Author archive: Barney Hoskyns

One from the RBP vaults: the late Doors keyboard maestro answers ten questions for Sylvie Simmons in MOJO, December 1997…   Ever since Jim Morrison’s death there have been many Elvis-style, alive-and-well-and- pumping-gas ‘sightings’. Has it ever crossed your mind … Continue reading →

The first official account of the iconic 4AD label, from RBP scribe Martin Aston… This Mortal Coil, the Birthday Party, Bauhaus, Cocteau Twins, Pixies, Throwing Muses, Breeders, Dead Can Dance, Lisa Germano, Kristin Hersh, Belly, Red House Painters. Just a … Continue reading →

Last night’s RBP Album Club was really something, especially if you’re a paid-up member of the Incredible String Band cult – as Robyn Hitchcock (centre, above), Green Gartside (left) and our “host for the evening” Mark Ellen so clearly are. … Continue reading →

Van Dyke Parks and his friend Loudon Wainwright III mug for my iPhone after Parks’ sublime show at London’s intimate Borderline on Sunday night. It was my cherry-on-top birthday present after Chelsea’s late three points at Old Trafford. Parks was magnificent … Continue reading →

I’d barely started Who Owns The Future?, the sobering sophomore tome by Silicon Valley maverick Jaron Lanier, when my eyes fell on this paragraph: “As much as it pains me to say so, we can survive if we only destroy … Continue reading →

Messrs Schmidt, Henley, Frey & Walsh line up for their press conf. last Thursday at Mayfair’s Connaught Hotel. See my report on RBP today…

My old friend Julian Keeling wrote (the substance of) this obit of George Jones 15 long years ago… Here’s what I wrote about George ‘n’ Tammy at the Hammersmith Odeon even longer ago than that: LONG AGO, in the days … Continue reading →

Richie Havens at the Bottom Line Remembering “the Eternal Flame of Woodstock” with a great piece by Kandia Crazy Horse from PopMatters on 7 August 2002… MOST OF MY generation (“X”) peers – especially indie rock & dance music critics – … Continue reading →

Nice to see Pierre Perrone’s obit of the great New York session guitarist Hugh McCracken in the Indie today… his playing on Laura Nyro’s early albums was nonpareil, but he also played on everything from Van’s “Brown-Eyed Girl” and Aretha’s … Continue reading →

See Mitch Meyers’ story about the closure of Greenwich Village legend Bleecker Bob’s… another sad day in the slow erosion of popular music as we knew it and loved it.

The Margaret Thatcher Interview!!? Tom Hibbert, Smash Hits, 25 March 1987 Come with us, why don’t you, inside the hallowed portals of Number 10 Downing Street where the so-called “Iron Lady” awaits your “pleasure”… AS I WALK into the drawing … Continue reading →

  Very sad to hear that Andy Johns has gone. He gave me a great two-part interview for my Zep oral history, the first (short) one in a typical Valley HM shack of a studio, the second (much longer) in … Continue reading →

Gillian G. Gaar, recently featured in our “Almost Famous” spotlight and the author of She’s a Rebel and many other great books, urgently needs eye surgery and has no medical insurance to pay for it. Please think about contributing to … Continue reading →

Start spreading the news about this event organized by Paul’s partner Cindy Lee Berryhill. Crawdaddy founder Paul (above right, with Kurt Vonnegut in the middle and Raymond Mungo on the left) is the father of all of us in this … Continue reading →

Just released on iTunes and other digital platforms today… the much-ballyhooed Beware of Mr. Baker. A deeply flawed but fascinating cat.

Remembering the great George “Shadow” Morton (far right with the NY Dolls during sessions for their sophomore Too Much, Too Soon. If he’d shepherded nothing into this world bar the Shangri-Las’ spellbinding ‘I Can Never Go Home Anymore’ he would … Continue reading →

More sad news from the world of longform music journalism (from today’s CMU Daily newsletter): THE STOOL PIGEON TO CLOSE Arguably the finest purveyor of longform music journalism left, The Stool Pigeon has announced that it is closing down after … Continue reading →

This post about Billboard Hot 100 chart-toppers Macklemore and Ryan Lewis by Waxy founder Andy Baio might have you believing it. And you’ve gotta love the lyric to their album track “Jimmy Iovine”:   Finally see an office with a mounted sign, … Continue reading →

Every Tuesday and Thursday, former Warner Bros. Records executive and industry insider Stan Cornyn (author of the great Warner-Reprise history Exploding)  ruminates on the past, present, and future of the music business on Rhino.com. Stan was there at the very … Continue reading →

RBP contributor Joe McEwen, aka the “Mr C” who helped Peter Guralnick out on Sweet Soul Music (and put together the great Lost Soul comps for Epic), has posted this nice reflection on cult Southern hero Dan Penn on Peter’s site…

  I finally got to see Eugene Jarecki’s brilliant The House I Live In, by turns heartbreaking, enraging, depressing… and ultimately deeply shocking. Far from America’s war on drugs being a failure, it turns out to have been a huge success – … Continue reading →

FROM NO OTHER PUBLICITY: Maverick soul artist Swamp Dogg (aka Jerry Williams) has been described as the “soul genius that time forgot”, and “a strange combination of Sly Stone’s progressive funk with Frank Zappa’s lyrical absurdism”. In the ’70s he … Continue reading →

Marking the passing of Montreux Festival founder and friend to the stars Claude Nobs…

Commencing on Valentine’s Day with – what else? – Love’s immortal 1967 release FOREVER CHANGES, RBP and The Idler unveil the first in a monthly series of ALBUM CLUBS at the delightful Idler Academy, 81 Westbourne Park Road LONDON W2 … Continue reading →

  The Dame is back, with a so-so single trailing a March 8 album… rumors of a fatal illness greatly exaggerated, then? Welcome home, spaceman.