Everything Flows

The Secret I Should Have Shared

Get Some In!

I'm Losing Sleep, Losing Dignity

Back to School

Deadhead Sticker

Pet Sounds

The new Name The Pet single is a bouncy pop choon more viral than YouTube embeds, while the promo admirably promotes the healthy benefits of physical exercise, although the sheer cheerleader chic of it makes it slightly dubious safety for work.



December is usually tragic in terms of PV updates, but hawk-eyed followers can expect a humongous gig review compendium, a long linkdump and the usual end-of-year lists before 2010 hits!

First Class Return

We know, we've been neglecting you. More content soon, including a review of the Saint Etienne-curated first day of the Moseley Folk Festival, but until then check out 'Dancing' by Sheffield's Standard Fare. It's a purdy, poignant choon that will appeal to fans of bands like Sky Larkin and The Dirty Mittens, and the promo resourcefully makes a virtue of the no-budget D-I-Y montage format.



Standard Fare are playing The Autumn Store in Birmingham in December. We should go dancing!

Llamas And Surprises

Being popcult bloggers and wannabe hipsters, we're feeling a little sheepish about admitting that, yes, we too, love the Dirty Projectors' new album Bitte Orca, and that 'Stillness Is The Move' is quite possibly our favourite song of the year. The recently-released promo, featuring as it does caped girls dancing with wolves and a random llama farmer, emphatically seals the deal.

Have Faith

The Dot-to-Dot review is undeniably late, but will be imminent. In the meantime, Katie Stelmanis supplies Single Of The Week with 'Believe Me' (out to buy on June 22 but the mp3 can be downloaded from NME), coming on like an electropop Frida Hyvonen to credible effect.



Witches nice.

Let The Outside In

This week's Single Of The Week is on a totally topical tip, so as Britain swelters away in a welcome heatwave, Swedish stunner Name The Pet offers a hymn to sunshine, shimmering pop loveliness given suntan motion by some delightful disco propulsion.

Name The Pet - Sunshine [Official Video]


But remember, popkids of all ages, don't forget the suncream! (via newly-NME adopted I Am The Crime)

Spring Time

Polly Harvey! Wet 'n' Wild! In a bouncy castle! Press play!

You Really Got The Power Over Me

Every interlude needs a dancing girl, right? So Parallax View went out and got one, and we got the best, Raquel Welch in her pomp doing a spacegirl routine, provin' once more that the future ain't what it used to be...



(via Pappa Comics)

I Am Curious, Yelle

We know little about Yelle other than that they're French and Ce Jeu is the third single taken off their album 'Pop-Up'. You can sit there berating us for our lack of research or just take in the colourful fun of their video, which apparently contains a brief nipslip at 2:09 so might not be safe for work if your boss has 20:20 vision. We described this elsewhere as 'a generous slice of Eurovision cheese sizzling on a beefy electropop patty' but this was possibly just us getting carried away with ourselves...



Yelle, then: officially a scream.

High Quality

Hippychick fuckyou anthem to chugging quasi-Strokes chords? We're in!!! And while we're at it, can we ask that all promo videos from now on feature someone playing the piano with stiletto heels? We're referring of course to 'My High' from Jonna Lee, the lead single from her upcoming sophomore album, which has a tender acoustic cover of The Killers' 'Human' on the flip (note: the lyrics still make no sense whatever).



Parallax View Single Of The Week, unless our highs deceive us!

Twice Bitten

Fed up of Lykke Li yet? Nope, us neither, which is why we make the re-release of her debut single 'Little Bit' this week's Parallax View Single Of The Week. Turning coy courtship into scintillating sonic splendour, we love it loads.



Further Parallax View content due later in the week, honest guv.

Mega Tilly

How cool would it be for the mighty Moshi Moshi Records to score a really, really big hit single? That weird prospect has become a greater possibility than ever before with the news that Radio One have playlisted 'Beat Control' by Tilly and the Wall (out in stores this week, including on heavy 7" vinyl).

We'd kinda forgotten about TATW and their tap-dancing percussionist since seeing them in quick succession a few years back, but new album O is receiving the best reviews of their career, and Beat Control finds them sufficiently focused on the business of producing a Proper Pop Single to ease them into a position where mainstream recognition is a viable target.

