News featuring Siouxsie and the Banshees

Sunday 12th May

• “Meltdown festival: Yoko Ono's choices”

  Yoko Ono, curator of the Meltdown 2013 festival of music and ideas, picks out some highlights

  "I am so excited with the line-up," says Yoko Ono, curator of this year's Meltdown festival, which takes place at the Southbank 14-23 June. "It brings together old and new, performers from my generation like Marianne [Faithfull] and Iggy [Pop] as well as cutting-edge groups from Japan like Cibo Matto. Plus there will be some amazing talks and discussions … it's not just a music festival, it is also about ideas and action."

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Friday 3rd May

• “Savages: 'It's about trying not to treat the audience like idiots'”

  Influenced by arthouse cinema and visceral post-punk, Savages are a band who take their music very seriously. So seriously, in fact, that it's hard to tell if they even enjoy being in a band together …

  Backstage at the Coachella festival, in the bright desert heat, I'm having an incongruous conversation in an incongruous setting with Savages drummer Fay Milton. One of her friends, she says, has an "in" with Elton John and there's a small chance she might get an introduction. She's excited. It's Elton John! The band's singer Jehnny Beth, who has been looking over at me, sizing me up, speaks. "You are saying this in front of a journalist?" she mutters, scowling, as if Fay has just admitted she spends her weekends at Justin Bieber fan conventions.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Saturday 27th April

• “Anarchy in the UK: punk's early years”

  Sheila Rock's fascinating photographs of punk, which have been turned into a lavish book, document the scene in its thrilling infancy. Nearly 40 years on, she explains why she never dreamed her work would prove so significant

  'I was simply in the right place at the right time," says Sheila Rock of her archive of early punk photographs, which, having sat in a box in her garden shed for years, have been turned into a beautifully designed, limited edition book entitled Punk+. Having just arrived in London from America, Rock was invited to see the Patti Smith Group's now legendary performance at the Roundhouse in May 1976 by her friend, Lenny Kaye, Smith's guitarist. Kaye also told her about a punk group called the Clash, who were playing a few months later at the ICA. Intrigued, Rock went along with her camera and started snapping.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Friday 19th April

• “Louise Burns Unveils 'The Midnight Mass,' Premieres New Song”

  Louise Burns previously spoke with Exclaim! about her upcoming sophomore album, which was produced Colin Stewart (Dan Mangan, the New Pornographers, Black Mountain) and the Raveonettes' Sune Rose Wagner. Now, the Vancouver pop songwriter has officially announced The Midnight Mass, which is due out on July 9 through Light Organ Records. In a statement, Burns said, "I went back to the music I first fell in love with. Which was the Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Depeche Mode, all of my favourite influences." You'll certainly hear some of those goth-y '80s influences in lead...Read More

  Read the complete article at exclaim.ca

Thursday 11th April

• “Readers recommend: songs about heat – results”

  RR regular sonofwebcore presents his pick of the answers to last week's question: what are the best songs about heat?

  What is it about the heat of the night that inspires physical contact? Well, there are fewer clothes in the way for a start. Captain Beefheart's Tropical Hot Dog Night sweats concupiscence. His usual stray into the naughty area is now a gasping plea for sex as a natural right.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Tuesday 12th March

• “SXSW 2013: The British are coming!”

  As the annual Texas beanfest of music gets underway, we look at some of the Brits who might make their mark

  True, a lot of the Ones to Watch at SXSW 2013 – from DIIV to Danny Brown, Death Grips to Flaming Lips – are either established or American, or both. And yet the festival is still the industry's most prestigious annual showcase for new and emerging talent from all over the world and the place to be for any aspiring British act. So here are 10 touted UK artists to see over the next few days in Texas.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Tuesday 27th November

• “Childhood: another great new UK band”

  Not long ago people were saying UK guitar music was dead. Along with Palma Violets and Savages, Childhood are part of a new wave of bands proving them all wrong

  Is it a ripple? Is it a wave? Or is it just a coincidence that this year has offered three young British guitar groups causing shivers of anticipation among those for whom "the band" is pretty much unbeatable as a vehicle for delivering pop thrills? There's Savages, harking back to Siouxsie and the Banshees with their striking, stern art-rock. There's Palma Violets, rickety and rackety, and – catnip for those who yearn for indie's golden age – signed to Rough Trade. And now there's Childhood, whom the more excitable champions of guitars are mentioning in the same breath as the Stone Roses.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Friday 24th August

• “Reading festival 2012 kicks off”

  Hirsute, heavy and homegrown, Reading festival gets underway with Deaf Havana, Future of the Left and Hadouken!

  And so to Reading and Leeds, the no-frills Big Gig in a Field that acts as the solo-squealing encore for the UK festival season. It sneers at Bestival's firework finale as it casually sets fire to its toilet blocks. It snorts at the piss bottles thrown at Cher Lloyd at V as it lobs whole deckchairs at 50 Cent. Here there are no Patagonian poetry grottos, no naked swimming, fancy dress pirate parades, English National Ballet, wishing trees, or Alice in Wonderland hookah lounges. At Reading you have two choices: rock, or get off the pot.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Thursday 16th August

• “Readers pick: songs about mirrors”

  He's been the fairest of them all at compiling the RR playlist. Now, for his final topic, Jon Dennis reflects on your suggestions

  It's been my privilege to compile the Readers Recommend playlist since the beginning of last year. And what is the playlist, if not a mirror to your collective tastes? So for my final topic at the helm, it seemed appropriate last week to ask for your favourite songs about mirrors.

  Read the complete article at www.guardian.co.uk

Thursday 21st June

• “Distort Me Deadly: The Top 10 Female Punk Bands”

  For three decades, punk's not-so-secret weapon -- pioneering women -- have shaped the sonic template and bristling attitude of underground music's teeming core.

  Picking and honing down a Top Ten list is never easy, especially when grappling with previously under-documented subjects like women in punk. Though women co-pioneered the genre, forming the indelible face and sound of the underground singing for the likes of the Bags, the Avengers, X-Ray Sex, Blondie, and Siouxsie and the Banshees, majority-female bands have often slipped beneath the radar of many critics, pollsters, and everyday fans. My plan here wasn’t to list a…

  Read the complete article at www.popmatters.com