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At 78, Corman remains tirelessly active. In the past four years alone he has produced over 20 movies for his straight-to-video enterprise and continues to be called upon by former employees to play cameos in their movies: most recently in Dante’s Looney Tunes: Back in Action, he’ll next be seen in Demme’s Manchurian Candidate remake. Here, though, the Godfather of American independent cinema graciously ushers Uncut into his busy schedule, to grade some of Corman University’s most illustrious alumni.

JACK NICHOLSON

Corman produced the film which gave Nicholson his first starring role, as the eponymous Cry Baby Killer (1957), then directed the actor’s  depraved breakthrough in The Little Shop Of Horrors (1960). Across the early 1960s, Nicholson developed into a key member of Corman’s stock company.

CORMAN: Little Shop Of Horrors was a comedy-horror, with the emphasis on comedy. Jack played a masochist in a dentist’s office who wanted to have his teeth drilled. He was very, very funny. The only problem was, the scene was supposed to end as a duel between Jack and the dentist, using a scalpel and a dentist’s drill and – I shot this picture in two days – on the first take, they knocked over the dentist’s chair, so I said, “Alright, the scene ends right there,” because we’d no time to repair the chair. I’d first encountered Jack through the acting classes Jeff Corey was running in LA. As a director, I had no experience or training. I had a degree in engineering, and felt able to learn the use of the camera, editing, all the technical aspects, but I didn’t know enough about acting, so I joined Jeff’s class to learn. Jeff was teaching the Method, which is based to a large extent on improvisation, and Jack was exceptionally good, really the best in the class. He had a unique ability to play a dramatic scene with great intensity and at the same time bring humour to it, without undercutting the drama. That’s very difficult, and very unusual – particularly when you consider Jack was only about 19. I think it’s one of the things that’s served him throughout his entire career. He’s always been a fine actor, and is simply getting better. He helped out behind the camera, too. I did a picture called The Terror (1962), with Boris Karloff and Jack, which I shot two days of on standing sets from The Raven (1962), with only part of a script written. Boris worked those two days, and Jack was going lead the rest of the picture, when the script was written. I had various people directing parts, Francis Coppola, Monte Hellman. The last day of shooting, there was nobody available, so Jack said, “Roger, every idiot in town has directed part of this, lemme direct the last day.” And the work he did was good. We stay vaguely in contact – I see all these people at parties and so forth. Jack, when he directed The Two Jakes (1990), offered me a role, but I had to be in Europe, so I was unable to do it.

FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA

Coppola cut his teeth recutting ’50s Russian sci-fi movies for Corman to redistribute Stateside; for his first effort, Battle Beyond The Sun (1963), he added a notorious new scene, involving monsters constructed to look like a huge penis and vagina. Corman subsequently produced Coppola’s directing debut, Dementia 13 (1962). Instigating a trend among Corman alumni, Coppola paid thanks by casting his mentor in a cameo in The Godfather Part II (1974).

Francis came straight out of UCLA film school. This was in the ’60s, and I had bought the American rights to some Russian science fiction films, which were very well made technically, but contained some really outrageous anti-American propaganda. So Francis’ job was to recut the films: dub them into English, cut out the anti-American elements. On Battle Beyond The Sun, I had told Francis I wanted an additional battle scene between monsters put in, and asked if there could be some erotic quality to it. Well, he went beyond anything kind of vaguely symbolic! He made it pretty blatant. We had to cut that back a little. Francis became my assistant after that, and went on to direct Dementia 13 for me. He was capable of doing just about any job there is on a film, and doing it well. For instance, we went to Europe to do The Young Racers (1962) with a very small crew, just followed the Grand Prix circuit, and on that, Francis was First Assistant Director, handled some of the sound, and also handled second unit camera on the racing days.  Both with him and Jack, I could recognise early on they had great abilities, and I expected them to do well. But I had no way of knowing they would do as well as they did. When he directed me in Godfather Part II, that was fine. When he cast the Senate Investigating Committee, of which I played a member, he used writers, directors and producers for all the various Senators, which was interesting. He talked to us, explained the scene, ran through the rehearsals, then left us to totally to our own during the takes. Which I think is a very nice thing for a director to do.

PETER BOGDANOVICH

A buff hoping to break into films, the future Last Picture Show director had recently arrived in Los Angeles and was working as a critic when Corman hired him to rewrite and help out on his biker classic, The Wild Angels. After Bogdanovich performed surgery on another Russian sci-fi epic – released as the self-explanatory Voyage To The Planet Of Prehistoric Women (1967) – Corman assigned him to direct his chilling debut, Targets (1968), based around preexisting footage of Boris Karloff.

I think almost all the good directors I’ve worked with have been very much in love with film. They all have a great knowledge of film history, but Peter and Marty Scorsese may have the greatest. Peter was still working as a critic when I first met him, in a screening somewhere. We began talking and were very friendly after the screening, and he came to work for me. On The Wild Angels, he was my assistant, and he directed some second unit. He didn’t get along, frankly, with the Hell’s Angels we hired for that film all that well; they clearly came from two totally different worlds. Then he wrote and directed Targets; I had a couple of days with Boris Karloff, as a result of a contractual obligation from a previous picture, and so Peter wrote Targets around Boris’ brief sequence. He had given me a number of ideas for the rest of the movie, which I had rejected. Then, when he came up with this idea – of juxtaposing the artificial horror of the motion picture screen, which Boris epitomised, with the actual horror of real life, a sniper in a drive-in theatre – I approved that. He worked out an outline, then he wrote the script which I approved, but in the actual shooting I left him totally alone. My approach changes from director to director, but, in general, when someone works for me, I talk mostly about the technical aspects and meaning of a film. The actual directorial style, I leave to the director. I feel I’ve made the choice of director, I have faith in that choice, and I must leave him free to do his film the way he sees it – providing he stays true to the thoughts he and I have discussed.  And that film’s concept of random violence in society is, if anything, actually more pertinent today, unfortunately, than when the film was made. 

PETER FONDA & DENNIS HOPPER

The Easy Rider duo first worked together on Corman’s Jack-Nicholson-scripted paean to LSD, The Trip. Prior to that, Fonda had already become a Corman icon as biker protagonist of The Wild Angels. Hopper, who had acted in new scenes in another of Corman’s Russian remix movies, Queen Of Blood (1966), was, not for the last time, on the comeback trail, after having been blackballed by the major studios following a legendary blow-up with Henry Hathaway on From Hell To Texas (1958).

I met Peter first. I think he was aware of the great fame and stature of his father and, to some extent was, as any son would, trying to establish his own persona. Of course on The Wild Angels I had a Fonda and a [Nancy] Sinatra, and that was two things; yes, partially to have those surnames on the posters, but also because they were both good actors and could play the roles. Peter Fonda got on a little bit better with the Hells Angles, because he was able to ride a motorcycle, and as a result could relate with them. And, as an actor, he worked with them, tried to help their performances. It was through Peter I met Dennis. They were friends, and after The Wild Angels, when I did The Trip, Peter suggested Dennis for a role. I think their friendship developed working together on that, and eventually led to Easy Rider; it was a friendship that became a friendship and also a business and artistic partnership. Dennis gave me no problems whatsoever. I had been told he had given problems to several directors and might be difficult. He was never difficult. I got along well with him, and have nothing but admiration both for his ability and work ethic. He shot some second unit for The Trip, his footage was very good, and that good work was one of the reasons I went along with the combination of Peter to produce and Dennis to direct Easy Rider; I was the original executive producer, but then it moved, for a variety of reasons, from [Corman’s regular studio] AIP to Columbia. You can almost chart a line from The Wild Angels to The Trip to Easy Rider, following the counterculture of the day. I thought Easy Rider was a good picture, and caught the spirit of youthful rebellion in the United States. I anticipated it being a success, but I didn’t realise how big it would be. The major studios were beginning to be aware for the power of the independent movement, and Easy Rider really shook them up, caused them to bring in a number of the independent film-makers.

ROBERT DE NIRO

The 26-year old De Niro had only acted in a couple of underground films by his friend Brian De Palma when Corman cast him as Shelley Winters’ youngest, glue-sniffing hoodlum son in Bloody Mama (1969). A loose adaptation of the life and crimes of Ma Barker, this Bonnie And Clyde cash-in ditched backwoods glamour for violence: just your everyday story of rape, incest, drugs and murder.

De Niro was and is just one of the most dedicated, most intense actors I have ever seen. We were going to be shooting in Arkansas, and De Niro went to Arkansas – on his own – a week or so before shooting, just hung around, wandering through small towns, picking up accents, learning how people moved, what their opinions were. He was a very, very intense actor, and it was clear, from the beginning, that he was brilliant. He played a junkie, and started losing weight to get into the character. I wouldn’t say starved himself, but… well, yes. I dunno how much weight he lost, but he definitely lost weight for that portion of the film. That level of commitment was somewhat out of the norm. But I understood what he was doing, and I approved of it, provided he didn’t damage his health, which he didn’t. But, yes, it was an intensity you will see in very few actors. 

MARTIN SCORSESE

Corman produced Scorsese’s first studio feature, the bloody depression ballad, Boxcar Bertha (1972), then came close to derailing cinema history when he agreed to back the young auteur’s next project, Mean Streets (1973), providing Scorsese rewrote it as a Blaxploitation flick. Scorsese turned the offer down, but was still granted use of Corman’s crew to shoot what would become his breakthrough.

