Get dressed! You’re about to be blessed with the best of the rest…in a vest…etc…

Most Controversial Review

JLS – ‘The Club Is Alive’

Y’know, I still don’t really get what all the fuss was about with liking this song. It’s clearly better than ‘One Shot’ or the Children In Need one they did (which came with its own comment storm), and even though it suffers from excessive autotune the tune it actually autos is a rather good one. Naturally, just shrugging and saying “ah well, horses for courses” was never gonna wash with the ChartBlog massive.

Key quote: “If the band are in the middle of doing what they do, and you, the audience, are concentrating on the words they’re saying over, say, how they look, what muscles are flexing, which way up Aston is, the beat, the music, the clothes, the bagginess of Ortise’s trousers, the hair, the teeth, the twinkly eyes, the voices, or what the song is saying even if the words are not, chances are you’re not really JLS’s core demographic.”

The weird thing is how long the reaction to this one opinion has continued to rumble on, really. I think the idea is that if you like something that someone else doesn’t like, then this exposes your soft underbelly, ready for spearing. But if you fail to like something that someone does like, then you’re cruel. How this theory has continued to thrive in an era of hateful YouTube comments and snarky Twitter feeds is beyond me, but there it is.

Plus that “hey!”, the one that pushed it from a 4-star to a 5-star review, is STILL brilliant. So ner.

Bubbling Under: Paramore – ‘Misery Business’ HOO-BOY!

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Most Successful Meeting of Minds

A Very Entertaining Chat With The Hoosiers…

If there’s anything we can learn from this marvellous interview it’s that it’s always a good idea – should you be lucky enough to interview a pop band – to call the singer a dwarf within seconds of the interview starting. It won’t work for everyone (waves to Kelly Jones), but the rewards are more than worth the price you have to pay to get them.

Bubbling Under: Los Campesinos! – Their Favourite Interview EVER

We Are Scientists – Bleeding-Heart Liberals, And Their Exploding Drum Carpet

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Mystic Meg Award For Predicting The Future

Wild Beasts – Bewilderbeasts

I don’t ever really try and predict whether things will be big hits or not. It’s not really for me to say, democracy being a strange beast that seems to explode in many different directions at once. And besides, just because one song sells more than another, it doesn’t mean it’ll make any more sense to you, the listener.

That said, I was pleased when, having written a big confused rant about why I kept listening to this early song by Wild Beasts when there were other, more poppy things to be getting on with, they then went on, a couple of years (and albums) later, to be quite popular, and Mercury nominated.

Quite why ‘Atlas’ by Battles wasn’t at No.1 for 10 weeks straight remains a total mystery, however.

Bubbling under: An Alternative Top 5

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Best Remix

Lost in Translation

It’s a simple premise. You take a song’s lyrics, use an online translator to convert them into a foreign language, then use the same translator to bring them back. Something gets interfered with along the way, and all sense is lost. LOST!

Bubbling Under: Important Moments In Pop History – The Saturdays Get Their Name

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Most Let Down By The Passage Of Time

Ringtone From Hell Generator – Glamorous

Remember polyphonic ringtones? Remember how they were a version of modern pop songs but always sounded awful and robotic, like Will.I.Am without the astonishing quality control? Well we made our own, and it was also awful. Trouble is, nobody has polyphonic ringtones any more. And quite right too!

Bubbling under: Fun With Press Releases

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Best Joke

A Peek Behind The Curtain…

Me and Steve ChartBlog were having a conversation one day about ‘All These Things That I’ve Done’ by the Killers, and thinking of other ways you could’ve written that like “I’ve got soul but I’m not a soldier”. We batted them about for a while, laughed a lot, I wrote them up for the blog, everything was hunky dory.

THEN, Bill Bailey started doing the SAME JOKE as part of his stand-up act. I’m not saying it’s cause and effect, because clearly anyone could’ve come up with the same idea. But the fact that it’s now been used by a professional comedian means it’s empirically the best joke on ChartBlog.

