On The Issue of Twitter and Taste

For those of you who missed these… whatever they are, I am pleased to say I have not forgotten you. A month on the tomato harvest gave me ample time to think. A fair portion is completely unsavoury, most of it was about a Wii and Boston Legal box set and a fair portion of it was bizarre dreams. But an hour a day I sat in quiet solitude and devoted my attention to keeping myself sane enough to come back and hoist myself back onto my soapbox, and I promise you, the view up here is brilliant.

My return to the Kingdom of Rust was marred somewhat by the spectre of an event that yearly makes me feel dead inside for a good twelve hours: the Logies. I’m glad I missed them. All the self importance of the Oscars with none of the credibility AND Richard Wilkins, who offends me. Next year, though, I may pay attention via Twitter, seeing as how most comedians and commentators were offering thoughts in real time. Genius! Unless you’re one of this country’s most popular comics, or a now former columnist for a major newspaper.

For those of who are blissfully unaware, I am talking about Wil Anderson and Catherine Deveny, both of whom were harshly criticised for their tweets. Deveny was made example of and lost her job. I won’t say what they were, suffice to say, Anderson did not comment, whereas Deveny made the unfortunate mistake of trying to defend herself.

Now:

I do not mind a bit of crass humour. I like it when the ire of society is raised. I defended the Chaser wholesale, and I have never demanded a person be sacked or resign over remarks made. The f-bomb and c-tilery are standard punctuation in my brother’s and my vocabulary. I like shock and I think it necessary. But shock is a very volatile substance, and if you use it wrong, you will be burned.

It is to Catherine I direct my attention in this piece. I can’t blast her too hard without feeling bad. She is a hard-working comedian and is quite an insightful columnist. But when you have to go on ABC Radio National and explain you are a comedian, you’re not doing it right. I suppose I was a bit taken aback when she said with seriousness I cannot deny that her tweets were “taken out of context” and that to understand them one must “understand social networking”. I don’t agree. I may be taking her comments out of context in this very paragraph, but this is Twitter we’re talking about.

Twitter is seen as a sort of ego trip usually but anyone who works with words for a living (I believe) should use it regularly. It’s a free and simple way of learning word economy, or to direct people who like your thoughts to other things you’ve written and are proud of. However, it is a totally blank canvas, and in 140 characters you must give your thoughts context and substance otherwise it is lost in the ether. The ‘hash tag’ is a brilliant way to do this. And by adding the hash tag “#logies” after her thoughts Deveny automatically gave them context. The nuances of social networking don’t enter into it at all. Anderson was catty, but funny. Deveny was just mean.

Part of it may have to do with the stance the two took. American journalist, activist and all-round arse kicker Allison Kilkenny has made the point that comedians from left wing political backgrounds will mostly be quite different to their conservative contemporaries. Anderson is undoubtedly from a liberal background, and his humour is very easily interpreted as such. Even when acidic, he’s still quite impish about it. Deveny’s background of writing for one of this country’s most conservative broadsheets is quite evident in what she writes, and when she is vicious, it is really quite cruel. Again, this is just me.

The reality is I think this whole incident has been blown out of proportion. There are hundreds of opinions about the Logies, each more offensive than the last. It’s a glitzy popularity contest at heart and if we’re going to be subjected to it, may as well have people make it interesting. And why would you fire anyone over their tweets? It’s fucking TWITTER. Had they been politicians tweeting through Parliament when they should be working, fair do’s, give them a talking to. But journalists and media types doing it at a very overrated event is nothing to bat an eyelid over.

Well that’s it. I’m back. I’m rusty I’ll admit but it’s good to be writing again. I thank Allison for letting me source her. www.allisonkilkenny.com is her brilliant blog and www.wearecitizenradio.com is the radio show she and comic Jamie Kilstein make three times weekly. Podcast it through iTunes. It’s awesome. (I hope I’ve repaired the damage of butchering a fine quote) Thank you for reading, and thank you for your comments in advance. Til next time.

Top Albums: 2010 Pt. 1

So let's assume I love music, and talking about music. Then let's assume I want to keep tabs on my fave albums this year. So the first three months down, here is the short list thus far:

Plastic Beach - Gorillaz
I know I panned it to start off with, but it's a slow burner and a work of genius.

One Life Stand - Hot Chip
Such a tender album... Yet you can dance to it, there's something genius at work here.

