rkershaw has written the following articles:
It’s the clatter of a cowbell that sparks the stage invasion. Everybody knows what song that means. Speaker stacks are knocked to the ground, the stage floods with people, someone grabs a microphone and screams… “HOUSE OF! JEALOUS LOVERS! SHAKEDOWN!”. Guitarist Luke Jenne»
Hip hop is not best known for making superstars of white, University-educated software developers, but Gold Chains looks set to change all that. The self-styled punk rock MC formerly known as Topher Lafata is responsible for a string of EPs on labels like Kit Clayton’s Orthlorng Musork and is in town t»
The Thrills know it’s not where you're from, it's where you're at. They appear to have lost their hearts in West Coast America rather than their native Dublin, and could scarcely appear more Yankophile if they arrived tonight wearing 'I Love NYC' t-shirts and 'Don’t Mess With Texas' baseball caps. The band co»
The last time I saw Interpol play, I had just fallen in love with their first LP. Four months later, they are back in London playing alongside The Thrills, The Polyphonic Spree and The Datsuns on the last date of the annual NME tour. The band slink on stage, sharp-suited and pretty, an»
Much of what is written about the Polyphonic Spree fails to get beyond appearances. That’s not to say that the happy-clappy Californian cult look doesn’t have a certain novelty value - 24 members dressed in white robes and permanent grins certainly makes a change from looking like the Strokes. They sin»
Jarvis Cocker and Pulp/Desperate Sound System cohort Steve Mackey joined the Polyphonic Spree on stage last night. Playing their last UK date at the Shepherds Bush Empire, the Texan 23 piece introduced Jarvis and Steve as members of the Spree choir for two songs after the pair DJ-ed earlier in t»
Last night a normal dose of Aphex acid was flying around, albeit rather loudly, at the Rephlex "Eat Your Own Ears" night in a warehouse on Brick Lane, London... But then, as one dis-oik reports... "I dont know any details (we suspect he »
Nik Cohn wrote Ball the Wall, the short story that inspired 'Saturday Night Fever', as well as penning 'Awopbopaloobopalopbamboom', one of the first serious attempts at rock’n’roll journalism. Neither of these provide much indication as to what this book is like. Yes We Have No is a travelogue arou»
Jack’s second album, 1998’s ‘The Jazz Age’, was a masterpiece of gin-soaked melancholy - 10 songs of twilight decadence and hungover despair. The band shared more with the Tindersticks, Nick Cave and The Walker Brothers than with their peers, who seemed lost in the post-Britpop doldrums. But»
Since the punk and new wave sensations that were Alternative TV and Squeeze, things have been a little quiet in Deptford - and before anyone mentions them, Dire Straits don’t count. But, as head-in-the-clouds hacks insist at six monthly intervals, this corner of London is apparently primed to be th»
It’s hard to know what to say about Brian Wilson by way of introduction - labelling him a genius seems clichéd, and yet it seems the only appropriate title for him. Plagued by personal difficulties, Wilson ceased touring with the Beach Boys in 1964 before starting work on Pet Sounds, the album tha»
How does an infamous former pop star and art-prankster react to the onset of middle age? Do you still have a mid-life crisis if you spent your formative years making massively successful pop records and carrying out increasingly bizarre art stunts? Alongside Jimmy Cauty, Bill Drummond was better known as the KLF (latte»
For a while Harland Miller appeared to be better known for his celebrity friends (Jarvis Cocker, Tracy Emin) and appearances in style magazines than for his writing, but with the publication of Slow Down Arthur, Stick to 30 that should finally change. The book tells the story of Billy “Kid” Glover, a teenage outsider i»
For a time in the mid ’90s, like their flagship band Oasis, Creation Records appeared to be unstoppable. As the marquee banner at the 1996 Knebworth shows had it, “form is temporary, class is permanent”. Many people hold a special place in their hearts for Creation, and like Rough Trade, Postcard or Cherry Red, it was »
