She Wants Revenge (Eponymous)
This album is number 1 on my play count for the past 3 months.
If you like Interpol, you’ll enjoy SWR.
But that’s the easy comparison and a little unfair. SWR’s music has an aggro edge in their lyrics without being angry; it’s more subtle than that.
Top tracks are Out of Control, Tear You Apart & These Things.
There’s a hidden track as well that’s very good.
The songs make me pumped up and would be great to listen to during a workout – like that would ever happen!
The Pipettes (Eponymous)
This one’s interesting because although I got the album last year after seeing it on the list of best albums of 2006, it has since been removed from the list (the entry was blank for #20) and is no longer available for purchase.
When I bought the single for You’re Kisses Are Wasted on Me the back cover mentions the forthcoming album (in 2007). Strange indeed, but I’m just happy to have it.
The Pipettes are an English 3 piece girl group that are backed by their band called The Cassette, or as the beautiful Louise calls them: the girl’s yellow-vested bitches.
The 3 girls present different personalities yet always wear polka dots and have great choreographed routines, think the Go-Go’s meet the Supremes, but for the new millennium.
Their stage presence and look are awesome, but it’s the music that makes them stand apart. Brit pop but without being overly bubbly, which is amazing considering their live set, which is one of the best I’ve seen.
My fave tracks are One Night Stand (with the great chorus: “If you think that this is cruel you should see what my friends do”), We Are The Pipettes ("We're the prettiest girls you've ever met"), Pull Shapes (I think this is English for Voguing), Dirty Mind was their hit, I think it was on some TV show (Grey's or OC), but there are at least 5 other gems on the album, it's hard to pick just a few (in fact in a recent review in Filter Magazine, the top tracks included none of the above).
Gogol Bordello (Gypsy Punks)
This one is frustrating for me. I bought the album because I was thinking of seeing them at Bonnaroo. Because I didn't listen to them before, I decided to skip their show for something else. The thought of Gypsy Punks appealed to me, but I assumed it was going to be a watered down Bad Religion, at best. Boy was I wrong.
A couple of weeks after returning from Tennessee I went to a Uni-Watch party and then found a group on facebook dedicated to the group. So I joined and noticed a message on the group's wall that had a youtube link and a caption that it was Paul Lukas' worst fears. That's an intriguing tagline (assuming you have no idea who or what Uni-Watch or Paul Lukas are, just know he hates purple in sports).
The clip was for Gogol's Start Wearing Purple video. The guy at the start had a Borat moustache, so I thought it was a joke.
I quickly realized it was no joke and damn it, the song was awesome. This was like nothing I've ever heard, and Gypsy Punk is the only thing it can be described as.
I wanted to learn more and while listening to gems like Avenue B, Not A Crime, Immigrant Punk & the amazing Think Locally, Fuck Globally I was able to find out that they were discovered playing in a small Bulgarian Cafe in New York.
They are Russians and Israelis packed in a group that writes some of the best party music around. Their shows, from clips I saw on youtube are colourful and flamboyant, think Scissor Sisters meets traditional Russian folkloric group meets Perry Farell meets Borat. I can't get enough of these guys, and now I'm sad because I missed out on what could have been a major highlight.
Well, they released another album recently, so maybe they'll come to town.
Magnetic Fields (69 Love Songs)
Like the title of this massive recording indicates, the triple volume album is comprised of 69 tracks that deal with love and it's related fields ...
This is not a compilation, these are 69 new songs from this great Stephen Merritt (formerly of the Future Bible Heroes) fronted band from Boston. You know that I'm no romantic, but this Joy Division meets Lou Reed meets everything else, inspired music can make even the most jaded believe anything's possible.
There's so many gems that I don't even think I've gone through the entire collection yet. But Chicken with It's Head Cut Off is an early favourite.
