Night Gallery was the follow-up show to the Twilight Zone and featured Rod Serling in an art gallery unveiling paintings that depicted the story ahead. I only know about it because it is parodied in a Halloween episode of The Simpsons. I don’t think it was as popular in the UK; over here we are all about Michael Aspel. Read more »
Vice Singles Club, 7 September 2009
When you’re a kid it’s pretty standard for a gang to demand a picture of a naked woman to get into their club. If you have an older sister, odds are it’ll be one of her. It’s pretty similar for the Vice Singles Club, only we want naked pictures of anyone with a single out this week. So, for example, if you applied today, we’d be demanding a Bananarama lesbo sandpit adventure snap and a picture of Mika’s cock in a burger bun. Read more »
Vice Singles Club, 4 August, 2009
LOVVERS
OCD Go Go Girls
Wichita
I desperately wanted to hate this – everything about this band has always screamed “AVOID” at me in huge elephant letters. However, they bypass the wanky sub-No Age teen thrills of their peers and go straight for a Real Kids/Television/Flamin’ Groovies dirty power-pop jugular. Seems almost entirely engineered for sad, middle-aged record collector scum like me, so clearly they’re never actually going to get any bigger.
9
LEICESTER BANGS Read more »
Vice Singles Club, 21 July, 2009
SIMPLE MINDS
Stars Will Lead The Way
Universal
There’s something quite likeable about Simple Minds – the fact that they are not U2. Yes, it’s true their head-held-high, arms-aloft Messiah rock is just as overblown, e-bowed, and reverbed, their lyrics just as cod-meaningful and their performances as excruciatingly serious and lifeless. But thankfully all the global-brand, meet-the-Pope, save-the-world bullshit has alluded them and they just remain, well, a bit silly. I find all this very comforting and I’d like to buy Jim Kerr a pint to commiserate.
6
SADDAM CLAYTON Read more »
The Rollercoaster Project is one worth joining
The Rollercoaster Project is one of those musicians whose music makes bloggers want to spew out crap like this: Exploding starlight bounces round the womb shimmering on the unborn Martian eyelids and setting the first glimmers of thought buzzing through the synapses, flowing finally into the sea of comprehension. But the Rollercoaster Project’s electronic drone is a lot better than any grotesque over-writing could ever suggest. Click through to hear the remarkable “Hoods Up”. Read more »
1234… It’s summer party time
On Sunday 26 July, the 1234 Festival returns to Shoreditch Park. Last year was such a mental teenage sex, jelly, and fireworks bonanza that this time “the man” has made them put a fence up around the park, which has limited the capacity to just 6,000 tickets. But then that adds a sense of exclusivity to the whole event, much like heaven (if you’re a Jehovah’s Witness). So go get a ticket now by clicking here! Go on!! Click!!! Click it!!!! If you need more convincing, look below for the line-up. Read more »
Vice Singles Club, 6th July 2009
HONOR BLACKMAN
The Star Who Fell From Grace
Music Infinity
This is more like it. Dame Blackman sing-talks her way through a litany of heart-wrenching pathos and regret that even Marc Almond would be ashamed to keep a straight face throughout. Probably the campest single since Elaine Page and Barbara Dickson power-moaned their way to the top of the charts, and at two minutes and nine seconds, sounds suspiciously truncated. Perhaps the intended finale was so overwrought that all involved dissolved in a pool of tears.
10
TONY MOLESTER Read more »
Vice Singles Club, 29 June 09
THE VIRGINS
“Hey Hey Girl”
Warner
The charming thing about the Virgins, or at least the song “Rich Girls” was they were a shitty guitar band trying to play R & B but failing in a dumb and glorious fashion. Then they re-recorded that song with some big shot producer who actually made them sound professional and ruined their schtick, which made them pretty rubbish. This is another song by them, which may have been good at some point, but now definitely isn’t. Basically if they hire me as their manager / guru I will make them shitty and glorious once more.
5
WALDO JEFFERS Read more »
Frankmusik trails bullshit around the nation
So ten days ago, majorly-hyped pop contender Frankmusik was dropped in a field in Scotland, with only twenty quid and his Blackberry. He was then asked to make it back to London while playing a succession of gigs that constitute his tour. More accurately, of course, Frankmusik’s been dropped in a field with twenty quid, his Blackberry © ® (TM) and a major cross-platform marketing campaign, driven by virals and street teams, including mailouts to all major news sources, a pair of Channel 4 cameramen updating his Myspace with clips of his continuing adventures on a daily basis, and GPS tracking his every move and uploading it to a map on his personal website while potted-summaries of his days are blogged by some or other backroom boyo on his official website. Read more »
20 Jazz Funk Greats - come and dance
If you haven’t experienced the maximalist, John Carpenter freestyle magik of Chicago’s Gatekeeper yet then you really need to acquaint yourselves now. Designed to make you want to trance-dance naked inside opulent giallo cathedrals as the sky darkens outside and demonic shadows conjure in the clouds, Gatekeeper’s music plays like a fever-dream of half-remembered horror movies from the 1980s. It’s all smudged lipstick, faceless men in trench coats that conceal horrific secrets, and sacrificial voodoo halls painted in blood hidden away in a vast and ominous metropolis overseen by men with black eyes and sharp suits.
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