Music

It’s that time of the year again when music lovers gather in a field to celebrate the thing they love, live music.

There are all sorts of festivals to cater for all sorts of musical tastes in all four corners of the world. The main ones kick off at this time of year and hecklerspray is here to tell you all you need to know about each festival, who the essential people are to see and which act to avoid so you can queue up for the overflowing shit-filled portaloos.

We begin with the first big festival-type affair of the year, this weekend’s Radio 1’s Big Weekend down in Kent. This particular bash doesn’t have a fixed location, but over the years it has proved to be a popular event for all who can get a ticket.

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Hey everyone, Coldplay are back! Finally, drearily self-important, emotionally hollow stadium rock for people who don’t like music has a voice again!

To mark their return, Coldplay recently decided to release their new single Violet Hill as a free download. And apparently Violet Hill has now been downloaded by two million people eager to hear Coldplay’s Spanish-influenced, Brian Eno-helmed new direction.

Sadly there aren’t any figures for how many people only listened to Violet Hill once, rolled their eyes because it’s exactly the same as every other Coldplay song ever written and instantly deleted it from their iTunes library. We’re guessing it’s just a shade off two million.

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Nine Inch Nails have always been pioneers, first in making rubbish music for sad idiots and now in innovative distribution methods.

Following an experiment with some self-indulgent noodly-doodly instrumental tracks earlier this year, Nine Inch Nails has decided to give its new album away to fans for free, without even an option to pay anything, until it comes out on CD when you suckers will have to cough up.

This move by Nine Inch Nails obviously has its critics, who claim that giving away music for free devalues it to the point where it becomes worthless. But these critics are plainly fools - the music of Nine Inch Nails has always been kind of worthless to everyone except for panda-eyed 13-year-olds with BO and a low-level interest in self harm. This just levels the playing field out a bit.

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Miley Cyrus rocked the stage last night at the Disney Channel Games Concert, sporting another piece of pornographic attire.

As she thanked fans for their support, singing some old hits and some new, she strutted about the stage in skin-tight, virginal-white jeans and top to match, which left very little to the imagination.

The outfit made a clear definition of the shape of her breasts and bottom. One source who attended the gig told hecklerspray:

It was disgusting. I was standing there, wanting to have an innocent boogie to some of the finest pop-music this millennium has had to offer when, all of a sudden, 15-year-old Miley appears, looking beautiful and slightly sexually arousing, and now I feel like a paedophile. This has got to stop. This would never have happened if Al-Qaeda were in control; either get the girl a hijab and let me boogie in unaroused peace, or burn her.

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When bands get big and famous, they tend to shun the grimy pubs and seedy back ally clubs. Instead of playing for a crowd of seven pissed old men who are more annoyed that you’re unsettling their darts night you elevated to superstar venues.

From playing horrible branded beer based academies, arenas and festivals, it’s a great milestone for any band, The Futurehead’s are no exception. After gigging around the North-East for to long, they finally got their spring bored to stardom with Hounds Of Love.

However, The Futureheads tonight played a very special and unique gig. In association with lovely tasting Gaymers cider and Channel 4, they aimed to take bands back to their hometown roots. And hecklerspray was there to see the band rekindle their love for Sunderland and play an intimate set for a handful of lucky competition winners.

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The planned Amy Winehouse and Mark Ronson Bond-theme has been cancelled because, according to Ronson, when it comes to her current mental state, Amy can’t find a quantum of solace anywhere.

However, a spokesman for Winehouse has said that this isn’t the case and that the real reason is to do with a clash of interests regarding the development of the song, of which Amy had “other ideas”.

Is Amy telling the truth, or is it Mark? Who knows? As far as that argument goes, it’s probably best to live and let die.

It’s a terrible shame for all things Bond as, when it comes to musical collaborations, nobody does it better than Winehouse and Ronson.

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Coachella was all about one thing this year - a dreary old man forcing a crowd to stand up for three hours while he played songs that your Dad likes.

