A Really Long-Winded FOB Sob Story That Also Deals With The Pains Of Bands We Love Going On Hiatus

_____Getting paid to write music, getting paid even more to perform it for hundreds and thousands of adoring fans, and having the time of your life in between. This is the tough and terrible life led by musicians across the globe, at least, for as long as they can hack it. Usually, this isn’t for long, as almost every single one of them eventually cries out for relief, for a break, for a hiatus. It usually comes around the time of the end of the third album tour, sometimes the second if a tour has been especially excruciating, or a fourth if the band were graced with a flop of an album somewhere along the line, granting time for a quick, heavenly breather. Then there’s always special cases like Kaiser Chiefs, where they take an indefinite break because they just can’t do it anymore. Not the stresses of being in a band anymore, the whole having to write decent music that at least somebody sort of likes a bit. I guess it can’t have come as surprise though, this lot, alarm bells started ringing for most of us when Lily Allen actually made Oh My God slightly better.
___But only 14 people worldwide actually care about Kaiser Chiefs taking a hiatus, while other bands have left literally millions, including myself, kinda disappointed you didn’t pay less attention to the slightly attractive drunk girl singing almost-along to each of their songs right beside you and really savoured that last concert, with the news that they will be stepping away from the music scene for an indefinite period. It can be worse than that though, it often deprives millions of vital rite of passages. Every 21st century teenagers will remember the time they drank their first six-pack, the time they lost their virginity, and the time they saw Blink 182 live. But, wait a minute, the selfish fags decided to play god with our lives and go their separate ways and form bands that make Kaiser Chiefs look ever-so-slightly less atrocious.



____I know, I know, they usually come crawling back soon enough, in the nick of time when it comes to Blink 182, just like it’s rarely more than a few weeks between the recovered crack addicts leave rehab and the rediscovered crack addicts walk right back in. Of course, with some really fly musicians like Pete Dickherty and Amy Wine-Smokes-And-Heroin-house, that’s also literally the case. But sometimes the wait is really fucking long. For instance, Soundgarden, not that I’m a fan, I was only seven or eight when they split, but like ten years!? If Muse disappeared for ten years and then all of a sudden somersaulted back into my life, I’m not sure if I could take ‘em back… I just don’t know if I could handle that kind of hurt again… Lolzers, only joking, course I would, not that they’d ever do that to me…right?
___That, perhaps, is what makes these things so much more painful; despite the formula prescribed above predicting the dreaded hiatus, it always comes as a sickening shock to hear such talent as Kaiser Chiefs are throwing in the temporary towel. Lolzers, only joking again, that was more a Bonjela-esque soothing relief. However, the end of the decade has seen the saddening announcements of two colossal bands’ respective indefinite spells away from the studio, as a group anyways. The first, as you’ve probably all heard by now, if not I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, is the band almost everyone knows and loves. They are unique like a pretty snowflake, about as camp as one too. They are a sound so varied it’s instantly recognisable. They are probably not as good live as they should be, yet I’d still pick them over MSTRKRFT every time. They are, at their purest, a lead guitarist with a disgustingly monumental side fringe. And fantastic music. Yes, definitely, that too. It’s Bloc Party.



_____I couldn’t speak highly enough of what Kele and Ko have created in the time they‘ve been together so far, yet I‘m going to surprise quite a few of you in telling you now that there is, in fact, another band that I will miss far more. And your opinions of me are most certainly going to drop when you see who they are. But I ask you now to hear me out. Don’t X-out in disgust straight away, it’s not what it initially seems, there is actually some sense to what I have to say. It’s close to impossible to have grown up as a “noughties teen” without having had at least one of their songs on your iPod at one stage, and physically, theoretically, mathematically, and utterly impossible not to have loved it. They slip comfortably into the pop, rock, emo, and everything-in-between scene, while the hard metal and softy indie kids send them dead cats in the mail, or make pathetic attempts at witty remarks as the rest of the world Dance Dance along, depending on which of the socio-musical groups above you fit into, although you still hum along to that one single you hate yourself for loving before you were swallowed up by the prescribed narrow-minded musical opinions of whatever musical scene you are currently affiliated with. Chances are that one track is still on your iPod, although you’ve carefully hidden it so that none of your peers can find it, renamed as a Foals B-side that doesn’t exist, and only listen to it when the house is empty, but you still lock the door just in case. Then, and only then, in complete solitude, you clear your throat, break out the air guitar, and pretend you were a slightly overweight American with horrid side-burns. You’d think one would prefer to be Pete, but if you were him then you wouldn’t be able to do dirty things to him now would you? Don’t pretend you don’t know the words.



