Pete Doherty is set to be quizzed by police over whether he provided drugs to documentary maker Robin Whitehead, who was found dead in London on Monday (January 25).

Whitehead had been making a documentary about Doherty’s old band The Libertines. She was found in the Hackney flat thought to be owned by Doherty’s friend and musical collaborator Peter ‘Wolfman’ Wolfe.

Now police are set to question the singer/guitarist over whether he provided drugs to Whitehead, reports The Sun. Drug paraphernalia was reportedly found in the flat, while Doherty was thought to have visited her the day before her death.

Wolfe denied that Doherty had visited the flat, instead saying that he and Whitehead had visited the Babyshambles man in his Wiltshire home. But the newspaper reports that a warden claimed he saw Doherty at the flat.

Despite the police seeking to question the frontman, the death is being treated as non-suspicious.

nme.com 29/01/10

Legendary songwriter Peter Gabriel has spoken about his soon to be released Radiohead cover

Peter Gabriel is a hugely influential yet deeply unfashionable musician. Once the lead singer with Genesis, the frontman helped to birth the prog rock movement yet never abandoned his art school roots.

The performer’s solo career has been typically varied. Almost bankrupting himself in an attempt to bring world music to greater prominence, Peter Gabriel was one of the founding partners in the WOMAD event.

Now Peter Gabriel is to risk the wrath of music fans by taking on some of pop’s finest texts. New covers album ‘Scratch My Back’ sees the English singer perform songs by David Bowie, Paul Simon and more.

Asking the same songwriters to cover one of his tracks, Oxford giants Radiohead have taken the singer up on his offer. The band are working on a Peter Gabriel cover, which should be released later this year.

Now Peter Gabriel has spoken about his upcoming version of the classic Radiohead track ‘Street Spirit (Fade Out)’. Speaking to The Quietus the singer said: “Radiohead have been one of my favourite bands for a long time - they’re brilliant and bold in their composition, experimentation and always seem drawn to new challenges“.

“John messed around with some of the chords at the end and I couldn’t get the original melody to work, so what you hear is an improvised solution to that problem“.

clashmusic.com 29/01/10

Tom DeLonge of American punk trio Blink 182 is set to launch a new digital label.

The music industry is in crisis. Failure to respond to the threat of illegal downloading has left many labels adrift, with artists and industry figures alike at odds over how to progress in the 21st century.

Now Blink 182 could have a solution. Tom DeLonge is set to release a new album by his side project Angels And Airwaves as a digital only project, with the musician attempting to make money through unusual means.

DeLonge has launched a new website, which aims to change the way the music industry works. His plan is to release the album, gain corporate sponsorship and then launch a subscription service with fans gaining monthly downloads.

Says DeLonge: “If only 5 percent of that 20 million came back and interacted with the Modlife platform that powers our Web site, the revenue would far exceed anything we’d make from a major label, in any way, shape or form.”

The New Yorker reports the Blink 182 musicians as claiming: “We’re redefining the music business. And I honestly think we’re going to be 10 times bigger because of it.”

It seems that Tom DeLonge is planning to increase the label’s roster. The New Yorker also reports that the musician attempted to sign Vampire Weekend recently, but the ‘Contra’ band shunned his approach.

“It sounded very reasonable and I thought he was a really nice guy” Ezra Koenig told the magazine, before re-affirming his commitment to British indie label XL Recordings.

clashmusic.com 28/01/10

British rapper Dizzee Rascal has insulted an Australian journalist during a foul mouthed rant down under.

Dizzee Rascal doesn’t suffer fools gladly. The rapper made his name in the competitive grime scene, where a word out of place could result in violence.

Now a fixture on the charts, Dizzee Rascal is currently touring through Australia as part of the Big Day Out festival. However the temperature appears to be getting to him, with the rapper at the centre of a series of incidents.

Recently a fan threw a bottle of water onstage, sparking a brawl with the rapper as Dizzee Rascal leaped into the crowd. Now the rapper has insulted a journalist backstage during a press call.

Asked if he had ever fallen when on stage Dizzee Rascal replied: “Yeah, yeah I have stacked it on stage“.

