WHEN Brandon Flowers was a kid, his dad tried to teach him how to fight.
The lad had been picked on at school, so his father Terry talked him through what to do if it happened again.
Brandon Flowers’s third solo album is rooted in country musicCredit: SuppliedThrasher arrives 11 years after his last solo album, The Desired EffectCredit: Supplied
The Killers’ frontman still remembers sitting beside his father Terry in his old 1946 Chevy truck. “I was in fifth grade, so only 11 years old,” he recalls.
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“My dad grew up fighting and I still remember him trying to explain to me how to fight.
“You can explain to me all day, but I’m not a fighter.
“He’d say, ‘You don’t just swing. You think about when you’re going to throw your punch and you have to block yourself’.
“When I’m on stage, I find myself doing it so much. You have this crazy relationship, boys and their dads. I’m still trying to show him that I can do it.”
Flowers is all smiles when we meet at his central London record label. He’s just back from a week in Scotland with his family and feeling refreshed and rejuvenated.
Thrasher arrives 11 years after his last solo album, The Desired Effect. It is inspired by country and western, the music his dad listened to when Flowers was growing up.
“Much has been said about how my love of music came from my brother [Shane].
“Yeah, it did, but at the same time, I was hearing country music from my dad. His favourites were the heavy hitters — Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and Merle Haggard — along with some of those who were not as famous. There’s a guy named John Conlee who he listened to, who I really love.
“As a teenager, I felt I had to choose — the kid who listens to New Order doesn’t also listen to Waylon Jennings.
“As I get older, I just seem to gravitate back to my father’s music.”
Flowers says he has become closer to his father, and increasingly like him, as he has grown older — and admits he is still trying to prove himself to his dad.
He says: “I’m trying to show my dad that I can do what he does. He’s a good man. He’s doing pretty good.
“He had open heart surgery at 81, which is a difficult thing. He’s five months past it now and is pretty good.”
Ideas for Thrasher began shortly after Flowers finished The Killers’ last record — 2021’s Pressure Machine.
Flowers looks back on his childhood on ThrasherCredit: Getty ImagesFlowers on stage with The Killers in 2018Credit: Getty
He says: “I really enjoyed making this. It was a very important record to me. I didn’t want to leave it alone, so I just continued. It was such a revelation.
“I had all these memories, all these characters and sadness — all of this stuff that I could now find a place for and turn them into something.
“These songs don’t feel like Killers songs — they’re quite personal, so it felt natural that it should be a solo record. It’s been nearly ten years since the last one — I can’t believe it.”
Thrasher is a beautifully observed, emotionally affecting record.
The first single Plans “picks up where Pressure Machine left off”, says Flowers.
“It does a good job of representing the record. There’s some strong emotional material on this album.”
One of the most moving songs on Thrasher is One Of Us, a tribute to his sister’s late husband.
Flowers, the youngest in his family, jokes that he was always told he was “a surprise” — until he was eight, when a friend’s dad bluntly informed him he was “a mistake”.
The Killers frontman received the Special International Award at The Ivors in 2025Credit: GettyThrasher was recorded in Nashville with seasoned session musicians, including legendary harmonica player Charlie McCoyCredit: Getty
“I have a sister who is 17 years older than me so her husband was around since I was a little boy.
“He was my brother, so when he passed, it was just heartbreaking and completely unexpected. He was just out of heart surgery. You just want to pay tribute to them and my sister loves it.”
The warm, wistful Paradise finds Flowers imagining the life he might have led, had music not taken him away from home.
“I always thought I would be a valet parker. That was my goal,” he says with a chuckle.
“And if music didn’t work out, it was my Plan B.
“I would be really happy to support my family and be a valet. That’s what my cousins and uncles have done — bellman and valet.
“I have a cousin, Bobby, who has spent his whole adult life as a valet parker, and he was sending me some texts one day complaining about work.
“I was sitting at the piano and just jumped on it, and used it as a launching pad for a song about an ageing valet parker.
“It’s basically him, and it’s where I would be right now if I didn’t have this incredible thing happen to me.
“I have this empathy for him and I’m exploring what could have been and what might have been. There’s sadness in it, but there are also winks and nods.
“That’s the thing I love about country music — how those can coexist.”
Thrasher was recorded quickly in Nashville with seasoned session musicians, including legendary harmonica player Charlie McCoy, whose credits include Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash and Dolly Parton.
Flowers says: “He played on all those Bob Dylan records and on Roy Orbison’s Oh, Pretty Woman and Simon & Garfunkel’s The Boxer. He played with Leonard Cohen and had great stories about them all. He’s the mascot of Nashville and so incredible.”
Flowers says that the song Red Ground came especially quickly.
“I was trying for a Lee Hazlewood vibe and that song fell into our laps. These guys do this every day for hours. They make decisions that would break a band.”
Thrasher also finds Flowers making peace with his own past.
Although Las Vegas has always been central to The Killers’ identity, he admits he once felt conflicted about his Utah upbringing.
Now he says: “It did feel like I was keeping Utah a secret because I am happy to wave the flag for Las Vegas, but had a bit of a conflict about Utah.
“Now, there’s nothing wrong with embracing both.
“I look back with more tenderness now, and I’m so grateful for my upbringing there.
“I really lived in a golden time where you’re just free. It was before phones and technology and was idyllic — like something out of Stand By Me.”
Having interviewed Flowers many times over the past 20 years, one of the biggest changes is how much more comfortable he now seems revealing parts of himself he once kept guarded, particularly his Mormon faith.
He says: “I was so shy back then. I’m still shy, but I was also unsure about interviews and you don’t know what you’re supposed to reveal.
“It’s so not rock ’n’ roll to talk about Jesus in a positive light. It’s very common in sports but I think people are less open in music.
“There is this authenticity turmoil, where you feel like we’ve always glorified hedonism and debauchery in rock ’n’ roll — and even beyond rock ’n’ roll.
“In every kind of art form, those seem to be the people that we really revere because they are outliers. But I’ve realised it doesn’t make me any less creative because I have faith. I’m just never going to be Sid Vicious.”
Flowers, 45, says coming to terms with his different identities, and simply being himself, has become easier as he’s got older.
“I’m more forgiving of my younger self, but I’m still hard on my current self,” he says.
“We all have that inner voice and it can be the worst critic.
“It’s not been easy, but I now realise I can be that guy on stage, and also a family man,” he explains. “But I was so conflicted for a while.
“Half of you feels like an imposter, and then the other half is trying to show why you belong — it messes with your mind. I was lucky to find something that I was passionate about.
“That’s what I encourage my boys to find.”
Flowers’ sons Ammon, 19, Gunnar, 17, and Henry, 15, have all grown up with their dad on stage — but they are not impressed by his status.
Flowers says: “Ammon loves fitness and being outside — he is just about to go to college in Philadelphia which he’s half excited and half scared about. My wife is sad about him leaving home.
“Then Gunnar loves horror and 90s rock and a lot of grunge, too.
“Mick Jagger was there as well but it was all about Beckham, who signed a football card for him. He’s also a full-blown Oasis fan, so I need to take him to see them when they play again next year.”
Flowers remains hopeful about the future, even though he admits he is deeply troubled by Donald Trump’s America and the actions of ICE.
“This administration is scary,” says Flowers.
