...And Now The Gloves Come Off

We haven't done a Parallax Jukebox for a while, which as good a reason as to do one now as any, headed this time round by our favourite new band, from Portland Oregon, it's The Dirty Mittens, who produce the most delicious sound since someone last said they loved us.

1. The Small Things - The Dirty Mittens
2. Young Adult Friction - The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart
3. Bugs and Flowers - Jeffrey Lewis and the Junkyard
4. 18 Wheels - Evening Magazine
5. Beeline - Sky Larkin
6. April - John Parish and P J Harvey
7. A Song For Our City - We Are The Storm
8. Yours To Share - Moofish Catfish
9. Jazz Serenade - The Artisans
10. The Sweetest Thing - Camera Obscura
11. Dull Life - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
12. Doubtful Comforts - Blue Roses

Dirty Mittens, then: who knew fun without fingers was so easy?

Beware The Ideas Of March

We interrupt this deadspace to give you a brief rundown of some of our favourite choons we've been listening to this year that we've hitherto not referenced on this 'ere blog. Most of these tracks are available through the usual download/retail outlets - use and enjoy.

1. 1901 - Phoenix
2. World News - Local Natives
3. Seven - Fever Ray
4. Enemy Within - Frida Hyvonen
5. Anti-Valentine - The Very Sexuals
6. magicweather - Alessi's Ark
7. Snore Bore Whore - Fight Like Apes
8. San Francisco - Jill Sobule
9. Outlaw Pete - Bruce Springsteen
10. The Last Of The Melting Snow - The Leisure Society
11. A Threaded Needle - Lotus Plaza
12. Flicker And Flutter - Future Islands

More updates soon (famous last words, we know, but...)

Parallax Jukebox

20 tunes to celebrate the fact the sun's not just got its' hat on, but is wearing it at a rather jaunty angle. Number One on the jukebox is released as a single this week, and therefore can be considered Parallax View Single Of The Week, with the artist(e) no doubt celebrating this honour when touring at the end of the month!

1. L.E.S. Artistes - Santogold
2. I'm Good I'm Gone - Lykke Li
3. Homecoming - The Teenagers
4. Black And Gold - Sam Sparro
5. Sirens - The Whip
6. Century - The Long Blondes
7. I Lust U - Neon Neon
8. Alice Practice - Crystal Castles
9. My Sunken Treasure - The Duke Spirit
10. Black Cat - Ladytron
11. Cross My Fingers - Laura Marling
12. Midnight Man - Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds
13. Cerrone Cologne Houdini - Goldfrapp
14. You're On My Fighting Side - Lacrosse
15. Paper Planes (MIA cover) - Panda Riot
16. Don't Look Down - Flaxenby
17. Profile - StRANGEtIME
18. Sweet Dreams Sweet Cheeks - Los Campesinos!
19. Clash - Victoria and Jacob
20. I Can't Do Anything - Strawberry Fair

Club Class

MGMT/Virgin Passages, Bar Academy, Birmingham, Monday March 3 2008, 8.45pm.
Yeasayer/Everett, Bar Academy, Birmingham, Wednesday March 5 2008, 8.15pm.

Two hotly-tipped Brooklyn bands on the brink of success with their newly-released debut albums touring the same level of venues at exactly the same time in the UK - did they not think about a co-headlining tour in bigger venues and thus bigger payola? Maybe they don't get on, or perhaps they do and it's just record/management company politics that prevented this good idea happening, and thus they're pining for each other as they plot parallel paths up and down the country?

Still, with the two gigs separated by two days we do get the bonus of additional support bands. Getting things warmed up for MGMT are Staffordshire's Virgin Passages whose strange, hypnotic take on alt.folk may find favour with fans of The Besnard Lakes and Low. Their songs rustle with rustic charm but with sufficient undertow of weirdness and menace to keep things interesting, even if your drooling diarist finds himself distracted by the delightful Davina Stevens' O-face as she coos her backing vox. It's perhaps not the right crowd tonight to fully appreciate the subtleties of what Virgin Passages are doing, but 'This Is Not The End Of The World' particularly impresses, their new ep 'Distances' (out now on Fire Records) is a keeper, and Davina and Kate are charming, engaging company from our brief conversation at the end of the night.

