The Fat Angel Sings

At a time when the Rolling Stones were forbidden from singing about spending the night together on national television, the Velvet Underground was crafting songs about such taboo subjects as illegal drugs, sadomasochism and black angels of death. And that was just on their debut. Throughout their first three albums, VU continued to challenge societal norms through their lyrics and rock music itself through their unorthodox instrumental approach. Their sound was theirs alone, which proved to be an obstacle when it came to sales. The majority of popular music fans simply weren’t ready for the bleakly beautiful vision of VU. But for those who were, this LP trilogy was a clarion call, drawing together the outsiders who felt disenfranchised and unfulfilled by Top Forty fodder. Like time release capsules, these LPs became catalysts for change as they spread from city to city and were consumed by adventurous listeners.

Bands formed, scenes coalesced and new musical paths emerged which would eventually branch off into punk, alternative, indie and more. Take a sample from any underground music genre and you’re likely to find VU DNA pulsing through its core.

As the alternative scene grew, so did the legend of the Velvet Underground. However, with relatively few of the original LPs in circulation, finding them could be difficult and, as a result, more people had probably heard OF the band than had actually heard their music. The emergence of compact discs in the mid-80s, along with a groundswell of VU-influenced bands singing their praises, finally got their music into wider distribution.

This beautiful, deluxe boxed set gathers the rare mono versions of the band’s first three studio albums along with the superior mono version of Nico’s Chelsea Girl and a definitive edition of the band’s unfinished fourth album! Mastered by Bob Irwin, cut by Kevin Gray, and pressed at RTI, this collection is an essential purchase for the discerning vinyl devotee. For all tomorrow’s parties, this is your soundtrack.

Includes:
The Velvet Underground & Nico
White Light/White Heat
The Velvet Underground
1969
Nico: Chelsea Girl

Since the release of their 2023 debut LP ‘Good Time’, Austin TX outfit DAIISTAR have spent the last couple of years touring relentlessly and spreading their baggy noise-pop good times across North America and Europe – be that headline runs of their own or tours supporting the likes of Brian Jonestown Massacre, The Black Angels, The Dandy Warhols and LA Witch. When over in the UK in September 2024, they holed up at London’s Lightship 95 studio – a floating studio on the Thames – to record this “Fuzz Club Session” LP, which is set to be released digitally and on limited coloured vinyl on September 26th, alongside a series of videos from the session.

DAIISTAR’s ten-track “Fuzz Club Session” LP – number 21 in the series – perfectly captures the band’s road-hardened blend of shoegaze, neo-psychedelia and Madchester-inspired grooves, featuring standout tracks from ‘Good Time’ such as ‘Star Starter’, ‘Tracemaker’, ‘Parallel’ and ‘Repeater’. It also includes their euphoric single ‘Clear’, a ‘Good Time’ outtake released on a limited 7″ last year, as well as their cover of Primal Scream’s ‘Burning Wheel’ which is now available on vinyl for the very first time. 

‘Star Starter’ is taken from DAIISTAR’s upcoming Fuzz Club “Session” LP released September 26th 2025.

Wunderhorse frontman Jacob Slater’s Wi-Fi is spotty — “Fucking nightmare on my end,” he says. He’s taking this Zoom call from the south of Morocco, where he’s spent the last four Januarys “surfing and doing nothing else.” The 28-year-old U.K. musician has grown accustomed to this kind of reset every so often. After his rambunctious but short-lived stint as the frontman of the post-punk trio Dead Pretties came to an end in 2017, he took refuge on the coast of Cornwall, picking up odd jobs, working as a surfing instructor, and taking a part as the Sex Pistols’ drummer in the TV miniseries Pistol. 

“It was kind of a baptism by fire,” he recalls of that time. “[Dead Pretties] formed when I was 17 and by the time I was 20, it was all kind of gone. It was very quick.” He remembers the following years as quiet and intense, during which he came down from some “bad habits” he’d developed. “I think it’s been published someplace, ‘Ah, he went teetotal, he went sober.’ It’s not quite the case, but I just didn’t indulge myself in those ways. It was getting in the way of my own life and definitely in the way of creativity.” 

