While I was away, a colleague sent me the lyrics to the Jack White / Alicia Keys Bond theme. I took one look and thought "fake".

Turns out I was wrong, and this terrifically incompetent bag of balls is the genuine article.


JW: Another blinger with a slick trigger finger for Her Majesty
AK: Another one with the golden tongue poisoning your fantasy
JW: Another pill from a killer turn a thriller to a tragedy
AK/JW: Yeah, a door never open, a woman walking by, a drop in the water, a look in the eye, a phone on the table, a man on your side, someone that you think that you can trust is just another way to die.

(snip...)

To fade: Just another, just another, bang bang bang bang.

To be fair, the words work a lot better in the context of the down and dirty bombast of the song - which you can buy now on iTunes. But I still prefer the two spoof themes performed by Adam and Joe of… er, Adam and Joe fame. Here's a sample of Adam Buxton's chorus:

I'd like a quantum of solace, but no more than a quantum
I know they do big bags of solace... but I don't want'em
I only want a teeny, tiny slice of solace
Before I shoot you

Much, much better, I'm sure you'll agree.

Adam Buxton - Quantum of Solace


Joe Cornish - Quantum of Solace


Perhaps we could collect together all these themes, and the ditched Amy Winehouse one, and put on a show, Kids of Fame-style, right here, right now.

I'll call Bruno. Can you text LeRoy?

Labels: alicia keys, bond, film, Music, Radio, white stripes

George Ergatoudis, the improbably named but highly influential head of music at Radio One, has done an interview with the Guardian where he heralds the "return of pop music" on the nation's favourite radio station.

But before you take to the streets, cheering and letting off party poppers from the back of a decorated pony, take a minute to read what he says.

"There's something of an increase in pop acts that I think are making really strong, quality new music. Ones doing really well for us at the moment are the Hoosiers, Scouting for Girls, the Wombats ... "

Now wait just a minute.

Scouting For Girls? The fucking Wombats? These second-rate unimaginative indie pissants are nowhere near the vast citadel known as pop. They're not even in the suburbs. They're about 500 miles off the coast, next to a sewer outlet on the seabed, slowly evolving into double-celled organisms.

In fact, when it comes to real pop, Ergatoudis admits he's only really ready to play Sugababes and Girls Aloud, who - great though they are - are getting a bit long in the tooth.

He glosses over the fact that Radio One chooses not to add similarly talented, quirky pop acts like Roisin Murphy, Alphabeat and Dragonnette to its hallowed playlist?

The Guardian also points out that Ergatoudis refused to play this week's (admittedly terrible) number one, Basshunter's Now You're Gone, until it hit the top of the charts and he was forced into an "embarassing climbdown".

Don't get me wrong - I'm all for the return of guitars in pop (and I'd have classed the Hooisers and Kaiser Chiefs as pop long before Ergatoudis had his Damascene conversion) but pretending that you're championing a genre by retrospectively re-categorising bands you already play is cuntery of the highest order.

Cheerio!

Labels: Music, Radio

So last night on Fabulous Rrrrradio One Eff Emm they played the new Arctic Monkeys single. Taken from their forthcoming sophomore album, Favourite Worst Nightmare, it's called Brian Storm (do you see what they did there?). It has since been played on the station every two hours or so. There's a law about it, apparently.

As we all know, Arctic Monkeys are the biggest band on the planet. "They're like this generation's Oasis" is what well-known rock critic Dizzee Rascal said.

We also know that Arctic Monkeys are popular because of the internet, which allowed their fans to come together and say "crikey, I quite like this music", except using typing and modems.

So the online response to this hotly anticipated new record is bound to be stellar, isn't it?

Erm... no.

A total of three (count 'em) bloggers have written about the single. "I heard it. It's good, yeah", says Imdagger with unique insight into the creative process. Meanwhile, Pillaged Prose is more effusive, but slightly more cryptic: "Damn what a follow up", he writes. "But not the sort of thing to listen to when trying to do finicky seam work". An important health warning for all of those kids listening to the Monkeys in a third-world sweatshop, there.

And what of the response on the group's fabled myspace page? Similarly poor,I'm afraid. Just five of the band's 62,989 "friends" felt moved to make a comment. One of them, Mikey, wrote "your new song is the sex", which makes me wonder if he has ever actually had sex (hint: no). But, apart from Mikey, no-one seems to be wetting their pants over this much-feted record.

