Happy New Year…

That’s it for me this year – I hope everyone has a great evening ahead of them.  This blog’s little more than six months old, and  although I’m deeply proud of it, I know it’s nowhere near the finished article.  But please keep following Some Of It Was True! in 2010, and hopefully it’ll become the very best London music blog out there.  In the words of the fabulous Walkmen, “it’s going to be a good year”.  See you then…

The Walkmen – In The New Year

mesparrow? – where did you go?

mesparrow? haunted me like no-one else in 2009.  I came across her during an unsuccessful date in March in Shunt.  Like the best things in life, I opened a door and stumbled into heaven; a dimly-lit chamber where this young and slight lady was performing all manner of songs. Some were gorgeous piano numbers enhanced by a voice that was alternately thick jazz-lounge then girly and shy.  Some were her singing balefully with the help of a pre-recorded brass instrument.  Some saw her hum softly over an already-playing record by another female singer.  It sounds bonkers; in fact, it was wonderful, albeit in a seriously eclectic, get-me, Shunt way.

Talking of which, here’s a weird and wacky version of Toxic, by Britney Spears.

I spoke to mesparrow? afterwards; she was French (though she sings in English), and adorable (some readers will have trouble with this).  I clarified her name and said I’d add her on MySpace, in the way that one does, expecting her to accept, in the way that artists do.  Except she didn’t.  Hmm, I thought, and added her again.  Same result.  And again – snap.  I try every so often now, and still the square root of nada.  Yet the page still gets updated.  Maybe she doesn’t like me.  Maybe she’s given up music, taken up ice-sculpture and gone to live in Greenland. 

I hope not.  Indeed, none of this would be a problem were it not that I use MySpace to keep up to speed with concerts, and indeed new material.  Songkick can’t help me with the former, and there’s no obvious source for the latter.  I can’t find a Facebook page.  In the end all I have are fading, fond memories, YouTube videos and a lame Google Alert set up.

Sooo: if anyone knows owt about the elusive, exceptional mesparrow?, please do let me know.  And if you fancy trying your luck on MySpace, here’s her page.  Meanwhile, here’s another video, this time with a cohort on piano duty.

Musical holidays

Inspired by Beach House’s Norway, I thought I’d compile a little list of other great songs honouring a possible holiday destination.  This is the time of year when folk plan their next year’s holidays, after all.  Here we go:

Beach House – Norway
The land of fjords and extravagant heaters is honoured by Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally.

Fleet Foxes – Mykonos
The idyllic Greek island, a famous party destination, is cited for its “gentle coast” in the lyrics of this gorgeous dreamer.

Harlem Shakes – Niagara Falls
The world’s most famous cascades, in Canada, inspire this chirpy number by the American indiesters with their beauty. 

Air France – Gothenburg Belongs To Me
The second Swedish city is seized by natives Air France, who must admire it’s galleries, nice hotels and archipelago.

Beirut – Nantes
It’s just another night in Nantes for Zachary Condon, his meandering harmony interrupted only by a snippet of a conversation from Jean-Luc Godard’s Le Mépris.

Led Zeppelin – Kashmir
Aaah, a classic – dreaming of the beautiful, Himalayan region in northern India.

Port O’Brien – Oslo Campfire
More Norwegian love, but this time specific to the trendy, and notoriously expensive, capital city.

Yellowman – Blueberry Hill
The slope in question is apparently a snog-spot in Taos, New Mexico. A much-covered song, but no-one’s done it better than the reggae legend.

Rainbow Arabia – Holiday in Congo
Hmm – not sure Congo, regularly steeped in violence, is an obvious vacation stop, but this blog will respect the California couple’s views.

Hieroglyphics – Fantasy Island
Not a precise location, admittedly, but the Hieroglyphics deserve inclusion simply for their unrivalled name-checking of global destinations in most songs.

Beach House get geographical

Talk about conformists!  Beach House’s latest song Norway – more Scandinavian musical inspiration! - does nothing to dispel the ‘dream pop’ description that the Baltimore duo have long been given.  It’s a tremulous, nicely-layered slowburn of a song, punctuated by gentle vocal hums and busy guitars, and founded as usual of Victoria Legrand’s piercing voice.  She’s often likened to Nico, but there’s something of Patti Smith for me too – a much deeper, fuller sound than most female singers offer.

