Great Danes

Me? I’m a sucker for a good pop tune. For all my indie affectations, sit me down in front of a fun video clip from some dorky pop group and I’ll probably be singing along in seconds. Unlike commercial rock, which seems to suck all the passion and life out of a vital genre, commercial pop can be a blast.

Still, I don’t always embrace the poptimist buzz-groups. Girls Aloud for example - well I can take or leave them. Now Alphabeat, they’re a group I can get behind. They’ve got guitars, they sound like the best bits of the 80s strung together. They’re Scandinavian (Danish to be exact) and that’s immediate pop points from me.

Alphabeat - “Fascination”

Some of their singles are dynamite. “Fascination” is the most energetic blast of pop sunshine I’ve heard in years. “Fantastic 6″ sounds like Bis doing the soundtrack to High School Musical 5. The album, This Is Alphabeat, kind of trails off after a few tracks but that’s not surprising. I mean, it took Phoenix three albums to get consistent and Alphabeat are really only just starting out.

If you haven’t heard them already, then now’s your chance.

Alphabeat - “Fantastic 6″

Alphabeat - “Fascination”

Still wild about you

A fun experiment to do is to queue up  soul legend Al Green’s new album Lay It Down back to back with one of his early 70s efforts and to try and pick when the album changes.  You’ll probably pick it, but only if you’re paying attention.

That’s partly because of producer ?uestlove’s attention to period detail (even bringing in the Daptone Horns to recreate the Hi Records sound), but also because the singing and songwriting are just stunning.  Al is in amazing voice for a guy in his 60s and he gives it all he’s got.  For a laid-back album, there’s a lot of passion.

And it’s VERY laid-back.  Al isn’t signing about the kind of animal passions he lifted to high art in the early days.  No, this is a guy who’s settled down into a quieter phase of life.  Which makes it perfect love music for couples.  Particularly people who’ve been together since Al started making records.

But there’s enough beauty for the rest of us to enjoy it too - and occasionally he gets his funk back on.

Al Green - Stay With Me (By The Sea)

Al Green - Standing In The Rain

Musique noire

For all the jaunty British pop that’s been clogging up the airwaves in recent years, very little of it has sounded like the “Britpop” of my teenage years. Their influences are different and their approach is a lot more abrasive, to my ears at least. At risk of sounding like a grumpy old man, that’s a little bit disappointing.

Someone who does summon up memories of those long summers is Jim Noir, a mid-20s Brit whose electronic-infused take on classic pop makes me think of the Super Furry Animals or the Boo Radleys or the Charlatans. It’s like crack for someone with premature nostalgia.

His second, self-titled album is excellent and full of laid-back, vaguely psychedelic pop music. If you have a BBQ or something to soundtrack, you could do a lot worse.

Jim Noir - “All Right”

Jim Noir - “Ships and Clouds”

Super no more?

In my teenage years, Supergrass was one of my absolute favourite bands. They were young, they ran green, they kept their teeth nice and clean. They had energy and great songs. And they had facial hair to die for. In fact, my decision to grow sideburns aged 17 was to look more like Gaz Coombes. True story.

But a lot of time has passed since those days. I Should Coco is 13 years old, In It For The Money is 11. Even the compilation Supergrass is 10 is a few years old itself. A whole new breed of Britpop band has exploded onto the scene with a similar kind of cockiness and swagger. Bands like Franz Ferdinand and Arctic Monkeys may be little more than the aftershock of the mid-90s quake, but for today’s kids they’re just as meaningful as the ‘Grass were for me back then.

Nostalgia is a bitch, though, and I got a bit excited when I saw Diamond Hoo Ha, the absurdly-titled new album from the Oxford lads, in stores. I can’t say it’s lived up to my hopes. In their quest for relevance, they’ve unleashed a first single (”Diamond Hoo Ha Man”) that starts off something like “Blue Orchid” and ends up sounding like…Jet?

Lucky for you and I that there’s at least one kickarse pop song on the album - latest single “Rebel In You”. Let’s hope there are still more where that came from.

Supergrass - “Rebel In You”

Can’t stop, won’t stop?

Are the Anticon crowd even slightly hip-hop anymore?

Those crazy Oakland nerds started out at least rapping over samples, even if they were pretty disconnected from hip-hop culture. Now it seems that their headline acts have gone wholly over into the world of whacked-out pop. Given the fact that I’m a completely un-hip-hop indie rock nerd, this isn’t a judgement. I quite like the new direction, but it makes me wonder who’s going to keep the spacey edge of beats and rhymes going without them.