Australian website News.com reports that the rapper then grew angry as the line of questioning continued. Speaking to journalist Alison Stephenson the star said: “What the f–k do you want from me man, I’ve already said I done it. Yeah I stacked it, bitch. F–k!”

Exiting the press call immediately, Dizzee Rascal then demanded that footage of the incident be destroyed. “A publicist came running up to me declaring I had to go back to the media area immediately and my Dizzee Rascal interview had to be deleted,” said Stephenson.

“He was refusing to do any other press that day until I agreed to delete it, including a radio station whose team was going into chaos. They were due to go live with the rapper but he was sitting in his trailer waiting for me to comply.”

“I was escorted to Dizzee’s trailer so his UK manager and publicist could emerge, watch me sign the document and agree to ‘just forget about it and move on’.”

Big Day Out publicist, Miranda Brown, declined to comment.

clashmusic.com 28/01/10

Sigur Ros have revealed that they have “chucked away” the work they’ve done on their new album.

The follow-up to 2008’s ‘Með Suð I Eyrum Við Spilum Endalaust’, the as yet untitled album was “near completion” according to a blog on Sigur-Ros.co.uk last May, but frontman Jonsi Birgisson has said they are going to “start it all again“.

“We haven’t got another [Sigur Ros] album ready - It was just a rumour,” Birgisson told SpinnerMusic.co.uk. “We started to record something, but then we chucked it all away. So I think we are going to have to start it all again.”

When asked if the band are on a break, he confirmed, “Yes we are on a break at the moment. Everybody in the band is having babies.”

Meanwhile, Jonsi Birgisson will release his debut solo album ‘Go’ on March 22.

nme.com 28/01/10

Pete Doherty has been fined £750 for being found with four grams of heroin in his coat pocket while at Gloucester Crown Court on driving charges last month (December 21).

Doherty, who was 40 minutes late to today’s (January 27) hearing at Gloucester Magistrates Court, claimed that he had not realised the heroin was in his coat pocket. The court heard that when the Babyshambles frontman had been asked to empty out his pockets by court staff on December 21 a plastic bag containing 13 individual wraps of the drug fell onto the floor.

District Judge Joti Bopa Rai questioned Doherty’s motives behind the incident, saying: “Either this was sheer stupidity or a ploy to get more publicity.”

The singer’s lawyer, Bruce Clark, denied the allegation against his client that he had taken the drugs to court on purpose, reports BBC News.

As well as the £750 fine Doherty was ordered to pay £100 in court costs. Judge Bopa Rai also said she was concerned that he still hadn’t paid the £2,210 fine imposed on him at his December 21 court appearance and ordered him to do so immediately, reports Thisiswiltshire.co.uk.

Doherty said that he had relied on his accountant to settle the payment, but Judge Bopa Rai stressed that it was his responsibility.

nme.com 27/01/10

Lostprophets have been forced to cancel their show at Afan Lido in Port Talbot after the venue was ravaged by fire.

The show, which was due to take place on March 1, was devastated by fire back in December and will now be moved to Cardiff’s International Arena on May 1.

Tickets for the Afan Lido show will be valid for the Cardiff show, while refunds are also available.

Playing in support of their new album ‘The Betrayed’, the Welsh group recently played a show at their old school in Pontypridd, with a full UK tour set to begin on February 4.

Lostprophets will play the following dates:

Leicester De Montfort Hall (February 4)
Hull Ice Arena (6)
Nottingham Rock City (7)
Margate Winter Gardens (9)
Portsmouth Guildhall (10)
London O2 Academy Brixton (11)
Doncaster Dome (13)
Leeds O2 Academy (14)
Cambridge Corn Exchange (15)
Birmingham O2 Academy (17)
Glasgow Academy (18)
Edinburgh Corn Exchange (19)
Yeovil Westlands (21)
Norwich UEA (22)
Newcastle O2 Academy (23)
Manchester Apollo (25)
Southampton Guildhall (26)
Bristol O2 Academy (28)
Cardiff International Arena (May 1)

nme.com 27/01/10

Proposals for a new digital music format that its creators claim could take over from the MP3 have been unveiled.

