XYZ October

‘Selling out’ is dead stock lingo in my book. See, I’ve been getting a few questions about integrity versus cash, art versus commerce, good versus evil, the usual narrative arcs that turn up when the worthy and just of this world start banging on about creativity, talent and other such myths. Seems like a synch-worthy artist is a sacrificial lamb to some areas of the music press, holding their righteous sword of pop truth aloft, swinging at those that dare to challenge the sanctity of their most precious commodity, musical expression. Yawn. But one man’s sell out is another man’s bread and butter and while some relish the thought that artists exist in a psychedelic bubble of scandalous self indulgence, each on a creative rampage leaving a trail of rock ‘n’ roll clichés and tired pitfalls in their wake, the truth is I can’t afford a pair of shoelaces, let alone the bibles that hold these standards so dear.
With the value of music slipping faster than Jacko’s feet in a Pepsi ad, creative survival has become a paramount concern to artists. Where the struggle to hit musical nirvana, tattooed into pops forearm forever, the starry eyed genius scrabbles around for change to replace his guitar strings. Labels lose their artist focus along with the huge advances; another Roller is spared its date with the swimming pool. Acts flicker on and off the radar in matter of months as the next label offensive is launched to stave off financial cardiac arrest. There’s no option but to roll with the punches and as the industry is knocked sideways, sideline screams of ‘Sell out!’ fade into round two. But what sounds like the final death rattle of integrity for the music industry to some, is a window of opportunity to others. In a business that’s looking more like the Wild West than coke’n’cars glory of its former years, a hilarious, lawless mess with everything to play for. Art and commerce have always been an intriguing blend. Jeff Koons’ latest work costs more to produce than he can actually sell it for and the KLF burnt a million quid, whether a purge of guilt or just a daft idea, you do whatever it takes to make sense of your place in the world.
I know what makes me happy and I know what keeps me awake at night and for all of those self-appointed bastions of culture and their concerns about artist integrity, there’s only one voice that should ever ring true. That little tune I made in the front room on dodgy headphones has now gone all around the world and zapped back to me through the telly. Like magic. It means I can continue, which is all I ever wanted to do, integrity intact, unlike the pitch on a shampoo ad which I declined. I‘m mostly bald see, and not being a fan of irony, really couldn’t get along with the idea. Precious slaphead.

XYZ - May 2008

A great man once said “it’s mostly tha voice that gets you up”. Well, yeah mostly, but for me it’s the guts that get me off. Cos the voice is the just the front end of everything else inside; portal to the truth, access to the soul. Or at least it’s meant to be.

Singers, singers, so many singers, there’s so many songs and so many voices nowadays that it’s easy to lose the plot as a punter. The smoke and mirrors of the industry clouds our judgement as we’re told that Duffy is the new Amy, Amy is the old Adele and Joss Stone is just a fucking joke that killed the Flake ad legacy.

We lurch down this well worn primrose path, all pissed on pop, giggly off Heat, swathe after swathe of singer/songwriters fly past, slapping us in the face with their ‘License to Motown’. All souled out and authentic as a good fuck; nods to Northern Soul, Reggae and Hip Hop are ladled on like varnish on the tarnished and battered hull of pops’ mighty Ark.

See, I have a love for pop music but a passion for soul, not ‘Soul’ as in it’s literal HMV/Virgin (or Zavvi…wtf?) ‘Urban’ category sense. When somebody opens their mouth and you hear that indefinable truth, well, that’s the shit right there.

In the extreme, Will Young singing “Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone” is like me singing “I’m black and I’m proud”. Obviously, severe market forces were at work on that one, but equally ironic is Diana Ross singing the greatest ‘coming out’ song ever (ermm…’I’m Coming Out’). So for the same reasons I don’t believe Amy ever when back to black. Amazing voice, great story but a whole load of showing off and tragedy does not a Nina Simone make. Ditto the ‘other lot’, apart from Beth Ditto. Uncut heroine.

Sure enough, everybody’s got make a living and go for theirs, but let’s hold off on handing out the Award for Eternal Greatness when it’s just a fancy lick of Dulux to the career.

