Features archive
July 2025
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59 articles
- July 12
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- “I understand people who say: ‘There is no Queen without Freddie.’ Because that’s what we felt following his death”: The epic story behind Queen’s triumphant comeback with Adam Lambert
- “Solitary confinement marks you. It tortures your soul. You’re living day-by-day in fear and uncertainty”: This is what it’s like to be jailed by a repressive regime for playing in a metal band
- “She left music behind – but music kept trying to find her”: What Judy Dyble did for Fairport Convention, Robert Fripp, and me
- “She wanted to go and live in Hackney and be with the common people”: the pub encounter behind Pulp’s timeless classic Common People, the song that changed everything for Jarvis & co.
- July 11
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- The 11 new metal songs you need to hear right now
- Excellent new proggy sounds from Ihlo, Our Oceans, Discipline, and more in this week's Tracks Of The Week
- “The album sounds incredible. A masterpiece, even though I say so myself!”: Black Sabbath are over – this is what the four members are doing next
- “I remember the urge to sing when I was out in nature. Soft, beautiful summers and dark, harsh winters. You find that in my music”: Eivør can’t escape the Faroe Islands’ influence, and doesn’t want to
- "The anxieties that Axl Rose generated were crushing him": Why Izzy Stradlin was the rock'n'roll heart of Guns N' Roses
- July 10
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- “Jim would come in too drunk to sing decently. Sometimes it was a phrase at a time”: The tortured story of The Doors’ Waiting For The Sun, the album that set Jim Morrison on the path to destruction
- “They wouldn’t bat an eyelid at Wagner, who believed the church was linked to the downfall of civilisation. But metal is ‘wrong’?”: The metal band who made history by playing one of England’s biggest cathedrals – despite accusations of ‘blasphemy’
- The Uriah Heep albums you should listen to... and one to avoid
- "The Queen Mother asked us to play something on the Moog. She was really cute": PFM on brushes with royalty, spaghetti with Aerosmith, and how to annoy America
- “Robert Fripp said he wanted to revolutionise rock’n’roll with us. I wasn’t sure, given what I’d just heard. But they were about to throw us out the squat”: The League Of Gentlemen led to Beat-era King Crimson
- July 9
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- One of metal’s greatest cult bands have returned after 30 years – but what are the chances of a new album?
- 30 rock and metal songs that defined the 1980s
- "He said, ‘If you play it backwards, Satan will haunt you!’" How Volbeat's Michael Poulsen went from occult-loving teenage guitar thief to leader of Denmark’s biggest metal band
- "I said, what are you talking about? Just step over Keith Richards?!" The cult of Keef: guitar hero, blues scholar, rebel, survivor, self-parody, genius
- "Ozzy stood up, produced a Zippo lighter from his back pocket, and set Bill Ward's beard on fire": A personal insight into the chaotic, beautiful mind of Ozzy Osbourne
- “Asked if Going For The One was about God, spirituality or the oneness of all people, he said no – it was about putting a tenner on a horse race. You’re almost better off not knowing that!” Steve Hogarth on his hero Jon Anderson
- July 8
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- “I had a terrible habit of playing bits of songs by other people”: The Pink Floyd classic that Roger Waters was worried David Gilmour had stolen from someone else
- "David Bowie saw something in Trent Reznor." What it was really like on Nine Inch Nails' infamous Self Destruct tour in the 90s
- "It's about seeking infinite possibilities and walking a path no one has travelled before." How Babymetal are embracing the future of metal on new album Metal Forth
- “We’d smoke a little dope then wander round Heathrow Airport at night. All these hums, knocks, and noises coming from behind locked doors – the whole airport was a musical instrument”: Penguin Cafe Orchestra’s prog credentials
- “I’ve gotten in trouble because my background is so varied. ‘Are you a jazz guy? Are you a rock guy?’ I get it – If I buy cornflakes I want cornflakes”: How Chester Thompson and Neal Morse formed Cosmic Cathedral
