Sunday, April 16, 2006
A Kute Angle
It's Easter Sunday! And guess what! Jesus isn't really dead after all, he was just pretending! Who'da thunk it? Well, not Thomas, obviously, and Judas must have been a bit pissed when he found out, but still. Personally, we think it was a bit cruel to crucify him only a few months after he was born, and doing the same thing to the Easter Bunny on the exact same day seems a bit unnecessary, but what do we know? Don't answer that. But that's not the only resurrection on the cards, however, as an e-mail from Kute, Girls Aloud's support act, has turned up in our in-box. Reading through it, however, swiftly brought to our attention 3 points of concern, namely:-
Secondly, their new material isn't half bad at all (And you can hear samples of it here). Some of it does veer into the maudlin ballad territory, notably Me Too and 3 Sides, the latter of which either has a male voice singing on it or one of the girls is having a few hormonal issues, but the rest of the tracks are really rather good indeed. Grounded sounds almost tATu like - perhaps their choice of logo makes sense after all - while Scream and Shout wouldn't sound out of place on the Charlotte Church album, having taken a detour by way of Kelly Clarkson first. Addicted takes a similar rock/pop route but currently lacks a bit of 'oomph'. We couldn't dance to it anyway. Mind you, as anyone who's ever seen us on the dancefloor will confirm, we can't really dance to any song. Never Gonna Change Me is a bit too Sheryl Crow for our tastes and, as the lyrics include the phrase "Eye to eye", we assume that this track is from the days they were labouring under that name. Finally, You're Not Gonna Get Him is particularly ace and, if it isn't a massive hit by the end of the year then we're a monkey's uncle. Of course, given the usual accuracy of our predictions, we're going to start researching what sort of presents are suitable for a chimpanzee nephew immediately, just in case.
So, to summarise then, Kute: Still ace. Phew!
music kute
- POINT 1: Prove Me Wrong, the incredibly ace Rainbow sampling track of such genius that, despite only having heard it once, we still have it bouncing around in our head like a prop from a Jose Gonzalez video, is now not going to be released, thanks to a problem clearing the incredibly ace Rainbow sample (You can download a short preview of it here, but it cuts off before it gets good, i.e. before the incredibly ace Rainbow sample kicks in). Unfortunately it seems that it's going to join the pantheon of great lost pop classics, a cloud which is getting far too crowded these days.
- POINT 2: The e-mail includes the phrase "Our style is a little more mature since the Girls Aloud Tour". There are few things more likely to strike fear into the heart of any pop loving girl or boy than a band claiming to have a more grown-up or mature style. What this generally means is that they've just recorded a whole album's worth of slow R&B ballads which even Blue might consider to be a bit syrupy and dull.
- POINT 3: This is their new logo:
Kute, lest we forget, are two sisters in their mid-teens. We're not entirely convinced that a logo comprised of the two of them apparently naked - though they were wearing unitards for the shoot - and leaning against each other is the most appropriate image of the girls. We can see Richard Madely getting all frothed up at the prospect even as we type.
Secondly, their new material isn't half bad at all (And you can hear samples of it here). Some of it does veer into the maudlin ballad territory, notably Me Too and 3 Sides, the latter of which either has a male voice singing on it or one of the girls is having a few hormonal issues, but the rest of the tracks are really rather good indeed. Grounded sounds almost tATu like - perhaps their choice of logo makes sense after all - while Scream and Shout wouldn't sound out of place on the Charlotte Church album, having taken a detour by way of Kelly Clarkson first. Addicted takes a similar rock/pop route but currently lacks a bit of 'oomph'. We couldn't dance to it anyway. Mind you, as anyone who's ever seen us on the dancefloor will confirm, we can't really dance to any song. Never Gonna Change Me is a bit too Sheryl Crow for our tastes and, as the lyrics include the phrase "Eye to eye", we assume that this track is from the days they were labouring under that name. Finally, You're Not Gonna Get Him is particularly ace and, if it isn't a massive hit by the end of the year then we're a monkey's uncle. Of course, given the usual accuracy of our predictions, we're going to start researching what sort of presents are suitable for a chimpanzee nephew immediately, just in case.
