Thou shalt not read NME.

I have this love-hate affair going on with the hipness. As a post-millennium individual, I am trapped with an infinite identity disorder. When I'm at work at the concert hall (We've had the Arctic Monkeys play. Bite me.) with a lot of bad ass older men, I wear my Smiths shirt and black safety shoes for respect. When I'm at the club with my friends, I wear this season's miniskirt and leggings and I ask whose song this is again and pretend to -"Ah, of course !"- recognise new and upcoming band Ghosts. (Their single Stay The Night is cool, though.)

It's so schizo. But after all, we're all slaves to the rhythm. And to commerce, for that matter. Would we really enjoy listening to the fucking Raconteurs, had Jack White not been in the band ? Where did the skinny jeans all of a sudden come from ? Why are we the one single blog in this solar system who did not blog about Justice ? Who fucking cares ?

In the indie music scene, hipness is as fragile as a dried and framed butterfly left outside in a raging blizzard. In january of 2006, it was so avantgarde to casually sigh: "I wish I could've attended the London Calling Festival at Paradiso, I would've loved to see the Kooks play." Your less well informed conversation partner would go like: "The who ?" And then you looked all "GOTCHA !" and said: "Ah, the Kooks. It's this band from Brighton. They're fab."

Anno now, June 2007, your mom thinks Inside In/Inside Out qualifies as a nice birthday present for her friends . It's the Pigeon Detectives who are on the top of the hill, but already slighty toppling over. New Kids On The Block The Films and the 1990s are at its foot. Bromheads Jacket is halfway down and previously named Kooks have basically fallen into a ravine.

It's all fucking schizo. It's NME-induced mass frenzy. Us hipsters, we're all part of a medieval mob, hunting for witches. Music somehow should inhibit more than a generic 'take away food in a styrofoam box'-feeling. Really, I love going to gigs, but after seeing The Rakes, The Brakes, The Flakes, Turin Brakes, The Hippy Hippy Shakes and The Hungry Hungry Hippoes, I pretty much went numb.

Can't we just stop the frenzy ? Not every new band is the next Beatles/Smiths/Jesus, so stop fucking treating them like they are. (In case of The Arctic Monkeys, it's true though.) It's okay to have bands that are okay instead of brilliant. It's okay to start a band which is not called The Nouns. Calling your band Somebody Still Loves You, You Blokes With Biblical Names, But Thanks To Those Exploding Chemical Toilets, I Think I'll Chose Darkness is pretty pompous, but it shows some creativity at least. It's okay to take NME with a pinch of salt, though I love the letters to the editor and the fact that they dramatically announce a Libertines reunion in every issue. It's okay to go see a gig while you haven't heard a note of the bands music before in your life.

Getting rid of this Big Dick Competition in the indie scene seems nice. Therefore, individuals who mock it deserve blogs. So, as a musical frame for this piece: Art Brut and Dan Le Sac. Art Brut is a British band and sarcasm is its middle name. Here's Formed A Band and My Little Brother (never mind the pictures of someone's little brother that come with the song) off their first album Bang Bang Rock 'n Roll. As a DJ, there's no better way to diss a bad band than to play Formed A Band immediately after their gig. Then, there's Dan le Sac. I've got no idea who the guy is, but his beard kicks the shit out of those worn by Bin Laden, Jim Morrison or Matisyahu and I totally dig his anthem Thou Shalt Always Kill.

Fuck reperitive generic music.

But after all, it's all very ironic and we're all the same. I pretend to distance myself from my definate wannabe-hipness and the fact that I indeed like the new Justice album and the woman on top of NME's Cool List: The Gossip's singer Beth Ditto.


I saw The Gossip in concert last Wednesday and it was fab. Beth Ditto has the nicest voice, Standing In The Way Of Control is going to be this years Seven Nation Army and I'm not going to waste any bytes talking about her weight and sexual orientation. That's what the NME is for. The Gossip: just another band, but as a band, they're well deserved mountaineers.

Feist

I first heard her voice on Broken Social Scene’s self titled sophomore album in 2004.

This version is really from the B-Side album but you know what I mean: Lover’s Spit (Piano Version)

Then her voice turned up on Kings of Convenience’s Riot on an Empty Street on two songs.

