DUEL 2002! Round 1 Match 14
Pete B. is on the case:
‘Meet the new music – same as the old music. The Hives are heavily influenced by both the Pixies and The Buzzcocks – influenced it that special way where they rip them off almost wholesale. Now this would not matter if they ripped off the good tracks. But does 2002 really need a Swedish second-rate post-punk band? Let’s check the dictionary after all: Hives: an itchy skin eruption characterized by weals with pale interiors and well-defined red margins; usually the result of an allergic response to insect bites or food or drugs or very poor music
Mind you if a band was going to give you an allergic reaction it might well be REM. It’s been making their lead singer Michael Stipe look ill for years. Surely someone should put this lumbering music warhorse out of its misery. Not least because if they keep touring one of them is going to get done for causing a disturbance on a plane (mid you if I saw Peter Buck on a plane I would twat him). And is ‘non-insane automatism’ just a polite way of saying ‘churns out dull records year after year’? U2 need an equally geriatric band to follow them into the second round: do your duty.’
Friday’s Results — Starsailor 81% : Baxendale 19%
It could go only one way, really — and Baxendale’s 19% should surely be taken as the result of ignorance, not endorsement. But even if they were a household name Starsailor would surely have beaten them (and Baxendale’s continued lack of fame is its own special defeat, considering). Here’s what you said:
‘James Walsh has an astonishingly flat face – I hope this is because someone has hit him very hard in the face with a shovel.’
‘Never heard Baxendale (I bet they sound like Heavenly)…Anyway, to the matter at hand, could anyone possibly challenge Stereophonics? yes! Starsailor! Yawnfest to the Nth degree, kinda like a party without cake.’
‘stop wailing! please!’
‘Har, baxendale don’t stand a chance up against the ODDS ON FAVOURITE.’
‘BaxenTOSSPOTdale!!!! Argrhhhh intense humming of tinny EVIL! KILL KILL KILL!’
‘This might be a bit unfair, since Starsailor is the only one I have heard of. But my conscience is clean, since they make such a wailing screeching racket! It puts cats in heat to shame.’
‘I’ve never heard Baxendale, but they get my vote as obviously shittest for the uber-indieness of their name alone. And it seems that they’re popular with *sinister* types.’
‘Don’t know Baxendale but is there a band which can be worse than Starsailor? Every time I hear them I wish someone would take away the micro from the singer.’
‘I doubt that anyone in the States knows Baxendale, so they (like me) will vote for Starsailor by default. Ooo, I hope we’ll get a Starsailor/Coldplay duel sometime in the future. That’ll be epic.’
‘Er, haven’t heard either (and ain’t going out of my way to do so)=> Starsailor get it on the coin toss. It really is grim up Norf!’