I struggled to do this I have to confess. It was a real killer to get it down to size.  So much to leave out.  My long list was 71 songs.  Anyway, here it is (if you can read it)…

But I persevered and ended up with this.  My absolute favourite songs of the noughties.  Again, I will send you a copy if you want it.

What surprised me when I finally got it down to size was how few female singer songwriters made it to the final list.

I remember dashing down to what was then a Virgin Megastore in Leeds one Monday during my time at uni in Leeds in order to grab one of the limited edition 7” pressings of ‘Freakin’ Out’, a marvellous power-punk single from Graham Coxon’s fifth solo album, ‘Happiness In Magazines’. The rough cardboard sleeve and garish artwork impressed but it wasn’t until I put it on the turntable, turned it up really very loud and started pogoing round the room that its position as one of my all time favourite bits of vinyl was assured. I soon stopped pogoing, by the way; a man of my size combined with a wooden floor do not a happy stylus-groove situation make.

And so vinyl has gone on to dominate my relationship with Coxon’s solo output. Although I owned the early albums on CD, it wasn’t until vinyl copies entered the collection that I really took them seriously and, similarly, it wasn’t until my double vinyl pressing of ‘The Spinning Top’ arrived that its standing in my collection was awarded. Having said that, I’d had the chance to hear it a little way ahead of release and duly loaded it onto the iPod and then left it for a bit. One Saturday evening, feeling full of cold and ensconced within more pillows than I thought we owned, I stopped scrolling at this album and set it going. When it came to a close, almost seventy minutes later, I was a little shocked to realise how well it had held my attention. For the next couple of days, I played little else. By the time the vinyl arrived, I already knew the album inside out and yet I was still ludicrously excited to play it.

What music it contains. Grizzly Graham is still there on ‘Sorrow’s Army’, sweetly innocent Graham pops up on ‘Feel Alright’ but new and improved folksy Graham steals the show. ‘Look Into The Light’ rightly won comparisons with Nick Drake, ‘In The Morning’ is an epic thing of gentle beauty which is pretty bloody splendid from the off but completely slaps you around the face when it starts properly noodling about around the five minute mark.

It’s a remarkably effective left turn after the commercial sound of the final two EMI albums and the lo-fi approach to the four before those. It is Coxon’s masterpiece, I’d wager, and while it received little attention due to the media frenzy over the return of his old day job it was one of the stand out releases of 2009.

I was going to do a list of my favorite records of the 00’s, but as I was getting my list together I started to realize it was kind of boring.  Really, how many music blogs do you need to tell you the same thing? That’s when I began thinking about the records that came out over last 10 years that I thought were criminally ignored, or just didn’t seem to get a fair shake.   So what I’ve got for you is a list of my most underrated albums of the decade. Every one of these records shoulda been a hit, but because the world is a cruel, cruel place they never were.

Putting this list together was a lot of fun, because it allowed me to make amends for some records that I missed the year they came out.  There is not a year that goes by that I don’t discover my favorite album from the previous year in March of the next year.  And so it goes….you’ll find a lot albums on this list that never made one of my year end lists from the past ten years.  I can assure you though, that everyone of these would make my top 100 albums of the aughts. I just thought focusing on the underdogs would be a little more interesting than seeing some list with the same records as every other list out there.  Hope that I have half-succeeded. Oh, and yeah, I know that the decade is officially over at the end of 2010, but I start counting at zero.

It’s Jo and Danny – Lank Haired Girl To Bearded Boy (2000: Double Snazzy)

This was one of those buys where I was in a record store flipping through CD’s and saw a cover that caught my eye.  I remember opening it up and seeing that Dan Treacy of Television Personalities had written the liner notes and thinking, that it’s got to be good.  Unheard, I bought this at some overpriced record shop in Paris (I’m so cosmopolitan) and it soon thereafter became my favorite record for months on end.  It’s got elements of Mazzy Star and shoegaze, but seems to carve out it’s own space making it kind of unclassifiable and kinda special.  They would put out three more albums in the decade, but none came as close to perfection as Lank Haired Girl.  To this day, I have no idea which one is Jo and which one is Danny.

mp3: It’s Jo & Danny – Repentant Song

The Fall – The Unutterable (2000: Eagle)

It’s just like Mark E Smith to come back from near disaster with an amazing album. After being arrested for assault of his then girlfriend Julia Nagel in New York and having his long time band quit on him Smith returned with an entire new band and the Unutterable. He’d done it before, releasing Extricate after Brix left him, so there is some sort of precedence. It’s amazing how the Fall can still sound vital some 30 years into it, but they do, and this is example number one for the aughts (see also Heads Roll and Country on the Click).

mp3: The Fall – Cyber Insekt

Moose – High Ball Me (2000: Le Grand Magistery)

Moose never officially broke up, so I still hold out hope.  High Ball Me was their fourth and last album. All three previous records were criminally ignored, so why should this one be any different.  The perennial underdogs, Moose made such great albums to the delight of those lucky enough to hear them.   High Ball Me is no different except that this one got released not only in the UK but in the US, a first for the band.  There was no slide in quality on High Ball Me.  Incorporating Nilson, Buckly, Hazlewood and House of Love into an intricate wall of sound that Phil Spector would envy.  It’s downright lush!

mp3: Moose -Can’t Get Enough of You

Broadcast - The Noise Made By People (2000: Warp)

Before Broadcast became a laptop band, they were actually a real band and The Noise Made By People was the culmination of their autumnal space-age pop.  It had an icy cold and unfeeling demeanor like Nico, but there was a glow to it like the Mamas and the Papas and a fiery intensity like Jefferson Airplane.  You get the picture, it has a definite 60’s feel to it, but it has it without sounding too derivative.  I remember seeing them at the Knitting Factory in LA for their tour to promote the album, and Broadcast as a full band in a live setting so greatly surpassed what they had put down on tape.  Trish Keenan’s voice, the retro light show, the noise created by the keyboards, but mostly the guitars filled the room with a hazy shade of winter.  Take note chillwave/laptop groups, you need a band, otherwise it’s just watching a guy clicking a mouse.

mp3: Broadcast – Come On Let’s Go

Goldfrapp - Felt Mountain (2000: Mute)

Some of the sounds on Goldfrapp’s debut album are otherworldly. It’s all strings and computers, but it sounds like it came from outer space.  Outer space circa circa 1960, something akin to Peter Thomas’s soundtrack to Raumpatrouille.  Alisson Goldfrapp looks like she could have been a Bond girl and has a voice to match. Before making Felt Mountain with Will Gregory, she had appeared on albums by Tricky and Orbital, so this record and its cinematic trip hop didn’t come out of nowhere, but the yodeling kind of did.

mp3: Goldfrapp -Lovely Head

The Aislers Set – The Last Match (2000: Slumberland)

You know what I do with this album?  I probably shouldn’t say this, but I only listen to the Amy Linton songs.  No offense to Wyatt Cusak (he sings 3 of the 14 songs on the album), but I’m a sucker for that girl group sound augmented with a big wall of guitars and that is what Linton specializes in.  The Aislers Set are kind of the Rosetta Stone of Slumberland, the linchpin of the label that links the seminal Black Tambourine to the current crop of bands like Lichtenstein, Brilliant Colors, Grass Widow, and Frankie Rose.  If there was a song that came out in the year 2000 that is better than the lead off track The Way To Market Station, I have yet to hear it.

mp3: Aislers Set -The Way To Market Station

Animals That Swim – Happiness From a Distant Star (2001: Snowstorm)

Admittedly Happiness from a Distant Star is not the best Animals that Swim album, that honor would got to I was the King, I Really Was the King, but Animals that Swim are so good that their third best album (they only made three) is better than anything someone like Sufijan Stevens could ever, ever come up with in his wildest dreams.  Singer Hank Stars is like the UK version of Silver Jews’ Dave Berman.  He paints vivid pictures of the down on their luck and downtrodden characters and does it with such an eye for melody and melancholy that you find yourself swept up in stories about Uncle Mackie, aliens and letter writing.

