this week: what rocked..., what sucked...

• Jamie T 'if you got the money' - brilliant track, much more haunting (in that positive way only purely genius songs are) than 'sheila'. in fact, his tales of modern surburbia are some of the best lyrical contributions to what is currently being played on the radio in this country. im disappointed in the general record-buying UK public since this track only went to #13 while My Chemical Romance spend a 2nd week at #1 and Razorlight stayed in the top 5...

• Razorlight 'america' - love, love, love the guitar riff. hate, hate, hate the poor lyrics that completely ruin this track's musical promise. johnny borrell, i blame you...

• My Chemical Romance 'welcome to the black parade' - i just don't get the fuss over this track... it is so incredibly unoriginal. it sounds like 4 songs crammed into one and conjures up comparisons with everyone from Blink 182 to Queen but it just doesn't work. MCR seem to want to embody all things emo but i can't help but feel that they are too aware of the emo-trend in popular music today and offer nothing beyond catering to that specific market. bring back musical originality, i say...
  

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oxjam - let's make some noise...

british charity oxfam has always been incredibly good 
at generating attention for their causes (remember the white 'make poverty history' wristbands that we all wore in 2005 when bob geldof was trying single-handedly to change world politics?) and it's a charity that deserves immense credit for the work they do and aid they provide. and their latest project: OXJAM. it is described as oxfam's biggest, most-ambitious, music event ever and judging by the activity going on just in edinburgh this month, i don't think they are far off with that description... it's basically 31 days in october dedicated to live music, raising money to tackle poverty, and changing lives (yep, i admit it, they convinced me, i think it's an absolutely brilliant way of getting people to help raise the money for the people across the world who dont have the privilege of having access to even such basic as fresh water, health care, and education).

the oxjam event at edinburgh uni's student union on wednesday was a pretty ambitious one (just check out the flyer!)



and considering it had all been organised by students, it was quite impressive (i also happen to think this had a huge effect on the fact that the whole event did not come across as a moral lecture where people felt guilted into donating money for the cause).

could have done without seeing edinburgh uni's cheerleaders but they were rather amusing with their enthusiasm yet lack of talent and i did have to try very hard not to laugh (reminded me soooo much of high school where we were forced to sit on those uncomfortable bleachers for a 1 hour pep-rally while the not-quite-as-talented-as-the-cheerleaders-in-american-movies- cheerleading squad jumped about waving pom-poms and smiling from ear to ear, generating very little pep from their not-at-all-captive audience).

found myself positively surprised by the first band we caught live on the main stage. kiDDO (no, i didn't really get this name either...) has been described as the strokes on speed and they did loose slight marks in the originality department because they did seem to try to sound like the strokes a bit (covering 'last night' (poorly) probably didn't help). however, there were loads of energy and genuine desire to be there and play some live tunes so overall they did rock. they also donated ½ the money made from the sales of their EP to oxfam so props for caring about the reason they were there playing. since i have no clue how to post mp3 files for people to download, im just gonna post the link to their myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/kiddoband




we were then informed that the second band on the main stage was one of radio 1's new bands to watch this year which naturally generated a fair bit of excitement. caught a bit of the african drumming beforehand and felt like we had taken advantage of oxjam's offering of world music at least a tiny bit. another pint at the bar and back upstairs to the main stage we went. this new band to watch was called the permissive society. dont know exactly what they were granting permission to on the night but it seemed they were quite happy to permit the lead singer to act like the new johnny borrell... there was a fair bit of 'im-such-a-good-frontman' attitude coming across and the music just wasn't impressive enough for him to get away with that (neither is razorlight's by the way...). listened to them on myspace after the gig though and i actually think their music is better in the recordings than it was live (which i very rarely do with any bands). perhaps they had an off night, perhaps they are a bit too up themselves because radio 1 and NME think they have something, i won't judge too much. check out their myspace page (http://www.myspace.com/thepermissivesociety) and if you are in manchester this coming week you can make up your own mind about their live set when they play In the City.




and with that, i'll finish my little evaluation of this oxjam event... had such a fab night and loved that what was essentially a fundraiser was such a pleasant experience (not like those bakesales in the school cafeteria...). i hope people go searching for their white 'make poverty history' wristbands or head to oxfam to get a new one - not to attempt to make it a craze again but rather to show support for oxfam's big noise campaign and the work that still needs to be done
concerning world poverty. http://www.oxfam.org.uk/

the magic of glowsticks and rhythmless dancing...

NME is the bible for most 17-year-olds as they desperately attempt to stay at the front of the pack of followers of today's trendy music (as determined by who? why, NME, of course). i kind of missed the whole NME phase of my teenage life on account of being surrounded by good charlotte obsessed americans in my tiny little high school bubble (which, on the upside, does mean that i know they were capable of making decent records before they became MTV-darlings and released songs like 'i just wanna live'). So i was both slightly apprehensive about what i might encounter on the glasgow leg of NME's club tour last thursday and excited to see how well, if at all, the klaxons could transfer their ecclectic electronic style from 80s-looking music videos to a live set. admittedly, i did help raise the average age of the girls in the audience by a couple of years but i still have to give NME credit for drawing attention to some of these acts. i think its time for electro-rock, glowsticks, and 80s hair (the big curls, NOT the mullet) to make a comeback...



... and what beats waving glowsticks about and dancing around without following the beat even the slightest? in my opinion, not much... which is why this gig was fab. the klaxons could have done with playing a longer set (30min? that's not even a full album!!) but they sounded brilliant. glaswegian shitdisco, clearly a local favorite of the crowd, were really impressive (despite the poor choice of name) and sounded wicked!



and thus, for a short while, it was like i was 17 and believing that NME is, in fact, the music bible. i predict this belief will only be temporary... NME will clearly run a story soon that has the automatic on the cover with a headline along the lines of 'the automatic will do what arctic monkeys didn't: break america' and anyone over the age of 17 (or at least with a mental age over 17...) know for a fact that the automatic will never have another top 10 hit, let alone break america... but for now, i am quite happy to go along with the electro-beats of NME's latest sweethearts because, this time at least, they seem to have gotten it right...