Bubbling Under: Armband Van Halen

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Best Pun

How To Destroy…McFly

Come on, MCFLY SPRAY!! *highfive*

Bubbling Under: Edgy Soldiers

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Best Use of Onomatopoeia

Dizzee Rascal – Bonkers

I love it when a pop song is thrilling and brilliant and stupid and clever all at the same time, and even though ‘Bonkers’ ran out of lyrics halfway through, it remains exactly that kind of song. Dizzee himself may have gone on to make less-enthralling songs, but so long as he’s never too far from a man with a deep voice going “BONKBONKBONKBONKBONKBONKBONKBONK”, he’ll always be forgiven in my house.

Key Quote: “The way he shouts “I let sanity give me the slip” so it sounds for all the world like “I let Sunny E give me the slip”. Sunny E presumably being an even more artificial version of Sunny D. “

Bubbling Under: Mark Ronson and the Business Intl. ft. Q-Tip & MNDR – ‘Bang Bang Bang’

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Most Damning Review

Scouting For Girls – ‘Famous’

There’s no trick to writing nasty things about people and their hard work. In fact it’s really, really easy to do. You just subtract fairness, add imperiousness and have at it. It doesn’t make it a desirable thing to do. But sometimes, when you’re being prodded in the chest by a song that clearly wants you to fight it, or it will hurt you, you’ve got to be able to defend your fragile inner self from torment. Or, in the case of Scouting For Girls, point out how incredibly rude it is to write a song slamming the modern obession with celebrity, when you’re the singer in a pop band.

Bubbling Under: Black Eyed Peas – ‘The Time (Dirty Bit)’

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And finally…here’s where we came in. My head on a superhero.

The Art of Naming A Blog

So that’s that. The real final end of this thing. Thanks again to everyone ever, especially those pop stars and their (sometimes) astonishing music.

You’ve been great, I’ve had my moments…TATTY BYE!

Fraser

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

The ChartBlog Awards – Part 2 is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

As promised, here’s a brief stone-skip over some of the better moments of ChartBlog’s four years of glory.

Some of these have been nominated by ChartBlog readers on Twitter. Feel free to nominate your own in the usual place.

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Most Ridiculous Froth-On

The Ting Tings – ‘That’s Not My Name’

The best song to have been released in ChartBlog’s lifetime. Yes it is. Yes it is.

Key Quote: “Stop all the clocks. Everybody put your guitars, synths, drum machines and microphones down. There’s no need to put any more music out in 2008, the race to have the Most Bestest Song Of The Year In The Whole World Ever has already been won, and if you continue to take part, you’ll be lapped more times than a lone saucer of milk in Catland. “

Bubbling Under: My Chemical Romance – ‘Sing’

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Best Soundtrack

A hotly-contested award this one. So hot, in fact, that we’ve had to split it between two equally astonishing winners.

First there was the cover version ChartBlog commissioned of the Klaxons song ‘Gravity’s Rainbow’, as performed by the Central Band of the Royal British Legion.

New Rave, Meet Old Dave

Apparently the band themselves were so taken with it that they used it as introduction music for a couple of gigs, and the Central Band themselves ended up playing at an MTV party. All because of one daft idea (mine), executed brilliantly (by them).

Smile, It’s Radiohead!

When Radiohead were doing their whole ‘honesty box’ thing, allowing people to pay what they wanted for their album ‘In Rainbows’, they also pioneered the concept of allowing assets from their songs to be released for remix purposes. They even set up a competition for people to remix the song ‘Numb’. So that is what I did. Didn’t win, of course.

Their song is sad, my remix is NOT SAD.

Bubbling Under: Delays and their ChartBlog song.

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Least Successful Meeting of Minds

McFly interview – When Harrassed Met Harry

Poor ChartBlog Hazel. So smitten was she with Harry McFly’s startling beauty that she entirely lost her grip on what she was supposed to be doing, while she was supposed to be interviewing him about stuff. The ensuing interview, while it was not as bad as she claimed at the time, did betray a certain nervous charm, shall we say?

See also: An interview with the lead singer of The Academy Is… about their song ‘We’ve Got A Big Mess On Our Hands’, in which he totally failed to see any connection between the song’s title and actual hands and mess.

