"All this sunshine's making me dizzy"

I've been largely absent from the internet recently, mostly due to the fact that I've been slacking around in the sunshine. This morning, on the hottest day for ages, I'm stuck inside waiting for a poxy engineer to come and make sure a piece of equipment still works as it should do. I have nothing against the engineer personally, it's just these ruddy huge timeslots which they refuse to narrow down and then turn up outside the vaguely outlined time of day anyway.

Anyway, here are three songs in keeping with the current weather conditions outside my window.

The Lucksmiths - T-Shirt Weather mp3 (available for 7 days)

Martha Reeves and the Vandellas - (Love Is Like A) Heatwave mp3 (available for 7 days)

Mildred Bailey and the Casa Lama Orchestra - Heat Wave mp3 (available for 7 days)

They'll be (break) dancing in the streets of Madrid tonight!

Break Machine - Street Dance mp3 (for 7 days)

(I've been looking for an excuse to get this song on here for ages!)

More (of the same) Trivial Pursuits

Finally, after days of searching, I've managed to locate the CD with another track I'd been intending to include in the post about our quiz the other day, Questions and Answers by Biffy Clyro. The ironic thing is, I'd actually given up trying to find it and was searching for a different CD entirely when it finally turned up in a stash of CDs perched in an unorderly pile behind my PC* this morning. (*that's my personal computer, rather than my police constable.) Gor blimey guv - my life!

Thanks to Breadman, Jones and Adam for giving the trivia round a go, by the way! How about the rest of you lovely people? Can I interest anyone else in having a squizz at our quiz?

Anyway, here's that Biffy Clyro track and the accompanying video, both of which are rather ace.

Biffy Clyro - Questions and Answers mp3 (for 7 days)



Buy Biffy Clyro stuff.

Trivial Pursuits

Spike (Sutti) and me (Hughesy) have our own daily trivia quiz. There are ten multiple choice questions to answer each day, on a variety of subjects. Fancy giving it a try? You can find it here.*

N.B. Although an enthusiastic bunch, we're mostly a bit rubbish at this answering questions malarkey, so if you're some sort of ultra-competitive trivia wunderkind you may wish to seek out a more challenging league instead. But if you're just after a bit of a laugh and a chance to answer a few questions each day, step right up!

*it's completely free, and registering only takes a few seconds.

Hello Saferide - The Quiz mp3 (for 7 days)

Buy Hello Saferide stuff.

Three of a Kind #48 (You Cescy Thing!)

Finally - at the fourth time of asking in a major championship on a June 22nd - Spain have won a penalty shoot-out (they had, rather spookily, lost the previous three that had fallen on this date in history), beating Italy in tonight's Euro 2008 quarter-final. Well done them - and to veteran coach Luis Aragonés for finally remembering that he had, in Cesc Fabregas, the best young midfielder in the world at his disposal, and belatedly introducing said midfield maestro for the latter stages of the game. Better late than never, gramps!

The Who - Substitute mp3

Supersub - Easy To Run mp3

Clout - Substitute mp3

(mp3s available for 7 days)

Buy music by today's featured artists here.

Here's the story of a lovely lady

Following on from Spike's Suzanne post the other day, today we feature a third - and fourth! - different song with the self-same title. London-based Hut signings and shoegaze pioneers Moose delivered their own Suzanne in 1991, as the opening track on the Cool Breeze EP. Jolly good it is too.

Moose - Suzanne mp3 (available for 7 days)

Mildly Interesting Moose Fact: Moose's bass player, Lincoln Fong, had what I believe to be the greatest name in popular music history. (unless anyone knows better?)

Mildly Interesting Moose Fact #2: The cover of the band's third EP, Reprise, featured a picture of the three Brady Bunch girls - Marcia, Jan and Cindy. Cindy Brady was played by Susan Olsen (right and right), whose first name sounds a bit like Suzanne. A mere coincidence? I think not!

Susannah is another name that sounds a bit like Suzanne; it was also the title of a cheesy 1984 Europop smash by Dutch group The Art Company. I bet you won't have heard this one for a while, eh, readers? (what do you mean no, thank god?)