The Family Jewels - Marina and the Diamonds
The newest addition to the quirky songwriter's winning circle proves she has the chops.

The Trials of Others - Midlake
A beautiful record and one to listen to at sunset...

Realism - The Magnetic Fields
Stephen Merrit proves his disdain of the mainstream by layering a beautiful pop record with every other instrument than synthesizers.

Transference - Spoon
So these guys have their formula so down pat that you cannot actually fault them.

Contra - Vampire Weekend
Surprisingly good second album from the whitest boys in America.

Odd Blood - Yeasayer
Odd by name and nature, but I get these guys easier than I get Animal Collective, think MGMT plagiarizing Tears for Fears...

Comments? Discussions? Fire away,

Time To Throw Some Stones...

What the hell is wrong with Australian television?

And no, I’m not talking about the way the programmers treat us like idiots, hiding the good stuff way past our bed time. Or putting off shows until the DVD has been released, both crimes they should pay dearly for. I’m talking about our local content. Crime drama, lifestyle or non-crime drama seem to be the only things we make of note. But only our comedies are for a large part quite brilliant, yet hounded by cretins telling us what comedy is “supposed” to be.

Imagine then my surprise that the killjoys who out and out crucified the Chaser and broke the Glasshouse sitting on their hands for Good News Week on Channel Ten because Ricki-Lee sings ‘Call Me’ or something similar to offset Mikey Robbins and the eternal filth imp Paul McDermott. See the bile rise in my throat when the same network invite Andrew Bolt on to The 7PM Project to present an ‘informed view’, when in fact he is part of what Hunter S. Thompson describes as the Fourth Reich. Can you dig this? I can’t.

I was ten when topical comedy set me aflame. Back in the day, I would watch Good News Week on a Friday night, and spend the next week guessing what stories they’d talk about on the next show (weird yes, but catnip to me). Mind you, 1998 it was revelation time for me. The Simpsons were at their legendary creative peak, The Micallef Program was starting out, and not long from then we discovered South Park and the world became a better place. But topical comedy, not quite satire, was –and still is- my ‘thing’. It was my dream to panel on Good News Week. Be good enough to write jokes for them. I breathed that stuff.

So imagine the heartbreak caused in 2000 when Ten not only axed the show after buying it away from the ABC, but doing so to dwindling numbers. I taped the final show then proceeded to wear the tape thin. It was a troubling time for me, as adolescence was a year away, and I still had nothing to fill that void. Comedy, you see, has been my way of compensating for being uninteresting and so beautiful that people assume I’ll never speak to them (I believe).

For this reason, I love the Glasshouse. It was the perfect continuation of the sort of humour that I found so exhilarating. The three main hosts were (at the time) three of the best up and coming comics in our country with a crack team of writers behind them and a ratio of knowledgeable types to funny types that the 7PM Project owes them for. It was childish at times. It was silly. It was nothing more than five people talking for a half an hour, usually making jokes about the government of the day, which became its undoing. But ultimately, our culture needed it.

Humour is the great leveller. It can transform a monster into a joke, and a joke into a unifying belief. History will speak of the leaders we have had in their factual connotations, but people will listen to the jokes about them before taking any facts into account. And when you laugh at the monsters they become less scary. And heaven only knows we have monsters.

So imagine the heartbreak caused in 2006 when the Howard Government broke it. Complaints to the effect that the show “lacked bipartisanship” in making many jokes about the government of the day rather than focus on the opposition. This leads me to two conclusions about the people who did this with the clarity of hindsight that the same people complained about the Chaser: 1) They were plants for a scared and upset government or 2) These individuals are constantly upset and will in fact die miserable.
That final show proved the pure potential this show had, with Kochie coming out with RELEVANT and INTERESTING discussion as a rare highlight of his career. The subsequent DVD is one I will watch every so often to reminding myself of the good times, but my heart yearns for a resolution…

I say it often. Loudly when I do, and without a trace of guilt or shame: “Dear Auntie, Bring Back The Glasshouse. And Bring It Back RIGHT NOW.” I’m an adult now, and Good News Week, my childhood benchmark of Australia’s premiere topical humour now answers to advertisers. It now plugs things openly on a commercial network so of course there are things it cannot say. It’s still good, don’t get me wrong.

But I came of age with the Glasshouse giving me a platform to care about the world and when it swerved from humour to serious issues, it did so with a humility and compassion you could not put in GNW for the simple fact that it’s divides the conservative thinker against the people who are right.

