The Drums – Down By The Water (Youtube)

I saw The Drums at the Reading Festival and they were very good. Here is some press release to prove I’m not lying.

Fresh from playing Reading and Leeds Festival, New York’s The Drums have announced a headline UK tour for November. Latest single “Let’s Go Surfing” is out now via Moshi Moshi / Island Records.

Well I suppose I could have been lying about them being very good but I wasn’t. Anyway never mind that because here’s a new video for set closer and all round enjoyable ballad Down By The Water.

It’s an arty sort of video in which some fey indie boys do some fey indie dance moves, but that’s fine because it’s a fey indie song. If that’s the sort of thing that you’re into, then you’re in luck because The Drums have got the whole bloody package.

I think it’s a nice little tune and a welcome break from the relentlessly catchiness that makes up the rest of their oeuvre. It’s still quite catchy though. Catch it while you can!

Grum – Through The Night (Vimeo)

Being traditionally late to the party, here is the video for Grum’s latest single.

I think out of all the artists I’ve looked at on this website, Grum probably takes the biscuit for the least appealing name. I mean, really. Grum. It sounds like a maudlin car from a kid’s TV show. Or a particularly unpalatable brand of after-dinner crackers.

You might be interested to learn, however, that the music of Grum does not sound like any of the things I just said. It, in fact, sounds very good. Electro, eighties, bit French. Basically all the things my favourite music sound like.

It also comes with a video that is quite the most homo-erotic thing you’re likely to see this week. Imagine the Beastie Boys Sabotage video, but with a lot more touching. It’s something alright.

Grum then – quite grood.

If you’re reading this blog (and unless this is being dictated to you, which would be amazing, you probably are) then you’re probably a connoisseur of the finer things in life. And when I say finer things, I mean music so good it makes you feel a bit nice inside.

With that in mind, you may well already be aware of the popular beat combo known as Hurts. They had a song that sounded a bit like Hazard by Richard Marx (the very wonderful Wonderful Life), which is a clear mark of quality as far as I’m concerned.

But were you also aware they’ve put up their new single and all round jolly good tune Happiness for free download? Well they have, and I’m very proud to be able to post a link to it and generally talk nonsense while I do so.

Billed as a live favourite, Happiness has quite the beat going for it, plus some epic vocals and a xylophone line that will leave you thinking “actually xylophones are a bit good”. Also there’s a very good key change in there. The art of the key change is alive and well and living in this song.

It’s being offered up as a free download on Amazon so it’s a bit of a faff to download, but I assure you it is ENTIRELY WORTH THE EFFORT.

Download:

Hurts – Happiness

Mega Hurts.

Scissor Sisters – Any Which Way (Youtube)

If you’re anything like me (and let’s hope for a second that you’re really not, or you’ll be posting blogs about music videos every five bloody minutes too), then you’ll have found the first release from the very excellent new Scissor Sisters album Night Work a bit pedestrian. Fire With Fire it was called. Yet fiery it was not!

So thank the heavens for this then, the second release from that album, and it’s as camp and as wonderful as you were hoping. It’s very funky and it’s very good.

Basically this is a video with lots and lots of stuff in it, so I can’t even begin to make a bullet point list of my best bits. It is all amazing. It might be my favourite music video of the year so far because it’s so bloody ridiculous. It’s the Bitter Fingers Single of the Week, no messing. Yeah you heard.

Off the flipping chain.

David’s Lyre – Tear Them Down (Youtube)

Here is the new video by the hot new artist David’s Lyre. It’s actually quite good. No, I don’t know what that ’s is about either but let’s just run with it for now.

It sounds a bit like Empire of the Sun, and that is a good thing as far as I am (and anyone ought to be) concerned. There’s a sort of indie/dancey feel about it and it’s quite the grower to boot.

Here are some further good things about David’s Lyre:

• Done an excellent Marina and the Diamonds remix (amazing)
• Quite likes masks
• Is doing a gig with Bitter Fingers fave Bright Light Bright Light

All of the above are reasons to enjoy.

Bag Raiders – Way Back Home (Youtube)

Well, what do we have here? It’s only a brand new Bag Raiders track! And what’s more, is it it’s very good. So that’s nice.

The Australian type duo made a very good song two years ago in the shape of Shooting Star which, you may be interested to know, made my extremely prestigious Best of 2008 list. (Actually so did Coldplay but let’s not go in that right now.)

So this is a nice electronic thing that sounds a bit like Cut Copy but also like Bag Raiders. It’s also a bit new romantic. Try putting in your ears!

of Montreal – Coquet Coquette (Youtube)

Ah, isn’t it lovely to have of Montreal back and making their peculiar brand of slightly off-kilter alternative agit-pop? Yes, it is. I wasn’t really asking a question there.

