Chris Martin sure does get animated when spewing his vague adages and maxims to the Coldplay faithful.
MP3: Coldplay – Lost!
Monthly Archives: September 2008
Little Boots Designer Drugs Remix
Just got this fresh news on the Little Boots front in my inbox, so I thought I’d share it with ya!
Designer Drugs have released a remix of her second best track, Meddle, for our enjoyment. The remix is titled the “Designer Drugs 80s Coke Jam Remix”. Which is a pretty fitting title as the remix has definately got a big, indulgent 80’s vibe to it. Big fat basslines, handclaps and cheesy sparkly keys abound. Infact, I might even prefer it to the original, which I always felt was a bit ‘meh’ instrumentally.
Also, the artwork for Little Boot’s forthcoming Arecibo EP has been released. It goes along with the whole fantasy space unicorns/lasers/gems vibe that is evident from her website.
The tracklisting is as follows and the EP is due for release in digital download and 12′ guises come Mid-November from IAMSOUND Records
A1. Stuck On Repeat
A2. Stuck On Repeat (Fake Blood Remix)
B1. Meddle
B2. Meddle (Ebola Remix)
Definitely one to check out.
MP3: Little Boots – Meddle (Designer Drugs 80’s Coke Jam Remix)
New Vampire Weekend – ‘Ottoman’
Sorry it’s been so long, as you may have guessed, I’ve recently started uni which has been keeping me very busy in and outside of my lectures, reading literature instead of listening to and blogging about music! Which means, unfortunately, that I’ve been unable to capitalise on my blog’s recent popularity on Hypemachine.
Anyway, enough about my personal life. Here’s a nice little slice of new Vampire Weekend for the soundtrack of some new movie. I say ‘new’ but they’ve seen fit to recycle a lyric from Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa “This feels so unnatural/Peter Gabriel, too” and features the same trebley guitars, harpsichords and strings as most of their debut, not that that is a bad thing of course…
[Audio http://jorichards77.googlepages.com/Vampire_Weekend_-_Ottoman.mp3%5D
The New Bond Theme: Another Way To Die – Jack White & Alicia Keys
This is OK, I guess. Not quite as explosive or dynamic as I was expecting. It all feels a little measured and reigned in. An acceptable Bond theme though, satisfactorily average.
Posted in Music
Tagged Alicia Keys, Another Way To Die, Jack White, James Bond, New Bond Theme, Quantum of Solace
Kubrick…
I’d just like to take a short from from my (nearly) regular blogging and ask a question of my readership, if I have one to question.
How can I make this blog look better?
What would you like changed or introduced to improve the blog for you?
How could the blog be more functional?
I ask because I’ve been getting frustrated with the default Kubrick theme. It is absolutely perfect (to me at least) design wise, I love the minimal and unintrusive lines, I’ve looked and tried plenty of other templates, but I always comeback to Kubrick.
But Kubrick has one small problem that really bugs me. No sidebar on individual post links! For example:
https://misspeakmusic.wordpress.com/2008/09/16/new-love-lockdown/
It makes the blog look really rubbish and (more) amateurish. I hate how the dimensions of the page stay the same, by the sidebar disappears and the post is centered it looks really untidy and triggers the obsessive compulsive hidden away inside of me.
And considering that around 50-70% of my hits, and likely all of my vistors that visit the blog for music content, come through Hypemachine, which will always dump visitors at post pages like that, it is exactly that sort of nightmare of design that will greet the majority of my visitors.
I considering buying some Custom CSS, but it looks very tricky and it turns out you can’t actually get a sidebar with the Kubrick template on wordpress.com blogs fullstop. So I can either.
* Leave WordPress for Blogspot.
* Get some hosting and a WordPress.org account.
* Get the custom CSS and play around with other templates.
Or…
* Do nothing.
I’m a complete cheapskate where possible, so the first and last options are the most inviting. For the more observant amongst you, I did used to have a Blogspot blog, but I rarely updated it and no one visited it, so I made a fresh start here.
There’s no doubting that a WordPress.com blog is far better out of the box, but it doesn’t take long till you start feeling constrained by the template format, which I guess is the point.
Blogspot on the other hand can be a complete nightmare to get looking decent, but once you’ve learnt the ropes the possibilities are endless. But it is worth it for a measly sidebar?
You’re the readers, so I value your imput.
Posted in Music
Tagged Blog, Blog design, Design, Misspeak Music, web design, Website design
New Love Lockdown
Off Kanye’s blog as per usual.
So Kanye is obviously very receptive and concerned about my criticisms of Love Lockdown and has rejigged the song in the space of 9 days in an attempt to win my favour. This is a nice precedent and would be something I would like to see other bands attempt in the future!
