News, Views and Music Issue 46 (Intro)

In which the number’s up for our laptop, the numbers lead to enlightenment for Cat Stevens and the top five adds up to a big fat zero for our two election candidates this year...

♫ Hello everybody and welcome to our much-delayed 46^th issue of everybody’s favourite Monkeynuts Newsletter (after the Young Conservatives Newsletter it seems) News, Views and Music. Apologies for the delay and yes all your guesses are right – I’ve been poorly the last few weeks and my computer’s felt even worse. We’ve had to send Dell Boy back to the IT Boffins after she froze on me a fortnight ago and we’ve only just had her back (and,typically, I’d just finished adding all 400 hours of my CD collection to her just before she died – I’m currently 150 hours of the way through adding them all on again!) So here is an extended version of this week’s newsletter catching up on all the news you’ve missed while we’ve been away and a special four-issue version of the anniversary section.

♫ Beach Boys News: What is there left for Brian Wilson to do, now that he’s resurrected Pet Sounds and Smile and released his 40-years-in-the-making follow-up concept albums to these? Well, the George Gershwin Library in America might have just had the answer: Brian Wilson’s favourite composer left a great deal of unreleased material in his archives when he died and his ‘Library’ think that Brian is the ideal person to finish them off. Brian, of course, has been telling interviewers for many many years that ‘Rhapsody In Blue’ was a huge inspiration for ‘Sounds’ and ‘Smile’ but this is the first time he will have covered a Gershwin song in a recording (barring a few on-tour doodles anyway). More news if and when we hear it!

♫ Beatles News: First up, distressingly the Beatles Rock band game has failed to meet chart expectations and has slipped out of the game charts for all consoles much quicker than expected. Even more distressingly, we at the AAA haven’t got a copy of them yet, so let’s hope the recent £10 reduction in cash doesn’t mean that they’re going to disappear really quickly!

Secondly, we were going to tell you about a new Lennon biopic that’s in the works. The film , provisionally given the horridly inappropriate title ‘Nowhere Boy’, is based on Julia Baird’s second book ‘Growing Up With My Brother’ (she shares the same mother as Lennon but different father) and tells the story of Lennon’s childhood up to the age of 17 and the formation of The Quarrymen. I say ‘we were going to tell you’ because chances are you’ve heard about it anyway in this last week – one of the stars and the film’s creator have fallen in love on set and are about to get married, hence the fact that publicity for this film is now sky high! The film is due for release on Boxing Day this year. More news if and when.

♫ Human League News: The Human League seem to have been dead unlucky on this list so far. First we have a review of their ‘Romantic?’ album all planned for the newsletters when our old computer packs up and then, when the new one has a hiccup, comes the first real news story of the year. No, not a new album (after all, it’s only been eight years since the last, let’s be patient!) but a documentary about the whole electronic scene in the late 70s/early 80s. Now, this has never really been my era, the League apart, and I’ve been disappointed by 1980s music documentaries before (the people I wanted to know about weren’t on and the people I didn’t want to know about were), but this BBC4 documentary was a classic, one of the best they’ve produced, full of intriguing insight into how several very different people ended up doing the same things with synthesisers more or less independently (it’s the fault of politics, sci-fi and the stagnation of punk, allegedly). It’s called ‘Synth Britannia’ in case you see a repeat of it some time soon – the follow up ‘...At The BBC’ was disappointing though, despite the presence of rare footage from league spin-off band ‘Heaven 17’ (lip-synching ‘Temptation).

♫ Pink Floyd News: The Wall will be 30 years old next month - and it still hasn’t been torn down from its rightful position at the forefront of music concept albums. We’ve already looked at this album in-depth (as review no 76) and have a lot more about the fall-out of the Floyd during the album ready for you next week (computers permitting), but have a look out for this month and next month’s Mojo Magazines, both of which have features about the album, the stage show and the film plus a CD with cover versions of every one of the album’s songs. We’ll have to see about December’s, but November’s issue included a very interesting interview with a surprisingly humble Roger Waters.

♫The Who News: We asked a couple of issues ago whether the Who reunion of 2006 was over already, after such a long gap between news stories and the fact that Pete and Roger have been working on different projects (Daltrey, for instance, is currently touring on his own , doing a ‘songs by Pete Townshend’ set list). Well since we said it other music journos have been asking the same question – only the band don’t seem to agree on what they will be doing next. According to Townshend in August the next album, titled ‘Floss’, will be a return to the prog rock concepts of The Who’s illustrious past focusing on ‘age and death’; according to Daltrey in October his partner’s now given that up and started focussing on an untitled album full of stand-alone songs instead. Either way, the band are due to return to the recording studio in December and the new album – whichever one it is or possibly a combination of the two – will be out in the new year.