“It feels so un-American, and it goes against all of our values and the things that are beautiful about our country.
“You do feel a little bit hopeless and helpless.” But he still believes change can come through younger generations and the ballot box.
“We have to remember to use our voices and to fight back at the polls when the time comes.”
He adds: “Nobody from the other side is rising up at the moment. Somebody needs to rise up. Get the hell up.”
Never one to stand still for long, Flowers has always had an impressive work ethic.
Another solo album is already in the pipeline, with a new Killers record also expected in 2027.
Until then, he is excited about his solo tour, which begins next week and arrives in the UK in October, including a night at the Royal Albert Hall.
He’s already debuted songs from Thrasher at July’s Newport Folk Festival — the famous Rhode Island event where Bob Dylan went electric in 1965.
“I’ve got a band together. This tour is going to be a different experience than you are accustomed to,” he says.
“I’m going to tell more stories and take advantage of these smaller rooms — the Albert Hall is the biggest room I’m playing.
“I want to explain the story behind the songs, which you can’t do in a stadium — so I thought this would be the time to give it a shot.
“I worry people will get sick of Mr. Brightside so I feel lucky that I have different outlets for my music.”
Grammy winner Jon Batiste placed his summer performing duties on hold as he “navigate[s] some personal circumstances.”
The Connecticut festival Westville Music Bowl on Wednesday published a statement from the composer-singer-multi-instrumentalist and former “Late Show with Stephen Colbert” bandleader announcing that he has canceled “a portion of my upcoming performance dates.” That includes his appearance at the New Haven fest on Thursday, according to the social media statement. The notice did not specify the additional cancellations but included mention of Batiste’s new releases including his piano-centric albums “Monk Meditations” and “Monk Movements.”
“My team and I are finding new ways and opportunities to share live music with you,” Batiste continued in the statement. “There’s so much more to come, and I’m looking forward to what’s ahead.”
People reported that Batiste’s shows in Pennsylvania and New York have also been canceled and ticket refunds will be available for the three canceled shows. A representative for the Grammy-winning musician did not immediately respond to The Times’ request for more information on Thursday.
Batiste, who will also release the album “Black Mozart” on Friday, is still scheduled to play several of his remaining tour stops including those in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio; Atlanta and the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. He is set to close off his tour at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley on Oct. 3.
“Thank you for your understanding and continued support,” Batiste said in the statement published by Westville Music Bowl. “I truly can’t wait to come back and perform for you soon.”
Batiste, 39, will share his trio of new albums four years after he won the coveted prize for album of the year at the 2022 Grammy Awards for his 2021 release “We Are.” Batiste, in addition to his late-night TV work, is also known for composing original works for the soundtrack of Disney’s 2020 animated film “Soul.”
Aug. 10 (UPI) — Todd Blanche, President Donald Trump‘s former personal attorney, was sworn in as U.S. attorney general on Monday, making the role he’s held for several months official.
“I am deeply honored by the trust and confidence President Trump has placed in me to lead the Department of Justice as our great nation’s 88th attorney general,” Blanche wrote on social media Saturday after the vote. “I am grateful to the Senate for staying late to finish the process.”
The vote was largely along party lines, with Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, voting with every Democrat against Blanche. While other Republicans, including Sens. Thom Tillis, R-N.C.; John Cornyn, R-Texas; and Bill Cassidy, R-La., had expressed concerns about Blanche’s independence and earlier actions, they voted for him anyway.
Blanche was Trump’s personal defense lawyer and represented him in a New York hush-money case and other criminal matters, The Guardian reported. He became a deputy attorney general in early 2025.
As acting attorney general, Blanche approved Trump’s $1,776 billion “anti-weaponization fund” and a deal that promises the Internal Revenue Service will not investigate Trump’s tax returns or those of his family members. Blanche rescinded the order establishing the fund last week.
As acting attorney general, he has overseen the departure of more than 200 prosecutors and agents who worked on Trump-related investigations and dealt with controversy from the handling of the Epstein files, The Guardian reported. Lawmakers continue to seek the full release of the records.
The director’s first two docuseries — “Tiger King” and “Chimp Crazy” — were smash hits about larger-than-life characters engaging in questionable and illegal activity surrounding the care and ownership of animals. Both had an underlying conservation message but drew viewers in with the colorful and chaotic worlds they depicted.
Goode’s third, “Monsters of God,” premiering Thursday on HBO, is both a direct descendant and forges a new path. While it also features a hugely entertaining menagerie of criminals, who speak frankly about many of their illegal acts and how much they dislike each other, “Monsters” is largely a historical look at reptile smuggling going back more than half a century — unlike the contemporaneous stories in “Tiger King” and “Chimp Crazy.”
Goode had opportunities to bring in current events — one dealer was rearrested shortly after being filmed and there were major smuggling arrests in California in recent years — but realized he couldn’t keep piling on more stories. “We’re just setting the tone of this multibillion-dollar reptile-smuggling industry that you’ve probably never heard of,” says Goode’s producing partner Jeremy McBride.
But the other difference is that Goode has spent his entire life immersed in the world of reptiles, starting long before he even contemplated making a documentary. Goode had a pet tortoise when he was 6 and slept with a tegu lizard in his bed as a teen. He also saw the industry underbelly up close and personal. “In the ’70s and ’80s, I even bought reptiles from some of the very people that I chronicle in ’Monsters of God,’” he says.
“I had personal connections in these worlds, which helped us go much deeper than in my other stories,” he says. “I don’t know if it’ll be anywhere near as successful, but in terms of investigative journalism, we went much further.”
An archival photo of director Eric Goode with a southwestern pond turtle. In addition to filmmaking, he created the Turtle Conservancy in Ojai.
(A24 / Goode Films / HBO)
(He also acknowledges that his earlier series could tilt toward sensationalism and be exploitative. “I was naive when I started all this and learned a lot from ‘Tiger King,’” he says, adding that there was internal friction about what direction to go with the material. “Now we’ve refined the like-mindedness of what we were trying to do.”)
He credits his mother with opening his eyes to the larger issues when he was younger. “She struggled with me keeping things in captivity and would say, ‘You can’t play God, these animals belong in the wild.’”
That said, while he is proud the Big Cat Public Safety Act passed in the aftermath of “Tiger King” and believes people should be banned from raising chimps at home, he views reptiles differently. “Kids should be able to have a bearded dragon or a leopard gecko or ball python. It nurtures a love for nature and for reptiles,” he says, adding that he’s focused more on the harm caused by smuggling.
Despite his love of animals and a high school obsession with making Super 8 film, Goode was not, for much of his life, a likely candidate to be directing these documentaries. “My whole trajectory doesn’t make a lot of sense on paper,” he acknowledges.
After attending the School of Arts and Sciences, which his father founded in Marin County, Goode moved to New York. He worked as a production assistant on big films. “I hated it,” he recalls. “I hated being a cog in a wheel, just moving things around.” (Today, even as his productions have grown more elaborate, he still goes into the field with a small team. “I like that intimacy.”) He also went to art school but was largely bored there.