The Art Company - Susannah mp3 (available for 7 days)

Mildly Interesting Pop Fact: 'The Art Company' was merely the English name for the group: they were actually called VOF de Kunst. And what was the title of the original Dutch-language version of Susannah? Why, Suzanne of course!

VOF de Kunst - Suzanne

"You know that you can trust her"

There have been many girls' names used as titles of popular (and less popular - Craig McLachlan and Check 1, 2's Mona springs to mind...) songs over the years, and it seems peculiar how often the one name can elicit similar sentiments. Take the bitter-sweet yearning and almost unwilling affection towards Suzanne from Leonard Cohen and Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions, for instance...


Lemon Cone's song entitled Suzanne featured on his first album, Songs of Leonard Cohen, and has been covered by anyone who's anyone, including such greats as Nina Simone, Aretha Franklin, Joan Baez and Françoise Hardy. And of course we must not forget country singer George Hamilton IV (not to be confused with the perma-tanned actor who starred in Jacqueline Susann's Once Is Not Enough).

Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions's song entitled Suzanne hasn't. But it's still bloody good! I love the complicated xylophone part underscoring the simple guitar backing. It can - and should - be heard on the 2001 album Bavarian Bread Fruit.

Leonard Cohen - Suzanne mp3 (available for 7 days)

Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions - Suzanne mp3 (available for 7 days)

Buy music from today's artists here

Leonard Cohen website | Hope Sandoval website

Three of a Kind #47

A selection from the 1994 compilation LP If I Were A Carpenter today; which isn't, surprisingly, a tribute to the skilled woodworkers of the world, but rather to the brother-sister duo who set the pop charts ablaze with their cheesetastic easy-listening hits in them thar seventies.

The album brings together what'd be best-described as a largely college radio-friendly bunch of artists: American Music Club, Shonen Knife, Sonic Youth, The Cranberries, Bettie Serveert, Dishwalla (I must confess I'd never heard of this bunch before), Sheryl Crow, Johnette (Johnette?!) Napolitano with Marc Moreland, Redd Kross, Babes In Toyland, Cracker, Matthew Sweet, 4 Non Blondes, and Grant Lee Buffalo - all performing, perhaps unsurprisingly given the nature of the album, covers of classic Carpenters cuts (alliteration alert!).

But are any of them up there with the originals, I don't hear you ask. Well, mostly, no. But it's a pleasant enough listen. Here are a few of my favourites - with pride of place going to Shonen Knife's frankly inspired take on Top Of The World!

Shonen Knife - Top Of The World mp3

Babes In Toyland - Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft mp3

Bettie Serveert - For All We Know mp3

(mp3s available for a week)

The album seems to have long since gone out of print, by the way, so it looks as if places like eBay and Amazon Marketplace would be your best bet for tracking a copy down now. If you're interested, like.

Simply Thrilled Like Honey

An old favourite from Malmo twee/shoegaze types Like Honey today, to celebrate the rather good news that the band are finally releasing their debut album, Leaves, in September. It would have been with us already but the pesky record company felt it would make more commercial sense to wait until the autumn, as the band explained in their MySpace blog recently:

We just had a chat with the executives of HYBRIS and we have agreed on releasing the album in early September instead of now. According to the marketing staff there its more strategic to release it after the summer. So we listen to the expertise, we want our little baby to get all the attention possible.

Ah well, as long as the album lives up to the likes of today's featured track, Airport, it'll be well worth the wait!




Like Honey - Airport mp3 (right click)

There's loads more Like Honey info, as you might expect, on their MySpace page.

Or do I mean Katie Derham?

Have a look at the video for the fantastic new single by north London sprog siblings Kitty, Daisy And Lewis, a cover of the old Canned Heat song Going Up The Country:



I've never actually heard the original but isn't that cover just bloomin' marvellous? Absolutely perfect for a summer's day - or any day, really! It's being released as a single on 7th July in a variety of era-hopping formats: 7", CD, download and, rather thrillingly, 78rpm 10". Their first long player will follow on 28th July, and you'll be able to choose from all these releases and more at the Sunday Best Shop.

