Black Sabbath make triumphant live return in Birmingham

Black Sabbath made their live return last night (May 19) with a homecoming gig at Birmingham's O2 Academy.

Back in city for the first time in over a decade, Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, and Geezer Butler, together with drummer Tommy Clufetos – the replacement for original sticksman Bill Ward, who’s contractual disputes with the rest of the band remain unresolved - blazed through a career spanning set to a sell-out crowd.

Billed as a warm-up for their forthcoming headline slot at this year's Download Festival, the heavy metal pioneers opened with ‘Into The Void’ from 1971’s ‘Master Of Reality’.

Black Sabbath made their live return last night (May 19) with a homecoming gig at Birmingham's O2 Academy.

Back in city for the first time in over a decade, Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, and Geezer Butler, together with drummer Tommy Clufetos – the replacement for original sticksman Bill Ward, who’s contractual disputes with the rest of the band remain unresolved - blazed through a career spanning set to a sell-out crowd.

Billed as a warm-up for their forthcoming headline slot at this year's Download Festival, the heavy metal pioneers opened with ‘Into The Void’ from 1971’s ‘Master Of Reality’.

Black Sabbath played:

'Into The Void'
'Under The Sun'
'Snowblind'
'War Pigs'
'Wheels Of Confusion'
'Electric Funeral'
'Black Sabbath'
'The Wizard'
'Behind The Wall Of Sleep'
'N.I.B.'
'Fairies Wear Boots'
'Lord Of This World'
'Tomorrow's Dream'
'Sweet Leaf'
'Symptom Of The Universe'
'Drum Solo'
'Iron Man'
'Dirty Women'
'Children Of the Grave'
'Sabbath Bloody Sabbath'
'Paranoid'

Source: nme.com

Soulsavers - The Light The Dead See

Soulsavers will release on May 21st their fourth album, "The Light The Dead See". This album will feature Depeche Mode's Dave Gahan on the vocals.

The album is streaming in full in their official website: http://www.thesoulsavers.com/

Arctic Monkeys' Alex Turner: 'We used to pretend to be Oasis in school assembly'

Arctic Monkeys' Alex Turner has admitted that he and drummer Matt Helders dressed up and pretended to be Oasis in their school assembly.

Speaking to Pitchfork, the frontman named the Britpop legend's seminal 1995 album '(What's The Story) Morning Glory' as one of the LPs which had had the most influence upon him as a teenager, and revealed that he had performed tracks from the record in front of his peers while brandishing a tennis racquet.

"In the UK, you go from primary school to secondary school at age 11," he explained. "And when we left primary school, all the kids would form groups and do a performance, like the girls would do a dance to the Spice Girls, or whatever."

He added: "So me and Matt and some of our friends put on 'Morning Glory' – we 'played' some tennis racquets and pretended to be Oasis. Matt was Liam Gallagher, he had the bucket hat on. I was the bass player."

The singer claimed their tribute act wasn't well received, however. "We were just standing ther, doing what Oasis did onstage," he said. "Which was not a great deal. I don't think we got as good a reaction as the Spice Girls."

Speaking about why he loved the LP, meanwhile, he said: "With Oasis, it's just that attitude, like it's resistant against everything else that's going on in music. I don't know if you can fully understand that-- it's like an impulse, innit? Especially at that age, you don't rationalize, you're just like, 'That looks cool.'

"And I feel like that's the fucking way it should be now, in a way. Guitar music or rock'n'roll or whatever you want to call it sort of goes away with trends, but it'll never go away completely. It can't die because it's so fundamentally attractive."

Source: nme.com

Black Sabbath to release new Greatest Hits album next month

Black Sabbath have announced that they will be releasing a new 'Best Of' album next month.

The compilation, which is titled Iron Man: The Best Of Black Sabbath, will be released on June 4 and contains a total of 14 tracks.

The album contains a selection of tracks from across the metal legends' back catalogue, including "Iron Man", "War Pigs", "Changes", "Paranoid" and "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath".

Black Sabbath will headline this summer's Download Festival along with The Prodigy and Metallica over the weekend of June 8-10, and last week announced that they will play a small show at Birmingham's O2 Academy on May 19 to warm up for the festival.

The band are currently recording a brand new album and will tour the world throughout the rest of the year, although guitarist Tony Iommi, who is currently undergoing treatment for lymphoma, will not take part in a large chunk of the band's summer tour dates.

The shows will see frontman Ozzy Osbourne joined by special guests including former Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash, Geezer Butler and Zakk Wylde. Iommi will, however, play at Download and at the Birmingham gig.

