First published on The Alternative UK 08/12/18 Eight years ago Mick Jagger told the New York Times that the days of artists regularly making millions from the music industry are over. It bummed me out at the time because I’d just signed a record deal and I realised he was right. No-one was going to […]

The UK’s obsession with immigrants and benefit cheats shows the cowardice rooted deep in our national psyche. There is legitimacy in the concern that large immigration numbers might impact on the economy and quality of life for working families in the UK. Equally, it is easy to understand the upset caused by working our fingers […]

I’m in a bar with two friends I’ve known my whole life, one getting the drinks, one beside me on his phone. I can’t see what he is looking at but I’m 99% confident he is NOT sending an unsolicited picture of his dick to some unsuspecting woman on Tinder. That’s what I’d like to […]

First published on Pure Moth. Like many artists working in the record industry I’m on an independent label having had the obligatory major label experience. I’ve seen both sides of the industry at work and am aware of the failings and strengths of each. With this in mind I would like to suggest that if […]

First published on Pure Moth. The great European author and semiotician Umberto Eco once posited the idea that the Erasmus project, so beloved of students wishing to spend a free year at another university in the EU, should be extended to all professions. Far from being confined to the elitism of higher education, it should […]

Originally printed in New Statesman 01/05/15 Just noise? These days you’d be hard-pressed to find any credible indie rock kids willing to admit they’re Status Quo fans. There are no breakbeats, hip hop samples or underground indie kudos here. It’s just the old guard cranking out the same old hits of yesteryear, pushing nostalgia tours […]