The View from Yoorp

My Books of the Year 2011

2011-12-29T16:55:00.005+01:00

Amazon Listmania list, with links to all the books on Amazon, here.

1. Stephen Pinker - The Better Angels of our Nature: The Decline of Violence in History and Its Causes
2. Norman Davies - Europe: A History
3. Brian Switek - Written in Stone: The Hidden Secrets of Fossils and the Story of Life on Earth
4. Ronnie Corbett - And It's Goodnight from Me
5. John le Carré - Our Kind of Traitor
6. Leonard Mlodinow - The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives
7. Steve Knopper - Appetite for Self-Destruction: The Spectacular Crash of the Record Industry in the Digital Age
8. Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow - The Grand Design
9. Oliver Sacks - The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
10. Michael Shermer - The Believing Brain
11. Jon Ronson - The Psychopath Test
12. Nick Lane - Life Ascending: Ten Great Inventions of Evolution
13. Jared Diamond - Collapse: How Societies Choose To Fail Or Succeed
14. Mark E. Smith - Renegade: The Lives and Tales of Mark E. Smith
15. Mark Stevenson - An Optimist's Tour of the Future
16. Penn Jillette - God No! Signs You May Already Be an Atheist and Other Magical Tales

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To...

2011-04-09T13:15:00.002+02:00

Vol. 40 April 2011
If you need the download link, contact me on Facebook / Twitter / by email / in the comments below.

1 Adele – Rolling in the Deep
2 Elbow – Neat Litle Rows
3 The Young Knives – Love My Name
4 The Duke Spirit – Everybody’s Under Your Spell
5 PJ Harvey – Let England Shake
6 Chapel Club - Surfacing
7 Radiohead – Morning Mr Magpie
8 The Strokes – Under Cover of Darkness
9 David Bowie – Hole in the Ground
10 Anna Calvi – Blackout
11 Smashing Pumpkins – Freak U.S.A.
12 Justice - Civilisation
13 TV On the Radio – Will Do
14 PJ Harvey – This Glorious Land
15 Kings of Leon – Pyro
16 White Lies – Bigger Than Us
17 Radiohead – Lotus Flower
18 British Sea Power – Living is so Easy
19 Elbow – Open Arms

My Films of the Year 2010

2011-01-13T09:01:00.003+01:00

1. Toy Story 3
2. Inception
3. Another Year
4. Animal Kingdom
5. The Town
6. 127 Hours
7. Four Lions
8. Winter's Bone
9. The American
10. Creation
11. Black Swan
12. True Grit
13. The Social Network
14. The Ghost Writer
15. Cemetery Junction

Haven't seen The King's Speech, Made in Dagenham, Machete, Enter the Void, Monsters, Scott Pilgrim vs The World, Kick-Ass, Shutter Island, Exit Through the Gift Shop and many others yet.

Best film from 2009 seen first in 2010: The Disappearance of Alice Creed

Worst film: The Expendables - I managed 8 minutes before switching it off.

My Books of the Year 2010

2010-12-31T00:25:00.002+01:00

Not all of these were published in 2010, that was just when I read them for the first time.

1. Matt Ridley - The Rational Optimist - persuasive arguments about the history and future of human civilisation
2. Derren Brown - Memoirs of a Conjuror - warm mixture of memoir and assorted anecdotes, shot through with unexpected vulnerability. His explanation of his life philosophy brought a tear to my cynical eye
3. Christopher Hitchens - Hitch-22 - written with his usual panache but with added poignancy given the circumstances
4. Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods - the audio book was the perfect accompaniment to many long walks in the spring of 2010
5. Stephen Fry - The Fry Chronicles - eminently readable, but what did we expect?
6. Chris Stringer - Homo Britannicus - a history of the presence of humans on British soil, taking us on a breathless trek around the various sites of prehistoric habitation in Britain
7. Ayaan Hirsi Ali - Nomad - not as fascinating as the first volume of her memoirs, but that was to be expected. Nevertheless some interesting insights into her life, work and philosophy
8. David Aaronovitch - Voodoo Histories - A good summary of major conspiracy theories. The cover blurb promises deep analysis of the phenomenon, which was rather lacking, however.
9. Alan Alda - Things I Overheard Whle Talking To Myself - a very enjoyable audio book read by the author, in which he muses on life's big (and small) questions.
10. Sam Harris - The Moral Landscape - this started out promisingly as a manifesto for a new evidence-based morality, but lost its way a little in the second half

My Albums of the Year 2010

2010-12-01T15:12:00.003+01:00

1. Gorillaz - Plastic Beach
2. Dreadzone - Eye on the Horizon
3. Klaxons - Surfing the Void
4. Slash - Slash
5. Kula Shaker - Pilgrim's Progress
6. Gogol Bordello - Trans-Continental Hustle
7. Interpol - Interpol
8. Chemical Brothers - Further
9. Alter Bridge - III
10. Grinderman - Grinderman 2
11. Groove Armada - Black Light
12. Iron Maiden - The Final Frontier
13. Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - The Logic of Chance
14. Maximum Balloon - Maximum Balloon
15. Baba Brinkman - The Rap Guide to Human Nature
16. Portugal. The Man - American Ghetto
17. Tricky - Mixed Race
18. Nas & Damian Marley - Distant Relatives
19. Menomena - Mines
20. Manic Street Preachers - Postcards from a Young Man
21. Foals - Total Life Forever
22. Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
23. UNKLE - Where Did the Night Fall
24. Kings of Leon - Come Around Sundown
25. These New Puritans - Hidden
26. The National - High Violet
27. Faithless - The Dance
28. The Black Keys - Brothers
29. Yeasayer - Odd Blood
30. Vampire Weekend - Contra

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To…. vol. 39

2010-11-18T09:32:00.004+01:00

Vol. 39 November 2010
Download here (large zipfile). Click on blue Download button then wait for the seconds to count down before clicking on Download File Now.

1 Klaxons – Echoes
2 Interpol - Barricade
3 Arcade Fire – Ready to Start
4 Manic Street Preachers – The Future Has Been Here Forever
5 Tricky – Kingston Logic
6 Gorillaz – Doncamatic (feat. Daley)
7 Biffy Clyro – Mountains
8 Dreadzone – Tomorrow Never Comes
9 Alter Bridge - Isolation
10 Maximum Balloon – Groove Me
11 Underworld – Always Loved a Film
12 Grinderman – Worm Tamer
13 Foals – Blue Blood
14 The Van Jets - Onawa
15 Menomena – Oh Pretty Boy, You’re Such a Big Boy
16 Baba Brinkman – She’s Ovulating
17 Kula Shaker – Winter’s Calling

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To…. vol. 38

2010-06-09T12:53:00.002+02:00

Vol. 38 June 2010
Download here (large zipfile). Scroll down to the blue DOWNLOAD button, the download should start automatically after 15 seconds. If not, you may have to click on the 'Download 0610.zip' link on the next page.

1 Gogol Bordello –Pala Tute
2 Blur – Fool’s Day
3 The Drums – Let’s Go Surfing
4 Muse – Neutron Star Collision (Love is Forever)
5 Chemical Brothers – Swoon
6 Smashing Pumpkins – Astral Planes
7 Faithless – Not Going Home
8 Foals – Miami
9 Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - Sick Tonight
10 Karen Elson – The Ghost Who Walks
11 Nas and Damian Marley – Tribes At War (feat. K’naan)
12 Arcade Fire – The Suburbs
13 Crystal Castles – Celestica
14 Gogol Bordello – Last One Goes the Hope
15 Chemical Brothers – Horse Power
16 Dreadzone – Gangster
17 Smashing Pumpkins – Song for a Son
18 UNKLE – The Healing

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To - Vol. 37 April 2010

2010-04-01T10:22:00.002+02:00

Download here (large zipfile). Scroll down to the blue DOWNLOAD link, the download should start automatically after 15 seconds. If not, you may have to click on the 'Download 0410.zip' link on the next page.

Vol. 37 April 2010

1 Slash – By the Sword (feat. Wolfmother)
2 Dan le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip – Get Better
3 The Radio Dept. – Heaven’s On Fire
4 The Dead Weather – Die By The Drop
5 Gorillaz – To Binge (feat. Little Dragon)
6 Cults – Go Outside
7 Black Keys – Tighten Up
8 Doves - Andalucia
9 David Byrne and Fatboy Slim – Please Don’t (feat. Santigold)
10 The National – Bloodbuzz Ohio
11 We Are Scientists – Rules Don’t Stop
12 Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip – Great Britain
13 Massive Attack – Pray for Rain (feat. Tunde Adebimpe)
14 Them Crooked Vultures – Mind Eraser, No Chaser
15 Stone Temple Pilots – Between the Lines
16 Broken Bells - October
17 LCD Soundsystem – Drunk Girls
18 Blood Red Shoes – Count Me Out
19 Lightspeed Champion - Marlene
20 Groove Armada – Shameless (feat. Bryan Ferry)

This Month I Will Mostly be Listening to...

2010-03-06T13:14:00.003+01:00

Vol. 36 March 2010

Download here (large zipfile). Scroll down to the DOWNLOAD link, then on the 'Download 0310.zip' link on the next page.

1 Gorillaz - Stylo
2 Broken Bells – The High Road
3 Crookers - Remedy
4 Jesca Hoop – Feast of the Heart
5 The Besnard Lakes – And This Is What We Call Progress
6 Groove Armada – Paper Romance
7 The Courteeners – You Overdid It Doll
8 New Young Pony Club - Chaos
9 Citadels – The Chemical Song
10 Yeasayer – O.N.E.
11 Gorillaz – Rhinestone Eyes
12 Them Crooked Vultures – New Fang
13 Blood Red Shoes – Light it Up
14 Groove Armada – Look Me in the Eye Sister
15 Vampire Weekend – Giving Up the Gun
16 UNKLE – Natural Selection
17 Bombay Bicycle Club – Evening/Morning
18 Florence and the Machine – You’ve Got The Love
19 Massive Attack – Paradise Circus (feat. Hope Sandoval)

This Month I Will Mostly be Listening to...

2009-11-24T18:48:00.004+01:00

Download here (large zipfile). Scroll down to the grey DOWNLOAD link, then on the blue 'Download 1209.zip' link

1 Muse – Undisclosed Desires
2 Yeasayer – Ambling Alp
3 The Rakes – The Light from your Mac
4 Raveonettes – Bang!
5 De Staat – The Fantastic Journey of the Underground Man
6 Wild Beasts – All The King’s Men
7 Peaches – I Feel Cream
8 Wolfmother – California Queen
9 Pearl Jam – Just Breathe
10 Biffy Clyro - Boooom, Blast & Run
11 Editors - Papillon
12 Bad Lieutenant – Sink or Swim
13 Skunk Anansie – Because of You
14 Ian Brown – Just Like You
15 Florence and the Machine – Dog Days are Over
16 Datarock – The Pretender
17 Kasabian - Underdog
18 Vampire Weekend – Horchata
19 Rammstein – Rammlied
20 Carl Sagan – A Glorious Dawn (feat. Stephen Hawking)

Top 75 Albums of the Decade 2000-2009

2009-10-10T20:08:00.000+02:00

Well it's that time of the decade again - eek! Ten years ago we were stocking up on tinned food and preparing for society to melt down after Y2K, as well as stocking up on champagne and party poppers ready for the party of the millennium. Sigh! Time, therefore, to take stock of the musical legacy of the decade. And thanks to blogs, filesharing, streaming, Youtube, the Hype Machine and specialist online radio stations, we've never had so much music at our fingertips before. So the job of distilling all these down to a small(ish) chart is by no means an easy one, but here goes...

1. War Stories by UNKLE (2007) Underrated stone-cold classic, featuring collaborations with the likes of Josh Homme and Ian Astbury. Dance grooves meet snarling guitars.

2. Kid A by Radiohead (2000) Groundbreaking follow-up to OK Computer

3. Return to Cookie Mountain by TV on the Radio (2006) In which TV On the Radio deliver on the promise of their debut album

4. Turn on the Bright Lights by Interpol (2002) Interpol's stunning debut channels Joy Division, Magazine and the Psychedelic Furs to create something dark, brooding and powerful

5. Blackbird by Alter Bridge (2007) This amazing album, by unreconstructed, devils-horn finger sign flashing heavy rockers Alter Bridge, manages to blend 70s hard rock with 90s grunge stylings, and features 14 classic tracks with no filler. Has been on heavy rotation here since its release

6. Is This It by The Strokes (2001) This album single-handedly kicked off the US hipster rock revival that brought us the likes of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Kings of Leon

7. Attack Decay Sustain Release by Simian Mobile Disco (2007) Best dance album of the decade (although Justice runs it a close second)

8. In Rainbows by Radiohead (2007) The hype surrounding its unorthodox release distracted from the fact that it is a killer album

9. Fever To Tell by Yeah Yeah Yeahs (2003) 'Maps' is arguably the anthem of the decade

10. Demon Days by Gorillaz (2005) Damon Albarn's music here transcends the cartoon-character focus of the debut

11. Youth & Young Manhood by Kings of Leon (2003) Outstanding raw bluesy debut

12. Cross by Justice (2007) Squelchy lo-fi dance with massive beats and hooks

13. Kasabian by Kasabian (2004) Britain's answer to the post-punk channelling of Interpol was a reinvention of Madchester, to great effect

14. Global a Go-Go by Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros (2001) A slow-burn grower, that I only really grew to appreciate after Joe's early demise

15. The Dream by The Orb (2007) A massive return to form for The Orb, thanks partly to the input of Dreadzone's Tim Bran

16. Dear Science by TV on the Radio (2008) More accessible than 'Cookie Mountain', this is a mesmerising success

17. Myths Of The Near Future by Klaxons (2007) Manic dance-punk meets art-rock

18. Come with Us by The Chemical Brothers (2002) The hipsters had moved on, and the Chems have struggled to get a good album review this decade. This remains a classic dance album, however

19. Reality by David Bowie (2003) Bowie's second 'return to form' album in 2 years. Since then, nothing. Please, sir, can we have some more?

