Released last September, "Getting Killed" is the 4th., studio album by Geese and produced by the band and Kenny Beats, so far, the album has been preceded by three singles "Taxes", "Trinidad" and "100 Horses".
Geese transitioned from a quintet to a quartet after the departure of guitarist Foster Hudson, attributed to his decision to pursue academic work, With Hudson gone, Winter assumed a larger share of the guitar arrangements on the new material, then DiGesu and Green later described the lineup change as a motivating factor that compelled them to refine their collaborative approach.
Geese's collaboration with producer Kenny Beats, a.k.a. Kenneth Blume, began informally in mid-2024, when Blume encountered the band's merchandise and became curious about their work. The two met at Austin City Limits in October 2024, where Blume expressed an enthusiasm for leaving imperfections intact—an attitude Winter regarded as a rare and liberating approach for a rock-adjacent producer. Geese spent several days that November at Putnam Hill, Blume's newly built studio in Los Angeles, to develop preliminary demos. Blume initially found the material structurally chaotic, though his view shifted after hearing a solo project Winter released later that year, which clarified the songs' internal logic and convinced him of the project's potential.
The new album, incorporates the New York band’s art-jazz and prog tendencies, definitive structures and recurrent motifs are readily employed; soundscapes unfurl more as shamanic palimpsests than flux-y improvs. In terms of songcraft and delivery, singer Cameron Winter draws from his solo 2024’s album Heavy Metal; joined by his bandmates – Emily Green, Dominic DiGesu, and Max Bassin – however, his idiosyncratic vocals and memeish lyrics take on added relevance and urgency. You have here a project that frequently sweeps the listener into a trance, ruptures that trance, and then reestablishes it.
The opener "Trinida" features gossamer instrumentation, as Winter pivots between languid, Thom-Yorke-inspired vocals. "Cobra", with its shimmery guitars and Winter’s croon-y cum Jagger-ish vocals, conjures bygone days while striving to revise the pop playbook. "Husbands" is undergirded by a casually metronomic drumbeat and sinewy guitar parts with references to gospel, mesmeric jam, and R&B-inflected lo-fi. Also, as charged as the project is, there’s a newfound sobriety here, an embodied sense of the precarious and tragic, albeit conveyed with theatricality and/or dashes of dark humor.
We have the closer "Long Island City Here I Come", builds in intensity and volume. The final section features Winter's voice gradually receding into a stream-of-consciousness monologue involving images such as "Microphones hidden under your bed" and apocalyptic anxieties, this is the perfect outro with many references to the Bible, pop culture, and American mythology.
The album has been focused on the band's effort than collaborators which seems to be fine for the band and the sound across the record, the title track "We Are Love" came easy and it feels the band was comfortable to perform it. The first album in almost a decade, The Charlatans are dealing with the well-documented ghosts and dark places that have been a feature of the their story, they're returned to the same place to work since keyboard genius Rob Collins died in a car collision driving from the studio in 1996.
The band shared 'hauntology' and 'psychogeography' as talking points whilst recording the album, partly influenced by the choice of going back to Rockfield according to frontman Tim Burgess, who further elaborated on the decision as an idea that what has been lost (or what never was) still affects and often determines the present. As artists get older, there’s bound to be a sense of loss in their work as has been handled brilliantly in recent albums by Suede and The Cure, and We Are Love can be added to this body of work, but The Charlatans channel their grief in a much more positive manner.
The album opener "Kingdom of Ours" opines that the curtain is coming down, but rather than being a maudlin sentiment, there's a sense of euphoria within the swelling music and the lyrics talk about the small, mundane things that deliver us from pain. The album's first single, the rip-roaring "We Are Love", felt like a return to form after the middling albums Different Days from 2017 and 2015's Modern Nature. Here, though, there's a catchy hook that's eluded the band for way too long, and the double hit of the eponymous track followed by "Many A Day A Heartache" are feel like a band reinvigorated, reenergised and it actually sounds like The Charlatans are enjoying making music again.