So, to summarise then, Kute: Still ace. Phew!
music kute
Saturday, April 15, 2006
Stupid People and Their Opinions
Oh fuck off.
Of course, our annoyance is slightly tempered by the fact that it was voted for by listeners to Kerrang! radio and not anyone who might, you know, actually have a clue.
music
Of course, our annoyance is slightly tempered by the fact that it was voted for by listeners to Kerrang! radio and not anyone who might, you know, actually have a clue.
music
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
10 Things We State About...
Morrissey found himself topping the album chart on Sunday with his newie Ringleader of the Tormenters. Something which led every single newspaper we saw on Monday to use a variation on "Heaven knows he's happy now" as their headline, and they all no doubt thought they were being really original and witty with it as well. Anyway, to celebrate this, here are ten entirely true and in no way made up facts about Morrissey and The Smiths:-- The Smiths named themselves after Morrissey's favourite branch of newsagents.
- As well as waving around gladioli on stage, Moz is also fond of putting on a pair of horn rimmed spectacles, a purple wig and calling himself Dame Edna Everage.
- "Everyday is like Sunday", he once mused, which is an interesting viewpoint from a metaphysical sense, but one which led him to be sacked from his job at a calendar manufacturers.
- Depending on which source you trust, Morrissey's first name is either Stephen, Mark, Alanis or Van.
- Hector was the first of the gang to die, the gang in question being the high school chess club. He died of chronic wheeziness.
- After a hard night's gigging, there's nothing Morrissey likes more than going to his dressing room and tucking into a groaning platter piled high with sausages, chops, mince, liver and various other animal based foodstuffs. Unfortunately his gorging can often bring on bouts of indigestion, and it was after a particularly bad night, when even a whole box of Rennie's failed to ease his stomach pains, that he found himself inspired to write Meat is Murder.
- There is a Light That Never Goes Out was written about Morrissey's fridge. Oh, hang on, sorry, we've just realised that we're not the first to say something along those lines and that joke isn't funny any more.
- Morrissey and Marr are such close buddies that the only reason they split The Smiths was because whenever they went into the studio together they just spent all their time larking about, laughing at each others' jokes and generally slapping each other on the back instead of actually getting any work done.
- We've only managed to come up with nine facts this week. We started something we couldn't finish.
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Erm, TV
Normally E4 is only as watchable as your tolerance for Friends repeats allows, but tonight it becomes possibly the greatest TV channel in the world - the mighty Quiz Call when Alex Kramer is presenting excepted, of course - when the first episode of Girls Aloud: Off The Record is aired.
It's a six part fly-on-the-wall documentary following the girls as they travel around the world being both generally brilliant and drunk. In fact, the latter has caused a slight furor as various people with nothing better to do with their time - yeah, like we can talk - have been complaining that both their drunken antics and occasionally foul language might well set a bad example to their younger fans. Which would be a fair point if it wasn't for the fact that a) the program is going out at 10.30PM, a time ever so slightly after the watershed, and b) the last time we checked it wasn't actually the Victorian era and so the concept of females swearing, having fun and drinking is unlikely to bring society down to it's knees.
Our main concern is that, much like their videos, the Nicola won't actually be in it that much. Indeed, we're actually quite worried that to the casual observer she'll seem less like a member of a band and, if truth be told, the very pivot on which their genius rests and more like some hanger on who doesn't have anything to do with the group. We shall see.