20. Think Tank by Blur (2003) The sound of Blur working through the loss of guitarist Graham Coxon is eclectic yet surprisingly coherent

21. Silent Alarm by Bloc Party (2005) A reinvention of sophisticated guitar pop

22. Gorillaz by Gorillaz (2001) The hype initially distracted from the songs, but these have shone through in the long run

23. Black Ice by AC/DC (2008) Finely crafted hard rock album, packed with hooks and the trademark Young brothers' riffs

24. Oracular Spectacular by MGMT (2008) Hyped to death by the music press, it's a good job this album lived up to expectations, and more

25. Antics by Interpol (2004) Somehow deemed a 'disappointment' on its release, this builds solidly on their debut

26. Church Mouth by Portugal. The Man (2007)
This band came out of nowhere (well, nearly - Alaska) and blew me away with this album 2 years ago

27. Alligator by The National (2005)
Downbeat and eloquent, for me this was the National at their best

28. Vampire Weekend by Vampire Weekend (2008)
Audacious blend of preppy harmonies with African sounds

29. Push the Button by Chemical Brothers (2005)
It received another critical mauling, but this album starts with 3 classic dance-floor fillers and continues with one corker after another

30. Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not by Arctic Monkeys (2006)
For those of us who had been playing their demos on repeat for most of 2005, the quality of this album was no surprise

31. Hail to the Thief by Radiohead (2003)
Another album that suffered a critical backlash at the time - undeservedly, as this is a solid addition to the Radiohead canon

32. Heathen by David Bowie (2002)
Bowie 'return to 70's hey day form' shock horror album

33. The Satanic Satanist by Portugal. The Man (2009)
Highest entry on this list from 2009, PTM reach maturity with this wistful, idyllic album

34. All Hour Cymbals by Yeasayer (2007)
Soaring harmonies that nod to Fleetwood Mac, simple yet complex pop melodies. If you haven't it heard it yet, do so

35. Amnesiac by Radiohead (2001)
A dense, dark album, recorded at the same time as Kid A

36. We Are the Night by The Chemical Brothers (2007)
The knockers continue to knock, but the Chems continue to deliver - this time the dance-floor fillers are leavened with more psychedelic fare

37. Songs For The Deaf by Queens Of The Stone Age (2002)
Acclaimed 3rd album by QOTSA. Features the track 'No One Knows'

38. Our Love to Admire by Interpol (2007)
The critics were sharpening their knives, but Interpol delivered a 3rd album which revealed progression, improved songwriting and heart-on-sleeve lyrics

39. Invaders Must Die by The Prodigy (2009)
The Prodigy are back, motherf***ers

40. The Back Room by Editors (2005)
'The British riposte to Interpol' - sums it up really. Their second album lost it a bit, but this was majestic

41. A Rush of Blood to the Head by Coldplay (2002)
42. We Are the Physics Are OK At Music by We Are the Physics (2008)
43. Nite Versions by Soulwax (2005)
44. Era Vulgaris by Queens Of The Stone Age (2007)
45. Black Sheep by Julian Cope (2008)
46. You Have No Idea What Youre Getting Yourself Into by Does It Offend You Yeah? (2008)
47. Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends by Coldplay (2008)
48. The Age Of Understatement by The Last Shadow Puppets (2008)
49. Only by the Night by Kings of Leon (2008)
50. Censored Colors by Portugal The Man (2008)
51. As Heard on Radio Soulwax Vol.2 by 2 Many DJs (2003)
52. The Eraser by Thom Yorke (2006)
53. Franz Ferdinand by Franz Ferdinand (2004)
54. West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum by Kasabian (2009)
55. Derdang Derdang by Archie Bronson Outfit (2006)
56. Acres of Dead Space Cadets by Elle Milano (2008)
57. Angles by Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip (2008)
58. Pocket Revolution by dEUS (2005)
59. The Loon by Tapes 'N Tapes (2006)
60. Crystal Castles by Crystal Castles (2008)
61. Colour It In by The Maccabees (2008)
62. LCD Soundsystem by LCD Soundsystem (2005)
63. Made in the Dark by Hot Chip (2008)
64. Hot Fuss by The Killers (2004)
65. Funeral by Arcade Fire (2005)
66. Voices of Animals and Men by The Young Knives (2006)
67. Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever by The Cribs (2007)
68. Favourite Worst Nightmare by Arctic Monkeys (2007)
69. Cuts Across The Land by The Duke Spirit (2005)
70. Guero by Beck (2005)
71. Show Your Bones by Yeah Yeah Yeahs (2006)
72. The Warning by Hot Chip (2006)
73. Box of Secrets by Blood Red Shoes (2008)
74. Antidotes by Foals (2008)
75. Idealism by Digitalism

Also available as Amazon Listmania! lists here, here and here:

This Month I Will Mostly be Listening To...

2009-09-01T16:25:00.001+02:00

Download here (large zipfile). Scroll down to the blue Download button, which may or may not be sandwiched between two rows of adverts, then on the 'Download 0909.zip' link

Vol. 34 September 2009

1 Reverend and the Makers – Silence is Talking
2 Manic Street Preachers – Peeled Apples
3 Arctic Monkeys – Crying Lightning
4 Florence and the Machine – Drumming
5 Ian Brown – Marathon Man
6 The Dead Weather – Hang Me From the Heavens
7 Cornershop – Who Fingered Rock 'n Roll
8 Wolfmother – New Moon Rising
9 Simian Mobile Disco – Cruel Intentions
10 Pearl Jam – The Fixer
11 Julian Plenti – Only If You Run
12 Portugal. The Man – The Sun
13 Kasabian – Secret Alphabets
14 The XX - Crystalised
15 Biffy Clyro – That Golden Rule
16 Arctic Monkeys – My Propeller
17 Radiohead – These Are My Twisted Words
18 Ian Brown - Stellify
19 Calvin Harris – Dance Wiv Me (feat. Dizzee Rascal)
20 Modest Mouse – Autumn Beds

First 6 months of 2009

2009-06-15T14:23:00.006+02:00

As we near the halfway mark in the year, I thought I'd make a list of my favourite albums of the year so far.

1. The Prodigy - Invaders Must Die - massive return to form
2. Portugal. The Man - Satanic Satanist - last minute addition to the list, leaked just in time, it's another masterpiece from Alaska's finest
3. Kasabian - West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum
4. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It's Blitz!
5. White Lies - To Lose My Life
6. Franz Ferdinand - Tonight
7. Fever Ray - Fever Ray
8. The Asteroids Galaxy Tour - Fruit
9. Emiliana Torrini - Me & Armini
10. Jarvis Cocker - Further Complications
11. The Maccabees - Wall of Arms
12. Morrissey - Years of Refusal
13. U2 - No Line on the Horizon
14. Doves - Kingdom of Rust
15. Bat for Lashes - Two Suns
16. Neil Young - Fork in the Road
17. Various - War Child presents Heroes
18. The BPA - I Think We're Gonna Need a Bigger Boat
19. The Veils - Sun Gangs
20. PJ Harvey and John Parish - A Woman A Man Walk By

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To...

2009-06-15T14:09:00.001+02:00

Vol. 33 July 2009

Download here (large zipfile). Scroll down to the blue Download button, which may or may not be sandwiched between two rows of adverts, then on the 'Download 0709.zip' link

1 Placebo - For What It’s Worth
2 Gossip – Heavy Cross
3 Kasabian - Fire
4 Simian Mobile Disco – The Audacity of Huge (feat. Chris Keating)
5 Jarvis Cocker - Angela
6 Doves – The Greatest Denier
7 Little Boots – New in Town
8 The Dead Weather – Treat Me Like Your Mother
9 Hot Chip - Transmission
10 The Maccabees – No Kind Words
11 Franz Ferdinand – Can’t Stop Feeling
12 We Have Band – You Came Out
13 Ladyhawke – Back of the Van
14 White Lies - Death
15 Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Heads Will Roll
16 Prodigy – Warrior’s Dance
17 Metric – Satellite Mind
18 Bombay Bicycle Club – Dust on the Ground
19 Graham Coxon – Sorrow’s Army
20 TV On the Radio – Heroes

My Albums of the Year 2008

2009-06-15T14:02:00.003+02:00

Somehow I forgot to post this here in January. Silly me. So here it is now. AC/DC looks very unlikely at the top of the list, and I must admit it has faded from view in the first 6 months of 2009, but then again what hasn't? With the constant onslaught of new albums to listen to, there are very few that stay in heavy rotation for long. But it definitely did give me the most pleasure of any album last year, and I think it will be remembered as a classic rock album.

1. AC/DC - Black Ice
2. TV On the Radio - Dear Science
3. We Are the Physics - We Are the Physics Are OK At Music
4. Julian Cope - Black Sheep
5. Coldplay - Viva La Vida
6. MGMT - Oracular Spectacular
7. Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles
8. Hot Chip - Made in the Dark
9. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
10. Does It Offend You Yeah? - You Have No Idea What You Are Getting Yourself Into
11. The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age of the Understatement
12. Portugal.The Man - Censored Colors
13. Late of the Pier - Fantasy Black Channel
14. Justice - Planisphère (EP but so what?)
15. These New Puritans - Beat Pyramid
16. Wolf Parade - At Mount Zoomer
17. The Dandy Warhols - Earth to the Dandy Warhols
18. Tricky - Knowle West Boy
19. Asian Dub Foundation - Punkara
20. The Pretenders - Break Up the Concrete
21. O Fracas - Fits and Starts
22. Foals - Antidotes
23. The Kills - Midnight Boom
24. dEUS - Vantage Point
25. Elle Milano - Acres of Dead Space Cadets
26. Metronomy - Nights Out
27. Duels - The Barbarians Move In
28. Operator Please - Yes Yes Vindictive
29. Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - Angles
30. Beck - Modern Guilt
31. Kings of Leon - Only By the Night
32. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!!
33. Portishead - Third
34. Hercules & Love Affair
35. Various - Fabriclive 41 - Simian Mobile Disco
36. REM - Accelerate
37. The Whip - X Marks Destination
38. Ladytron - Velocifero
39. The Courteeners - St Jude
40. We Are Scientists - Brain Thrust Mastery
41. Soulwax - The Mashup Machine
42. I Am Kloot - Play Moolah Rouge
43. The Gutter Twins - Saturnalia
44. Correcto - Correcto
45. The Raconteurs - Consolers of the Lonely
46. Fear of Music - Actor/Actress
47. Ghostland Observatory - Robotique Majestique
48. The Cure - 4.13 Dream
49. Was (Not Was) - Boo
50. The Rascals - Rascalize

Final Vinyl - please

2009-06-04T10:23:00.003+02:00

So Jack White thinks vinyl is going to save music, does he? Well as someone who was buying music before he was born (first single: Popcorn by Hot Butter, bought 2nd hand from a market in 1971, first album The Sweet’s Biggest Hits) I have plenty of history with vinyl. I spent my college years moving from one shared house to another, carefully packing my precious collection of records and cassettes in crates and lovingly transporting them to each new location. A collection which, with regular investment on an extremely limited budget, slowly grew to be something I was proud of at the time - a couple of hundred albums(!). So I think I know enough about it to list some of the down sides of Jack’s plan:

- Vinyl is heavy. Schlepping crates around is a pain and can easily result in damage to your back or to the records themselves
- Vinyl is fragile – albums can warp due to heat, due to their own weight or due to pressure during storage, and scratches can mysteriously appear on irreplaceable items.
- Album covers are vulnerable to damp and mould
- Music on vinyl is not exactly portable, you have to play it on specialized equipment in a specific location
- Vinyl offers a maximum of 25 minutes continuous music

Given my nomadic lifestyle at the time, the arrival of Walkmans and ghetto blasters in the early 80s already made me favour cassettes over vinyl for portability. But when CDs exploded in the late 80s, their low size, weight and fragility made them the perfect replacement of vinyl, and I stopped buying vinyl altogether. Then in the mid-90s, affordable PCs with CD-rom burners came along which made it possible to make perfect copies of audio CDs, and a worthy successor to the audio cassette had arrived. Suddenly you could make perfect copies of any CDs you could borrow off your friends or from a library. Finally, around the turn of the millennium, decent quality MP3 formats and software showed up, which allowed you to make your own compilations, and upload and download music.

Thanks to all these post-vinyl innovations, I and millions of people like me now have music collections running into the thousands of albums, rather than hundreds. We have discovered artists we would never have heard of and go to more concerts than ever – I, for example, went to 16 gigs and 2 festivals in the 3-year period 1996 - 1998, compared to 33 gigs and 6 festivals in 2006 - 2008.

Vinyl will never return to the mainstream. Vinyl is for music snobs with deep pockets. Vinyl is a fad. There’s another format for music which is also gaining a lot of popularity at the moment, and for which I foresee a much rosier future - on-demand streaming services such as Spotify. If I were Jack White, I would try to switch bandwagons as quickly and quietly as I could, before the vinyl fad passes and he's left looking rather foolish…

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To... Vol. 32 April 2009

2009-03-31T10:21:00.005+02:00

This compilation has somehow slipped into a bi-monthly cycle in the last 6 months, but I think this schedule works ok. Maybe I should change the name to 'This Bi-month I will Mostly be Listening To'... or not, eh. Let me know what you think in the comments - should I make more of an effort to get one out every month like in the past, or are you happy with it like this? And if the latter, does it need a name change? Suggestions?

Download it here. (Scroll down to the blue Download button, which may be sandwiched between two rows of adverts)

1 Depeche Mode - Wrong
2 Bloc Party – One Month Off
3 Royksopp – Happy Up Here
4 The Maccabees – Love You Better
5 Pearl Jam - Brother
6 Fischerspooner – The Best Revenge
7 U2 - Magnificent
8 Maximo Park - Wraithlike
9 Peter, Bjorn & John- Nothing to Worry About
10 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Zero
11 Calvin Harris – I’m Not Alone
12 PJ Harvey & John Parrish – Black Hearted Love
13 Noisettes – Don’t Upset the Rhythm
14 White Lies – Farewell to the Fairground
15 Thermals – When I Died
16 Oasis – Falling Down
17 The Rakes - 1989
18 The Horrors – Sea Within a Sea
19 Doves – Kingdom of Rust
20 Kings of Leon - Revelry

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To...

2009-01-27T10:56:00.002+01:00

Vol. 31 February 2009
Download here - scroll down to blue Download button (in between the 2 rows of adverts)

1 Franz Ferdinand - Ulysses
2 The Prodigy - Omen
3 Morrissey – I’m Throwing My Arms Around Paris
4 Sky Larkin - Beeline
5 M.I.A. – Paper Planes
6 U2 – Get on Your Boots
7 Kaiser Chiefs – Good Days Bad Days
8 White Lies – To Lose My Life
9 The Brighton Port Authority – Toe Jam (feat. David Byrne & Dizzee Rascal)
10 Cut Off Your Hands – Oh Girl
11 Nirvana vs Destiny’s Child – Smells Like Booty (finally a proper release for this classic Soulwax mashup!)
12 CSS - Move
13 Franz Ferdinand – No You Girls
14 James Yuill – No Pins Allowed
15 Brakes – Hey Hey
16 Santogold – Say Aha
17 Morrissey – Something is Squeezing My Skull
18 Justice – The Party
19 Kings of Leon – Use Somebody
20 Pete & The Pirates – Blood Gets Thin
21 The Asteroids Galaxy Tour – The Sun Ain’t Shining No More
22 Late of the Pier – Random Firl
23 AC/DC – Big Jack
24 Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip – Thou Shalt Always Kill (De La Edit)

2008-12-30T00:34:00.003+01:00

STORM by Tim Minchin, 2008.

In a North London top floor flat,
All white walls, white carpet, white cat.
Rice paper partition, Modern art And Ambition

The host's a physician,
Lovely bloke,
Has his own practice,
His girlfriend's an actress -
An old mate of ours from home,
And they're always great fun,
So to dinner we've come -

The fifth guest is an unknown,
The hosts have just thrown us
together for a favour.
The girl's just arrived from Australia,
And she's moved to North London,
And she's a sister of someone.
Or has - some connection.

As we make introductions,
I'm struck by her beauty,
She's irrefutably fair,
With dark eyes and dark hair.
But as she sits, I admit:
I'm a little bit wary,
As I notice the tip,
Of the wing of a fairy,
Tattooed on that popular area,
Just above the derrière,
And when she says "I'm Sagittarius!"

I confess, a pigeonhole starts to form,
And is immediately filled with pigeon,
When she says her name is *Storm*

Conversation is initially bright and light-hearted,
But it's not long before Storm gets started.

"You can't know anything.
Knowledge is merely opinion."