mp3: Animals That Swim- Mackie’s Wake

The American Analog Set - Know By Heart (2001: Tigersyle)

Up until Know By Heart, American Analog Set were background music to me, but with this record they seemed to grow some teeth and develop a pulse.  It’s still mellow, but there is a welcome tension to their songs.  The band create a hypnotic swirling sound that is so crisp and clean you could eat off of it.  Although the playing is at the forefront (the drumming is lovely), front guy Andrew Kenny comes to bat with some really strong pop songs.  The Postman is pretty unforgettable and Aaron & Maria is the poppiest thing that AmAnSet have ever laid to tape.

mp3: American Analog Set – Aaron and Maria

The Tyde – Once (2001: Orange Sky)

Back in 2001 I wrote that the Tyde answer the question: What if Felt were from Southern California?  Darren Rademaker is an obvious fan that Birmingham, UK band, but you can also tell he knows his local history, showing an appreciation of the Byrds and Buffalo Springfield.  When this record came out in 2001 I was living down in San Diego, the perfect place to hear it.  Once was meant for the beach, surfing, getting good and high and eating at Swami’s Natural Food Cafe on a sunny Encinitas day.

mp3: The Tyde -All My Bastard Children

Cornelius - Point (2002: Matador)

Japanese pop alchemist Cornelius is a master of precision and layering on texture after texture onto the frame of a pop song.  A song might start with a water drop, become a trickling stream and end up a waterfall.  Each part taken by itself seems so basic and simple, but as they layer upon one another the complexity in it all becomes apparent.  Cornelius has this uncanny ability to create these engineering marvels and still make them sound vibrant, catchy and exiting.  If you ever have the chance to see him live jump at it, you will not regret it.  A true master builder at work.

mp3: Cornelius -Drop

Radio Dept. - Lesser Matters (2003: Shelflife/Labrador)

Lesser Matters has not lost a spec of goodness since I first heard it back in 2003.  I never get tired of Johan Duncanson’s sleepy singing over top of  the band’s over-modulated drums and feedback tinged guitars. I hesitate to call it Swedish shoegaze, but they do seem to worship at the alter of the Mary Chain, albeit with synthesizers and cheap drum machines.  Later on in the decade Sophia Copula would put their music into movies and they would become somewhat more well known, but the band still seem to be a secret.

mp3: Radio Dept. -Where Damage Isn’t Already Done

A Frames – 2 (2003: S-S Records)

Any one of the A-Frames records could be on this list. The Seattle goth-punks birthed three albums in the early aughts and every single one of them was worthy.   Their paranoid, doom-laden, angular take on punk rock comes off as it was made in A Brave New World.  Everything is sterile, there is no emotion, and the skies are gray with nuclear fall-0ut.  Their second album, intuitively titled 2 has just enough pop juxtaposed with dread to make it a winner.  The band would go on to sign with Sub Pop for their third album, before drummer Lars Finberg would leave to concentrate on his other band the Intelligence.  The A Frames are what so-Cal punks DI would have been if they lived in the Pacific Northwest deprived of sun, surf and girls.  Feel the angst!

mp3: A Frames -Ionic

Graham Coxon – Happiness in Magazines (2004: EMI)

Blur. Bleh. Blah. Kind of sums up my opinion of Blur as their career progressed.  I just kind of lost interest.  Blur guitarist Graham Coxon always seemed  like he was the conflicted member of the group, not really embracing their super-stardom, keeping his foot in the lo-fi with his solo albums.  After he left the band, his records moved away from the feedback drenched jams to became a lot more structured and pop focused and Happiness in Magazines is easily his best record.  He drafted Blur producer Stephen Street to twiddle the knobs and he showed up with his grade A songs.  There’s the straightforward pop of Spectacular and Freakin Out, but he delves into the blues on Girl Done Gone and is downright funny on Bottom Bunk. I think with Happiness In Magazines Coxon reaches a level of comfortable with who he is and it shows.

mp3: Graham Coxon – Bottom Bunk

Katerine - Robots Après Tout (2005: Rosebud/Barclay)

When this came out, I called it a freak-show in a jewel case.  I stand by those words, but I mean them in the best possible way.  Just by glancing at the cover you might get the idea that this is not your normal album.  Yeah, Katerine is French, so maybe it was cool to walk around in pink silk turtlenecks and women’s underwear back in 2005 somewhere in France, but I kind of doubt it.  Philippe Katerine’s records seemed to be getting stranger and stranger and this is the wacked out amazing culmination.  I think I like the really over the top songs the best.  The club-y strangeness of Borderline, the disco of 100% VIP and the funky Cornelius-like Qu’Est-Ce Qu’Il A Dit ? No matter what shade of strangeness you gravitate to, you will undoubtedly find it on this record and probably end up dancing to it.

mp3: Katerine -Borderline

Rough Bunnies – Rough Bunnies Saved My Life (2005: Self-released)

Frida and Anna are the Rough Bunnies.  They’ve also been The Flame and Inside Riot, but Rough Bunnies is their favorite band.  They’re kind of Riot Grrl, they’re kind of Moldy Peaches, but mostly they’re Swedish punks releasing cd-r’s.  The songs are immediate and the Bunnies greatest concern seems to be to get it on tape before they forget it.  So everything has a ramshackle, but endearing feel to it.  The Bunnies are prolific as they are obscure, popping out CD-r’s like, umm rabbits.  They nearly signed to Alan McGee’s Poptones and Fine Arts Showcase did an entire album of Rough Bunnies covers.  Where do you start?  Rough Bunnies Saved My Life might be their best album, and if you like it there’s a treasure trove waiting for you.

mp3: Rough Bunnies -Rough Bunnies Saved My Life

Human Television – Look At Who You’re Talking To (2005: Gigantic Music)

Ahh, the jangling 80’s.  You know the saying, they don’t make ‘em like they use to.  Human Television take it to heart and conjure the ghosts of the Rain Parade, Dumptruck, the Feelies and Let’s Active.  They write melancholy sounding songs punctuated by bright chiming and jangling guitars.  It’s a tried and true juxtaposition, and Human Television do it so well that they are excused for not bringing something new to the table.  Each and every one of these songs will make you shake your head in wonder at how good it is.  How good?  To paraphrase the album: sunshine your face, room spinning round your head good.

mp3: Human Television -People Talking

The Go-Betweens – Oceans Apart (2005: Yep Roc)

2000 marked the release of the first Go-Between album in 12 years, Friends of Rachel Worth, and 2005 marked the release of this, the final Go-Betweens album because of Grant McClennan’s sudden death in 2006. On Oceans Apart, McClennan was ever-present with his classic wistful pop songs as always. He always seemed to be able to reel off perfect pop without even trying and Boundary Rider and Finding You are among his best. But, on Oceans Apart it was Robert Forster that put this record on the map as my favorite Go-Betweens album. His frantic opener Here Comes a City, historical reminiscing rampage of Darlinghurst Nights and beautiful Lavender put this Go-Betweens album in the hallowed company of 16 Lovers Lane.

mp3: Go-Betweens -Darlinghust Nights

Tom Vek – We Have Sound (2005: Go-Beat)

I can’t help but think that if this album was released two or three years later it would have been much bigger. Of course I’m usually wrong about things like this, but singles like Nothing But Green Lights and A Little Word In Your Ear mine similar veins as what James Murphy gets called a genius for.  Vek was in his early 20’s when he made We Have Sound, writing and playing everything.  It was such a stellar debut, and the future looked so bright the guy was wearing shades.  That was 2005, oh Tom where have you disappeared to?

mp3: Tom Vek -Nothing But Green Lights

Blumfeld – Verbotene Fruchte (2006: Sony/BMG)

