demons

i love mew but i was expecting more. the record tails of into prog/80's keyboards hell after a while. first few songs are decent but hmmm....

lets just admit its rubbish shall we? all i heard was leaden production, samey songs and no tunes whatsoever. a record made solely so they can break america.

....almost all of his records sound like to me save the really stripped down ones. watch the love from the sunday papers though

were exceptional and i won't listen to anyone who says otherwise. is there a smugger band than The Chap (thats not called Hot Chip)?

when (b)ryan adams played a well known uk festival a few years ago - he demanded his own personal toilet and then said he wouldn't play unless the promoters found another band he could play impromtu drums with. after going through the bill with everyone turning him down they finally some poor sap who agreed. unfortunately i witnessed the resulting performance which lets just say was not good at all - acoustic singer songwiter strumming joined by someone throwing some bins down the stairs. but hey at least later on we got to see him and his bob seeger isms in all his glory

........wyatts the only one i could give a toss about

i was probably wrong in my initial post. it has certainly grown on me and i'd now put it in the 'quite good' bracket

....as niche as unloved as clinic because lets face it in the great scheme of things both bands aren't very good.

yes they are original but by gum is this poorly executed. original doesn't always equal good. admittedly theres some good tunes lurking in there but their sound is so damn annoying - the minute he opens his mouth is when the problems start. they seem to be marketed now as some kind of wacky eccentrics (a la british sea power) -it all seems rather contrived to me. they don't seem to realise that using that hideous squawk on song after song makes the whole thing totally unlistenable and headache endusing.....and i'd have loved to have been present in the meeting where it was decided that 'assembly' was left off as its the best thing they've done by a country mile. oh and don't get me started on the lyrics 'take these chips with cheese' is not a good lyric..

i have to admit i did like bits of that EP but this album is massively overrated - its boaring...sorry boring and extremely safe - like 2008s answer to the magic numbers...in fact i can't believe the album i heard is the same one that is getting reviewed- maybe it isn't. buy the sun kil moon record instead

one of the best albums of the year and a real return to their earlier (and best imho) stuff. national shite day is just stunning (and hilarious).

i wasn't there but i heard about this. my brother got so pissed off with adem bloody droning on all night around the campsites that he was found queuing for the bus the next day to go home. the spirit of folk music is to have a sense of community and let everyone have a go and join in and not to be insular and certainly not shushing if other people dare to have a go.

hebden on the other hand i admit has done some good stuff in the past but that collaboration with steve reid is simply dreadful and he did indeed ruin yorkstons second album with the flat production. notably yorkstons last lp without hebden was much more like it.

....and i was only talking about adem not hebden who i think is talented but way over rated....they may be ridiculous opinions but they are certainly not ill informed. i've seen adem live on several occasions and heard all his records - i think he's smug and his music is very very average and bland. he's just a typical london careerist who has had it all on a plate. theres no soul to anything he does. its all about jumping on bandwagons and schmoozing with people who can give him a leg up in his career. that might be fine for some people and of course it is but to me the music that comes out is very safe, non threatening and not at all interesting.therefore i liken him nearer to singer songwriters such as david gray than to the more interesting, original musicians to which he is often aligned.

what a nightmare this sounds....he's about half a step away from being david gray. don't worry rosbeef i too irrationally hate him with a passion that borders on insanity. probably because he's everything i hate about that breed of middle class london aren't-i-great-and-look-at-my-exquisite-taste smug rich kids. notably he doesn't cover anything by a band no-one has heard of.

...trying too hard to be liked. i like it less and less on each spin which is the entire opposite to every other why record so far. i'd give it a 6 as its still better than a lot of records about at the moment

...the day disco inferno split up. what post rock became wasn't what reynolds originally envisioned when the term was coined. bands like moonshake, insides and DI were re-inventing the wheel, using samples where guitars once were, introducing beats into pop music, mixing can with electronica. what post rock later became was 657 varieties of slint which has become more and more watered down over the years so that a lot of it is now appears to be just bland muzak.

heard their single on the radio the other day and it was extremely mediocre. i quite liked some of their earlier stuff but the newer things have been bland bland bland. why must bands go in this direction? - why can't they go wierder???......so therefore unless its an album full of stonking tunes its always going to be a 6 out of 10. one simple thing they need to do if they don't like it. work outside the music industry machine - do the music you want to hear rather than what you think the music press is going to like. don't play nme shows. thats where all these bands fall down time after time.

that this was all spin but its been mentioned in every review and got them valuable column inches so i guess its done its job. its the way the cynical (desperate?) industry works.

what is so good about this? i've tried and tried but i still hate it. to me it sounds like white boys trying to do r & b without any soul or the necessary production skills topped by a vocal that would have been rejected by sarah records for being too fey.

....and some bad bits. starts pretty well but then gets a bit samey. i like the production but the songs don't match up. he's never been very consistent. am i the only person in the world to think that 69 love songs is his worst ever effort?

....icicle works. another bland stadium filler. bigger is not necessarily better.....but sells more records

overblown stadium rock.....get your lighters out

So Scott says: -"Playing night after night, senseless shows in the US in the middle ofBumfuck Nowhere with five people in the audience… to sell three more records? What’s the point? Get in your car, drive to the next biggest city. I only asked to play five shows this time in the US. I’ve ended up with 30. "

well theres one little word in the dictionary, scotty boy - NO. you can't have it both ways - sell shit loads of records without getting off your arse. thank god i live in a city that has a load of people living in it or else he'd be turning his nose up at gracing us with his presence. then again i don't think i can be bothered going either as his new record continues the "heres a few good tracks and a load of pathetic filler" that has marred every single thing he's done since "one word extinguisher".

