2012 in Music

January
"Tidal" - Imogen Heap (x)
I listened to this on a beach on New Year's Eve last year, and the year before somewhere else, holding onto a Thai lantern full of wishes and letting it go as midnight struck. This song fills you with a kind of unexplainable intrinsic motivation, the rhythm to run and skip and make big decisions. Imogen Heap has stated it's about being on a beach and trying to get someone to have meaningless sex with you. It's also about spontaneity and what it is to be carefree, a beautiful arrangement of acoustic guitar, of flute and a keytar solo right in the middle.

February
"The One You Say Goodnight To" - Kina Grannis (x)
I saw Kina play in Manchester Academy, one of my old favourite venues, this month. "The One You Say Goodnight To" is, nothing original, a pop song about love, but like all of her music completely acoustic and stripped back.

March
"Give It All Back" - Noah and the Whale (x)
In March, my two best friends and I went to Manchester to see this band play. We couldn't get a train home until 5am so ended up all telling our parents we were at each other's houses, staying out in the city killing time for the whole night. It was fucking freezing and we stood outside until 2 waiting to meet the band because we had nothing else to do. When Charlie Fink, Tom Hobden, Michael Petulla, Fred Abbott and Urby came outside, all I had for them to sign was a copy of F. Scott Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise which I had with me on the train, and it sits happily today on my bookshelf. That night was perfect, walking around the streets of Manchester in the cold, a taste of freedom, a little danger and a lot of dancing. This band really brought my friends and I together for a time and this song will always be one of those that did it the most, kooky keyboard patterns and electric guitars blended with lyrics that talk of lost youth, innocence and mistakes. I think I like Noah and the Whale so much because their music is completely authentic, but they don't deny cheesy outfits and gimmicks occasionally. They manage to mix meaningless fun and soul, something I think is very hit and miss.

April
"The Woods" - Bon Iver (x)
Bon Iver is incredible, the way Justin Vernon writes music is a complete recreation and reinvention of sound. "The Woods" is from their EP Blood Bank, and is an adventure, one line sung over and over again in the most melancholy way, playing with the roots of the melody and the harmonies around it each time. This record came to Ishgul with me, where I went with my family in the spring. The forest, the snow and the wooden lodges are the perfect backdrop to listen to Bon Iver.

May
"Rivers and Roads" - The Head and the Heart (x)
A band from Seattle, the Head and the Heart make music that is true and uncomplicated, the kind of gorgeous folk music that reflects family and community. They just bring it all back to home, acoustic guitars and perfect harmonies. I listened to it lots in the last few weeks of high school, but also I sang this song playing in a bar over the summer, splitting the audience into halves and asking them to sing in harmony, assigning each a part. It was one of those things that would have been really awkward if it messed up but just went perfectly, and I couldn't stop smiling.

June
"Fighting Arizona" - Bo Bruce (x)
Bo was a contestant on The Voice this year, a show I watched one night when I was babysitting because I didn't have another choice and ended up completley captivated by her voice, going against all of my 'reality-TV-is-stupid' moals. I bought her EP Search The Night at the start of June, and had this weekend in Hamburg literally a few hours after I got it, listened to it as I spent a lot of time cycling alone. I love every song on this album but this song was there one night in the early summer when everything was going wrong. I sat by the railway line at three o clock with a packet of cigarettes and this playing, just listening to the words because nothing else could be made sense of. "If you'll be my lost my found, reject the dark, reject your crown, I swear, you'll never go back down." Bo wrote "Fighting Arizona" about a friend she met in rehab, struggling against the contagious cycle of addiction and crime. I like the video of this song, too, because it is an honest representation, it just looks real, the cast in it aren't glossy-haired, shiny-toothed actors and actresses, no falsified beauty or glamourisation of the fact.

July
"Samson" - Regina Spektor (x)
I went to see Regina Spektor play in the most impromtu of situation, finding tickets on eBay literally a few hours before and hopping on a train to Manchester as quick as I could. She's amazing, every song of hers playful and magical, drifting between languages, between instrument  between topics of lyrics. But I love "Samson" because it's simple and peaceful and also there is so much to find in its words, a story based on the bible with the most beautiful of imagery.