I had seen a picture Marty had done in New York, an underground picture in black and white, I don’t even remember the title [Who’s That Knocking At My Door], and it was clear he was a brilliant young film-maker. He had never done a film in Hollywood, and I met him, I don’t remember exactly how, but we got along well. I had done *Bloody Mama*, about a rural woman gangster in the 1930s, and AIP wanted me to do a second one. I had just started my own company, New World, so I said I would produce, but didn’t want to direct, because I didn’t have the time. So I chose Marty to direct, and he did an exceptionally good job. But, at first, AIP did not like his work. Some junior executive or someone had seen the dailies and didn’t think Marty’s work was good. They wanted me to step in and replace him. I said I didn’t have the time, and also that they were wrong; I considered this work to be exceptionally good. Eventually,they agreed with me – and history has vindicated me! But, yes, it’s true I offered to back Mean Streets if he changed it to – well,  I dunno if it was a black exploitation, but my idea was that black films were doing very well, and I felt this type of film as a black film would be very successful. And, yes, in the long run, he was totally correct not to do it. 

You know, I’m still as enthused by the young people working for me; I have two young directors who have just finished two low-budget films: Brian Sechler, out of New York University film school, who’s done a picture about black amateur boxers, Rage And Discipline, and Henry Crum, who’s done a street-racing picture with a Hispanic background. These are two of the best young directors I’ve ever worked with… 

The latter paired her with the Portland rabble-rousers TK & The Holy Know-Nothings, who certainly roused some rabble on her songs and exposed a live wire in her vocals. Its finest moment, however, was her mostly solo reimagining of Michael Hurley’s “Wildegeeses”, which she sang like she was missing some remote piece of land very dearly. As confident as she sounded on record, Valazza suffered from stage fright, depression and social anxiety that was very isolating even in a city full of friends and fans.

Hoping a change of scenery might alleviate those concerns, in early 2024 she returned from a long tour and immediately packed up her guitars and records and headed east. Her plan was to settle in Nashville, but she overshot and ended up in New Orleans. She quickly learned she couldn’t outrun her demons, but new surroundings inspired new songs as well as new perspectives on old songs.

Valazza took this second batch to Portland and finished the album, although there’s no Side One/Two split between her Oregon songs and her Louisiana songs. Instead, she wisely mixes them together to reflect a certain kind of wanderlust that has always motivated her music but feels more acute and certainly more conflicted on From Newman Street.

These songs are perched somewhere between home and away: the warmth of her bed and the lure of the larger world. That is, of course, the clash faced by any musician who makes her living playing songs in different cities every night. With its gently percolating percussion and nimble bassline, “Your Heart’s A Tin Box” is a touring lament that’s disarmingly matter-of-fact in its misgivings: “Two months of selling out most of the shows/ I’d sure like to see where all that money goes”, she sings, before building to a moment of stark self-reckoning, where she hopes “they like the way you sing”. She ends the songwith a chorus of “you think too much”, which sounds like the punchline to a grim joke.

She addresses most of these songs to “you”, which sounds more like “I”, as though each song is a pep talk or a warning addressed to Valazza’s future self. Her Portland bandmates, many of whom have been playing long before Valazza even arrived in the city, provide breezy accompaniment to her breezy melodies, instilling songs like “Your Heart’s A Tin Box” and “Market Street Savior” with the motion of travel.

Erik Clampitt’s pedal steel traces the line of the horizon in the distance, while the rhythm section of drummer Ned Folkerth and bassist Sydney Nash count off the highway lines one by one. Favouring arrangements that highlight one instrument – the muted Byrdsy guitar theme on “Market Street Savior”, the billowy organ blowing through “Small Things”, but most of all Valazza’s deft guitar picking – they never crowd her songs, but leave lots of open, empty space. That lends the album a gentle melancholy, nothing too dark, but these songs all sound like they’re meant to be heard while staring out the car window during a long road trip.

In its sense of motion and its travelogue sensibility, the album sounds like a millennial update to Hejira, Joni Mitchell’s mid-’70s document of her local travels along American highways. Both albums are sharp, complex, slightly elusive and offhandedly funny. “Some say you look like your father”, Valazza sings on “Small Things”, “but me, I’ve never met your father”. It’s a line overflowing with implications.

Hejira is full of dalliances and encounters, but Valazza’s album is lonelier, directed inward rather than outward, stuck inside her own head. It’s a fascinating place to be, not least because she’s so strenuous in her self-interrogation. These songs never let her off the hook. She also peppers her lyrics with references to geographical landmarks: not just Newman Street but St John’s Park on “Shadow Of Lately” and Market Street on “Market Street Savior”. They’re like breadcrumbs to mark her path, or perhaps just a means of getting out of her own head, if only for a line or two.

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If there’s one landmark she names most often, it’s her own bed, which is even featured on the album cover. This is the place where she can retreat into solitude. “All things look the same from the pillow on my bed”, she sings on “Weight Of The Wheel”, which has a bit of the folk-rock elegance of The Band. “I’m stressed out, I’m far away/ There’s a dizzy dancing in my head”.

Or, as she sings on opener “Birds Fly”, “It’s so nice to have a bed and watch the trees grow”. That song begins with a hallucinogenic intro before fading into a quiet arrangement that foregrounds Valazza’s voice and guitar, her thumb picking out a pendulum on the low strings. The album concludes not far from where it starts, with the spare title track set, ironically, back in Portland. It’s a kitchen-sink reverie, an idle reminiscence while she washes the dishes.

“Wishing you well from Newman Street”, she muses. “How is the weather on the open sea?/ Now I sit here all alone, keeping control”. Both musically and lyrically, From Newman Street is Valazza’s strongest, boldest and most vivid expression of emotional restlessness, but it’s also a search for stable ground and a nice view – some place or person or mood that feels like home.

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There’s a host of Glasto first-timers, too. These include Alanis Morissette, Noah Kahan, Lola Young, Myles Smith (winner of this year’s BRITs Rising Star award), Busta Rhymes, Brandi Carlile and Gary Numan.

Elsewhere, it was confirmed that Doechii would be clashing with Charli XCX when she closes out the West Holts Stage on Saturday evening. It has also been reported that RAYE will be taking to the Pyramid Stage that same night in the slot immediately before Neil Young.

Organisers have promised that “many more acts and attractions [are] still to be announced” in the coming months. As has become customary in recent years, Glasto later kicked off its rundown of the individual area poster drops in the lead-up – revealing more names and details on who’s playing where and when.

Fans can expect the full stage-by-stage bill and times to be revealed in late May or early June. See all the confirmed venue line-ups so far below, and check back at this page for the latest news as we get it.

Woodsies

The string quartet and tape piece Different Trains (1988) is the most famous example. Its quietly shocking transition from Reich’s nostalgic childhood memories of trans-continental railroad trips to the recollections of Jewish Holocaust survivors on the trains to the concentration camps struck a nerve, and the Kronos Quartet’s definitive version was a huge hit, in classical music terms. It emboldened Reich to compose other works evoking a sense of people caught in history’s cogwheels: Three Tales (2002, a video opera featuring the Hindenburg disaster, the Bikini atomic tests, and the cloning of Dolly the sheep); Daniel Variations (2006, on the Jewish American journalist Daniel Pearl, murdered by Islamic kidnappers); and WTC 9/11 (2011, on the terror attacks in New York that took place near his family home).

All of these are included in the boxset, not least because Reich came of age in the phonographic era, meaning that his career has been aided and augmented by ongoing relationships with specific record labels. During the ’70s it was ECM and Deutsche Grammofon who helped to spread his reputation by releasing key works such as Music For 18 Musicians and Drumming. In 1985 Reich signed a deal with Nonesuch for his choral work The Desert Music (1985). His compositional output has enjoyed a symbiosis with their release schedules ever since.

This set contains not only all the Reich music Nonesuch has released, but they have also licensed some of those earlier works, to make this a true survey of the man’s oeuvre. As it was my own first encounter with Reich on a spotty DG vinyl, I’m glad to hear again the lovely, twinkling Music For Mallet Instruments, Voices And Organ (1973). From the Ghanaian-influenced Drumming (1970–71) through the rest of the decade, Reich – who played a jazz kit in his youth – pushed percussion to the foreground. He referred to his practice, which he explored with his own ensemble of likeminded players, as ‘music as a gradual process’. Now that we have lived through the rise of funk, electronica and sample-based music, it’s easy to overlook how radical this formulation was. It’s what makes Reich’s music so anti-bombastic, compared to the symphonic sounds of the 19^th century. The music is built on a system of repetitions and small phase-shifts that ripple through the whole thing with a sonic butterfly effect. It can give the impression of having a mind of its own: instead of a crescendo, it simply halts when the program has run its course, like tickertape running out of the gate. At the same time, though, it is determined by very human components – the players themselves and their choices, the length of time they can hold a breath, the skeletal physics of percussive strikes.

