They're here. They're Queer. Get tickets for it.

Garbage have just announced plans to do a 20th birthday party for Queer...

Band Aid 30: Or, keeping Emeli Sande busy

Could there be anything worse than the Band Aid 30 idea?

Oh, hang on...

Announcing the project, Bob Geldof and Midge Ure said the song's lyrics would be changed to reflect the Ebola crisis.

This does give the impression that Bob and Midge had this conversation earlier in the year:

- Hey, it's the 30th anniversary, we should definitely do a Band Aid 30
- Who is this?
- It's Midge
- Midge Who?
- This isn't a knock-knock joke
- Oh, Midge. Hang on... how did you get this number?
- Jools Holland
- Bloody Jools. Anyway, what did you want?
- Band Aid. Band Aid 30.
- Oh. Yeah... but is there an African crisis we can help with?
- Well, Syria's in Africa...
- [silence]
- Bob?
- [silence]
- Bob?
- [silence]
- Well, I'm sure something will turn up...

God knows how they'll change the lyrics - "It's Christmastime, that's no time to die from ebola/ At Christmastime, we let in light and we wash our hands properly/ And our world of plenty handwash/ We can scrub our fingers clean/ Throw your arms around the world/ After checking its temperature, of course..."

Geldof and Ure, who masterminded the first version, said the project was nothing to do with nostalgia.

Then why call it after Band Aid, and mark the 30th anniversary, and use the same song that was used 30 years ago?

So far, confirmed artists include U2's Bono, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Emeli Sande, Underworld, Sinead O'Connor, Paloma Faith, Foals and Bastille, who have given up two arena dates to record their contribution.

Who would have guessed that Bono would be involved, eh?

But don't think this an insular British thing:

Versions will also be recorded in France, Germany and the US. "Think Daft Punk. Think Johnny Hallyday," said Geldof.

Ah, Johnny Hallyday - Bob's finger-on-the-pulse understanding of the Francophone music scene is, clearly, second to none.

As ever: it's lovely to raise money for charity, but you can donate right now to the DEC Ebola fund, and we don't need to make Emeli Sande do any singing at all.

Full Bible. No apocrypha.

Joining the 'playing an album in full to celebrate its 20th anniversary, thereby making you feel both giddily excited and incredibly ancient' gang: the Manics, doing The Holy Bible.

Time ticks on for Mika and Swatch

What do Mika and Swatch have in common?

Yes, yes, besides both having once been inexplicably popular despite reeking of clunky, bright coloured plastic. And now being pretty much biding their time until they can scramble onto an ironic retro revival.

Besides that.

It turns out they're both thirty years old, and so Mika has been invited to design Swatches to celebrate.

In fact, not watches but:

two colourful timepieces inspired by tribal mask motifs

Yeah, they're busy watches.

To me, it looks like it's just a bunch of vague, patronising tribey-wibey stuff lobbed together. But I'm perhaps being unfair. Mike, explain you vision to us:

“The patterns are a mix of designs that can be found in Tunisian, Moroccan, other African and Oceanic tribal motifs,” according to Mika. “The tribal mask heads are a mix of sources; it’s difficult to pinpoint what they might be. But it doesn’t really matter, because they have the same function ― they’re there to inspire curiosity and awe.”

Ah. It doesn't really matter whether there's any coherence to the work so long as you can think about it. That might sound like the sort of lazy cop-out you'd come up with if you'd just knocked something together, but I'm sure it isn't.

Swatch have produced 999 of the more expensive version of the watch; they call this a limited edition; I suspect it's an overoptimistic oversupply.

Happy birthday, Master Mika.

One from the "that's like getting a telly that only shows Russell Harty" file

There's an elaborate reissue to mark twenty years since Lenny Kravitz released Are You Going To Go My Way.

Apart from trying to make us all feel old and impotent, it's hard to see why.

This song is thirty years old today

[Buy Blue Monday]

Thirty years ago today

It's thirty years since Karen Carpenter died.

What the pop papers say: Fifty years, more or less.

After the 60th anniversary of the NME (or the 60 and a half-th), the next big anniversary the NME is celebrating is the 50th anniversary of the NME Awards.

