Music News

Dame Shirley Bassey has announced the release of her first album in five years, 'Hello Like Before'.
The iconic singer has returned to the studio to record the collection of covers, which includes some of the greatest songs of the 20th century, to celebrate her stellar career spanning 60 years.
The most impressive track will see the 77-year-old star collaborate with 'Only Love Can Hurt Like This' singer Paloma Faith on a cover of 'Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend', made famous by Marilyn Monroe in the 1953 film 'Gentlemen Prefer Blondes'.
The collection has been recorded at the legendary Abbey Road studios in London with producer and musical director Stuart Barr, and will also see the Cardiff-born lass revisit her unmistakable James Bond theme 'Goldfinger' which she originally released in 1964.
Talking about returning to the well-known tune, she remarked: "I got a couple of notes wrong originally! After 50 years I got the chance to re-record it and get it right. It was great to record it in Abbey Road, wearing a gown!"
Elsewhere on the album - which will be released on November 17 - the star will cover some of her personal favourites including Sting's 'Englishman in New York' and 'Hey Jude' by The Beatles.

The full tracklisting is below:
1. This Is What You Are
2. Englishman In New York
3. Fever
4. I'm Still Here
5. Macarthur Park
6. Wild Is The Wind
7. Goldfinger
8. Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend (duet with Paloma Faith)
9. Here's To Life
10. It Was A Very Good Year
11. Hello Like Before
12. We Got Music (deluxe bonus track)
13. Hey Jude (deluxe bonus track)

Sir Paul McCartney says a show by Kanye West and Jay Z is his favourite ever live performance.
The 72-year-old music legend conducted a Twitter Q&A session with his two million followers and during it admitted that of the legendary acts he has witnessed over the last 60 years, a concert by the 'Watch the Throne' rappers was the greatest he has ever witnessed.
When asked by a fan what the favourite gig he'd been to was, he wrote: "There are many, but @S_C_ & @kanyewest comes to mind #askPaul (sic)"
The Beatles star also spoke to adorers about the tunes which he's enjoying at the moment, singling out the new single from the Foo Fighters, 'Something from Nothing', and acknowledging Sia's smash hit 'Chandelier'.
However, some users did prompt the 'Let It Be' singer for some sillier answers, with one asking: "Do you ever twerk #askPaul (sic)"
Paul responded by saying: "The last time I tweaked I was with @katyperry. She was rather good at it! #askPaul (sic)"
Paul ended the conversation by premiering an unreleased demo version of the Wings track 'Beware My Love', featuring John Bonham, the late drummer of Led Zeppelin, which will appear on a remastered edition of the band's 'Wings at the Speed of Sound' album.

S Club 7 have confirmed that they are reforming and their first appearance will be at 'Children in Need'.
The pop group took to their official Twitter account to post two messages announcing that all seven members will be performing together for the first time in 11 years during the BBC television fundraiser next month.
The band wrote: " There Ain't No Party Like An S CLUB Party . . . #SCLUB7 #Bringitallback #SC7
"It's official, we're back for BBC Children In Need #sclub7 #bringitallback #sc7 @BBCCiN (sic)"
The messages were accompanied by an audio clip on the 'Reach' singers' SoundCloud page in which they all announced: "We're bringing it all back for Children in Need 2014."
The seven-piece band rose to fame in 1999 with their hit single 'Bring It All Back' and released four albums and starred in their own TV show before announcing their split in April 2003.
It won't be the first time the 'Don't Stop Movin'' hitmakers have appeared on the telethon, as they performed the official 'Children in Need' single 'Never Had a Dream Come True' in 2000, and sang their hit 'Have You Ever' on the broadcast the following year.
The band told the BBC: "We're massive fans of BBC Children in Need and it was great to be able to support the charity all those years ago.
"We're really looking forward to bringing it all back for Pudsey, for BBC Children In Need and for all our fans who have been so great over the years. This is going to be the mega S Club party of all time!"
The announcement follows months of speculation that the band would be reforming for a tour following the success of other bands such as Blue, Steps and 5ive who have appeared on reality television shows documenting their return to music.
S Club 7 have not confirmed any plans to return to music full time, but it is believed that their future plans depends on how well their BBC performance goes down with audiences, when they take to the stage on November 14.

