aliens
Before Midnight
Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Birth
Magnolia
Doctor Sleep
The Full Monty
Alita: Battle Angel
Tenet
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
Training Day
Unstoppable
Wreck-It Ralph
Dazed And Confused
Sleepy Hollow
Spectre
No Strings Attached
Mean Streets
Hail, Caesar!
Christopher Robin
Scrooged
White Christmas
Black Christmas
The Killing Of A Sacred Deer
Battle Of The Sexes
Foxcatcher
Once Upon A Time In Hollywood
Nightmare Alley
The Color Of Money
Barton Fink
ParaNorman
Red 2
Princess Mononoke
Nomadland
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
License To Kill
King Richard
Jungle Fever
Hell Or High Water
The Thin Red Line
Fallen Angels
Million Dollar Baby
The Legend Of Tarzan
The Maze Runner
Trance
Maleficent
The Fighter
Jumanji
Monsters vs Aliens
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
The Green Hornet
Tick, Tick… Boom!
Pinocchio
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome
Pacific Rim
Only God Forgives
Aeon Flux
Mulholland Drive
As Tears Go By
Black Hawk Down
Beautiful Creatures
Away We Go
The Blues Brothers
Barbie
Sideways
The Descendants
Nebraska
About Schmidt
Election
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Dracula
Train To Busan
Fury
Donnie Brasco
Don’t Breathe
Panic Room
The Fog
Eraserhead
Arachnophobia
The Evil Dead
Despicable Me
The Boxer
Encanto
The Lion King (2019)
Deepwater Horizon
Creature From The Black Lagoon
Minority Report
Diamonds Are Forever
Bridesmaids
The Strangers
Breakfast At Tiffany’s
Promised Land
Big Fish
The Book Of Eli
Cinderella
It Chapter Two
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Bohemian Rhapsody
Doctor Strange
Dogville
Crimson Tide
The Accountant
Before Sunset
Blonde
Finding Forrester
Beauty And The Beast
The Kids Are All Right
Constantine
Clash Of The Titans
I Give It A Year
The Expendables 3
Blow Out
Lilo & Stitch
The Sea Beast
The Karate Kid
Cocaine Bear
Office Space
The Brothers Grimm
Get On Up
Shrek 2
In the Mood for Love
Glengarry Glen Ross
Magic Mike
Pearl Harbor
My Dinner With Andre
Spotlight
Spider-Man
Deliverance
A Bug’s Life
American Ultra
Coming To America
Eastern Promises
The Favourite
Dead Presidents
Bad Moms
The Prince Of Egypt
Empire Of The Sun
Don Jon
The Help
Dallas Buyers Club
Coming 2 America
Collateral
Blazing Saddles
Baywatch
Jack Reacher
The Interview
The Impossible
Gangs of New York
Friday
Batman
Hustle & Flow
Hook
This Is England
Saturday Night Fever
Xanadu
Watchmen
Mary Poppins
Hitman: Agent 47
Gattaca
The Fugitive
Disclosure
Anything Else
Contagion
Begin Again
The Age of Adaline
A Star Is Born
Spaceballs
Batman & Robin
After Yang
Man On The Moon
Norma Rae
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Enter The Dragon
Girl, Interrupted
Army Of The Dead
Deep Cover
Cruella
Pulp Fiction
Dune
Commando
Avatar: The Way of Water
Blade
Atomic Blonde
American History X
Bad Grandpa
Capote
Man With A Movie Camera
Battleship
Driving Miss Daisy
Barry Lyndon
Clueless
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure
Bedknobs and Broomsticks
Beetlejuice
At First Sight
Crocodile Dundee
The Bling Ring
Dumbo
Falling Down
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
The Lion King
Big
Army Of Darkness
James And The Giant Peach
Creed
The King’s Man
Bad Times at the El Royale
The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button
Aquaman
Cloud Atlas
Cujo
The Godfather Part III
Game Night
Philadelphia
El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie
Dog Day Afternoon
Dial M For Murder
Cast Away
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
The Fifth Element
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Departed
Deadpool 2
Red Sparrow
Limitless
Hacksaw Ridge
Battle Royale
Big Trouble in Little China
A Wrinkle in Time
Adaptation
Jumanji: Welcome to The Jungle
Ed Wood
The Menu
The Green Knight
Fences
Furious 7
Dick Tracy
Deep Blue Sea
The Village
Independence Day
Pride
Shrek
Trainspotting
Hellboy
First Man
Almost Famous
Snowpiercer
The Great Muppet Caper
The Last Samurai
Crazy, Stupid, Love
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues
The Ballad Of Buster Scruggs
A Million Ways To Die In The West
Looper
Miami Vice
Inherent Vice
Gods of Egypt
The Fly
Chappie
The Big Year
Brave
Bridge of Spies
Anna Karenina
Toy Story 2
Speed Racer
Fifty Shades of Grey
Cleopatra
Con Air
Car Wash
A.I. Artificial Intelligence
Garden State
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
Beauty and the Beast
Ben-Hur
The Place Beyond The Pines
Sound of Metal
Before Sunrise
Centurion
Aloha
Elysium
Hercules
The French Dispatch
Free Guy
Legally Blonde
War of the Worlds
Assassin’s Creed
Peter Pan
Red
Queen of Katwe
Ready Player One
Synecdoche, New York
Walk the Line
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
Boyz n the Hood
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events
Out Of Africa
The Equalizer
Rain Man
Ender’s Game
The Girl On The Train
I Know What You Did Last Summer
Attack The Block
Everything Everywhere All At Once
Riddick
Team America: World Police
Milk
Mars Attacks!
World War Z
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
The Graduate
I, Tonya
The Hunt For Red October
The Color Purple
Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
The Wiz
Lawrence Of Arabia
Apollo 13
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
Erin Brockovich
Drumline
Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse
The Darjeeling Limited
Zero Dark Thirty
Glory
The Founder
A Fish Called Wanda
Prometheus
Ali
Napoleon Dynamite
Do The Right Thing
The King Of Comedy
Edward Scissorhands
Under The Skin
Man Of Steel
8 Mile
Akira
You’ve Got Mail
Amélie
Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them
GoldenEye
Basic Instinct
Step Brothers
Little Miss Sunshine
Sin City
Jarhead
Fast & Furious 6
Lost In Translation
Coraline
I, Robot
Finding Nemo
The English Patient
Marathon Man
Heat
The American
Forrest Gump
Ex Machina
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
The Iron Giant
The Aviator
Flash Gordon
Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice
In Time
Face/Off
Cake
Alien
The Royal Tenenbaums
My Neighbour Totoro
Due Date
Nightcrawler
Billy Elliot
Vertigo
Lady Bird
Manchester By The Sea
Top Gun
300: Rise Of An Empire
Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire
Home Alone
Shazam
Babe
The Polar Express
Elf
Die Hard
It’s A Wonderful Life
Inside Out
In Bruges
The Purge
Argo
Mean Girls
Batman Returns
Side Effects
Chicago
Dumb And Dumber To
Any Given Sunday
The Nightmare Before Christmas
House of Flying Daggers
Black Widow
Manhattan
The Great Gatsby
Bend It Like Beckham
Australia
Chef
About A Boy
There Will Be Blood
Cars
The Da Vinci Code
Drive
Warcraft
Hocus Pocus
Pain & Gain
Koyaanisqatsi
Mamma Mia
The Hateful Eight
Paul
Wayne’s World
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
The Shape of Water
Quantum Of Solace
The Princess Bride
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Cool Hand Luke
Ted
21 Jump Street
The Sound Of Music
Moneyball
The Hunger Games
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Iron Man
Men In Black
Gravity
The Mask
Escape From Alcatraz
Gladiator
Hugo
Ghostbusters
Halloween 2
Frankenstein
The Hangover
The Muppets
Annie
Bronson
The Amazing Spider-Man
A Nightmare On Elm Street
Marriage Story
The Thing
Grease
Frozen
Amistad
Saw
Armageddon
Memento
Anaconda
The Incredibles
Fast Times At Richmond High
Austin Powers: International Man Of Mystery
The World’s End
Chariots Of Fire
A Few Good Men
Perriort Le Fou
Zoolander
The Tree Of Life
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
Juno
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Dunkirk
The Matrix
School Of Rock
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Ad Astra
American Hustle
Tropic Thunder
Casino Royale
Caddyshack
Dredd
Fantasia
Sicario
RoboCop
I Am Legend
Deadpool
Cool Runnings
2001: A Space Odyssey
Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
A Beautiful Mind
Titanic
Beverly Hills Cop
Air Force One
King Kong
Rocky
The Theory of Everything
The Gentlemen
Now You See Me
The Notebook
Dead Poets Society
Captain Phillips
Aladdin
When Harry Met Sally
The Mummy
The Martian
Hero
The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty
La La Land
Braveheart
The Revenant
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Slumdog Millionaire
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Mud
The Lego Movie
Gremlins
The King’s Speech
Mrs. Doubtfire
Moulin Rouge!
The Hurt Locker
Galaxy Quest
Armadeus
Free Solo
The Goonies
Black Swan
The Social Network
Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby
Sleepless In Seattle
Thor: Ragnarok
Arrival
Jojo Rabbit
Her
The Big Short
The Breakfast Club
Sunset Boulevard
Notting Hill
We’re The Millers
Rango
Knives Out
Catch Me If You Can
The Shining
12 Years a Slave
Fruitvale Station
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
The Dark Knight
Whiplash
Seven
Baby Driver
Into the Wild
The Cabin In The Woods
Color Out of Space
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Saving Private Ryan
Zodiac
Back to the Future
Minari
Uncut Gems
Bad Boys II
Interstellar
Up
American Psycho
Bad Education
Howl’s Moving Castle
Inglorious Basterds
The Godfather.
Apocalypse Now
Children of Men
Big Hero 6
The Proposal
Parasite
Crazy Rich Asians
Soul
28 Days Later
About Time
Birds of Prey (or Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey)
The Lighthouse
Kong: Skull Island
Joker
Eyes Wide Shut
Bird Box
Isle of Dogs
Midsommar
Goodwill Hunting
10 Cloverfield Lane
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Moonlight
Guardians of the Galaxy
Requiem For a Dream
Les Miserables
No Country For Old Men
1917
The Imitation Game
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
The Godfather Pt II
Brokeback Mountain
The Truman Show
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Inception
300
Alien Resurrection
District 9
A Quiet Place
Birdman
WALL-E
Gone Girl
BlacKkKlansman
Jackie Brown
Pineapple Express
Hereditary
Pan’s Labyrinth
A Fist Full of Dollars
One Hour Photo
Schindler’s List
The Exorcist
Bladerunner 2049
Back to the Future Part II
Black Panther
Shutter Island
O’ Brother Where Art Thou?
The Witch
Django Unchained
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That’s all you need to know about Framed, and the answer for today. For more puzzle-game goodness, check out our hints for today’s Heardle.
The production will run at the Duke Of York’s Theatre from May 11 to August 3, and will be directed by Lloyd. Tickets are already sold out.
Newcomer Francesca Amewudah-Rivers has been confirmed to play Juliet alongside Holland’s Romeo.
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Also starring in the highly anticipated production will be Freema Agyeman (Nurse), Michael Balogun (Friar), Tomiwa Edun (Capulet), Mia Jerome (Montague), Daniel Quinn-Toye (Paris), Ray Sesay (Tybalt), Nima Taleghani (Benvolio), Joshua-Alexander Williams (Mercutio) and Callum Heinrich and Kody Mortimer (Camera Operators).
Amewudah-Rivers previously appeared in two seasons of the BBC series Bad Education and three short films. She has stage experience in productions at the Globe and Lyric Hammersmith among other venues.
Francesca Amewudah-Rivers. Credit: Getty Images
Holland said of the cast announcement: “Beyond excited to announce our cast for Romeo and Juliet. I can’t wait to get started and I know we’ll create something really special together.”
Amewudah-Rivers added: “I’m so grateful to be making my West End debut as Juliet with The Jamie Lloyd Company. It’s a dream to be joining this team of incredible artists with Jamie at the helm. I’m excited to bring a fresh energy to this story alongside Tom, and to welcome new audiences to the theatre.”
Lloyd commented: “I’m very excited to introduce the amazing cast who will be joining the incredible Tom Holland in Romeo & Juliet, including Francesca Amewudah-Rivers — an exceptional young artist.”
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The script, based on the classic play by William Shakespeare, has been edited by Heartstopper actor Nima Taleghani. It will be Lloyd’s first Shakespeare production since his 2014 staging of Richard III at Trafalgar Square, with Martin Freeman leading the performance.
Lloyd is also known for helming many successful versions of traditional plays, including The Seagull with Emilia Clark, Doctor Faustus with Kit Harington and most recently, the musical Sunset Boulevard with Nicole Scherzinger.
The nominations for the 2023 Grammys have been announced with Beyoncé, Kendrick Lamar, Adele and Harry Styles leading the way.
READ MORE: Ukraine, Billie Eilish, Louis CK: the biggest talking points from the Grammy Awards 2022
The official Grammys YouTube hosted a livestream today (November 15) for the announcement which you can watch below, with the winners set to be announced at the 65th Grammy Awards ceremony on February 5, 2023.
Beyoncé clocked up the most nominations with nine nods including Record Of The Year and Album Of The Year, closely followed by Lamar with eight nominations.
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Adele picked up seven nominations while Future, Harry Styles, Mary J. Blige and DJ Khaled each scored six nods. Jay-Z, who picked up five nominations, is now tied with Beyoncé for the most nominated artists in Grammy history, having clocked up 88 nods in total.
Notably, the 2023 Grammy Awards will be the first time Beyoncé and Adele will go head-to-head for Record, Album, and Song Of The Year since 2017, when Adele swept all three categories.
Meanwhile, both Wet Leg and Måneskin were both nominated in the Best New Artist category.
