SPECIAL: The New Pornographers - Electric Version

Co-inky-link

You may have noticed it says "SPECIAL:" up there, if it says Co-inky-link then you're not looking far enough, little bit more, there you go. What was I saying? Oh yes, "SPECIAL:". Well it's "SPECIAL:" because it's a request review, that is a review requested by a third party. In this case the third party is not the Lib Dems but Howlie, who almost all of the people (but not all) will know from Mark Watson related activities. Anyway, this isn't the first thing she requested I do but that was a EP and I couldn't be bothered to write a lot about a little amount of music. But anyway I asked her for another one and she gave me this...


The New Pornographers are a band, not Pornographers at all. Once you get past this confusion you find out they're pretty much An American Indie Band but as with the case with almost all of the bands in the sector they don't fit in it very well. Yeah they sound like the kind of Vampire Weekend stuff we're used to these days (I should point out now that due to the nature of this review I've only heard one of their albums (well, not even very much of it yet) and it's from 2003, 7 years ago these days. For all I know they could now be on a voyage into Reggae Metal.)but they also sound pretty much like The Shins or anyone like that.


See, kinda crazy, no?

You may have noticed in that video that there was a mansinger and a ladysinger and when a mansinger and a ladysinger love each other very much they make sweet, sweet music. I think that sometimes female women singing in bands like this does result in something that sounds like a 90's Japanese Girlgroup but I think even when she is singing you don't get drawn into that trap. (Hmm, turns out I was listening to it on shuffle, I won't complain about the ordering of the album then). It's sublime, it's rediculous, it's cheery, slightly cheesy, clever and charming in its simplicity.

It'll hook you in with its... hooks and keep you guessing with its twisty turny twisty turniness. It's got as many  organs as Mrs. Lovett's meat pies. It'll put a great big smile on your face AND its got a monkey in a amp on the front cover. Is that a bit mean? Yes it is. Is it entertaining? Without a doubt.

Lookat'im. He is not interested in that white thing. He's got his own things to do, like wearing a ruff. He's a Stuart gent. He makes me happy.

I feel I've become sidetracked. 

This album I'm reviewing, it's really good. If you feel a bit down, listen to it, look at the monkey, do a silly little dance. It's very good music to do a silly little dance to. It's very good music to do most things to.

It's very good music.

That seems a bit short, it wouldn't have taken me that long to write that amount. I'll tell you the truth, I forgot about this post. I always seem to apologise about one thing or the other on here. Maybe if I just thank Howlie, it'll be fine.

Thank you Howlie.

I enjoyed that.

DOES IT OFFEND YOU, YEAH?

So, after a delay slightly longer than the minute I promised, my review of Does It Offend You, Yeah? goes along the lines of this:

The house lights are off, the stage is empty. A synth starts playing the intro to Being Bad Feels Pretty Good*. I bid goodbye to my companions and organise where to meet up after the show. The band come on and the crowd become a single organism, an organism that lives to feel and respond to Does it Offend You, Yeah?
I was definitely impressed by the support acts but I could see instantly why these guys were top of the bill.

My poor Pizza Hut Chef Hat, already almost blasted from my head by Housse de Racket disappeared at this point, never to be seen again.

I assume you've never heard of DIOYY (as their friends call them), most people haven't. You'll have probably heard We Are Rockstars though, if only because it's at the beginning of Horne and Cordon. I'd embed it but apparently as they're signed to EMI, I can't, so I'll link you instead. LINK

The best thing you can hope to have at a gig is a crowd that loves the band, and on this front this must have been one of the all-time greats. Never before have I seen a mosh-pit that sings along. Having only heard DIOYY in passing before I found out I was going to see them I wasn't 100% on the lyrics and was therefore in a serious minority. For most songs this wasn't much of a problem though, Let's Make Out is comprised almost entirely out of the title and for the others, the right vowel sounds seemed to do. Anyway, the band.

They spent the evening cranking out blinder after blinder, if anything only getting better as the night progressed. Attack of the 60 Foot Lesbian Octopus gave us all a chance to rest our voices and have a little game of "who can jump the most". They even played us some new stuff, for example the song which could possibly have been called The Monkees are Coming which gave them an excuse to slag off the music business and support illegal downloading, which generated a large amount of love. They also gave us their phone number (07575 610169) so we could ring them up and say how much we loved them.

They finished of with a special Acoustic version of Dawn of the Dead (well worth a listen by the way, I'll link you again LINK) which segued into the grand finale of, of course, We are Rockstars.

I urge you, if you can see these guys, do. You will not regret it. If you can't, you'll just have to listen to their debut album You Have No Idea What You're Getting Yourself Into... until the next one comes out and then you can listen to that.

Next time, The Dead Weathers.

*I think, that night's a bit of a blur really.

Hello and Welcome to Aural Sex

Hello my darlings,
So, I've made this, well I made it ages ago but that's not really the point, the point is that this is, as the name may suggest, a music blog. As I can't work out how to embed music I was planning to embed youtube clips. However, I was planning to do Robots by Dan Mangan today but all the you-tube clips of it are live ones on rubbish cameras so if anyone can find a way of getting it in here advice would be much appreciated.

Anyway, let's do another of my favourite songs of the moment by one of my favourite bands of all time. Salivating by The Broken Family Band.




So, this is the first single off their latest album Please and Thank You and a triumphant display of their testicles to NME who apparently think they have none. This is a very testicular version of TBFB (as their friends call them) with that fancy guitar thing they do and the word shit. Incidental when played on the radio they've altered the aforementioned shit into "fish", which leads to the lyric "I'm gonna get my fish together, head out and get some breakfast" which is quite simply charming. Anyway, this song has fantastic lyrics without sacrificing the music itself, which is classic TBFB, while still pushing forward towards the testicular future. 5 years ago TBFB played country with a pop twist and lyrics sharper than the teeth on a rattlesnake, now look at them, playing alternative indie rock that if anything has been busy filing down those teeth. Some people suspect I am a little too devoted to The Broken Family Band, some just say the only thing I don't know about them is why no-one's heard of them.

All of that and I didn't even mention the video.