The number one album of 2006, well at least here at the Finest Kiss.  Obviously the band were nonplussed about the dubious honor,  deciding to break up in early 2007.  Verboten Fruchte is probably the German band’s most fleshed out record with lots of keyboards and even strings and horns.  Like Love circa Forever Changes they’ve thrown off their garage rock roots and blossomed into a more nuanced and textured way of doing things.  All of that fancy stuff can’t mask the garage rock origins of the band, it just shows their restlessness, and wanting to stretching out and trying new things.  If you’re like me, this record will have you reaching for your German-English dictionary, so you know what exactly you’re singing along to.

mp3: Blumfeld – Strobohobo

Kelley Stoltz - Below the Branches (2006: Sub Pop)

There is one group of people who I know loves this record. Advertisers and marketing dickies have latched onto Below the Branches and won’t let go. You can’t turn on the TV these days without hearing a song from it. Kelley Stoltz can sell other people’s products with his music, but has trouble selling his own records. Below the Branches is chock full of classic pop, one listen and you’ll want to start a marketing company.

mp3: Kelley Stoltz – Memory Collector

Holland – The Paris Hilton Mujahideen (2006: Teenbeat)

Almost coming off like a Guided By Voices record with short songs that are so catchy you can’t believe he only made them a minute and a half long.  Shards of guitar crash down on echo-y bass and keyboards as one man band Trevor Kampman croons with an icy disconnectedness.  The production is so clear, yet the songs are so  jarring and choppy that they literally reach out and grab and shake you.  Kampan is jaded, and down about the state of the world.  Paris Hilton Mujahideen is good illustration of the world back in 2006. Not much has changed.

mp3: hollAnd – Boolean Misery Index

BOAT - Songs That You Might Not Like (2006: Magic Marker)

Seattle bands that love power pop and have a sense of humor, may sound like an oxymoron, but BOAT picked up the torch that was passed to them from a rich lineage that includes the Young Fresh Fellows, The President of the United States of America, Harvey Danger and even Mudhoney.  Songs That You Might Not Like wasted no time in firing salvo after salvo of funny, sad, heart-on-the-sleeve power pop.  How could you not like a bunch of guys that drink too much soda,  cruise in minivans, destroy noise rock bands, get called reptile boy, have ninjas sitting on their couch at home, and use skeleton keys?  This was their first record, and they would only get better.

mp3: BOAT – Remember the Romans

Pants Yell! – Alison Statton (2007: Soft Abuse)

At first I was perplexed by Pants Yell! naming their record after the Young Marble Giants singer and not sounding anything like them.  Then I thought, I named my blog after a Boo Radleys song and never write about that song or the band.  I won’t deny it, Pants Yell! are twee, but it’s twee with melancholy and attitude.  They actually sound equal parts Housemartins and Lucksmiths. Singer Andrew Churchman has an instantly memorable voice and this record equals any album from either of those two previously mentioned bands.  The only problem with Alison Statton is getting passed the first song More Purple, it’s so damn good you’ll find yourself  hitting rewind and never get to the rest of it.

mp3: Pants Yell! – More Purple

Pelle Carlberg - In a Nutshell (2007: Labrador)

Pelle Carlberg is a clever fellow. He’s got nothing but bad luck, a wonky wheel on his shopping cart, a crap career as a pop singer, and a broken clock. Carlberg got an ace up his sleeve though, his ability to make his mundane life seem so interesting.  He’s funny, self-deprecating, has a better command of English than most native speakers, and has a pocket full of pop songs that will make your ears prick up.  In a Nutshell was his second solo album after his band Edson broke up and it’s the one where he put all the pieces together to come up with something that people like Morrissey and Billy Bragg have long since stopped making.

mp3: Pelle Carlberg – Clever Girls Like Clever Boys Much More Than Clever Boys Like Clever Girls

Electrelane – No Shouts No Calls (2007: Too Pure)

One of the great disappointments of 2007 for me was Electrelane.  After making what I would argue is their best album they went and quit.  No Shouts No Calls was the Brighton, England band at their most melodic and immediate.  The production is raw with the drums nice and in your face, they way Albini made the Wedding Present sound on Seamonsters.  The songs contain elements of twee-pop and Kraut-rock combining to form melody driven grooves.  They can be gentle and understated like on Cut and Run or lay it all out on songs like Tram 21 and To The East.  I hold on to the hope that they really meant it when they said that they were going on indefinite hiatus, and not really actually quitting.

mp3: Electrelane – To the East

Intelligence – Deuteronomy (2007: In the Red)

Up until Deuteronomy the Intelligence were decidedly lo-fi, but in 2007 the band’s mastermind Lars Finberg decided to turn up the bass and make a record that didn’t sound like the treble button was stuck at 11.  There are elements of darkness that his former band the A Frames excelled in, but the genius of Deuternomy is it’s skewed take on pop that he would later take to another level on this year’s Fake Surfers.   Intelligence records are like trip into the head of Finberg, and his world is a weird, wild, funny place place.  Weird like the Residents, wacked like Brainiac but catchy as Devo.

mp3: Intelligence – Moon Beeps

Gentleman Jesse – Gentleman Jesse (2008: Douchemaster)

Jesse Smith’s likely heros  include Nick Lowe, Paul Collins, Elvis Costello and Paul Weller.  These names certainly command respect, but the style of power pop that they are so well known for is decidedly out of style these days, and the likely reason that this album got no traction when it came out last year.  That’s the only reason I can think of because back in the old days when a record like this came out, it was blasting out of dorm rooms and cars everywhere.  Nowadays it’s all about headphone music and records that need to be heard blasting at full volume into the open air suffer.

mp3: Gentleman Jesse – Black Hole

olha esse documentário que o blur vai lançar nos cinemas, pelo menos lá na gringa, sobre a turnê de reunião que eles fizeram durante o último verão europeu. parece que o filme vai servir meio que como um réquiem da banda já que, a julgar pelo que o graham coxon anda dizendo por aí, não há planos de levar a turnê adiante.

Aún no se sabe a ciencia cierta si la reunión de Blur continuará, si grabarán un disco, o todo quedó en unos pocos shows este verano, pero gracias a Dylan Southern y Will Lovelace, el año que viene vamos a poder disfrutar de este documental.

Como vieron, los dos directores tuvieron acceso a ensayos, entrevistas backstage y seguramente el material será de lujo. Mientras esperan puede revisar la Página oficial de la banda y ver el trailer en resolución gigante.

Damon Albarn sa come far parlare di se stesso e dei suoi progetti, non c’è che dire. I Blur tornano a suonare dal vivo e fanno uscire l’album gratuito della performance con un importante quotidiano britannico, il chitarrista Graham Coxon preme per tornare a suonare con lui e i giornali ci vanno a nozze e, come se non bastasse, i Blur hanno ricevuto la Blue Plaque, targa che commemora il primo concerto della band tenuto col nome Seymour nell’Essex.

Se pensate che le notizie siano finite qui, state sbagliando. Già, perché i Gorillaz stanno per tornare sulle scene: sembra che il nuovo disco si intitolerà Plastic Beach, che i pezzi siano pronti, che Alan Moore abbia partecipato ai testi e che la lista degli ospiti includa Lou Reed, Bobby Womack, Snoop Dogg, Mos Def, The Horrors e Barry Gibb.

2009 has definitely been a Graham Coxon year. It started off in April, when I saw the guitar player of my favourite band Blur live in person for the first time ever. He did an Instore at puregroove. I ate cake when he came on stage to set up his guitars. Yes, when I first saw Graham Coxon, guitar hero, I was eating cake. Oh well.

The second time I saw him wasn’t as personal, it was in Hyde Park in July and 54999 others were there as well. I have never been as emotional at a gig ever, seeing Blur live as a full four-piece for the first time in my life (and maybe it was the last time as well).

Third time, Union Chapel. If I should name the best venue I’ve ever been to, I would definitely say Union Chapel. It’s a church, people are sitting in church benches seeing great musicians play. Sound quality is incredible in there and they even sold tea in proper mugs. I was having a tea while watching Graham play.

