2oceans Vibe

To all the guys out there, if you’ve ever sat through p.s. I Love You starring Hilary Swank and Gerard Butler, you’ll know that the movie makes listening to Slipknot played backwards at maximum volume for 12 hours straight seem more fulfilling. It’s the story of a charming Irish lad who falls in love with an American tourist. They marry. He dies. She is sad. Her friends worry that she will be sad forever. Then one day, while she is still being sad, a birthday cake and tape recorded message from the charming Irish lad mysteriously arrives, marking the beginning of a series of letters that guide her on a magical life journey that the charming Irish lad has found the time to plan for her… No prizes for guessing how each letter ends. They lay it on so thick in this movie that you feel like you’ve been swamped by a tidal wave of honey mixed with treacle and syrup. You can’t move, you can’t think, you feel slightly sick.

Girls really should know better than to even let their guys watch stuff like this, let alone actively persuade them to do so. It’s the equivalent of making a guy inspect the contents of those mysterious little bins they have in the ladies’ bathrooms. We don’t want to know. We’re better off not knowing. There’s a whole universe of girly stuff that men should never see. The line “Nobody puts Baby in the corner” induces nausea in men. It makes girls’ eyes well up with tears of joy. Enough said.

The same goes for music. Take the song “Bubbly” by Colbie Caillat. Just that title alone is hard for me to look at. Bubbly? Are you joking? But check out some of the lyrics of this ode to being a girley girl: “Every time I see your bubbly face, I get the tinglies in a silly place/It starts in my toes and I crinkle my nose…” Ok, now I’m actually retching. Can I just point out that this is some hardcore frontline journalism going on right now people. I am currently wearing a bulletproof vest, reporting from the heart of chickdom – a pink, fluffy place where few men dare to tread for fear of being put off girls forever. I hope you appreciate it.

Anyway, that crinkly nose shit is like napalm for guys, just as Megadeth is for girls (at least the kind you want to hang out with). So, I think we’ve established that, while opposite sexes are often drawn to each other, there will always be parts of them that go together like oil and water. They’re best kept separate. Just occasionally though, something comes along that both sexes can get their kicks from.

Florence + the Machine could, at first glance, be deemed to be music designed for chicks. But it’s so much more than that. Yes, ladies are clearly going to dig it. But it’s a bit like Pixar movies such as Shrek or The Incredibles – they throw plenty of extremely witty stuff in there for the adults, making these movies great to watch and taking the pain out of accompanying your kids to the cinema. Now I’m not saying that girls are like kids and guys are like adults, I’m just saying that Florence + the Machine have made music that girls will love and guys will appreciate too. But it’s not because they’ve put stuff in there for guys; it’s just because the sheer force of its power respects no boundaries.

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If you’re a legendary aging rock star who has fallen out with his band mates… or a talented soul singer whose career has taken a nose-dive… or a thoroughbred reggae artist who produced an amazing album a few years ago but hasn’t been able to follow it up… or if your band was a huge in the 80’s but your band mate’s fabulous solo career has left you kicking stones… Fear not. It’s time to throw the dice and try something crazy.

That’s what Mick Jagger, Damian Marley, Joss Stone, Dave Stewart and Indian composer A.R. Rahman have done. They’re all in a band called SuperHeavy. They should have called it Motley Crew but it was taken apparently. The music is as diverse as the musical backgrounds of its members, with reggae, soul, Indian orchestral string arrangements and of course Jagger’s inimitable vocal stylings all being tossed into the brew.

Mick Jagger hasn’t really been himself since the eighties. To be fair, it must be exhausting waking up in the morning, looking in the mirror and thinking, “Okay, here goes, another day being Mick Jagger.” Especially when Keith Richards is looked upon as an international treasure and is writing memoirs telling the world what a “tiny todger” you have. Yet somehow Mick seems liberated in his roll as the mad great uncle in the band. It is worth checking out the video for the single Miracle Worker. Mick truly knocks it out the park when he appears in his pink suit and belts out the lines “There’s nothing wrong with you that I can’t fix, I come a running with my little bag of tricks…” The guy is pushing 70, and looks a little scary to be honest, but he still sings like a legend – the definition of a cool voice. Not a technical master, just fucking cool sounding. And let’s not forget those moves…

Somehow, in this guise, Mick’s not grasping for his title as a rock god, as he seems to be in the Stones. He’s just a legend, and there’s nothing to prove. Maybe he feels threatened by Keith or something, whereas here he’s just chilling, “passing frontman duties around like a spliff” as they wrote in Rolling Stone magazine.

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You know the way a lot of professional “critics” seem to be incredibly satisfied with every word that emanates from their non-smiling mouths? Well, I reckon the reason for this is that deep down inside they know their role in society is, in fact, quite menial. Nothing they say really matters when all is said and done. The self-righteous attitude is an attempt to mask the resultant low self-esteem. I believe Theodore Roosevelt said it best:

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.