Although Iommi will play, there is still no word on whether the band's estranged drummer Bill Ward will be part of the line-up for the show. The drummer had previously revealed he was unhappy with the contract for the band's new album and world tour and claimed he would not take part in the new album sessions and shows if a 'fair agreement' was not met.

As a result of this, the remaining members of the band vowed to carry on without him. They have yet, however, to announce a replacement for Ward.

The tracklisting for Iron Man: The Best Of Black Sabbath is as follows:

'Paranoid'
'Iron Man'
'Changes'
'Fairies Wear Boots'
'War Pigs'
'Never Say Die'
'Children Of The Grave'
'The Wizard'
'Snowblind'
'Sweet Leaf'
'Evil Woman (Don’t Play Your Games)'
'Sabbath Bloody Sabbath'
'Black Sabbath'
'N.I.B.'

Source: uncut.co.uk

Arctic Monkeys: 'We couldn't make a record like our first one again'

Arctic Monkeys have spoken about their plans for the follow-up to 'Suck It And See' and have said that they feel that they could never make another album like their debut 'Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' again.

The band are currently touring across North America as support to The Black Keys and told the Calgary Herald that making another record like their debut would "feel fake".

Asked about whether they ever felt expectation to recapture the spirit of their debut, drummer Matt Helders said: "For us, it seems obvious to do something different when you make a new record. I know that bands can successfully carry on by having a similar sound forever, can have a full career out of it."

Helders then said that he felt the band had "grown up" and had no intention of letting "expectation" dictate what they did next.

He added: "We've never really thought that we can let expectation dictate what kind of music we make. I think it's important that we make a record that we think is good and hopefully people share that opinion. Since that first record, we've all changed and hopefully the people that were into us have changed as well, grown up with us."

Then asked if he and his bandmates were ready to head into the studio again, Helders said he thought they were and didn't see them taking much of a break.

He added: "This is the longest we've ever toured a record, since its come out. Usually, we have got back in the studio by now or we've had a break. This tour's great, we're really enjoying it but I think we're ready to record again or at least think about it. We never really take that long to make a record."

Source: nme.com

Kasabian to release 'Live At The O2' album and DVD next month

Kasabian have announced that they will be releasing a new live album and DVD in June.

The package, which is titled 'Live!: Live At The O2', will come out on June 25 and was filmed during the band's show at London's 20,000 capacity O2 Arena on December 15 last year.

The release will contain a 19-track live DVD film, which was shot in high definition, and a 13-track live CD. The DVD will also be available in Blu-Ray.

'Live!: Live At The O2' will also come with a documentary about the band's arena tour, which is titled 'I Hear Voices'.

Kasabian recently spoke about their plans for the follow-up to 'Velociraptor!' and have "loads of stuff written", according to frontman Tom Meighan.

The singer said that the band's lead songwriter Serge Pizzorno had been hard at work on new material, but that the band probably wouldn't record anything until 2013.

Asked about this, Meighan said: "I think Sergio's got loads of stuff written already. I imagine he has because he never stops writing. So I can't imagine when we're going to record a record, not at the moment, probably next year sometime."

The tracklisting for 'Kasabian Live!: Live At The O2' is as follows:

DVD
'Days Are Forgotten'
'Shoot The Runner '
'Velociraptor!'
'Underdog'
'Where Did All The Love Go?'
'I.D.'
'I Hear Voices'
'Thick As Thieves'
'Take Aim'
'Clubfoot'
'Re-Wired'
'Empire'
'La Fée Verte'
'Fast Fuse' / 'Pulp Fiction'
'Goodbye Kiss'
'L.S.F.'
'Switchblade Smiles'
'Vlad The Impaler'
'Fire'

CD

'Days Are Forgotten'
'Shoot The Runner'
'Velociraptor!'
'Underdog'
'Take Aim'
'Clubfoot'
'Re-Wired'
'La Fée Verte'
'Goodbye Kiss'
'L.S.F.'
'Switchblade Smiles'
'Vlad The Impaler'
'Fire'

Source: nme.com

Ringo Starr to write soundtrack for Hollywood musical

Ringo Starr is to write the soundtrack for a new Hollywood musical, according to Deadline.com.

Starr will collaborate with former Eurythmics'Dave Stewart on Hole In The Fence, a coming of age story about a group of kids who form a band in a mining town.

Starr and Stewart came up with the idea and will act as both executive producers and songwriters for the film.

Both Starr and Stewart have some history in films. Aside from the Beatles films, Starr also appeared in The Magic Christian, opposite Peter Sellers, That'll Be The Day and Ken Russell's Lisztomania, where he played The Pope opposite Roger Daltrey.

Source: uncut.co.uk