I've heard bits by the Zutons but White Lies are new to me. I find the best thing to do is just sample whatever the latest hip cool band is by watching/listening to them on Youtube. There seems to be a new " Best band ever" out every other day.

Part of the problem is instant access- there is no sense of mystery left in music. Before people had to wait and that created a sense of anticipation. Now anyone can spend the whole day watching stuff on Youtube and getting through dozens of new bands and very soon you forget most of them. I'm not necessarily knocking new technology- the genie is out of the bottle in terms of how we can access music but technology has just made modern life "infoheavy". We are bombarded all day with largely useless information (Boomtown Rats forum excepted of course!)

I've just gotten the new Midlake album The Courage of Others which Mojo claims is the album of the month when it was released. Or at least one writer in Mojo claims this- do they sit around taking a poll of all the staff or is it just the editor and his mates that decide?

There's a band called The Drums which seem quite good- there must be a factory somewhere making all these bands for the NME to champion!

noelindublin · Loudmouth

quick recommendations

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

If you are looking for something that sounds like The Boomtown Rats anything by Razorlight for a start.

Down By The Jetty - Dr. Feelgood to hear what The Rats started off like.

Also more obscurely The Flys - Own (circa 1979) http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flys-Own/dp/B00005TZEO/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1288669880&sr=8-7

An example

-- Edited by ArrGee on Tuesday 2nd of November 2010 04:08:17 AM

-- Edited by ArrGee on Tuesday 2nd of November 2010 04:13:31 AM

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

Another example

-- Edited by ArrGee on Tuesday 2nd of November 2010 04:10:05 AM

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Both those tracks by the Flys are good, typically late seventies " ones that got away". Does anyone remember the Vapours track called News At Ten - its really good and with brilliant lyrics- they used to play it on Radio Luxembourg which always reached Ireland if the wind was blowing in the right direction! The rhythm of night lift in Great Britain as the old Luxy jingle used to go. And Bob Stewart was really a Scouser!

I really like those obscure sixties psychedelic compilation albums and bands like XTC and Clinic have deepened my knowledge and appreciation of psychedelia so Razorlight would probably seem dull by comparison.

Someone has given me a copy of Animal Collectives Strawberry Jam cd so that's something to look forward to- music in a way is mind expansion.

-- Edited by noelindublin on Tuesday 2nd of November 2010 01:29:40 PM

Laibach · Someone's Looking At You

I got the new Razorlight album Slipway Fires a few weeks ago as I kept reading they sound like the Rats but to be honest I found it pretty forgettable. If you like XTC Noel and you haven't heard it give the Dogs Die In Hot Cars album Please Describe Yourself a listen, they claim not to have been influenced by XTC but they sound very alike and its a brilliant album.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Laibach wrote:

I got the new Razorlight album Slipway Fires a few weeks ago as I kept reading they sound like the Rats but to be honest I found it pretty forgettable. If you like XTC Noel and you haven't heard it give the Dogs Die In Hot Cars album Please Describe Yourself a listen, they claim not to have been influenced by XTC but they sound very alike and its a brilliant album.

I've heard limited amounts of Razorlight and they haven't really impressed much. Why bother when you can have the real thing and listen to the best band ever!

XTC are my second favourite band after the Rats and I have all their albums including their Dukes of Stratosphere alter ego psychedelic escapades.

The Futureheads sound a bit like XTC but its probably unconscious plagarism ,your honour rather than, ahem, stealing.

I have heard of Dogs Die in Hot Cars and should be able to get a cd from a friend of their efforts. Its nice to see an influence without feeling it's a blatant rip off of the sound in the way that the Boomtown Rats were influenced by Doctor Feelgood.

To me the Rats were a once off and I don't go looking for bands that sound like them necessarily.

Its occurred to me on more than one occasion that nobody has ever purchased an album they didn't want to like- however much we may be disappointed if we waste our money on some hot newly tipped band.

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

noelindublin wrote:

Laibach wrote:

I got the new Razorlight album Slipway Fires a few weeks ago as I kept reading they sound like the Rats but to be honest I found it pretty forgettable. If you like XTC Noel and you haven't heard it give the Dogs Die In Hot Cars album Please Describe Yourself a listen, they claim not to have been influenced by XTC but they sound very alike and its a brilliant album.

To me the Rats were a once off and I don't go looking for bands that sound like them necessarily.

The first two Razorlight albums are better, Up All Night especially

If you want a more current album, try Suburbs by Arcade Fire. Doesn't sound like the Rats, but is up that sort of street.

Jules · The biggest Geldof fan in the world, bar none!

Are you looking for sound alike or what might appeal?

As ArrGee says try earlier Razorlight for sound alike. i didn't go for them at first, but really got used to them and love them now.

How about the Artic Monkeys, Muse or the Killers? They appeal to me, anyway smile

noelindublin · Loudmouth

ArrGee- I got the first two Arcade Fire albums when they came out and they are both very good the first moreso. If anybody mentions Razorlight again....I do think I can be a bit quick to judge music so maybe I'M doing them an injustice but there is just so much music about these days. That Animal Collective album is rubbish particularly the lyrics- just what is the matter these days with embarrassing awful lyrics that never make sense.

The killers and that line "are we human or are we dancer"- jesus h christ wept.

I find Muse very bombastic like U2, just over the top singing and emotional overkill.

These are a few of my favourite bands- Echo and the Bunnymen, The Band of Holy Joy , Captain Beefheat, Magazine, The Go Betweens, Scott Walker (Scotts 1-4 solo albums and later stuff) The Only Ones , The Fall and loads of indie bands too numerous to mention. I forgot to mention Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine who are just brilliant and could teach today's plodders a lot about tunes and lyrics.

Generally I like Pete Doherty/ Babyshambles and Dirthy Pretty Things.

Theres a line in one of Scott Walkers songs "Go seek the lady/who will give / not take away" which amounts to not wasting time on music you don't care about.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Jules wrote:

Are you looking for sound alike or what might appeal?

As ArrGee says try earlier Razorlight for sound alike. i didn't go for them at first, but really got used to them and love them now.

How about the Artic Monkeys, Muse or the Killers? They appeal to me, anyway

These are the sort of bands the NME likes so I have loads of Cds from the early naughties with these bands you mention on but the all seem a bit samey. I'm not saying they are bad or rubbish. O yeah I just remembered Hard Fi are pretty good as well as the Kaiser Chiefs.

One of the best albums I've heard is Joanna Newsom's first album in 2004 The Milk Eyed Mender- I never though just a voice and a harp could have so much impact so that's worth checking out or just watching on Youtube to sample for free!

Jules · The biggest Geldof fan in the world, bar none!

Have you listened to the Zutons or White Lies? Try Zoo seven, if you go to their website you can download for free.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Jules wrote:

Have you listened to the Zutons or White Lies? Try Zoo seven, if you go to their website you can download for free.

I've heard bits by the Zutons but White Lies are new to me. I find the best thing to do is just sample whatever the latest hip cool band is by watching/listening to them on Youtube. There seems to be a new " Best band ever" out every other day.

Part of the problem is instant access- there is no sense of mystery left in music. Before people had to wait and that created a sense of anticipation. Now anyone can spend the whole day watching stuff on Youtube and getting through dozens of new bands and very soon you forget most of them. I'm not necessarily knocking new technology- the genie is out of the bottle in terms of how we can access music but technology has just made modern life "infoheavy". We are bombarded all day with largely useless information (Boomtown Rats forum excepted of course!)

I've just gotten the new Midlake album The Courage of Others which Mojo claims is the album of the month when it was released. Or at least one writer in Mojo claims this- do they sit around taking a poll of all the staff or is it just the editor and his mates that decide?

There's a band called The Drums which seem quite good- there must be a factory somewhere making all these bands for the NME to champion!

-- Edited by noelindublin on Thursday 4th of November 2010 02:20:29 PM

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

noelindublin wrote:
These are a few of my favourite bands- Echo and the Bunnymen, The Band of Holy Joy , Captain Beefheat, Magazine, The Go Betweens, Scott Walker (Scotts 1-4 solo albums and later stuff) The Only Ones , The Fall and loads of indie bands too numerous to mention. I forgot to mention Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine who are just brilliant and could teach today's plodders a lot about tunes and lyrics.

If you like Scott Walker, listen to Last Shadow Puppets and Pulp's We Love Life. Right now I am listening to the Velvet Underground a lot.

"today's plodders a lot about tunes and lyrics" - There are some decent bands out there. Try Vampire Weekend for something a little more innovative

noelindublin · Loudmouth

ArrGee wrote:

noelindublin wrote:
These are a few of my favourite bands- Echo and the Bunnymen, The Band of Holy Joy , Captain Beefheat, Magazine, The Go Betweens, Scott Walker (Scotts 1-4 solo albums and later stuff) The Only Ones , The Fall and loads of indie bands too numerous to mention. I forgot to mention Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine who are just brilliant and could teach today's plodders a lot about tunes and lyrics.
If you like Scott Walker, listen to Last Shadow Puppets and Pulp's We Love Life. Right now I am listening to the Velvet Underground a lot.

"today's plodders a lot about tunes and lyrics" - There are some decent bands out there. Try Vampire Weekend for something a little more innovative

I've heard the LSP album - musically its good, sounding very sixtyish akin to the Walker Brothers but I just found the subject matter of the songs too limiting for me. Its fine if you're a twenty two year old kid obsessed with love - all the songs seem to deal with love breaking down and how life will be awful if that happens.

I've heard the first Vampire Weekend album -what struck me was the awful lyrics- these people are supposed to be college educated Wasps- the lyrics are perhaps one of the worst in recent memory- seems to have escaped the music critics. At a certain point I asked myself - why should I listen to this gibberish. Maybe they have improved lyrically on the second album but I doubt it.

Don't worry- Pulp are miles ahead musically and lyrically- I've been listening to Deep Fried In Kelvin about the old guy who grows an indoor garden on the tenth floor of the Kelvin flats in Sheffield. Its grim up North when you googleimage the Kelvin flats .

Love JC's line- "Are you talking to me/ or are you chewing a brick!" in that song.

There's a very good band a bit like Pulp maybe called Golden Silvers- two songs of theirs to impress are Magic Touch and Arrows Of Eros. Both these songs are instantly likable and the singer has a Jarvis like laconic delivery. I think they're from somewhere called north London. BTW Pulp are to reform for some gigs next summer. I saw them in Dublin before they became big around 1994 when they were doing songs like Stacks and Razzmatazz.

-- Edited by noelindublin on Monday 8th of November 2010 02:06:34 PM

-- Edited by noelindublin on Monday 8th of November 2010 04:03:04 PM

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

noelindublin wrote:
There's a very good band a bit like Pulp maybe called Golden Silvers- two songs of theirs to impress are Magic Touch and Arrows Of Eros. Both these songs are instantly likable and the singer has a Jarvis like laconic delivery. I think they're from somewhere called north London. BTW Pulp are to reform for some gigs next summer. I saw them in Dublin before they became big around 1994 when they were doing songs like Stacks and Razzmatazz.

Golden Silvers - what's not to like? From norf London to boot, no wonder they are good!

Very interesting the Pulp re-union. First time I saw them was at Highbury Garage back in 1993, so similar sort of time. Thing is I avoided their bigger gigs so not sure I'll be keen on seeing them in Hyde Park. I will see.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/08/pulp-re-form-live-dates

http://pulppeople.com/

noelindublin · Loudmouth

I saw The Wonderstuff a few years ago in Dublin on a comeback tour and was amazed at how good they were - not just going through the motions for the money- seems they had a lot to prove so that gig worked surprisingly well.

I also saw the Inspiral Carpets which was ok but a little sad as nobody was really dancing, just bobbing around. Maybe music is really only meant for young people. I'd still, in my dreams, like to see the real Boomtown Rats reform and I think they could get the crowd going. Philosophical question- would Geldof reform the Rats if it could solve the problem of hunger in the Third World- just for five or six gigs!

I like Jarvis' general style so I think Pulp would do well- I'm pretty sure they would do more than one British gig at Hyde Park. I reckon a proper British and Irish tour would be on the cards as well as dates abroad. Wonder how Pulp did go down in the US - do the folks in Montana and Wyoming "get them"?