Who could we use as an example to illustrate this point? Ooh, I know, how about Randall Abrahams? Did you catch Mark Haze on Idols covering Lady GaGa’s Born This Way? It was like a giant leap forward for SA Idols. The song choice was a stroke of genius and the execution was outrageously good. The guy’s talent was there for everyone to see. But when Randall spoke, he didn’t say a word about the inspired song choice or the pitch perfect rendition. No, he seemed to have a pre-prepared script in his head and he was sticking to it no matter what. He announced with great authority that Haze was too professional or too polished or something. I can’t actually remember. Which says a lot. Whatever it was, it was as if he’d just been watching Rick Astley wheeling out Never Gonna Give You Up for the billionth time.

Could it be that there was something else at play? Did Randy perhaps feel threatened by a performance that rendered his encyclopaedic knowledge of popular music irrelevant and dull? So, I guess what I’m trying to say is, take the authoritative words of those who criticise with a pinch of salt. There are of course writers who truly know their stuff and act as a kind of quality control for music, movies, books, food etc. They are often referred to as critics, but they’re really writers. A writer aims to inspire debate and form an opinion. Hunter S. Thompson performed this role to some extent. So does AA Gill. The writer is very much “in the arena”, risking failure whilst striving for success. The people I’m talking about are more like bouncers at a nightclub; spitefully exercising what little power they have to take their revenge on society.

The reason I’m banging on about this with such self-righteous authority (see what I did there?) is that I read a couple of reviews of the latest Cold War Kids album online and started to wonder whether I was listening to the same album, and subsequently began to question how much credence should be given to reviews, particularly online.

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I learned something new about the world the day Freddie Mercury died. Firstly, that there was a new way to die, and its name was AIDS. Secondly, that one of my heroes was, in fact, gay. As a young teenager I had never given either topic much thought. Queen rocked and that’s all that really mattered. Which brings us to the music.

Queen is one of those bands that make you think, “They don’t make ‘em like this anymore.” All the best bands flirt with madness. Queen, of course, did cross the line from time to time, but this is an occupational hazard of being true rock gods. And I’m sure they didn’t beat themselves up when they spilled a bit too much madness into the magic potion, which they did fairly regularly, and may be the reason why Queen are best known for their Greatest Hits albums, as opposed to that one perfect studio album, like Led Zeppelin managed with Physical Graffiti, or the Stones pulled off with Exile On Main Street. What they are remembered for is a stunning array of incredible songs and mind boggling live performances, most notable at Live Aid in 1985, a performance that was voted the world’s greatest rock gig in an industry poll in 2005. Freddy had 75 000 people clapping in unison to Radio Ga Ga. It was outrageous.

The musicianship within this band is ridiculous. We all know that Freddie had the voice, with its operatic undertones and the kind of power and range that would make Pavarotti sweat more than usual. He also wrote many of the hits, including Bohemian Rhapsody and Don’t Stop Me Now (only he could have written this song) amongst many others. But let’s have a look at the rest of the chaps, starting with John Deacon, the bass player. George Harrison was the quiet Beatle. Bill Wyman the quiet Rolling Stone. John Deacon was, er, the quiet Queen. A great bass player and multi instrumentalist who also happened to write Another One Bites the Dust, You’re my Best Friend and I Want to Break Free amongst others. He also invented an amplifier used by himself and Brian May, helping to create some of those unique Queen tones. Roger Taylor was not just the drummer, he is also an accomplished singer and wrote Radio Ga Ga, A Kind of Magic and These Are the Days of Our Lives amongst others. As for Brian May, well aside from his PhD in astrophysics, Brian has been known to dabble in guitar godliness (ranked 39 in Rolling Stone Magazine’s 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time), songwriting (Tie Your Mother Down, We Will Rock You and Fat Bottomed Girls – brilliant song title, Brian) and lest we forget that he, with help from his dad, built his own guitar, the legendary Red Special. A guitar he uses to this very day. He also plays using an old six pence coin instead of a plectrum (all the guitarists out there are raising their eyebrows). [Click 'continue reading' for more of this AWESOME review - Seth]

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Sinatra. Ol’ Blue Eyes. The Chairman of the Board. It’s hard to know where to start with Frank Sinatra. There’s the young Frank of the 1940’s, the Oscar winning movie star, The Rat Pack years, with his old pals Sammy Davis, Dean Martin and the boys. Then there’s the manic depression, the equal rights activist and the alleged links to the Mafia. Not forgetting the broads. Ah yes, all the beautiful broads.

The Frank Sinatra I picture in my head is in his mid 40s and up. Always wearing a tux. On stage, microphone in hand, maybe a tumbler of whiskey resting on the grand piano, and ideally a 25 piece big band orchestra behind him. In Vegas, of course. The old Vegas, before “the big corporations took it all over, when the dealers knew your name, what you drank, what you played. Today, it’s like checkin’ into an airport”, as Ace Rothstein ranted at the end of the movie Casino.

