Focus Music Notes. "Out of the Blues". Popular music through the decades

2010 has seen NYC based quartet The Drums go from being one of the most talked about new bands of the year to being the band most likely to make 2010 their own, with the release of their self-titled debut LP out on June 7th. Off the back of their critically acclaimed Summertime! EP - released in October 2009 on Moshi Moshi Records - The Drums took the coveted opening slot of the NME tour throughout February before being crowned winners of the "Philip Hall Radar Award" at the NME awards. Having played an intimate sold out three-date UK tour during the last week of March (where they were watched by Morrissey, Mike Joyce and Andy Rourke of The Smiths), the band has just put the finishing touches on their debut album, produced by lead singer Jonny Pierce. Joining the dots between the melodic glitter of sixties girl groups and some of Factory Records' finest, The Drums contains 10 brand new tracks with only summer hit-in-waiting Let's Go Surfing and torch-burning, heartb

Fans of English Soul are in for a treat tonight. If you can bear to tear yourself away from the football BBC4 schedule tonight (Friday June 18) includes: 9pm- Steve Winwood English Soul 10pm - Steve Winwood and Eric Clapton This is followed by 50 Years of Island Records Island Records who celebrated their 50th Anniversary in 2009, released the definitive career retrospective of this all-time great of the UK music scene on 7th June 2010. Entitled “ Revolutions – The Very Best Of Steve Winwood ” it is a portrait of one of the most influential British musicians in rock history, a singer-songwriter, peerless vocalist, guitarist and keyboard player. Click here to read all about Steve Winwood "Revolutions" Enjoy!

Welcome to the world of Kid Adrift. The Oxytocin EP is a personal manifesto from Iain Campbell, the brains behind the Kid Adrift project. It’s passionate, intense, and is set to establish him as a rare talent in 2010. With a demo of ‘ Red, Green and Blue ’ being picked up on radio last year, so far it has seen plays all over Radio 1, with Zane Lowe, Huw Stephens, Fearne Cotton and Rob da Bank, as well as featuring on BBC Introducing . Ambitious and creative in equal measure, live the band is a four-piece, and sure to become an essential live band in the coming months. ‘ Oxytocin ’ is a guitar led, with more brutal beats and waves of dense electronic waves whilst synthesized strings and mechanical beats bring the song to a thrilling crescendo.‘ Crash Therapy ’ hits with a wall of electronica, heavy and propulsive. With clear nods to Warp Records, its testament to Kid Adrift that this is very much his own work, a new unique voice for music fans to discover. ‘ Static ’ illustrates the

From Florence to Dappy, from Jay-Z to Alici a, they’re all agreed Drake is amazing and about to explode…The marquee signing to Lil Wayne’s Young Money Records , and without question the hottest, most exciting artist to explode onto the US music scene in recent memory, Drake will be playing his first ever UK headlining dates at London’s 02 Shepherd’s Bush Empire on Monday July 12th and Tuesday July 13th . The sense of anticipation for this 23 year old Canadian’s arrival in the UK is such that a second date had to be added after the original show sold out within hours of going on sale. Tickets are £25.50 in advance (plus booking fee) and are available at www.livenation.co.uk . The shows, ( featuring special guests ) will be the US superstar’s first headlining dates in this country and follow his recent special guest performances on Jay-Z’s June Manchester and Birmingham dates . Drake is also confirmed as special guest of Jay-Z for the Wireless festival on July 4th . The June dates prec

Bombay Bicycle Club release double A-sided single Ivy and Gold / Flaws on July 5th – the first release from their stunningly beautiful, new acoustic album also titled Flaws. Having finished recording their debut LP I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose in February 2009, the band went straight back into the studio (The Church, Crouch End) days after they submitted the master for I Had The Blues, and started the initial recordings for this album. Recorded in between touring over the past year and a half, a few early tracks were laid down at The Church and produced by Neill MacColl (guitarist Jamie's Dad), but the rest was recorded in singer, Jack Steadman's bedroom and produced by Jack himself. The album is characterised by a delicate, heart-swelling beauty and lightness of touch throughout. Those that had BBC pegged merely as an indie band may need to re-think. The A-side to the single Ivy & Gold (already made “ Hottest Record In the World ” by Zane Lowe on Radio 1) wrap

ROBBIE WILLIAMS releases a brand new single “ Shame ” on Virgin Records on October 4 . The single was co-written with Gary Barlow and is a duet between the two superstars. This is the first time the two of them have ever recorded and performed a duet together and the first time they have written and recorded a song together since Robbie's departure from Take That in 1995. The single is a brand new track which will feature on the forthcoming Robbie Williams 39-song greatest hits set “ In And Out Of Consciousness – The Greatest Hits 1990 - 2010 ”, to be released on CD and DVD on Virgin Records on October 11. The album is spread over 2 CDs and is the definitive hits collection of one of the biggest superstars to have emerged from the UK in the last 20 years. With a staggering 57 million album sales and 11 million singles sold, Robbie Williams has been breaking records over the course of his whole career.  7 No 1 UK albums meant he is easily the biggest selling solo artist in UK

Jack Johnson makes a hot return this summer with the follow-up to his previous two UK No.1 albums and his fifth studio LP ‘ To The Sea ’, released May 31st on Island Records. He released the album’s beautiful lead single ‘ You and Your Heart' and heads out on a mammoth world tour, which features four eagerly anticipated UK dates in June. The 18 million album-selling artist’s new record was recorded at the Mango Tree Studio in his native Hawaii and the Solar Powered Plastic Plant using 100% solar power. The 12-track record was written by Jack Johnson and produced by Jack with three-time Grammy winning producer Robert Carranza .“ I can’t tell you anything but the truth. ” sings Jack Johnson in his beautiful new studio album, To The Sea, defining the ethos of a man born and raised in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. You could say it was his late father’s solo sail from California to Hawaii that opened his son’s future fate and underpinned it with a personal mythology, but it was J