Update

Sunderland are shit but life is still good because my Glastonbury ticket arrived yesterday. Woohoo!

The best ever 69….

….sleeps before Glastonbury 2009 that is.

If you followed this link for any other reason then please accept my most humble apologies for I was only Glastobating.

Doves – Kingdom Of Rust

Close the book now, the album of the year has just been released. It’s just too good.

From the first to the last there’s not much anyone with ears and the ability to hear could possibly complain about. The five year hiatus has been frustrating, but now the moment has arrived every minute of this album proves it has been worth the wait.

Not only have I already lost Elbow to the public at large, but now my beloved Doves are about to be taken. Call me a music snob but I hate it when every man and his dog jumps on the bandwagon. Who next? Surely not the Super Furry Animals. Thankfully I think they’ll always remain a bit too leftfield.

Long time

Been over a year since I graced these pages. How some things have changed. Equally others have not.

Does life begin at 30? Well mine does! but …

(music+sport+beer) = life

As always.

Elbow – The Seldom Seen Kid (Album Review)

With Doves continued hiatus I thank the God of Stella for this new release from Elbow to stifle my cravings for the intelligent music they both excel in providing.

With soaring melodies aplenty to accompany the melancholic vocal from Guy Garvey the album provides an immediate familiarity – if it ain’t broke no need to fix it.

If I were to pick out highlights I’d probably find myself copying out the entire tracklist as there doesn’t seem to be a bad/weak song on the album, with plenty to keep new and old fans alike wanting more. A welcome return.

BRIT Awards 2008 – Winners

Didn’t watch the BRITs last night and can’t say I’m too disappointed. They always let you down.

Where were the awards for Richard Hawley and PJ Harvey in their respective categories? Surely more deserving than the actual winners.

Well done to the Arctic Monkeys on picking up a couple of awards, but it looks like they sold their souls to get them. I thought they said they didn’t attend stuffy industry award ceremonies to pick up meaningless awards. How times change.

Glastonbury 2008 Line Up

Sick of hearing people moaning about the “poor” line up, especially those who always drone on and on about how many times they’ve been before. Fair enough TITP looks to have topped them with their bookings, but surely these are the people who should know better than most that “Glasto is about more than the music”.

Here’s hoping that all these same people don’t bother to clog up the tinterweb super-highway on April 6th. That way there’ll be more tickets left for those of us who DO want to go.

Guillemots on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross

Anyone see this?

Must say I was a bit taken aback by the full-on-ness of the song they performed. Is this a change in direction or just The Guillemots expanding their repertoire? Love the fact they’re always willing to experiment with their music and don’t seem to worry too much about consequences. Sign of things to come though? Only time will tell….

A poor year for new British music

Over the last few years we’ve been spoilt with a wealth of new talent being discovered and the resurgent British music scene being particlarly strong, however, I cannot help but feel that 2007 has been a poor year.

None of the homegrown bands breaking through have inspired any real kind of excitement with their run of the mill tunes and cardboard cutout rock star personalities, perfect examples of this are Pigeon Detectives and The Twang. I blame the Arctic Monkeys! They found a format which propelled them from obscurity to stardom at such a rate that all new bands are trying to clone this success, unfortunately, they lack a number of essentials: originality and talent.

Luckily, some of the old guard have produced the goods, with Editors, Babyshambles and Super Furry Animals to name a few all releaseing excelent albums.

Radiohead In Rainbows and Illegal Downloading

How much is it acceptable to pay for In Rainbows by Radiohead?

I hold my hands up and admit I paid the scrooge-like sum of £0.00. As much as anything this was to see if I could, but before I get people ranting and raving about ripping Radiohead off, if it’s any good I’ll buy it when it gets released in a physical format on 31st December.

I tend to purchase at least 6 albums every month but often like to try before I buy, especially if it’s a band or someone I don’t know much about, so to this end I do illegally download. Also, why should it just be journalists who get to hear the latest albums before they are released, illegal downloading offers fans this same chance. Recent news reports suggesting that the music industry are going to start prosecuting individual downloader’s are a worry and it will be interesting to see if they act on this threat.

I always wondered if this situation ever arose whether the defence of “what do you mean I illegally downloaded X, Y and Z? Here they are in my CD collection” would work?

However, “ah yes, I didn’t actually bother buying that one, it was shit” might not stand up quite so well!!