Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Dec 26, 2012 14:58:43 GMT 1
27TH JANUARY- STARZ IN THEIR EYES- Just Jack (2 wks)I loved this at the time, mainly because its release in the immediate aftermath of the most recent X Factor series seemed so appropriate, not necessarily for the (then) winner Leona Lewis, but for the ones who say "it's not the last you've heard of me" only to slip into either obscurity or an endless parade on "celebrity programmes" in a bit to cling on to any bit of fame that they can. Rather than being savage to those individuals (who are after all trying to follow their dreams etc) JJ turns his attention to those who promise the fame and fortune but who are uninterested once the star starts to dim. It's also rather a downbeat track melodically, for all the uptempo-ness(?) going on here there's an essential sadness underneath the surface, not a surprise given the theme, but there is genuine empathy with the contestants on these shows. Whilst acknowledging that those individuals are willing participants, so it isn't exactly exploitation more unfulfilled promises and the inevitable consequence that the comedown isn't going to be pretty. All in all a far subtler song than it first appears.
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Post by Earl Purple on Dec 26, 2012 20:17:37 GMT 1
I hate Eric Prydz with a passion. His #1 is my worst ever, even more than any X-Factor sh*t. He took one of my favourite songs and just repeated one line of it again and again in a horrible dance beat with the "hey isn't this cool" attitude. No it isn't. Radio stations shouldn't have even acknowledged its existence. Yeah I know at the time it was #1 I had a #1 that sampled a track too, but Akira The Don was artistic with what he did. Eric Prydz had none with his.
As for Just Jack, now this is what dance music should be like. If you call this dance music. That track reached my top 10 too, and we're into the "new era" of download-only singles which started so brightly, with this peaking behind "Grace Kelly" and the View being #3. Musically 2007 was a pretty good year until the end part.
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Post by greendemon on Jan 1, 2013 15:24:03 GMT 1
i actually find 'call on me' marginally more tolerable than 'proper education', but then again i was always very fond of the original with that one whereas i had never heard of the original used in 'call on me'.
that said, probably the best thing that 'call on me' ever did was introduce me to 'valerie' by steve winwood which i rather like!
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Post by greendemon on Jan 1, 2013 15:25:06 GMT 1
oh and i really liked the just jack song when it came out - whatever happened to him?
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jan 6, 2013 23:28:53 GMT 1
10TH FEBRUARY- THIS AIN'T A SCENE, IT'S AN ARMS RACE- Fall Out Boy (1 wk)It's always interesting when a band within a genre analyses itself and here Fall Out Boy take on the growing "Emo" subculture that was starting to emerge by that point. The song mocks elements of the more overly earnest groups within the genre "I'm a leading man; and the lies I weave are oh-so intricate" Stump sings, but it isn't war on anything apporaching it he wishes to inspire, more a reflective tone asking the scene, and the wider music industry to have a word with itself and to stop hyping the genre. As a piece of pop music this passed me by entirely at the time, and listening now it doesn't sound bad as such, just underwhelming and kind of empty, 2007 has a lot better to offer than this fortunately.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jan 6, 2013 23:50:04 GMT 1
17TH MARCH- SWEET ESCAPE- Gwen Stefani Featuring Akon (2 wks)I know this is almost like sacrilege now to say but I wasn't a fan of the LAMB period with the sole exception of "Cool" which was a little gem. I suppose my former dislike of No Doubt may come into play here as well, yet "Sweet Escape" doesn't displease me, and it takes a lot for me to say it given that fact! Catchy, sweet and endearing DESPITE the appearance of Akon, this has a charm that gives you earworm. It great achievement is therefore in getting me to like it despite a lot of things that mean I should hate it given my normal prreferences in music, in general I find her music too reliant on gimmicks and annoying hooks, let's not forget the evil "Hollaback Girl" or the single that preceded this song "Wind It Up" with its reliance on the yodelling!, in short after "Cool" this is my favourite Stefani track, but even then it isn't rocking my world.
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Roo.
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Post by Roo. on Jan 7, 2013 0:37:41 GMT 1
Saddened by your FOB commentary but they are one of my favourite bands so that's to be expected. It isn't close to being one of their best.
LAMB was a wonderful album, almost perfect pop on a whole, and I agree Cool was the best thing from it much as Sweet Escape was the best thing from an underwhelming, messy second album.
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Post by greendemon on Jan 9, 2013 17:04:14 GMT 1
i think the commentary on 'this ain't a scene...' is spot-on. i was never a big FOB fan; i always got them confused with panic at the disco 'sweet escape' i was pleasantly surprised by, having disliked 'hollaback girl' when it first came out.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jan 19, 2013 16:41:37 GMT 1
7TH APRIL- GIRLFRIEND- Avril Lavigne (2 wks)Ok so it was sued successfully by the Rubinoos who claimed that the writers of "Girlfriend" had certainly borrowed the idea from their 1979 hit "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" but failing that there is something curiously very 80s about the track. Similarities were also drawn to Toni Basil's "Mickey" particularly for the catchy punchy chorus which is, at its heart, very simplistic. For me "Girlfriend" is a little too simplistic to really catch the imagination, she had shown in such songs as "I'm With You" that she was really capable of doing much better work and whilst this track did the job of launching the album and getting her airplay it is ultimately a little too vacuous to hold the attention beyond the four minutues it lasts. Pop can be, and often is, disposible, totally of its time and fades quickly and I doubt "Girlfriend" will stand the test of time, and it won't be alone in that club, so I can't be too harsh on it, treat it as a bit of fun and you'll enjoy it....probably.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jan 19, 2013 16:51:59 GMT 1
21ST APRIL- STOP ME- Mark Ronson Featuring Daniel Merriweather (1 wk)I should start the review by stating that I am a Smiths fan so by rights I should clearly hate this. I don't, Ronson genuinely treats the song with love (it is his favourite Smiths record apparently) and the orchestration keeps the essence of the melancholy that the original had in spades, but what is lacking in the bile and vitriol that Morrissey brought to the 1987 track but not to worry. The idea to segue the song into "You Keep Me Hanging On" is inspired, and moreover demonstrates quite Ronson had become such a big name with the album, he tries to bring something new to the table when covering old hits, and not in a cheap way either. There is no guarantee that any of these covers would have worked, nor indeed is there anything very 2007 about them, why they work, in my opinion, is the care taken over them. To be honest anything that brings more attention to the Smiths in my opinion is not a wasted effort, not the best 07 has to offer but it's certainly not disgraced it!