“I saw the creative energy in New York in the nightlife there,” he says. So while Goode was working as an artist, he also created Area, one of the city’s biggest nightclubs of the 1980s, where he brought in collaborators like Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, David Hockney and Kenny Scharf, with rotating themes like a carnival or natural history (which featured snakes and lizards). “Everyone came from somewhere else or were misfits and I was bringing in these interesting characters, which is very similar to what I’m doing in these films,” he says. “I like lifting up the rocks and finding the eccentrics out there.”
Area’s success led to a big career in nightclubs, restaurants and hotels. Then 20 years ago, he took his profits, along with his passion for reptiles, and created the Turtle Conservancy in Ojai. “I realized that the two most endangered groups of vertebrates in the world were primates and turtles,” he says, adding that nearly half of the smuggled animals seized at LAX in the last three years were turtles. When officials recently confiscated 350 turtles there, they brought them to the conservancy to care for them. “I’m going to go feed them after this interview,” Goode says.
The conservancy now has a worldwide reach in protecting turtles and their habitats and has become a leader in trying to stave off extinction for the ploughshare tortoise, whose fate is a major storyline in “Monsters of God.”
Tom Crutchfield, one of the reptile smugglers featured in the docuseries, with a monitor lizard in a photo taken circa 1970s.
(Photograph by Bill Love. Courtesy of Goode Films / HBO)
As filming was finishing, the conservancy became home to the first ploughshare births in captivity. “It was such a coincidence but really meaningful,” McBride says. “It anchors the film’s purpose and gives a little bit of hope in what otherwise feels bleak.”
This docuseries has been in the works for nearly 20 years, since Goode read Brian Christy’s “The Lizard King” in 2008 and tried to option it. “I even filmed him badly back then — the sound was terrible and the camera fell off the tripod during the interview,” he recalls. (Christy appears in the docuseries.)
In 2014, he finally got started but it was always on and off again as other projects got in the way. In “Tiger King,” Goode shows he’s first drawn to that story when he sees a guy with a snow leopard in his van, which happens while he’s filming Tom Crutchfield, one of America’s most notorious reptile smugglers. “But while I was making these other stories, I was always opportunistically filming reptile people,” he says, adding that they interviewed not only the criminals but federal law enforcement and others, seeking a broader scope than his previous films. “It was critical for us to get all sides of the story. Part of the reason it took so long was it sometimes took years to get someone to agree to talk.”
McBride says they finished with 1,500 hours of footage and interviews with a hundred different people, including the most notorious smugglers (some of whom were also murderers and drug dealers) and the law enforcement officials who dedicated years of their life undercover to catch them.
It’s a true crime story on some level but Goode says the series is more layered and complex than his previous projects.
“I don’t want people to think we’re the animal police,” Goode says. “Law enforcement has good intentions but they sometimes backfire with unintended consequences. Often, the more laws you create to prevent people from having a reptile, the more they want them. But sometimes prohibition does work.” (In Asia’s wet markets, the most endangered animals sell for more money with their protected status used as a marketing tool.)
“Hopefully, people come away recognizing that we have to think about doing things differently than maintaining the status quo, because a lot of what we’re doing is not working,” Goode says. “It’s a messy story without easy answers.”
WASHINGTON — Sen. Bob Packwood (R-Ore.) warned Monday that the sex lives of at least two other lawmakers would be disclosed to the Senate Ethics Committee if the Senate subpoena for nearly five years of his personal diaries is enforced.
Packwood insisted that he is not trying to “blackmail” senators into voting to reject the unanimous demand of the ethics panel, which is conducting an inquiry into charges that Packwood repeatedly made unwanted sexual advances to women on his staff.
Rather, the Oregon lawmaker said, it is the Ethics Committee that wants entries from his diary concerning the longtime affair of another senator and an intimate relationship between a member of the House Democratic leadership and a Senate staff aide.
In his dealings with the committee, Packwood said, he concealed the name of the prominent Democrat by masking it with a piece of paper.
“The Ethics Committee lifted the piece of paper and saw the name and demanded that we produce that page in the diary,” Packwood said. “These were not threats by my lawyer, that if my diary is subpoenaed, that I will tell these things.”
Sources close to Packwood said he fears that some of his diary entries would become public through leaks to the media, even if the committee itself does not disclose them.
The committee said in a report to the Senate last Thursday that Packwood reneged on an agreement to allow a neutral third party to screen the diaries and exclude those parts covered by attorney-client or doctor-patient privileges or related to personal, private family matters.
It voted, 6 to 0, to issue a subpoena for Packwood’s diaries from 1989 to the present, concluding that “the documents in their entirety may be relevant and probative” in connection with its investigation of Packwood’s conduct.
Unless a compromise can be reached, the Senate is expected to vote shortly on whether to back up the Ethics Committee by authorizing it to seek a federal court order for the diaries or to uphold Packwood’s protests that his privacy is being invaded.
Packwood told the Senate that he has kept a personal diary for 25 years that now amounts to 8,200 single-spaced pages. He sets aside time early each morning to dictate his thoughts about events of the previous day, apparently covering both his personal life as well as his official duties.
Entries cover his “hopes and dreams and despair,” the 61-year-old Packwood said, including his discussions with former President Richard Nixon over the Watergate scandal, as well as meetings with Rep. Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, on tax reform.
In addition, as Packwood’s attorney James F. Fitzpatrick said in a statement Friday, the diary also has information on the senator’s “private consensual personal relationships” with women who were not on his staff.
Senate records disclosed that Packwood has raised more than $280,000 for a legal defense fund since the Ethics Committee started its inquiry early this year, including a $10,000 donation from Sen. Robert F. Bennett (R-Utah) and a $1,000 contribution from Sen. John H. Chafee (R-R.I.).
Lobbyists and other major campaign contributors have put up most of the money.
Packwood, accused by more than two dozen women of sexual harassment over the last two decades, also has been charged with using his Senate staff to try to silence his accusers by intimidation.
AFTER years of writing about politics, technology and the chaos of the modern world, Matt Bellamy wanted something different for Muse’s tenth album.
“The theme was to get back into mystery a little bit,” he says. “The mysteries of the universe, mysteries of spirituality and returning to the rawness of the unknown.”
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Matt, Chris and Dom are back with their tenth album, The Wow! SignalCredit: SuppliedThe veteran band in a photo shoot for their new albumCredit: Tim Saccenti
Inspired by the 1977 Wow! Signal — an unexplained radio signal from space once seen as possible evidence of alien intelligence — and a turbulent period in his personal life, the record finds Bellamy searching for meaning on both a cosmic and personal level.
“I’ve turned completely apolitical,” he admits. “It’s weird when you go through things in your personal life — the news just becomes an annoying noise.
“When your life’s going great, you get drawn into the news and what’s going on in the world.
“But when you’re actually going through something yourself, the news and politics just become a headache.
“I’m a little bit gloriously out of touch. I’ve normally been so in touch, my finger’s always been on the pulse, and a lot of the albums I’ve made talk about the rise of populism. But this album and my life for the last year-and-a-half has been different.”
“I’ve been through a separation involving two young kids,” he says carefully.
“I can’t really talk about the reasons behind it, but it was not your normal run-of-the-mill situation. I became a full-time single parent for a period of eight months.
“She’s doing a lot better now and she’s getting better, but it was an unusual situation to go through. It made writing the album so much easier.
“It’s hard to talk about what’s behind the album because I don’t throw people under the bus. And I don’t want my kids to grow up reading stuff.”