This all matters to a London blog because Beach House are due in our beloved smoghole early in 2010, in support of third album, Teen Dream, released 26 January through Sub Pop, following on from first single Used To Be (video below).  First up is a date at the Bush Hall in Queen’s Park on Wednesday 17 February (tickets here), and then two nights supporting the fabulous Grizzy Bear at the equally fabulous Roundhouse on Saturday 13 March and Sunday 14 March, of which only the latter is still available (tickets here).  One song you’ll definitely hear at some point is Slow Life - a Grizzly tune featuring Victoria Legrand’s singing talents.  The two acts in such an atmospheric arena really ought to equate to a great night.  

MySpace | Website | Buy
MP3: Beach House – Norway
MP3: Grizzly Bear – Slow Life (Feat. Victoria Legrand)

RATM as Xmas number one: same old same-old, or a new Nirvana?

This blog never pays attention to the UK charts – but this past fortnight they’ve been near impossible to ignore.  After four unchallenged years, reality TV show X Factor, steered by Simon Cowell, has lost its grip on the coveted Christmas Number One slot.  Cowell’s 2009 horse, a clean-faced angel named Joe McElderry, was outpaced in the final furlongs by Rage Against The Machine’s Killing In The Name.  The mobilisers behind this pop revolution were not RATM, however, but the co-founders of a Facebook campaign. 

It is a sensational story.  But is RATM’s coronation at the top of the festive pops really worth celebrating?  Is it a victory for music, set to go down as one of those seminal moments in pop history?  Or is it actually the final proof of just how illogical and irrelevant the charts really have become?  Below, in two contrasting opinion pieces, my friend Adrian Van Cooten sees the positives just as my glass becomes at least half-empty:

Adrian Van Cooten – This Could Be A Seminal Moment
RATM’s recent success in the Christmas charts has sent shockwaves through the music world.  It’s been labelled the biggest chart upset in history.  And, to a music fan that has felt alientated from the UK charts for the best part of a decade, the announcement on Sunday felt enormous.

But why?  Well, it all goes back to 1991.  That’s when a little band called Nirvana released a little album called Nevermind, the landscape of MTV and the music world having until then been dominated by hairbands, Michael Jackson and - in America at least - Garth Brooks.  Existing in an alternate universe to this stale musical landscape,  the appropriately-labelled Generation X were in the midst of mass unemployment, neglected and alientated by society.  They felt disenfranchised by the music industry; when Nirvana came along, the band were readily elected as their posterboys.

 
Nirvana weren’t the best band in the world, but they resonated to the masses, opening up the charts to a galaxy of alternative music: Smashing Pumpkins, Radiohead, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, etc, etc…  I could write a list for days.  This was the era of ’grunge’ (I guess they had to call it something!).  These artists spoke like us, looked like us, dressed liked us, shared our opinions and, well, wrote songs we could relate to - very much the opposite of X Factor superstars, in fact.  I rarely see any chart artists that I can empathise with nowadays.  Alternative music seems to have gone quite underground, existing only in obscure blogs (thanks Adrian!) and MySpace pages.
 
This time round in 2009, we are all the new disenfranchised and, when given a voice, we spoke in our thousands.  Simon Cowell’s monopolisation over the Christmas No.1 was wrong: it took away the mystique and the competition of the UK charts. As a kid I used to listen intently to the Top 40, and would eagerly await the announcement of the new week’s No.1.  It was genuinely thrilling; when Mr Cowell stole that mystique by pretty much appointing artists for the summit, it angered me.  Where was the competiton?  Charts stopped being about popular music, but instead the success of a TV program.  That left a bitter taste.
 
In many ways there are a lot of similarities between 1991 and 2009.  Just like a couple of decades back, today the artist whose label has the deepest pockets essentially gets catapulted by advertising, TV, radio and, yes, Spotify campaigns.  And we have mass unemployment.  Maybe it’s just a sign of the times, but maybe there really are deeper socio-economic repercussions here, deeper than the simple positions of a numbers-based music chart.
 
The RATM Facebook campaign has, against all odds, done great things here.  It inspired competition (democracy) in the charts, it inspired people to buy records again – a tremondous feat - and I think it inspired a generation into believing truly anything is possible, no matter how slim the odds.  Perhaps best of all, it restored the faith of lovers of alternative music, lovers like me.  I feel RATM will usher in a whole new wave and approach to supporting a band/artist, as opposed to the purchasing of a single on the basis of mass-media hype surrounding a TV program.  Kudos to RATM!

