POP-EYE 5/5/02
Well, in retrospect the earth didn’t quake, civilization did not fall and the Sugababes were only number one for a week. Now I know this all seems terribly unfair when G-G-Gareth Gates and Will Young can sew the charts up for aro[…]

What I’ve been doing today: downloading tracks for the sixth Freaky Trigger Focus Group. A slimmed-down affair this time, with only 29 songs, but still the usual struggles to find half the tracks – and then to find the correct mixes of ha[…]

Queen classic named all-time favourite single – yeah yeah whatever, but look what’s at No.8! What curious persistence![…]

The chairman and CEO of Turner Broadcasting is a deeply scary man.[…]

DEMPSEY — “ODB on the run”
OK, so this is a novelty single. While Russell Tyrone Jones languishes in chokey the smart-arse undie-ground are partying up a storm on the back of another tragi-comic hip-hop legend in process. Like the r[…]

october symphonies – an excellent piece by the village voice’s dennis lim on two overlooked, autumnal british pop records, the pet shop boys’ release and pulp’s we love life — one released quietly in the u.s., the other,[…]

KATE BUSH — ‘This Woman’s Work’
What Isabel likes about Bush is her range — ‘lots of variety; most of your CDs get boring after a few tracks’ — and I kind of agree, though one Kate Bush song is more lik[…]

The honour of a nation is saved! – by, erm, Dirty Vegas.[…]

‘We can live in the
empty spaces of this life/my baby says ‘Far away/the STARS ARE COMING ALL UNDONE/oh but that’s far away, and we’re young!/If the Devil comes, we’ll just shoot him with a gun’[…]

LATA MANGESHKAR – “Zamana Yeh Samhja Ke Hum Pi Ke Aaye”
Now as you may have noticed questions of authenticity and the circumstances surrounding the making of records don’t really bug me much. Head for ILM and nose around if yo[…]