Sinatra and Las Vegas go together like whiskey and water. When he died in ’98, the city honoured him by dimming the lights on the strip. This new compilation, Sinatra – Best of Vegas, has 17 tracks recorded at the Sands, Caesars Palace, and the Golden Nugget between ‘61 and ‘87.

The first group of tracks was recorded at the Sands during November of 1961. This is Sinatra in his mid 40s at the height of his powers, cocky and self-assured, throwing little chirps in between lyrics and clowning around a little. But this doesn’t detract from the genius of his vocal delivery and song interpretation. Moonlight in Vermont is a smoky introspective number, hypnotic in its subtleties and orchestral arrangement. The crowd is spellbound. In the middle of singing, “Evening summer breeze…” Franks suddenly says “God damn boy I tell ya!” The crowd laughs, before being put straight back under as Frank immediately returns to his vocal master class. He’s basically toying with them. Later, at the beginning of The Lady is a Tramp, he’s obviously taking a sip of his drink: “Jack Daniels.” [a ripple of laughter]. “That’s what it is”.

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Not many true guitar gods have walked this earth. In the hands of these rare beings, the guitar is more than a six stringed musical instrument; it is a source of immense power, a weapon of mass destruction, a light saber, the most magical of wands, capable of removing a groupy’s panties with a single note.

To be a guitar god, you have to be a lead guitarist. You have to be able to rip into a solo that slices through a song like a chainsaw through butter. Ideally you should be able to play a million notes a second, but some are able to sore equally as high with half as many notes. Clapton, Page and Hendrix spring to mind. In some ways these ones are the most special. They’re the ones that really make the guitar speak a language that we all understand, but don’t understand why. Speed demons like Van Halen, Randy Rhodes, Slash and Hammett boggle the mind; the aforementioned boggle the heart.

Guitar gods are what fighter pilots are to aviators. Bass players will always claim that the bass guitar is “cooler”, but deep down inside they know they’re just flying cargo planes, while the lead guitarists are pulling 3G inverted dives and vertical take-offs in their F14 Tomcats. Only the fighter pilots have a shot at being the Top Gun. It’s the same with lead guitarists. And let’s not even get into the fact that these men are caressing large phallic objects protruding from their crotches…

Other prerequisites of being a guitar god are that you have to have a repressed childhood, ideally with few social skills as a teenager, brought on by debilitating acne or late development, thus making practicing the guitar in your bedroom the most attractive means of killing time.

They’ve just released a compilation album called Gods of Guitar. On it you’ll find Keith Richards (Stones), Paul Kossoff (Free), Richy Blackmore (Deep Purple), Eric Clapton (Cream and Derek & The Dominoes), John Frusciante (Chilli Peppers), Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age) amongst others, making sweet love to their fret boards.

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There was a time when hip hop was the only music with any credibility. It was during the honeymoon period of the Hip hop culture, like the one punk went through in the seventies, when it sprung out of the ghetto like a flower through a crack in the sidewalk. It was un-contrived, real, authentic, existing for no rational reason, it just happened, inexplicably and with great force. It’s like when a super-hero is created by a chance accident at a nuclear reactor or from a spider bite. Hip hop was created by a chance accident involving urban youths, rhythm, spoken word, boredom, an urgent need to create music without the means or know-how to learn an instrument, and, of course, two turntables and a microphone.

Like all revolutionary musical genres, it was dismissed as a fad and completely misunderstood by old people. The rock establishment were shocked when rap music got its very own category at the Grammies in the early nineties. Today, rock music is lucky to get a mention.

In the early days of hip hop; the thought of a white boy trying to be a rapper was as far fetched as a black guy becoming President. Vanilla Ice may have thought it was safe to jump in, but he was sadly mistaken. This made rap even more irresistible to scores of suburban white kids. It was playing hard to get, which made it the coolest thing out there. The more removed from the white picket fenced, leafy suburbs, the better. Heavy Metal? Forget it kids, it’s over. Get a haircut and some baggy clothes and crank up the beats. Sure you’re gonna look like a wannabe, but what are the alternatives?

Today, shit has changed big time. One of the top ten rappers of all time is a skinny white boy and the President is a black dude. Rap is not the pure urban art form it once was, and has been bastardised and blinged up to within an inch of its life, but there’s clearly some awesome music out there and hip hop culture is alive and well. The white kids have been aloud to come out and play too. Which brings us to Travis Barker, whose more than just another white kid with hip hop aspirations; he is in fact the drummer from goofy pop punk rockers, Blink-182.

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I’m lucky in that I am not told what album to review each month. I can choose. But this is a double-edged sword. Because life is short I generally try to review something that is actually enjoyable, rather than wasting time listening to music that drains me of the will to carry on and then telling the world about it. So a lot of time is spent unearthing a newish release of the requisite quality.

Nothing was capturing my imagination this month. I want to do a piece on Jack Parow, but first I want to really get to grips with it (I can barely speak a word of Afrikaans which doesn’t help) and time is short this month so I am going to get to it another time. I was bitching to the TBG (sorry to be such a name dropper) about this. He happened to mention Florence + the Machine’s album. I had skimmed over this last year but not really given it much thought, and another buddy had mentioned that it was chick’s music, which sealed my indifference.

