The Good Brothers View Queen's Bad Blood (anag.)
You can tell the year is starting to develop in exciting ways when the first crop of new albums arrives. It doesn't tend to happen in the first week of January, mainly because the albums that come out around then tend to be the ones that possibly wouldn't cause too much of a splash at any other time of year. So, three weeks into THE '07, here's three exciting new releases which will be out on Monday 22nd.
THE ONE YOUR ROCKSNOB MATES WILL BUY
The View - 'Hats Off To The Buskers'
Don't ask, I'm not going to say it. I've read four bazillion reviews of the View (which will undoubtedly all have been sent to magazine editors in emails with the subject heading 'RE: View Review'), and every single one of them has quoted THAT chant which View fans do at gigs. I'm not gonna do it cos a) that thing I said just now about the other reviews and b) it's a lie. The band aren't literally on fire, no matter how much you indie-haters may wish it otherwise, and they're not really metaphorically on fire either. They're a bunch of likeable scruffs with the right attitude, churning out junior Libertines songs and having the time of their lives. Doesn't make them special or (the dreaded word) 'important', but they're good fun to have around.
But I guess chanting "The View, the View, the View are quite good" wouldn't be as exciting.
GIVE ME AN EXAMPLE
BUY, BORROW OR BREAK?
Borrow. All your indie-mad mates will have it.
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THE ONE YOUR PARENTS WILL HATE
Blood Brothers - 'Young Machetes'
Some songs have what is called a 'hook'. That's the musical moment in any song which lodges in your brain (like a hook, see? Clever.) and comes back to you time and again, when you're least expecting it. Sometimes these hooks are very sophisticated, like a silver hook designed to capture a lightning mind. Sometimes they are very big and broad and obvious, like the kind of hook you would use to fish a T-shirt out of a swimming pool. Being shouty rock types with a love of excitable pop, Blood Brothers pack their songs with great big rusty, blood-soaked scary hooks, like you'd find in an abattoir. Most of them are either screamed or yelled, and once they're lodged in your brain, you'll probably die. Oddly, this isn't a bad thing AT ALL...
GIVE ME AN EXAMPLE
Here's 'Set Fire To The Face On Fire'...grrr!
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BUY, BORROW OR BREAK
Buy, then break everything you own.
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THE ONE WHICH WILL PUT THE WILLIES UP YOU
The Good, The Bad & The Queen
Before we get into the album, can I quickly say that the expression 'put the willies up you' simply means 'give you a fright'. There's no hidden filth here, and besides, most of this band are clearly too old to put their...er....well...let's leave it there, shall we?
You'll already know this is Damon Albarn's latest venture, and that he's got the bass player from the Clash working alongside. What you might not know is that this is an album filled with all manner of unsettling beauty. It's like Damo has taken the hidden darkness of the Gorillaz, and removed any trace of sweet cartoony pop, then added a series of spooked lyrics about London's imminent doom and an echoey chapelful of eerie atmospherics. It's exactly the kind of album Blur and Gorillaz would have made, if they were actually ghosts from Victorian times, only with that bloke out of the Clash on bass.
GIVE ME AN EXAMPLE
OK, here's 'Kingdom Of Doom'
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BUY, BORROW OR BREAK?
Buy. It'll take a little while to sink in, see....
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