August
"Charlie Brown" - Coldplay/Bo Bruce's cover (x)
I feel like including somebody's cover is cheating, but I love both versions of this song, admittedly not knowing it until when Bo Bruce sang it on Saturday night TV, the most magical moment. August was my first trip to London on my own, and this show changed my life. Through this artist I have made friends and been on adventures, and I will go on more, I know that, it's also the reason I started going out busking this summer, something else that changed my life. Her album is due for release next year, which I'm really excited about.
As for Coldplay, I've noticed this stigma around liking them (interestingly only with British people, French or American I've talked to don't seem to mind) and I think that, similarly to Ed Sheeran, they get a lot of credit for a genre that isn't exclusively there's. Having said that, "Mylo Xyloto" is a really special album and I think they've written some gorgeous songs, this being one of my favourites.

September
"You Won't Feel A Thing" - The Script (x)
Their third album "#3" came out this month, which I wrote about here at the time. There's a lot of good and bad about  The Script, but they were one of the first bands I got to like by myself, in 2008, aged twelve, and I got to rediscover them this year after Danny O'Donoghue's appearance on The Voice and discovered Science and Faith is such a smart, heartfilled and genuine pop-rock record. This is the first song on the album, about overcoming pain and trust.

October
"Wires" - Athlete (x)
I saw Athlete play this month literally ten minutes from my house, and heard "Wires" a couple of weeks before. It came at the perfect time, it related to something that was happening in my family. It still is, I still listen to it nearly every day. It absolutely breaks my heart and the music that was 2012 for me can't be talked about without mentioning the woman that sat next to me at the show that night and gave me the most comforting of smiles as I cried, make-up streaming down my face Joker-style. Joel Pott is an incredible songwriter, and this band so underrated.

November
"The Bed Song" - Amanda Palmer (x)
This is probably cheating because it was at the end of October I went to see Amanda Palmer play, but it doesn't matter, things don't always fit. This song is the saddest of stories, in 3/4, a series of snapshots of two people at different points in their lives as they drift away from each other.

December
"Lover of the Light" - Mumford and Sons (x)
I wrote about this really recently, but after a long wait I finally went to see Mumford and Sons play towards the end of this year. "Babel", their second album, was released this September, and it's everything it promised. This song is one of my favourites, that banjo line just gets me every time.

I had so much trouble choosing a song for each month this year, and forced myself to cut it down and not use more than one. So much music old and new has woven its way into my life this year, some that fits nicely with timings and events and other songs that are just always around. Ben Howard's "Promise" deserves a mention, "Cosmic Love" by Florence and the Machine, "The Boxer" by Simon and Garfunkel and "Good Ol' Days" by The Script, which has sort of become the song that gets played when I'm with my friends and we're drinking, as has, regrettably, Taylor Swift's "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together." I discovered Kate Bush this year and therefore have to include "Running Up That Hill", and also "And The Boys" by Angus and Julia Stone which I listened to on long drives across France with my exchange family over the summer. There will be others I've forgotten and want to kick myself when I realise.


I know these aren't all from this year, obviously. They were just in it a lot for me.

I'm going to finish with the song (below) from the night that changed my life this year, back in the summer, in London. Not going to lie, you can totally spot me dancing with tear-filled eyes in this video if you concentrate.

I am going away for a while and will be back January. Thanks for sticking around, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year xxxx


Bo Bruce - "Charlie Brown" - Live at The Garage, Islington



"We run riot -
We'll be glowing in the dark"

'After the show, you cannot sing wherever you want'

This is "Sing" - The Dresden Dolls

Whenever I walk away from a gig after it's over, I think about how these moments of euphoria all of the people in that room just experienced are falling apart, drifting away, and we have no choice but to welcome it. It's just crazy to me. We are surrounded by each other, the band have just left the stage, the last song is still bouncing around our heads and it is something so many want to cling on to. And then you're getting further and further away. Away from the stage, past the merch table, walking past all of these people in the car park or outside the venue that saw what you saw, felt what you felt, and getting further away from it, then getting in the car, on the train, on the bus, in the taxi to leave. They're getting further away. The cars on the road aren't all theirs. The people on the street aren't all them. And then you pass a certain point and they're gone.

The other night after I saw Florence, there were a carful of drunk guys singing "Dog Days Are Over" out of the windows, and so I joined in as I passed. And they slurred "woo"'s. And it felt like clinging on.

There is no option but to get off of the rollercoaster and stand on the ground and go back to real life. You can't live like this all the time.

These last couple of months and especially this last week have been surreal. Concert after concert, spending money I can't really afford to spend and it has been so perfect. Last Friday I finally went to see Mumford and Sons, which I wrote about, and then Monday was another show which I should have some kind of hopefully coherent write-up of tomorrow. The thing that happened today was something different, that I'm not allowed to talk about for a while, but it was unexpectedly amazing.