........south

heard the single the other night - terrible simply terrible.....

is to go to a gig where i knew what the setlist is. i go to gigs for the unexpected - to hear new songs, to hear old nuggets appear out of nowhere. to hear songs performed badly or in the wrong order -to hear songs you maybe didn't like performed brilliantly or changed around in structure. its like going to a football match where you already know the result. its also an admission of failure by the band that their best work is behind them.

the day a band like the fall does a don't look back is a day i eat these words.

saw them at bingley festival - they reminded me of frankie goes to hollywood with the two male singers and the hints of homoeroticism

plan B - my thoughts exactly

its ok.....i find them very irritating at times. the a side is catchy at first but once you've played it a few times it loses its magic - its all surface & no depth. it brings to mind they might be giants more than pavement. the b side is horrible and completely unlistenable

yep its true i really like this song a lot - its very nice.

i heard a story recently that doherty was recording new stuff with a fairly well known producer. nothing was happening so the producer strode over and put a guitar around doherty's neck and said play. by the time he'd got back to the desk to set it to record doherty was still stood there but he was asleep.

i love mice parade but was very disappointed by this. its kind of all too twee and the lyrics are terrible. i'm not sure how the noisy distorted drums fit in with they fey almost indie-pop sound of the music. pierce is one talented drummer and musician but his voice is wearing and samey after a couple of tracks. it seems to me mice parade are trying to go for the obvious pop hooks but have left the experimentalism and mystery out of their music this time......and if i have to hear her from mum sing on anything ever again my ears are going to beat me to death - they just can't take that frequency.

wave them around like you just don't care. say uuurggg. say aaaaaarggghhh. are you enjoying yourselves glastonbury? i said are you enjoying yourselves glastonbury? i can't hear you. i still can't hear you. louder. say yeah. say no. say three bags full. er....wave your hands around again glastonbury.say yeah. get your lighters out. put them away again.

....on the road hopefully. did anyone see that picture of her where she looks like lily allen with a different head? you can just hear the producer going 'more cockerney please!'

it sounds to me like 3 wealthy men faffing about. theres no attempts to push any boundaries anywhere - its just the kind of reasonable instrumental rock that was two ha'penny in 2001

god they were awful on the telly at glastonbury though - i had to turn off out of sheer embarrasment when they attempted that shirley bassey song. also: too many guitar solo's - stop with the guitar solos.

i thought they were good on later with jools but the guy can't sing at all. so i listened to this thinking i might be wrong about them after all but the good bits from the live performance weren't there and i felt that the whole thing was rather bland and insipid and that the song didn't really progress the way it did live. new order 'ceremony/in a lonely place' was one of the great singles of all time but sadly this isn't. its embarrassingly derivative and has none of the mystery and dynamism of new order. i absolutely agree with the review that the song doesn't sound finished.

i find myself changing my mind on a regular basis about this. I can understand the artists right to make money off their music and lets face it no-one buys many albums these days but i do find it a bit cynical that people such as those old hippies banhart and bunyan can allow their music to be used to sell mobile phones. i can't really treat either artist seriously anymore. the thought of selling phones is just so alien to how they like to portray themselves. i was upset for many years about the shins macdonalds/gap flirtations. i don't really know how anyone could align themselves with such irresponsible companies. it did make me think i'll just download or copy their music as they obviously now don't need the money.

as someone who has released the odd bit of music in the past, if i were ever to be asked (which lets face it it aint gonna happen), i could probably bring myself to license stuff to tv docs or ads by ethical companies.if i were a huge artist like the white stripes theres would be so many other ways to make money. tom waits & bruce springsteen seem to do ok for themselves & correct me if i'm wrong but both have said they would never license their music to ads.

its starting to grow on me but i still find atlas a complely redundant novelty-for the use of mobile ringtones only. some of the other tracks are great but i can't get away from the feeling that its just one step away from Yes style progressive noodle rock nonsense.

...but i still felt wierd listening to it in that certain songs particularly on the first cd are obviously outtakes some songs that didn't quite work - the odd dodgy lyric or forgettable melody. i'm not altogether 100% comfortable with music being released after someone has died that for good reason they wanted keeping to themselves

had the misfortune of seeing this 'un in leeds the other night. i wish i'd stayed at home and slashed my wrists instead. i've never seen anyone make so many people so unhappy so quickly. the night was ruined - absolutely ruined. After the caterwauling was over the DJ tried deperately to cheer everyone up by playing 'maneater' and 'one thing' in quick succession....but it was too late....i was already weeping into my beer.

this is simply horrid and i am dumbfounded that people are impressed. musically its mid '80's plodding lite funk (the kind orange juice did when they were going down the drain), vocally a hideous gravelly squawk. like a plumbers mate trying to do an impression of russel mael after seeing sparks on top of the pops in 1976. if these become popular theres nothing else for it - i'm chopping off my ears.

can't wait

nice to see him advertising mobile phones recently...these hippies eh?

but now i hate it. it gets worse on every play. the only redeemable thing are the lyrics which of course ronson had nowt to do with.

great to get breaking news that spandau ballet aren't reforming.

was brill...will reserve judgement til i've heard this though.

was brill...will reserve judgement til i've heard this though.

....sounding like the cure

.....crazy frog