New album from Andreas Mattsson!

Forgive the exclamation mark, but the arrival of any new Andreas Mattsson-related release has been incredibly exciting news for me for over fifteen years now - ever since I first heard Make Up by Popsicle and instantly found myself a new favourite band - and his new album Kick Death's Ass, due on February 18th, is the first we've heard of him for nearly five years since 2006's brilliant solo debut The Lawlessness of the Ruling Classes. (Well, apart from producing and contributing to Hello Saferide's last album, which was admittedly pretty great also.) So yes, a momentous day.

Appropriately, with today being football transfer deadline day and all, Kick Death's Ass (shame about the spelling of "Arse" there, but nobody's perfect) sees Andreas switch labels from Hybris to Razzia Records from where you can pre-order the album. I cannot wait to hear it, but suppose I'll just have to.

Although Kick Death's Ass is still a couple of weeks away, the album's brilliant first single, AA, is already available to buy as a download here, and can be streamed using the fancy Soundcloud gismo below. It's classic Mattsson right from the very start, and buying it will constitute the best 80p you'll spend all week.

AA - ANDREAS MATTSSON by RAZZIARECORDS

Now if you'll excuse me, I have an album to pre-order. Roll on February 18th!

Song of the Day

Like most bands I've been enamoured with over the years, I'll have written about Brainpool here before - but I don't think I've featured their 1995 single In A Box To You - until now. If The Wannadies were The Beatles of Swindie and Popsicle The Kinks, then Brainpool were at the very least The Rolling Stones. Or something. Anyway, if it's joyous, life-affirming power-pop with lots of fa-fa-fas you're after, look no further!



Brainpool - In A Box To You mp3

S.P.O.C.K around the clock

A slice of classic mid-nineties Swedish synth-pop today, courtesy of the Star Trek-loving S.P.O.C.K. - I'm guessing they must be quite keen on that show, anyway, bearing in mind a) their name b) the fact that they like to don Starship Enterprise uniforms on stage & c) because one of their most famous songs is called Never Trust A Klingon. Oh, and d) their band members include one "Android" and a "Captain Eddie B Kirk".

So yes, they're possibly a *bit* wacky. Maintaining the space theme (I'm not a massive authority on S.P.O.C.K but it would seem that pretty much everything they ever recorded was sci-fi related in some way), today's song, Astrogirl, is chuffing brilliant if, like me, you're a fan of the whole cheesy electro Europop thing. Knocks Star Trekkin' by The Firm into a cocked hat too (not difficult, admittedly).

S.P.O.C.K. - Astrogirl mp3

Crushed by the wheels of industry

Cripes, just discovered I missed out on the release of a new I, Ludicrous single in September. Strange really as I'm sure it would've been record of the week on all the major music networks. Ho ho ho. Here it is anyway, and just in time for the new working week: Clerking Til I Die.



Download it here

Jonny Jonny Ooh!

A band comprising Euros Childs from Gorky's Zygotic Mynci and Teenage Fanclub's Norman Blake sounds like a pretty wonderful proposition, doesn't it? Well such a band now exists! They're called Jonny and they sound every bit as accomplished and effortlessly melodic as you'd expect a combo featuring this pair of indiepop luminaries, to sound.

Jonny's self-titled debut album will be released on the 31st of January, with lead single Candyfloss appearing two weeks before that. (Warning: watching the following video may well make you crave a certain kind of spun sugar confection.)



Mildly Interesting Floss Fact: Candyfloss is, as you may know, called "Cotton candy" in the U.S. and "Fairy floss" in Australia. I think I like the Aussie name best.

Late last year, Jonny released a free download single, which included the following paean to Gloria Estefan. (I feel like I should add the words "of all people" to the end of that sentence, but that would seem a tad churlish. Good song though.)

Jonny - Gloria mp3

The Orange Juice

Hello again! I trust you had an at least bearable Christmas and New Year. Mine was so diverting I managed to forget I had a blog to run. Speaking of which, let's get this thing cranked into life again, shall we?

The Sweptaways returned last month with their own inimitable take on Oh My Darling Clementine "supported by" Swedish fruit juice purveyors Brämhults, who it seems have a tradition of getting different acts to interpret the song on their behalf at this time every year (well, they've done it for the past two years at least). Here is that Sweptaways version in its entirety. As you might expect, it's rather good.




The Sweptaways - Oh My Darling Clementine mp3