Some things in life just make our day.

A puppy dog’s smile, solid chocolate Kit Kats, not having to get a round in at the pub, bacon sandwiches for lunch, not having to do any work, realising it’s quitting time after thinking it was only two o’clock, Firefox not crashing and finally, getting sent free stuff. Go on PR companies, you know you love us.

Whenever bucketloads of music comes hurtling towards us, the majority of it can be summed up in a few words. ‘Radiohead wannabes’ and ‘bum toss’ are terms most frequently used. But when bands like The Lovely Sparrows come along, we can’t just simply say ‘they make lovely sounding songs’. Partly because the word lovely is a bit vague, and even we’re not that lazy to recycle the band’s own name in to a review.

Birds as a general rule can’t play any instruments. So we apologise in advance if you thought this trawl was going to present a band made up of birds performing happy hardcore. The only musical bird we know of is Big Bird off the TV. But then, someone told us he wasn’t real when we were writing this. So now we have to put up with the annoying wood pigeons that squeal like ruddy pigs before any daylight breaks through the table cloth we use as curtains. We’re poor, you see.

Having the word ‘lovely’ in your band name seems to be a winning combination for us. Last year we looked at The Lovely Eggs who were quite wonderful in their own unique and quirky way. The Lovely Sparrows are keeping up this biannual tradition by making music that won’t have Radio 1 DJs ejaculating all over it, but should still have people getting moist in excitement.

Armed with a guitar and the humble voice, The Lovely Sparrows trudges through a selection of releases from over the years. Year Of The Dog is the stand out track for us with its sad undertones and glistening echoes of hope. Interestingly, we read that this is the only song that survived a recording session after a laptop was stolen featuring all of the demo’s for a new release. Please note, we didn’t steal that from Wikipedia, so it’s quite likely to be true.

Admittedly, this week’s band was discovered after listening to someone else on YouTube and then seeing this video pop up as a recommended choice. We always thought robots and machines were evil devices, simply designed to enslave the human race, well that’s before they run out battery power. However, if more utterly ace bands like this can be found, we may consider renaming this feature to ‘YouTube Recommendation Trawl’.

But probably not, we’ll need to wait for MySpace to implode first.

For more:

Lovely Sparrows MySpace

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We seem to have neglected the wonderful world of glitch recently. To a lot of people, it sounds like a needle has been dragged across a record and the results recorded. We like the sound of something that sounds a bit raw, uncommercial and generally exciting. Fuck your cleanly polished studio sounding production where the vocal goes through seventy two filters to make it sound as clean as a whistle.

Going through various stages, there is everything here from Nedry. Sassy sounding vocals go alongside the sweeping sounding electronics that slowly build momentum before crashing in to one final rhythm.

It’s rather good you know and we can’t wait for their debut album to be released in the impending weeks. The release should make you smile that little bit extra. Dubstep, electronic, glitch and Portishead style vocals are all here.

For more:

www.myspace.com/nedrymakesmusic

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Christ almighty, summer has been a bit rubbish hasn’t it?

We’d gathered up all our pennies from the winter months to throw at the ice-cream man, but we can’t because Mr Sunshine has decided to stick two fingers up at us and bugger off. It means we can’t don our Speedos and make ourselves toasty brown. Or lobster red depending on your preference.

At this time of year, there is always a song that’s drilled into our heads and dubbed the ’summer’s anthem’. Usually featuring a girl with boobs the size of beach balls, it’s always rubbish. We want to hear something that’s fun, full of spirit and jolly. Without further ado, we present The Candle Thieves to you.

As we know, the rising temperatures should be making us all flock to the beach and overdose on burnt BBQ food. Lovely ladies should also appear from literally nowhere and then return to their hole in the ground when the sun goes away. Fat blokes with hairy manboobs should also be whipping off their shirts and jiggling their stuff around when playing football.