Between Two Lungs by Florence + The Machine

But as many of 2oceansvibe readers know, when the TBG bequeaths a magical pearl of wisdom unto you, let alone glances your way, you take notice. Plus, as I write this it’s his birthday, so every word he utters on this special day is a blessed universal truth that holds even more gravitas than usual, if that’s even possible.

He casually mentioned that he really enjoyed their album. He acknowledged that it is chick’s music but then followed that statement up with the words,

“But I dig it.”

I basked in the glow of his oracular wisdom for a moment before literally diving for a special edition of Florence + the Machine’s debut album, Lungs – called Between Two Lungs – a new two-disc version with extra remixes and some live tracks from the iTunes Festival in ’10. I frantically unwrapped the album and force-fed my laptop with the TBG-approved CD.

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Dear Nelly,

I remember when I first laid eyes on you. It was in the video for Turn Off the Light. I was just one of the guys at the time, not really taking any notice of the pop tarts on the scene – Britney, Christina, Kylie and the rest. But there was something different about you. Pretty, but still approachable. All those bubblegum blondes looked so disposable next to you with your olive skin, green eyes and black hair. But it was the song that truly made you the belle of the ball. It was pop, but it had an edge. It had elements of hip-hop, a touch of rootsy acoustic guitar, and some electronica. Most of all it was the way your voice cut through: “They say that girl you know she act so rough rough rough, well it’s till’ I turn off the light, turn off the light, and I say follow me follow me follow me down down down down, till’ you see all my dreams, not everything in this magical world is quite what it seems.”

That is so true Nelly! Nothing in this world is quite as it seems. And when you say you’re like a bird and you want to fly away I totally agree. You are JUST like a bird. I seem to remember that was your breakthrough hit, before Turn Off the Light. In the video for I’m Like A Bird you were laying in a field and then all your friends lifted you up above their heads and stuff, because you’re special, and when someone’s special, other people don’t mind lifting them up above their heads. When someone thinks they’re special, people will tend to “accidentally” drop them, but not you. You’re the real deal and everybody knows it. If you did a stage dive, the audience would definitely NOT part ways like they did for Courtney Love that one time.

Then your second album, Folklore, came out and you started exploring other sounds and instruments. Only you could get away with putting a banjo in your music, like you did with that song Powerless (Say What You Want). You must be the first Latino girl that’s ever been in the same room as a banjo, let alone put one in your song. And that’s another thing I really like about you – you don’t limit yourself.

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When you go and see U2 in concert you expect a religious experience of some kind. And why wouldn’t you? God is on lead vocals after all. And the price of the ticket leads you to believe He’s going to pay you some special attention, forgive you for your sins and send you on your way to begin a new life as a more enlightened individual. You expect too much. It’s all Bono’s fault of course. He puts himself on a pedestal alongside Popes, Presidents and Dalai Lamas, none of whom have anything to do with music.

To make matters worse, my friend and I decided that being a “rock concert” of epic proportions, the whole experience would be enhanced by sparking up a naughty cigarette. The woman sitting next to me immediately shrieked in my ear, righteously instructing me to put it out at once. Then the girl behind tapped me on the shoulder and wagged her finger at me. This kind of lowered the tone of the evening a little bit. Because we were seated I couldn’t get away from these morons – I was stuck with them for the entire show. I never dreamt that in my lifetime I would go to a gig and be told how to behave by a woman old enough to be my mother. Surely this goes against everything that Rock n’ Roll stands for? Sure, you can attempt to impose your draconian values on me any time, but not while I’m in church, trying to worship Bono. I felt like she’d come into my house and lifted her leg on my favourite LPs.

After this minor incident, the Greenpoint stadium started feeling less like a cathedral of Rock and more like a giant Walmart selling an expertly packaged product called U2. When they played I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For, Bono was a little quick to quieten the band down and let the crowd sing. It didn’t feel spontaneous; it felt like something they do at every show, his eyes closed in feigned pleasure. To be fair, I was in a pretty bad mood by this point. I can’t help feeling that had I been watching from down on the floor I may have had a very different perspective, taking the whole thing with a pinch of salt and allowing myself to be entertained. I have never enjoyed a concert while sitting down. It’s magical down there in the standing area. The sound is better, the atmosphere is better, and the band is playing to you, not the half-hearted old farts up in the stands who are out for a bit of a show, but not at the expense of their comfort and convenience.

So U2 was a little confusing. Which is why Pearl Jam’s new live album came as a welcome antidote. There are no seats at Pearl Jam concerts. There are no old women monitoring your behaviour. There are no dramatic speeches or crying fans being pulled up on stage for a “life changing moment” in the arms of the lead singer. It’s pretty rough and ready and straight down the line. And because Pearl Jam haven’t stopped touring since the early 90s, their live performances have acquired a kind of cult/mythical status, similar to The Grateful Dead, who toured America performing to Deadheads for decades.