Wunderhorse began in 2020 as a solo project. It quickly became clear that the vision was too big to remain a one-man endeavor, and Slater recruited old friends Harry Fowler (guitar), Jamie Staples (drums), and Pete Woodin (bass). Wunderhorse released their excellent debut, “Cub“, two years later, and their second album, “Midas”, this past summer, both garnering glowing critical acclaim. With their dark, distinctive melodies and rupturing guitar riffs, these albums are the sound of seasoned rockers who are skilled at evoking the Nineties indie-guitar recombination of the moment.  

Naturally, comparisons run rampant. Rolling Stone’s Jon Dolan spoke for many when he described “Midas‘ title track as “Nirvana’s In Utero crossed with Radiohead’s The Bends.” A quick scan of the r/wunderhorse Subreddit finds plenty of similarly bold sentiments: “If this band was Radiohead, “Midas” would be their Pablo Honey.” “‘Rain’ is so good. This is our “Nevermind.”  

Slater’s thoughts on this high praise? “I’ll take that,” he says. “The aim is to find a voice that’s totally ours, but when you first come out, people sort of gauge what you’re like. So I don’t take any sort of offense to that, especially not when it’s bands of the caliber of Nirvana and Radiohead.” 

“Just when you think you’ve heard just about all the retro-Nineties indie-guitar recombinations you need in one lifetime, these U.K. malcontents come up with one so ingenious, and yet so palm-smacking-forehead obvious it seems criminal no one’s thought of it before. To wit: “Midas”, the title track from their great second album, sounds like Nirvana’s In Utero crossed with Radiohead’s The Bends. And it bangs like Hades. That’s it. That’s there tro-Nineties indie-guitar recombination.Sometimes it really is the simple things.” – Rolling Stone

Slater says he was brought up by the “great songwriters.” His dad played Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan around the house, and he remembers writing his first song when he was 12 years old. He describes the experience as “magic.” 

“It was like something had come from somewhere more ethereal,” he says. “It was the first time I felt touched by that, and I haven’t really looked back since. It’s such a unique feeling. I just wanted to make it my life.” 

He wrote the tracks from “Cub” and “Midas” over a long span of time, with the oldest songs going back to his late teens. “It’s kind of weird playing that stuff now,” he says. “It feels like somebody else wrote that. I don’t really know who that was now.” But that’s OK, he adds: “I think the fact that certain songs make you a little bit uncomfortable, that’s part of the vulnerability that comes along with being an artist as you change and move. Not every skin you wore is going to fit anymore, and you just have to find a way to live with that.” 

These days, Slater is making more room for collaboration. “I’m still writing the bones of everything, but the sound of the band now is much bigger than just me,” he says. For “Midas”, the band tapped Grammy-winning producer Craig Silvey (whose credits include mixing Portishead’s Third and the National’s Trouble Will Find Me).  

“He totally changed the way we even listen to music,” Slater says. “We’d sit down every day and listen to songs that we’d known our whole lives and he’d point things out and say, ‘Isn’t it interesting they’ve done that?’ or ‘They’re using the room mics there, and then they’re taking this out and they’re letting this bleed.’ You could visualize this song that was so familiar, whether it’s Neil Young or a Stones track or something, and suddenly I could see it in a whole different dimension in my head.” 

The band is spending much of 2025 on the road, bringing songs from “Midas” to life for the first time. “I’m still forming a relationship with lots of those songs in terms of a life context. All I want to play now is just that record,” Slater says. 

Wunderhorse have taken pages out of the books of acts like Sam Fender and Fontaines D.C., both of whom they’ve supported on tour. “All those guys have reminded me, like, ‘You’re human too and you and the band are at the centre of this thing,” he continues. “You have autonomy as a person and as an artist to be able to make decisions and make your own calls and respect yourself.’” 

