Blog Posts by Barney Hoskyns

Don Snowden delves into the whereabouts of the sassy gal who gave us 'Buffalo Stance' — and attempts to bring her story up to date——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

The original title for this piece was "Ticked Off at a Tick". The reason being that I spent more than a few years operating under the misconception that the Lyme's Disease Neneh Cherry came down with right around the time 'Buffalo Stance' hit worldwide was behind her oh-so-limited recorded output — a mere three full albums in her solo career and then largely dropping off the map after 1996. A journey to Google/Wikiworld set me straight on the Lyme's front — ran its course within a year — but did little to dispel the mystery over why so little music had been heard from someone so talented.

'Buffalo Stance' really had seemed like a clarion call for the dawning of some new day when it burst on the scene. It was simply a glorious song, pulling diverse musical strands together into a cohesive whole that was

It is 40 years since the Grateful Dead — the ultimate tribal hippie band — brought their psychedelic Americana to Europe for a first tour of the continent. Underground legend Mick Farren filed this heady report for International Times in April '72——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

To mark the 60th birthday of Britain's New Musical Express, here's a classic piece from the paper's vaults: Ian Penman's 1980 homage to August "Kid Creole" Darnell——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

A man stands alone in a baggy white suit, a black masquerade visor over his eyes. He is concealing a broken heart and a loudhailer...

Just imagine: you have the opportunity to write one of those all-time sexiest and most heartbroken of songs. First step: you get involved with someone who drives you crazy with desire — ensnares you, mesmerises you, has you at arm's length and in the palm of their hand. Then something happens: that inevitable separation. You're classically awry — but where's the gain (or the end) in being uselessly melancholy?

Write that song about it, summing up both your despair and the wonder of the love and sex that caused it in the first place.

You have to choose your words carefully, carnally; you have to find a crucial metaphor. It has to be just

Davy Jones was the cheeky-chappie pretty boy from England that all female Monkees fans fell for. His untimely death at the age of 66 is a desperately sad loss for anyone who loved the wacky antics (and often wonderful music) of TV's "Prefab Four." Here is a delightful encounter with the Manchester lad, as written up by NME's Keith Altham in February 1967——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

Davy Jones — the little Monkee with a big heart — arrived via Nassau last week wearing a battered black top hat, purchased from a hotel doorman, and accompanied by his friend Stephen Pearl, who was once a journalist and is now a karate expert "for the use of!"

Davy is the Monkees' front-man, diplomat, humorist and honorary press relations officer for the group — a kind of mini-McCartney to Nesmith's long-legged Lennon.

He prefaced most of his remarks like, "They tell me I should be a millionaire by Christmas" with "and here's something else you can't print" when I found him

As a way of remembering him on what would have been his 80th birthday, we present this exceptional 1971 portrait of the great Johnny Cash by acclaimed Beatles/Rolling Stones biographer Philip Norman——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

The heavy carved front door into House of Cash, Johnny Cash's state mansion, in Madison, Tennessee, swung inward to reveal blinding sunshine and the awe-struck face of a tourist. His eyes grew wider still as he surveyed the sumptuous foyer, its heavy brocades, its gilded Tennessean Louis XIV furniture, its massively-framed photographs of Johnny Cash, his wife June Carter, his new baby son and his celebrated folk-singing mother-in-law. Not until this point did the tourist descry Cash himself, on an unexpected visit, lounging in a high-backed armchair.

"Well — good gosh. I'm all excited!" the tourist said with a gasp.

Cash seldom laughs. His life beats in an unease of his large muscles, in shifting feet, a collar turned up against the

They've just won the Outstanding Contribution at this year's Brit Awards. 18 years ago — when Paul Moody interviewed them for NME (March 5, 1994) — Blur were about to boss Britpop with the imminent and brilliant album Parklife——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

High up on the roof of London, above the glow of soft-porn peepshows and beetling black cabs, above the fluorescent record shops and the rush-hour crush of Piccadilly, a dazzling red and blue neon screen flashes out its message over and over again.

Freddie Mercury, Buddy Holly and Mick Jagger, forced to watch the skies forever from the upper balcony of the Rock Circus waxwork museum, stare up in silent homage, blinded over and over again by its silent mantra.

Hundreds of feet below, Damon Albarn's eyes are gleaming almost as much as his solid silver identity bracelet.

"See that? Next time we'll be up there with that lot!"

And all the while, the message keeps flashing: "LONDON LOVES BLUR... LONDON LOVES

Former Rolling Stone and New York Times writer Loraine Alterman Boyle remembers the remarkable singer-songwriter Dory Previn, who died last week——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

My dear friend of nearly 40 years, Dory Previn, died last week. She was a great songwriter who exposed her deep feelings about love and lovers, life and feelings, religion and paranoia in poetic lyrics that truly expressed her unique sensibility. Yet her writings illuminate all of us as we struggle to find our way in the dark. When Previn performed at Carnegie Hall in 1973, a friend of mine who had never heard her before, poked me and whispered: "How does she know me? How does she know those details about me?"

Born in New Jersey in 1925, Dory was brought to Hollywood by Arthur Freed, a famous producer of MGM musicals, to work as a lyricist. She was eventually paired with Andre Previn, who she married in 1959. During her film career in Hollywood as a lyricist, she earned Academy Award

Whitney's debut album

The pitiful death of Whitney Houston in a Beverly Hills hotel room should not overshadow the talent that took the R&B world by storm in 1985. Billboard's Bud Scoppa documented her discovery and her rise to fame in December 1986——Barney Hoskyns, Editorial Director, Rock's Backpages

Once in a blue moon, a new artist emerges who simply takes over, in utterly decisive and undeniable fashion. So it was with Whitney Houston — signed at nineteen, unleashed at twenty-one, a superstar at twenty-two. She has it all — artistry, presence, beauty, style, substance, naturalness - and you can't miss it. Whitney Houston is huge, and she can back it up for miles.

What a coup: Houston's self-titles debut album has smoothly become Whitney Houston's Greatest Hits, with a full half-dozen bell-ringers and steadily spectacular sales. It's a perennial, a standard, a classic, a Tapestry — yup, among the recordings of female vocalists, only Carole King's magnum opus has sold more units... ever. And Whitney's a