Called MusicDNA, the format will go into beta testing in the spring with an aim to launching properly in the summer. Among its primary aims is to allow music fans to download complete artist packages that include music, videos, pictures, the option to buy merchandise and access to official blog and Twitter posts written by musicians, reports BBC News.

Among the labels to sign up to MusicDNA are Beggars Group, which owns Rough Trade (The Strokes, Mystery Jets), 4AD (The Big Pink, TV On The Radio), Matador Records (Sonic Youth) and XL Recordings (Vampire Weekend, MIA).

Unveiled by representatives at the Midem Industry Conference in Cannes, MusicDNA aims to be an ever-growing format which will have new information added to it as time progresses.

Developer Dagfinn Bach, who created MusicDNA, said that the format was more versatile than normal MP3s.

“We can deliver a file that is extremely searchable and can carry up to 32GB of extra information in the file itself,” Bach explained. “And it will be dynamically updatable so that every time the user is connected, his file will be updated.”

The format is likely to receive competition from the iTunes LP format, which also groups together music, videos and related content.

nme.com 26/01/10

Radiohead raised more than £350,000 for Haiti relief on Sunday, playing a benefit concert in Los Angeles. The one-off gig, which didn’t include any television cameras, Leonard Cohen covers or cameos by Bono, marked the band’s first performance since last year’s Reading festival.

The Oxford band are “in the middle of recording” their eighth studio album, they said on their website, and only announced the charity concert on Friday – about 50 hours before hitting the stage. Tickets were sold in an online auction, fetching between $475 (£293) and $2,000 (£1,230) each, according to the Los Angeles Times.

“You’ll be catching us on the fly,” drummer Phil Selway said, “but if you’re up for it, then we are too.” Before 1,300 people, including singer Justin Timberlake, director Paul Thomas Anderson and actors Drew Barrymore and Jessica Biel, Radiohead ran through a dozen hits, two encores and one new song – Lotus Flower, previously performed at a Thom Yorke solo gig. “What did you do to get a ticket?” Yorke joked with the audience. “Get money from your dad? Or blackmail your boss?”

Later that night, the frontman was handed a piece of card. “This is how much money we made,” he told the audience. “Gross: Fuck me! $572,774!” Proceeds will be donated to Oxfam.

Radiohead’s Hollywood performance is part of an ongoing Oxfam fundraiser, including auctions for items donated by Coldplay, Arctic Monkeys and others. Generous fans have until 2 February to bid for such glittering prizes as a custom-written song by Blur’s Damon Albarn.

guardian.co.uk 26/01/10

Franz Ferdinand singer Alex Kapranos has ranted at his American label after they licensed a track without the band’s permission.

Franz Ferdinand have always been a little bit more thoughtful than other indie acts. Perhaps it’s due to their art school background, or possibly Alex Kapranos training as an English teacher - whatever the reason, they’ve got brains.

Which makes recent events so much more bizarre. Franz Ferdinand’s American label Epic have licensed a track to McDonalds for an upcoming ad campaign, but forgot to ask the band for their thoughts.

The result? A tirade of abuse from Alex Kapranos. Venting his spleen on Twitter the singer claimed the incident was “an example of how a band falls out with their US label. Did they think we’d approve this shit?”

Continuing, the indie icon ranted: “Dirty bastards. Stupid arrogant motherfucking pig-brained arseholes. I’d rather eat a cowpat on a bun than a bloody McDonalds.”

Alex Kapranos later clarified his thoughts, claiming that he was angrier with Epic - and parent company Sony - than he was with McDonalds. “I’m not really pissed off with McDonalds,” he wrote.

“They’re just the same as any other psychopathic corporation - no more evil, no less. The psychopathic corporation I am pissed off with is Sony who owns Epic who release our records in America. But not really surprised.”

The singer finished on a humorous note, joking that he had been in line to claim a sponsorship deal with regional burger chain White Castle. “I’m just pissed off because I had a sponsorship deal with White Castle on the cards which is now totally scuppered“.

“I was going to get a lifetime supply of those cute (much tastier than McD) burgers and they were going to open a Dennistoun franchise.”

clashmusic.com 25/01/10