springfield-vs-shelbyville:

You kids don’t know Grand Funk? The wild shirtless lyrics of Mark Farner? The bong-rattling bass of Mel Schacher? The competent drumwork of Don Brewer? Oh, man!

This weekend (on Sunday in fact) I was lucky enough to dj at the Odd Box Weekender in the Buffalo Bar, Islington, That London.  I was a bit drunk, and didn’t live tweet my set.  Therefore this will be full of omissions and isn’t necessarily in the right order.  You’ll get the idea though:

The Lovely Eggs – Don’t Look At Me (I Don’t Like It)

The Ramones – Blitzkrieg Bop

Kenickie – In Your Car

Delta 5 – Mind Your Own Business

Orange Juice – Rip It Up

Yazoo - Don’t Go

Depeche Mode - Just Can’t Get Enough

David Bowie – Modern Love

De La Soul – Magic Number

Martha & The Vandellas – Nowhere to Run

The Supremes – Can’t Hurry Love

Janelle Monae – Tightrope

Harry Belafonte – Jump In The Line

Beyonce – Crazy In Love

Tatu – All The Things She Said

Fleetwood Mac – Go Your Own Way

The Smiths – Ask

Housemartins – Happy Hour

Paul Simon – Call Me Al

Talking Heads – Once In A Lifetime

La Casa Azul – Love Is In The Air

Mint Royale – Don’t Falter

ELO – Mr Blue Sky

Thanks to Mr Trev Odd Box for letting me dj, and to the people who danced and said nice things about my set afterwards.  Sorry I didn’t have any Beastie Boys.

Love this!

lala-love-you:

Pete McKee on the Arts Council funding cuts, posted on his Twitter earlier.

shitmystudentswrite:

If your girlfriend were to ask Kant how she looked, Kant would be a cunt and say ‘You do not look good’ instead of lying.

Real Estate - Days

This is a record I missed last year when it came out, and have now fallen in love with after one listen.  I was intrigued by “Municipality”, which ambled out of my radio a few times in late ‘11. 

It’s a laid back, jangly, summery (I description I use too much I know) album which reminds me of early REM, the Feelies and the Sundays.  It sounds like an August afternoon, all lazy and hazy.  In a less rubbish world than this one, Days will soundtrack this summer, swirling around barbeques and billowing from every open window.  I can’t wait for the sun, because it and Days will be perfect together.

I have decided to limit myself to 1 song per band.

10. Blood Oranges (now called Shark Teeth) - French Word For Love

With it’s huge chorus and exhilarating build and release toward the end of the song, French Word For Love is an indiepop dancefloor anthem in waiting.  The relentless surge of guitars, drums and harmonies should have swept all before it this year.

9. Moustache of Insanity - We Need More Awesome

A lament for the lack of decent action heroes these days, and about how the film Predator may have important lessons for life.  We Need More Awesome packs a lot into it’s short running time, but the huge dance drums that come in toward the end bring more awesome than you thought was possible.  See also: Aaaargh! Noooooo!, Superiority Complex, Lynn Lowry

8. A Hawk And A Hacksaw - Cervantine

The track where A Hawk And A Hacksaw’s mix of Eastern Europe and Mexico is most evident.  The swirling strings and accordian conjure up a grey sky, then the brass section bursts through like sunbeams (to re-use a similie).  See also: Espanolo Kola, Lazslo Lassu

7. The Weeknd - House of Balloons/Glass Table Girls

Built around a sample of Happy House by Siouxsie and the Banshees, House of Balloons seems to be the least downbeat moment of the Weeknd’s album.  But then Glass Table Girls, with it’s droning synths and downtuned vocals crashes the party, and hard drugs and meaningless sex take on a much more sinister edge.  See also: High For This, The Party and the After Party

6. This Many Boyfriends - Young Lovers Go Pop!

An ebullient burst of indiepop energy, with an absolutely massive chorus, this was deseverdly all over 6music for a while.  Likely to be setting off mayhem on indie dancefloors for years to come.