And when I thought it couldn’t get any better with me and Graham this year, I saw him again, and again it was a very special gig. Seeing Graham is apparently never just going to a gig. It’s always a remarkable, beautiful, emotional thing. And that is exactly what it was like at the Barbican on Saturday.

Graham, accompanied by The Graham Coxon Power Acoustic Ensemble, containing about 12 musicians overall, played his latest record “The Spinning Top” in its entirety and in correct order. Guest musicians such as Martin Carthy and Robyn Hitchcock joined Graham on stage.

In the background video visuals made by director Chris Hopewell could be seen (he is also the mastermind behind this incredible music video).

Graham in front of flowers, playing “In The Morning” . The visuals fitted perfectly. The rather joyful song was accompanied by grass, blue skies, flowers, sun. The combination of music, words and pictures merged to a perfect symbiosis.

It’s still incredible how a man as successful as him, being part of one of the biggest British bands of the 90s, who played in front of 55000 people this summer, is still that insecure when it comes to talking on stage. It’s like his guitar gives him all the confidence he needs, but when he doesn’t play it anymore, it’s just little Graham again – the shy bloke living somewhere in Camden, who doesn’t know what to say whilst being in front of an audience. It doesn’t even matter how big the audience is – if it’s about 70 at PureGroove or almost 2000 at the Barbican Hall.

Since his music is always full of despair and misery, his whole attitude and his imperfect voice just make him even more adorable. I probably wouldn’t believe any other successful musician if he’s singing along the lines

“I… don’t wanna go out
I… don’t wanna stay in
I’ll sit inside my room and vandalise my dirty mind
I won’t get any food but then I’ll eat myself alive”

Graham Coxon – I Don’t Wanna Go Out

It’s the feeling that he actually cried “Bitter Tears” before he wrote a song about it what makes his music so special. His insecurity and vulnerability is a large part of the quality. Apart from his undeniable outstanding guitar playing skills, obviously. Apparently he recorded the first song he ever wrote – “You’re So Great” on Blur’s self-titled album – whilst lying under a table.

It took me years to get into his music, since his records are kind of hard to get. I’d say they are bulky and not very accessable to casual Blur-Song 2-lovers. It’s not pop music at all, it’s weird, sometimes noisy, sometimes freaky guitar play pared with grumpy lyrics. Graham, proving again how wonderful he is, calls it “despondo-rock”.

The performance on Saturday at the Barbican was simple perfection. The sound was amazing, the ensemble recreated every little piece of noise that is on the album on stage and created impressive sound and atmosphere. The video installation delivered the right pictures. It couldn’t have been any better.

After playing all 15 songs of “The Spinning Top” – large parts of it are as bulky as his first records by the way – he came back to do an encore. Just him and his guitar. And three songs of “A Kiss of Morning”, my favourite Graham Coxon record, including the beautiful little “Baby You’re Out Of Your Mind” .

And after all, Graham was just having fun. It’s always such a pleasure to see “despondo” laugh on stage.

Damon Albarn y Graham Coxon, terminaron por separar a Blur, una banda que se presagiaba sería la descendencia directa de los geniales The Kinks. Proyectos solistas, arrebatos musicales y diferencias artísticas, fueron solo algunos de los problemas que enfrentaron a los creadores de “Boys and Girls” y “Coffee and Tv”.

Después de 7 años de separación y de haber superado los problemas que alguna vez los aquejo, los oriundos de Colchester  han decidido regresar con un  compilatorio doble llamado “Midlife: A Beginner’s Guide To Blur”, (una guía completa para los que no conocen a la banda) y que recorre 25 aparentes grandes éxitos de los cuales 6 valen la pena ser considerados.

La inconsistencia en este nuevo recopilatorio es evidente, partiendo por la genial “Beetlebum” y pasando por una rockeada “Song 2” ( el video fue ironizado por la banda punk “Millencolin”), los demás temas son meros sobornos, para que suban las ventas de sus Lp, exceptuando “Parklife” y “The Universal”. Sin ir más lejos, los ingleses no logran enganchar como fue con su antecesor y sustancial ‘The Best Of Blur’, además, en este nuevo Greatest Hits que termina con la tranquila y agradable “Battery In Your Leg”, se dejaron de lado grandes y redentores éxitos como “Country House” y “Chamless Man” resignando y decepcionando a los supuestos noveles seguidores de la banda británica.

Por otro lado, hace algunos meses después de los apoteósicos conciertos realizados en Hyde Park, Damon Albarn, confirmó que “el grupo no ofrecería más conciertos”, no obstante, el panorama parece haber cambiado. Cercanos a la banda han mencionado que Blur estaría planeando seriamente realizar una nueva gira mundial, para sus fieles admiradores el próximo año.

Quizás en la ficticia y no confirmada nueva gira mundial, no dejen de lado las maravillosas y legendarias canciones que alguna vez, nos hicieron vibrar al ritmo de guitarras y “rave”. A continuación el decepcionante track list del nuevo recopilatorio de Blur

1 Beetlebum 2 Girls & Boys 3 For Tomorrow 4 Coffee & TV 5 Out Of Time 6 Blue Jeans 7 Song 2 8 Bugman 9 He Thought Of Cars 10 Death Of A Party 11 The Universal 12 Sing 13 This Is A Low 14 Tender 15 She’s So High 16 Chemical World 17 Good Song 18 Parklife 19 Advert 20 Popscene 21 Stereotypes 22 Trimm Trabb 23 Badhead 24 Strange News From Another Star 25 Battery In Your Leg

Álbum solo do integrante do Blur, acho esse som melhor que o próprio Blur, confiram.

Faixas do álbum:

1. Spectacular

2. No Good Time

3. Girl Done Gone

4. Bittersweet Bundle of Misery

5. All Over Me

6. Freakin’ Out

7. People of the Earth

8. Hopeless Friend

9. Are You Ready?

10. Bottom Bunk

11. Don’t Be a Stranger

12. Ribbons and Leaves

LINK – Happiness In Magazines

Parece com? Jarvis Cocker, Blur.

Clipe da música Bittersweet Bundle of Misery.

Enjoy o/

“… songs do become autobiographical, because they’re like spells, and quite often I’ll write songs and they’ll become true.”

I heard Graham Coxon say that in an interview [1], and it’s happened to me too. I wrote this song in 2003 while in India, and now I’m 33, and life seems to have floored me, too, lately.

It is part of a group of songs I wrote together, for an album about war. The demonstrations against going into the 2003 Iraq War were going on all around the world at the time. I remember being in Mysore in India, and wishing I could go to one of them, but I was too ill. I’d been to one in London, but even though it was the biggest march ever recorded there [2], they still ignored it and went ahead with the war.

Lol. Just looked up that link for the march, and the date at the top means I can’t have been there. Must’ve been another one Oh, my time ravaged brain!

D7 Am Am7
Fmaj7 Gmaj7 (Fmaj7shape) Am7(Fmaj7shape)
C G C G C G F Bb

Timothy Thomas lives across the road from me
He leaves the house in time for the 7.23
An hour on the train
He doesn’t make a sound (just reads his paper),
Navigates his way to work through zombie crowds

Can you save me from this place?
Of quiet desperation

Saturdays are spent
Washing the wife’s car (a 4 by 4),
He used to take his kids down to the local park
But now his family all
Lead their own lives (they don’t need him),
He’s given up wanting to have sex with his wife

Can you save me from this place?
Of quiet desperation

Over and over
Over and over again
He makes the same mistakes (x4)

He can’t remember the last time he felt happy
All his dreams had disappeared by the age of 33
Frustration beats his body to the ground
Lying on the floor there seems to be no way left out

Over and over
Over and over again
He makes the same mistakes (x4)

Copyright 2003 by Iain Barnett

[1] Graham Coxon interview with NME
http://www.nme.com/video/bcid/39313723001/search/Graham%20Coxon

[2] BBC News report on the march
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/2765041.stm

With guest Graham Coxon.