Whilst people are indulging in all of these activities, they need some sort of song to accompany it. But radio and TV pump just out the same old-sounding dance record that oddly resembles every other song that is played throughout the day.

We want some kind of diversity, something that sounds original but could feasibly be popular too. The Candle Thieves make a delicious blend of music that’s quirky without being up its arse and contains silly amounts of fun. Now we don’t know if the songs on their MySpace have been deliberately titled for the summer season, but we don’t care.

The Sunshine Song is what everyone should hear in the morning. It’s utterly charmless and features nuggets of good feelings. Rainbows, flowers, sunshine, smiles and flattering remarks about people are all on this song. We think there is a screeching trumpet in there, but our knowledge of wind instruments is a bit rubbish. But plenty of clapalongs and tremendously well worked piano is crafted alongside gentle strums of the guitar. All you need for an ace song really.

The Candle Thieves use instruments that your everyday megabucks musician wouldn’t be associated with. Simply knowing that they use toy instruments such as the piano indicates to us that they are all about having fun. Scott McEwan and the mythical Glockenshiels make up the band who simply want to make uncomplicated songs without any ego or drama attached.

Only two songs are on their MySpace player. The second is called Sharks and Bears. You may not think it’s not a very summer-related title – however people go camping in the woods where bears live and occasionally get mauled. Sharks always come and say hello when the oceans warm up, though sharks do tend to take a quick bite out of people. Not good – unless you’re the shark.

The band are heading out to gig soon, but it’s not your average sort of tour. Known as The Garden Parties, The Candle Thieves will literally come and play in your front or back garden. We’re not sure how you get an invite but the fact that you can have a band perform right in front of you is a rare opportunity. Would Metallica do that? Of course not, well, only if you gave them a large cheque.

For more:

The Candle Thieves MySpace

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On Tuesday, the nominees will be announced for the 2009 Mercury Music Prize.

Last year, the ruddy fantastic Elbow took home the prize, beating artists such as Radiohead and Burial. But that was then, this is now! Every year, there are a few nominations that no-one will be surprised to see – we expect Lily Allen to be one of them.

But what about the people who aren’t massively marketed by their record companies? Even though they’re making music that is just as good? If we had any money to bet on a rank outsider, then we’d put it on Polly Scattergood.

The most famous Polly we knew of before discovering the music of Polly Scattergood was Polly Pocket. Strange really, when we used to play the toy when we were younger, people always gave us disapproving looks.

At the moment, there are plenty of ladies out doing their own thing in the charts. The utterly bonkers Lady Gaga combines her music with a warped fashion show. La Roux serves up accessible electro which everyone can dance to.

Like a lot of musicians who seem to pop up from nowhere, Polly Scattergood has been writing and recording since 2005. A lot of people might have given up after not making some sort of impact. But finally, after four years she has broken through with her self-titled debut album.

The album is a complete mixed bag. From the simple plucking of a guitar chord to swirling synths, there is something here for everyone. Despite being 22, it’s clear that she isn’t scared to attempt any style of song. However, while we’ve come across plenty of artists doing the same thing of mixing genres up, it’s the lyrics that make Polly Scattergood stand out.

Describing herself as a ’storyteller’ the various tracks do take us on a weird and complex journey that feature everything from reciting various memories and darker subjects such as drugs. There isn’t a stand out song with an instant catchy chorus to annoy people with on the bus, thanks to the way she approaches a song – blending spoken word and singing – but we like it.

We’d very much like to see Polly Scattergood and recently trawled Micachu get some sort of nod from the bigwigs in the music world. Both of these artists are making very different sounding music, but ending up with the same results of having a record which remains a hidden treasure. Let’s just hope the same indie guff doesn’t get a mention. Their profiles are big enough, let’s expose some fresh talent to the masses.

Polly Scattergood MySpace

Sometimes, you can a little bit attached to something and talk about it a little bit too much.

Take the humble iPod for example. It doesn’t matter if it is actually an iPod or not, everyone calls their MP3 player an iPod. Even though it’s a £50 knock off from Tesco.