Bellamy, 48, is in London for band rehearsals and when we meet, he’s just back from the gym in a bid to shape up for the tour.
“I’m not that old,” he laughs. “But I met Mick Jagger at a party and I went straight in on the fitness. I was, like, ‘What is your secret?!’ He said when he was in his 30s, he started working out a few weeks before a tour.
The record finds frontman Bellamy searching for meaning on both a cosmic and personal levelCredit: Getty – ContributorDominic Howard, Matthew Bellamy and Chris Wolstenholme in LondonCredit: Getty Images – Getty
“By the time he got to his 40s, he was working out for the same length as the tour.
“If it was a three-month tour, he’d work out for three months before. And by the time he got to his 50s, he was just working out all the time, all year round.”
The 1977 Wow! Signal fascinates Bellamy because it remains unexplained and happened around the time the band members were born.
“The Wow! Signal is probably, to this day, still the most interesting signal that’s ever been seen in space,” he explains.
“It happened in 1977, which is basically within 12 months of all the band being born.
“Chris [Wolstenholme] and I were born in 1978 and Dom [Howard] in 1977, so I just thought it was funny that this little Wow! Signal appeared around the time we came into this world.
“I think this album was really me letting go a little bit and engaging with the unknown.
“What is this thing inside me, or all of us, that wants to not be alone? I don’t mean with a partner or friends. I mean this thing in the universe. At the moment, we appear to be so alone, and we have this drive, which you see through religion and science.
“Behind all of it, we just don’t want to be alone.”
That search drew Bellamy back to one of his formative influences.
“I grew up watching Contact, the Jodie Foster film from the 90s,” he says. “I used to read Carl Sagan’s books and that film really stayed with me.”
It has also led him into the world of AI.
He adds: “I’ve spent time in the tech world, in California’s Silicon Valley and the Bay Area, and I had some involvement in that world.
“I went to a private talk where Sam Altman (CEO of OpenAI) was talking off the record about his thoughts on AI.
“I saw (Meta CEO Mark) Zuckerberg talking about it, too, and I was interested in what they were saying.
“When you really hear them, they know they’re ushering in an intelligence which is beyond us. They start to see it as, ‘Well, we’re just kind of messengers bringing in this thing that is going to be more intelligent than us’.”
Matt, pictured performing at Reading festival, was brought back to one of his formative influences for the albumCredit: GettyThe new album also explores artificial intelligenceCredit: Getty – Contributor
Bellamy says he enjoys asking AI philosophical questions — and that is where Hexagons began.
“That’s actually my favourite thing to do with AI, and where I got the idea for Hexagons,” he says. “And again, I think that is part of the same human condition.
“Whether it be religion, looking for aliens in space or trying to bring in artificial intelligence, it’s kind of all the same thing.”
Epic, organ-led Be With You was the first song that made the album’s direction clear.
“You can look at it as a love song, or you can look at it as a religious song, almost,” he says.
“I’m not a religious person, but I decided to play the song on a church organ.
“I went to the biggest church organ in Los Angeles, so the song was recorded in this church-like setting.
“I liked the idea that it could be perceived as searching for alien life, or searching for alien intelligence of some kind, or God. That was the first song that felt right, lyrically and musically.
“There are a lot of personal elements in the album that are quite unusual for me.”
Bellamy says the album came from a difficult period, but that made the music flow.
“This was actually the easiest album for me to write and make for 15-plus years,” he says.
“Space Debris is probably the biggest reveal of what I went through, especially lyrically at the end,” he says.
“It’s the rawest moment of explaining what really happened over the last year. I like using space analogies — space debris, things breaking up and falling apart in gravity — to describe the chaos and feeling in your life.
“It also fits the theme of connecting this search into outer space for a higher power with the chaos and feeling in your own life.
“I hope the fans don’t ask me to play that one live.”
If Space Debris is the album’s rawest confession, Bellamy says it also opened the door to bigger questions running through the record.
“What I went through threw me off into the unknown,” he explains.
“When things go wrong in your life, that’s when you’re most likely to seek meaning or search for answers.
“In my case, it was a blend between religious thought, alien intelligence and AI.
“I don’t know what it is, but you’re searching for this higher power to guide you, or to give you answers.
“Music became my catharsis. It became my way to understand my situation.
“Making this album gave me flashbacks to these periods where music was my everything.
“It wasn’t something I had to do to pay the bills. It wasn’t something I had to do for the record label. It was something that I had to do for myself.
“That’s why I think this album is probably, since the 2000s anyway, the most raw, emotionally raw and honest album I’ve done.”
Bellamy says despite the personal nature of the album, Chris and Dom were central to every song.
“I’ve always been in charge of the lyrics, and I’m the leader in terms of the concepts,” he says.
“But musically, this is the most equal album we’ve had for a long time.”
The Wow! Signal includes some of the best tracks Muse have made in years.
Cryogen has already been compared to early Muse, while Shimmering Scars shows off the vulnerability in Bellamy’s voice.
“Cryogen is deliberately Muse from 2001,” he says.
With Shimmering Scars, he explains: “I felt like I needed to do five or six takes, so we could edit the best bits in.
“But producer Dan Lancaster was, like, ‘Nah, let it be raw, let it be weird.’
“To me, it sounded a bit off — not quite what I wanted it to be. But he was, like, ‘No, that’s the whole point. That sounds a little bit raw’.
“This is the first album where we said, ‘Let’s give Dan a go at producing it’. The last two albums were self-produced, so it was nice to hand the reins to someone else.
“He did a great job keeping us towards that more raw, vulnerable state in the performances.”
Bellamy believes AI is pushing younger listeners back towards authenticity.
“My stepson with Kate [Hudson], Ryder, is 22 and he’s just graduated from NYU,” he says. “Then Bing is 14, and I’ve got the two little ones as well.
“Having a boy who’s 22 and a boy who’s 14 means I get a real sense of what’s going on in their generation.
“I think that generation is turning away from pop, hip-hop and dance a little bit. They’re seeking raw, chaotic-sounding music.
“I think the reason why is because that generation is drowned by AI. AI is dominating everything they do, from schoolwork to music and the arts.
“I could be wrong but from what I sense from them, they’re gravitating towards what they know to be real.”
Recent single Nightshift Superstar was the band wanting to go French disco.
“I love Daft Punk, Justice and ABBA,” Bellamy says. “I went to see ABBA’s show and I loved it. They’re some of the best songs ever written. So after that and seeing Justice in Paris, I was, like, ‘How do we do that? Let’s just go there’.
“The song has a late-70s feel but with a more cutting-edge tone associated with modern dance music.
“But the good thing about it is that it really is us playing.”
One surprise on The Wow! Signal is Hush — a collaboration with pop star Ellie Goulding.
“Ellie was in the studio next-door, working with Marshmello on something,” says the singer.
“We have known each other for years and always wanted to try and do something together.
“Muse fans will read online that we’ve done a song with Ellie Goulding and think it’s going to be a pop song.
“But it’s got one of the biggest, heaviest riffs we’ve done in a long time. To me, it sounds a bit like New Born or something from 2001.
“The verses get a little bit poppy, I guess, but the main riff is pretty hard rock, so I thought it was quite fun to get Ellie’s voice over that kind of heaviness.