_____Now, before your jaw hit’s the floor, allow me to reassure you that in no way do I rate Fall Out Boy anywhere near the standard of Bloc Party musically, there are few bands I do. However, while the latter is quite an acquired taste, a carefully crafted delicacy, FOB are microwavable popcorn. You haven’t a clue as to how it works, and when it doesn‘t it‘s absolutely vile, but when it does, and you’re in the mood, it is divine. The first song I ever really loved was 1000 Miles, and the second was Sugar, We’re Going Down. And while I have long since buried Vanessa Carlton’s piano pop-ballad, I still rock out to Fall Out Boy’s 2X Platinum global hit on an unhealthily regular basis. Sure, at a gaff party, Helicopter is as certain to be played as that guy who gets really drunk every week and makes a fool of himself will get drunk and make a fool of himself while anyone who plays FOB is, most likely, quite a lonely person, but ya know what else always gets played? I’ve Got A Feeling This Song Sucks Balls, and that, as my funnily edited title suggests, sucks balls. And yup, every album Fall Out Boy have released has sucked similar balls, while each of Bloc Party’s were almost flawless. I even bought two of them. ___However that’s exactly why I didn’t feel sad when I heard I won’t have the chance to buy number four for at least year or two, Bloc Party have more than strong enough a back catalogue to keep me going while I wait for their glorious return. Fall Out Boy don’t. They have three and a half tracks. And those three and a half tracks have just about kept Fall Out Boy alive for me over the past three years, which saw my beloved FOB release eight singles which did as much for me as earthquakes do for Haitians, including one machete-wielding stab at a Michael Jackson cover.

_____I’m going to miss Fall Out Boy more than Bloc Party because this isn’t fork in the long road of their musical career, it’s the end. Bloc Party will be back and the roadtrip of a lifetime will resume in what I imagine will be spectacular fashion, but for FOB, c’est fini. And all I have left is three and a half photographs which will be soon lost in my musical attic of my computer hard drive. It had to end eventually, I just always dreamt it would end on a more romantic and less pathetic note than Alpha Dog. But, while not my dream ending, at least it it didn’t end in a catastrophic car crash of a third album like Kaiser Chiefs…
___I’m actually being cringe-inducingly serious here, I really loved Fall Out Boy when I was smaller. I loved those three and half singles enough that it didn’t matter everything else they wrote was, if left exposed to it for long periods of time, borderline cancerous. I loved the way the guitarist always did those ridiculous whirlwind spins at every opportunity. I loved the way their music videos have those annoying pauses in the music for a bit of pointless dialogue. Most of all, I just really fucking loved Sugar, We’re Going Down.

Vampire Weekend - Contra

_____So I think it’s pretty fair to say that this is the first widely anticipated album of 2010. It’s also pretty certain that following the success of their self-titled debut album since it’s release in early 2008, Vampire Weekend, while fully deserving of the credit and acclaim received for what was a stunning first album, kind of put an uncomfortable amount of pressure on themselves to write an equally stunning follow-up. They had to somehow retain their individual and unique sound from the first, but at the same time not produce a samey-sounding second. They couldn’t afford to lose their upbeat chirpiness, but had to keep it sounding fresh. After listening to Contra, I shouldn’t change my opinion of Vampire Weekend, more add to it, expand it, deepen it. It would have been too easy to produce Vampire Weekend II, and even easier to go all Arctic Monkeys on it and release a far too complex, far too different, and, on the whole, far too suckish epilogue to what was a fantastic success story.
___So, when I can first heard free download Horchata in October, I was kind of disappointed. Not that it doesn’t sound lovely, it does, and I wouldn’t hesitate to introduce it to my parents, but it was purely, completely, 100% what was expected of them. They just reminded me so much of that guy who’s just so fucking nice it sort of annoys you? Like, I sort of hoped they’d come out with some outrageous track with a Kiss Of Life style African drum chorus, Gravity’s Rainbow-y dominating bass, and, I dunno, some sexist lyrics to match or something? Instead, I got this vibrant, quirky track that, to my unrelenting anger, makes me smile every time I hear it…