Now is a great time to bring it back, now is always the best time to bring it back. Maybe not with the same people. But get new folks in. Easy fixed.

And for those of you who say “Well why don’t you go and do it? You love it so much, why not try it yourself?” Okay. I’ll just need about eight staff writers, 2-4 more hosts, some learned guests and the rights to the Mock the Week format over in Britain. Oh and a camera or three and editing equipment. And if the ABC don’t like it, YOUTUBE BABY. See, that’s the thing about loving something so dearly, you’ll want to take it somewhere else. But where I take it may not be the best place.

So to all you news freaks and comedy nerds who loved this show as much as I did, I say: We’re never alone. We’ll always have that fire burning. And to the ABC: DO SOMETHING RIGHT FOR ONCE.

Gregory Big: A History

A few years back I started writing about a certain remarkably unremarkable man. As I have been inundated with people begging me to bring him back, I thought I would write this biography as dictated by the man himself. After a 5-year hiatus, folks, I’m bringing back the big. Enjoy.

Gregory Big: A Biography


I was born in a year when mittens were the fashion item of the spring to Jimothy and Ezzzz Big. After doctors asserted I was indeed a boy (plus the three week waiting period) I was named Gregory Arbuthnot Big after Earnst GregoryMcTeal, a man whom my mother once saw in a newspaper shouting at a yam and Alexander Arbuthnot who invented boats.
I was the oldest of two, my younger brother was born two years after me and then a week after that and was named Fritzkreig “El Incubator” Hamish Big after the first few things my Grandmother once said in a fever dream.

My father was a freelance professor of Spoons & Associated Cutlery and my mother exposed magicians. We lived well in luxurious 4 bedroom-3 bathroom hovel in a shanty town situated in a sewer, until the sanitation people moved us on. We lived in a lot of interesting places after that; a tree, a shed, a bunker, a u-boat, pages 45-168 of a first edition of ‘Dude, Where’s My Country’ By Michael Moore and in the basement of a fruit stall, which was the best place to raise a child until the owner wheeled it home for the night. Then it was the worst place to raise a child.

During my 8th year, my father became Walcott University’s resident Professor of Running up the Stairs Two at a Time, Flinging the Door Open & Shouting ‘Aha! Caught You, Mildred!’ which meant we could afford to settle into a quaint little house on Thrif St. However, it was not long after this that my mother contracted Spatchcock’s Disease.

Named after Dr. Glen Spatchcock, this terminal disease, (for those not doctors,) irreversibly damages a person’s stock portfolio by investing large chunks of money in various terrible ideas and leave the patient in the firm belief that they are a miniature Tibetan yak. Since I was eight, I saw this dreaded disease’s effect on my mother whilst laughing like a drain when she would ram people she did not know.

All went along quite uneventfully bar the odd adventure for a while, and then I met a young man who found my life quite eventful. So I recounted to him all my stories and he in turn sang Bjork songs at me. Which I believe was a very unfair deal considering he knew none and was just screeching at me…

So thank you for reading about my uninteresting life. Thank you young sir for chronicling it. And thank you for reading about my uninteresting life.


Gregory Big. New Adventures. Coming Soon in 2010.

Regarding Haiti: An Open Letter to You

Dear whosoever reads this,
It’s been one week now, and still there’s a growling in the dirt. A wailing in the air. We all know it.

Haiti is screaming. Her air is fetid with the stench of the dead. The news reports are all of how the Haitian people “live in insufficient housing,” which caused so much destruction. The scream we ignored is louder than ever now.

This mess is deplorable. But the West feels no guilt, only sympathy and pity.

Since it became it’s own country and rejecting French control, Haiti has been less than stable. It’s like this in parts all over the world. “There are three sides to every story: yours, mine and the truth” as the old adage goes. One side fight to maintain power, one side fights to be fed and the truth is nobody is sure what’s going to happen. THEN CAME THE WEST AGAIN. The International Bank gave the government a huge loan, and then bled the country dry. No remorse. Business is business.

In all fairness the media have reported so extensively on this, it’s hard for governments not to act. But aid is still at a trickle, so I wish to beg you follow me in this. Last Friday I put the whole mess out of the mind for the weekend. And on one level that’s reasonable, I had a trip to go on. But as soon as I got home I felt crippling guilt. The 200, 000 reported dead are being buried, one-and-a-half million are confirmed homeless, and yet more are trapped.