My Favourite Sushi Game

Keeping It Real

Some ones been giving indie a bad name and while I generally relish any kind of bile leveled at those fine protagonists of pap, casting their gangly, jangly shadow across an overpopulated musical landscape; lets not get bogged down in terminology, as indie is, for the most part defunct by the fact it’s ‘major’.
Howls of ‘mortgage indie’ berate those bands on a quest to sell out and cash-in , puking pops pick’n’mix cocktail all over the shop, two parts brit-pop, one part 80 ‘s drive time, a dash of 90’s Seattle and a lovin spoonful of sugar for the bitterest pill of cynicism. Nevermind.
Authenticity and the music industry have never been mutually exclusive, quite the opposite, but all that is a well trodden path in this column, everything is not as it seems and y’alls should know better. To have a passion for something does require a level of criticism, panning for musical gold, sifting crap from cream is all part of the fun and while some records are built like a PowerPoint presentation for the benefit of a bank balance, this fretting over it’s origin, form, credibility to find its actual worth, only distracts from whether the song is good or not.
As much as Baddona and Cowell dress it all up in lights, cameras and re-invention, engaging us in an all out assault on the senses to sell the songs, is all part of the same argument. We know more about an act than we do their music, spilling onto tabloid pages before a chord is struck, distorting the ‘voice’ and romancing us with a cinematic version of events - building a story to fit the market. In the same way, ‘keeping it real’ is an overrated angle, keeping it right is mostly forgotten.
Guitars have bloated the scene for several years, to the point it’s like the only way to make music, that rock’n’roll standard ad infinitum and in another throw of the postmodern dice mutate into nu-rave and artrock, becoming so angular it might slit its own throat. Maybe these voices of descent (‘landfill indie’ was also a good one) wanting something ‘real’ might be missing the point but blow a wind of change. I’ll hold out on a revolution for now but whatever the future holds, guitars or not, can we just have some more fucking cracking records please? Like mine, available in all good stores now (hmmm, might not get away with that).

XYZ - August

Noel Gallagher’s a dick inee?, asking J-HOVA for a scrap round the back of the cow sheds for the hearts and minds of a 150,000 strong army. There was only going to be one outcome, but he should have read the Hip Hop Instruction Manual before waging war on an entire culture.

Page 1. Point A. ‘We know how to rock a party’.

Having said that Hip Hop is in a bit of a state, like the way rock went in the eighties, messy, well trodden and full of more shit than the Pyramid stage swill on Friday. A culture, which in at its core is inclusive, allowing all to partake in all of its many faceted outlets, now looks more like a Happy Meal promotion. The all singing, all dancing way of the dollar. No great surprise there, it’s just the final, predictable chapter in a beautiful story of talent, empowerment and politics. But as we turn the final page to find out whodunit – Who Stole The Soul?...I’d like to think it’s as yet unwritten.To have Lil Waynes ‘Lollipop’ the full stop to thirty summat years of the most focused and determined art form in my lifetime is just plain daft.

For all it’s pointless, skewed notions of what empowerment is, the sexism, occasional racism and lambasting of all those other ‘fears’ as truth, the language of hip hop will always remain an essential forum. There’s never one defining argument as a thousand voices respond and bring it to the cypher. Self-policing democracy in action, but for those who hold the spotlight, some remain silent. Yo, Bum Rush The Show!

Some declare Hip Hop dead before claiming the crown to its saviour, only clamouring for the same flattering glow of those dead presidents that Fiddy counts in his (fucking) Candy Shop. But for every blustering gob-shite, there’s a Rising Styles or Slip Jam B that doesn’t need to roll on chrome 22’s to prove its worth. Keeping hope alive, like.

No doubt, the ‘hip hop moment’ of Glastonbury was the first few chords of Wonderwall. See, Noel forgot the second rule in The Manual too –

‘We know how to do ‘beef’’

,and while that frustrated little man and his band of hairy Muppets ,dummies flying everywhere, demand ‘their festival’ back (that bloke from Kasbian wants his say too – see you in the comedy tent!); Jay Z performed hip hop to all of its glorious strengths and weaknesses. Elating, empowering, funky and yes, occasionally pointless

But, don’t look back in anger, eh boys.  

XYZ Magazine July 2008 - Good Work 303!

It’s the 20^th summer of love this year and while there have been washouts, dropouts, too many over-cooked realities and dodgy clothes; it remains the last true musical revolution in recent decades.