And: Trying To Get An Interview With Beth Ditto

Bubbling Under: Five Minutes with Justin Bieber

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Cuckoo Award For Extensive Nesting

Jedward ft. Vanilla Ice – ‘Under Pressure (Ice Ice Baby)’

Behind every great blog, there’s a great community of regular commenters. They read every post, laugh, high-five and generally support everything the bloggers ever say or d-hang on, that can’t be right…

Oh yes, what they do is pick the most preposterous place on the entire blog and build a new community there. It’s like guerilla message boarding, or something. Then they talk to each other about up and coming pop songs, swap reviews, and tease one another, while claiming significant numbers as their own. Now that the parent blog is about to fly the nest, ChartBlog’s own comment-cuckoos are seeking other places to settle, so don’t be surprised if you hear strange noises coming from your attic in a week or two.

PS: To the ChartBlog commenters – only kidding! Love you guys! Mwah!

Bubbling Under: Alexander Rybak – ‘Fairytale’

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Best Pretend Science

Lyriscope – Katy Perry

Ah remember the Lyriscope? What fun that was! Acting out the lyrics to hit songs, and seeing how close to reality they were, or are, or both. I might have to let you into a little secret though. Some of the things that are written about in Lyriscope reports did not really happen. You can probably guess which ones (and if you say “all of them”, there might even be a prize.)

Key quote: Lyric: “The taste of her cherry chapstick…” …is cherry. What is all the fuss about?

Bubbling Under: Lyriscope – Nickelback’s Rock Star

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Best Mission Statement

Everything Everything – ‘Photoshop Handsome’

Some reviews are about the song and nothing but the song. Some are about other things around the song which are more interesting or more relevant to whether it’s a worthwhile purchase or not. And some are about The State of Music In General and how it can only be improved by the song the review is supposed to be about.

Key quote: “I’m not asking this for my sake, or the band’s sake, but for the future of pop music as we know and love it. Let’s make this song a hit, and maybe, just maybe, show *insert name of least favourite pop act here* that there is more to this music lark than turning up half-dressed and pouting suggestively in a photogenic fashion.”

Bubbling Under: Lady Gaga (or GaGa, as I wrongly wrote at the time) – ‘Bad Romance’

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Best Attempt At Satire

Cage Against The Machine – ’4’33″‘

Need I say more?

Bubbling Under: When Is A Sugababe Not A Sugababe?

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Coming Soon: Part 2!

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

The ChartBlog Awards – Part 1 is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

Hello, I have some news.

Over the last four years, it has been my privilege to write daft stuff about songs; songs which have been in the charts, songs which should have been in the charts, and songs which happily fell short of going into the charts. It has been the most fun job I’ve ever had.

And, as is fitting for a blog about the charts, it’s been a hit! We’ve not really talked about it before, possibly because it would’ve been vulgar to crowbar a bit of bragging into a review, but somewhere in the region of five thousand of you smashers have been coming here every day to have a read and a row about pop music. ChartBlog has constantly been in the Top 3 of BBC music blogs, and often in the Top 1. That’s right, NUMBER ONE! WITH A BULLET!

Unfortunately, after all of this larking about, it’s time for me to move on, pack up my idiosyncratic worldview, dismantle the old wry asides, saddle up the Lyriscope and ride off into pop pastures new.

By which I mean I will soon be leaving ChartBlog, to bang on about music for other people, and that means ChartBlog won’t be updated, although it will continue to be archived.

There are some amazing plans for the chart on Radio 1, some really exciting new ideas are on their way, so don’t fret, it’s all going to be alright.

This isn’t even the final ChartBlog post. Over the next few days I’m going to put together a compilation of our greatest hits – best reviews, best interviews, daftest rants – and generally wallow in a bit of nostalgia, partly because I’m a little sad to go*, but mainly as a way of saying thank you.

That’s a thank you to everyone who has written things for the ChartBlog, everyone who has taken the time to roll up their sleeves and comment, and most of all, you. Yes you. You have always been the best.

Come and say hello on the internet if you haven’t already. We can argue about pop music! Again!

You have all been FIVE STARS OUT OF FIVE.

Bye!

Fraser

*On the plus side, it does mean I don’t have to review the new Aggro Santos single. *HIGHFIVE*

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

End of a ChartBlog is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

Look, let’s not mess about. The choice is very clear. Do we want pop music to be thrilling and odd and devious and brainy and joyful and brilliant, or do we want it to be familiar and acceptable and formulaic and stupid and ignorable and…just…THERE as a kind of aural emulsion? Cos I think we all want the former, and if that’s the case, there’s a few things we need to get sorted.