But Roger Waters‘ Coachella set was livened up by one tiny thing - the moment when his giant inflatable pig broke free and blew off. Blew off into the desert. Get your minds out of the gutter. Cuh!

And the escape of Roger Waters’ big pig has been the talk of the town ever since, with extensive discussions in the press and monetary rewards being offered to whoever recovered it first. Anything, in fact, to take people’s minds off the fact that they’d just basically exchanged $270 for a week of agonising lower back pain and an eighth of a day spent listening to an old posho bleat on about Southampton.

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We like free things, and this week has been brilliant for poor people like us getting things for nought.

CSS are the ace Brazilian band who emerged a few years ago with a feisty record full of no-holds barred indie electro complete with equally feisty lyrics. Proving that girls can actually rock out, their live gigs are full of energy, confusion and the occasional flash of nudity.

CSS have served up a new single called Rat Is Dead (Rage) as a taster for their second album Donkey. We don’t know if it’s a tribute to Shrek’s bumbling sidekick, but we won’t let that put us off. Interestingly enough, this download sees a distinct lack of electronics and a heavier use of guitars. It’s still bloody class, and if you don’t like it, just go and listen to the dire Coldplay offering that they made available today. Honestly, funeral music was a non-existent genre until they made Violet Hill available.

Visit www.csshurts.com now for a tasty music treat.

Last year the music industry cacked itself senseless as Radiohead decided to break the monotonous music industry procedures.

Others have since copied Radiohead and given their music away for free. And today another major band is set to do the same. Coldplay may not be everyone’s band of choice, but anything free is usually welcomed by all.

At 12.15pm GMT, you can download new single Violet Hill for nothing! Though we recommend visiting at 1pm as the website will probably crash due to heavy web traffic passing through early on. And because you don’t like Coldplay enough to download it immediately. Nobody does.

Not quite as spectacular as Radiohead, but still shows that big bands are shunning the traditional system of distributing music. However, if you do want to own a physical copy of the new Coldplay single, you can sell your soul to the NME. It plans to give away a 7” copy of the single along with a non-album track.

To download the single, visit www.coldplay.com

Blonde thingy Paris Hilton and boyfriend Benji Madden are being investigated by police for an alleged hit and run, according to The Sun.

They are accused of driving over photographer Glen Gurniak’s foot as they left a club in Los Angeles Thursday.

Gurniak was left grounded, squealing in pain, as if he were nothing more than a piece of disposable paparazzi trash.

However, he soon got up to file a police report against them with the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department. Spokesman Steve Witmore said:

“The incident is currently under investigation.”

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Mitch Winehouse, father of beehived bandit Amy, has told the News of the World that he wants his daughter to be sectioned.

Just yesterday there were reports that Amy didn’t want her husband to come out of jail.

What is it about this family that makes them want to incarcerate their closest relatives so much?

Love?

And by ‘mental’ home, we don’t mean it in the modern-youthful sense of the word (i.e. a ‘wicked-fun time’) as if the hospice was run by clowns who could heal patient’s injuries with heavy doses of laughter.

We mean it in the traditional sense; the Syd Barrett sense; the Jon Bon Jovi sense.

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Amy Winehouse is officially the week’s most talked about celebrity. A fairly remarkable feat when you take into consideration that she hasn’t died, escaped death, or so much as flashed a tit to a camera.

Why are we interested in this girl? It surely hasn’t got anything to do with talent, has it?

At the beginning of the week, there was news of her being nominated for three Ivor Novello awards. A couple of days later she was named as the youth of the UK’s ‘Ultimate Heroine’, which coincided with rumours of her assaulting two members of the general public, for which she was arrested for last night and cautioned for today, as well as coming tenth in the Sunday Times Young Music Millionaires list.

And now, according to The Sun, she doesn’t want her husband to be released from jail, she does want a divorce, and she’s falling in love with her manager’s assistant.

No wonder she’s allegedly on crack.

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