"For The Girls" is next and there's a clearer sense of what the band are trying to achieve on We Are Love. This track sounds like a prime cut from 1999’s Us and Us Only, and here is a band looking forwards whilst acknowledging the persistence of the past. The brilliant "Deeper and Deeper" is a love song for the ages. In the middle of the heartbreak, there's room for finding new love and for having your head in the clouds so much that you’ll never want to come back down. "Out On Our Own" starts with a dreamy bass intro, it’s a song in three parts, but they often intertwine too much where a breath between sections might have been a better idea.
The album was planning to be released in 2024 but Le Bon felt too exhausted after a break-up, even thought she described the album as something cathartic realising you are totally abandoned of a certain lover, so the break-up is always like an amputation you don't want but it will save you in the end. The dissolution of a long-term relationship, and throughout Michelangelo Dying she wrties and express with sadness, desolation, tenderness, and the feelings of self-satisfaction that come in the acceptance phase and the industrial and angular sounds were meant to violently tamper down her grief.
Musically, the album represents a natural continuation of its 2022 and brilliant, "Pompeii". The opening track, "Jerome", finds her “eating rocks” and drawing out the word “cry" and the bass playing has a reminiscent of the style Mick Karn brought to Japan and Euan Hinshelwood’s saxophone tends towards a continual emotive note. "Love Unrehearsed" gives the album its title, a theme developed with references to “a marble face” and the question, “does she sleep like a stone?” There are hints of the emotional chaos of post-relationship trauma with conflicting lines, Hinshelwood's playing at the song’s conclusion is especially lyrical and gives it a lift.
Next is "Mother of Riches" that provides ‘Michelangelo Dying’ its first instantly memorable melody. The interplay between keys, guitar and sax weaves well-layered patterns while the drums and percussion of Dylan Hadley and Valentina Magaletti stand out as it sends the song in some unexpected rhythmic directions. The glorious "Is It Worth It (Happy Birthday)" continues with a deeply melodic vein, its slow-motion sliding style akin to floating through treacle, trying to celebrate while in torment.
The complex "Pieces Of My Heart" echo the discombobulation that she feels from the opening line, “this is how we fall apart” it captures a gamut of emotions from muddle, through denial and resignation. That understatement is maintained on the spacious "About Time". "Heaven Is No Feeling" proves itself one of the record's most memorable tracks with Le Bon's vocals veer from coolly observational to rising and swooping as the sax captures the heated intensity of the scene, "Body Is A River" breaks up the mood before she is joined by John Cale on the chorus of the crawling "Ride" a song finishes with some rare vocal histrionics which contrasts effectively with Cale's deadpan delivery. The album finishes with "I Know What's Nice" a song that almost collapses in on itself under the weight of emotions at the end of the song, Le Bon acknowledges, “I’m leaving someone I love / I can’t breathe for someone I love” before repeating “I can’t break down”.
A truly raw emotion throught the record with a diverse musical shifts in where Le Bon created a brilliant/fine beauty from her rollercoaster of feeling, inspired in breakup things and relations thus not a collection of the artist long-term relantionships in its demise, she use her feelings to write an album with different focus and great music offering a richer experience.
Jam frontman Paul Weller has opined that Sound Affects is the Jam's best album. Unhappy with the slicker approach of Setting Sons, the Jam decided to go back to basics, using the direct, economic playing of All Mod Cons and "Going Underground," the simply brilliant single which preceded Sound Affects by a few months. Thematically, though, Paul Weller explored a more indirect path, leaving behind (for the most part) the story-song narratives in favor of more abstract dealings in spirituality and perception.
Musically, Weller drew upon Revolver-era Beatles as a primary source the bassline on "Start," which comes directly from "Taxman," being the most obvious occurrence, incorporating the occasional odd sound and echoed vocal, which implied psychedelia without succumbing to its excesses. From beginning to end, the songs are pure, clever, infectious pop -- probably their catchiest -- with "That's Entertainment" and the should-have-been-a-single "Man in the Corner Shop" standing out. "Pretty Green" includes a funk bass-line and rhythm with melodic guitar breaks and psychedelic sound effects.
Sound Affects was the Jam's magnus opera. From beginning to end, it was their most consistent and inventive album, filled as it is with compelling, mesmerizing songs. Here the Jam developped into a legitimate post-punk outfit, taking cues from contemporaries such as Wire, Joy Division and Gang of Four. The guitar and rhythm section sound were more jagged and menacing, while the production was near perfect, filled with surprising subtleties. Mixed with this fresh sounding development of their sound is the Jam's already familiar love for 60's music.
