Hi-Fi Popcorn

THIRTY DAYS OF MUSIC: DAY FIVE

2010-04-05T01:47:00.000+01:00

day 05 – a song that reminds you of someone

Feeder - Just A Day

My dog Rudi used to like this song and so did I.

THIRTY DAYS OF MUSIC: DAY FOUR

2010-04-04T01:29:00.034+01:00

day 04 – a song that makes you sad

Randy Newman - When I'm Gone

"I'm a better man than I was before,
Knowing you has made me strong.
And I sure am going to miss you when I'm gone."

Randy Newman wrote this song for the last ever episode of Monk.
After eight beautiful seasons, this unavoidably clichéd ballad soundtracked the final sequence; a collage of moments belonging to our fictional pals, in their past, present and future... as we saw them, as we knew them, and as we'll never know or see them again.
There's nothing pretentious or clever about this. It's just honest and painful, like all goodbyes.
:'(

THIRTY DAYS OF MUSIC: DAY THREE

2010-04-03T01:05:00.030+01:00

day 03 – a song that makes you happy

Hemstad - Sommar i Göteborg

"..."

There are certain bands and certain songs which I only ever listen to when conditions are ideal.
Hemstad is one of them.
So Hemstad imbue the summer. Hemstad imbue tropicalia. Hemstad imbue smiles.
Imbuement is inspiration.
And inspiration is half the battle.

THIRTY DAYS OF MUSIC: DAY TWO

2010-04-02T19:00:00.004+01:00

day 02 – your least favorite song

Crazy Town - Butterfly

"Come my lady
Come come my lady"

It's so much more difficult to choose one for this than for favourite/favorite song.
And I can't even bear to re-listen to this to remember why it's so bad.
Maybe I'm just scared that I'll nostalgically love it.
No way.
It's obviously not the worst song in the world. And it's not Jedward or whoever.
And it's not like it still bugs me or anything.
But I think it does well to represent the disgusting eejitry of much of 'the music world', as well as the awful shit that weird people actually enjoy.
The people making this music are fucking fools and that's that.

THIRTY DAYS OF MUSIC: DAY ONE

2010-04-01T18:18:00.022+01:00

I'm gonna take attempt to take part in this thing, just cos it looks mildly amusing.

day 01 – your favorite song

Tripping Daisy - Field Day Jitters

"Wondering jets inside of me...
I've got the field day jitters, wet matches, and a bottle of Mr. Clean"

It's like the drums are playing the main melody.
It's like the world is ending.
This song is a real trip. There are so many parts and they all flit into each other and glide along leaving a silver vapour trail which spits out other more colourful colours into the ether.
It's a total assault too. There are so many moments to savour but no time allowed during which to do so.
I think this song sums up music.
And also everything that's good about life. There's a steamrolling enthusiasm which infects my heart as it passes through my body.
It's so strange to think the guitarist on this committed suicide the year after recording this.
Could he not have just given his piece one little quick spin before taking that gamble?

DIETARY TIPS AND TRICKS.

2010-03-26T03:07:00.001Z

Princeton: Cocoon of Love

2010-03-26T02:37:00.002Z

ALBUM REVIEW (written for some magazine)

As it is the overly-obvious comparison which will surely plague California's Princeton, and because I wish to maintain some journalistic integrity, I endeavour to complete my review of their debut record 'Cocoon of Love' without once mentioning a young group of well-doers who call themselves Vampire Weekend.

Whoops.

Such a challenge is quite clearly testing, if not impossible. Any band who arrive with an original scope - and succeed - plow the way for a plethora of admirers, highly inspired by their new musical bastion. Princeton share the same age, gender, class, intelligence, level of education and influences (as well as the key to the same orchestra's cupboard) as Koenig and friends. And their name, although a reference to their home street and not a pretentious scholarly nod, kind of gives the game away.

And first impressions are everything. If that opening line of the Bible didn't do well enough to set the scene for the unashamedly epic and extravagent series of affairs which followed, then nothing could. And so when 'Sadie and Andy' opens with a stately harpsichord which can't help but bring 'M79' to mind, and then the first vocals we hear steals melody from The Four Seasons' 'Sherry', a certain level of expectation is founded. The truth is that there isn't a shedload of originality here. A better writer might avoid namechecking other bands for comparison, but a better band would obscure their influences better. Princeton have essentially compiled a mixtape of their favourite songs, featuring prime selections from the likes of Andrew Bird, Jens Lekman, Beirut, Camera Obscura and Guillemots.

Despite such criticisms, or probably because of them, this is an adventurous album; remarkably accomplished coffee table music with the tonality of the morning's small hours, but the sound of the summer. And in 'Calypso Gold' they distill everything wonderful about themselves with a whole load of panache and potential, implanting great anticipation for the days when they graduate and get their own place.

Calypso Gold

The Grandmother of St. Stephen's Green.

2010-02-01T01:30:00.003Z

A TRUE STORY

The Boys On The Bus.

2010-01-30T21:42:00.016Z

A TRUE STORY

I like to make music.

2010-01-28T13:20:00.008Z

NO MONSTER CLUB

No Monster Club is the amalgamation of a symphony of one. It is a revival of dirges and waltzes unearthed from the attics of dead popstars. It is the society of noise which silently forms around the cells and atoms of a young but ageing troubadour. It is a slideshow of the grotesque and a gramophone of the absurd, which - if you are of any valour, virtue or melody - you cannot help but join.

NO MONSTER CLUB - A MORBID FASCINATION from Bobby Aherne on Vimeo.

MYspace

"I'm Gonna Go Pray At A Different Thing"

2010-01-10T17:15:00.012Z

BOBBY'S FAVOURITE MOVIES OF THE "NOUGHTIES" (EW)

1. The Darjeeling Limited
2. The Devil and Daniel Johnston
3. Napoleon Dynamite
4. The Science of Sleep
5. Big Fish

6. The Royal Tenenbaums
7. Ratatouille
8. Amelie
9. Thumbsucker
10. Where The Wild Things Are
11. Paris Je T'aime
12. Danielson: A Family Movie (or, Make a Joyful Noise Here)
13. Hedwig and the Angry Inch
14. Up
15. Mamma Mia!
16. The Fearless Freaks
17. Adam and Paul
18. 28 Days Later
19. Fantastic Mr. Fox
20. Rat Race
21. High Fidelity
22. Enchanted
23. Howl's Moving Castle
24. Bubble Boy
25. Pan's Labyrinth

Two Thousand and Eight.

2008-12-31T13:40:00.003Z

Another fucking album list to glance at, just because I made one to give myself a New Year's Eve buzz... Looking at it, I think the top (baker's) dozen or so are ones which I'll still be listening to in years to come. That's a successful year, I think...

1. Islands - Arm's Way
2. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
3. So Cow - I'm Siding With My Captors
4. Times New Viking - Rip it Off
5. Human Highway - Moody Motorcycle

6. Titus Andronicus - The Airing of Grievances
7. El Guincho - Alegranza!
8. No Age - Nouns
9. Fight Like Apes and the Mystery of the Golden Medallion
10. Why? - Alopecia
11. The Mae Shi - HLLLYH
12. Deerhoof - Offend Maggie
13. Jape - Ritual
14. Born Ruffians - Red, Yellow and Blue
15. Wolf Parade - At Mount Zoomer
16. David Turpin - The Sweet Used-to-be
17. Nobunny - Love Visions
18. The Spinto Band - Moonwink
19. Adam Green - Sixes and Sevens
20. Dodos - Visiter
21. Jonathan Richman - Because Her Beauty Is Raw and Wild
22. Andy's Airport of Love - Ballad of the Aleutian Sea Otter
23. Psychedelic Horseshit - Magic Flowers Droned
24. Jason the Swamp - Jason the Swamp
25. The Mountain Goats - Heretic Pride
26. Stephen Malkmus - Real Emotional Trash
27. Jeremy Jay - A Place Where We Could Go
28. Cheap Time - Cheap Time
29. Wavves - Wavves
30. Minor Constellations - Ten Things

Interesting Observation
Not a single British band. And this isn't some stubborn "you stole our taters" thing on my part. Just to prove it...

Best British Band
Let's Wrestle

Annnnnnnd...
As soon as I typed that, I remembered that Pete and the Pirates' Little Death came out this year and is very good. I'm not going back. Olé olé olé.

Addendum
I didn't include either of Jay Reatard's singles collections because I've only ever heard the songs from them as they were on the EPs. They'd be there otherwise, I promise.

P.P.S.
I didn't include Wackity Schmackity Doo for the same load of reasons which I suggest in that review.

Best Show
La Casa Azul at FIB/Animal Collective at Whelan's/Islands at Róisín Dubh (you'll have the share the trophy, you champs)

'Unacknowledged Genius' Award
Nicholas Thorburn - made stellar albums as Islands, Human Highway and Reefer. Drew amusing comic strips. Was a swell dude. Got slated lots.

Best EP
Grand Pocket Orchestra - Make Happy War

Best Single
The Barbaras - Summertime Road

Best New Band
The Barbaras

Best New Old Band
Jan and Dean

Band of 2009
The Barbaras

C'mon da babs.

The Barbaras - Heaven Hangs
Human Highway - The Sound
Abba - Happy New Year

Hitch A Ride In My Wetsuit.

2008-11-19T11:59:00.001Z

JAN AND DEAN

What kind of music is one meant to listen to during the winter time? Is it the cold, dark folk of someone like thinguma*jigSaw to reflect and amplify the present world and chill your bones even more? Or maybe something like Sung Tongs where the guitars crunch like the leaves underfoot and the heartstopping melodies wrap themselves around you like a body sock; the breakaway yellows in a palette of autumnal browns. Then again, perhaps the most ideal music is the least befitting? Bouncy, fun, summertime pop which, when coupled with closed eyes, will help you slip away to the beach for five minutes? Fuck it, a combination of all three suits me down to the ground thank you very much! But I've been finding the latter style to be the most agreeable S.A.D. combattant as of late, largely in the form of the greatest hits of hunky Beach Boys seed-planters Jan and Dean.

To a postmodern child, these guys' music is essentially Eddie Rockets without the bloatedness and brain freezing. In fact - shit! - I just realised upon typing that sentence that the Empty Pockets 'theme tune' is a horrific appropriation of 'Surf City'! Weird. As American as a bullet-riddled apple pie (the collection even includes their song for a Coke ad), the young womanisers rarely have anything on their minds aside from surfing, girls and surfer girls. Indeed, the aforementioned song (their truly greatest hit) opens with the harmonised line "two girls for every boyyyyyy!"; a ratio which the slutty bastards continue to celebrate and taunt us with ("all you gotta do is just wink your eye!") for the next three minutes. I'm walking around the place listening to this stuff wearing a multitude of layers, the cold streaming tears down my face. I'm not "going to Surf City, gonna have some fun/going to Surf City cos it's two-to-one". There's nothing here for me to presently relate to but it's tremendous fun anyway. And there's definitely nothing relatable about 'Dead Man's Curve', their tragic car crash drama (complete with out-of-control-car-swerving-off-the-road sound effects), which is rendered totally bizarre because of them unafflictedly delivering the song in the same charming chirp they use to sing about boning beach babes.

Surf City

'Surf City' live video - Jan's (I think) reactions to Dean's (I think) lyrical blips are mildly amusing.
The Little Old Lady (From Pasadena) live on The Dean Martin Show.
Old people are cool.

Advertisement For A Phone Network.

2008-11-15T11:25:00.002Z

CHEAP TIME

People talk
People talk
People people talk
People talk
People people talk
People talk
People people talk
Na na na

People Talk

Their myspace

Life Is A Rollercoaster, Just Gotta Ride It (All Night Long).

2008-11-12T22:28:00.003Z

ANDY'S AIRPORT OF LOVE

The closing track - and highlight - of 'Ballad of the Aleutian Sea Otter' is entitled Old Wooden Rollercoaster. Far be it from someone writing about music to pull a dumb metaphor out of his hole (sorry, I mean "apropos of nothing"), I won't bother suggesting that this debut "album" from Andy's Airport of Love (all 7.3 minutes of it!) is somewhat akin to a ride on a rickety wooden coaster. Perhaps Blackpool Pleasure Beach's Grand National? Over seventy years old and with the erratic track eroding away from beneath you, your only security on the thing is a flimsy seatbelt which is as if it's been digested and regurgitated by the herd of horses which the uncomfortably jerky carts are supposed to mimic. But this noisy old lo-fi rollercoaster is no less thrilling despite all of this, as you unpredictably careen around the theme park, all the time jeering the opposing train racing alongside you, even with the niggling fear in your mind that smashing your face off of the steel bar in front of you is a very viable possibility.

But yeah...

Here are eight songs, each one clutching onto the 60-second mark for dear life, always swooping, drooping, clipping, tripping and concluding far too soon (LIKE A ROLLERCOASTER!!!!!!!). Just thank Jehovah that this record doesn't come with a "no repeat rides" sign.

Download 'Ballad of the Aleutian Sea Otter' for free.

"Zip him back up, he sucks!"

2008-11-05T22:45:00.002Z

TRIPPING DAISY: I AM AN ELASTIC FIRECRACKER

Here's another review which was originally written for the first issue of 'Underground Wires'. All of the albums reviewed within the zine were released in 1995 and were thus required to be written about from the perspective of one stuck in the dead centre of the nineties.

Is Tripping Daisy a band comprised of recreational drug-users? Well, the Texans' second long-player is entitled 'I am an ELASTIC FIRECRACKER'. The cover features an elderly Italian man, naked and covered in what looks like - but surely isn't! - blood (it's Guglielmo Cavellini "in the process of self-historification"). And the final track is entitled 'High'. So yes, they're probably boys who enjoy their illegit medicine.

And what if you were to ask if they'd been taking more or less mind-altering substances since their debut release? Urine samples would be needed to come to any sort of judgement. 'Bill' (1992) came floating in on a wave of grunge, but with a splash of acid. Whilst they admittedly had bassy power chord riffs, and promo videos featuring unkempt youngsters going ape-shit at messy-looking live shows, they weren't making the same empty protest music as their peers. Frontman Tim Delaughter was fresh. He was a grinning bundle of joy. And he was happy ("love makes it good to be free!"). No guns and no self-obsessed moping; just charisma, energy, and (further one-upping Cobain) life.

Mr. Delaughter is still a carrier of all of these attributes, but now he and his merry men also have the weight of a smash hit on their shoulders. 'I Got a Girl' may have been transplanted from its rightful place as track three of this psychedelic suite to a unit-shifting "alt-rock" (ew) anthem, but here it's not a made-for-radio novelty song. Like the rest of the album, it's just gleefully goofy pop music with ridiculous lyrics which are more interested in imagism than realism: "I am there choking on bubbles", "lying here with you is like heaven in the sun, in the seventies", "if I had the strength of ten men, I'd pull your arms out and stick them on your head".

High-octane opener 'Rocketpop' sets the tone for the record as it bursts forth with layers of guitar and powerhouse drumming, before gorgeous Kim-Deal-on-Where-Is-My-Mind harmonies come out of nowhere and temporarily massage the song into a lazy euphoria. This fascinating sense of dynamics is most interesting to observe, and is perfectly matrimonial with Delaughter's voice, which possesses the ability to mutate from a touching drawl to a tuneful scream within milliseconds. Every track here is an anthem, even though many clearly aren't that way intended, from the sleazy and fierce 'Bang', the pastel-shaded 'Raindrop' and the haunting Pavement-esque 'Same Dress New Day'.

This is indeed an album which reflects its title. Like a firecracker, it exudes energy, warmth and colour. And like Hooke's Law of Elasticity, F is equal to minus kx.

Official site
Unofficial myspace (with a nice 'Tripping Daisy for Daisy-dummies' playlist)

Nuts!

2008-11-01T20:55:00.003Z

THE MACADAMIA BROTHERS

Continuing the trend of misleadingly named "bands" on Rack and Ruin Records, The Macadamia Brothers consists of Canuckman Scott and... nobody else; not his sibling, nor a fellow friar. In fact, not even he is a friar!

He doesn't specialise in making one particular sound of music, unless "good" can be considered a genre of its own. Amongst his polarised array of tunes is '(So) Into You', a song which resembles an even more layaround version of the Unicorns; its lazy, longing, seaside strumming of an acoustic guitar so bright and lulling that you'll be listening to it with your eyes in that comfortable glazed state somewhere between perfect relaxation and sleep and your only remaining thought will be "why don't I have a stalk of hay between my lips and why is it pissing rain out?". Its proud recorder riff is cleverly positioned so as to lay the foundations of the childlike chorus melody ("do do do do, she's so into you") within your head from the off.

However, the swift concise pop song is not the only thing within The Macadamia Brothers' area of expertise, as April's Tomatoey Plates EP proves, sounding like a particularly lush and epic videogame soundtrack with wintery bells making it more ideal for listening to right now rather than in the early spring of its release. Each of the three sprawling songs on it contain a soothing repetition of the figures which are established, stretched and slowly garnished, all the time perfectly happy within themselves and displaying what could almost be considered to be an ambitiouslessness which is somehow exactly what makes them so ambitious.

(So) Into You

Download the Tomatoey Plates EP for free. The follow-up (and also free) Cissura EP will be brought-to-life on November 19th.

His myspace

A Hi-Fi Hallowe'en.

2008-10-29T13:15:00.002Z

HALLOWE'EN MIXZIP

Click here to download my spooktacular Hallowe'en mix. Give it a spin to fend off evil spirits from your party, or you could of course come along and jive to them at the Hi-Fi Popcorn Hallowe'en Ball.

Tracklisting:
1. North American Hallowe'en Prevention, Inc. - Do They Know It's Hallowe'en?
2. Vic Mizzy - The Addams Family
3. Final Fantasy - The CN Tower Belongs to the Dead
4. Neutral Milk Hotel - Ghost
5. Daniel Johnston - Casper the Friendly Ghost
6. Treehouses - The Trick or Treat Serial Killer
7. Bobby Boris Pickett - Monster Mash
8. France Gall - Frankenstein
9. Unicorns - Ghost Mountain
10. The Shaggs - It's Halloween
11. Pixies - The Thing
12. Volunteer Pioneer - Funeral Scene
13. X-Press 2 - Witchi Tai To (featuring Tim Delaughter)
14. The Paper Chase - We Know Where You Sleep
15. The Immediate - A Ghost in This House
16. Animal Collective - April and the Phantom
17. The Zombies - Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914)
18. Evangelicals - The Halloween Song
19. The Marketts - Out of Limits
20. The Polyphonic Spree - Town Meeting Song

Some obvious exclusions from the mix include Ghostbusters, Thriller, Pet Semetary, Ghost Town, I Put a Spell on You, Scary Monsters and Devil's Haircut, as well as more recent vaguely-linkable-to-the-season treats from the likes of Jay Reatard, No Age, Patrick Wolf, The Libertines, Islands, Jape, The Mae Shi, TV on the Radio, thinguma*jigSaw, Nobunny and Wolf Parade.

Actually, I was just the other day pondering as to why the only bona fide Hallowe'en HIT is the bonkers Monster Mash. Almost five decades after its release, no other popular song has appeared which really comes close to being as widely-associated with the holiday. The immense Do They Know It's Hallowe'en? was an admirable effort, but that was only available on a painfully-limited seven inch vinyl! What the hell's that about? There's a niche market if ever I've known one! Louis Walsh, you reading this shit? Get off my blog!