Richard Mellor – Has Pop Just Eaten Itself?
Few people dispute that X Factor’s hold on British pop music is unnatural: it’s a monopoly via the means of dramatic primetime TV, advertising and endless resources.  I doubt that the 450,000 who bought Joe McElderry’s dire The Climb have enough personality to vaguely object to that assertion; unlike RATM, they’ll do exactly what I tell them.  For being Christmas Number One no longer comes down to who has the best song, unlike those great clashes of yesteryear - Pet Shop Boys vs The Pogues & Kirsty MacColl in 1987 for example.  Nope, today it’s defined by who has the most exposure.  Put more simply, it’s dictated by who wins the year’s X Factor contest.  Even this year’s charts.

Unquestionably, John and Tracy Morter’s toppling of the house that Cowell & co built made for thrilling viewing – this was David slaying Goliath, or the triumph of Cool Runnings’ Jamaican bobsleigh team.  You felt that it wasn’t so much this song, with its emblematic “Fuck you…” line, as much as the name of the band was important.  Rage - Against - The - Machine; the rage was everybody’s who had downloaded this emblematic single, while the machine was very much Cowell and his super-brand.  This was a victory for decency: it told Cowell ‘no’: you can’t bludgeon your way to yuletide glory every year through brainwashing, through dominating the newswires, through intense marketing.   No, Cowell, no!

My problem with all this zeal is that RATM’s – not that Zack and the band themselves did too much but ride along in bewildered appreciation – ascension of the charts is no less unnatural.  In effect this whole campaign was more of the same: the mortified Morters brainwashing consumers into thinking they’d been brainwashed by X Factor; their campaign dominating the newswires due to a great idea, clever choice of song, and the very tenets of Facebook – mass, swift communication.  And even - what I’d cynically label a marketing failsafe – a chosen charity on board.  Ouch – how do you like them apples, Simon?  I’d suggest Killing In The Name is Christmas Number One so that a point be made, rather than due the quality of the song.

Has the point been made?  Yes and no.  X Factor knows it needs to do more to win hearts and minds - but equally, any dunce can work out it’ll come back stronger next year; what’s more, all this outcry simply served to raise the show and its star greater publicity.  Through brilliance of initiative and people power, and with the help of Mark Zuckerberg, the Morters briefly altered the pop hegemony – but they’ve made it no more natural, and in no way shown that being number one comes down to quality of a song.  RATM’s anthem is better than Joe’s toilet paper - but that’s not really why it’s number one. 

Worst of all, RATM’s song is owned by Sony – the company which employs Simon Cowell, who of course represents the runner-up, too.  McElderry actually did very well, too: selling more copies - 450,000 – than all of his forbears bar Alexandra Burke, and then getting to play the mature runner-up to boot.   Sony, Cowell, McElderry, RATM and  Facebook are the real winners here, along with the Morters, social media visionaries that they’ve unwittingly become.  But pop music fans?  Have they really triumphed?  I don’t think so.

Cowell and Sony remind me here of the Joker in a scene in Christopher Nolan’s semi-recent Batman film.  Batman, Harvey Dent and Commissioner Gordon go to great, mass-mobilisation lengths to intercept a dastardly scheme by Heath Ledger’s Joker.  They appear to succeed, victoriously slinging the villain in jail.  Trouble is, the Joker saw them coming all along: he cheerfully proceeds to wreak far more devastating havoc from his cell.  And then he breaks out, with sublime ease.  To beat a foe like that, you need to come up with more than just raw aggression and anger.  To beat Cowell and Sony, the same applies.

Adrian Van Cooten is a drummer in an excellent, upcoming band called Breakfast With Wolves.  Check them out here.

4ad Sessions launched – with Tune-Yards

Here’s something that’s very neat.   Independent London label 4ad has set up ‘4ad Sessions‘, wherein there are videos of the bands on its roster playing a good few songs.  This is especially appealing given the quality of these acts – they include The Big Pink, The National, Bon Iver, Scott Walker, Efterklang, St Vincent, TV On The Radio and Camera Obscura among many others.  Definitely a sight to keep an eye on, and a brilliant innovation by 4ad.

So far the only sessions up comprise the sombre beauty of Deerhunter, and, above, the rather androgynous Tune-Yards – ostensibly Merrill Garbus and her supporting players – who somehow blends folk and R’n'B into swirling, itinerant melodies. 

Unfortunately, it only opens in a wide window, but I’m sure you’ll manage:

MP3: Tune-Yards – Sunlight (zSHARE) (I’m away from my laptop now, so it’s zshare only for a few days, sorry.)