She opines over her Cabernet Sauvignon
Vis-à-vis,
Some unhappily empirical comment made by me.
Not a good start I think,
We're only on pre-dinner drinks,
And across the room my wife widens her eyes,
Silently begging me "Be nice!"

A matrimonial warning,
Not worth ignoring.
So,

I resist the urge to ask Storm,
Whether knowledge is so loose weave,
Of a morning, when deciding whether to leave,
Her apartment by the front door,
Or the window on the second floor.

The food is delicious,
And Storm whilst avoiding all meat,
Happily sits and eats,
As the good doctor slightly pissedly holds court on some anachronistic aspect of medical history.

When Storm suddenly insists:
"But the human body is a mystery
Science just falls in a hole
When it tries to explain the nature of the soul."

My hostess throws me a glance,
She, like my wife, knows there's a chance,
I'll be off on one of my rare, but fun, rants.
But I shan't, My lips are sealed,
I just want to enjoy the meal.

And although Storm is starting to get my goat,
I have no intention of rocking the boat,
Although it's becoming a bit of a wrestle,
Because, like her meteorological namesake,
Storm has no such concerns for our vessel.

Pharmaceutical companies are an enemy,
They promote drug dependency,
At the cost of the natural remedies,
That are all our bodies need,
They're immoral and driven by greed,
Why take drugs when herbs can solve it?
Why do chemicals when
Homeopathic solvents can resolve it?
I think it's time we all return to live,
With natural medical alternatives.

And try as I like,
A small crack appears in my diplomacy dyke.

By definition, (I begin)
Alternative medicine, (I continue)
Has either not been proved to work,
Or been proved, not to work.
Do you know what they call
'Alternative Medicine'
That's been proved to work?

-- Medicine

So you don't believe in any natural remedies?
On the contrary, Storm, actually,
Before we came to tea,
I took a natural remedy,
Derived from the bark of a willow tree.
It's a painkiller, virtually side-effect free.
It's got a, a weird name,
Darling, what was it again?
Maspirin?
Baspirin? Oh, yeah -
Aspirin!
Which I paid about a buck for,
Down at the local drugstore.

The debate briefly abates,
As my hosts collect plates.
But as they return with dessert,
Storm pertly asserts,
Shakespeare said it first:
There are more things in
Heaven and Earth,
Than exist in your philosophy
Science is just how we're trained, to look at reality,
It doesn't explain, Love or spirituality.
How does Science explain
Psychics, auras, the afterlife,
The power of prayer?

I'm becoming aware,
That I'm staring,
I'm like a rabbit suddenly trapped,
In the blinding headlights of vacuous crap.
Maybe it's the Hamlet,
She just misquothed,
Or the fifth glass of wine I just quaffed.
But my diplomacy dyke groans,
And the arsehole held back by its stones
Could be held back no more.

Look up, Storm, So I don't need to bore ya,
But there's no such thing as an aura,
Reading auras is like reading minds,
Or tea leaves, or star-signs,
Or meridian lines.
These people aren't plying a skill,
They're either lying, or mentally ill.
Same goes for people who claim
To hear God's demands,
Spiritual healers who think
They've got magic hands.
By the way, why do we think it's okay,
For people to pretend they can talk to the dead?
Isn't that totally fucked in the head?
Lying to some crying woman whose child has died,
And telling me you're in touch with the other side?
I think that's fundamentally sick.
Do I need to clarify here,
That there's no such thing as a psychic?

What are we - fucking two?
Do we actually think that
Horton heard a Who?
Do we still believe that Santa brings us gifts,
That Michael Jackson didn't have facelifts?
Or are you still so stunned
by circus tricks,
That we think the dead would
Wanna talk to pricks like John Edward?

Storm, to her credit,
Despite my derision
Keeps firing off cliches
With startling precision
Like a sniper using
Bollocks for ammunition.

You're so sure of your position,
But you're just close-minded,
I think you'll find tat
Your FAITH in science and tests,
Is just as blind as the
faith of any fundamentalists,

Wow, that's a good point,
Let me think for a bit.
Oh wait, my mistake,
That's absolute bullshit.
Science adjusts its views
Based on what's observed.
Faith is the denial of observation,
so that belief can be preserved.

If you show me that, say,
Homeopathy works,
I will change my mind,
I will spin on a fucking dime.
I'll be as embarassed as hell,
Yet I will run through the streets yelling,
It's a MIRACLE!
Take physics and bin it!
Water has memory!
And whilst its memory
Of a long lost drop of onion juice is infinite,
It somehow forgets all the poo it's had in it.

You show me that it works,
And how it works,
and when I've recovered,
from the shock,
I will take a compass and carve
'Fancy That',
On the side of my cock.

Everyone's just staring now,
But I'm pretty pissed and I've dug this far down.
So I figure.. In for a penny, in for a pound!

Life is full of mystery, yeah,
but,
there are answers out there.
And they won't be found,
By people sitting around,
Looking serious,
And saying: Isn't life mysterious,
Let's sit here and hope,
Let's call up the fucking Pope,
Let's go on Oprah,
And Interview Deepak Chopra.

If you must watch telly,
you should watch Scooby-Doo,
That show was so cool!
Because every time
There was a church with a ghoul,
Or a ghost in a school,
They looked beneath the mask.
And what was inside?
The fucking janitor,
or the dude who ran the water slide!
Because,
throughout history,
every mystery
ever solved,
Has turned out to be -
Not Magic!

Does the idea that
there might be knowledge frighten you?
Does the idea that
one afternoon on Wiki-fucking-pedia
Might enlighten you,
Frighten you?
Does the notion that there might not be a supernatural,
so blow your hippy noodle,
that you'd rather just stand in the fog of your
Inability to google?

Isn't this enough?
Just,
this world?

Just this
Beautiful,
Complex,
Wonderfully Unfathomable,
Natural World?

How does it so fail to hold our attention
That we have to diminish it
with the invention
of cheap man-made
myths and monsters?
If you're so into your Shakespeare,
Lend me your ear
To gild refined gold,
To paint the lily,
To throw perfume on the violet,
Is just fucking silly
Or something like that.
Or what about Satchmo?
I see trees of green,
Red roses too...

And fine, if you wish to,
Glorify Krishna and Vishnu,
In a post-colonial,
Condescending,
Bottled-up-and-labeled
kind of way,
Whatever, That's okay.

But, here's what gives me a hard-on,
I'm a tiny, insignificant
Ignorant bit of carbon.
I have one life,
And it is short and unimportant,
But thanks to recent scientific advances...

I get to live twice as long,
As my great-great-great-great
uncleses and auntses.

Twice as long!
To live this life of mine,
Twice as long,
To love this wife of mine.
Twice as many years,
Of friends, of wine,
Of sharing curries and getting shitty,
At good looking hippies,
With fairies on their spines,
And butterflies on their titties.

And if perchance, I have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,

We'd as well be ten minutes back in time
For all the chance you'll change your mind.

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To...

2008-12-15T15:13:00.001+01:00

Download it here (scroll down to the blue Download button)

Vol. 30 December 2008

…featuring the usual recent favourites plus some hitherto missed gems from 2008

1 The Asteroids Galaxy Tour – Around the Bend
2 AC/DC – Rock n Roll Train
3 The Ting Tings – Shut Up and Let Me Go
4 The Cure – The Only One
5 MGMT – Electric Feel
6 Chemical Brothers – Keep My Composure
7 Fleet Foxes – White Winter Hymnal
8 Santogold – Les Artistes
9 Midnight Juggernauts – Into the Galaxy
10 Kings of Leon - Crawl
11 The Pretenders – Boots of Chinese Plastic
12 Simian Mobile Disco – Sport Music
13 Ida Marie – I Like You So Much Better When You’re Naked
14 Cut Off Your Hands – Happy As Can Be
15 TV On the Radio – Golden Age
16 Portugal. The Man – Lay Me Back Down
17 Glasvegas - Geraldine
18 The Fireman – Sing the Changes
19 The Futureheads – The Beginning of the Twist
20 Jeff Scott Soto & friends – We Wish You A Metal Xmas

Sinterklaas explained

2008-11-25T10:51:00.001+01:00

by David Sedaris:
In France and Germany, gifts are exchanged on Christmas Eve, while
in Holland the children receive presents on December 5, in
celebration of Saint Nicholas Day. It sounded sort of quaint until
I spoke to a man named Oscar, who filled me in on a few of the
details as we walked from my hotel to the Amsterdam train station.

Unlike the jolly, obese American Santa, Saint Nicholas is painfully
thin and dresses not unlike the pope, topping his robes with a tall
hat resembling an embroidered tea cozy. The outfit, I was told, is
a carryover from his former career, when he served as a bishop in
Turkey.

One doesn't want to be too much of a cultural chauvinist, but this
seemed completely wrong to me. For starters, Santa didn't use to
do anything. He's not retired, and, more important, he has
nothing to do with Turkey. The climate's all wrong, and people
wouldn't appreciate him. When asked how he got from Turkey to the
North Pole, Oscar told me with complete conviction that Saint
Nicholas currently resides in Spain, which again is simply not
true. While he could probably live wherever he wanted, Santa chose
the North Pole specifically because it is harsh and isolated. No
one can spy on him, and he doesn't have to worry about people
coming to the door. Anyone can come to the door in Spain, and in
that outfit, he'd most certainly be recognized. On top of that,
aside from a few pleasantries, Santa doesn't speak Spanish. He
knows enough to get by, but he's not fluent, and he certainly
doesn't eat tapas.

While our Santa flies on a sled, Saint Nicholas arrives by boat
and then transfers to a white horse. The event is televised, and
great crowds gather at the waterfront to greet him. I'm not sure
if there's a set date, but he generally docks in late November and
spends a few weeks hanging out and asking people what they want.

"Is it just him alone?" I asked. "Or does he come with backup?"

Oscar's English was close to perfect, but he seemed thrown by a
term normally reserved for police reinforcement.

"Helpers," I said. "Does he have any elves?"

Maybe I'm just overly sensitive, but I couldn't help but feel
personally insulted when Oscar denounced the very idea as grotesque
and unrealistic. "Elves," he said. "They're just so silly."

The words silly and unrealistic were redefined when I learned that
Saint Nicholas travels with what was consistently described as "six
to eight black men." I asked several Dutch people to narrow it
down, but none of them could give me an exact number. It was always
"six to eight," which seems strange, seeing as they've had hundreds
of years to get a decent count.

The six to eight black men were characterized as personal slaves
until the mid-fifties, when the political climate changed and it
was decided that instead of being slaves they were just good
friends. I think history has proven that something usually comes
between slavery and friendship, a period of time marked not by
cookies and quiet times beside the fire but by bloodshed and
mutual hostility. They have such violence in Holland, but rather
than duking it out among themselves, Santa and his former slaves
decided to take it out on the public. In the early years, if a
child was naughty, Saint Nicholas and the six to eight black men
would beat him with what Oscar described as "the small branch of
a tree."

"A switch?"

"Yes," he said. "That's it. They'd kick him and beat him with a
switch. Then, if the youngster was really bad, they'd put him in
a sack and take him back to Spain."

"Saint Nicholas would kick you?"

"Well, not anymore," Oscar said. "Now he just pretends to kick
you."

"And the six to eight black men?"

"Them, too."

He considered this to be progressive, but in a way I think it's
almost more perverse than the original punishment. "I'm going to
hurt you, but not really." How many times have we fallen for that
line? The fake slap invariably makes contact, adding the elements
of shock and betrayal to what had previously been plain, old-
fashioned fear. What kind of Santa spends his time pretending to
kick people before stuffing them into a canvas sack? Then, of
course, you've got the six to eight former slaves who could
potentially go off at any moment. This, I think, is the greatest
difference between us and the Dutch. While a certain segment of
our population might be perfectly happy with the arrangement, if
you told the average white American that six to eight nameless
black men would be sneaking into his house in the middle of the
night, he would barricade the doors and arm himself with whatever
he could get his hands on.

"Six to eight, did you say?"

In the years before central heating, Dutch children would leave
their shoes by the fireplace, the promise being that unless they
planned to beat you, kick you, or stuff you into a sack, Saint
Nicholas and the six to eight black men would fill your clogs
with presents. Aside from the threats of violence and kidnapping,
it's not much different from hanging your stockings from the
mantel. Now that so few people have a working fireplace, Dutch
children are instructed to leave their shoes beside the radiator,
furnace, or space heater. Saint Nicholas and the six to eight black
men arrive on horses, which jump from the yard onto the roof. At
this point, I guess, they either jump back down and use the door,
or they stay put and vaporize through the pipes and electrical
wires. Oscar wasn't too clear about the particulars, but, really,
who can blame him? We have the same problem with our Santa. He's
supposed to use the chimney, but if you don't have one, he still
manages to come through. It's best not to think about it too hard.

While eight flying reindeer are a hard pill to swallow, our
Christmas story remains relatively simple. Santa lives with his
wife in a remote polar village and spends one night a year
traveling around the world. If you're bad, he leaves you coal. If
you're good and live in America, he'll give you just about anything
you want. We tell our children to be good and send them off to bed,
where they lie awake, anticipating their great bounty. A Dutch
parent has a decidedly hairier story to relate, telling his
children, "Listen, you might want to pack a few of your things
together before you go to bed. The former bishop from Turkey will
be coming along with six to eight black men. They might put some
candy in your shoes, they might stuff you in a sack and take you
to Spain, or they might just pretend to kick you. We don't know
for sure, but we want you to be prepared."

This is the reward for living in Holland. As a child you get to
hear this story, and as an adult you get to turn around and repeat
it. As an added bonus, the government has thrown in legalized drugs
and prostitution-so what's not to love about being Dutch?

Oscar finished his story just as we arrived at the station. He was
a polite and interesting guy-very good company-but when he offered
to wait until my train arrived, I begged off, saying I had some
calls to make. Sitting alone in the vast terminal, surrounded by
other polite, seemingly interesting Dutch people, I couldn't help
but feel second-rate. Yes, it was a small country, but it had six
to eight black men and a really good bedtime story. Being a fairly
competitive person, I felt jealous, then bitter, and was edging
toward hostile when I remembered the blind hunter tramping off
into the Michigan forest. He might bag a deer, or he might happily
shoot his sighted companion in the stomach. He may find his way
back to the car, or he may wander around for a week or two before
stumbling through your front door. We don't know for sure, but in
pinning that license to his chest, he inspires the sort of
narrative that ultimately makes me proud to be an American.

The History of Christmas by Tim Minchin

2008-11-24T17:28:00.006+01:00

The History of Christmas by Tim Minchin

Christmas to me means writing a column about Christmas. The only time I ever get asked to write columns is at this time of year. An editor of a music magazine somewhere says, Who are we going to get to write a column about Christmas? We need someone moderately well-known, musical and preferably comic. And some spotty intern says, How about moderately-well-known musical comedian Tim Minchin? And the editor says… well the editor says, Yes.

I do understand my task here. I understand that I am expected to produce some amusing whimsy about turkey with in-laws and drunken blowjobs at office parties and why no one ever gives Myrrh and more. What ever happened to Myrrh?, I might write, and you might think, Good point, C-grade celebrity Tim Minchin, good point. What did ever happen to Myrrh? And that would be nice. Because we would have achieved empathy.

But instead I am going to write a short History of Christmas. Note: everything I write is true.

Go.