_____Horchata is actually down to be their next single at the moment, an odd decision in my view as there are much better songs on this record, namely the heart-wrenchingly cute White Sky, or possibly the most different sounding track on the record (apart from Taxi Cab, but that‘s terrible), Run, or most definitely the best sounding track on the record, Giving Up The Gun. After those three? Erm, yeahhhhh…not really.
___Don’t get me wrong, I do like the majority of songs on the album, I Think Ur A Contra is a beautiful song with which to close the record, and I’ll be the first to admit that Cousins was a fantastic first single transition from the A-Punk sound to the extremely similar yet just about different enough sound that Contra offers. And there I was thinking Diplomat’s Son perfectly integrated the hip MIA noise, making an average song far greater than just that, only to find it actually samples said hip MIA…But my point is that none of these seem to me to be single material, they just lack identity or something? They sound exactly like what they are, Vampire Weekend album filler. Awesome album filler, but album filler all the same. The rest of which, I’m afraid, is not so awesome.
___They’re not disgraceful, but Holiday just doesn’t work for me, and I’ve already remarked on my dissatisfaction with Taxi Cab, and then California English, well I’d like to know why California English Pt. 2, a bonus track, didn’t make it onto the original release, because Pt. 1 leaves quite a bit to be desired. Unlike Giving Up The Gun, which, like I said, rocks.



_____Like I said before, Vampire Weekend are the ridiculously nice guy you hate to like but can’t hate. And that’s not going to change with Contra, an album which I do like, but am secretly trying to find holes in, and perhaps that’s why, looking back on what I’ve written, I’ve probably been a bit harsh. And I’m going to give it a slightly harsh mark, considering it was far from a bad listen, but that is solely due to two authentic reasons. The first is that I feel Contra was a tad on the safe side. They just could have let loose a bit more, made it sound less like the old Vampire Weekend’s second album a bit more like a new, more experienced, more confident Vampire Weekend’s first, but maybe I’m forgetting the pressures places on new bands like this to stick to what sells, especially following relatively recent news of Klaxons having their second album being rejected by Universal, and Friendly Fires being told to cut down on the whole samba influence that kept creeping up in their first album. And the second is that the huge success of their debut album meant that this album was never going to be quite as good, and I am confident it won’t be, nor will it sell as well. My three favourite Vampire Weekend tracks still all come from their first release, and I’d be surprised if it’s a different story for anyone else.

B3

Delphic - Acolyte

_____Probably the most annoying thing about new bands is, when you find their first smashing single, you’re like “Yeah, awesome, I love these guys, I can’t wait to hear some more of their stuff”, but when you head onto their MySpace, all you find is the smashing single that’s it. No mention of an album, not even an EP, nothing. Wikipedia is the next port of call, if they even show up there, but that rarely provides anything more than a brief paragraph about where they’re from and more useless information about their one, solitary, lonely, stand-alone single. Then, finally, you Google them, and find about halfway down the page a link to an interview where they mention that they’re writing an album! Success! Except not really, cause it’s not out ‘till March 22nd 2047.
___Like seriously, Ou Est Le Swimming Pool, that song is really cool and all, but, with no album whatsoever on the horizon, there’s a fair chance I’ll be obsessed with Marina & The Diamonds’ album by then, and even more hopelessly in love with her, and won’t have time for what I’m sure will be a fantastic album.
___Anyways, Delphic were one of those annoying new bands. But they’re not anymore, because the long-awaited album, Acolyte, is here now. And it was worth waiting for. Well, parts of it were. Mostly this part.



_____See, when I was starting to give up on Delphic, what with no new material throughout the whole of winter, and Counterpoint getting quite old quite faster, Doubt, their latest release, came along and rocked my Delphicworld all over again.
___This Momentary rocked said Delphicworld in a similar fashion when I first heard it back in August, but that was more like a gentle, caressing rocking, while with Doubt it’s more like eyes-roll-back-and-your-head-blows-off-type rocking.
___The third, and unfortunately final, rocking comes in the form of Clarion Call. This actually is a better all-round rocking, kinda like a mix of the two aforementioned tracks, except, like most good rockings, it’s over all too soon. Still though, two minutes fifty-six seconds of heaven.



____Like I said, after those three tracks, there isn’t much else too striking on the record. Title track Acolyte did impress me on first listen, but at almost nine minutes long, it doesn’t really evolve much, or at all, and so the first listen ends up being the last, as life’s just too short. Red Lights and Remain are similar in the that they're quite long-winded, but quite dissimilar in that they’re painfully dull.

_____So, if I were to put an amusing, yet probably too detailed metaphor on the album as a whole, I guess it would be like a love affair between a girl and a far less attractive boy, where she’s drawn in by his weird, nervous, Counterpoint charm, when she eventually beds him finds out he has a HUGE tool, in Doubt, but is then ultimately disappointed when the sex, although granted quite romantic, is either amazing but over too soon, or epically long and seems like it’ll never get to any finish. However I’m definitely gonna keep Delphic around, as I actually do think the word romantic brilliantly describes a lot of what Acolyte brings to the table. It’s the common case of whether stick with the romantic, sweet, yet unable to completely satisfy, or go out and listen to Fantasy Black Channel for the best meaningless love-experience of your life. Yeah, I’d always pick the latter too, but the huge tool is reason enough to keep the other guy around. Ya never know, they might learn to use it in their next record.

