6 Music (BBC) have informed us that they will be broadcasting their archive recording of the Stranglers at the Reading Rock Festival in 1983. This material will be aired twice: on March 18 between 23:00 and 23:30 (UK time) and on March 23rd between 19:00 and 19:30.

The broadcasts can be heard online via www.bbc.co.uk/6music/.

We have received the following dates for Baz in April and May. For further information, check out the official Baz Warne site at: www.bazwarne.com.

Apparently, Sony Music Entertainment (UK) Ltd recently released "Sweet Smell of Success - Best of the Epic Years" (Catalogue number 5 099750 982624). We are currently waiting on further information from Sony.

The track-listing for this release is:

Sweet Smell of Success; 96 Tears; All Day and All of the Night; Shakin Like a Leaf; Big in America; Always the Sun; Nice in Nice; Let Me Down Easy; No Mercy; Skin Deep; Paradise; Midnight Summer Dream; European Female; Strange Little Girl*; Golden Brown*; Who Wants the World*; Nuclear Device*; Nice n Sleazy*; No More Heroes*; Peaches*.

"*" = Live

Many of you know Maaike Uijthoven from her dedicated work on the official Baz Warne site and from her photography of Baz, Paul and the Stranglers.

On February 6th, we received word from her mother that she had been involved in a serious accident and is now in hospital. Baz asked us to pass on his best wishes to Maaike for a speedy recovery through this site: sentiments that we at the Rat's Lair would also like to express.

Today (February 7th) we received an email from Maaike, who is now back at home. She would really like to thank everyone who sent her "get well" wishes (bflat@planet.nl) -- 10 Mb of messages so far!

As for the Baz Warne site, that will probably not be updated for a while. Maaike is also likely not to be too active on the internet, as she recovers.

According to the official Baz Warne site, MP3s of Baz's solo work and Sun Devils material have been posted to the www.mp3.com site.

JJ has informed us that he will now be playing the February "3 Men and Black" shows, with the exception of those on the 14th and 15th. Dave Sharp, of The Alarm, will be replacing JJ for the Derby and Wolverhampton dates.

From the information we currently have, the dates will be as follows. As always, these dates are subject to changes beyond the control of the artists, their managers or agents. Please check with the venues prior to travelling.

The official "3 Men and Black" site can be found here.

On February 14th, JJ will be the special guest for "Temple of Sound", at Le Botanique (l'Orangerie) in Brussels. The box office number is: 32 (0) 2 226 1251.

In support of the Croation Mine Victim Association (CMVA), Paul and JJ have recently been involved in the recording of a single called "Ordinary World", performed by "Below the Bridge" (formerly "B-Low"), a Croation group that writes and performs in English. This release will be sold as "a humanitarian single for the CMVA" and has been recorded to increase mine awareness as well as to raise funds for CMVA, leading up to the humanitarian concert "Mine Aid Croatia 2003", to be held in Croatia this summer.

Following the Stranglers' gig in Zagreb earlier last year, Paul and JJ subsequently returned to Croatia to record bass and vocals.

More information as we get it.

Welcome to the new-look Rat's Lair.

We have now stopped taking entries for the Fan Locator Map, which can now be found on its own page. We would like to thank the nearly 1300 fans, distributed over all seven continents, who contributed to this map.

The hit-counter has also been removed from the front page. This was getting increasing inaccurate, as not everyone comes onto the site via the "front door". We are now logging statistics in the background, so that we can see which pages are being used the most and respond to reader demand.

We get a fair number of enquiries regarding merchandise. Please note that we (the Rat's Lair) are not commercially affiliated with any of the official sites selling merchandise -- please direct any questions about any merchandise they carry directly to the folks at the appropriate site.

The Official Stranglers Merchandise Site can be found at www.stranglers.co.uk. This site carries various CD recordings, videos, a line of "album cover" t-shirts and the customised gold disc (see below), among other things. New or "renewed" fans (of which we seem to have many of late) may be interested in the double-CD documentary "Rock-n-Roll According To The Men In Black" by Dave Mason, which includes 3 exclusive acoustic tracks and covers the career of the band to date.

The official merchandise site also hosts a mailing list, through which fans can receive bulletins on merchandise and exclusive offers.

The Official Paul Roberts site ( www.paul-roberts.co.uk) offers a range of Paul's Albums and other recordings, plus a t-shirt and printed material.

The Official Baz Warne site ( www.bazwarne.com) offers a range of t-shirts, recordings, posters, etc. They are currently offering a 30% discount on t-shirts, plus a selection of special-deal packages.

