That's all for today folks so thanks for joining us.

Scroll down for news of a brand new Liam Gallagher film, why we "cannot afford to lose" Kanye West and Janelle Monae on the fallout from her 'pansexuality' comments.

Plus a sneak preview of what's to come from the Arctic Monkeys new album.

There are local elections happening across England today so we'll leave you with David Bowie's ode to the suffragettes (kind of but not really).

We'll meet back here tomorrow for New Music Friday and the 5 Things We've Learned This Week.

All in favour, say 'aye'.

Obviously they've been inspired by Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds rather than any kind of psychotropic illegal drug.

The unusual trio have just shared their debut single Genius - sorry but we can't embed it here due to some potentially offensive language.

But it does have a pretty funky summery vibe and you can find it and its freaky animated video online.

Here's a wee snippet below.

We're not sure that's Ryan Reynolds in the suit to be honest but to give him the benefit of the doubt, we never knew he was such a talented mover.

And he really rocks those heels.

Ashes is from the forthcoming sequel to the 2016 superhero movie.

He definitely pops up at the end of the promo asking Celine to "take it down from an 11 to a 5".

"Beat it Spider-Man," she replies.

Enjoy,

Image source, PA

Nowadays, we dread seeing what he's said/done next but once upon a time it was rather exciting to hear what he'd done next.

The controversial Chicago rapper's last album, Saint Pablo, came out in February 2016 and its accompanying tour was cut short as he was admitted to hospital.

He has since returned to the public eye as one of only a few music stars to come out in support of Donald Trump, re-affirming his stance in recent weeks from his newly re-activated philosophical social media account.

It's may just be promotion for his forthcoming album Love Everyone but when he told TMZ that he believed many black Americans chose to be enslaved, it was a step too far for many.

So, for five minutes today, can we please just remember Kanye as we all love him best, spitting out a sick lyrical flow over the top of a tastefully selected sample.

Our #TBT is the Daft Punk-inspired Stronger (above), taken from his 2007 album Graduation.

A lot can happen in 11 years...

Rolling Stone magazine

That's Arthur Buck to you and me.

The pair of veteran rockers are seen wandering through Oregon in the video for their Paul Weller-esque retro psych rock track Are You Electrified?

A Grammy-nominated artist in his own right, James told Rolling Stone

"The best part about making this video for me was riding around, listening to Peter's playlist of obscure garage rock, overlooked Prince gems and latter day Bowie tracks."

Their debut album drops on 15 June and the singer-songwriter confessed he had an ulterior motive to the whole project.

"My personal mission for Arthur Buck [is] to campaign covertly or otherwise for Peter to get hired by some satellite radio juggernaut into a DJ position, a la Dylan's turn as DJ that was fantastic some years back.

"The world would be richer for it."

Good a reason as any we suppose.

Christina has just shared the raunchy visuals from her track Accelerate, which features 2 Chainz and Ty Dolla $ign.

Sadly there are some naughty words in there so you'll have to head to her YouTube channel to watch it yourselves.

For now be content with her licking from a glass of milk (above). We're not sure this is the most effective way to get your glass a day but who are we to question her?

Her new album Liberation is available from 15 June.

Neil Smith
Entertainment reporter

Image source, Manuel Harlan

From Blurred Lines and Ed Sheeran to Sam Smith's Stay With Me, the issue of songwriting credits has become one of the music industry's most talked-about topics.

Now, the subject has inspired a West End play that sets a successful record producer and a rising young female singer on a collision course over a question of attribution.

In Joe Penhall's Mood Music, Bernard (Ben Chaplin) and Cat (Seana Kerslake) are locked in a protracted battle over who should get the credit - and the royalties - for a hit song they both had a hand in.

Managers, lawyers and even psychotherapists are drawn into a topical story that at one point has Bernard hogging the mike at the Ivor Novello Awards - a scene that inevitably brings to mind Kanye West's infamous stage invasion at the 2009 VMAs.

Image source, Manuel Harlan

"Whatever field of the arts you work in - films or theatre or music - these cases keep cropping up about ownership and credit," said Penhall after Wednesday's press night at the Old Vic in London.

"Everyone thinks playing music is all about being free and it’s not really; it’s about control and domination.

"It’s always struck me as a supreme irony that something as beautiful and special as music is subject to the most brutal kind of market forces," continued the playwright, whose previous shows include the Kinks musical Sunny Afternoon.

"It’s inherently dramatic and ultimately quite tragic in a lot of cases, and theatre is all about tragedy."

Mood Music - which, we should point out, is also very funny - runs at the Old Vic until 16 June, external.