First, when astonishing pop songs come along, we need to make sure they are treated as the precious things they really are, shown a lot of love, bought, taken to the top table of the charts, and handed the keys to the executive bathroom.

Secondly, putting up with things which only work on paper is no longer acceptable. To have a passionate relationship with something means you sometimes have to be let down. Why not admit it? Some songs offer to take you somewhere amazing, and then leave you on the pavement in the rain, throbbing with irk and wanting to hurt it like it has hurt you.

I don’t mean physically, of course, tripping up a pop star just because their third single isn’t quite as good as their second is a little mad. But it’s just as mad to pretend that a song is good just because it’s a hit record. That implies that other songs, songs which are not hits, are not as good.

We can’t allow that idea to prosper, or Everything Everything, a troupe who really should be a global household name by now, might decide that they’re not as wonderful as they clearly are, and give up in the face of continuing public support for *insert name of least favourite pop act here*.

(Here’s the video. It’s surreally good.)

‘Photoshop Handsome’ is a song which has been released before. It did not make the band’s fortune, but it did help turn a few heads, and rightly so. It manages the twin trick of being about something – excessive retouching of pictures so that people don’t really look like people anymore – while being so choc-full of vim and fizz that you can’t really say what is going on. Not without several listens and a chemistry set. I’m not even really sure that it IS about photoshop. I mean it appears to be, but when someone is squeaking and bashing and thrashing away in such an alarming fashion in front of you, interpreting their meaning can be a little tricky.

And that goes double when the thing they’re doing is this amazing, because suddenly I don’t WANT to know what every cough and comma of the song are supposed to be about. I like my interpretation better in any case. They’ve taken the trouble to cram the song with so many brightly-coloured musical treats it has become the sonic equivalent of a full sweetie jar. A full sweetie jar at a jumble sale to raise money for victims of poor photoshopping. That’s basically it.

Being adventurous sorts, the band haven’t spent the last year just sticking out old singles and petulantly demanding respect in any case. They’ve been re-scoring their entire debut album for a string and wind ensemble and using their own music to make their fans cry with joy. That’s the level of thought they put into things, and it’s only matched by their ability to make these ideas fly.

So, come on, I’m not asking this for my sake, or the band’s sake, but for the future of pop music as we know and love it. Let’s make this song a hit, and maybe, just maybe, show *insert name of least favourite pop act here* that there is more to this music lark than turning up half-dressed and pouting suggestively in a photogenic fashion.

Not MUCH more, obv, but still…

Download: Out now

www.everything-everything.co.uk
BBC Music page

(Fraser McAlpine)

There Goes The Fear says: “Wow, this sounds nothing – nothing – like anything I’ve heard before.”

The Sound Medium says: “An upbeat Modest Mousy tune with a pretty bizarre video.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

Everything Everything – ‘Photoshop Handsome’ is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

For someone who is straightforwardly, transparently, a massive talent, Adele’s records aren’t half troublesome at times. Her earliest successes seemed to come coated in a thick layer of brushed-on egg-yolk production (or, more accurately in the case of ‘Chasing Pavements’, a thick layer of Eg White production), to the extent that the raw astonishment of her voice sometimes got buried underneath the swooping avalanche of immaculate perfection.

It was, at times, a bit like watching a tiger in the zoo. You’re perfectly aware that there’s a beast in your presence which is possessed of huge reserves of power and beauty, but something very human and restrictive keeps getting in the way.

The exception to this, obviously, is ‘Make You Feel My Love’: a song which, in its simplicity and power, doesn’t so much free the beast as smash the zoo down; destroy the entire town around it, grow a rain forest, develop an eco-system, release the tiger; and then run for the hills.

The question is, does Adele’s comeback single seek to re-capture that tiger, or send David Attenborough (or Steve Backshall, if you’re more of a CBBC fan) with a camera crew, ready to watch it tear a deer to pieces?

(Bambi, you might want to stop reading around about now.)

(No video. She’s laying something unspeakable bare.)

So, here’s what’s going on. Adele’s looking back over the end of a relationship, and she wants to be perfectly clear that while it is a very sad thing that things have turned out the way they have, she’s not gonna waste her time pining at home. Not when she can castigate her ex for letting everything fall apart. And when you’re being castigated by someone who can sing like this, you STAY castigated.

