Suicide
Blank indifference, riotous mobs: for 30 years Alan Vega and Martin Rev have survived them all. In New York, Alan Licht hears how their latest album American Supreme ties up the loose ends separating proto-punk and electroclash

Invisible Jukebox: Tony Allen
Fela Kuti's ddrummer of choice downs sticks and gets in a blue funk trying to identify tunes by Parliament, James Brown, Can, The Temptations, Art Blakey And the Jazz Messengers, The Meters and more. Tested by Mike Barnes

John Stevens
Possessed with tireless creative energies and a desire to expand minds via improvisation, the British drummer's place in history is assured. Julian Cowley recalls the founding of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble in London

Mr Lif
A phantom presence in the new HipHop scene, the Bostonian rapper and onetime Company Flow associate survived the US education system to emerge with lyrical guns blazing against corporate America. By Tony Ware

Video Arcadia
Since Pong and Space Invaders touched down, videogames have become music's biggest entertainment industry competitor, their sound chips inspiring the otaku generation. Ken Hollings investigates the real sound of the suburbs

Alan Lomax
After a life devoted to tracking down and preserving the folk songs and traditions of the world, the celebrated musicologist died in July aged 87, leaving a huge and still largely untapped archive. Tribute by Chris Grier

Deerhoof
The San Francisco quartet talk to George Chen about bridging the divide between pop, rock, and experimental

Jazzkammer
Philip Sherburne meets the Norwegian duo who run the gamut of jazz Improve drone and modern electronics

BARK!
The sound hounds and improvisors reach outside their native Manchester to pull Ben Watson into their head-spinning sonics.

Global Ear
Thom Bailey hears disturbing ripples in Osaka, Japan's City of Waves

Epiphanies
Byron Coley's mind unspools to a cut-up classic by Orchid Spangiafora

Print Run
Previsioni Del Tempo (Forecast): Italian Instabile Orchestra, edited by Massimo Iudicone & Franceso Martinelli; Bright Balkan Morning: Romani Lives & The Power of Music in Greek Macedonia, by Charlie & Angeliki Keil; Music and Modern Art, edited by James Leggio;

Cross Platform
The LMC's radical Resonance 104.4 FM station has transformed London's airwaves, giving open house to anything goes radio. By Jerome Maunsell
Plus: Reviews of: Lightning Bolt DVD; Oddstruments and Sound/Shift

On Location
Whistle Concert: Hayley Newman/Steve Beresford/Matt Wand/Mick Beck, Birmingham CBSO Centre, UK; Lee Konitz & Kenny Wheeler, Warwick University Arts Centre, UK; Beck/Drenching/Pleasure + Larry Stabbins + Maggie Nicols Quartet, London Bonnington Centre, UK; Zeitkratzer: Pour Les Oiseaux, Pour Les Cage's!, Berlin Podewil Arts Centre, Germany