Music News
Music News

Image source, PA

Ok time for today's Kanye news part deux (scroll down for insight into his recent Ye Vs the People political rap battle).

The rapper is reportedly seeking a restraining order against Snoop Dogg's cousin - producer Daz Dillinger - a member of notorious Californian gang the Crips - after he allegedly issued a "Crip alert" online urging local gang members to attack Kanye on sight.

According to Music News, external he posted a now-deleted video on Instagram taking aim at Kanye for his recent vocal support of US President Donald Trump.

In the video, Daz apparently said: "We are in one boat and they’re killing all of us. He jumps over there and says 'Master, I'm your side. I'm with you master Trump..."

Daz apparently updated fans later on his Snapchat, revealing that Kanye had taken legal action after his threat.

Tuesday night saw the Canadian rocker and Woodstock veteran get the old band - minus Poncho - back on stage for the first time since 2014, as they began "another beautiful chapter" of their long career.

The apparently unrehearsed gig was the first of three straight nights, concluding tonight - so if you happen to be passing through Fresno, California.

Thought not, us neither.

It was their first gig without guitarist Frank 'Poncho' Sampedro since 1975 and he was replaced on guitar by The E Street Band's Nils Lofgren.

Image source, Getty Images

Janelle Monae has been speaking to fans about coming out as pansexual in an interview with Rolling Stone last week.

The singer said she'd "been in relationships with both men and women" and was still exploring her identity.

Her interview prompted an outpouring of support, but some felt Rolling Stone's headline - "Janelle Monae Frees Herself, external" - was patronising and "reductive".

"I'm also free to let that slide off my back," she said on a Reddit forum.

"Being an artist sometimes means allowing others to use your image to push an idea based off of something you say or create.

"In this case, I think that there are a lot of people who may find courage in the story (at least I hope)."

Read more

Image source, Lind McCartney/V&A museum

Macca has gifted more than 60 photos taken by his late wife Linda to the V&A in London.

The shots span Linda McCartney’s career from the 1960s to the 1990s and include portraits of The Beatles (above), The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix.

It's the first time many of the original pictures have been made available to the public.

Linda died of breast cancer in 1998.

The photos will be displayed from 12 October.

She's carrying the nation's weight of expectation on her shoulders when she heads to Lisbon on 12 May.

Win or lose, SuRie is already a champ in our eyes, having recorded a sign language version of her song Storm.

She had to learn it from scratch:

"Eurovision is about everybody," she says.

Image source, Reuters

Listen up LG fans.

Liam Gallagher: As It Was, will be directed by documentary-maker Charlie Lightening and tell the story of how the singer went from Oasis megastar to "living on the edge, ostracised lost in the musical wilderness of boredom, booze and bitter legal battles."

The feature will include his performances from One Love Manchester, Reading and Glastonbury festivals and the 45-year-old's emotional first ever performance as a solo rock 'n' roller at The Ritz.

The main man himself, who last year returned with a number one debut solo album; As You Were, said: “As It Was is a documentary about my musical comeback.

Who knew that he'd one day end up with very his own catchphrase?

Lightening, who has previously worked with Liam's brother Noel (uh oh), Sir Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Bjork and Robbie Williams, added that the film will chronicle "one of the greatest rock ’n’ roll comebacks of all times and you are there with him each step of the way”.

The Mancunian rock star this week began work on his 'biblical' follow-up album.

In 2016, a Mat Whitecross-directed Oasis film, Supersonic, was released but the new one will focus solely on the younger Gallagher, who performs at this month's BBC Biggest Weekend.

He's released a new lyric video for his track Bloom, which features a shiny CGI Troye floating around a greenhouse.

The 22-year-old South Africa-via Australia electro-pop artist is due to release his second album soon.

Troye's debut album Blue Neighbourhood came out in 2015. and won two Aria awards down under for song of the year and best video.

Watch the new video above

Image source, Reuters

The rapper, who you may have heard arguing for 'the people' on Kanye's recently previewed track Ye Vs. the People, has stated his belief that the Chicago superstar's recent tweets in support of US President Donald Trump and comments regarding slavery are neither publicity stunts nor intended to offend fans.

Speaking to US radio show The Breakfast Club, T.I. said: "We, as the black delegation, cannot afford to lose Kanye West.

The rapper was invited to Kanye's LA home studio, to work on the new track after reaching out to him and asking Yeezy to re-think his political views.

You can hear T.I. arguing the point with Kanye on the latter's own website now, where he makes the confession that "half the stuff Trump does, I don't agree with."