Donate what you can. Pray if you choose to. But for all that is sacred, do something. This is two-thousand-and-fucking-ten. The days of ignoring the countries that scream out for help (be honest, we do) are over. Time’s a-ticking and Earth will have to introduce itself to all other intelligent life. How well you think it will reflect if we leave our equals to die?

We aren’t to blame personally for this. But I’ll be damned if I allow this to be treated like a toddler who tripped and grazed their knee. In the Port-au-Prince General Hospital, the country’s largest by far, the bodies are stacked FOUR HIGH BY THE AUTOPSY DOOR. Find a charity. Just pick one. And throw a bit of money at them. If we start with this, we’ll be doing well, and the healing can begin.

Thnks,

Simon

COP15, Your Leaders & You (OR, Use Stronger Sunscreen and Place All Perishable Items on a High Shelf)

Esteemed leaders of the developed world,

Speaking as a member of the society that 1) Put you in power; 2) Pays your salary and 3) Will have to live with your decisions well after your time can I just comment about your triumph in Copenhagen.

What I wish to say is this: Don’t come back yet. Please. What we wish you to do is stay in a room there, and we’ll gradually turn up the thermostat. Slowly at first, then higher and higher, until you start to get uncomfortable. Then when it’s up as high as it can go, we’ll light a giant brazier, and fan it to all corners of said room. How will we fuel it you ask? Simple, we’ll burn your tables. And it’ll get pretty stuffy still, so we might light another. But not to worry, because the fire sprinklers will come on at that point. So you’ll be burning up with no relief, no resources and water slowly filling up your immediate vicinity.

That’s not very nice is it? Now you know how Tuvalu feels, China.

Who the hell do you people think you are? Your children’s generation and other “dirty leftists” have a vested interest in keeping this planet healthy for as long as possible and you encourage its ruin so blatantly. And to prove it, as the summit in Copenhagen crawls to an end like an elderly dog quietly going somewhere secluded to die, you took the one big moment to change this planet for the better and gave us… what? A promise to cool the planet by 2 degrees and nothing else.

Now, as many learned and notable public figures will say (i.e. Jeremy Clarkson, Tony Abbot, Andrew Bolt, Sarah Palin, Fox News’ Glenn Beck, any member of the former Bush administration and several other important people with money that smells of petrol in their pockets) this whole conference is a farce, that climate change does not exist and that we’re doing nothing wrong depending on fossil fuel and ravaging the planet like we have for most of our industrialised history. These people will be dead by the time the effect has kicked in, so of course they’d say that. But they have the media by the sensitive parts and so their message is seen as the sensible one.

I really do feel sorry for the protesters at COP15. You know the angry and concerned people the police kept hitting? The loud ones outside who wanted you to work? The ones who sounded like the little countries you ignored? You failed them. You have ignored them and in turn you have forgone any chance of respect from the masses. Mr. Obama, sir, I know you’re a moderate but surely you could have taken a stand…

And if I may direct this at you, Kevin, I am so disappointed at you. You proved everyone right. This was supposed to be your moment to make the months of bad press melt away, but that could not be. You followed the U.S like your predecessor, and lied to the press (again) saying this conference was a success. Because of this, I can foresee you being elected from office. I can foresee Herr Abbot taking over, and then we will burn as Hell becomes a certainty.

Praise must go to those protesters who put up with police brutality in the finest tradition of unarmed people meeting law enforcers, to Tuvalu, who stood firm as China ignored their demands to help cut carbon emissions, to Sudan’s Lumumba Stanislas Dia-ping who was one of the loudest voices condemning the agreement’s effect on the African nations saying of the pact “[it] is based on values, the very same values in our opinion that funnelled six million people in Europe into furnaces” and especially to Venezuela’s Claudia Salnerno Caldera who cut her palm in an effort to gain the conference chair Denmark’s attention and spitting bile as she labelled the agreement a “coup d’état against the United Nations”. Your efforts were more valiant than my mere words can convey and I feel ashamed to be a part of this gigantic problem. I am truly sorry.

But back to the glorious rich. For the millions of dollars and the attention this conference got, one small fact can come out of what was billed as “the most important summit since WWII”. And it is as follows:

You Have Failed Us, And We Will Not Forgive You.

You just may have successfully condemned the generations after you to burn. And for what. For what? The chance to avoid blame as the money keeps flowing and the campaigns keep you smiling and waving. I cannot comprehend how absurd your outlook is, to hear grown adults delude themselves like this is worrying and unpleasant.