Idiocy is bliss.

2008-10-25T17:40:00.001+01:00

THE IDIOTS

The following review was originally written for the first issue of Underground Wires. All of the albums reviewed within the zine were released in 1995 and were thus required to be written about from the perspective of one stuck in the dead centre of the nineties.

I’ll immediately assassinate the elephant in the corner of this room by mentioning a young group of upstarts called My Bloody Valentine. Four years on from the release of Loveless, The Idiots - a dreamy Dublin trio - release a record seeped in the influence of Shields and company. But it has also been seeped in a vat of uniquity and goes to great lengths to try to make both progress and a solitary work of stature. Although this self-titled ‘mini-album’ counts only seven tracks amongst its ranks, it clocks in at around 35 minutes long, testament to the band’s effort of design and liberty of structure.

The opening track ‘Slow’ is the most traditional and accessible song here, but it too is inventive through its usage of layers of filthy duelling guitars, effects-laden with varying levels of fuzziness. One of them is played to provide a beat (on top of the already pounding drums) and another is severely altered in order to convert its sound into that of a synthesiser. But the real success of this tune is its chorus, where lead singer Brian Mooney stretches a simple and everyday first person pronoun into an impossibly catchy six-syllabled refrain. I defy you to rid your cranium of the phrase “I have had enough” for quite a while after having heard this.

From hereafter, it becomes evident that the three Idiots like to shun conventional structure and the wordy cramming of songs, instead preferring to spend their time oxymoronically building spaces wherein they can then litter their chunks of tasteful noise, waves of reverb and fits of vocal repetition. At times - like on ‘Screwdriver’ - the thumping drums and high voltage riffs can make them sound almost like a metal band, but there’s also an underlying fragility buried beneath the bed of sound and intimate vocals. Exhibit A is the haunting game of hide-and-go-seek that is ‘Pinned’. The drum beat’s B.P.M. replicates human running and the tone of the music suggests a dark woods, late at night. To add to this canvas of fear, Mooney’s breathless and creepy “I’ve found you” is enough to strike fear in even the bravest of listeners.

As a fascinatingly inventive piece of art music, this album is one which needs to be allowed to wash over you (despite the hygiene-related worries I’d have in doing so) and stands in direct juxtaposition to its humbley-monikered creators. Although much of what is to be heard here is militantly challenging and wondrously deep, it’s also possible to listen to without supplies or a shovel. Constantly dynamic and mysterious, the only obvious thing about it is the lack of idiocy involved. Then again, ‘The Genii’ isn't quite as good a band name, is it?

I Should Go
Slow

1997 interview
Beautiful Unit myspace - the current solo project of Mr. Mooney.
Trust Me I'm a Thief - an excellent record label founded and run by two of The Idiots.

Ghosts Die

2008-10-22T10:10:00.001+01:00

A HAUNTED NIGHT OF LO-FI AT THE LOWER DECK

I'm putting on a fun night of music in The Lower Deck this All Hallow's Eve. It's a third of the price of the Phantom FM Hallowe'en party. Come in costume, see five bands and dance to the Monster Mash til early November. Find it on last.fm here.

A Series of Dark Caves
An ideally named project for a Hallowe'en concert comes courtesy of David Ferguson, a young musical messer with a penchant and a dab hand for constructing tense, lushly layered slices of curious suburbia which suggest a formidable partnership between Noah Lennox and John Darnielle.

Although on 'To The Kids' he heartbreakingly declares "I wanna know what's killing me", I can't help but get the feeling that he has no interest in genuinely knowing the answer to this mystery, with his catchy compositions being also as reverb-soaked, puzzling and open-ended as they are.

Download: This Year in a Nutshell EP
myspace

Treehouses
It brings me great pleasure to draw a comparison - however slight and unfounded - between an Irish act and the marvellous Californian indie-hop outfit Why?. 'Abandon House!' fires up with the thick beat-and-bassline combo and intimate stream-of-consciousness poetics which my mind has come to associate with Anticon's finest sons, but it's also so freeform and capricious that any mild contrasts are fleeting. The chiming metronome which rings throughout cleverly mimics the persistent doorbell which is being bemoaned by our narrator as he attempts to peacefully retreat from society in the way in which his pseudonym 'Treehouses' would suggest.

Download: Abandon House!
myspace

How Will They Cope?
The one time that I saw the cryptically monikered How Will They Cope live, it was a glorious mess. 75% of the band were... pie-eyed... and the remaining percentage (lead singer Davy Kehoe) was left to be the night's designated paperclip as the promoter tried desperately to pull the plug on their delayed and chaotic set as soon as possible. Fortunately, this kind of carry-on is totally my thing. They also answered their own question and coped quite capably, by allowing to seep out of themselves their intriguing collection of oft-meandering synth-inflected tunes with a spirit and energy sadly absent from so many of our island's feet-superglued-to-the-floor cool dudes.

'Mistral' - named after a violent French wind, shame on you for not knowing - finds Kehoe in a meditative mood in a meadow (hence its original punning title 'Meadowtations', I wisely assume), his dynamic alto vocals leaping and bounding over the band's Pavement-esque patterns, as together they gust towards a killer chorus and a sweetly lilting breakdown.

Download: Mistral
myspace

Dublin Duck Dispensary
I don't know much about these.

Download: Mamma Mia (Abba cover)
myspace

Secret Special Guest
Who knows!

I Know A Place.

2008-10-18T13:30:00.001+01:00

JEREMY JAY

Jeremy Jay's A Place Where We Could Go opens with one of the most pointless tracks in music history. It's not some terrible lengthy self-indulgent 'experimental' noodling which Jay will refer to as his defining work while everybody else sneers, nor is it filler spat out on the last day of mixing to make it to twelve tracks. No, it's a super-brief clip of him saying the words "night night". It's so short that when selected on my iPod, it results in this weird glitch where it just plays a sudden and paltry excerpt of whatever I was last listening to before firing straight into the album's second track, a shimmeringly romantic moonlit-stroll-and-red-wine tune which, funnily enough, is called 'Nite Nite'.

This reiteration of the naming of the period which exists between 9pm and 4am does, however, allow for the musician to recommend the ideal time for listening to his gorgeous wandering minstrel meditations. To these ears, Jeremy Jay is the colourful Venn intersect of Jonathan Richman, Andrew Bird and Mark Bolan (during the stray moments when he wasn't being crap), but the K Records stamp on his album sleeve is a quiet and friendly reassurer as to his idiographic and self-styled talent.

Nite Nite

His myspace

Bogman Jason.

2008-10-15T09:00:00.001+01:00

JASON THE SWAMP

A swamp can't walk, a swamp can't talk, a swamp can't smile, a swamp can't cry and a swamp can't die. All a swamp can do is sit there being wet and dirty. Are we genuinely expected to believe that a marsh named Jason is a regular producer of sweetly bouncing ditties such as those contained on the Mice in the Mouse Organ EP from earlier this year? It's not even as though 'swampish' would be a suitable descriptor of his crisp and clean stylings. 'Running Around' sounds like he travelled back in time to 1983 Texas, visited Daniel Johnston's sister's basement, washed the gunk and grime out from Johnston's tatty old chord organ, figured out how to multi-track vocals and lobbed a giddy kitchen sink drumbeat on top.

Some of the other tracks on the EP are spacious flashes of beauty; brief and twee will-o'-the-wisp instrumental pieces which resemble the pretty little melodies that often crop up in a good movie score and disappear near-instantaneously, meaning that you forget to do the necessary further research to find the responsible artist. Maybe Jason the Swamp is behind each of these sweet moments? If he isn't, he should be.

Red Flannel Soup

Download two free albums and an EP at Rack and Ruin Records. His song featured on We Love You Too! - A Rack & Ruin Covers Compilation is a terrific version of Man Man's 'Van Helsing Boombox'.

His myspace

Bar Bar Bar Bar Barbara Ann

2008-10-11T20:35:00.000+01:00

THE BARBARAS

Personally accumulated knowledge is leagues more reliable than that which is discovered offhandedly from browsing the world wide web, but it's also likely to be markedly less interesting. Here's a quaint factoid which I can offer to you having listened to The Barbaras' 'Summertime Road' 7" record a few dozen times over the summer: I love it, it soundtracked the season. But here are two tidbits of information which I picked up from blogs and other such modern rumourmills: 1) Jay Reatard's bassist and drummer are in the group (this one isn't arguable, or controversial), and 2) Mr. Lindsey/Reatard apparently pleasured a "disabled" member of the band, who happened to be sleeping at the time.

For fear of beginning to sound like a red-top, I should now blast into a cavalcade of metaphors, similes and adjectives which help me convey the muddy and static yet irrepressibly melodic noise that these guys make. But holy shit! One of them's disabled and Jay Reatard gave him a handjob???? That's flippin' mental!

Summertime Road
Live at Gonerfest mp3s
Buy the Summertime Road 7"

Their myspace

I Can't Stand the Sound of Flesh Hitting Bone.

2008-10-08T20:00:00.001+01:00

GRAND POCKET ORCHESTRA

I count the odds as highly unlikely that Grand Pocket Orchestra is a band which formed through a notice in a supermarket or a guitar shop or a parish hall. It's obvious that the thing which connects this 'riot pop' quartet is not a slim field of common influences ("everything from the Foos to the Chilis!") nor an impulse to combat boredom in the suburban evenings. Instead, I can imagine the four young hooligans of the group having being beamed down from outer space like Rowan Atkinson in the opening credits of Mr. Bean. There's the multi-tasking lady with neon pink candy floss hair, the punk drummer whose bare arms are a blur, the bratty, yelping lead singer whose movements suggest that he's permanantly engaged in a Nintendo Wii game within his head, and 'Flesh', the darkly mysterious Boris Karloff guitarist. These foreign beings then stumbled upon the music shelf of a branch of Formative Fun and, mouths agape like the guy on the escalator in those bad "he don't belong here!" comedies, began to make their singular and unbounded racket.

Their new EP 'Make Happy War' consists of the eight finest concurrent minutes of audio to reach my ears this year. And I'm not being silly. It's such thrilling and unpredictable lunacy. There are melodies catchier than the expression "catchier than the plague" and indeed catchier than the plague itself. There are drumrolls to roll with, gangshouts to shout out and lyrics to lyricise, despite their largely incomprehensible nature. On an infuriatingly regular basis over the past three weeks, I've had lines such as the following (which are unlikey to be genuine Grand Pocket Orchestra lyrics) barge into my head uninvited: "I bet you wish you'd never bit the head off Italy", "Joe paints new pictures/they look so pretty", "in a river of cherry paths/oh yeah/I saw him/he was wearing next to nothing" and "everyone everyone everyone rock/let's all go to a Nokia stop". What the fuck! I don't know.

Over the past year, Grand Pocket Orchestra has made nine songs available for public consumption. They have yet to release a single millisecond of junk. And judging by their live set and the album turnover rate of the music industry, it could be a number of years before they do, if ever. Everyone everyone everyone rock.

Using the Body (from nialler9)
Little Messy
Odd Socks

Their myspace

Bó Cow: When Bobby Met Cowey

2008-04-25T01:00:00.000+01:00

So Cow

So Cow is Brian Kelly, a young Galwegian man with a penchant for the scuzzy side of pop music. His most recent album These Truly Are End Times (2007) is a truly unique gem which I - personally, yet passionately - believe to be one of the greatest Irish records of all time. Critically acclaimed and loved by all those who listened, it also resulted in support slots with the likes of Dan Deacon and Ted Leo and The Pharmacists. His marvellously haphazard cover version of Deerhoof’s ‘The Perfect Me’ even attracted the attention of musical savant Greg Saunier who made it available for download from their website. Having spent the past few years teaching English in South Korea, he has returned to our island community clutching the half hour of power that is I’m Siding With My Captors. I catch up with him as he eats a curry and listens to Times New Viking, an unwise, stomach-upsetting combination.

Hey! asl?
12 / other / Basra

Sweet. First of all - don’t kill me - why are you called So Cow?
So Cow comes from a spelling test given to a classroom of elementary school kids in Korea. One of the words I tested them on was ‘such’. One kid, Nick, wrote 'so cow'. I saw that, and the rest, as they say, took a while. Then, by coincidence, I found out that the Korean word for ‘cow’ is ‘so’. And when asked how they are feeling, if in anyway not totally happy, Koreans will answer in English “so-so”... it snowballed from then. It’s bigger than all of us now.

Wow, I had no idea it was so intricate. So the third So Cow album is coming out soon. What’s happened so far?
Well, the first one doesn't count [2005’s That’s It, Christmas Is Cancelled!]. The official first one was released last year to moderate acclaim and minimal financial reward. It was called These Truly Are End Times. Google it and, indeed, buy it. The new one is called I'm Siding With My Captors. It’s the second and a half, counting the first as the half. But yeah, it's the second. The first was burned onto, like, 41 CD-Rs for friends and nobody ever commented on it. If it was a dog, it would have been a stray knocked down by a lorry on a motorway.

From what age were you musically involved? What first got you ‘into’ music?
I liked music from early on, specifically The Beatles and Queen. But as for writing songs, I was more of a fantasist. I would imagine myself and three classmates standing on a stage, all playing guitar (which, in hindsight, was stupid… I used to imagine Beatlemania scenarios). This would have been when i wasn't restaging All-Ireland football finals in my back yard. I would guess I was a pretty inward kid… But writing songs took ages, until I was 16 or something. And I should point out, I was restaging ENTIRE Beatles shows and ENTIRE football finals. They were more innocent times.

Now, on to So Cow: The Korea Years. I once heard someone describe you, aptly I think, as “Guided by Voices meets Cornelius”. Do you think your time spent in Asia has changed or modelled your sound in some way?
Do you think I sound "Asian"?

I think some stuff - say the guitar solo on Casablanca - sounds un-European.
I mean… if you listened to me independent of knowing where I lived - and excepting the odd Korean lyric - the Cornelius would probably fall out of that equation. Though I guess I've learnt a lot of harmonies and ways of going about them while over there. They use different scales and whatnot, and I've planned on adopting those but not got around to it yet. But yeah, I get asked that a lot. It sounds, I would think, like a man in his flat writing songs in the style of music that he likes. I'm kinda stuck in many ways with my writing. I'm not going to leap out of the blocks with an Afrobeat record any time soon… Am I this generation’s Status Quo? That's actually something I'd aspire to.

You're this generation's Vampire Weekend.
I do what I do, and that's the end of it. I really shouldn't have had curry.

Where has been more receptive to your music, do you think... Korea or Ireland?
Oh, Ireland. but maybe that's the language barrier. In the last few months, America has been the place where from I get mails and CD orders and radio play and all that. Ireland, less so. Korea, not at all. Also, Korean crowds tend to be extremely reserved. I end up trying to goad them. Irish crowds... I don't know... I haven't played to enough, and perhaps “crowds” might be optimistic. What's smaller than a crowd but bigger than a rabble?

On record, you play everything yourself. So what’s your song writing process? What comes first?
The idea, then the humming, then the quick documentation (MP3 player mic or jotter), then the tryouts, then the melodies, then the lyrics, then the recording from which to run. That’s the usual method. So then the song only exists in my head, and I find it very difficult to tell other musicians what to do. They could be ace musicians but it wouldn't be what I'm hearing and I’d end up disappointed. I'm better on my own.

But do you ever feel restricted by it just being you?
No, I don’t. I'd feel 75% more restricted in a four piece band. I'm not a good drummer. They'd be pissed off. And I'm competent at most other things, and good on guitar. With bands, there are compromises that I can't imagine making. I'm not Ian MacKaye or anything... I'm not sticking it to The Man. They’re just personal choices as to how I go about things and about the work left behind when I'm done.

So do you think it's a good or a bad thing that it's just you involved throughout, until the final product?
Yes, I think it's a very good thing.

So you won't be going into a studio with a producer anytime soon?
I would go into a studio sure, but I’d run how things go, and I'm aiming to be the only person ever to play a note on a So Cow record. (thinks) Hell, my friend Adam Hopgood of Australia introduces the first song on this album… Well, I'd have someone there to make sure things aren't clipping or sounding shit. It's not an ego thing... I know that there are roughly 3,465,331 better drummers in the world than me, or recording engineers and so on. But at bottom, I make the decisions because it's my thing. But if you're going to do something, and you have the ability to do it yourself - or at least learn from it - then why not? Then again, I'm not hell bent on being a fixture. I'm not going writing soundtracks to Lucozade ads. I could go that way if I wanted.

What do you mean you're not hell bent on being a fixture? You're not going to stop making music.
No. I'm going to put out an album every year until I die... that's set in stone. I'll never stop.

Phew.
But I haven't gone the route I've always assumed is the route so far... “do some demos, gig like mad, try and get a radio session, do an IMRO tour, do a half page in a monthly music mag where you talk about how cheap the beer was in Prague, release a decent first album, gig some more, play CMJ, release a less good second album with some odd musical direction and then, well... leave quietly”. I mean... that's a fairly solid route... “gotta play Oxegen in 09!”. If this all finally comes together in a commercially/critically successful way in, say, 2022, that's fine. I have other stuff to do, like jobs. So Cow will continue. I don't see this as something where I need to be at a certain place at a certain time. There will be many songs, that I can promise. But there are bands now where I just think "this will be over in two years", which I guess they are fine with. But I'm in this for the long haul, i.e. LIFE.

You have a sexy aesthetic.
Why thank you. It's not often my aesthetic gets called sexy. Anyway, So Cow for 2022.

A lot of your songs are love songs, but even so they manage to be really fresh and clever - the likes of Casablanca (So Cow bemoans the Hollywood portrayal of romance), Commuting (So Cow falls in love with a lady on a bus), Ping Pong Rock (So Cow proclaims love by quoting everyone from The Beach Boys to Mirakil Whip) and Moon Geun Young (So Cow’s relationship crumbles beneath a billboard where a Korean teen superstar flogs mobile phones). What do you aim for when writing lyrics? Where do they come from?
I find lyrics difficult, and I like ladies. So what tends to emerge are songs about the various stages of liking ladies... the before, middle and after. I don't aim for cleverness a whole bunch. I aim to sum up something so neatly that my friend Muiris will go "ah, nicely said". I like the idea of someone listening and going "ah, that's what I thought!". But thoughts are scattershot. We all think stuff. But I always like listening to a song where someone says something and you just think "right, well summed up". The lyrics of a Coldplay song, for example… that's why I don't like them. The lyrics have that vague "we are running through the speed of light, everybody knows the way is not the way" bollocks. I like places, times, contexts, references. I like to be someplace in a song… a map that folds out with each line. I don't always write like that, mind. Very often I get vague. Often it's a necessity of rhyme.

I can’t think of many other bands whose lyrics make me laugh AND say "that's just perfect!".
I get tagged with funny lyrics a lot. That's fine, but I'd hate for anyone to think I'm on a bus with a notepad chuckling to myself.

What about the lyric "I've got one hundred Helens on my street"… what’s that about? Do you actually have that many Helens on your road?
It's about nothing. When I was playing that riff over and over again, I just sang that. I since found out where it comes from... Kids In The Hall [a Canadian comedy troupe] apparently had a sketch called 'Thirty Helens Agree' which I probably saw on telly when I was 9. I guess that's coming through.

