Kitty Daisy and Lewis

Right, I'm just off down the shops to pick up this weeks new music magazines. I'm interested to see the NME feature regarding the 50 most forward thinking people in the music industry, so I will report back on that one in a bit.

In the mean time, check out Kitty, Daisy and Lewis. It's quite astounding that such a young family trio in their teens have the ability and musical maturity to create such 50s, slicked haired, swing that seems pretty much non-existent in today's new music.

Vintage country-like blues-bounce rockabilly from a trio of Londonders. And even better. The band roped in their mum and dad to play a handful of instruments on their 2008 debut. It's got a rustic, crackily sound that adds to the authenticity of it, and at no point would you think this album was made last year. Proper knee-bending, arm-swinging sweet jives.

Download Kitty, Daisy & Lewis - Mean Son Of A Gun

New Education

I heard about this gobby gang of Stoke rockster's when they supported The Rifles on their past tour. Having read a little about their aggy antics and confrontational performances I was intrigued. Picking fights with audience members, being banned from pretty much every Stoke establishment and harvesting the self-proclaimed brilliance of Liam Fray is no easy feat.

NME recently ran a radar feature on this lot and labelled them 'proper good British rock' or something along those lines. Firstly, I don't disagree with the statement. They invoke all the solid features of what is considered to be proper British rock. They've got attitude, they don't give a fuck, they think they're the best thing since the last over-hyped band and their outlook takes both the positives and negatives of inhabiting our little island...

But when we talk 'proper good British rock' it always seems like a euphemism for Oasis. Twisted Wheel, The Courteeners, The Enemy etc have all suffered the prick of this out-dated syringe at one point or another. Now, I like these bands, all be it some more than others, but why must we continually cast these similarities that pay very little relevance to the band in question. Sure Oasis were one of the best English bands ever, but it doesn't mean that every loud-mouth northerner thinks they're Liam or Noel. Ambition to create a BIG sound doesn't need to mean 'The Next Oasis', and it often doesn't. The Courteeners sound nothing like Oasis but because they're Manc's people will identify in such a way, all be it harmlessly. Twisted Wheel, same story. I could go on.

I feel that northern vocals always add something special to a track. If you're Southern and you can't sing it's pure cack. If you're Northern, however, there's a certain flare of hometown pride and heritage that sounds like it's got a better story to tell. New Education's vocals, on the track up for download, 'Today', is rich in this certain je ne sais quoi vocal experience, steeped in break away tendencies and longing.

Let it be known, these guys are not scared of you, they're not scared of me and they're certainly not scared of anything anyone has to say about them. You, on the other hand, should be scared. You might just end up liking them and getting a very personal beating from one of them at a gig near you soon...

Download New Education - Today

Eight Legs - These Grey Days

Binge drinking is actually, well, quite fun. Don't fight the facts, every British twenty-something does it. I know it's disgusting and eroding the cultural legacy of this nation but it doesn't mean that every young'un who fancies a bevvy will kick the shit out of a homeless man or smash the windows of your elderly neighbours car. That's not down to binge drinking, those people are just cunts.

To fight this incongruous activity the Government have decided to spend yet more money on some fruitless and ineffective adverts. 'Drink Sensibly'. Oh, Ok then. That's that sorted. Come on guys!

I will settle on one thing regarding this issue. Those rather shocking ads involving people dying and smashing their bones into oblivion are a little effective. No one wants to fall of scaffolding while pretending to be Batman, you not only look like a bellend but I think it might hurt. Drink driving as well. They're a little graphic. Nose breaking trips home from the pub and the guilt of running over a cat sucks. But the same rules apply to all of these. IF YOU DO ANY OF THOSE THINGS YOU ARE AN IDIOT, so, although it's a little crude, you kind of get what you deserve because your self centered and fatuous actions are no ones fault but your own.

But there's one good thing to come out of these adverts. A recent campaign titled 'Binge Drinking Boy' or something along those lines was not only amusingly inaccurate at trying to emulate the actions of today's teens, but it featured a rather tantalisingly, distinctively British ditty by Eight Legs titled 'Those Grey Days'.

A precise British swagger that combines The Libertines with the cockney scent of The Rifles and the ruckus, ripped denim scour of The Paddingstons twinkles through the gritty cracks of 'Those Grey Days'. It's a very East London type of song, the sort of jingle that would have had the indie pups whacking on their Chelsea boots and leathers had it been released about four years ago.