Candi Staton is very excited to be performing with rapper Little Simz at the MOBO Awards tonight (22.10.14).
The legendary singer will be taking to the stage at the ceremony at the SSE Wembley Arena for a special one off performance of her hit 'You've Got the Love' with the rising star, the first time she has ever performed the track with a rap part.
Candi knows very little about Simz and only met her at rehearsals yesterday (21.10.14) but their chemistry is great.
Speaking to BANG Showbiz, Candi said: "I hadn't met her, I'm not familiar with her music but I've read some of her lyrics, other than that I met her yesterday.
"She's a new artist though. It's going to be exciting for me too. I have never had anyone rap on you've got the love before so that's going to be different."
Candi - who released new album 'Life Happens' this year - had put forward the idea to duet with Sam Smith at the ceremony, as he is up for four awards and she is a huge fan, but the organisers couldn't make it happen.
The 74-year-old soul diva was first introduced to the 'Stay With Me' singer's music when she saw him performing on television and she immediately rushed out to buy his debut album.
She said: "When they first started to arrange it one of my publicists was thinking about coupling me with Sam Smith, I said, 'Oh wow!' I was so excited.
"He's a great singer, he's wonderful. I saw him on some awards show in America and everyone was talking about Sam Smith afterwards. I went to the store and picked up something by him straight away."
Other artists performing at the MOBOs, supported by HTC, include Jessie J, Nicole Scherzinger and Ella Eyre.
The ceremony will be broadcast live on ITV2 with a highlights show on ITV.

911 used to fix competitions for the "fittest female adults" to win - and then sleep with them.
The 90s boy band - made up of Lee Brennan, Jimmy Constable and Simon "Spike" Dawbarn - have claimed they enlisted the help of their tour manager to select the best-looking women who had entered their competitions, so they could try to bed the lucky ladies when they met them.
Lee said: "We used to have competitions and we got our tour manager to only pick out the fittest female adults.
"He'd keep the tickets and the nicest bird would win it because it was fixed and one of us would take her back and sleep with her."
The group - who have reunited on TV show 'The Big Reunion' - also revealed other naked antics nearly got them into serious trouble one night in Bahrain when they stripped off and went swimming in a hotel pool which nearly landed them 10 years in jail.
Spike told The Sun newspaper: "We were all naked in the swimming pool with our dancers. It's a Muslim country and we were all there with our danglers out.
"We were doing a show for the king. If we weren't doing that we would've been jailed for ten years.
"Instead, they just placed us under hotel arrest and deported us."
Five - who are now a trio made up of Sean Conlon, Ritchie Neville, and Scott Robinson - have also revealed they had some crazy experiences touring in the 90s, such as when former member Abz Love accidentally set fire to a hotel, causing serious damage to the building.
Scott explained: "We told the fire brigade it was a cigar in the ashtray by the window which set fire to the curtains.
"What actually happened was that Abz was flicking matches out of the window and one went inside the valance. It set the whole room on fire. That whole floor was shut for a year."

