boyzone

Although this is the blog’s fourth edition of Spotted Dick this is my first contribution to a feature which has unarguably taken the music world by storm since it’s conception and put a previously little known music application firmly on the map. Recently blogging has been part of my life that has been severely neglected and I’m sorry to say, dear readers, there’s no narcotics addictions or short lived love affairs for me to blame this on. In fact I have little to no excuse for leaving the fate of INFTC almost entirely on the very capable and far more consistent shoulders of Mr. Gavin Williams who I sincerely thank for taking the role of a pushy mother and not letting a day go by without leaving a nagging post on my facebook wall.

Apologies aside it’s time to let you know the music and news that’s been tickling me this week in playlist form. The world of pop has had a pretty turbulent one this week with stars facing actual real problems like being punched in the face by avid fans and dying but rest assured my sympathy does not stretch far enough to listen to their shit music and, therefore, it doesn’t appear on the playlist. Dying at 33 is pretty lame though so included is a picture of Stephen Gately to give you the opportunity to take a moment to remember him in his curtain haired and puppy eyed glory days. Once you’re done with that look and listen to what’s been happening in real music this week.

Pavement-Cut Your Hair It’s not often in music that being predictable an pay off but when you work with the selection of bands ATP works with that predictability becomes reassuring like a old arm chair that you know will never let your comfort needs down. So when last week Pavement announced, after years of hinting, that 2010 was definitely definitely the year they would reform and come to the UK it was a matter of minutes before forums everywhere began speculating the possibility of them taking part in an ATP event. And low and behold the band are curating the second weekend of the May festivals but with Matt Groening curating the first weekend that comfy chair now has a rival and with limited arse to go around there’s a difficult choice to be made.

Tubelord-Night Of The Pencils It’s been well over a year now since we first started blogging about the Tubelord boys so it’s amazing to see them finally moulding their angular teen angst sound into their debut album ‘Our First American Friends’. The recording may be a bit clean for my tastes but it’s still a great record with a unique pop punk sound. Be sure to get your hands on a physical copy of this one as they’ve gone all Willy Wonka on us leaving 10 golden tickets in the albums with the recipients getting free entry to a Tubelord show of their choosing. YAY!

Johnny Foreigner-Sofacore Another INFTC favorite, only a year after their debut album, this birmingham based trio are ready to hit us with another full length release which suggests, as they’ve been almost constantly touring, this band has barely had time to breath in the last twelve months. With the release and an instore at rough trade coming up in two weeks I would have left it until then to sing my inevitable praises of both their live show and the record if it wasn’t for their appeal for a microphone stolen at a recent show in Leeds. Any news on the microphone, which has sentimental value, should be sent to johnnyforeigner@hotmail.com.

Pixies-Where Is My Mind Last week saw Pixies take up a four day residence at Brixton Academy when the tickets got released back in June I pulled my usual stunt when a big band I love comes to play and decided the tickets were too expensive and when I realised my idiocy all four dates were, of course, sold out. Some friends of mine who had the intelligence to buy tickets at the time were stung by the postal strike and spent four days battling with touts and eventually managed to get tickets for the only night the band added ‘Where Is My Mind’ to the Doolittle set list. This song is for the rest of the world who weren’t there.

Kraftwerk-Computer Love Few bands can get away with remastering and re-releasing their entire back catalogue in one week but with electro weirdo pioneers Kraftwerk that notion is far from an issue. Especially when they pulled off a headline slot at Bestival with what appeared to be the greatest of ease. The fact that a certain English music website decided to go ahead and review every single one of these re-release has meant I’ve been going back to Kraftwerk more and more this week and hopefully this will encourage you to do the same.

Yo La Tengo-Sugarcube This is the second of three ATP inspired songs which I realise is a little lame but they’ve just been pushing all the right musical buttons of late so I’m in no way ashamed to continue. The Nightmare Before Christmas line-up has had me looking into some bands I didn’t know as well before and surprisingly it’s not professional bellends Primal Scream who have caught my ears the most (sorry Kevin). The album which features this track ‘I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One’ is an absolute treasure and I fully encourage you to check it out.

Fever Ray-If I Had A Heart (Fuck Buttons Remix) This is one of two remixes on Spotify unfairly representing the entirety of Fuck Buttons work. This representation is false and by no means shows the genius of the noise duo whose second album ‘Tarot Sport’ was released on ATP this week. However, I couldn’t let this record go unmentioned as it has already firmly earned a place in my albums of the year so you’ll have to stick with a remix which will hopefully push you to find and listen to more of their music if you haven’t done so already.

Animal Collective-In The Flowers New EP out by the end of the year. Why not refresh your ears with their ever growing brilliance? Nice.

Spotted Dick