That said, compared to their back catalogue this is a great deal more accessible with some very enjoyable guitars, and only a dash of swearing. It’s a fine introduction to the band, but I urge you to check out An Eluardian Instance for more special goodness.

The video has something for everyone though, provided that you enjoy at least one of the following:

• Rafts
• Cavemen/women
• The odd bit of gore
• Frottage
• Beaches

It makes literally no sense but that’s fine because it’s several minutes of you’ll life that you’ll go on to cherish.

Remember when Simian Mobile disco did that amazing Audacity of Huge tune? Man, I do! You couldn’t move for it last summer (if you were in my house and listening to my iPod). Anyway, those SMD types are back with something entirely darker and you get to have a download entirely gratis.

It’s not exactly the poppiest thing they’ve ever put out and a whole world away from their indie, Clor-esque past, but it’s a captivating listen (especially when it gets a bit floopy in the middle) and an interesting insight into what their new mix CD Simian Mobile Disco Is Fixed will sound like. Have it.

Download:

Simian Mobile Disco – Nerve Salad

Do it now, before everyone does!

Yeasayer – Madder Red (Youtube)

Here is the video for Madder Red by the popular beat combo Yeasayer. It is rather perculiar.

I’ve already written about this particular slice of noise over in my Pile of Promos post for last week, where I also made it my single of the week. And yes, that is a a thing! The nerve of you people.

Anyway give it a watch, you’ll thank me later.

So then, to a review of what for me is the most anticipated album of 2010.

Ever since grabbing my attention with Photoshop Handsome all the way back towards the beginning of last year, I’ve been keeping close tabs on the progress of the Newcastle/Channel Islands/Kent originating but Manchester based popular beat combo Everything Everything, and at last their debut album Man Alive is right in my grubby mitts. It’s an exciting time to be me (and them too, I should expect).

It’s probably important to preface this review by stating that I’m a big fan of the band. So big, in fact, that I can tell you which b-sides I’m upset didn’t make the album (all of them) and that I think some of the original versions are better than the ones that made the LP proper. I’ll try and leave that to one side for now and be subjective about the album, however.

Basically, it’s bloody amazing.

There’s no-one else making music quite like this. Aside from the refreshing sound it’s extremely well executed, and no-one seems to know quite how to describe it. Here just a few of my favourites from the blogosphere:

• “XTC-style brain-pop chemists”
• “skewering tropical rhythms with skyscraper synth lines”
• “razor wire post-punk-funk with opaque lyrics”

Which is all clearly bollocks, but shows how much fun people are having with these tunes. And that’s to be congratulated.

In my opinion, this is very well put together guitar pop music. Dress it up any way you like, but all that verbiage takes away from the innate song writing and thought that’s gone into all these tunes.

Yes, Jonathan’s lyrics are surreal, bordering on the mental and straying into the incomprehensible, but that’s part of the charm. Frankly, I don’t much listen to the words anyway, and it’s the melodies that are the strongest part of this record. As a side note Jonathan is also rather fond of saying “eh” quite a lot, which as vocal ticks go is one of the more pleasant.

Lead single MY KZ UR BF starts the album off, and as a slice of funk infused pop it’s pretty much peerless. In terms of up-tempo songs, it’s joined by possibly the most straightforward track on the album in Qwerty Finger and the riotous, live sounding Suffragette Suffragette with a chorus that might make you spit your lunch out if you’re not expecting it.

But don’t think Everything Everything have forgotten about the slow jams! NASA Is On Your Side contains off kilter rhythms, staccato drums and the feel of a waltz somewhere close to the end of the universe. Album closer Weights ramps up the epic level to about 11, and Leave The Engine Room covers suitably bleepy ground with some fat organs thrown in for good measure.

It’s with Final Form, however, that you hear a band really beginning to find their feet. Weighing in at a hefty five and a half minutes, it builds up into one of the more sublime choruses of the year, and just keeps going from there. It’s catchy in a way you wouldn’t expect, and as a song it gives me a great deal of hope for what’s coming next from these boys.

No, it’s not a perfect album – the live sound of Photoshop Handsome and Suffragette Suffragette, seemingly hastily re-recorded doesn’t quite fit with the polished feel of the rest of the CD, and the decision to omit Luddites and Lambs strikes me as odd given how strong a b-side it was.

What we do have however is one of the strongest debut albums I’ve heard in a long time – the time and thought put into this release really shows. Also Two For Nero has references to a Game Gear and any album referring to battery-eating portable video game consoles from the early nineties is always going to get thumbs up from me.

Make no mistake, this is only the beginning for Everything Everything. If you’re not humming tunes from this album already, give it a few months. They’re not going anywhere – apart from the top of the hit parade! Oh dear.

In conclusion, it’s a bit special.