So what does ‘I'm Siding With My Captors’ sound like? Is it different to the last one?
It's more rocking. There are eleven songs in 28 minutes. The only acoustic song is the last one. I wanted it to be ‘bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang relax’. I'd like to think, in a parallel universe where I was releasing singles, that I'd have a choice on this one. Then again, it was recorded in an office, so I think we'll stick to this universe and say that I'm far more confident in this album as an across the board batting average. If I could go back to the first album, I’d cut five songs - I just got giddy - or rename it 'The Kitchen Sink Story'. But yeah, I think it's better recorded and rocks more and is pop more. There's less fucking around… not that there's anything wrong with that.

I read that you started work on I.S.W.M.C with 32 songs. How did you whittle them down?
haha, that's how furious I am. Half of them were ideas, half of them songs. Fourteen or so ended up not fitting in at all. Six or so ended up being dead ends. Two or so got culled at the final moment for bringing things down, upsetting the apple cart. About ten will be re-jigged. They make more sense for the next album.

What are your plans for 2008?
I’m going to do an Irish tour in late April. I'm Siding With My Captors is out around then. But so far it's only Galway and Dublin and I’m kinda fine with that. I'm off to America in May, for a West Coast tour with a dude called No Bunny who is amazing. Then shows in NYC, Cleveland, Columbus and hopefully Montreal and Toronto.

How did that come about?
It's all fall-out from a seven inch of Moon Geun Young that a label called Almost Ready Records put out. Some people went nuts for it. Sometimes I still think it's a big piss-take. But America seems a bit more interested than anywhere else, so I'm off to see why.

Is the So Cow/No Bunny thing a coincidence?! Is he like the American version of you?
It only crossed his mind after the third email... totally a coincidence. But I reckon it'll make for good posters. He's just him; amazing songs, such fun. So I’ll come back in July, then release album number three. That'll be out in October, I would guess.

Oh, is that nearly done?!
There are about eighteen songs ready. It's written. I'm recording the drums for it in two weeks. It's probably going to be twelve or so songs. Again poppy, but with some noisy noisy bits. Like, disgustingly horrendously noisy... the sugar and piss album.

Like Times New Viking?
Em, maybe. Shit, you've just popped my balloon! I'm not going back to four-track or anything. The fidelity will remain the same. There'll just be more... well, Cornelius would be a good mapping point. By which I mean I'll be playing with the stereo aspect of things... going nuts with it hopefully. What else you want to ask? Ask anything! Ask away! I'm into the spirit of things.

I don’t trust myself.
haha, in what sense? Are you a muck raking hack?

If you could be in any band ever, who would it be? And how different would they be because of you?
Fantastic question... In the past: The Who maybe? Everyone in that band was going nuts. I used to want to be in Pavement or a band like that, but there's no real challenge there. Me and you and two other people could fuck around in a practice room for a weekend and be like Pavement. In this modern day and age, I’d choose Deerhoof for much the same reasons as The Who. They’re just musically exciting and above and beyond, without being an arse about it. But I would hope not to effect the band at all.

Oh! And why The Who?
I don't know. I liked Noel Gallagher's quote about them… "they were all playing lead... mental!”. I'm not a prog-head or anything. I just think they had something a lot of bands in that time lacked. I mean… I still can't find any reason to like Bob Dylan. It just seems like petulant, whiny, plodding shite. I know I WILL like it someday. It WILL click, but right now, no.

I don’t get him either. I saw The Flaming Lips supporting him a few years ago and they whooped his wrinkled arse.
In Nowlan Park?

Yeah [on June 24th, 2006]… I was an alien onstage!
Really? How hot was it?

It was unbearable until we could take the masks off. They were these big heavy plastic yolks, but we had to wait until three or four songs in. Best day ever though.
I think my brother was there. I was at a wedding in Ennis. I remember that day - at around 5a.m - getting up on the roof of the hotel and having a weird pivotal moment where I decided to start doing shit, finally.

And So Cow did indeed start doing - as he modestly puts it - shit, and has being doing shit consistently and brilliantly since then. I’m Siding With My Captors will be launched at Anseo on Sunday April 27th, with support from Big Monster Love. It is available for a bargainous purchase here. Click onto So Cow's myspace for more info, tour dates and new tunes.

The League of Impressionable Teens (from 'These Truly Are End Times')
It's Over (from 'These Truly Are End Times')
The Perfect Me (Deerhoof cover)

I'm The Wolf Today, Hey Hey Hey.

2008-03-07T01:00:00.002Z

B*WITCHED

As teenagers and members of B*Witched, Edele and Keavy Lynch were international superstars. Ten years on from the record-breaking success of their debut single 'C'est La Vie', they have returned, manifested in the form of Ms Lynch. Hi-Fi Popcorn caught up with them before their triumphant show at NUI Maynooth to talk smack and shoot the breeze.

You’re not calling yourselves B*Witched anymore - it’s Ms Lynch. Are there any particular reasons for this name change?

Keavy: A comeback would be the four of us and it’s a new project so we have to call it a different name really.

So is there any chance of a comeback someday?

K: We’re really happy with where we’re at and… you know where everything’s pointing in the right direction? It really is for Ms Lynch at the moment, so we’re really happy with where we’re at.

It said on the bill “enjoy your favourite cheesy acts under the guise of ironic pleasure”. What would you think of that?

E: “Under the guise of…”. What does that mean? 'Ironically, they’re actually quite good or something?''

K: Ironically, they’re as cheesy as hell but you’ll have fun.

E: Once they think we’re good.

Why do you think people would consider you to be a sort of guilty pleasure?

K: I think it was just the jeans and the innocence of it all. There was really nothing to it. I suppose if you look back, we probably looked like four quite geeky people, singing cheesy songs that probably do your head in.

E: It was very innocent, nicer than nice, cleaner than clean.

Do you think that’s the reason that people might be somewhat embarrassed to admit that they bought C’est La Vie? Because a million or so people bought it, but how many would be willing to admit it?

K: A million people bought it, maybe like 200,000 say they did.

Would you consider yourselves to have been a manufactured pop group?

K: In some way. We weren’t manufactured to the point where we were put together.

You were all friends.

K: We were friends, and we put ourselves together and started the whole project, so in that respect we weren’t manufactured. Having said that…

E: Everybody is manufactured.

K: Yeah, and we had a record company, so everything was planned.

E: Our denim was definitely manufactured.

Sweatshops.

K: But we did write our own songs which manufactured bands don’t.

So what’s your opinion on manufactured bands, like those from reality TV shows like X-Factor or Pop Idol?

E: It kind of does my head in. In one way, it’s brilliant. It’s a lovely way of giving an opportunity to people.

K: But they seem to only have the year, until the show comes back around again, and then the public are like “who’s next?”.

E: But then you have the lucky ones like Leona and Will who want to stand up for themselves and actually come out with something that they can stand for, rather than doing what everyone tells them to.

K: They took the time to write their own record, a record that was true to them, and that’s why they’re sticking around for longer.

B*Witched split up as soon as you were dropped by Sony BMG. Why did you not keep on going?

E: We did try actually. We had another label on the table. But Sony made it difficult for us to leave. Even though they let us go, they weren’t letting us go very easily.

K: Legally, we were still under their contract. We couldn’t sign another one, and by the time they’d let us go, the other one had spent the money somewhere else.

So with Ms Lynch, would you be reluctant to get involved with a major label like Sony again?

Both: No, not at all.

K: It was just an unfortunate shame that they had a new managing director come in and he wanted to put his own mark on the record company.

E: It happened a lot with a lot of other bands, not just us.

So now you’re 29 years old, which is still really young, and you have a new project called Ms Lynch. Tell us a little bit about that.

K: We started about a year and a half ago. We were writing separately before then and we just thought ‘actually, we’re better together’. We write better music, we’re better performers… So we’ve been writing the album ever since. We started gigging to get people used to the fact that there’s only two of us and it will be live. So it was kind of doing the background work first to make sure people would accept the new music and the new look.

E: So people would understand what to expect from us as a duo, without trying to rewrite B*Witched in 2008.

A couple of songs - ‘Tip It’ and ‘Diet Coke’ - first appeared on your myspace in January 2007. A year is a long time in the popular music business. What’s been going on?

K: They were the first two songs we wrote for Ms Lynch. We put them straight on our myspace when they were written. We just wanted people to understand that we were out there and we had stuff that was maybe worth listening to.

E: We haven’t been ready for a release yet. We’re still with the gigs and the studio work and stuff. We’ve been finding Ms Lynch’s feet, and now our feet have been found.

Edele, you’ve been writing for Xenomania. When you were co-writing hits for Sugababes and Girls Aloud, did you ever think ‘actually, I want to keep this for myself’?

E: Totally. I remember someone going “are you so excited that they’re gonna do your songs?” and I was like “not really, I’d rather do it myself”.

K: Somebody approached us about taking the Ms Lynch songs for somebody else and we were just like “how dare you!”.

You have a song called ‘Diet Coke’ which positively mentions the drink. Do you hope to get it on to an ad or something?

K: No, that would be great! But that’s not why it’s there.

E: All our songs should be called ‘Gucci’ or… whoever wants to sponsor us, we’ll change “Diet Coke” to whatever… (singing) L’Oreal, L’Oreal! Lyon’s Tea, Lyon’s Tea!

But you’re just fans of diet coke?

K: Yeah, it’s just…

E: I hate diet coke.

K: Actually I don’t drink fizzy drinks at all. I drink vodka though. Vodka and diet coke.

E: Wait, can we not say we hate diet coke in case they do give us an ad?

I’ll edit it out. So anyway, what are your hopes for Ms Lynch?

K: Just to get back on the road, back touring, sell our records.

E: It would be really nice to think that people still want us out there, because we are good and I think the music is good. I’m blowing my own trumpet here, but… (trumpet sounds).

Dustin is representing Ireland in the Eurovision. What do you think of that?

K: The Irish are gonna love it. We’re all gonna think it’s brilliant.

Have you heard it?

K: No actually, I haven’t, but just for comedy value we’re gonna love it. But I think the rest of the world is gonna go “what?”. I was talking to Lindsay earlier and she said it was on the English news, going “oh my god, you’re gonna make a show of yourselves”.

Would you ever consider entering the Eurovision?

E: I couldn’t be bothered. It’s very political now. The year that Brian McFadden wrote the song, England and Ireland had two of the best songs and they were way down the bottom. It’s a very European thing now. I don’t think we’re gonna win it ever again.

C'est La Vie video

Their myspace

Holy Moly, Look At The Crazy Dude On The Beach.

2008-01-27T03:41:00.000Z

EL GUINCHO

Within several cynical and elitist bubbles of the internet, folk have recently been dreading 2008's inevitable arrival of a bandwagon crowded with "the solo artist with the sampler", desperately attempting to mimic Panda Bear's breathtakingly original Person Pitch record. Hipsters: you can treat yourself to a rest and some fresh air, because the bandwagon has pulled into town and El Guincho has disembarked, armed with a Boss SP-303 and a love of loops. And he's fucking good!

Whilst it's undoubtedly true that nobody will ever speak of Pablo Díaz-Reixa without mentioning Noah Lennox in the same breath, that's no excuse for resistance. In many ways, his debut album Alegranza is the heads to Person Pitch's tails. Gone are the sounds of trains rattling by and in are the sounds of schoolchildren singing and clapping. It isn't a dark journey through the cavernous chambers of the listener's mind, but rather a trippy picnic in a sun-kissed inlet. It'd be more sensical to consider that El Guincho has inherited Jay Dilla's wondrous trove of samples than to think that he's actively splicing up long-forgotten songs by Cat Stevens and the Zombies. And whilst the vocals are still as indecipherable as Lennox's, this time it's due to a language barrier and not a productional technique, as Díaz bounces through the songs in an exotic Spanish tongue. The lyrics could be a musical adaptation of Stroszek, but ignorance is almost as blissful as tropicalia. Similarly, he might mask his face in hair and ignore the audience when performing live, but it's difficult to imagine him not dancing around the crowd topless, wearing baggy yellow trousers.

Antillas features a tropical flickering guitar riff which sounds like the resulting treasure of a day digging through sand on the beach, bursting to the surface and greeting the summer sky. Sung over this is a vocal melody which is suspiciously - yet forgivably - similar to that of Animal Collective's future classic Brother Sport. Strangely, Kalise sounds even more like the Collective's electro-pop breakdown, either pinching or coincidentally concocting the same tune as both the "open up your, open up your... Maaaaaatt" and "you're halfway to fully grown..." sections of their song, as well as building-up in an unnervingly comparable fashion. But don't worry! Even Martin Luther King plagiarised, and he wasn't half as cool as this dude.

And before you check your pockets during Costa Paraíso; no, that's not your phone vibrating. It's a sample. Nobody loves you, but cheer up! Here are nine songs as gleeful as Hey Ya, delivering everything you'd expect from a record named after an uninhabited volcanic island off the coast of Lanzarote, which was itself named after the Spanish word for 'joy'. Let the summer begin.

Fata Morgana
Palmitos Park

Buy Alegranza here or here.

Kalise video

His myspace

Hard Working Class Heroes: Part 3/3

2007-09-28T17:25:00.000+01:00

The Radio - One of Two Ways

The Radio is the studio project of Stephen Murray (formerly guitarist with one of the best Irish bands of all time [Rollerskate Skinny]), in which he composes incredibly catchy ditties and enlists various females to contribute gorgeous vocals. 'One Of Two Ways' is so angular it could take your eye out, and its crispness suggests that Murray's shoegazing days are well and truly behind him. The most wonderful and concise definition of 'art rock' yet.

Oh No Ono - Keeping Cold In Warm Country

Keeping Cold In Warm Country is what would happen if The Strokes were gifted with an otherworldly synthesiser and forced to enter the Eurovision. In other words, Oh No Ono are awesome! Despite often sounding so impossibly 1970's NYC, there's definitely enough inventiveness in their music to convince us that we're actually listening to 21st century Danish rock music.

The Lovekevins - Tamagotchi Freestyle

The only thing stopping this Swedish duo from being called Suburban Kids With Biblical Names - apart from the very obvious legal reason - is that they have names like Lindefelt and Fredrik. Yes, Lovekevins brand a very similar brand of digital twee to that of their tourmates and friends. But I - and anyone else with half an ear - should find it very hard to get tired of any number of Pavement/Abba fusions.

Jape - Floating

Here's an all-time classic by the man who promises to be the saviour of Irish music in the very near future. His forthcoming 'Jape Is Grape' EP will contain the first of the much-anticipated batch of songs which have been amazing Jape concert attendees for over a year now. 'Floating' is where the many colours of Richie Egan combine to create a blinding white light, as slacker-pop and intentionally-lazy philosophical meanderings gradually squelch towards a euphoric conclusion.

Hard Working Class Heroes: Part 2/3

2007-09-27T14:03:00.000+01:00

Fight Like Apes - Lend Me Your Face

Here we have 114 of contemporary Irish music's most celebrated seconds. Despite the misleading running time, everything is played at such an illegal speed that the tune seems to squeeze in at least three choruses. And that's not to mention the pant-shittingly scary and forceful title motto which has since taken on a life of its own, in various "lend me your..." forms. It won't be long before this is a household phrase and Fight Like Apes a household name.

The Terribles - These Songs

The Terribles' predominantly downbeat and tremendously rich compositions makes their team statement - "to make people with converse-type trainers dance" - appear ludicrous. But it's not as though the world needs another Maximo Park. 'Those Songs' is a slice of lo-fi Americana just the way that Jason Lytle and Georgia Hubley like it, with dreamy vocals, lush drums and twinkling glockenspiel.

Evil Harrisons - Lion Salad

There's something distinctly theatrical about Dundalk quartet - and purveyors of showband indie - Evil Harrisons. 'Some Grand Plan' is their masterpiece; shuffling drums, Libertines-esque guitar, a stirring string section and oddball stream-of-consciousness rap vocals which are thankfully closer to Born Ruffians than they are to Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Loveninjas - I Wanna Be Like Johnny C

Labrador Records continue their generous, hook-laden contribution to the world with this group of electro-pop messers. Although they can sometimes be an annoyance (see: a song entitled 'She Broke His Penis In Two' and a couple of forays into 'eighties' overkill' mode), their debut album 'The Secret Of The Loveninjas' is filled with enough lovely moments to balance the books. The slow-building opener 'I Wanna Be Like Johnny C' is a good example, all climbing synths and Jarvis Cocker shouts. It is only unfortunate that their HWCH set clashes with that of their similarly-monikered countrymen Lovekevins.

Hard Working Class Heroes: Part 1/3

2007-09-24T21:00:00.000+01:00

Hard Working Class Heroes festival 2007 takes place this weekend, in six venues within Harcourt Street's POD complex. There has never before been such an abundance of amazing Irish bands and - as many of them have yet to release albums - a festival like this is ideal for people to figure out what's awesome and what's awful. As well as showcasing hundreds of great tunes from this island, the weekend will feature a 'Scandinavian Invasion'. Although the Canadian showcase of last year's festival was of a slightly disappointing calibre, the foreign bands - probably en route to Ireland on longboats right now - performing this year are almost entirely great. This week, Hi-Fi Popcorn will be featuring twelve of the best acts...

Soda Fountain Rag - Red Tape

This bedroom pop project introduces us to a yé-yé girl for the 21st century. Ragnhild Hogstad Jordahl - drummer with Norwegian indie-popsters The April Skies - makes chirpy songs influenced by some of her fantastic fellow Scandinavians. Think France Gill or Clothilde, but armed with Fruity Loops and a laptop. Her debut album is due for release this autumn on Ireland's lovely yesboyicecream records, but until then, she has fifteen songs available for free download.

Super Extra Bonus Party - Everything Flows

Choosing a name which strings together three massively enthusiastic adjectives with one of the most positive nouns in existence doesn't leave a band with many options. And so Super Extra Bonus Party rise to the challenge, throwing samples, indie guitars and guest vocals on top of breakneck beats. Their awesome live show is a collision of inventive goodtime electro and bizarrely appropriate visual art.

Michael Knight - Coronation Street

Michael Knight is neither the name of a Knightrider obsessed band nor a singer-songwriter with a bizarre birthname. It's actually the assumed title of Berlin-based musician Richie Murphy, a man who specialises in clever piano-based pop songs infused with the spirit of many dead classical composers, as well as the smart-arse bounce of The Divine Comedy and multi-tracked harmonies which recall that band which were fairly popular during that decade we were in around forty years ago..

Grand Pocket Orchestra - Radio

Following in the footsteps of their sometime bandmates Fight Like Apes, Grand Pocket Orchestra look to the genius of America's Elephant 6 collective for inspiration and to procure a distinctly un-Irish sound. 'Radio' is an exciting sprint to the finish line with clanging guitars and duelling vocal melodies, whilst 'Little Messy' is a summertime gem which falls somewhere between Pavement and Modest Mouse. HWCH sees the band make a much-anticipated rare live appearance.

Danielson In Dublin.

2007-09-14T18:54:00.000+01:00

DANIELSON FAMILE

It's not everyday that a troupe of film stars clamber onto a Dublin stage, fully decked-out in matching medic's regalia. Whilst maybe not - yet! - of the same calibre as Tom Cruise or Julia Roberts, last year's A Family Movie marked the Danielson Family's induction into the rockumentary hall of fame. Charting the band's progress since their inception (the first songs were written in 1993 as part of frontman Daniel Smith's thesis project), the film is a thorough study of an intriguing group. Perhaps most surprising is its exposition of Smith's stringent Christian beliefs. He often sings somewhat tell-tale lyrics such as "I love my lord, I love my lord, I love my lord", but it is still surprising - and perhaps even refreshing - to hear such a talented, respectable and nice man speak passionately about his spiritual mentality. As he insists that the band's material is written by God but channeled through him, we are given reason to praise the lord (and God's lawyers are given reason to sue the band for some royalty cheques).

Shortly before the release of Danielson's sixth - and latest - record 'Ships', one of their cohorts released a solo album entitled 'Illinoise'. Although he utilised a similar approach to instrumentation, melody and harmony as his employers, it's easy to see why Sufjan became a megastar - whilst Danielson remained firmly underground - when you hear Stevens' soft croon alongside Smith's yelping, excitable and radio-unfriendly falsetto. According to the ever-industrious Pitchfork Media, he has a voice "like a mouse! Or a scary clown!", although maybe something like "Black Francis on helium" would be a more fitting reference point (Hi-Fi Popcorn 1-0 Pitchfork Media). Either way, they are some truly unique vocal chords which will be resonating and colliding with glockenspiels to fill the air in Dublin's Crawdaddy on Sunday night, as Danielson make their debut Irish appearance.

We Don't Say Shut Up
Rubbernecker
Did I Step On Your Trumpet
Good News For The Puss Pickers
Uh Oh (It's Morningtime Again) (live Little Wings cover)

'Did I Step On Your Trumpet' video

Their albums and shirts are all at reduced prices right now!

Their myspace

First I Was Afraid, I Was Petrified.

2007-08-21T17:37:00.000+01:00

LA CASA AZUL

I first heard La Casa Azul at 4am in their native country. Hammock-bound after an exhaustive day's exposure to a 35°C sun and even hotter music (yes, I went there), I passed by an Elefant Records stall which was playing some wonderfully bouncy music. Despite being full on that day's gluttonies of Animal Collective, The Go! Team, Patrick Wolf and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, I was compulsed to find out who was behind the sugary sweetness that was quickly eroding my teeth and ears. The guy at the counter pointed towards a t-shirt which featured four grinning cartoon figures and I instantly realised that this pop group must be Spain's equivalent of the likes of Steps, S-Club 7 or Aqua. I was later to discover that La Casa Azul is actually the mysterious solo project of a musician called Guille Milkyway. But far from being one of those millionaire pop masterminds who have inexplicably found fame as-of-late, Milkyway is a bearded and unmistakably "indie" music boffin who seeks to modernise disco and surf rock from the 60's and 70's. It even transpired that on the fateful early morning that I first heard his music, he was working at the stall next to Elefant Records selling t-shirts and bags; far removed from the world of private jets and a spin-off TV series set in Los Angeles.

Lots of bands nowadays compose 'kitschy' music in an ironic style and try to sculpt it into something more credible, varied and substantial. Why bother! Listen to La Casa Azul and you will hear shameless midi synths, female backing vocals, handclaps and vocoders. One song even sounds a bit like 'I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day'! It's like the most exciting elements of Electric Light Orchestra, Of Montreal, Leo Sayer, The Jackson 5 and Abba have been channeled through a blender and outputted in Spanish. It also proves that music in Spain consists of a lot more than drunken karaoke editions of 'I Will Survive' and 'Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da'.

En Noches Como La De Hoy
El Sol No Brillará Nunca Mas (video)

His myspace

Oh, The World Is Ridiculous!

2007-07-28T00:22:00.000+01:00

BODIES OF WATER

You do not need to own guitars
You do not need a set of drums

Usually, it would be rather contradictory of a rock band to include such lyrics in a song. However, Bodies of Water's insistence that "all you need is your throat and mine" is entirely accurate and unironic. Despite Our Friends Appear Like The Dawn being punctuated by piano, organ and trumpet stabs, the cheering vocal melody is the one indespensible thing that makes it so stomach-churningly powerful.

By tapping into the Polyphonic Spree's patented 'more is better' theory, this band realises that having four human beings in a band means that you also have four sets of vocal chords at your disposal. No matter what the subject is, when everybody sings or yells at once, it is sure to sound universal and rousing. Over thirteen songs - as on their excellent and excellently-titled debut album Ears Will Pop and Eyes Will Blink - it results in an album of timeless campfire anthems.

Our Friends Appear Like The Dawn (from Said The Gramophone)
Doves Circle The Sky (live video)

Their myspace

Rabbit, Rabbit, White Rabbit.

2007-07-02T14:49:00.001+01:00

WHITE RABBITS

On White Rabbits' official site, they include a 'Press' section which - rather than linking to Pitchfork's glowing review of their debut album 'Fort Nightly' - consists of a number of often disparaging reviews from 13-year old schoolkids. One of the more appreciative children makes a sidenote to state that they are in the school orchestra and so knows "alot about music". This is obviously true, because they then concisely describe White Rabbits without their fellow reviewers' need for incaccurate and repellent comparisons to the likes of The Strokes, Muse, Madness or Arctic Monkeys.

"nice beat, great choice of notes, flows quite well, fine choice of words"

This summary could easily be elaborated upon to include references to their beautiful summertime Calypso piano lines, powerful double drumming, multi-layered vocal and instrumental harmonies and mass singalongs ("We held our tongues throughout it, one day we'll laugh about it!"), but those few words are simple and understated enough to simultaneously address and reflect the wonderful pop music of White Rabbits.

Kid On My Shoulders
The Plot

Their myspace

White Rabbits were performing in Dublin last Saturday night at Nokia Trends Lab's inaugural event, alongside Simple Kid (download Simp's free 3-track EP here) and Halves. The Rabbits and The Kid will both be returning to Ireland in September to play on Electric Picnic's 'Nokia Trends Lab' stage. The stage will also host - at least - three more of the festival's highlights; The Kissaway Trail, Good Shoes and The Little Ones.

So Cool.

2007-06-10T19:45:00.000+01:00

SO COW

Mundy is gonna freak! Finally, Ireland has been blessed with a singer-songwriter who is aware that a computer can handle more than just one track, and is therefore able to innovate with the utilisation of instruments other than an acoustic guitar. Instead of living off the dole in a dreary bedsit (and singing about it), he is a teacher in South Korea (and sings about non-boring stuff). And instead of covering people like fucking Jeff Buckley, he covers fucking Deerhoof!

The ADD-tempo'd League of Impressionable Teens is carefully comprised of everything that is great about So Cow. And so we are bombarded with a scuzzy staccato guitar riff, an infectious - if short-lived - vocal melody, schizophrenic harmonies, a gloriously theatrical solo and yells that would make Black Francis proud.

Released in February of this year, 'These Truly Are End Times' is the country's finest album of 2007 to-date, as Brian (unfortunately, 'So Cow' isn't the name on his passport) takes us on a journey through the past, present and future annals of indie rock. Once you've heard them, you're defied to ever rid your head of songs as catchy as Moon Geun Yeong, the wonky allusion-fest of Ping Pong Rock or the frentic drumroll of Casablanca. However, the LP is unlikely to retain its crown for much longer, considering that a new album - entitled 'I'm Siding With My Captors' - is nearing completion and set to feature songs whose working titles include 'Ba Ba Da Da Da', 'Voice 115 - Isn't It Just Casablanca Slowed Down?', 'Weird Picking, Three Chords, Add a Fourth', 'Starts On G, Stays On G, Ends On G, Goodnight' and 'David Pajo Will Sue'.

The League of Impressionable Teens
The Perfect Me (Deerhoof cover)

Buy These Truly Are End Times

His myspace

a museum facility primarily dedicated to the presentation of historical and cultural information about a place and its people

2007-06-03T01:03:00.000+01:00

HERITAGE CENTRE IN WHELAN'S - 02.06.07

(photo: Dara Munnis)

It's not difficult to fall in love with Heritage Centre, as they make their grand entrance onstage waving around a bubble machine to the soundtrack of Stig Baasvik's Darkplace theme tune (based on a melody originally whistled by Garth Marenghi). The stage itself is lovingly adorned with a living room lamp, an inflatable palm tree, a pinata and lots of elaborate artwork, making it immediately apparant that Heritage Centre don't wish for their audience to have any qualms about having fun. And for an unsigned band without a release to date, it's an audience that is more crammed and enthusiastic than they have any right to be. It's not every Irish band of their calibre that attracts English devotees across the channel especially for one of their shows. And it's not any band - at all - who are accompanied in the limelight by an enormous rubber duck with "Fuck Heritage Centre" scrawled across its face.

Conal McIntyre's former band Walter were expert purveyors of bright piano-based pop songs. The nagging melodies are still there, but this time they're at the foreground of an altogether fiercer wall of sound which is aided by the inclusion of an actual guitar (and sometimes two). Floating over a sublime concoction of Grandaddy-style Americana and British Sea Power-style grandiose - as well as dozens of tubes of bubbles distributed by an avid fan - are McIntyre's smooth vocals. Elegant and wistful, they shine particularly during set hightlights The Boss, Oldest Friend and Death By Science. One hundred extra bonus points go to the song which is seemingly-titled Proof Rock, but later transpires to be the more thoughtful 'Prufrock'.

Later, after all has been said and done, genuinely deafening yells beckon the band back onstage for an encore. Having broken his instrument by using it to violently smash a pinata, guitarist Darragh Grant joins the audience down the front. As the three remaining members breathlessly cover Weezer's Surf Wax America, limbs flail, stage props fly and bouncers are called to break up the most fervent and energetic scenes I've seen in this venue since Arctic Monkeys played here almost two years ago. As the band sings the chorus of their current radio single - "we could be stars in the city" - one begins to realise that they already are, somehow.

Oldest Friend

Their myspace

Whatchamay*callitSaw

2007-05-12T18:53:00.001+01:00

Thinguma*jigSaw

A banjo. A flute. A seriously demented singer.

Just over two months ago, Seth Buncombe and Martha Redivivus decamped from their native Norway to the Albion-esque Dublin, to start afresh in what they considered to be both the mythical world of a James Joyce novel and the Earth's folk capital. Marvellously for them (and us!), the town's changes of the last eighty years haven't left the band downbeat and disillusioned and they have quickly become darlings of the underground scene.

In such a short time, they've seemingly plied their trade around every venue in the city, where they stand amongst the crowd and direct their raw, unamplified tunes towards each onlooker individually. As Buncombe viciously strums his banjo in a way that the instrument has never before known (think Joey Santiago during the breakdown in Vamos), Redivivus splutters deranged half-notes into the air. Atop of this glorious stew of sound are Bumcombe's lyrics, which reference Moby Dick, Stephen King's Carrie, Ulysses, The Bible and Daniel Johnston (Buncombe's previous band collaborated with Johnston and thinguma*jigSaw are known to deliver terrific versions of Walking The Cow and Spirit World Rising). Although his yelping, grunting and general air of insanity may lead the audience to genuinely consider that he may be possessed by the quare fella, he is actually quite a mild-mannered man who speaks in a whisper ("I can't even make myself heard in Londis") and - like Redivivus - assumes a stage persona; this, of course, despite the fact that they don't utilise a stage.

Their debut album will be released in June on Deserted Village Records, and it is expected to be bundled with a live recording of their haunting performance on the top floor of the equally archaic Hotel Ballymun.

Vox Populi (On The Verge session)
Spirit World Rising live video

Their myspace

It's Time For You To Lose Your Excitement!

2007-04-26T21:57:00.000+01:00

THE POLYPHONIC SPREE

The Fragile Army today began their march towards their LP release in June, with this seamless (I thought everything started at the seam?) teaser of each song on the record.

The "video" for the album's title track is as bizarre, original and brilliant as the song itself (which is an ode to soldiers dying on a battlefield, sung over a dynamic interplay of sorrowful ballad and celebratory theatrical pop song). It actually features no video footage, instead weaving together 2,341 photographs of the band performing live, hanging around backstage and posing for their album cover and press shots.

The Ides of April.

2007-04-24T12:00:00.000+01:00

frYars

This time last week, it would have been silly to refer to frYars as "the new Patrick Wolf", as the old model was still in perfect working condition and came supplied with all mod cons. But now it seems fitting. As the hi-fi pop inclinations of The Magic Position LP lead to soul-destroying promotional duties, one wandering antique Englishman falls as another begins to rise. With laptop beats and imaginative countryside lyrics, the soft-singing 17-year old Ben directly evokes the sauntering spirit of Lycanthropy or Wind in the Wires.

And In the Depths of the Scilly Isles, I heard you reside,
And in the depths of my mind, I can still see your eyes.

Over a barrage of enough tinkling piano, swirling synths and electronic drums to make Didier Dambrin a very proud man, The Ides' verses sprint along in harmony with the singer headlong into a killer chorus and a rousing group chant. In Chocolate, swooning vocals tell a tale of a girl who wants to be a boy and a boy who wants to be a girl over the kind of music you'd expect to soundtrack your completion of a Pokémon game. It is, of course, impossible to "complete" a Pokémon game.

The Ides
Chocolate (Demo)

His myspace

Emergency.

2007-04-22T22:40:00.000+01:00

PATRICK WOLF SPLITS UP AND THEN REFORMS

Today, 23-year old multi-instrumentalist and songwriting virtuoso Patrick Wolf fortunately unretired, although making little sense about why he announced his demise in the first place!

Whilst touring his brilliant third album The Magic Position, he made his way over to Dublin's Olympia Theatre in support of The Arcade Fire and Today FM persuaded him to perform a stripped-down and slowed-down acoustic session.

The Magic Position
Pigeon Song
Enchanted

Lend Me Your Apes.

2007-04-20T12:32:00.000+01:00

FIGHT LIKE APES

Female fans of Fight Like Apes everywhere have long been commending lead singer May Kay for her lyrics, which they believe are powerfully feminist. If you're on the lookout for your gender's new icon, it's obvious that the phrase "I'm gonna cut you with glass" is loaded with far more Girl Power than "gold lion's gonna tell me where the light is". The only problem with this is that the band's (male) synthist Pockets actually writes most of the group's lyrics, creating an altogether more confusing situation regarding the identity of the speaker and the intended recipient, as well as giving some of the songs a somewhat more sinister aura.

The majority of the band's influences are wonderful guitar-based pop groups such as Deerhoof and Apples in Stereo (who they will support on the Apples' first Dublin outing on May 17th) but because they omit the inclusion of a six-string friend, what is produced is an entirely original - yet instantly familiar - mash of exciting synth lines, loud tribal drums and insistent vocal melodies.

Faces will be lent and KFC may or may not be tasted when their debut EP 'How Am I Supposed To Kill You If You Have All The Guns?' is released on May 18th.

Lend Me Your Face
Lend Me Your Face video

Their myspace

Taps N Taps.

2007-04-15T19:56:00.000+01:00

TAP TAP

The musical side-project of a band's frontman is rarely better than what is made during the dayjob. Albums by the likes of Sunset Rubdown and Handsome Furs may be brilliant, but it's evident that each of them could only benefit from the contribution of the other. As the chief decision-maker in a band called Pete and the Pirates, it makes little sense for Tom Sanders to branch out and release a solo album under the suitably more indie-sounding moniker 'Tap Tap'. But be glad that Mr. Sanders did bring a separate set of songs to the world, when late last year he assembled a collection of wondrous scuzzy gems onto an LP called 'Lanzafame'.

The album opens with the great unwashed 100,000 Thoughts, which could easily be the joyous and climactic sound of I'm From Barcelona marching and clapping along en route to a picnic in outer space. But there's a darkness to these perfect tunes which is brought on by the Mangum-ated acoustic guitar sound, coupled with the lush Beach Boys' harmonies of the likes of To Our Continuing Friendship.

With the Isaac Brockish accordion-led blast of Way To Go, Boy and The Reason I'm Here's euphoric and intimidating guitar riff, there is more vitality, jauntiness and timelessness crammed into Sanders' bedroom than there is amongst the rest of today's English bands combined. It feels unjust to refer to Tap Tap as a "side project" - given the implications of this tag - so perhaps it is time for his swashbuckling cohorts to join in on his party and lend a hand on deck. Anything could happen.

The Reason I'm Here
100,000 Thoughts

Buy Lanzafame
His myspace

What Happens In Newbridge Stays In Newbridge.

2007-04-06T16:19:00.000+01:00

SCHARPLING AND WURSTER

Every Tuesday night, Tom Scharpling hosts his perfectly-titled The Best Show on New Jersey's brilliant radio station WFMU. It's a music/entertainment show loved by everybody who's anybody (Ted Leo, Conan O'Brien, Ben Gibbard, Danielson Famile, Zach Galifianakis, Henry Owings, Paul F. Tompkins). But as a call-in phone show, it unavoidably attracts some extremely weird characters who have questionable morals and exciting - yet insane - plans which they often insist on Mr. Scharpling involving himself in.

The Art of the Slap is the forthcoming fifth release of hilariously bizarre conversations being put out on Scharpling and Wurster's Stereolaffs record label.

The Hero's Call (from Fluxblog)

Go to the Stereolaffs website to hear clips and pre-order your copy.

Subscribe to the podcast and listen to the archives.

Become a Friend of Tom.

Bird Flu.

2007-04-01T13:00:00.000+01:00

ANDREW BIRD

Andrew Bird's best record Armchair Apocrypha has just been released and I finally got to see him live last week. Oddly - but wonderfully - for an Irish concert, a bootleg recording of the show has surfaced on the Internet Archive. Despite suffering from flu, his music was twice (or even more!) as brilliant live as it is on record, combining his own amalgamation of M. Ward's old-timey electric guitar pickings and Owen Pallett's 21st century violin virtuosity with Martin Dosh's futuristic drum beats and samples. He may have been clad in a countless number of jumpers and scarves to fight the fever, but he even managed to play more layers than he was wearing.

Plasticities (live in Dublin)
Live in Crawdaddy, Dublin on March 21st 2007. (entire show, zip file)

His myspace

The Lovely Feathers?

2007-03-31T17:17:00.000+01:00

THE GORGEOUS COLOURS

For some bizarre reason, my mind always associates the music of The Gorgeous Colours with various bright colours. Perhaps this is due to some masterstroke in subliminal marketing, or it could have something to do with their stage clothing; each member subtley draped in orange/purple/yellow/white/green. Or maybe this is vaguely related to their glittering summertime pop tunes; a type of mellow tropicana indie (could this be a scene? "Nu-mellowtropicanaindie"?) which aurally resembles what we'd hear if we had Nick Thorburn's eccentricities and innovation in front of the melodic assault of Good Shoes or The Spinto Band.

That said, it is clear that each one of their songs is distinctly different from their last and that the band is currently basking in a love of music (guitarist Neil sports his Electric Picnic wristband, seven months later). But they still manage to produce a coherent sound, from the mariachi trumpet and incessant riff of forthcoming single Hunting Something to I Miss You (which sounds like a jangle-pop version of something from Neon Bible). Definitely gorgeous and definitely colourful.

Burning video
Hunting Something (FM104 acoustic session)
I Don't Know (FM104 acoustic session)

Their myspace

The Shiny Army.

2007-03-18T20:45:00.000Z

THE POLYPHONIC SPREE

Last year, a stripped-down crew of 6 of The Polyphonic Spree contributed a few songs to the soundtrack of a movie called Keeping With The Steins. I presumed that these tunes had been lost forever, due to a limited movie release and non-existent soundtrack release. But the latest episode of Coverville includes the semi-Spree's cover of R.E.M.'s Shiny Happy People.

From The Fragile Army blog:

yes, yes we know...how perfect to have polyphonic sing about shiny, happy people! the original idea was to really strip it down and do an acoustic version at a much slower tempo but...in the end, we stayed true to the track although it only features tim, mark, bryan, audrey, annie and jennifer from the band...

This is a bland radio hit that I've never been quite able to sit through comfortably and I'm certainly not an R.E.M fan, but I'm fanatical enough of a Spree fan to enjoy their version a lot.

Shiny Happy People

A song at least 20 times better than Michael Stipe's is Section 21 (Running Away). There is currently a snippet of it available on their official site and I'm pretty sure that one of the song's lyrics is also a review of their new album:

It's like running away with the wind in our face, it's like flying!

The Fragile Army will be released on TVT Records on June 15th. Buy it and you will have a long, exciting list like this:

Section 1 (Have a Day/Celebratory)
Section 2 (It's the Sun)
Section 3 (Days Like This Keep Me Warm)
Section 4 (La La)
Section 5 (Middle of the Day)
Section 6 (Hanging Around the Day Part 1)
Section 7 (Hanging Around the Day Part 2)
Section 8 (Soldier Girl)
Section 9 (Light & Day/Reach For the Sun)
Section 10 (A Long Day)
Section 11 (A Long Day Continues/We Sound Amazed)
Section 12 (Hold Me Now)
Section 13 (Diamonds/Mild Devotion to Majesty)
Section 14 (Two Thousand Places)
Section 15 (Ensure Your Reservation)
Section 16 (One Man Show)
Section 17 (Suitcase Calling)
Section 18 (Everything Starts at the Seam)
Section 19 (When the Fool Becomes a King)
Section 20 (Together We're Heavy)
Section 21 (Together We're Heavy)
Section 22 (Running Away)
Section 23 (Get Up And Go)
Section 24 (The Fragile Army)
Section 25 (Younger Yesterday)
Section 26 (We Crawl)
Section 27 (Oh I Feel Fine)
Section 28 (Guaranteed Nightlite)
Section 29 (Light To Follow)
Section 30 (Watch Us Explode (Justify))
Section 31 (Overblow Your Nest)
Section 32 (The Championship)

Befriend the Spree to keep up-to-date!

Wren and Stimpy.

2007-03-17T19:46:00.000Z

THE WRENS

"We'll never be rockstars but we couldn't give a titanic fuck!".

This is an easily believable statement coming from a band with an average age that makes The Hold Steady look like Smoosh. But listen to any of their songs or go to see them live and you'll laugh at how ridiculously untrue and modest this is. They may have 9 to 5 jobs back home working "for the Investment Manager Services division where I sell operation processing outsourcing technology platforms to investment managers", but once they get on a stage and throw out their epic slacker-pop with enough enthusiasm to convice everyone that they've stolen The Spinto Band's sugar, you'll have no reservations in agreeing that their 2003 classic The Meadowlands puts them up there with Pavement and Tripping Daisy and the best of them.

This Boy Is Exhausted
Everyone Choose Sides

The Sordid Truth Behind the Swindie Music Scene

2007-03-15T15:09:00.000Z

At the check-in gate of a Swedish airport, I'm From Barcelona's Jacob realises that he has forgotten his passport and would have to tell his friends to party on without him in Dublin. Later that day - under lashings of coloured confetti and balloons - Emanual "Wayne Coyne Jr." Lundgren calls him on speakerphone to find out if any way of spending an evening could possibly beat THIS. "What are you doing? Are you watching Seinfeld?!", he asks. The following night, Annika of Hello Saferide sings a song which functions as a questionaire for prospective boyfriends to answer. It is apparant that a certain TV show is of considerable importance to Annika as she quizzes her would-be suitors by singing "do you talk in the middle of Seinfeld?". So having seen five Swedish bands over two nights, is the only thing we've learnt about the country the fact that they all love Seinfeld? No. It is also apparant that every Swedish person - without exception - is a musical genius.

Salem Al-Fakir is a superstar back in his homeland. We know this because he keeps cheekily reminding us. "This song is a big hit in Sweden so when I play it live, people applaud when they recognise it. You should do the same!". The crowd doesn't need much prompting when the songs are as good as Dream Girl and This Is Who I Am, and the frontman veers between expertly playing the piano with a wild grin and jumping into the audience to shake hands with the front row. According to Salem, he doesn't actually listen to music and is entirely influence-free, so it is just a happy coincidence that his tunes come somewhere between the classic guilty pop of Leo Sayer and the more eccentric and modern stylings of Patrick Wolf.

Taxi, Taxi! are the most charming and entrancing band of the festival, quietly delivering their well-crafted heartstopping tunes over piano, accordion, guitar and ukulele to a completely hushed and awe-struck crowd.

I'm From Barcelona make no excuses for being a novelty band, because they are quite simply the best novelty band in the world. It can be difficult to listen to their entire debut in one sitting but the live show is the easiest thing in the world. Delivering a euphoria which seems to be exclusive to just a handful of bands (The Polyphonic Spree, Arcade Fire, Flaming Lips and The Spinto Band, I think!), the evening is filled with throwaway chants ("I have built a treehouse/I have built a treehouse/Nobody can see us/Cos it's a you-and-me house") and never-ending choruses. Two new songs prove that there is actually life beyond Let Me Introduce My Friends, although it doesn't look like the band is going to be getting serious anytime soon. One song features the lyric "Does anybody really care that good old Britney shaved her hair?" and the other is introduced with the statement "I robbed this one from Justin Timberlake". The song's riff is from Cry Me A River. But even if their set was made up of *NSync covers, it'd all be forgiveable when they play the fabulously communal We're From Barcelona after a brilliantly teasing minute-long intro. When they finally transform that repeated note into the song's riff, everything in the world swirls and 700 people are catapulted into the eclipsed moon outside.

They're that good.

I'm From Barcelona - We're From Barcelona
Hello Saferide - The Quiz
Taxi, Taxi! - Old Big Trees
Moneybrother - Reconsider Me

myspaces
Salem Al-Fakir
Moneybrother
Hello Saferide
Taxi, Taxi!
I'm From Barcelona

You Know You Do Need Some of This.

2007-02-16T21:20:00.000Z

APPLES IN STEREO

I'm sure everybody is in love with Apples In Stereo right now. They've just rolled out their sixth album of amazing pop songs, and with Elijah Wood's money behind them, it looks as though a broader audience may be waiting in the wings for them. I'm mostly infatuated with them because a rare recent sunny day revealed New Magnetic Wonder to me as perhaps their best album, and they will be playing their first Irish show in May.

Also, I've just found a 4-part "making of" the album on youtube (part 1 is here and the others are alongside it) and hence I've just discovered exactly how friendly, funny, excited, talented and plain old nice a man that Robert Schneider is. The video of the band miming along to Same Old Drag on their van's stereo is also worth a look.

7 Stars
Baroque (Live in Toronto, 2002)

Their myspace

MINICAB!

2007-02-14T12:25:00.000Z

TAXI, TAXI!

There's something about that picture that says a lot about Taxi, Taxi.

If the people in the photograph were of the same age (17) but male, you could almost be positive that their music would be rubbish. Maybe they'd make boring bedsit strums about losing women and living in a lonely bedsit. But no, thankfully! They are two Swedish girls - identical twin sisters - and their songs are as well-crafted and beautiful as any output you'd expect from pretty girls who slave over a guitar and typewriter instead of doing their homework.

Now labelmates with the likes of Grizzly Bear and Cacoy at Rumraket Records, they'll be releasing an EP soon, sure to be stuffed with more wintery yet warm love songs, laden with ukulele, synth and handclaps.

Old Big Trees

Their myspace

Neu Bible

2007-01-30T15:21:00.000Z

THE ARCADE FIRE

My original attraction to The Arcade Fire came from their Us Kids Know EP blending together perfectly two of my seemingly most incompatible favourite bands. They were symphonic and tender like The Polyphonic Spree, yet ferocious and yelping like the Pixies. Three years later, it's time for their third release and their sound has changed vastly. But anthemic epics like 'Intervention' still carry the same undeniable influences, as the Pixies' squealing guitar meets the Polyphonic Spree's choir. But there's also an obvious - and huge - spiritual element to the band, and this isn't constrained to their punch-the-sky "holy shit, I'm alive!" live show. And while they've made lyrical references to religion before, Sherlock Holmes wouldn't be charging premium rates to figure out that this album was written and recorded in a church. Over half of the album is soaked through with mentions of churches, antichrists, bibles and judgement day, and the whole record carries the aura of a creepy sermon delivered by a demented cryptologist.

Somewhat surprisingly, Neon Bible doesn't feature a Neighbourhood #5, but that's not to say that it doesn't carry forward the spirit of its ancestor. 'Black Mirror' is a murky piece of beauty, furnished with fairground piano and ghostly voices wisping between channels. 'Keep The Car Running' positions itself wonderfully, somewhere between The Spinto Band (assuming they've copyrighted all usage of the mandolin) and Shout Out Louds, yet remains as authentically Arcade Fire as the concept of an tunnel between two bedrooms. The title track is a definite grower; a short, whispered acoustic lullaby with a "don't fuck with us" gang (but still whispered) chorus. 'Ocean of Noise' builds itself into an incredible haunted mariachi waltz and the questionable decision to include a rerecording of 'No Cars Go' results in a no-brainer answer, from its flourishing Disney intro to its spectacular "LET'S GO!" breakdown. And on the album's climatic 'My Body Is A Cage', their newly acquired church organ is further utilised in a dramatic Zombies-esque epic which goes out of its way to successfully secure its place on the tracklisting of every retrospective compilation of "the noughties".

While Funeral sounded like an antique recovered from under the soil of an indefinable era, Neon Bible sounds decidedly modern; even futuristic. If their debut was their celebratory funeral, Neon Bible is their more sombre resurrection. But they are alive, and how they know it.

Intervention

Pre-order Neon Bible at a discounted rate.. You have three equally-lovely format choices, and you'll also get a poster and other free stuff!

Satan Said Yeah!

2007-01-17T12:53:00.000Z

CLAP YOUR HANDS SAY YEAH

Emily Jean Stock

Last year, I got a hold of some of Clap Your Hands' early demos and was particularly amazed by one song I can't remember the name of (although I know it wasn't called Emily Jean Stock), because even in its raw homemade state, it was one of THOSE songs. Reminiscent of a handful of classic tunes (most of which probably don't actually exist), its weirdness of melody and harmony ranked it as possibly Ounsworth's best composition. Under the impression that these demos were from times past, dug from the vaults, I mourned the fact that this song would never receive studio justification and public adoration. So when the second song on their second album smacks of instant familiarity, I beam and gape at my laptop and this song, now uninspiringly entitled 'Emily Jean Stock'. Dave Fridmann has taken the studio reigns (they're obviously spending their self-produced debut's profit margin wisely!) and given the band a fresher sound, throwing in - on this song - big Flaming Lips' drums, Flaming Lips' gongs and, er, 'Do You Realize??' guitar. To do this and avoid sounding anything like the Flaming Lips is an admirable and ear-pleasing achievement.

And so it is that CYHSY acquire an epicness and intensity well-demonstrated on album highlights such as the single Satan Said Dance (terrifying when on the radio at 10am) and the ungrammatical Underwater (You & Me). Fridmann has marked their foreheads with a lightning-shaped scar which sets them apart from the rest of the 'blog bands'. And to accompany the lightning is some loud thunder - 3/4 of an hour's worth of striking and tuneful gems.

They have the debut album and some different versions of new songs at eMusic.

All Free Today.

2007-01-15T22:43:00.000Z

VOLUNTEER PIONEER

Some bands just sound important. And importance in the 21st century is measured using a unit known as the "myspace friends". So it is with great shock that - having listened to four of their tracks - I discover that Volunteer Pioneer have less than 400 friends!

After one listen, it was possible for me to decide that Separate Planes would easily be making it on to my 'Best of 2007' list. Neutral Milk Hotel's twinned acoustic guitars play basic chords and Spencer Krug's yelp sings to the listener in a style so clearly subliminally influenced by Mangum's familial familiarity ("your parents fly on separate planes to make sure you don't end up an orphan"). All this whilst a harp plays a melody so sickly sweet and infectiously memorable that it sounds like it belongs on a TV advertisement for toot sweets, Chupa Chups and treacle tarts. This music will rot your teeth and melt your ears.

Separate Planes

3 more demos at Macktronic
Their myspace

Huns, I Shrunk The Kids.

2006-12-14T00:38:00.000Z

BORN RUFFIANS

If Born Ruffians weren't from Canada; they'd be called The Ruffians, they'd be based in London, they'd be on the cover of NME and they'd sing about England. But geography has granted us one of the most exciting new bands in town. Jerky guitars and manic drums leave absolutely no space for contemplation or a breath of air, whilst Luke LaLonde yelps out an almost inaudible list of his goals. Fortunately, he has no time to achieve any of them as he's too busy writing (or entirely improvising - I can't tell!) songs like the breakneck This Sentence Will Ruin/Save Your Life.

This Sentence Will Ruin/Save Your Life

Knife
Grizzly Bear clearly went to a whole lot of trouble to write, arrange and record the incredible and sprawling Knife. So it's fun to hear a bunch of teens completely tear apart its epicness with a raw guitar sound and heaps of enthusiasm.

Their myspace

Your Band Needs You!

2006-12-06T22:53:00.000Z

Bishop Allen - undisputably the best band of 2006 - have gotten themselves involved in a song contest on Salon.com. If you think one of the other four finalists are more deserving of a Christmas bonus, vote for them, but trust me - they aren't! Also, I'm sure that winning the accolade of "best unsigned band" in such a tight competition would peak more than a few businessmen's ears in plenty of time for their new album, set for a June release.

All it takes is literally one click on this link. In exchange, you can reward yourself with 9 absolutely amazing free tracks:

Clementines
Like Castanets
Click Click Click Click
The Same Fire
Butterfly Nets
Flight 180
The Monitor
The News From Your Bed
Corazon

Buy their CDs.

Great Disco!

2006-11-16T22:30:00.000Z

GHOSTLAND OBSERVATORY

This "new rave" "scene" is seemingly destined to begin and end with Klaxons. Having witnessed Shit Disco (one of maybe 2-3 other bands in this musical revolution) live in what amounted to a horrific mauling of my ears, I can assuredly say that there is nothing ironic about their name and nothing promising about their genre. Despite Austin's Ghostland Observatory sharing similar sentiments, influences and musical targets, they - luckily - have no chance of being groped into the NME's current phase for the simple (and career-saving) fact that they aren't English.

Upon first hearing their music and reflecting upon their band name, their GameBoy blips and upbeat playfulness led me to the conclusion that Ghostland Observatory is the name of a level in SuperMario. It's not, but it should be!

Piano Man features a chorus which is almost certainly a rewrite of the "if I move, this could die..." refrain from Take Me Out, but we're moving so fast we don't have time to file lawsuits and point fingers... and also because directly after this spot of light-fingeredness comes one of rock music's greatest ever piano solos.

Piano Man
Sad Sad City

Their myspace

Worship The Hawk, Worship The Hacksaw.

2006-11-15T17:30:00.000Z

A HAWK AND A HACKSAW

"Put on Sunday shoes, and dance 'round the room to accordion keys, with the needle that sings in your heart."

When Jeff Mangum sung this line to a two-headed boy in 1998, he probably didn't realise that he was also singing to fans of his drummer's future band; beckoning them to waltz to dusty experimental Eastern European folk.

As a rule, two-piece bands consisting of a male part and a female part are rarely wonderful. Mates of State? Annoying! White Stripes? Overstayed their welcome! But when Jeremy Barnes checked out of the Neutral Milk Hotel - suitcase stuffed full of obscure thrift shop vinyl - and hooked up with Heather Trost, he set out to produce something brilliant and timeless. Their recent third album The Way The Wind Blows has finally elicited a response from the public, thanks in large to their collaborations/touring with the similarly-influenced Beirut. Unlike Condon and friends, the vast majority of A Hawk and A Hacksaw's music is instrumental which gives them more freedom to experiment, whilst keeping closer to their (artificial) roots.

They are a marvel to experience live. As the duo battle to recreate the sound of a massive Balkan orchestra, Jeremy tapes drumsticks to his knee and head, wears sleigh bells on his hat, has his feet rigged to a drumkit via a series of pedals, plays an accordion and sings! Whilst it may look as though Barnes drew the short straw in this partnership, Trost must exorcise the demons of buzzing violin lines from her instrument over a barrage of ADD-tempo'd melodies.

Put on Sunday shoes!

The Sparrow
Portlandtown

Get their albums using your free eMusic trial!
Their myspace

The Love Letters Of...

2006-11-05T21:48:00.000Z

ST. VINCENT

For a 23 year old, Annie Clark is a well-weathered girl. A member of The Polyphonic Spree, she has also toured with Castanets, can currently be spotted as a winged multitasker in Sufjan Stevens' band and her debut solo album will undoubtedly be cropping up in every Top 10 list of 2007 come this time next year.

Essentially a solo project, the drumsticks that complete St. Vincent's line-up have fallen into the able hands of Brian Teasley (Man or Astroman, The Polyphonic Spree, Chunklet magazine). However, the live performance features the extremely likeable Annie alone on the stage effortlessly entertaining the crowd with her expert guitar-playing, foot-tapping (which produces a bass drum beat), beautiful singing into a regular microphone and atmospheric shouting/humming into a Copperphone.

Her lyrics are wonderfully evocative and filled with dark romance. Directly after playing Bang Bang in Dublin's Olympia Theatre (where she shoots her lover), she airs a brilliant tune called Marry Me, introducing it by commenting "although I doubt many of you will want to marry me after that". But audience opinion couldn't be more contrary, her constant smile allowing much of the crowd to forgive her insanity and savour the prospect of a lifetime of this sweet music in their ears.

Standout track Paris Is Burning is a chilling wartime two-step, where eerie underground drumrolls dance with picked guitar and handclaps. Ever the cold-blooded murderous minstrel, Clark seductively sings for her companion to "come sit right here and sleep, while I slip poison in your ear". The tune jives into a fittingly French-sounding carnival waltz which would be the perfect soundtrack to a colourful carousel, revolving as the capital falls around it.

Paris Is Burning

Her blog
Her myspace

The Magic Pack.

2006-10-28T00:54:00.000+01:00

PATRICK WOLF

Accident and Emergency
The Magic Position

Jim Noir longed to be in the (major) key of C, and seemed to be pretty pleased when he reached his goal. Joining the ranks of the diatonic and sounding just as delighted to be doing so is the reinvigorated Patrick Wolf who will proclaim "I’m singing in the major key" on his new album's title track The Magic Position. We can only assume that said position is standing at the forefront of a miniature symphony awash with soaring strings and Bobby's Girl harmonies. Alongside this ridiculously marvellous concoction is the goodtime 80's electro-pop of Accident and Emergency. His trademark vocal swagger is placed atop fanfares, synths, an addictive chorus and anthemic lyrics ("if you never lose, how you gonna know when you've won?") in an entirely faultless three minutes.

Accident and Emergency video
Bluebells - video of another new song, live from his flat. The first in a series of 6 Wolf vidcasts by iCast.

Search for free Patrick Wolf stuff at eMusic!

The Subsistence Farmers

2006-10-22T18:41:00.000+01:00

LOS CAMPESINOS

Los Campesinos' flagship tune 'It Started With a Mixx' (apparantly their re-imagining of a Hot Chocolate "classic") opens with the lyric "trying to find the perfect match between pretentious and pop...". And although they may claim that this refers to the art of compiling an impressive ode in the form of a mixtape, it also seems to act as their manifesto as to how to form the perfect pop songs. And slipping in a mention of the "perfect match" to give it a double meaning is a pretty clever move, too!

Another ditty that complies with these harsh restrictions is 'You! Me! Dancing!'. It's as exciting and positive as its title implies (and as caesuric, with a minute-long, almost post-rock intro and sprawling end section) and is the bubbling biological ignition that would result from an experimentational merging of 'It'5' and 'A Certain Romance'. This is a band who have successfully found their desired match and are now destined for the dancefloor.

You! Me! Dancing!

Their myspace, where you can download another couple of greats.

William Shakespeare Presents...

2006-10-21T01:14:00.000+01:00

TITUS ANDRONICUS

Titus Andronicus

According to their myspace, it has been remarked upon that this band sounds like "Guided by Voices mixed with Andrew WK". You're curious to hear that combination, right? You need party music, but with some sophistication and credibility? You need to listen to Titus Andronicus!

In their self-titled tune, they have given us the most life-affirmingly aggresive knees-up anthem this world has ever seen. It could easily be the product of a cocaine-fuelled songwriting session between The Arcade Fire and The Libertines, no matter how unlikely such an occurance and unimaginable its result would be. If Hollywood had guts, Titus Andronicus' theme tune is what would've soundtracked Titanic as Jack let go of the iceberg, and every audience member of every screening would've shat themselves. It's a tale of being told to give up, but the snarling passion of this performance suggests that Titus Andronicus won't be taking advice from anybody anytime soon. Phew!

"...the most exciting song of 2006 from the best band of 2007..." - Hi-Fi Popcorn

Their myspace, featuring the awesome Albert Camus and the fuzzy, hymnal, Neutral Milk Hotel-esque Every Time I See The Light.

A Gift of the Sea.

2006-10-13T00:39:00.000+01:00

JEREMY WARMSLEY LIVE IN WHELANS - 08.10.06

What's in a name? Musicians often have their destined style of songwriting printed on their birth certificates decades before they poignantally strum their guitar or boot up their laptops. Thus, we are presented with the glorious subtleties of the music of James "blunt" Blunt (or not) and the juxtapositionally lovely scorching heat of Jeremy Warmsley's fiery furnace of ideas. Tonight, against a backdrop of the year's most horrible day, not even the open fire of Whelans' front bar can provide a sufficient tog value. But in the venue, Warmsley takes to the stage to promote his debut LP The Art of Fiction and what results is a hug for every punter and a tune for every thought.

On record, the majority of his songs are lush and multi-layered, but tonight he appears armed only with a battered guitar and the most capable and enchanting voice indie music has heard in a long time. Performing the duties of a dozen choirs, it soars over epics such as 5 Verses and I Believe In The Way You Move with the audience in a state of intent awe. It's when we're listening to songs like the ferocious Dirty Blue Jeans and marching warbeat of I Promise that we realise that what we are hearing is a ragged and catchy manifestation of thermal energy.

5 Verses

Watch a selection of his amazing videos.
Dirty Blue Jeans live and acoustic from his kitchen.
His myspace
Buy The Art of Fiction LP.

Marilyn Blushes...

2006-09-28T09:39:00.000+01:00

RED MONROE

Texas is thriving. Maybe not quite on the same level as Sweden or Canada, but they have the distinct advantage of being countries. Recent releases from Philip E Karnats, Pilotdrift, The Polyphonic Spree and forthcoming albums from the female Patrick Wolf (St. Vincent) and those wonderful Sprees far outweigh any negative attention the state may garner for much less serious matters than indie rock. For more than a month, local hooligans Red Monroe have been residing at the top of the album charts of the musical Mecca that is Good Records. And praise be to Allah, for it's an extremely good record.

A swirling glaze enshrouds the album but each of the eight tracks break out of the seamless blanket to scratch their own signature on to the listener's ears. If Secret Machines were set on fire and told to allow escape to as many 3 minute pop songs as possible, something like this might pop out. From the standout gang holler of A Return To The Old Way Of Thinking to the Tripping Daisy-esque sprint of Carolina Cigarette, Red Monroe exert a 29 minute long force strong enough to soundtrack a fight to the death between Newton and Paschal and thumping enough to deliver the final blow.

Fingertips
Carolina Cigarette
Their myspace

Disco In Your Skull.

2006-08-30T17:43:00.000+01:00

POLYPHONIC SPREE - WAIT EP

Mental Cabaret

The first piece of 2007's best album The Fragile Army has finally dropped (well, it's been ripped from the stream on their site). A new sound has been much-heralded and Mental Cabaret is definitely a step in a different direction length-wise (3 minutes sharp), production wise (very hi-fi) and instrument-wise (a synth takes front speaker over their roster's more orchestral components). So we're left with the most perfect 80's pop gem imaginable, decorated with trademark swooping symphonics, church choir and a tap dancing solo. It's the Spree song most likely to be played alongside The Killers and Arctic Monkeys at the discotheque, but they didn't sacrifice any of their originality or innovation in making it.

Mental Cabaret will be released on iTunes and selected indie retailers on Tuesday September 5th as part of a 5-track EP entitled Wait, as a stopgap until the full-length (which was originally intended to be released around this time). Other tracks on the EP include another brand new song and 3 covers - their renditions of the Psychedelic Furs' Love My Way, Tripping Daisy's awesome Sonic Bloom and the most incredibly super-duper thing you'll ever hear: Lithium, which Kurt Cobain was born to write for them.

Official Site
Recording Blog

Free Chips.

2006-08-15T18:30:00.000+01:00

NACHO LIBRE

With Nacho Libre, the most perfect comedy pairing of modern times (only the cast addition of Leslie Nielsen could improve its connection with the Ulnar nerve) have shown us what A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man would be like had Joyce been replaced by a wrestling Napoleon Dynamite. Jared Hess' 2nd feature is almost as triumphant as its predecessor, sticking to the unflawed formula of awkward pauses, hilarious quirks and ridiculously innapropriate dialogue. But in between aches of laughter (mutant midget wrestlers, Nacho's "I DON'T WANT NO CORN" and the fat lady's secret method of transport being the highlights) and urges for nachos and mayonnaised corn, my ears were intrigued by the soundtrack.

Directly to the record shop went I, but the CD was nowhere to be found. Research informed me that it hasn't been released, something unheard of for any release these days (the rumour that Danny Elfman - who partially scored the movie - had removed his name from his work may be the reason). The movie's peaks and troughs were highlighted by Elfman, Beck and numerous really interesting Mexican 1970's psychedelic acts (one covered Os Mutantes). But the real nugget of the bunch is Mr. Loco, a band who contributed several tracks, including the wonderful theme tune Real Religious Man. I've been scouring the net trying to compile as much of the soundtrack as possible, so here's what I've found:

Mr. Loco - Real Religious Man
(Others at Some Velvet Blog.)

2006-08-12T21:45:00.000+01:00

X-PRESS 2 WITH TIM DELAUGHTER

Witchi Tai To
You might remember X-Press 2 as that gang who got David Byrne to phone in vocals on a track called Lazy a few years back. As far as I can remember, that was the only single from their debut that really hit it big (and that REALLY hit it big). Well, their 2nd album is almost ready to be unleashed and this CD's "Lazy" is - apparantly - going to be their reworking of Harper's Bizarre's Witchi Tai To (which is itself based on an ancient Indian chant). The key to this cover is that Mr. Tim Delaughter is fronting it. Last time round, David Byrne's shares enjoyed a massive price increase and we can only hope that the Polyphonic Spree will be on the receiving end of a similar amount of attention in the coming months, as we approach the release of The Fragile Army early in the new year. Going by Tim's performance on what is likely to be 2006's crossover dancefloor hit, the masses may be in for a whole load of sonic fulfillment.

The Family That Plays Together.

2006-07-28T00:23:00.001+01:00

TRACHTENBURG FAMILY SLIDESHOW PLAYERS IN THE SUGAR CLUB - 26.07.06

It isn't very reasonable to expect every family to live in a comfortable housing estate, attending school or work daily and interacting around a television. It takes a very special nuclear group like the Trachtenburgs to come along and show some initiative by dressing in homemade 1970's threads and travelling the world singing Happy Birthday to photographs of dead nurses and uncles.

Husband/father Jason - the Adam Green of New York's anti-folk scene in the late 80's/early 90's and onetime Daniel Johnston collaborator - excels in crafting hilarious observational commentaries over quirkily childish melodies in the vein of They Might Be Giants or the Danielson Famile, but with an even more severe bout of A.D.D. His wife Tina - the band's projectionist - is the traditional homely American “mom” who exudes warmth and acts as the night‘s gracious hostess. Despite fierce competition, the fan’s favourite is their thirteen year old drummer daughter Rachel, which is apparent from the band’s merchandise (her cartoon manifestation is emblazoned on colouring books, badges, dolls and bags made from eco-friendly materials by Tina's mother). It is obvious to all that the good-humoured and multi-talented teen (she was originally the band's harmonica player and has guested as a bassist for several bands) has a certain fate to fulfil as the next decade's Kim Deal.

Jason utilises Tina's reel-changing break between each song and their mid-set questions/answers session to showcase his tendencies as an intentionally bad fast-talking stand-up comedian ("The Who reformed to record their final album. It's going to be called Who Cares!"). He is a sort of stumbling, musically-inclined Tommy Cooper who substitutes a fez for a brown velvet suit, gigantic moustache and oversized glasses. He is also immensely likeable; afterwards, there’ll be a 15-minute queue to shake his hand and say hello.

But there’s much more to the band than their style and their smiles. The set's highlights include their visual odes to eggs and dandelions, with the centrepiece being a 6-piece rock opera based on a slideshow of McDonald's corporate plan for 1978 ("Let's Not Have the Same Weight in 1978 — Let's Have More"). The fast food giant couldn't have dreamed of their strategy coming into the possession of a more inappropriate person, as Mr Trachtenburg bemoans the company's relative inability to "take advantage of efficiency" over a polka rhythm and a clashing drum beat. The contrast between the two interacting worlds is perfectly accentuated and the family once again serve to represent a delightful schism from the norm.

The band also exist to bring life to the lifeless and forgotten. Here are people's long-discarded memories and lost friendships being projected on to a wall in a country thousands of miles away from where they were formed, to a paying audience of hundreds! The adventures of best friends Jean and Kathy (probably now deceased) make up the naggingly-catchy pop gem Look At Me and bewilder the audience into side-splitting laughter (what is a "Festival of Gas" and why are they at it?!).

Hollywood handyman and comic David Cross said it best when he remarked upon Tina and Jason's parenting skills as "a way to raise a family and conduct your life that most of us either haven't thought of or simply lack the imagination and courage to carry out." An innovative government would surely authorise cloning so that every neighbourhood could be home to a few Trachtenburg Families.

Eggs
Eggs (Video)
Mountain Trip To Japan, 1959 (Video)
Their myspace

The Players are releasing a live DVD 'Off And On Broadway' on August 1st, which can be purchased here.

Oh! You Little Things.

2006-07-27T20:10:00.000+01:00

THE LITTLE ONES

With each summer comes a massive indie harvest so my 3 precious months aren't the happiest of fellows, having being complimented by my loss of touch with the twee underground scene (thanks, British Telecom). An eagerness to maintain some sort of contact with the whole mp3 thing has resulted in my (non-exclusive, judging by the amount of attention they've been getting) fling with The Little Ones.

Having had only 3 of their songs and no access to the informational highway to give me their story (or figure out if it's a different band to Pete Doherty's cohorts The Little 'ans [the fact that they sound non-English - and good - suggests so]), the music had to do all of the talking. Well, the music has talked, walked, yelled, blimpered, blampered and jammed. Perfectly crafted gems jangle from their stadium drums and twittery guitar lines meet and greet you like shy woodland creatures from their hollow tree homes.

"Hey! Hey! Hey Oh!", barks Farthing Wood's lovely red fox in 'Lovers Who Uncover', over handclaps and dark bass.

The Little Ones don't (overly) conjur up an image of a forest neighbourhood where the inhabiting creatures secretly communicate amongst themselves. But they've a cute little name and cute little songs and you want to give them a cute little hug for crafting these 3 little darlings. Three out of three ain't bad. With a bit more research, this could be our favourite new band.

Lovers Who Uncover
Cha Cha Cha
High On A Hill
Let Them Ring The Bells (from Rock Insider)
Their myspace

Hey, It's The Sun!

2006-07-01T01:06:00.000+01:00

A Hi-Fi Summer

The summer is evidently correct and present, with droughts and heatwaves in their appropriate positions. So take this zip file - filled with some incredibly obvious choices and hopefully some not so much - out into your garden with some cool carbonated refreshments and Wibbly Wobbly Wonders.

1. Starlight Mints - Submarine #3
2. Danielson Famile - Rubbernecker
3. Suburban Kids With Biblical Names - Marry Me
4. Scissors For Lefty - Next To Argyle
5. The Lovely Feathers - Photocorners
6. The Spinto Band - Did I Tell You
7. Apples In Stereo - Benefits of Lying (With Your Friend)
8. Two Gallants - Steady Rollin'
9. Beirut - Postcards From Italy
10. Linda Ronstadt - Different Drum
11. Hemstad - Fyllekarring
12. Tripping Daisy - Kids Are Calling
13. The Revs - You Shine
14. The Vines - Take Me Back
15. Jim Noir - A Quiet Man
16. The Immediate - Aspects
17. Neutral Milk Hotel - In The Aeroplane Over The Sea
18. Man Man - Van Helsing Boombox
19. Pavement - Carrot Rope
20. Simian - La Breeze
21. The Polyphonic Spree - It's The Sun
22. Bishop Allen - Butterfly Nets

With 22 perfectly delightful artists, it'd be a sin if you didn't want to investigate a handful of them further, so here's your obligatory eMusic link to pick up a few free albums by these people. I tried to avoid the apologies that these sites so often have, but explanations have to be given for the recent patchiness of Hi-Fi Popcorn, the result of (temporary) full-time work, a lack of internet access and a Dublin concert famine (I didn't want to say drought twice, although the smooth alliteration would probably forgive the repetition.)

But July and August will be fruitful.

Do You Like To Think?

2006-06-08T20:39:00.000+01:00

THE THINKING FAN'S GUIDE TO THE WORLD CUP

If you're getting excited about the World Cup and aren't interested in watching anything else, wearing anything else, drinking anything else (Coca Cola, apparantly) or reading anything else, I thoroughly recommend that you pick up a copy of The Thinking Fan's Guide To The World Cup. Edited and compiled by Sean Wilsey (Mc Sweeney's) and Matt Weiland (Granta), it's a veritable landmine of information on football and statistics about this year's tournament, but for (us) people who don't care about Japan's qualifying route, the real attraction of this book is how informatively and entertainingly it deals with each of the 32 competing nations. Contributing short stories of thrilling non-fiction, we have authors like the marvellous Dave Eggers writing on his native USA, Nick Hornby investigating the Land of Eng and Eric Schlosser on a quest to discover Sweden.

The prefaces from the editors are particularly interesting as they explain how, as 2 Americans, they became obsessed with the tournament in the first place. Wilsey also describes the heartbreak of seeing nations such as Ireland and Uruguay fail to reach Germany, as the book would have featured additions by writers of the calibre of Roddy Doyle and Eduardo Galeano had they been successful.

You'll also pick up a series of thrilling facts, such as the Muslim decree which means that Saudi Arabian footballers are putting their lives at risk by competing (if a team member scores a goal and celebrates "like the players in America and France do, you should spit in his face, punish him and reprimand him"). The harrowing statistic that the average age of death of an Angolan native (it's their World Cup debut) is 38 years of age means that even their team's child prodigies would be currently experiencing mid-life crisises.

For anyone with an interest in the world (that's you), this is an essential almanac.

Buy it at Amazon.

Official website

Jim Noir: Eanie Meany
You may as well!

Kids Do Care.

2006-06-07T12:47:00.000+01:00

SIMPLE KID IN CRAWDADDY - 04.06.06

With around 500 avid fans filling the intimate venue and “tickets only” being yelled from the entrance, it’s obvious that Simple Kid’s low-key (and late night) return to his home country’s capital is going to be a special night. Back when Mike Skinner was deemed revolutionary for recording an album in his bedroom that didn’t really sound like it had been made in his bedroom, Kieran Mc Feely had done the same thing, except his LP was actually amazing. Despite having been recorded in 8 tracks on a laptop with a (presumably) bad soundcard, it featured massive stadium-filling drums, perfect choruses and harmonica playing that led reviewers to the lazy belief that this guy was some sort of reincarnation of Bob Dylan. In actuality, he was a more focused, pumped-up and country-tinged Badly Drawn Boy or Beck, with a penchant for lyrics depicting himself as a pining underachiever with a distaste for modern society.

Tonight, he opens with King Kong, a newbie from his forthcoming album (simplicity entitles the record ‘2’) and regardless of it not being a groundbreaking departure from his sound (if it ain’t broken…), it’s brilliantly anthemic and received by the fans like a lost brother might be, if he was actually a really good song. Alternating his instrument (guitar, banjo and harmonica; often simultaneously), he plays over backing tracks which are projected from Cubase on his laptop to a screen behind him, and if he feels like a spot of improvisation, he just pauses the track and does what he likes. Innovatively, his laptop also conducts the audience in a karaoke version of Running, despite it being the song’s first ever performance.

Golden oldies such as Staring at the Sun, Truck On and The Commuter warrant mass singalongs (“this is like a really bad version of Queen at Wembley arena!”) and the Kid looks genuinely overwhelmed, particularly during The Commuter’s rousing rebel chant of “I said to my boss ‘go fuck yourself’” and when we effortlessly recite the endless list of facts of The Average Man that even he can’t remember. Unfortunately, his ecstasy soon turns to dismay when a small group of hecklers, uninterested in new material, call a halt to his presentation of a touching piano-led tune which - despite only around 90 seconds of undisturbed beauty - has the air of a classic. Visibly bothered by the few drunken “fans”, he tied things up as quickly as possible with a selection of songs from his debut. Despite being deprived of hearing some of the exclusives that his Cubase setlist hinted towards, what we heard of SK2 promises it to be another masterful piece from the eclectic, talented and thoughtful multi-instrumentalist.

Staring At The Sun
Link stolen from Music For Ants

His myspace

May I Recommend?