“I think it’ll be a nice surprise.”
Bellamy says the song came together by chance.
“This was an experiment,” he says. “It’s the only song on the album that really involves multiple writers.
“Ellie popped her head in towards the end of the day, at about 11pm, and went, ‘Hey, what are you guys up to?’ We played the song and she said, ‘Oh, can I sing on it?’ We tweaked the lyrics and turned it into a duet.
“It came completely by chance. It wasn’t planned to be a collaboration.”
Bellamy says the reaction from Muse fans to the new songs has “been the best we’ve had for at least 15 years” and he’s looking forward to getting back on the road following their special Brixton Academy show in April to launch the album.
The show marked Muse’s first appearance at the venue in 25 years, just before the release of Origin of Symmetry.
“I didn’t realise it had been so long,” Bellamy says.
“I remember the last time we played there, it was around the second album and I was so nervous because it was the biggest show Muse had ever done.
“We got to debut Be With You for the first time, and we had a great time.”
Visually, Bellamy says the full Wow! Signal world will come to life properly when Muse return to Europe in November.
“The American tour starts with what I’d call a medium-level production,” he says.
“But when we come to Europe, including London and Manchester in November, that’s when we’re going to ramp it up to a really sophisticated production.
“I think there’ll be a lot of geometry, a lot of hexagons, shapes and lasers, and strange, interesting visuals.
“Hopefully we’ll build the spaceship you see on the album cover in the arena.”
There’s a sense of quiet mystery in tarot. That’s why during my reading last week, it was more peculiar than disruptive when a dancer hopped on a table to lay at a 90-degree angle and jet her feet in the air.
Despite said activity, the tone was contemplative, and moments later, as I was being asked to describe the colors and mood of a Ten of Swords card, I was tapped on the shoulder. After a gesture to follow, I was handed a lantern.
The way I swayed the light would now dictate the performer’s movements. We may not have been dancing, but it was close. Melancholic and intimate, the performer (Haylee Nichele) silently guided me to become comfortable in my discomfort, to sit with the evening’s themes of longing, loss, confusion and impending grief.
Sam Alper’s Bill, foreground, and Haylee Nichele’s Constance in Koryn Wicks’ “You Must Be Here for the Reading,” an immersive tarot show.
(Daniel Kleen)
“You Must Be Here for the Reading,” running through June 20 at North Hollywood’s After Hours Theatre, is part theatrical and dance performance, part tarot reading and part cocktail hour. It’s also personal, led by two actors who encourage the attendees to open up, to complete poems and to generally tune into their vulnerability.
The 60-minute show, partly scripted and partly improvised, comes from the mind of Koryn Wicks. Trained in dance and choreography, Wicks’ day job is in themed entertainment while her personal projects explore the immersive space. They’re theatrical works that experiment with audience interaction. “You Must Be Here for the Reading” is no different.
The setup: Collectively, our group of eight has arrived at a tarot reading, only the famed reader we are there to work with, Constance, performed by Nichele on the night I saw, never arrives for her assigned role. We know her fate, but her partner, Sam Alper’s Bill, who nervously attempts to carry on with the performance in her absence, does not.
From there, “You Must be Here for the Reading” becomes a show heavy on audience participation. There are scripted, story-specific beats, but the cards pulled — and the tales they tell — is, of course, randomized.
Sam Alper as Bill, an unsuspecting tarot card reader in Koryn Wicks’ “You Must Be Here for the Reading.”
(Daniel Kleen)
“I knew that I wanted the audience to be the primary drivers of the tarot reading,” Wicks says. “I knew that I wanted the host to not be a tarot reader and there to be some sort of event that made it so the audience would have to take the reins and read the tarot.”
In turn, “You Must Be Here for the Reading” works for both those who are novices to the space as well as those who are more experienced. During the pre-show, guests can explore tarot books and uncover slips of paper hidden in them that prompt us to answer questions or complete poems — the latter will figure into the performance. A worksheet given to us asks us to interpret some core tenets, as well as to enter the reading with a question we would like to explore.
The show then focuses on how each attendee’s desires, concerns or lived experiences shape the perception of the reading.
“What’s drawn me to tarot is the way it’s built on symbolism and the way that symbolism is embedded in the collective unconscious,” Wicks says. “I think it’s really fascinating that we have this artifact that has this ability to give us insight into a lot of shared experiences. When I’ve read different books about tarot, or had my cards read by different people, there is an openness to interpenetration.
“The assignment I gave myself for this piece,” Wicks continues, “was to create an experience in which you had a group of people coming together and going through the process of defining the symbolism and meaning of the cards in real time.”
And yet the show also pulls from Wicks’ background in dance. While Constance never shows for the reading, her presence is still felt, often hovering or circling around the table with movements designed to interpret the tone of the reading. She’s a ghostly presence, the gracefulness heightening the somber emotions of the night. Though she and Bill never interact directly, much of the dance seeks to explore their unseen bond. At times, Constance may call on various audience members to act as a dance partner.
Koryn Wicks, creator of “You Must Be Here for the Reading,” an immersive tarot performance in which audiences are tasked with deciphering their own cards while a melancholic story unfolds around them.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
“I really believe that one of the most beautiful things art does for us is remind us that we are not alone,” Wicks says.
Immersive art allows for a sense of participation, which Wicks hopes will increase one’s appreciation of dance.
“Dance is an embodied art form,” Wicks says. “There is science that shows that some of the enjoyment from watching dance comes from imagining yourself moving. In North America, a lot of people haven’t had an experience or education with dance, especially not concert dance. Then we ask them to sit in a dark auditorium in a small chair and not move to enjoy it. I found through my research, both practical and academic, there is something to inviting audiences to participate in dance that allows them to derive meaning from it.”
‘You Must Be Here for the Reading’
While there isn’t enough time in the show for everyone to have a one-on-one experience with the dancer, watching an audience and cast member attempt to get in sync with each other underlines the night’s themes of connecting. Ultimately, that’s the space where the show resides. “You Must Be Here for the Reading” uses tarot as a means to bring some structure to our often disconnected lives.
“It stands in contradiction to our current historical moment,” Wicks says of the show. “It’s very anti-AI. It’s asking people to sit with books and to find little seeds and not necessarily pursue solutions or puzzles. It’s asking us to connect, sometimes with strangers.”
I kept my question that I brought to the reading secret, but I found the show provided a hopeful answer. Not because the cards offered a solution. Instead, they provided a community.
A Love Island star has made a surprise exit from the competition just days into the latest series and after a shock double eviction
Love Island is back(Image: ITV)
Love Island fans are set to be stunned as one islander has left the show just days into their time on the villa. After a double bombshell eviction, a third member of the villa has now cut their time short.
George Knight has sensationally quit the villa shortly after sending Samraj and Ellie home. The footballer had only arrived as a bombshell, but is now said to have left due to “private reasons”.
He is still set to feature on Thursday evening’s show, but is thought to already have said his goodbyes. His exit is reportedly not going to be aired.
A Love Island spokesperson said: “For private reasons, George has left the Love Island villa. Duty of care for the Islanders is paramount so at this stage any further comment will come from George. Bosses and viewers alike had been loving his contribution.”