Christmas was originally a Roman pagan festival of lawlessness called Saturnalia. For a week, no one could get arrested for wrecking shit or going nuts. There was lots of singing in the nude (a practice recommended by Tim), plenty of shagging (also recommended by Tim), some rape (not recommended by Tim, but you can watch heaps of it on CSI SVU – I heart modern morality), and some eating of human-shaped biscuits (Tim impartial). It was fun for everyone. Well… nearly everyone. See, at the beginning of the week they’d find a dude who they didn’t like (could be a chick, whatever, lay off) and they’d feed him loads of food and make him shag and party and stuff and then at the end of Saturnalia they’d kill him. Totally kill him dead. Kill the living fuck out of him. Ostensibly in order to ward off evil forces and enemies of Rome.

Saturnalia was – understandably – pretty popular. Completely amoral behaviour (not immoral – who am I to judge?) and a wee bit of human sacrifice. If they’d had cameras, it would have made perfect reality TV. (But they didn’t have cameras, not for many many years yet. In fact not until Joseph Nicéphore Niépce squeezed out his first image over an 8 hour period in 1827. Eight hours! Bet he didn’t delete that fucker, even if it made him look fat or whatever.) So when the homies who were running the increasingly pop cult of Christianity wanted to get more members, they decided they’d just tell everyone that Jesus (or whatever his name was) was born on the final day of the festival, which was… wait for it… December 25th. (Actually, the most likely date of the big J’s b’day is thought to be September 11th. How fucking weird is that? Someone make a documentary.) In this way, the Christian leaders back then were very similar to the leaders of the Pentecostal churches of today: to increase membership, you just change the frickin rules dude. Reinterpret the story. Like reinterpreting the Lord of the Rings to make it about lanky people with hairless feet on a journey to get rid of a necklace. Don’t fucking start me.

So Jesus was introduced and the hitherto pagan Romans just shrugged their shoulders and went with it. They didn’t really care about the justification for getting nude and singing and rooting and eating person-biscuits, as long as they still got the week off. Of course, even back then the Christian church was pretty into their moral directives and all, and they weren’t really sure how the traditions of Saturnalia fitted in with said directives, but they really wanted to get their numbers up, so they just started calling it Christmas and let the Romie Homie’s get on with the raping and the eating of the gingerbread men (or women, whatever, lay off).

To reiterate: the church put Jesus’s name to a festival of sexual abuse and human sacrifice in order to increase income. Oh, and here’s a cool thing: you know how Jews are always banging on about how their people have been so mistreated through the ages? Blah blah blah. Well in 1460ish, Pope Paul the Twoth revived some of the old Saturnalia ways for the amusement of the Roman people by force-feeding a whole lot of Jews food and booze and then making them race naked through the streets while all the good Catholics laughed at them. I think it’s a hilarious idea, and I don’t know why Jews are so sensitive. Maybe ol’ Pope Benedict should revive the tradition, but use gays instead of Jews. It’d be just as funny I reckon.

I know what you’re thinking: “But where does Tim Allen come into this?”. I’m getting there, alright?

Nicking bits of other cults was the bit of business development strategy that made Christianity what it is today. Another example: the church encouraged decorating Christmas trees when they were trying (successfully) to pinch the members of the pagan hippy mob, the Asheira cult. Oh and I assume you know about Santa? He was a Turkish bishop called Nicholas who was the dude who first called Jewish people the “children of the devil”. Bless him. He was idolised by these sailor dudes who took his bones to Italy where he usurped the stocking-filling attributes of a local lady-deity known as The Grandmother. The cult spread to the Germans and the Celts where Nick got mixed up with Woden (big white beard, rode a flying horse), then the Christians took him on board to try to… wait for it… increase membership. Time passes, Coca Cola hires a Swedish artist to make a Santa who drinks coke, and now here we are, 5 years old in Myer Perth city, sitting on the knee of a fat man in a red suit who is touching our thigh and asking us what we want for Christmas and the answer is: to get away from you, you obese, sweaty, antisemitic paedo fuck.

Hold on, hold on, I’ve skipped a bit. Roughly one thousand nine hundred and fifty three years after the birth of Joshua (or whatever his name was) and twenty-two years after the birth of Santa Cola, a boychild was born in Denver, Colorado to Gerald and Martha Dick. His name was Timothy Dick. Timothy Allen Dick.

Tim Dick’s dad died in a car accident when he was eleven, and his mum married an Episcopalian deacon two years later. When Tim was twenty-five he was arrested on drug (dunno which type) charges and spent two years in gaol, after which he changed his name to Tim Allen and made the hit ABC comedy series Home Improvement before bringing us the cinematic joy of The Santa Clause 1, The Santa Clause 2 and The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause.

A clause can be defined as an article, stipulation or proviso in a treaty, bill or contract. In the case of Allen’s seminal trilogy, it is a pun.

In the case of the above sentence, the word seminal is a pun.

Have a spoofy Christmas.

(Thanks and apologies to Mr Minchin for nicking this)

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To...

2008-10-05T17:06:00.004+02:00

Vol. 29 October 2008

To download, click here and scroll down to the blue Download button.

.7z is a zip format, you can unzip it with Winzip, Winrar or 7-zip

1 The Verve – Love is Noise
2 Metallica – The Day that Never Comes
3 Julian Cope – These Things I Know
4 TV On the Radio – Dancing Choose
5 Fujiya and Miyagi - Uh
6 Portugal. The Man – And I
7 Friendly Fires - Paris
8 Those Dancing Days - Hitten
9 Justice – Planisphère part 2
10 Justice – Planisphère part 3
11 Kings of Leon – Closer
12 Deerhoof – The Tears and Music of Love
13 The Last Shadow Puppets – My Mistakes Were Made For You
14 The Faint – The Geeks Were Right
15 Coldplay - Lost
16 Tricky - Slow
17 MGMT – Kids (Soulwax Remix)
18 The Raconteurs – Many Shades of Black
19 UNKLE – Open Up Your Eyes (featuring Abel Ferrara)

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To....

2008-08-21T15:55:00.001+02:00

Vol. 28 September 2008

Download it here

1 Bloc Party – Mercury
2 The Vines – Get Out
3 Kings of Leon – Sex on Fire
4 Ra Ra Riot – Ghosts Under Rocks
5 The Chemical Brothers – Midnight Madness
6 The Rascals – Rascalize
7 Beck – Gamma Ray
8 Air France – June Evenings
9 Late of the Pier - Broken
10 Van She – Cat & The Eye Alright
11 The Subways -
12 Metronomy – Radio Ladio
13 Noah and the Whale – Shape of My Heart
14 The Automatic – Accessories
15 Does It Offend You, Yeah? – Dawn of the Dead
16 The Dandy Warhols – Wasp in the Lotus
17 Coldplay – Lovers in Japan / Reign of Love
18 Black Kids – I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You
19 UNKLE - Chemical
20 The Prodigy – Ghost Town
21 XX Teens – Darlin'

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2008-06-24T11:20:00.001+02:00

Vol 27 July 2008. Download it here.

Comments appreciated!

1 O Fracas – And So a Scratch Runs Down A Wall
2 Wolf Parade – Language City
3 Death Cab for Cutie – Bixby Canyon Bridge
4 We Are the Physics – Bulimia Sisters
5 The Shortwave Set – Harmonia
6 These New Puritans – Swords of Truth
7 Hot Club de Paris – Hey Housebrick
8 Late of the Pier – Space and the Woods
9 Elle Milano - Carousels
10 Sky Larkin - Molten
11 Radiohead - Bodysnatchers
12 Paul Weller & Noel Gallagher – Echoes Round the Sun
13 Infadels – Free Things for Poor People
14 Shy Child – The Volume
15 Morrissey – All You Need is Me
16 The Whip - Blackout
17 The Dandy Warhols – Mission Control
18 CSS – Left Behind
19 Tricky – Puppy Toy
20 We Smoke Fags – Canape of Love
21 The Fratellis – Mistress Mabel
22 Asian Dub Foundation - Superpower

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2008-04-29T17:47:00.005+02:00

Vol. 26 May 2008

Download it here
Comments appreciated!

1 The Last Shadow Puppets – The Age of the Understatement
2 Dan le Sac VS Scroobius Pip – The Beat that My Heart Skipped
3 dEUS – The Architect
4 Was (Not Was) – Semi-Interesting Week
5 The Courteeners – Not Nineteen Forever
6 REM – Living Well is the Best Revenge
7 Elle Milano – Laughing all the Way to the Plank
8 Does It Offend You, Yeah – Doomed Now
9 The Long Blondes - Guilt
10 Cajun Dance Party – The Race
11 LCD Soundsystem – Big Ideas
12 Operator Please – Yes Yes
13 The Young Knives – Turn Tail
14 Simian Mobile Disco - Simple
15 The Raconteurs – Consoler of the Lonely
16 The Kooks – Do You Wanna
17 Ladytron – Ghosts
18 We Barbarians – In the Doldrums
19 Asian Dub Foundation – Awake / Asleep

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2008-04-03T23:52:00.004+02:00

Vol. 25 - April 2008

Download it here

Comments appreciated!

1 R.E.M. – Man-Sized Wreath
2 Mystery Jets – Half in Love with Elizabeth
3 Moby – Live For Tomorrow
4 The Young Knives – Up All Night
5 The Kills – Getting Down
6 Tokyo Police Club - Tessellate
7 Duels – The Furies
8 Neon Neon – I Lust U
9 The Raconteurs – Top Yourself
10 Hot Chip – Bendable Posable
11 The Kooks –Always Where I Need to Be
12 We Are Scientists – Let's See It
13 Foals – Red Socks Pugie
14 The Gutter Twins – Each to Each
15 Elle Milano – Meanwhile in Hollywood…
16 Ghostland Observatory – Club Soda
17 The Eye The Ear and the Arm – Sell This
18 Portishead – Magic Doors
19 Hercules & Love Affair - Blind
20 Tapes n Tapes – Hang Them All
21 Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Dig, Lazarus, Dig

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2008-02-15T10:18:00.006+01:00

Vol. 26 February 2008

Anyone wanting a copy please leave a comment

Comments appreciated!

1 Hot Chip – Ready for the Floor
2 Supergrass – Diamond Hoo Ha Man
3 Infadels – Play Blind
4 Envelopes – Freejazz
5 Voicst – High as an Amsterdam Tourist
6 Robots in Disguise – We're in the Music Biz
7 Torpedo – From Russia With Love
8 Vampire Weekend – Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa
9 Crystal Castles – Untrust Us
10 School of Language – Extended Holiday
11 Taken By Cars – Uh Oh
12 Cut Copy - Lights and Music
13 Morrissey – That's How People Grow Up
14 Holy Fuck – The Pulse
15 The Epochs – Thunder & Lightning
16 Correcto - Inuit
17 David Gilmour Girls – Tar and Feather
18 Bauhaus - Undone
19 The Eye The Ear and the Arm – All Claws and Teeth
20 Alter Bridge – Buried Alive
21 Does It Offend You, Yeah – Let's Make Out

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2008-01-10T10:38:00.003+01:00

Vol 23. January 2008

Ones to Watch in 2008

Anyone wanting a copy, please leave a comment

Comments appreciated!

1 I Am Kloot - One Man Brawl
2 Kill Casino - Underwater
3 Marah – Old Time Ticking Away
4 Ladyhawk – I Don't Always Know What You're Saying
5 Crystal Castles - Crimewave
6 Let's Wrestle – I Won't Lie to You
7 Los Campesinos – Death to Los Campesinos
8 Friendly Fires – On Board
9 Vampire Weekend – Mansard Roof
10 Black Mountain – Stormy High
11 The Ting Tings – That's Not My Name
12 The Do – On My Shoulders
13 Sons & Daughters – The Nest
14 Does It Offend You, Yeah? – Weird Science
15 Blood Red Shoes – Try Harder
16 Black Kids – Hit the Heartbrakes
17 Foals – Balloons
18 School of Language – Rockist Pt. 1
19 Say Hi – The Twenty-Second Century
20 Pete & The Pirates – Come on Feet
21 These New Puritans - Numbers
22 Bombay Bicycle Club - Ghost

This Year I Have Mostly Been Listening To....

2008-01-09T23:52:00.008+01:00

My best of 2007 2CD mixtape - download it here (CD1) and here (CD2)

Comments appreciated!

CD1
1 Gogol Bordello - Ultimate
2 Klaxons - Golden Skans
3 The Maccabees - About Your Dress
4 Digitalism - Idealistic
5 Cold War Kids - Hang Me Up to Dry
6 Siouxsie – Into a Swan
7 Arctic Monkeys - Brianstorm
8 The Whip - Trash
9 Manic Street Preachers - Your Love Alone is Not Enough
10 Calvin Harris - Acceptable in the 80s
11 We Are the Physics - This is Vanity
12 Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - Thou Shalt Always Kill
13 Yeasayer - 2080
14 Art Brut - Pump Up The Volume
15 LCD Soundsystem - North American Scum
16 The Cribs - Our Bovine Public
17 Modest Mouse - Dashboard
18 MSTRKRFT - Work On You
19 Good Shoes - The Photos on My Wall
20 Queens of the Stone Age – Into the Hollow

CD2
1 Justice - D.A.N.C.E.
2 Biffy Clyro – Living Is a Problem Because Everything Dies
3 The Orb - Mother Nature
4 Interpol - Mammoth
5 Younger Brother - I Am a Freak
6 Menomena - The Pelican
7 UNKLE - Burn My Shadow
8 Holy Fuck – Lovely Allen
9 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - 10 x 10
10 Chemical Brothers - Do It Again
11 Ian Brown - Illegal Attacks
12 Radiohead - Nude
13 Les Savy Fav – What Would Wolves Do?
14 Simian Mobile Disco - Hustler
15 MGMT - Time to Pretend
16 The Duke Spirit - A Wild Hope
17 Architecture in Helsinki - Heart It Races
18 The Cult - Born Into This

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-11-21T00:58:00.000+01:00

Vol. 21 November 2007

1 The Cult - Dirty Little Rockstar
2 MGMT - Time to Pretend
3 Radiohead - 15 Step
4 Yeasayer - Sunrise
5 Louis XIV - There's a Traitor in the Room
6 Younger Brother - Ribbon on a Branch
7 The Orb - Mother Nature
8 UNKLE - Broken (feat. Gavin Clark)
9 Siouxsie - Loveless
10 Menomena - The Pelican
11 Poni Hoax - Involutive Star
12 Les Savy Fav - The Year Before 2000
13 Holy Fuck - The Pulse
14 Yeasayer - 2080
15 David Gilmour Girls - Young Rats
16 Digitalism - Pogo
17 Interpol - Who Do You Think
18 Radiohead - Nude

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-10-25T11:48:00.001+02:00

Vol. 20 October 2007
1 Siouxsie - Here Comes the Day
2 Queens of the Stone Age - Enter the Hollow
3 Poni Hoax - Budapest
4 The Cult - Born Into This
5 Interpol - Pioneer to the Falls
6 The Orb - Let The Music Set You Free
7 Jose Gonzalez - Teardrop
8 Louis XIV - Misguided Sheep
9 Unkle -Burn My Shadow (feat. Ian Astbury)
10 Simian Mobile Disco - I Got This Down
11 Ian Brown - Illegal Attacks
12 Mark Ronson - Toxic (feat. Ol' Dirty Bastard and Tiggers)
13 We Are Wolves - Some Words
14 The Hives - Tick Tick Boom
15 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Isis
16 Joakim - Drumtrax
17 Those Dancing Days - Disc hoe
18 The Pierces - Boring