On this one for example: Know How

Then her modest chansonnière-ish masterpiece Let It Die ruled my winter in 2005.

Especially her hit in this remix: Mushaboom (The Postal Service Remix)

And even with all the anticipation her follow up The Reminder blew me away. Which could’ve been enough. But now she keeps astounding with her choice in remixers.

The first single got electrofied (and got a dirty vocoder): My Moon, My Man (Boys Noize Remix)

This weird albumtrack got more funky: Sea Lion Woman (Chromeo Remix)

But this latest one is just incredible, Van She did it before (the remix they did for Klaxons most notably) and does it again. This ultra sweet song (penned by New Buffalo by the way) complete with horns and choirs gets the French Disco treatment:

1 2 3 4 (Van She Technologic Remix)

Kensington

It doesn't seem to happen very often, Actually, I can count the times it's happened on one hand; A supporting act that manages to impress. Mostly I'm satisfied if I'm not bored/annoyed to death.
WorhtyNonsense convinced me to go see Under the Infuence of Giants in Ekko in Utrecht with him (see previous post). Opening for UioG was a local band called Kensington which I truthfully had no intention of seeing. We had a drink in the lounge before UioG started playing but the sounds coming from the stage lured me in. Some nice guitars, very tight drumming, beautiful harmonising and a fresh poppy sound. They combined two styles I haven't heard combined before. My first thought was “it's emo” but there was something off. No annoying screams, no whining teenage-angst and most importantly, it's totally danceable! When I asked them to describe their music they called it danceable emo which is as adequate a description as any. But they refined their description saying it's music ''to dance and cry at the same time to'', which admittedly sounds even cooler. Wednesday the 27th (also known as tommorrow) is their EP presentation show.

I imagine they'll put more songs on their myspace when their debut EP is out but for now you can listen to Man Mission Mayhem

Their music appears on Bram de Wijs' Stuckinaday label which also houses Bram's band Impossible Situations. They make fun electropop with very clever lyrics. Check the video for Easy to Fuck You, Harder to Trust You

Under the Influence of the 70s

“I could be brown, I could be blue, […] Why don’t you like me? Why don’t you like me?” Well, Mika, let me tell you: it’s nothing personal. It’s just that it has been you and your silly, yet brilliant, track all over the radio for the last couple of months. Fourteen-year-old girls all over the world have started googling who the hell is Grace Kelly, something they hadn’t been doing since OutKast released ‘Rosa Parks’!

The world is screaming for a solution to this Mika-overkill, and I’m proud to let you all know that Ulkedoof will finally bring an end to your despair. Two members of the editorial staff of this highly appreciated and internationally leading music weblog have attended the unofficial presentation of Mika’s successors as the world’s most beloved Indie-fähig act that will inevitably be picked up by every thirteen in a dozen radio station, putting it in their playlists somewhere between Ph*l C*ll*ns and L**n*l R*ch**: Under The Influence Of Giants

Their sound could definitely be compared to that of Mika, although their album had its first release half a year before Mika’s. Apart from that, we can hear some Scissor Sisters, a little Delays perhaps and finally a subtle touch of The Shins. Or, to refrain from this kind of standard reviewers’ discourse, they provided us with an album containing nothing but hits. Even the unreleased tracks you will find groping their way through the internet are genuine earwigs! In addition, their so-called flirting with the seventies could easlily be confused with straightforward whoring.

Their album will get its European release on July 17th. Some highlighs:
Mama's Room (vid)
In The Clouds (vid)
Ah-Ha (mp3)
Self-recorded outro of 'Meaningless Love' (poor quality, live@Ekko) (vid)

Suffer in anything but silence

I had been wanting to see The Frames for a while now but for some reason never did. Yesterday they played in Utrecht and this time I let nothing stand in my way. The Frames (sometimes called ‘Dublin’s other rock band’) have quite a reputation as a live band. So, was it everything I hoped it would be? Well, as good as the music was that’s how bad the crowd was!

I know that a lot of people simply wanted a rock show but couldn’t they just suffer in silence during the slower songs? I like an enthusiastic crowd but not at the cost of the music. And if you feel the unstoppable need to keep moving could you at least try not to touch me! And to the girls in the back, nobody asked you to annoy us with your fancy claps each song, and their certainly was no need to shout or sing the entire time!