The zenith of this approach was Music For 18 Musicians (1974–76), surging like a pulsar, never stepping in the same river twice. Reich’s signature work is a miracle of aural hallucinations. Describing a performance in his sleevenote, Timo Andres puts it perfectly: “One has the sense of observing a utopian society in miniature, a mass of people working towards a common goal with no apparent leader.” The piece appears in two versions here: the one recorded by Reich’s group for Nonesuch in 1996; and Ensemble Signal’s lithe, swinging version from 2011. The presence of this youthful ensemble on the last disc serves to show how Reich’s music is being accessed and carried into the future by young generations of musicians. The secrets will not be lost with the dying-out of the composer’s closest circle.

Reich’s career began among the whirlpool of radical energies in the ’60s, including alternative spiritual practices such as yoga and meditation. By the end of the ’70s, he felt compelled to reconnect with his Jewish roots, beginning with Tehillim (1981). The 1994 version here masterfully combines the ecstatic female vocals with the earthy ground harmonies of a small group. There is less sense that the music is ‘programmed’, and Reich allows his love of Hebrew psalms and the medieval polyphony of Perotin to combine with intricate rhythms that sound as if a Balinese gamelan troupe had been parachuted into a court in Moorish Spain. Reich has since returned to Old Testament and Jewish themes in works like You Are (Variations) (2004), Traveler’s Prayer (2020) and Jacob’s Ladder (2023), the most recent work in this collection. With its aural depictions of angels climbing and descending a ladder between Heaven and Earth, it is a vivid and mature piece of sonic painting which also perhaps represents the ageing composer gazing into the infinite. 

From The Orb sampling Pat Metheny playing Electric Counterpoint to Reich’s creative relationship with younger composer Nico Muhly, Reich has become a lodestar visible to many younger musicians beyond the contemporary music field. Radio Rewrite (2012) was a homage to Radiohead containing veiled motifs from songs like “Everything In Its Right Place”. Travelling across the entire sweep of this extraordinary boxset, you’re joyously reminded of Steve Reich’s diversity and invention over 60 years, while all the time retaining an audible stamp that is instantly recognisable. It’s a lovingly prepared and curated collection, with essays by some of Reich’s fellow musicians and industry colleagues, extensive listening notes on every piece, complete lyrics and librettos for all the vocal works, exhaustively compiled credits, and a useful timeline of his life and works. A musical evolutionary leap housed in a discographic treat.

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25
NALA SINEPHRO
Endlessness
WARP
Sinephro’s blissful 2021 debut Space 1.8 placed the London-based harpist and modular synthesist at the vanguard of the new cosmic jazz movement. This filmic follow-up made fine use of some of the scene’s most expressive players – Sheila Maurice-Grey, Nubya Garcia and Natcyet Wakili among them – but it never felt like a jam session, instead radiating a unanimous sense of wonder and calm.

24
PHOSPHORESCENT
Revelator
VERVE
Matthew Houck’s eighth album as Phosphorescent, and his debut for Verve, was a beautiful refinement of the elegant melancholy he has been steadily crafting since 2013’s Muchacho. A standout was “Poem On The Men’s Room Wall”, which found some respite from the end of the world in a cold beer and the underappreciated erotic charm of Phyllis Diller.

23
HIGH LLAMAS
Hey Panda
DRAG CITY
Turns out you can teach an old Llama new tricks. After three decades of exquisite retro orchestration, Sean O’Hagan took an unexpected left-turn here into digital production and avant-R&B. The results were spectacular, retaining all of O’Hagan’s beloved quirks while allowing guest vocalists like Bonnie “Prince” Billy to indulge their inner pop freak.

22
ALAN SPARHAWK
White Roses, My God
SUB POP
Written and recorded after the loss of wife and bandmate Mimi Parker
in 2022, Sparhawk’s first post-Low release was an astonishing, artful transmutation of grief into cybernetic gospel via the medium of the Helicon VoiceTone pedal. It sounded, on the closing “Project 4 Ever”, like PC Music producing the Book Of Job.

21
JOHN CALE
POPtical Illusion
DOMINO
After the jagged future-shock of last year’s heavily collaborative Mercy, this impressively swift follow-up found Cale in more contemplative mode – though he still sounded more vital than most artists a quarter of his age, dispensing the sagest of wisdoms over dreamily inventive electronic beats: “If you’ve done things you’d wished you’ve never done/ Think of the things you’re going to do tonight…”

20
HURRAY FOR THE RIFF RAFF
The Past Is Still Alive
NONESUCH
“Say goodbye to America, I wanna see it dissolve,” sang Alynda Segarra on “Colossus Of The Roads” – amid stiff competition, the most devastating track on the ninth Riff Raff album. But on songs like the Conor Oberst collaboration “The World is Dangerous”, they remained committed to making astonishing music while the ship goes down.

19
PETER PERRETT
The Cleansing
DOMINO
Perhaps as astonished as anyone to still be here, the mercurial former Only Ones frontman joked about outstaying his welcome on nagging punk earworms “Do Not Resuscitate” and “I Wanna Go With Dignity”. The irony being, of course, that Perrett was in the form of his life, decrying our morally bankrupt leaders and the evils of WhatsApp in his bone-dry south London drawl.

18
SHABAKA
Perceive Its Beauty, Acknowledge Its Grace
IMPULSE!
Swapping his trusty saxophone for an array of Japanese and South American flutes naturally led Shabaka Hutchings towards more serene waters. But just as you’d hope from the former Comet/Kemet firebreather, he approached this seemingly tranquil music with gripping intensity, the introspective mood matched by guest vocalists including Lianne La Havas and Moses Sumney.

17
JOHNNY BLUE SKIES
Passage Du Desir
HIGH TOP MOUNTAIN
He’s thrown a few curveballs in his time, but country renegade Sturgill Simpson – for it was he – pulled off his greatest trick yet by absconding to Europe and adopting the Johnny Blue Skies moniker to consider the lot of the semi-famous musician from a position of wry remove. Beautifully sung and played, these were also some of the finest songs he’s ever written: soulful, wistful, funny and tender.

16
BILL RYDER-JONES
Iechyd Da
DOMINO
The title is Welsh for ‘good health’, and on his first album in five years the former Coral man set sail from lockdown anguish to calmer waters, buoyed by the kindred spirits of Gal Costa, Echo & The Bunnymen, and – on the gorgeous orchestral interlude “…And The Sea” – the inspired combination of Michael Head and James Joyce.

15
JACK WHITE
No Name
THIRD MAN
“Nothin’ in this world is free”, warned Jack White on No Name’s taut, prowling opener “Old Scratch Blues”. That is, unless you were lucky enough to visit the Third Man store on July 19 to have a copy of this unmarked LP slipped into your bag. But if the release was discreet, the music itself was anything but: a relentless barrage of garage-rock bangers with White in blistering, rabble-rousing form.

14
MDOU MOCTAR
Funeral For Justice
MATADOR
Though recorded thousands of miles from Moctar’s Niger homeland, Funeral For Justice went in hard on both the country’s current leaders (the title track) and its malign colonial overlords (“Oh France”). Suffice to say, this fiery rhetoric was more than matched by some incendiary guitar-playing; while to underline the strength of the songwriting, an acoustic version of the album – Tears Of Injustice – is due early next year.

13
FONTAINES DC
Romance
XL
With their colossal fourth album, the Irish post-punkers hooked up with a new label (XL) and a new producer (James Ford) to venture far from the Dublin cobblestones. They drew on the cityscapes of Tokyo, the fashion sense of Korn and apocalyptic arthouse cinema to create an IMAX-scale album of dystopian lovesongs, fit for the stadiums they increasingly seem destined to fill.

12
JULIA HOLTER
Something In The Room She Moves
DOMINO
When Julia Holter topped this chart in 2015 with Have You In My Wilderness, we described its unique sound as “Aphex Twin meets The Beach Boys”. If anything, this album pushed that glorious dichotomy even further as Holter’s psychedelic nursery rhymes inhabited an alluring fourth-world wonderland full of squelching electronics, stacked voices, fluttering flutes and fretless bass.

11
CASSANDRA JENKINS
My Light, My Destroyer
DEAD OCEANS
Cassandra Jenkins proved that An Overview On Phenomenal Nature was no fluke with a cosmic third album that roamed from Betelgeuse to Aurora, Illinois, via the pet shops of Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Throughout, her quizzical sprechstimme and calmly forensic eye rooted her in the reality of everyday heartaches.

10
WAXAHATCHEE
Tigers Blood
ANTI-
“You just settle in like a song with no end”, sang Katie Crutchfield, harmonising beautifully with 2024’s MVP MJ Lenderman on “Right Back To It”, the lead single from her boldest, most accessible record yet. Tigers Blood was an album that saw her burnishing the romantic hooks that always lurked in her songwriting and laying a reasonable claim to being the millennial Lucinda Williams.

9
CINDY LEE
Diamond Jubilee
REALISTIK
Patrick Flegel’s seventh release under his indie-drag alias Cindy Lee was a tour de force of lo-fi Lynchian guitar soul lasting more than two hours. Astonishingly for a 32-track album, there were no space-filling goofs and hardly any drop-off in song quality: witness, around 83 minutes in, the heart-tugging triptych of “To Heal This Wounded Heart”, “Golden Microphone” and “If You Hear Me Crying”.