See the full list of Grammys 2023 nominations below:
Record Of The Year
ABBA – ‘Don’t Shut Me Down’
Adele – ‘Easy On Me’
Beyoncé – ‘Break My Soul’
Brandi Carlile Featuring Lucius – ‘You And Me On The Rock’
Doja Cat – ‘Woman’
Harry Styles – ‘As It Was’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘The Heart Part 5’
Lizzo – ‘About Damn Time’
Mary J. Blige – ‘Good Morning Gorgeous’
Steve Lacy – ‘Bad Habit’
Album Of The Year
ABBA – ‘Voyage’
Adele – ’30’
Bad Bunny – ‘Un Verano Sin Ti’
Beyoncé – ‘Renaissance’
Brandi Carlile – ‘In These Silent Days’
Coldplay – ‘Music Of The Spheres’
Harry Styles – ‘Harry’s House’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers’
Lizzo – ‘Special’
Mary J. Blige – ‘Good Morning Gorgeous (Deluxe)’
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Song Of The Year
Adele – ‘Easy On Me
Beyoncé – ‘Break My Soul
Bonnie Raitt – ‘Just Like That
DJ Khaled Featuring Rick Ross, Lil Wayne, Jay-Z, John Legend & Fridayy – ‘God Did’
Gayle – ‘ABCDEFU’
Harry Styles – ‘As It Was’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘The Heart Part 5’
Lizzo – ‘About Damn Time’
Steve Lacy – ‘Bad Habit’
Taylor Swift – ‘All Too Well’
Best New Artist
Anitta
Domi & JD Beck
Latto
Måneskin
Molly Tuttle
Muni Long
Omar Apollo
Samara Joy
Tobe Nwigwe
Wet Leg
Best Pop Solo Performance
Adele – ‘Easy On Me’
Bad Bunny – ‘Moscow Mule’
Doja Cat – ‘Woman’
Harry Styles – ‘As It Was’
Lizzo – ‘About Damn Time’
Steve Lacy – ‘Bad Habit’
Best Pop Duo/Group Performance
ABBA – ‘Don’t Shut Me Down’
Camila Cabello Featuring Ed Sheeran – ‘Bam Bam’
Coldplay & BTS – ‘My Universe’
Post Malone & Doja Cat – ‘I Like You (A Happier Song)’
Sam Smith & Kim Petras – ‘Unholy’
Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album
Diana Ross – ‘Thank You’
Kelly Clarkson – ‘When Christmas Comes Around…’
Michael Bublé – ‘Higher’
Norah Jones – ‘I Dream Of Christmas’
Pentatonix – ‘Evergreen’
Best Pop Vocal Album
ABBA – ‘Voyage’
Adele – ’30’
Coldplay – ‘Music Of The Spheres’
Harry Styles – ‘Harry’s House’
Lizzo – ‘Special’
Best Dance/Electronic Recording
Beyoncé – ‘Break My Soul’
Bonobo – ‘Rosewood’
David Guetta & Bebe Rexha – ‘I’m Good (Blue)’
Diplo & Miguel – ‘Don’t Forget My Love’
Kaytranada Featuring H.E.R. – ‘Intimidated’
Rüfüs Du Sol – ‘On My Knees’
Best Dance/Electronic Music Album
Beyoncé – ‘Renaissance’
Bonobo – ‘Fragments’
Diplo – ‘Diplo’
Odesza – ‘The Last Goodbye’
Rüfüs Du Sol – ‘Surrender’
Best Contemporary Instrumental Album
Brad Mehldau – ‘Jacob’s Ladder’
Domi & JD Beck – ‘Not Tight’
Grant Geissman – ‘Blooz’
Jeff Coffin – ‘Between Dreaming And Joy’
Snarky Puppy – ‘Empire Central’
Best Rock Performance
Beck – ‘Old Man’
The Black Keys – ‘Wild Child’
Brandi Carlile – ‘Broken Horses’
Bryan Adams – ‘So Happy It Hurts’
Idles – ‘Crawl!’
Ozzy Osbourne Featuring Jeff Beck – ‘Patient Number 9’
Turnstile – ‘Holiday’
Best Metal Performance
Ghost – ‘Call Me Little Sunshine’
Megadeth – ‘We’ll Be Back’
Muse – ‘Kill Or Be Killed’
Ozzy Osbourne Featuring Tony Iommi – ‘Degradation Rules’
Turnstile – ‘Blackout’
Best Rock Song
Brandi Carlile – ‘Broken Horses’
Ozzy Osbourne Featuring Jeff Beck – ‘Patient Number 9’
Red Hot Chili Peppers – ‘Black Summer’
Turnstile – ‘Blackout’
The War On Drugs – ‘Harmonia’s Dream’
Best Rock Album
The Black Keys – ‘Dropout Boogie’
Elvis Costello & The Imposters – ‘The Boy Named If’
Idles – ‘Crawler’
Machine Gun Kelly – ‘Mainstream Sellout’
Ozzy Osbourne – ‘Patient Number 9’
Spoon – ‘Lucifer On The Sofa’
Best Alternative Music Performance
Arctic Monkeys – ‘There’d Better Be A Mirrorball’
Big Thief – ‘Certainty’
Florence And The Machine – ‘King’
Wet Leg – ‘Chaise Longue’
Yeah Yeah Yeahs Featuring Perfume Genius – ‘Spitting Off The Edge Of The World’
Best Alternative Music Album
Arcade Fire – ‘WE’
Big Thief – ‘Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You’
Björk – ‘Fossora’
Wet Leg – ‘Wet Leg’
Yeah Yeah Yeahs – ‘Cool It Down’
Best R&B Performance
Beyoncé – ‘Virgo’s Groove’
Jazmine Sullivan – ‘Hurt Me So Good’
Lucky Daye – ‘Over’
Mary J. Blige Featuring Anderson .Paak – ‘Here With Me’
Muni Long – ‘Hrs & Hrs’
Best Traditional R&B Performance
Adam Blackstone Featuring Jazmine Sullivan – ’Round Midnight’
Babyface Featuring Ella Mai – ‘Keeps on Fallin’’
Beyoncé – ‘Plastic Off The Sofa’
Mary J. Blige – ‘Good Morning Gorgeous’
Snoh Aalegra – ‘Do 4 Love’
Best R&B Song
Beyoncé – ‘Cuff It’
Jazmine Sullivan – ‘Hurt Me So Good’
Mary J. Blige – ‘Good Morning Gorgeous’
Muni Long – ‘Hrs & Hrs’
PJ Morton – ‘Please Don’t Walk Away’
Best Progressive R&B Album
Cory Henry – ‘Operation Funk’
Moonchild – ‘Starfuit’
Steve Lacy – ‘Gemini Rights’
Tank And The Bangas – ‘Red Balloon’
Terrace Martin – ‘Drones’
Best R&B Album
Chris Brown – ‘Breezy (Deluxe)’
Lucky Daye – ‘Candy Drip’
Mary J. Blige – ‘Good Morning Gorgeous (Deluxe)’
PJ Morton – ‘Watch The Sun’
Robert Glasper – ‘Black Radio III’
Best Rap Performance
DJ Khaled Featuring Rick Ross, Lil Wayne, Jay-Z, John Legend & Fridayy – ‘God Did’
Doja Cat – ‘Vegas’
Gunna & Future Featuring Young Thug – ‘Pushin P’
Hitkidd & Glorilla – ‘F.N.F. (Let’s Go)’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘The Heart Part 5’
Best Melodic Rap Performance
DJ Khaled Featuring Future & SZA – ‘Beautiful’
Future Featuring Drake & Tems – ‘Wait For U’
Jack Harlow – ‘First Class’
Kendrick Lamar Featuring Blxst & Amanda Reifer – ‘Die Hard’
Latto – ‘Big Energy (Live)’
Best Rap Song
DJ Khaled Featuring Rick Ross, Lil Wayne, Jay-Z, John Legend & Fridayy – ‘God Did’
Future Featuring Drake & Tems – ‘Wait For U’
Gunna & Future Featuring Young Thug – ‘Pushin P’
Jack Harlow Featuring Drake – ‘Churchill Downs’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘The Heart Part 5’
Best Rap Album
DJ Khaled – ‘God Did’
Future – ‘I Never Liked You’
Jack Harlow – ‘Come Home The Kids Miss You’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers’
Pusha T – ‘It’s Almost Dry’
Best Country Solo Performance
Kelsea Ballerini – ‘Heartfirst’
Maren Morris – ‘Circles Around This Town’
Miranda Lambert – ‘In His Arms’
Willie Nelson – ‘Live Forever’
Zach Bryan – ‘Something In The Orange’
Best Country Duo/Group Performance
Brothers Osborne – ‘Midnight Rider’s Prayer’
Carly Pearce & Ashley McBryde – ‘Never Wanted To Be That Girl’
Ingrid Andress & Sam Hunt – ‘Wishful Drinking’
Luke Combs & Miranda Lambert – ‘Outrunnin’ Your Memory’
Reba McEntire & Dolly Parton – ‘Does He Love You (Revisited)’
Robert Plant & Alison Krauss – ‘Going Where The Lonely Go’
Best Country Song
Cody Johnson – ‘’Til You Can’t’
Luke Combs – ‘Doin’ This’
Maren Morris – ‘Circles Around This Town’
Miranda Lambert – ‘If I Was a Cowboy’
Taylor Swift – ‘I Bet You Think About Me (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)’
Willie Nelson – ‘I’ll Love You Till the Day I Die’
Best Country Album
Ashley McBryde – ‘Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville’
Luke Combs – ‘Growin’ Up’
Maren Morris – ‘Humble Quest’
Miranda Lambert – ‘Palomino’
Willie Nelson – ‘A Beautiful Time’
Best New Age, Ambient, Or Chant Album
Cheryl B. Engelhardt – ‘The Passenger’
Madi Das, Dave Stringer & Bhakti Without Borders – ‘Mantra Americana’
Mystic Mirror – ‘White Sun’
Paul Avgerinos – ‘Joy’
Will Ackerman – ‘Positano Songs’
Best Improvised Jazz Solo
Ambrose Akinmusire – ‘Rounds (Live)’
Gerald Albright – ‘Keep Holding On’
John Beasley – ‘Cherokee/Koko’
Marcus Baylor – ‘Call Of The Drum’
Melissa Aldana – ‘Falling’
Wayne Shorter & Leo Genovese – ‘Endangered Species’
Best Jazz Vocal Album
The Baylor Project – ‘The Evening: Live At Apparatus’
Carmen Lundy – ‘Fade To Black’
Cécile McLorin Salvant – ‘Ghost Song’
The Manhattan Transfer & The WDR Funkhausorchester – ‘Fifty’
Samara Joy – ‘Linger Awhile’
Best Jazz Instrumental Album
Joshua Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride & Brian Blade – ‘LongGone’
Peter Erskine Trio – ‘Live In Italy’
Terri Lyne Carrington, Kris Davis, Linda May Han Oh, Nicholas Payton & Matthew Stevens – ‘New Standards, Vol. 1′
Wayne Shorter, Terri Lyne Carrington, Leo Genovese & Esperanza Spalding – L’ive At The Detroit Jazz Festival’
Yellowjackets – ‘Parallel Motion’
Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album
John Beasley, Magnus Lindgren & SWR Big Band – ‘Bird Lives’
Remy Le Boeuf’s Assembly Of Shadows – ‘Architecture Of Storms’
Ron Carter & The Jazzaar Festival Big Band Directed by Christian Jacob – ‘Remembering Bob Freedman’
Steve Gadd, Eddie Gomez, Ronnie Cuber & WDR Big Band Conducted by Michael Abene – ‘Center Stage’
Steven Feifke, Bijon Watson & Generation Gap Jazz Orchestra – ‘Generation Gap Jazz Orchestra’
Best Latin Jazz Album
Arturo O’Farrill & The Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra Featuring The Congra Patria Son Jarocho Collective – ‘Fandango At The Wall in New York’
Arturo Sandoval – ‘Rhythm & Soul’
Danilo Pérez Featuring The Global Messengers – ‘Crisálida’
Flora Purim – ‘If You Will’
Miguel Zenón – ‘Música de las Américas’
Best Gospel Performance/Song
Doe – ‘When I Pray’
Erica Campbell – ‘Positive
Maverick City Music & Kirk Franklin – ‘Kingdom’
PJ Morton Featuring Zacardi Cortez, Gene Moore, Samoht, Tim Rogers & Darrel Walls – ‘The Better Benediction’
Tye Tribbett – ‘Get Up’
Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance/Song
Chris Tomlin – ‘Holy Forever’
Crowder & Dante Bowe Featuring Maverick City Music – ‘God Really Loves Us (Radio Version)’
Doe – ‘So Good’
For King & Country & Hillary Scott – ‘For God Is With Us’
Maverick City Music & Kirk Franklin – ‘Fear Is Not My Future’
Phil Wickham – ‘Hymn Of Heaven (Radio Version)’
Best Gospel Album
Doe – ‘Clarity’
Maranda Curtis – ‘Die To Live’
Maverick City Music & Kirk Franklin – ‘Kingdom Book One (Deluxe)’
Ricky Dillard – ‘Breakthrough: The Exodus (Live)’
Tye Tribbett – ‘All Things New’
Best Contemporary Christian Music Album
Anne Wilson – ‘My Jesus’
Chris Tomlin – ‘Always’
Elevation Worship – ‘Lion’
Maverick City Music – ‘Breathe’
TobyMac – ‘Life After Death’
Best Roots Gospel Album
Gaither Vocal Band – ‘Let’s Just Praise The Lord’
Karen Peck & New River – ‘2:22’
Keith & Kristyn Getty – ‘Confessio – Irish American Roots’
Tennessee State University – ‘The Urban Hymnal’
Willie Nelson – ‘The Willie Nelson Family’
Best Latin Pop Album
Camilo – ‘De Adentro Pa Afuera’
Christina Aguilera – ‘Aguilera’
Fonseca – ‘Viajante’
Rubén Blades & Boca Livre – ‘Pasieros’
Sebastián Yatra – ‘Dharma +’
Best Música Urbana Album
Bad Bunny – ‘Un Verano Sin Ti’
Daddy Yankee – ‘Legendaddy’
Farruko – ‘La 167’