Fool’s Gold announce five January dates in London

I’ve done a series of posts about exciting gigs recently – but nothing’s got me panting as breathlessly as this one.   They of my music tips for 2010, Fool’s Gold are coming to London, to play five dates:  Thurs 21 January at Notting Hill Arts Club; Fri 22 January at Fabric; Sat 23 January at Proud Galleries; Mon 25 January in-store at Pure Groove; and Tues 26 January at Madame JoJo’s, where tickets somehow only cost a fiver. 

African adapters, trop-rock outlaws, funk revivalists.. whatever you want to call them, Lewis Pesacov’s Fool’s Gold (it’s him, Luke Top and various live musicians) are a thoroughly exotic, bewitching outfit.  Surprise Hotel, perhaps my song of 2009, represents the musical moon on a stick: careering guitars without a care in the world; mesmerising vocals in a seductive foreign tongue; a relentless beat and a tantric length, all the way to paradise.  Then there’s Nadine, a wicked concoction of trooping brass and the quirks of lord knows what other instruments between pleas to a mystery woman, who could or couldn’t be known to Chuck Berry.  Ha Dvash, meanwhile, is more Arabic desert blues in style, its rhythmic guitar and channty singing bringing to mind a gentle Sunday stroll across the Sahara.

You’ll dance, sway, pray, whoop and eventually droop.  You will be entranced.  You must go. 

MySpace | Buy | MP3: Fool’s Gold – Surprise Hotel

Next Big Thing full line-up announced; includes Lisa Mitchell

The complete line-up for HMV”s Next Big Thing winter festival (which I covered a few days ago) here in London has been announced, HERE.  Mystery Jets, Marina & The Diamonds and The Soft Pack appear to be the biggest names, while Rough Trade soul hopeful Rox also features.  I’m particularly pleased to see Aussie folk-pop chick Lisa Mitchell on the bill (Borderline, Weds 10 February).  Popular Down Under, she’s scarcely known here, despite a recent move to these shores.  That ought to change soon. 

Check out the attached for a typically jangly, warm and well-written slice of Mitchell life.  Her voice is faintly reminiscent of Ellie Goulding, but with nicer arrangements and none of the electro trickery.  I wrote about Holly Throsby recently, and this is from the same cupboard of good stuff.

MySpace
MP3: Lisa Mitchell – Neapolitan Dream

Thao With The Get Down Stay Down playing Barfly

Another day, another exciting 2010 concert to talk about.  This time it’s San Francisco-based Thao With The Get Down Stay Down, touring in support of their fourth,  and apparently best yet, album.  Their music is a sweet and sometimes chaotic: swirling, bramble-like vocals from Thao Nguyen that sound like the pleas of a fairytale princess; string sections that rise and fall in energetic fervour; punchy, punkish drums; and a general folk-pop sensibility, sometimes a lullaby, sometimes not.

The London date is Monday 1 February at the Barfly in Camden.  Details and tickets here.

MySpace | Website
MP3: Thao With The Get Down Stay Down – Know Better Learn Faster

Next Big Thing festival coming to London in February

The risks of holding a winter festival were last week proved by Disco Not Disco, whose five-day stay at the Legion coincided with freezing temperatures, snow and sapping morale.  In such weather, 50-50s become 40-60s and a five-minute walk from the tube station takes on the aura of a trek to Everest Base Camp.  These are the same risks being boldly run by Next Big Thing, an HMV-led event planned for February – normally the scene of Britain’s worst climes, and a tiger compared to December’s pussycat.

 
Nevertheless, Next Big Thing sounds pretty exciting.  It will feature up to 50 acts over ten days (5-14 February) across six distinct venues -  Borderline, Heaven, Barfly, Relentless Garage, the Jazz Cafe and ULU.  The line-up pledges to be equally diverse, and so far includes Ou Est Le Swimming Pool?,  Mystery Jets, The Low Anthem and Two Door Cinema Club (below).  Each venue will host three acts per night, for a total of £10, whatever the line-up – definitely something of a snip.  Confirmed dates, and tickets, are here.  More info also here on Spoonfed.

HMV has said it hopes NBT will be viewed as the official start of the festival calendar, providing a chance to see much-hyped bands in the flesh, when often you have to wait until the long days of summer.  They could well be onto something; whether the festival takes off does seem to depend largely on the meterological gods, though.  If they avoid being seemingly climactically cursed like Field Day and luck out with some relatively mild days, Next Big Thing may just become as anticipated as Stag & Dagger, it’s closest festival relative.

MP3: Ou Est Le Swimming Pool? – Dance The Way I Feel
MP3: Two Door Cinema Club – Something Good Can Work Out