As for what’s next for Wunderhorse? “Just keep trying to put one foot in front of the other, really,” says Slater. “I’m definitely always writing stuff. Sometimes I go, ‘Oh, maybe that’s for Wunderhorse, maybe it’s something to keep in the vaults.’ I think there’s some things cooking.”

Radiohead have just announced “Hail to the Thief Live Recordings 2003-2009” – a new live album that allowed the band to re-evaluate their relationship with their 6th studio album, “Hail To The Thief“.

This is available to pre-order now as a one-off pressing, set for release on 31st October. It draws together performances of songs in London, Amsterdam, Buenos Aires, and Dublin between 2003 and 2009. The album was mixed by Ben Baptie and mastered by Matt Colton.

Speaking about the new live album, Thom Yorke says: “In the process of thinking of how to build arrangements for the Shakespeare Hamlet/Hail To The Thief theatre production, I asked to hear some archive live recordings of the songs. I was shocked by the kind of energy behind the way we played. I barely recognised us, and it helped me find a way forward. We decided to get these live recordings mixed and released (it would have been insane to keep them for ourselves). It has all been a very cathartic process. We very much hope you enjoy them.”

Thom Yorke recently co-created the critically acclaimed Hamlet Hail to the Thief, a frenetic adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, set to a deconstructed score of reworked songs from 2003’s “Hail to the Thief”. Rolling Stone UK said of the new production, “The biggest testament to Yorke and his co-writers that these worlds collide so seamlessly, as if they were always meant to be together.”

“Blues For Allah” is the 8th album and 3rd released on Dead’s own label, Grateful Dead Records. In their 10th year, the Grateful Dead recorded one of their most ambitious albums since the late 1960s, with songwriting and songs that were as out-there, jam-filled, and as psychedelic as the music they were making in 1968-1969.

The Grateful Dead’s self-released September 1975 LP “Blues for Allah” is many a Deadhead’s almost favourite album. It is indeed home to a near-perfect dizzying blend of ultra-tight playing, funk-forward, progressive, jazz-fusion-oriented music wrapped up in a handful of incredibly catchy tunes. Much of this music went on to become concert staples for the band as well, and now this pivotal Dead album rightly sees a 50th anniversary 180g 1LP reissue via Rhino.

When the Grateful Dead took a self-imposed hiatus in 1974 after their farewell October run at Winterland Ballroom, they left the road with no clear sense of when—or if—they’d return. A year later, they surprised everyone with Blues for Allah, which the band recorded in novel fashion at Bob Weir‘s home studio almost entirely without pre-written material. Robert Hunter wrote lyrics on the spot. Keith Godchaux‘s keys gave the album spacious texture. Donna Jean Godchaux‘s harmonies added new layers to songs like “The Music Never Stopped”. “Crazy Fingers” became, in late bassist Phil Lesh‘s words, “a marvellous essay in smoky ambiguity.” Drummer Bill Kreutzmann noted the title suite “bordered on acid-jazz composition,” a notion underscored by Mickey Hart‘s incorporation of unorthodox sounds including field recordings of crickets.

In 2022 I had the pleasure of remixing Grateful Dead’s albums American Beauty and Europe 72 in Atmos. However 3 years before that I had also been invited to create a new mix of their 1975 album Blues for Allah, which for whatever reason never got the green-light at the time. Now to celebrate the album’s 50th anniversary the SW version will finally be issued, and even better it’s being made available in high resolution on a physical blu-ray which includes my 2019 stereo, instrumental stereo, and 5.1 mixes, plus a 2022 Atmos mix.

It also has 2 bonus alternate stereo mixes, including a version of the 12 minute title track which includes many parts that were not used in the original. I’m happy about all this, it sounds great (well I think), and it’s my favourite Dead album, their most experimental and progressive you might say. So better late than never. Steven Wilson .

