Scene and Heard: Tips for Electric Picnic

PICNIC PARTICULARS: The programmers at Electric Picnic have been doing their stuff for quite a few years, so hopefully the mellow tones of Portishead won’t jar with the exuberance of the Saturday mainstage crowd at 10.30pm.

They’ll be following Paolo Nutini, which won’t make their job any easier. Foals and Pet Shop Boys headline tonight, while Sunday is the real biggie with Lily Allen (below) (7pm), Beck (8.30pm) and Outkast (10.15pm). I’m looking forward to Outkast and Sbtrkt, while Irish Examiner music correspondent Ed Power has Pet Shop Boys, St Vincent and FKA Twigs at the top of his wishlist. Our resident blogger Eoghan O’Sullivan (The Point Of Everything) is tipping Metronomy, Portishead and Girl Band. Start your engines.

MUSIC NEWS: Neil Young has apparently filed for divorce from his wife Pegi after 36 years of marriage. According to Rolling Stone, the 68-year-old singer first met Pegi when she was working as a waitress in a diner in California. Meanwhile, Andre 3000 may be taking to the stage in Stradbally over the weekend, but we’ll be seeing a lot more of him from October 24, when the Jimi Hendrix film he stars in is released. Some of it was filmed in Dublin. If Prince was a bit younger, he might have been an ideal candidate for the Hendrix role, but his royal oddness follows the announcement of two new albums on September 19 with the release of a collaboration with Lianne La Havas from one of the records.