Kylie Minogue has cancelled the German leg of her tour due to "financial difficulties".
The 46-year-old 'Sexy Love' singer has been forced to cancel four dates for her 'Kiss Me Once Tour'.
The shows - which were due to start on Wednesday (22.10.14) in Cologne followed by concerts in Munich, Berlin and Hamburg - were cancelled amid the promoter's preliminary insolvency hearings.
Kylie announced the sad news via her official website. She wrote: "I am extremely disappointed that due to financial difficulties of the German promoter CT Creative Talent GmbH, I am unable to perform the scheduled shows in Cologne, Munich, Berlin and Hamburg.
"The Administrator who is now controlling CT Creative Talent GmbH, is unable to confirm that we have the venues and facilities needed to be able to put on the shows.
"I have always had great support in Germany from a loyal and loving fan base and I can't stress enough how difficult and disappointing it is to be ready to play the shows and to have been let down at the last minute."
She later tweeted: "German #lovers, I'm so disappointed I won't see you next week. We're working really hard to bring the KMO show to u soon. Keep you posted (sic)"

Orbital have announced they have split.
The dance duo - brothers Phil and Paul Hartnoll - have stopped working together and decided to call time on their career for a second time after initially disbanding in 2004 before reforming in 2008.
Paul - who formed Orbital in 1989 with his sibling - said in a statement: "Orbital had stopped working properly. We had a great four years since getting back together in 2008, but it was time to move on."
Orbital's last album was 2012's 'Wonky' and the group got their name from Greater London's orbital motorway, the M25, which played a key role in the early rave scene and acid house movement in the South East of England in the late 1980s.
Following the split, Phil is now going to release a solo album, entitled '8:58', on February 16.
Speaking about the LP, Phil has revealed it is inspired by his fascination with time.
He said: "I've always had a thing for clocks and for time as a powerful force - but also the way it oppresses you.
"It's one of those things I keep coming back to. For me, '8:58' is a moment of choice. It's almost 9 o'clock. Are you going to school? Are you going to this job you hate? Everybody faces that decision now and again - 8:58am is when you've got to make up your mind."

John Newman is "massively" excited by the prospect of writing a song for Rihanna's new album.
The singer/songwriter has already worked with the likes of Jay Z and Eminem during his career, and the 'Love Me Again' hitmaker is being lined up as a potential songwriter for the Bajan beauty's next LP, something he is eager to do.
The 24-year-old star told The Sun newspaper: "I'm writing for a lot of people at the moment. There's a lot of talk of me writing for Rihanna, which we need to look into. That would be massively exciting."
Although Newman occasionally appears on songs he writes for other artists, such as 'Blame' with Calvin Harris, he has no intention of duetting with Rihanna, 26, on the song he hopes to pen for her.
He explained: "I try to write a song a week but I don't feel I could release that much under my name because there could be too much of it. It's for them personally."
Jessie J is another artist who Newman recently wrote for, giving her the track 'Fire' for her third album 'Sweet Talker' - which was released last week.
Although they didn't get a chance to work together in the studio, Jessie took him for a special birthday dinner to thank him for writing for her record.
She told BANG Showbiz: "Unfortunately with John I didn't get to go into the studio with him but I took him out for dinner on his birthday and that was my thank you."

Nicki Minaj says 'Anaconda' is just a "normal" video.
The 31-year-old rapper attracted criticism for the highly sexual video which features Nicki in a g-string and a host of scantily clad babes twerking and writhing around to the music in the jungle-set promo.
However, Nicki insists she is bemused by the outrage her video caused insisting it depicted nothing more shocking than the dancing that would happen at a girls' slumber party.
Speaking to the new US edition of GQ magazine about 'Anaconda', she said: "I don't know what there is to really talk about. I'm being serious. I just see the video as being a normal video.
"I think the video is about what girls do. Girls love being with other girls, and when you go back to us being younger, we would have slumber parties and we'd be dancing with our friends."
The 'Bang Bang' hitmaker also claims one suggestive scene showing her with a banana is actually a reference to female empowerment.
Referring to the scene, she explained: "It's just cheeky, like a funny story. I'm chopping up the banana. Did you realise that? At first I'm being sexual with the banana, and then it's like, 'Ha-ha, no.'
"That was important for us to show in the kitchen scene, because it's always about the female taking back the power. If you want to be flirty and funny that's fine, but always keeping the power and the control in everything."