It is so weird to think that this is my life now, this is the thing that keeps me going. I'm probably annoying to be around now, most long winded conversations with me involve me telling an anecdote about a recent gig I went to. My room is covered in setlists, tickets, and you'll most likely find me wearing a paper venue bracelet I don't have the heart to take off yet.

I don't know if this is a good thing to hold on to, because it's such a fleeting source of happiness, it's not something you can rely on all of the time. It's a few months now, I think, until I'm going to a show again, and it's going to be strange and I'm going to miss it but there are going to be so many more.

I guess it's just strange returning to real life and all the things I have ignored. I'm not sure I'm ready to leave Wonderland.

Mumford and Sons - Friday 7th December 2012 - LG Arena, Birmingham

Mumford and Sons are considered one of the bands that the increasingly popular genre that so frequently gets referred to now as “nu-folk” stemmed from. They are Ben Lovett, Marcus Mumford, “Country” Winston and Ted Dwane and long with the likes of Noah and the Whale, Laura Marling and Johnny Flynn,  the four of them met amongst a circle of musicians in a London folk club that became a community and wrote together, played in each other's bands et cetera. Their name is chosen for its similarity to that of an old English family business.

They didn't stay small. Now, they win Grammys and fill arenas and perform in the White House.

I was late to the party with Mumford and Sons, buying "Sigh No More" in late 2010 but I fell in love with their music so easily, and consider them one of my favourite bands. Their first album is rousing folk-rock, revolutionising the banjo and the mandolin, glittering with lyrics that frequently reference Shakespearian literature and the bible. "Babel", their second release from September this year, follows the winning formula.

The LG Arena that night was so profoundly their's, decorated with trademark strings of fairy lights hanging over the crowd and the Gentlemen of the Road logo across the curtain, the four red flags that symbolise their new album hanging gratuitously above the stage.

Support kicked off with the unenthusiastic, witty and completely hilarious Piff the Magic Dragon, who entertained the crowd with magic tricks. He was followed by Post War Years, a band that brought together rock and electronica in a set that had the crowd dancing. The third of their opening bands were Dawes, a band from Los Angeles that carry reminders of both Dire Straits and Ryan Adams in their music, but you can also hear Mumford and Sons in them. After this, Piff the Magic Dragon came on for a second set, bringing with him this time a chihuahua.

At nine pm, the lights went down, to huge amounts of applause, and those first piercing and sharp chords of "Babel" shone out through the arena. And the curtains came down.

The crowd were open-hearted and loud, singing along with every word of "Babel". Seeing Marcus, Winston, Ben and Ted for those first few minutes was completely surreal, it never feels quite real when I see a band play for the first time, especially when their voices and their sound has been along with me every day for years before. They brought so much life and energy to the stage from those first few moments.

"I Will Wait" is all jangling guitar rhythms and rousing choruses; it had the whole crowd dancing, and there is something special about crying out "Raise my hands, paint my spirit gold!" aloud, along with a giant arena full of other humans, doing and feeling the same. For "Winter Winds", a song from the first album, Marcus took on an electric mandolin, and every moment of it reminds me of Christmas. "Below My Feet" is thoughtful and soft, with more of a focus on keyboard than most other songs, during which they sing together in perfect harmony. Those moments in which all of the instruments stop, leaving the room alone with the four guys and their voices, were some of the most beautiful of the night.

This was followed with "White Blank Page", beautifully bursting with passion and anger. Tonight, they said, was the third time only they had played "Hopeless Wanderer" to an audience but like everything else it was flawless, rousing feet to dance and warming hearts' cockles with contagious melodies and beautiful words as hands slammed violently and impossibly quickly across strings.

"So when your hope's on fire
But you know your desire
Don't hold a glass over the flame, don't let your heart grow cold,
I will call you by name, I will share your road."

This intense spell of energy was followed by "Timshel" - the song entitled after an old-English word meaning "thou mayest", a moment of quiet and beauty. It's a song that always reminds me of Christmas. "As brothers we will stand and we'll hold your hand." 

"Little Lion Man" was That One everyone knew the words to, the whole crowd chanting the chorus from the bottoms of their lungs. "Thistle and Weeds", strong and stormy and loud, blew over into "Ghosts That We Knew", the most tender of melodies, a comfort blanket of a song, sounding so fragile though it never could break.

"Lover of the Light" was one of the most beautiful moments of the night for me, and there's a particular banjo line in this one - you'll probably know which I mean - that tangles right through my heartstrings every time. During this song Marcus went over to drums.

