Curated playlist
Art rock musicians
- David BowieDavid Bowie died two days after releasing his final album. He planned Blackstar as a parting gift while privately dying.
- Kate BushKate Bush's second UK number one came 44 years after her first. That gap beat Tom Jones's record of 42 years.
- Peter GabrielOn the 19th of June 1971, Peter Gabriel took a running jump off a stage and expected the audience to catch him. They moved aside instead. He landed on the floor and broke his ankle, then performed the next several Genesis shows with a…
- Lou ReedLou Reed made a record that almost nobody bought, and a future president of Czechoslovakia still credited it with changing his life. Václav Havel picked up The Velvet Underground & Nico while visiting the United States. He later said it…
- Thom YorkeThom Yorke was born on the 7th of October 1968 in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, with a paralysed left eye. By the age of six he had undergone five operations on it. The last, in his own word, was "botched", and it left him with a…
- Patti SmithPatti Smith, the American singer, songwriter, poet and author, lost her place in the middle of a song at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony in Stockholm. The date was the 10th of December 2016. She was standing in for Bob Dylan, winner of the…
- Todd RundgrenTodd Rundgren, born on the 22nd of June 1948, once called one of his own albums "my act of tyranny". He said it brought "a complete loss of about half of my audience". He said the episode became the model for the rest of his life. Rundgren…
- Phil CollinsPhil Collins is the only artist who performed at both Live Aid concerts on the 13th of July 1985. He crossed between London and Philadelphia by helicopters and a Concorde to do it. Born Philip David Charles Collins, he went on to sell an…
- Robert Smith (musician)On the 14th of October 2024, Robert Smith of the Cure said he plans to retire in 2029. His reasoning was tidy. He turns 70 that year, and 2029 marks 50 years since the band's first album, Three Imaginary Boys. Smith added a caveat: he has…
- St. Vincent (musician)The musician St. Vincent took her name from a hospital in a Nick Cave song. It is where poet Dylan Thomas died.
- Florence WelchFlorence Welch, the English singer and songwriter, chose the name of her band while the clock was running out. About an hour before her first gig, she still had no name to announce. Her best idea was Florence Robot Is A Machine, which she…
- Brian EnoBrian Eno once calculated that hearing every possible combination of a single one of his generative pieces would take almost 10,000 years. He is an English musician, record producer and visual artist, born Brian Peter George Eno on the…