It's an interesting insight but before you head to Kanyewest.com it does come with a language warning.

Image source, Getty Images

T.I. recalled what he was thinking at the time of the initial face-to-face debate, which then provided the inspiration for the new rap battle, set to the tune of The Four Tops' 7 Rooms of Gloom.

"'I'm sure you have a very logical explanation to all this. Where's it heading? What's the punch line?'

"And [Kanye] said, 'Man, I'm just being a free thinker.'"

Watch the full interview., external

Kev Geoghegan
Music News LIVE reporter

Image source, Caroline International

Supergrass singer Gaz Coombes is releasing his new album World's Strongest Man on Friday, his first new music since his Mercury Prize-nominated Matador, and it's addressing issues like masculinity, ego and anxiety attacks.

The Oxfordshire singer-songwriter has been telling us about why he decided to subvert the title phrase, instead using it as a jumping off point to address topics like mental health and "what seems to be an in-built way of being for some young men, to protect their territory and be the hard guy".

"At first I liked it in the sense of, what if I was the world's strongest man at being a bit weird and bit rubbish at things?," he explains. "Being the greatest at being not complete.

"I thought it was great, the irony of these ridiculous alpha males, who dominate and cause chaos for everyone."

We've already had a few tasters of the album from the first single Deep Pockets to the strutting cock of the walk funk of Walk The Walk (above).

Image source, Caroline International

The album's cover (above) also pays a debt of gratitude to one of British artist David Hockney's most iconic paintings (below).

Image source, PA

"I didn't shy away from the influence," Gaz admits.

"I went to his exhibition last summer in Paris and I just loved it and walked into the room with the full size Bigger Splash painting and thought that's how I want the album cover to look."

Gaz will be taking his new album out on the road this year and is set to play London's Palladium later this month.

"It's been quite an adventure, I love this stage when you start grooming them for the stage, they kind of have a rebirth, they reinvent themselves, these songs so it's great, it puts a new light on them."

Read more about the new album.

Reasons to revive cassettes...

• They're cheap
• They're easy to transport
• Many old cars still have the facility to play them

Reasons not to...

• They get chewed up
• You have to fast forward 'blindly' to find your favourite tune
• No new cars have the facility to play them

We're sure there are more but while we're thinking of them check out Ben and Jules Walker (above) who are starting their own tape label.

No this is not a rewind up.

Image source, Reuters

Well the chapel in Vegas has become a bit cliche these days, hasn't it?

Foos mega-fans Belinda Marie Rosales and Tony Rosales got hitched during the band's performance of Everlong at the Starplex Pavilion a few weeks back.

Check out the beautiful - if slightly impractically loud moment - below, as their nuptials are legally confirmed by a fellow Foos fan with a torchlight, shouting above Dave Grohl's amp.

"Do I whaaaaat?"

Only joking guys, congratulations.

The new bride, adorned with a flower head scarf, later thanked the band on Twitter for "helping our dreams come true."

Nearly half of the UK's classical musicians don't earn enough to live on, says the Musicians' Union (MU).

Young musicians are particularly affected, with two-fifths of newcomers taking unpaid work in the last year.

Forty-four per cent of players told the MU they struggled to make ends meet.

Rank-and-file members of the BBC Philharmonic or Birmingham Symphony Orchestra are paid about £30,000 a year, but wages elsewhere across the board have stagnated as funding cuts take hold.

"Wages are increasingly depressed," said Michael Kidd, who plays French horn with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.

"If it continues in that direction, its not going to remain a viable career option."

Read more.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Zackery Michael

So here's a glimpse at what you might be getting this summer if you managed to get your hands on some of those (£70) tickets that sent everyone into a tizz.

The Monkeys made their live return last night in their new home America, more specifically San Diego where they played four new tracks; Four Out of Five, American Sports, She Looks Like Fun and One Point Perspective.

Check out some fan-shot footage of Alex shredding the guitar and full on crooning on the latter track below.

The new tunes will feature on forthcoming album; Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino, which drops on Friday 11 May.

Tame Impala's Cameron Avery, who you may also know from fellow Aussie psych band Pond and of late Alex Turner's side project The Last Shadow Puppets, accompanied the band for two of the new tracks.

No sign yet of Alex singing from the piano... but then the tour is yet young.

The Sheffield band have added four new dates to their sold out UK and Ireland tour and you can check them out below.

Wednesday 12 September: London, O2

Sunday 16 September: Birmingham, Arena Birmingham

Tuesday 25 September: Dublin, 3Arena

Friday 28 September: Newcastle, Metro Radio Arena