People are stupid. Unendingly, gruesomely stupid, like a lobotomised, shaved badger – every last one of us a fetid, gormless lump of uselessness. I apologise for the crass generalisation there, but really, it needed to be said. And really, I should have said it in big bold letters: a collection of blithe, oblivious pixels, squatted thoughtlessly right there on your screen, taunting the entire laughable idea of your pointless existence. A person is just a…
And to think that some people are still deluded enough to believe that U2 are Ireland’s premier live band. I don’t know if it’s sheer media saturation that’s perpetuated that myth, or just widespread ignorance, but it needs to be stamped out post-haste. Bono can take his impossibly huge stage monstrosities and stick them where the streets have no name; Ham Sandwich have claimed the crown so wrongly placed on Hewson’s overinflated noggin, and painted…
So, apparently, the 16th MTV European Music Awards “went down” on Thursday. Did you notice? I didn’t – I was preoccupied with more relevant, pressing matters, like noticing that ooh, it’s getting quite cold this time of year, and hey, I need a shave. Of course, the fact that these two realisations came in quick succession meant that my addled brain became quite confused, and I ended up shaving my woolly fleece. Live and learn,…
Hooray! I love when I get to talk about Irish indie heroes Ham Sandwich, as I’ve done before here, wherein I recount how their gig both melted my face, and rescultped it in a new, smiling, more handsome fashion. But now? Now I bring news of their new single, Out of the Darkness, which is available from here and here, and it’s streaming here. It’s the first song to be made available from their upcoming…
Album name: The Circle Artist name: Bon Jovi Genre: Rock Released: November 2009 Label: Island ZME Rating: 7/10 Website: bonjovi.com There are two possible scenarios that come to mind when I try to picture a Bon Jovi songwriting session. Obviously, Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora are there. They’re probably joined by their co-writer of choice – say, Desmond Child or Billy Falcone or whoever – and they’re brainstorming ideas for a spanking new set…
Spending too much time thinking about anything in particular is dangerous. So dangerous, it should quite possibly be illegal. Giving any amount of extended thought to anything rarely leads to a good outcome. Imagine if Hitler hadn’t been allowed enough “thought-space” to write Mein Kampf – wouldn’t that be wonderful? Hitler’s awful, demented thought process, brutally cut off before it could develop into an insane quest for Lebensraum, all because of some ridiculously ill-formed notion…
Anytime I receive a press release that labels a band “an extremely exciting arts collective [and] a perpetual multimedia art installation”, a tiny emergency klaxon in my brain – wedged somewhere between the hippocampus and the primary auditory cortex, so the sound is both unbearably loud and very memorable – goes off. The klaxon reminds me to regard the offending group with the kind of scorn you reserve for only the most pretentious of ponces,…
Music: it’s entirely, utterly, completely, undeniably, irrefutably subjective, right? Wrong. You daft idiot. Look, I know it hurts, but it’s true. Some music is just objectively woeful. In fact, the odds are pretty high that if you’re listening to music right now, it’s crap. Whether it be chart music on the radio, an album on your iPod, or a memory on the tiny little Fisher Price turntable that is your mind, the song remains the…
This seems important. Also, make sure you follow the good Serafinowicz’s Twitter feed for daily hilarities. Paul McCartney ‘I’ll Kill’ – watch more funny videos
When did music television die, exactly? I’ll tell you when – it was when we all gave up on it, and with a collective mouseclick accepted Youtube and Myspace as our appointed saviours. But! There’s a more pressing question on my mind: is there a single post-Myspace moment where we can say music television went beyond an existence of pallid, pathetic obsolescence, and into fully-fledged, crap-slinging horribleness? When I say “music television”, I don’t mean…
Al Byrne