Scroobius Pip Poetry

One half of Essex based hip hop duo Dan le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip, David Meads has redefined British hip-hop with his spoken word reformation of the genre alongside Daniel Stephens' eclectic electronic backing instrumentals. Now the summation of a work that began in 2008, Meads is releasing a book of his poetry titled 'Poetry in (e)motion':

“It’s just another reason for me to just be stupidly excited at the moment. I’d been asked a few times if I would release a book of poetry and I never really read a lot of poetry; I like to watch it be performed live, I like to hear the writer perform it. So I decided that for me to release a book of poetry would be kind of arrogant, like ‘I don’t read poetry but you should read mine.’ But the thought of that made me question why I didn’t read poetry as a youngster, so I came up with the idea of putting together a graphic novel of poems.

“I used MySpace and it’s all from fans and the public. I got artists from all over the world to submit pictures of each poem and turn it into a comic strip almost. The work that came in was amazing and I half expected the standard to be quite average [laughs]. I then took it to Titan Books who put out The Watchman comic books and all sorts of amazing stuff. They saw the standard and loved it and that’s coming out on Titan now; which is a huge testament to the quality put out there”.

Scroobius Pip who takes his name from a misspelling of the nonsense poem by Edward Lear initially used spoken word to overcome a speech impediment and is now regarded by many as one of the greatest creative minds in terms of British lyricism. Following the recent release of 'Logic of Chance' on March 15th this is yet more reason to be excited about this British artist.



Scroobius Pip will be signing Poetry in (e)motion at the Forbidden Planet Megastore, 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London WC2 H 8JR on Wednesday 24th March 6 – 7pm

Poetry in (e)motion will be released on Friday

New Dead Weather Album

Jack White's latest band 'The Dead Weather' who presented us with the excellent 'Horehound' last year have announced at South by Southwest the details of their second album. 'Sea of Cowards' is set for a May 7th release date whilst the first single 'Die by the Drop' is to be released tomorrow along with its b-side 'Old Mary'.

I have no idea how he has managed this seeing how he is currently on tour with the band and has just spilled the beans on a a collaboration he has done with Jay-Z where he has stated:

“I just did a record with Jay-Z… We did a song together a few weeks ago. It was incredible. I played him something that I’ve been kicking around for a while and he immediately came out with words for it. It’s unbelievable-sounding.”

In an interview with MTV, White has mentioned that the tour has not only yielded new songs but has also informed the older tunes. "It's changing every day, and we want it to change even more. We've got a lot more material going and changing a lot of the songs from the first record. We have a lot more cover songs than when we started too." Which covers have they been playing around with? "It ranges from Christian metal to Christian gospel."

MTV Shows

Gorillaz Plagiarisers?

There has been a great tiffle in music news this week as Damon Albarn's cartoon band Gorillaz have been threatened with a law suit against one of their songs. The track in question is the first single 'Stylo' featuring Mos Def and Bobby Womack from their latest release 'Plastic Beach' which came out earlier this month.

It turns out that eighties reggae star Eddy Grant, most famous for his 1983 track 'Electric Avenue' has claimed that the similarities between 'Stylo' and his 1981 track 'Time Warp' are far too many in number for it to be the result of mere coincidence.

Grant said himself: “I am outraged that the Gorillaz have infringed the copyright of my song 'Time Warp', claiming their song 'Stylo' to be an original composition,”.

It's quite ironic how both artists share the same record label, EMI, which is part of the reason why Grant is so annoyed seeing as he believed that they would have come to him first to try and make some sort of agreement in sampling the song. As Grant comments: "In a properly configured relationship I would have gotten a call from EMI to say, 'Damon wants to use 'Time Warp'. What arrangement can you guys come to? Would you claim 100 per cent, would you claim 60 per cent, or 70 per cent of whatever it is?'," he suggested.

"That phone call never came. Instead what happened is somebody went straight to a musicologist, implying that there was some kind of pre-knowledge of some kind of infringement."

According to NME, an EMI spokesperson told them "This is a private matter between Eddy Grant and Gorillaz, and we're not intending to make any further comment."

Personally, I feel it is a bit of a ridiculous claim made by an outdated musician who hasn't seen any success since the eighties and is a bit strapped for cash.

I guess you should judge for yourself:

Peter Gabriel - Scratch My Back, Now Fuck Off!

All hasn't gone to plan with the rock legend Peter Gabriel's supposed dual album release as artists aren't cooperating.

Gabriel's latest album 'Scratch My Back' which was released last month was a series of covers of new and old artists where he presented his own interpretation of the original songs. The initial plan was for Gabriel to release this album of covers and then follow it up with an album consisting of his songs covered by the artists in the first. Instead there has been a problem in that the artists who Gabriel had hoped to participate in the project are either missing deadlines or refusing to take part at all. As such, Gabriel has been forced to release the material as a series of monthly downloads available from iTunes.

In an interview with the New York Times, Gabriel said: "We may not get everybody, but I hope we will." The first two songs, featuring Paul Simon's version of Biko, and the Magnetic Fields' take on Not One of Us, are available now, with others following over the coming months.

According to Pitchfork, Arcade Fire are not covering 'Games Without Frontiers' as originally promised. It is unclear whether they are covering another Gabriel song or if they are even participating in the project at all.

The only artist to officially turn Gabriel down was David Bowie. Gabriel covered the track 'Heroes'on 'Scratch My Back'. Instead, the song's co-writer, Brian Eno, is to record something instead.

Death of Sparklehorse Frontman

Singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Mark Linkous of the American alternative rock band Sparklehorse committed suicide last night according to Rolling Stone. The musician who was in his forties died of as yet unknown causes but a statement from his family confirms that it was suicide.

Linkous has not had it easy having become temporarily paralysed following the ingestion of a dangerous amount of valium and anti-depressants whilst on tour which caused him to be unable to move and cutting off the circulation to his legs which were pinned underneath him. When he was found 14 hours later he underwent a heart attack when medics attempted to straighten his legs due to the build up of potassium. The damage was significant and he almost lost both legs but instead he was left wheelchair bound for 6 months.

Linkous was said to be working on a new album for Sparklehorse that had almost reached completion and was set to be released on the Anti- record label.