8
MJ LENDERMAN
Manning Fireworks
ANTI-
Still only 25, Jake “MJ” Lenderman is already wiser than most of us
will ever be. On his fourth solo studio album – he’s also notched up another couple as guitarist for the equally excellent Wednesday – he skilfully deployed classic rock references to paint vivid portraits of smalltown ennui (“How many roads must a man walk down ’til he learns/ He’s just a jerk who flirts with the clergy nurse ’til it burns”). Great solos, too.

7
THE SMILE
Wall Of Eyes
XL
The first of two terrific albums The Smile released in 2024, emphasising the purple-ness of the patch in which Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood and Tom Skinner currently find themselves. Here, their agitated rhythms were often wreathed in lush orchestral arrangements, though that only seemed to heighten the ever-present sense of threat (“I am going to count to three/ Keep this shit away from me”). Next stop: a rumoured Radiohead live reunion in 2025…

6
ADRIANNE LENKER
Bright Future
4AD
Lenker’s solo career is the opposite of a diversion from her main gig fronting Big Thief. “Real House” continued the raw, autobiographical tale of “Mythological Beauty” from the band’s 2017 album Capacity, while recent single “Vampire Empire” was presented in a radically different form. Yet beyond these fan-pleasing callbacks and overlaps, there is much to be said for hearing Lenker’s precise melodies and perennially wise words in their most unadorned state.

5
JESSICA PRATT
Here In The Pitch
CITY SLANG
Even when playing these songs live in the flesh at a bewitching Union Chapel gig earlier this year, there remained something apparitional about Jessica Pratt, the ghost of LA’s Gold Star Studios. Ingenious arrangements – brass, Mellotron, Brazilian percussion, whole caverns full of echo – warped these songs so far out of time to be completely discombobulating, yet Pratt’s piercing melodies cut straight to the core.

4
AROOJ AFTAB
Night Reign
VERVE
Keen to puncture the myth of the “Sufi goddess” while maintaining the intense and rarified emotion of 2021 breakthrough Vulture Prince, Aftab found the perfect blend of earthiness and otherworldliness in Night Reign’s rich, seductive ambience. A splash of Auto-Tune here and a filthy bassline there showed that she could bend pop techniques to her will, rather than the other way around. And, oh, that voice…

3
BETH GIBBONS
Lives Outgrown
DOMINO
A decade in the making, released as she was about to turn 60, Beth Gibbons’ solo debut proved worth the wait in gold. Working with producer James Ford, she drew upon all the bitter wisdom of midlife. On songs like “Reaching Out” and “Rewind”, she constructed an awesome orchestra of loss from corrugaphone, recorder, folksong and her indomitable, astonishingly wracked voice.

2
GILLIAN WELCH & DAVID RAWLINGS
Woodland
ANCONY
Thirty years into their musical partnership, Welch and Rawlings released the first original record credited to the two of them. Maybe it was disaster that strengthened their union? Woodland was full of the stuff, from the 2020 tornado that destroyed their studio to an apocalyptic vision of the Mississippi run dry. They’ve certainly never sounded so attuned, their harmonies blending to uncanny effect on the desolate “What We Had” and the closing “Howdy Howdy”.

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1
NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS
Wild God
PIAS
“We’ve all had too much sorrow/ Now is the time for joy”. For the first time since 2016, Nick Cave properly reconvened The Bad Seeds – Thomas Wydler on drums, Martyn Casey on bass, Warren Ellis a one-man orchestrator of chaos and grace – and the result was a surging, storming work of radical, Blakean exuberance. It had the form of the blues but felt more like a rapture, full of “bright, triumphant metaphors of love”, with producer Dave Fridmann arranging the tumult like a man conducting a storm-tossed ocean.

Like so much of Cave’s work since 2016, it was addressed to his lost sons, but there were also heartfelt songs of devotion to his wife (“Final Rescue Attempt”), his dear, departed exes (“O Wow O Wow (How Wonderful She Is)”) and songs of praise for any creator who saw fit to invent Anita Lane’s panties, cinnamon horses and Kris Kristofferson.

Since the mid-1980s, Nick Cave has been trying on the vestments of these lay preachers – Glen Campbell, Neil Diamond, the Elvis of “An American Trilogy” – and a large part of the charm has been the gall and gumption of this skinny Aussie goth to assume their orphic mantle. But now the robes finally fit, with Cave returning from the drag of hell to ascend to the heavens like… a prehistoric bird? An awestruck frog? A joyful rabbit? Never mind, never mind. Wild God was Nick Cave’s latest, great, indisputable masterpiece. Amen.

27 
DRIVE-BY TRUCKERS
Southern Rock Opera (Deluxe Edition)
NEW WEST
The Truckers’ great 2001 concept album, an epic tale loosely based on the myths around Lynyrd Skynyrd and the American South, was richly documented on this impressive and timely reissue: a double-turned-triple LP with added outtakes, unreleased overflow songs, live cuts and a meaty new essay by Truckers ringleader Patterson Hood.

26
ROBERTA FLACK
Lost Takes
ARC
Across two days in November 1968, Roberta Flack sat down at a piano in RCA Studios and demoed 39 songs for potential inclusion on her debut album. Many of those that didn’t make the cut – including terrific versions of “Afro Blue” and “To Sir With Love” – languished unheard until the 2020 deluxe edition of First Take. Here, 12 of those songs received their first-ever vinyl release, working perfectly as an enchanting standalone album.

25
PAUL MCCARTNEY & WINGS
Band On The Run (50th Anniversary Edition)
CAPITOL
The definitive album of Macca’s post-Beatles career was given an anniversary makeover, complete with an expanded half-speed remaster and ‘underdubbed’ companion version. Mixed by Geoff Emerick from the original Lagos recordings, before George Martin and Tony Visconti added orchestration, it revealed the unvarnished rock’n’roll roots of songs like “Nineteen Hundred And Eighty Five” and “Let Me Roll With It”.

24
LOU REED
Why Don’t You Smile Now: Lou Reed At Pickwick Records 1964-1965
LIGHT IN THE ATTIC
The latest fruits of the ongoing trawl through the Lou Reed archive revisited his time as staff writer for the Pickwick International label/sweatshop in Long Island, specialising in surf, R&B and girl-group knock-offs for budget compilations. There were real jewels amid the hackwork, the pick of the bunch being “Oh No Don’t Do It”, recorded by Ronnie Dickerson – a weird glimpse of Lou’s untravelled path as a Brill Building princeling.

23
EMAHOY TSEGE MARIAM GEBRU
Souvenirs
MISSISSIPPI
Ethiopia’s ‘honky-tonk nun’ lived an incredible life before finally passing on last year, just shy of her 100th birthday. This collection of home-recorded demos from 1977-85 was the first to feature her fragile but defiant singing voice as she reminisced about life before the Red Terror and pondered her future exile in Jerusalem. Sad but hopeful, beautiful and unique.

22
AIR
Moon Safari (25th Anniversary Edition)
PARLOPHONE
Air’s return to the stage – the French duo as suave as ever inside their sleek white box – was one of this year’s live highlights. It was all to celebrate a quarter-century of their swooning, retro-futuristic touchstone Moon Safari, reissued as a 2CD+Blu-Ray package. Among the highlights: an astonishing live synth version of Funkadelic’s “Maggot Brain”. 

21
SUEDE
Dog Man Star 30
DEMON MUSIC
When anyone tries to tell you that Britpop was all about Blur v Oasis and lager lads in Ben Sherman shirts – and there’ll be a lot of that next year – just play them this: a fabulously grandiose vision of seedy proclivities and love on the dole amid the rapidly fading glamour of England’s capital. As the bonus discs proved, Suede’s B-sides of the time were almost as good as the singles – witness Brian Eno’s eldritch 16-minute remix of “Introducing The Band”.

20
KEVIN AYERS
All This Crazy Gift Of Time: The Recordings 1969-1973
CHERRY RED
The essential works of Herne Bay’s wizard of whimsy, neatly packaged in a 10-disc box set along with lashings of bonus material. Even if you already own all the studio albums, there was plenty here to astound and delight, from a brilliantly haywire 1970 Hyde Park show with The Whole World band (Mike Oldfield, Lol Coxhill et al) to a host of mildly slicker BBC sessions and a suggestive poem about a banana.

19
APHEX TWIN
Selected Ambient Works II (Expanded Edition)
WARP
As we all know, Selected Ambient Works 85-92 was a high-water mark for British electronic music, but it wasn’t strictly ambient. Richard D James rectified that with his 1994 follow-up, two discs of atmospheric yet increasingly sinister pieces with blurry photos of random stuff for names. Bonus tracks on this expanded edition included a stunning orchestral version of “#3” (AKA “Rhubarb”).

18
GALAXIE 500
Uncollected Noise New York ’88​-​’​90
SILVER CURRENT
A fantastic shadow history of the short-lived but hugely influential dream-pop trio, across two LPs of non-album tracks, outtakes, alternate versions (“Blue Thunder” with bonus wailing sax!) and cover versions; in their trembling hands, both Joy Division/New Order’s “Ceremony” and The Rutles’ “Cheese And Onions” sounded equally spellbinding.

17
SONIC YOUTH
Walls Have Ears
GOOFIN’ RECORDS
In a year when great new albums by both Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore continued the Sonic Youth mission, it was intriguing to be thrust back to 1986, when the band began to transcend their downtown art-scuzz beginnings for a more universal kind of teenage riot. A former bootleg barely cleaned up for this official release, it’s not the live album Sonic Youth themselves would have sanctioned, but it’s a compelling document nonetheless.

