Miscellaneous - April 2018

  by Admin

published: 26 / 3 / 2018

intro

Hello and welcome to the April edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine. In September Pennyblackmusic will celebrate its twentieth anniversary, and in the build-up to this some of our longer-serving writers will be writing in our regular 'Ten Songs That Made Me Love...'column

Hello and welcome to the April edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine. In September Pennyblackmusic will celebrate its twentieth anniversary, and in the build-up to this some of our longer-serving writers will be writing in our regular 'Ten Songs That Made Me Love...'column about ten of the songs that have been amongst the most memorable to them during their time at Pennyblack. First of all it is the turn of Fiona Hutchings and Lisa Torem. Fiona, who joined us 2009, reflects on writing about and sometimes interviewing artists including Madness, the Magic Brothers and Mark Morriss from the Bluetones, while, Lisa, who has been writing for us since 2009, recalls interviewing artists including 10cc's Graham Gouldman, Donovan, Dave Davies from the Kinks, Buffy Saint-Marie and the Gang of Four. We are also running another 'Ten Songs That Made Me Love...' column in which, after front man Mark E Smith's death in January, Jon Rogers weighs up his favourite songs by the ever caustic Fall. Amongst our twelve new interviews this month we have our usual combination of well-established and newer acts. In our lead interview Erick Mertz talks to singer-songwriter and Throwing Muses front woman Kristin Hersh about the differences between writing for a solo and a band record, her lengthy career and future plans. Our other main interviews are with Steve Firth, the bassist with former Brit pop band Embrace about his group's just released seventh album 'Love Is A Basic Need'; former Bauhaus drummer Kevin Haskins about his new book 'Bauhaus – Undead: The Visual History and Legacy of Bauhaus'; Colin Blunstone from iconic 60's act the Zombies about his group's resurgence and solo career; country star Lilly Hiatt about her favourite music for her different frames of mind, and ex-Move guitarist and bassist Trevor Burton on his solo debut album 'Long Play' which is being released on Gray Sky Records on vinyl for Record Store Day. Other interviews include Johny Brown, the front man with ever creative London-based alternative rock group the Band of Holy Joy about their latest two albums, ‘The Clouds That Break the Sky’ and ‘Funambulist We Love You'; Stuart Avis, the main songwriter in Brighton-based prog rock band Servants of Science, about his group's debut album 'The Swan Song', which is a concept record about an astronaut witnessing the end of the world from outer space; Cambridge/London-based indie pop group the Pony Collaboration about their first album in nine years, ‘Everything Was Ages Ago', and rising Newcastle stoner rock trio Dunes on their second EP. There are also interviews with Chris Haddon, the singer and guitarist for Manchester bands The Minx and Heavy On The Magic, about his new full-time career as a holistic healer, and author and singer-songwriter Bob Shiel about his book '61 Highways Revisited: The Albums of Bob Dylan'. There is also an extensive tribute to the original Alice Cooper group who celebrate their 50th anniversary this year. We also have twenty new album and singles reviews. In our previous update in mid-March we added another eight reviews. As always this magazine has come together through the hard work of a lot of people. Thank you to Darren Aston, Kimberly Bright, Malcolm Carter, Daniel Cressey, Nicky Crewe, Nick Dent-Robinson, Anthony Dhanendran, Cat Goodwin, Dave Goodwin, Marie Hazelwood, Adrian Huggins, Fiona Hutchings, Adrian Janes, Richard Lewis, L.Paul Mann, Jon Rogers, Maarten Schiethart, Harry Sherriff, Anthony Strutt, Lisa Torem and Cila Warncke. Special thanks to our webmaster Richard Banks for his work behind the scenes. Just after this edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine went online, we learned of the death of our writer Anthony Strutt on Sunday 25th March after a lengthy battle with cancer. Anthony was one of our longest-serving writers, having contributed to this site since 2000, and was absolutely passionate about music. He will be missed for his vast musical knowledge, informed articles and above all as a friend. We will be paying full tribute to him in our next magazine which is due online at the beginning of May. Our thoughts in the meantime are with his wife Celia and his family. Thank you as always for reading Pennyblackmusic, John Clarkson Magazine Editor www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk