It’s Been a Long Time

So, looks like I’ve definately neglected this blog but I’m going to try and get it regularly updated now…even though I’ve said it before -_-

So yeh, the first and only update for tonight is the recent Peter Kay/Liam Gallagher shenanigans that have happened at the Brits. Don’t we all love Twitter arguments.

So for all those who don’t know what’s happened. Basically Mr Gallagher accepted his award for the Best Album of the Last 30 Years at the Brit Awards last night (personally I think Travis should have won that) and then proceeded to throw the microphone and award at the crowd. After leaving the stage, Peter Kay, this years host said down the microphone, ‘What a knobhead,’ triggering a twitter argument between the two.

It’s been a long time since Liam had an argument as publicised as this.

Yes, some may find that Liam’s antics were abit out of hand or that Peter Kay shouldn’t have said that from the perspective of hardcore Oasis fans.

I for one, am neutral on this one. I mean, it’s part of the rock n roll tradition to cause some sort of controvercy. Some might disagree with me but who doesn’t love a good old celebrity style argument. I certainly do.

Anyway, post is a bit brief tonight but the next ones should be more detailed.

Till then xx

Christmas: Worth Listening To?

Okay, so unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last couple of weeks, we all know that Rage is the Christmas number one but it’s hardly Christmassy right? Likewise with second place Joe Mcelderly. Even if we go further down the charts, Lady Gaga certainly is a Christmas song…

So, are there any Christmas songs that were created in the last decade or so that are worth listening to?

Let’s look at this years contenders.

Everyone likes a traditional song they’ve heard before right? Let’s rape it with a crappy club bass.

Seriously???

Okay Jules, reasonable effort but it’s not really going to be memorable is it?

A good one this year however is this…

It’s nice to hear a Christmas song with a bit of flavour.

So what is the greatest Christmas song ever?

This?

or?

maybe this

These are all fantastic Christmas songs but these are all from decades ago. This shows even more that a huge memorable Christmas song hasn’t been made for a while.

I know I’m sounding a bit like Scrooge here but I’m not trying to. I love Christmas. What I’m saying is that there are some good ones recently but as memorable as these? If we do get a big memorable one, it should be epic.

My personal favourite this year though is…

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Oh Peter, Peter, Peter.

It’s happened again, Pete Doherty has been arrested for yet another drug related crime. For those not in the know, this offence follows from his previous driving ban. Upon leaving the court and going through security, a clear small bag fell out of Pete’s pocket which contained what looked like blue crystals which then prompted the police to arrest Doherty. So that’s basically the supposed story in a nutshell.

So what of this “bad boy” rock n roll image that Pete constantly gets associated with. Well for one, it’s getting tiring. Don’t get me wrong, I love the music Pete makes including when his time in the Libertines, the music he makes now with Babyshambles and his solo stuff but as a fan and you may also agree, it’s getting tiring.

For one, it’s damaging to the fans. Due to some of Pete’s previous prison and court visits, some of his shows have been cancelled dissapointing fans. Fans who have paid good money in order to see something they are genuinly excited for. I’ve never experienced it myself but it must piss them off pretty badly. Dissapointment isn’t even the only result, some people have even stopped being fans because of the missed shows. I know he may not do it on purpose but think about it Pete? You’ve said you’d stop several years ago but obviously you haven’t. What’s better, drugs or your fans?

I for one also find the labels placed upon him an annoyance. Some people I’ve talked to just see him as the way the media labels him. They instantly block themselves from listening to the music of a “drugged up smackhead” and label the music “shit” without a listen. Take a look at the below video for Can’t Stand Me Now. Is this shit? This may come as a biased opinion as with the other parts of the article but how many bands do you know can channel such emotion into a song like this?

I for one, hope that Pete gets his act together, not only for himself but for his fans and finally get rid of the label that he is a “drugged up smackhead.”

Are They Really Raging Against The Machine?

So the Christmas Number One has finally been announced. I didn’t even need to turn on a TV, Radio or look at any music sites to find out who won. The legions of Facebook and Twitter updates did this for me. I for one, am happy that it is Rage Against the Machine and not the generic musical template producing machine that is Simon Cowell and his Shit Factor.

I’ll be honest though, I didn’t really contribute to anything of Rage Against the Machines victory. Why? Because I didn’t really see any point in it. I mean don’t get me wrong, As i mentioned earlier, lots of kudos to the band for winning but I get a feeling that alot of the people that voted weren’t really Rage fans at all. These could have just been people who had caught on to the Facebook group and became part of the tidal wave of votes just to join in. Look at the age of the song. The song is almost 18 years old. I feel as if the attention its getting is not the right one compared to the attention it got all those years back. I’m all for Rage against the Machine and they’ve done some absolute cracking stuff. It’s great that the band got lots of attention for the song but I feel it should have been better if it was for more of the right reasons and not part of some random stunt. However though, all criticism aside, I am rather looking forward to details of the free show they’re planning.

PS: Bit late but I’ve decided to give links to each of my latest reviews at the end of each post. Here’s the latest.

http://www.audioscribbler.co.uk/reviews/16699

Top Five Bands: 2009

You’ve probably seen constant “best of” lists for 2009 flooding many music websites like a huge wave. I’m not going to lie to you, this is another one of those lists. Nothing particularly special but the simple things are sometimes the best things in life. Here it is, my favourite bands of 2009.

