“I just go mad”: How Elton John led the fight against noise restriction laws in Leeds
Unlimited decibels or else.
Author: Andrew Clayman Archives: 03/2026
‘Dixie Flyer’: Randy Newman’s most autobiographical song
A songbook far better known for character studies.
Christy Brown: The Irish artist portrayed by Shane MacGowan and Daniel Day-Lewis in the same year
A biopic and a tribute in song, one right after the other.
“The universal mind!”: Richard Ashcroft explains the inspiration for ‘Bittersweet Symphony’
A little thing called “visualisation”.
“That’s my excuse”: The album Ian Anderson said was too pompous to be a triumph
“Some of the humour went out of it”.
Robert Smith believes “a certain amount of disrespect” was key to The Cure’s success
“How brilliant that they care so little about what they look like”.
Why does every 1990s alternative rocker seem to be a Chicago Cubs fan?
The baseball allegiance is weirdly consistent.
eden ahbez: The first hippie of the counterculture movement
The nature boy who wrote ‘Nature Boy’, one of the biggest jazz hits of the ’40s.
The Notting Hillbillies: The roots group that re-connected Mark Knopfler with his own roots
An unplanned side project with old pals.
The album that made Brandon Flowers say “this is what I’m going to do”
It came out 30 years before he heard it.