The contestant had made a big entrance and was getting to know Robyn and Mica. Robyn, who quickly friend zoned Sam appeared keen to forge a pairing with George, so it remains to be seen how she will take the news. The pair had already shared a kiss on the terrace.
On Wednesday’s show, Yasmin was in tears as the time for the bombshells to make their decision approached. And their decision wasn’t well received by viewers at home. One labelled it a “sinister” move, while others were shocked.
But while tears ran down the villa and gutted Samraj and Ellie heading for the exit, they were told that all may not be as it seemed. It left fans confused as to what might come next in a series that has already thrown up a number of twists in the first week.
Straight off the bat, islanders had to choose their own couples. This moved away from the public who normally picked who they thought was best matched.
Love Island All Stars winner Gabby Allen told us of the bold move at the time: “The producers are doing a great job at changing things up. This has never been done before.
“A recoupling done by themselves is crazy! I would panic in this situation and hope somebody whisked me off my feet so I didn’t have the decision.”
After the first episode, Gabby also predicted high energy between some of the cast – and Gabby knows vibes when she sees them! “OMG!!! The vibes between Lola & Ope already,” she said.
“These two coming in I feel like is already spicing things up. BOTH of them have very good energy. You heard it here first, Ope is going to do well. Player of not. People are going to like him.”
CHICAGO — Former President Obama’s influence in his presidential museum runs deep, from the location on Chicago’s South Side to textured stone adorning its dramatic tower to striped reading chairs that resemble ones in his own home.
The Obama Presidential Center opens to the general public on Juneteenth after a celebratory dedication in Chicago with dignitaries. But tens of thousands of people — friends and family of museum staff, students and journalists — have already been offered a sneak peek of the nearly 20-acre campus as crews finish final art installations and landscaping.
The roughly $850 million project covers the political and personal realms of the nation’s first Black president. Campaign memorabilia and presidential artifacts are displayed in the admission-based museum tower while public spaces of the sprawling campus feature other things important to Obama: a new library, basketball court and picnic area with grills.
“This is a safe space for people to come and, yes, reflect on the historic moments of this presidency and the campaigns, but also to come together as a community to think about what change you can bring to your own neighborhood,” Josh Harris, the Obama Foundation’s vice president of public engagement, said during a recent tour with The Associated Press.
Here’s a closer look at the top attractions of the campus that is expected to draw as many as 1 million visitors annually.
President for a day
Obama’s presidential museum will be the first fully digital museum of its kind. There will be no official papers on display. Instead, visitors will experience high-tech and hands-on exhibits spanning the campaigns, key moments of Obama’s presidency and life at the White House.
One of the largest attractions is a life-sized replica of the Oval Office.
On a recent day, a stream of visitors, including schoolchildren, walked through the circular room, stopping to sit behind the desk and pose for pictures. The top drawer holds a copy of a handwritten letter from his predecessor, President George W. Bush, and Obama’s beloved BlackBerry phone.
“We want to make sure that people from all walks of life have the opportunity sit behind the Resolute Desk,” said Harris. “You think about the possibilities that if a young organizer from the South Side of Chicago can be president, you can be president too.”
Other sections of the museum detail the Affordable Care Act, immigration policies, and smaller moments such as when Obama unexpectedly sang during a 2015 eulogy for those killed in a South Carolina church shooting. A large television screen plays a clip of Obama singing “Amazing Grace.”
Peppered throughout are areas for personal reflection, which museum organizers say is key.
“We’re passing that baton and inviting people to bring change home, however change may be defined, both small or large,” said Louise Bernard, the museum’s director.
Touching iconic ballgowns
When Obama touted the museum’s contents at its groundbreaking in 2021, he predicted one of the top draws.
“We want this center to be more than a static museum or a source of archival research,” Obama joked at the site. “It won’t just be a collection of campaign memorabilia or Michelle’s ballgowns, although I know everybody will come see those.”
Roughly a dozen outfits on mannequins are behind glass, including a black and red dress designed by Narciso Rodriguez that the former first lady wore on Election Night in 2008 in Chicago.
Visitors will also get a chance to touch swatches of the fabrics, including the rose gold chain mail Atelier Versace evening gown she wore at her final state dinner in 2016.
Obama’s personal touches
The museum’s location is near where Barack Obama started his political career, taught law at the University of Chicago and where the family lived. Michelle Obama also grew up on the South Side.
A lifelong basketball lover, Obama requested a glass-paneled, professional grade basketball court to be used for community programs.
The former first lady designed a garden, where lettuce and strawberry plants are sprouting. There are also charcoal grills available for public use — an element that Obama envisioned when he pitched the plan in community meetings nearly a decade ago.
“President Obama always talked about his feelings of being in Chicago and one of his memorable moments was grilling in the park,” Harris said.
The Obamas’ design tastes and love of history are also evident.
The museum campus features dozens of commissioned works of art while different parts of the campus are named after prominent figures. The central “John Lewis Plaza,” named for the late congressman and Civil Rights leader, is designed as a public gathering spot.
Inside a new Chicago Public Library branch, a 70-foot mural depicts literary figures, including Walt Whitman and James Baldwin. At the center, Toni Morrison reads to a boy wearing orange shirt, representing a young Obama.
The presidential reading room features thousands of books chosen by the Obamas, ranging from presidential biographies to best-selling fiction. One of Obama’s favorite parts are two high-backed chairs with blue, yellow and black stripes. They were selected by the former president as top-notch reading chairs similar to ones he has at home.
Pricey admission with free options
Tickets are $30, the highest of any U.S. presidential museum or library. Next on the list is the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in California, where tickets are $29.
Obama Foundation leaders say the prices are justified for the state-of-the-art facility.
Tickets at the adjacent Griffin Museum of Science and Industry are $25.95. In downstate Illinois, tickets to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield cost $15.
Along with free days and discounts for Illinois residents, Obama Foundation officials also argue that most of the campus is free, with only four floors of the museum tower requiring tickets.
Anyone can walk the campus, use the playground, library, sledding hill or grilling area. The tower’s top floor, which feature panoramic views of the nation’s third-largest city, is also free.
“The idea behind this institution, this campus, was to make it accessible to as many people as possible,” Harris said.
Nvidia is set to bring artificial intelligence to laptop and desktop computers with brands like Microsoft and Dell later this year as the US tech giant broadens its AI presence.
The Santa Clara, California-based AI chipmaker unveiled on Monday at its annual Nvidia GTC event in Taipei new powerful chips that would bring advanced AI functions to laptops and desktop computers.
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CEO Jensen Huang said that the new development is “going to reinvent the PC [personal computer]”.
The changes come amid three years of collaboration between Microsoft and Nvidia and pit the latter against companies like chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices and personal computer brands Intel and Apple.
“This is going to be the new PC,” Huang said as he unveiled Nvidia’s RTX Spark superchip — which combines CPU, or central processing unit, and GPU, or graphics processing unit, capabilities — that would power new Windows laptop and desktop computer models in what the company called “AI personal computers”, expected to debut in the fall of this year.
The chip, developed with Taiwan’s MediaTek, will be in compact desktops from Dell, HP, Lenovo, ASUS, Microsoft Surface and MSI, with models from Acer and GIGABYTE to follow.
“When it has an autonomous [AI] agent, an agent that’s helping you, that understands you, you could talk to it. It could look at you. You could ask it to read files, go help you do some research. It could do a lot more,” Huang said.