Songs like "That's Entertainment" and "Monday" paint brilliantly vivid pictures of everyday working class life through a psychedelic lens. "Man in the Corner Shop" delivered biting social commentary to a gorgeous jangle-guitar tune. On the more post-punk side of things, there is "Music for the Last Couple" and "Scrape Away," where brilliantly unconventional production, jagged guitar licks and existential lyrics collide to awesome effect. The lyrics were up to the standard one would expect from Weller, which is to say they are completely brilliant. The ability of Weller as a young man to dissect the true nature of the world was always astounding, arguably on this album more than ever before. There is the usually scathing social commentary combined with a thoroughly existential, philosophical tone. Sound Affects is one of the greatest albums of all time, and arguably the best album The Jam ever made.
Released on 28 November 1975 "A Night At The Opera" was the 4th., studio album by the British rock band Queen. Produced by Roy Thomas Baker and Queen, it was reportedly the most expensive album ever recorded at the time of its release, the album spawned two singles "Bohemian Rhapsody" & "You're My Best Friend".
Named after the Marx Brothers' film of the same name, A Night at the Opera was recorded at various studios across a four-month period in 1975. Due to management issues, Queen had received almost none of the money they earned for their previous albums. Subsequently, they ended their contract with Trident Studios and did not use their studios for the album (the sole exception being "God Save the Queen", which had been recorded the previous year). They employed a complex production that extensively used multitrack recording, and the songs incorporated a wide range of styles, such as ballads, music hall, sea shanties, dixieland, hard rock and progressive rock influences. Aside from their usual equipment, Queen also utilised a diverse range of instruments such as a double bass, harp, ukulele and more.
It also produced the band's most successful single in the UK, "Bohemian Rhapsody", which became their first number-one song in the country. Despite being twice as long as the average length of singles during the 1970s, the song became immensely popular worldwide.
Queen's previous album, Sheer Heart Attack, had obtained commercial success and brought the band mainstream attention, with the single "Killer Queen" reaching number two on the UK Singles Chart. Despite this success, the band was broke at the time, largely due to a contract they had signed which meant that they would produce albums for a production company, who would then sell the album to a record label. This meant that Queen saw almost none of the money they earned, as Trident Studios paid them £60 weekly. Guitarist Brian May was living in a bedsit in Earls Court, West London while frontman Freddie Mercury lived in a flat in Kensington that suffered from rising damp. The matter eventually reached a turning point when bassist John Deacon, who had recently married, was denied a cash advance of £4,000 by manager Norman Sheffield to put a deposit on a house. This increasing frustration led to Mercury writing the song "Death on Two Legs", which would serve as the opening track to A Night at the Opera.
In December 1974, the band hired Jim Beach as their lawyer and began negotiating their way out of Trident. While Beach studied the group's contracts, the group continued touring. They began their first tour of Japan in April 1975, where thousands of fans met them at Haneda Airport and they played two sold out shows at the Nippon Budokan, Tokyo. After a nine-month dispute, Queen were finally free of Trident and signed directly with EMI Records in the UK and Elektra Records in North America. They regained control of their back catalogue, while their former publishing company, Feldman, was taken over by EMI. Because Trident had invested over £200,000 in promoting Queen, the group were required to pay half that to buy out their contracts, and they had to give Trident 1% royalties from their next six albums. Additionally, a tour of America scheduled for September 1975 had to be cancelled as it had been organised by Jack Nelson, who was associated with Trident, despite the already booked venues and sold tickets. This tour was necessary for regaining funds, and its cancellation was a major setback.
Queen worked with producer Roy Thomas Baker, who had also split from Trident, and engineer Mike Stone. It was the last time they would work with Baker until 1978's Jazz. Gary Langan, then 19 years old and who had been a tape operator on two of Sheer Heart Attack's songs, was promoted to an assistant engineer on the album. It was reportedly the most expensive album ever made at the time, with the estimated cost being £40,000.
