Rock's Backpages: Search Results

Retrospective by Len Brown, Rock's Backpages, 22 May 2009

N.B. This is the full, unedited version of a piece published in The Guardian on 22 May 2009 ...

Buddy Holly: The Angel with the Devil's Music: Buddy Holly

Retrospective by Richard Williams, The Guardian, 30 January 2009

Fifty years ago, Buddy Holly's life was sadly cut short. Richard Williams salutes the clean-cut 22-year-old who came to Britain and showed a whole generation ...

Randy California, Spirit: Randy California

Retrospective by Johnny Black, MOJO, February 2004

Just turned 22, Spirit guitarist and figurehead Randy California stands on Chelsea Bridge, staring down into the grey waters of the River Thames. It's April 1973, ...

Awopbopaloobop Alopbamboom: The book that declared pop music dead

Retrospective by Bob Stanley, The Observer, 6 February 2016

Nik Cohn thought John Lennon "self-pitying", Led Zeppelin "embarrassing" and rated Del Shannon's 'Runaway' above Van Morrison's entire career. Bob Stanley revisits his 1969 book. ...

Eyewitness: The Twist

Retrospective by Johnny Black, Q, February 1997

THE TWIST WAS the most remarkable dance phenomenon in the history of the rock era. Here's the story of how it happened in the words ...

Buddy Holly: Down the Line: Buddy Holly

Retrospective by Mark Kemp, Texas Music, January 2009

WHEN THE FIRST gentle notes ring from Buddy Holly's acoustic guitar on his cover of Mickey & Sylvia's 'Dearest', you could swear it was recorded ...

The Supremes: Mary Wilson on The Supremes

Retrospective by Johnny Black, MOJO, April 1997

"ONE DAY IN mid-April we were all summoned to berry’s home on Outer Drive," remembers Mary Wilson of The Supremes. "As I drove there, I ...

Dennis Linde

Retrospective by Mick Houghton, MOJO, April 2007

The sound of the wildly original country cat who penned Elvis' 'Burning Love'. ...

The Pogues, Shane MacGowan: Shane MacGowan: It's A Long Way From Tipperary

Retrospective by Ian Fortnam, Vox, January 1998

AS PUNK PASSION dissipated and died, choking on its own irrelevance, a generation of serial venters were suddenly deprived of its primal, therapeutic effect. The ...

Ritchie Valens: The Young Singer Who Pioneered Chicano Rock

Retrospective by Martin Hawkins, The History of Rock, March 1982

WHEN ROCK'N'ROLL first stopped calling itself rhythm and blues in the mid Fifties, it became a young man's game. Teenage performers like Ritchie Valens began ...

The Bay City Rollers

Retrospective by Ian Fortnam, Uncut, May 1998

Ahh, those much-mimicked hedgehogian coxcombs; those calf-chafing, tartan-trimmed trews with half a yard of surplus flapping flare to spare; those cheery, cheeky chipmunk grins and ...

Rain Parade: Unsung Heroes: The Rain Parade

Retrospective by Terry Staunton, Uncut, February 2010

Pioneers of LA's '80s "Paisley Underground" — it's warring psych revivalists the Roback brothers! ...

Whitney Houston: The diva who had — and lost — it all

Retrospective by Nick Hasted, The Independent, 13 February 2012

From her rise as a fresh-faced teen to her sudden death in an LA hotel room at 48, Nick Hasted charts the highs and lows ...

Top 10 Hits from the '60s: Who Played on 'Em

Retrospective by Harold Bronson, Rock's Backpages, 14 January 2014

THE WRECKING CREW, a much-needed documentary about the behind-the-scenes elite crop of studio musicians who provided the instrumentation for many of the hits of the ...

Aaliyah's Age Ain't Nothing but a Number Ages 20 Years

Retrospective by Michael A. Gonzales, Ebony, 27 May 2014

THE LATE SONGSTRESS'S DEBUT ALBUM DROPPED IN MAY 1994, LAUNCHING A TOO-BRIEF CAREER THAT'LL NEVER BE FORGOTTEN ...

Band of Susans, Big Black, Butthole Surfers, Sonic Youth: Sonic Youth and the Blast First axis

Retrospective by David Stubbs, The Wire, February 2013

A previously unpublished essay by David Stubbs, on Paul Smith's Blast First label and Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon's Sonic Youth. ...

Jefferson Airplane, Moby Grape, Skip Spence: We need to talk about... Skip Spence: Oar in dark water

Retrospective by Graham Reid, elsewhere.co.nz, 5 March 2012

SYD BARRETT of Pink Floyd and Roky Erickson of Thirteenth Floor Elevators don't own the category of "mad '60s acid casualty" exclusively. ...

Buddy Holly: Why Buddy Holly will never fade away

Retrospective by Philip Norman, Daily Telegraph, 30 January 2009

ON A BASIS OF simply counting heads, rock music surpasses even film as the 20th century's most influential art form. By that reckoning, there is ...

New Order: Lost Years in Original Modernity? On Listening to New Order's Lost Sirens

Retrospective by Steve Redhead, Rock's Backpages, March 2013

THIRTY SEVEN Year Party People! Since Ian Curtis, Stephen Morris, Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook began playing regularly as Joy Division in 1978, that's effectively ...

Jimmy Jones: Timin' Is The Thing

Retrospective by Penny Reel, Let It Rock, May 1975

What would have happened if you and IHadn't just happened to meet?We might have spent the rest of our livesWalking down misery street. ...