And! If that wasn't enough pop related TV for you, you can warm yourself up for the documentary by tuning into E4 half an hour early to watch the so bad it's, well, bad, Boys Will Be Girls, a show in which Nathan Moore attempts to pull off the second audacious hoax of his career - the first being to try and fool people into thinking that Lisa Scott-Lee was a plausible popstar - by taking some male singers, dressing them up unconvincingly as women, before attempting to trick the music industry into believing they're a genuine, albeit somewhat ropey, girl band. Some of you may have seen this show a year or so ago when it was originally broadcast under the title The Atomic Kitten Story.
music tv girl aloud boys will be girls
It's a six part fly-on-the-wall documentary following the girls as they travel around the world being both generally brilliant and drunk. In fact, the latter has caused a slight furor as various people with nothing better to do with their time - yeah, like we can talk - have been complaining that both their drunken antics and occasionally foul language might well set a bad example to their younger fans. Which would be a fair point if it wasn't for the fact that a) the program is going out at 10.30PM, a time ever so slightly after the watershed, and b) the last time we checked it wasn't actually the Victorian era and so the concept of females swearing, having fun and drinking is unlikely to bring society down to it's knees.
Our main concern is that, much like their videos, the Nicola won't actually be in it that much. Indeed, we're actually quite worried that to the casual observer she'll seem less like a member of a band and, if truth be told, the very pivot on which their genius rests and more like some hanger on who doesn't have anything to do with the group. We shall see.
And! If that wasn't enough pop related TV for you, you can warm yourself up for the documentary by tuning into E4 half an hour early to watch the so bad it's, well, bad, Boys Will Be Girls, a show in which Nathan Moore attempts to pull off the second audacious hoax of his career - the first being to try and fool people into thinking that Lisa Scott-Lee was a plausible popstar - by taking some male singers, dressing them up unconvincingly as women, before attempting to trick the music industry into believing they're a genuine, albeit somewhat ropey, girl band. Some of you may have seen this show a year or so ago when it was originally broadcast under the title The Atomic Kitten Story.
music tv girl aloud boys will be girls
Monday, April 10, 2006
Thoughts of the Pops
It's Monday! And we went to see Protocol play on Friday night. "Strokes with synths" is our lazy shorthand journalistic description of them, but they're a lot better than that may sound. Also, we have to admire their, ahem, interesting fashion choices, with not one but two of the band dressing up like gay sailors. Well, gayer sailors anyway. Anyway, here's what we learnt from this week's Top of the Pops:-- Snow Patrol are one of the few bands who make Embrace seem interesting.
- The title of new single You're All I Have presumably refers to The Indie-Rock Handbook, the rules of which they're following to the letter, including closing their eyes and refusing to look like they're in any way actually enjoying their chosen career.
- Belle and Sebastian, at number 25 with The Blues are Still Blue, are back. They're back in denim. And denim put the soul in your rock & roll.
- Sticking two fingers up to those who may doubt their mastery of stagecraft, Stuart Murdoch pulled out a bubble machine disguised as a box of Belle & Sebastian washing powder half way through their set. We reckon they nicked the idea from Geri Halliwell's Bag it Up Girl Powder.
- RETRO: Yazz doing The Only Way is Up. After releasing this record, Yazz then went on to lead the PLO, before becoming the Palestinian leader in 1993, a role she maintained until her death in 2004. While a controversial figure, she was a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004, an award of which she was justly proud.
- Andy Abraham, from X Factor, is going on a tour this year which he has titled Unforgettable. We are on the phone to trading standards as we speak.
- The Streets' All Goes Out The Window has gospel esque backing singers and sounds a bit like an awful version of the actually quite good Liberty X single Song For Lovers.
- Is the lead singer from The Crimea the same bloke who used to sing in The Crocketts? We're too lazy to research it ourselves. Apparently The Crimea were one of John Peel's favourite bands. Maybe he was losing his touch.
- In Daniel Powter's new single he asks us to "Lie to Me". OK then, your new single really is a high watermark for music and anyone who clearly sees Billy Joel as a valid role model definitely is not a twat in any way shape or form. Also, by wearing a hat all the time to keep it covered up, absolutely no-one suspects you of being bald. Not a single person.
- After they joined his band on tour, Bono wrote The Zutons a poem about them as a thank you. It ran as follows:-
There once was a girl who played sax,
Whose playing was as sharp as tacks.
Their music don't rock me,
But she's really quite foxy,
So let's make the beast with two backs. - Gnarls Barkley is still at number one. Now that proper CDs have been included their achievement is no longer as epoch defining. Still a good tune though.