They start trailing this in the current issue, with an announcement of "a special Spotify playlist" (ooh, you're spoiling us) and a look at the new art-deco logo.

I have no idea why the logo is based on the 1920s for a celebration of an event from the 1960s, but anything that gets us away from that awful raised-finger statue has to be welcomed.

I'm not sure the celebration is quite right, though. The promo says:

It's 50 years since rock n roll's biggest knees-up began...

- but surely for a long period of that time there wasn't any event as such, just the publication of a magazine containing tabulated results?

Still, there were parties and TV specials. Although, erm, it looks like there was one in 1961 - shown on ABC. Which would make 2013 the 52nd anniversary.

Never mind, it's an impressive track record however you miscount it. And clearly the NME would be keen to focus on the mid 1960s instead of the start, when they scored a pretty sweet presenter for their events. Chap called Jimmy Savile. Why wouldn't you want to fudge the numbers a little to remember those days, eh?

What the pop papers say: NME at sixty and a half

With a multitude of covers to choose from, this week it's the NME's 60th birthday.

Only it isn't, is it? As the free facsimile of issue one inside shows, the magazine launched in March 1952. Were you looking for a metaphor for "slightly behind the curve", turning up six months late to your own party would be a pretty good one.

So, who do we get on these multicovers? There is a nice surprise - a Patti Smith variant, meaning that at least there's one woman given front page prominence. A fifty per cent drop in the number of women who appeared on the front of issue one, but - hey, who said progress would always be a straight line, eh?

Smith is a slightly risky choice for the anniversary - she's not been considered worthy of a cover for over thirty years and so, unlike some of the other cover stars is a bit less grateful, a bit less eager to please. She tells an anecdote about how, to punky New Yorkers, NME was too expensive, so they'd read the content but not buy the magazine. Ah, for the days when that was just a problem in overseas markets, eh, IPC?

Other covers- well, obviously there's not one but two Gallaghers.

Liam is reminded that the NME in the 1990s was "practically stalking" him every week - imagine that, eh? Asked why the NME is important (a leading question) he burbles out something almost incomprehensible that they transcribe anyway:

When I go and do my weekly shop I get NME and I read it while my misses is putting all the gear in."

Ah, the magazine of choice for boorish middle-aged men; such a quick read you can get through it while someone lobs a couple of foccacias and a bottle of merlot into the Bag For Life.

Noel, meanwhile, makes a more spirited attempt to justify the NME's existence:

I don't read about things in the Daily Mail, or a Sunday supplement, or the fucking Guardian. I read them in the NME.

Me, Liam, Noel. Is there anyone in the actual demographic that NME sells to its advertisers buying the thing?

Talkingnof demographics, there's an inadvertently revealing quote from Noel when he's talking about his brother's covers:

I'd go into the shop, and me two Asian mates, they'd be reading it under the counter.

"Me two Asian mates", Noel? Apart possibly from David Cameron, who mentions irrelevant ethnicity in the middle of an anecdote?

Paul Weller awkwardly tells a story about the Melody Maker (hey, how is that Meldoy Maker website coming along, IPC?) but does spark a wonderful admission from Gavin Haynes, that the Preston from The Ordinary Boys interviews his hero Weller piece was a bit of a sham:

[Preston] wasn't even a fan, despite claiming to be. [...] He only didn't because that was the feature that would get him in the NME.

Really? Preston pretending to like someone just to raise his profile? Hard to imagine, innit?

Weller helpfully announces that he, too, reads the NME rather than blogs. The advertising department must have been screaming "can you find someone who doesn't wear trousers with elasticised waistbands who reads the bloody thing?"

There are some teenaged readers in the Arctic Monkeys piece, but, erm, they were the teenaged Monkeys.

Nicky Wire actually has something interesting to say, recalling a time when NME spoke confidently about Roth and Amis and - wonderfully - singling out the Sing Me To Sleep Youth Suicide issue, which normally gets pointed to as an example of what the NME shouldn't have been doing, despite it coming from an era of more solid sales and a more creative product.

John Lydon out of the estate agency business gets a front, too - I think he's the only person to mention Sounds, and as far as I can see, there's not a single mention of the fourth power, Record Mirror, anywhere in the issue.