7th November 2009

Tracklisting:

Them Crooked Vultures — New Fang
Morcheeba — Crystal Blue Persuasion
Howlin’ Wolf — Well That’s Alright
David Bowie — Always Crashing in the Same Car
Kings of Leon — Crawl
Marcia Griffiths — When Will I See You Again
New York Dolls — Back in the USA
Pearl Jam — Got Some
Lipps, Inc. — Funky Town
Billie Holiday — All of Me
Santana — Persuasion
Cameo — Hangin’ Downtown
LL Cool J — Rock the Bells
George McCrae — I Get Lifted
Bill Withers — I Can’t Write Left Handed
Interview With Graham Coxon
Graham Coxon — Brave the Storm
Led Zeppelin — D’Yer Mak’Er

Did this on my sister’s old Casio keyboard. I used to love that keyboard, right from when she got it in 1984 (or something like that). Can’t beat those old analogue bleeps with a samba beat!

It also featured an Alesis SR-16 drum machine, now dead, and it was probably all piped into a Tascam 4 track tape recorder. I bought that recorder in Brighton around the time that Graham Coxon’s first album [1] came out, and he walked past me on the road in front of the pier with a girl who had pig tails (pig tails always look great).

He eyed me suspiciously, since I was wearing a Fred Perry, and he probably thought I was about to bother him, but I’m too shy for that. I once went to an Aphex Twin gig at Turnmills in Farringdon with a friend. It was still early and not many people were there, so I walked over to his gear to take a look. He was on the floor, behind a table covered with grey and black boxes, sitting cross legged, and chatting to a girl. Every now and then he’d reach his arm backwards and over his head, not taking his attention from the conversation, and twiddle one knob. Just one. It didn’t seem to have any discernible effect on the music, which was constantly mutating regardless of whether the equipment was being touched or not.

He saw me and turned around, and said “Hello”. I realised this was about to become a conversation, and instead of spewing out, “I think you’re a genius, everything you do is great, I love you, you’re fantastic, I wish I was you…” etc etc, I said the kind of good mannered hello you say to the staff in a clothes shop when you’re just browsing, and scuttled away.

I took the sighting of Coxon on the same day as buying the 4 track as an omen. But it wasn’t. I didn’t get a band together, and I didn’t record much. I would find the whole process of recording very frustrating, as I couldn’t get the sound I wanted, and I had to play every instrument – it was all just too much for me on my own (you had to program every single beat into the Alesis!) Because of this, I stayed away from songs that I thought had any wider appeal in case I ruined that appeal. Stupid really.

I did come to like some of the stuff I recorded though, and I do love this, and funnily enough it has a strange mix of Blur and Aphex influences. It’s just about my favourite tune in the world, (after Into Another by Blur.)

Copyright 1998 by Iain Barnett

[1] Wikipedia article on The Sky Is Too High – it’s a very, very good album (in my opinion)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sky_Is_Too_High

La recensione è passata sul nuovo sito di Mag-Music

With guest Graham Coxon.

31st October 2009

Tracklisting:

Max Romeo — Chase The Devil
Rosie Flores and the Pine Valley Cosmonauts — Chauffeur
Jimmy Cross — I Want My Baby Back
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins — What That Is
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins — My Kind of Love
John Renbourn — Faro’s Rag
Graham Coxon — Brave The Storm
John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers — I’m Your Witchdoctor
Enemys — Mojo Woman
Desmond Dekker — Dracula
Jim Lauderdale — I’m Kind Of Learning As I Go
Salty Holmes — The Ghost Song
Wykham Porteous — Please Please Me
Graham Coxon — Tripping Over
The Swanks — Ghost Train
King Automatic — King Takes Queen
Screaming Lord Sutch — Jack The Ripper
Link Wray — Jack The Ripper
Sparrow and the Workshop — Devil Song
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins — All Night
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins — I’m Lonely
Kevin Ayers — Whatevershebringswesing
Graham Coxon — Sorrow’s Army
The Forest Hillbillies — The Munsters
Richard Hawley — Open Up Your Door
Jimmy Martin — Widow Maker
Peppermint Harris — Cadillac Funeral
Joe Thomas — Lavender Coffin
Daniel Norgren — Mean Old Devil Got On
Tami Lynn — Mojo Hanna
Randa & The Soul Kingdom — Find Your Groove
XTC — The Ballad Of Peter Pumpkinhead
The Brooklyn Skyways — The Holy Ghost Is Here Right Now
Mighty Clouds of Joy — The Holy Ghost
Tom Waits — Alice
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins — Hong Kong
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins — She Put The Wammee On Me
The Misunderstood — I Can Take You To The Sun
Pee Wee King — The Ghost and Honest Joe
Cliff Carlisle — The Devil’s Train
The Jackson Analogue — Snakes and Wolves
Louis Jordan — Somebody Done Hoodooed The Hoodoo Man

Yes, it matters.  If you were to — as I did — just preview Doherty’s solo album via the iTunes 30-second snippets, you might hear the notoriously dissolute Libertine and Babyshambler in the Kinks-influenced guise all British rock stars at some point don — part music hall showman, part busker — and be tempted to pass.  It was only with the arrival of the December Uncut and its boss interview with Blur guitar genius Graham Coxon that we learned he’s the axeman on it.  And of course, when you hear a song like “Palace and Bone” it all comes clear, and it is pretty wondrous.

I didn’t succumb to the charms of Coxon’s folk album, The Spinning Top.  I want to hear him play those weird, twisted tunings like “Song 2″ all the livelong day, not an update of Bert Jansch.  I want his solo albums to be like Happiness in Magazines, the best British Powerpop album of 1979, even if it was released in like 2004. On Pete Doherty’s “Grace/Wasteland”, Coxon’s able to shine the light on both sides of his musical personality, the rough and raw and the fey and magical, gloriously twisted in both camps.

Admission: Tulip Frenzy ranked Babyshambles’ Shotters Nation one of the best albums of 2007, and the resistance to Doherty’s solo album was a reluctance to commit, to take a leap of faith.  It took the knowledge that Graham Coxon — perhaps the most brilliant guitarist between Nels Cline and the White Cliffs of Dover — was standing there on that Albion precipice to get us to jump.  Thank Heaven we did.  An eye opener, and ear pleaser, this one is.

Aujourd’hui, c’est illu du clip de Bittersweet Bundle of Misery, chanson de Graham Coxon… Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!!!!

Ca aurait quand même été un peu plus fun si on m’avait laissée danser dans le clip…

“when i hear the word culture, that’s when i reach for my revolver“, or so goes the poorly translated quote often misatttributed to nazi leader hermann göring or even joseph goebbels. in actual fact it was a line from schlageter, a play staged on hitler’s birthday on the year the nazi party gained power, centered on the life of nazi matyr albert leo schlageter, whose wartime comrade friedrich thiemann ranted on his disillusionment with all the ideological babble on brotherhood, equality, freedom, beauty and dignity, before uttering those iconic words. that jaded sentiment prevails in the mission of burma 1981 classic “that’s when i reach for my revolver”, which speaks of past heroes and discarded dreams, and the formerly cherished restraint and boundaries that must now be crossed, a rousing call to arms against the things of this world that deaden our minds and souls. it’s amazing how much reverence is accorded to this song in subsequent covers by moby and graham coxon, both stepping up with passion and resolve, and in chilling resonance with each other in reporting for duty.

mp3: mission of burma – that’s when i reach for my revolver

mp3: moby – that’s when i reach for my revolver

mp3: graham coxon – that’s when i reach for my revolver

Lists are funny things.

Lists, to men, are like catnip to cats. We can’t resist them. It doesn’t matter what it is, we’ll create a list for it. It’s our anally retentive side coming into play; we like to know everything has its place. Most men I think can name their favourite albums, movies (and perhaps girlfriends) in a specific order since we’ve had every waking day to think about it.