The same can be said about lots of other products. Generally, most people ask for a Coke when the actually drink is called cola. What are we getting at? We’re not sure; maybe we’ve had too much Pepsi. One thing we do know through our sugar rush is that we only really hear one drum n bass band on radio and TV. Why not something else, like Cooh?

Don’t get us wrong, we’re not here to slag bands like Pendulum off, they’ll always make better music than us. But sometimes we do get a little bit bored of hearing them dominate every bit of broadcast time when there are plenty of other people out there. There isn’t just one drum n bass act in the world. Yes, we know it’s hard to believe.

Quite frankly, Cooh takes all that’s sweet and cute about music, whips it up and pretty much drills it a new arsehole. The beats are fast, brutal and might just melt your ears off. Making music from the region listed as the ‘broken Balkanz’, the drum n bass he’s producing might just do the same we to you, leaving you wailing and crying on the floor.

If you fancy a gamble on an artist who’s completely underground and undiscovered, take a listen to Cooh. We love him so much that the glowsticks are already out and we’ve painted stupid UV paint across our faces. Rave on.

For more:

Cooh MySpace

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We’re not going to lie.

Thanks to someone leaving the heating on, the UK has rocketed up in terms of temperature, leaving us hot, sticky and dressed in our underpants. As we write this, our sweat-soaked bodies are stuck to the leather office chairs and as we slept this afternoon, a lolly stick may have entered our back passage.

We just want to relax like you with some beer and as little clothing as possible. We’ll, before the judge tells us off again. Enjoy the lovely combination of electro, dance and hip-hop from Product.01. It’s all samples mind, but it’s good enough for you to get up and shake your sweaty pits around!

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Product.01 MySpace

In all of the years we’ve been hacking away through the silly amounts of artists on MySpace, we’ve done so on our own.

Well most on are done on our own, sometimes during a late night radio listen we’ll pick up on groovy records locked away in the grim dark of the night.

Amazingly, this feature isn’t the result of a PR lady throwing records at us and offering favours that we’ll get later on. You see dear reader, we want to keep things independent and physically scour for stuff that is different and you’ll hopefully enjoy. What we don’t like is people clawing through our attention and claiming to be the next big thing when, in reality, they sound like a dog poo that’s been stepped on.

At one point, MySpace used to be all about adding friends and keeping in contact with each other. With a few licks of HTML, you could even customise your page to make it all flashy and weird. But now, the friend factor has disappeared over to Facebook and we are left with a sticky goo that once was the dominant force of social networking.

Now we don’t get people wanting to be our friend when we log in. Gone are the days when Gary the speccy four-eyed nerd wanted to remind you that his greatest achievement was to attain three stars at McDonalds. All the friend requests we get now are from bands.

But they do send messages. However, they don’t do much to make us want to bother clicking on their profile. Instead of a nice friendly welcome and a hug, we get comments like “Saw you like this band. I do similar stuff. Maybe you’ll like me?” Perhaps we will, but mostly we won’t.

Below are a couple of examples that people send us and think we’ll respond to. We won’t, and if it was possible, we’d use the following written words as toilet paper. Now that would be handy wouldn’t it?

“Hello there, I am the new piano playing singer/songwriter from SE London. As you enjoy the music of _________, you might buzz off mine too.”

“Hi you may like what I’m doing. I write, music, videocreate. Add me if you like.”

“Hi ******** here, wishing you a well of happiness. If you like acoustic music and Coldplay then you’ll like me. . I have new EP on the way and soon I’ll be touring soon if you want to check out my stuff.”

Don’t fret its business as usual next week. Expect the typical sort of music which is quite wonderful, but probably won’t be heard on a grand scale.

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Certain bands have different means of thinking when it comes to making music.