16
ELVIS COSTELLO
King Of America & Other Realms
UMe
Much more than just a remaster of Costello’s pivotal 1986 album King Of America, this mammoth six-disc box set ventured both inward and outward to take in everything from original solo demos to unreleased collaborations with Allan Toussaint and duets with Lucinda Williams  and Emmylou Harris. A new habanera version of “Brilliant Mistake” brought it right up to date.

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15 
ANNE BRIGGS
Anne Briggs
TOPIC
A stone-cold British folk classic, rendered all the more precious by Briggs’ reluctance to add to her slender catalogue down the years. As a result, the four unreleased recordings included as a bonus 7” with this remastered vinyl reissue – including typically spare, devastating takes on “The Cruel Mother” and “Bruton Town” – were something of a holy grail. 

14
VARIOUS ARTISTS
Congo Funk! 
ANALOG AFRICA
James Brown’s visit to Kinshasa in 1974 inspired bands on both sides of the mighty Congo River to pick up electric guitars and incorporate American funk moves into their rambunctious, rumba-derived rhythms. This terrific comp showcased the unfailingly uplifting results.

13
MARGO GURYAN
Words And Music
NUMERO GROUP
Margo Guryan sadly left us in 2021, her uniquely sophisticated soft-pop compositions never properly celebrated in her lifetime. This deluxe three-disc boxset, collecting her slender but essential complete recorded output – plus sundry demos and curiosities – recorded her journey from Bach devotee to jazz wunderkind to gently psychedelic baroque pop magician. A fitting tribute at last.

12
THE WATERBOYS
1985
CHRYSALIS

This enthralling 6CD trawl explored every stage in the creation and performance of The Waterboys’ ‘big music’ statement This Is The Sea, unpacking the panoramic visions of Mike Scott and the musical innovations of Karl Wallinger (who sadly passed away in March). The cherry on top was a fast version of “This Is The Sea”  with elemental guitar breaks by Tom Verlaine.

11
DOROTHY ASHBY
Afro-Harping (Deluxe Edition)
VERVE/UMR
In a great year for jazz harp reissues, Dorothy Ashby’s once-obscure and now highly-prized 1968 LP – expect to pay £200 for an OG copy – finally received the deluxe treatment. The vibe was more swinging than spiritual, evidenced by two (arguably superior) alternate takes of “Theme From Valley Of The Dolls” and a slower, sultrier version of the much-sampled “Soul Vibrations”, with bonus theremin freakout.

10
GASTR DEL SOL
We Have Dozens Of Titles
DRAG CITY
Both David Grubbs and Jim O’Rourke have become prolific contributors to the musical avant-garde over the last few decades; here was a chance to revisit their inquisitive, influential work together in the 1990s as post-rock duo Gastr Del Sol. Rounding up rare and unreleased material, including their last ever live performance from 1997, this 3LP set was an endearing study in how to gently wriggle free from convention.

9
NICO
The Marble Index 
DOMINO
“A weird excursion into atonality that will appeal only to a selective audience,” sneered a contemporary review quoted in the liner notes of this reissue. Forbidding and foreboding it may be, but in the intervening 56 years, Nico’s second solo album – her harmonium locked into a death spiral with John Cale’s gnawing viola – has become an essential part of the Velvet Underground story. Some versions came with a bonus 7”, the first time on vinyl for key outtakes “Roses In The Snow” and “Nibelungen”.

8
BOB DYLAN & THE BAND
The 1974 Live Recordings
COLUMBIA
If you ever felt shortchanged by Before The Flood’s anthology of Dylan and The Band’s barnstorming 1974 arena tour, here was a colossal 431-track, 27-disc collection, capturing the full force gale of the concerts from Chicago through to LA. It found Dylan on his own career precipice, returning from the commercial wilderness, The Band at the peak of their powers. The box vividly demonstrates how Dylan’s songs change as he looks for fresh treatments.

7
DOROTHY CARTER
Troubadour
DRAG CITY
This masterful reissue of the 1976 private press album by nomadic dulcimer visionary Dorothy Carter revealed a mesmerising tapestry of medievalism, folk, new age and ambient music. Ahead and out of her time, Carter connected ancient psalms, hymns and carols from across Europe and Asia to the burgeoning US counterculture and avant-folk underground.

6
JONI MITCHELL
Archives Vol 4: The Asylum Years (1976-1980)
RHINO
Joni’s archive series reached the most fascinating phase of her career, as she hitched a ride with the Rolling Thunder Revue and ended up consorting with Charles Mingus. As well as offering a glimpse into the creative processes behind Hejira and Don Juan…, there was a real sense of joy to these many unreleased live performances, whether Mitchell was road-testing an a capella version of “The Dry Cleaner From Des Moines” (“one more verse!”) or pausing “A Case Of You” halfway through to extol the medicinal virtues of Canada Dry.

5
NEIL YOUNG
Archives Vol III (1976-1987)
REPRISE
Across 17 discs, 198 tracks plotted the turbulent tale of Neil’s unhinged late ’70s and wild ’80s, including a series of glorious live sets from 1976, an entire set of songs recorded in Linda Ronstadt’s kitchen and the full shitkicking country set from his mid-’80s International Harvesters tour. For extra ragged glory, a deluxe edition (sadly only available in the US) added five Blu-Ray discs of live shows and gonzo cinema.

4
BROADCAST 
Distant Call / Spell Blanket
WARP
Billed as the last ever Broadcast releases, these two demo collections – the latter destined for their tragically unfinished fifth album – turned out to be as magical as anything in their catalogue. As Trish Keenan trilled these embryonic (yet often still perfectly structured) songs, as if to herself, it’s clear that Broadcast would have been otherworldly and transportive even without their banks of antique synths. 

3
CAN
Live In Paris 1973
SPOON / MUTE
The only release in Can’s revelatory live series to feature the impish presence of Damo Suzuki, and therefore instantly essential. As with the band’s other concert recordings, recognisable ‘hits’ like “Spoon” and “One More Night” were subsumed into longer, mesmeric jams, surging into the stratosphere with maximum countercultural force. A couple of excellent 1977 recordings (from Aston and Keele universities) completed Can’s invigorating archive trawl.

2
DAVID BOWIE
Rock ‘N’ Roll Star!
PARLOPHONE
“I don’t mean heavy loud but heavy sweet,” intoned the unmistakable voice of David Bowie, gently instructing Mick Ronson as to how many saxophones he wanted on “Soul Love”. Not every recent collection of Bowie demos have been essential, but this one was a revelation, offering you a ringside seat as a generational pop genius knocked together his game-changing Ziggy Stardust… project in real-time. 

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1
ALICE COLTRANE
The Carnegie Hall Concert
IMPULSE!
Finally, it appears that Alice Coltrane has taken her deserved place at the top table of 20th century musical icons, alongside her trailblazing husband. Rifle through Uncut’s best albums of 2024, and her influence is everywhere – not just on harpists like the amazing Nala Sinephro and Brandee Younger (who makes several key contributions to Shabaka’s recent album) but on artists as diverse as Julia Holter, The Smile, Arooj Aftab and Dirty Three. 

Naturally, the Impulse! archivists have been furiously trawling the vaults to see if there might be anything from Alice’s early ’70s heyday to match the jaw-dropping discovery of John Coltrane’s lost album Both Directions At Once a few years ago. With The Carnegie Hall Concert, they hit the jackpot. 

Recorded live in New York in the same month as the release of her spiritual jazz touchstone Journey In Satchidananda, it featured the first two tracks from that album blissfully spun out to more than twice their original length with the help of an expanded ‘double quartet’, including the likes of Jimmy Garrison and Clifford Jarvis. But it’s on an incredible version of John Coltrane’s “Africa” – with Alice having switched from harp to piano – where dual saxophonists Pharoah Sanders and Archie Shepp really earned their corn, trading blazing solos for almost half an hour with no let-up in intensity. 

“The spirit was there at all times,” recalled bassist Cecil McBee in the liner notes. “I’ve never heard anything that I played that was more intense… It was absolutely amazing.” Listening back today, it’s hard to disagree.

If there’s a musical theme to Mahashmashana, it’s as if Tillman was collating the best aspects of his previous albums in one place, piecing them together like an anthology or portmanteau or even a sort of sonic eulogy. “Mental Health” is a throwback to the Hollywood glamour of Chloë And The Next 20th Century. That means melodramatic strings that provide a deliberately absurd juxtaposition for the chorus of “mental health, mental health”. The song features one of the album’s many great couplets, a shot across the bows of detractors – “the one regret that’s really tough/Is knowing that I didn’t go far enough”.

On “Josh Tillman And The Accidental Dose”, he’s back to the self-referential wit of Pure Comedy and I Love You, Honeybear. The song is a dark and queasy romp with a classic opening line “She put on Astral Weeks/Said ‘I love jazz’ and winked at me”. There are fascists and publicists – as there often are in Tillman songs – and it ends with a sad ice cream. Musical flourishes emphasise the punchlines.