Support band Dawes came back on to join them for "Awake My Soul", as did Piff the Magic Dragon who helpfully fed Winston Doritos. That song sounds like the walk you take that makes you think differently, or just like breathing in fresh air. "Roll Away Your Stone" is playful and loud and full of life, has your feet stomping. "Whispers in the Dark" is romantic and swings between the loud and the quiet.

I was so pleased that they played "Dust Bowl Dance", a song different to all of their others, it is a ballad in the traditional sense that it tells a story. It is dark, growing in pace, lyrics that talk of betrayal and, most of all, of revenge, complete proof that folk music does indeed rock out a lot.

They left, and then, for encores, emerged on a smaller stage right in the middle of the crowd, just the four of them crowded around one acoustic guitar. They sang "Where Are You Now?" in gorgeous four part harmony, the tale of someone lost without a trace. This moment of peace and quiet continued with "Reminder", before the band headed back to the main stage and played "The Cave", a song that's become an absolute anthem. It was a moment of complete communion, and assured me however big this band gets, however big venues they are playing, it does not mean there will be distance. Where I was that night, squashed up in the front row, the room felt tiny and everyone close by.

They brought Dawes back on for the last song, a cover of the Beatles' "With A Little Help from My Friends" which was both brilliant and hilarious, Ted and Winston leaning towards the mic in unison to sing backing vocals and Marcus and Dawes' vocalist both singing lead.

Mumford and Sons had as much heart and enthusiasm in the huge LG Arena than they would have playing in a tiny venue where everyone was quiet or a pub where nobody would listen, I'm sure, because you can tell so easily that they just love doing this. They breathe life into their music, they stick with their roots and explore at the same time, and I don't think this is going to change, however "mainstream" or not they are considered. The idea of "Mumford and Sons" as an old English family business completely defines and influences their music, carrying all the values of something shared through love, pride and community. 

***
A Really Slushy Note:
This took two days to make myself write because I have these childish feelings of not wanting it to be over, wanting to cling on in every way possible and blogging about a concert is always sort of like the last step in the process for me. I've loved Mumford and Sons for two years and during this time I have had a lot of almosts in terms of getting to their shows and then being disappointed. When I was fourteen one of my friends went and my mum didn't let me, because it was on a week day, it was too far away for me to go on my own, various other things that didn't seem sensible at the time and to be honest still don't really. Then earlier this year they were in England when I was in Hamburg, which was really frustrating. So it didn't seem real when we finally got tickets in October. It was in a lot of ways nothing like I thought. I wasn't there with the person I thought I'd be going with, and they played songs I didn't think they would, and vice versa didn't play songs I would sure would be on the set list. It didn't matter, it was really perfect.
I want there to be a neat way to conclude this but there isn't. I suppose what I'm saying is, that band you are waiting to see that you listen to every day, it is so worth it to keep trying. Even if you live on a tiny goat farm somewhere and you need to travel, or it means you have to cut back on spending on other things for a while.
It is worth it. Honest.

I hope you're all well. I'll be back really soon.
Sincerely, with post-gig depression and a heavy heart,

Lizzie xxxxxxxxxx

"my love is in the water"

I don't really know how to begin to tell you about Bo.

You might remember, I went to see her play over the summer, in a tiny venue in Islington, and it was just one of the most magical nights I've experienced. It sort of changed my life. That sounds very teenage girlish, very melodramatic, but it did. I still think about it every single day. Bo Bruce is not the typical contestant that emerges from reality TV contests. She writes from the heart, beautifully and honestly. This is not demonstrated more than in "The Fall", a collaboration with Johnny McDaid, which she released today. It is here.



"THE FALL" - Bo Bruce

It's gorgeous, and I was so pleased to see that the studio version of the song isn't much more than the simple piano arrangement it carried when I first heard her play it. Filmed in the woods in Wiltshire, where she grew up, everything about this song is personal, honest and so incredibly brave, and visually, this music video is stunning, the costumes, the forest and the fire are nothing over-clichéd. Her voice, the way she looks and the way she puts across her thoughts into music are beautiful in all ways.

I am so sorry for the lack of eloquence today.

Bo's album is due out early next year and wrapping up recording at the moment. She is working with heroes and friends old and new, including Danny O'Donoghue, Joel Pott, Johnny McDaid, Henry Binns and many more.

And for now, "The Fall" is avaliable for free download, for limited time, here.

"Halycon" - Ellie Goulding

"Halycon" is Ellie Goulding's second release, following her hit album "Lights", 2010. She's from Herefordshire in England, makes music that is sometimes electric, sometimes more orchestral, and nearly always stems from an acoustic guitar and her gorgeous soprano vocals. "Halycon" is darker and more adventurous than her first album, heavily inspired by a break-up.