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-09-07T09:37:00.000+02:00

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….
Vol. 19 August 2007
1 Gogol Bordello - Ultimate
2 Paul Weller & Graham Coxon - This Old Town
3 Jakobinarina - This is an Advertisement
4 Calvin Harris - Acceptable in the 80's
5 The Enemy - Away from Here
6 The Cribs - Moving Pictures
7 The Whip - Divebomb
8 Architecture in Helsinki - Feather in a Baseball Cap
9 Portugal. The Man - Bellies are Full
10 Digitalism - Echoes
11 Interpol - Mammoth
12 Smashing Pumpkins - Bleeding the Orchid
13 UNKLE - Keys to the Kingdom
14 Victorian English Gentlemens Club - La Mer
15 Art Brut - Late Sunday Evening
16 Justice - Genesis
17 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Down Boy
18 Two Lone Swordsmen - Glories Yesterday
19 The Chemical Brothers - Burst Generator

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-07-05T08:08:00.000+02:00

Vol. 18 July 2007
1 Queens of the Stone Age - Sick Sick Sick
2 Battle - The Longest Time
3 Calvin Harris - This is Industry
4 Editors - The Racing Rats
5 The Horrors - She Is the New Thing
6 UNKLE feat. The Duke Spirit - Mayday
7 Hot Club de Paris - You Can Call Me Al
8 Brakes - Hold Me in the River
9 Simian Mobile Disco - I Believe
10 The Cribs - Our Bovine Public
11 Portugal. The Man - Church Mouth
12 Asian Dub Foundation (feat. Sinead O'Connor) - 1000 Mirrors
13 Tokyo Police Club - Cut Cut Paste
14 The Hold Steady - Chips Ahoy!
15 Klaxons - Gravity's Rainbow (Soulwax Dub)
16 Kings of Leon - Fans
17 Architecture in Helsinki - Heart it Races
18 Charlotte Hatherley - Siberia
19 Justice - Phantom pt. 2
20 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - 10 x 10
21 Nine Black Alps - Burn Faster
22 The Chemical Brothers feat. Willy Mason - Battle Scars

KEEP 'EM PEELED

2007-06-06T20:12:00.000+02:00

When I first heard of Peel, I thought that a band from Texas that chooses as its name the surname of such a typically British indie icon must have a very forced British sound. Another Five O'Clock Heroes, in other words. Well, no.

First track on the album, Oxford, (which featured on April's mixtape) reminded me of a fuzzed-up Big Audio Dynamite! Good start, in other words! This was just to get me off on the wrong foot, however, as the album then takes off on a zig-zag course of different styles. The only constants are a blending of sweet pop sensibility with jagged-edge noise, and incredible songwriting.

Other blogs have compared them favourably to such wildly differing bands as Pavement, Meat Puppets, Apples in Stereo and Belle and Sebastian, but I wouldn't take too much notice of this - you're much better off just having a listen yourself. And you're in luck - the nice people at Fanatic Promotions have made their entire album available to stream in very high quality here, and will let you download 2 of the tracks as MP3s:
Sliding Doors
Workers Wake Up

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-06-03T18:01:00.000+02:00

Vol. 17 June 2007

1 Biffy Clyro - Living is a Problem Because Everything Dies
2 Pull Tiger Tail - Hurricanes
3 Justice - D.A.N.C.E.
4 Smashing Pumpkins - Tarantula
5 Arctic Monkeys - Fluorescent Adolescent
6 Paul Hartnoll - Please
7 The Cribs - Men's Needs
8 Editors - An End Has a Start
9 Queens of the Stone Age - 3s & 7s
10 Go Team! - Grip Like a Vice
11 Good Shoes - Morden
12 The White Stripes - You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You're Told)
13 Malcolm Middleton - A Brighter Beat
14 The Chemical Brothers - All Rights Reversed (feat. Klaxons)
15 The National - Mistaken for Strangers
16 Blood Red Shoes - It's Getting Boring By the Sea
17 Reverend and the Makers - Heavyweight Champion of the World
18 Digitalism - Idealistic
19 Architecture in Helsinki - Hold Music
20 Cajun Dance Party - The Next Untouchable
21 Simian Mobile Disco - Sleep Deprivation

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-05-04T12:32:00.000+02:00

Vol. 16 May 2007

Instructions: Dôwnloäd, unzip file using Winrar, burn to CD, place in car stereo, listen.

1 Bjork - Earth Intruders
2 White Stripes - Icky Thump
3 Groove Armada - Get Down
4 Editors - Smokers Outside the Hospital Doors
5 Manic Street Preachers - Send Away the Tigers
6 Chemical Brothers - Do It Again (feat. Ali Love)
7 We Are The Physics - Less Than Three
8 Pull Tiger Tail - Secret Says
9 Motocade - Bomb Squad
10 Simian Mobile Disco - Hustler
11 Air Traffic - I Like That
12 Interpol - The Heinrich Maneuver
13 Arctic Monkeys - Temptation Greets You Like Your Naughty Friend
14 Kid Harpoon - Riverside
15 MSTRKRFT - Work On You
16 Tokyo Police Club - Box
17 Ra Ra Riot - Can You Tell
18 Art Brut - Pump Up the Volume
19 Zapped By a Million Volts - What's the Miles Per Gallon Alan?
20 Shout Out Louds - Tonight I Have to Leave It
21 Klaxons - Magick (Simian Mobile Disco Mix)

Insert obligatory sheep joke here

2007-05-04T08:11:00.000+02:00

Well it's been a while since I highlighted a new band on here, basically because there hasn't been that much new stuff that has pushed my buttons. So when finally something came along that did just that, it really made me sit up and notice. And it was doubly surprising when it turned out the band comes from New Zealand, not exactly known as a hotbed of cutting edge rock.

Motocade are that band, and their new EP Into the Fall has been on heavy rotation here for the last couple of weeks. And I mean heavy rotation. I know some people think it's really lazy just comparing one band with others to give you an idea of what they sound like, so I won't. But it's no coincidence that their top MySpace friends include Tokyo Police Club :D . Seriously though, if you like TPC you are certain to love this, so have a listen.

Visit their MySpace page to hear four songs, or alternatively download two of them as band-approved high-quality MP3s here:
Bomb Squad
My Friends

and here's the video for Bomb Squad:

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-04-06T18:18:00.000+02:00

Vol. 15, April 2007

1 Arctic Monkeys - Brianstorm
2 Mark Ronson - Stop Me (If You've Heard This One Before)
3 The Enemy - 40 Days and 40 Nights
4 The Pigeon Detectives - Romantic Type
5 Good Shoes - Things to Make and Do
6 CSS - Off The Hook
7 The Ripps - Loco
8 I Was a Cub Scout - I Hate Nightclubs
9 Manic Street Preachers - Your Love Alone is Not Enough
10 Shitdisco - 72 Virgins
11 The View - The Don
12 Peel - Oxford
13 We are the PHYSICS - This Is Vanity
14 Frank London's Klezmer Brass Allstars - A Time of Desire
15 The National - Fake Empire
16 Foal - Hummer
17 Modest Mouse - Fire It Up
18 The Bravery - Time Won't Let Me Go
19 Fury of the Headteachers - Not What It Used to Be
20 Simian Mobile Disco - It's The Beat
21 Polytechnic - Won't You Come Around
22 Art Brut - Direct Hit
23 Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - Thou Shalt Always Kill

London Calling 30 & 31 March 2007

2007-04-04T00:11:00.000+02:00

Last weekend was my long awaited first taste of the twice annual festival of up-and-coming British (and British influenced) bands, London Calling in Paradiso, Amsterdam.

Friday:
I started out on the balcony, in a perfect position, 2 metres in front of the bar, directly in front of the stage. And when bands played on the second stage they rolled down a screen and showed the live feed from the cameras there. So when it was a band we weren't that bothered about, or the small stage was packed out, we could sit back and enjoy our beers with a great view of the action.

Our Lunar Activities started off proceedings, without leaving any great impression on me. Then came The Wombats, one of the bands I was most looking forward to. Unfortunately they were programmed a bit too early in the proceedings, the hall was less than half full as people were still arriving, which didn't help the acoustics there, which are dodgy at the best of times. The band then proceeded to play a set made up mainly of new songs and only a few off their brilliant debut album Girls, Boys and Marsupials. No Metro Song! No Party in a Forest! No Derail & Crash! Boo! The crowd (including me) responded in a predictably muted manner.

The Wombats

Kate Nash then came on the small stage, and again I watched on the screen. She did a nice acoustic version of Caroline's a Victim, but otherwise after about four songs they all started to sound the same to me. The Twang were up next on the main stage, and they came on with an impressive swagger. They made a decent effort, but the songs weren't quite strong enough to win over the crowd or me.

The Twang

My Luminaries on the second stage were not my cup of tea at all - big washes of sound with a very earnest singer. The Long Blondes followed on the main stage. It was good to hear their songs live, but their sound was another victim of the main hall's poor acoustics, and possibly the fact that bassist and female guitarist looked as if they would rather be anywhere than there.

The Long Blondes

At this point (after my third pint of Kalimocho) I decided I had to get my feet moving and went off to the small stage to watch a band I felt were going to be the surprise hit of the festival. Isn't it lovely when you're right? we are the PHYSICS were exactly what the crowd had been waiting for - wonky, punky, stop-start pop, a great, tongue-in-cheek theatrical stage presence, geeky clothes and none of them over 21. Boom. The place went bonkers, moshing like idiots, stage invasion, stage diving, you name it, with yours truly the oldest mosher in town right in the thick of it.

we are the PHYSICS (with stage diver Joep)

After that, the Pigeon Detectives came on the main stage. They were headlining and were a little bit full of themselves, but they also put on a great show and got the crowd going. The singer stage dived twice, which is always a good way of getting the crowd on your side, and he treated the equipment with a healthy disrespect, trashing or disconnecting at least 3 mics during the show. Once again I got myself right down the front - in my book you either watch at a safe distance, like on the balcony, or you get right up into the moshpit. Halfway back is nowhere.

Pigeon Detectives (love the top photo!)

The last three gigs were billed as the afterparty, but they were more like an afterthought in my book. I stayed virtually till the end but regretted doing so. Maybe I was just too tired...

Saturday:
Moke kicked things off on the main stage. I'd seen their Noel Gallagher lookalike singer when he was with Supersub, many years ago, and he is still peddling the same sub-(hah)-Weller crap as he was then. Meuk more like (Dutch joke, sorry).

The Victorian English Gentlemen's Club were first up on the small stage, and they were excellent, but were on a bit too early to get the hungover crowd dancing.

The Victorian English Gentlemen's Club

The next acts came and went without making much impression on me. Good Books had one good song (the one I knew of course) and the rest blended into a Keane with guitars stew. The Strange Death of Liberal England held my attention for a while, but their shoegazing meanderings felt out of place at London Calling. Air Traffic were then the other extreme, riffs and hooks honed to perfection and poised to unleash themselves on the charts. I did enjoy some bits of The Kissaway Trail, and certainly wouldn't write them off as emo as some other reviewers have done. They reminded me more of a band like Aberdeen City, very widescreen and a touch ethereal.

The Enemy did a very good job of filling the main stage, even though there were only 3 of them. They had the sound and the confidence to dominate the big stage, and mostly the tunes to match, although none of them particularly lodged in my consciousness.

The Enemy

Ox.Eagle.Lion.Man were the leftfield hit of the evening. Some super tunes and an off-the-wall front man to sing them. They pushed all the right buttons and were almost as big a hit as We are the PHYSICS in the same slot the night before.

Finally the moment I'd been waiting for all evening, when Switches took to the main stage stage. I'd seen them on telly recently and they'd looked horribly full of themselves, so I feared the worst, but I was pleasantly surprised. They got the crowd going, played a tight set and, for me, were the hit of the evening.

Switches

Screendump from film on OOR.nl :P

I missed the afterparty this time in order to catch the last train home and thus be able to get up in time to order a ticket to Glastonbury the next morning. Which I did! :)

Jimmy Three Gigs

2007-03-04T14:27:00.000+01:00

I got a bit carried away buying concert tickets recently. I'd been disappointed by the lack of good gigs in Holland in the autumn of last year, so when some interesting bands came along I went a bit mad buying up tickets. It was only when I wrote them on the calendar that it became clear that the week just gone was going to be a busy one - Kasabian on Monday, Goose on Thursday and Klaxons on Saturday (all sold-out, incidentally). And as two of these were in Amsterdam and I already had enough other things going on, I decided to try to sell either the Goose or the Klaxons ticket.

Suffice to say I didn't manage to get rid of either, and eventually decided to go to all 3 concerts. And in retrospect I'm mighty glad I did. All three were great in their own way.

Kasabian - great music, crowd less so. Adidas clad Brits on stag trips for the most part.
Goose - Brilliant, squelchy Belgian indie dance. Apart from the singer, all apparently aged 14 and able to effortlessly switch instruments at the drop of a hat.
Klaxons - one of the best gigs I've seen, ever. And only 40 minutes long. The crowd were mental, flinging glowsticks all over the place, singing their lungs out, moshing, stage invading, crowd surfing and stage diving like idiots. Utter mayhem. Gramps here was glad he could find a quiet corner on the balcony! And the band were awesome. They managed to make even the sweet harmonies on numbers like Golden Skans sound punky and ominous, and the twee faux-shanty Isle of Her became a thundering beast from the deep.

At a guess I'd say this is the first time I've been to 3 separate gigs in a week since Intro Week at Sheffield Poly, *cough* years ago. Arctic Monkeys in the Melkweg next Saturday. Bring 'em on!

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-03-03T11:51:00.000+01:00

Vol. 14 March 2007

1 Klaxons - Two Receivers
2 The Fratellis - Baby Fratelli
3 Kings of Leon - On Call
4 Dartz! - St. Petersburg
5 The Rakes - We Danced Together
6 Bloc Party - Secrets
7 The KBC - Pride Before the Fall
8 Goose - Bring it On
9 The Wombats - Kill The Director
10 Fields - Song for the Fields
11 Deerhoof - Believe E.S.P.
12 Tokyo Police Club - Citizens of Tomorrow
13 Kate Nash - Caroline's a Victim
14 The Harrisons - Monday's Arms
15 Malcolm Middleton & Alan Bisset - The Rebel on His Own Tonight
16 Bloc Party - Cain Said to Abel
17 Arcade Fire - Keep the Car Running
18 Pull Tiger Tail - Let's Lightning
19 Charlotte Hatherley - I Want You to Know
20 Air Traffic - Charlotte
21 Hot Gossip - Real Mess
22 Klaxons - It's Not Over Yet

Who's hot and who's not?

2007-03-03T08:17:00.000+01:00

Funny how band names seem to go through trends of containing the same words. How many bands have there been with 'stereo' or 'super' somewhere in the name? Answers on a postcard to the usual address... 'Superstereo' - good name for a band that.

Current favourites seem to be 'Good' (Shoes, Books) and of course 'Hot' - apart from veterans Hot Hot Heat and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, we've now got Hot Chip, Hot Gossip (who disappointingly do not feature any lycra-clad dancing girls - showing my age here) and of course Hot Club de Paris, my favourite new band of the past twelve months (official - see my Last.fm page).