Mildly Interesting Pop Fact: Kitty, Daisy And Lewis Durham's mum, Ingrid Weiss, used to play the drums in post-punk combo The Raincoats.

Completely Made-Up Pop Fact: In her spare time, youngest sibling Kitty Durham presents the ITV Lunchtime News.

Visit Kitty, Daisy & Lewis's MySpace page for more band info, tour dates, videos and downloads.

My money's on Hornsby

Well it was certainly a relief to see an exciting Euro 2008 game at last, with the Netherlands trouncing the world champions Italy 3-0 in the sixth game of the tournament last night - a scoreline few would have predicted beforehand. To add to the surreal atmosphere, Ruud van Nistelrooy spurned a chance to go down in the area for what would have been a clear penalty, and Dirk Kuyt played a blinder. Quite bizarre! The Dutch fans were terrific too, as ever.

Actually, the whole spectacle reminded me very much of England's even more unexpected 4-1 thrashing of the Dutch themselves at Euro '96. Highly enjoyable stuff.

Back to 2008's tournament, and up until Monday night's game the first five matches had been almost universally rubbish, so this minor classic was long overdue. Fingers crossed we get a few more over the coming weeks now.

Away from the pitch, the best thing, for me, about the '08 Championships has been The Guardian Football Daily podcasts with James Richardson & Barry Glendenning. They're a terrific listen, and far more entertaining than anything you'll hear from the pundits in the Match of the Day studios (with the honourable exceptions of messrs O'Neill, Strachan & possibly Dixon). For example, it's hard to imagine the Alans Shearer and Hansen having an argument about who'd win a fight between Bruce Hornsby & The Range and Huey Lewis & The News!

You don't even have to go to the trouble of downloading the podcasts either; they can be streamed directly from here.

Anyway, I don't know about you but it's normally about this time that I like to listen to a couple of classic Teenage Fanclub covers!

Teenage Fanclub - The Ballad of John and Yoko mp3

Teenage Fanclub - Like A Virgin mp3

(mp3s available for a week)

Buy Teenage Fanclub stuff.

There's a Razzia going on

Hello you! Guess what? Stockholm's Razzia Records have a fantastic-looking compilation album, There's A Razzia Going On, coming out on June 18th. Just have a butcher's at the goodies on offer:

01. Hello Saferide - I was definitely made for these times
02. Adiam Dymott - Memory loss
03. Konie - My Life Is Shit But I Am Funky (remix)
04. I Are Droid - Blood & Ether
05. Firefox AK vs Laid -Once I was like you
06. Maia Hirasawa - Melody
07. Tripoli - Walk on
08. Säkert! - Det var tre månader sedan idag
09. They Live By Night - Meaningless repair
10. Timo Räisänen - Spill your beans
11. Svenska Kürkan - Besatt
12. The Plan - Stay Awhile
13. Jonna Lee - I wrote this song
14. Mange Schmidt feat. Thomas Rusiak & Eye N I - Håll käften del
15. Thunder Express - Switch
16. Tellevika feat. Firefox AK - Eric
17. Ebbot Lundberg & Mattias Bärjed - Coming down cold

The Hello Saferide track - indubitably one of the best UK-released singles of 2007 - would be worth the admission fee alone, but with Firefox AK, Maia Hirasawa, Timo Räisänen, Jonna Lee and Annika Norlin's side-project Säkert also present, this album just has to be a very good thing indeed.

More exciting Hello Saferide news: Annika's announced on the HS website that the band've been busy recording a new album, which "will be released September-ish". As if that wasn't enough on its own, it turns out the album's being produced by Swedish indie pop legend Andreas Mattsson of Popsicle, Sweet Chariots and Andreas Mattsson fame (and who I wrote a gushing tribute to in this entry)!

So anyway, it's all good, to borrow a phrase from that nice Sarah Assbring lady. And, while we're here, let's have some classic Hello Saferide and Popsicle by way of a celebration. Why not!

Popsicle - Histrionics mp3 (left click - available for a week)

Hello Saferide - Valentine's Day mp3 (right click)

Buy Razzia Records stuff from their webshop.