C1

PS I would give an illegal downloadable link, but I got an awfully formal email from the internet police saying not to… What I will give you though, is a link to Filestube, a wonderful website that I’ve grown quite fond of.

iPods, Not Eyes, Are The Window To The Soul

Right so you're out at a party. It's not that good a party though, as in free food but not beer, only half decent clunge:cock ratio, and the music playlist consists of only three songs, two of which are sung by Black Eyed Peas, and they're not even their old, half-decent stuff. So, logically, you get to work one of the few girls at the party who isn't taken or face down in vomit...yet, and thus begins the long and laborious process of screening the potential mate for any hazards forward slash mental instability. We all know what to look for; clingy tendencies; annoying laughs; mind-numbingly boring personalities; oral herpes; etc. However, in the glorious age of today where practically everyone owns an iPod, all this effort can now be compacted into a quick scanning of an mp3 player. I will now walk you through an easy, step-by-step guide to identifying the signs that tell you when you should allow biology to run its course, when you should consider the consequences of running this particular course, and when you should whip around and never look back.

:::::Sorting - Have they arranged their music in a logical, organised fashion? This isn't that important in the case of a one-night wham-bam-thank-you-mam scenario, but I know that, personally, I could never love a girl who has 7 songs under Arctic Monkeys and then 2 under artic monkeys. Grammar is free, fucking go get some.

:::::Albums/Singles? - If they only have the big hits by Bloc Party and Crystal Castles, then they're mindless trend-following drones. This is the case for most teenagers, so if, on the other hand, they have every Chemical Brothers album with the correct album art, then there's a good chance they'll actually be able to conduct a semi-lengthy conversation.

:::::Top 25 Most Played - This one's dead easy; if Akon or Taylor Swift feature in any way prominently, then simply shout "OMG A YELLOW BANANA!" and point the other way, then use the 45 second window to finish your drink, place it on the table, and casually walk away; if there's a non-single Radiohead song, or anything by The Strokes, then begin considering any and all techniques to try to get into this girls pants.

:::::Remix Junkie? - Think of this one like so; you wouldn't stick you're finger in a pie whose contents had been unofficially tampered with by random computer nerds, so why would you stick your finger in a girl whose iPod is full of perfectly good piesongs which have been unofficially tampered with by random computer nerds? Yehyeh, sometimes the computer nerds enhance the pie by adding stronger basses or kickass electro aspects which the pie previosuly lacked, but more often or not, they just stuck their finger in and messed things around.

:::::Bogey Bands - La Roux, JLS, Chipmunk, Take That... if any of these, or similarly terrible bands, feature in their artists, then you may want to seriously consider the very strong possibility that any lengthy period of time spent around them may cause some of this god-awful music taste to rub off on you. First you'll just be humming along to the painfully boring Underdog, but before you know you'll be downloading their graciously brief back catalog of equally dull tracks.

:::::Vital Bands - There are some bands that we simply assume will be on every iPod; Muse, Prodigy, Daft Punk etc, but there is always the possibility that the person you are dealing with isn't like normal people. If they don't even have the basic necessities for musical appreciation, namely Breathe, Aerodynamic, any Muse song (apart from Supermassive Black Holes, not that it's not assome, just it's highly likely they only have it because it was in Twilight), then they obviously have something seriously wrong, and you should alert the authorities immediately, don't assume someone else will.


Once you've followed these simple checks, you should be able to assert whether or not it is safe to proceed with your endeavors to acquire any form of sexual activity. And always remember "Be Safe, Check For X Factor Contestants"

The 10 Albums Of 2009 You Simply Must Download Illegally:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: No. 10 = The Joy Formidable - A Balloon Called Moaning

_____Ok so let’s get the esoteric one out of the way first, shall we? Stumbled upon this gang whilst YouTubing bands from the Leeds poster, and I eventually found them hidden amongst the numerous bands that NME had been sucking off for the past year in the hopes that one of ‘em made it on the Festival Republic Stage. As a hetrosexual male, their clever set-up of a lead semi-attractive, but not too attractive as to draw attention away from the music, girl with two dudes providing the testosterone and musical ability immediately appealed to me. La musique, as it happened, was also quite to my liking.