They make brilliantly skewed pop, with tight barber-shop harmonies, crazy time signatures and lashings of chiming guitar, and their awesome debut album Drop It Til It Pops is currently available with a bonus CD of b-sides and the videos for their 3 singles. Bargain!

Alternatively you can watch the videos here:

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-03-03T08:16:00.000+01:00

Vol. 13 February 2007

1 Klaxons - Golden Skans
2 Charlotte Hatherley - Behave
3 The Maccabees - About Your Dress
4 Bloc Party - I Still Remember
5 The Wombats - Lost in the Post
6 Lo-Fi-Fnk - Steppin Out
7 Arcade Fire - Intervention
8 Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Love Song No. 7
9 Dartz! - Once, Twice, Again
10 Tokyo Police Club - Cheer It On
11 Beck - Think I'm in Love
12 Klaxons - Totem on the Timeline
13 Bloc Party - Sunday
14 Kubichek - Taxi!
15 The Wombats - Party in a Forest (Where's Laura)
16 The Fratellis - Got Ma Nuts from a Hippy
17 Kasabian - Me Plus One
18 Goodbooks - Walk With Me
19 Enter Shikari - Sorry, You're Not a Winner
20 Kaiser Chiefs - Ruby
21 The Good, The Bad & The Queen - Northern Whale
22 Frank Turner - Thatcher Fucked the Kids

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2007-01-17T12:02:00.000+01:00

Vol. 12 January 2007

1 The Wombats - Moving to New York
2 The Fratellis - 3 Skinny Girls
3 Bloc Party - Hunting for Witches
4 The Good, The Bad and the Queen - Kingdom of Doom
5 Pull Tiger Tail - Mr 100 Percent
6 Tokyo Police Club - Shoulders & Arms
7 LCD Soundsystem - North American Scum
8 The Wombats - Backfire @ The Disco
9 Cold War Kids - Hang Me Up to Dry
10 The Rapture - Wooh! Alright! Yeah!.…Uh Huh
11 GoodShoes - The Photos on My Wall
12 The Hours - Ali in the Jungle
13 Switches - Drama Queen
14 Bloc Party - Uniform
15 The Wombats - My First Wedding
16 Chikinki - Assassinator 13 - old, but new to me
17 Tokyo Police Club - Be Good
18 Battle - Tendency
19 Jamie T - Salvador
20 Fear of Music - Sixteen
21 Modest Mouse - Dashboard
22 Luxembourg - We Only Stayed Together for the Kids

Tip for 2007: Black Gold 360

2006-12-13T20:18:00.000+01:00

Veering away slightly from my usual preference for all things indie, one album from a totally different ballpark has been pushing my buttons recently. Blending together such diverse influences as Squarepusher, Miles Davis, Abba, John Coltrane and The Orb, Black Gold 360 creates an electronic soundscape where jazz and electronic/dance vibes meld together perfectly.

The album is the creation of Simon Sixsmith - label boss of Beluga Recordings, sometime member of Electric Puha and in-demand DJ.

The album has been impressing reviewers around the world, here are some quotes:

"An excellent forte into free form electronic jazz ... nothing can fully describe the complexity of its clever and eclectic mix.
BARCODE Magazine, USA

"Excellent fusion of jazz meets electronics, in a beautiful package, as we have come to expect from the beluga crew."
Auke Ferwerda - 365 MAG, USA (www.365mag.com)

"The Album crosses boundaries in a way that makes you smile and wonder.
A miracle has happened: Black Gold 360 has got me liking jazz! A must-have for Four Tet-fans."
Dj Marcelle - ANOTHER NICE MESS, NL (www.anothernicemess.com )

"Quite simply one of the best and most accomplished free internet releases ... Truly excellent."
Marvin Suicide, RESONANCE FM, UK

If you enjoy jazz or electronic music from the likes of Squarepusher, Four Tet or Nightmares on Max, give it a listen. And the best news is, you can download the entire album here for free!

Tip for 2007: The Wombats

2006-12-13T19:22:00.000+01:00

There haven't been that many albums this year which have blown me away on the first listen. Particularly among the post-Monkeys bands, who have blended choppy/spiky guitar riffs with slice-of-life lyrics. From Bromheads Jacket to Milburn to Little Man Tate their albums have pretty much all more or less failed to live up to the promise of their early singles.

Then along came the Wombats. The name alone was enough to put me off initially, but eventually I decided to give them a try, and downloaded their new album 'Girls, Boys and Marsupials'. I put it on at a low volume in the background, but by the second track I was pricking up my ears, bumping up the volume and getting hooked. By track 3 the windows were shaking and I was bopping round the room. And it's been playing ever since.

And I still can't work out why. Is it the occasional doo-wop harmonies, at times reminiscent of my other current favourite Liverpool band, Hot Club de Paris? Or is it the killer riffs and hooks, which embed themselves in your subconscious and refuse to leave? Could be a combination of those two I guess!

Lead track 'Moving to New York' features the line 'Looks like Christmas came early for me' in the chorus. Too f***ing right it did! What an album!

In any event, I strongly recommend you have a listen for yourself. You can hear four of their tracks on their MySpace page, and six others on their band site. And if you want to download some MP3s, Bill at Sound Bites has a couple for you.

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2006-12-05T14:48:00.000+01:00

Vol. 11 December 2006
1 Bloc Party - Song for Clay (Disappear Here)
2 Guillemots - Made Up Love Song #43
3 Ripchord - Lock Up Your Daughters (And Throw Away the Key) - tip for 2007
4 The Noisettes - Scratch Your Name
5 Muse - Knights of Cydonia
6 Pigeon Detectives - I Found Out - tip for 2007
7 Switches - Message from Yuz
8 Polytechnic - Man Overboard - verses, a chorus and a melody, who'd a thunk it?! Could even be a hit.
9 Babyshambles - The Blinding - long-awaited return to form of Tabloid Pete
10 The Veils - Jesus for the Jugular - caught the tail-end of their show in The Hague last month. Awesome
11 Hot Club de Paris - Clockwork Toy
12 The Maccabees - First Love - tip for 2007
13 Bloc Party - The Prayer - lead single off the new album, sounding better than ever. Tickets for their gig in Utrecht in April 07 already purchased
14 Howling Bells - Setting Sun
15 Union of Knives - Operated On
16 Pigeon Detectives - I'm Not Sorry
17 Band of Horses - Funeral
18 New Young Pony Club - Get Lucky
19 Larrikin Love - Happy as Annie
20 The Horror The Horror - Ipanema
21 The Veils - Not Yet

Year-end mixtape

2006-11-16T16:26:00.000+01:00

Here's the tracklist of my year-end double CD mixtape.

This Year I Have Mostly Been Listening To….

2006

CD1

1 Akira the Don - Thanks for All the AIDS
2 Archie Bronson Outfit - Dart For My Sweetheart
3 Arctic Monkeys - A Certain Romance
4 The Beatles - Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
5 Bloc Party - Song for Clay (Disappear Here)
6 Boy Kill Boy - Suzie
7 Easy Star All*Stars - Airbag
8 Franz Ferdinand - The Fallen
9 Fratellis - Chelsea Dagger
10 Graham Coxon - Standing on My Own Again
11 Hot Chip - Over and Over
12 Hot Club de Paris - Everyeveryeverything
13 Howling Bells - Blessed Night
14 Infadels - Can't Get Enough
15 Jim Noir - My Patch
16 Justice v Simian - We Are Your Friends (Edison remix)
17 The Killers - When You Were Young
18 Klaxons - Atlantis to Interzone
19 The Knife - We Share Our Mother's Health
20 Kooks - Naive

CD2
1 Hess is More - The Magic Invention of T.D.P.R.C.
2 Lily Allen - LDN
3 The Longcut - A Tried and Tested Method
4 Lovely Feathers - Wrong Choice
5 Morrissey - You Have Killed Me
6 Mystery Jets - The Boy Who Ran Away
7 Paolo Nuttini - Jenny Don't be Hasty
8 Peter, Bjorn & John - Young Folks
9 Portishead - Requiem for Anna (Un jour comme un autre - Anna)
10 Pretty Girls Make Graves - Parade
11 Pull Tiger Tail - Animator
12 Raconteurs - Steady as She Goes
13 The Rakes - All Too Human
14 The Rapture - Get Myself Into It
15 Roots Manuva - No Love
16 Switches - Message from Yuz
17 Teddybears - Cobrastyle
18 Thom Yorke - Harrowdown Hill
19 TV On the Radio - Province
20 The Victorian English Gentlemen's Club - Ban the Gin
21 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Gold Lion
22 The Young Knives - She's Attracted To

Second-album syndrome

2006-11-13T11:01:00.000+01:00

I'll be interested to see if the class of '04 can come up with the goods this year - Razorlight, Kasabian, Interpol, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Futureheads, the Bravery, the Zutons, the Caesars.... Franz Ferdinand have raised the bar for second albums, let's see who can step up and match them.

I wrote this in my first post on this blog, on 5 January of this year. Well the second albums have come and gone (please can we stop using that horrible word 'sophomore'? It means a second-year American student, FFS) some (Kasabian, Killers, YYYs) acceptably decent, others (Razorlight, Futureheads) a pale shadow of the potential shown on the first albums, but all of them missing that spark that makes you shout YESSS!

One of the names missing from my original list is Bloc Party. Their second album, Weekend In The City, is not due out until February 2007, so it doesn't count as an '06 release anyway - or does it? An early mix of the album has been leaked online in the past few days and I've been lucky enough to get my hands on a copy. To say that it has the wow factor missing from the second albums mentioned above is putting it lightly - very lightly. This album is making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I even just caught myself headbanging at my desk.

So be excited. Be very excited!

You can download live versions of various tracks off the album from my fellow bloggers at Good Weather for Airstrikes blog here, and read the official track-by-track guide published in this week's NME here.

And here's a video of them performing track 2, Hunting for Witches:

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2006-11-12T10:16:00.000+01:00

1 Pull Tiger Tail - Animator
2 Ali Love - K Hole
3 Cansei de Ser Sexy - Alala
4 The Fratellis - Whistle for the Choir
5 Babyshambles & friends - Janie Jones
6 Green Day & U2 - The Saints are Coming
7 The Horrors - Count in Fives
8 Switches - Testify
9 The Legion of Doom - Crazy As She Goes
10 The Maccabees - Lego
11 Graham Coxon - What You Gonna Do Now?
12 IV Thieves - You Can't Love What You Can't Understand
13 Radio 4 - Packing Things Up on the Scene
14 The Knife - Like a Pen
15 Hot Club de Paris - Your Face Looks All Wrong
16 The Automatic - Rats
17 65daysofstatic - Radio Protector
18 Klaxons - Hall of Records
19 The Good, The Bad & The Queen - Herculean
20 The Victorian English Gentlemen's Club - Ban the Gin
21 Tokyo Police Club - Nature of the Experiment
22 The Holloways - Two Left Feet
23 Snakes Say Hisss! - Love is a Heart Attack

Album of the Month

2006-10-05T20:49:00.000+02:00

The best album to be released in the past month also has the huge advantage of being absolutely free - well, when you buy a copy of this week's NME that is. For a mere £1.95 you get the World's Greatest Music Weekly and Dancefloor Distortion, a compilation put together by Simian Mobile Disco, who were responsible for indie dancefloor smash We Are Your Friends, featuring wonderfully distorted (yes) and squelchy remixes of the likes of Franz Ferdinand, Klaxons, The Gossip and Hot Chip.

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2006-09-28T11:02:00.000+02:00

Vol. 8 September 2006

1	Jim Noir - Eanie Meany
2	The Rapture - Get Myself Into It
3	Little Man Tate - House Party at Boothy's
4	Larrikin Love - Downing St. Kindling
5	The Young Knives - She's Attracted To
6	Mission of Burma - Donna Sumeria
7	Heartless Bastards - Brazen
8	Easy Star All-Stars & Horace Andy - Airbag
9	Professor Murder - Champion
10	Archive - Sane
11	Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Cheated Hearts
12	The Fratellis - Chelsea Dagger
13	Señor Coconut - Smoke on the Water
14	Pigeon Detectives - You Know I Love You
15	Los Campesinos - You! Me! Dancing!
16	The Rifles - She's Got Standards
17	Cut Chemist - The Garden
18	Jarvis Cocker - (Cs are Still) Running the World*

Blogged to death but I don't care

2006-08-10T22:44:00.000+02:00

Jared and the boys from Bel Auburn have been blitzing us bloggers with links to the band's new album, Lullabies in A & C. Coz of course, as you are probably aware, there have been quite a few bands who've leaped from obscurity to major (indie) success after being championed by blogs, message boards, podcasters and the various other new media outlets which have sprung up on the internet in the past few years. And who knows, with a bit of luck your band could be the next Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!, Tapes 'n Tapes or (gasp) Arctic Monkeys to ride a tidal wave of blog hype to relative megastardom.

Unfortunately there's one very important thing a lot of the bands sending round MP3 links and begging for your kind attention are lacking, and which thankfully Bel Auburn have got in bucketloads. And that's the tunes, maaan. Yes, it's a piece of piss to put together a shimmering 24-track demo in your bedroom these days, but if it doesn't grab the listener's ear nobody's going to hear it, beyond say the first track.

So yes, Bel Auburn are a ray of light in amongst all the bands currently shlepping their music around the blogs. It's indie rock which is widescreen without veering over the top like so many of the bands around at the moment. And it's got an indefinable spark - you know, when a track gives you 'butterflies'. Can I call it the butterfly effect? Could be apt, really - a handful of emails sent in America create major ripples the other side of the world...

Anyway, please have a listen to the tracks below, then go on over to the band's site and find some more downloads, photos and stuff, buy a t-shirt, buy the album for a friend, go and see them on tour - tell them Jim sent you:
Bel Auburn - Metropolitan (Watercolor)
Bel Auburn - Blind Ward
Bel Auburn - Just Love

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To...

2006-08-01T22:34:00.000+02:00

Vol. 7 Aug 2006

1 Polytechnic - PEP - awesome new band from Manchester. My tip for mega indie stardom in the near future.
2 Boy Kill Boy - Civil Sin
3 Paolo Nutini - Jenny Don't Be Hasty
4 Thom Yorke - Harrowdown Hill
5 Arctic Monkeys - Leave Before the Lights Come On
6 Justice vs. Simian - We Are Your Friends (Edison remix)
7 The Young Knives - Weekends and Bleak Days
8 Kasabian - Empire
9 Killers - When You Were Young
10 Hot Club de Paris - Sometimesitsbetter…
11 Polytechnic - Turn Around (Live) - love this band
12 Metric - Monster Hospital
13 Peter, Bjorn and John - Young Folks
14 The View - Wasted Little DJs
15 Joan as Police Woman - Eternal Flame
16 Mumm-Ra - Song B
17 The Dykeenies - New Ideas
18 Union of Knives - Taste for Harmony
19 Polytechnic - Penguin - getting the message yet?
20 The Dears - Ticket to Immorality

More magic from Manchester

2006-07-28T07:51:00.000+02:00

Two in a row from Manchester - is this a sign that we are on the verge of a new period of creativity from the city that gave us Joy Division, The Smiths, The Happy Mondays and Madchester? The latest export from the north-west to impress me is Polytechnic, a five-piece whose new single Pep is out on Monday on hip label du jour Transgressive. I got my hands on a six-track demo, which along with first single Won't You Come Around / Let Me Down has been on repeat play here non-stop for the past 2 days.