The album was recorded at seven different studios over a period of four months. Queen spent a month during the summer of 1975 rehearsing in a barn at what would become Ridge Farm Studio in Surrey. The group then had a three-week writing and rehearsing session in a rented house near Kington, Herefordshire before recording began. From August to September 1975, the group worked at Rockfield in Monmouthshire. For the remainder of recording sessions, which lasted until November, the group recorded at Lansdowne, Sarm Studios, Roundhouse, Scorpio Sound and Olympic Sound Studios. As their deal with Trident had ended, Trident Studios was not used during recording. The only song on the album recorded at Trident was "God Save the Queen", which had been recorded on 27 October the previous year, shortly before the band embarked on their Sheer Heart Attack Tour.
The group required multi-tracking for their complex vocal harmonies which typically consisted of May singing lower registers, Mercury singing middle registers and Taylor performing the higher parts (Deacon did not sing). Unlike their first three albums, which had used 16-track tape, A Night at the Opera was recorded using 24-track tape. Their vocal harmonies are particularly notable on the song "Bohemian Rhapsody", which features an elaborate opera sequence dominated by multitracked vocals. Similarly, "The Prophet's Song" has an a capella middle section that utilises delay on Mercury's vocals. For their self-titled "guitar orchestrations", May overdubbed his homemade Red Special guitar through an amplifier built by Deacon, known as the Deacy Amp, later released commercially as the "Brian May" amplifier by Vox. Guitar layering is one of May's distinctive techniques as a rock guitarist. He has said that the technique was developed whilst looking for a violin sound.
Aside from their usual equipment, the group used various instruments on the album. Mercury used a grand piano for most of the songs, contributing a jangle piano on "Seaside Rendezvous", while Taylor used a timpani and gong on "Bohemian Rhapsody". Deacon played double bass on "'39" and Wurlitzer Electric Piano on "You're My Best Friend". In the album liner notes, May was credited to "orchestral backdrops" – a reference to the fact that he played a number of instruments not typically found in Queen songs. He played an acoustic guitar on "Love of My Life" and "'39", as well a harp on "Love of My Life", and a toy koto on "The Prophet's Song". The song "Good Company" also features May recreating a Dixieland jazz band, which was done on his Red Special.
The album has been affiliated with progressive rock, pop, heavy metal, hard rock and avant-pop. It contains a diverse range of influences including folk, skiffle, British camp and music hall, jazz and opera. Each member wrote at least one song: Mercury wrote five of the songs, May wrote four, and Taylor and Deacon wrote one song each. The closing track was an instrumental cover of "God Save the Queen", the British national anthem, for which May was credited as the arranger.
For their first two albums, much of Queen's songwriting combined contemporary progressive rock and heavy metal, which led to a "Led Zeppelin meets Yes" description of the band. Starting with Sheer Heart Attack, Queen began drawing inspiration from their everyday lives, and embraced more mainstream musical styles, a trend which A Night at the Opera would continue. Lyrical themes ranged from science fiction and fantasy to heartbreak and romance, often with a tongue in cheek sense of humour.
The album opened with "Death On Two Legs" considered to be Mercury's hate letter to Queen's first manager, Norman Sheffield, who for some years was reputed to have mistreated the band and abused his role as their manager from 1972 to 1975. "Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon" was another song by Mercury, the lead vocal was sung in the studio and reproduced through headphones in a tin bucket elsewhere in the studio. "I'm In Love With My Car", was written and sung by Taylor. The song was initially taken as a joke by May, who thought that Taylor was not serious when he heard a demo recording. The revving sounds at the conclusion of the song were recorded by Taylor's then current car, an Alfa Romeo. "You're My Best Friend" was the second song and first Queen single to be written by John Deacon. He composed it while he was learning to play piano, and played the Wurlitzer electric piano (which Mercury disliked) on the recording and overdubbed the bass guitar afterwards. The song was written for his wife, Veronica. "39" was May's attempt to do a 'lover's pirate shanty.' It relates the tale of a group of space explorers who embark on what is, from their perspective, a year-long voyage. Upon their return, however, they realise that a hundred years have passed, because of the time dilation effect in Einstein's theory of relativity, and the loved ones they left behind are now all dead or aged. "Sweet Lady" was a fast rocker written by May. and then "Seaside Rendezvous" written by Mercury, has a mock-instrumental bridge section which begins at around 0:51 into the song. The section is performed entirely by Mercury and Taylor using their voices alone.
