In the mid-’50s, no-one wanted to cut Bye Bye Love. The songwriting team of Felice and Boudleaux Bryant shopped it around Nashville and got 30 rejections. Then the song found its way to a teenage duo freshly arrived in town and signed to Cadence Records. Don and Phil Everly – 19 and 17 years old respectively – agreed to cut it. But once they got in the studio with a band, led by their mentor Chet Atkins, they realised something was missing. ORDER NOW: Read the full interview in Uncut’s November 2021 issue During a break, Don started practising a...
Fifteen years on, José González is still primarily known, to the tune of 342 million Spotify plays, for his cover of Heartbeats by fellow Swedes The Knife. Much of its initial popularity was down to an appearance on Sony Bravia’s memorable ‘coloured balls’ TV ad – exactly the kind of ‘sync’ every emerging artist (and their publishing company) would kill for. The single duly made the UK Top 10 and its parent LP Veneer went platinum, yet the introverted González was never really cut out for mainstream success. ORDER NOW: The Rolling Stones are on the cover of the November 2021...
Rap is so often a study in braggadocio – the voice of the strutting peacock, the narcissist with a hunger to conquer. Rappers play the role of the alpha male or the queen bee – they brag, they boast, they rhyme endlessly about themselves. But rap also attracts some nerdy, introverted types, drawn to the way in which rap uses poetry as a defensive carapace. One of them is Simbiatu Abisola Abiola Ajikawo – the north London actress, musician and singer who performs as Little Simz. ORDER NOW: The Rolling Stones are on the cover of the November 2021 issue...
Last year’s Rock Bottom Rhapsody partly detailed the existential crisis that befell LaFarge following his move from St Louis hometown to LA in 2018, a long dark night of the soul that brought out self-destructive tendencies. The follow-up, provisionally titled Siesta Love owing to its summery afternoon swing, is brighter in tone, charting his journey back to some kind of contentment. The pandemic, it transpires, worked in his favour, a cancelled tour giving him the space and time to fully recharge. ORDER NOW: The Rolling Stones are on the cover of the November 2021 issue of Uncut Opening track Get...
You expect biopics of musical legends to be awestruck, but this fictionalised life of Aretha Franklin suffers from reverence rather than respect. Starring Jennifer Hudson as the late soul legend, it depicts a woman struggling to find her true voice, and then, once she’s found it, to free herself from the oppressive men in her life – her authoritarian preacher father (Forest Whitaker) and abusive husband and manager Ted White (Marlon Wayans). Narratively, it comes across as melodrama, punctuated by earnest confrontations and scenes in which Aretha’s mentors impart sound advice (“Find the songs that move you”). ORDER NOW: The...
Details of a new John Lennon tribute event, Dear John, have been announced. ORDER NOW: The Rolling Stones are on the cover of Uncut’s November 2021 issue READ MORE: Hear three tracks from The Beatles’ new Let It Be special editions The online event will follow on from the release earlier this year of the Dear John tribute album, which featured Lennon covers by a range of artists and raised money for War Child. A livestream tribute concert will now take place on October 9 to mark what would have been Lennon‘s 81st birthday, with the event benefitting War Child...
Amy Winehouse is set to be the subject of a new retrospective exhibition at the Design Museum in London. ORDER NOW: The Rolling Stones are on the cover of Uncut’s November 2021 issue The late singer is being honoured to mark the recent 10-year anniversary of her death in July 2011 at the age of 27. Amy: Beyond the Stage will open at the Design Museum on November 26 and aims to celebrate “a cultural icon that the world lost too soon”. Advertisement The collection will “explore the creative process, powerful music and unforgettable style of a musician whose work drew...
Presenting Uncut’s Ultimate Genre Guide to shoegaze. Classic archive interviews and heavily distorted new writing on the genre, including Cocteau Twins, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Spacemen 3, My Bloody Valentine, Pale Saints, Lush, Slowdive and more, which is a bonus. Buy a copy online here.
On the Rollercoaster tour of early 1992, it seemed that if Damon Albarn couldn’t get past My Bloody Valentine, he was going to try and get over them. Or possibly under. Such was his athleticism as Blur presented their opening act set of post-Baggy, pop-psychedelia, it seemed as though while the Jesus and Mary Chain, and Dinosaur Jr were there as musical diversions, Blur were partly there for sport. BUY NOW: The Ultimate Genre Guide to Shoegaze On that night, as others on the tour, lots were drawn as to the order of the bill – as per the...
Blues has always been a vital channel of protest and nonconformity, and in recent years a powerful new group of artists have risen up to rail against the problems of the 21st century. There are plain-speaking singer-songwriters such as Buffalo Nichols, whose self-titled debut is our Album Of The Month, Tré Burt, Amythyst Kiah and Allison Russell; guitarists like Gwenifer Raymond and Cameron Knowler taking on the instrumental might of the blues; and those harnessing the raw, ragged power of the sound, from The Black Keys to Eight Point Star. CLICK HERE TO GET THE NEW UNCUT DELIVERED DIRECT...