5. Lykke Li - Sadness Is A Blessing

The best use of the “Be My Baby” drumbeat in ages, the universal signifier of dramatic teenage heartache propels Lykke’s greatest song to dizzying heights.  Every chorus increases the intensity, but the song is pulled back before it becomes mawkish.  See also: Youth Knows No Pain, I Follow River, Get Some

4. Nicola Roberts - Beat of my Drum

The first solo single from a member of a massively successful girl group shouldn’t sound like this.  It should be a rubbish ballad or an off the peg “banger” (maybe with Calvin Harris involved).  N-Robz instead gave us a digi-dancehall curveball from Planet Huh?, all stuttering drums, warped synths and over excited yelping.  Other singles from her album were ace, but this is why she has been adopted as the hipster popstar of choice.  See also: Lucky Day, Yo-Yo, Gladiator

3. Lovely Eggs - Don’t Look At Me (I Don’t Like It)

The guitars and drums hit like a hurricane, and Holly shouts the words at you like it’s the most important thing in the world.  That those words are a typically Eggs-ian expanding list of surreal imagery just adds to the brilliance.  The song I’ve played most while dj-ing this year.  See also: People Are Twats, Why Don’t You Like Me?, Watermelons, Allergies

2. The Give It Ups - Why Won’t You Go Out With Me?

I was first struck by it’s simplicity, which I mean as a compliment.  It’s a song which could have been written at any time since pop music began.  Then it’s the energy of the song, the ramshackle bursts of guitar and the shouts of “You know you want to!”.  For anyone who’s found themselves in the grip of unrequited longing, this song is the cathartic anthem you’ve been waiting for. See also: Knives Chau

1. Sock Puppets - Can’t Wait

In any other year, the mighty Why Won’t You Go Out With Me? would’ve walked it as my favourite pop song of the year.  But the Sock Puppets managed to top it with an even more perfectly formed blast of serrated, heartbroken genius.  Again the simplicity is key, anyone could’ve written that chorus, and the sentiments are universal.  But Sock Puppets give it so much conviction.  I’m not a good enough writer to explain why I love Can’t Wait so much, except to say it’s everything I love about pop music, so here’s a link to the youtube video.  See also: I Blame Gravity, Summer Jacket, Because I Told You So

Bubbling under: Joe Goddard - Gabriel, Brett Anderson - Brittle Heart, Rihanna - We Found Love, The Dirtbombs - Good Life, Metronomy - Everything Goes My Way, Cults - Go Outside, Very Truly Yours - Sorry To Say, Just Handshakes, We’re British - Falling Over Our Fear

Ones I couldn’t choose because I’m not sure whether the came out this year, or because I play bass on them: Colour Me Wednesday - Purge Your Inner Tory, The Sweet Nothings - She’s An Accountant & Subterranean Mosely Blues

Here is a list of my 10 favourite records of the year, probably in the right order.

10. Cut Copy - Zonoscope

Cut Copy have become masters of building tension and of blissful release.  Zonoscope is their best record yet, a mix of 80’s postpunk and 90’s dance (with the occasional bit of glam stomp and AM pop thrown in for good measure).  Best song: Pharaohs and Pyramids

9. Gruff Rhys - Hotel Shampoo

A record that shows off Gruff’s undeniable skill at writing songs that sound like they’ve existed for decades.  A bit too polished production-wise for some tastes, those who could see through gloss found an album packed with retropop gems.  Best song: If We Were Words We Would Rhyme

8. Heroes of the Mexican Independence Movement - Signal Box EP

Hull’s bestest band treated us to an ep which ranged from dreamy folk to torrential noise rock.  Underpinning it all was a knack for infectious melody and genuine “wtf?” lyrics. Best song: The Way To Show Me

7. Moustache of Insanity - Album of Death

Spiky indiepop that deals with video games, horror films and missing your girlfriend when she’s away (among other things).  Catchy as anything and spiced with genuine wit and inventiveness.  Best song: We Need More Awesome

6. The Weeknd - House of Balloons

It’s tempting to describe the narcotised soundscapes of House of Balloons as “dreamy”, but a cursory listen to the lyrics would reveal those dreams to be nightmares.  On the surface a typical r’n’b record obsessed with sex and drugs, the Weeknd turned it on it’s head to show the moral corrosiveness of the lifestyle the genre normally extols.  Best song: House of Balloons/Glass Table Girls

5. Lykke Li - Wounded Rhymes

Epic without resorting to bombast, Wounded Rhymes mixed 60’s girl group melody and melancholy with huge 80’s production.  Apparently written as a response to an unrequited crush, the sadness was sometimes overwhelming (for this listener at least), but the sheer pop genius always gleamed through.  Best song: Sadness is a Blessing