The second part started with "The Prophet's Song" it was composed by May. He explained that he wrote the song after a dream he had had about The Great Flood and his fears about the human race and its general lack of empathy. He spent several days assembling the song, and it includes a vocal canon sung by Mercury. The vocal, and later instrumental canon was produced by early tape delay devices. "Love Of My Life" was one of Queen's most covered songs it was such a concert favourite that Mercury frequently stopped singing and allowed the audience to take over. "Good Company" was written and sung by May, who sang all vocals and played ukulele. The recording features a recreation of a Dixieland-style jazz band using May's Red Special guitar and Deacy Amp. Then the masterpiece "Bohemian Rhapsody" was written by Mercury with the first guitar solo composed by May. All piano, bass and drum parts, as well as the vocal arrangements, were thought up by Mercury on a daily basis and written down "in blocks" (using note names instead of sheets) on a phonebook. The operatic section was originally intended to be only a short interlude of "Galileos" that connected the ballad and hard rock portions of the song. The interlude is full of "obscure classical characters: Scaramouche, a clown from the Commedia dell'arte; astronomer Galileo; Figaro, the principal character in Beaumarchais' The Barber of Seville and The Marriage of Figaro; and Beelzebub, identified in the Christian New Testament as Satan, Prince of Demons, but in Arabic as "Lord of the Flies". Also in Arabic the word Bismillah', which is a noun from a phrase in the Qur'an; "Bismi-llahi r-rahmani r-rahiim", meaning "In the name of God, most gracious, most merciful". "God Save The Queen" the British national anthem, on 27 October 1974 at Trident Studios before their Sheer Heart Attack tour. He played a guide piano which was edited out later and added several layers of guitars. After the song was completed it was played as a coda at virtually every Queen concert.
After the album's positive reception in Australia, the duo considered an international release – its date was held back until 2001 in the United Kingdom and North America and appeared in slightly altered forms. The delay and changes occurred so that the group could obtain permission to use the samples or use replacements. Four singles were released from the album "Electricity", "Frontier Psychiatrist", "Since I Left You", and "Radio".
The Avalanches began work on the album in 1999 under the working title Pablo's Cruise, primarily working with a Yamaha Promix 01 and Akai S2000 samplers. Group members Darren Seltmann and Robbie Chater spent hours sampling music from vinyl records to create the songs on the album: Chater has estimated that there are over 3,500 samples that were used overall although some estimate the number to be much lower, roughly 900. After sampling and arranging, the pair would swap their tapes, listen to each other's ideas, and expand on whatever they had heard. Despite working separately, both Chater and Seltmann had nearly identical studio set-ups.
Initially, Seltmann and Chater were not planning for an international release. They were not concerned with copyright restrictions and so did not keep a list of which tracks were being sampled. According to Chater they "were really unorganised and were just sampling on the fly as tracks progressed ... We had no idea the record would get such a wide-scale release so we saw no need to keep track of what we were using – we were definitely guilty of harbouring a 'No-one's going to listen to it anyway' sort of attitude."
The sources span many different styles of music, sampling artists such as Françoise Hardy, Blowfly, Sérgio Mendes, Raekwon, Wayne and Shuster, and Madonna. Later, Seltmann and Chater had a few problems when trying to clear all the samples. One sample that had to be removed was from Rodgers and Hammerstein in the intro that featured harps and girls singing. After checking clearances, the album is slightly different to its original form in that it had a whole new introduction, which apparently was really recognisable, so we had to take that off straight away". The Avalanches worked with sample-clearance expert Pat Shannahan to clear the thousands of samples in the record. The group played their songs to flatmates to get input on which tracks were worth including on the album. "Electricity" was the first song the group felt that worked; it was a last-minute addition to the album as The Avalanches felt the song "still sounds good". In February 2000, Seltmann (as Dazzler) and Chater (as Bobby C) finished production on the album under the pseudonym Bobbydazzler, and its official title was revealed as Since I Left You in March 2000.