Idols and glory - pop in a nut shell. Walls littered with posters of the latest god/ess with a guitar, Stage-front, spouting those incisive, unifying ditties about unrequited love, the ‘square peg in a round hole’ of teen angst or just how nice it all is to be lucky, lucky, lucky. All good stuff but there’s always been something a bit daft giving it up for someone who doesn’t even know you exist. God knows, I’ve done time thinking I was Prince, Mick Jones and the Beasties (imagine Adrock pogo-ing in paisley and before you know it, the word ‘cock’ will pop in there). The fabulous, formative years spent appropriating words and chords, moulding your little identity into a tangible lump of fierce opinion, sexuality and a dash of tenderness are essential to all punters.

Then acid house turned up, all exotic, open minded and faceless. Now, electronic music weren’t new or anything, Chicago, Detroit and New York had been knocking out this stuff for years and, for most, the idea of dancing to something with no human identity was a bit mental but in the space of a year, ubiquitous. The adoration given up to that rock’n’roll standard now bounced around the warehouse. Where there was once just an audience, transformed into a united single minded mass, in turn unlocking the creative and political potential of the crowd…it scared the authorities shitless. Good work 303!

The story always ends the same, money to be made, see. Exclusivity, dress codes and duff drugs buffed and splintered the harmonious blob into a shiney smiley con or ‘Flaceeiiid!’ But as the last squeal echoed from the speaker stack, it’s musical legacy was left to run wild and flourish, before this dissolves into a Powerpoint presentation of Darwins’ ‘Evolution of Electronic Musique’, let’s just say there’s nothing ‘nu’ about glowsticks. 

Kidda an' Ting

I dun a remix of that Ting Tings song...all Baltimore/bassline and whatnot. Damn fun. Click the pic and shake what your gene-pool gave ya.

animation ...WTF?

So, the Falklands war, right... the Belgrano (Gotcha!), Simon Weston, sheep and Thatchers lame pop at that 'New World Order' shit (that stuff's ubiquitous...keep your eyes on the prize kids,no doubt), and she still got votes for another term.
Fuck it, Argentina is clearly on fire.
Where Banksy gave the art world a new street ho to pimp (Brangelina so on his dick forever) and while he's still one of the sharpest minds on the block, Muto rocks the best. Muto makes a fresh new box to work outside of, the worlds not a canvas, it's a massive flipbook. Incredible.
I'm lookin forward to an animated battle between Nike and Muto over their visual copyright held at Cleveland Centre car park, Middlesbrough...bound to happen, and I hope they make a fucking fortune.

"let's talk about me!"...again.

A little movie about me, how I made an album, why I made an album and how tapestry can give you callouses. Shot on the cusp of the worlds worst flu epidemic (to ravage our gaff, anyhow) my 'nasal flow' was also offset by a delightful pallor, only obtained by exploring that well trodden wine/fags axis the night before. Come 7pm that evening, I was stuck to the sofa like a mouldy Wrestlers hotdog, hallucinating that Eastenders was actually taking place in the front room as I drifted in and out of consciousness...oh, and everything fucking knacked.
I don't think I ever got over it, nothings the same anymore and as I watch this little movie, I remember gentler times. You could leave your front door wide open and not have to worry, the local bobby would give you a clip round the ear if you gave him any lip and twenty Marlboro lights cost £1.20. Ah yes, March 2008 , I'll remember those days for the rest of my life.
This was all shot and edited by my good friend Collina 'Greenie' Greenwell...hollaaaa!

Under The Sun - The Bacardi Diaries

My song on a proper telly commercial and everything!...well i'd be more enthusiastic about it if I actually got a paid, but I haven't yet (the PRS will come through in about 20 years or something) EMI and my record label put paid to any idea of us having a secure household for once...that'll teach me to go sampling other peoples records, won't it now.
Still, very nice of Bacardi to stick with it and it'lll no doubt do wonders for promotion and whatnot...still waiting on that bathful of rum though?
Turns out it was directed and produced by HSI (my animation agency/buddies in our fine capital) from their LA offices (by Joseph Kahn...he did the Wu Tang - 'Gravel Pit' video,a bit like the Flintstones but more sexist and with more expensive furs) which was weird cos I was trying to find out who was producing it as it was on-going and it was right under my nose all a long. Fine job too...