4. A Hawk and A Hacksaw - Cervantine

An album that mixes Eastern European, Asian and Mexican music was always going to be a tough sell, but the relative absence of an album this intoxicatingly melodic and richly inventive from end of year lists is a travesty.  From the mournful sweep of Lazslo Lassu to the way the mariachi horns burst through the clouds like sunbeams on the title track, this album rewards each re-listen.  Best song: Cervantine

3. The Field - Looping State of Mind

Most electronic albums are designed for the night, but the sun-dappled trance of The Field should be listened to at sunrise, or when stretched out on the grass on a blazing hot day (or crashed out on bed while full of codeine, as I discovered earlier this year).  Its endless loops are packed with sonic detail in which to get lost, while each repetition increases the ecstatic bliss.  Best track: Burned Out

2. Girl Talk - All Day

It’s possibly cheating to include this, but epic mash-up marathon All Day is the thing I’ve listened to most this year, usually on a Friday or Saturday, dreaming of the weekend adventures to come.  I’m going to do a list of my favourite moments from this in the next couple of days.  Favourite bit: probably the Ramones/Missy Elliot collision see the additional info below

1. The Lovely Eggs - Cob Dominos

Sublime silliness, tender sadness, blazing guitars, jokes that are actually funny, life affirming anthems, god-awful puns, kazoo solos, melodies that are instantly catchy but never get old.  Lyrics about OCD, shit previous jobs, the perils of going out with musicians and men with “sausage roll thumbs”.  These are some of the things that make up Cob Dominos, the most joyous, and best, album of the year.  Best song: all of them.

My favourite songs of the year may make an appearance tomorrow.

EDIT: It seems that All Day by Girl Talk came out late 2010.  I’m keeping it in because of how much it soundtracked my year.  If you think that’s cheating, take it out, move everything up one and put “It Is The Rehearsal That Will Make This” by The Middle Ones at 10.

 Songs that I played at the Pop-o-matic Christmas Special Friday 16^th December

Lykke Li – Sadness Is A Blessing

The School – And Suddenly

Greg Lake – I Believe In Father Christmas

Gruff Rhys – Shark Ridden Waters

The Siddeleys – What Went Wrong This Time

The Hollies – I’m Alive

Nick Lowe – Cruel To Be Kind

The Freshies – I’m In Love With A Girl On A Certain Manchester Megastore Checkout Desk

Sock Puppets – Can’t Wait

Colour Me Wednesday – Purge Your Inner Tory

Ace Bushy Striptease – HM9 (Waterfall)

Paul Simon – Me and Julio Down By The Schoolyard

Squeeze – Take Me I’m Yours

This Many Boyfriends – Young Lovers Go Pop!

The Replacements – Left Of The Dial

Then Shark Teeth played a typically awesome set

The Just Joans – I Won’t Survive

Allo Darlin – Henry Rollins Don’t Dance

The Rubinoos – I Think We’re Alone Now

The Ronettes – Be My Baby

Del Shannon – Runaway

The Tammys – Egyptian Shumba

Then The Birthday Kiss played a set of shimmery loveliness

Jona Lewie – Stop The Cavalry

Teardrop Explodes – Reward

Martha and the Muffins – Echo Beach

Beyonce – Crazy In Love

Rachel Stevens – Sweet Dreams My LA Ex

De La Soul – Me Myself and I

Blancmange – Living On The Ceiling

OMD – Enola Gay

Stevie Nicks – Edge of Seventeen

Altered Images – I Could Be Happy

Then our guest dj Joel played a brilliant set of pop awesomeness

The Waitresses – Christmas Wrapping

Kim Wilde – Kids In America

Blur – Girls and Boys

Depeche Mode – Just Can’t Get Enough

The Cure – Friday I’m In Love

Saint Etienne – He’s On The Phone

Girls Aloud – Biology

At this point my phone ran out of battery, so I has to stop live tweeting the set. Relying on memory, I think the rest of the night went like this:

Sugababes – Overload

The Supremes – Baby Love

Maxine Nightingale – Right Back Where We Started From

Martha and the Vandellas – Dancing In The Street

Cee Lo Green – Fuck You

Nicola Roberts – Lucky Day

Liberty X – Just A Little Bit

Fleetwood Mac – Go Your Own Way

Slade – Merry Christmas Everyone

Wizzard – I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day

Madonna – Like A Prayer

The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl – Fairytale of New York

tomewing:

It’s OK, don’t worry. I know it seems difficult to understand right now, but the first thing you need to realise is that what you’re feeling is normal. A lot of people are going through the same process you are. What’s more, a lot of people have gone through it before and come out OK. Music…

Awesome!