Posted on September 3, 2010 by extremelisteningmode
Grunge was, mainly, full of hairy men and skanky women. Oh, it was. Courtney Love certainly titillated, but she did look like she’d need a good wash before you’d go anywhere near her in real life. One exception to that was the very attractive Tanya Donnelly, ex- of Throwing Muses but probably best remembered for Belly and their clutch of magnificent early 90s singles. This was one of those, the mighty ‘Gepetto’. This performance is taken from the seminal 1993 BBC show ‘No Nirvana’. Enjoy.
Posted on September 1, 2010 by extremelisteningmode
This is a great name. Even if you can’t stand the music, you’ll have to give it up for a band called What Would Jesus Drive. They’ve been touring with Dirty Pretty Things and The View and making a few new friends with their raucous, lo-fi pop. This is their track ‘The Girls are in Charge’. And as for the answer….a Toyota.
We are not usually given to breathless displays of hyperbole, but we’ll allow ourselves the luxury of hype today – this is incredible. Cynicism often permeates us all, but I defy you not to be a teeny bit moved by this.
For the video for their new single ‘We Used to Wait’, Arcade Fire have commissioned a short film by interactive genius Chris Milk entitled ‘The Wilderness Downtown’.
We’ll let you be the judges of whether it is a success. Read more »
There are some words which popular music simply couldn’t do without. ‘Love’, obviously, would be much missed by any aspiring Hal David out there. A blanket ban on the word ‘baby’ would cause much wailing and gnashing of teeth for wordsmiths from any genre. These are the building blocks of the lyric, the sturdy foundations of so many lyrical conceits. And, for the most part, they work just fine, thank you very much. If your all time top 10 doesn’t have song featuring wither of those words, for example, you have no soul.
It’s easy to take something bad and make it worse. Look at an X Factor final. You think it won’t get much more wretched, then Robbie Williams walks on. But taking something great and making it better, now, that’s a challenge. So credit to Conor Oberst for taking Bright Eyes‘ most famous song and having the ‘eureka!’ moment of asking Gillian Welch to sing on it. Enjoy.
If you believe, as we at ELM do, that you gotta sin to be saved, you’ll have to take your hat off to top Italian entreprenuer The Pope. The Italian businessman jets in to Scotland next month to raise funds for his organisation and definitely not show remorse for all the kiddy fiddling. But credit where it is due; Il Papa has turned down the offer of entertainment and will instead by sung at by lovable monster Susan Boyle.
The 49-year-old singer, who is a devout Catholic, is ecstatic at being asked to sing for Pope Benedict XVI in an open-air ceremony in Glasgow when he visits the city next month. Boyle, whose ‘the-mental-next-door’ looks and ability to sing one song reasonably well despite looking like a bag lady won her millions of idiots as fans, was thrilled by the offer to serenade the annointed ex-Hitler Youth member. Read more »
Names are important in music. A good name won’t guarantee success, but a bad name will amost certainly prevent it. Look at !!! They may be brilliant, but already some of the loyal ELM Universe refuse to give them houseroom, so irritated were they by their moniker. Well, Prego were a band who were hamstrung by a shit name. We saw them at Hinterland last year and liked them, but there was nothing happening. Not the names fault entirely….but definitely a factor! Now they have returned with a name you can see appearing on a t-shirt someday, Union Sound Set. This is called ‘Hiding Places’. Let us know what you think.
Diversity. It’s more than a group of dancers who foiled Susan Boyle’s plans to win Britain’s Got Talent. It’s about you and me, living as one. It’s about ebony and ivory, stick together in perfect harmony. Side by side on piano, keyboard, oh Lord, why can’t we?
Well, today’s new releases should inspire us, because they are as diverse as a group of very random things gathered together for no reason at a mixed bag convention. Read more »
Lucky Elephant is a mean brand of American popcorn. It is also, strangely, the chosen name of a French folk-rock group who make music infused with a Gallic charm which instantly elevates it above some of the folk-inspired tat that has been shifting units in the UK over the last 18 months. This is their track ‘Edgar’. Enjoy.
One of the images of the 90s was supermodel Eva Herzivogová staring at her ample bosoms clad only in a black bra. To much nudge-nudge, wink-winkery the caption read ‘Hello Boys’. Yes, it was the Wonderbra, the single most disingenuous invention of the last fifty years. Many a young lady would look devilishly saucy in a nightclub, but when you got down to the nub of the matter, it was all lies. The problem with a wonderbra was that, like the Millennium Dome, it looked mightily impressive from the outside but in reality there was nothing inside worth seeing.
Kings of Leon are the musical equivalent. They look great. They have all the tools. But their music is just so unremittingly average that it makes you question what the point is.
We are not usually given to breathless displays of hyperbole, but we’ll allow ourselves the luxury of hype today – this is incredible. Cynicism often permeates us all, but I defy you not to be a teeny bit moved by this.
There are some words which popular music simply couldn’t do without. ‘Love’, obviously, would be much missed by any aspiring Hal David out there. A blanket ban on the word ‘baby’ would cause much wailing and gnashing of teeth for wordsmiths from any genre. These are the building blocks of the lyric, the sturdy foundations of so many lyrical conceits. And, for the most part, they work just fine, thank you very much. If your all time top 10 doesn’t have song featuring wither of those words, for example, you have no soul.
If you believe, as we at ELM do, that you gotta sin to be saved, you’ll have to take your hat off to top Italian entreprenuer The Pope. The Italian businessman jets in to Scotland next month to raise funds for his organisation and definitely not show remorse for all the kiddy fiddling. But credit where it is due; Il Papa has turned down the offer of entertainment and will instead by sung at by lovable monster Susan Boyle.
Diversity. It’s more than a group of dancers who foiled Susan Boyle’s plans to win Britain’s Got Talent. It’s about you and me, living as one. It’s about ebony and ivory, stick together in perfect harmony. Side by side on piano, keyboard, oh Lord, why can’t we?
One of the images of the 90s was supermodel Eva Herzivogová staring at her ample bosoms clad only in a black bra. To much nudge-nudge, wink-winkery the caption read ‘Hello Boys’. Yes, it was the Wonderbra, the single most disingenuous invention of the last fifty years. Many a young lady would look devilishly saucy in a nightclub, but when you got down to the nub of the matter, it was all lies. The problem with a wonderbra was that, like the Millennium Dome, it looked mightily impressive from the outside but in reality there was nothing inside worth seeing.