Music News

CeeLo Green, Pixie Lott and Tinie Tempah have been added to the bill for this year's V Festival. The acts will join Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Childish Gambino, John Martin, Vance Joy and Chloe Howl, who will also play the event on August 16 and 17 in Hyla...

The Libertines have hinted at a reunion gig in London's Hyde Park.
Frontman Pete Doherty is reportedly suffering "financial difficulty" and is hoping the large sum of money offered to reform with co-frontman Carl Barât, drummer Gary Powell and bassist John Hassall in July will help clear the huge debt he accumulated after discovering he had fathered an 18-month old daughter.
According to musicharger.com, Pete - who already has son, Astile and daughter Aisling from previous relationships - told an Israeli newspaper: "I don't know if I'm supposed to even tell you this, but we were offered to reform The Libertines for a show this July in Hyde Park. I got the call just yesterday.
"Well, I said, 'Yes'. The thing is when I think about it now, it was kind of a strange answer because I think in most days if you asked me the same question I would say no, but recently I tried to call Carl and couldn't reach him."
"Not long ago I listened to The Libertines songs on YouTube and had a burst of nostalgia so I said what the heck, and then they told me how much they will pay us and I cannot lie to you I couldn't say 'No', at least not in my state right now."
"I was recently called to family law court after a young girl I knew told me I was the father of her baby. I have a year and a half old girl and I need to pay a lot of alimony, I'm in debt. It's very complicated for me to say 'No' right now, I have financial problems."
Pete's band mates are yet to comment on the speculation, but the group have since teased their appearance at the festival by posting a picture of Hyde Park to their Facebook page.

Robin Thicke's 'Blurred Lines' is the most downloaded song of all time in the UK.
The 2013 smash hit, which features Pharrell Williams and rapper T.I., has sold 1.54 million copies through digital stores since May 2013, the Officials Charts Company has confirmed.
The track comes ahead of singer Adele's Grammy Award-winning ballad, 'Someone Like You', which has been bought 1.53 million times.
Robin told OfficialCharts.com: "I'm so honoured, the success of 'Blurred Lines' is a dream come true."
Official Charts Company executive Martin Talbot added: "'Blurred Lines' is surely one of the catchiest pop hits of all time, so its success is no great surprise. But to become one of only two tracks to have been downloaded 1.5m times - and climb to the top of the poll as the biggest download of all time - is an incredible achievement."
Other songs which are among the UK's most downloaded include 'Moves Like Jagger' by Maroon 5 and Christina Aguilera, 'Somebody That I Used to Know' by Gotye and Kimbra, and 'I Gotta Feeling' by the Black Eyed Peas.
The top ten is rounded out by Daft Punk's 'Get Lucky', Rihanna's 'We Found Love', 'Wake Me Up' by Avicii, 'Happy' by Pharrell Williams and Kings of Leon track 'Sex on Fire'.
The countdown was compiled to celebrate the tenth anniversary of legal downloads contributing to the UK charts.

Sarah Harding has written a song about 'f***ing up'.
The former Girls Aloud singer, who has launched her solo career, has been working on "controversial" material but is unsure as to whether she should finish writing a certain song about her past, seemingly about her old partying lifestyle, which involved alcohol addiction and prescription drug abuse.
She exclusively told BANG Showbiz: "I did start working on a song which was controversial. It was called 'Oh no I f***ked up again' sort of thing.
"It was probably [drawn from personal experiences]. It was called 'Make Things Right' it was a really cool song [but] I never quite finished writing it."
The 32-year-old star, who spent time in rehab before swapping clubbing for the quiet life, insists she's still "drawing from person experiences" when writing music but admits she doesn't want to swear in her songs just to impress people.
Sarah explained: "I just don't feel the need to be like, 'Oh m****r f****r', I'm not going to try and be something I'm not. I'm not a rap artist, I'm not that urban, I'm not going to swear to be cool. At the end of the day, my roots are in pop."
The blonde beauty - who is still friends with her former band mates Cheryl Cole, Nadine Coyle, Kimberley Walsh and Nicola Roberts - has an "eclectic" taste in music but is sticking to what she knows best when it comes to her first solo album.
She said: "I was a drum and bass junkie back in the day, I love rock music, blues music, I grew up with Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley [and] The Eagles.
"Then came the 80s, then 90s, then dance music, if you look at my iPod, it's a real mish-mash of stuff. But yeah, I'm not going to start doing heavy metal."

The Vamps think they have an "advantage" over other boy bands on the market.
Tristan Evans, who plays the drums for the 'Wild Card' hitmakers, credits the group and their pop rivals, 5 seconds of summer, for bringing an acoustic sound back to the charts and claims that creating this "new sound" has helped put them ahead of their competitors who don't play their own instruments.
Tristan exclusively told BANG Showbiz: "We really like 5 Seconds of Summer, we spoke to them before both of us even released anything so, you know, it's great to work with them in a way to bring back the guitar-y band sound."
The 19-year-old star and his band mates Connor Ball, Bradley Simpson and James McVey achieved UK chart success with their debut single 'Lets Dance' and he insists he isn't worried that the boy band market is becoming overcrowded because together they are setting a new precedent for pop music.
He added: "The more similar bands in the charts, the easier to make the statement that this is the new music. It will be to our advantage that there are more bands in the charts. It's setting 'this is what's in now' and this is what people like so we're all different. We're more kind of indie pop."

