Quite what the inside line is behind the latest 'parting of ways' - that between the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and the US bit of Virgin Records - we're not sure, though it's hard to believe the EMI imprint would want rid of a band who seem to be very much still on the rise. Either way, BRMC confirmed yesterday that its two album relationship with Virgin was over and, while stressing this was a 'mutual parting of company', bassist Robert Turner's comment that "we are free free free from Virgin Records" suggests band / label relationships weren't on top form.

Confirming 'freedom', Turner wrote to his fans: "We've been fighting to get out of our record contract for the last six months and are sorry we couldn't tell anyone about this but it was a very delicate thing that we didn't ever want it to become ugly. There are many reasons we wanted to leave Virgin but instead of going into that, and digging up the past, we'd rather just look forward. "

"We're going back to basics, when things felt right and we did things more ourselves. This is actually the greatest day in our band's somewhat short history. As a lot of people know being off a major record label can be crippling to tours and band's can lose all tour support and funding. But we never had tour support anyway and we've always found ways to get by, so
we'll see you soon. And we have many plans for what we're going to do next and how and who with we're gonna release our records."