This week has certainly been jam packed with music news – here’s a roundup of the hot headlines hitting the press this week!

Pete Doherty has announced his forthcoming solo album will be released on March 16th and will be titled ‘Grace/Wastelands’. A debut single from the twelve-track album will be released March 9th, called ‘Last of the English Roses’. Blur guitarist, Graham Coxon, and singer-songwriter, Dot Allison, are just some of the names Doherty has collaborated with on the new album.

Boy George was sentenced to 15 months in prison on Friday after being charged with false imprisonment. The former Culture Club singer is said to have handcuffed and beaten a male escort at his East London flat in April of 2007. Boy George, real name George O’Dowd, denies all charges.

Katy Perry (pictured top) and her smash hit ‘I Kissed A Girl’ were incorrectly awarded the gong for Best International Song at the NRJ Awards in Cannes. The trophy was actually intended for Rihanna and her hit song ‘Disturbia’, but Perry was mistakely announced as the winner at the famous French award show.

Famous London music venue, The Astoria, closed it’s doors for good this Friday to make way for the new Crossrail transportation project. The famous venue, which will be completely demolished, has hosted a range of iconic gigs from The Rolling Stones, to Nirvana, to Radiohead.

Russell Brand (pictured top right) is rumoured to be releasing a novelty one-off single with the help of music mogul, Simon Cowell. The song, titled ‘The Chugga Chugga Song’, even comes complete with a supposed dance routine. Syco Records were apparently made aware of the song after Russell played the track on his now defunct Radio 2 show.

Damon Albarn has expressed concern over the upcoming Blur reunion gigs at Hyde Park this July. Following his playing of a 1997 live Blur session on Radio 1 this week, Damon said “I’m going to have to work hard to get back to that standard.”.

Lady GaGa (pictured left) is number one for the second week in a row this Sunday with hit track, ‘Just Dance’. The New York songstress is proving a big hit with music fans – her album, ‘The Fame’ is also notching at an impressive number three in this week’s album charts.

And finally, check out the new music video for the week – ‘Fonz’, by the brilliant Eugene McGuinness. The track, which is taken from his acclaimed self-titled album, is set to be released next month (February 23rd).

Russell Brand photo is taken from The Street Circus’ flickr stream under the Creative Commons license.

Sometimes a band comes across as a bit of a gimmick, a good one-trick pony. At first I thought The Polyphonic Spree were just this, a (large) collective with three albums of the same summery tunes. However, after being coaxed into going to see them, I quickly changed my mind – they’re a force to be reckoned with, ensuring that whoever is around them can’t help but feel the summer is here.

Opening up the show, a town crier and his son introduced the band with a bit of pantomime-audience participation, before a red banner was draped across the stage whilst the entire band assembled in their places allowing “musical director” Tim DeLaughter cut a heart shaped window into the fabric. The band revealed, things got off to a flying start. The band have ditched their traditional choral robes for this tour, instead opting for army-style jackets, all with the “Fragile Army” logos on – the Spree have got Political.

Flowing into one continuous piece of music, the 22 member band managed to remain as tight as anything, with DeLaughter directing all the action throughout. Epic wasn’t the word, as they plunged through a setlist that would keep everyone happy: from the diehard b-sides fan through to those of us who only knew the classics. “Soldier Girl” was thrown into the set quite early, providing a chance for DeLaughter to come down to the front, and get generally mauled by the crowd. “Hold Me Now” saw mass hug-sessions from groups of friends, loving couples, and the just plain drunk.

All too soon, it was announced that it was time for them to go, slowly leaving the stage one by one until only the harpist is left remaining, and crowd are left chanting for more. Soon enough, the band emerge. In the balcony. In their traditional robes. Congo-ing along the balcony rows, they make their way down to the stalls and through the crowd, making it up to the stage one by one, security counting them in and the band launching into one hell of a jam. Soon, Tim emerges, crowd surfing his way to the front to launch into a cover of Nirvana’s Lithium. To some of you, this will appear to be sacrilege, however it was absolutely amazing – the lyrics shining through and the self-loathing of the song becomes ironic with the whole band in tow.

Soon enough the end is upon us, DeLaughter seeming genuinely touched by the crowds reception, wishing a light-hearted farewell: “I hope y’all can still remember how to ride your bikes – you’re gonna need ‘em with this bitch of a tube strike!”, and with the final flourish of an old Tripping Daisy (DeLaughter’s old band) song “Sonic Bloom” they were gone, in a flourish of colour. Whilst we were coming down from the amazing high, we had to admit: they’re no one trick pony: they’re a force to be reckoned with. Make sure you catch them next time they’re in the capital.

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Everyone’s favourite crazy “cult” band, The Polyphonic Spree, have announced a one off London show.

They’ll be bringing their robes and feel-good summery tunes to the Astoria on Monday 3rd September.

Photo comes from Ian Mutoo’s flickr stream.

Interpol have announced a one off show at London’s Astoria ahead of their new album, ‘Our Love To Admire’ which is out on July 9.

The tickets went on sale at 9am this morning (yes, yes, I’ve been out shopping today so have only just found this out!)

Tickets available from See tickets for their latest date.

Photo taken from Pinkbelt’s flickr stream.

Normally support bands get better as the evening progresses. However, at last night’s NME awards show with We Are Scientists at London’s Astoria, this was not the case. Opener Switches started playing to a quarter full auditorium, and by the end of their set they’d converted virtually all those present.

The Southend-on-sea four piece led by the charismatic Matt Bishop took us on a romp through their brief back catalogue, with both energy and excitement. Sounding like they’d be right at home in the background of an episode of Skins on E4, they’re the anthem to a night out, and their set was all too brief. Highlights ‘Drama Queen’ and ‘Lay down the Law’ got the crowd going, and were everything the best support bands should do.

The stage was quickly turned around and soon the audience’s favourites Pull Tiger Tail came out complete with day-glo tubes and tiger masks (which they only remembered to put on halfway through). Sounding like a mix between the Killers, Panic! At the Disco and Klaxons, the London three-piece were loved by the girls on the front, whilst some of the older audience members looked on in bemusement. Their energy was briefly halted when Davo their bassist / keyboardist knocked his synths and keys off their stands, causing much amusement.

Going on the last two bands, I was hopeful that Australians “The Scare” would be amazingly good. How wrong I was. Coming on looking like the typical stereotype of the hard living rock stars, Russell Brand look-alike Kiss Reid gave it his all, telling us that we were “boring… come on, give it some”, before spending much of the last two songs in the crowd. At the end of the last song he was joined by his two guitarists, who seemed to think that we loved them more than we did. Their music was overshadowed by their dramatics, with their generic brand of rock proving as unique as everyone else.

Finally, We Are Scientists graced the stage, coming on, looking genuinely surprised to the audience’s reaction. Starting off with a new slow song ‘Spoken For’, WAS were on top form, ploughing through most of their debut album whilst also throwing in a few extra new songs. WAS’ new stuff was good, though nothing they played stood up to their debut album: hopefully they’ll have some better songs hidden up their sleeves. Their inter-song banter between Keith and Chris was amusing, though a little short compared to other times. Pretty soon they launched into ‘Nobody Moves, Nobody Gets Hurt’, when the place erupted into a sweaty mess that The Scare would have loved to have been a part of. Closing off the evening was the obligatory “Great Escape”, sending the crowd off into a frenzy once again, and bringing a brilliant evening of great (and not so great in the case of The Scare) music to a close.