Andy writes:

I found this on the official album site of Gene:

Martin - on meeting your idol the being too pissed to remember... Radio 1 Interview

Rozzer Meets Mozzer

Radio 1 Newsbeat speaks to Martin on Meeting his Idol...14th July

Martin: "I'm still quite good friends with Alain Whyte who is a-hem (coughs)'s guitarist. He lives in Los Angeles with his girlfriend Blossom, he rang me up and said: "Hi, I'd really love to see you mate" and he brought him with him. He was large, actually, quite a big feller, that really surprised me. A bit like Tony Blair, he's really big, that surprised me when I met him. He was huge. Huge!! It really was quite exciting, I mean I bought his records, and it's always lovely to meet people who when you're 14 you'd listen to their records. And he was quite shy and I was quite shy, and beer was drunk... and that was about it. And we talked about... well I don't know what we talked about because I was pissed."

Related link: "More Morrissey at Gene" (June 13, 2000)

Vanessa writes:

There's an interview with Jason Slater of Snake River Conspiracy in the latest issue of goth/industrial magazine Outburn which includes the following conversation on their "How Soon is Now" cover:

Q: Why did you choose that song? The original is so good, maybe that's a song that shouldn't be covered.

Jason Slater: We totally dropped the ball on that one. Our version of that song is a piece of shit. We were a song short for the record and the label was, "Do another cover." I didn't really want to do another cover, but I had four days to finish the record... So we're at the studio and I'm just throwing ideas around like, "'How Soon is Now' is a great song." Everybody jumped on it, and I was, "Fuck me and my big mouth." I started working on it and I hated it... It's such a direct copy of a great song, and to me I fucking ruined it.

UPDATE: 7/28: Dan also writes:

From the July 21 issue of Gavin, the radio trade magazine:

From a brief interview with Tobey Torres, singer for Snake River Conspiracy:

Q: What has the response been to your single?
A: ... I think our single has been getting some good airplay. I also heard that Morrissey was quoted as saying that he thinks it's better than the original.

I wish Moz would just tell us if he really said that!

Related link: "Snake River Conspiracy ad claims 'Better Than The Original'" (July 20, 2000)

Anonymous Coward writes:

From The Guardian newspaper website. Excerpt:

In from the cold

Coldplay's debut album invents a rich new form of guitar romanticism. Dave Simpson meets their lead singer and tries not to mention Radiohead

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Note: Since Johnny Marr has his own site now (http://www.jmarr.com), go there first if you're looking for news on his current activities.

First with the review at nme.com is Eric Wang:

My personal favorite line is, "Like a busted lift,...":

Excerpt:

Johnny Marr's Healers - Sheffield Leadmill by Jim Wirth

...Like a busted lift, they don't work on so many levels. They're stuffed with the entrails of other rubbish bands (Alonza Bevan from Kula Shaker, Zak Starkey from The Lightning Seeds), their singer (Marr himself) can't sing and, most importantly, the songs are appalling...

And from Matthew Zolan, first with a link to the review at allstar:

Johnny Marr Proves His Best Is Still Ahead At Sheffield Show by Dave Simpson

Excerpt:

...Those gentler Smiths chiming guitar sounds seem light years away -- although "Last Ride" contains tantalizing echoes of "How Soon Is Now" -- as Marr pours sounds like molten metal. Looking remarkably unweathered (hair teased back into the Keith Richards tousle of his mid-'80s incarnation) it's odd to see Marr as a frontman, but the guise suits him. His voice is vaguely reminiscent of Gerry Rafferty, and at 36, he certainly doesn't lack for charisma. If it's slightly frustrating that some of the songs echo those Marr has influenced (the Charlatans, Oasis), this is inevitable given his back catalogue.

Allstar link from MozMan68:

Electronic Finally Sees U.S. Release Date For Twisted Tenderness
July 24, 2000, 12:40 pm PT

Nearly a year and a half after its release in the U.K., Electronic has finally lined up a Stateside release for its third album, Twisted Tenderness, on Sept. 12 on Koch Records.

Electronic, consisting of New Order singer Bernard Sumner and ex-Smiths/current Healer guitarist/vocalist Johnny Marr, previously saw its first two albums (1991's Electronic and 1996's Raise the Pressure) released on Warner Brothers.

Meanwhile, Marr's latest project, the Healers, recently finished up their first string of live shows (allstar, July 17) in the U.K. and are currently in negotiations with an American label to release the band's debut, tentatively titled Play Dumb (allstar, Jan. 26). Sumner is still holed up with a recently reformed New Order, writing and recording songs for the band's follow-up to 1993's Republic.

-- Kevin Raub

NO NAME writes:

An all-Smiths tribute band played at the club called Spaceland in Silverlake (Los Angeles) on Sunday night. They played a 40 minute set including covers of "There Is A Light", "Ask", "Panic", "What Difference Does It Make?", "Bigmouth", "Handsome Devil" and "How Soon Is Now?" The singer did very well, he was not trying to mimic Morrissey, he had his own twist on improvising lyrics and vox.

trouble writes:

Club Addiction

FRIDAY AUGUST 4, 2000
"THE SMITHS / MORRISSEY NIGHT"
With DJ's Jeremy, Kitty & T.D. playing your Favorites and Requests + 80's Visuals

UPDATE (7/29): Venue change below.

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As of last night (July 25) the site has been updated to use the latest version of slashcode (1.07). As usual, let me know if you see any problems.

It's been about a month and a half since the switchover and after some minor adjustments it seems to be in a fairly stable state now. If you have any questions about the Slash format or if something about it bothers you, leave a comment below.

One of the few questions that has come up is "What are those scores next to the comments?" Basically, this is a tried and tested method used at Slashdot to help bring the more interesting comments up to the top so more people will see them (comments can be sorted by highest score). Who determines which comments have higher scores though? As the only current author I have moderation access and at random the system chooses a few people who have created login accounts to moderate.

In addition to the random moderators, I would like to add some other full-time moderators to mix it up a little, preferably those who have the time and like to read most of the comments. If you are interested in helping out, fill out the Moderator access form.

At the moment I personally like reading most of the comments and I don't think the scoring system is of that much importance. Much like the other customizations that can be done to the site, you don't have to use it, but it's there if you want to.