Kevin, when you get home, we are having words.

How does that Elbow song go?
“The leaders of the free world are just little boys throwing stones…”

Yours indefinitely,

S. P Cantwell

Originally posted Dec 20th 2009

A Right of Reply...

I have had a few glorious amendments to my 'Year in a Facebook status update' summary since I put it up this evening and after being (quite dismissively, I believe) called a pessimist now may be an appropriate time to justify what I said piece by piece. Please keep in mind I know that these aren't the major stories of the year. Here we go:

What a year 09 has been; deaths left right and center including MJ, (Bud) Tingwell, Farrah Fawcett, Molly Sugden and Myspace,

Now, this was a brazen attempt at satire, and had I been in a serious mood I would have of course brought up the current conflicts in Afghanistan, Darfur, Israel, Iraq (?), El Salvador and so on and so forth. In doing that, I would be seriously doing the men and women dying for a right to a fair vote, basic living needs, clean water, a job that pays well enough to support their families and so many other things we as Western people forget, thus I would be unable to continue doing anything. Besides, I like Charles (Bud) Tingwell, I like Molly Sugden and Farrah Fawcett was a fairly respectable person. And like him loathe him or otherwise Michael Jackson will never go away. Like background radiation. I know deaths happen all the time. I'm just highlighting some media ones that I know will have mattered to someone. I forgot Don Lane. I liked his stuff a lot too. But please don't treat this as dismissive, satirical I tried to be but the end result is one of nostalgia.

And Myspace and Facebook though starting out at a similar time had their futures predestined. Seeing as Murdoch's media company bought Myspace just before it's general release in 2006, it is inevitable that the system would become as Murdoch's other big media venture Fox News; showy, over burdened, superficial and completely free of facts after a time. Now it is a stalking ground for sexual predators, underage
high school students and very poor bands. The main reason I left that site is because a combination of these three would not stop adding me. Twitter is not helping it's own cause either.

the global economy becoming more like a giant hole for money,

The main argument I've heard here is that Australia's economy is better than four months ago. It is. But an economic structure is dependent on the money earned by it's industries and it's people that it can only take. Our economy will never be fixed. It will always need money. You put money in, everything else comes out the other side. It's how our civilization is geared. Oh, apart from the bankers globally who took billions of dollars and froze over assets superannuation and pensions just for their own needs. Fuck them.

more dying,

Satire again. I apologise.

'Hey Hey' proves how stuck in the past it is,

http://thescrivenersfancy.com/scarcely-relevant/2009/10/14/off-white.aspx

Above is the article I believe best sums up a rational view of what happened on the second Hey Hey special. And I want to remind those who dismiss Connick for what he said, at no point did he refer to the skit he disapproved of as racist.

This in no way detracts from previous statements I have made regarding taste and standards of decency in entertainment. The Chaser were crucified unjustly. Kyle was reprimanded justly, but real genuine outrage was placed on him and a stupid and disgraceful woman was let off because of it. Home and Away is still on the air. But all these things, as any sensible person will tell you, must be judged on their own terms. I do not see why people get such pleasure out of being offended and furthermore believe society is being weakened by them. Why not get outraged at the fact that the Catholic church's policy on contraceptives is helping spread AIDS in Africa? Or the fact that genocides occur daily? That's the real issue with media outrage, it dulls us to things that we should be pissed off about.

Rove quits,

I liked Rove. He may have been daggy, plucky, overconfident whatever but the fact remains that he was our only Tonight Show. So now we have none except Richard Wilkins who nobody truly believes actually exists.

Up, Glee, Florence and the Machine

Up is my movie of this year, Glee is a great show for my tastes and Florence and the Machine make me happy and blow my mind. When I like something I preach about it. YOU KNOW ME.

and it looks like the Abbot will win next election unless our current leader kicks some arse.

This one is the most tongue-in-cheek statement I have yet to write ever. In 2007 I voted not to get someone in, but to make DAMN SURE I never had consider Tony Abbot a federal minister ever again. A singularly evil and petulant individual who enrages me so much I just want him away from the media. But people think he'd do a better job than the current Prime Minister. And the sick thing is they may be fucking right.

The Government's ETS will rage on for months more. And like the U.S public health care bill, by the time it passes through our political system, it will be so watered down that no person could ever credit it as a any form of worthwhile goal. And now the Liberal party are all badasses now, it seems like that terrible gap between the rich and poor will be increased again.