2006-06-03T20:09:00.000+01:00

BISHOP ALLEN

Butterfly Nets
When Bishop Allen announced that their now-traditional experimentation with their sound on their May EP would come in the form of a saxophone, I was understandably weary. For non-jazz boffins like me, a saxophone exists only for Bleedin' Gums Murphy or Lisa Simpson to play tuneless solos. So when the particular song begins as their first ever female-fronted track with the beautiful backing of a ukulele, it's a surprise. This wonderful song is definitely one of the best summer tunes of all time. That clearly puts it in the running for best song of 2006, without a question. It's the softer, brighter sister of the Velvet Underground's amazing After Hours with an even more hummable melody, and when the saxophone sneaks into proceedings, it does so extremely cleverly and subtly. And the lyrics (Darbie sings about catching butterflies to keep herself company) couldn't be more fitting.

This is everything perfect about the summer summed up in three minutes. It'll be interesting to see what other delights are on the May EP (let alone the June, July and August editions!) and the only way to find out is to order it now.

The Winners.

2006-05-31T19:46:00.000+01:00

SEMIFINALISTS

Semifinalists are dream pop tycoons whose self-titled debut album begins with barbershop a capella harmonies before thumping drums, atmospheric synths and jangly guitars build the song up, back down and then up again into a different tune. It's this experimentism and sense of dynamics and harmonics that really mark Semifinalists as a really big new band, although they aren't yet massively popular. They're big, as in epic, and as close to a fresh 2006 version of Mercury Rev or (mid-era) Flaming Lips as we've got. Or maybe we've just got a more uptempo and condensed Secret Machines, with a girl. Either way, it'll be anthems like You Said, Show The Way and The Chemicals That Wait that transforms them from 3 film school students of different nationalities who produced a record, into sculptors of beauty that needs to be protected like they are some sort of culturally-important castle.

You Said
Let's Kill This
You Said (Video)
Show The Way (Video)
Their myspace

Attack, Decay, Sustain, Release.

2006-05-29T11:26:00.000+01:00

ENVELOPES

Some of them are Swedish and one of them is French but despite being rather distanced from the staples of the modern day indie diet, their debut Demon gives the impression that they've been smuggling Velvet Underground and Deerhoof CDs ender their covers. What results is a collage of influences, resulting in a perfect mixture of twee singalongs over fuzzy riffs. Perhaps conceive Bishop Allen relocating - with a Moog and a heavier bass sound - from NYC to the leafy Scandinavian kingdom (and then re-relocating to Yorkshire, for some reason) and you'll have some realisation of their summer delights.

Sister In Love is a cutey jingle-jangle duet and some other songs (My Fren, I'm looking at you!) recall their countrymen Hemstad. Opener 'It Is The Law' begins with a stumbling treble guitar before it catches the listener off-guard by supercharging our ears when it fires up with a full-on audio massage.

As an all-in-one one-stop-shop for spiky, quirky, grand and catchy music, Demon is perfection. Despite being a glorified (and glorious) demo, it's already one of the year's finest masterpieces.

It Is The Law
Sister In Love
Sister In Love Video
Their myspace
Buy Demon on Amazon.

Wednesday is the last day of eMusic's offer of 50 free mp3s, so if you want 4 or so free albums, get on it!

Gorgeous Quills.

2006-05-26T11:48:00.000+01:00

THE LOVELY FEATHERS

There's really no point in them trying to hide it underneath layers of instrumentation, and there's no need for people to flailingly dodge the issue when talking about the Lovely Feathers... One listen and you know that they must have really loved their local heroes the Unicorns and have now decided to pick up somewhere between where they left off and Islands continued from. They've got everything in its right place: jokey/schizophrenic dual vocals, fun lyrics and some naggingly irritating melodies.

One thing that the Feathers do quite a lot (perhaps too often) is hitting upon a line in a song and then just staying at that line for as long as they want. So we end up with lyrics like "I really, really, really, really, really like you" and "blue Lawrenceville blazer, blue Lawrenceville blazer, blazer, blazer". Maybe they try to hard to sound quirky, but as far as quirk pop goes, these guys have rushed into the lead with their 2nd album Hind Hind Legs (which is actually more of a re-recording of their debut, but never mind that).

With massively catchy anthems like Photocorners (which builds up into a euphoric refrain of "we'd laugh if we were younger") and the harmonic elevator rock of Frantic, the Lovelies have already found their niche market in their delighted audience of melody-lovers. And everybody loves melodies...

Pope John Paul
Photocorners
Frantic
Frantic Video

Their myspace

Sha-la-la-la-la, We're Still Lost In Space.

2006-05-24T12:00:00.000+01:00

THE REVS

The Revs named this website, you know. Hi-Fi Popcorn is an as-yet unreleased studio cut from their amazing (self-titled) 3rd album. I've actually yet to hear it beyond its intro, but I figured the title alone (and the intro, of course) was deserved of some sort of little tribute. But they've got a helluva lot going on otherwise, aside from being very good title-thinkers.

As a rule, they seem to resist the temptation to make any song that has less than 3 massively hummable melodies, amazing guitarwork and perfectly poetic lyrics. Their live shows are awesomely energetic performances which culminate in all 3 of them primally attacking their poor ol' drumkit like hooligans beating out a football terrace chant. And their CD covers often feature work from talent such as artistic luminary Banksy. As a whole package, you couldn't hope for a better band.

You Shine
The opening track of their masterpiece LP is a psychedelic punk tune with a thumping drum beat you've never heard before, and a summer chorus and swirling breakdown that you'll want to hear a million times more.

Borderland (Acoustic)
On record, Borderland is a bass-heavy political epic, so it's a curiosity to see how it translates acoustically. This performance - captured backstage at a German festival last month - is a ferociously rough and rowdy singalong.

Live at the Paradiso
This video footage (from last October) of an entire live show at Amsterdam's famous Paradiso venue depicts the band in fine form... a wonder, given the city they're in.

Broken? Video
The loveable video for Broken?, their 2004 single which showcased a new sound to the world at large.

Buy the album. You can stream it here too.

Their myspace has another 4 tracks for you, including the chart-topping art rock stomp Time Slippin'.

Clap Your Hands Say Demos.

2006-05-23T23:11:00.000+01:00

ALEC OUNSWORTH

To my excitement, I recently came across more than an album's worth of old homemade demos from the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah frontman. While a lot of them could succintly be described as "boring", there are some gems, such as early versions of 2 of my personal favourite CYHSY songs; Heavy Metal and Lost and Found. Fully formed and near-pristinely recorded, many of the featured songs serve to reinforce the opinion that Ounsworth is more of a solo artist with a backing band than the group's frontman. The harmonies, keyboards and trademark whine are all intact but when percussion is included, it's in the form of a singular drum machine loop. The whole thing makes for an extremely interesting insight into the evolution of one of the current biggest indie stars and a glimpse as to where the seeds were planted for a classic debut album.

Over And Over
Heavy Metal
Pass Along This Way
I Think I'd Like To Go Back To Heaven

Laika Dog.

2006-05-22T23:08:00.000+01:00

HER SPACE HOLIDAY

Her Space Holiday is Marc Bianchi - an indie-electro artist - who in 2003's The Young Machines, has produced my favourite album under that genre's umbrella, by far. It's a squelchingly atmospheric triumph comprised of cool space rock ballads and giant pop songs.

My Girlfriend's Boyfriend
This is such a grand and magnificent song. A gently-paced cruise based around a marvellous violin line and a thumping drum loop suddenly crushes the listener's skull in the chorus, when the smashingly crunchy guitars come in.

Something To Do With My Hands
There's a lot of talk of finger-sucking going on here, but musically, it's an innocently warm rainy-day lullaby.

Official site

Leaking Vessels Make The Best Sound.

2006-05-21T13:25:00.000+01:00

BUILT TO SPILL

Built to Spill have always been a staple of modern indie rock who - in Keep It Like A Secret and Perfect From Now On - delivered 2 of the Americana scene's trademark classics. Carrying magnificent melodies forged from the pop sound of Guided By Voices (but a whole lot cleaner) and Big Star, these records also contained an epicness formed from their layer-upon-layer of guitars and their (often arguably overlong, but always bearable) winding solos.

Their new album You In Reverse - despite being 5 years in the making - doesn't mark any huge changes for the band. However, as an epitomy of their sound, it's a definite success. Listening to it through, it becomes a singular, sprawling track which takes the listener on a seamless trip through the history of nice sociable guitar music. Highlights include the charming and chiming Velvet Underground-ish Saturday and the simply massive Conventional Wisdom, a naggingly catchy sunny song seemingly made for the radio but then stretched out for a delightful extra 4 minutes on an afterthought.

Conventional Wisdom

The Wait

Carry The Zero
An oldie from Keep It Like A Secret.

Their myspace

Whilst You In Reverse comes recommended, Keep It Like A Secret would be an entirely better album for a Built to Spill beginner.

The Eurovision.

2006-05-21T12:51:00.000+01:00

I thought that there might be some people blissfully unaware of Europe's annual clash of cultures, and although its place in the limelight for 2006 is already well over (it was held last night), I think it's deserved of some publicity.

From wikipedia:

Running since 1956, the Eurovision Song Contest is an annual televised song contest with participants from numerous countries whose national television broadcasters are members of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).

The standout track was a cocky Lithuanian Gary Glitter knock-off (there's an entendre), which featured heartwrenchingly straight-to-home lyrics, such as:

Everyday you hear us on the radio
(that's right)
And everyday you see us on the news
(yeah)
It doesn't matter in mono or in stereo
(it's better in stereo)
'cos we are here to represent the truth that

We are the winners of Eurovision
We are, we are! We are, we are!
We are the winners of Eurovision
We are, we are! We are, we are!
Go baby!

Watch the video of LT United's valiant attempt, the hightlight being the little bald man losing his marbles, soundtracked by a distorted violin solo.

Download the mp3. Actually, by the time it's on your computer, the novelty factor will be long gone.

The surprise winner was actually this bunch from Finland (bear in mind that this is voted for by hundreds of millions of Europeans):

For any Americans reading this, delighted that they're immune from anything like it:

In 2006 NBC announced plans to produce a similar show, replacing the member countries of the EBU with the different states and territories of the United States. As of May 2006 the EBU was in talks with NBC to license the rights to the Eurovision Song Contest format.

Cut Your Hair.

2006-05-19T01:30:00.000+01:00

SCISSORS FOR LEFTY

San Fran's newest, coolest and bestest are a lo-fi melodic indie group with a Ricky Wilson lookalike (although it's only really noticeable in that particular photograph) and a name that's sure to have a fascinating story behind it. They possess the tunes of Pavement, the dreamy vocal delivery of British Sea Power and in Save It Cory, a wavy harmonic intro that will remind millions of lazy journalists of the Arcade Fire's Wake Up. Songs such as Marsha bounce up and down like the Unicorns playing on an underwater coral sponge and Next To Argyle boasts headnodding upstrokes, teasing choruses and a condensed epicness showcasing their pop sensibilities, like David Byrne fronting Grandaddy.

Apologies should be made for the vast number of references, but Scissors For Lefty really take the best bits from all the greatest indie pop ever made, figure out what they need to hold on to, package it all together and stamp it with their own unique freshness. Live, they're a funky delight with jittering dance moves from THE perfect frontman. You'll wonder how the towering keyboardist is also drumming, before figuring out that they're 2 separate entities, and brothers. And you'll try to work out what the thing dangling from Brian's mic stand is, before you're hit by the revelation that it's a CB radio used for a vintage distorted vocal sound. But not before it doesn't work as it should and the band fumble to see where the problem lies ("that's our gimmick!", Garza cries), soon realising that it's not plugged in.

Recently signed to Rough Trade, they'll deliver their debut top 10 single Ghetto Ways in June and a number 1 album (Underhanded Romance) soon after.

Next To Argyle
Save It Cory
Marsha
Next To Argyle (Acoustic)
Their myspace

You can download their out-of-print self-produced debut LP for free, using your eMusic trial.

The Spirits Within.

2006-05-17T00:55:00.000+01:00

FINAL FANTASY LIVE IN WHELANS - 14.05.06

For a band named after one of the longest running, most epic video games of all time, the music is just as you'd expect. Sprawling classical violin lines which wouldn't sound out of place on a "best of classical music" box set, fronted with a fragile voice singing about zombies climbing Canada's tallest building and the dreams of the Arcade Fire.

Owen Pallett himself comes across as a mixture between a bow-slinging Robin Hood and Cloud from the 7th game in the aforementioned RPG series. His live show is wondrously inventive. Feeding his violin into a loop pedal and then playing over the existing line, he creates layer-upon-layer of lush harmony, luring the listener into a magical world where - if we were to close our eyes - there could just as easily be a dozen violinists battling it out over wartime chamber pop.

To keep things fresh, a drummer joins him for a handful of songs including the ferocious update of debut album highlight This Is The Dream of Win and Regine, renamed This Is The Dream of Emma and Cam. He also employs the services of a talented projectionist who shines brilliantly imaginative companion pieces of old English castles, royal weddings and galloping horsemen on to a screen behind him. The "Ye Olde" connotations to his backdrop only reinforces his image of the kind of musician a 17th century king might send for. But this king has exquisite musical taste (fit for a king), and this musician is 400 years before his time.

Final Fantasy's lovingly - and extremely juxtaposingly - titled sophomore album He Poos Clouds ("a set of songs that attempt to modernise each of the eight Dungeons and Dragons schools of magic, which nobody who listens to will ever again entertain thoughts of suicide") finds its place on a record store's shelf later this month.

Live WFMU Session (from Mocking Music):
Spell For A Weak Heart
The CN Tower Belongs To The Dead
If I Were A Carp
What Do You Think Will Happen Next
This Is The Dream Of Win And Regine

This Modern Love
The video of his massively-popular (despite being a one-off, as far as I can tell) Bloc Party cover. What begins as an assumed joke (note the audience laughs) becomes an amazing rendition of an already-classic song.

The Tripping Spree.

2006-05-12T13:27:00.000+01:00

TRIPPING DAISY

Look at the picture! Yes, the fellow to the left is the bassist of the Polyphonic Spree and that guy in the middle is Tim Delaughter, songwriting genius and frontman extraordinare. To the right is fantastic singer-songwriter Philip Karnats and the boy in the middle? That's Benjamin Curtis of Secret Machines. Why are these all gathered together? For Tripping Daisy, that's why!

Having notched up (in chronological order) a grunge classic, a pop-rock chartbuster, 2 amazing sprawling masterpieces and numerous excellent EPs, they then left their legacy behind to be properly rediscovered when their new bands hit the bigtime. Now is that time, so here's your Tripping Daisy starter pack:

Field Day Jitters
The rocky opener of Jesus Hits Like The Atom Bomb sees Tim with "wondering jets inside of me, I've got the field day jitters". This nervousness, as a reaction to something new and exciting, is probably a result of a vision of this record: "it's what I want, it's what I see...". The drums on this - from a green, teen Secret Machine - are nothing short of incredible (as on the rest of the album).

Sonic Bloom
A should-be sixties classic, transported to the nineties and given a makeover using all of the musical discoveries in the 30 years prior. Tim recently realised that this is one of the greatest love songs of all time, so keep a clever ear out for the Polyphonic Spree's breathtaking rejuvanation of this.

Rocketpop
One of their grungey stadium-busting ear assaults, innovated with glorious harmonies and the temporarily relaxing breakdown: "lying here with you is like heaven in the sun, in the seventies".

I Got A Girl
The smash hit which gave them a tag amongst the ignorant as a one hit wonder. The reason for this one's inclusion is (despite being a fantastic song) that it might ring a bell with the more "mature" reader.

One Through Four
Featured on their final - self-titled - album as a "cover" of a song on their debut. When put alongside with the original, this really shows how much they'd evolved. The subject matter is (allegedly!) the issue of premature activity in the bedroom.

The notoriously hard-to-please Pitchfork even dished out high praise for their magnum opus Jesus Hits Like The Atom Bomb, citing it as "the intersection of Built To Spill and Brian Wilson, with lyrics straight off of Robert Pollard's Guided By Voices lyricpad". It's the type of album you've never heard before which makes you not want to hear any others any time soon. Seriously, this is one of the very greatest albums of all time, a psychedelic pop classic with melodies strewn throughout like they're going out of fashion, sugar-coated harmonies everywhere, and breakdowns which don't stop 'til they reach the strasosphere! And Tripping Daisy overall - they're one of the very greatest ever too.

Official Website
Redesigned and relaunched last year to tie in with the news of a forthcoming box set, this site will give you promo videos, live videos, streaming mp3s, lyrics, pictures and everything else.

Their unofficial myspace

The Polyphonic Spree's official studio blog for their forthcoming 3rd album The Fragile Army. They've acquired an extra guitarist and are aiming for at a considerably bigger version of the Tripping Daisy days. The 3 songs I've heard from it live have blown me away.

Babe Ruth?

2006-05-11T15:10:00.000+01:00

BEIRUT

19 year old Albuquerquen Zach Condon is Beirut and his debut album Gulag Orkestar (available here for free, once you've signed up to eMusic) has already cemented its place as the underground album of the year. And as the summer approaches, the possibility of it becoming the overground album of the year is becoming ever more realistic. With a warbling voice somewhere in between Alec Ounsworth, Owen Pallett, Thom Yorke and Scott Walker (good company to keep) and a style reminiscent of Neutral Milk Hotel (minus a guitar and plus a lot more horns and accordions and things), he makes the kind of music you'd expect to hear being played by a busker with a moustache outside a café in Venice or being played by a gypsy in a war-torn European country, on a sunny day. Or perhaps a band formed by the gypsy and the moustachioed male. It's ukuleles at dawn for this exotic waltzing maestro.

Postcards From Italy

Canals of Our City

His myspace

Nun Allen

2006-05-10T00:22:00.000+01:00

LILY ALLEN

I saw Lily Allen for the first time on the telly a few weeks ago, being interviewed and showing off the video for LDN (London?!). It's always a good idea to acquire a taste for some mainstream pop just in case you ever get stuck in a car with only a radio for company. So she seems to have carved herself a niche market of people like me, similar to what Gnarls Barkley have done. That said, I wouldn't be actually paying for either of their services, but they're still nice. Like her or not, you'll need to find out soon enough, so get downloading and forming an opinion!

HINT: She is the daughter of Keith Allen, mastermind behind England's Euro 96 anthem Vindaloo.

LDN
Musically like a pepped-up Billie Holiday which aims to be nothing less than a summer number 1 that gets annoying really quickly. Cute, bright and tuneful though.

Knock Em Out
This is half decent until they start singing, but it's still better than pretty much everything the Streets have ever released.

LDN Video

Her myspace

A Portrait Of The Artist.

2006-05-05T09:00:00.000+01:00

THE DEVIL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON

Hitting your local multiplex today (assuming you live in Temple Bar or on Parnell Street, Dublin, Ireland) is a documentary spanning the life of Texan singer-songwriter Daniel Johnston, a cult hero and renowned nut. He's been recording simple songs on a cheap boombox since his teens at the start of the eighties and documenting his life since before then, on similarly cheap video equipment. This footage has been blended into the film by direcor Jeff Feuerzeig who took responsibility for tracing the past dozen years since he became a beloved underground star thanks to support from the likes of Kurdt Cobain, David Bowie and MTV.

The film has had mixed reviews so far. Existing fans view it as a heartbreaking account of an extremely talented man's battle with mental illness. A healthy handful of non-fans come out with a new icon, whilst the others think it's an often-hilarious mockumentary, not believing that the extraordinary life depicted could possibly be real, or not understanding his talent and reacting with bemusement as to how this man could be regarded as a genius.