Best of all, for once, the production is all behind her, emerging in a fan formation like a street gang, ready for a fight. The ghostly harmonies, the propulsive handclaps, the played-with-my-face piano…it’s all there to support that remarkable voice in full flight. And it flies, like, really really high. The chorus alone could exfoliate an entire university, should any students be foolish enough to stick their faces too close.

And it’s clearly the kind of huffy soul strop that matches her no-nonsense personality too. Rather than mimsying around town, wondering what to do with herself, she’s got some poor soul by the knackers and has lifted him off the ground. Who knows, maybe she’s about to dangle him off a bridge.

That’s what you get if you mess with a tiger in the wild.

Download: Out now

www.adele.tv
BBC Music page

PS: Adele! Live Lounge! Incoming!

(Fraser McAlpine)

The Beat Review says: “‘Rolling In The Deep’ is a sign that ’21′ might produce a more adult, contemporary and jazz incorporated with enough soul for our earbuds.”

The Complex Media says: “I’ve been unable to stop playing and singing it (horribly) for days.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

Adele – ‘Rolling In The Deep’ is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

Sometimes, when settling down to listen to a hot new waxing by a world-beating band or singer, it helps to forget that you already know and love songs they’ve done before, or that you have some idea of who they are and what they do. It’s especially helpful to let go of what kind of genre field you assume that they operate within.

In the case of My Chemical Romance, it’s a good idea to put amazing bratty brilliance like ‘Teenagers’ and ‘Na Na Na’ to one side, so you don’t wind up letting the momentum of your approval steamroller all over their new ideas. Nobody wants that, and your taste will always win out in the end anyway.

A useful trick is to imagine listening to the song as if you’re a visitor from an alien planet, attempting to make sense of the bangs and huffs and scrapes, and trying to work out what this human thing called ‘pop’ may or may not be.

Incidentally, I said ‘pop’ and not ‘rock’ for a very good reason. As we are about to find out…

(Here’s the video. It’s the same as the last video, but in cars.)

See, while the band operate within the rock arena, using the outsider myth as a launchpad for who they are, ‘Sing’ is absolutely a pop song. It’s not a pop song in the unhinged, cartoony way that ‘Na Na Na’ was a pop song, either. That’s always been part of the MCR sonic arsenal.

Take away the Mad Max video and everything you know about MCR as a band and it’s not really that big a stretch to imagine this mid-tempo, stately anthem coming out of the gobs of grown-up insider pop acts like Maroon 5 or the Script, is it? OK, not a perfect comparison, but not that far off either.

And hell, if Matt Cardle can cover Biffy Clyro and, without dramatically changing the structure of the song, still make it sound like The X Factor Winner’s First Single, it’s becoming clear that the boundaries between that which is pop and that which is rock are becoming riddled with more holes than a teabag’s string vest.

In fact, it’s only Gerard Way’s customary finger-pointing list of people he would like to pay attention to his song – “the deaf”, “the blind”, “the ones that’ll hate your guts” etc – that mark this out as a particularly My Chemical Romance sort of a song. The rest of it, from the moody piano/funky drummer introduction to the swirling dark synth at the end, is pure Radio 2. I guess it’s only a startling revelation because the chuntery guitars have been toned down for once, but still…

That’s why it’s sometimes best to come at these things with a fresh mind, cos I’d be tempted to love it more, if the sonic evidence that this isn’t really my sort of a thing wasn’t quite so overwhelming.

Download: Out now

www.mychemicalromance.com
BBC Music page

(Fraser McAlpine)

The Quietus says: “What follows is the mother of all sing-along choruses and a bass line so cavernous you could hollow it around and take shelter in it.”

Filthypop says: “The chorus really is an empowering sound and is a sort of a sound that makes you want to rekindle your love with that special someone because the apocalypse is coming.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

My Chemical Romance – ‘Sing’ is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

Mashup fans, I’ve a job for you. Someone needs to put the “na na nah” refrain from Kylie Minogue’s ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’ under the verses to this song. It would please me, it works musically (same chords, y’see), and best of all, it would actually give the lyrics a bit of balance.

Here’s Bruno tearing his heart out, dropping that cocky ladies-man thing which over-sweetened ‘Just The Way You Are’ and pleading with his girl not to dismiss the depth of his feelings.

