Music and the gentle art of making it really badly

"We want you to write some music reviews for us, your opinionated, like a lot of different types of music and know words"
Well...they're right on two counts, I'm opinionated and do know some words like "apple", "cat" and "floccinaucinihilipification"..as for different types of music...Well I only like one type 'Good' and thats relative.
So with pen in hand, a good internet speed, a huge cup of coffee and a selection of uppers and downers we can have a look at some of the new music coming our way in the forth coming month of May...

Okay first let's just get this out of the way so we can get onto some real tunes....
Chris Brown will release his new album Fortune on the 8th of May a 15 track opus thats also available as a snazzy deluxe edition that'll pump that track list up to a heady 19. A serious lack of Irony is on display on Mr Brown's part as track 3 is called "Dont Judge Me". Well Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Patricia Schnegg did after you had three domestic violence incidents. Weirdly Chris's Dad apparently works as a Corrections Officer in a prison. Anyway Chris wants us to forget about all that and move on and stop mentioning that he abused a girl with his fists. Oh and he also parks in disabled spaces.
This is the usual poor mixture of what in general rap, hip hop and soul are quickly becoming. Rubbish...generic and lacking any originality. 'I Love You' the hidden track is so run of the mill you could give it to any singer who uses "auto-tuning" as a standard vocal practise and you'd still want to stick dynamite in your ears.
This kind of nothing and vapid music will continue to plague the genre till Jay-Z releases another Blue Print album...Regardless the little girls who dont know better and the gays who should will buy it in droves...if you want to listen to hip hop might I suggest Public Enemy, N.W.A, Run D.M.C or The Beastie Boys instead. At least they have a message worth hearing and are actually quality.

Think of a number between 99 -100 add a - and thats how many out of 10 this album should get.
Ah that had a kind of catharsis to it did it not. Still onwards and upwards.

Marilyn Manson willl also be back in the spotlight with his eight studio album Born Villain. Mr Brian Warner has described his new long player as "suicide death metal" so it be should uplifting to the max and and no doubt nothing at all like the continual cheap rip off of AntiChrist Superstar he's been trotting out every couple of years or so since Mechanical Animals wasnt the album everyone wanted. He's been busy writing this album with Jeordie  White aka Twiggy Rameriez and the other non Spooky Kids since 2009 and it's got the usual tradmarks of slightly off keyboards, sonic noise, thumping drums, wrenching guitars and a  terrible cover -  'You're so Vain' featuring Johnny Depp (WTF?) - and silly gothy, outsider lyrics.
The title track it's self is overly long and half way through contains a section where the music drops away to some lines from Macbeth "This is a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury." he misses the last section of the line "Signifying nothing."...which is pretty much what this is really...more of the same cod schlock rock industrial nothing. College kids who wont conform to anything other than the tight conformity's of the Goth scene will be overjoyed at this long awaited new relase from Cher's stunt double no one else will bat an eyelid.
 I should mention that Hollywood mannequin Shia LaBeouf was involved in making a promotional video to coincide with the albums release...Labouf has had as much to do with the destruction of a generations childhood as George Lucas has and you would be well advised to be wary of anything he turns his talentless, Indiana Jones saga ruining, Transformers breaking,  "aren't you too old to still be a child actor?" hands to.

let's say this is a 7/10 purely based on the fact Antichrist Superstar was one of the best rock albums of the late 90's and those who love him will buy it regardless.

Keane are back! And thank the good Lord, or the bad one depending on your point of view. Personally I'm an atheist and dont care either way..nor do I care about Keane not when I could be spending my time hammering nails into my scrotum. There's gonna be a deluxe edition available with a DVD...so you can watch that in bed to help you dose off and a book complete with pictures of three average looking guys who make average nonthreatening, bland 'alternative' sounding music that makes Coldplay look like Guns and Roses. There are 12 tracks...which is 12 good reasons to press stop on your CD player, the lead single 'Silenced By The Light' isnt actually that bad, if you want to listen to a band who are ripping off The Killers...really I'm bored even thinking about Keane now so let's just get to something worth while and interesting...

4 ZZZZ's and a cup of horlicks out of 10.

Thankfully May isnt actually going to be a total audio waste land and I'll be rushing down to my local independent record shop (cos I'm that cooler that much of a try hard that I wont go to HMV like the sheep or I Tunes like the ...er....other sheep) on May the 21st to purchase what'll probably be one of my  musical highlights of the year The Light, The Dead Sea by The Soulsavers.
Yes indeedy Electronica's very own grunge band will be hitting the ground running with the newly conscripted Dave Gahan (Depech Mode) replacing normal singer for hire and Grunge Legend Mark Lanegan (The Screaming Trees, Q.O.T.S.A and the Twilight Singers amongst others) and for once I think it may be a smart move to replace Lanegan - never thought I'd say that - but listening to "Longest Day" and it just feels like Gahan adds a little more uplift to the music than Lanegan did with his deep smokers drawl. Fear not however the swaggers still the same, the beats are just as juicy and the subject matter still the kinda dark and bleak "Is there a God, a point to all this and can I get a light please?" lovelyness guys like me listen to with whiskey and grass at about 4 in the morning.  Plus Gahan has had a heart attack on stage, attempted to commit suicide and once died for 2 mintues and then came back to life after taking speedballs while wearing Guy liner...and thats proper cool and rock and roll in my book.
The fact the Soulsavers get to work with both of these icons of alternative music and also other legendary big cheeses like Mike Patton, Jason Pierce, Richard Hawley and Gibby Haynes should tell you all you need to know about how good Rich Machin and Ian Glover are at what they do as the Soulsavers. My only request for any future Soulsavers project is that they manage to find a track big enough to get Lanegan, Patton and Gahan to work on together....Maybe a cover of Alice Mudgarden's 'Right Turn' would be just the thing eh?

I'm biased as hell toward this... 10 /10 and if you have any idea what I'm talking about give yourself a "self high five" light up a doobie and pour yourself another drink dude, you deserve it.

Other albums to keep your eyes open for are..
Garbage Not your kind of People
Joey Ramone ...Ya Know
Carrie Underwood Blown Away
Tenacious D Rize of the Fenix
Nora Jones Little Broken Heart


right that's enough nonsense for this month, see you next time for more of the same lameness and half truths. I'm off to Icon for a double tequila.

Your's with F + L

Aidy Gerrard,

Disclaimer
the comments above do not reflect the views and opinions of the publication, editors, publishers, the journalist himself or even reality, and shouldnt be read by anyone.

The Future of the Far Right

Some mornings on the bus into work - should I decide not to get the train -  I go past a Nursery in Didsbury. Nothing remarkable about it - it's a normal  late1800's Mancunian construction surrounded by a miss match of lame styles that the good people in the Construction and Development trade seem to keep putting next too each other. Anyway...the point...yes the point...Each morning I go past this building and I see a small blonde haired child holding a toy pressed up against a large bay window looking out on to Palatine Road. It's at this precise moment that I always note how early it is...7.45 am to be precise and this young chap has already been ditched by his parents and will be spending the day looking out of that window, drinking milk, sharing toys and  being taught by some spotty, caked in orange make up, with no qualifications school leaver how to behave- probably blissfully unaware of how this moment in his life will continue for ever...people take you somewhere then you watch them leave.


The circle continues...and he like me will one day be trapped in amber. I wonder what will happen to this little Nazi pin up...will he grow big and strong or weak and pityful...I hope somewhere in between,...that would be best for him, and for the rest of us. Heaven hopes that during this early satge in his life being dumped with 'strangers' at 7.45 in the morning doesnt make him as weird as the rest of us.

Hmmm.......Nazi poster boy? Strong words to describe a toddler on a Wednesday morning..but what the fuck..he's never going to read this and if you're his parents I'm sorry I'm not judging you I just worry about his future sanity, the little guy looks okay at the moment with his chubby little face pressed up against that window...but one day, mark my words he'll get bored of waiting and you leaving....then you'll loose him forever.  Then he'll be a crack head.

the sun always shines...

...on Coach Trip.
I never watch that programme. I have a life and I work so I don't find the time...what I do know about it is that it's got people on it going around Europe on day trips and they get to vote on each other at the end of the programme and the losers get sent to Auschwitz. I think. That all seems a little too severe to me...I prefer them to be shot in the head. Put them out of their -no longer on holiday- misery.

A friend I recently made and I where watching 1984 on video the other day. When the men from Eastasia are being tied up and shot...I laughed. My friend asked me why I thought that scene was funny when it was so obviously not. I told him that the context was amusing, these poor bastards are being used to make the masses feverish and are no more a threat to them than a piece of paper with a drawing of a mouse on it...or something along those lines...the truth is..if you cant laugh at everything what can you laugh at?
The only other option is to cry at how cruel we are sometimes.
I choose to laugh but that doesn't mean I'm laughing on the inside.

And so why not

Well it's old hat now and even my Grandmother has a blog...it consists of ways she is consistently rude to young ladies like Jodie Marsh (she called her 'Cheap' to her face) and the girl at the Hairdressers who cant do anything without having her mouth open. Ah but why the hell not...she's old and cranky and if she wants to call a woman cheap...well she worked in a munitions factory in the war...so she has the right goddammit.

But (a new paragraph starting with BUT ! And yes I sleep very comfortably in bed at night thank you) we digress...a blog...what to say??? well I'm normally always full of words...usually useless, nonsensical ones but I'll try just to write about life the universe and...er....everything and possibly we'll get some childish humor along the way. All I can promise is we wont be discussing the Human Condition in a pretentious...nay, arrogant way. As an observer of you humans and your ways, surely I'm well equipped -having spent the last thirty years trying to avoid you all  - to comment on your ludicrous comings and goings. Shit I've spent enough time laughing that my life is almost sound tracked by Canned Laughter...a somewhat depressing thought.

So...I'll do my best to write often...maybe once a day - don't hold your breath - or maybe even as often as never again...but I'm making changes...I'm turning and facing the Strange and as always I find it beautiful, exciting, scary and fucking hilarious all at the same time.

Peace - I'm up out this Bitch

Your Master and Ruler



Aidy