“Being You”, one of Tillman’s many songs about acting, has some of the sparse quality of God’s Favorite Customer, albeit with an electronic backdrop. The outstanding “I Guess Time Just Makes Fools Of Us All” – which originally appeared on 2024 compilation, Greatish Hits – is rambling Dylanesque that recalls Fear Fun’s freewheeling dark humour. Then there’s “Cleaning Up”, a taut funk-blues with Tillman rapping rather than crooning. “I know just how this thing ends”, he sings with nods to Scarlett Johansen in Under The Skin, Leonard Cohen and much else besides. Amusingly, The Viagra Boys get a co-writing credit. There’s another blink-and-miss-it reference to Under The Skin on “Being You”, and it can occasionally feel as if you are trapped in the sonic equivalent of a movie by Quentin Tarantino or the Coen Brothers, a hyperreal world built from original borrowings and head-spinning allusions. That can make it seem a bit like homework, a set of clever traps designed to trip the guileless.

But boy, can he sing. Tillman is an outstanding vocalist, a master of phrasing and inflection, whether he’s holding together the dramatic final bars of “Mahashmashana” against a backdrop of atomic sax, spitting bars on “She Cleans Up”, embracing the corn of “Mental Health” or crooning the happy-sad closing number “Summer’s Gone”. Sometimes his skill as a musician gets overshadowed by his lyrical brilliance, which might be why Tillman was eager to perform the songs of Scott Walker with the BBC orchestra at the Barbican in 2023. Before the show, he admitted he was worried that if the concert is release as a live album it will be subsumed by the Father John Misty brand that he has created. So maybe he’s ready for a change?

If he is, there’s no big reveal on Mahashmashana, but it’s interesting that the final track, “Summer’s Gone”, another song about endings, contains several references to “Fun Times In Babylon”, the first song on Fear Fun. That song ended with the immortal war cry “Look out Hollywood, here I come”, and “Summer’s Gone” delivers the sad reality, as the narrator, now “a lecherous old windbag”, drives around a city he no longer recognises and ponders what lies ahead. “Time can’t touch me”, he sings at the close, and you can’t tell that if that is a lament, a promise or a threat.

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Absolutely none of which should be read as indication that Five Dice, All Threes is any kind of mawkish manifesto for a mid-life crisis. On quite a lot of the album, Bright Eyes sound like they’ve never had so much fun in their lives. “Rainbow Overpass” is a glorious Old 97s-ish cowpunk romp, “El Capitan” a Joe Ely-like hallucination of incipient apocalypse cresting on a big brass outro, “Trains Still Run On Time” a clattering country singalong which seems to be wondering if the collapse of a republic can really be this ridiculous (“There’s a Disney character breaking down the door/And the orchestra plays a cartoon score for war”).

This is the second album of Bright Eyes’ second act, following 2020’s hiatus-ending Down In The Weeds, Where The World Once Was. It was always likely that the approach of middle age would suit them: their recent “Companions” series, re-recording selected earlier works, felt like a reconnection with works their creators now understand to have been old, and wise, before their time. Five Dice, All Threes sounds like they’ve caught up with themselves: even if Bright Eyes are struggling to scrape together optimism about the future, there is every reason why their fans should.

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It’s when Johnson looks inwards that he produces his most stirring work. “Where Do We Go When We Die?” is a beautiful tribute to his late father that wrestles with life after death, while pondering the cycles and meanings to be found in life while experiencing grief. There’s more emotional weight carried in the two lines he sings about taking his father’s clothes and books to the charity shop than can be found in any of the state of the world addresses heard elsewhere on the record.

“I Hope You Remember (The Things I Can’t Forget)” unfolds with an almost Tom Waits-like shuffle, with Cadogan’s snaking guitar lines matching the woozy percussion. Johnson leans into a slightly more gruff voice too, as he imagines a world on the brink but dives deep into the comfort of nostalgia, basking in the scent of his grandmother’s perfume and the engulfing haze of old tobacco smoke. It’s these kinds of moments and details that are needed to lift the album up from the bleakness and paranoid leanings.

Historically, The The have always been a difficult band to label. Over the years, they’ve hovered around art-rock, synth-pop, post-punk and new wave yet they’ve never really belonged to any of them. On Ensouled, things feel equally as tricky to nail down, but generally things are slower and less musically direct, and so you have an amalgamation of alt.rock, leftfield folk, pop, jazz and touches of electronica. However, while stylistically varied, it can feel a little lacking in variety and dynamism at times, as it very much sits in mid-tempo mode for much of the 12 tracks, the sprightly pop of their early period rarely appearing. Johnson feels nicely in sync with his band though, who possess both precision and personality in their playing.

Regardless of a few wrong turns, it’s wonderful to have such a natural songwriting talent as Johnson back on record again. It’s just a shame he doesn’t always seem to realise that the most interesting soul he could mine here is his own.

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KING OF AMERICA & OTHER REALMS SUPER DELUXE EDITION TRACKLISTING

DISC 1 – KING OF AMERICA (2024 REMASTER)
1. Brilliant Mistake
2. Lovable
3. Our Little Angel
4. Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood
5. Glitter Gulch
6. Indoor Fireworks
7. Little Palaces
8. I’ll Wear It Proudly
9. American Without Tears
10. Eisenhower Blues
11. Poisoned Rose
12. The Big Light
13. Jack Of All Parades
14. Suit Of Lights
15. Sleep Of The Just

DISC 2 – LE ROI SANS SABOTS
Demos, Outtakes & Other Realms
1. The People’s Limousine – The Coward Brothers
2. Next Time Round *
3. Deportee *
4. Brilliant Mistake (First Draft) *
5. Suffering Face 
6. Poisoned Rose
7. Jack Of All Parades 
8. Sleep Of The Just *
9. Blue Chair *
10. I Hope You’re Happy Now 
11. I’ll Wear It Proudly  
12. Indoor Fireworks 
13. Having It All 
14. Shoes Without Heels *
15. King Of Confidence 
16. They’ll Never Take Her Love From Me – The Coward Brothers
17. American Without Tears No. 2 (Twilight Version)

DISC 3 – KINGS OF AMERICA LIVE AT THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL
Royal Albert Hall 27th January 1987
1. The Big Light *
2. Only Daddy That’ll Walk The Line *
3. Our Little Angel *
4. It Tears Me Up *
5. I’ll Wear It Proudly *
6. Lovable *
7. Riverboat *
8. Sally Sue Brown/36-22-36 *
9. American Without Tears *
10. Brilliant Mistake *
11. What Would I Do Without You *
12. Your Mind Is On Vacation /Your Funeral, My Trial *
13. Pouring Water On A Drowning Man *
14. Payday *
15. That’s How You Got Killed Before *
16. Sleep Of The Just *
17. True Love Ways *

DISC 4 – IL PRINCIPE DI NEW ORLEANS E LE MARCHESE DEL MISSISSIPPI
1. There’s A Story In Your Voice – with Lucinda Williams
2. Country Darkness
3. The Delivery Man
4. Nothing Clings Like Ivy
5. Heart Shaped Bruise – with Emmylou Harris (Live At The Hi-Tone, Memphis) **
6. Bedlam (Live At Montreal Jazz) **
7. Either Side Of The Same Town
8. Wonder Woman
9. In Another Room 
10. The Monkey * – Rehearsal with Dave Bartholomew & The Dirty Dozen Brass Band
11. Monkey To Man
12. Deep Dark Truthful Mirror
13. Clown Strike (Live At Montreal Jazz) **
14. Who’s Gonna Help Brother Get Further?
15. The River In Reverse
16. The Greatest Love – from Treme *
17. Ascension Day

DISC 5 – EL PRÍNCIPE DEL PURGATORIO
1. Stations Of The Cross
2. Quick Like A Flash (Previously Unreleased) *
3. Sulphur To Sugarcane
4. Red Cotton
5. Lost On The River #12
6. A Slow Drag With Josephine
7. I Felt The Chill
8. Complicated Shadows (Cashbox Version)
9. She’s Pulling Out The Pin
10. Condemned Man (Demo) *
11. Hidden Shame
12. Red Wicked Wine – with Dr. Ralph Stanley
13. The Scarlet Tide – with Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings (Live at the Grand Ole Opry) *
14. One Bell Ringing
15. Bullets For The New Born King
16. All These Strangers
17. For More Tears (Demo) *
18. You Hung The Moon

DISC 6 – DER HERZOG DES RAMPENLICHT
1. Stella Hurt
2. Mr. Feathers
3. Under Lime
4. Jimmie Standing In The Rain
5. Down Among The Wines And Spirits
6. Dr. Watson, I Presume
7. Church Underground (Demo) *
8. A Voice In The Dark
9. April 5th – with Rosanne Cash & Kris Kristofferson
10. Indoor Fireworks (Memphis Magnetic Version) *
11. That’s Not The Part Of Him You’re Leaving – with Larkin Poe *
12. Brilliant Mistake/Boulevard Of Broken Dreams (Cape Fear Version) *
13. That Day Is Done – with The Fairfield Four

* previously unreleased
** first-ever audio release

Recommended

Meanwhile, Lively also made a surprise appearance as Lady Deadpool in Deadpool & Wolverine. Their children, Inez and Olin, also appeared as Kidpool and Babypool.

Here’s every song on the It Ends With Us soundtrack

As well as the original score by Rob Simonsen and Duncan Blickenstaff, It Ends With Us includes a raft of songs by contemporary pop and alternative acts, from Taylor Swift and Post Malone to Ethel Cain and Cigarettes After Sex.