Sleazy squatter indie-punk has never sounded so strangely patriotic and binge drinking has never looked so appealing.

Download Eight Legs - These Grey Days

Camera Obscura

The elegance and finesse of pops past femme fatale's was principle to their refined and majestic heart breaking glares. Suggestively they swooned on stage, beehive barnets and flirtatious frocks in hand, unknowingly entering the souls of the onlookers.

It was a time when less was more. The likes of Dusty Springfield and Lulu could seduce an audience with a gaggle of lovable pop pennings and needed little more than a flutter of their eyelids to get the geezers going. There was no market for saucy, under dressed bimbos wrapped up in pythons singing in showers, and despite MTV, I don't think there is today.

Camera Obscura's new album 'My Maudlin Career', harks back to a simpler time. An air of '64 sophisticated-mod revels in this albums timeless lucidity. Both souly and temptingly poppy the Camera Obscura invoke very little from the egotistical, crass chart temptresses of today.

Despite only two fifths of the band being female, Carey Lander and Tracyanne Campbell, it's vital to assess these comparisons because, well, they make Camera Obscura the lavishly gorgeous vintage pop outfit they are today. Get your over priced Camden charity clobber on and relish in the band who are everything that The Long Blondes wanted to be.

A Time For Jokers?

"Pete Doherty has revealed that he and Carl Barat discussed plans to make an album and tour together after The Libertines reunited for a one-off gig in London in May."

On July 31st the above statement hit the Internet like a Katy Perry nip-slip...all over the place. Some, no doubt, would be on a bohemian cloud nine at this point with idealistic images of their Arcadian dream drifting poetically around there minds as they pull their military tunic form the depths of their wardrobe. For others, however, this statement, much like Miss Perry's unintended garment malfunctions, would have been greeted with the same disgust and disdain as it always has. Played out, dried up and now, not only irrelevant, but a bit bloody boring. Ask yourself, do you really care if The Libertines reform?

If we're talking the comfort of nostalgia then it's an easy one. 'Up The Bracket' and 'The Libertines' were records that defined a nation of identity searching youths who scoured music for some form of consolidation and rebellion in a time of need. Punk ideologies with a gritty indie sound, fronted by two charasmatic charming young urban poets seemed perfect, and it was. The United Kingdom hadn't seen that sort of uprising since the birth of punk in the late 1970s.

There was that sense of live fast and die young, felt both by the fans and the band. Who knew what The Libertines would do next? what hole they'd wake up in trying to piece together the events of the previous night. It was exciting and unpredictable, it was what British music had been looking for since Oasis sunk into a pit of becoming a parody of themselves.

The brilliance of songs such as 'Time For Heroes', 'Don't Look Back...' and 'What A Waster' have become songs of potency and legacy. We love these songs because they now define our youth (depending on how old you are obviously). They embody the trippy and raw essence of what was once Britain's most exciting act - fast and fucked up.

What with recent discussions regarding The Stone Roses and their constantly unsure yes-no reformation, the highly succesful Blur reunion and the Pixies storming various show stopping sets, the topic of reforming, reuniting and regenerating what once was once great is now a hot topic in the music biz - all be it for various reasons. But is it worth trying to revive something that was, for the most of it, such hard work?

Regardless of your Doherty related opinions, be he brilliant or be he bullshit, this is a rejuvination of four people, not just one. Hassel now has the quite bad Yeti to keep warm and comfortable, Barat, well we don't really no know what he's got at the moment, Gary, yep same answer, and Pete has Babyshambles, his solo career and a troupe of adoring females following him wherever he wanders, praising him as Dylan or some sort of modern literairy genius, and that, right there, is part of the problem.


I'm all for iconic, lustful figures in music. Marc Bolan and Mick Jagger had more females following them than Hefner, but for good reason. Now it seems like Pete Doherty has become glorified as a godly figure who encapsulates all that is great about music when in fact his skatty, under produced attempts are nothing but the ramblings of a lost boy whose hype rarely lives up to its reality.

