VBS.TV, a web-based TV station, have recently interviewed one of my favourite music artists Kevin Shields.

Shields, is the man behind the band My Bloody Valentine, one of the finest bands to come out of the late 80s and early 90s music scene, alongside fellow luminaries The Pixies and Dinosaur Jr.
2008 should be a great year as MBV are touring again, along with some brand new material which is rumoured to be appearing. Can’t wait, it’s only been 17 years since the last album!

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The hugely talented Shepard Fairey has created another art masterpiece, this time, for the great Led Zeppelin and their new compilation album Mothership.

Shepard, the creator of the OBEY brand, has designed some truly beautiful pieces of work over the last 15 years. He has a fantastic art style using a very limited colour palette, which is something I like to do in my work, which in turn creates a really strong graphical image.

Recent work includes posters protesting against war, the Walk The Line movie poster and numerous album covers for artists like DJ Shadow and Smashing Pumpkins.

Here’s a selection of some of my favourite Shepard Fairey pieces produced in the last couple of years…

On Friday 10th August 2007 the music world lost a very special man, the legend that is, Tony Wilson.

Tony Wilson, AKA Mr. Manchester, put Manchester on the musical map through setting up and co-founding both Factory Records and then The Haçienda (FAC51) nightclub. In setting up the Factory record label, he discovered some of the greatest music acts Britain has ever produced, namely the Happy Mondays, Joy Division and then New Order.

He will be sorely missed by me and millions of other fans of the Madchester music scene in the 1980s and early 1990s. As a small tribute to him I’ve modified the background of this blog, reflecting the classic poster designs created by Peter Saville for The Haçienda.

You can read more tributes on the Manchester Evening News website.

Keeping up her great history of highly original and album artwork is this, Björk’s latest album Volta.

The album artwork created by m/m along with photography by Nick Knight, both of whom have also collaborated with her last couple of albums Vespertine & Medulla.

Check out May’s issue of i-D magazine, it features one of my favourite artists Cat Power. Her last album was called The Greatest and I’m not going to disagree with her, its an absolutely amazing album.

Cat Power (real name Chan Marshall) is still a relatively unknown artist, but those that have heard her beautiful, soulful voice would struggle to think of a better female singer than her at the moment.