In October 1974, the Grateful Dead had established an undeniable following that cemented their status as cultural iconoclasts, bred from the beatnik movement’s rejection of conformity. A tribe of originalists with nearly a decade of gigs under their belts, the band performed what they believed was their final stint of concerts at San Francisco’s Winterland, dubbed the “farewell run.” What followed was a self-imposed hiatus, which would come to an end a year later with the surprise release of Blues for Allah. 

Emerging on September 1st, 1975, the original collection of music presented essential compositions, including the three-movement suite: “Help On The Way” / “Slipknot!” and “Franklin’s Tower,” a still cherished piece in the Dead’s catalog. Surfacing as a fan favourite, Blues for Allah houses the group’s concert anthem, the John Perry Barlow and Bobby Weir co-write, “The Music Never Stopped,” the eastern influenced title track, and striking instrumentals: “King Solomon’s Marbles,” “Sand Castles and Glass Camels,” and the light and fluttery “Sage & Spirit.” 

Now, in recognition of Blues for Allah’s 50th anniversary, a deluxe edition of the Grateful Dead’s eighth studio album has been remastered and prepared for release on September 12th, 2025. The revisited collection will be available as a 3CD set and on digital streaming platforms. It features a newly remastered version of the original album by Grammy Award-winning engineer David Glasser. He sourced from the original analogue tapes, which underwent speed correction and tape restoration by Plangent Processes. 

The Grateful Dead have shared a previously unreleased recording of “Crazy Fingers” from their August 12th, 1975 soundcheck at San Francisco’s Great American Music Hall. The track is one of many newly unearthed recordings included on the upcoming ‘Blues for Allah’ (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition),’ due out September 12th via Rhino.

“One of the most ethereally psychedelic lyrics in the entire Grateful Dead canon, this beautiful ballad by Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter is like a beautiful dreamscape, like a feather drifting from the sky and landing gently,” said band archivist David Lemieux. “This rendition is from the Dead’s rehearsal/soundcheck at the Great American Music Hall… the day before the classic ‘One From The Vault’ show. Practice makes perfect!”

As a significant inclusion in the forthcoming release, the revisited set turns over 2 hours of previously unreleased recordings. Included is the band’s August 12th, 1975, soundcheck at San Francisco’s Great American Music Hall, which captures renditions of album features: “Sage & Spirit,” “Help On The Way,” “Slipknot!,” and “Franklin’s Tower.” As an added feature, performances from the group’s June 21st, 1976, show at the Tower Theatre in Pennsylvania draw attention to five Blues for Allah tracks, and “Eyes of the World.” 

A final feature of the collection turns over song selections from Bill Graham’s SNACK (Students Need Athletics, Culture, and Kicks) Benefit at Kezar Stadium on March 23rd, 1975, previously included on the 2004 Beyond Description box set’s Bonus Disc. It also housed one of only three known live performances of the “King Solomon’s Marbles.” Vinyl enthusiasts can purchase a 180-gram black picture disc and limited-edition “Midnight Fire” custom vinyl, exclusive to Dead.net. 

The first single from the revisited set, “The Music Never Stopped,” is now available to stream. Grateful Dead Legacy Manager and Archivist David Lemieux commented, “This fanciful take of life on the road, the journey of Dead Heads, and the magic the Grateful Dead brought from town to town was a fan favourite every time it was played.” 

Blues for Allah represented a studio reset for the band, who tried a different approach to making this set by rejecting the pre-writing process and allowing the songs to emerge in the moment. “The whole idea was to get back to that band thing, where the band makes the main contribution to the evolution of the material,” Garcia explained.

Working at Bobby Weir’s home studio, which had just enough space to house the ensemble and their equipment, the session evolved into an intimate exchange of ideas, characterized by an exploratory approach that pushed the boundaries of what they were capable of generating. 

“Blues for Allah is the Dead’s unique vision, a deeply humane parable that framed their own artistic renewal in the most inclusive, expansive terms,” writes Nicholas G. Meriwether, Executive Director of the Grateful Dead Studies Association and author of the set’s liner notes. “Fifty years later, it remains one of their most musically successful and resolutely experimental albums.”