Since I Left You was originally developed to be a concept album. Chater described its initial theme as a love story, "an international search for love from country to country. The idea of a guy following a girl around the world and always being one port behind. And that was just because we had all these records from all over the world, and we'd like to use all that stuff." The concept album idea was abandoned when the group felt they should not make their themes too obvious. The album's sound was in response to dance music at that time, that Chater felt was "about big drums, big production: think of a record like the Chemical Brothers "Block Rockin' Beats", with those amazing drums, and how huge those records sounded". The Avalanches felt their early music could not compare to that sound and desired a recording with less bass that was influenced by 1960s music such as the Beach Boys and Phil Spector.
When Since I Left You was being recorded, The Avalanches had trouble choosing songs to be released as singles, finding them not sounding as good outside the context of the album. On 13 September 1999, they issued "Electricity" as a four-track 12" vinyl single in Australia (on Modular Recordings) and as a two-track 7" vinyl single in the United Kingdom (on Rex Records). Chater felt that Modular was very patient with the group releasing the record. On 21 August 2000, "Frontier Psychiatrist" was released as the second single from the album by Modular in Australia in both a four-track and two-track version.
The initial release date for Since I Left You was going to be 11 September; however, it was delayed due to issues with sample clearance. On 27 November, the album was issued in Australia with plans to have a worldwide release in early 2001. The later release date outside Australia was due to additional sample clearances needed for international markets. To celebrate the album's release in Melbourne, the group had a boat cruise party through Port Phillip Bay. On 5 February 2001, they released the album's title track as the third single in Australia, and followed on 23 July with "Radio".
Few musical artists have had the lasting impact and relevance of Talking Heads. One of the foundational bands of New York's downtown 1970s music scene, Talking Heads have endured as a musical and cultural force for decades. Their unique brand of transcendent, experimental rock remains a lingering influence on popular music—despite their having disbanded over thirty years ago.
Now New Yorker contributor Jonathan Gould offers an authoritative, deeply researched account of a band whose sound, fame, and legacy forever connected rock music to the cultural avant-garde. From their art school origins to the enigmatic charisma of David Byrne and the internal tensions that ultimately broke them apart, Gould tells the story of a group that emerged when rock music was still young and went on to redefine the prevailing expectations of how a band could sound, look, and act. At a time when guitar solos, lead-singer swagger, and sweaty stadium tours reigned supreme, Talking Heads were precocious, awkward, quirky, and utterly distinctive when they first appeared on the ragged stages of the East Village. Yet they would soon mature into one of the most accomplished and uncompromising recording and performing acts of their era.
In 1985, with £100+ million in his back pocket from Live Aid – the greatest rock concert the world had ever seen – Bob Geldof took a trip across Africa to decide how to spend the money he had raised for the Ethiopian famine. He asked Paul Vallely to go with him. Over the next four decades Vallely became one of Geldof’s closest advisers – travelling with him to meet the world’s top rock stars and politicians.
Here, for the first time, Vallely gives his full eye-witness account of those 40 years. The book, which has a foreword by Bob Geldof, is crammed with stories of how pop, poverty, politics and power are interwoven in the Live Aid story. Geldof encounters presidents, prime ministers and popes as well as the pop heroes who adorned his bedroom wall as a boy. Bob drinks late-night whisky with Margaret Thatcher, is forced to write a grovelling apology to Bill Clinton and meets Vladimir Putin on a boat in the Mediterranean. He pressurises The Who, sweet talks Pink Floyd, and is awestruck by Bowie. Is Bob Geldof a bully or a charmer, saint or ‘white saviour’, or simply a force of nature?
After the released of the acclaimed and succesfully "Rattlesnakes" the previous year, "Easy Pieces" became the band's fastest-selling album, selling more in its first two weeks than Rattlesnakes had managed in a whole year. It was also their highest charting album in the UK, peaking at number 5 propelled by the three singles which managed to reach the UK top 40 singles. However, despite Easy Pieces' commercial success, the reception from critics was lukewarm and the band themselves were unhappy with the end result.
Cole himself would later say, "It strikes me that there's something really fresh on the first album which has been dragged onto the second album, and the freshness is not there and something to replace the freshness is not there either".