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Although I didn’t know it at the time, all my friends at school in England were way cooler than me. I was listening to Led Zeppelin, Nirvana, Guns n’ Roses, Blind Melon and the Peppers while they were into the Acid Jazz scene that was considered extremely hip in England at the time.

But I wasn’t strictly hard rock and grunge. I also wanted to be seen as cool so I used to go with my friends and check out live acts playing in a tiny venue called The Penny Theatre. Bands like the Brand New Heavies, Galliano and Jamiroquai, all of whom went on to become successful but none more so than Jay Kay and his crew. The night we saw them I’m not sure they even had a record deal yet. Without wishing to incriminate anyone, my friend (allegedly) purchased some of that stuff you smoke – similar to tobacco but greener and more effective – from the man himself. That is (allegedly) a true story. That cheeky little chappy on the microphone who is now a huge star was doing what he had to do to make ends meet.

Of all the bands from the scene, Jamiroquai were the best. It was exciting when their first album Emergency on Planet Earth came out – we felt like they were our band because we had seen them in a little theatre down the road and also because we got high on their supply. At 16, that pretty much made you a god.

That first album ended up going platinum in the UK and from that point on Jamiroquai were never quite as cool as they were that night in The Penny Theatre playing to 200 people. They went from zero to hero so quickly that they never had time to be thought of as “fashionable”. A blessing in disguise for bands, because if you’re ever in fashion, then some day you’re also going to be out of it. Instead you become fashion-proof like Sade or AC/DC, who appear out of nowhere every five to ten years and sell millions and millions of records.

Another requirement for this style of success is that your sound doesn’t alter too much over the years. Whilst Jamiroquai have flirted with disco and even rockier sounds over the years, there’s no mistaking who they are when you hear one of their songs on the radio.

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Great song lyrics are almost impossible to master. And that’s before they’ve even been weaved into a perfect melody. When the two come together it’s alchemy. Some songwriters only manage it once in their lifetimes. We have a name for them. Hands up who knows what it is.

Writing a great lyric seems like it should be so simple, like poetry except dumber. I mean, who couldn’t write: “I woke up this morning, smiled at the rising sun, three little birds, sat on my doorstep, singing sweet songs…”

The answer is nobody. Nobody except Bob Marley, one morning in Kingston Town, who for a brief moment managed to capture perfect happiness, bottle it up and put it in a song.

Some musicians instinctively know that although they’ve got melodies on tap, the lyrics are best left to someone else. Elton John has never written a single word, leaving it up to his writing partner Bernie Taupin who penned nearly all of the classics. Lyrics are a huge responsibility and just one wrong move, one brief flirtation with schmaltz, can bring a song to its knees.

Which is why it makes sense that Ben Folds should entrust lyric writing duties to the novelist Nick Hornby. Many of his novels are informed by a deep love of music, the most famous of which being the music geek classic, High Fidelity, which later became a movie starring John Cusack. He also once said that he only writes books because he doesn’t know how to write songs, so this is his chance to get involved in the elusive songwriting process.

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The thing about music, or any art form, or anything that human beings do for that matter, from inventing something to being nice to strangers, is that it has an effect on the quality of our lives. If someone does something brilliant, like ending world poverty, or serving a beer at the perfect temperature, they are in some way making the world a better place.

If you were a hippy, you could put it down to simply putting out good vibes. On the other hand, you could get more specific and say that by doing something excellent, you are furthering the cause of humanity by adding quality to lives and in turn inspiring people to also do something excellent.

This is why bad music should not be taken lightly. If we let people get away with it, then other people may start believing that it’s okay to have zero talent and not bother trying to do excellent things. If we don’t watch ourselves, the standards of the world will drop even lower than they already are and we will start devolving – that’s right, I’m talking about humans getting stupider and the world going backwards. Are you listening Paris? Any more flirtations with music (or any form of entertainment for that matter) will be dealt with in a zero-tolerance manner. Not quite sure what “zero-tolerance” implies exactly. Murder is clearly over the top. Any suggestions are welcome. Confiscate her Bentley? Something unbearable.

The Black Keys are the kind of band whose existence makes the world a better place. They are influenced by Hendrix, The Doors and Led Zeppelin, as well as the original Chicago bluesmen like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf and the old time delta bluesmen like Robert Johnson and Lightnin’ Hopkins. All of these musicians shaped modern music in some way. They all attempted do something magical and thankfully they all had the God given talent to pull it off.

This is the Black Keys’ sixth album. They’re the kind of band that many people are glad to have around, but this hasn’t necessarily translated into cementing them into our collective conscience in the same way, say, The White Stripes have been. Some people compare the two and say The Black Keys wouldn’t exist without The White Stripes, but the fact is they’ve been around for just as long and it’s clear they would be making their music whether their counterparts existed or not. Follow link for more.