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Post by andrew07 on Jan 20, 2013 18:24:47 GMT 1
It's a shame that The Smiths' original only got an international single release years ago, as I think that would have been a better choice of single than "I Started Something I Couldn't Finish" but then they had already split by that time. Mark Ronson's version was okish, but didn't really do much for me compared to the original.
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Post by thehitparade on Jan 20, 2013 21:03:15 GMT 1
I've read that the Smiths version was planned as the second or third single from the album but was cancelled because the lyric about a shy Buddhist contemplating mass murder would have been thought inappropriate after the Hungerford massacre. Personally, it's not a track I was ever that fond of, but still nowhere near as annoying as the Mark Ronson version. What happened to Daniel Merriweather anyway?
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Post by greendemon on Jan 28, 2013 20:13:41 GMT 1
'girlfriend' is noisy and annoying - a bit like avril herself, really.
i never did like ronson's 'stop me...' as much as the original, nor do i think i ever will.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 28, 2013 21:04:39 GMT 1
I liked FOB when they broke onto the scene, but after that second album got played a few times I just lost interest. Pretty boring live too.
Never liked "Arms Race" either, it's just too pop like and weak.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 29, 2013 11:07:19 GMT 1
Great track from Mark Ronson - i love the vocals from Daniel Merriweather. Whatever happened to both of them chartwise?
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Roo.
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Post by Roo. on Jan 29, 2013 18:15:47 GMT 1
Ronson produced Locked Out Of Heaven so he's still very much about, I don't know where Daniel Merriweather went but I hope he comes back as I really enjoyed his album, and still think Red is a superb song.
I also still like Girlfriend - I think it works very well at what it wants to be, unlike most of the album, although it does have When You're Gone which is my favourite Avril song so it's not all bad.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jan 29, 2013 21:18:28 GMT 1
28TH APRIL- BRIANSTORM- Arctic Monkeys (1 wk)So that tricky second album complex rears its head for the Arctic Monkeys by the time 2007 comes around. "Brianstorm" isn't altogether a successful answer,certainly there is an attempt, sonically, to do something a little different whilst keeping the strong narratives that AM had become famous for, the problem lies in the fact that the song lacks any real heart or essentially, a great story. The frenetic guitar work attempts in part to make up for this or compensate, but it's only papering over the cracks, and as if to add insult to injury the truly magnificent "Fluorescent Adolescent" would highlight everyhting that this song is not. Of course being the flavour of the month is always a hard tag to live up to with the press moving on quickly to the next thing leaving you to wonder what you did wrong, normally the answer is nothing at all, but "Brianstorm" doesn't help matters. Perhaps the best stories in Alex Turner's repertoire had been saved for other songs but this is more an announcement of their return rather an essential AM track or a song that will be recalled as a classic in years to come.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jan 29, 2013 21:54:52 GMT 1
12TH MAY- YOUR LOVE ALONE IS NOT ENOUGH- Manic Street Preachers Featuring Nina Persson (1 wk)The fact that the Manics are still getting these sizeable hits some 16 years into their chart career is a fact overlooked too often when discussing the group. To top that they can even still produce some little corkers such as this one with a little help from the lead singer from the Cardigans, it's a duet which makes sense within the confines of the record (well much more sense than the normal rent a rappers that constitute a featured artist these days). In some ways it feels like a bit of a re-awakening, rediscovering the mojo, but certainly it's much more upbeat and poppy than what we've been used to from them for some time and it's very welcome, follow up "Autumn Song" is another gem which in general marks a small golden period for them in my opinion. Persson purs on the record with suitable playfulness and there seems to be a real sincerity in the track that makes it hard to dislike even if you were so minded, all in all a cracker.
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Roo.
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Post by Roo. on Jan 29, 2013 23:23:50 GMT 1
Send Away The Tigers was a great album as far as New Manics are concerned, and YLAINE is a highlight. Instant and catchy and still sounds great today.
I actually like Brianstorm a lot too, was nice to see they could just rock out and have fun.
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Post by greendemon on Jan 30, 2013 14:29:21 GMT 1
haha, even as someone who likes arctic monkeys i had to play the clip for 'brianstorm' as i couldn't remember it at all! of course, within seconds i was thinking, 'oh... it's THAT one', but i guess that it was so forgettable nicely confirms what you've said in your commentary. all hook, no content - and even the hook itself isn't that good. just sounds like the riff from 'when the sun goes down' but in a slightly different order!
i was never a big fan of the manics song, i have to say - though roping in nina persson was a nice touch.
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