The end result is so delirious with melody it could be Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine resurrecting a neglected Monkees classic, a veritable Wall of Sound that fully deserves the accolade of Parallax View Single Of The Week.

Breaking Muse

For those of you wondering whatever happened to the Lykke Li lass, rest assured she's alive and kicking up a storm, earning herself in the meantime Parallax View Single Of The Week with her new single Breaking It Up (out in stores now). With many middle-aged middle-brow columnists who oughtta know better currently writing Madonna off as she turns 50, it's worth noting that there's something haunted, serious and driven undertowing even the most delirious of Lykke Li's tunes that recall the Queen of Pop in her early striving pomp.

Manic Mondo

Because the internet would just be boryn without a bit of Robyn, we start off this Monday mini-mitherpiece with some self-styled self-regarding nonsense from the suddenly big and bossy Ms Wilder. Titbits include revelations about wandering through London with her blouse undone to the waist, but it's not just blogging ninja divas who suffer from wardrobe malfunctions, as Rihanna shows in this set of dubious-safety-for-work photos, proving that not even an umbrella (ella, ella, ella) could hide your blushes when it's that nippy out.

Raising our eyes from the gutters to the stars somewhat, Warren Ellis gives a sceptical glance back at speccy sci-fi boffin Joe 90 (via LMG) and Carl Hiassen's Lucky You is being adapted for the British stage. Elsewhere, various bods recall this year's Indietracks; On Dancefloors is a Bristol music blog with a funky attitude; In Pictures: Kate Bush is 50 and, remember Cardiff pop kids, Tell The Police The Truth.

Bloggers don't so much fade away as they do diversify, a case in point being Creepy Lesbo's Slash Media (NOT SAFE FOR WORK) in which she samples some of modern pop culture's gashtronomic delights. Skin Flicks is much more safe for work, although as he considers himself to be a very angry man and is found pleading for fallen women to be shown to him, maybe due caution should be shown after all.

Meanwhile, the undisputed star of Bristol's Dot-to-Dot, the inimitable Big Jeff, has MySpace.

And wherever else your browser points you, remember, Jesus Can See!

Closely Observed Pre-Trains

The Autumn Store Presents A Pre-Indietracks Special: The Smittens/The Zebras/Red Pony Clock, The Sunflower Lounge, off Queensway, Birmingham, Tuesday July 22 2008, 9.30pm.

Just get into the venue in time as Red Pony Clock start limbering up, a Tijuana-based octet who sound like a mix between Calexico and all-out chaos. Their van exploded on the way to the venue, but they seem in surprisingly good spirits about it, perhaps because on the plus-side it means you're not short of things to talk about between songs. You know those pictures that look like random dots but if you stare at them for long enough all of a sudden this brilliant 3-D image pops up before your eyes and makes sense of it all? Red Pony Clock are the sonic equivalent, as their seemingly ramshackle material develops into something clever, organic and fun to fully reward the patient, open-minded listener. There's still not enough dancing going on for the band's liking, though, until The Smittens' drummer Holly shows how it's done, leaping around like a frisky kitten ricocheting from furniture, to hugely engaging effect.

The Zebras aren't from South Yorkshire, they're from Rotherham - Rotherham, in Australia, that is, although Northern English influences like The Smiths and The Wedding Present would seem evident in a band with a much more immediate, accessible appeal to an indie crowd than Red Pony Clock. The Zebras are more than the sum of their influences, however, with songs that swoop and soar and stir, destined to go down well with Weddoes fans at this weekend's Indietracks, we feel. Their stage banter needs some work, however, maybe they need to emerge unscathed from a tour vehicle inferno to put some fire in their bellies?

With things running later than planned, your harassed hack needs to make a Last Train to Larksville exit halfway through the headline set from Burlington, Vermont's The Smittens, but what we see/hear is confident, breezy and tuneful, and fully in line with all the good things we've heard about/from them, and we'll look out for them next time they're jingling their jangle back on these shores.

All in all, another fine evening of high-quality indie gathering courtesy of those friendly folk from The Autumn Store!

All three bands featured will be playing at Indietracks this weekend (July 26-27, festival fact fans) in deepest Derbyshire.