Maluma – ‘The Love & Sex Tape’
Rauw Alejandro – ‘Trap Cake, Vol. 2’
Best Latin Rock or Alternative Album
Cimafunk – ‘El Alimento’
Fito Paez – ‘Los Años Salvajes’
Gaby Moreno – ‘Alegoría’
Jorge Drexler – ‘Tinta y Tiempo’
Mon Laferte – ‘1940 Carmen’
Rosalía – ‘Motomami’
Best Regional Mexican Music Album (Including Tejano)
Chiquis – ‘Abeja Reina’
Christian Nodal – ‘EP #1 Forajido’
Marco Antonio Solís – ‘Qué Ganas de Verte (Deluxe)’
Natalia Lafourcade – ‘Un Canto por México – El Musical’
Los Tigres del Norte – ‘La Reunión (Deluxe)’
Best Tropical Latin Album
Carlos Vives – ‘Cumbiana II’
Marc Anthony – ‘Pa’lla Voy’
La Santa Cecilia – ‘Quiero Verte Feliz’
Spanish Harlem Orchestra – ‘Imágenes Latinas’
Tito Nieves – ‘Legendario’
Best American Roots Performance
Aaron Neville & The Dirty Dozen Brass Band – ‘Stompin’ Ground’
Aoife O’Donovan & Allison Russell – ‘Prodigal Daughter’
Bill Anderson Featuring Dolly Parton – ‘Someday It’ll All Make Sense (Bluegrass Version)’
Fantastic Negrito – ‘Oh Betty’
Madison Cunningham – ‘Life According To Raechel’
Best Americana Performance
Asleep At the Wheel Featuring Lyle Lovett – ‘There You Go Again’
Blind Boys Of Alabama Featuring Black Violin – ‘The Message’
Bonnie Raitt – ‘Made Up Mind’
Brandi Carlile Featuring Lucius – ‘You And Me On The Rock’
Eric Alexandrakis – ‘Silver Moon [A Tribute to Michael Nesmith]’
Best American Roots Song
Anaïs Mitchell – ‘Bright Star’
Aoife O’Donovan & Allison Russell – ‘Prodigal Daughter’
Bonnie Raitt – ‘Just Like That’
Brandi Carlile Featuring Lucius – ‘You And Me On The Rock’
Robert Plant & Alison Krauss – ‘High And Lonesome’
Sheryl Crow – ‘Forever’
Best Americana Album
Bonnie Raitt – ‘Just Like That…’
Brandi Carlile – ‘In These Silent Days’
Dr. John – ‘Things Happen That Way’
Keb’ Mo’ – ‘Good To Be…’
Robert Plant & Alison Krauss – ‘Raise The Roof’
Best Bluegrass Album
The Del McCoury Band – ‘Almost Proud’
The Infamous Stringdusters – ‘Toward The Fray’
Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway – ‘Crooked Tree’
Peter Rowan – ‘Calling You From My Mountain’
Yonder Mountain String Band – ‘Get Yourself Outside’
Best Traditional Blues Album
Buddy Guy – ‘The Blues Don’t Lie’
Charlie Musselwhite – ‘Mississippi Son’
Gov’t Mule – ‘Heavy Load Blues’
John Mayall – ‘The Sun Is Shining Down’
Taj Mahal & Ry Cooder – ‘Get On Board’
Best Contemporary Blues Album
Ben Harper – ‘Bloodline Maintenance’
Edgar Winter – ‘Brother Johnny’
Eric Gales – ‘Crown’
North Mississippi Allstars – ‘Set Sail’
Shemekia Copeland – ‘Done Come Too Far’
Best Folk Album
Aoife O’Donovan – ‘Age Of Apathy’
Janis Ian – ‘The Light At The End Of The Line’
Judy Collins – ‘Spellbound’
Madison Cunningham – ‘Revealer’
Punch Brothers – ‘Hell On Church Street’
Best Regional Roots Music Album
Halau Hula Keali’i o Nalani – ‘Halau Hula Keali’i o Nalani (Live At The Getty Center)’
Natalie Ai Kamauu – ‘Natalie Noelani’
Nathan & The Zydeco Cha-Chas – ‘Lucky Man’
Ranky Tanky – ‘Live At The 2022 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival’
Sean Ardoin & Kreole Rock And Soul Featuring The Golden Band From Tigerland – ‘Full Circle’
Best Reggae Album
Kabaka Pyramid – ‘The Kalling’
Koffee – ‘Gifted’
Protoje – ‘Third Time’s The Charm’
Sean Paul – ‘Scorcha’
Shaggy – ‘Com Fly Wid Mi’
Best Global Music Performance
Arooj Aftab & Anoushka Shankar – ‘Udhero Na’
Burna Boy – ‘Last Last’
Matt B & Eddy Kenzo – ‘Gimme Love’
Rocky Dawuni Featuring Blvk H3ro – ‘Neva Bow Down’
Wouter Kellerman, Zakes Bantwini & Nomcebo Zikode – ‘Bayethe’
Best Global Music Album
Angélique Kidjo & Ibrahim Maalouf – ‘Queen Of Sheba’
Anoushka Shankar, Metropole Orkest & Jules Buckley Featuring Manu Delago – ‘Between Us… (Live)’
Berklee Indian Ensemble – ‘Shuruaat’
Burna Boy – ‘Love, Damini’
Masa Takumi – ‘Sakura’
Best Children’s Music Album
Alphabet Rockers – ‘The Movement’
Divinity Roxx – ‘Ready Set Go!’
Justin Roberts – ‘Space Cadet’
Lucky Diaz And The Family Jam Band – ‘Los Fabulosos’
Wendy And DB – ‘Into The Little Blue House’
Best Audio Book, Narration, And Storytelling Recording
Jamie Foxx – Act Like You Got Some Sense
Lin-Manuel Miranda – Aristotle And Dante Dive Into The Waters Of The World
Mel Brooks – All About Me!: My Remarkable Life In Show Business
Questlove – Music Is History
Viola Davis – Finding Me
Best Spoken Word Poetry Album
Amanda Gorman – Call Us What We Carry: Poems
Amir Sulaiman – You Will Be Someone’s Ancestor. Act Accordingly.
Ethelbert Miller – Black Men Are Precious
J. Ivy – The Poet Who Sat by the Door
Malcolm-Jamal Warner – Hiding In Plain View
Best Comedy Album
Dave Chappelle – ‘The Closer’
Jim Gaffigan – ‘Comedy Monster’
Louis C.K. – ‘Sorry’
Patton Oswalt – ‘We All Scream’
Randy Rainbow – ‘A Little Brains, A Little Talent’
Best Musical Theatre Album
Original Broadway Cast – ‘A Strange Loop’
New Broadway Cast – ‘Caroline, Or Change’
‘Into the Woods’ 2022 Broadway Cast – ‘Into the Woods (2022 Broadway Cast Recording)’
Original Broadway Cast – ‘MJ The Musical’
‘Mr. Saturday Night’ Original Cast – ‘Mr. Saturday Night’
Original Broadway Cast – ‘Six: Live On Opening Night’
Best Compilation Soundtrack For Visual Media
Various Artists – Elvis
Various Artists – Encanto
Various Artists – Stranger Things: Soundtrack From The Netflix Series, Season 4
Lorne Balfe, Harold Faltermeyer, Lady Gaga & Hans Zimmer – Top Gun: Maverick
Various Artists – West Side Story
Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media (Includes Film and Television)
Germaine Franco – Encanto
Hans Zimmer – No Time To Die
Jonny Greenwood – The Power Of The Dog
Michael Giacchino – The Batman
Nicholas Britell – Succession: Season 3
Best Score Soundtrack For Video Games And Other Interactive Media
Austin Wintory – Aliens: Fireteam Elite
Bear McCreary – Call Of Duty: Vanguard
Christopher Tin – Old World
Richard Jacques – Marvel’s Guardians Of The Galaxy
Stephanie Economou – Assassin’s Creed Valhalla: Dawn Of Ragnarök
Best Song Written For Visual Media
Beyoncé – ‘Be Alive
Carolina Gaitán – La Gaita, Mauro Castillo, Adassa, Rhenzy Feliz, Diane Guerrero, Stephanie Beatriz & Encanto – Cast – ‘We Don’t Talk About Bruno’
Jessy Wilson Featuring Angélique Kidjo – ‘Keep Rising (The Woman King)’
Lady Gaga – ‘Hold My Hand’
Taylor Swift – ‘Carolina’
4*Town, Jordan Fisher, Finneas O’Connell, Josh Levi, Topher Ngo & Grayson Villanueva – ‘Nobody Like U’
Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella
Armand Hutton Featuring Terrell Hunt & Just 6 – ‘As Days Go By (An Arrangement of the Family Matters Theme Song)’
Danny Elfman – ‘Main Titles’
Kings Return – ‘How Deep Is Your Love’
Magnus Lindgren, John Beasley & The SWR Big Band Featuring Martin Auer -‘Scrapple From The Apple’
Remy Le Boeuf – ‘Minnesota, WI’
Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals
Becca Stevens & Attacca Quartet – ‘2 + 2 = 5 (Arr. Nathan Schram)’
Cécile McLorin Salvant – ‘Optimistic Voices / No Love Dying’
Christine McVie – ‘Songbird (Orchestral Version)’
Jacob Collier Featuring Lizzy McAlpine & John Mayer – ‘Never Gonna Be Alone’
Louis Cole – ‘Let It Happen’
Best Recording Package
Fann – ‘Telos’
Soporus – ‘Divers’
Spiritualized – ‘Everything Was Beautiful’
Tamsui-Kavalan Chinese Orchestra – ‘Beginningless Beginning’
Underoath – ‘Voyeurist’
Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package
Black Pumas – ‘Black Pumas (Collector’s Edition Box Set)’
Danny Elfman – ‘Big Mess’
The Grateful Dead – ‘In And Out Of The Garden: Madison Square Garden ’81, ’82, ’83’
They Might Be Giants – ‘Book’
Various Artists – ‘Artists Inspired By Music: Interscope Reimagined’
Best Album Notes
Andy Irvine & Paul Brady – ‘Andy Irvine / Paul Brady’
Astor Piazzolla – ‘The American Clavé Recordings’
Doc Watson – ‘Life’s Work: A Retrospective’
Harry Partch – ‘Harry Partch, 1942’
Wilco – ‘Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (20th Anniversary Super Deluxe Edition)’
Best Historical Album
Blondie – ‘Against the Odds: 1974 – 1982’
Doc Watson – ‘Life’s Work: A Retrospective’
Freestyle Fellowship – ‘To Whom It May Concern…’
Glenn Gould – ‘The Goldberg Variations: The Complete Unreleased 1981 Studio Sessions’
Wilco – ‘Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (20th Anniversary Super Deluxe Edition)’
Songwriter of the Year, Non-Classical
Amy Allen
Laura Veltz
Nija Charles
The-Dream
Tobias Jesso Jr.
Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
Baynk – ‘Adolescence’
Father John Misty – ‘Chloë And The Next 20th Century’
Harry Styles – ‘Harry’s House’
Robert Glasper – ‘Black Radio III’
Wet Leg – ‘Wet Leg’
Producer of the Year, Non-Classical
Boi-1da
Dahi
Dan Auerbach
Dernst “D’Mile” Emile II
Jack Antonoff
Best Remixed Recording
Beyoncé – ‘Break My Soul (Terry Hunter Remix)’
Ellie Goulding – ‘Easy Lover (Four Tet Remix)’
The Knocks & Dragonette – ‘Slow Song (Paul Woolford Remix)’
Lizzo – ‘About Damn Time (Purple Disco Machine Remix)’
Wet Leg – ‘Too Late Now (Soulwax Remix)’
Best Immersive Audio Album
Anita Brevik, Nidarosdomens Jentekor & Trondheimsolistene – Tuvayhun – ‘Beatitudes For A Wounded World’
The Chainsmokers – ‘Memories…Do Not Open’
Christina Aguilera – ‘Aguilera’
Jane Ira Bloom – ‘Picturing the Invisible: Focus 1’
Stewart Copeland & Ricky Kej – ‘Divine Tides’
Best Orchestral Performance
Berlin Philharmonic & John Williams – ‘John Williams: The Berlin Concert’
Los Angeles Philharmonic & Gustavo Dudamel – ‘Dvořák: Symphonies Nos. 7-9’
New York Youth Symphony – ‘Works by Florence Price, Jessie Montgomery, Valerie Coleman’
Various Artists – Sila: ‘The Breath Of The World’
Wild Up & Christopher Rountree – ‘Stay On It’
Best Opera Recording
Boston Modern Orchestra Project & Odyssey Opera Chorus – ‘Anthony Davis: X: The Life And Times Of Malcolm X’
The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra & The Metropolitan Opera Chorus – ‘Blanchard: Fire Shut Up In My Bones’
The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra & The Metropolitan Opera Chorus – ‘Eurydice’
Best Music Video
Adele – ‘Easy On Me’
BTS – ‘Yet To Come’
Doja Cat – ‘Woman’
Harry Styles – ‘As It Was’
Kendrick Lamar – ‘The Heart Part 5’
Taylor Swift – ‘All Too Well: The Short Film’
Best Music Film
Adele – Adele One Night Only
Billie Eilish – Billie Eilish Live At The O2
Justin Bieber – Our World
Neil Young & Crazy Horse – A Band A Brotherhood A Barn
Rosalía – Motomami (Rosalía TikTok Live Performance)
Various Artists – Jazz Fest: A New Orleans Story
Calvin Harris has shared his new single ‘Stay With Me’ featuring Justin Timberlake, Halsey and Pharrell Williams.