One: Grammatics

Leeds based Grammatics are one hell of a band. Scoring a perfect ten out of ten on www.audioscribbler.co.uk, one of the music sites I write for, the band are carving a name for themselves in the music industry. Often sounding beautiful yet powerful at the same time, the band create a dark sound that is just phenomenal. The string section adds a pleasant element to the band while the lead vocals are heart stopping.

Two: Passion Pit

Fans of New Order will love these guys. The band pave out pleasant and ear pleasing electronic pop while giving out the odd twist with songs such as the frankly deep “The Reeling.” I have reviewed both their EP and debut album and they both sound fantastic. The band are down to earth and provide warmth to their songs. The band prove that there is more than one dimension to them with songs ranging from the happy to the dark and frantic.

Three: Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong

Where the fuck is your debut album Joe Lean? We certainly cannot wait to hear it. Joe Lean and the JJJ provide simple indie rock. The band’s songs have a certain passionate romantic edge to them filled with beautiful melodies and mellow chord progressions. Definately a band to jump up and dance to on the indie dancefloors.

Four: The XX

Close your eyes and imagine yourself drifting off into a different world. This is what the XX will do to you. Often containing mid paced, reverbarent melodic hooks backed by heart like drum beats, the band are definately a pleasure to listen to often filling our ears with beauty and soul.

 Five: Little Boots

Apart from being amazingly hot, Little Boots doesn’t half create a good tune. Electro synth pop has never sounded so good. Listening to her, my body can’t help but do some sort of movement. Each song is amazingly catchy, the instruments are strong and powerful and there’s an element of sexiness to them. What every good pop song should be.

New Music: Modern Cliches

Another day, another batch of new CD’s waiting to be reviewed by me. In today’s pack I got Weezer’s latest album and the NME Album of 2009. With these CD’s however were a relatively new band. The band was Modern Cliches and they’re 2 track single.

If you love indie pop, you’ll love these guys. Modern Cliches provide raw and catchy songs which sound alot like the Cribs. The singer sounds very quite like actor turned musician Joe Lean of the Jing Jang Jong fame. The band show that simple songwriting can still finish off with a fantastic product.

Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/moderncliches

BBC Sound of 2010

The list is finally out for the entries that could be making it into the shortlist! Last year we had the likes of Little Boots and La Roux who have made quite an impression on the music scene over the last year. The longlist entries are no doubt fantastic acts who are most likely to stamp an imprint on 2010′s music scene.

The variety is fantastic. There’s your guitar rock in the form of the Drums to your more electronic alternative in the form of Delphic to the beautiful music of Marina and the Diamonds. Safe to say then that the list is a good one.

My favourites for this year include Delphic,  Everything Everythijng and Marina and the Diamonds. This blogger is hoping that one of these will become the winners.

The list is:

Daisy Dares You

Delphic

Devlin

The Drums

Everything Everything

Giggs

Gold Panda

Ellie Goulding

Hurts

Joy Orbison

Marina and the Diamonds

Owl City

Rox

Stornoway

Two Door Cinema Club

Fred Durst: The Biggest Douche in Music?

I was going through my Twitter today and came upon this tweet from Durst;

freddurst

I wonder how many “cool” people will be pleasantly displeased by the new Limp Bizkit album. Hopefully, most of them. It’s cool to be a hater

 

So it appears that Durst is now launching an attack on people who actually like decent music. To be honest, in this bloggers opinion, Durst cannot make good music. Even at his height of fame during the now defunct nu metal scene, Durst’s biggest audience was a bunch of teenagers all wearing NY caps. In all fairness, all these “cool” people hate Dursts music because they’d rather to listen to something else rather than the product of this mans back door. I mean where has he been for the past few years? Dissapeared off the music scene. Lets hope its the face of the world the next time.

Potential Glastonbury Headliners

A few days a go U2 were announced as the headliners of Friday’s Glastonbury. Now Muse are a potential rumour. In my opinion, Muse would make a good headliner for the weekend but it’s not official yet. Seeing as many other sites are doing this, yours truly is going to have a guess at potential headliners for Glastonbury and here they are.

The Rolling Stones

The band are one of the biggest bands in the world, even bigger than U2 most obviously and it wouldn’t be suprising if they didn’t. I mean the Stones have still been gigging throughout their old age selling out many shows. The band obviously have plenty of experience aswell.

The Remaining Beatles

Another big guess. Could be another potential headliner because think about it, who is bigger than the Beatles?

Foo Fighters

Most festivals have at least one American band in the headline slot and the Foo Fighters could be a possibity. The band is still together and they’ve produced album after album of good material.

So these are my guesses at who could potentially headline the remaining two nights. We’ll have to wait a bit longer to find out…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

U2: The Perfect Glastonbury Headliner

So the first Glastonbury headliner has been announced and it is none other than the Irish foursome, U2.  Glastonbury has been known for booking class headliners such as Radiohead and the Verve. U2 are no different.

Even though the band’s latest album has been a bit of a dissapointment, the band still have such a class catalogue from albums such as the Joshua Tree or the Unforgettable Fire. Combine this with the bands epic sound that is suited for a big stage and their decades of experience and you’ve got one hell of a headline set. The only worry is that Bono will introduce Geldof and start Live 8 again rather than do the headline set.