Meanwhile, Yeasayer's planned support, all-girl goth-poppers Ipso Facto, cancel on the night and local lads Everett from nearby Dudley are drafted in at the last minute. Their polite keyboard-driven pop-rock will draw obvious comparisons with the likes of Coldplay and Keane, and while it's tempting to suggest that times have moved on since those bands were in their pomp, their tunes are strong enough that given sufficient airplay they might just have a chance, particularly if they focus on the more energetic numbers which give them more opportunity to transcend their antecedents.

With brilliant new single 'Time To Pretend' (a Parallax Jukebox favourite for weeks now) out in the shops on the day of the gig and accumulating airplay as fast as Dead Kenny develops rockstar crushes MGMT are already too big a proposition for the Bar Academy, evidenced by the fact there seems twice as many people here than is usual for sell-out shows. Surprisingly, live the duo are augmented to a fairly standard band set-up, but while there's nothing particularly remarkable about their presentation, the confidence with which they drop the huge breakthrough bomb that's 'Time To Pretend' just second track in does indeed signpost exceptional belief.

Curiously, the tactic works, because it releases the tension that otherwise builds up to the song everyone knows, and also gives the crowd no other option but to give some time and attention to the rest of the band's tunes. Having snagged an import copy of 'Oracular Spectacular' in HMV Reading the prior weekend, your calm correspondent knows the cockiness isn't misplaced, the first five tracks on the album being one of the strongest sequence of tunes released this decade, two of those tracks - 'The Youth' and 'Kids' providing the encores which finally allow band and audience alike to drop their cool and start to party.

On Wednesday, Yeasayer have the advantage of their debut platter 'All Hour Cymbals' being in circulation for a few months now, meaning more people are likely to be here for the music than the buzz alone, and their dress sense of vests, ponytails and straggly beards is likely to scare away the fickle fashionista. All the better for the rest of us to lock into their groove-based rock which is difficult to describe without sounding wanky, but trust your happy hack when he says it just simply works. At once mellow and urgent, the music has the soothing qualities of feelgood muzak without ever lapsing into smugness, complacency or schmaltz, and never forgets to keep you moving, 'Wait For The Summer' particularly standing out on the night.

The lead singer convulses as if the tunes are being wrenched from deep inside his gut, as if exorcised by Max Von Sydow or something. This is more remarkable when you consider that rather than howls of angst, he's producing something so melodic that it's as if he's suffering from a kind of tuneful Tourette's. It's an impassioned, exhausting performance all-round from the band, and while MGMT execute drop-dead tunes with remarkable precision, you don't have to be a yes-man to concur that Yeasayer possess something even more precious: they're simply made of the right stuff.

Parallax Jukebox

Ten tunes to cool the embers of Camden Market -

1. She Dares All Things - Panda Riot
Bold, shimmering standout from Chicago shoegazers.

2. Time To Pretend - MGMT
Electro-pop genius from forthcoming Oracular Spectacular.

3. Ex-Guru - David Byrne
Byrne's bright on this Fiery Furnaces cover.

4. Midnight Surprise - Lightspeed Champion
Sprawling epic from surprisingly good debut album Falling Off The Lavender Bridge.

5. Oneitis - StrangeTime
Sly, dry break-up song from their upcoming EP.

6. Men Not Worth Their Weight In Words - Beestung Lips.
Scathing highlight from their Songs To And From The Iron Gut mini-album. We hope it's not about bloggers. Or maybe, we hope it is.

7. Pop Kids Of The World Unite - Horowitz
Re-released on heavy yellow vinyl as AA-side to Tracyanne, this is the Stoke-On-Trent outfits' finest recorded moment to date, a call to arms for the army of twee, recorded, appropriately enough, in a bedroom. Live review to follow shortly.

8. Yes! You Talk Too Fast - Johnny Foreigner
The JoFo MoFos support Los Campesinos! at Birmingham Academy 2 on Wednesday 13th.

9. All My Friends - Land Of Talk
Sleek but straight-taking pop-rock from the Montreal trio's Applause Cheer Boo Hiss album.

10. A Trip Out - British Sea Power
BSP broaden their outlook and expand their sound on new record Do You Like Rock Music?

