Preview of Hank Wangford on Native Monster [Shropshire Star] website on 16th May 2014

Preview: Hank Wangford

As Hank Wangford motored up the M6, the veteran country singer had a message for anyone who doesn’t care for the sound of mournful ballads and slide guitars.

“I really like playing to people who don’t like country music, because I know that, by the end of the gig, a lot of them are going to come up to me and say, ‘I never liked country music, but I liked what you did there,’” he told Native Monster from his tour bus en route to Glasgow on Thursday.

The 73-year-old’s tour arrives in Birmingham on Monday, with Wangford promising an unusual twist on country music.

“There’ll be a good smattering of waltzes. We’re not going to do the album from beginning to end, because I think that would test the audience too much, but we’ll do quite a few,” he said.

The album in question is Save Me The Waltz, Wangford’s latest release, which is full of tunes in triple time, and features a mixture of originals and covers, including “Baby’s In Black,” an early Lennon and McCartney tune.

“They were really influential, so I wanted to do a Beatles tune that was a waltz, just to tip my hat to them,” he said.

Hank Wangford plays the O2 Academy 3, Birmingham on 19 May. See www.o2academybirmingham.co.uk for booking details

By Stephen Taylor

Preview of Echo and the Bunnymen concert in the Shropshire Star on 9th May 2014

Wolverhampton set to welcome Echo and the Bunnymen Meteorite

Ian McCullough’s hair may not be as voluminous these days, but the Echo and the Bunnymen frontman has lost none of his characteristic swagger, ahead of the release of the band’s new album.

 

 “At long last we’ve made the worthy successor to Crocodiles, Heaven Up Here, Porcupine and Ocean Rain. Meteorites is what Echo and the Bunnymen mean and are meant to be,” the 54-year-old said.

While Meteorites is sure to feature heavily when the Bunnymen return to Wolverhampton for the first time in five years on Sunday, it will be songs from those classic 1980s albums referenced by McCullough that are sure to be eagerly awaited.

 

Formed in 1978, Echo and the Bunnymen led the march of Liverpool’s post-punk scene into the early 1980s, though it took four years for them to make a dent in the singles chart, with the release of "The Back Of Love."

On stage, the Bunnymen earned a reputation as one of the most visceral live bands of the 1980s.
Whether it was the vocal extemporising of the cigarette-toting McCullough or the epic guitar sound generated by Will Sergeant, the intensity of the group’s soaring anthems, such as the 1984 single, “The Killing Moon,” ensured that Bunnymen gigs were memorable occasions.

McCullough left the band in 1988, but reformed the Bunnymen with Sergeant and original bassist Les Pattinson nine years later, resulting in a Top 10 single, "Nothing Lasts Forever," and the critically-acclaimed album, Evergreen.

The release of Meteorites on May 26 will be studio album number 12 for the group, and this time it seems that the tunes live up to McCullough’s customary grandiose rhetoric – quite an achievement for the man who described Ocean Rain as “the greatest album ever made”.

And as a celebrated Liverpool fan, don’t be surprised to hear a rendition of "You’ll Never Walk Alone" from McCullough if Liverpool win the Premier League title on Sunday.

Echo and the Bunnymen play Wulfrun Hall, Wolverhampton on Sunday.

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Interview with Jean-Jacques Burnel in the Shropshire Star on 21st March 2014

40 years on The Stranglers are still fighting

In 1977, The Stranglers demanded that 'Something Better Change' but, with their 40th anniversary tour rolling into Birmingham tomorrow, one thing that hasn’t altered is the attitude of the band’s bassist and singer, Jean-Jacques Burnel, towards the music industry.

Photo by Stephen Taylor

“[This tour’s] a fingers up, because at one point it was us against all the others, but people forget that we outsold all the other bands –The Sex Pistols and The Clash – and it’s through being dogged and following our own instincts, rather than copying others or jumping on bandwagons, that we’re the last men standing,” the 62-year-old said backstage at Liverpool’s O2 Academy earlier this month.
While some critics might argue that The Stranglers were guilty of jumping on the punk bandwagon, there’s no denying that the four-piece recorded some of the most defining tunes of that era, with “Peaches” and “No More Heroes” completing a hat-trick of Top 10 hits for the band when they stormed into the charts thirty-seven years ago.

And in an era before overnight success was commonplace, Burnel recalls what it was like before they signed a recording contract.

“It was quite hard, and especially demoralising when you get turned down by 24 record companies.”
So, what can the audience expect to see at Birmingham’s 02 Academy tomorrow? “We’re pushing the boat out for this one They’re going to see a complete retrospective, with lots of amazing imagery, so we’ve got huge screens, which we’ve never used before,” he said.

And as for the future, Burnel remains positive. “Fourteen years ago, we were being dismissed by everyone, but now the last few albums have proved that there’s still life in the old dog yet,” he said.

By Stephen Taylor