- "I was just lying in bed, and my wife came in and said I was blue": Shuyler Jansen on near-death experience, broken ribs and Elton John's piano
- Every album by The Who ranked from worst to best
- July 7
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- “Bill’s brother used to be in a gang, and he was like the knife man. Bill suggested we write a song about him”: The stories behind the three most obscure Black Sabbath covers played at the Back The Beginning gig
- 9 moments that made me cheer, laugh, despair and cry like a baby at Black Sabbath's epic Back To The Beginning show
- Classic Rock's Tracks Of The Week: July 7, 2025
- “We knew the album would stick out like a sore thumb and we’d have to show real tenacity. But if it wasn’t for Pull Me Under there’s a strong chance we wouldn’t be having this conversation”: When Dream Theater beat the odds with Images And Words
- July 6
- July 5
- July 4
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- Cool new prog you must hear from Auri, L.O.E., Gaupa and more in this week's Tracks Of The Week
- The 12 best new metal songs you need to hear right now
- Here's everything you need to know about Black Sabbath and Ozzy Osbourne's final ever show, Back To The Beginning, including who's playing, where you can watch it and more
- "Is this Ozzy's last show? One thousand per cent": Sharon Osbourne on Black Sabbath's Back To The Beginning all-star blowout
- Every song on Queen's Greatest Hits, ranked from worst to best
- "The last thing I remember, I was playing at a topless bar and had a Volkswagen bus and a hundred bucks": What former Heartbreaker Stan Lynch did next
- “A lot of metalheads wind up finding prog – but it’s in a lot of their favourite bands already”: Progressive metal has never been healthier, and here’s why
- July 3
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- "Korn got ripped off a lot." Shavo Odadjian on nu metal vs deathcore, weird lyrics and whether a new System Of A Down album can live up to their legacy
- 4 brilliant new metal bands you need to hear this month
- From hardcore to hard rock to the nation’s favourite balladeers: The Goo Goo Dolls albums you should listen to... and one to avoid
- "There was something about the way he carried himself. He quite clearly was going to shine": The early years of Soundgarden's Chris Cornell
- Dead Daisies: John Corabi on singing BB King, band lineup changes, and those "billionaire's hobby" jibes
- July 2
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- "You want a smack in the face in the beginning." How Ghost Of Perdition went from a concept about Satanism to the defining Opeth anthem
- Snowman romances and dancing with Oppenheimer: these are the 10 best Kate Bush deep cuts
- From Black Sabbath to Napalm Death: these are the 10 greatest metal bands from Birmingham
- "We're one of the only bands where the original members are still alive and speaking with one another": The final Black Sabbath interview
- "I really have beat the odds here. It's very surreal": Meet Ally Venable, the young blueser who's gone from being bullied at school to playing with Buddy Guy
- “It was only after Woolly killed himself that it seemed an opportune moment to make a last statement, if you like”: Barclay James Harvest probably wouldn’t have made North if co-founder Wolstenholme hadn’t died
- July 1
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- “At one point, he held up an inflatable doll with an erection, dressed like a bee." From orgasmic laugh yoga to shamanic drumming for Mother Earth, here’s what really happens at Glastonbury Festival beyond the music
- Here are five brilliant sets from Glastonbury this year that you probably haven't heard about
- The ‘popularity’ of an AI-generated rock band was inevitable – and it highlights a depressing fact about success in the music streaming age
- The 40 best Black Sabbath songs ever
- "Peaches is voyeuristic, but it's not misogynistic": The meaning behind The Stranglers' controversial classic Peaches
- The Beatles' albums you should listen to... and one to avoid
- "What I stand for is probably closer to Jesus": Ghost's Tobias Forge on spirituality, isolation and the positive joys of fandom
- “The label didn’t want me to do it, but didn’t want to piss me off. We were both famous guitarists so I thought there’d be a lot of interest. I was right all along”: Andy Summers and Robert Fripp collaborated with remarkable ease
