The latest Sonic adventures...

Cheer up! Yoko wants your smile at the Serpentine

Vending machines? They've been around for ever, we hear you say; what's so modern about them? Well, yes, they have been around a long time – but the products they now offer far exceed the expectations of any Victorian gent, the first to benefit from these coin-operated mechanical contraptions, which sold postcards as long ago as the 1880s.

'Grapefruit is a hybrid of lemon and orange. Snow is a hybrid of wish and lament."

A major retrospective of the man widely considered to be the world’s first video artist opens at Tate Liverpool this week.

Three days before he was gunned down, John Lennon complained about his critics - saying they were just interested in "dead heroes".

As music fans prepare to mark the anniversary of the Beatle's murder, Andrew Johnson reports on his ever-growing financial legacy

A jeweller whose clients have included Donald Trump and Yoko Ono has been convicted of murdering his wife by incinerating her in an oil drum. Werner Lippe, 68, of Cortlandt, New York, had confessed to the killing three times, but then recanted. He stood trial in February, but the jury was unable to reach a verdict.

The cuts have thrown up a philosophical debate, Catholics are claiming Homer Simpson, and the BBC is becoming a techno tyrant. Thank goodness for the wit of Paul McCartney

Don't hold your breath waiting for Beatles songs to go on sale at iTunes or other online retailers, Yoko Ono said yesterday.

Whether it's used purely for fun, or to make a statement, getting our kit off always causes a stir. John Walsh lays bare the history of nakedness

It's said that if you remember the Sixties, you weren't actually there – a saying variously attributed to Grace Slick and Paul Kantner, both of Jefferson Airplane, and Dr Timothy Leary, so-called "Galileo of consciousness". Barry Miles was there throughout: present at the recording of the Beatles' "A Day in the Life", the climactic track of Sgt Pepper, and at the live recording of "All You Need is Love", which marked the first global television link.

Decent Christmas albums don't come along that often – it's ten years since Low's remarkable Christmas, while the last unqualified success, Aimee Mann's One More Drifter in the Snow, arrived in 2006 – so we should celebrate an undertaking as poised and thoughtful as Thea Gilmore's Strange Communion, the best of this year's batch of seasonal offerings.

Advancing age clearly poses less of a barrier to pop success than in previous eras, as the recent chart placings of Bob Dylan and the Beatles can confirm.