Saturday, April 08, 2006
Rung Up
Madonna fans up and down the country spent yesterday morning on the phone, hoping to get hold of tickets, but mainly discovering that the ticket touts got there before them and their only hope of getting a pair is to pay the astronomical prices on ebay, as opposed, of course, to paying the equally astronomical prices that Madonna herself was charging right from the get go. We're not quite sure if there's any gig we'd pay 160 quid to go and see, as we reckon that no matter how fantastic it might be - and it'd have to be something pretty fantastic in the first place to make us splash out, An Audience with Daphne and Celeste, maybe, or a reformed B*Witched with Girl Thing on support duties - we'd be spending the entire gig thinking about the fact that we'd spent £160 for it and wouldn't really be able to focus on anything else. Anyway, despite announcing roughly two hundred and seventeen extra dates, a number of fans still came away disappointed, which means that they must have £160 burning a hole in their pocket and no real idea of what to do with it, especially as spending it on Madonna tickets seemed like a good idea. Fear not! Because here at Talent in a Previous Life we've prepared a brief guide on what exactly you should do with that money:-
- Buy up her entire back catalogue on Amazon. OK, fair enough, most people who think that spending that much money on Madonna tickets is a good idea probably already owns her entire back catalogue already, but it probably won't hurt to have a back-up set for when they inevitably wear out the originals. Also, buying a new set would give them the impetus to listen through all her old albums again, and hopefully realise that a lot of it is rather lacking in the old quality department.
- Buy as many smelly, flammable sticks as you can. You need these as, after all, you clearly have more money than incense.
- Use it to pay off your credit card bill and American Express yourself.
- Send the cheque to Madonna anyway. If she's having to charge that much for tickets in the first place, then clearly she's in dire straits and needs as much help as she can get, lest she have to start selling off the family silver or, worse, having to rent out the East wing of her mansion to poor people.
- Buy up some Kaballah
merchandisereligous artifacts. After all, it is a proper religion and not just an impressive marketing exercise so this will guarantee you entry into heaven. At current rates £160 will buy you either half a length of tatty red string or a thimble full of undrinkable water. - Buy a small selection of skirts and trousers and send them to Madonna with a note attatched reading "For the love of God, wear these!"
- Similarly, send her a large vat of moisturising cream with instructions to rub liberally into her neck and hands in the vain hope that it might make a difference.
- Help the record company out by buying up as many of the millions of unsold copies of the American Life album as you can, saving them the hassle of dumping them in various landfill sites up and down the country.
- Buy a glitterball, hire a cheap, elderly hooker and get her to put on a leotard and mime along badly to some of Madonna's greatest hits. This will likely be a more convincing performance than the real thing.
- Spend it all on cheap vodka and spend the night of the gig drinking and weeping and wailing, desperately trying to convince yourself that you didn't really want to go anyway and you're more than happy to be doing this instead. You may wish to keep back some money to pay for the carpet and sofa cleaning which will be required when you inevitably vomit all down yourself and all over the floor.
- Go and see a dozen or so Rachel Stevens gigs instead. She's a bit like Madonna, only better, more attractive and a lot cheaper. And also a lot less popular, so you'll not have to queue for as long at the toilets. Or, indeed, at all.
Thursday, April 06, 2006
A Patchy Indian
Despite being one of the single greatest pop moments released thus far this year, WigWam is not exactly setting the midweeks on fire and may even fail to chart. Clearly this is not a good thing and it's led to us pondering on exactly why the public has failed to take it to their hearts. Clearly it's not the music, which crackles and pulses and does all the sorts of things that good pop should do, which, given that it involves the hairy hand of a Blur member, is quite impressive and may well be the dictionary definition of the phrase 'against all odds', so what could it be? Well, we've studied this long and hard - well, for about five seconds - and we think we've found the answer: The public are confused by the lyrics. Now, given that there's only about a dozen words in the song, and most of those are "Miaow", you'd be forgiven if you think that that is, quite frankly, a ludicrous suggestion, and to be fair, you'd pretty much be right, but bear with us here. The lyric we reckon is causing the public to scratch their heads in consternation is when Betty invites us all to start checking out her WigWam. Given that the pop fan of Native American descent is something of a rarity in the target demographic, it's only natural that people are shying away from this, not knowing what they should be looking for or even where to begin when it comes to the underused skill of wigwam appreciation. To try and rectify this and help it at least vaguely scrape into the top 40, we got Betty - honestly, ahem - to write us a quick 'How To' guide in a bid to educate the public on this lost art.
