When Pete Yorn needed to record in the past, he would just drive to his studio and record everything himself, surrounded by the city sprawl of Los Angeles. For 'Back and Fourth,' his new album due June 23,, he found himself driving around Nebraska, getting lost and looking at corn fields. Yorn recorded the album with producer Mike Mogis (Bright ...

PJ Harvey has long talked about her need to never repeat herself. Surprises, she says. Well, here's one: Harvey wants to branch out into comedy. "I love comedy," she tells Spinner. "It's one of my favorite things to do or see. And believe it or not, I have quite a healthy sense of humor. [laughs] Although it's not always that I'm portrayed like ...

Pete Yorn was having lunch with an old friend from Columbia's A&R department, who told him he should record with Charles Thompson. Yorn was puzzled. He remembers asking, "Who's Charles Thompson?" Thompson, of course, is better known to the world as Frank Black. Yorn was excited by the idea, but he didn't think it was a possibility. "I didn't ...

The current production of 'Hedda Gabler,' at Manhattan's American Airlines Theatre through the end of this month, marks the first time PJ Harvey has scored an entire work for the stage or screen. She told Spinner that only one thing has prevented her from taking on a project like this in her two-decade music career: No one ever asked. "All my ...

When you hear a little bit of Faces-era Rod Stewart when listening to Pete Yorn's latest, 'Don't Wanna Cry,' that may be more than a coincidence. Yorn told Spinner he had Stewart in mind when he recorded the song for his upcoming album, 'Back and Fourth,' produced by Mike Mogis and executive produced by Rick Rubin, due June 23. "The presentation of ...

PJ Harvey's new album with longtime collaborator John Parish, titled 'A Woman a Man Walked By,' doesn't hit proverbial shelves until March 31, but Harvey has already begun working on the follow-up to her 2007 solo album, 'White Chalk.' "I've demoed my own next record," she tells Spinner. "I'll hopefully be recording that in the spring of next ...

Polly Jean Harvey hit the jackpot in 1988. Back then, she was a small town teenager making trips to nearby Yeovil and in Sherborne, the closest place in her part of England that rock 'n' roll bands came to play. One of her favorites was Automatic Dlamini, led by singer/drummer John Parish. She had even asked them to play her 18th birthday party. ...