Microsoft said in a separate statement that the personal computers running on Nvidia’s RTX Spark superchips would be able to support “highly capable AI models” and complex workloads. With the new superchips, these personal computers can run AI agents locally, Nvidia said.
“This is the first across the lineup of PC reinvention for 40 years,” Huang said.
Nvidia’s move is significant at a time when demand is growing for the use of personal AI agents, said Lian Jye Su, chief analyst at the technology research and advisory group Omdia.
“For consumers, it means more choices, which is always a good thing,” Su said.
Neil Shah, analyst and co-founder of Counterpoint Research, described Nvidia’s announcement as a move that’s “revolutionising how PCs would look like in the next 10 years”.
The new laptops and desktop computers “will drive agentic AI applications in every home”, Shah said, with an aim of having an “AI supercomputer” in each household.
Also during Monday’s speech, Nvidia’s Huang said its new Vera CPUs for data centres are in full production and are “going to be our new major growth driver” on the boom of AI agents, with early customers including Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceXAI.
Huang also revealed a humanoid robot reference design that could act as a blueprint for future research, especially within the higher education sector. Nvidia said its “Isaac GR00T” stands nearly 1.83 metres (6 feet) tall and has the humanoid chassis of Chinese robot maker Unitree’s H2. It is equipped with five-fingered dexterous hands, made by Singapore-based robotics startup Sharpa, that are capable of finely controlled movements.
Reception for AI PCs has been mixed so far. HP reported last week that the devices helped prop up quarterly sales, but Dell said earlier this year that demand had fallen short of initial expectations. Qualcomm, looking to capitalise on AI demand, has also been offering AI PCs with Microsoft.
On Wall Street, Nvidia stock rose nearly 4 percent on the news in midday trading. Microsoft ticked up 2.5 percent and Dell surged 9.3 percent. Competitors AMD and Intel, on the other hand, are on the decline. AMD is down 0.1 percent from the market open, and Intel is down by 2.5 percent.
WHO can blame Paul McCartney for glancing in the rear-view mirror on his latest record?
At 83, the likely lad from Liverpool, who became a Beatle and Britain’s best-loved songwriter, is due a moment of reflection.
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Paul McCartney’s new album The Boys of Dungeon Lane was recorded over the past five years, between touring and other commitmentsCredit: UnknownMacca at his album playback in Studio Two, Abbey Road, wearing Beatles socks. And he won’t need Father McKenzie to darn them!Credit: Unknown
He looks at it this way: “As a writer, you often write about things in the past, even if it’s just yesterday.”
Or even, as Macca can’t resist saying, if that past “always seems so far away”.
“That’s another nice idea. I think I might have done that one,” he adds in acknowledgment of his immortal Beatles ballad Yesterday.
His 20th solo studio album, The Boys Of Dungeon Lane, finds him casting his mind back to innocent times before The Beatles changed his life for ever.
Five of the 14 tracks visit the simple pleasures of youth — As You Lie There, Days We Left Behind, Down South, Home To Us (a first ever duet with Ringo) and Salesman Saint — and, as you’ll discover, each comes with a captivating back story.
Here, the master storyteller, whose previous character studies include Eleanor Rigby, The Fool On The Hill and She’s Leaving Home, turns the spotlight on himself for what might just be his most personal song cycle yet.
On The Boys Of Dungeon Lane, Sir Paul makes you believe in HIS yesterdays.
Asked why much of his latest work deals with memories, he replies: “I think writers, including me, ask themselves that.
“When you think about, say, Charles Dickens, what’s he going to write about except stuff he knows and stuff he remembers? Then he can gussy them up.”
And do recent Beatles and Wings reissue projects have an impact on the way he fashions a song these days?
“No,” answers McCartney emphatically. “The thing that pulls it all together is me — it’s my brain making music.
“I don’t think, ‘Wow, oh yeah, let’s do this. This is a Beatles idea, or this is a Wings idea’. I don’t think like that. It’s all current. It’s me. This is what I do.”
Listen to The Boys Of Dungeon Lane and you’ll understand what he’s getting at.
Despite first picking up a guitar nearly 70 years ago, he’s still making eclectic, freewheeling music, brimful of ideas, even if many lyrics are bathed in nostalgia.
The album was recorded over the past five years, when time permitted between touring and other commitments, in the company of in-demand American producer Andrew Watt, known for his work with Ozzy Osbourne, Post Malone, Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus and, ironically, The Beatles’ chief Sixties chart rivals, the Rolling Stones.
“We just enjoyed it,” says Macca of his sessions with Watt. “We were like a couple of Boys Of Dungeon Lane — little boys in a sandpit — and we were having fun.”
Paul and Beatles drummer Ringo Starr are still closeCredit: GettyMacca riffing with producer Andrew WattCredit: Unknown
So, with the help of telling observations from the man himself, given to me by his team, let’s take a deep dive into the key tracks.
As You Lie There begins proceedings in memorable style with an intimate spoken word passage delivered over minor key acoustic strums.
McCartney intones: “I used to walk past your house. Every night I’d look up at your window. The light was on. I saw your silhouette on the blind. Do you think of me? Do I ever cross your mind?”
The song, with its squalling rock refrain, recalls a teenage crush from the time Macca lived at 20 Forthlin Road in the Allerton area of south Liverpool, in the house where he and John Lennon first discovered their spark of creative chemistry.
“Up in one of the windows, there was a girl I fancied called Jasmine,” he says of his tale of unrequited love. “But I didn’t know how to approach her. I never spoke to her.
“The joke was, she did show up later that year and knocked on the door. I was indisposed — I was on the toilet — so I missed Jasmine.”
Aside from the sweet story behind the lyrics, As You Lie There is important because it is the song that kickstarted the whole process, just as the world was emerging from the Covid pandemic.
McCartney says: “The album really started when my manager said, ‘Would you like to meet Andrew Watt?’
“I knew he was an active young producer, and I liked some of his stuff. I said, ‘Yeah, great’. He said, ‘Well, it’s just a cup of tea. Go down to his studio’.”
The pair hit it off and what began as that cuppa at Watt’s basement studio — located in his Beverly Hills residence once owned by Charlie Chaplin — soon turned into something much more significant.
Macca described his songwriting process, how he would try “to find
a really weird chord”, to give him “a little inspiration”.
To his delight, he realised that Watt, a big guitar collector, “had figured that if I was coming down, it would be handy to have a left-handed guitar.
“I struck this mad chord,” he continues. “I still have no idea what it is, then I changed one note, then another. Suddenly we had a three-chord sequence and Andrew said, ‘We should record this’.”
As the song took shape, they considered bringing in Chad Smith of Red Hot Chili Peppers on drums but Watt suggested that McCartney, a more than proficient drummer, should play them himself.
He says: “I really enjoyed drumming to it, so I put down the drum track, then obviously the bass.
Paul first picked up a guitar nearly 70 years ago, but still make eclectic, freewheeling music, even if many lyrics are bathed in nostalgiaCredit: GettyPaul during filming of ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ in 1967Credit: Redferns
“Then Andrew put the guitar lick down, because he’s a good guitar player. And over a few days, we made As You Lie There. That started the journey.”
