Mstation Pop etc Commentary, Reviews
pre Dec 04 reviews are here
- 33Hz
- A new format: June 06
- AFX
- AMPOP
- Acoustic Set
- Afrobeat
- Agoria, Spinach Girl
- Arctic Monkeys
- Art of performance
- Art of the DJ
- At the Lake
- At the Lake
- Autechre, Untilted
- Autumn/Fall pop etc
- Babyshambles
- Baxter Drury
- Ben Harper
- Black Eyed Peas
- Blues Explosion, Crunchy
- Bovaflux
- Broadcast
- Cadillac, Magnetic City
- Can Labels not Suck?
- Can, Unlimited Edition
- Carpathian ....
- Catskills Sampler
- Ch3vy
- Chk Chk Chk
- Chok Rock, Big City Loser
- Clearlake, Amber
- Client, city
- Coldplay, X and Y
- Collabs 301
- Commercial Women
- Cornershop
- Crazy Girl
- Creative Shambles
- DJ Corner
- DJ Corner and House Mix download
- DJ Tom Baker -- DJ Corner
- DJ corner June
- Decemberists
- Diefenbach, Glorious
- Disco Heaven
- Domino Sampler
- Dr. Who: Volume 1 and 2
- Electric Six, Vibrator
- Embrace, A Glorious Day
- Emetrex, Wish Me Dead
- Erasure, Here I go ...
- Exploring Europe
- FBC Fabric and Reindeer, It's not ...
- Fall Pop, dance etc
- Fire Engines
- Fisk Industries
- Four Tet
- Four Tet, Smile Around the Face
- From Russia with love and beats
- Fujiya & Miyagi
- Futureheads, Decent Days and Nights
- Goldfrapp
- Goldfrapp, Number 1, Beautiful
- Gravenhurst
- Gravenhurst, The Velvet Cell
- Guns and Lollipops
- Hed Kandi
- Hed Kandi 50th
- Hedkandi
- Holding hands out the back: The Autons
- Hood, Outside Closer
- Hush the Many
- Husky Rescue, Country Falls
- Husky Rescue, New Light of Tomorrow
- I suppose that somewhere here there are
- Ian Gillan
- Icky thumps and Bad Bananas
- Indochine
- Infadels, Can't Get Enough
- Infadels, Jagger '67
- Jackson and His Computer Band
- James Holden
- Jamie Liddell, Multiply
- Jamie Lidell, Multiply
- Jane Birkin
- Jeans Team
- Jimmy Edgar, Bounce Make Model
- July 06 Pop World
- KT Tunstall
- Lawrence, The Night Will Last Forever
- Layo & Bushwacka!
- Liars, Drum's Not Dead
- Little Man Tate
- Lou Barlow
- Louise Attaque
- Low
- Melnyk
- Metal existance
- Miles Davis ... sorta
- Moby Live DVD
- Moby, Hotel
- Moby, Lift Me Up
- Moby, Slipping Away
- Moby, Spiders
- Mutts, Life in Dirt
- Myspace World
- NYC Rock
- Natalie C June 2005
- Nate James, Set the Tone
- New Order DVDs
- New Order, Krafty
- New Order, Waiting for the Sirens' Call
- New RSS system and Feeds
- Nick Cave, Warren Ellis
- Nightwish, Once
- Nizlopi
- Noise Hurts
- Noise music and other stuff
- Octavarium, Dream Theatre
- Paper Cut Moon
- Peyton
- Placebo
- Plantlife, The Last Song
- Popkomm Berlin 08
- Prefuse 73
- Prefuse73, Surrounded by Silence
- Prince
- Puppetmastaz
- Queurelle
- Raumschmiere
- Residents, Animal Lover
- Revolve promo CD
- Richard Hawley
- Richard Hawley
- Richie Hawtin
- Rimbaud and Rockers
- RollDeep
- Rolling Stones
- Rough Trade Shops Counterculture 2004
- Royale Deluxe
- Royksopp
- Royksopp, 49%
- Rythmes Digitales
- Secret Machines
- Shortwave Set
- Simon Fisher Turner
- Smog, A River Ain't Too Much in Love
- Sonic Art
- Spektrum
- Stereo Sushi
- Steve Angello
- Stonebridge
- Stonebridge, Freak On
- Subways, Oh Yeah
- Subways, Rock 'n Roll Queen
- Summer Pop
- Tears
- Templin, 5
- Test Icicles
- The Mutts
- The Residents, Commercial Album
- The Streets, Could Well Be In, Radio edit
- Trabant
- Trans Slovenia Express
- Tricky things
- Twisted Disco
- Ukrainian Music
- Village Orchestra
- Warp artists DVD
- Wilco
- Woody McBride
- beautiful new born children
- various, Back to Love, Hed Kandi
- ˙ūD e p e c h e M o d e
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Tue, 03 Jul 2007
Icky thumps and Bad Bananas
It's an eternal artists quandary - how do you keep
yourself interested if you're doing the same ole shit,
year in, year out. Take the White Stripes for example -
that raw, powerful, and sparse, big single coil guitar
sound rocked but good on their early albums. It's why
people came out in large quantities and declared them
saviours of the world.
And now I find myself being like those people I
don't like who can never accept any new stage from any
artist, and especially one they like. There's lots of
history in this too and lots of people who failed to
join transitions - and lots of people who joined later
and were sneered at by the originals. I know, you can
think of lots of examples of this as well, but let's
name some anyway - Dylan's going electric was a pretty
big one... and then his going religious another
although, soundwise, it was just smoother. The Beatles
went from being basic beat monkeys to psy-preachers and
lost me and gained two gazillion people in my place.
Bowie did a lot of changing, but musically? And I mean
big changes here - so let's give him a couple. The
picture is confused a little when artists make changes
that boost their popularity hugely... which leads on
to issues about the goodness of anything, especially
popularity.
Well, Mr. Stripes has had an itch or two. One of them
was apparently calmed by moving to Nashville where he
says he loves the do-anything-for-a-buck mentality.
Crass commercialism? Bring it on! You can't blame him
though. He was totally sick of indy poseurs - who are,
like most camp followers, always whispering
conspiracy and always on a super-sensitive hunt for
signs of non-belief in The Code.
Icky Thump isn't about crass selling-out though. It
is about more complicated mixes - and about a
blurring of the original simpler musical thoughts to
enter a land many have entered before. The crucial
question to the listener (other than where that album
name came from) is does all this added stuff make any
sense? Does it grip? You know my answer. To me it seems
like part of a continuum of dilution.
(thunderfinger)
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