“BLUES FOR ALLAH is the Dead’s unique vision, a deeply humane parable that framed their own artistic renewal in the most inclusive, expansive terms. Fifty years later, it remains one of their most musically successful and resolutely experimental albums.” Nicholas G. Meriwether, Executive Director of the Grateful Dead Studies Association

Release date is 12th September

Celebrate the 50th Anniversary

This week, Wombo unveiled their new single/video, “Neon Bog,” taken from their forthcoming album, “Danger in Fives” (out August 8th). The track’s video is an eleborate set up of surreal practical effects (helmed by the band’s own Cameron Lowe) that distills Wombo’s singular essence. It’s the perfect companion for the “off-kilter, whimsical gem” (Stereogum). 

“Danger in Fives” isn’t a reintroduction; it’s a reminder. Throughout the record, Wombo not only enhance their formula, but routinely perfect it. Maintaining the confidence of their last full-length, 2022’s “Fairy Rust,” “Danger in Fives” reconnects with the intuition that led their wild experiments on the 2020 debut LP “Blossomlooksdownuponus”. The elements central to Wombo remain true, and are only strengthened across a near-decade of crafting mesmeric rock. 

But that’s not all! We’ve got some limited “Danger in Fives” tees up for pre-order now! Designed by Cam, modeled by Sydney, and blessed by Joel. These tees are avail in black (unisex) and white (baby tee) — stock is very limited so get your orders in before there’s nothing left to order

& while we’re at it — you got your Wombo tickets yet? Big tour right around the corner & the first support slot is officially spoken for. Fire Talk extended fam shower curtain will be joining the band on the east coast, 

from Wombo’s new album, “Danger in Fives”, out August 8th on Fire Talk

Wombo’s third album, “Danger in Fives”, isn’t a reintroduction; it’s a reminder. Throughout  “Danger in Fives”, Wombo — the Louisville-bred three-piece of Sydney Chadwick (bass/vocals), Cameron Lowe (guitar), and Joel Taylor (drums) — not only enhance their formula, but routinely perfect it.

The 11 tracks on “Danger in Fives” fine tune Wombo’s enchanting alchemy while firmly pushing the band into new territory. Wombo first connected in Louisville in 2016 and have crafted a unique lane over the near-decade since forming, contorting post-punk structures into uncanny shapes.

today the band is dropping its final advance single, “S.T. Tilted.” It comes alongside another unreal video helmed by the band, and it’s a perfect distillation of Wombo’s unique sound: hypnotic vocals, frantic guitars, and incisive drumming.

On “Danger in Fives” they twist another knot into their belt, and come out creatively renewed. Throughout “Danger in Fives”, it’s clear what has made Wombo one of the most respected bands in their class, and it’s thrilling to hear them command new terrain.

Wombo’s new album, “Danger in Fives”, out August 8th on Fire Talk Records

Australian experimental outfit King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard have built a well-earned reputation as one of the most prolific, adventurous and inventive bands of all time. Since 2010, the band have released 25 studio albums, which range from expansive jazz-rock, to spaghetti Western soundscapes, semi-acoustic cosmic ballads, sci-fi prog, kaleidoscopic garage rock, thrash metal, explorations of microtonal tunings, kraut-rock and more. King Gizzard’s prolific nature has led them to release music at a frenetic pace, and their intense desire to seek out new sounds and follow new creative paths means that every one of their multitude of releases sounds different from the last. Often released in swift progression of one another (notably, the band released five albums in 2017, and again in 2022, with three in the month of October 2022 alone) King Gizzard have taken the traditional rules of the industry of music making and thrown them out the window. Their intense stage shows and the puzzle-like intricacies of their records have attracted a global fanbase of dedicated Gizzheads, while their Bootlegger program – which sees the band make their music available to independent record labels for free – results in hundreds of variations of certain releases, across vinyl, cassette and CD. Formed in 2010 in Melbourne, Australia, by a group of friends who jammed casually, the line up consists of Stu Mackenzie, Ambrose Kenny-Smith, Cook Craig, Joey Walker, Lucas Harwood, and Michael Cavanagh.