Your friendly neighbourhood death metal will want you to rock out when they’re not baking cookies. And of course, we can stereotype all day long when we assume all reggae fans will listen to their Bob Marley 12”’s while dreadlocking up their arm and smoking funny-smelling cigarettes.

What is certainly different about Japanese Pop Songs is their approach to how they write and record music. A lot of bands can sometimes take up to two/three years to complete a song from when a lyric is penned, to the final mastering process. Japanese Pop Songs do everything in twenty minutes.

It almost sounds like this wouldn’t work. Kind of like being in an exam at school, you realise with twenty minutes left that there’s an extra question on the back and it’s worth 50% of the mark. We don’t know why they operate this way. In the band’s own words they say:

“Our songs are written and recorded in 20-30 minutes and are never longer than 2 minutes. Because that’s how we play.”

What we’re left with are a collection of songs that do come in short bursts. Give or take a few seconds that sound like they must have taken longer than twenty minutes to create. If they can work this quick, giving Japanese Pop Songs a week in a studio would see an output of about ten albums.

Our favourite song is one that Kerry Katona would quite likely applaud between a gobfull of chips and curry sauce. Called Bi Polar Love, the song title does seem quite literal. When listening to the song, it somehow deleted itself from the player and wouldn’t reappear. God knows how we broke it. But it is a good song, honest! Bands like Japanese Pop Songs make us smile – they are doing something different.

Next week; OAP prog rock. Ok, maybe that’s a little too different:

For more:

Japanese Pop Songs MySpace

Pop is a handy word, as it can be used to make other ones up!

If you’re religious for example, the simple addition of an ‘e’ will transform the word in to Pope, aka God’s best chum on earth. Other words that pop can be extended in are popcorn, poppet and populace.

In the musical sense, the word pop is shortened from the word popular. Most music in the top forty is often referred to as pop. Even though we like Jamaican funk rock, a lot of people don’t appreciate it as popular. Micachu describes her music as pop despite the music not having a cheesy gloss sprayed over it compared to music classed as ‘pop’.

To avoid the confusion we found ourselves in, Micachu is the creation of 21-year-old Mica Levy. With debut album Jewellery being written and produced by herself, there are are additional musicians helping her out. Known as The Shapes, they are a band who perform with Micachu on tour and to help create various sounds in the studio. Everything clear? Ace. Have we quite likely got something factual wrong? Probably.

Don’t let the illusion of the word pop confuse you into thinking that this is some sort of squeaky-clean record using conventional sounds and lyrics. We don’t expect to see many manufactured popstars from X Factor using vacuum cleaners or broken bottles as instruments.

Tracks such as Golden Phone are the perfect example as to why much more important people and publications are giving Micachu glowing reviews. An almost hypnotic tribal beat immediate gets the fingers tapping as chantable lyrics are echoed throughout the song. Breaking it down with what can be described as a distressed organ makes for an enjoyable listen.

This is one of many songs that feature on an album full of songs ranging from one-minute post-punk blasts to sonic waves of electronic. Lyrically, mini stories are crammed into brief three minute spaces which may not make sense to us the humble listener but can be interpreted however we see fit.

Yes, we hate building things up too soon, but this album has been on our fruit-based MP3 player for weeks. It’s quite likely to be on plenty of best-of lists at the end of the year and earn nominations at various music award shows.

Visit Micachu’s MySpace page below to check out various songs which display another British talent, videos and free mixtapes for you to download and enjoy with your stuffed animals.

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Micachu MySpace

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As we’re on a mission to try and bring you pop music from around the world, it only seemed suitable to trawl through Norway.

After being crowned the winners of Eurovision 2009, it only seemed right to see what else they have to offer us. Surely the country has better stuff then Alexander Rybak?

Norway’s most famous musical export of late has been the electronic duo Royksopp. Though the recent output hasn’t really lived to their debut album Melody A.M. It’s all been a bit rubbish and reliant on guest vocals from people like Lykke Li and Annie. Thankfully, Flunk don’t do this.