The sixth cover is The Killers, who use their platform to announce that Razorlight get a bad rap. Which is true; Razorlight are no worse than The Killers.

Perhaps what's more interesting than the people who turned up is the people who didn't - most notably, no Bowie, who was something of a God for the 40th and 50th anniversaries and used to hold the record for most covers back when you had to wait for a while between reappearances. I wonder who fell out of favour with whom.

And there's barely a whisper of Pete Doherty.

What else do we get? There's a collection of "crazy covers" which ignores Wire's genuine enthusiasm for a time when NME was interested in the culture that created music rather than just rerunning old Lennon interviews. An arch eyebrow is raised for the Karen Grant and Blind Date covers - imagine, eh, the NME putting TV on its front cover. What were they thinking? It'd be like, say, half the 2012 NME website being given over to film and telly, wouldn't it? That would be crazy.

There's a two-page history of the magazine, which runs thought the well-trod path: Accordian Times, singles chart, Beatles, swinging London, falling sales, Tony Parsons, indie pop, lion rock, The Arctic Monkeys.

Alright, it might not have mentioned Lion Rock. But the is a namecheck for shrromadelica.
u
Rather awkwardly, the history starts with an error, suggesting it was a merger between the Musical Express and the Accoridan Times which created the NME - a "fact" which the Guardian repeated this week.

The reprint of issue one is lovely, although to be honest, I'm more curious to see what the final Musical Express & Accordian Times looked like. It's interesting to see a tension as to what the magazine might be known as back in March 1952 - there's a small lobby for The New ME, and NME appears only once. The page given over to Accordians mentions the first ever electric accoridan. Dropped from the masthead and electricity - it must have been a worrying week for accordianists everywhere.

Perhaps the most heartening thing in the issue, though, is a short bit by Matt Wilkinson setting out a manifesto for the next 60 years. Part a diagnostic on what's gone wrong in alt rock - no stars, no spirit - and part a pledge for the future:

Personally, I'm for smashing the whole fucker wide open

Next week's cover is Palma Violets. That's a start. But only time will tell if this really is a new rallying call, or merely the new music ed doodling in the corner while the churn of Gallagher - Beatles - Gallagher - Clash covers roll on.

Bikini Kill: New thrill

This year, it's twenty-five years since Bikini Kill started.

How do you mark an occasion like that? Turns out by launching a record label of the same name:

As our 25th anniversary approaches, Bikini Kill has decided to start our own record label called Bikini Kill Records. The Bikini Kill back catalog is currently available digitally via bikinikill.com, eMusic & iTunes. The Frumpies and Casual Dots are also up for sale now. We are working towards reissuing the physical Bikini Kill records one at a time. There are brand new Bikini Kill T Shirts available from bikinikill.com at this time with more merch to come in the near future.

Bikini Kill's Self-Titled EP will come out in the fall of 2012 to commemorate the 20 year anniversary of its original release. We also plan to re-release our original demo tape, which contains songs that were previously unavailable and/or hard to find on vinyl & CD. We are currently going through our archive, which include photographs, practice tapes, live recordings, unreleased songs, films, video, writing, interviews, zines and flyers that we intend to feature on future releases and document on our website. Please subscribe to our newsletter to receive news about our progress.

Best. Jubilee. Ever.

Going Blank Again again

Good news: to mark the 20th anniversary of Going Blank Again, Mark Gardener is going to do some dates.

Less good news:

Now Gardener has booked shows in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and Los Angeles in June and will play three cities — Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne — in Australia this August, with additional shows expected in Japan and Germany, according to his website.

Depending on where you are, that's less good news, I suppose.

Happy birthday, NME

I've been reading it since it was not as good as it used to be, and it's remained not as good as it used to be, consistently, since. I've been lucky enough to have had some stuff published in there in the past, which was always a teenage dream. For all its faults, it remains the best weekly pop paper - okay, it would be by default, but you know what I mean.

It still has some great people writing for it; it can still surprise and often delight. However much I might wish for a different NME, I'd never want a world without any NME.

Sixty years getting people to give you money for writing about music. Happy birthday, you magnificent beast.

30,000

How to mark this, the 30,000th post on No Rock And Roll Fun?