And yet.

There is still hope. As long as people still see things differently, as long as we can offer humility and hope to those who need it, as long as one person still questions every single thing they're told, things can get better.

HAPPY 09 FOLKS!

That was a typo. Happy 2010 everybody!

Originally posted Dec 6th 2009

Top Albums 2009: The Close Contenders List.

Lawks, milarky! A caveat!

Having tried twice to post my best albums of 2009, I do feel like I restricted myself limiting it to just ten albums. And having seen Australian Rolling Stone’s fifty (including the disgusting omission of ‘It’s Blitz’ in favour of Green Day’s ‘21st Century Breakdown’. I mean come on.) I feel I should post a further list of my favourite 09 albums. Because to hell with being outdone by Rolling Stone. I won’t rank or eulogize this time, it’s huge. But still, I strongly recommend the following:

- Biffy Clyro, Only Revolutions

- Eels, Hombre Lobo

- Gossip, Music For Men

- Future of the Left, Travels With Myself And Another

- Monsters of Folk, Monsters Of Folk

- Lily Allen, It’s Not Me, It’s You

- La Roux, La Roux

- Mumford & Sons, Sigh No More

- Daniel Merriweather, Love And War

- Mariachi El Bronx, Mariachi El Bronx

- Muse, The Resistance

- Regina Spektor, Far

- Maximo Park, Quicken The Heart

- Passion Pit, Manners

- Bruce Springsteen, Working On A Dream

- Them Crooked Vultures, Them Crooked Vultures

- Yves Klein Blue, Ragged And Ecstatic

- The Mars Volta, Octahedron

- Dirty Projectors, Bitte Orca

- Flight of the Conchords, I Told You I Was Freaky

- Major Lazer, Guns Don’t Kill People… Lazers Do

- Paloma Faith, Do You Want The Truth Or Something Beautiful?

- The Flaming Lips, Embryonic

- White Rabbits, It’s Frightening

- The Decemberists The Hazards Of Love

This article first appeared on my Facebook page on January 7th 2009.

Best Albums 2009

Many a ‘Best of 2009’ list is coming out this time of year. Guess what? Here’s another! The difference you must accept here is I’m a flawed yet wonderful person, not some god awful critic. So here goes. Remember you are free to disagree, and I welcome discussion but don’t be lazy about it. [Deep breath]

10: Ben Folds Presents: University A Cappella! – Various
Ben Folds’ music is the stuff which music geeks adore, so it seems a fitting and touching gesture to his fans that he would record reworked versions of some of his best loved songs as done by college a cappella groups. The results turn ‘Not the Same’ into an epic, ‘Brick’ into a hymnal, ‘Jesusland’ into an angelic choir (by the stellar all-girl group of the University of North Carolina, The Loreleis) and the wit and humour in ‘Army’ becomes more evident with tongue planted firmly in cheek. What we have here is the greatest ‘best of’ ever.

9: Ignore The Ignorant – The Cribs
To the uninitiated, this post punk band of brothers is seeped in indie cred. Their previous album (2007’s “Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs, Whatever”) was produced by Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand. In the interim, Johnny Marr (the Smiths’ legendary guitarist) joined the band. And then they topped it all off by writing an album full of anthems for the well-dressed hipster inside us all, the whole thing topped with Marr’s distinct guitar ringing out clear (as demonstrated by Smiths tribute ‘We Share The Same Skies’).

8: Veckatimest – Grizzly Bear
One thing the world does not need is one more word written about how you can “hear the Radiohead influences on this album”. That is an insult to the quartet from Brooklyn who created such a beautifully crafted set of songs and named the whole thing after an island off Cape Cod that is a haven to grizzly bears. Not one part in twelve songs sounds out of place, as harmony upon harmony sweeps over you.
Ed Droste’s plaintive croon and Daniel Rossen’s quavering folk troubadour voice compliment each other beautifully, but it’s the band’s “pop” songs that offer the biggest satisfaction. ‘Two Weeks’ screams of Beach Boys, ‘Ready, Able’ swings between two different moods violently enough to shock the system and ‘While You Wait For The Others’ is a lost 70’s AM gem to a tee.