The “journey” included recordings in various LA studios as well as Macca’s own Hog Hill Mill in Sussex and his old Beatles stomping ground, Abbey Road.
Of all the ensuing songs, first single Days We Left We Behind sets the tone — and is also significant for yielding the album title.
“This is very much a memory song for me,” says McCartney. “I was just thinking about those days I left behind.”
Whenever he goes to Liverpool these days, to visit the city’s Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA) for instance, he notes that “the back entrance to the airport is in Dungeon Lane”.
He remembers trips down that lane “as a little kid, because I used to wander off, just on my own, with my little bird book”.
It was the keen ornithologist’s gateway to stunning Mersey Shore, an area teeming with wading birds just a short distance from suburban Speke where he lived between the ages of five and 13.
“Speke is quite working class,” says McCartney. “We didn’t have much at all but it didn’t matter because all the people were great and you didn’t notice it.
“It’s my wife Nancy’s favourite track on the album. When we play it to people, we say, ‘You don’t need to cry’, and then you look up and see that they are.”
When asked how he settled on the album title, Macca says you could ask the same question about Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
“It’s just some words I like. We were thinking Along The Mersey Shore could be good. But then I liked The Boys Of Dungeon Lane — it’s a bit more, ‘What’s that about?’ ”
McCartney says Days We Left Behind “involves a bit in the middle about John and Forthlin Road”. (The McCartney family moved there in 1955).
It suggests that he and his much-missed songwriting partner in The Beatles “wrote a secret code, to never be spoken”.
This leads us to the folkie Down South which, says Macca, is “another one about reminiscing”.
“I often think about John and George,” he continues. “We used to hitchhike in the days before The Beatles. It was in the days when you could — now I warn my grandkids, ‘Don’t do it’, because there are too many nutters out there.”
He remembers: “I got a tip from someone who said, ‘You start off in Chester — because that’s where all the lorries are and they’re all going straight down south. That’s a good place to get your first lift’.”
With Harrison, seven months his junior, coming along for the ride to places like Harlech in Wales, it was a perfect chance to do some “bonding” with his future bandmate.
And speaking of bandmates, what about the rousing Home To Us, which, for good reason, is the only track McCartney doesn’t play the drums on.
During one of his breaks from sessions with Watt, he “talked to Ringo about Andrew”.
“Then Ringo went round to Andrew’s studio and drummed a bit. Next time I saw Ringo, he said, ‘Well, he didn’t do anything with it.’
“I asked what he’d expected and he said, ‘Well, you know, a track’.”
When Macca finally heard his old mucker’s efforts, he suggested to Watt: “We SHOULD make a track and send it to Ringo. So, we did.”
On writing the Home To Us lyrics, he reveals: “This song is done totally with Ringo in mind. I’m talking about where we came from.
“In common with a lot of people, you come from nothing and you build yourself up. Ringo was the one who came from the most ‘nothing’ in The Beatles.
“He was from the Dingle and that was well hard. He used to get mugged coming home from work.
“Even though it was crazy, it was ‘home to us’ and I made the song around that idea.” At first, Ringo only sang a few lines of chorus, but Macca rang him and said he’d “love to hear him sing the whole thing”.
“Next, we took my first line, Ringo’s second line and we had a duet — something we’d never done before.
“We also wanted backing vocals, and I had the idea it would be nice to hear girls. Chrissie Hynde and Sharleen Spiteri are mates — and they did it.”
The last of McCartney’s memory songs is the most poignant, Salesman Saint, which pays tribute to his midwife mother Mary who died when he was only 14 (the “mother Mary” of Let It Be) and his salesman/amateur musician father Jim.
He says: “This song is me remembering my mum and dad. I was born in World War II and I often think, ‘Bloody hell, it’s tough enough having a baby now but imagine if we were all conscious that bombs could be falling any minute’ — and Liverpool was getting heavily bombed.
“I was thinking about them bringing up this kid in those circumstances. My dad happened to be a cotton salesman, and my mum was a nurse. They did it. They managed it and they brought up me and my brother [Mike].
“Got us to doctors, got us to school and did all these things under those circumstances. At the end of the song, there’s music I’m trying to make from their era.”
So now you’ve heard about all the songs inspired by McCartney’s youth but there are NINE more tracks to digest. So here, in Macca’s own words, are his thoughts on those:
Lost Horizon: “This one came about when our dearly beloved and now sadly deceased studio manager, Eddie Klein, was logging some old cassettes of mine.
“He asked me if I remembered Lost Horizon and I said, ‘No’. He said, ‘It’s good, you should listen to it’. So, we remade it faithfully to the cassette version — just with a more modern sound.”
Ripples On A Pond: “It’s a love song. Like a few of the songs, we started this in my studio in Sussex. I said to Andrew, ‘You’re supposed to be a pop producer and we’re making all these records that don’t sound like that to me so, come on, let’s pop this one up!’ ”
Mountain Top: “My wife is a real live music fan and if there’s anything on she’s like, ‘Can we go?’ So, we go to Glastonbury every year and I started fantasising about some young girl tripping — she’s magic mushroomed out. The things you write songs about!” (Nancy delivers the closing spoken words.)
We Two: “A lot of Beatles records were made on a four-track Studer machine, including A Day In The Life. It’s such a classic now. I’ve got one in the studio and we use it sometimes. Andrew loves all these recording legends of the past. I showed him the Studer and he said, ‘Can we use it now?’ Luckily, it’s in full working order so we did We Two on it. It’s a little love song.”
Come Inside: “Going to side two now. We start it off with a rocker love song. It’s straightforward — but with verve.”
Never Know: “When I was in LA, I always liked the idea of Laurel Canyon and that scene. The days of Joni Mitchell, the Eagles — all that hanging out, getting stoned and playing guitars. So that was the vibe that started off Never Know.”
Life Can Be Hard: “I had a little instrumental chord sequence during Covid — and there was a little baby in the house, my wife’s niece’s new baby and it was a thrill. For a lot of people, Covid was terrible if you weren’t with family.
“Anyway, this baby used to like these chords, and it became a song. Life can be hard, but that’s when we put it together again. It’s a positive message.”
First Star Of The Night: “I was on tour and had a day off, which was precious. We were in Costa Rica and it rained hard — all day heavy, tropical rain. I was thinking about being out by the pool, but you really couldn’t go out.
“I thought, ‘I know, I’ll write a song’. I had my guitar with me. So, this starts out, ‘Even when it’s raining’, but then I switched it to, ‘Even when it’s raining inside’, just to give myself somewhere to go with the song.”
Momma Gets By: “The last track on the album and it’s totally imaginary. I was thinking of Porgy and Bess’s world. It’s basically about a woman who you can see is the strength in the family.”
Finally, Macca is asked how he hopes listeners will respond to his new album.
He replies: “Well, I hope they fall in love with the songs and the performances. I hope it takes them to a place of joy.”
Whether it’s Penny Lane, Dungeon Lane or Memory Lane, Paul McCartney will transport you there.
Roll up! Roll up! He is your magical not-so-mysterious tour guide.
PAUL McCARTNEY
The Boys Of Dungeon Lane
★★★★★
Whether it’s Penny Lane, Dungeon Lane or Memory Lane, Paul McCartney will transport you there with his new albumCredit: AP
