Sex Pistols John Lydon and Rolling Stones Ron Wood Want to Support Britney Spears

In a brilliant piece of publicity seeking SEX PISTOLS JOHN LYDON has come out saying he wants to write a song for troubled star Britney Spears- to help turn her life around

Apparently he can really feel for her and also wants to collaborate on a song with her.

He says, "I haven't written a song for Britney yet but I would love to. I'd like to help out because there's a girl who needs some help. She's been hurt. And hurt is the root core essence of good music."

Ronnie Wood has also offerred to help: he has battled alchoholism and went to rehab in 2006. He also seems to feel for Lindsay Lohan......

“The poor things. I’d love to help them, you’ve got to go through it to get to it. You have to experience all the lows because life is hard,”

They will both be lining up though it seems: Mel Gibson and Justin Timberlake are already part of her emotional support crew, as is Dr Phil.

Images: Courtesy Warner Bros/ Virgin/ Jive

Classic Albums ? Three 1950's Rock and Roll Cover Albums by John Lennon, The Everly Brothers and Sid Vicious (well kind of)

By coincidence I heard about three albums for the first time this week, all rock and roll cover albums, by John Lennon, the Everly Brothers and Sid Vicious (Kind of)

John Lennon's album, Rock 'n' Roll is (1975) has a pretty interesting history. Lennon was threateed with a lawsuit by Roulette Records for borrowing from Chuck Berry's "You Can't Catch Me" on his song Come Together and copying the line "Here come old flat-top" from the song. The company agreed to drop the suit if Lennon recorded at least three songs from their catalogue. When Lennon found out they were all 50's rock and roll numbers he decided to do a whle album. The album includes, "Be-Bop-A-Lula" (Gene Vincent), Rip It Up (Little Richard), "You Can't Catch Me" (Chuck Berry) and "Ain't That a Shame" (Fats Domino)
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The Everly Brothers also released a classic rock and roll cover album in 1964 called Rock N Soul. The country tinged harmonies of the Everly Brothers were enourmously significant in the history of rock, influencing both the Beatles and the Beach Boys, but for this album they relied on classic rockabilly and Rhythmn and Blues numbers like"That'll Be the Day", "I Got a Woman", "Hound Dog" and "Susie Q"

Last but not least (well maybe least) is Sid Vicious's contribution, Sid Sings, released in 1979. It features lo-fi punk versions of "Something Else" , "C'mon Everybody" and 'My Way" of course and stuff by the Stooges and the Ramones. It also has the very poor taste Pistols track Belsen Was a Gas. If you listen carefully you can also hear the sound of a fan who happened to be present for the recording shouting "yeah, yeah, yeah" much too often. Mick Jones from The Clash is also rumoured to be on it but their are no liner notes to speak of.

Image: Courtesy Apple/EMI

Mapping the Rock Genome: What Do The Sex Pistols and The Bee Gees Have in Common ?

Did you know that rock has it's own version of the human genome project with the site BandToBand.com which identifies all of the convoluted connections between one album or band and another.

Deep Purple, for example is connected to Porcupine Tree: Jon Lord was in Deep Purple and Whitesnake, Neil Murray was in Whitesnake and National Health, Pip Pyle was in National Health and Pyle, Iung and Greaves, John Greaves was in a band called The Lodge, Jakko Jacsyk from The Lodge was in Dizrhymia and their Gavin Harrison is in Porcupine Tree

Thanks all well and good but what about more unlikely combinations.

Sex Pistols and Black Sabbath ? No worries, you can trace the genome through members of albums from Sex Pistols to The Greedies to Thin Lizzy to Colloseum to Black Sabbath

Sex Pistols to Electric Light Orchestra ? Easy, Sex Pistols to the Greedies to The Rockers to Electric Light Orchestra.

Ok thats all well and good, but lets take the bar higher even higher....

Sex Pistols and the Bee Gees ? Paul Cook was in the Sex Pistols and the Greedies, Phil Lynott was in the Greedies and The Rockers, Charles Hodges was in the Rockers and Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, Cliff Bennett was in Toe Fat, Alan Kendall was in Toe Fat and the Bee Gees

So what about Kylie Minogue and BlueCheer ?

Dolly Parton and Megadeth ?

Head straight to http://bandtoband.com to find out

Images: Courtesy Paramount/Virgin