Their sound is being described in many quarters as Manchester's answer to Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!, which while a lazy comparison will give you some idea of what to expect. The vocals in particular have an element of the CYHSY / Wolf Parade / Modest Mouse fragility. Meanwhile the songwriting is as good as any of the above.

Download 3 tracks off their MySpace site and watch and listen to various videos and tracks on their band site.

Some press quotes culled from their website:
'My favourite thing at the moment? POLYTECHNIC, a new band from Manchester... I'm desperate to see them live because their demo is absolutely brilliant - one of the best I've ever had, really'
Steve Lamacq, NME

'This hand-clapping, sugar-rushing off-kilter classic-in-waiting hasn't left the stereo since we discovered them at Manchester's In The City last month'
pep on NME's what's on the stereo?

'The hottest new band in Manchester…'
bbc gmr

'There is hope for guitar music yet... They aren’t comparable, over the course of a live set or an EP, to anyone else. 5/5'
drownedinsound

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2006-06-15T08:17:00.000+02:00

Vol. 6 June 2006
Round-up of the best albums of the first half of 2006*

1 Infadels - Love Like Semtex
2 Love is All - Felt Tip
3 Hot Chip - Over & Over
4 Tapes 'n Tapes - Ten Gallon Ascot
5 Graham Coxon - I Can't Look At Your Skin
6 Seth Lakeman - The Charmer
7 Klaxons - Atlantis to Interzone
8 Serena Maneesh - Drain Cosmetics
9 Archie Bronson Outfit - Jab Jab
10 Arctic Monkeys - Mardy Bum
11 TV On the Radio - I Was a Lover
12 Morningwood - Nth Degree
13 Morrissey - The Youngest Was the Most Loved
14 Akira the Don - Thanks for all the AIDS
15 The Knife - We Share Our Mother's Health
16 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Turn Into
17 Longcut - A Quiet Life
18 Mission of Burma - 2wice
19 I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness - According to Plan
20 Hess is More - Yes Boss

* some of which were released in 2005 but I only heard them for the first
time this year.

A new contender

2006-06-01T15:36:00.000+02:00

The Thom Yorke solo album ("it's not a solo album") has leaked online, and it's a cracker, but there's something else I want to draw your attention to. An album I knew after one listen was going to be in my top 5 of the year, alongside TV On the Radio and Archie Bronson Outfit. I'm talking about A Call and Response, by Manchester's The Longcut. An album that manages to evoke the spirit of Manchester's past, with influences ranging from Joy Division to the Happy Mondays to the Fall, while taking off in a totally different direction to the likes of Kasabian, Interpol or Editors.

You can sign up for signed copies on their website (well you can once they fix the link!), which sounds like the deal of the year to me. You can also download various live and demo tracks there, as well as a track off the album, just click on the Download link on the home page (I can't link directly to the downloads, unfortunately). Well worth a visit!

There's also a 40-minute gig available in streaming video on the XFM website.

Have a listen and let me know what you think - leave a comment below.

2006-05-20T20:47:00.000+02:00

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

Vol. 5, May 2006

1 Akira the Don - Boom
2 The Automatic - Monster
3 Editors - Orange Crush - best REM cover ever?
4 Lily Allen - LDN
5 The Kooks - Naive
6 Princess Superstar - My Machine
7 Life Without Buildings - Young Offenders - from forgotten 2000 masterpiece album Any Other City
8 Katzenjammers - Cars - from Rough Trade compilation Counter Culture 05
9 Fratellis - Creeping Up the Backstairs
10 Muse - Supermassive Black Hole - first single off long-awaited new album
11 Hope of the States - Sing it Out
12 The Black Keys - Work Me - from the awesome Chulahoma mini album
13 TV On the Radio - Dry Drunk Emperor - about a certain president's 'response' to Hurricane Katrina
14 The Feeling - Fill My Little World
15 Hot Chip - Boy From School
16 Archie Bronson Outfit - Cherry Lips
17 Akira the Don - Bankers - put your fingers in the corner of your mouth, say…
18 Howling Bells - Blessed Night
19 The Longcut - Vitamin C - from A Call and Response, my album of the month
20 Paul Simon - How Can You Live in the Northeast - Brian Eno has done for Simon what his former acolyte Daniel Lanois did for Dylan

Capo di tutti capi

2006-05-05T23:10:00.000+02:00

Partly thanks to his lablemates Kid Casanova (see below) I have been encountering the music of Akira the Don a lot recently. He is not unfamiliar to the world of blog - not least because he himself is a fervent blogger and vocal supporter of filesharing, who makes huge chunks of his output freely available to the world.

His mixtapes are legendary - ATD12 has just been released - and most of my exposure has been to these free downloads up to now, so I was very pleasantly surprised to hear more original tracks by him on the recent Something in Construction sampler and the Camden Crawl compilation.

And what stands out is the contrast between his genial rapping style and the brutal, intelligent to-the-pointness of his lyrics, most of which are wry dagger blows aimed at the heart of the global economic system and the political status quo that goes hand in hand with it. Unsurprisingly, the record business does not get off lightly.

So I was pleased to see Something in Construction have put the entire sampler online to download here, including two fabulous Akira tracks:
Bankers (mp3)
"Put your fingers in the corners of your mouth, say Bankers"
and
Jerusalem (mp3) (with Bravecaptain)

Don't miss the rest of the sampler though, it's class from start to finish.

Like a kid with a new toy

2006-05-04T17:05:00.000+02:00

John Peel famously received 400 demo tapes / CDs a week on average, and struggled with feelings of guilt when he was physically unable to listen to all of them. These days bloggers and podcasters are taking over the role of new music promoters from radio DJs to a certain extent, but the format of the demo has also changed - more often than not we are sent links to MP3 downloads (mostly at a measly 128 kbps, as well....). So imagine my childlike pleasure at receiving my first ever real promo CDs in the mail this week ;-)

From Kid Casanova, to be precise, a four-piece from New York who play catchy indie pop songs which reward repeated listenings. Sparkly jangle on the surface but with a darker, Bowie-tinged undertow. Their debut album is due out in July on Something In Construction (in the UK). But, I hear you ask, are they any good, or are you simply plugging them out of a pathetic gratitude for your meaningless freebies? Well to be honest they didn't grab me straight away, but I'm glad I persevered - the songs definitely reveal additional layers after the 3rd or 4th listen.

So head on over to Kid Casanova's website at www.kidcasanova.com, and download these four tracks in glorious MP3:

Hey Johnny
Like We Did Last Year
By & By
Rec Center (the Kids in This Town)

I'm not sure how I'd cope with Peel-like levels of demos, but I'm happy for now.

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To….

2006-04-23T16:23:00.000+02:00

Tracklist for this month's compilation CD (Vol 4.)

1. Boy Kill Boy - Susie
2. Graham Coxon - You & I
3. Editors - All Sparks
4. Bromheads Jacket - When You Wasn't Famous
great cover of the Streets hit by yet another Sheffield band
5. Franz Ferdinand - The Fallen (scroll down)
6. Seth Lakeman - Riflemen of War - from new album Freedom Fields
7. Archie Bronson Outfit - Dart for my Sweetheart
from Derdang Derdang, the best album this month, and one of my top 3 of the year so far. Qualifies for rare double entry here.
8. The Infadels - Girl That Speaks No Words
9. Brakes - All Night Disco Party
10. Larrikin Love - Edwould
11. Dirty Pretty Things - Deadwood - former Libertine shows how it's supposed to be done
12. Futureheads - Skip To The End
13. Lovely Feathers – Wrong Choice
14. Hess is More - The Magic Invention from TDPRC
from new album Captain Europe by this amazing Danish multi-instrumentalist
15. TV On the Radio (with David Bowie) - Province
16. Gorillaz - Kids With Guns (scroll down)
17. Shit Disco - Disco Blood
18. Archie Bronson Outfit - Dead Funny
19. Duels - Animal
20. Tapes 'n Tapes - Buckle
21. Depeche Mode - Suffer Well

My ears are thanking me and yours will too

2006-04-06T11:17:00.000+02:00

Some of you might have guessed that I've been put off my stride somewhat by the FileLodge incident (see below). What with the famous Ryan Adams blogger case and the announcement yesterday of another 2000 cases to be brought against filesharers in Europe, my opinion of the record industry has dropped lower than I thought was possible...

On the other hand I've also been working my ass off the past 10 days and haven't had any time to blog. But then along comes an album that has made me sit up and take notice to such an extent that I had to make time in between to give you a heads up.

The Archie Bronson Outfit is a trio from the west of England whose new album Derdang Derdang is total psych-out rock n roll, with here and there Celtic / Irish touches and even a bit of early Hawkwind squeaky saxophone floating over the top. OK this description does it no justice whatsoever, but suffice to say if you like Tapes 'n Tapes and/or TV On the Radio you will love this.

So I urge you to nip over to their Myspace page and stream the songs there, or pop over to Musicisnotdead blog and download two songs. I've pasted the links below, thanks to Andy for these.

The album is out now on Domino, if you buy only one album this month, make it this one!

Archie Bronson Outfit - Cherry Lips [MP3]
Archie Bronson Outfit - Kangaroo Heart [MP3]

Belly warming

2006-03-28T19:11:00.001+02:00

Two ostensibly very different recent releases take traditional music forms and give them a modern twist, resulting in both cases in something wondrous.

Seth Lakeman has admirably resisted any attempt to divert him from the template he established on his Mercury Prize nominated second album Kitty Jay. New long-player Freedom Fields once again features traditional English folk instrumentation and lyrical content suffused with a modern indie/dance oriented attitude. And while there's nothing here with quite the impact of the title track of Kitty Jay, this is nevertheless an awesome album.

The Black Keys' mini album Chulahoma is not due for release until 1 May, but advance copies appeared online this week. The EP features covers of tracks by blues legend Junior Kimbrough, and its name is taken from Junior's home town. Their earlier albums never quite managed to win me over, but this is a different story. They tap into the spirit of the old bluesmen, but electrified in a way that is reminiscent of Stevie Ray Vaughan at his best. Simply put, it is a work of genius.

Both albums give you something only the very best roots music can provide - a warm glow in the belly.

Seth Lakeman - Setting of the Sun [mp3]
Seth Lakeman - Riflemen of War [mp3]
The Black Keys - Have Mercy on Me [mp3]
The Black Keys - Meet Me in the City [mp3]

Normal service will be resumed...

2006-03-28T16:46:00.000+02:00

By the look of things, all the files I had hosted on FileLodge have been suspended, so if you are wondering why none of the downloads work, there's your answer. Luckily there are still other options available, so all the newer files will be available (for a limited period) through YouSendIt.

BAD news to cheer you up

2006-03-22T17:25:00.000+01:00

STOP PRESS: Just after I wrote this article, Carbon/Silicon released a new 12" single on their website. I have uploaded the two tracks here with improved tags (full band name and titles):

Carbon/Silicon - The News [mp3]
Carbon/Silicon - Grow Up [mp3]

The time seems right for a reassessment of one of the most influential British bands of the 80s. Big Audio Dynamite were primarily famous for being the band of 'Mick Jones of the Clash', but their first full-length LP, This is Big Audio Dynamite, was not only revolutionary in the way it incorporated samples and beatboxes into the traditional rock band format, it was also a killer album, packed with infectious rhythms, samples of Sergio Leone and Nic Roeg films and funny, thought-provoking lyrics.

They went on to make many more great albums, including Megatop Phoenix and The Globe (as BAD II), which saw them almost break through into the major league in the USA.

As the 90s progressed, however, interest in the band waned, and the last album they recorded (in 1997) was rejected by their record label. And while it wasn't perfect, it sounds pretty good today - better than its two predecessors in my opinion. The band eventually released the songs one by one through their - now-defunct - website, and the whole thing, including a load of bonus tracks, has just been made available to download in its entirety. In glorious 320 kbps MP3 format, no less, and free!

Click here to go to the download page.

Meanwhile Mick Jones has not been sitting still, of course, having famously produced the two Libertines albums and the Babyshambles album, Down in Albion. He has also been working with Tony James (formerly of Generation X and Sigue Sigue Sputnik) in Carbon/Silicon. According to Wikipedia, "similar in many respects to Jones' earlier work in Big Audio Dynamite, Carbon/Silicon aims to break the traditional approach to rock and roll. The band described by critic Alan McGee as "...the Stones jamming with a Laptop," make use of samples in their recordings and live shows. The formation of the band was catalyzed by the internet and p2p file sharing. The first song written by Jones and James was entitled "MPFree," in which they expressed their willingness to embrace the technology of the internet and file sharing, in the interest of spreading music, rather than profit."

Which is music to the ears of this long-time BAD admirer!

Carbon/Silicon have made 6 tracks available for download from their website:
Carbon/Silicon - The Whole Truth [mp3]
Carbon/Silicon - Caesar's Palace [mp3]
Carbon/Silicon - Barnes Wallace [mp3]
Carbon/Silicon - The Global War on Culture [mp3]
Carbon/Silicon - What The Fuck! [mp3]
Carbon/Silicon - Are You Terrified? [mp3]

There is artwork for the 2 EPs available on the website, and for more information you can visit the official fansite.

Libertine making tracks

2006-03-20T22:38:00.000+01:00

Dirty Pretty Things, the band of 'other Libertine' Cart Barat, is set to release its debut album in May. If the tracks on the promo sampler recently sent out to reviewers and record shops is anything to go by, we have plenty to look forward to. The songs bristle with the punk energy of early Libertines numbers. This will come as a pleasant surprise to anyone who like me was slightly underwhelmed by first offering Bang Bang, You're Dead.

In an interview with the NME late last year, Carl said that after a difficult year his new band feels like "four guys against the world again", and the tour has given him the chance to bond with the rest of the group.

He said: "I've taken a year to sweep up the pieces, focusing, and remembering who I was and why I did what I did rather than tying up the loose ends of the Libertines, which has really taken up a lot of time and emotional space."

Sounds like it did the trick:
Dirty Pretty Things - You Fucking Love it [mp3]
Dirty Pretty Things - If You Were Wondering [mp3]
Dirty Pretty Things - Deadwood [mp3]
Dirty Pretty Things - Gin & Milk [mp3]

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To:

2006-03-15T20:38:00.000+01:00

Tracklist for the March CD

These are my favourite tracks of the past month. There's a preponderance of female singers this time around, but that's pure coincidence, these bands just happen to be making the best music out there in my opinion. Most of them shouty, with one notable exception - the big P is back, with a track from the Serge Gainsbourg tribute album Monsieur Gainsbourg Revisited. We truly are not worthy.

