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- Same as it ever was: the power of pop consistency
'There is comfort in pop fandom – I'm reassured by a new Fall release. Michael Bublé fans can say the same of him'
Like a lot of people, I was thoroughly seduced by the first Fleet Foxes album, to the extent that my initial thought on hearing their new one was: hold on, do I actually need this? They smelt, from the start, like a band that did a particular thing very well. Did that mean they should do it again? Subsequent plays of Helplessness Blues have left me little the wiser. Fleet Foxes are very kind indeed on the ear, so it's easy to lose yourself in their heartbreaking wistfulness – but it was the first time around, too, and a second dose of this immediately soothing folk-pop feels a little like sucking both thumbs at once.
Perhaps they'll be one of those bands that simply sticks with the style they've got and wrings maximum effect out of it. A couple of weeks ago I asked friends on Twitter to name the acts who had gained the most critical acclaim with the least stylistic variety. I got a range of convincing responses, from the Ramones to the White Stripes, which pointed to two ways to keep critics onside without changing your sound too much. One – the most common – is to go the AC/DC route, and spin your consistency as a brand of no-bullshit efficiency or truth-telling. The other is to be so idiosyncratic that you own your own patch of pop from the start, like Stereolab.
What was interesting, though, were the answers that got me all defensive. Take the Fall, for example. Once you've been initiated, it's very easy to see the group shift between post-punk, rockabilly, and art rock: play Totally Wired then Free Range and the differences are obvious. Except they're also not – to the non-fan, the primary texture of the Fall is absolutely changeless. The band is forever a scary man mumbling nonsense over a savage clatter: next to that, the precise nature of said clatter is irrelevant.
We like to think that the fan's perspective is more valid, and it's certainly more rewarding and interesting to hear from people who've dug into a band enough to track its progression. But it's also the case that the idea of artistic progression flatters the listener: there is a strong element of comfort in pop fandom, not necessarily tied to any smoothness in the sound. Once I'd been buying Fall records for a while I realised I felt reassured – cosy, even – when each new one appeared, and I'd imagine a Michael Bublé fan would say much the same about him. These powerful feelings are obscured when we focus on the differences between records. There's nothing necessarily wrong with comfort, but it helps if we're honest about it and don't dress up habit as discernment.
"Same as last time, only better," is a powerfully attractive proposition: just ask Adele. It's also a potential trap. When the BBC opened its repeat season of Top of the Pops with a 1960s clip show, a familiar highlight was Status Quo doing Pictures of Matchstick Men. But for all the song's charm, the main intrigue is trying to spot hints of the band's future as the ultimate icons of rock consistency. You can hardly imagine these likable hippie chancers evolving, like some terrifying Pokémon of pop, into the Quo's perpetual boogie machine. But there were flashing glances from Francis Rossi to Rick Parfitt that seemed to say: "Hey, Rick, let's ditch this psychedelic malarkey and just chug."
Fleet Foxes are as un-Quo a band as you could find, though I already get the sense that if they wanted to make the same record forever, they'd find an uncomplaining fanbase. But Helplessness Blues reminds me more of Portishead's second album. Both records worked to consolidate a debut that hit big out of nowhere. Both managed to completely satisfy expectations and still leave a niggle of disappointment. Portishead, back then, looked as if they might make a career out of consistency. Instead they vanished for a decade, tore the guts out of their sound, and returned on the startling and brilliant Third as a dystopic version of themselves. It doesn't seem likely that Fleet Foxes will do the same. But it's fun to imagine them trying.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - New music: Salem v Britney Spears – Till the World Ends
Britney's apocalyptic original gets the Salem treatment, complete with semi-naked girls and military footage (obvs)
Warning: video is probably best described as NSFWFeeling a comedown after the storm of excitement over that version of Bieber's grammatically incorrect ballad U Smile? Fear not, for here are witch house figureheads Salem. With five singles, nine official mixtapes and one album under their (studded) belts ('cos they're gothic), the group have decided to unleash their reworking of Britney's latest tooth-grinder Till the World Ends. And it's gone down a treat so far, possibly because they've debased the vocals to such an extent it sounds like it's being performed by an evil Transformer.
The song is accompanied by a signature Salem video, all fuzzy and mysterious, introduced with a brief nod to the original artist in the form of dancing, grinding, near-naked anonymous American girls who make Britney look like Kate Middleton. This is followed by green-tinted military footage of bomb explosions. Not one to bother the charts, then, but likely to have us lot humming like androids for the next few days.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - New music: Grimes – Fragments of the Future
It's Salem meets Mariah Carey, apparently – though another description of Claire Boucher's music is 'western medieval organum'. Oh-kay ...