We don’t really know what traditional Norwegian music sounds like. For all we know, it could just be two people aimlessly smacking a stick off a wall and trying to put some sort of rhythm in to it. As much as we’d like to pick on some twee recording done in a remote Norwegian forest, one of the first bands we searched for grabbed our attention.

With an output spanning over six albums, Flunk have remained under the radar for way too long. Constantly gigging along the way in the UK, Europe and the USA, a small of army of fans have surely convinced them to carry on performing and not to stop. Success to them may not be coverage in Heat magazine, but perhaps a love for the music they are producing.

Annoyingly, Flunk are one of those artists whose output can be loosely classed as electronic, but they use so many styles to create their sound. From diced up guitars that are in turn splashed over dark ambient landscapes, the sharp basslines don’t sound at all out of place.

Lazily, we could just tell you that they are the Norwegian version of Portishead. Just like the Bristol trip-hoppers, they also have a vocalist whose powerful vocals are lost in the mix of chopped up drums. The tracks could easily be left as instrumentals, but Anja Øyen Vister’s does a sterling job of enhancing the various tracks.

Not all of the songs require a crisp and clear vocal to hit you in the face. Instead, some are weaved in to the background, making them sound like they were sung into the mic halfway across the studio. Though some clever studio trickery was probably more likely than our cack-handed theory.

Hooray for Norway! Good music is still being created there and it doesn’t all sound like that annoying angel-faced git who won Eurovision.

For more:

Flunk MySpace

Girls Aloud, Sugababes, McFly, The Saturdays and er…Blazing Squad.

This is pop music that all the kids listen to. Maybe not through choice, but they end up listening to them anyway. This got us thinking, there must be more pop music out there then what we’re exposed to.

So in a mission that will quite probably end in failure after a couple of weeks, we will make it our mission to bring some cultural pop music to your attention. There’s better place then starting with Japan. Not only is the country a bit mental, but some of the soundtracks to some of their manga animations are literally bonkers. After a selective search, we fell upon Unisex who will no doubt brighten up your day.

The beauty of listening to Japanese music means that we really don’t have a pissing clue what they are going on about. For all we know, it could be spiels about sugarcoated castles on top of mushroom hills. Or the lyrics could be a bit more sinister and go off on tangents about slaying goats with blunt sticks.

Based on the band’s cartoony imagery, we assume that there quite loving people who’d give you a caramel apple in the street and dish out plenty of hugs. But then again, we can’t guarantee that. They could have baby Godzilla creatures in their house and are waiting for the perfect opportunity to set them on people.

Believe us or not, we weren’t looking to bombard you with a sweet-sounding Japanese band with high pitched giggly female voices. The chances of you ever discovering Unisex were probably quite low until now. But they aren’t that bad. Are they? We just can’t read any of their text or understand what they are saying.

Because we are kind and caring, we’ll let you pick a country for our foreign pop trawl mini spin-off series. Think of it as a cultural adventure around the world to discover different things. Or, an excuse to laugh at someone sing in another language.

For more:

Unisex MySpace

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Oddly, Acrnym has already featured in MySpace Trawl.

Before you jump to conclusions and accuse us of being lazy, that isn’t the case. Acrnym is a member of band who have recently released an album and are gaining the praises of everyone in the music world.

Compare the two together and you wouldn’t expect it was from the same person. This project takes us into the world of breakcore where time structures don’t exist, samples come from everywhere and fastness is guaranteed. It may not be for everyone, but we like an artist who can switch from doing electronic projects and those that are completely different.

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Acrnym MySpace

This isn’t the collective of a group of bears who escaped the circus in China and decided to make an album. As we all know, bears can make porridge at best.

If you did have a message for a bear, what would it be? We’d ask them to stop crapping in woods near us. Bears are allowed to do it and won’t get fined, so how come we get slapped with a fixed penalty? Never mind, that’s a separate issue, let’s concentrate on the wonderful Message To Bears.