1. Portishead - Requiem for Anna (Un jour comme un autre - Anna) [mp3]
2. Mystery Jets - The Boy Who Ran Away [mp3]
3. Deerhoof - Wrong Time Capsule [mp3]
4. The Harrisons - Blue Note [mp3]
5. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Gold Lion [mp3]
6. Cayto - Christmas In Russia [mp3]
7. She Wants Revenge - Red Flags and Long Nights [mp3]
8. Be Your Own Pet - Adventure [mp3]
9. Gossip - Standing In The Way Of Control [mp3]
10. Tapes 'n Tapes - Cowbell [mp3]
11.Roots Manuva - No Love [mp3]
12. Pretty Girls Make Graves - Parade [mp3]
13.Thunderbirds are Now! - From: Skulls [mp3]
14. Who Made Who - Hello, empty room [mp3]
15. Love is All - Make Out Fall Out Make Up [mp3]
16. TV On the Radio - Snakes and Martyrs [link to mp3]
17. Gnarls Barklay - Crazy [mp3]
18. The National - Secret Meeting (remix) [mp3]
19. Morrissey - You Have Killed Me [mp3]
20. Secret Machines - Alone Jealous & Stoned [mp3]

More magic from Italy

2006-03-14T09:36:00.000+01:00

Afterhours have built a huge name for themselves in their native Italy, and have been championed by the likes of Mercury Rev, REM, Mark Lanegan and Afghan Whigs founder Greg Dulli. Now they have recorded for the first time in English and are poised to break out into the rest of the world.

"Ballads for Little Hyenas" is an amazing album, dark, brooding and rich in drama. Singer Manuel Agnelli's voice veers from gritty Maggie May-era Rod Stewart growl to keening falsetto to Nick Cave baritone, while the music and atmosphere are drawn from a similar well to Cave, The National, Lanegan and their ilk.

The album is no.1 download at the moment in the eMusic Power Chart, and with the band currently touring Europe, they look as if they could be on the brink of gaining a worldwide following. Catch them while you can in these small venues:

Mar 15 2006 Paradiso - Upstairs Hall AMSTERDAM
Mar 16 2006 Rotown ROTTERDAM
Mar 17 2006 Vera GRONINGEN
Mar 18 2006 Ekko UTRECHT
Mar 23 2006 TBC BERLINO
Mar 25 2006 Stadtgarten ERFURT
Mar 26 2006 Carrera MONACO
Mar 30 2006 Alcatraz MILANO
Mar 31 2006 New Age Club RONCADE (TV)

You can buy the album for a mere £7.66 from the One Little Indian website, and there's also a video promo you can stream here.

Here are some MP3s in case you are not yet totally convinced!

Afterhours - The Ending is the Greater [mp3]
Afterhours - Fresh Flesh [mp3]
Afterhours - White Widow [mp3]

Afterhours MySpace page
Band page on One little Indian site

My cup overfloweth

2006-03-09T21:08:00.000+01:00

There are some mind-bogglingly good resources out there on 't interweb. I've mentioned Fabchannel before, which features live and streamed recorded video of concerts from the two best venues in Amsterdam, from the likes of Bloc Party, the Charlatans and Franz Ferdinand. Now I have stumbled across something even bigger and better - an archive of thousands of audio recordings of concerts:

The Archive.org live music archive, featuring crystal clear soundboard recordings to stream or download (!) of performances by the likes of My Morning Jacket, Mogwai, Soul Coughing, Matisyahu, Ween, The Decemberists, Zwan, Godspeed You Black Emperor!, Fugazi, Two Gallants, etc., etc.

The Grateful Dead are the best represented band there with 2923 separate gigs on offer. Seriously. Americans, eh?

I listened to a streamed recording of a 1996 Soul Coughing gig earlier, and was transported back to the time I saw them in a tent at Lowlands in '97, playing an almost identical set. Quality recording of a great gig.

I've been a better lover with your mother

2006-03-03T11:29:00.000+01:00

It's funny how a buzz grows around a band or an album. A distinctive album cover definitely helps - you see it out of the corner of your eye a few times, stuck away down the bottom of the page on Pitchfork, PlayLouder, Gigwise, DiS. Then you start seeing the band name appearing on blogs, on the front page of the Hype Machine, and finally you put the band name and the album cover together and think "I suppose I'd better listen to this".

Tapes 'n Tapes - The Loon is the buzz album du jour, and I am listening to it for the first time as I write. That's right - it's so good I couldn't wait to write about it. The sound is not a million miles away from Modest Mouse, Wolf Parade and their ilk, except they come at you with some really unexpected rhythms - sometimes uptempo jazzy, sometimes a slapped rockabilly snare - which make you sit up and notice.

Ditto the lyrics, which also deliver regular slaps round the face when you are least expecting them - see the heading above.

As always, an MP3 paints a thousand words, so here are a couple of tracks that I haven't seen on other blogs up to now:
Tapes 'n Tapes - The Iliad [MP3]
Tapes 'n Tapes - Buckle [MP3]
Tapes 'n Tapes - 10 Gallon Ascot [MP3]

You can buy the CD direct from the band on their website, where you can also download 3 other tracks off the album and 3 tracks from their debut EP.

Turn on. Tune in. Get blown away.

2006-03-01T10:15:00.000+01:00

TV On the Radio's second album, 'Return to Cookie Mountain', has leaked, and first impressions are that this will sweep all before it. It's a massive soundclash of styles, impossible to pigeonhole yet utterly New York-ian, a riot of distorted guitars, sound collage and falsetto-Mick-Jagger vocals.

A certain D. Bowie also lends his vocal backing on one song (Province).

It is one of those albums that picks you up, takes you on a 50-minute emotional rollercoaster ride and leaves you reeling.

If you haven't got them already, buy their first EP and album and get yourself prepared, this is going to be one of the albums of the year.

Here are some tasters:
Blues From Down Here [mp3]
A Method [mp3]
I Was a Lover [mp3]

Artex Monkey

2006-02-28T11:47:00.000+01:00

If you've never lived in the North of England you might not get a lot out of this, but a thort it were reight 'ilarius:

Artex Monkey site

Artex Monkey - A bet tha luks gud on a pushbike [MP3]

Unreleased Liars track

2006-02-21T01:28:00.000+01:00

Let's be generous here and say "I don't get them". Liars that is. But there are apparently plenty of you out there who do, and as I have been sent this cover of the Nirvana track, which I have been reliably informed will not be released elsewhere, I might as well post it, eh?

Liars - Territorial Pissings [mp3]

Knock yourself out!

Decline? Wot decline?

2006-02-16T19:15:00.000+01:00

The BBC and everyone else is once again parroting the spin put out by the music and film biz that sales of CDs, DVDs, etc are in decline - as a direct result of all those evil filesharers, obviously - when patently the opposite is true. This time booming DVD sales are 'bucking the trend'... Er, but surely the trend in all the others is also booming - it was only yesterday the Beeb was informing us that 'business is booming' in the UK music industry...

Wait a minute, VHS, yes that's definitely in decline. Silly me.

Take Your Medicine podcast

2006-02-05T13:44:00.000+01:00

As proud sponsor of the inaugural Take Your Medicine podcast, which is ear-blessingly good, I'm taking this opportunity to plug the very wonderful eMusic (and hopefully earn some free downloads in the process...).

You've probably seen the swirly-dot banner ads all over the place - on Pitchfork, for example - but you might not have got around to clicking on them yet, or hesitated to sign up because of the credit card needed.

Rest assured, however, that it is definitely worth a visit. New members get a free trial of 50 downloads, and these are worth having. A brief browse through their catalogue turns up masses of hard-to-find albums and EPs by a huge range of artists - all on independent labels. Whether you just fancy the latest indie chart toppers, such as Maximo Park, Sufjan Stevens or Bloc Party, would like to try something new or want to dig around for some obscure track you've been looking for for years, it's all here.

The website is packed with recommendations, lists and links to related artists, all of which help you discover music you didn't know or had forgotten about - like Amazon's Listmania only better, and with the added bonus that you can download a single track (for free during the trial period, just 15p / 25c a track thereafter) in order to hear it for yourself.

All the tracks are in pure MP3 format, with no DRM or licences to worry about.

Once you've had a look and decide you'd like to try it out, please email me first and wait for the invitation email from eMusic to arrive. Not only do you get your 50 free downloads, I get an extra 50 for recommending you if you decide to sign up at the end of the trial. But even if you're sure you won't sign up at the end, please email me first anyway!

Arctic Monkeys remixed

2006-02-01T16:31:00.000+01:00

A website dedicated to Actic Monkeys remixes/bootlegs/mashups

Including an absolutely bonkers mashup of IBYLGOTD with I Predict A Riot as sung acapella by the Cheshire Chord Company (a choir)...

These two are also definitely worth a listen:
Arctic Monkeys vs Roots Manuva - Witness the Curtains Closing [mp3]
Arctic Monkeys vs The Killers - Scumbody Told Me [mp3]

Tip of the week - The Features

2006-01-26T11:56:00.000+01:00

Again not a new band, they released their debut album in April 2005, but they're new to me and by rights they should already be up there with the likes of the Kaiser Chiefs and The Killers. Their songs are 3-minute slabs of perfect indie pop jangle, and their sound has elements of the Buzzcocks, the Cars and Blur.

You can download their standout single Blow It Out, which sounds like the New Pornographers fronted by Conor Oberst, here. The best tracks off the album are the the aforementioned Blow it Out, The Idea of Growing Old [stream], There's a Million Ways to Sing the Blues and Leave It All Behind [mp3].

You can also download some MP3s from their website:
Paid to Think [mp3]
Thursday [mp3]
The Beginning [mp3]
D-Con Radio One [mp3]
Anti-Gravity Class of 93 [mp3]
Exhibit A [mp3]

The Features website
Myspace

XRRF

2006-01-13T14:24:00.000+01:00

Congratulations to No Rock&Roll Fun for reaching its fifth birthday (and 1 millionth visitor!) yesterday. The UK's best place for up-to-the-minute comment on the world of popular music, it's like Private Eye but with stories you're actually interested in reading, delivered free to your doorstep every morning. Yes, it's that good.

Aberdeen grower

2006-01-11T14:36:00.000+01:00

I've downloaded a few more tracks by Aberdeen City and they are all seriously good, proving that the MP3s on MySpace were not killer and the rest filler (scroll down for the links). The three I found on Limewire were Pretty Pet, Incredible Story and Final Bout. I've had the six tracks I've now got on heavy rotation for the past couple of days and they just get better and better.

I've just spotted a comprehensive list of MP3s to download via blogs which I am just about to explore.

On the basis of what I've heard so far, I will be buying (gasp) my own copy of the album soon.
[product]

This Month I Will Mostly Be Listening To:

2006-01-09T20:16:00.001+01:00

Tracklist of January's compilation CD

1 We Are Scientists - It's a Hit
2 Tom Vek - CC (You set the fire in me)
3 Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Let The Cool Goddess Rust Away
4 Ladytron - Destroy Everything You Touch
5 Queens of the Stone Age - Little Sister
6 Mike Doughty - Looking at the World from the Bottom of a Well
7 Bloc Party - Banquet (Phones Disco remix)
8 Wolf Parade - I'll Believe in Anything
9 Seth Lakeman - Kitty Jay
10 Death From Above 1979 - Black History Month
11 The Crimea - Lottery Winners on Acid
12 The Rakes - Retreat>
13 Bob Dylan - Like a Rolling Stone
14 Lemon Jelly - The Staunton Lick
15 Art Brut - Moving to LA
16 Autolux - Turnstile Blues
17 Modest Mouse - Float On
18 Aberdeen City - Sixty Lives
19 Cuban Boys - The Nation Needs You Highly recommended - infinitely better tribute to Peelie than the so-called tribute album!

Searching for the Fall

2006-01-08T10:45:00.000+01:00

The story of The Fall, whether you love them or hate them, is a fascinating saga. In the Guardian, Dave Simpson tells about his quest to find all the former members:

"This has been my life for weeks. I've become an internet stalker and a telephone pest, all because of an obsessive drive to track down everyone who has ever played in the Fall. That's 40-odd people, including drummers abandoned at motorway services, guitarists left in foreign hotels and various wives and girlfriends of the band's provocateur-ringmaster, Mark E Smith."

XFM's Music Response top 50 tracks of 2005

2006-01-07T19:51:00.000+01:00

XFM have posted the Music Response top 50 tracks of 2005. Very UK-skewed, but generally a fair assessment of the year.

The only surprise for me is Athlete at no. 2 (and 33). They do about as much for me as Snow Patrol, yawn.

The top 5:
1. Arctic Monkeys - I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor
2. Athlete - Wires
3. Kaiser Chiefs - Oh My God
4. Hard-Fi - Hard to Beat
5. The Bravery - An Honest Mistake

My tips for 2006 - part 1

2006-01-07T14:00:00.000+01:00

OK so now I've had the chance to read everyone else's tips and I can cherrypick my own ... not quite the point, I hear you say, but that's exactly what plenty of other bloggers and journos seem to have been doing. And how much insight do you really need to predict that Arctic Monkeys are going to be massive?

So it might look like lazy journalism (not to mention partisanism, considering my links to the city) to predict that a few others from the Sheffield scene will break through this year, but the fact is that the ground is currently very fertile in that particular corner of South Yorkshire.

The five bands most likely to make it, in my opinion, are Little Man Tate (pictured) [mp3], The Long Blondes [mp3], Bromhead's Jacket [mp3], Milburn [mp3] and (long shot this one) Bhuna [mp3].

St John

2006-01-06T18:36:00.000+01:00

Thanks to Take Your Medicine for pointing me in the direction of The Cuban Boys - The Nation Needs You. A tribute to John Peel which in 3 minutes 14 seconds achieves more than all the tribute albums, concerts, biographies and commemorative magazine issues put together.

The National in session

2006-01-05T22:36:00.001+01:00

The National released one of my favourite albums of 2005, Alligator. For those of you not yet familiar with them, here's the perfect opportunity - a radio session which you can download in high quality MP3 format from The Muzzle of Bees blog. The sound quality is excellent, it sounds like you are in the studio with them.

Second Impressions

2006-01-05T15:47:00.000+01:00

After reading Alexis Petridis' review of the new Strokes album in the Guardian, in which he claims that the album is smothered in 'widdly-woo guitar', I was half-expecting to hear something approaching Santana when I eventually heard the thing. This seemed unlikely though, given the chugging groove of Juicebox (love the song, hate the video), and on first listen I thought he was way off the mark.

Second and third time through, however, I started to see what he meant. In the new musical landscape dominated by stripped back rock a la DFA 79, acoustic singer-songwriters and 20-piece bands from Montreal, the Strokes are sounding very quaintly out of touch.

Never mind though, the way the fashion in retro sound keeps lurching from era to era, 2006 might be 2000 all over again, in which case they're in luck!

Hear First Impressions of Earth on the NME Media Player

Albums to look forward to in 2006

2006-01-05T13:08:00.000+01:00

I posted this as a comment on the excellent Take Your Medicine MP3 blog, but decided it was worth using as my first entry here:

2006 looks like being another vintage year for albums. Apart from anything else, there should be a new one from Radiohead to look forward to.

I'll be interested to see if the class of '04 can come up with the goods this year - Razorlight, Kasabian, Interpol, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Futureheads, the Bravery, the Zutons, the Caesars.... Franz Ferdinand have raised the bar for second albums, let's see who can step up and match them.

Then of course there's Graham Coxon - and Blur. I expect plenty of magic to flow from GC's guitar, and hopefully Damon can find some time to hit the studio with Blur. Will his overtures to Graham bring him back into the Blur fold? And would it be a good thing? I can hardly wait to find out.

Another big question (for me) is - will Portishead finally get their 3rd studio album finished, and if so will it cut the mustard in this so-called 'Dance is Dead' era? Or has time passed them by to such an extent that they have given up on the idea and decided to stick to producing the likes of the Coral? I for one hope not.