7: Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix – Phoenix
After years of being “that awesome French band that not enough people listen to”, Phoenix rose to the public’s attention with this little album that did. Produced by Phillipe Zdar - the dance impresario of Paris- Phoenix’s golden sound was made even more interesting (the two-part epic “Love Like A Sunset”) and the whole thing is propelled forward with an energy impossible to describe (like on ‘1901’, ‘Lisztomania’ and ‘Lasso’).

6: West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum – Kasabian
If 2006’s pleasure-fest “Empire” was a promise to deliver, have these boys Delivered. It swaggers (‘Underdog’, ‘Vlad The Impaler’, ‘Where Did All The Love Go?’), it gets dirty (‘Fast Fuse’), it gets a little crazy (‘Swarfiga’, ‘West Ryder Silver Bullet’) and boy oh BOY does it get epic (‘Fire’). In the year Oasis called it quits, it’s a pleasure to know that the next generation of loud-mouthed rockers are going to keep their banner flying high and proud.

5: It’s Blitz! – Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Synth was the weapon of choice this year, and the howlin’ Miss Orzolek and friends were no different. Although the album never quite recovers from the one-two punch of openers ‘Zero’ and ‘Heads Will Roll’, it still is a weighty testament to the band’s versatile sound, from the Celtic flavour of ‘Skeletons’ to the barnstormer ‘Dull Life’, Karen O, Nick Zinner and Brian Chase control their own chaos, and the result is more upbeat then their previous albums.

4: Kingdom of Rust – Doves
The heartfelt at its most grandiose, brothers Andy and Jez Williams along with Jimi Goodwin dish out something so beautiful at points it’ll tear you apart to listen. The spaghetti western influenced title track could very well be the anthem of all heartbroken sensitive blokes everywhere. Contrast that to the pounding ‘House of Mirrors’, or the slinky electronic opener ‘Jetstream’ where the giant sound is inverted.
Doves are one of the most underrated bands in the world today, constantly making great albums, yet never getting more than slight airplay outside their native England. This album, however, got them one step closer to the attention they richly deserve.

3: Horehound – The Dead Weather
Jack White’s next band did what he does with his other two: blues rock with a lot of bite. This time though, he’s a drummer, with Alison Mosshart of the Kills on synth and vocals deeper than White. The result is definitely twisted. Debut single ‘Hang You From The Heavens’ is twisted and the rest of the album gets just as mangled from there… Especially ‘I Cut Like A Buffalo’… Real twisted music.

2: Danger Mouse & Sparklehorse Present: Dark Night of the Soul – Danger Mouse & Sparklehorse
Ladies and gentlemen, the best album not to be released this year. Alternative troubadour Mark Linkous (Sparklehorse) and renegade producer Brian Burton (Danger Mouse) teamed up together with director David Lynch and a legion of singers including Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips, James Mercer of the Shins, Black Francis of the Pixies, Julian Casablancas of the Strokes Iggy Pop and Nina Persson of the Cardigans. The result is a beautiful film in music, with David Lynch’s alien vocals on ‘Star Eyes’ a standout.
But due to a legal dispute with EMI, the album may never be released. Not to be outdone, the albums website still sells the CD-R that should contain the music but it’s blank! So do your bit and find one of the many album torrents floating around. Maybe even buy a DNOTS CD-R. I’m not condoning an illegal activity. I’m trying to introduce this album to a wider audience.

1: Lungs – Florence and the Machine
Florence Welch is one crazy woman with amazing talent. From the opener ‘Dog Days Are Over’ all stomping and Welch’s voice harmonising over itself to the final XX cover ‘You Got the Love’ none can deny what is here. Her off-centre style calls to mind Kate Bush and the sultry earthen voice makes her all the more powerful.
It get quite strange on ‘Kiss With a Fist’ and ‘My Boy Builds Coffins’ and it may take a few listens to understand what’s going on. But elsewhere on ‘Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)’ and ‘Cosmic Love’ everything feels magnificent, so much so that it’s impossible to feel anything but uplifted time and time and time again.

This article first appeared on my Facebook page on January 5th 2009.

Hello

Good tidings to you, reader.

I shall not lie to you, this will be my second attempt at an internet blog. But I think I will really try this time. The fact is, I am uninteresting. I try to be interesting, but it fails. I Tweet like it's finite, but I Facebook like it's mine to violate.

There are few people who genuinely warrant their opinions heard, but despite this, I intend to blitz froward in a tempest of crude disregard, posting my ill-informed views on anything in the vain hope somebody reads. For the most part to start off with I will just be posting featured successes from Facebook.

Enjoy!