But genius is definitely the correct tag for him. His grainy recordings are haunted by disjointed piano chords forming touching melodies and sung by a torn childlike voice. He has many extreme obsessions with subjects as varied and enthralling as Captain Planet, Satan (he and his parents are strict Christians), The Beatles (he possesses around 2,000 Beatles' bootlegs) and Casper (yes, the friendly ghost). He claims to identify with Casper as a well meaning person who sometimes upsets people (in Johnston's case, his heartfelt songs are the offenders). He also often portrays himself as being dead, a trait which caused much confusion when his recent tribute album was entitled 'The Late Great Daniel Johnston' with the cover depicting a mourner (albeit himself) at his grave.

All of Daniel's albums are available for download here at eMusic, where registering will get you 50 free mp3s (that's worth a fistfull of dollars!). You can easily unsubscribe once you've gotten your freebies. A good starter recommendation would be for the aforementioned Late Great Daniel Johnston album, where one disc is his songs being performed by the likes of Flaming Lips, Starlight Mints, Eels, Beck, TV On The Radio, Mercury Rev and M Ward, and the other is the corresponding originals. Although there are some gallant efforts, the crackling versions with the pounding pump organ are the easy victors.

Like A Monkey In The Zoo
The film has prompted many people to point the finger at the people around Daniel accusing them of exploitation, and although I don't believe that to be the case (it's an inevitable claim), this song would do their case no harm.

Living Life
One of his grandest and most touching compositions.

Walking The Cow
For a song with a title like that which begins with a child's talking toy, this one really excels.

Movie Trailer

Pitchfork Interview

April In May.

2006-05-03T15:51:00.000+01:00

BISHOP ALLEN

Bishop Allen's 4th EP of the year - aptly named 'April' - is now available to buy on their webstore. It won't be shipped out until May 18th when it returns from the pressing plant but as always, they've made a quarter of it available for free download.

Flight 180
Each month, Bishop Allen have been progressing more and more. At the turn of the new year, they introduced the piano to their music for the first time. March brought on an entirely new dimension in the experimental delay-strewn The Monitor. This time, they've outsold themselves once again in an epic violin-led masterpiece. Despite evading any pigeon-holing with their sound rapidly sprinting between influences, this one is much closer to the Velvet Underground or Sigur Ros than the happyclappy perfect pop of their debut LP Charm School.

I still fail to comprehend how they continually process these EPs. In the limited amount of time they have for each disc, they match amazing music with amazing lyrics, self-produce, post off a thousand or so copies and play a few shows where the fans can pick up free bootleg copies of the singles.

They're even hoping to find a nice and co-operative label to release their 2nd full-length album Clementines (another dozen brand new songs) before the year is out. If there are any bands looking for a role model, they could do much worse than look up to this lot.

There's plenty more BA in this post.

The Acorn Brothers.

2006-05-01T10:44:00.000+01:00

AKRON/FAMILY LIVE IN CRAWDADDY - 30.04.06

Before this show, the only reports I'd heard of an Akron/Family live show were easily distinguishable. It was either going to be mindblowingly boring or mindblowingly amazing. Thankfully, tonight's show was definitely the more positive of the two.

Resembling a more sombre Kings of Leon 10 years in the future and seated throughout the show, it's a shock when they hit into their intro track with folk guitar noodling, yells and a dance routine. But that's the nature of the band. Their songs are vast soundscapes where subtle strumming and beautifully layered four part harmonies materialise into a thrash metal jam entirely out of nowhere. Slowly but surely, the noise begins to lessen and become more coherent until it's turned into a magnificent sunshining melodic stomp with even more harmonies. Within another few moments they will have descended into another swirling mess. What results is a quilt of music. The nonstop racket is always enthralling and when a tune finally emerges from the end of the haze, it's all the more enjoyable.

Their experimentation is complimented by and further pronounced by their use of instrumentation. They pluck from wherever they can; xylophones, dinner bells, keyboards, recorders, slide whistles, sleigh bells and soft toy animals who make their applicable sound when squeezed. Their bassist Miles produces a paintscraper and screwdriver which he attaches to his instrument, and later he takes something mysterious out of his pocket to produce a fantastically loud metallic sound emulating the outside rain. Furthermore, before playing The Future, they ask what the song title would translate to in "Gaelic". When a volunteer from the audience offers "an tochaí", they insist he says it into the microphone which they then loop and distort to form part of the song's booming intro.

Their good humour is evident when they cautiously wonder if anyone in attendance is from Belfast... "Let's just say it reminded us of Detroit". Although they have no real defined frontman, Miles sits in the most central position and spends most of the show laughing hysterically; at his bandmates, the audience and (probably) his own ingenuity. They always maintain rapturous attention, which is evident from onlookers peering on tiptoes to see how exactly they're making that glorious commotion. If they really do look like an older Kings of Leon, there's hope for the Followill brothers yet.

Italy

Running, Returning

Their myspace

Official site

The Best Dressers.

2006-04-30T15:53:00.000+01:00

DRESSY BESSY

Elephant 6 has been the most reliable record label in the world of recent times, constantly dispensing psychedelic gems of groundbreaking perfection from the likes of Neutral Milk Hotel, Apples In Stereo, Of Montreal, Beulah and Olivia Tremor Control.

Dressy Bessy fit right into that eye-poppingly good roster with a sound like Kim Deal fronting the excellent aforementioned Apples In Stereo (they share a guitarist). Take a listen and turn your heart of stone into a heart of music.

Who'd Stop The Rain
A summer classic if ever there's been one, and delightfully has nothing to do with Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Electrified
This contains one of those choruses you could listen to forever but it only flashes by briefly. Until it comes around for the 2nd time and welcomingly lingers.

Just Once More
If the smooth female vocals were removed and John Lydon snarled over the music, and then took it on a time machine back to 1977, the Pistols would have their best song. However complicated that may sound, I think it's achievable.

Side 2

Electrified Video

Their myspace

Turn It Up, Switch It On.

2006-04-28T12:15:00.000+01:00

SWITCHES

My first encounter with Switches was seeing their tourbus parked outside of their support show to the Spinto Band. Emblazoned on the back of the bus - in masking tape - was "myspace.com/weareswitches". That's innovative and cheeky enough to quirk the interest of any tailing vehicle, as it was for me. And then, inside, they played.

And whilst they are by no means a groundbreakingly original - or even different - band, their tunes found a way into my head and the 200 other early-heads.

Lay Down The Law opens with the almost cringe-inducingly bad lyrics of "we lay down the law, so what the hell are you here for?". But it's only 8 seconds and it serves to accentuate the song's good parts once they commence (on 9 seconds). The rest of the song is a blisteringly good stompalong which has no alternative but to be the now patented "this year's Take Me Out". Bouncy bass, crunching drums, a high guitar line and a snazzy breakdown only ever add up to perfect powerpop.

Message From Yuz couldn't stroke from the Vines any more (they even pinch the backing vocals from Outtathaway's middle 8), but if you're dying for a grunge riff painted over with Beach Boy harmonies, you're about to be revived.

The background Casio keyboard drums in Every Second Counts is enough to make anybody fall for them, but the forceful but simple chorus, 80's synth and cute handclaps (a regular feature) also grab the listener quite rudely.

Switches are only currently recording their debut EP in London. This fact that they haven't yet released anything must be the only reason they aren't residing on top of the NME chart. Seriously, it won't be long. They've got the melodies and the bite.

Testify
Blur rocking out with the Dandy Warhols.

Their myspace, featuring the 3 highlights mentioned above, available for free.

More Flaming Lips.

2006-04-23T21:00:00.000+01:00

A "making of" the amazing Yeah Yeah Yeah Song video has just surfaced on YouTube. It's in 3 parts, which can be found here, here and here. Cleverly, it's been produced in the form of a "making of a making of", poking fun at the many clichéd making ofs.

Also, if you're lucky enough to be seeing the band live this year, instead of 2 dozen animals onstage, there'll be an even split of "scientologist ninjas" on one side of the stage and Santa Clauses on the other.

Like this, from The Oh So Quiet Show:

I can't imagine how GREAT it'd be to be in costume up onstage with the Flips. Oh, yearn!

Adidas Jim.

2006-04-22T23:21:00.000+01:00

The Adidas summer World Cup advert featuring Jim Noir's Eanie Meanie is now viewable here. It's not a bad week for adverts - after Jack White's - especially for the people who discover music through adverts. They're in for an indie-ish summer. The widespread success of Jim Noir is something that would please me greatly.

If you want mp3s and more on Noir, check this review.

Verrett Good, Sir.

2006-04-20T17:29:00.000+01:00

JONAS MURDOCK AND THE CHILD INSIDE

Damien Verrett - or Jonas Murdock and The Child Inside as he is known as in North and South America to avoid legal wrangles - is a 14 year old boy from California. You'll never guess his age from listening to him though, as his music is a delicate blend of Animal Collective and Unicorns, with a vocal styling similar to Eliott Smith.

Lyrically, his songs are bizarre outings into the psychedelic world where babies are christened in apple sauce and he battles with severe phasmophobia.

If you're looking for insane ramblings soundtracked by the bleeps from Nintendo GameBoy soundtracks, Jonas Murdock is the band for you. With this amount of talent and potential, if he doesn't evolve into your favourite indie artist by the end of the decade, you're sure to hear him at the cinema soundtracking 2010's biggest indie movie.

Applesauce Baptism
This will swim in your head, swaying from one side to the other. Makes me think of Animal Collective at their best.

Butterfly Massacre
This is a perfect acoustic Unicorns' song in every way, from the lyrics ("Dragon flies can go to hell") to the twinned vocals (albeit the same voice) and beautiful guitar harmonies. Written from the persepective of a deranged butterfly fiend.

His myspace, with 2 other excellent tracks. Add him.

Further Evolution.

2006-04-20T12:50:00.000+01:00

THE VINES - VISION VALLEY

Apart from being the The Vines' third album, Vision Valley is the name of a recreation centre in the band's native land which "has grown into one of the most popular and best known retreat venues in Australia". The same could easily be said for the record itself. It must have provided Craig Nicholls with some solace in the form of a much-needed outlet for his tumultuous experiences in the past couple of years which have seen him appear in court for assault, be diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome and have childhood friend and band bassist Patrick leave the group.

Their sophomore release Winning Days received unwarranted scathing reviews from the press. Coincidentally, so did the 2nd LP from The Strokes, their fellow 2002 garage rock revivalists. In both cases, the backlash was undeserved and surely came as a result of modern day media's short attention span. Unphased by a few disappointed reviewers, Nicholls finished his loathed tours forever and returned home to compose an album which would get them back into the world's good book. And despite his biological disorder preventing the disc from being released in a flurry of lavish promotional stunts, strings of international dates or even interviews, the attention that Vision Valley has being receiving nonetheless is testament to the quality of the work he has produced.

As always, the vast majority of song titles could only appear on the back sleeve of a Vines' album, with 'Gross Out', 'Fuk Yeh', 'Futuretarded', 'Dope Train' and 'Atmos' being prime examples. And as with their previous releases, Nicholls proves to be living in an entirely different world. His lyrics regularly paint a picture of nature, the deterioration of the mind or simple curiosities that get his attention. But they're always detached, rarely referring to himself or real people and often not making any sense at all ("C'mon now let me feel the gross out ain't corrupting you"). But that's all part of their charm, especially due to the fact that his strangling Ozzie yelp often smudges the words into the music. It's probably no accident that the simplest and most understandable track on the record - Don't Listen To The Radio - was the first glimpse the world got of the new material. This is also the album's highlight, with cute handclaps and trodding bass leading into a giant catchy grunge chorus.

Elsewhere, the album is stylistically closer to Winning Days than the world-beating debut Highly Evolved. There are large chunks of sparkling melancholy like the title track and epic closer Spaceship. Country-tinged Take Me Back is a slice of summer beauty which could easily rule the airwaves whilst the sun shines. Another highlight is the aforementioned Gross Out, a 75-second long bloodcurdling scream, which is best described by drummer Hamish Rosser - "It assaults you. It leaps out of the speakers at 100 miles per hour." It leaves the listener shellshocked, but they'll find it smashing up things in their head later on in the day.

Some have viewed Vision Valley as a stopgap in the Vines' careers, a quick shout-out to rid of the rumours of their break-up. If that is the case, this album is perfect. And if it isn't, we can't help but feel that the Vines are only just getting started and their masterpiece is yet to come. In the sleeve notes, Craig is pictured reading a book entitled 'How To Be An Artist'. We should hope he picks up a few additional tips, because he's the kind of character who needs to be remembered.

Going Gone
Exclusive acoustic video.

Gross Out
The video for the new single.

Don't Listen To The Radio
Video.

Podcast
A track-by-track video podcast.

Jacko Juice.

2006-04-18T16:05:00.000+01:00

Watch the new coke advert featuring Jack White's specially-written song. I'm not sure if little boys should be encouraged to share their drinks with dirty homeless men. And I'm not sure about the song..it sounds like a mish-mash of about 3 different White Stripes' songs. If he was hoping to write an "I'd like to buy the world a coke", he's fallen short a bit.

The director also directed this video, and borrowed the concept for the coke ad.

Turn It Down!

2006-04-15T00:28:00.000+01:00

SHOUT OUT LOUDS LIVE IN WHELANS - 13.04.06

I sacrificed seeing Baby Shambles for the 3rd time to see the Shout Out Louds instead. It wasn't a massive sacrifice by any standards, but being approached by Dublin's infamous one-legged tout - offering to buy my non-existent ticket from me for €80 - gave me food for thought:

Me: Do you know if the gig is even on?
Him: Huh?
Me: I mean, last I heard was at about 5 o' clock...he was in bed in Paris.
Him: Ah, who does he think he is?
Me: Dunno.
Him: What exactly has he done? Nothing.

This coming from the thief who makes hundreds of euro at every major concert in the city from decent music fans, in comparison to a musician who made the best punk album of all time and almost a dozen fantastic free acoustic albums.

Shout Out Louds in Whelans is the debut show of 2006's Bud Rising festival, so the venue is packed out with industry folk and alcohol promoters. Otherwise, I'm sure their Irish premiere wouldn't be sold out with masses being turned away at the door. I counted myself as part of that mass, and it was down to the kindness of the lovely bassist (he's obliged to be nice: his name is Ted) to let me in.

Opening with the chugging guitars and keys of The Comeback, they perfectly showcase their lovelorn, outsider lyrics juxtaposed with beautiful and well-crafted melodies. The crowd is entranced from the opening beeps of their set which signal "go!", and they often let loose to sneak in a sly jump or sing the keyboard melody that isn't being played live for some reason. Although their set is relatively short (it seemed to be shorter than the support band's), they managed to spin out all of their perfect singles with the only irritating ommission being the obscurely popular Wish I Was Dead.

Standing at the frontline of Sweden's amazingly good music scene, it can only be a matter of time before their deal with Capitol takes them to the very top (presumably with their long-awaited 2nd album, in early 2007). They give us a quick sneak preview of their new material and it sounds like world-conquering stuff. Largely incomparable (however; think of a poppier Pavement), I recommend you buy their LP Howl Howl Gaff Gaff right away.

(Perhaps you could sign up to an entirely free trial at eMusic, where you'll receive 50 free mp3s of your own choosing. 10 of your choices should definitely be HHGG.)

Videos
A vast array of their excellent videos, during all of which they seem to be playing bored. They aren't though! Who could be, with that type of music emanating from within them?

Their myspace

Wolves On Parade

2006-04-14T21:52:00.000+01:00

The new Wolf Parade video for Modern World is really brilliant and entirely deserved of its own post.

Bud Rising Preview.

2006-04-11T14:01:00.002+01:00

Bud Rising festival is happening all over Dublin this weekend, from Thursday until Monday with a religious gap on Friday. They've bagged at least one band well worth seeing per day, so instead of reviewing the bands afterwards (resulting in you missing out!) I'll stick up 2 of each bands best mp3s now so you know who to go see.

Shout Out Louds.
Whelans, Thursday April 13.

The Comeback
Wish I Was Dead

The Young Knives, White Rose Movement and The Immediate.
Whelans, Saturday April 15.

Young Knives - Weekends & Bleak Days
The Immediate - A Ghost In This House

The Spinto Band and Director.
Whelans, Sunday April 16.

Brown Boxes
Oh Mandy
Director's myspace

We Are Scientists.
The Village, Monday April 17.

Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt
The Great Escape

Giant Drag.
Crawdaddy, Monday April 17. MIDNIGHT!

Kevin Is Gay
My Dick Sux

If it comes down to choosing between a few, GO TO THE SPINTO BAND!

Also, it appears that if you go to the Village before your concert on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, there's gonna be free food and some "special guests" playing acoustically.

Boredom Leads To Lists.

2006-04-10T22:21:00.000+01:00

AND LISTS LEAD TO GREAT ALBUMS

So, pointlessly, here's my top 10 albums of the year so far, along with "key track" mp3s.

1. Hemstad - Hemstad
Patrik Sjoberg

2. Love Is All - Nine Times The Same Song
Make Out Fall Out Make Up

3. Islands - Return To The Sea
Rough Gem

4. Suburban Kids With Biblical Names
Funeral Face

5. Flaming Lips - At War With The Mystics
Yeah Yeah Yeah Song

6. Danielson - Ships
Did I Step On Your Trumpet

7. Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
Mardy Bum

8. Destroyer - Destroyer's Rubies
Watercolours Into The Ocean

9. Secret Machines - 10 Silver Drops
Alone, Jealous And Stoned

10. The Vines - Vision Valley
Don't Listen To The Radio

Those 10 mp3s would make up the best compilation album 2006 has ever seen, at least for the months of January through 'til May.

And I know the Suburban Kids' record was 2005, but allow me some air!

Scandinavia Rox.

2006-04-07T16:46:00.000+01:00

HEMSTAD

What's going on in Sweden? They're spitting out fully-formed bands with amazing albums like they're going out of fashion. But there's absolutely no way they're going out of fashion. So what the hell are they playing at?

Hemstad are an instrumental band. But hold on! They really aren't just any old instrumental band. And with them being of different tongues to us English-speakers, it works out nicely. They aren't singing in a different language and they aren't working around it by singing naive lyrics with the few words they have. Instead, we get the occassional "ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, bam" and ..eh.. "bom bom bom bom bom". It's like the Polyphonic Spree orchestra heaped up on acid, covering Nintendo soundtracks. Entirely upbeat and lacking a bad song, their self-titled debut is guaranteed to make you grin, marvel and move.

They're crazy, they're genius, they're incredible.

Kaserntorgets Charkdisco
The album opener and a massive celebratory anthem. Hammond organs and theremins, trumpets and crashing drums building up into a commmunal chant. If they play the festival circuit, this will be the summer's Wake Up singalong moment (probably just to me, though).

Patrik Sjoberg
Surf guitar and a Caribbean beat, this is your beach holiday soundtrack. There's a couple of short breakdowns like the sad violins and the (genius) bicycle bells playing along with the bongos, which means that when it hits you again, it's full force. They keep things fresh by introducing an accordian later on. Amazing.

Fyllekarring
Heavy bass and more Joey Santiago guitar. This song's biggest "wow" moment is the theremin in harmony with the guitar.

Buy the debut record for only $6. Limited edition of 500. We seem to have just missed out on getting one that comes with a free hand-painted CD-R.

Official website

Their myspace