The Keys To 2008

22 days into the New Year, Parallax View presents 21 bands to unlock sonic delights in 2008.

We start in an appropriately biblical sense with an Adam. Adam Kesher that is, a French band whose gallic drone-pop deserves some cross-channel contemplation.

If Beestung Lips can translate half the energy and spite they mustered live at Supersonic last year into their recorded output they'll be one of the bands of the year, for sure.

Emerging from Crouch End, Highgate and Tufnell Park, young Londoners Bombay Bicycle Club are similar enough to what's going around to ride the charts high, but have a lead singer with distinctive enough vocals to make us care.

Bugners Eye is urban slang for flapless female genitalia but you wouldn't go round calling this ferocious Birmingham blues band pussies as their pulsating pubrock takes no prisoners.

Gorgeous Emmy The Great seems to have been around for ages now, but her guest backing turns on the raved-about Lightspeed Champion record may sufficiently raise her profile for deserved success when her debut album finally surfaces later this year.

We saw Johnny Foreigner support Los Campesinos! last March, and will do so again this February, because we liked what we saw and their mini-LP 'Arcs Across The City' has whetted our appetites for more of their stroppy, sarky take on US alt.rock.

Another band to leave their calling card late last year were Montreal's Land Of Talk whose 'Applause Cheer Boo Hiss' channelled the sounds of Howling Bells and Metric into something sleeker, sexier but equally demanding of attention.

Leila isn't exactly a new name, but since it's been eight years since her last record, news of an imminent release in 2008 is worth flagging up for your attention.

Gothenbourg's Liechtenstein are an all-girl pop group who hail The Modettes as a primary influence, what's not to like?

Brooklyn's MGMT administer surprisingly thoughtful electropop that's smart enough to make you want to dress to impress. Album 'Oracular Spectacular' is due out in the UK this week.

Californians The Mae Shi have been around for a few years but a new poppier sound sees them sounding like The Go! Team trying on The Polyphonic Spree's tunics for size and having a lot of demented fun in the process.

Make Model seem to have been overlooked by the pundits for this year's predictions, but the anthemic punch of last autumn's single 'The Was' suggested the Glaswegians have what it takes to construct a viable future.

Cardiff's The School bring a DIY aesthetic to some zinging pop choons for adorable results. Recently signed to Elefant Records this is a group you'll never want to forget.

StrangeTime won't be new names to Parallax View readers either, but the spiky threesome who were too sexy/scary for Walsall look destined to rattle cages further afield with a new ep out soon and Sky TV starting to pay attention.

The Ting Tings won a coveted Parallax View Single Of The Week last May with 'That's Not My Name' and things are continuing to ring loudly for the Salford songsmiths as they've gotten themselves a slot on next month's NME tour supporting The Cribs, Joe Lean and The Jing Jang Jong and Does It Offend You, Yeah?.

Back in the West Midlands The Voluntary Butler Scheme looks set to put Stourbridge back on the map serving up his eccentric but decidely dreamy folk-pop ditties.

Manchester's The Whip should have a cracking start to 2008 unless their fun brand of danceable electro-pop suffers as a result of the inevitable nu-rave backlash, of course...

Thomas Tantrum are another band who emerged last Autumn with spiky pop splendour and a Parallax View Single Of The Week (for 'Shake It! Shake It!') and our expectations for further brilliant output has yet to be tempered.

Imagine TV On The Radio if they decided to just sit back and relax in the sun for a while and you get somewhere near the sound of Brooklyn's Yeasayer whose 'All Hour Cymbals' came out the back end of last year and looks set to be one of this year's sleeper breakouts.

If 2007's taste for genre fusions continues in the New Year then Telford's You And What Army? look set to profit with their rap/trance/prog/metal shenanigans regularly causing a live stir.

Finally, it's back up to Glasgow for Zoey Van Goey whose offbeat take on West Coast pop could charm the scarves and knives off an Old Firm derby crowd.

That should keep you going for a while, but remember you can use the comments to register your outrage, point out the glaring omissions and broken links, and hawk your band or blog.

Blast Off

Happy New Year to all Parallax View readers everywhere. Yeah, even you.