Following promotion for Rattlesnakes, the band went back into the studio with Paul Hardiman again to record the follow-up. However, the relaxed atmosphere that had surrounded the recording of the first record was not replicated – Polydor had left the group alone while recording Rattlesnakes but now the band were well known and commercially successful, they took a more active interest and soon dismissed Hardiman, after the initial recording sessions did not immediately prove fruitful. Experienced producers Clive Langer and Alan Winstanley, were drafted in to replace him. Unlike Hardiman, who had taken a hands-off approach, Langer and Winstanley made more suggestions during the recording process, which the Commotions didn't always agree with. Langer asked Cole to control the vibrato in his voice, which Cole had no idea how to do as it was his natural way of singing, and as a result he became self-conscious about his singing.
Cole felt that they had been pushed into making a second record too quickly: "We didn't give ourselves time to step back and think. The record company was telling us 'this is your moment and you must take it now' – which is crap. People would have waited for us. We were insecure so we made the record too soon and the record company fired Paul Hardiman."
The band intended Easy Pieces to be more accessible than Rattlesnakes, with Cole saying, "We wanted the sound to be warmer, more luscious". He described the lead single "Brand New Friend" as being "about a character who's in a fairly pitiful position of being aware that he's not as happy as he once was, but not being sure what to do about it. He's also aware that he's verging on self-pity, which is also quite ridiculous. So it's quite funny too. He's aware it's a little cry for help." Cole would later disown some of his writing on the album, stating in 1990, "There are two terrible songs on Easy Pieces, one called "Grace" and another called "Minor Character" which is literally the worst lyric ever written.
Unlike the widespread praise for Rattlesnakes, the reception for Easy Pieces was noticeably cooler by saying the songs sound second-hand , Cole's lyrics sound as though they were written to fit the metre rather than to say anything. Others observed that the solid production swells to leave no white space, and individually many of the tracks are opalescent, only Spint was far more enthusiastic saying: the promise reflected on their impressive debut album Rattlesnakes has been kept and the band wrote clean, crisp, guitar-oriented pop songs with addictive hook lines.
The album title is a play on the term "in high fidelity," which used to appear on album covers. The album art is an illustration of this pun where an act of sexual infidelity is apparently occurring while the man is putting an LP record to play on the hi-fi stereo. While the band had previously released some successful recordings, none of them came close to what happened for them with Hi Infidelity.
It spawned several hit singles, including the first of two Number #1 hits they would have in their career. The album itself also made it to #1 on the charts. It would end up becoming the biggest-selling rock album of 1981.
Six songs from the album charted on the Billboard charts, including "Keep On Loving You" which was the band's first Number 1 hit, and "Take It on the Run", on the other hand "Tough Guys" was one of two songs from the album that charted on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart despite not being released as singles.
The album opened with "Don't Let Him Go", a great rocking song for them to start the album with. Singer Kevin Cronin sounds fantastic, as do the rest of the band members. I especially love the playing of keyboardist Neal Doughty and guitarist Gary Richrath on this track, "Keep On Loving You" was the first single that eventually became the band's first No. 1 song and it become one of the most popular ballads of the 1980s. "Follow My Heart" many believe this song was a kinda of a filler but in the end it was another great rock and roll song criminally underrated, "In Your Letter" the 4th., single that made it onto the top 20, a song that was inspired by how keyboardist Neal Doughty found out that his wife was leaving him. He and the band had just finished a tour. Doughty returned to his home and found a “goodbye” letter from his wife in their kitchen, informing him that she had left him for another man. The man in question was actually a person who supplied the band members with illegal drugs. Now here it comes the masterpiece "Take It On The Run" was the second single released from the album and it was almost as successful as “Keep On Loving You,” reaching No. 5 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart.
He later added in the comments: “Reunited with his beautiful wife Imelda.”
A cause of death has yet to be disclosed.
Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown also confirmed the news, writing a brief tribute on X that said: “REST IN PEACE MANI X.”
Raised in Crumpsall, Manchester, Mounfield joined The Stone Roses in 1987, having previously been a member of rival band The Waterfront, and performed with the band until their split in 1996.He then teamed up with Primal Scream and was a full-time member of the band, finding a kindred spirit in guitarist Robert "Throb" Young, with whom he made a memorable appearance on the Scottish TV show Trout ‘n’ About in 2004.
