That’s just music

Famous pop group Take That was recently granted with the second Silver Clef Award in their history, said BBC News. Therefore, they’ve turned to be more successful (of course, in terms of getting this award only) than Paul McCartney and The Rolling Stones, which have received Silver Clef just once. The first award was given to the band way back in 1995, only a few months before Robbie Williams has left them in order to start his absolutely smashing solo career. Why this award’s organisers like Take That so much is not very clear though, and why such monsters of music as The Rolling Stones and Sir Paul were left behind them is even more strange. However, Take That is not without a talent, and definitely they deserve certain amount of respect. After all, musicians like McCartney are surely way above them, and their fame is dwelling on the higher level, on the level of history. Take That is not that huge, so maybe that’s the reason why they deserve to have more awards of this sort. Silver Clef Award was founded by the Nordoff-Robbins charity foundation and is traditionally given out annually to all kinds of musicians including such bands as Take That. During this year’s ceremony there was an auction, which enabled Silver Clef’s organisers to collect up to 400 thousand pounds. Surely, not without Take That’s help.

Infamous Christie’s auction house, for recently able to sell John Lennon’s guitar for more than 240 thousand euros, said The Guardian on Thursday, June 2. In the beginning auction’s organizers were showing some interest in selling it for 100–150 euros, but the interest for this lot just grew out of any expected proportions. Practically, it’s not about the price, but it’s about the one who was using it, so all these huge costs seem to be slightly off track. Why just selling it all, selling it all the time while thinking only about prices, lots and other ‘down to earth’ miserable things, when musician’s art matters the most? Neil Roberts, auction’s manager who is specializing on selling of items that deal with pop/rock culture said that on the day when they’ve put on sale Lennon’s guitar, his firm was literally attacked with phone calls, emails and visitors. This guitar turned to be a spectacle among thousands of fans. As historians believe, Lennon had purchased 1958 Hofner Senator in one of the Liverpool’s music stores and used it primarily at home. Auction’s lot also included George Harrison’s letter in which he is saying that Hofner Senator was one of Lennon’s first guitars. Possibly this fact was the major force that drew fans into buying it.

Recently, a rip from Bob Dylan’s radio performance was incorporated into one of the Beastie Boys’ new songs, said New Musical Express. Musicians have chosen some radio broadcast episode where Dylan is hosting the show, but no Bob’s music was included in a song. Beastie Boys and Bob Dylan are very different in what they’ve been doing, their styles and sound cannot be compared to one another, but definitely there is a big deal of respect. As the Beastie Boys have mentioned, they’ve decided to use Dylan’s story about the band. He was very positive towards them on the show, the band’s art and even decided to air some of their stuff. So far there is no definite information on how Dylan himself had reacted on the band’s decision to use his words as the part of a song. Hopefully, Dylan will welcome it. Beastie Boys’ followers may hear this rumoured material not earlier than their album “Hot Sauce Committee Part 2” will come out – a special continuation of the upcoming “Hot Sauce Committee Part 1”. The release date of Part 2 was not announced yet, but it’s already known when Part 1 will hit the stores. It’s going to happen on September 15 this year.

American Federal court has ruled out that the World Wide Video company possesses no rights to John Lennon’s rare footages made in February 1970, and gave these rights to his widow Yoko Ono, said Associated Press. Ten hours video content was filmed by Ono’s first husband Anthony Cox in London at Lennon’s house during three whole days. This material includes terrific moments when Lennon is playing piano, smokes weed, and jokes about giving Richard Nixon a cup of tea with LSD. Seriously, why this stuff should belong to some strange video company, when it morally and even historically must be owned by Yoko. It’s worth of noticing that recently she is winning nearly every case that deals with Lennon’s heritage, sometimes this may look slightly unfair when McCartney or Ringo are losing these cases, but right now it seems to be absolutely fair. World Wide Video representatives have gained the copyright for 125 thousand dollars from Cox himself (originally the price went up to one million, so they’ve planned to use these money to make a documentary called “3 Days in the Life”). However, after a public demonstration of some parts of this unique footage, the WWV company was immediately contacted by Ono’s lawyers. The result was her total victory.