Why? was probably the first act to jump ship - Elephant Eyelash a few years ago was pretty much a Pavement album with loops and added misanthropy.

Then there was the collaboration by Themselves with the Notwist as 13 & God - there was rapping sure, but the music was much more Germanic lap-pop than anything else.

Enter 2008 and Why?’s new album Alopecia is in a similar vein to his last, with lots of fractured melodies and strange nasal vocals. It’s all pretty weird and catchy and memorable. And Subtle’s new ExitingARM seems to have a similar direction.

These groups never really caught on with the purists, so there won’t be any outcry. And if you’re just a lover of adventurous pop music, then this might be just what you need.

Why? - “The Hollows”

Subtle - “ExitingARM”

Sometimes, words fail

It looks like all the people who judged The Pipettes for being “manufactured” can have the last laugh now. Or possibly the first.

They’ve just released a press statement to announce that RiotBecki and Rosay have left and been replaced. Yes, that’s right - the two original members.

I don’t actually think I can make a joke about this, since the band themselves have made the obvious one about the Sugababes.

Oh well - we still have the music.

The Pipettes - “I Love You”

Incidental music

One of the virtues of living in a large city is the likelihood of cool music playing in your regular haunts. Take for instance this morning when Cafe Fioro was pumping out some of Phoenix’s exquisite It’s Never Been Like That album from a few years back.

The more surprising occurrence was hearing Rogue Wave’s “Lake Michigan” blaring out of the Strand McDonalds at 9pm. Since when have Sub Pop bands become popular with Scottish fast food joints?

It doesn’t matter really, they’re good songs.

Phoenix - “Second to None”

Rogue Wave - “Lake Michigan”

The Return of Jim

Jamie Lidell is a genius. So many people have attempted to pilfer from the riches of old soul music and it always ends up sounding like empty mimicry. Jamie writes songs that are arguably on a par with the best things that Otis or Marvin or Curtis or Michael or Prince sang. He also has the vocal chops to pull it off.

The new album Jim, out later this month, is a little bit safer than his future-past-disco-soul debut. He’s taking fewer risks and the songs belong more clearly to specific time periods. But the quality is still there.

You can get a bit of a taster in the amazing video below:

And here are some of the standouts from my first listen to the album.

Jamie Lidell - “Another Day”

Jamie Lidell - “All I Wanna Do”

One night of love

I like to think I’m not someone to get all hot and heavy over the latest buzz band out of the UK. In fact, I’m usually at pains to avoid even listening to the critics’ faves. Sometimes this is to my detriment, other times to my benefit. Luckily I hadn’t read a lot in the press about Mystery Jets before their second album Twenty-One hit stores and the internet. If I had, you probably wouldn’t have been reading this post.

And I wouldn’t have been able to enjoy the melodic, brit-poppy goodness that the Jets are.

You may have heard the lead single, “Young Love” - it’s a good one and has a delightful clip. If you can resist the hand-mouths during Laura Marling’s verse, you’re made of far cooler stuff than me.

Best of all is that “Young Love” isn’t even the choice pick of the album. Personal favourites are the rough-edged and bittersweet “Veiled In Grey” and the superb 80s throwback “Two Doors Down”. Most of these new Brit bands tend to deal in nothing but 80s throwbacks, but Mystery Jets aren’t afraid to go beyond the Orange Juice/XTC influences to sound more like…um…A-Ha? Bugger it - I’m going to use that as a compliment.

Mystery Jets - “Veiled In Grey”

Mystery Jets - “Two Doors Down”

Disco Hour

I wasn’t a huge fan of Moloko, although I’ve got to admit to having danced to some of their singles. I guess I found them a little bit “strange” at the time.

Now that frontwoman Roisin (Ro-sheen) Murphy is all solo and stuff, I’m quite interested, even if she’s a lot more pop and a lot less strange than what I normally listen to. Contradiction? Maybe.

After her last Matthew Herbert-produced record earnt some attention (and some Gray’s Anatomy plays), Murphy seems to have upped the disco.  And taken on some interesting headwear.

Overpowered came out just at the end of last year and it’s a bit of an oddball assortment of different pop styles.  There’s no real coherence or flow, but most of the tracks are pretty unforgettable.   A few favourites of mine are the friends-becoming-lovers track “You Know Me Better” and the Kylie-esque “Let Me Know”.

You may like them too.

Roisin Murphy - “You Know Me Better”

Roisin Murphy - “Let Me Know”