Montreal's Grimes, aka Claire Boucher, is, according to her label, influenced by "R&B, industrial, goth, hip-hop and western medieval organum" and references Salem, Mariah Carey, Gang Gang Dance and the Smiths. In reality, she sounds nothing like any of these artists and the genres are mixed in such a way that if she does touch on any of them, then it's so fleeting as to be almost instantly forgotten (we're not even sure what "western medieval organum" is). Grimes's music is best described as weird pop, with recent single Vanessa a good example. Altered Zones has just posted a new mixtape by Boucher, beginning with Fragments of the Future, a gorgeous wash of piano, synth and contorted vocals. On first listen, it's pretty slight – but there's magic in its minimalism.
Download the full mix for free from SoundCloud.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - New music: Tyga ft Adele – Reminded
Adele's Someone Like You is everywhere right now, but few artists use it as cleverly as this American rapper
Adele's Someone Like You has helped propel her album to ridiculous sales in the UK and US, where it has spent five non-consecutive weeks at No 1. It's ubiquity leads it to an unexpected place, fleshing out the chorus on a track by Young Money signing, Tyga. Reminded features Tyga rapping about the same themes in Adele's original, describing a recent break-up. For the chorus he samples lines from Someone Like You over a simple beat and plaintive guitar, inverting the lyrics and stopping short of the chorus so Adele never reaches the point of wishing her ex-lover well: "I hoped you'd see my face and that you'd be reminded, hate to turn up out of the blue uninvited but I couldn't stay away, I couldn't fight it." Reminded works because the sample isn't just dumped for the sake of it, but teased into the song and given a new context, which for a track that soundtracks every teary moment in The Only Way Is Essex is some feat.
Reminded is taken from Tyga's mixtape, Black Thoughts Volume 2, which you can download for free from hereguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - Secret diary of a band: the corporate gig
This week, our anonymous band discover the perils of playing to the fashion crowd
Since starting the band, we've written more than 50 songs for our debut album. I think it's fair to say that 98% of those compositions are complete and utter tripe, though if you were to ask other members of the band they'd disagree with me over which ones. Each song is laboured over, each demo is produced to the highest standard, and after each one is finished we feel euphoric with creative afterglow. But when the dust settles, it's obvious some of these endeavours simply aren't good enough.
However, having now agreed on a final 12, we've worked with a producer who's made them sound bigger and better than we ever could, and the waiting game begins. Ideally we want to self-release. We'd be the first to admit that we're control freaks, and when you've fallen in love with something you've created it's hard to let it go. I know it's a cliche but this album really is our baby. Our vomiting, farting, poo-streaked infant. But even self-releasing takes time, since you need to work with a distributor: there are contracts, meetings and phone calls. As I'm sure many of you know, once you've finished a lengthy project waiting for other people to make decisions is excruciating. Or maybe we're just incredibly restless.
In the middle of this, and perhaps as a move by our management to take our minds off it, this week we played a "high-profile fashion party in London's glittering West End". We arrived at 6.30pm for soundcheck and they were still assembling the stage, spraypainting the speakers a vicious pearly pink. A nervous and techy member of our band sidled up to a worn-out looking girl, mumbling: "Er, don't you think that'll interfere with the sound?" Her withering look was enough to turn milk. So we did the only thing we could, and slunk up to our dressing room to graze on the rider.
The best gigs to play are always the small ones, where you can hold a conversation with the audience between songs that is more nuanced than, "Hello [insert name of city]! You having a good time?" You want to be able to see the faces of the people who've decided to spend their money coming to see you rather than on ... cheese graters, Lazy Susans, I don't know, whatever people spend their money on.
Big gigs are thrilling but as as Russell Hammond says in Almost Famous: "I look for the guy who isn't getting off, and I make him get off", and it's much easier to do that when you're playing to 200 people instead of 2,000. Not that we often get to play to 200, let alone 2,000. Also, the use of the phrase "get off" always worried me. If getting off is what I think it is, I should clarify people don't "get off" at our gigs. Maybe that's where we're going wrong?
Deciding what to wear at a fashion event can be tricky. Do you rise above the pomp and shrug on your same grey T-shirt and jeans, hoping that will make you look like you haven't made an effort? No, because everyone there knows what you're doing and thinks, "Oh they're doing the old 'I haven't made an effort' trick". Or do you go all out with razorblade vest, spandex trousers and a blow dry, as if to say, "Yeah I have no idea why I'm wearing this either, but at least it's weird". The answer is neither; you try to do both – grey T-shirt, razorblade vest and nothing on your bottom half – and then as soon as you arrive you realise everyone else is far too worried about what they're wearing to notice the entertainment.
Our gig was a disaster. Since we didn't get a chance to soundcheck, we couldn't hear anything on stage and probably half-deafened the crowd. Not that they would have noticed; the roar of glamorous conversation halted only when a famous fashion model turned DJ sauntered in and took her place behind the decks, cutting short our set by 15 minutes (it was a 30-minute slot).
However, as we were packing up, disgruntled and whiny, a small lady in a kaftan with silver hair and monocle slid over to us. "That was glorious in its chaos" she whispered. Possible album title?
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать
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