”Me and you, staring competion..right now! You win, you always do….”

Will Ferrell geek alert…..

I’m a big fan of Will Ferrell, He is a genius, no-one can bring life to comedy scripts like Ferrell. although I barely made it through Bewitched the other night, he was sublime in Melinda and Melinda, it’s a crying shame about the film though which contained only characters which exist in Woody Allen’s social circles. Anchorman for me was “scrumtrulesent” (Ferrell geeks only) with a terrific script and brilliant cast. My mouth waters at the prospect of his new film from the Anchorman team:Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby. As a NASCAR driver Ricky Bobby (Ferrell) faces stiff competition in the form of his new teammate, Jean Girard (Sasha Baron Cohen). Bobby partners with his buddy Cal to form Thunder and Lightning, the most feared duo in the game.

Sounds like that and Nacho Libre (see last post) are the ones to look out for in the UK over summer. Though aparently Baron Cohen’s has a Borat movie coming out which is interesting……….If you forget about In Da House and think about his good performance as king of the Lemmurs in Madagascar (not joking!- him and the penguins were brilliant).

Can anyone confirm if this will be released? It apparently has caused a stir in Kazakstan (read that story here). Borat did claim that in Kazakstan they “hunted jews” among other shocking revelations  (Baron Cohen – being Jewish himself).

 I’m sold, are you?

I know this blog has a music slant, but I have to say when I found out that Jared Hess, Napoleon Dynamite’s director, was teaming up with Tenacious D’s Jack Black (Actor and f**king “musician” - there’s your slant cynics!) to make a film about a Priest who moonlights as a Luchador (Mexican Wrestler), well, I needed to have some time alone. Just as I thought that there was nothing more to look forward to apart from remakes of Magnum PI, Vectorman or Manimal (actually that might be allright, modern FX etc, you can steal that pitch if you like) bang! Nacho Libre appears and you can watch the trailer here. Whilst I’m on the subject of Jack Black, If anyone knows whether the Tenacious D Film is still going to be made, drop me a comment on this post.

 

 

They’re mint….

 Do you watch Ferris Beuller’s Day Off whilst skiving from work? Do you backcomb your hair, own cherry red DMs and sulk around as your mascarra drips down your white powdered face? Do you have pogoing sessions round the front room, curtains closed and lights off to “Panic” by The Smiths smashing flowers off the side board in the name of nostalgia? If this sound like you - but you’ve hit thirty or so and tend to have dinner parties with close friends rather than getting trollied at the local goth/indie disco….. Then Nouvelle Vague are the band pour vous (sorry) and they are tres bon (sorry and I’ll stop). They are essentially a covers band, however, all their tracks are  alternative 80s music and some may be rather familiar. For example their versions of “Teenage Kicks” by The Undertones (from some advert for cars?), “I’ll Stop The World and Melt with You” by Modern English (from some mobile phone advert and the Mr and Mrs Smith Soundtrack) and ”Just Can’t Get Enough” by Depeche Mode (From some other bloody car advert!) are taken from their first album and will, no doubt, been drumed into your subconcious already, whether you like it or not. Their new album: “Bande A’Part” contains another corking tracklist which you can find by clicking here (this link has the debut album tracklist too, bonus!).

 I reckon they’d be great live – even with less revealing clothing

The main twist, for me personally is that they play new versions in a gentle gallic lounge style. Unlike the humourous Richard Cheese covers or the plain crazy Senor Coconut, there is an unpresidented air of cool and class about Nouvelle’s covers which makes them ideal background music for someone who grew up listening to 80s music.

FOR MORE INFO ABOUT NOUVELLE VAGUE CLICK HERE

 When not making cracking mid-field performances for club and country local lad makes nice tunage………

Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes plus another Yes! N0rthern B0y rocks well lounges at least. N0rthern B0y is a project by Gary Bell well, is him really. Another local lad, but this will appeal to anyone with a touch of Royksopp here and a dash of Air there.  His slinky grooves should don films, adverts, TV screens and elevators across the globe like a fine feathered chapeau (or is it chapeaux? A f**kin bad-ass flamboyant hat anyway). Really, Really great check him out by clicking here.

 

           Free Diamonds!                                                   Expensive ones!

More Shameless, tasteless promotion, this time on behalf of old friends. Free Diamonds are a band from Newcastle, Uk who have recently got snapped up by the well-respected Deep Elm Records in the US. They have possibly the most manic and unique sounding singer in Scott…..that alone is worth the admission fee. Free Diamonds? maybe not, but quite cheap on I-Tunes, Their debut Album “There should be more dancing” is oot noo. Check them out by clicking here.

Well, I suppose it’s about time I blogged on about my own personal bands for a bit of shameless self-promotion. I’ll try to make it short though and feel free to post comments about what you think of the tracks.

 Luminaries Demos Cover

I’ve got two music projects on the go: firstly I’ve got a kind of indie/alternative pop/ rock style project called Luminaries, which consists of me on keyboards ,vocals and guitars, the studio engineer, Dave Curle on drums and my friend Lee Dolman plays most of the bass. Ross “rooster” Foster plays aditional guitar too! (thanks mate). The second is kOMPUTa bANd which is a solo effort (well dave does his percussion magic, I’m poor at percussion!) more “mature” for want of a better word, it’s quite gentle a bit loungey etc.