Of course, it’s still the same basic message, isn’t it? Both songs want to impress upon someone the desperate passion that Bruno feels towards them. And why not? People love to hear that stuff and Bruno’s a very giving man.

First he bestows upon his victim chosen one the gift of compliments. He thinks you’re amazing, you shouldn’t put yourself down so much, you’re perfect just the way you are, just to be around you is to know that life can hold no greater thrill, and this is something he will always feel, even when you’re old and saggy. After all, he’ll be old and saggy too.

(Here’s the video. That is NO WAY to deliver a piano.)

Sadly, over the course of the relationship, all of that positive energy, that giving, starts to curdle. A little voice at the back of his head is noticing that while he is very quick with the compliments, you tend to just beam, blush, and change the subject. Oh you always look happy to see him, that’s very clear, but not quite as happy as he is to see you.

Over time, this voice has gone from a disgruntled whisper to a full scream at the back of his mind. He’s still very generous, still keen to let you know that he adores you, but somehow he has started to obsess over the fact that it’s not really in your nature to say extravagent things back. Why can’t you do it? Why can’t you tell him that HE is amazing just the way he is? What’s stopping you?

Oh no…it can’t be…it’s because you don’t love him as much as he loves you, isn’t it? It turns out you have one tiny imperfection after all. Your heart is defective. It looks roomy enough, but there’s not quite enough space to fit Bruno in, in the way that he has filled his heart with you. He knows it, you know it. It’s bad news all round.

Suddenly, the compliments are starting to become more barbed, more desperate. You’re not perfect and amazing any more, you’re the person he would catch a grenade for, and it is plain as the nose on your pretty face that YOU WOULD NOT DO LIKEWISE. If someone tossed a grenade towards Bruno, you would duck under a table.

Never mind that a) this is perfectly rational behaviour and b) it might be a blessed relief to let him catch the grenade, what with all the shouting, the simple fact of the matter is that Bruno has given you everything, and all you can offer in return is your ridiculous claim to be amazing and perfect just the way you are. What rot. Whoever filled your head with such nonsense? HONESTLY!

So you can see how it would be nice to have an answering female voice, within all of this bitter breast-beating and finger-pointing, especially one singing “na na nah, na nah nu-nah nah.” Just seems fairer…

Incidentally, I maintain that there’s a mashup to be made of the original theme to the legendary kids’ TV show Grange Hill and Rage Against The Machine’s ‘Killing In The Name Of’. And one day I shall bother to prove this. What a day that will be, eh?

Download: Out now

www.brunomars.com
BBC Music page

(Fraser McAlpine)

Radiopopaction says: “One of the best songs i’ve heard in a very long time!”

Planet Ill says: “Mars finds himself in an easy vocal range that allows him belt out his melancholy in a beautifully soulful way.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

Bruno Mars – ‘Grenade’ is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

Ah, January; let the purging begin.

We’ve spent all of December cluttering up the house and mind with all sorts of stuff – hidden carrier bags of presents, shopping lists, wrapping paper, cards, decorations, Matt Bloody Cardle – all or some of which are lovely in their own way, but after a while, they just build up into a big mess.

Time to have a bit of a sort-out, a bit of a recycle, a bit of a decks-clear. It’ll feel a bit brutal at first, stripping back the layers of shiny, ribbony stuff and exposing the cold, clear surfaces beneath, ready for use. But it’s also kind of exciting. What kind of fresh wonder will fill this space? What joy will it bring? What day do the recycling men come around?

This applies just as much to music as it does to houses and the mind. Sometimes you just need to clear everything out, put valuable stuff away, and start again.

This is the aural equivalent of taking a massive shovel to everything festive and Christmassy, and dumping the lot in a skip, ready to face the year ahead with a clean slate, a new diary (and a massive shovel).

(Here’s the video. It’s all white.)

It starts, innocuously enough, with a high, wordless squeal, which repeats and repeats in a manner which is both piercing and unforgiving, like a woodpecker putting up a wall of CD shelves. This is then held aloft by some pleasant-but-unremarkable bass and drums action, a clockwork guitar, and a dour, asymmetrical verse which is neither joyful nor formidable in any great measure – the kind of thing you hear a lot of these days (apart from that squeal, which is hard to ignore).