♫ Happy birthday bonanzas to the following AAA artistes (October 16^th-22^nd): Bob Weir (rhythm guitar with the Grateful Dead 1965-95) who turns 62 on October 16^th. Anniversaries of events include The Kinks release ‘All Day And All Of The Night’ just three months after storming the charts with ‘You Really Got Me’ (October 16^th 1964), The Beatles appear on TV for the first time ever – singing ‘Some Other Guy’ live at the Cavern for the BBC show ‘People And Places’ (October 17^th 1962), The Dick Lester film ‘How I Won The War’ with John Lennon among the cast receives its premiere at the London Pavilion (October 18^th 1967), there are yet more riots at a Rolling Stones concert as the mayhem follows the fab five to, err, France – the same country that became the only European one not to feature screaming teenage fans at Beatle concerts; £1400 of damages are reported (October 20^th 1964), The Who – still using original name ‘The High Numbers’ - are rejected by EMI (October 22^nd 1964 – you can see the rejection letter in copies of the band’s ‘Live At Leeds’ album), The Beach Boys release ‘Good Vibrations’ in the USA (October 22^nd 1966) and finally it’s 30 years since Paul McCartney died. Allegedly. (Actually it’s 30 years since Macca first denied the rumours which had been circulating among the underground press for the past few months; October 22^nd 1969).

And from the 23^rd-29^th: Happy birthdays to Bill Wyman (bassist with The Rolling Stones 1964-89) who turns 70 on October 24^th and Denny Laine (guitarist with The Moody Blues 1964-66 and with Wings 1972-79) who turns 65 on October 29^th. Anniversaries of events are seriously Beatles-filled this week and include: Paul McCartney receives a unique prize – the only rhodium-plated disc in history, courtesy of the Guiness Book Of Hit Records, in honour of his long track record of record sales (October 24^th 1980); back in 1964 Macca was busy receiving a then-record five Ivor Novello songwriting awards along with John Lennon (October 25^th); Things were hotting up for Lennon in 1973 when – in desperation at attempts to deport him from his new homeland of America – he files a lawsuit against alleged phone-tappers working on behalf of the US Government (allegations later proved genuine under the 30-year-secrets act); The Beatles receive their MBE’s from The Queen on October 26^th 1964 (the last time she was useful for anything! – there goes my knighthood!); that magical day in 1961 when a customer named Raymond James walks into Brian Epstein’s NEMS music store and asks him for a single by an obscure ‘German’ group called ‘The Beatles’ (the record – ‘My Bonnie’ – was of course recorded and released only in Germany at the time; October 28^th) and finally, Pink Floyd’s ‘Dark Side Of The Moon’ becomes the longest ever chart entry on the LP charts after clocking up it’s 491^st consecutive week in the top 200 (beating Johnny Mathis’ ‘Greatest Hits’ 10-year-run for the first time; October 29^th 1983).

From October 30^th-November 5^th: Hip-hop Birthdays to Bert Jansch (guitarist with Pentangle 1967-72 and intermittent reunions along the way) who turns 66 on November 3^rd, Lulu (wee Scottish lass with a big voice 1964-present) who turns 61 on the same day, Art Garfunkel (tall American with heavenly voice, with Paul Simon 1964-70 and solo thereafter) turns 67 on November 5^th and finally Gram Parsons (with The Byrds 1968) would have been 63 had he not died in mysterious circumstances just after his 27^th birthday. Anniversaries of events include: Hotlegs AKA 10cc make their live debut – supporting The Moody Blues at the Royal Festival Hall on October 30^th 1970; George Harrison releases ‘Wonderwall’ – the world’s first ‘proper’ solo Beatles album – on November 1^st 1968; The Beatles appear at the Royal Variety Command Performance in 1963, with the rich rattling their jewellery and the kids grooving like it was, umm, 1963 (November 4^th); The Beach Boys’ infamous ‘Good Vibrations’ single is finally released in the UK after a then-record amount of hours in the studio and the highest cost of any 45 single (November 4^th 1966); The Who’s tour of ‘Quadrophenia’ gets off to a bad start after the click-track tape the band play to gets out-of-synch and Townshend has a temper tantrum on stage (November 5^th 1973) and finally The Beach Boys return to the top of the American charts with ‘Kokomo’ in 1988 – their first no 1 since ‘Good Vibrations’ 22 years before (November 5^th).

And for the last time, from November 6^th-12th: Happy Hip-Op Birthdays to Ian Craig Marsh (synthesiser with the Human League 1978-80) who turns 53 on November 11^th and Neil Young (Grunge Godfather/Country Captain/Rock Radical/Folk Fanatic Etc) who turns 64 on November 12^th. Anniversaries of events include: Bill Graham, legendary concert promoter, puts together his first show at the Fillmore West – naturally, both the Dead and the Airplane are on it! (November 6^th 1965); Dylan and the Stones have an interesting night at New York’s Hilton Hotel – an electricity blackout for most of the night results in an in-the-dark jam between the Bobmeister and Brian Jones (November 6^th 1965); Paul Simon returns to the stage after a five-year-absence, performing at London’s Hammersmith Odeon on November 6^th 1980; The Human League officially split for the first time on November 8^th 1980 – Martin Ware and Ian Craig Marsh form Heaven 17 whilst Phil Oakey recruits two new keyboardists and two girl singers to the line-up; Brian Epstein sees The Beatles on-stage at The Cavern for the first time (November 9^th 1961); David Crosby officially leaves The Byrds just two months before the album ‘Notorious Byrd Brothers’ is released (November 9^th 1967); The Moody Blues release seminal single ‘Nights In White Satin’ (November 10^th 1967) and finally, the new-look Human League make their first ever live appearance (November 12^th 1980).