Come on, guys, the song's not that bad. I mean, the words are clever. And the guitar riff is pretty ferocious. Yes, the tune just repeats itself every two bars and there's no chorus - but what do you expect? They are this generation's Oasis, after all.

Labels: arctic monkeys, Music, Radio

You made the Top 40 countdown the single most exciting piece of radio in the UK - every week for thirty years.

You said Not 'Arf and Pop Pickers rather a lot.

You genuinely loved the music you played. Unlike, say, JK and Joel.

Speaking of whom, you would never have spent a cringeworthy five minutes trying to chat up Nelly Furtado - every single bloody time she was on the show.

But then, she probably isn't that into wooly jumpers.

You were the only Radio 1 DJ who was simultaneously friends with John Peel and Noel Edmonds.

You pulled off the feat of making a piece of swing band music the calling card for the world's most exciting rock and roll music chart.
Proof:

You will be missed.

PS: Read a proper obituary at No Rock and Roll Fun.

Labels: DJ, Music, Radio

Sometimes, in the course of my day job, I get asked to provide voice-overs. Nothing you're likely to have heard, mind you, just the occasional programme trail or narration for a news pacakge.

Today, I was asked to pop into the recording studio for a piece on the BBC 's website. I dutifully obliged, recording two lines of translated dialogue for a piece from Japan.

At the time, I didn't pay much attention to the script. My lines were quite simple: "It's really fun - both the way it looks and the way it smells. It's the first time I've bathed in curry and my daughter loves it."

Hang on just a cotton-picking minute, there... Bathing in curry?! My daughter loves it? Had I really considered what I was lending my voice to as I sat in the recording booth?

Looking at the video now [click here] it feels like I've been sucked into a disappointingly nudity-free edition of Eurotrash.

Perhaps in the future I'll exercise a little more caution over the jobs I accept. Unless there's payment involved, in which case I'll dress up like a monkey and pretend to be the second coming of Jesus. It's not like I have standards.

Labels: links, Radio

Oh dear. Being on the radio isn't as glamorous as it's cracked up to be...

Last night, thorough a combination of weak-will and idiocy, I was roped into appearing on the BBC World Service. They billed me as an 'entertainment reporter and composer', which is technically true even if it does sound a little bit grand compared to "writes about music and plays the piano".

My mission was to be Simon Cowell for five minutes on the World Have Your Say programme in a feature they called "Your-o-vision".

Although, clearly, that pun doesn't work on radio.

So I put on a tight black vest, pulled my trousers up to chest height and set about my task, judging music from podcasts and blogs around the world.

The majority of the 'entrants' were actually very good - and I ended up exaggerating my minor quibbles with the songs to avoid saying "yeah, I quite like that, actually" after every track.

It was all over very quickly (or, perhaps, the vest cut off the blood supply to my brain and I blacked out). I gave my douze points to a creole-style song from Colombia, but the other judges overruled and British punk band Itchy Tits won the contest.

I've put a link to all of the songs featured on the programme below, because I don't feel any of them deserved to be judged in this cruel manner. Certainly not by me, anyway.

There's also an MP3 of my appearance, which I've provided out of sheer vanity.

If only I'd asked for a fee...

King Elio Boom: Il Fulo is available at WFMU

Nathan Asher: Turn Up The Faders is available on myspace

Itchy Tits: Videophone is available on Xan Phillips podcast
(Xan was also on last night's show - so read his blog too!)

Hear the whole shameful episode on this short mp3

By the way, if you want my opinion on this year's actual Eurovision contest, I say it's Lithuania all the way. This country either has a fantastic sense of humour or appalling taste in music. Or maybe it's both...

The song is utterly devoid of any tune or progression, and the band, LT United, would appear to consist of six blokes they found waiting for their wives outside the changing rooms in Lithuania's equivalent of Debenhams.

But their lyrics are superb: "We're the winners of Euorvision," they repeat, "Vote for us / vote for us". The band's official website even redirects you to www.winnersofeurovision.com!

If this brazen attempt at mind-control doesn't work on you, then you're not human and I claim my five pounds.

Labels: discopop, Radio