READ MORE: Calvin Harris live at Glastonbury 2022: Fans amplify the hit-fuelled Arcadia set
The funky disco track was teased by the superstar DJ last week and is set to feature on ‘Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 2’, his first album in five years.
The song, which you can listen to below, sees all three guest artists swapping vocals with Halsey picking up a section where she sings: “I’ve been waiting for you all year/ Come play, make a mess right here/ Do whatever, I like it weird/ Okay, let ’em disappear/ Say whatever you want to hear/ Just stay.”
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‘Stay With Me’ comes a couple of weeks on from ‘New Money’ featuring 21 Savage. Meanwhile, that track followed ‘Potion’ (feat. Dua Lipa and Young Thug), which was released in May.
‘Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 2’, which is the follow-up to 2017’s ‘Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 1‘, is set to drop on August 2 and will also feature Stefflon Don, Pusha T, Lil Durk, Offset, Coi Leray, Busta Rhymes, Donae’o, Latto, Swae Lee, Snoop Dogg, Chlöe, Shenseea, Tinashe, Normani, 6LACK and Jorja Smith.
Meanwhile, Harris is set to appear at this year’s Creamfields North 2022 alongside David Guetta, Fatboy Slim and CamelPhat over the August Bank Holiday weekend (August 25-28) in Daresbury, Cheshire.
Other names on the bill include Fatboy Slim, Martin Garrix, Bicep, Carl Cox and Becky Hill.
This year marks the 25th anniversary of the festival. The 2021 edition of Creamfields saw performances from The Chemical Brothers, Chase And Status and Tiesto.
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Meanwhile, Harris also recently performed at Glastonbury 2022. In her three-star review, NME‘s Erica Campbell noted that the crowd carried much of the energy, no thanks to Harris’ tunes “playing at such a low decibel they barely make it to fans who aren’t standing directly under [Arcadia’s] blaze”.
“Still, this is Glastonbury,” she continued, “and although there’s talk of the sound being ‘shite’, the high energy on the farm is palpable, and Harris’ audience is more than happy to amplify their singing and dancing to make up for any gaps in the volume.”
Chvrches have said that they have ideas about marking their decade as a band as well as how to celebrate 10 years of their 2013 debut, ‘The Bones Of What You Believe‘.
READ MORE: Chvrches at Mad Cool 2022 on karaoke bangers, Robert Smith and a decade together
The Scottish trio were speaking to NME backstage at this year’s Mad Cool in Madrid, Spain. Chvrches played the first day of the festival yesterday (July 7) and in the NME video interview talked about their anniversary, working with The Cure‘s Robert Smith and more.
When asked if fans can expect more music from the band soon following the release of their fourth record, ‘Screen Violence‘, last August, lead singer Lauren Mayberry said: “Not at present! We’re touring a bunch and doing mostly that for the rest of the year, and then who knows? I think we’ll figure that out as we get to it.
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“It’s weird, I thought you were going to say ‘10 years’ because everyone keeps talking about how it’s 10 years since the band started and next year will be 10 years since the first record, which feels kind of mental. It’s a nice time to take stock of things and figure out where we want to go.”
Chvrches at Mad Cool 2022. Credit: Andy Ford for NME
Asked if they have any plans in place to mark their decade milestone, Mayberry said: “We talk about it in the pub. We haven’t put anything into action yet.”
Synth player and singer Martin Doherty added: “Someone needs to ask us to do stuff, like for promoters to say, ‘Do you want to come and play this album?’ I’ll say yes as long as people don’t think that’s us out to pasture!
“I hate it when bands are like, ‘Oh, we can only play this old album now because we’re no longer relevant.’ I don’t want to fall into that trap.”
Mayberry added: “You could do it as part of regular touring but with specific shows for that. We just need to figure it out.”
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Meanwhile, Chvrches recently teamed up with handmade FX pedals company Old Blood Noise to release an effects pedal.
The ‘Screen Violence’ pedal is inspired by the band’s acclaimed 2021 album of the same name, and was released in May.
The FX pedal features a one-knob effect that expresses itself as modulation, delay and reverb and according to a statement “blends inspiration from decades past and present to create a new stereo effect.”
The first 200 pedals purchased come with a signed card of authenticity (buy here).
Jack Harlow, Lizzo and Chance The Rapper are among those set to perform at this year’s BET Awards ceremony, with the event’s full roster – sporting 27 performers and 25 presenters – being finalised yesterday (June 24).
READ MORE: The BET Awards 2021: the big talking points, from Cardi B’s bump to a poignant DMX tribute
10 of those performers will appear as part of a tribute to Sean “Diddy” Combs, who will receive this year’s BET Lifetime Achievement Award. In addition to Combs himself, the special performance will feature Mary J. Blige, Nas, Lil’ Kim, Busta Rhymes, Jodeci and more.
A total of 15 artists will perform songs on the ceremony’s mainstage, including 11-time BET Award winner Lil Wayne, five-time winner Kirk Franklin (whose performance will be a joint effort with Maverick City Music), and one-time winners Givēon and Roddy Ricch. Latto, Joey Bada$$, Babyface and Fireboy DML are also featured, with the line-up rounded out by Chlöe, Doechii, Ella Mai and Muni Long.
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GoGo Morrow and OGI will perform on the BET Amplified Stage, which highlights up-and-coming artists.
Meanwhile, the roster of presents includes a litany of Black icons in modern pop-culture, such as Daniel Kaluuya, Idris Elba, Janelle Monáe, Keke Palmer, Ray J and Ne-Yo. Taraji P. Henson will host the show – which airs live on BET at 8pm ET tomorrow (June 26) – for the second year in a row.
The event be simulcast on eight additional stations in the US – BET Her, Comedy Central, Logo, MTV, MTV2, Pop, TV Land and VH1 – and internationally on BET Africa, BET France and BET Pluto (for the UK and Brazil). UK viewers will also be able to tune in on My5 and Sky On-Demand.
Doja Cat leads the nominations for the 2022 BET Awards, earning nods for six trophies. She’s tailed by Ari Lennox and Drake, who have four nominations each, while 11 artists – including performers Chlöe and Mary J. Blige – have three nominations each. The other nine to rack up a trio nods are Baby Keem, Silk Sonic, Future, Kanye West, H.E.R, Jazmine Sullivan, Kendrick Lamar, Tems and Lil Baby. See the full list of nominees here.
The mainstage performers at the 2022 BET Awards are:
Babyface
Chance The Rapper
Chlöe
Doechii
Ella Mai
Fireboy DML
Givēon
Jack Harlow
Joey Bada$$
Maverick City Music / Kirk Franklin
Latto
Lil Wayne
Lizzo
Muni Long
Roddy Ricch
The performers for Sean “Diddy” Combs tribute’ are:
Mary J. Blige
Sean “Diddy” Combs
Jodeci
Nas
Lil’ Kim
Busta Rhymes
The Lox
Bryson Tiller
Faith Evans
The Maverick City Choir
The performers for the BET Amplified Stage are:
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GoGo Morrow
OGI
The hosts and presenters are:
Big Freedia
Bleu
Carl Anthony Payne II
Crystal Hayslett
Daniel Kaluuya
Ebony Obsidian
Eva Marcille
Idris Elba
Irv Gotti
Janelle Monáe
Keke Palmer
KJ Smith
Luke James
Marsai Martin
Mignon
Nene Leakes
Ne-Yo
Novi Brown
Ray J
Sanaa Lathan
Serayah
Tamar Braxton
Terrence J
Tisha Campbell
Will Packer
A$AP Rocky has been booked to headline Poland’s Open’er Festival 2022, joining the previously announced top-billers The Killers.
READ MORE: 20 festivals to look forward to in 2022
The rapper joins dozens of acts already announced for the festival held at Gdynia-Kosakowo airport from June 29 until July 2.
Dua Lipa, Doja Cat, Imagine Dragons, Twenty One Pilots, Playboi Carti, Martin Garrix, The Chemical Brothers, Måneskin, Megan Thee Stallion, Glass Animals, Gunna, Clairo, Tove Lo, Little Simz, Jessie Ware, Royal Blood, Years And Years, The Smile and Michael Kiwanuka are all playing the festival.
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A$AP Rocky is the second headliner of the festival’s first night on the Wednesday (June 29) on the Orange Main Stage. Imagine Dragons also headline the first night.
The Killers previously headlined the 2020 edition of the Polish festival and will close out this year’s festival on July 2.
A$AP Rocky. CREDIT: Press
Open’er Festival is operating in solidarity with Ukraine and says it “will be a place of support for Ukrainians facing the barbaric Russian aggression of their country”.
A special initiative “Wspierajmy Ukrainę na koncertach / Support Ukraine at concerts” will take place during the festival to help the actions of Polish Center For International Aid. Find more information here.
Four-day tickets are priced at €150 (£126), while four-day tickets with camping cost €175 (£147). Two-day tickets cost €105 (£88), but with camping are priced at €125 (£105). One-day tickets cost €75 (£63).
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Some tickets remain on sale while the promotional tickets stock lasts. Find any available ones here.
In other news, A$AP Rocky recently weighed in on the row between Chris Rock and Will Smith at this year’s Oscars ceremony, where after Rock made a joke about Smith’s wife Jada Pinkett Smith being bald, Smith walked up to the stage and slapped Rock.
The rapper said: “I think it’s unfortunate that he emasculated another Black man in front of all them people like that.”
On April 2, 1968, Rudy ‘?’ Martinez was one of three men picked up by Michigan state police in a lay-by near the Zilwaukee Bridge, not far from his home town of Saginaw, the trio arrested for possession of “several tubes of glue and brown bags containing glue”. In the wrong place at the wrong time with very much the wrong drugs, the perma-shaded ? And The Mysterians singer thus found himself about as far from the psychedelic action as he could have been, an improbable local success story recast as something of a laughing stock.
ORDER NOW: Queen is on the cover of the latest issue of Uncut
Naive, sci-fi crazy, Mexican-American youngsters from a blue-collar backwater two hours’ drive from Detroit, ? And The Mysterians contrived to record the second-biggest-selling US single of 1966 (outsold only by The Mamas & The Papas’ “California Dreamin’”) in a basic studio in Bay City, Michigan. A wounded rant with a killer keyboard sound, “96 Tears” sold a million, but the two albums the band released – now back on vinyl after a long spell in legal limbo – went largely unnoticed, with mismanagement, racism and more goings-on elsewhere helping to seal the band’s fate as a one-hit wonder. As ? whoops presciently on the debut album’s “Ten O’Clock”: “You miss your train, now your name’s erased”.
However, for lovers of garage rock – the genre post-rationalised into existence following Lenny Kaye’s 1972 compilation of overlooked small-time 7” singles, Nuggets – ? And The Mysterians’ underachievement remains heroic. These crystal-clear new versions of 96 Tears (1966) and Action (1967) show a band impervious to the psychedelic winds of change, persisting in playing lascivious, Brit-style R&B at teenage velocity, in blissful ignorance of anything The Beatles, The Rolling Stones – or indeed anyone else – had done since 1965.
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Once a covers band, ? And The Mysterians hit on a neat gimmick when ? renounced his birth name, but seemed fated to go nowhere, their first attempts at recording vanishing after the studio owner was murdered in Detroit. They got a second chance, with “96 Tears” going viral after receiving a limited release on the tiny Pa-Go-Go label, becoming a hit in Saginaw, then Flint, then Detroit, before a deal with the Cameo-Parkway label helped propel it to the national No 1 spot in October 1966.
With future Casablanca disco mogul Neil Bogart whipping them on, the Mysterians recorded two albums in the space of six months, guitarist Bobby Balderrama and 15-year-old Vox Continental wizard Frankie Rodriguez providing tunes for their hyperactive frontman to adorn with campy yelps and rather less subtle come-ons. Quite how
no-one at the relatively strait-laced Cameo-Parkway noticed him muttering “girl, you masturbate me” on Action’s fuzztoned calling card “Girl (You Fascinate Me)” is anyone’s guess.
If they were young and a little unsubtle, ? And The Mysterians were not the musical lightweights some latter-day fans would perhaps like them to be. Frankie Gonzalez’s sly drop of a passage of “Mary Had A Little Lamb” into “I Need Somebody” – the opening track from the debut album – is evidence of a band that knew their history. Fellow Saginaw keyboard king Stevie Wonder slipped a bit of the same tune (on harmonica) into his 1963 No 1 “Fingertips”.
The instrumental “Set Aside” and “Midnight Hour” show that the Mysterians had jazz and blues chops too, but if they aspire to the alpha-male thud of the Spencer Davis Group’s“Keep On Running” on “Don’t Break This Heart Of Mine”, ?’s Prince-pitched vocals subtly queer their pitch. He comes on like a repentant Little Richard on a take of “Stormy Monday” – the only cover on 96 Tears – and plays the wounded innocent superbly on the featherweight “Why Me”, a wet lettuce approximation of Love’s “My Little Red Book”.
Producer Bogart perhaps recognised this appealing androgyny in ? when he forced the soppy “Can’t Get Enough Of You Baby” (previously recorded by “A Lover’s Concerto” hitmakers The Toys) on to the band for Action. The hackneyed attempt to graft the keyboard line from “96 Tears” on to this potential comeback hit sounded clueless to the teenaged Balderrama (see interview), but ?’s slightly mocking delivery suggests he may be in on a joke somewhere.
Toughened up by an intense bout of touring, the Mysterians essay the streetwalking cheetah bit rather more convincingly on Action. Groovy, laidback and nasty, “Smokes” does the Muddy Waters “I’m A Man” bit as ? scowls: “I don’t care if you’re blue or red/I’ll take you any time anywhere in the night”. The fade-out to the hard-edged “It’s Not Easy” is similarly lusty, the singer promising: “I got kisses and I can hug you and I can… I said I can…” Meanwhile, the jaunty “Don’t Hold It Against Me” is a gaslighter’s excuse for infidelity on the lines of Shaggy’s “It Wasn’t Me”, ? sorry/not sorry as he keens “you were gone and she was there”.