Lets just deal with the name first. Mumford & Sons. Not ideal, if you’re trying to be cool that is. There are bands out there with names like Jane’s Addiction, Primal Scream and, of course, The Rolling Stones. Just plain cool. In fact, if there’s one thing the Stones had over the Beatles, it was their name. The Beetles would have been better, but they had to get playful and incorporate the word “beat” into their name. Naughty guys, very naughty. You were young and you thought you were being clever, but no one loves a pun. I guess you made up for it though.

But Mumford & Sons? That’s a lot to make up for. I’m not even sure that John, Paul and the boys could do enough to distract us from that incredibly dorky name. I’ve seen it being mentioned in various music magazines and have sub-consciously just ignored the band. But then I started hearing that they were getting a reputation for incredible live shows with a kind of party atmosphere where everybody just lets loose.

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I am in a state of shock as I write this. I was just trying to remind myself when the Killer’s debut album, Hot Fuss, was released and Wikipedia told me it was 2004! As in nearly seven years ago. I dared Wiki to try lying to me one more time but it promised me it was telling the truth. “Why would I lie?” it asked. I had no good answer.

Occasionally, when I’m not rocking out to AC/DC, I look around and realise that there’s more to life than three-chord, blues based hard rock. There are also bands that don’t seem to conform to any particular genre, bands that invade our collective consciousness through their sheer force of creativity – their sounds so fresh and untainted by record executives and accountants – bands like the Pixies, The Cure, Nirvana, the Velvet Underground and the Ramones.

Nearly all groups start out dreaming of making it big with music as pure as this. It happens extremely rarely though. They are forever getting signed on the condition that they drop their drummer, change their name, re-write their songs or basically do what ever they’re told in exchange for a record deal. On a good day, popular music is a world of compromise. On a bad day it’s a world of selling your soul to the devil.

Arcade Fire’s new album – “The Suburbs”

Occasionally though, you get these groups that sprout up, seemingly from nowhere. They start out in small, obscure towns and develop a following – a small group of devoted fans that realise they’ve got something special to call their own. Sometimes a “scene” emerges and other bands join in, making music in the same spirit as their counterparts. But there’s always one group that truly defines them all.

By the time the record companies cotton on, the groups in question are way past the point of being told what to do. You think the Ramones were open to suggestions? They’d basically invented their own style of music which people were already religiously devoted to.

And so, we have albums like the Pixies’ Surfer Rosa with tracks like “Where is My Mind?” proving that while the world isn’t perfect, it does have its moments.

The song “Wake Up” from Arcade Fire’s album “Funeral” is up there. “No Cars Go” from Neon Bible is another one. Like all the groups mentioned above, Arcade Fire don’t sound like anyone else. Their songs are epic and exuberant, yet the lyrics are confessional and intimate. There’s nothing restrained about their performances either, it’s like: grab the nearest instrument and play it until it falls apart.

That “difficult second album” syndrome that affects so many lauded bands (the Killers?) did not apply to Arcade Fire. The third album doesn’t flinch either.

The Suburbs is like an observation of the world that suburban kids grow up in. (Rock n’ Roll 101: rock music was invented as a means of rebelling against the mundanity of suburban living) The title track has lyrics like, “All the houses they built in the 70’s finally fall; it meant nothing at all.” So, basically that world that Kevin Arnold grew up in in the Wonder Years doesn’t exist anymore. But don’t worry Kevin, Arcade Fire are here to help.

This band isn’t wallowing in self-imposed alienation or peddling misery to emo-kids. If anything, it’s telling those negative types to snap out of it. Check out this lyric in the song Month of May:

The kids are all standing with their arms folded tight…
Well I know it’s heavy, I know it ain’t light,
But how you gonna lift it with your arms folded tight?

At the same time as telling the world to let go, The Suburbs feels a little more studied, more crafted than the previous two. It all fits together to form a complete album that you can put on and leave on for days. You won’t necessarily be skipping forward to your favourite tracks. It’s crazy for me to try and intellectualise this music. It’s too overflowing with awesomeness for that. These guys have an over abundance of inspiration and imagination and I urge you to get this album and play it repeatedly – for your own sanity!

*Check out their new music video which is taking the internet by storm here.

A lot of people get quite angry with Keane, especially in England where they hate the fact that they went to private schools and the fact that lead singer Tom Chaplin’s cheeks are too rosy and he seems like a bit of a choir boy – despite upping his rock n’ roll credentials with a stint in rehab for drugs and booze a couple of years ago.

Maybe the biggest gripe with Keane, however, is the irresistible nature of their soaring melodies – there’s nothing worse than catching yourself belting out a chorus line from a band you’ve decided to hate. Everybody knows the hits from their debut, Hopes and Fears – Somewhere Only We Know and Everybody’s Changing. No matter how you slice it, those are some fine tracks.

Music snobs are the worst! They just don’t get it. Good music can come from anywhere – from a rare piece of vinyl in a basement NY record store/hipster hangout, to the “most played list” on MTV. I remember having a really drawn out argument with some American girl in London, around the time that the Strokes had gone huge with Is This It. She had a problem with the Strokes being too hip or too hyped or something, and insisted that their music sucked. Maybe they were a bunch of spoiled Manhattan rich kids pretending to be the Stooges, but that didn’t stop the songs from being perfectly formed little nuggets of rock n’ roll mastery. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot of crap music out there, but people who consider themselves to be “into music” get snooty when they deem it to be too mainstream, too light or not gritty enough to satisfy their tragically hip souls. Hit Me Baby One More Time? Absolute corker. Fact.