Talking about Primal Scream that band was "most of a democracy", whereas with the Stone Roses we were more looking over our shoulder seeing if Ian and John Squire were pleased. Because they were writing the songs and being touted as the Lennon-McCartney, Jagger-Richards kind of thing. For me now there's a lot more freedom.
He rejoined The Stone Roses with core members Brown, John Squire and Alan "Reni" Wren for their reunion shows between 2011 to 2017. Ed Power for The Independent noted how it was the recruitment of Mounfield that seemed to "change" something for the band. Brown, Squire and drummer Reni were dreamers, he wrote.
Mani was a rocker. Now the tweeness that characterised early singles such as "Sally Cinnamon" evolved into something slicker, sleeker, groovier. Aside from music, Mounfield was a keen angler, having first started fishing as a boy around the canals of his native Manchester.
Mounfield’s death comes almost two years to the day since his wife Imelda Mounfield died from cancer, on 18 November 2023. He and Imelda raised money for a cancer charity by organising auctions of memorabilia donated by friends including members of Oasis and David Beckham.
They shared twin sons, Gene Clarke and George Christopher, born in 2012.
Mounfield had also just announced that he would be embarking on a national in-conversation tour from September 2026, for talks in which he would reflect on his 40-year career in music.
Most of the songs were extended mixes. Several had been previously released on 12" singles, but some were completely remade, with Smith recutting vocals due to the original tapes not being available. The record closes with the extended version of a new single, "Never Enough". The remix of "Pictures of You" was originally released under the title "(Strange Mix)". Robert Smith described the remix album as something "fun after the doom and gloom of Disintegration".
The Cure also released some other new mixes as the B-sides of the singles from Mixed Up: the first single, "Never Enough", featured a remix of "Let's Go to Bed", titled "Let's Go to Bed" (Milk Mix) on the 12", cassette and CD versions, as well as a new song, "Harold and Joe", while the second single, "Close to Me" (Remix) contained "Just Like Heaven" (Dizzy Mix) on all formats and "Primary" (Red Mix) on the 12", CD and cassette versions as B-sides; the third single, "A Forest" (Tree Mix), contained the original version of the song and "In Between Days" (Shiver Mix) only on 5-inch CD as B-sides
Released on 18 November 1985 "Rock A Little" was the third solo studio album by US singer and songwriter Stevie Nicks. It was released in late 1985 while Fleetwood Mac were still on a lengthy hiatus following their album Mirage (1982), Rock a Little hit the top 20 in its second week and peaked at No. 12 on the US Billboard 200, although sales did not match Nicks' earlier albums, Bella Donna (1981) and The Wild Heart (1983). The album spawned four singles "Talk To Me", "I Can't Wait" which were the two most succesful of the album,then "Has Anyone Ever Written Anything For You" and "Imperial Hotel" for Australia only.
The recording process for the album originally began in 1984. The initial sessions took place at a converted church studio in Dallas owned by Gordon Perry. By the end of those sessions, which lasted one month, Nicks emerged with around six tracks that she believed could be developed further. Two of those songs were "Running Through the Garden" and "Mirror Mirror". However, Nicks scrapped these recordings and parted ways with long-time producer and romantic interest Jimmy Iovine, and in late 1984 began work on what is now we recognized as the Rock a Little project. Nicks later called the initial sessions with Iovine a "bad planning move" and that she put Iovine "in a very weird position" as she gave him little direction on how to approach her songs. Keith Olsen, Rick Nowels and Nicks herself took over production duties after Iovine's departure.
The album is reputed to have cost $1 million to record, also it was later revealed that Martin Page and Bernie Taupin had specially written the track "These Dreams" for inclusion on the album, but Nicks turned it down. The track was then recorded by the band Heart and became their first number 1 hit in 1986. Tom Petty and David A. Stewart also wrote "Don't Come Around Here No More" for the album, but after hearing Petty perform the vocals for her, she declined it as well, feeling she couldn't do the song justice. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers would record and release the song on their 1985 album Southern Accents. Nicks' subsequent relationship with Eagles member Joe Walsh produced the ballad "Has Anyone Ever Written Anything for You". Nicks had recorded various other tracks prior to the album's release like the rock ballad "One More Big Time Rock and Roll Star" was relegated to the B-side of the "Talk to Me"