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If the Mysterians can pass as leathery road warriors, ?’s hard-man act continues to mask a more delicious ambiguity. In the intro to “Girl (You Captivate Me)”, he has a strange premonition of Patti Smith as he intones, “Dark alleys and streetlights I’d walk a lonely sleepless night/The shadows were all I had until you came into my life”, a knowing wink – perhaps – to a love that might have been wary of speaking its name in Saginaw. Elsewhere, he delights in tossing off romantic cheese like “Just Like A Rose” and high-kicks his way through the Isley Brothers’ “Shout” while the “la la la”s of his own “I’ll Be Back” show that he may have missed his true calling as a Ronette.
However, as a commercial proposition, ? And The Mysterians were not about to be anyone’s baby. Even at the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, the colour of their skin probably closed doors for them, and ?’s eccentricity perhaps did not help (he was liable to tell interviewers that he was from Mars, and had been walking the earth since the time of the dinosaurs).
Cameo-Parkway kept vainly chasing another hit, the band putting out further doomed singles plus would-be novelty hits as the Fun Sons and the Semi-Colons? for the label, which went bust in September 1967. Beatles lawyer Allen Klein picked up ? And The Mysterians’ back catalogue in the subsequent fire sale, but his ABKCO label blocked any large-scale reissues until relatively recently. Meanwhile, the band barely survived into the 1970s; Capitol put out a one-off single, “Make You Mine”, in 1968, but a third album – recorded for Ray Charles’ Tangerine label – remains unreleased.
“96 Tears” fared pretty well without them, though. Recorded by Aretha Franklin, Eddie & The Hot Rods and Suicide among others, it provided minor hits for Big Maybelle, The Stranglers and Thelma Houston, as well as the “I’ve got 96 tears in 96 eyes” hook for The Cramps’ ’50s slasher “Human Fly”. ? And The Mysterians’ two LPs don’t quite live up to that improbable hit, but they at least highlight the subtle musical smarts and off-stage drama integral to a story where the sweet smell of success gives way to the disorienting fog of solvents. Read between the lines and you’ve got a novel.
The Lathums have today (April 15) shared a soaring new single called ‘Sad Face Baby’ – check it out below.
READ MORE: The Lathums live in Manchester: the latest landmark in an incredible year
Performed for the first time last summer, the track is the first new music release for the band this year and features the work of their new producer, Jim Abbiss (Adele, Arctic Monkeys, Bombay Bicycle Club).
Reflecting on ‘Sad Face Baby’ and the last two years of the band, frontman Alex Moore said: “The Lathums has been a world of opportunity for us, but things still get to you.
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“We have had to come to understand each other more and the ways the world works around us. Naivety and innocence have been lost and ‘Sad Face Baby’ is the sharper edge of what we can do as a band.”
The band are about to begin a short headline spring tour ahead of a long run of dates that will see them support The Killers on their European arena tour, as well as performing at festivals including TRNSMT, Neighbourhood, Reading and Leeds and Boardmasters.
Check out the dates of their tour below and buy tickets here.
APRIL
23 – Galway, Ireland, Roisin Dubh 24 – Limerick, Ireland, Dolans 25 – Dublin, Ireland, The Academy 27 – Belfast, Limelight 1 30 – Liverpool, Sound City
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Reviewing their debut album, NME said: “While the initial rise of The Lathums has already drawn comparisons with the Arctic Monkeys, this record is very much steeped in the jangly sound of The Smiths and The Housemartins: jaunty guitars and anthems with swelling festival crowds in mind.
“…Yet while The Lathums may crib from their working class heroes, they don’t solely rely on them. Defiant standout track ‘Fight On’ – which has become a staple anthem in their live set – shows the strength of Moore’s own ability to write a tune. The element of personal loss that runs through the heartbreaking ‘I’ll Never Forget The Time I Spent With You’ and ska-spitting ‘I See Your Ghost’ shows Moore has his own trauma to tell, even if he is doing so reluctantly.”
Joni Mitchell has delivered her first public performance in nine years, taking to the stage at MusiCares’ 2022 Person of the Year benefit gala.
Mitchell was bestowed with this year’s titular honour on Friday night (April 1), following in the footsteps of previous recipients Aerosmith (who were celebrated with the title in 2020) and Dolly Parton (in 2019).
Mitchell was not announced to be performing at the event, but joined the likes of Beck, Brandi Carlile, Cyndi Lauper, Stephen Stills, Jon Batiste and more to sing her 1970 classics ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ and ‘The Circle Game’.
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It marked her first time singing in public since June 2013, when she performed two short, impromptu sets at events being held in her honour, where she was initially booked to recite poetry. Prior to those, her last performance took place in 2002, with Mitchell having retired from touring altogether in 2000.
Watch Mitchell singing ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ at the MusiCares gala below:
At other points during the event, which took place at the Marquee Ballroom in Las Vegas, Mitchell was honoured with a sprawling roster of tributes.
Among them were a cover of ‘The Jungle Line’ (from Mitchell’s 1975 album ‘The Hissing Of Summer Lawns’) performed by Beck, St. Vincent’s rendition of ‘Court And Spark’ (from the 1974 album of the same name) and a take on ‘River’ (from 1971’s ‘Blue’) by John Legend.
Other covers performed included Mickey Guyton’s rendition of ‘For Free’, Herbie Hancock and Terrace Martin’s take on ‘Hejira’, a performance of ‘Help Me’ by Dave Grohl’s 15-year-old daughter Violet, Billy Porter’s spin on ‘Both Sides Now’, and ‘Woodstock’ by Carlile and Stills. Carlile also served as one of the night’s artistic directors, alongside Batiste.
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“When I heard that Joni was named Person of the Year, I knew I wanted to be involved in a meaningful way,” Batiste said in his opening speech. “Brandi and I worked with the producers to paint a beautiful picture of poetry and music through Joni’s eyes.”
Mitchell has largely kept out of the public eye since 2015, when she suffered a brain aneurysm that left her temporarily unable to walk or talk. She’s been making more appearances lately, though: the iconic singer-songwriter gave a speech at last year’s Kennedy Center Honors, where she received a lifetime achievement award, and presented Carlile’s performance at the 2022 Grammys last night (April 3).
Mitchell herself won the Grammy for Best Historical Album, taking out the award for her five-disc boxset ‘Joni Mitchell Archives – Vol. 1: The Early Years (1963–1967)’. The effort compiles rarities from the years preceding the release of Mitchell’s debut album, 1968’s ‘Song To A Seagull’, including various live bootlegs, radio sessions, jams and demo tapes.
In January, Mitchell declared her support for Neil Young’s battle against Spotify, removing her discography from the streaming platform in protest of it platforming misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine.
Last month, she gave her stamp of approval to the title of Harry Styles‘ recently-announced third solo album, ‘Harry’s House’. Mitchell included a song called ‘Harry’s House/Centerpiece’ on her 1975 album ‘The Hissing Of Summer Lawns’. Shortly after Styles announced the album on Twitter, she retweeted his post, writing that she “love[s] the title”.
The Grammys 2022 takes place tonight (April 3) in Las Vegas, with performances from the likes of Silk Sonic, BTS, Lady Gaga, Olivia Rodrigo and more lined up.
The main bulk of the awards will be handed out at the pre-telecast ceremony, which will be broadcast on the Grammys website and YouTube channel.
Then, at 8pm EST (1am BST), the main ceremony will air and hand out the biggest trophies of the night, including Record Of The Year, Song Of The Year, Album Of The Year and Best New Artist.
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Going into the event, Jon Batiste leads the nominations with 11 nods, while Justin Bieber follows on eight. Doja Cat, Rodrigo, and Billie Eilish all have seven nominations each.
Jon Batiste CREDIT: Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
A tribute to Foo Fighters’ drummer Taylor Hawkins will also be staged following the iconic musician’s death last week (March 25). Foo Fighters were scheduled to perform at the ceremony, but have since pulled out, as well as cancelling their planned touring schedule.
The full list of nominees for the Grammys 2022 is below – winners will be highlighted in bold as they are announced.
Record of the Year
ABBA – ‘I Still Have Faith In You’
Jon Batiste – ‘Freedom’
Tony Bennett, Lady Gaga – ‘I Get A Kick Out of You’
Justin Bieber, Daniel Cesar, Giveon – ‘Peaches’
Brandi Carlile – ‘Right on Time’
Doja Cat, SZA – ‘Kiss Me More’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever’
Lil Nas X – ‘Montero (Call Me By Your Name)’
Olivia Rodrigo – ‘Drivers License’
Silk Sonic – ‘Leave The Door Open’
Album of the Year
Jon Batiste – ‘We Are’
Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga – ‘Love For Sale’
Justin Bieber – ‘Justice (Triple Chucks Deluxe)’
Doja Cat – ‘Planet Her (Deluxe)’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever’
Olivia Rodrigo – ‘Sour’
Lil Nas X – ‘Montero’
H.E.R. – ‘Back Of My Mind’
Kanye West – ‘Donda’
Taylor Swift – ‘Evermore’
Song of the Year
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Ed Sheeran – ‘Bad Habits’
Alicia Keys, Brandi Carlile – ‘A Beautiful Noise’
Olivia Rodrigo – ‘Drivers License’
H.E.R. – ‘Fight For You’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever’
Doja Cat, SZA – ‘Kiss Me More’
Silk Sonic – ‘Leave The Door Open’
Lil Nas X – ‘Montero (Call Me by Your Name)’
Justin Bieber, Daniel Cesar, Giveon – ‘Peaches’
Brandi Carlile – ‘Right On Time’
Best New Artist
Arooj Aftab
Jimmie Allen
Baby Keem
Finneas
Glass Animals
Japanese Breakfast
The Kid Laroi
Arlo Parks
Olivia Rodrigo
Saweetie
Best Pop Solo Performance
Justin Bieber – ‘Anyone’
Brandi Carlile – ‘Right On Time’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever’
Ariana Grande – ‘Positions’
Olivia Rodrigo – ‘Drivers License’
Best Pop Duo/Group Performance
Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga – ‘I Get A Kick Out Of You’
Justin Bieber & Benny Blanco – ‘Lonely’
BTS – ‘Butter’
Coldplay – ‘Higher Power’
Doja Cat Featuring SZA – ‘Kiss Me More’
Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album
Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga – ‘Love For Sale’
Norah Jones – ’Til We Meet Again (Live)’
Tori Kelly – ‘A Tori Kelly Christmas’
Ledisi – ‘Ledisi Sings Nina’
Willie Nelson – ‘That’s Life’
Dolly Parton – ‘A Holly Dolly Christmas’
Best Pop Vocal Album
Justin Bieber – ‘Justice (Triple Chucks Deluxe)’
Doja Cat – ‘Planet Her (Deluxe)’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever’
Ariana Grande – ‘Positions’
Olivia Rodrigo – ‘Sour’
Best Rock Performance
AC/DC – ‘Shot In The Dark’
Black Pumas – ‘Know You Better (Live From Capitol Studio A)’
Chris Cornell – ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’
Deftones – ‘Ohms’
Foo Fighters – ‘Making A Fire’
Best Metal Performance
Deftones – ‘Genesis’
Dream Theater – ‘The Alien’
Gojira – ‘Amazonia’
Mastodon – ‘Pushing The Tides’
Rob Zombie – ‘The Triumph Of King Freak (A Crypt Of Preservation And Superstition)’
Olivia Rodrigo. Credit: Kevin Winter/Getty Images for MRC
Best Rock Song
Rivers Cuomo, Ashley Gorley, Ben Johnson & Ilsey Juber – ‘All My Favourite Songs’ (Weezer)
Caleb Followill, Jared Followill, Matthew Followill & Nathan Followill – ‘The Bandit’ (Kings Of Leon)
Wolfgang Van Halen – ‘Distance’ (Mammoth WVH)
Paul McCartney – ‘Find My Way’
Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins, Rami Jaffee, Nate Mendel, Chris Shiflett & Pat Smear – ‘Waiting On A War’ (Foo Fighters)
Best Rock Album
AC/DC – ‘Power Up’
Black Pumas – ‘Capitol Cuts – Live From Studio A’
Chris Cornell – ‘No One Sings Like You Anymore Vol. 1’
Foo Fighters – ‘Medicine At Midnight’
Paul McCartney – ‘McCartney III’
Best Dance/Electronic Recording
Afrojack & David Guetta – ‘Hero’
Ólafur Arnalds, Bonobo – ‘Loom’
James Blake – ‘Before’
Bonobo, Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs – ‘Heartbreak’
Caribou – ‘You Can Do It’ Rüfüs du Sol – ‘Alive’ – winner
Tiësto – ‘The Business’
Best Dance/Electronic Music Album
Black Coffee – Subconsciously’ – winner
ILLENIUM – ‘Fallen Numbers’
Major Lazer – ‘Music Is The Weapon (Reloaded)’
Marshmello – ‘Shockwave’
Sylvan Esso – ‘Free Love’
Ten City – ‘Judgement’
Best Alternative Music Album
Fleet Foxes – ‘Shore’
Halsey – ‘If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power’
Japanese Breakfast – ‘Jubilee’
Arlo Parks – ‘Collapsed In Sunbeams’
St. Vincent – ‘Daddy’s Home’
Best R&B Performance
Snoh Aalegra – ‘Lost You’
Justin Bieber, Daniel Cesar, Giveon – ‘Peaches’
H.E.R. – ‘Damage’
Silk Sonic – ‘Leave the Door Open’
Jazmine Sullivan – ‘Pick Up Your Feelings’
Best Progressive R&B Album
Eric Bellinger – ‘New Light’
Cory Henry – ‘Something To Say’
Hiatus Kaiyote – ‘Mood Valiant’
Lucky Daye – ‘Table For Two’
Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper, 9th Wonder & Kamasi Washington – ‘Dinner Party: Dessert’
Masego – ‘Studying Abroad: Extended Stay’
Best Traditional R&B Performance
Jon Batiste – ‘I Need You’
BJ The Chicago Kid, PJ Morton & Kenyon Dixon Featuring Charlie Bereal – ‘Bring It On Home To Me’
Leon Bridges Featuring Robert Glasper – ‘Born Again’
H.E.R. – ‘Fight For You’
Lucky Daye Featuring Yebba – ‘How Much Can A Heart Take’
Best R&B Song
Anthony Clemons Jr., Jeff Gitelman, H.E.R., Carl McCormick & Tiara Thomas – ‘Damage’ (H.E.R.)