When we forget to take the rubbish out, or wash up, it’s probably because we’re making a mental list of something (boring household chores perhaps…)

Lists are also endlessly used in television.

No doubt you will have sat through the Top 100 Singles of All Time, Your Favourite Films Ever or Top 100 Celebrity Sex Scandals – all the cheapest of TV formats and laziest of concepts, which is why they usually end up on satellite channels you’d rarely watch otherwise. They bring out the same D- and C-list celebrities (who’d turn up to the opening of a Coke can) to sit in front of a brightly-coloured animated backdrop – similar in style to a Lava Lamp – and then talk about an event/film/album/song/person the producer had reminded them about a few minutes earlier was such an important part in their life. The better celebrities may retell an amusing anecdote; most will resort to just laughing about nothing (the more they laugh, the more we’ll notice their smug faces while we’re drifting off to sleep) and talking bullshit.

“Oh yeah – haha – this one time my brother and me were – haha – were listening to this Queen song and doing that thing they do in Wayne’s World – haha – and – haha – my brother hit his head on the window of the car! Haha (remember me from that obscure show five years ago?… No?…I was great, honest…)“

However – and the producers of these shows know it – there’s something strangely addictive about them. Even if you get the most irritating celebrity most of all; stitching all the segments together with a witty thing to say before and after each advert break.

One of the worst example of this was probably David Gest (winner of I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here!) presenting the 100 Best Michael Jackson Songs (or something). It was an old show, repeated especially for the death of MJ. The embarrassing links provided by Mr. Gest reached their apex when he announced something along the lines of “You’ll live forever, Michael – you’re the best!”. David? I’m Embarrassed, Get Me Out Of Here!

Blogs also use this format. It’s a sure-fire way of getting people looking at your blog – people love lists remember!

So, all this being said, for the sake of both selfish amusement and the irony of my last paragraph, I’m going to resort to a list myself.

This list is (as you will have noticed from the title) regarding The Ten Best Music Videos in the World… Ever! (The title inspired by all those compilation albums from the late ’90s – in fact, they’re probably still churning them out).

The reason I’m picking music videos is that, by chance, I was watching MTV and between the irritatingly inane shows they put on, and the endless Rihanna videos, something interesting (and refreshingly pleasant on the ears) came on. Something with a wonderful hand drawn style featuring a superhero fighting squirrels and things to reach the princess in distress. The video is number one on my list (which is actually not in any particular order) and it inspired this little blog entry, so blame it for any boredom caused for this post.

It’s worth saying that I’ve been a fan of music videos ever since I got MTV2 a long time ago (in the good old days before it turned into the channel for Shit American Rock), so I know my Michel Gondry from my Chris Cunningham. There are many, many wonderful music videos around (and really, the top ten directors would have been more appropriate since so many are consistently fantastic) but leave any comments if you think I’ve missed out something really amazing.

1. Coldplay “Strawberry Swing” directed by Shynola. View on YouTube
This the first Coldplay video I’ve loved. The others have been okay, but either linked to a damn durge of a song (The Scientist) or just a bit too odd for their own good (Don’t Panic). The basic concept is that Chris Martin is a superhero on a background drawn, with chalk, on a pavement. Obviously this kind of effect could have been achieved in a computer but it seems Shynola actually hand-drew the damn thing with Chris Martin balancing/laying/hand-standing for each frame – I imagine having to wait for the artists to finish each drawing. To someone lacking patience like myself (I love animation but really, it’s boring as hell doing it frame by frame – see this fantastic Fast Show sketch) this makes Chris Martin an absolute star in my books (as if the rest of the world didn’t already consider himself one).

As for the song itself, I didn’t actually think much of it when I first listened to the album (to the point where, on seeing the video, I wondered whether it was even on an album) but now, I listen to it on an almost daily basis.

Users on YouTube obviously love it as well… “this is the most coolest video i have ever seen” is one of the more insightful comments.

It’s a rare but wonderful thing when a music video makes you like a song even more – or even to notice it at all. It doesn’t happen very often, but when it does it makes for a great experience. You’re able to listen to the song at any time and, even if the lyrics don’t connect specifically with you or if they are too abstract in the song to relate to anything, being reminded of the video makes it much more visual. It’s like a soundtrack album to a movie but in reverse, I’ve listened to The Shawshank Redemption soundtrack countless times, and it always evokes memories of the film (which is my favourite by the way – I’m sure I’ll do a ten ten movies as well some time…)

The talented artists behind this video are called Shynola who created the wonderful animations for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (one of the better things about the film) along with countless other videos – their best listed below, check ‘em out as they say in the States.

• Blur “Good Song” – Drawings by my favourite cartoonist, David Shrigley, animated – again, making an otherwise fairly pedestrian song come to life in what I think is the funniest music video I’ve ever seen, although I appreciate it’s not to everyone’s taste. View on YouTube

• UNKLE “Eye for an Eye” – An amazing video about cute little things running around their happy place being duped into drinking from giant nipples by an evil race of wasp things that then assimilate them all and take over their land. A thinly veiled political comment about the way the West come in, guns blazing, promising a better life and leave having destroyed everything. Well, I think that’s what it’s about anyway. It’s an amazing song and I bought the album because of this, which is lucky because it was, in my view, the best album of that year. View on YouTube

• Junior Senior “Move Your Feet” – I’m of the Commodore 64 generation, so anything with pixel graphics gets my vote, and it doesn’t get any better than this. It’s a crazy song (let’s face it – gay as cheese) and sounds like Terence and Philip from South Park singing, but it fits the video perfectly. As before, I bought the album after this, which is why I refuse to put this video in the overall Top Ten; the album is beyond terrible. View on YouTube

2. Radiohead “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” directed by Jonathan Glazer. View on YouTube
In those good old days on MTV2 that I spoke about with tear-filled nostalgic eyes earlier, this video was one of the most shown – with good reason. It’s a great song for a start. I’m not a massive Radiohead fan (I think they’re vastly overrated) but this one is tortured, weird and has a great tune.

The video ticks several boxes for me:

It’s in black and white (almost everything looks better in black and white); it has bits that are slowed down; bits that speed up; jumping nuns; locusts flying in slow motion; evil dogs; Thom Yorke looking weird; band member, Jonny Greenwood looking like a woman (many women would kill for his figure); glass smashing and someone falling over on their chair.

It’s put together with so much style that you can forgive them for what I imagine amounts to just a ‘brainstorming’ session where they thought “would would look cool slowed down in black and white”.

I’m sure there are many more videos considered better than this but this just sticks with me far more than most, I think due to its haunting nature and probably just that it’s, in my opinion, Radiohead’s best song.

The director is top of his class with a string of fantastic videos to his name. He also directed the wonderful film, Sexy Beast, which, if you haven’t seen, needs to be watched as soon as you can; Ben Kingsley should have gotten an Oscar for it. If that wasn’t enough, he’s the man behind the Guinness ad with the horses in the sea, the Sony Bravia ad with the exploding towerblocks of paint and the Levi’s ad with the emaciated boy and girl jumping through walls in order to reach space (apparently the most expensive advert ever at the time).

Other great videos by Jonathan Glazer:

• Jamiroquai “Virtual Insanity” – The irritatingly popular Jay Kay prances about with his stupid hat while the furniture moves around. Very cleverly done (albeit quite simple when you know how) and an example of a really good pop video, which is quite a rarity. View on YouTube

• UNKLE “Rabbit in Your Headlights” – A scruffy man walking down a tunnel, mumbling to himself, getting hit by cars. I’ve no idea what he’s thinking about (I read that he’s trying to work out the meaning of life) but the ending is spectacular. View on YouTube

3. Bjork “All is Full of Love” directed by Chris Cunningham. View on YouTube
This is one of the first videos (I think) released as a DVD single and it was the perfect video for the format. It’s stark and fascinating (like Bjork herself I suppose) and manages to be beautifully classy, despite the ridiculous premise (two robots, both with Bjork’s face, ‘get jiggy with it’ whilst robot arms prod them and cover them with something suspiciously milky and white).

