[I really should delete this post, but I think I deserve it to be left up as a salutory lesson about the perils of drunken posting. What a shambles. Feel free to read the utter nonsense below and then point and laugh. I hang my drunken head in shame. WordPress really should come with a fucking breathalyzer.]
Fuck me people, pull yourselves together. This is not a Radiohead, nor a Snow Patrol, nor a Travis fanboy site (Oxford comma there – everyone get that? Cunts). This is a place for people to bring new things and to get really fucking excited about folk having a go, showing some spunk and trying to make the most of a merciless, shitty industry.
As such, when I post about four groups in a single day who are good, young, up-and-coming and showing some enterprise and spirit I am fucking dismayed to come home and find not a single comment and no love at all for these lads. Why are we here, folks, eh? Why, really? Any of us can log onto the nearest bloody Pitchfork, Q Magazine, whatever sort of site and download trendy stuff, even ‘alternative’ trendy stuff. That is not what Song, by Toad is for.
In an industry full of commercial cunts, I make no money at all. I am here to give the small bands, who no-one has heard of and no-one cares about, some praise and some recognition and I should fucking well hope that is what you are here for too. Money and support are parcelled out awfully stingily in this industry and places like this, where small numbers of enthusiasts gather, are oases of love and generosity.
So the next time I write about four small, unheralded but nonetheless superb bands like I have done today I fucking well expect some response. It’s easy to remark on the merits or otherwise of the Arcade Fire. But you can read about them on Drowned in Sound, surely? Here is where you come for something a little different, and I love the fact that I get a ton of hits, but when bands come here and see that I have written about them and no-one gives a shit, then I am fucking well ashamed. If I’m writing about The Mountain Goats then by all means stay silent, but when I’m writing about young bands just on the verge of gaining a little bit of recognition it’s really important that you show them a bit of love.
I know there’s enough of you out there, and I don’t mean to resort to blackmail, but really, when you are needed around here is when the bands are yet to hit the NME.
I write about big bands, like Feist and British Sea Power because they interest me and I guess they probably interest you as well. But I write about small bands, like every band I have written about today, because these little enterprises are what I love: people with a bit of belief and a bit of conviction pitting their passion against the markets (ie: fighting a terminally losing battle) in the hope that some folk will latch onto their stuff. This is supposed to be one of those places – or, at least, it will always be one for me – where the little people get the praise that the quality of their output merits.
So even if you don’t like what I’ve posted it is way, way more important to me that you have your say when I write about bedroom bands than when I write about Vampire Weekend. Honestly, the point of blogs is side-stepping the massive, tedious, PR-fuelled music industry. We are here for the little people so, if you do nothing else ever again, go and find an unsigned band on this site and let everyone know what you think of them. Even criticism is good, as long as it is largely constructive. Just let these lads know you appreciate their efforts. The New Pornographers don’t need it, but wee Edinburgh folk-tronica groups do.
I can’t for the life of me think of a group that will want to be associated with this sort of infantile temper tantrum, so I apologise in advance to Honeytrap.
These fellas are currently assembling one of my most anticipated albums of 2008. Label-mates of the superlative Coventry group The Sequins, Honeytrap are also signed to Tough Love Records and have produced some of the best songs I have ever heard. Death Before the Silver Screen has never been bettered by anyone. Anywhere. Ever. So there you go. Sorry to Honeytrap for roping them into this little rant, but really folks, turn off Black Mountain’s prog-revival shit-fest and clamp your ears around one of the most promising groups the British Isles has produced for fucking years. They have an album approaching this year and if I’m the only one here who splashes out for it then I’ll have a right fucking tantrum. Yes, even crapper than this one.
And if you wish I was posting about someone more famous then fuck you. Fuck you hard and unlubricated with a fucking sea urchin. (And, erm, cheers to Simon for making himself known. Ta mate, much appreciated, honestly).
Honeytrap – Death Before the Silver Screen
Honeytrap – I Don’t Know How it Begins
Honeytrap – Spotlight
Go and buy Honeytrap and Sequins stuff from Tough Love Records. And forsake your subscription to Q forever.
It’s been a very, very long time since we had a nice simple podcast of me just chattering about music without extraneous distractions of various drunken people babbling to one another over the top of it.