Jacob Collier, Carter Lang, Carlos Munoz, Solána Rowe & Christopher Ruelas – ‘Good Days’ (SZA)
Giveon Evans, Maneesh, Sevn Thomas & Varren Wade – ‘Heartbreak Anniversary’ (Giveon)
Denisia “Blue June” Andrews, Audra Mae Butts, Kyle Coleman, Brittany “Chi” Coney, Michael Holmes & Jazmine Sullivan – ‘Pick Up Your Feelings’ (Jazmine Sullivan)
Best R&B Album
Snoh Aalegra – ‘Temporary Highs In The Violet Skies’
Jon Batiste – ‘We Are’
Leon Bridges – ‘Gold-Diggers Sound’
H.E.R. – ‘Back Of My Mind’
Jazmine Sullivan – ‘Heaux Tales’
Justin Bieber performs at the Beverly Hilton on New Year’s Eve 2020. CREDIT: Jeff Kravitz/Getty Images
Best Traditional R&B Performance
Jon Batiste – ‘I Need You’
BJ the Chicago Kid, PJ Morton, Kenyon Dixon, Charlie Bereal – ‘Bring It On Home’
Leon Bridges, Robert Glasper – ‘Born Again’
H.E.R. – ‘Fight for You’
Lucky Dave, Yebba – ‘How Much Can A Heart Take’
Best Rap Performance
Baby Keem, Kendrick Lamar – ‘Family Ties’
Cardi B – ‘Up’
J. Cole, 21 Savage & Morray – ’My Life’
Drake, Future, Young Thug – ‘Way Too Sexy’
Megan Thee Stallion – ‘Thot Shit’
Best Rap Album
J. Cole – ‘The Off-Season’
Drake – ‘Certified Lover Boy’
Nas – ‘King’s Disease 2’
Tyler, the Creator – ‘Call Me If You Get Lost’
Kanye West – ‘Donda’
Best Melodic Rap Performance
J. Cole, Lil Baby – ‘Pride Is The Devil’
Doja Cat – ‘Need to Know’
Lil Nas X, Jack Harlow – ‘Industry Baby’
Tyler, the Creator Featuring YoungBoy Never Broke Again, Ty Dolla $ign – ‘WusYaName’
Kanye West, The Weekend, Lil Baby – ‘Hurricane’
Pablo Alborán – ‘Vértigo’
Paula Arenas – ‘Mis Amores’
Ricardo Arjona – ‘Hecho A La Antigua’
Camilo – ‘Mis Manos’
Alex Cuba – ‘Mendó’
Selena Gomez – ‘Revelación’
Best American Roots Performance
Jon Batiste – ‘Cry’ – winner
Billy Strings – ‘Love and Regret’
The Blind Boys of Alabama and Bela Fleck – ‘I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to be Free’
Brandy Clark Featuring Brandi Carlile – ‘Same Devil’
Allison Russell – ‘Nightflyer’
Best American Roots Song
Rhiannon Giddens, Francesco Turrisi – ‘Avalon’
Valerie June Featuring Carla Thomas – ‘Call Me A Fool’ Jon Batiste – ‘Cry’ – winner
Yola – ‘Diamond Studded Shoes’
Allison Russell – ‘Nightflyer’
Best Americana Album
Jackson Browne – ‘Downhill From Everywhere’
John Hiatt with the Jerry Douglas Band – ‘Leftover Feelings’ Los Lobos – ‘Native Sons’ – winner
Allison Russell – ‘Outside Child’
Yola – ‘Stand for Myself’
Best Bluegrass Album
Billy Strings – ‘Renewal’ Béla Fleck – ‘My Bluegrass Heart’ – winner
The Infamous Stringdusters – ‘A Tribute To Bill Monroe’
Sturgill Simpson – ‘Cuttin’ Grass Vol. 1 (Butcher Shoppe Sessions)’
Rhonda Vincent – ‘Music Is What I See’
Best Traditional Blues Album
Elvin Bishop and Charlie Musselwhite – ‘100 Years of Blues’
Blues Traveler – ‘Traveler’s Blues’ Cedric Burnside – ‘I Be Trying’ – winner
Guy Davis – ‘Be Ready When I Call You’
Kim Watson – ‘Take Me Back’
Doja Cat performing at Lollapalooza Brasil on March 25, 2022. Credit: Mauricio Santana/Getty Images.
Best Contemporary Blues Album
The Black Keys Featuring Eric Deaton and Kenny Brown – ‘Delta Kream’
Joe Bonamassa – ‘Royal Tea’
Shemekia Copeland – ‘Uncivil War’
Steve Cropper – ‘Fire It Up’ Christone “Kingfish” Ingram – ‘662’ – winner
Best Folk Album
Mary Chapin Carpenter – ‘One Night Lonely (Live)’
Tyler Childers – ‘Long Violent History’
Madison Cunningham – ‘Wednesday (Extended Edition)’ Rhiannon Giddens with Francesco Turrisi – ‘They’re Calling Me Home’ – winner
Sarah Jarosz – ‘Blue Heron Suite’
Best Regional Roots Music Album
Sean Ardoin and Kreole Rock and Soul – ‘Live In New Orleans!’
Big Chief Monk Boudreaux – ‘Bloodstains and Teardrops’
Chia Wa – ‘My People’
Corey Ledet Zydaco – ‘Corey Ledet Zydaco’ Kalani Pe’a – ‘Kau Ka Pe’a’ – winner
Best Reggae Album
Etana – ‘Pamoja’
Gramps Morgan – ‘Positive Vibration’
Sean Paul – ‘Live N Livin’
Jesse Royal – Royal Soja – ‘Beauty In the Silence’ – winner
Spice – ’10’
Best Global Music Album
Rocky Dawuni – ‘Voice of Bunbon Vol. 1.’
Daniel Ho & Friends – ‘East West Players Presents: Daniel Ho & Friends Live In Concert’ Angélique Kidjo – ‘Mother Nature’ – winner
Femi Kuti, Made Kuti – ‘Legacy +’
Wizkid – ‘Made in Lagos: Deluxe Edition’
Best New Age Album
Will Ackerman, Jeff Oster, Tom Eaton – ‘Brothers’ Stewart Copeland, Ricky Kej – ‘Divine Tides’ – winner
Wouter Kellerman, David Arkenstone – ‘Pangaea’
Opium Moon – ‘Night + Day’
Laura Sullivan – ‘Pieces of Forever’
Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
The Marías – ‘Cinema’
Yebba – ‘Dawn’
Low – ‘Hey What’
Tony Bennet, Lady Gaga – ‘Love For Sale’
Pino Palladino, Blake Mills – ‘Notes With Attachments’
Producer of the Year, Non-Classical
Jack Antonoff
Rogét Chahayed
Mike Elizondo
Hit-Boy
Ricky Reed
Best Remixed Recording
Soul II Soul – ‘Back to Life (Booka T Kings of Soul Satta Dub)’
Papa Roach – ‘Born for Greatness (Cymek Remix)’
K. D. Lang – ‘Constant Craving (Fashionably Late Remix)’
Zedd, Griff – ‘Inside Out (3Scape Drm Remix)’
Demi Lovato, Ariana Grande – ‘Met Him Last Night (Dave Audé Remix)’
Deftones – ‘Passenger (Mike Shinoda Remix)’
PVA – ‘Talks (Mura Masa Remix)’
Best Immersive Audio Album (63rd Grammy)
Stemmeklang – ‘Bolstad: Tomba Sonora’
Booka Shade – ‘Dear Future Self (Dolby Atmos Mixes)’
Tove Ramio-Ystad, Cantus – ‘Fryd’
Alain Mallet – ‘Mutt Slang II: A Wake of Sorrows Engulfed in Rage’ Jim R. Keene, the United States Army Field Band – ‘Soundtrack of the American Soldier’ – winner
Billie Eilish. Credit: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images
Best Immersive Audio Album
Alicia Keys – ‘Alicia’
Patricia Barber – ‘Clique’
Harry Styles – ‘Fine Line’
Steven Wilson – ‘The Future Bites’
Anne Karin Sundal-Ask, Det Norske Jentekor – ‘Stille Grender’
Best Engineered Album, Classical
Sérgio Assad, Clarice Assad, Third Coast Percussion – ‘Archetypes’
Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax – ‘Beethoven Cello Sonatas: Hope Amid Tears’
Manfred Honeck, Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra – ‘Beethoven Symphony No. 9’
Chanticleer – ‘Chanticleer Sings Christmas’
Gustavo Dudamel, Fernando Malvar-Ruiz, Luke McEndarfer, Robert Istad, Grant Gershon, Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, Los Angeles Master Chorale, National Children’s Chorus, Pacific Chorale, Los Angeles Philharmonic – ‘Mahler: Symphony No. 8, Symphony of a Thousand’
Best Contemporary Instrumental Album
Randy Brecker, Eric Marienthal – ‘Double Dealin’’
Rachel Eckroth – ‘The Garden’
Taylor Eigsti – ‘Tree Falls’
Steve Gadd Band – ‘At Blue Note Tokyo’
Mark Lettieri – ‘Deep: The Baritone Sessions, Vol. 2’
Best Country Solo Performance
Luke Combs – ‘Forever After All’
Mickey Guyton – ‘Remember Her Name’
Jason Isbell – ‘All I Do Is Drive’
Kacey Musgraves – ‘Camera Roll’ Chris Stapleton – ‘You Should Probably Leave’ – winner
Best Country Duo/Group Performance
Jason Aldean & Carrie Underwood – ‘If I Didn’t Love You’ Brothers Osborne – ‘Younger Me’ – winner
Dan + Shay – ‘Glad You Exist’
Ryan Hurd & Maren Morris – ‘Chasing After You’
Elle King & Miranda Lambert – ‘Drunk (And I Don’t Wanna Go Home)’
Best Country Song
Jessie Jo Dillon, Maren Morris, Jimmy Robbins & Laura Veltz – ‘Better Than We Found It’ (Maren Morris)
Ian Fitchuk, Kacey Musgraves & Daniel Tashian – ‘Camera Roll’ (Kacey Musgraves) Dave Cobb, J.T. Cure, Derek Mixon & Chris Stapleton – ‘Cold’ (Chris Stapleton) – winner
Zach Crowell, Ashley Gorley & Thomas Rhett – ‘Country Again’ (Thomas Rhett)
Cameron Bartolini, Walker Hayes, Josh Jenkins & Shane Stevens – ‘Fancy Like’ (Walker Hayes)
Mickey Guyton, Blake Hubbard, Jarrod Ingram & Parker Welling – ‘Remember Her Name’ (Mickey Guyton)
Best Country Album
Brothers Osborne – ‘Skeletons’
Mickey Guyton – ‘Remember Her Name’
Miranda Lambert, Jon Randall & Jack Ingram – ‘The Marfa Tapes’
Sturgill Simpson – ‘The Ballad Of Dood & Juanita’
Chris Stapleton – ‘Starting Over’
Best Improvised Jazz Solo
Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah – ‘Sackodougou’
Kenny Barron – ‘Kick Those Feet’
Jon Batiste – ‘Bigger Than Us’
Terence Blanchard – ‘Absence’ Chick Corea ‘Humpty Dumpty (Set 2)’ – winner
Best Jazz Vocal Album
The Baylor Project – ‘Generations’
Kurt Elling & Charlie Hunter – ‘SuperBlue’
Nnenna Freelon – ‘Time Traveller’
Gretchen Parlato – ‘Flor’
Esperanza Spalding – ‘Songwrights Apothecary Lab’
Best Jazz Instrumental Album
Jon Batiste – ‘Jazz Selections: Music From And Inspired By Soul’
Terence Blanchard Featuring The E Collective And The Turtle Island Quartet – ‘Absence’ Ron Carter, Jack DeJohnette & Gonzalo Rubalcaba – ‘Skyline’ – winner
Chick Corea, John Patitucci & Dave Weckl – ‘Akoustic Band LIVE’
Pat Metheny – ‘Side-Eye NYC (V1.IV)’
Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album
The Count Basie Orchestra Directed By Scotty Barnhart – ‘Live At Birdland!’