Betty Boo's Guide to Checking Out a Wigwam
music wigwam
- NEVER confuse a WigWam with a Tee-Pee. Despite some similarities they're two entirely different things. Equally don't confuse it with a Tippi either, she has nothing to do with tented living and was a scottish pop/rock artist who fancied herself as the next Janis Joplin but wasn't even good enough to be the next Amy Studt
- ONLY buy from registered, trustworthy dealers. While most are reputable, there are a number of sharks and con-artists in the world of second hand WigWam sales. Buying from these you're more likely than not to end up with a WigWam which is, in fact, two different WigWam's stiched together into one. This is dangerous as you're likely to find yourself staying in a WigWig or, worse, a WamWam. There really is nothing worse than finding yourself forced to share your new home with two Andrew Ridgelys and two George Michaels.
- DESPITE what some insecure types may tell you, size does matter. First of all circumference is important, you never know quite when the urge to do the do will take you so you need to make sure you've got enough space for that, as well as making sure there are no sharp objects in the way. Also, height is equally important. If you can't stand up to your full height while wearing 5 inch high silvery space boots then you shouldn't even consider it. After all, if you bring someone back to your WigWam and you both have to crouch down, it'll be quite unlikely that you'll find yourself doing the do that evening.
- DON'T think that trying to save money by renting your WigWam on a part-time basis is a good idea. You'll need it 24 hours.
- SOUNDPROOFING is very important, but if you can't afford that then you must pitch your WigWam well away from any residential areas. Your neighbours won't be too impressed when the B is for "Back late from the pub, completely pissed" and the Boo is for "Booming out your record collection as loud as your stereo can take", so you're likely to end up discovering that the A is for "Anti Social Behaviour Order".
- AS indicated above, your WigWam should be relatively isolated, but be careful that the location isn't too close to woods, rivers, wells, disused coal cellars and any other location where a small child might get lost. The last thing you want to be doing is wandering around in the middle of the night shouting "Where are you, baby" at the top of your voice, desperately asking anyone passing if they know where she's gone.
- IF you're looking for slightly more indier advice about WigWams, why not ask Radiohead to help you out. They're always in tents. (In tents/Intense? No? Please yourself).
music wigwam
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
10 Things We State About...
Having failed to make the top spot in the singles chart thanks to someone 'losing' a chunk of their download sales - no, we don't understand how that could happen either, unless someone turned the monitor round the long way and all the 1's and 0's fell out the side - Embrace made up for it this week by getting to number one in the album chart. Despite this being their, oooh, umpteenth album at least, some of you may be a bit unsure who they actually are, which is mainly thanks to them having all the stage presence and star quality of a wet towel. Fear not, though, as to help you out here are ten entirely true and in no way made up facts about the nations favourite band to listen to when Coldplay aren't releasing any records:-- If you've ever wondered who the lead singer of Embrace is, his name is Danny McNamara and he's the leader of the band. Although they're small in number they're the finest in the land. They play at wakes and weddings and every country ball, and when they play at funerals, they play the best of all. Apparently.
- Whenever Embrace play a gig, the RSPCA report a marked increase in calls related to camel mutilation from concerned members of the public.
- During interviews Danny is likely to storm out if asked about his obsession with Star Trek and similar Sci-fi shows. As far as he's concerned his geekness is none of your business.
- Their latest album cover, featuring faceless silhouettes of the band, possesses more life and personality than the band themselves.
- Without Coldplay gifting the band Gravity at a time when they looked likely to split and leave the music industry entirely, the band wouldn't be having the success they currently enjoy. This is another reason to hate Coldplay.
