Deep Purple’s longest-serving guitarist Steve Morse on the records, artists and gigs of lasting significance to him.

As their triumphant Instant Hologramstour wendsits way back to the UK, Stereolab promise “Morlock rock” and “radical joy”

Welcome to the second of our special Review Of The Year joint interviews. Here, indie provocateur BAXTER DURY and Sleaford Mods’ splenetic frontman JASON WILLIAMSON turn their attentions to the landscape, musical or otherwise, of 2025. Stand by for a bleak, brash, honest and often humorous assessment of the year just gone. Their conclusions? “We’re just flogging this dead horse, aren’t we?” they tell Mark Beaumont

30 JACKIE MITTOO Reggae Magic SOUL JAZZ ...

There’s more than a whiff of swing in the air–and on the airwaves. Will Hosie explores the resurrection of one of music’s most gentlemanly genres

Music was an all-consuming escape. Now, every song he writes is a love song At 16, I was just starting to take writing seriously. I became obsessed with lyricism and writing lines and my heroes were a