Jazzmeia Horn And Her Noble Force – ‘Dear Love’ Christian McBride Big Band – ‘For Jimmy, Wes And Oliver’ – winner
Sun Ra Arkestra – ‘Swirling’
Yellowjackets + WDR Big Band – ‘Jackets XL’
J Cole (Picture: Jeff Hahne/Getty Images)
Best Latin Jazz Album
Eliane Elias With Chick Corea and Chucho Valdés – ‘Mirror Mirror’ – winner
Carlos Henriquez – ‘The South Bronx Story’
Arturo O’Farrill & The Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra – ‘Virtual Birdland’
Dafnis Prieto Sextet – ‘Transparency’
Miguel Zenón & Luis Perdomo – ‘El Arte Del Bolero’
Best Gospel Performance/Song
Dante Bowe Featuring Steffany Gretzinger & Chandler Moore; Dante Bowe, Tywan Mack, Jeff Schneeweis & Mitch Wong – ‘Voice Of God’
Dante Bowe; Dante Bowe & Ben Schofield – ‘Joyful’
Anthony Brown & Group Therapy; Anthony Brown & Darryl Woodson – ‘Help’
CeCe Winans – ‘Never Lost’
Elevation Worship & Maverick City Music; Dante Bowe, Chris Brown, Steven Furtick, Tiffany Hudson, Brandon Lake & Chandler Moore – ‘Wait On You’
Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance/Song
Kirk Franklin & Lil Baby; Kirk Franklin, Dominique Jones, Cynthia Nunn & Justin Smith – ‘We Win’
H.E.R. & Tauren Wells; Josiah Bassey, Dernst Emile & H.E.R. – ‘Hold Us Together (Hope Mix)’
Chandler Moore & KJ Scriven; Jonathan Jay, Nathan Jess & Chandler Moore – ‘Man Of Your Word’
CeCe Winans; Dwan Hill, Kyle Lee, CeCe Winans & Mitch Wong – ‘Believe For It’
Elevation Worship & Maverick City Music Featuring Chandler Moore & Naomi Raine; Chris Brown, Steven Furtick, Chandler Moore & Naomi Raine – ‘Jireh’
Best Gospel Album
Jekalyn Carr – ‘Changing Your Story’
Tasha Cobbs Leonard – ‘Royalty: Live At The Ryman’
Maverick City Music – ‘Jubilee: Juneteenth Edition’
Jonathan McReynolds & Mali Music – ‘Jonny X Mali: Live In LA’
CeCe Winans – ‘Believe For It’
Best Contemporary Christian Music Album
Natalie Grant – ‘No Stranger’
Israel & New Breed – ‘Feels Like Home Vol. 2’
Kari Jobe – ‘The Blessing (Live)’
Tauren Wells – ‘Citizen Of Heaven (Live)’
Elevation Worship & Maverick City Music – ‘Old Church Basement’
Best Roots Gospel Album
Harry Connick, Jr. – ‘Alone With My Faith’
Gaither Vocal Band – ‘That’s Gospel, Brother’
Ernie Haase & Signature Sound – ‘Keeping On’
The Isaacs – ‘Songs For The Times’
Carrie Underwood – ‘My Savior’
Best Música Urbana Album
Rauw Alejandro – ‘Afrodisíaco’
Bad Bunny – ‘El Último Tour Del Mundo’
J Balvin – ‘Jose’
KAROL G – ‘KG0516’
Kali Uchis – ‘Sin Miedo (Del Amor Y Otros Demonios) 8’
Best Latin Rock or Alternative Album
Bomba Estéreo – ‘Deja’
Diamante Eléctrico – ‘Mira Lo Que Me Hiciste Hacer (Deluxe Edition)’
Juanes – ‘Origen’
Nathy Peluso – ‘Calambre’
C. Tangana – ‘El Madrileño’
Zoé – ‘Sonidos De Karmática Resonancia’
Best Regional Mexican Music Album (Including Tejano)
Aida Cuevas – ‘Antología De La Musica Ranchera, Vol. 2’
Vicente Fernández – ‘A Bis 80’s’
Mon Laferte – ‘Seis’
Natalia Lafourcade – ‘Un Canto Por México, Vol. II’
Christian Nodal – ‘Ayayay! (Súper Deluxe)’
Best Tropical Latin Album
Rubén Blades y Roberto Delgado & Orquesta – ‘Salswing!’
El Gran Combo De Puerto Rico – ‘En Cuarentena’
Aymée Nuviola – ‘Sin Salsa No Hay Paraíso’
Gilberto Santa Rosa – ‘Colegas’
Tony Succar – ‘Live In Peru’
123 Andrés – ‘Actívate’
1 Tribe Collective – ‘All One Tribe’
Pierce Freelon – ‘Black To The Future’
Falu – ‘A Colorful World’
Lucky Diaz And The Family Jam Band – ‘Crayon Kids’
Best Spoken Word Album
LeVar Burton – ‘Aftermath’
Don Cheadle – ‘Carry On: Reflections For A New Generation From John Lewis’
J. Ivy – ‘Catching Dreams: Live At Fort Knox Chicago’
Dave Chappelle & Amir Sulaiman – ‘8:46’
Barack Obama – ‘A Promised Land’
Best Comedy Album
Lavell Crawford – ‘The Comedy Vaccine’
Chelsea Handler – ‘Evolution’
Louis C.K. – ‘Sincerely Louis CK’
Lewis Black – ‘Thanks For Risking Your Life’
Nate Bargatze – ‘The Greatest Average American’
Kevin Hart – ‘Zero F***s Given’
Best Musical Theater Album
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Nick Lloyd Webber & Greg Wells, producers; Andrew Lloyd Webber & David Zippel, composers/lyricists – ‘Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella’ (Original Album Cast)
Burt Bacharach, Michael Croiter, Ben Hartman & Steven Sater, producers; Burt Bacharach, composer; Steven Sater – ‘Burt Bacharach and Steven Sater’s Some Lovers’ (World Premiere Cast)
Simon Hale, Conor McPherson & Dean Sharenow, producers (Bob Dylan, composer & lyricist) – ‘Girl From The North Country’ (Original Broadway Cast)
Cameron Mackintosh, Lee McCutcheon & Stephen Metcalfe, producers (Claude-Michel Schönberg, composer; Alain Boublil, John Caird, Herbert Kretzmer, Jean-Marc Natel & Trevor Nunn, lyricists) – ‘Les Misérables: The Staged Concert (The Sensational 2020 Live Recording)’
Daniel C. Levine, Michael J Moritz Jr, Bryan Perri & Stephen Schwartz, producers (Stephen Schwartz, composer & lyricist) – ‘Stephen Schwartz’s Snapshots’ (World Premiere Cast) Emily Bear, producer; Abigail Barlow & Emily Bear, composers/lyricists – ‘The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical’ – winner
Best Compilation Soundtrack For Visual Media
Various Artists – ‘Cruella’
Various Artists – ‘Dear Evan Hansen’
Various Artists – ‘In The Heights’
Various Artists – ‘One Night In Miami…’
Various Artists – ‘Schmigadoon! Episode 1’
Jennifer Hudson – ‘Respect’ Andra Day – ‘The United States Vs. Billie Holiday’ – winner
Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media
Kris Bowers – ‘Bridgerton’
Hans Zimmer – ‘Dune’
Ludwig Göransson – ‘The Mandalorian: Season 2 – Vol. 2 (Chapters 13-16)’ Carlos Rafael Rivera – ‘The Queen’s Gambit’ – winner Jon Batiste, Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross – ‘Soul’ – winner
Best Song Written For Visual Media
Kristen Anderson-Lopez & Robert Lopez, songwriters (Kristen Anderson-Lopez & Robert Lopez Featuring Kathryn Hahn, Eric Bradley, Greg Whipple, Jasper Randall & Gerald White) – ‘Agatha All Along [From WandaVision: Episode 7]’ Bo Burnham, songwriter (Bo Burnham) – ‘All Eyes On Me [From Inside]’ – winner
Alecia Moore, Benj Pasek & Justin Paul, songwriters (P!nk) – ‘All I Know So Far [From P!NK: All I Know So Far]’
Dernst Emile II, H.E.R. & Tiara Thomas, songwriters (H.E.R.) – ‘Fight For You [From Judas And The Black Messiah]’
Jamie Hartman, Jennifer Hudson & Carole King, songwriters (Jennifer Hudson) – ‘Here I Am (Singing My Way Home) [From Respect]’
Sam Ashworth & Leslie Odom, Jr., songwriters (Leslie Odom, Jr.) – ‘Speak Now [From One Night In Miami…]’
Best Instrumental Composition
Brandee Younger – ‘Beautiful Is Black’
Tom Nazziola – ‘Cat And Mouse’
Vince Mendoza & Czech National Symphony Orchestra Featuring Antonio Sánchez & Derrick Hodge – ‘Concerto For Orchestra: Finale’
Arturo O’Farrill & The Afro Latin Jazz Ensemble – ‘Dreaming In Lions: Dreaming In Lions’ Lyle Mays – ‘Eberhard’ – winner
Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella
Bill O’Connell, arranger (Richard Baratta) – ‘Chopsticks’
Robin Smith, arranger (HAUSER, London Symphony Orchestra & Robin Smith) – ‘For The Love Of A Princess (From “Braveheart”)’
Emile Mosseri, arranger (Emile Mosseri) – ‘Infinite Love’ Charlie Rosen & Jake Silverman, arrangers (The 8-Bit Big Band Featuring Button Masher) – ‘Meta Knight’s Revenge (From “Kirby Superstar”)’ – winner
Gabriela Quintero & Rodrigo Sanchez, arrangers (Rodrigo y Gabriela) – ‘The Struggle Within’
Silk Sonic. CREDIT: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images
Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals
Ólafur Arnalds, arranger (Ólafur Arnalds & Josin) – ‘The Bottom Line’
Tehillah Alphonso, arranger (Tonality & Alexander Lloyd Blake) – ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’
Jacob Collier – ‘The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)’
Cody Fry – ‘Eleanor Rigby’ Vince Mendoza, arranger (Vince Mendoza, Czech National Symphony Orchestra & Julia Bullock) – ‘To The Edge Of Longing (Edit Version)’ – winner
Best Recording Package
Sarah Dodds & Shauna Dodds, art directors (Reckless Kelly) – ‘American Jackpot / American Girls’
Nick Cave & Tom Hingston, art directors (Nick Cave & Warren Ellis) – ‘Carnage’
Li Jheng Han & Yu, Wei, art directors (2nd Generation Falangao Singing Group & The Chairman Crossover Big Band) – ‘Pakelang’
Dayle Doyle, art director (Matt Berninger) – ‘Serpentine Prison’
Xiao Qing Yang, art director (Soul Of Ears) – ‘Zeta’
Best Boxed Or Special Limited Edition Package
Darren Evans, Dhani Harrison & Olivia Harrison, art directors (George Harrison) – ‘All Things Must Pass: 50th Anniversary Edition’
Lordess Foudre & Christopher Leckie, art directors (Soccer Mommy) – ‘Color Theory’
Simon Moore, art director (Steven Wilson) – ‘The Future Bites (Limited Edition Box Set)’
Dan Calderwood & Jon King, art directors (Gang Of Four) – ’77-81’
Ramón Coronado & Marshall Rake, art directors (Mac Miller) – ‘Swimming In Circles’
Best Album Notes
Ann-Katrin Zimmermann, album notes writer (Sunwook Kim) – ‘Beethoven: The Last Three Sonatas’
Ricky Riccardi, album notes writer (Louis Armstrong) – ‘The Complete Louis Armstrong Columbia And RCA Victor Studio Sessions 1946-1966’
Kevin Howes, album notes writer (Willie Dunn) – ‘Creation Never Sleeps, Creation Never Dies: The Willie Dunn Anthology’
David Giovannoni, Richard Martin & Stephan Puille, album notes writers (Various Artists) – ‘Etching The Voice: Emile Berliner And The First Commercial Gramophone Discs, 1889-1895’
Robert Marovich, album notes writer (Various Artists) – ‘The King Of Gospel Music: The Life And Music Of Reverend James Cleveland’
Best Historical Album
Robert Russ, compilation producer; Nancy Conforti, Andreas K. Meyer & Jennifer Nulsen, mastering engineers (Marian Anderson) – ‘Beyond The Music: Her Complete RCA Victor Recordings’
Meagan Hennessey & Richard Martin, compilation producers; Richard Martin, mastering engineer (Various Artists) – ‘Etching The Voice: Emile Berliner And The First Commercial Gramophone Discs, 1889-1895’
April Ledbetter, Steven Lance Ledbetter & Jonathan Ward, compilation producers; Michael Graves, mastering engineer (Various Artists) – ‘Excavated Shellac: An Alternate History Of The World’s Music’
Patrick Milligan & Joni Mitchell, compilation producers; Bernie Grundman, mastering engineer (Joni Mitchell) – ‘Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 1: The Early Years (1963-1967)’
Trevor Guy, Michael Howe & Kirk Johnson, compilation producers; Bernie Grundman, mastering engineer (Prince) – ‘Sign O’ The Times (Super Deluxe Edition)’
Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
Josh Conway, Marvin Figueroa, Josh Gudwin, Neal H Pogue & Ethan Shumaker, engineers; Joe LaPorta, mastering engineer (The Marías) – ‘Cinema’
Thomas Brenneck, Zach Brown, Elton “L10MixedIt” Chueng, Riccardo Damian, Tom Elmhirst, Jens Jungkurth, Todd Monfalcone, John Rooney & Smino, engineers; Randy Merrill, mastering engineer (Yebba) – ‘Dawn’
BJ Burton, engineer; BJ Burton, mastering engineer (Low) – ‘Hey What’
Dae Bennett, Josh Coleman & Billy Cumella, engineers; Greg Calbi & Steve Fallone, mastering engineers (Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga) – ‘Love For Sale’
Joseph Lorge & Blake Mills, engineers; Greg Koller, mastering engineer (Pino Palladino & Blake Mills) – ‘Notes With Attachments’
Producer Of The Year, Non-Classical
Jack Antonoff
Rogét Chahayed
Mike Elizondo
Hit-Boy
Ricky Reed
Best Remixed Recording
Booker T, remixer (Soul II Soul) – ‘Back To Life (Booker T Kings Of Soul Satta Dub)’
Spencer Bastin, remixer (Papa Roach) – ‘Born For Greatness (Cymek Remix)’
Tracy Young, remixer (K.D. Lang) – ‘Constant Craving (Fashionably Late Remix)’
3SCAPE DRM, remixer (Zedd & Griff) – ‘Inside Out (3SCAPE DRM Remix)’
Dave Audé, remixer (Demi Lovato & Ariana Grande) – ‘Met Him Last Night (Dave Audé Remix)’
Mike Shinoda, remixer (Deftones) – ‘Passenger (Mike Shinoda Remix)’
Alexander Crossan, remixer (PVA) – ‘Talks (Mura Masa Remix)’
Best Immersive Audio Album
George Massenburg & Eric Schilling, immersive mix engineers; Michael Romanowski, immersive mastering engineer; Ann Mincieli, immersive producer (Alicia Keys) – ‘Alicia’
Jim Anderson & Ulrike Schwarz, immersive mix engineers; Bob Ludwig, immersive mastering engineer; Jim Anderson, immersive producer (Patricia Barber) – ‘Clique’
Greg Penny, immersive mix engineer; Greg Penny, immersive mastering engineer; Greg Penny, immersive producer (Harry Styles) – ‘Fine Line’
Jake Fields & Steven Wilson, immersive mix engineers; Bob Ludwig, immersive mastering engineer; Steven Wilson, immersive producer (Steven Wilson) – ‘The Future Bites’
Morten Lindberg, immersive mix engineer; Morten Lindberg, immersive mastering engineer; Morten Lindberg, immersive producer (Anne Karin Sundal-Ask & Det Norske Jentekor) – ‘Stille Grender’
Producer Of The Year, Classical
Blanton Alspaugh
Steven Epstein
David Frost
Elaine Martone
Judith Sherman
Lady Gaga at the premiere for ‘House Of Gucci’. CREDIT: Stefania D’Alessandro/WireImage
Best Orchestral Performance
Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor (Nashville Symphony Orchestra) – ‘Adams: My Father Knew Charles Ives; Harmonielehre’
Manfred Honeck, conductor (Mendelssohn Choir Of Pittsburgh & Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra) – ‘Beethoven: Symphony No. 9’
Nico Muhly, conductor (San Francisco Symphony) – ‘Muhly: Throughline’
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor (Philadelphia Orchestra) – ‘Price: Symphonies Nos. 1 & 3’
Thomas Dausgaard, conductor (Seattle Symphony Orchestra) – ‘Strauss: Also Sprach Zarathustra; Scriabin: The Poem Of Ecstasy’
Best Opera Recording
Susanna Mälkki, conductor; Mika Kares & Szilvia Vörös; Robert Suff, producer (Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra) – ‘Bartók: Bluebeard’s Castle’
Karen Kamensek, conductor; J’Nai Bridges, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Zachary James & Dísella Lárusdóttir; David Frost, producer (The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra; The Metropolitan Opera Chorus) – ‘Glass: Akhnaten’
Simon Rattle, conductor; Sophia Burgos, Lucy Crowe, Gerald Finley, Peter Hoare, Anna Lapkovskaja, Paulina Malefane, Jan Martinik & Hanno Müller-Brachmann; Andrew Cornall, producer (London Symphony Orchestra; London Symphony Chorus & LSO Discovery Voices) – ‘Janáček: Cunning Little Vixen’
Corrado Rovaris, conductor; Johnathan McCullough; James Darrah & John Toia, producers (The Opera Philadelphia Orchestra) – ‘Little: Soldier Songs’
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor; Karen Cargill, Isabel Leonard, Karita Mattila, Erin Morley & Adrianne Pieczonka; David Frost, producer (The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra; The Metropolitan Opera Chorus) – ‘Poulenc: Dialogues Des Carmélites’
Best Choral Performance
Matthew Guard, conductor (Jonas Budris, Carrie Cheron, Fiona Gillespie, Nathan Hodgson, Helen Karloski, Enrico Lagasca, Megan Roth, Alissa Ruth Suver & Dana Whiteside; Skylark Vocal Ensemble) – ‘It’s A Long Way’
Gustavo Dudamel, conductor; Grant Gershon, Robert Istad, Fernando Malvar-Ruiz & Luke McEndarfer, chorus masters (Leah Crocetto, Mihoko Fujimura, Ryan McKinny, Erin Morley, Tamara Mumford, Simon O’Neill, Morris Robinson & Tamara Wilson; Los Angeles Philharmonic; Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, Los Angeles Master Chorale, National Children’s Chorus & Pacific Chorale) – ‘Mahler: Symphony No. 8, ‘Symphony Of A Thousand’’
Donald Nally, conductor (International Contemporary Ensemble & Quicksilver; The Crossing) – ‘Rising w/The Crossing’
Kaspars Putniņš, conductor; Heli Jürgenson, chorus master (Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir) – ‘Schnittke: Choir Concerto; Three Sacred Hymns; Pärt: Seven Magnificat-Antiphons’
Benedict Sheehan, conductor (Michael Hawes, Timothy Parsons & Jason Thoms; The Saint Tikhon Choir) – ‘Sheehan: Liturgy Of Saint John Chrysostom’
Craig Hella Johnson, conductor (Estelí Gomez; Austin Guitar Quartet, Douglas Harvey, Los Angeles Guitar Quartet & Texas Guitar Quartet; Conspirare) – ‘The Singing Guitar’
Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance
JACK Quartet – ‘Adams, John Luther: Lines Made By Walking’
Sandbox Percussion – ‘Akiho: Seven Pillars’
Sérgio Assad, Clarice Assad & Third Coast Percussion – ‘Archetypes’
Yo-Yo Ma & Emanuel Ax – ‘Beethoven: Cello Sonatas – Hope Amid Tears’
Imani Winds – ‘Bruits’
Best Classical Instrumental Solo
Jennifer Koh – ‘Alone Together’
Simone Dinnerstein – ‘An American Mosaic’
Augustin Hadelich – ‘Bach: Sonatas & Partitas’
Gil Shaham; Eric Jacobsen, conductor (The Knights) – ‘Beethoven & Brahms: Violin Concertos’
Mak Grgić – ‘Mak Bach’
Curtis Stewart – ‘Of Power’
Best Classical Solo Vocal Album
Laura Strickling; Joy Schreier, pianist – ‘Confessions’
Will Liverman; Paul Sánchez, pianist – ‘Dreams Of A New Day – Songs By Black Composers’
Sangeeta Kaur & Hila Plitmann (Virginie D’Avezac De Castera, Lili Haydn, Wouter Kellerman, Nadeem Majdalany, Eru Matsumoto & Emilio D. Miler) – ‘Mythologies’
Joyce DiDonato; Yannick Nézet-Séguin, pianist – ‘Schubert: Winterreise’
Jamie Barton; Jake Heggie, pianist (Matt Haimovitz) – ‘Unexpected Shadows’
Best Classical Compendium
AGAVE & Reginald L. Mobley; Geoffrey Silver, producer – ‘American Originals – A New World, A New Canon’
Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor; Jack Vad, producer – ‘Berg: Violin Concerto; Seven Early Songs & Three Pieces For Orchestra’
Timo Andres & Ian Rosenbaum; Mike Tierney, producer – ‘Cerrone: The Arching Path’
Chick Corea; Chick Corea & Birnie Kirsh, producers – ‘Plays’
Amy Andersson, conductor; Amy Andersson, Mark Mattson & Lolita Ritmanis, producers – ‘Women Warriors – The Voices Of Change’
Best Contemporary Classical Composition
Andy Akiho, composer (Sandbox Percussion) – ‘Akiho: Seven Pillars’
Louis Andriessen, composer (Esa-Pekka Salonen, Nora Fischer & Los Angeles Philharmonic) – ‘Andriessen: The Only One’
Clarice Assad, Sérgio Assad, Sean Connors, Robert Dillon, Peter Martin & David Skidmore, composers (Sérgio Assad, Clarice Assad & Third Coast Percussion) – ‘Assad, Clarice & Sérgio, Connors, Dillon, Martin & Skidmore: Archetypes’
Jon Batiste, composer (Jon Batiste) – ‘Batiste: Movement 11’
Caroline Shaw, composer (Dawn Upshaw, Gilbert Kalish & Sō Percussion) – ‘Shaw: Narrow Sea’
Best Music Video
AC/DC – ‘Short In The Dark’
Jon Batiste – ‘Freedom’
Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga – ‘I Get A Kick Out Of You’
Justin Bieber Featuring Daniel Caesar & Giveon – ‘Peaches’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever’
Lil Nas X – ‘Montero (Call Me By Your Name)’
Olivia Rodrigo – ‘Good 4 U’
Best Music Film
Bo Burnham – ‘Inside’
David Byrne – ‘David Byrne’s American Utopia’
Billie Eilish – ‘Happier Than Ever: A Love Letter To Los Angeles’
Jimi Hendrix – ‘Music, Money, Madness…Jimi Hendrix In Maui’
Various Artists – ‘Summer Of Soul’
A forthcoming fundraising event Concert For Ukraine has added more huge names to its line-up.
READ MORE: Ukrainian artists on the Russian crisis: “Now is the time to push for change”
Nile Rodgers and Chic, Manic Street Preachers, Tom Odell, Becky Hill and The Kingdom Choir have all been freshly announced for the show, which takes place next Tuesday (March 29) at Resorts World Arena Birmingham.
Announced last week, the two-hour benefit show will air live on ITV in aid of the Disasters Emergency Committee‘s (DEC) Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. Tickets go on sale today (March 22) at midday – you can find them here.
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Also announced today are hosts Martin Kemp, Emma Bunton and Marvin Humes, while acts already confirmed for the show are Camila Cabello, Ed Sheeran, Emeli Sandé, Gregory Porter and Snow Patrol.
Joining the line-up are @nilerodgers and Chic, @BeckyHill, @TheKingdomChoir, @Manics and Tom Odell! ? #ConcertForUkraine
— ITV (@ITV) March 21, 2022
Rodgers said ahead of the show: “In times of trouble you can always count on great musical artists to come together to help bring focus on what really matters. At this moment in time nothing is more important than showing the people affected by conflict in Ukraine that we stand with them, that we are family.
“I’m therefore delighted to be joining Ed Sheeran, Camilla Cabello and all the wonderful artists coming together to make this a success. As we say in our song ‘Everybody Dance’, ‘Music never lets you down.’ ”
Arcade Fire, Patti Smith and Franz Ferdinand have performed at Ukraine fundraiser shows recently, while London’s Shepherd’s Bush Empire has announced that it will host ‘A Night For Ukraine’ this week.
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Elsewhere, The Cure launched a new charity band t-shirt as Massive Attack confirmed plans to sell off special artwork to help victims of the Ukraine invasion.
You can donate here to the Red Cross to help those impacted by the conflict, or via a number of other ways through Choose Love.
CHVRCHES have announced details of a huge new North American tour for 2022 – check out the new list of dates below.
The Scottish trio are fresh off a three-song performance at this week’s (March 2) BandLab NME Awards 2022 in London, where they performed with The Cure‘s Robert Smith.
READ MORE: CHVRCHES & Robert Smith at the BandLab NME Awards 2022: a world-first meeting of minds
After a UK tour that begins next week (March 10), the band will head to the US and Mexico from the end of April, playing a host of shows that take them up until the end of June. The new headline dates begin in late May.
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See the band’s full list of tour dates below.
MARCH 2022 10 – Dundee, Fat Sam’s 12 – Glasgow, SWG3 Poetry Club 14 – Edinburgh, O2 Academy 15 – Newcastle, City Hall 16 – London, Brixton Academy 18 – Birmingham, O2 Academy 19 – Manchester, Academy
APRIL 2022 29 – Atlanta, Shaky Knees Festival
MAY 2022 13 – Mexico City, Tecate Emblema 18 – Monterrey, Showcenter 21 – Guadalajara, Corona Capital 27 – Napa, BottleRock Festival 30 – Tampa, Jannus 31 – Miami, Revolution Live
JUNE 2022 1 – Orlando, House of Blues 2 – Raleigh, The Ritz 4 – Charlotte, The Fillmore 5 – Washington, DC, 9:30 Club 9 – Buffalo, Artpark 10 – Grand Rapids, 20 Monroe Live 11 – Indianapolis, WonderRoad Music Festival 13 – Madison, The Sylvee 15 – Omaha, The Admiral 16 – Kansas City, Uptown Theater 18 – Manchester, Bonnaroo Festival
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Chvrches and Robert Smith performing at the BandLab NME Awards 2022 (Picture: Andy Ford / NME)
During their set at the BandLab NME Awards 2022, the band performed their track ‘Asking For A Friend’ from 2021 album ‘Screen Violence’ and then teamed up with Smith for a world exclusive live premiere of ‘How Not To Drown’. To cap the set off, they joined Smith in covering Cure classic ‘Just Like Heaven’.
After the performance, the band’s Martin Doherty described the experience to NME as “really, really scary,” adding: “Honestly, I’ve never practiced four notes so much in my life.”
Reviewing the set, NME wrote: “Following widespread disruption to regular touring and recording, tonight isn’t just the first time that Smith and have performed live together – it’s actually their first time meeting in person, full stop.
“Realised on stage, with all creative minds present and correct, it’s completely magical (Drag Race star Bimini certain seems to think so, they’re headbanging away) and spirals right up to the roof with a squalling, Robert Smith guitar solo special.”
Ru Paul’s Drag Race UK star Bimini has teased a set of “exciting new collaborations” to come while appearing at the BandLab NME Awards 2022.
Bimini was speaking to NME on the red carpet at last night’s (March 2) ceremony at the O2 Academy Brixton in London, where they presented the Best TV Series supported by 19 Crimes award to Mae Martin’s Feel Good.
READ MORE: BandLab NME Awards 2022 – full list of winners
The star, who released debut single ‘God Save This Queen’ last summer, spoke of future projects, saying: “I’ve been working on lots of new music, [with] some really exciting collabs coming up.
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“I’m really excited for this summer, so hopefully will be dropping some new music very, very soon. I’m excited for everyone to hear it. Get ready!”
Pressed on the identity of the new collaboration, Bimini declined to name them specifically but teased: “I’ll tell you that it’s very unexpected and they are a big deal.”
Bimini presented the Best TV Series award alongside Adam Lambert later in the night, telling him: “You look so good, you make me wanna overthrow the government.”
