Let's party like it's 1989!

Well it has been a little while hasn't it? Right down to the haircuts, this band has it all going wrong. If I was to say that they were from Leicester and that they had adopted that cocksure arrogant posture much beloved of certain Mancuian bands of the last (is it nearly 20 years already?) 20 years. That their music was the same watered down facsimile of those bands that those same bands themselves ended up producing once their one idea had run it's course. You could be forgiven for assuming I was talking about Kasabian. But this is Leicester and where Kasabian have trod, many others follow. No friends, I speak of course of The Manhattan Project. Named after the allieds WWII efforts to develop the nuclear bomb, because apparently they are "The muthafukin bomb." They have transported themselves away through time and space to Manchester in the mid '80s. Well in their minds they have. Of course in the real world it is 2007 and they are in Leicester. So you can see their problem.

The Manhattan Project on MySpace.

What's in a name?

Sometimes it's just too difficult to get worked up into the teeth gnashing frenzy that this blog requires. Sometimes things just don't catch you at all. The Authentics are much like that. Sure they seem to work hard, I mean they tour all over the place, and not just in enormodomes either...they play some right shitholes too. *ba-dum-tish* But it seems like a lot of effort that could be better spent elsewhere. They make the kind of featureless music that soundtracks any one of a number of US teen "dramas." And you know, they have to use bland inoffensive music because, well, given the writing on most of those shows, anything with a splash of colour would tend to stick out. So given that they make that painfully inoffensive west coast "rock," where do you gentle reader think they hail from? No cheating now. It begins with an L, go on...no, not LA. Are you ready? Leicester, a small city in the middle of England.

Authentically local.

In-Ger-Lund!

Every now and then the unthinkable happens, a local band makes it big. For some reason Shed Seven spring immediately to mind. Even their name was desperately local. To be fair to "The Shed" though, it probably wasn't their fault they got signed. They had that local band schtick down pat. It's just that in the putrid backwash of Oasis' success, the record companies figured people would buy any old shit. And guess what..?

Anyway, as the World Cup starts today, here is the video for the official England World Cup song. It's performed by Embrace, another inexplicably over-achieving local band.

Four legs bad...

Question: What do Teen Amateur, Chris Martin and That Fucking Tank have in common?
Answer: They are but the tip of the iceberg of a new breed of band. The type of band that thinks outside of the box and dispenses with the notions of conventional band structures by stripping down the band format to it's base level and dispensing with all superfluous extremities. Yes, that's right they don't have enough friends to form a proper band so they make do with a drummer and a single guitarist/bassist. This simple act immediately makes them, in the eyes of those who don't know any better, amazing! Outstanding! Incredible! Or in the not so humble opinion of this correspondent. Tosh. See, now I don't particularly care that such a ground breaking set-up is as old as the hills. I don't particular care that if you scratch the surface of the "scene" there are already more than enough of these groundbreaking "bands" oozing out of the cracks in the woodwork, no, I just care that the music isn't actually any good. I just care about the complete lack of imagination that these bands invariably show. When there is just two of you in a band you can pretty much play anything and it will sound alright, these bands play "big riffs," "big stereotypical rock riffs." Over and over again. As if there aren't enough bands playing that crap already. But as there are only two of them in the band peddling that crap it suddenly becomes amazing! Outstanding! Incredible! Give me a break.

Teen Amateur
Chrismartin
That Fucking Tank

[Starter]

Ah MySpace, a valuable resource for the modern local band. It brings people together, allows you to get your music out there, and most importantly of all, it means that us here at EAHO towers can make sure we don't waste our time by going to see your crappy gigs. It's like trying before you buy without the guilt.

And that brings us nicely to todays local band, [Starter]. [Starter] are typical of local bands in that they produce generic plod along indie rock with nothing at all to make them stand out from the crowd. Their singer commits the cardinal sin of adopting a faux US accent, which just serves to make his nasal whine more irritating and alas ultimately forgettable. [Starter] do nothing you haven't heard before and nothing that you won't hear again, but at least with the help of MySpace you won't make the mistake of going to see them.

[Starter] on MySpace

Destined to stay local.

Satans Little Heartbreakers

There's not that much to be said about Satans Little Heartbreakers that their video doesn't already say, except that their singers nickname is "2 dicks." That'll be five dicks in the band then.