that 'Smile' video

Just finished animating and directing a video for the first single 'Smile', just waiting for the comments from stupid motherfuckers on Youtube going 'that's just a rip off of Napoleon Dynamite!!!!...I can't believe!!!'. 10 out of 10 cocknose, it's called a homage , go read a fucking book or something.
Despite only taking 4 weeks on one machine whilst juggling a four year old with a passion for stuffing Hama beads up her nose (just like I did when I was four, not Hama beads, those ceramic ones that slide up the cavity all nice), I think it does the job and makes people smile...does what it says on the tin, innit.
See, Ive been out of the animating thing for a while (not through choice, just market forces or whatever they call it) and mostly spending most of my time juggling Hama bead-riddled-kids, making music, indulging in extreme tapestry and occasionally sleeping. But it's got me back into it all again, you know all visual and shit. So hopefully my record label would like me to do another one (basically giving me the opportunity to pay myself to make a video for me) in order to hold off court action from the loan company/council/inland revenue or pay off some of the bills that make up the snuggly duvet of debt I roll into every night. Hmm all cosy warm and panicky.
Anyway, I do hope you enjoy the video and it makes you smile (and not through gritted teeth like I have to).

Motown Jackin' Mix

Did a mix a while back for Kiss FM's Joe Ransom show. Got some Motown acapellas and sonically sellotaped them onto some other records to varying degrees of success...the mix is actually better than it's title, but I was in a hurry...have a listen

XYZ Magazine April...The Great Pop and Roll Swindle

“Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?”

I do and so does Johnny Rotten, but then he’d lost a shit load in the deal. Rotten left, and Sid self-destructed along with the band. No fun, no fun at all. Reduced from an incendiary force to a sad, smacky circus in only two years; and so is the way of the music industry .Forever. Cheers Malcolm.

But if there’s anything barks loudest from the swathe of bullshit sound-bites, and all that retrogressive “You kids don’t know how it was back in the day” misty-eyed punk crap, it’s that question.

We know full well that in the main, pop music is a process of manufacture. From Motown to X-Factor, the plan has been to get some kid in the studio with somebody else’s song, book that flight to the Seychelles and watch the royalties roll in. It’s an industry after all.

But a good tune is a good tune. Almost undeniably so, and I could bang on about music and the ‘capitalist factories’ that churn it out until some Bacharach/Holland & Dozier/Ashford & Simpson number pops up out of nowhere and takes me somewhere else for a bit. You know that ‘hairs on back of neck’ stuff. Lovely.

But my beef lies with that great big distorting wedge between fantasy and reality; everything we invest our hearts and imaginations in only to be dashed on the shabby rocks of reality.

Every year The Brits turns up and I clap my hands. Not generally in appreciation for a particular talent, just for watching humanity dissolve into a bloated keg of self importance, all faux-humble and whatnot. Tee-hee. But this year it left a bad taste in my mouth.

For one, there was serious lack of the good pop folk of Britain making right royal dicks of themselves. All that ‘meedja training’ has no doubt has put paid to the Brandon Block brilliance of yore.

But just what fuck is all that Brit school stuff about?

Nobody more than me supports the funding of Arts in education. To hear people prattle about lottery money and hospitals is a major worry. Like we should just turn up to the call centre/coal face to earn a wage, have kids and that, before snuffing it without once thinking, aspiring or looking outside the confines of our own consciousness for inspiration or just ‘summat else’. Warhol to Leona Lewis, it’s the difference between being a donkey and human being. Period.

But never has pop music stooped to become so transparent. Not only do we know it’s a music factory but we’re also invited to watch it. The ‘kids’ in the audience at the Brits were mostly from that Brits Academy, a school funded by the British Music Industry to develop young talent. For them, an investment in potential profits. For the kids, a fast-track to fame and fortune. So the winners look down into the audience all grateful and humble thinking about how they were down there last year, wide-eyed and hopeful, the audience looks back thinking ‘that’ll be me next year’. Like walking round a battery hen farm, the whole process from the egg to supermarket shelf is laid bare.

What a shame. The best pop music comes from nowhere, sweeps you off your feet, wines and dines you for three minutes then dumps you. But now we just have ‘the product’, the joy and mystery sucked out of it from the off. Plaudits and pundits all hail the emperors’ new clothes, but it looks like knock-off Nike to me.

Dorothy pulls back the curtain and Willy Wonka shouts ‘You lose!You get nothing!’

Ouch.

Pop music has cheated on me and broke my heart, but I’d take her back tomorrow.

XYZ Magazine June

more bile...politikin'

Rock Against Racism is back (re-branded as Love Music Hate Racism) and I’m hoping it’s not too little too late. I’m hoping it stays in the limelight and doesn’t disappear in a flurry of articles destined for the recycle bin.

As we ride culture’s tin-pot carousel, spewing its hilarious tat and knock-off rewards, why not sit back and enjoy this return to politics in music as its hijacked by the blur of our own sinister status quo…brought to you in HD, 5.1 surround sound, of course.

Big Brother rallies to win the hearts, minds and votes of a planet and the Battle of the Birkenstocks takes place on a global yoga mat. Therapies, meditation, conspiracy theories (and other ‘faiths’) pull the plug on these fine communities as self-preservation descends like a giant fair-trade Bag For Life, smothering the good folk in an all encompassing ‘victim fog’. A wailing soundtrack of modern life commands all to ‘chill the fuck out...now!’ This cast of millions, who once had their eyes on the prize, lose the plot and the credits roll.

God that film was rubbish, get a round in.

In the last twenty years the swing from human to global politics has been huge. A concern for the global community over societies still prevalent ‘isms’, now occupies the majority of punters brain-politic and, while such concerns maybe honest and true, the scale of these problems is so great and non-specific, a certain punch has been lost from the fight.

As confrontation is perceived to be at the heart of all politics, too often I hear ‘I don’t really do politics’; opting for a lifestyle of liberal trappings y’know, Fair-trade coffee, awful hemp clothes and Coldplay. All have this element of ‘invisible politics’ where you can pay to feel involved; commerce replaces protest and (thankfully) your own voice is untraceable.

The argument that music and politics don’t work is as conclusive as that age-old ‘frapaccino vs latte’ debate…pointless distracting guff. No doubt, ‘yoof cultcha’ never had it so good, Nokia,GTA4,MSN,Bit Torrents and you even get rubber johnnies from school. So, while I don’t hold my breath for a new dawn in social politics following LMHR’s latest big push, the brattish holler of ‘Mum, can you start this revolution for me?’ would be a start. At least it proves there’s a voice out there.

XYZ Magazine May

...second bile-ridden XYZ mag installment.

A great man once said “it’s mostly tha voice that gets you up”. Well, yeah mostly, but for me it’s the guts that get me off. Cos the voice is the just the front end of everything else inside; portal to the truth, access to the soul. Or at least it’s meant to be.

Singers, singers, so many singers, there’s so many songs and so many voices nowadays that it’s easy to lose the plot as a punter. The smoke and mirrors of the industry clouds our judgement as we’re told that Duffy is the new Amy, Amy is the old Adele and Joss Stone is just a fucking joke that killed the Flake ad legacy.

We lurch down this well worn primrose path, all pissed on pop, giggly off Heat, swathe after swathe of singer/songwriters fly past, slapping us in the face with their ‘License to Motown’. All souled out and authentic as a good fuck; nods to Northern Soul, Reggae and Hip Hop are ladled on like varnish on the tarnished and battered hull of pops’ mighty Ark.

See, I have a love for pop music but a passion for soul, not ‘Soul’ as in it’s literal HMV/Virgin (or Zavvi…wtf?) ‘Urban’ category sense. When somebody opens their mouth and you hear that indefinable truth, well, that’s the shit right there.

In the extreme, Will Young singing “Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone” is like me singing “I’m black and I’m proud”. Obviously, severe market forces were at work on that one, but equally ironic is Diana Ross singing the greatest ‘coming out’ song ever (ermm…’I’m Coming Out’). So for the same reasons I don’t believe Amy ever went back to black. Amazing voice, great story but a whole load of showing off and tragedy does not a Nina Simone make. Ditto the ‘other lot’, apart from Beth Ditto. Uncut heroine.

Sure enough, everybody’s got make a living and go for theirs, but let’s hold off on handing out the Award for Eternal Greatness when it’s just a fancy lick of Dulux to the career.