Three of a Kind #46

Three songs from the second volume in the Indie Top 20 series today. Twenty tracks spread across two shiny vinyl LPs. Despite the fact that the release date of this album would have been 1987, I never actually got around to buying it until about eight years later, from a stall in Clacton covered market. Better late than never, though, eh? Here's the full track listing:

Side 1
1. Crazyhead: What Gives You The Idea That You're So Amazing Baby? 2:38
2. Pop Will Eat Itself: Love Missle FI-II 2:44
3. Three Wise Men: Refresh Yourself 3:36
4. Renegade Sound Wave: Kray Twins 3:16
5. Bambi Slam: Don't It Make You Feel... 2:47

Side 2
1. Close Lobsters: Never Seen Before 2:52
2. The Flatmates: Happy All The Time 2:14
3. The Pastels: Crawl Babies 3:15
4. The Soup Dragons: Head Gone Astray 3:40
5. Mighty Mighty: Built Like A Car 2:07

Side 3
1. The Beatmasters featuring the Cookie Crew: Rok Da House 3:50
2. The Beloved: Forever Dancing 3:38
3. The Chesterfields: Ask Johnny Dee 2:53
4. Voice Of The Beehive: Just A City 3:30
5. All About Eve: Our Summer 3:19

Side 4
1. Michelle-Shocked: If Love Was A Train [live] 3:27
2. The Passmore Sisters: Every Child In Heaven 3:30
3. Blue Aeroplanes: Tolerance 2:44
4. The Brilliant Corners: Brian Rix 2:51
5. Talulah Gosh: Talulah Gosh 3:19

But which three to choose for today's selection? Ooh... these I think!

The Beatmasters featuring the Cookie Crew - Rok Da House mp3

The Chesterfields - Ask Johnny Dee mp3

Michelle Shocked - If Love Was A Train (live) mp3

(mp3s available for 7 days)

Buy music here.

Christ not on a bike!

If I was going to introduce today's song in haiku form, it would possibly go something like this:

Here's the new single
from Swedish combo Club 8
who died for our sins
but I realise I was probably pushing my luck already with that Harold Melvin one the other night, so instead I'll merely say this: Jesus, Walk With Me is a gorgeous slice of surprisingly acoustic pop from one of the best acts around, and it comes from a new 5-track EP of the same name that's available to buy for a paltry 6 EUROS from the Labrador webshop. So there you go.

Club 8 - Jesus, Walk With Me (right click)

Haiku of Don't Leave Me This Way

Communards version
appealed to the youthful me
- but Melvin's the man!

Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes - Don't Leave Me This Way mp3 (available for 7 of your earth days)

Buy the Best of Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes for a snipsome £1.99 here.

Search Us III

It seems I made something of a schoolboy error when putting together the previous Search Us entry, by reporting the five or six searches we'd had at the time from people looking for pictures of a certain Ashes To Ashes star with no clothes on. I wouldn't want to make the same mistake by repeating the offending search string here, but here's a clue: it wasn't any of the male members (chortle) of the cast these lustful Googlers were seeking out.

Anyway, subsequent to that particular post - in which I foolishly repeated the dread phrase i.e. "Marjorie Dawes lewd!" (or words that sound not unlike those) several times - our Statcounter page went pretty much insane with people (or more specifically blokes) feverishly searching for nuddy pics of old bolly knickers.

Now, with at least a dozen of these exact same searches coming in every day, this soon started to become a tad annoying for Spike and me. Sort of like a constantly dripping tap. Or a busload of people you didn't invite arriving at your party - only instead of bringing a bottle, these gatecrashers were brandishing something far less appetising in their hands. Bleurgh. But thankfully they've largely pissed off now, and we're down to about five a day. Bloody hell, though, what a pain in the arse!

As for the very few searches that weren't asking for pictures of ****** ***** sans kit, there now follows a quick round-up of some of the best ones.

Is that your wife (A new gameshow, coming soon to ITV1. Probably.)

Are you really going out with him? (Who, Joe Jackson? Yes. Yes I am.)


Hylda Baker nude (I kid you not!)

****** ***** knockers (I love this one. This is the type of search Sid James would be making if he was looking for clothes-avoiding pictures of a certain Ashes To Ashes star on the 'net. And if he wasn't dead, obviously.)

