making life more tolerable....

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Earworms of the Week

Evening all. My turn! My turn!

10. Where Do You Go (My Lovely) - No Mercy

I heard this in the cinema whilst I was waiting for the Bourne Ultimatum to start. It's a stomach churningly awful number of immense cheesiness, but unfortunately that little guitar trill in the chorus also means that this has always been a weapons grade earworm for me.... so needless to say, the second that I heard it, I knew I was doomed and began to sing along immediately, much to C's consternation.

Never has a band been more aptly named.

Incidentally, the film itself is very good, as long as the handheld camera work in all of the many chase sequences doesn't make you feel sick.

9. Ace of Spades - Motorhead

Radio 1 were doing some gimmicky thing over the bank holiday where they played only hip-hop anthems on Saturday, only dance classics on Sunday, and only guitar music on Monday. As I drove down to my mum and dad's on Monday, it was the first time in absolutely ages where I was pretty much pleased with every track that came up on the radio. They even played the full version of 'Stairway to Heaven' for goodness sake. Mind you, as soon as they slipped this little beauty onto the airwaves, I was in earworm heaven. They might be a one song band as far as most people are concerned... but what a song!

8. My Doorbell - The White Stripes

Another song that I heard on the radio on the drive down to my parents' new house. This dates from Jack White's "Zorro" era, but like most of the best songs by the White Stripes is a stripped down and slightly eccentric little classic... Jools Holland accompanied them on the keyboard when they played this song on "Later..." recently, and it ruined it. Just guitar and drums! There's no denying that Jack and Meg have chemistry, and adding anything else to the mix seems to dilute it.

Apparently Tom Jones is going to cover this. God spare us.

No. Really. Spare us.

7. Suburban Knights - Hard-Fi

This has taken a little while to grow on me, and I originally had this down as nothing more than a Clash clone, but after a few listens I'm really starting to like it. It is undeniably Clash influenced, but there's also some Ennio Morricone Spaghetti western type soundracking in there.

Plus they're mates of Billy Bragg and hang out in the Leftfield at Glastonbury, so we should support our comrades.

6. Angry Mob - Kaiser Chiefs

I'm not a big Kaiser Chiefs fan and I haven't bought the last album because I think they are (in the main) horribly unoriginal sub-Britpop chancers, but for some reason I find this song strangely appealing. I think it's the chorus:

"We are the angry mob

We read the papers every day

We like who like

We hate who we hate
But we’re also easily swayed"

They're not half as clever as they think they are, but credit where credit is due. Anyway, I caught myself singing this in the shower, so it has to go on the list really.

5. The Pretender / My Hero - Foo Fighters

The Foo Fighters sit proudly at the top of my "Bands I Want to See Live" list... so I was naturally delighted to be able purchase some tickets to go and see them at the NEC in November. Hurray! Actually these songs were in my head before I saw that the gigs were about to go on sale. "The Pretender" is the new single and is pretty much the Foo Fighters all over: pedal to the metal rock with a strangely amiable feel to it (thanks I think to Dave Grohl). "My Hero" is a bit of a slower one, and it's not really one of my favoruites, but as with "Angry Mob", I caught myself singing it in the shower, so it's clearly got stuck on my internal jukebox.

Special mention here for Lord Bargain, who bravely volunteered to accompany me to the Foos gig because he knows how much I'd like to see them... even though he himself doesn't really like the band at all. That's friendship for you. As it happens I'll be going to the gig in the company of Sarah and Mark, but the offer was very much appreciated.

4. Neighbourhood #2 (Laika) - Arcade Fire

The Arcade Fire are a band that so many people have raved about that I find myself instinctively suspicious of them. I haven't really listened to "Neon Bible" very much yet, but I caught about half of their set at Glastonbury this year and they were so impressive live that I am going to see them at the Arena later on in the year. They're in my head this week because I was exploring the interactive content on BBC3 and ended up watching their set from last weekend's Reading Festival. I thought they were brilliant, although C. told me that she thought that they were "depressing". Each to their own I suppose. I immediately dug the first album out and I've had it on in the car ever since.

3. Nobody Moves, Nobody Gets Hurt - We Are Scientists

Well, actually, I replaced the Arcade Fire CD with the We Are Scientists CD on Thursday morning, and was immediately reminded how much I love the album and this song in particular. They're a great band: quite loud, angsty and slightly silly.

"My body is your body
I won't tell anybody
If you want to use my body
Go for it
Yeah!"

Lots of "woah-oah-ohs" in this song too, which is always a good thing.

2. Anything Goes - Willie Scott (Kate Capshaw from Indiana Jones & The Temple of Doom)

It's quite a rock-y list this week, so by way of a change of pace, here's a song that was planted in my head by a certain Mr. Mark Reed who mentioned it in a text message. You may remember that this is from that long opening sequence in the club where Indy has inadvertently drunk some poison and is scurrying around with some Chinese gangsters looking for the antidote / a giant gemstone / the ashes of an ancestor.

It's the mandarin bit that really sticks in my head:

"Yi wang si-i wa ye kan dao
Xin li bian yao la jing bao jin tian zhi Dao
Anything goes."

Incidentally, have you seen the pictures of Harrison Ford in full Indiana Jones get-up as they start to film the next movie? I had my doubts, but he's still got it.....

1. The Unthinking Majority - Serj Tankian

(it's a great video too, so do check it out)

Zane Lowe played this the other day, and I immediately loved it. Tankian is the singer from System of a Down, and this is instantly recognisable. It's very political, apparently:

"I believe that you're wrong

Insinuating that they hold the bomb

Clearing the way for the oil brigade

Clearing the way for the oil brigade"

...but to be honest I like it mostly because of the trademark slightly bonkers loud/quiet/loud format.

Let's rock!

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I'm thinking of doing another Shuffleathon -- you know, that thing we did where you make a compilation CD, I draw names out of a hat and you send your CD to that person and they review it. You also receive a compilation CD from someone else and review that.

It took ages last time, but it was a lot of fun I thought.

Whaddaya say? Would anyone be interested?