- Come Back To What You Know was the title of an early Embrace single, and it's a philosophy the band have stuck firmly to throughout their career, returning time and time again to the leaden, emotionless, dull, stodgy and vaguely anthemic sound which first found them fame, all those years ago, much like a dog returning to its own vomit.
- Embrace were named after Danny pondered for hours on what the least likely outcome from someone who had just received one of his band's CD's as a present would be.
- Like Oasis, Embrace were big in the late nineties, contained a pair of argumentative brothers and were northern. Also like Oasis they achieved a remarkable amount for a group with no apparent talent whatsoever.
- You're Not Alone was written as an attempt to make Embrace fans feel a bit better about themselves.
- Wonder was quite good, mind.
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Urban MySpaceman
We're never ones to shy away from jumping onto a bandwagon, even when the bandwagon has flown past so long ago that it's been put out of commision and been replaced by a big silvery hovering monorail style thing. Which is a slightly longwinded way of saying that we've finally gotten round to getting ourselves a MySpace account. Yes, we know, we are at the cutting edge, aren't we? To be honest we don't really understand what we're doing with it yet, but if you'd like to be our 'friend', and we can think of a few reasons why you might not, then you might want to make your way to http://www.myspace.com/talentinapreviouslife. Thanks!
Monday, April 03, 2006
Thoughts of the Pops
It's Monday! And we trust you'll all be rushing out at some point this week to buy the rather ace Wigwam by the equally ace, ummm, Wigwam. We may have more to say about this later on in the week but frankly, given our recent form, we wouldn't bank on it. We definitely learnt some stuff from this week's Top of the Pops, however. Stuff like...- Trevor Nelson apparently still has some sort of career. We know! We couldn't believe it either.
- The Kooks do the sort of indie music that no-one really makes nowadays. Mainly because it's godawful.
- Their new single Naive is probably about Katie Melua, instantly making it a hundred times more interesting than The Melua herself.
- Other things more interesting than The Melua include traffic cones, Forever Friends prints and dust.
- Mary J Blige's cover of U2's One manages to be even more painfully overwrought and falsely emoted than the original. Which is quite an impressive feat when you think about it.
- She also refuses to use one note when she can cram half a dozen into each syllable.
- RETRO: Wham! doing Wham Rap! (exclamation marks model's own). Singing "Hey everybody look at me / I've got street credibility" when you've apparently based your style entirely on The Fonz from Happy Days takes some balls, something which was amply demonstrated by their overly tight jeans.
- The Streets' When You Wasn't Famous sounds remarkably similar to The Man With The Stick's song about Terry from Vic Reeves' Big Night Out.
- Nature's Law presumably refers to survival of the fittest, which makes it hard to understand exactly why Embrace still appear to be a going concern. Particularly when you consider the fact that Danny has a singing voice akin to a wounded animal.
- The video for LL Cool J and Jennifer Lopez's Control Yourself was introduced as having something for everyone. For the girls, apparently, there was LL's abs to enjoy, while for the boys there was the 'bootylicious' J-Lo. They failed to state what was in it for those of us who prefer to look at attractive people.
- Someone called Nerina Pallot is releasing a record called Everybody's going to War. Is the world really crying out for another Meredith Brooks?
- RETRO: Massive Attack doing Protection. For all the critical acclaim they received, they really were quiet a dull band, weren't they? Matters here aren't exactly helped by the fact that the thrill a millennium yawnsomeness of Tracey from Everything But the Girl was on vocal duties.
- We're not sure whether Andy Abraham's, from the X Factor, as we're sure you'll need reminding, new track is a cynically chosen cover or a cynically appropriated rip off of that style of music.
- He seemed quite chuffed to receive applause at the end of his song, probably because he would rarely have received that sort of reaction while he was emptying the bins.
- Gnarls Barkley's Crazy is at number one. This is the first song to reach the top spot on downloads alone, which is apparently all exciting and historic and not just an inevitable event which has no real importance in the real world.
