Reeves & Bill Nelson's album launch on July 7th

Photo credit: Martin Bostock

Bill Nelson & Reeves Gabrels launch their new album 'Fantastic Guitars' and discuss their artistic collaboration in conversation with Tom Wilcox in London.

Launch and Talk: Curzon Soho, Screen 1, London W1
Monday 7th July 2014, 4pm-6pm

Reeves Gabrels, long-time artistic partner of David Bowie and The Cure’s current lead guitarist, and Bill Nelson, the musical innovator and legendary force behind Be Bop Deluxe present the results of their joint musical genius in an album which draws a complex picture of layers and sonics. The musicians will be discussing their prolific careers, the events which led them to join forces, and the creative processes behind the collaboration.

Tickets £15. Available from WeGotTickets at:
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/279928

The launch and conversation will be held at the Curzon Soho cinema, 99 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, W1D 5DY
Tube: Leicester Square, Piccadilly Circus
Overground: Charing Cross

‘Fantastic Guitars’ by Reeves Gabrels & Bill Nelson is released on the Sonoluxe label on 7th July 2014.

Trouble for Riot Fest Denver?

From The Denver Post:

Riot Fest permit decision expected within 10 days for event in Byers

By John Aguilar

With Riot Fest scheduled in Byers less than three months away, it's not known what might happen to the three-day punk and rock festival — and the thousands of fans who plan to attend — should Arapahoe County deny a permit for the show.

County commissioners on Tuesday night listened to several hours of comments from residents of Byers, an agricultural community 40 miles east of Denver, many of whom said traffic problems, drug use and noise levels arising from last year's Riot Fest made it an unwelcome event this year.

The county must decide whether to issue festival organizers a temporary use permit, without which the Sept. 19-21 show at May Farms can't go on.

An Arapahoe County spokeswoman said Wednesday that a decision probably will be made by the zoning division within 10 days.

Uncut's Ultimate Music Guide out May 15th

Coming May 15th, the Uncut Ultimate Music Guide focusing on The Cure. (Thanks Perfect.Murder)

Update (05/13/14): Uncut has posted a bit of a preview. If you can't find it in stores, you can order a copy at uncut.co.uk/store or download digitally at uncut.co.uk/digital-edition.
(Thanks @aequatomnecinis and Hugh)

Update (05/16/14): Posted some photos from it here. (Thanks Perfect.Murder)

Update (07/01/14): From Uncut on Twitter - "American readers... The Cure: Ultimate Music Guide goes on sale in east coast book stores today!"

Mogwai's 'CODY' influenced by '17 Seconds'

Stuart Braithwaite tells Uncut that Mogwai's 'Come On Die Young' was influenced by 'Seventeen Seconds'.

Uncut: At the time, Mogwai had developed a reputation as a loud band. But CODY is largely a thing of quiet restraint. Was this a matter of conscious intent – to go against what was expected of you?

Stuart: I think we wanted to show that there was more to our music than radical dynamic shifts, and definitely had that in mind. A lot of very minimal records like Seventeen Seconds by The Cure and Spiderland by Slint were influencing us at the time too. I think it's aged reasonably well. We tend to avoid doing anything gimmicky on our records, which hopefully helps them from sounding too time-specific. As far as our catalogue I think it has its own place. I still like all the songs and I'm pretty proud that such a bleak record made it into the charts – especially as records actually still sold back then. (Thanks Benj)

Chicago Riot Fest ticket update

3 day VIP passes are sold out. GA 3 day passes are still available, but are said to be close to selling out, and are now $190. Single day passes are still expected to go on sale towards the end of July, when the daily schedule is announced.

Support The Cold & Lovely

From Roger on Facebook: "Ok you like great music right? You want to hear new bands and support up and coming artists. You don't believe in stealing music do you? So BUY SOME! They need $500 to meet their goal which is basically nothing. Please support one of my favourite bands...http://www.pledgemusic.com/artists/thecoldandlovely/"

They've met their goal now, but you can still support them. 

Also, they've recently covered 'Lullaby' for Studio Delux, after playing it with Roger & Reeves back in January.

Ian McCulloch is NOT a Robert Smith fan

Well this is unfortunate. From the July issue of Record Collector. (Thanks Lars)

Excellent BottleRock photos & article

An article and some excellent photos from William Soragna have been posted at Freakshow magazine. (Thanks Bill)

50 Iconic Albums That Defined 1984

Guitar World says that 'The Top' is one of 50 Iconic Albums That Defined 1984. (Thanks Greg)

100 Best Glastonbury Performances Ever

The Cure's 1986 set comes in at #8 on The Telegraph's list of the 100 Best Glastonbury Performances Ever.

"Headlining Saturday night, The Cure played a blinder, featuring three encores, and an unplanned but spectacular thunderstorm which broke early in the set so their green laser show played amongst the raindrops." (Thanks @wouterdeboeck)

The Cure support Music Without Barriers

Photo from Attitude is Everything.

From NME:

The Cure, Alt-J, Franz Ferdinand support campaign to improve gig access for disabled fans

Music Without Barriers aims to get venues and festivals to sign up to a best practice charter.

The Cure, Alt-J, Franz Ferdinand and Toy are among a host of artists who have signed up to a campaign to help improve gig access for deaf and disabled music fans.

The online Music Without Barriers campaign is led by charity Attitude is Everything, which works to improve Deaf and disabled people’s access to live music. It wants to encourage more UK venues and festivals to join the 90-plus who have signed up to the charity’s Charter of Best Practice.

