28 June 2005
There will be much, much more on this front but from a pure visceral piece of musical fun there was really only one place to be in Glastonbury. That was the Roots stage in the Dance Village which unfortuantely also seemed to only ever have about thirty punters in it. Nae matter. The festival finished with Seeed: and their Glastonbury Dancehall Dancing competition which was tremendous fun (and Seeed’s German dancehall was pretty top too). They also get bonus points for asking “Glastonbury: Are You (Still) Alive!”
However same stage, two nights before, while 808 State were playing their own records at themselves I stumbled across Swami. who used to be DJ Swami but is now a six piece bhangra rock rap act who for sheer energy wiped the floor with anything on the John Peel Stage (and could probably teach the Go! Team a little bit about being a live act). More information on Swami here. Don’t mind the moody photo, they were lovely boys on stage.
Pete Baran in Blog 7 / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
21 February 2005
Clear your sidebars. Via Troubled Diva (whose decades countdown is still going on and still well worth voting in), comes details of a blog by none other than THE REAL McCOY as in MC Sar and the Real McCoy, as in “Another Night”, as in mid 90s Eurodance legend. Well, sort of a legend.
Tom in FT / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
14 January 2005
BUSTED TRIBUTE #2
How to judge how much a band affects ones life? How about the medium of karaoke?
I like karaoke. I rather like flicking through the big book and picking whatever takes my fancy at that moment. I do not have standards that I always do, not any more. Where is the fun in that.
EVERY KARAOKE NIGHT I HAVE BEEN TO SINCE SUMMER 2002 I HAVE SUNG A BUSTED SONG*
What I Go To School For is tremendous fun to sing. It is tremendous fun just to read, but straining for the notes and the three-in-one harmonies can easily be sung by one person. Year 3000 is even sillier (and has my name in it). You Said No allows a decent shouty rant bit as well. And of course the most karaoke friendly dance move is the Busted jump, you are literally staying on the spot.
I have never sung Thunderbirds Are Go! I need a karaoke night now to commiserate.
Buh-bye Busted!
*Except for the one in New York, and now that there Americee will never have the chance to fall for the ‘Sted.
Pete Baran in FT / New York London Paris Munich • 1 Comment
BUSTED TRIBUTE #1
I BLAME BIFFY CLYRO!!
Ah Busted. I saw you at Wembley Stadium. By myself. I sat in a row of three seats on the balcony as close to the front as the balcony allowed. I appeared to be the only person drinking. How I smiled as I handed over my three pounds for a pint of Carling in a plastic glass. And then more. And then some more. I was the tallest person in the venue, at 5″2. And possibly the oldest person who wasn’t a parent. How I loved you Busted. How I mocked you, YOU, CHARLIE, when you did your solo emo song which was k-rub. How I thought, “that will never be a single”. And now, it’s over. It’s all over. I suppose I could transfer my allegiances to McFly, but since the Popjustice BUSTED WZ ROBBED TRAVESTY I’m afraid my principles won’t allow it.
Those were the days, my friends. We thought they’d never end. We’d sing and dance… forever, and a day. We’d live the life we choose, we’d fight… and NEVER LOSE! For we were Busted fans! And we were sure (SURE!) to have our way.
What, I’ve stopped my touching tribute just to recite song lyrics by Mary Hopkins/your common or garden local drag act?
It’s a fair cop.
PS it has occured to me that a tribute to Busted should be written, to the tune of A House’s Endless Art just so we can all shout “TORY BUSTED, ARRR OII PEE”. Good old “A House”. Any Music-Ian readers reading – get on it.
Sarah in FT / New York London Paris Munich • 2 Comments
13 January 2005
I was hoping to finish writing about The Honeycombs’ “Have I The Right?” today in order to put it up on Popular, but no luck. Then I remembered that the mighty Dr C. had written about that song (and others) for us a few years ago, so a bit of fiddling with the essays blog and here it is, wrongly credited to me on the front page.
Tom in FT / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
Things you never hear on the radio any more
1. People Announcing Who The Song Is By
This started as a sarky comments box dig at 6music, who may well be playing rub new band The Bravery day and night but frankly I wouldn’t know, because it’s so rare for anything new on their playlist to get actually named as such by the DJ. And when they do bother to tell you they mumble it. XFM are bad on this too, and I grumpily assumed that this is an ‘indie thing’ but when I thought about it some more I realised that Radio 1 were if anything even worse. It’s as if the transmittion of basic information is some kind of naff hangover from the old school Smashie and Nicey days and now Simply Not Done unless people email in and ask. Some credence is lent to that theory by the fact that the most informative pop station is cheesy old Capital.
Hand in hand with this is the rise of commercial digital stations which simply dispense with DJs entirely. Smash Hits radio can probably assume that anyone listening knows its entire playlist, but Kiss FM can’t. Maybe not telling you what’s been playing is some kind of cunning scheme to thwart the downloaders. I grabbed recent hot dance smash Uniting Nations off the inter only to find that I’d heard it fifty times in the last week.
(The exception to this is Andrew Collins, who is a DJ of the Peelite old school and very diligent about letting you know what’s playing. Good for him – but since everything Collins, A. plays comes from when Collins, A. worked for the NME, i.e. when I read it, I know it all anyway.)
Tom in FT / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
Vacuum Energy
Rachel Steven’s new single is written/produced by Swedish electro group Vacuum according to popjustice’s top showbiz links. So here’s an link to all you need to know about that secret Army of Lovers plan to rule pop by 2005.
(NB popjustice’s slogan “We love the pop – so you don’t have to”, a) that sounds familiar, b) but we want to anyway, c) we love you too!)
Bonus science: Vacuum Energy Problems
Alan in FT / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
12 January 2005
First order of business is obviously the total farce that the 1000th No.1 has descended into. Midweeks are out showing that it’s going to be Elvis again, with a reissue of the not-particularly-great “One Night”. Underwhelming to say the least. Mind you when you look at the alternatives – The Killers and, oh sweet mercy NO the Manic Street Preachers – maybe we should count our blessings. (Actually I must reluctantly back the Killers on the grounds that i) it’s less annoying than their last one and ii) it at least hasn’t been number one before)
What gets me is that no record company seems to have realised that there’s a marketing opportunity here. Not a big one, but a chance for a chart scrap, a bit of publicity in a weak month, maybe a few extra sales. But no – the release schedules are a graveyard and the fattest corpse around is having a clear run. Even the Official Charts Company aren’t making any fuss about the 1000th No.1. Maybe only I care (and I admit I lost perspective on this some while ago). Bring on the sodding download chart and end this sorry business now, I think.
Tom in FT / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
6 January 2005
1 January 2005
Skinnyman, not to be confused with Skinner (Mike), who also produced a UK rap concept album this year. Council Estate Of Mind is a huge worthy polemic on the opportunities available to youths on inner city council estates which comes bundled with a pretty well argued essay in the sleeve notes. Unfortunately for Skinnyman his raps are bookended with rather large excerpts from the soundtrack of Made In Britain, included to help emphasise Skinnyman?s point. The excerpts are far too successful at this, after a couple of listens I wanted to hear Tim Roth’s anti-social anti-hero more that Skinnyman?s raps. So I put the Made In Britain video on instead.
Pete Baran in FT / New York London Paris Munich • No Comments
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