Out with the old and all that, so let's get this party started with a crudely ripped linkdump.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, Robyn's back for another Wilder reunion with the internetwhatnot.

Here's something to put a lightbulb in your milkglass: Hitchcock Blonde. Writer/actress, yeah we know.

Live recordings from Supersonic 07 includes our pick of Gig Of The Year, Beestung Lips!

Kevin Greening RIP.

Steve Gerrard Rock Photographer. He shoots bands for three score.

Simon has again lovingly compiled the UK Blogger Poll of Polls for Albums of 2007. 7 of our top 10 made the 50.

Still feeling listless? The Top 10 Celebrity Sex Moments of 2007 are unsurprisingly NOT SAFE FOR WORK.

On a similar UNSAFE FOR WORK tip here's the list you've really been waiting for: The Top 20 Nude Scenes of 2007 with pictures and movie clips attached to get your boss hot under the collar.

Another blog of note: Thomas Moronic.

And finally, the first of our music tips for 2008: Ida Maria a Swedish-based Norwegian with a distinctive rockchick rawr, who's playing a couple of gigs in London later this month.

Parallax View Albums Of The Year 2007

Kings Of Leon become the first act to get the coveted nod of Parallax View Album Of The Year twice (following on from Aha Shake Heartbreak in 2004) in a year which, on reflection, was of pretty solid vintage.

1. Because Of The Times - Kings Of Leon
2. Under The Blacklight - Rilo Kiley
3. Mens Needs, Womens Needs, Whatever - The Cribs
4. In Rainbows - Radiohead
5. Our Love To Admire - Interpol
6. Let's Stay Friends - Les Savy Fav
7. We Can Create - Maps
8. Neon Bible - Arcade Fire
9. The Dreamer Evasive - Apartment
10. The Deep Blue - Charlotte Hatherley
11. The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse - The Besnard Lakes
12. Grinderman - Grinderman
13. Icky Thump - The White Stripes
14. Knives Will Have Your Back - Emily Haines And The Soft Skeleton
15. Without Feathers - The Stills
16. Widow City - The Fiery Furnaces
17. Citrus - Asobi Seksu
18. A Weekend In The City - Bloc Party
19. The Kissaway Trail - The Kissaway Trail
20. An End Has A Start - Editors
21. I'll Sleep When You're Dead - El-P
22. A Brighter Beat - Malcolm Middleton
23. Myths Of The Near Future - Klaxons
24. White Chalk - P J Harvey
25. The Fragile Army - The Polyphonic Spree
26. Love's Miracle - Qui
27. Watch The Fireworks - Emma Pollock
28. Person Pitch - Panda Bear
29. The Bird Of Music - Au Revoir Simone
30. Wincing The Night Away - The Shins
31. Magic - Bruce Springsteen
32. Hey Trouble - The Concretes
33. Cheap Demo Bad Science - Serafina Steer
34. No Shouts No Calls - Electrelane
35. The Body, The Blood, The Machine - The Thermals
36. Sermon From Exposition Boulevard - Rickie Lee Jones
37. Made Of Bricks - Kate Nash
38. Wait For Me - The Pigeon Detectives
39. Late December - Maria McKee
40. The Secret Sickliness - Piskie Sits

Best compilation: Weirdo Rippers by No Age.

Best re-issues: Dead Men Tell No Tales by Monarch! and Eat To The Beat CD/DVD by Blondie.

As ever, use the comments box to vent your spleen, point out the glaring omissions and/or hawk your blog. Then it starts all over again in 2008 with the release of the new British Sea Power record in the second week of the New Year.

Hissy Hit

It's been a while since we've introduced a new band to you here at Parallax View so please step forward Thomas Tantrum, all the way from Goattee Beach (?!) with the superior strop-pop that is forthcoming single 'Shake It! Shake It!' (released via Marquis Cha Cha on November 26).

With lyrics that appear to be some kind of dippy deconstruction of nightclub smalltalk half-sung half-spoken by vocalist Mega, it's another love-it-or-loathe-it proposition suitably impossible to ignore we make it Parallax View Single Of The Week. Whether you've got good hair or not.