The Charter of Best Practice encourages event producers to go beyond their basic legal requirements to ensure disabled access, and promote four key principles – that improving access to gigs and festivals doesn't have to be expensive; that there is a strong business case for improving access; that it's vital deaf and disabled fans have access to information before events; and to lose the assumption that all disabled people are wheelchair users.

Mystery Jets' Blaine Harrison, an Attitude is Everything patron said in a statement: "The work Attitude is Everything do is close to my heart, because I strongly feel that everyone should be able to experience live music. Whether it’s watching a friend’s band at a local venue or watching Radiohead from the disabled platform at Glastonbury, gigs should be accessible to everyone. I would like to see more venues taking stock of what they can do to accommodate a more diverse audience. It is also really important that as many artists as possible get involved to show their support to this great campaign. The barriers are there to be broken down."

Artists who have already signed up to the campaign include Alt-J, Slow Club, The Cure’s Robert Smith, Anna Calvi, Enter Shikari, Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos, Jimi Goodwin, Frank Turner, Toy, Tom Odell, Summer Camp, Darren Hayman, The Wytches, Stealing Sheep, and Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell. (Thanks Aaron)

More articles about this: RTT News, Diffuser, ContactMusic, Gigwise.

Reeves picks 10 essential guitar albums

Music Radar has an article where Reeves Gabrels picks what he thinks are the 10 most essential guitar albums.

Update (06/23/14): Here's Part 2 of Reeves' 10 essential guitar albums list.

New Cure ink

Lorna from Glasgow's Lullaby tattoo. Thanks Moggieboy.

Added some new tattoos to the photo gallery - Billie C,  Andrea, Jeff K, and 2 for Lorna from Glasgow,

Denver Riot Fest daily lineup

@RiotFest says the daily lineup for Denver's Riot Fest will be revealed tonight, June 18th, at 7pm Mountain time. No mention of them releasing the single day tickets at the same time, but be ready just in case.

Update: While we wait for the official announcement, it looks like the band Clutch posted it early (and then removed it). It says The Cure are playing Saturday, Sept. 20th. Yep, it's official. And single day tickets ARE on sale now! $60 for regular (will go up to $65, then $70), $100 for VIP. They've also added a 2 day pass for $120.

"Robert Smith loves all of this music"

Grolsch Filmworks talks with Eric Green about his documentary 'Beautiful Noise':

What made you approach Robert Smith and Wayne Coyne, who aren’t really considered as part of the scene?

You know, funnily enough I thought that would have been a little more obvious. I did lots of research – also Trent Reznor and Billy Corgan – they’re all fans of this music, they’re all big fans, and they’re all mainstream musicians who have some of the ideas of this genre at heart in their playing; while they are more mainstream, they are in ways, each individual musician, a kind of kindred spirit. It came out in some of the interviews: Robert Smith loves all of this music and he’s very vocal about it.

He seemed the most passionate and romantic about some of the bands.

Absolutely. Perfect wording;  very romantic, very passionate, very interested in everything they did. And Wayne Coyne – Flaming Lips recently played in Ireland and Kevin Shields (from My Bloody Valentine) joined them onstage; we’re also talking about people that are friends with a lot of these bands. Billy Corgan was very friendly with the Cocteau Twins, Billy was also very friendly with Kevin and particularly Debbie Googe. Lots of connections there.
(Thanks Laurent)

Reeves in Nashville on June 13th

June 13th, 2014 at The Family Wash
Reeves Gabrels - guitar
Kevin Hornback - bass
Jeff Brown - drums.

Update (06/17/14): "I went to the show. Reeves was awesome. He played Yesterday's Gone. Got to talk to him after the show and he signed my CDs. He sort of apologized for YG not sounding as good as when Robert sings it. It's different live but very good."
(Thanks Alan)

Slowdive loves The Cure

Nice interview with Slowdive at Post Punk. Safe to say they are big fans of The Cure and would love to play with them some day. Lots of Cure mentions in it, here's one excerpt:

Nick: But it’s just- no, it’s never happened. So you know, maybe that’ll be something for the future.
Rachel: That’s Nick’s ultimate dream.
Nick: Well, I’ll just have to throw myself at Simon’s feet, won’t I? “I’m not worthy!”
Rachel: Simon’s his hero.

Post-Punk: Oh yeah?
Nick: Well, you know, he was one of my sort of early reasons where I thought, Yeah, I wanna play bass guitar.

Post-Punk: He’s still got it.
Nick: He’s on it!

(Thanks @Kafdancer)

New dates for Liqueur

Cure Tribute band Liqueur have  added 2 more dates for this year. September 13th , the '9:13 Dream' show at The Square Harlow and Nov. 22nd at O2 Academy Islington (2).

Update (05/07/14): The London show is now a 'Disintegration' Anniversary show.

Fan of The Cure? Catch Liqueur - The Cure Tribute Disintegration Anniversary Gig. Sat 22/11 On sale Sat 10/05 @ 12pm pic.twitter.com/RLA1adRif6
— O2AcademyIslington (@O2Islington) May 7, 2014

Update (06/01/14): New show added - a Disintegration set on Nov. 21st at Granny's in Lowestofts. Free show but limited space available, so please message Granny's to be put on the guest list.

Update (06/17/14): Another show added - Nov. 1st in Milton Keynes at the Craufurd Arms.

Photo shoot for Roger's Love & Other Tragedies

Posted on Roger's Facebook: "Photo shoot for Love and Other Tragedies thanks to Peony for the pictures."

Photos from BottleRock

Great photos as usual from Mauro Melis at Sound of Violence. More coming to his Flickr soon.

And check out his B&W Series on Facebook.