Where to start?
When Peter Hook announced that he, and his band the Light, were to perform a special one off show for the 35th anniversary of Ian Curtis’s death there was huge excitement. The tickets for the show sold out in under 10 minutes, and I was lucky enough to get a pair, and the chance to see Peter Hook playing the entire Joy Division back catalogue – all 47 tracks that they recorded and released – is a proposition to make any Joy Division fan salivate.
When you’ve personally witnessed Nick Cave nodding out on heroin and slowly lowering his head into a candle flame – his mass of dyed black hair igniting as you rush over with a tea towel to extinguish the blaze – you are likely to do a minor double-take when, years later, you hear that he’s been made an honorary doctor of letters by the University of Brighton, the English seaside town he calls home.
Such is the unlikely trajectory of a musician who, for more than three decades, has staggered along the fissure that separates low life from highbrow art. Like very few other “rock stars” – not a breed he has ever closely identified himself with – Cave has survived the thanatos of his self-destructive impulses to become a canonised artist of the transgressive. He’s made several acclaimed albums, written novels and screenplays, and been showered with awards. He’s even had his own South Bank Show.
THE Twilight Sad have revealed their delight after rock legend Robert Smith of The Cure teamed up with them for his latest single.
Legendary frontman Robert is a huge fan of the Scots indie group and revealed to Mogwai’s Stuart Braithwaite he had been impressed by them when the two rocks bands toured together.
Jeanette (Aka Ginette) Landray was born March 4th, 1960 in Liverpool, where she lived until the age of 16. She then moved to London with then boyfriend Budgie, ex-drummer for Big In Japan, The Slits, Spitfire Boys, and Siouxsie and the Banshees. “I had originally moved to London to follow a dance career, and took many classes. During this time Budgie and I grew apart and split up, and although Budgie got together with Siouxsie Sioux, we remained friends.
Another “best bands” articles, but, like this 20 best goth records article, this ones pretty good…
Bauhaus
I’m sure Peter Murphy, a.k.a the “Godfather of Goth,” would want to see his band Bauhaus first on this list. And, the truth is, Bauhaus were actually one of the most brilliantly compelling and sometimes confounding bands to come out of England following that country’s progressive, glam rock and punk scene. They were a kind of decadent hybrid of all of that music, influenced by early David Bowie and Brian Eno (they released a fabulous single with faithful renditions of “Ziggy Stardust” and “Third Uncle” late in their career). There was makeup and mullets, but nobody wore them cooler.
Another “20 best” article – but this time (from me) the selections are pretty good…
It’s June, 1999, or thereabouts. I’m sixteen years of age. I’m in a nightclub for the first, perhaps second time in my life. The nightclub is called Spiders, and it’s located on the edge of an industrial estate in Hull. The air as my friends and I queue up outside is foul with burnt cocoa fumes wafting from a neighbouring factory. The smell inside the club is worse.