_____I didn’t actually end up seeing them at Leeds, despite having loved their album and having jerked off on two occasions to the lead singer, the beautiful Ritzy Bryan.. Ok she’s not THAT beautiful, but the latest edition of Photoshop is just one of the many amazing abilities of the human mind. See they were following The xx, and they had the oddest effect on me of making me just want to go back to my tent, have a drink, and light myself on fire.

_____The album contains a fair few top notch tunes, most notably singles Cradle, and Austere, the latter of which you simply must check out the accompanying video, banned form YouTube, on their website, but their strongest performances come in the forms of The Greatest Light Is The Greatest Shade, and Greyhound In The Slips, the latter not technically on the original album release, but I lashed it on there on my iTunes cause it simply adds trucks to the thoroughly enjoyable listening experience that is The Joy Formidable’s debut album, A Balloon Called Moaning.



I’ll leave you with their latest free festive download release. See, this band ticks all the boxes; girls; rock music; Christmas.



http://rapidshare.com/files/243192414/tjf.rar

The 10 Albums Of 2009 You Simply Must Download Illegally:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: No. 9 = The Big Pink - A Brief History Of Love

_____Another band who’s hole has been licked thoroughly by NME, but I swear, this isn’t a pattern emerging. Although, it must be said, NME got it right this time. There an electro-rock duo from London, best described as a slightly harsher version of Klaxons. A Brief History Of Love is their debut album also, and straight away was a big hit amongst annoying indie-kids everywhere, with pre-album releases Velvet and Too Young To Love having got numerous plays at only the most alternative of nightclubs across the UK.



_____The album didn’t come out until September, but by that stage they had already attracted huge media attention, with a brownnosed NME awarding them a high place in their Future 50 helping them to pack out their stage at Reading with some of the trendiest teenagers on the planet AND some normal people too. Things were looking pretty good for The Big Pink. And then, Dominos.



_____This is probably the closest runner-up to my song of the year, narrowly missing out to an sexually arousing Simian stunner you’ll hear about later. The majority of you have probably already heard it, either on Phantom FM for the cooler kids among you, on the Xbox Live ad, or from numerous other dangerously mainstream music providers. I even caught it playing on Smash Hits! once or twice. Nah, only kidding, but it did achieve a #27 spot on the UK Singles Chart, highlighting the extent of the album’s success. I can tell you, the indie kids were not happy about the Chart appearance, as this inevitably meant they had to stop liking them with immediate effect. At least they still have La Roux. Oh wait…

_____A record deal, a well solid album, and an amazing single, 2009 was pretty good to The Big Pink, yet things got better when they were announced as support for Muse’s UK tour, making them even awesomer by association. Yet, one can’t help but sense that the future will be slightly disappointing for the London duo, as who knows if they’ll ever get the chance to see Matt Belamy so close-up again…

The 10 Albums Of 2009 You Simply Must Download Illegally:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: No. 8 = Weezer - Raditude

_____I was weirdly excited in the run-up to this album’s release. It was weird because I used not to be that big a fan of them. Sure, I liked Buddy Holly and Island in the Sun as much as the next guy, but that was as far as it went really. Make Believe probably should have done something for me in hindsight, as it’s a really nice record, but it just didn’t. The Weezer fire simply didn’t burn in me. The potential was there, as, apart from Maladroit, every album of theirs really rocks., just no spark. However, once more YouTube to the rescue. Spark.



_____First single from The Red Album is in my opinion their most underrated song by a mile. The whole album is underrated. My four favourite Weezer songs come from that album, which sparked the Weezer inferno which burns in me to this day. So yeah, I was really weirdly excited about Raditude. First impressions were also weird. Raditude doesn’t sound like the Weezer of the past. There’s glimpses of the golden days in Put Me Back Together, but personal favourites Let It All Hang Out and I’m Your Daddy, are très different to what you’re used to. And you can’t say anyone could picture Lil Wayne featuring on a Weezer album before could you? Unfortunately, Chamillionaire had to fill in for him on this slightly different recording, Lil Wayne was busy getting arrested for carrying around a BB Gun.



_____Although it does drag on a tiny tiny bit, the albums a must listen for anyone who considered themselves at any point a Weezer fan. It hasn’t blasted them back onto the scene or anything near it, but that’s party due to the criminality that Weezer haven’t played in Europe for almost five years. They’re coming though, strong rumours for Reading and Leeds (just one of many reasons why you should go there instead of Oxegen next summer), and, with this album added to an already impressive repertoire, you can bet they’ll be making some pretty kickass noise.