He turned down Hendrix, butted heads with Lemmy, was saved from a bad trip by Pete Townshend, present at a thousand pop-culture flashpoints… Ten Years After bassist Leo Lyons explains why he’s like “the rock’n’roll Forrest Gump”.

Guitarists Adrian and Richie prepare to take their side project on the road with shows in the UK.

With Joe Bonamassa having gathered the cream of the scene for the B.B. King’s Blues Summit 100 tribute album – and written the intro to this feature – we take an alphabetised look back at the blues legend’s classic tracks, hotel bombings, car crashes, conspiracy theories, towering infernos and more…

The Accidental EARMUSIC

Louisiana soul man ROBERT FINLEY overcame his hardscrabble origins, loss and blindness to finally find success in his later life. Amazingly, he believes he still has much to prove. “Most people retire at 65,” he tells Kevin EG Perry. “Hell, I came alive at 65.”

Thirty years after its release, Billy Corgan looks back at the making of The Smashing Pumpkins ’ era-defining big, bold, bombastic masterpiece Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness .