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CD Review – The Ripps, Long Live The Ripps

by Stuart Heritage

If you can draw comparisons between today’s British music scene and Britpop, then Kasabian want to be Oasis, The Kooks want to be Cast and James Morrison… actually, no singer in history has ever been as bad as James Morrison ever.

Anyway, our point is this – there doesn’t seem to be a new Supergrass. OK, our mistake – there didn’t seem to be a new Supergrass; now we’ve heard Long Live The Ripps by feted young Coventry band The Ripps, that vacancy seems to be closed. Fans of loud, perky, partially-Spanish power-pop – and the occasional duff cover version – are advised to read on.

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Watch The Grace Wonderful Video

by Stuart Heritage

File this one under Bands You Kind Of Like Now But Are Prepared To Be Pretty Sick Of By Christmas. We get the creeping suspicion that Grace are going to be pretty enormous this year, so now’s the time to get in quick and quite like them before everyone else does.

It’s chilling to think that a song like Wonderful can only be Grace’s second single; the level of production – and quality of video – that has gone into Wonderful suggests that someone is putting a lot of money behind Grace, and the band are starting to get noticed where it matters. Barefoot Terrahawk puppet Jo Wiley and indie cyborg Zane Lowe have already been playing Grace songs, and the band’s last single made it into The Times’ Songs Of 2006 list. Having said all that, though, Wonderful by Grace does sound a little bit like it was put together by a committee – “Like Radiohead, yeah? Only happier. Can we make them sound a bit more like Keane? But thin. Imaging the potential of a thin Keane” – but maybe when Grace’s album comes out they’ll sound a little bit more like themselves.

Watch the Grace Wonderful video now

File this one under Bands You Kind Of Like Now But Are Prepared To Be Pretty Sick Of By Christmas. We get the creeping suspicion that Grace are going to be pretty enormous this year, so now's the time to get in quick and quite like them before everyone else does. It's chilling to think that a song like Wonderful can only be Grace's second single; the level of production - and quality of video - that has gone into Wonderful suggests that someone is putting a lot of money behind Grace, and the band are starting to get noticed where it matters. Barefoot Terrahawk puppet Jo Wiley and indie cyborg Zane Lowe have already been playing Grace songs, and the band's last single made it into The Times' Songs Of 2006 list. Having said all that, though, Wonderful by Grace does sound a little bit like it was put together by a committee - "Like Radiohead, yeah? Only happier. Can we make them sound a bit more like Keane? But thin. Imaging the potential of a thin Keane" - but maybe when Grace's album comes out they'll sound a little bit more like themselves. Watch the Grace Wonderful video now
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Watch The K-Os Sunday Morning Video

by Stuart Heritage

K-Os, then. Rapper. Seller of over eight bazillion records in Canada. Conscientious. Producer of an album that we quite like. Categorically not Bryan Adams, Alanis Morrisette or Nickelback. But what the jiggery flip does he sound like?

Although we gave K-Os’ album Atlantis: Hymns For Disco a pretty complementary write-up on Friday, chances are you haven’t heard any of it yet – unless you’re one of those tutting Canadian types, obviously. But now you can, because we’ve got the video to K-Os’ Sunday Morning single for you. Imagine Mos Def performing Hey Ya and you’re probably getting close to what Sunday Morning sounds like. Sunday Morning by K-Os is catchy, soulful, relaxed, melodic and relentlessly positive in its outlook, even though it does contain the line “Every day is Saturday night,” which leads us to believe that’s the reason why K-Os can never hold down a proper job.

Watch The K-Os Sunday Morning video now

K-Os, then. Rapper. Seller of over eight bazillion records in Canada. Conscientious. Producer of an album that we quite like. Categorically not Bryan Adams, Alanis Morrisette or Nickelback. But what the jiggery flip does he sound like? Although we gave K-Os' album Atlantis: Hymns For Disco a pretty complementary write-up on Friday, chances are you haven't heard any of it yet - unless you're one of those tutting Canadian types, obviously. But now you can, because we've got the video to K-Os' Sunday Morning single for you. Imagine Mos Def performing Hey Ya and you're probably getting close to what Sunday Morning sounds like. Sunday Morning by K-Os is catchy, soulful, relaxed, melodic and relentlessly positive in its outlook, even though it does contain the line "Every day is Saturday night," which leads us to believe that's the reason why K-Os can never hold down a proper job. Watch The K-Os Sunday Morning video now
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Watch The Buckcherry Next 2 You Video

by Stuart Heritage

There comes a time in everyone’s life when only big stupid tattooed dumb knuckle-dragging rawk will do – let’s hope this is one of those times, because that description fits Buckcherry exactly and you’re about to watch one of their videos.

Buckcherry’s new single Next 2 You comes from their newest album 15. It’s an album that’s sold over 800,000 copies in America and got Buckcherry nominated for a Grammy. If all of 15 sounds like Next 2 You, then to these ears it’ll sound a whole lot like Jet. Whether that’s a good thing or not is down to you. For the video to Next 2 You, Buckcherry staged a fan competition to come up with the best user-generated treatment and, somewhat unsurprisingly, the finished result includes girls leaping around in bras fairly heavily. The great big dirty tattooed buggers.