The full list of songs in It Ends With Us is:

Ethel Cain – ‘Strangers’
Rhye – ‘Hymn’
Chyvonne Scott – ‘Everybody Needs a Friend’
Tow’rs – ‘Girl In Calico’
Barrett Strong – ‘Money (That’s What I Want)’
Fatboy Slim – ‘Praise You’
Thom Yorke – ‘Dawn Chorus’
Post Malone – ‘White Iverson’
Drama – ‘Dark Rain’
Cigarettes After Sex – ‘Nothing’s Gonna Hurt You Baby’
Dashboard Confessional – ‘Carry This Picture’
Brittany Howard – ‘I Don’t’
Birdy – ‘Skinny Love’
Lana Del Rey – ‘Cherry’
Lucinda Williams – ‘Fruits of My Labor’
Aldous Harding – ‘Horizon’
It Ends With Us Cast – ‘With Arms Wide Open’
Taylor Swift – ‘My Tears Ricochet’
Lewis Capaldi – ‘Love The Hell Out Of You’
Ethel Cain – ‘Everytime’

Anderson heightens the drama as Earhart’s flight nears its watery end. The music of “India And On Down To Australia” is melodious and dreamy as excitement builds, Anderson whispers and sings using Auto-tune. But as they head over Indonesia, the physical toll hits Earhart – “I’m tired, so tired” – she’s exhausted, almost hallucinating as the chintzy melody from Altered Images’ “Happy Birthday” appears on “Road To Mandalay”, curdling as she becomes disorientated. The titles tell the rest of the story – “Broken Chronometers”, “Nothing But Silt”, “The Wrong Way” – but Anderson’s admiration and affection for this feminist icon is such that you come away from Amelia with a greater respect for those who keep on taking risks.

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1 MIND GAMES

(Evolution Documentary)

The Evolution Documentary mixes tell the story of a track from demo to completion. “Mind Games” began as a piano-and-voice demo recorded at Lennon’s home in Ascot, Surrey in 1970, before he returned to the unfinished song ahead of the Mind Games sessions in summer 1973. The Evolution Documentary follows the song from this initial demo and into the studio, where Lennon gives instructions to the band, and Yoko Ono offers observations from the control room. Then we hear the final mix, starting with guitar, piano and vocal as the other familiar elements are finally introduced. “Mind Games” was the sole single from the album, reaching No 18 in America.

2 I’M THE GREATEST

(Ultimate Mix)

Originally written in 1970, Lennon took the title of “I’m The Greatest” from a quote by Muhammad Ali – but wasn’t sure he could get away with singing the phrase himself. He felt it made much better sense, however, when it came from the mouth of Ringo Starr, who was looking for songs for his 1973 album, Ringo. “I’m The Greatest” became the opening track. Lennon’s original reading was a little maudlin and sarcastic, but by May 1973 he was in upbeat mood as he recorded it in LA with Ringo, George Harrison and Klaus Voormann. This Ultimate mix features John’s original guide vocal.

3 AISUMASEN I’M SORRY 

(Ultimate Mix)

One of the hidden gems on Mind Games, “Aisumasen (I’m Sorry)” was Lennon’s apology to Yoko Ono for some of his recent bad behaviour. It’s a tranquil, hypnotic song, with excellent overdubbed pedal steel by Sneaky Pete Kleinow. This Ultimate mix of “Aisumasen” highlights the craft of the Plastic U.F.Ono Band through Ken Ascher’s subtle piano and a stunning onetake guitar solo from David Spinozza. This underscores Lennon’s pained and plaintive vocal, which is given renewed prominence in the new mix.

4 YOU ARE HERE

(Outtake, Take 5)

The lilting “You Are Here” was another Mind Games song written by Lennon for Yoko Ono. It saw him pursue a theme of two people who are born 3,000 miles apart but defy chance to find each other and fall in love. Possibly one of the finest love songs Lennon ever wrote, this outtake is a stunning 10-minute journey with additional lyrics. It finds the Plastic U.F.Ono Band locked into a slow and steady Latin groove. It feels like a song that never needs to end, something to be played as John and Yoko waltz off together into the sunset.

5 TIGHT A$

(Raw Studio Mix)

One of the two rockers on Mind Games, “Tight A$” is presented in Raw Studio Mix form. This mix provides the chance to hear songs as they were recorded live in the studio, without any effects such as echo and delay. And thus it gives us an idea of what the Plastic U.F.Ono band might have sounded like if they had gone on the road. “Would I have liked to play live?” says bassist Gordon Edwards. “It would have been a smash. Can you imagine how good we would have sounded playing these songs together for a period of weeks? Wow.”

6 BRING ON THE LUCIE FREDA PEEPLE 

(Elemental Mix)

The Elemental Mix was conceived by Sean Ono Lennon to provide a more stripped-back, acoustic-style version of the album, with some of the more intense features – notably that of the rhythm section – toned down. These were created at the request of fans, who said they wanted to hear tracks they could listen to when at work without getting too distracted. This funky mix of one of the album’s few political songs puts more focus on the guitar and backing vocals alongside Lennon’s own excellent lead vocal.

7 YOU ARE HERE

(Elements Mix)

This second version of “You Are Here” offers a different way into the song. The Elements Mixes isolate a single musical element from each song – perhaps the bass part from “Intuition”, Ken Ascher’s wild piano on “Out The Blue” or the organ from “Mind Games”. In the case of “You Are Here”, it is Sneaky Pete Kleinow’s pedal steel, which brings much of the exotic vibe to this song about distance and travel. “Sneaky Pete had all these tricks to make strange sounds and John loved Sneaky Pete,” says engineer Dan Barbiero. “He would get all excited when he was coming into the studio.” A mystical, magical ride.

8 OUT THE BLUE

(Elemental Mix)

“Out The Blue” was another song on Mind Games where Lennon expressed wonder and gratitude for finding his wife and soulmate. “Two minds, one destiny”, he sings in a similar line to one from “You Are Here”, before likening Ono to a “UFO” – Lennon would claim to have seen a flying saucer in the sky above New York in 1974. This Elemental Mix cuts to the emotional heart of the song, with Lennon’s raw vocal underwritten by minimal musical backing until Ken Ascher’s piano and David Spinozza’s guitar are introduced for the stellar outro.

9 MEAT CITY

(Evolution Documentary)

At nearly eight minutes long, this Evolution mix of “Meat City” tells a fantastic story. It begins with Lennon’s fumbling home demo, as he hits some fat chords and searches for lyrics, seemingly unaware he is even recording. The mix then drops us into the studio, where the song has already evolved a chunky groove, although the twin drummers – Jim Keltner and Rick Marotta – are still struggling to work out how to play together. Come for the groove, stay for the backing vocalists, who deliver great studio banter before the mix takes us into the finished version of one of the album’s most unrestrained moments.

THE NEW UNCUT COMES WITH A FREE, ULTRA-COLLECTABLE JOHN LENNON CD – ORDER A COPY HERE

In 2002 she collaborated with Rustin Man, the pseudonym of Talk Talk bassist Paul Webb, to record Out Of Season, a jazzy-folky hybrid that drew considerable acclaim. In 2019 came Symphony Of Sorrowful Songs, a recording of Henryk Gorecki’s Symphony No 3 with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra. And then, once again, a quiet retreat.

There has been no explanation for Gibbons’ absence or re-emergences. She loathes interviews, feels little compulsion to justify her creative decisions. The effect is that when Gibbons sings, one has the sense that she has Something To Say.

On Lives Outgrown there is much that needs to be said. Gibbons has worked on these songs for a decade, and they come with a sense of depth and distillation. The album begins with “Tell Me Who You Are Today”, a glowering song of eerie strings and pagan drums, and of Gibbons’s opening lines: “I can change the way I feel/I can make my body heal” – a reckoning of sorts with the physical self. Those anticipating the voice of Portishead era may be surprised to find Gibbons launch out with something that leans more towards recent Lucinda Williams: low, half-caught, moving here between sorcery and incantation.

This album sees the first time the singer has used backing vocals, and it proves a clever decision; not only is it sonically arresting, but it gives the sense of Gibbons singing with various selves, those titular outgrown lives rising up and sinking down — the familiar tones of her ’90s self, the Gibbons of Out Of Season’s “Show” and Gorecki’s “Lento e Largo”, all seem to show their faces. The result is a song that captures some of the disorientation of midlife womanhood, when body, purpose, identity feel in disarray.

“I realised what life is like with no hope,” as Gibbons has explained. “And that was a sadness I’d never felt. Before, I had the ability to change my future, but when you’re up against your body, you can’t make it do something it doesn’t want to do.”

While the songs that follow return to these ideas, the album does not stay in this sonic space, instead it pulses on through “Floating On A Moment”, with its shades of Sufjan Stevens’ in Illinois mode, through the punky, prickly “Rewind” and on to “Beyond The Sun”, which seems to nod to Nick Drake’s Five Leaves Left era. “Whispering Love” closes the album with a kind of radiance. 