Wincey Willis this is your life (Actually I think you'll find it was Banderas who did that one.)

Headcases ITV rubbish
Headcases poor (Does anyone like this show?)

nude toffs (Again, this sounds like something the commissioning editor of ITV or Five might give the go-ahead to.)

Watch video Paul Jewell Derby porn (I'd rather not, if it's all the same to you.)

TV-AM weatherman with silly pullovers (How dare you! Wincey was all woman.)

silly noise website (Why, it's almost as if Google are trying to tell us something!)

stupid web searches (...we've had a few, but then again too few to mennnntion! Or not.)

And we'll finish, as ever, by stuffing our faces with comedy apple/pies:

too pie
apples much
pie face nude
how much is the apple pie?
nude women hit with pies
great britain's apple pie
apple pies facts with silly words
pie sold on internet
catchy pie phrases
misses apple pie
apple not pies
because of too much pie
I like pie even more than the last time I Googled this

I love that last one, as it appears that someone has deliberately gone out of their way to perform a daft search in a - successful, as it turns out - attempt to appear in one these posts. Now we shouldn't really be encouraging that sort of thing in a business as, erm, gravely serious as collating inane web searches for an obscure music blog, but fair play to you, whoever you are!

Change - Searching mp3 (available for 7 days)

Nat'll Do Nicely

With her band currently on hiatus, Monkey Swallows The Universe singer Nat Johnson has recorded some lovely acousticy solo demos and, rather helpfully, put them up for the world to hear on her MySpace page. My favourites among these are the frankly wondrous Wonderful Emergency and a live version of the fifties classic A Teenager In Love. Marty Wilde eat your heart out!

Nat Johnson - Wonderful Emergency mp3 (available for 7 days)

Nat Johnson - A Teenager In Love (live) mp3 (ditto)

Absolutely chuffing brilliant, eh? If you live in or near Sheffield you can buy copies of Nat Johnson's demo CD for a measly £2 a throw from Jack's Records in Division Street. But if, like me, you live nowhere near England's Steel City, fear not, as Nat's recently announced on her blog that she's planning on doing some 'proper' recording later in the year. Fan-bloomin-tastic.

In the meantime, you could always buy The Casket Letters by Monkey Swallows The Universe on CD or as an mp3 album, if you haven't already.

Three of a kind #45

Ah, Eurovision Song Contest, how I love am continually baffled by thee! On Saturday night I sat down to, once again, be entertained, outraged and reduced to a helpless mess of uncontrollable laughter by Europe's premier songwriting contest. As usual, my top three bore no relation to the actual top three, which was populated by the most irritating man to grace the stage that night (with the exception of the host) and a couple of women of whom I had no recollection.
The votes from the Too Much Apple Pie delegation go to:

1. Sebastien Tellier - Divine mp3 (available for 7 days)

Sebastien Tellier - representing France - caused a bit of controversy before the show, apparently due to his video containing images of him in Christ-like poses. Personally I rather enjoyed his (mostly) female backing singers all wearing Jesus facial hair. And the song is pretty good, with lovely 'ooh-la-la' backing vocals and lead vocals which remind me of Jarvis Cocker.

2. Simon Mathew - All Night Long mp3 (available for 7 days)

Demark's entry this year was what I think of as a typical, enjoyable Eurovision song: upbeat, catchy enough to be remembered a good five minutes after the performance has finished, derivative ("Celebrate good times, come on", "Blue suede shoes"? I can't help feeling I've heard those lyrics somewhere before...) and thoroughly unpretentious.

3. Laka - Pokušaj mp3 (available for 7 days)

Finally we have the Bosnia-Herzegovinian song which can't really be done justice without seeing the performance which accompanies it. Bride backing singers, knitting? Public schoolboy outfit? A polka-dot-skirted Helena Bonham-Carter-a-like with a washing line? Fair enough...



Sadly the poncy Russian bloke supported by a poncy violinist and a poncy ice skater won the whole shebang.


The top three was rounded out by forgettable women from the Ukraine and Greece. Bosnia Herzegovina finished 10th, Denmark 15th, and France 19th out of 25. There's no justice!