The Stranglers came 19th in a poll of the "All Time British Artists" conducted by Virgin Radio in the UK. This poll was compiled by online voting and can be found in full at: www.virginradio.co.uk/tmusic/top100artists/

Ben Carlish, a freelance journalist based in Manchester has kindly provided an interview that he conducted with JJ recently. This, and other interviews, etc., form part of our reference articles section.

The Faith Band (Paul Roberts and company) have released an album comprised of 14 songs recorded during the October 2002 "Set In Stone" tour. Entitled "LISTEN?", this album features Paul Roberts, Baz Warne and Richard Naiff, with a guest appearance by Papa George.

The track listing is: When Reason Sleeps; Chasing Rainbows; New Mourning Town; Too Late; Postcard; Walk On By; Can't Seem; Wrong Connection; Eight Days; Grateful; Sinister; Dallas; Willing; Track 14.

For more details, visit: www.paul-roberts.co.uk

Please note that we now have a new email address: liggins@telus.net. The old address is still functional for now and the links on this site (to our email box) will be moved over to the new address shortly.

For the past 5 years, we have been accepting your entries on our "Visitor Distribution Map" on the main page. Following a major update of entries, we have decided to close this feature. As of today, we will no longer accept entries from the British Isles (as there is no more space to be covered). We will cease to accept world-wide entries after December 31st.

We would like to thank the 1200+ fans who have contributed to our map over the years.

We have just received confirmation that the Stranglers will be appearing at the Taksirat 4 Festival, Skopje Macedonia, on November 30th. More information can be found at: www.lithiumrecords.com.mk/eindex.htm.

The Rat's Lair team are now back from the successful UK tour. As always, we welcome your submissions of photographs and reviews (but cannot guarantee that anything we receive will be used on the site).

This tour featured some tracks that have not seen the light of day for quite some time, plus three new offerings. The play-list was (not necessarily in order):

Goodbye Toulouse; Peaches; Was It You?; Skin Deep; I've Been Wild; Walk on By; Mine All Mine; Coup de Grace; Golden Brown; Dead Loss Angeles; Tucker's Grave; Something Better Change; Grip; Curfew; Death and Night and Blood; Tank; Nuclear Device. First Encore: Never to Look Back; Duchess. Second Encore: Always the Sun; Five Minutes; No More Heroes.

The official merchandise site is currently offering a specially-commissioned and limited edition presentation disc, which was showcased on the recent UK tour. The disc itself is coated in 24 carat gold and is set in a Perspex-fronted gold metal frame. A gold metal plaque below the disc reads "Presented to (your name) by The Stranglers with thanks for your continued support over the past 25 years". The plaque also features copies of the band's autographs.

Full ordering details can be found at: www.stranglers.co.uk

"Euro Live" is a new Stranglers DVD, released by Zenith (catalogue number ZEN 003320) and first seen on the merchandise stand for the UK tour. This release features a recent European concert, plus a home movie of the band in Kosovo (including JJ driving a tank) and a history/discography supplied by the Rat's Lair. The DVD is coded for Region 2 (Europe) only and is in PAL video format.

The track-listing is:

Waltzinblack; (Get a) Grip (on Yourself); Skin Deep; Golden Boy; Coup de Grace; Nice 'n' Sleazy; Always the Sun; Thrown Away; Five Minutes; Valley of the Birds; Money; Strange Little Girl; Golden Brown; Goodbye Toulouse; Something Better Change; Who Wants the World; 96 Tears; Tank; Hanging Around; Duchess; Straighten Out; No More Heroes.

To order, check out the official merchandise site.

Once again, it appears that a Stranglers track is being used in advertising. We have received reports that "Hanging Around" is featured in a WonderBra advert which has, so far, aired in both the UK and France.

We have had a number of enquires regarding a remix of "Golden Brown". Apparently, Rebel Records have released a 12" vinyl containing two substantially "remixed" versions of this track from X-Ert Sound Systems (the folks behind "Clubbed to Death"), which bear only a passing resemblance to the original.

As with "Clubbed to Death", please note that these are dance tracks using licenced samples of Stranglers material and are released independently. As such, they are NOT an official Stranglers release.

The compilation "Out of the Black" has just been released on the Delta label (catalogue no. 4 006408 471035) in the UK. No word on any distribution outside of the UK at this time.

The track listing for this CD is:

God is Good; No More Heroes (live); Money; Little Blue Lies; Golden Brown (live); Coup De Grace (S-O-S); Miss You; Summer in the City; Valley of the Birds; Joy De Viva; No Reason; Strange Little Girl (live); Lies & Deception; Blue Sky; All Day and All of the Night (live); Always the Sun (live).