Working alongside Gibbons were producer James Ford, and Lee Harris, best known as the drummer from Talk Talk. Harris has spoken of the album’s unorthodox drum kit: Tupperware, and wooden drawers, and tin cans filled with peas; a cowhide water bottle, a paella dish, a kick drum conjured from a box of curtains. He has talked, too, of how quietly the record was played – soft timpani beaters leading the music around Gibbons’ voice.

Ford, too, joined the unconventional approach: playing recorders and chopsticks and hammers; climbing inside a piano to strike the strings with spoons; joining Gibbons and Harris as they whirled tubes around their heads and made animal noises to create a gathering, ominous sound.

It’s a clever trick. Not only is the listener continually unbalanced by the strangeness of the album’s sounds, there is also a sense of the recognisable world re-thought, familiar objects in new places, and life dampened down and muted.

Lives Outgrown is a quite different prospect to Gibbons’ previous work – more intimate, more personal, coloured by the grief and goodbyes she has weathered in recent years. But it is still possible to find a thread that runs from here to Out Of Season, and back to Portishead. There is a kind of ‘outness’, that these various stages of her career all share; a sense of dislocation or disembodiment, a repeated desire to find the self. “Who am I, what and why?” she sang on “Sour Times”. Three decades on, it’s a question that Gibbons is still driven to explore.

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Of course, busy work can help rein in bleak thoughts about the state of things, a dynamic that plays out across Only God Was Above Us. “Blacken the sky and sharpen the axe/Forever cursed to live unrelaxed,” Koenig croons over crisp punk drumming on “Gen X Cops”, whose title nods to the comic Hong Kong action film franchise, while its lyrics suggest how subsequent generations kick social crises down the years, disastrously. The album ends on a hopeful note, rather self-awarely titled “Hope”. It’s a folksy invocation proposing that the only way forward is to, well, move forward. It may be realistically cold comfort, but it’s comfort nonetheless.

The biggest hit from Billion Dollar Babies suggests Alice Cooper’s greatest target for scorn was themselves. “No More Mr Nice Guy” has been so thoroughly absorbed into classic rock radio that you might even forget that it’s by Alice Cooper – or that it’s really savvy and really funny. It’s about rebellion, but not the romanticised counterculture of the 1960s. Furnier saw a grimmer, lonelier angst in this new decade, and he also saw the ravaging effect of adolescent hormones on America’s youth. “No More Mr Nice Guy” is a wicked coming-of-age tale, with Furnier playing the part of a kid suddenly at odds with the adult world. That title phrase may be commonly used as a threat, but any menace Furnier represents is hollow: the song ends with the former Mr Nice Guy getting clocked by Reverend Smith.

Just months after Billion Dollar Babies, Alice Cooper released the strained Muscle Of Love, a too-quick follow-up that is best known for its bulky cardboard packaging. Furnier left the group and took their identity with him, legally changing his name to Alice Cooper before releasing his solo debut. This album, then, while cementing their status as hitmakers, represents the end of an era for Alice Cooper the band and the man, neither of which would reach this peak of weirdness again. Fifty years later, it’s lost none of its morbid magnetism.

EXTRAS: The ’73 live show shows the band in their true elements, but it was already included on the 2001 reissue. The single versions are new, but largely redundant. 5/10

This week (October 18), music publishers including Universal Music Group Publishing, Concord Music Group and ABKCO sued an Amazon-backed AI company over alleged copyright infringement. Anthropic recently secured roughly $4 billion (£3.29 billion) in investment from Amazon, but the publishers are seeking potentially millions of dollars in damages.

The role of AI in creating music is highly contentious among artists and music fans. Earlier this year, Grimes gave permission for fans to use her voice in their own music with the help of AI, provided they share the royalties with her, while Liam Gallagher recently praised an AI version of a ‘lost’ Oasis album as “mega”.

Nick Cave, however, described it as a “grotesque mockery of what it is to be human” and told platforms such as ChatGPT to “fuck off and leave songwriting alone”. Ed Sheeran and Sting are others that have spoken out against the perceived threat of AI.

Earlier this month, Snoop Dogg announced that he was now officially the owner of Death Row Records, the iconic record label where he started his career 30 years ago.

Death Row Records was founded in 1991 by Suge Knight, Dr. Dre and Michael “Harry O” Harris. Snoop was one of the three key artists responsible for the success of the legendary west coast rap label alongside Dre and 2Pac.

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Doubtful of a solution or any more government funding soon, Thomas said the venue would likely remaining on the MVT’s critical danger ‘red list’, “because there’s no way we’re completely safe of staying afloat – we’re on the edge.”

“I’m hesitant to get excited about anything, because every time we do something happens,” she said. “We’re trying to book bands, but a lot of agents say they want to now put their bands on bigger venues because of the increased demand to see live music. They haven’t made any money for a year either so obviously they want to cash in at bigger venues. We’re having shows pulled from us and that’s really fucking annoying, to be honest.”

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While concerned about the potential logistics of testing and vaccine passports should live music return this summer, Thomas added that all she wanted to do was welcome audiences back.

“It’s all a bit unknown and I’m trying not to get my hopes up, but I’d really just like to thank the fans,” she said. “I feel like our staff should line up and clap everyone back in like a guard of honour, and then run behind the bar and start serving.”

Another venue hoping to make it through to the point where they can welcome fans back is The Priory in Glasgow – who recently won the support of Liam Gallagher who donated items to auction. Having welcomed the likes of Gerry Cinnamon, Baby Strange, Lucia & The Best Boys, The Van Ts and Walt Disco to their stage among other rising local and Scottish acts, manager John Jokey said the venue’s future would only be safe when they can get back to doing what they do best.

“The Priory means a lot of different things to different people,” he told NME. “So many different stories come through the bar, and we’ve still got more to tell. A lot of people think we’re the heart of the Glasgow music scene, and without us it would be a lot harder for up and coming bands from the city. They need space to play, to make mistakes and feel part of the community.”

He continued: “Since the actual pandemic took hold, we’ve been open two weeks in the last year. We’ve got late night licence because we put on a lot of midnight gigs, so we were only able to open for three or four hours at a time to begin with. We tried that, but being a venue live music, DJs or any kind of music playing through the PA was important to us – but in Scotland we weren’t allowed to have any background music. It just didn’t work.”

Jokey admitted that the last year has “been precarious from a mental health perspective too because there are times where the uncertainty has been horrific,” and also fears that a third wave and second wave of the virus would find the venue “back at square one”.

He added: “It’s been difficult, but my big fear is about when we’ll be able to operate again as we usually do. Our whole business model is hot gigs with sweaty ceilings and bands and fans all going crazy. Everybody just wants to get back to it. We’re in a tight spot, and the stress takes its toll – but there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Hopefully we all get through it and survive.”

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So far the Music Venue Trust’s #SaveOurVenues campaign has raised over £4million from more than 800,000 donations – with London’s The Black Heart securing a massive £150,000 just last week. MVT CEO Mark Davyd described the public’s gargantuan efforts as “one of the most heartwarming efforts I’ve ever seen”.

“I’ve had a long career in the music industry and never seen anything like this,” Davyd told NME. “People think it’s just about the money, but it’s not. Every time I read a message on Twitter saying, ‘What can I do to help?’ That’s just life-affirming.

“I got into this because I genuinely believed that grassroots music venues had been undervalued for years and had something very important to tell us about the way that we run the whole of our society. It’s incredibly heartwarming to find that a huge number of people agree with that. We will not sit here while our society is ripped apart.”

 

With health passports set to be trialled to “reopen live music safely“, Davyd called on the government to bring about test events for grassroots music venues sooner rather than later so that all obstacles can be overcome in time for the summer.

“We’re not out of the woods in any way, shape or form – but we’ve moved to the stage where we know what the road ahead might look like, and it does look very difficult,” Davyd told NME.

”There are going to be a lot of problems along the way around things like the restrictions that venues are going to have to try and enforce, decisions they’re going to make around who to let in and how to handle them.

“However, the light at the end of the tunnel is not an oncoming train but something that we just need to work out. We’ve worked most things out over the last 12 months.”

He added: “Less than one per cent of venues have closed down for good. Compared to the 83 per cent we feared would close, that’s remarkable. If we can achieve that during a crisis then think of how well we can do when we bring live music back and revive the whole sector. We remain very focussed.”

Speaking to NME at the end of last year, Davyd put the saviour of UK music venues down to “people power”.

“When we look at where donations are coming from and when they spike, it is very closely linked to the coverage we receive from the NME,” said Davyd. “What that means is that NME readers are taking action and making a huge difference to keep these venues alive. We want to make it incredibly clear to the NME and its readers that the Music Venue Trust are merely standing in front of the work done by the public, by artists and by good samaritans.”

He continued: “This is the result of people power. When Music Venue Trust and NME were first talking about this crisis in March, we were looking at the very real closure of 500 venues. It’s quite an astonishing achievement and it belongs as much to the writers and readers of the NME as anyone.”

Visit here for information on how to help or donate the #SaveOurVenues campaign.

Imma keep it two virgils … Virgil Abloh needs to be arrested for this pic.twitter.com/Kzy5qUxoMD

— Two ? (@Tw0Virgils) June 29, 2020

virgil abloh be like pic.twitter.com/4sY38nLWLY

— ultralightbeam MIAMI YEEZUS BLONDED WHITE FERRARI (@MIAMIULTRRA) June 29, 2020