Then there’s a buzzcut guitar, a warning of something big and scary on the way, and suddenly a wall of noise smashes through everything. That squeal is still there, the calm voice continues to intone, but it’s all lost in the whoosh. And there are other things, new things hiding in there too: squeaks and wails, sledgehammers through windows, a piano, the metal hull of an aircraft carrier being used as a backscratcher by a giant with a mountainous stony spine.

From here on in, it’s not so much a song, more a punishing sonic head-kick in the form of a huge racket. It’s also a useful tool for dislodging any lingering festive detritus, making it fall from your ears in a snowy pile of dandruff.

Then all you need to do is brush the past from your shoulders, much like Jay-Z does with dirt, and you’re good to go. It probably works all year round too. Let’s see, shall we?

Download: Out now

www.thejoyformidable.com
BBC Music page

(Fraser McAlpine)

Curiosity Killed The Kat says: “Ritzy is a force to be reckoned with, and for a petite lady she’s good with the vocal screams and smashing of guitars on stage.”

This Is The Big Beat says: “The guitar burst over the last 45 seconds of the song sends chills up my spine.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

The Joy Formidable – ‘Austere’ is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

As I write this, the majority of the country is covered in blizzard-skin; once-friendly pavements seek to up-end all but the most careful traveller and the shops are full of things which are sparkly, glittery and festive. It feels, for better and worse, like Christmas.

And now here’s Coldplay, with a suddenly-here dusty waltz about using the magical properties of the festive season to try and put a broken relationship back together, in much the same way that the Pogues did what that song about the perils of buying low-cost meatballs.

It’s at one and the same time, a cynical song about a romantic situation AND a romantic song about a cynical situation. People who use Christmas as an excuse to bury the hatchet often find someone has dug it right back up again once the New Year hangover kicks in. And bands who make romantic Christmas singles aren’t exactly doing it with the purest of motives either. Everyone wants to join Mariah, Slade and Phil Spector in The Pantheon of Christmas songs which come back year after year.

(Here’s the video. Nothing says ‘the good old days of yore’ like a waistcoat.)

And that’s the conundrum on which this thing rests. You don’t want to be cynical at Christmas, that pose is just a great big cliche anyway. It doesn’t make you especially clever or perceptive to realise this whole thing is hooey built on nonsense, and that it’s an excuse for a lot of silly things to happen. It just makes you look defensive, like someone who won’t be hugged in case it makes them cry.

However, giving in to every soppy gesture at this time of year is a recipe for re-believing in Father Christmas again, even though you know it’s your dad. And it’s always a little bit irksome to feel like your emotions are being tugged at by puppeteers.

So, what I have to say is this. I like this song just fine. I like the tempo changes, I like the swoop and the swish and I especially like Chris Martin’s voice when it’s all low and growly. But I’m not transported by it, and really, that’s what would need to happen to make this the magical festive experience it so clearly wishes to be.

Download: Out now

www.coldplay.com
BBC Music page

(Fraser McAlpine)

PS: If it’s festive indie you are after, but you want something with a bit more oomph, can I recommend ‘Christmas Was Better In The 80s’ by the Futureheads? It basically starts like a carol, just like the Coldplay song, but then…well it’s pretty much brilliant bedlam from there on in. Also, it occasionally sounds like they’re singing “Christmas was better in the A-Team”, which is a sentiment it is hard to refute.

Evigshed says: “A sweet ballad to warm the hearts and have the smile on your face.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

Coldplay – ‘Christmas Lights’ is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace

Delicious ChartBloggerers, this will be the last time we speak in the year of our Lord 2010. You’ve got presents to buy, cards to write, best-of-year playlists to compile and friends to see, and so have I (apart from the presents, the cards and the friends, obv).

But I haven’t forgotten your insatiable need for musical treats to feast upon, so here’s a quick roundup of notable things which are around and about over the next couple of weeks. Feel free to come back to this page again and again during the holiday period, cos if you don’t pace yourself, you might find you wind up with the musical equivalent of heartburn. And they don’t make a Gaviscon for that.

The big question is: who will win the race for the coveted New Year No.1? Will it be Matt Cardle? Will it be someone else? Or Matt Cardle? Who can say?

Week beginning December 20th

Katy B ft. Ms Dynamite – ‘Real Love’

Utterly great: an ode to dancing even when the music is over, which also features some engaging shouting from Ms. D. If I were a DJ, I doubt that her words would convince me to play that extra song, but only because it would be hard to be sure what it is she really wants. The time? The police? A hug? Maybe a friendly wave, some mumbling and a blush, that oughtta do it.