I have a third act, Luminaries of Golf,which is now defunked, but still “funky” (sorry) this is electronica mixed with live music two of the tracks were written by a robot!

To check out any of the bands click on the band names above.

enjoy……or not! Wasn’t a very good promo that really……was it?

I’ll blog about the official website when that’s up and running in the next few weeks.

The Motorettes from Tynemouth, a sleepy sea-side village in the north east, (apart from sunday night when it’s full of charvers, or chavs if your southern) have been hard working under various AKAs for some years now.

Check out the cool graphics/axe on that!

They’ve finally struck a deal with Kitchenware Records and singer/guitar player Robin and co. are releasing a debut album in the next few days. Even if they’re not everyone’s cuppa I can’t help but feel blasting out their punky-pop cover of The Boss’s “I’m on fire” would bring a grin to even the sourest of pusses. There single “You gotta look the parts” is out now, you can watch the video here.

I feel congratulations are in order as well as good luck wishing for these aimiable chaps.

If you don’t click on the link you’ll never know what your missing!

Sitting in boxershorts in front of computer screen usually means only one thing for most gentleman of leisure, however, it’s not what your thinking for this particular blogger. I spend a great deal of time and conscious effort scouring I-Tunes Music Store for good new music. Those 30 second previews of each track are usually enough for me to condem the bands to a very fiery plateau of hell or download entire collections. Usually, and to my dismay, the ammount of MOR stuff that is churned out is so vast that over a two hour stint of listening I’m lucky to find any wheat in the dense chaff (sorry that was a bit poor). I love the experimental, but I’m still a sucker for melody, Beck is obviously a hero then….. I enjoy the diversity of styles and the fact that production adds to the asthetics of French bands Air and Phoenix. I can’t forget to mention the Strokes, Kings of Leon, Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Kraftwerk, Beastie Boys, DJ Shadow, Super Furry Animals, Lo-Fidelity All Stars, Royksopp, De La Soul, Nouvelle Vague, Echo and the Bunnymen, Saint Ettienne (breathe), Sigur Ros, Sly and The Family Stone, Daft Punk, The Chemical Brothers, The Kinks, Blur, The Who, Lalo Schiffrin, John Barry, The Cure, The Smiths, The Charlatans, The Stone Roses, The Beta Band, Belle and Sebastian, The Bee Gees (really! Saturday Night Fever is a cracking album – discuss….) Johnny Cash, The Boss (again, really! I think so anyway!?) Otis Redding, Nina Simone, Aretha Fraklin and…….out of breathe, I could go on but you get the picture. I still like the odd bit of Sh**e, we all do, past purchases include Kim Wilde albums, Roachford and sin of all sins Stefan Dennis’s “Don’t it make you feel good” (Paul from neighbours play that funky music white lad!) 

 Sigur Ros – Experimental? Maybe

Beck, genius – Probably

Air – French? Definitley!

Back to the plot, I’m in my kegs thinking – it has been a while since I felt inspired by new tunes, in particular a whole album, I’m a sucker for the mix tape/CD/Mp3 playlist nowadays as a consequence of this lack of quality Long Players….

Thanks then must go to Band of Horses whose “Everything All the Time” Album is great on the whole. If you like bands like My Morning Jacket and Great Lake Swimmers, this will be right up your Americana Alley (Ouch!). Blending breezy, yearning and heart-felt vocals that are reminisent of The Band with slacker rock and accoustic country folk providing the grooves. Band of Horses brings to mind Neil Young: beautifully fragile this record stinks of class. It subtle though so for some it may take a few listens……If anyone knows of any other band of this ilk then I’m interested?

Luminaries is me, but I’d like to think that one day it could be us……. Why? Imagine you had a 200 piece Anglo/Asian/African orchestra with a cajun band, DJ, MC, gospel choir, female and male singers of all kinds, guitar players, bass (double, upright, accoustic), drumers, drum machines (from 303s to sampled loops ). Oh and Keyboards, I mean seas of them; grand piano to Fender Rhodes, Clavinova to hammond, SH101 to Moog. How about percussion, doesn’t really bare thinking about, I’m talking about acess to all of Bongolia here. Kazoos, maybe? Stylophones, theremins…..Oh…..Oh….FX units Wah-Wah, Delay, Reverb, Phaser….Flanger. What songs could you create with this type of musical kit and musicians at your and their disposal, what would you create? All playing at once, how about the asian orchestra, the DJ, kazoos and some wah-wah porn action?!

I think we should try it don’t you?……

Apart from some blogging about music and movies and stuff , my aim is also to get musicians from different backgrounds together to create some interesting music drawing on people’s individual skills and talents and the diverse music they make and the wide range of instruments they play.

 

Imagine the different fomulae and combinations you could come up with. Example fomular follows:

  +  + =

Imagine that album!!!!!!!!!