By raving about Doherty's supposedly infinate potential and 'rock star' facade he's become an image of disapointment. Constantly churning out mediocre melodies and unsatisfactory performances should be shunned and not commended. Since when did any other act recieve a fair cop when they turned up late, pissed and incoherent? Maybe John Martyn, but that's different, he actually gave something back. Doherty's become self obsessed, narcistic and cares about no one but himself - and that is the fucking truth.

The second problem that then occurs is money. Yep, the one thing that can cause rifts in an empty room. Money is one of the primary reasons why this band will reform. Doherty's pissed his royalties up the wall right next to his blood-painted poetry, John has clearly invested it in the bland Yeti and Carl, well, he doesn't really have any. Be it both cliche and cringe, the last reason that people should reform is for money because no matter how much they resist or fight it, their hearts will be firmly dislodged and their priorities will be unsettled and unjustified.


We want to see bands reform because they've settled their differences and taken on their problems as one, not as a separate group of profit derby individuals who happen to be playing a show together.

Now I don't doubt that if the reunion occurs the shows will be epic. Firstly it gives everyone that opportunity to re-live what at first they couldn't. They are given the chance to bask in those holy anthems, sweat, blood an' all. But, and this is just a but, will The Libertines not be in any danger of becoming a covers bands of themselves? What was once washed up and dead, left in its swirling mystery will now be readily available. That's like knowing the meaning of life, it would just ruin everything.

Part of the reason why we love The Libertines so much is that it's now untouchable to us, a mystery of unknown Arcadia. Our hearts ache because we can't have them but we want them. What's to say if we could have them...wouldn't we be disappointed and under-nourished with a shit storm of paradoxical numb-nuts parading around with unjustified self-belief and guitars? It seems a little scary.

People have constantly debated the Oasis situation. Should they have quit after Knebworth? blah blah blah. And honestly, I think they should have, but that's just me. Say a year down the line and The Libertines are up and about, headlinning festivals and playing the O2...the love and the romance is gone, and not only gone, but well and truely shat on by a profit hungry gang of industry bods who don't care about the unreleased tracks, the better-than-album b-sides and the whole fucking dream of having something that seems no more accessible to you than it is to the next guy or girl.

I for one would not like to see Pete and co reform. I've thought about. At first it was an exciting idea - finally, I thought, I will be able to witness this greatness and the enigma of this act who've painted an audio picture for me but have always been out of my reach. But isn't the enigma and greatness of this band kept great by not knowing, by waiting and hoping and by, finally or though rather ironically, never knowing.

The Underground Heroes - The Rebirth

I remeber the first time that I saw The View. I was obsessed. I think it was August 2006. After hearing 'Wasted Little DJs' in May I was waiting for what felt like a year to actually see them. The rowdy rabble made the trip down to Tunbridge Wells where they DESTROYED the Forum - a converted public toilet to gig venue inhabited mainly by 90's grunge throwbacks and satanist goths...

Sweat dripped from the low ceilings in this cramped scum-box, bodies cascaded the heads of the onlookers like a human tidle-wave and there was a general sense of 'Fuck Everything' - brushing hair from their Stella soaked brow's everyone in the room had the same feeling. This is filthy, this is dirty, this is fucking amazing.

Prior to those little Dundonian upstarts was a local Kent band from Chatham, The Underground Heroes. Now for those of you who don't know Chatham, how shall I put this...well...it's a real fucking dive, Britain's own practical joke, a social mistake...yeah something like that. Apparently home to the 'chav', its Burberry clad inhabitants ain't the sort of characters who embody a sense of cultural heritage.

After a brief encounter with 1965 records that amounted to the release of one or two singles ('Stella...' and 'Skinny Twins') they went solo. Arranging their tours and shows pretty much on an independent basis, and why not? they've certainly got a bit of a cult following.

Their grotty Marlboro-munching antics and booze fuelled weekenders have a certain urban mystic to it. Far from dwelling on the negatives, the Heroes make the best of a bad situation by loading themselves up with cheap piss-like cider and trashing through some grotty gutter punk.

After a seven month or so hiatus the Heroes have had a little revamp. Their new website looks flashier than a scensters myspace page, they've gone a little less chav, now opting to sport Iron Maiden t-shirts and leather jackets rather than the previous Nicholson stripped garments, and they've returned optimistic and excitable, eager to get back out there and spit in the face of something delicate.