Peaches - Rock Show (mp3)
The Frames – Suffer in Silence (mp3)
The Frames – The Cost (myspace)
Kate Bush – Moving (mp3)
The Hot Stewards – Touch Me (Samantha Fox cover) (mp3)
White Rose Movement – Girls in the Back (hugo Nicholson Bad Birthday Mix) (mp3)
Wolf Parade – Fancy Claps (video)
Architecture in Helsinki – Need to Shout (Mocky Remix) (mp3)
Dresden Dolls – Sing (video)

Broken Social Scene

I like Broken Social Scene. I mean I reeeeeeeally like them. For those unfamiliar with the Canadian Behemoth an introduction in five steps.

1) Broken Social Scene is a collective with Kevin Drew and Brendan Canning as it’s core members. The two of them made the instrumental album Feel Good Lost in 2001. It has some nice songs but honestly as a whole isn’t that special.

Guilty Cubicles is my favorite from the debut, it sounds to me like spring after a heavy rainstorm. But that might just be me (mp3)

2) For their second (Juno-award winning) album they managed to collect an insane amount of talented people from the Canadian indie scene. In 2002 the Broken Social Scene really became a scene. It was followed by a collection of b-sides in 2004.

You Forgot it in People contained instant classics like the ever fresh Almost Crimes (Radio Kills Remix) (myspace)

And the haunting Lover’s Spit in piano version from Beehives (the b-side collection…obviously) (mp3)

3) In 2005 they came back with a self-titled album which featured even more collaborators. They remained as eclectic as ever and sounded even more complex and well…broken. They toured with a steady crew and a rotating cast. Fans were always dying to see which of the female vocalists would sing this time.

Broken Social Scene featured the ‘radio hit’ 7/4 (Shorelines) (mp3)

And was mashed with an R. Kelly song giving us this (which I lovingly refer to as Whorelines) (video)

The album also featured Hotel, a weird disco-y track that worked amazingly well live (mp3)

4) In the summer of 2006 BSS announced an undefined hiatus which bummed the hell out of me. The separate members wanted time for their own bands and solo-projects. But gradually I began to realize that this meant more output, albeit more fragmented. Virtually all members proved successful in their own rights.

Listen to Emily Haines’ band Metric with Empty (myspace)

Or to Amy Millan's band Stars with Your Ex-Lover is Dead (mp3)

Or to Do Make Say Think with The universe! (mp3)

Or to Feist’s I Feel it All (mp3)

5) When the singers from both Metric and Stars also made a solo-album I knew that it could take a very long time before we’d hear from the collective again. And although I generally love everything that is in some way attached to BSS the collective itself held a special place for me. But recently a new set-up was announced. There will be ‘BSS Presents’ albums with a primary songwriters who will get help from the BSS cast. First up is Kevin Drew whose album Spirit If will be released in September. In early june Brendan Canning will release his BSS Presents. My fear of a world without BSS were alleviated by the next song. Apparently the social scene has just been broken a bit more,but not broken down.

Listen to Kevin Drew’s Tbtf (too beautiful to fuck) while he eats breakfast and watches porn (download from his site)

Almost all the BSS members have the label Arts & Crafts as their home. Aside from the mentioned artists they have The Dears, New Buffalo, Phoenix, The Hidden Cameras, Apostle of Hustle, Jason Collet, Young Galaxy, Valley of the Giants, The American Analog Set, The Most Serene Republic and Los Campesinos!

Fledermaus

I've been meaning to post this for weeks but was all caught up in some voodoo-related treasure hunt of which I shall spare you the gory details. So. Let's get to the music. If like me you love Mark E. Smith and men in wigs check this out:

Von Sudenfed - Fledermaus can't get it (youtube)

The group is a collaboration between two members of the german group Mouse on mars and the before-mentioned Mark E. Smith of the legendary group The Fall.


If you just have a fondness for men in wigs c-check this out:
Kelly - Shoes (youtube).
If you hated that you're a deck. Like totally.


And as an encore a wonderful, wonderful song by Long Fin Killie with (yes) Mark E. Smith. Enjoy!

The heads of dead surfers (mp3)
(Link will be up for a week or two, so be quick or get it yourself)

The original is to be found on the 1995 album "Houdini". Maybe next time more on them.