Anyway, in all seriousness this version is marginally better than the one posted up last week, which was obviously rushed to capitalise on the publicity of the live performance. On the blog itself Kanye admitted that he only wrote the song a week and a half before the VMAs, so it’s bound to still sound quite rough and ready.
The drums and chorus vocals, that were pathetically weak under the drums in the first version and featured Kanye clapping like an over enthusiastic child trying to compensate for his poor singing, have been beefed up and it has a more professional sheen to it thanks to the extra time in the studio.
However there are no new verses to break up the repetition of the song, the sound quality is still really low and crackly, if that’s a symptom of the streaming limitations, a lack of production time or something intentional that Kanye thinks is a good idea, (The breaking up on “SYSTEM OVERLOOOADDD” Is intentional I imagine) we don’t know.
But an improvement’s an improvement. And it’s welcomed Mr West.
RIP Richard Wright (1943-2008)
Well I didn’t expect to be blogging about Pink Floyd or Richard Wright today. But the sudden and shocking death of the Pink Floyd keyboardist requires me to blog about my first love in music and one of my favourite bands in the most unfortunate fashion.
Richard Wright sadly passed away today, aged just 65, after a short struggle with Cancer. Often underappreciated in the shadow of the Waters-Gilmour writing partnership, it is easy to underestimate his influence on the sound of the band. His atmospheric and often stirring keys and synths created a stunning foundation on which the grandiose lyrics of Waters and the mindblowing guitar of Gilmour could flourish and succeed.
His most prominent compositions came in two of Dark Side Of the Moon’s finest songs, The Great Gig in the Sky and Us and Them. Both of which feature his evocative and plangent piano playing at the forefront and are made all the more perfect for it.
His other prominent writing credits, on songs such as Echoes, Interstellar Overdrive and Shine on you Crazy Diamond read out as a list of my personal favourites and only reinforced my affinity with his music, even if I didn’t know it explicitly at the time.
Without his compositions, without his work on keyboards, the extended instrumentals and psychedelic, mind bending sounds that Pink Floyd would become celebrated and renown for, inparticular in their earlier guises, would be so much poorer.
RIP, Richard.
[Audio http://jorichards77.googlepages.com/05TheGreatGigintheSky.mp3%5D
MP3: Pink Floyd – The Great Gig in the Sky
MP3: Pink Floyd – Interstellar Overdrive
Posted in Music
Tagged Echoes, Pink Floyd, Richard Wright, Rick Wright, Shine on your crazy diamond, Time
Jack White/Alica Keys Bond Theme gets first airing – In a Coke advert
Vodpod videos no longer available.
I first posted news about this interesting collaboration back in late July. I didn’t really expect to hear any of “Another Way To Die” until the Quantum of Solace‘s actual release, or perhaps a few days before it, but here is a small snippet of it – In an advert for Coke Zero. Instrumentally, from this clip at least, it doesn’t sound that weird or left field as you would imagine a collaboration between Jack White and Alicia Keys to sound. Infact it sounds remarkably, well, Bondish.
Before new allegations arise of Jack White being a corporate ‘sellout’ or being in the pocket of Coca Cola again after his previous, much publicised Coca Cola Advert. Jack White didn’t actually intend for this instrumental snippet of his Bond Theme to be used for this advert.
According to his Management:
“Jack White was commissioned by Sony Pictures to write a theme song for the James Bond film Quantum of Solace, not for Coca-Cola. Any other use of the song is based on decisions made by others, not by Jack White. We are disappointed that you first heard the song in a co-promotion for Coke Zero, rather than in its entirety.”
Ah well!
Posted in Music
Tagged Alicia Keys, Another Way To Die, Jack White, James Bond, James Bond Theme, Quantum of Solace
Love Lockdown available for stream
From Kanye’s blog.
It’s really low quality and crackly. The composition of it is slightly different to the live performance, slightly worse if you ask me, but ah well, Kanye’s singles have never been the best cuts from his albums.
New Bloc Party – Talons
Bloc Party have unveiled a new song on their Myspace, this was apparently the last song of the ‘Intimacy sessions’ and I imagine it will appear on the physical CD release come October. Unfortunately it shares a lot of the traits with the rest of the depressingly average album.
Over produced sound? Check
Messy guitar riff with plenty of effects? Check
Unsubstantial Electronic flotsam to show a ‘progression’ of sound? Check
Awfully earnest and clunky lyrics? Check
Shouty chorus? Check
Oh what have you done with yourselves Bloc Party?
Because my Internet/PC/Google space is being stupid, You can go to Bloc Party’s Myspace, if rightfully, you don’t want to clog your hard drive up with this.
MP3: Bloc Party – Talons
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