Watch The Buckcherry Next 2 You video now

There comes a time in everyone's life when only big stupid tattooed dumb knuckle-dragging rawk will do - let's hope this is one of those times, because that description fits Buckcherry exactly and you're about to watch one of their videos. Buckcherry's new single Next 2 You comes from their newest album 15. It's an album that's sold over 800,000 copies in America and got Buckcherry nominated for a Grammy. If all of 15 sounds like Next 2 You, then to these ears it'll sound a whole lot like Jet. Whether that's a good thing or not is down to you. For the video to Next 2 You, Buckcherry staged a fan competition to come up with the best user-generated treatment and, somewhat unsurprisingly, the finished result includes girls leaping around in bras fairly heavily. The great big dirty tattooed buggers. Watch The Buckcherry Next 2 You video now
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Hecklergigs – Mika @ Northumbria Uni – 24/2

by Matthew Laidlow

Until yesterday, there had only been two acts to have been number one this year in the popular music charts. For most of January, we had to listen to the gawky-looking lass from X Factor. Maybe it’s our judgement, but she seems to have faded into the hole she crept out of.

Knocking her from number one is the guy who we would compare to Marmite – Mika. You either love him or hate him so much you want to start some kind of violent fight. Before approaching the gig, we did wonder what it would be like. After listening to the album a good few times, we came to the conclusion that it was at times sickly sweet but also full of Mika’s personal feelings. Hecklerspray approached with caution.

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CD Review – K-Os: Atlantis: Hymns For Disco

by Stuart Heritage

Canadian music is enough to strike fear into the hearts of most right-thinking people – yes Alanis, Celine, Bryan and Nickelback, we’re referring explicitly to you hear – so imagine the night-terrors and panic attack that come with the prospect of listening to a Canadian hip-hop album.

And not just any Canadian hip-hop album, either – a Canadian hip-hop album made by the son of some Jehovah’s Witnesses who can’t seem to find one style of song that suits him. Against the odds, though, that album is Atlantic: Hymns For Disco by K-Os and we’ll be jiggered if the bastard didn’t win us over.

More…

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Hecklergigs – Bloc Party @ Newcastle Carling Academy 22/2

by Matthew Laidlow

Hecklerspray loves a good gig. In fact we’ve been to so many musical shenanigans that we can’t physically remember half the ones we’ve been to. Nearly every week, our inbox is rammed to capacity with the cool and not so cool bands begging us to come see them rock out on stage.

Of course we oblige to these requests and get given star-studded VVIP treatment. That’s Very Very Important Person. VIP is not good enough for us. Bus despite being treated like royalty, sometimes we like to get back to our dark and dingy indie roots and share the experience with all the other sweaty kids. We don’t like to stay in our royal box all the time. And what better occasion to do this with one of the UK’s most loved bands at the moment, Bloc Party?

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CD Review – Television Personalities, Are We Nearly There Yet?

by Stuart Heritage

Seven weeks into 2007 is far too early to start making grandiose statements about the best albums of the year, so that’s exactly not what we’re going to do. But it’s plenty early enough to make grandiose statements about the most gut-wrenchingly heartbreaking album of the album of the year, because this is it.

Are We Nearly There Yet? is the tenth album by Television Personalities – the ever-changing group of musicians hiding behind indie veteran Dan Treacy. And where previous Television Personalities albums were full of sparkling verve and razor-sharp wit, Are We Nearly There Yet? – a collection of songs apparently culled from sessions just after Treacy was released from prison in 2005 – contains none of that whatsoever. Depressing? That’d be an understatement, but not for the reasons you think.

Seven weeks into 2007 is far too early to start making grandiose statements about the best albums of the year, so that's exactly not what we're going to do. But it's plenty early enough to make grandiose statements about the most gut-wrenchingly heartbreaking album of the album of the year, because this is it. Are We Nearly There Yet? is the tenth album by Television Personalities - the ever-changing group of musicians hiding behind indie veteran Dan Treacy. And where previous Television Personalities albums were full of sparkling verve and razor-sharp wit, Are We Nearly There Yet? - a collection of songs apparently culled from sessions just after Treacy was released from prison in 2005 - contains none of that whatsoever. Depressing? That'd be an understatement, but not for the reasons you think.
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Hecklergigs – Duke Special @ The Cluny, Newcastle – Feb 7

by Matthew Laidlow

After giving praise to Duke Special for months on end via picking him out for our MySpace Trawl feature and giving him one of our albums of the year awards for his debut Songs From The Deep Forest, we decided that we had to check him out on the live circuit.

And indeed we did. Once again after getting through the streets of Byker (No it’s not where Byker Grove is made, it’s actually made somewhere much rougher) through getting bad advice from people in the corner shop, old people and gormless students, we finally arrived at The Cluny to check out the mighty Duke Special perform to a sold out audience.

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CD Review – Drone, colourformoney

by Stuart Heritage

In some ungodly cock-up, the UK seems to be the last country on Earth to have the new Cornelius album released on its shores. While we’re forced to wait one more poxy month for that, is there anything vaguely similar to fill the time?

Well, colourformoney by Drone seems to have been doing the trick for us. Released on Monday, colourformoney by Drone is just about as much folksy lo-fi skittering laptop braindance as you can fit on a CD. Containing tracks that shawshank into your brain and just drift around for hours, pushing everything else to one side, we’re sure that we’d be listening to colourformoney by Drone a lot more if only some of it didn’t plain unsettle us so much.

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