[Here here! - Seth]

Keane have sold 10 million albums so far. Their previous release, Perfect Symmetry, didn’t get the recognition it deserved. It had a more hard edges sound and coupled with Chaplin’s darker, post-rehab subject matter, the album was a far weightier proposition than its predecessors. Give it a listen if you have a chance.

This new one is like one of those quick “in-between” mini albums that bands like to make. Like when U2 did Zooropa and Radiohead did Kid A. Both those albums came quickly after their previous full-length extravaganzas and both were quite experimental and different. That’s what Keane are doing with Night Train, except this isn’t an offbeat art project, if anything; many of the tracks are surprisingly poptastic. They’ve even got a rapper on two tracks. All sounds potentially a bit Flight of the Concords, except not intentionally funny, but Keane wear it lightly – it’s a bit of experimentation and who cares? It’s just a quick mini album, written and recorded at various locations around the world whilst on tour.

There’s nothing in the least bit fluffy about the start of Night Train. It’s a bit like an electro-pop version of the start of Hell’s Bells by ACDC. Then it kicks in nicely to a sick tune called Back In Time. It’s got a tinge of 80’s Duran Duran about it and it works well for this band’s sense of melody and Tom Chaplin’s incredible pipes.

Stop For A Minute features that rapper I mentioned earlier. At the time of recording, K’Naan was a little-known Somalian born Canadian rapper, but since then has become quite famous for Wavin’ Your Flag – the Coca Cola World Cup anthem. Stop For A Minute (which I believe was released as a single a couple of months ago) has one of those typically huge choruses that Keane are so good at. This is very much a pop song – maybe if it had been released after the WC, it would have been one of those monster smash hits that the whole world just goes crazy for. It sounds like one of those tunes to me. It’s a great uplifting pop song.

Elsewhere on Night Train we hear Keane indulging in a little melancholy (My Shadow) and further experiments in electro-pop. This isn’t necessarily the most consistent album stylistically, it’s more like the sound of a band deciding where to go next, which is exactly what makes it a great listen. It’s like they’ve just decided to take the pressure off and loosen up. All the songs have one thing in common: they go somewhere. They all have a start, middle and an end, which keeps you listening. Even if you’re a hardcore Rammstein fan, there’s always room in your life for some well-crafted melodic pop songs. They’re harder to master than people imagine.

I was born and raised on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii. At 17 I was the youngest invitee to make the finals at the Pipeline Masters. A week later my career as a pro surfer ended when an accident at the Pipeline put 150 stitches in my head. So, I turned to music and have since released 5 albums, selling over 8 million records to date. In my downtime I direct and star in surf movies. I give most of the profit from my tours to charities. I also do cool stuff like record my albums using nothing but solar power…

Hawaii’s North Shore – it’s fine..

Oh, sorry, you caught me daydreaming that I was Jack Johnson for a minute there. Yep, Jack’s back with another collection of tunes that are annoyingly hard to dislike. In fact, the same can be said about Jack Johnson himself. If he rattled out his CV like that in real life, you’d have every right to assume that old Jacky boy was a bit chuffed with his lot, sun radiating from his ass as perfectly formed miniature Pipeline barrels shoot out of his main chap. But oh no, not Jack, he may be an over-achiever, but he also leads a humble life, making the most of his good fortune to be a force for good in the world. This man is basically the exact opposite of Cristiano Ronaldo.

Critics of his music say that it’s all a bit middle-of-the-road. Many reviews categorise it as “soft rock”. I’m sure there’s not a band in the world that would categorise their music as soft rock, including Jack Johnson, who to my mind holds a pretty unique position in the music spectrum. It’s not edgy, it’s not controversial and it doesn’t make you want to stake your claim as the rightful owner of the dance floor. No, Jack Johnson sounds good at braais, or when the sun is setting at the end of a perfect summer’s day, or when your head is hurting on a Sunday morning. It tells you to try entertaining some positive thinking and to try not be such a greedy, materialistic, selfish tool the whole time. This music may work well in the background, but then, so does Bob Marley – and no one has more cred than the king of reggae himself.

Jack Johnson’s “To The Sea”

Jack pretty much sticks to his usual formula in his latest release, To the Sea. The songs contain their usual little pearls of wisdom, enhanced of course by the blissed-out melodies that have a way of flowing out of the speakers and filling the room with an indefinable warmth. The production is ever so slightly more edgy than on previous releases, with electric guitars featuring far more heavily than before – there’s a cool little guitar solo on title track, To the Sea.