Here’s the video – it’s dotty.)

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Arcade Fire – ‘The Suburbs’

This would be the title single from a quite well received album from fondly-thought of Canadian band with an enthusiastic fan-base who really do enjoy their work a lot. The eager-beavers among you might want to re-listen to Zane Lowe’s Arcade Fire special (available for a limited time only), which features a new session and interviews with the band.

(Here’s a video of them on Later With Jools Holland. It’s wholesome.)

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Cee-Lo Green – ‘It’s OK’

Heroically unrubbish soul retread, with amazing finger-clicks, from Professor Green’s uncle*. Possibly won’t do quite as well as his last song, but a wondrous thing, nonetheless.

(No video. STILL swearing then, Mr Green?)

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Pixie Lott – ‘Can’t Make This Over’

This is taken from the revamped version of Pixie’s debut album, ‘Turn It Up (Louder)’ and is co-written by Daniel Bedingfield. It’s one of Pixie’s more contemplative, thoughtful songs, and for some reason, listening to it made me sad for the weird way the Sugababes self-destructed. Pop is a strange place sometimes.

(Here’s the video. It’s backwards.)

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Week beginning December 27th

Well, after the excitement around the Christmas No.1 and the New Year No.1, the race is on this week to see who will get the coveted first-new-No.1-of-the-year No.1. Will it be Matt Cardle? Pixie Lott? Or one of this lot? You’ll just have to wait and see.

Eliza Doolittle – ‘Skinny Genes’

Reissue of the whistly song that was nearly a Top 20 hit earlier this year. The whistly bit is code for the extremely rude things Eliza can’t bring herself to say in song form, so she has found a clever way around the problem. A lesson she could possibly have taught to a certain Mr Green, thinking about it.

(Here’s the video. It’s a clown party.)

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Tinie Tempah ft. Kelly Rowland – ‘Invincible’

A song in which Tinie takes the time to consider where he has come from and what he has achieved, through the lens of a relationship, so that Kelly has something to sing about. It is this lens which separates this song from a LOT of other hip hop songs (how-far-I-have-come is second only to why-you-are-rubbish-and-I-am-great on the hip hop hot topic list). And to be fair, he really has come a long way in a very short time, so it’s probably fair comment. His aunt’s house must be FULL of clothes by now.

(Here’s the video. It’s curiously Kelly-light.)

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The Wanted – ‘Lose My Mind’

Anthemic pop noise from this young boyband with old boyband tendencies. Gets all lively in the choruses, breathy and pleading in the verses and a little bit congregational – like Arcade Fire – in that wordless refrain in between. Not as good as ‘All Time Low’, but then, very few songs are.

(Here’s the video. It’s fair.)

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AND, while we’re here, let’s have a quick look into the strange world of The Future, where the dogs are invisible and every Ugg boot has its own personality…

Week beginning January 3rd TWENTY-ELEVEN!

Cheryl Cole – ‘The Flood’

Another contemplative song from a wronged popstrel with a rueful eye towards the failings in her love life. It’s mature and a bit sad, and, if I’m honest, a bit dreary. Maybe Cheryl should go for some kind of girl’s night out with Pixie, to Katy B’s club, and dance her cares away. Or just get Ms Dynamite in to shout all over her next single. Should liven things up a treat.

(Here’s the video. It’s wet.)

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Professor Green ft. Maverick Sabre – ‘Jungle’

And finally, here’s Cee-Lo’s nephew* with a song which is designed to be utterly terrifying. From the stomach-destroying bass wob to the Prof’s sneering, jeering leer. The entire thing has been constructed to make you feel dislocated and slightly threatened. It comes with a video which just makes everything worse, and as such, is probably not for everyone, even though it’s undeniably grand. If you enjoy having your ears harassed by happy hoodlums in hoods, you know where to come.

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So, plenty to get your cranial receptacons around there.

Thanks to everyone for a brilliant year throwing words at pop music and drawing finger-paintings with the mess. Merry Christmas to all, and a happy new year.

See you in the ’11.

* No relation.

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

2010: End of A Year(a) is a post from: Taub Judah Entertainment Palace