A recent blog posted on their myspace states this very enthusiasm. Titled 'This Is The Dawning...' there appears to be a certain air of epithany following them. Rather than embarking on a spiritual mission to 'find themselves' at a Buddist temple in Tibet they decided to lock themselves up in their new practice space and get down to some writing, recently deciding what should be done with all these old and new tracks:

we have been thinking about what to do with our now extensive catalogue of old songs and demos. The solution was/is to make them available to buy!!! How about that? Underground Heroes selling some music? The first installment of music will be ready and available to buy in digital and physical format by the way of a 5 track EP in October. This will consist of 3 old tracks, a new Demo and a "Wild-card". This maybe a live track, a home demo or something never heard! All going well we plan to release one of theses every 3 months. We haven't given up on our quest to put out a full proper album, but until then we want our music to be readily available and by doing this we can!

Excited? I am. This mini release series of e.p's will begin to paint the anarchist image of just how rambunctious this bunch of unruly chaps really are.


The words 'lad' and 'rock' and undoubtedly 'lad rock' are sure to surface soon enough. A stigma unwelcomed by pretty much everyone, but the only reason this analogy will arise is due to the small minded connotations related to songs that tell stories of something we all do, yet due to some fucked up social circle, may not admit. Getting tanked up, trying it on with girls and running out of dollar may seem a little 'ladish' to a handful of indie-musos who prefer a coffee to a can, but to me, I think it's a pretty accurate depiction of teenagers in this country. Plus, things only seem to adhere to such lad, oi oi correlations because people can sing their socks off to them. Since when has that been an negative thing? I can certainly see a lot more folks bellowing out to 'Chasing The Buzz' than they do at a Little Boots or Frank Music gig...

'Dolly Birds...' is rammed with youthful experimentation and 'Lost In Dundee' Rawley scopes out the highs and lows of a chaotic weekend in Scotland with their friends and fuck-ups alike. Then there's 'Brixton Stories'. An escalating anthem of the Heroe's fans and themselves. It's winy but hey, that's the beauty of it. Their brash, shoulder-barging swagger sounds so wrong under George's cockney squeak, but at the same time, it's hard to deny it's nothing but brilliant.

New track 'The Ripper' follows the same suit as Plan B's 'Suzanne' cover but takes a notable turn when they switch onto a metal-like solo that courses its destructive mannerisms mid-way through the track. Lavishly ramshackle they haven't changed their ways, just built on them, safe in the knowledge that they now have the technical capabilities to indulge in both the hardcore-punk scene and the indie scene.

I've got faith in the Heroes, and have done for a few years now. It's often that bands come and go, that much is true, but there's no getting rid of these Chatham hell raisers. They never 'went away' as such, just took a much deserved break. But yesterday was yesterday and today's a new dawn, a heroic dawn. Get ready. It's going to get ugly.

Download the not-stop jam of 'Tracksuit Bottoms And Polo Tops' below. Appreciate the lyrics and social acceptance because you might just end up liking them...

Download underground heroes - Tracksuit Bottoms And Polo Tops

Monsters Of Folk

In my quest for modern folk classics I've come across some great bands. There's something about the organic, country feel of modern folk that separates itself from other music genres. It's honesty and simplicity is the essence of its beauty - and whether it's stripped down acoustic pluckings or the rusty twang of a Fender it generally retains its authenticity.

Now expectations are high for the group in this feature. The aptly named Monsters Of Folk consists of Jim James of My Morning Jacket, M. Ward - an American singer-songwriter, Producer Mike Mogis and Bright Eyes unpredictable lonely genius Conor Oberst. A tall order here. With a band comprised of these talented young buggers great things are expected.

Where Oberst has drawn comparisons to a modern day Dylan in the past we have to sit up and take notice. He's one of the best song writers in the world at this point, he's an adaptable young whipper-snapper as he proved with the Mystic Valley band, and now, in this Crosby, Stills and Nash-like outfit his talent is scouring new shores.

'Say Please' is a pre-released track from their forthcoming debut. It's got the dreary wail of Obersts scouring vocals and it's got a more-country-rock-than-thou electric lick throughout, making it a sturdy foundation for them to certainly build on. I'm guessing that this is far from everything the group have to offer, because although it's a wonderful track, the talent that congeals amongst this outfit is top-notch, a real gang of visionairys and with this in mind, lets all wait for the album due out September.

Download say please - Monsters Of Folk