With a song with an appropriate title - Wilco's My Thirty Thousand - and a song which captures how music can be hugely important, and make a difference, and be a focus and a rallying point for good:



Thanks for reading, commenting and suggesting stuff.

Q is 25 years old

And to celebrate, it is producing 25 different covers - which is one for every reader they have left, I think.

Quick hint, Q - if you're looking to mark a quarter century of taste and discernment, this...

... might not be the way to flag that message.

Gennaro Castaldo Watch: Bismillah! No!

It's forty years next year since Queen started. Apparently this calls for "a year-long celebration" which seems a bit rich, given that the actual Queen has been going for 60 years and is quite happy with just a weekend to celebrate.

And who would be equal to the task of arranging the revels for this grand occasion? Step forward, HMV and Island Records:

Island Records and HMV are partnering to invite fans to nominate their all-time favourite lyric by the iconic rock-band.

This exciting development is difficult to imagine. If only HMV had a spokesperson who could explain it all... hang on...

HMV's Gennaro Castaldo comments: "We're thrilled that Queen are set to join other iconic artists in HMV's 'my inspiration' campaign, but rather than ask the remaining members of the band which song lyric has most inspired them, we felt it would be appropriate in this special anniversary year to flip the question and ask their fans which Queen lyric they would choose. Some of the most memorable and anthemic lines in rock and pop history have come from Queen, so it will be fascinating to see what the public goes for as its favourite Queen lyric of all time."

I hope, with all my heart, that the winning line is "This kettle is boiling over/I think I'm a banana tree". We can only hope.

Downloadable: Is This It? (Not quite)

Ten years on from the release of Is This It, Stereogum have rounded up a bunch of bands to produce a tribute-y, cover-y thing.

It runs from Homebase's Peter Bjorn and John doing the title track, through to Computer Magic doing Take It Or Leave It. Go download, and remember to say "thank you, Stereogum".

Downloadable: Room40

Room40 are celebrating their ten years in the electronic music business by giving away a 40 track sampler.

The headline names are probably Xiu Xiu, Grouper and Tenniscoats, but there's obviously much more to explore, sample and delight. Happy birthday, Room40.

[via CollapseBoard]

Downloadable: Sloan

Here's the link first, then: Follow The Leader, a new track by Sloan.

It's from their new album, The Double Cross, out in May. Their tenth album, and twentieth year of activity.

Jay Ferguson's quote is too good to leave languishing in a press release:

“I think every band always says of their latest LP, ‘it's our best yet!’ or perhaps ‘it's our greatest work since Exile on Main St.’, and then you hear it and you say to yourself, 'hmm, well, not quite, guys'. Hopefully I'm not joining those ranks, but for this our 10th album, I personally feel it's up there with my favorites of ours. Short and sweet with unexpected turns down different paths.”

Ten years on

Ten years ago this morning, the first post appeared on this blog.

Of course, it was always going to take bit of time to hit our stride and work out exactly what it was we were going to do with this "blog" thing. Today, we're closer than ever to having a bit of an idea. Maybe give it a couple of years, and we'll know where we're going.

There's only one way we can mark this auspicious occasion: with thanks to Sleater-Kinney, from whom we borrowed the name.

Annie after 40 years

You have to take your hat off to Annie Nightingale - for quite a while, Radio 1's only woman presenter, and now chalking up forty years on the station. They're going to celebrate her 40th anniversary - an Annie Versary, if you must - with a night of special programmes:

The main event of the tribute evening will be a three-hour concert, featuring such Nightingale-approved acts as Primal Scream, Fatboy Slim, Tinchy Stryder, Professor Green and I Blame Coco.

I Blame Coco? I should coco, more like.

Naturally, a proper Nightingale tribute concert would feature Is That All There Is and Fish heads, a brief period when her place in the audience would be filled by Mark Ellen sitting in, before a spot of theatre whereby a man dressed as The Controller shows everyone how much they value her by shoving her into a 2am slot on Wednesday mornings.

This will all happen in September. After all, October's when the network lives up to its pledge to honour its previous longest-serving employee, by Keeping It Peel. This year, they're going to build on last year's doing bugger all, and do bugger all, all over again.