No Good With Faces is a melancholic number with Jack proclaiming that he’s “too tired to try”, then giving himself a good talking to in the chorus with the lines, “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves now, there’s no need for rain, it’s our own parade, let’s not be afraid of our reflections…” There’s more emotional depth to this album, which may have something to do with the passing of his father, to whom the album is dedicated. This may be Jack Johnson’s greatest achievement – he maintains an endearing vulnerability. Such as in the paranoid outburst At Or With Me – “Are they laughing at or with me… Is there something telling you, you can’t trust anyone in this town”.

You have to admire the way this guy knows his strengths. He knows his music is not going to rock your socks off, but he also knows that sometimes you want to keep your socks on, put your feet up and chill the hell out. Sometimes it’s best just to “stop upsetting yourself, upsetting your thoughts, upsetting this world that you’re standing on”. Thanks Jack, that’s not bad advice. I give this album 4 stars out of 5 for being great at what it does. But also because I secretly want to be Jack Johnson.

It takes a recessionista’s ear to appreciate the genius of Meat Loaf.

Meat Loaf has never been everyone’s cup of tea. Apart from one time in the late 70’s when Bat Out of Hell sold 48 million copies. Ok so yes, Meat Loaf was once everyone’s cup of tea, but that was before most of us were born.

Bat Out of Hell was an impossible act to follow. Meat has tried his very best throughout the 80’s, 90’s and double zeros (I refuse to say noughties) but has failed to reach the heady heights of Bat Out of Hell, partly due to the music itself (“I would do anything for love, but I won’t do that” – but Meat, I thought you said you’d do ANYTHING?!) and partly due to an interesting phenomenon. Bear with me:

In the late 70’s and early 80’s the world was in a terrible recession – everyone was poor and miserable. When times are tough, the last thing anyone wants is the boy next door singing sweet love songs.

Outrageous, OTT, melodramatic, outlandish Rock n’ Roll is what you want. Those dark days spawned too many Gods of Rock to mention, but also the likes of David Bowie, Iron Maiden, Prince and Cindi Lauper. None of these artists could ever be accused of being middle of the road.

Meat Loaf’s New Album: “Hang Cool Teddy Bear”

Then the world got rich, and the music got sensible. I guess if people aren’t spending their days wondering how they’re going to pay the mortgage, there’s less of a need for escapism. People just want a nice soundtrack to their fabulous lives. Stuff like Dire Straits, Phil Collins and Chris DeBurgh – men in suits fiddling around with drum kits and electric guitars. Some of them are good musicians, but none were aiming for the stratosphere.

Then in the 90’s the world continued getting richer so we got The Dave Mathews Band and Hootie & the Blowfish – college kids dressed in T-shirts and jeans. (Sure, I’m skirting around some pretty awesome bands in order to make my point, but do you see where I’m going with this?) In the double zeros, the world got even richer, and we all settled down to a spot of Jack Johnson.

The only meat loaf being consumed was at your granny’s place for Sunday lunch. Then all of a sudden, the world got really poor again. And look what’s happening. Now things are getting crazy again. Lady Ga Ga springs to mind. Adam Lambert came 2^nd in American Idol. The winner, who’s name I can’t remember, was a pleasant chap who any young lady would be more than happy to take home to mommy. But we don’t want that guy anymore. We’re poor and miserable. We want the guy in eyeliner who will melt your face off with a scream that can be heard in the depths of Hell.

Welcome back Mr. Loaf, we’ve been expecting you. I have never been the biggest fan, but how can an album entitled Hang Cool Teddy Bear possibly be a failure? I don’t care what it means, it’s just cool.

Meat is trying something different here. He still sings like his life depended on it and it’s still as mad as ever but the overall sound has been updated – the album’s produced by Rob Cavallo of Green Day fame.

Cleverly titled single Los Angeloser is the story of a guy who is, well, a loser, with a rich older girlfriend. It’s a mutually beneficial arrangement: I’m just a white boy/ I play the guitar/ I put my pants on/ I drive a shit car/ Up into the valley/ To see my girlfriend/ She’s got a big couch/ She got a Mercedes Benz”.

Then there’s Living on the Outside: “I got my mama’s smile and my daddy’s gun/ You got your honest face & your liars tongue”. There are loads of characters and stories in this album – the kids who want to escape their one-horse towns and take their chances, not in pursuit of the American Dream though, they already know that’s a crock – they just want to be “Livin’ like the only sinners left alive”. Then there’s the guy who’s got nothing going for him other than the size of his manhood. That song’s called California Isn’t Big Enough. Good humour. In fact, a lot of this album is just a riot to listen to.

There’s also an all star cast, including Jack Black, Brian May, American Idols judge: Kara Dioguardi and strangely, Hugh Laurie (of House fame) playing the piano on the Dioguardi penned song: If I Can’t Have You. Everyone is clearly having a blast participating in a balls to the wall album that’s one part insane, one part hilarious and one part just plain over the top. That’s pretty much exactly what the world needs right now.

So, if you want to forget about your worries for a while, crank Hang Cool Teddy Bear up to 11, kick back and listen to this crazy old dude having a late-career triumph.