Message To Bears is the work of one man called Jermoe Alexander. Call him a smartarse if you like, though he may prefer the term ‘multi-instrumentalist’. He can do the following: acoustic guitars, pianos, glockenspiels, samples, drums, loop pedal, melodica, toy piano, harmonium and sing. You may be able to do some of those as well, but probably not as well.

It’s hard to place a finger – or a paw – on what to describe his overall sound as. It’s certainly calming and wouldn’t be the ideal choice of a party. But to wind everything down at 4am when everyone is slightly groggy and hazy? Yes, the songs could very easily slot in that particular situation.

In terms of genre, it’s not really electronic, folk, ambient or post rock. Instead, everything is brought together in one snug listen to make some emotionally sound music which could definitely bring something out in you depending on the situation.

Old material seems hard to come by at the moment, though his MySpace page hints at a new album in the immediate future. A few tracks on the player like November are a teaser for what is to come. This glorious track uses a simple piano melody before gradually building a string section around it. The only annoying thing we have to say about this track is that it’s too short! We want a longer version so we can indulge in its beauty and warmth.

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Message To Bears MySpace

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The site of Pierce Brosnan and other old gits dancing around in Mamma Mia only made people go out and buy crusty records from time gone by.

Amazingly, not all Swedish music involves sickly sweet ballads about romance, love and spatulas. First Aid Kit are a sisterly duo who are slowly turning heads. At such a young age, they are producing quality songs that can take take indie monkeys like Razorlight years to achieve.

Their MySpace biog pretty much sums up the entire history of the First Aid Kit project, utilising just a guitar, angelic vocals and lyrics that seem utterly beyond their years. At such a tender age, Klara & Johanna Söderberg aren’t writing about teenage topics such their local H&M running out of clothes, or what colour they want to paint their nails.

The songs are deep and meaningful. After Klara heard the brilliant First Day Of My Life by Bright Eyes, it ignited the acoustic folk songs that we are quickly learning to love. Originally released in their native Sweden, the record entitled Drunken Trees has been re-released. Following a YouTube recording of Fleet Foxes‘ Tiger Mountain, the song has been recorded and placed on the EP.

All we can get you to do is listen to the music and make up your own mind about how right or wrong we are about this band. With one EP under their belts, more will follow and, as they mature as musicians and songwriters, things can only get better.

Oh, and if you want to be clever, First Aid Kit can be pronounced Förbandslåda or Första hjälpen.

For more:

First Aid Kit MySpace

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“Starting Teeth is a collaboration project born between brains of electronic producers Childe Grangier & Nathan Jonson, formerly Hopen & Hrdvsion, who are Pacific and Atlantic and more than ever united in the quest of doing freely the things!!!

To not do what they can do, Childe Grangier & Nathan Jonson decide to join their forces to create a recess of development for the next Century Haunted Dancefloor Twisted Legs Fighters!

What makes the Starting Teeth project so fresh is their unique and futuristic vision of doing electronic music, with special mixture of free-electronica, funny mental techno and breaks ‘n cuts hyphy. They combine an imaginative and groundbreaking electronic music which will break your ankles trying to dance to it. Watch out on the dancefloor!”

Phew! That’s the brief history of Starting Teeth and done in a way that makes sure we don’t look like idiots by not doing our research. As if that’s ever happened before.

Off the five tracks available for streaming, opening song Mochipet gets our ears all excited and cranking up the volume until we’re slapped on the wrist. The track starts with blendered vocals and they remain cut up until the opening beat stomps in. The lyrics become clearer and we are presented with something that smashes hip-hop and dirty electronics together.

Usually when an artist’s biog bigs themselves up, we have reasons to be sceptical but the above track is one of those occasions when the produce matches the claim. Despite this being a new project, we hope the duo continue to release more records and don’t stop after their debut album I Won’t Do Anything I Can Do.

For more:

Starting Teeth MySpace page