Half Term Report

Later than usual (and we're usually late) here's the official, exclusive, Parallax View selection of the best albums released for the first time in the UK in the first six months of 2007. To clarify, Editors album which was released on June 25 came under consideration, but the Interpol record, released on July 2 was not (fear not, Carlos D & co., the end-of-year lists are more nigh than ye think).



1. Mens Needs, Womens Needs, Whatever - The Cribs
2. Because Of The Times - Kings Of Leon
3. The Dreamer Evasive - Apartment
4. The Deep Blue - Charlotte Hatherley
5. Neon Bible - Arcade Fire
6. The Kissaway Trail - The Kissaway Trail
7. Grinderman - Grinderman
8. Without Feathers - The Stills
9. A Weekend In The City - Bloc Party
10. Knives Don't Have Your Back - Emily Haines And The Soft Skeleton
11. I'll Sleep When You're Dead - El-P
12. Icky Thump - The White Stripes
13. The Bird Of Music - Au Revoir Simone
14. An End Has A Start - Editors
15. Hey Trouble - The Concretes
16. No Shouts No Calls - Electrelane
17. Wincing The Night Away - The Shins
18. Sermon From Exposition Boulevard - Rickie Lee Jones
19. Wait For Me - The Pigeon Detectives
20. Late December - Maria McKee

With honorary mentions to Piskie Sits and Panda Bear, whose efforts 'The Secret Sickliness' and 'Person Pitch' respectively, just missed the cut.

So did PV exclude your favourite? Splutter your indignation in the comments box provided.

And You Will Know Them By The Trail Of Dead Kenny

The Kissaway Trail/Envy And Other Sins, The Buttermarket, Shrewsbury, Thursday July 12 2007.

We don't often get decent gigs down Shropshire way, so perhaps we shouldn't complain too much when things don't start off on time. But when the posters advertise 8pm doors, it's not unreasonable to ask questions when you turn up at 8.25pm to be told they're not ready yet and could you pop round the Britannia for 15mins while they set things up? Still, not being the complaining sort(!) your correspondent does indeed investigate said pub, settle down with a pint of Youngs's, and sample the best of the pub jukebox to while away the quarter-hour experiment -

Parallax Real-Life Jukebox, The Britannia, Shrewsbury, 12/07/07

Golden Skans - Klaxons
Country Girl - Primal Scream
Pacific State - 808 State
All Around The World - The Jam
Dakota - Stereophonics

Do the best of a bad job there, reckon, so duck and dive past postal workers drifting in off the picket line to wet their whistle and head back to The Buttermarket where the KT standstill is over, the doors are now open but the Caffreys casks are empty so Guinness it is. First band don't make it on stage until 9.10pm and your blackstuff-imbibing hack doesn't quite catch their name but they're from Birmingham, the lead singer is trying his best to sound like Ray LaMontagne, they have a cute cellist and that's about as much as can think of to say about them at this point.

Next up is another Brum-based band, Envy And Other Sins, a stylish quartet picking up a fair amount of momentum at the moment it seems, and the group members seem to have very distinct looks/personalities which may help them in the long run. They peddle a polite form of keyboard driven pop-rock, which while occasionally diverting, only really comes to life in the more rousing numbers that bookend the set. That said, they have the potential to be moulded into a chart-troubling post-emo pop act with the right guidance, and, after all, the green-eyed monster is never far away, n'est-ce pas?

By the time The Kissaway Trail find the route onstage your timetable-consulting scribe is already having concerns about making the last train home, but such anxieties are nearly immediately allayed by the impressively dark pop noise they create. Imagine Interpol and The Monkees exchanging secret sonic handshakes at a mountainside spa resort while The Wannadies tend the bar under the watchful gaze of Wayne Coyne as Maitre'D and you've at the very least taken a mazy meander inside Dead Kenny's imagination if not been given an exact aural interpretation of the wares on offer. If you require something less verbose it's bloody good stuff to bounce up and down to after a few pints of Guinness, with 'Smother+Hurt=Evil'; 'Tracy' and 'La La Song' amongst the standouts. XXX marks your hack's spot sufficiently that he doesn't buy the company as such (relatively old and greying compared to our last Salop gig) but instead resolves to purchase the band's self-titled debut with appropriate speed and elan.

Related link: The Prykemeister's 2005 impression of Moseley's Envy And Other Sins (need to scroll down a little).