The director, Chris Cunningham, has a something of a midas touch giving all his work a strange, sometimes scary, stylish as hell look that must be damn difficult to do.

In an ideal world, he’d direct an Alien film. Maybe one day…

Two of his other videos for you to look at (do a Google search for his others – they’re all great):

• Madonna “Frozen” – I think it’s Madonna’s best video. Not much happens, she’s a bit goth, she’s in the desert, there’s a black dog… but it’s a great song and it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling seeing Madonna grown-up, sensible, and not jumping around in a leotard telling people they’re ‘motherfuckers’ and pretending to be twenty again. View on YouTube

• Aphex Twin “Windowlicker” – One of life’s great annoyances for me (proving I don’t have too many) is that music as God-awful as Aphex Twin gets to have a decent video to go with it. This video is wonderfully stylish, funny, strange, freaky and deserves mention because it highlights the ridiculous conventions set in rap videos where some idiots ogle girls in bikinis. This video is the antithesis of The Thong Song. View on YouTube

4. A-Ha “Take on Me” directed by Steve Barron View on YouTube
Given my love of animation and ’80s music, it’s no big surprise that this is in my list and I think most people of my age remember this video very vividly (even down to the “Nice Cold Ice Cold Milk” poster in the cafe that haunted my youth in the school canteen).

Looking back, the video is extremely cheesy but the animation is so well done it’s easy to forgive it. I also wish they’d resisted the temptation to shoehorn the rest of the band into the video using crappy footage of them playing their instruments against a suitably ‘comic book’ style background. (The same problems haunt videos these days as well – it’s so much better when a band’s ego-driven demand to feature in the video doesn’t get in the way).

The director was very successful during this period, working on loads of other memorable videos but none were really as innovative as Take on Me.

5. The BPA “Toe Jam” directed by Keith Schofield View on YouTube
The BPA (or Brighton Port Authority) is a Fat Boy Slim (aka Norman Cook) project and this, the first release, comes with a fantastically inventive video.

To explain it would ruin the joke of it, so just watch and smile…

6. The White Stripes “Fell in Love with a Girl” directed by Michel Gondry View on YouTube
When I was young (here he goes again with nostalgia) I loved Lego and animated little things with it as well. I imagine the director, Michel Gondry, did the same when he was growing up since this video (like most of his actually) has a whimsical quality.

It’s a video comprised solely of animated Lego blocks. People swimming, the band singing and playing their instruments, running – everything damn difficult to animate anyway, especially in Lego.

Michel Gondry has a knack for doing really complex things (‘high concept’ should be his middle name), as his other videos prove even further. He’s now mainly doing feature films (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind being one) which is a shame as I think his ideas suit a short running time much better.

More of his videos:

• Kylie Minogue “Come Into My World” – Kylie must have gotten dizzy making this video; several versions of her walk around several times in a circle. I have no idea how he co-ordinated a shoot like this but it’s wonderfully done. View on YouTube

• Massive Attack “Protection” – A great video with the camera moving into different windows of a big house. It doesn’t sound exciting and, well, it isn’t really, but it’s a great video. View on YouTube

• Bjork “Bachelorette” – Difficult to describe, this video starts with a story being told and then a theatre production based on that story played out within it. Just watch it, it’s fantastic. View on YouTube

7. Blur “Coffee & TV” directed by Hammer & Tongs View on YouTube
Like Shynola, Hammer & Tongs are another group of talented chaps that have worked on many videos and they all (well, the ones I’ve seen) tend to have a humourous slant which defines their style.

Coffee & TV is the tale of a little milk carton that goes off on a little quest to find a missing person. It’s the kind of video that appeals to everyone; it’s funny, cute and there’s even a bit of emotion in there as well for the kind of people that cry over spilt milk.

They’re now doing feature films as well. Their first, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy was good, but flawed. Their latest – Son of Rambow – is supposed to be very good but I’ve not seen it yet unfortunately.

Hammer & Tongs have worked on many great videos, but two of my other favourites are below:

• REM “Imitation of Life” – Worth watching for Michael Stipe’s interesting dance moves as well as the technical cleverness involved. It’s a piece of camcorder footage that keeps running forward, then backwards for twenty seconds at a time – we zoom into parts of the video to see details. A tough one to explain, but worth watching, and it’s a nice little tune! View on Spike (I couldn’t find a version on YouTube with audio)

• Fatboy Slim “Right Here, Right Now” – Evolution squeezed into 3:30 minutes with a great social comment at the end. Well, I think it’s meant like that anyway, or it’s just that they wanted to end with the guy from the album cover. View on YouTube

8. David Bowie “Ashes to Ashes” directed by David Mallet View on YouTube
It makes no bloody sense at all, but it’s an example of a really inventive video when music videos were still very ‘new’ (it was back in 1983 – MTV had only been around a couple of years at that point. It was also was less shit than now). I think it was the most expensive video ever at the time due to its use of the fancy video effects (things we can all do on an iPhone these days with the correct app).

Director, David Mallet, directed loads of rock videos (specialising on Queen and AC/DC, strangely) but this is, I think, his most famous.

Of all these videos, it’s probably the one you’ll disagree with the most. “It looks crap”, mate, “You’re getting nostalgic and losing your sense of style.” But, there’s just something about it that I love. I’m not a big David Bowie fan particularly, but there’s something wonderful about him walking down the beach dressed like an idiot with an old woman wagging her finger at him (and telling him not to trust Major Tom).

9. Michael Jackson “Thriller” directed by John Landis View on YouTube
I include this video a little reluctantly as every damn list of “best music videos ever” has this in it, but it really has to be. I’m not a fan of musicals (I turned Chicago off after the DVD menu) but there’s something mesmerising about a really great piece of choreography.

There’s also the fact that this music video was an ‘event’. I was too young to remember it at the time but enough people have told me how they stayed up late to watch it to make me think that perhaps it was more of a big deal than we can appreciate these days. The Internet has ruined things a bit really… we don’t have ‘events’ any more, do we?

Anyway, the director’s other films include American Werewolf in London (that qualified him to make Thriller really), Trading Places and Coming to America so that makes him damn good in my book.

10. Massive Attack “Teardrop” directed by Walter Stern View on YouTube
God knows how a video comprised entirely of a foetus singing can be so good, but it really is.

The director is another fairly prolific one, working on videos for Prodigy, David Bowie, Madonna and INXS as well as another two for Massive Attack.

Another of his videos:

• Verve “Bitter Sweet Symphony” A riff on Massive Attack’s video for Unfinished Sympathy, this was the video that, thanks to Richard Ashcroft walking down the road like an arrogant bastard, helped launch Verve into the public eye when we already had arrogant bastards, Oasis. View on YouTube

So, that’s it.

You’ll have noticed that I’ve cheated a little bit by including other videos from some of the directors (making the list far more than just ten) but I don’t care, it’s my list, I can do what I want with it.

There are, however, some other videos I’ve not mentioned that I feel I should for various reasons – those are listed below. Have a look at all of them if you find the time!

Leftfield “Swords” View on YouTube
Summary: A bunch of people in cars, singing along to a chilled out track. I find it mesmerising.

Fatboy Slim “Weapon of Choice” View on YouTube
It’s Christopher Walken. Dancing. Nothing more needs to be said.

Supermen Lovers “Starlight” View on YouTube
Traditionally, 3D animation tends to be quite slick but here the animator has gone at great lengths to make the characters as ugly as possible. It’s a great little story and strangely emotional at the end!

Elbow “One Day Like This” View on YouTube
I’m including this partly because the song is wonderful but also because I think the video is so strange. It doesn’t match the lyrics at all but just focuses on one guy finding joy doing a mundane job. Beautiful.

Nizlopi “JCB” View on YouTube
A wonderfully nostalgic little song with a video to match.

Super Furry Animals “It’s Not the End of the World?” View on YouTube
Another great piece of 3D animation.

