Cuttings

"instant feedback"  Neil Young plus electricity plus us, the ticket-holders. It's been a volatile but vital combination for over three decades. On the eve of the great man's return to the heart of the hurricane with Crazy Horse, he talks exclusively to Sylvie Simmons. Meanwhile, band-members and bystanders over the years recall "the most intense experience" in live rock music. In a misty redwood clearing an hour south of San Francisco, high up on Skyline off of Highway 92, sites the Mountain House Restaurant like a lost Twin Peaks prop. Wood-clad, fireplaced, folksy - fake owl on the mantelpiece, signed hockey-stick on the wall — local boys Neil Young and Crazy Horse once played a seven-hour electric set on the enormous verandah that soars out over a ravine. No use the neighbours complaining; the cops were enjoying the show. Young’s ranch Broken Arrow is a 10-minute drive away — less if any of his cars were under 30 years old—but the Mountain House is where ...

MADHATTAN'S TEA PARTY NEW MUSIC SEMINAR 90 • A freeloader’s paradise or a valuable talkshop for new ideas depending on what time you get up, New York’s NEW MUSIC SEMINAR is certainly the biggest, strangest, funniest gathering in the music biz calendar. Lured by tales of eight live bands a night and a chance to ‘schmooze’ STEVE LAMACQ gamely took a look. In search of the perfect pitcher (of margueritas): KEVIN CUMMINS Vicar of that quaint English parish The Hacienda, Tony Wilson talks in the type of reverent tones you last heard in a school assembly. Sitting, centrally, twixt a panel of nominated celebs, he looks down from his pulpit on a conference room full of 200 expectant music biz folk and announces: “Welcome to the New Music Seminar. The rest of the shit going on in this building this week is the OLD Music Seminar. This is the NMS.” Wilson, casually dressed, hair slightly unkempt, takes charge of this year’s first (most?) interesting discussion panel at the 11th New Music Se...

Power In The Darkness An artistic rebirth celebrated. By Tim Peacock New Order Power, Corruption & Lies - Definitive Edition ★★★★★ Rhino cat no tbc (2CD + LP + 2DVD ) They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger and that old adage rings true when you consider New Order’s early years. The band themselves were the biggest critics of their flawed, but underrated, 1981 debut, Movement , but they had to endure the growing pains of making it to emerge from the long shadow cast by their recent past as Joy Division. In retrospect, it’s astonishing Movement was ever completed at all. Not only were the fledgling foursome still reeling from the loss of Ian Curtis, but their relationship with Martin Hannett hit rock bottom during the sessions. Movement still bore the mercurial producer’s stamp, but his increasing irascibility, burgeoning heroin habit and lack of faith in the band sans Curtis led to an inevitable parting of the ways. Few would have guessed...