Aloe Blacc will "train" his daughter not be influenced by R-rated videos.
'The Man' hitmaker had his first child, daughter Mandela, with his wife Maya Jupiter last year and he claims that he'll have no problem with her watching sexualised music videos when she's older because he'll "train" her to not be influenced by them.
Quizzed on whether he'd let his daughter watch R-rated material, he exclusively told BANG Showbiz: "Actually, I probably would because I know what kind of training she will have and how she will be able to receive it.
"I have some wonderful friends and they have the kind of children that when they see these images they have insightful open conversation with their parents and say, 'Mom, dad can you believe what they're forcing us to listen to?'
"It's really interesting and with the right parenting you can allow your kids to engage in any kind of media."
The 35-year-old musician began his career as an underground hip-hop artist but moved on to other genres because he wanted to provide young audiences with different kinds of messages.
He said: "Knowing that music is a huge part of a teenager's self-identity and developing that identity makes me want to balance the marketplace with music that gives them alternative ideas about how they can conduct themselves or think about themselves.
Aloe also recognises that the more successful his music, the more people will hear positive messages.
He explained: "The more I can do to give people songs of hope, inspiration and motivation the better, and the bigger those songs are the better because they're directly competing with those messages that ultimately lead to internal conflict."

Kodaline thought it would be "unrealistic" to try and break America.
The 'High Hopes' band, who recently appeared on 'American Idol' and went straight into the top 20, admit in the beginning they thought success across the pond was out of their reach and it was only when they started performing in the country they realised it could be done.
Guitarist Mark Prendergrast told BANG Showbiz: "I didn't think [breaking America] was that important to us when we started out, because it seemed unrealistic.
"But when we started touring over there, you kind of fall in love with it. You're in a different state and city every night.
"We only found out we got 'American Idol' about two weeks before, so we were already in America, it was a huge deal.
"It got our name out there a lot more. Our Twitter followers definitely went up, [the show] went out to about 15million people."
And Mark enjoyed meeting all of the judges, including Randy Jackson, Jennifer Lopez and host Ryan Seacrest, and was surprised when they told the band - also made up of Steve Garrigan, Jason Boland and Vincent May - how much they loved their music.
Mark continued: "Randy Jackson is a huge fan, he was bigging us up. Because it was so big, all these cameras and lights, people made it easy for us and looked after us. Everyone was really cool."

Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry thinks pop stars need to "step out of their comfort zones".
The 'Heart of Glass' hitmaker and her bandmates - Chris Stein, Clem Burke and Tommy Kessler - release their new album 'Ghosts of Download' next month and she feels it's important to continue to re-invent yourself as an artist and has accused many musicians of being too safe.
Debbie told Gay Times magazine: "I'm excited because I love the new stuff. It's always a chance to breathe fresh air. It's good for artists to step out of their comfort zone."
Although the 68-year-old singer likes to see artists take risks, she also doesn't mind when people cover her music.
Asked if she knew of Atomic Kitten, who released a cover of her 1967 track 'The Tide Is High', she replied: "Of course [I know who they are] I thought it [the cover] was ... OK. It's funny how that song keeps coming around, it's very interesting how that happens.
"There's something about it. We've been working on a surprise with that song [for the new album]. There's a guest artist on it."
Meanwhile, Blondie have announced they will perform at this year's Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm in Somerset in June.

Yes bassist Chris Squire insists he won't "lose any sleep" over his band missing out on a place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
The 66-year-old musician, who is touring with a new line-up, was nominated alongside his band mates this year but isn't bitter that they missed out on a spot.
He exclusively told BANG Showbiz: "There were bands nominated who had been up before so I didn't really think we would get in there this year. We missed it by a few votes or something I was told but I'm sure it will come up again.
"I don't lose any sleep over it, if it happens, okay, good, that would be very nice.
"Most of the time they're not prog rock sort of people. In the past couple of years they've made an effort by putting Genesis in there and Canadian rock band Rush but generally they've always stayed away from prog rock people. I can't say whether that's fair or not but people have different tastes. Punk rates a lot higher than prog rock on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame."
Chris claims the logistics of figuring out which members of the band to include would be a "pain" due to so many line-up changes, but he would like the band to be included one day.
He also thinks he's one of the top three bass players in the world, having been inspired by the greats before him.
He explained: "I would quite possibly rank myself in the top three bass players. There are a lot of good bass players, Paul McCartney, and of course John Entwistle was one of my favourites before he passed away.
"In the 70s, actually, I think I won all the bass player poll awards for about 10 years in a row or something.
"It's just trends and we just happened to be riding the crest of a wave back then and we ended up getting more votes."
Yes will release their new studio album 'Heaven and Earth' on July 8.