Pet Shop Boys “I’m With Stupid” View on YouTube
I’ve never been a fan of the Pet Shop Boys’ videos, but this one is great since it’s the guys from Little Britain doing a terrible (yet accurate) impression of Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe.

Peter Gabriel “Sledgehammer” View on YouTube
Most ‘top video’ lists include this at a high position because it was groundbreaking (and it marked the arrival of Aardman Animation – the makers of Wallace and Gromit). It is a very clever video, and perhaps the Coldplay video I mentioned at the beginning of the list wouldn’t have existed were it not for this. Oh, and it’s about shagging, but you knew that…

Definitely not on any of my lists:

Queen “Bohemian Rhapsody” Don’t View on YouTube
Just plain awful.

I hope you liked this list and feel free to write a comment challenging me on any of my picks. I’m sure I’ve left out some great videos, so tell me and I’ll be happy to rethink any of the ones above if you prove that I’m wrong in some way.

With Graham Coxon.

14th September 2009

Tracklisting:

Speech Debelle – ‘Spinnin’ (Big Dada)
Hadouken! – ‘MAD (Plastician remix)’ (Atlantic)
Euros Childs – ‘How Do You Do?’ (National Elf)
Kraftwerk – ‘Radio-Activity’
Graham Coxon In Session – ‘Dead Bees’
The Dirty Projectors – ‘Stillness Is The Move’ (Domino)
The Flaming Lips – ‘Silver Trembling Hands’ (Warner Bros)
Ungdomskulen – ‘Idunno (David E Sugar Remix)’
First Aid Kit – ‘Hard Believer’ (Wichita)
Beastie Boys and Nas – ‘Too Many Rappers’ (White Label)
Starsmith feat Ellie Goulding – ‘Sleepyhead’
Nero – ‘Do You Wanna’
Book at Bedtime – Marcus from Mumford & Sons reads from John Steinbeck’s ‘East Of Eden’
Mumford & Sons – ‘Little Lion Man’
Wild Beasts – ‘We Still Got The Taste Dancin’ On Our Tongues (Raffertie Remix)’
Little Comets – ‘Adultery’ (Columbia)
Graham Coxon In Session – ‘Brave The Storm’ ‘If You Want Me’
Illa J – ‘Sounds Like Love feat Debi Nova’ (Delicious Vinyl)
Nancy Elizabeth – ‘Feet of Courage’ (Leaf)
King Cannibal – ‘Dirty feat Daddy Freddy’ (Ninja Tune)
Orkestra Del Sol – ‘Reinventing The Wheel’
Fool’s Gold – Surprise Hotel’ (I Am Sound)
Cate Le Bon – ‘Hollow Trees, Hollow Hounds’ (Irony Bored)
Gold Panda – ‘I Suppose I Should Say ‘Thanks’ Or Some S**t’
F*** Buttons – ‘Space Mountain’ (ATPR)

I am a fan of Blur. In so far as I like their music and have some of their CD’s. I have also always wanted to see them live. By the time I got ‘into’ music I had only got into the ‘Best of’ that my brother had. I remember in my early days of musical education, my Brother (one of my favourite guitarists) saying “I love Graham Coxon’s sound. he’s very unique.” From my brother that is a BIG compliment. He never compliments anything, let alone anyone. So it stuck with me. Later, when I joined the Psychotic Reaction having loved their album Rumble, and found Alex Williams (another of my favourite guitarists) was a fan of Coxon too. This became more evident as his choice of guitars came to light and certain idiosyncrasies in strumming, chords etc. Prior to this I had always drawn parallels between my friend Josh’s frontman actions to that of Albarn. Both high-energy and stirring stuff. My other friend James can also be said to have a similar presence. So all in all many of my ‘closer-to-home’ influences counted Blur as an influence. As such I got into them and have enjoyed their work eversince. I did, however, miss their heyday and whilst ThinkTank was different and Gorrilaz are great, Coxon solo had the edge but still none of the err… stuff Blur had. So when the initial reunion was mooted I got very excited.
So I got paid yesterday and while paying a bill online I got a targeted add on Facebook that told me there were still tickets available. I checked. There were. They were also expensive. Ticketmaster has a timer on the page so it acts like a virtual ‘que’. With seconds to spare and no one responding to my texts I caved. Normally I buy tickets waaaaaay in advance so I was excited all day today for a gig I hadn’t planned for, for a band i really wanted to see. So I went home and washed and brushed up then headed straight out. Took me half an hour to get to the MEN (I loooooove Manchester) picked up my ticket and went in.
The MEN is a tomb. A frickin’ barn of great proportion. All concrete with little charm. Doesn’t even feel that big. Not an auspicious start. I went in to glance at the support.
As a parenthetical aside, who books, suggests, demands, hires, feels they need support bands? I can count on the fingers of one hand the amount of good or relevant support bands I’ve seen when seeing a headline act. They do little to warm-up, enhance or reflect the head bands music/performance normally. In fact, i have plaid a few gigs where I thought “What the hell am I doing here?”
Anyway, I don’t know who the fuck Florence and the Machine are but all I know is I want her dead. I truly haven’t seen a band play a gig that big, that Baaaaaadly. They were actually bad. The girl cannot sing an iota and everything was out of her range. Truly, truly dreadful. I stomached a song and a half then walked out. First time I have ever walked out of anything. Ever.
The Klaxons were up next, who I had at least heard of. I’m not a fan of theirs either. I didn’t like Rave the first time round and I like it less now. They were very energetic and ‘exciting’ but as my Dad used to put it, “All fur coat, no knickers”. Lots of style, no substance. I managed two songs then left again. Dull, dull, dull.
I returned for the main event and realised the MEN can change with more people in it. When the boys came out I experienced that weird sensation you get when you see people you’ve only ever seen in photos and on telly. With barely a hello they Launched into She’s So High and I was in Heaven.
Albarn, say what you will of the man, is a force of nature on stage. Far more so than his oh-so-arrogant counterpart/nemesis L*am G*ll*gh*r. He really goes for it and even more amazingly for a man well in his 30’s kept up the pace and didn’t chicken out on any of the notes. Melodies were almost always note for note and hardly embellished. I was really impressed.
James looked a tad bored, which I might be mistaking for ‘looking-cool’ but the bass sounded excellent and Girls & Boys and Tender were pretty much carried by him.
Rowntree is of the Ringo school of drumming, simple but effective. No real ‘fills’ or showy-off bits but played for the song all the way. Very solid. What more do you need?
Then comes Coxon. As stated, I’ve always liked him but now he is my new favourite guitarist. He seems to match Mathmatical precision with all-out WROCK! He really threw himself around (even causing the guitar to cut out for a good minute) but had a note for note, pitch for pitch guitar sound from record. As such he did the work of 10 guitarists. He favoured his Tele Deluxe and an lovely Gibson ‘59 or ‘60 with P90’s. Twin Marshall stacks pushed a truly bassy and roaring sound out that made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Beetlebum sounded Fan-fucking-tastic, I still don’t know how he wrote or plays that riff. Brilliant.
The other thing that was really great was, unlike the G*ll*gh*r brothers, they really seemed to ENJOY the gig. Albarn and Coxon mucked about and laughed and smiled. They all looked rather, well… happy.
Downsides; too bloody loud (i’m getting old) and the rather predictable “Poor Jacko” moment. Blah, blah, blah.
Highlights; Beetlebum probably my favourite. Country House and Parklife- I have never seen an audience go TRULY Ape-shit before (and I mean seriously Gaga) but you really get swept along. Wow. This A Low – Felt the love, man. The first set of encores – punk-tastic! And the truly Epic finale of The Universal. Awesome in the truest sense of the word. Awe inspiring.
In Summation, after REM and Ed Harcourt it comes a very close third in my top 5 best gigs. If you haven’t already seen them, do so. Catch ‘em quick or you might just get a Blur.
(God that was cheesy…)
Leo