April 2007

With the indefatigable Blackbelt Jonez

Pop Levi invents the wheel

Clearly a favourite with boys and girls, mums and dads, ducks and squirrels etc, Pop Levi (real name Poppy Levington) has hit upon a great new idea. Brace yourselves: “People are encouraged to add Pop Levi’s instant messenger alter ego to their ‘buddy lists’ for a chance to chat to him using the popular instant messenger services”. The artificial intelligent ‘Robopop’ has been “developed” (you know, like when they develop gum for smokers and cars that run on eggs. Painstaking months in a lab, etc) to chat about Pop’s releases. That’s nice, dear. Erm, how is that different to any other digital service then, apart from the fact you get an advert going “ahem – hellooo” pestering you on your desktop rather than logging on somewhere to find it in your inbox?

Anyway, Robopop will send fans video and audio clips and links to live dates. Again, not super different to MySpace is it? This nifty promotional tool is presumably to aid the sales of the forthcoming “The Return To Form Black Magick Party” on Ninja Tune’s new label, Counter Records.

Journalists be wary. If you do interview Pop Levi at any stage he will insist on reading transcripts before publishing and adding a ‘k’ to any ‘magic’ references. It’s not that he believes that ‘magick’ is the science and art of causing change to occur in conformity with the will, but more that he once cheated at Scrabble with this spelling and until the person he cheated is ‘out of the picture’ he has to cover his shame with smoke, mirrors and a biro. Despite cheating at board games, Pop Levi’s music is more than tolerable so it’s worth tuning in, if only to cheer up Robopop (a six year old boy who eats batteries and has foil stapled to his face).

For Aim or iChat use robopoplevi
For MSN use robopoplevi@hotmail.com

It’s A Family With Hair

Families in the music industry have released albums with varying degrees of success in the charts and beyond. Over the years, The Corrs, The Jackson 5, Spandau Ballet and The Nolan Sisters have all guzzled long and hard from the goblet of greatness. In ‘The Krays’ Gary and Martin Kemp done us all a favour and punched each other in the face loads. Last month, Jermaine Jackson managed to come second on Celebrity Big Brother. As recently as 2004 The Nolans took part in a filmed experiment on telephone telepathy (really), and as you read this The Corrs (probably excluding Jim) will still be getting their pretty heads superimposed onto porn models in The Sport because they’re too selfish to take their clothes off for the benefit of others.

However, Jim and William Reid formally of The Jesus And Mary Chain are sticking to playing music after a failed farm takeover proved a bridge too far for the Scottish rockers… The collapse of their Cheeses and Dairy Chain project hit them hard but was enough to convince them that their future was back on the big stage, playing music and not knee deep in shit attaching devices to cow’s udders.

It’s already been announced that The Jesus And Mary Chain will perform at The Coachella Valley Music And Arts Festival, California in April this year but the hot news is that they will be performing on Sister Linda Reid’s “Little Pop Rock” album under the moniker Sister Vanilla on March 19th. Whether Sister Vanilla can live up to the massive reputation left by the brothers’ former band remains to be seen, as does the answer to the question “good or not?” The sound is similarly heavy but this time round it’s laced with lazy lady vocals (a good thing) so chances are thumbs will be pointing skywards.

It’s alright Pa, I’m only boozing.

Bryan Ferry is becoming a bit of a regular in our news column. This time round we’re announcing his ‘Dylanesque’ release on March 5th which is an album of – you’ve guessed it – Bob Dylan covers. In 1973, he had an idea: “I just thought it would be great to make a whole album of Dylan songs. And at the end of last year, finally, it happened.” Next year, look out for the shoe with the flappy sole that Bryan had been meaning to glue since the late ‘60s. “When I put my mind to it, I always get the job done – even it does take me 30 years sometimes,” he never said.

‘Dylanesque’ was recorded in just over a week and is likely to gain recognition from hardcore Ferry fans although quite what Dylan has to say about it is another matter entirely. “What would I say if I did meet him?” asks Ferry. “I hope you don’t mind.”

Quite. I’d imagine that the royalty cheques and partial deafness will soften the blow for Bob. In fact, perhaps he won’t notice at all, Bryan. You know, the same way your son Otis didn’t notice that he was drinking triple vodka Red Bulls at a party before careering home in a VW doing 20mph. Crazy like a foxhunter.

Stooges fill stadiums. Conservatives fill their pants

A few years ago a wit devised the idea for ‘Deadstock’, an imaginary festival where the rotting corpses of deceased musicians were “dug up, brushed down and plugged in”. Social commentators may argue that this was a statement of how poor our current pool of entertainers are, that a parade of blue lipped blues musicians and bullet ridden bad boys would fill the void now occupied by James Blunt, 50 Cent and fucking Razorlight. Whilst a concert featuring Notorious B.I.G jamming with Hendrix would be delightful, a parade of electric zombie musicians could never happen. Or could it? No, of course it couldn’t. European law wouldn’t allow it and it’d stink to high heaven. However, edging towards the ‘next best thing’ title comes the news that The Stooges have been back in the studio for the first time in 33 years. The New York Dolls have already dropped an album that got critics hot in their special places and now Iggy, plus two of the original band members, guitarist Ron Asheton and drummer Scott Asheton are next up to bat.

‘The Weirdness’ is out on 19th March and is produced by Steve Albini who worked with Nirvana and The Pixies. The release of the album will be followed by a full world tour that will probably disturb people to within inches of their timid lives, not least because of what these fellas probably look like right now. Tip: If you’re one of those dirty buggers so into weight-lifting women that you have a parade of muscular beauties on your PC as wallpaper you can always lie to people and tell them it’s Iggy.

Yellow Snow Patrol

What can you say about Snow Patrol? Too much really, and none of it nice. The question should really be ‘What can you say about the people who buy Snow Patrol?’ because if we’re going to deflate their gassy bubble of blandness then we may as well pray for collapse of the lung that inflated it and their egos in the first place.

Arise, iTunes and its loyal suckling flock, who in all of their wisdom voted Snow Patrol’s ‘Eyes Open’ as ‘Best Alternative Album of the Year’. Unless this category is really ‘Best Alternative To Dry Shaving Your Testicles And Applying Vinegar To Soothe’ then the question begs – alternative to what?

The latest offering from Snow Patrol apparently featured in the final episode of the last season of ER. An amputation scene would be the likely visual compliment to this sing-along, but it’s far more likely to depict a surgeon hugging a widow in the rain. An appeal has been lodged to Snow Patrol by those of us at Beatmag. Chaps, if you’re reading this could you please release future material in braile format only? Thanks x

Filed under: Culture, News by Flexmaster Nylon
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