In the spring of this year it was beginning to look for all intents and purposes like the sun was setting on the autumn of Belle & Sebastian’s necessity. For that was when The Hidden Cameras ceremonially crossed the Atlantic in Y-fronts and balaclavas to snatch the Glaswegian’s presumably safe twee-indie crown with a determined and effortless superiority. And it wasn’t only that their songs gushed out with an inherently religious twinkle, but also that there just seemed to be Continue Reading

At the beginning of last year these four civil white t-shirted kids came to our attention, spilling out of their native Bolton and into the provinces with a self-financed mini album called ‘Worship Yourself’, using the visceral power of The Pixies as kindling and the acidic lyrical nous of early vital Manics as their fuel. Then they struck a match. They were young, naïve and a little timid, but dissatisfied, determined and beyond their years in influence, intellect and political Continue Reading

‘Charmed’ enters the same fray as those feisty, cutesy, supernatural dramas like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. Currently airing on cable and terrestrial here in the UK and the WB Network in the US, ‘Charmed’ follows the conflicts of life and love amoug the three unique and clashing Halliwell sisters. Sounds simple. Well not quite. Petty sibling differences have to be overcome in order to fulfil an ancient witchcraft prophecy. Well don’t they always? Starring Alyssa Milano, Rose McGowan Continue Reading

Vitality is one thing. Shouty, pedestrian punkiness is enough. There’s nothing substantially wrong with the Toronto-based Billy Talent debut release, but with the exception of the blistering and the grungey single, ‘Try Honesty’ there’s nothing substantially remarkable either. Perhaps more emotional, edgy and less bubblegum than their animated peers, Sum 41, this is still the kind of breezy, featherlite punk the US has been peddling now for years. However much the anarchy is provided by proxy; Johhny Lydon vocals, serial killer Continue Reading

There’s nothing to get excited about on the surface. Go on, scratch it. Maudlin acoustic tap-alongs, 4/4 beats, tales of rotten loves and life straying off the tracks. It’s the ingredients of a scene that for its chosen moments a few years ago nobody broke a heartstring forgetting about in a hurry. But just listen. That colloquially mesmeric, warm, leathery, North-Western English vocal twang. It’s like John Lennon clambered to his feet and staggered off into the New York night Continue Reading

This album drops a matter of weeks before the return of the band that everyone seems to presume are New York City, like, umm period. But while That Other Band rely on the association like an umbilical cord to feed their legend, define their cool, give contextual meaning to the way they walk, blah blah etc, Stellastarr* don’t even seem to have considered the exploitable potential of their immediate geography. Fools, obviously. They might as well hail from New Earswick Continue Reading

In the deliriously vibrant and glittery environment of the actual music, the kitsch and domestic understatement of the album cover and artwork for ‘The Little Ginger Club Kid’ makes for something of an interesting and rebellious choice. Whereas Basement Jaxx comply the full nine-yards with album titles as club friendly as ‘Rooty’ and ‘Remedy’ and artwork as style-conscious to boot, Tim Deluxe roots his debut offering firmly in the ordinary and familiar. The pictures accompanying the release depict an ordinary Continue Reading

Anyone could have made the same mistake. For the first thirty minutes of this album I genuinely thought that the Lyte Funky Ones had finally surmounted their less than unique brand of boy band funky hip hop with something rather exceptional. Then I realized I had the wrong band. This wasn’t the Lyte Funky Ones, this was Warp Records’ LFO: Lo Frequency Modulation, if you please – the boys who virtually reinvented techno in the early nineties with the sound Continue Reading

Last years’ double dose of Black was in comparison to this a rather sprawling and patchy affair. Gone are the dust balls, mothballs and mutant side-show freaks of ‘Black Letter Days’ and the blurry, agitated glam of ‘Devils Workshop’ and in their place a bakers dozen or so tracks of effortlessly consistent – if sardonic –alt-country rock. It wasn’t that the last two were in any way sub-standard, it’s just that they were a little less economical. Not so much Continue Reading

The thing about cults, you see, is that there’s almost certainly something alarm-ringingly wrong-in-the-head about them. Otherwise the natural human sheep-herding instinct would have kicked in wouldn’t it, and when there’s no more room in the paddock, it’d have to move to larger premises and probably end up building a ticket office and merchandising stand into the entrance hall. Then it loses its privileges and can be a cult no longer. Meaning a cult can only actually be a cult Continue Reading