Yo indie labels, bootleggers, fans, weirdos. We’ve got a deal for ya…if anyone wants to release this show, you’re free to do so. Feel free to get creative with it if you like – it’s yours. Directed, produced & shot by Heaps Keen @heapskeenfilms, aka Jackson Devereux & Allen Dobbins Recorded by our sound crew: Sam Joseph, Joe Santarpia, Grace Reader, Gaspard De Meulemeester Lights and visuals by Terrence Ankeny and Jason Galea King Gizzard are: Amby Kenny-Smith, Mickey Cavanagh, Cookie Craig, Joey Walker, Lukey Harwood and Stu Mackenzie

Recorded live at The Gorge Amphitheatre on September 14th, 2024.

In 1972, when rock & roll was all but dead in Manhattan, five cross-dressing glam punks from the boroughs convened and began hammering out sub-Chuck Berry rock for the downtown in-crowd. It took another year before a record company dared to sign them, thus foisting The New York Dolls on an essentially uninterested world. Taking their cue from the band’s guitarist/Keef-alike Johnny Thunders, hardcore Dolls fans pooh-poohed Todd Rundgren’s production as wimpy: twenty-five years after its release, songs like “Personality Crisis” and “Looking for a Kiss” sound more trashily invigorating than ever.

Declared both the Best New Band and Worst Band in Creem magazine’s year-end poll, the New York Dolls were nothing if not polarizing when their self-titled first album hit the streets. Back then they were occasionally crossdressing Lower Manhattan gutter punks that – despite packing such NYC venues their debut, released July 27, 1973.

Today, they are hailed as innovators and visionaries. What a difference time can sometimes make. The album was recorded in eight days at New York City’s Record Plant and mixed in half a day. During the process there was no love lost between the band and the album’s producer Todd Rundgren, who disdained the quintet as amateurish. Their aura of danger, recklessness, flamboyance and decadence was borne out by a trail of death: original drummer Billy Murcia died in 1972 from an overdose; guitarist Johnny Thunders (a longtime heroin addict) in 1991 from indeterminate causes that could have been ill health, drugs and/or foul play; drummer Jerry Nolan the next year from chronic health problems.

They had emerged from a residency in New York’s Mercer Arts Center as both pariahs and icons.

Now considered proto-punks, the Dolls were a bridge from glam and early hard rock to punk (the band’s late-in-career manager was Malcolm McLaren, who went on manage the Sex Pistols). They were an inspiration for Kiss and such later metals bands as Motley Crüe, Guns N’ Roses and Hanoi Rocks. Today such album tracks as “Personality Crisis,” “Trash,” “Looking for a Kiss” and “Jet Boy” are regarded by some as rock classics, and the LP is seen as one of rock music’s great debut records.

In 2004 original members Johansen, Syl Sylvain and Arthur Kane reunited to play London’s Meltdown festival, invited by that year’s curator, Morrisey. Kane died later that year from leukemia. Johansen and Sylvain released a new Dolls album in 2006, and another in 2009 that was produced by – of all people – Rundgren. Sylvain died on January 13th, 2021.

The New York Dolls is a powerhouse of Stones swagger, bluesy attitude, garage punk sloppiness and 60s girl group pastiche. From the opening scream of “Personality Crisis” via the social commentary of “Vietnamese baby” and chronicling of NY’s demi-monde in “Looking For A Kiss”, “Subway Train” or “Bad Girl” it appealed equally to fans of the MC5, glam or heavy metal. No one at this time had combined all this into a single band. The riffs of Johnny Thunders and the bawling of David Johansen gave birth to big hair metal as well as punk and still sounds like the end of civilisation. Their follow-up was so rightly named, “Too Much Too Soon”