"Don't Say A Word", the first track on the album, is the most unordered and beautiful arrangement of Goulding's vocals, which are so angelic and effervescent particularly in this one. Caresses for the ears. It follows by "My Blood", which is a little darker, drum-heavy and twinkles along the upper end of a piano during the chorus. 

"Anything Can Happen" was the first single from this album, one of those that you recognise as soon as you hear her sing that very first bar. Ellie Goulding sings of regret, and hope. This song just soars and swoops around your head, her beautiful voice around you from all four corners. It is absolute magic, a breath of life.

What I love about this album is how natural it sounds; "Only You" kicks off with raw vocals, and a rhythm sounding like clapping hands. "Baby, I'm on my knees" repeats like a chant, music brought right back to its roots. "Halycon" is, I guess, a little chattier than the others lyrically, and it is so beautiful, rising from acoustic guitar beginnings to something bigger and more electronic, a constant variation on volume and weight, until it fades away.

"Figure 8" is so very haunting, a story of love and a call of desperation. It draws in harps, synthesisers, massive pressing drum beats, and it's like nothing she has ever done before. The combination of these instruments and, of course, the gigantic vocals, remind me of Florence, and in a way Kate Bush. It drives off in places you wouldn't expect, a really beautiful song.

Next is "JOY"; a rest and a moment of peace, of quiet. Gorgeous strings lift and dive around her voice. "I'm seeing stars, watch me fall apart." It sounds like dreams, or like the winter, like the walk you take the morning after to think and take things in.

"Hanging On" is a little closer to electronica than most, the kind of song you could both dance to or lie in peace and quiet, a cover of Active Child's. Like most of this record, it lacks the structure we expect from a typical pop song, lifting between stretches of lyricless vocals, repeated single lines and non-choruses, and this is brilliant.

Another odd, courageous and choral opening starts off "Explosions", later bringing in strings and a piano. "It will never be the same." This later combines with drums, and Ellie Goulding's lovely voice sounds just as perfect like this, restrained and quiet at times.

"I Know You Care" is beautiful, so sad and gentle and nostalgic, a song about love broken and lost. "Atlantis" follows it, in which she sings the lyrics in that intentionally blurred way, similarly to Bon Iver, the way that doesn't let you concentrate on it too much. It is so gorgeous, some of the things she does with her voice in this song is just incredible. It is so large and bright, and almost sounds cinematic at times.

The last song on the album, "Dead in the Water" is barely instrumental for its first two minutes, leaving the listener along with Goulding's beautiful voice. It is sorrowful, brings the album to a close in peace and calm. Everything about this album is so ethereal and pretty, and I really believe that after the success of "Lights", she's finding her feet even more.

Ben Howard - Monday 12th November 2012 - O2 Apollo, Manchester

Ben Howard is from Devon, a singer-songwriter who, along with Mumford and Sons, Pete Roe, and such, is lumped in a genre that gets called "nu-folk". He's also compared to John Martyn increasingly often. His album "Every Kingdom" was released last year, and received a Mercury prize nomination in 2012.

Manchester Apollo filled up quick last night with an odd mix come to see him - an audience dominated by girls, but there were a lot of couples there too, and guys in their early twenties and thirties. The old, converted cinema welcomed support act Willy Mason - a country singer, I suppose, he played alone, sometimes with a second guitarist and sang of pick-ups trucks and suicide. He's really great, and I hope he's going do well, especially with Jake Bugg making this kind of thing cool again.

There was the wait, that time of achy backs and wondering if you should have bought a drink whilst the bar was still accessible.

And then the lights went out.

Ben Howard opened with the soft plucking of an electric guitar in the dark, whispers of cymbals. He opened with "Burgh Island", one of the darker, quieter ones from his new EP and it was just stunning. "Diamonds" followed, in which the stage lit up slowly, the entire audience singing along with the chorus.

His band was a beautifully disarranged affair, the drummer played bass at times, guitarist would switch to keyboard and then there was India Bourne, who contributed harmonies, played cello, drums, and bass, moving around throughout the show. It was perfect.

One of the best things about the setlist that night was that one mood would be carried through several songs. Whilst there's still a mixture, two or three lively ones that bring the crowd to dancing and screaming out the lyrics will be followed by a quieter, more solemn moment. His music is sort of a constant stream - several songs drift gracefully into the next, as they do on the album.

Highlights included "Old Pine", a really beautiful moment in which the crowd sang along throwing out full heart and soul, and the incredible energy of "The Wolves". "Esmerelda" is from his new release, "The Burgh Island EP", and brought to the stage it was haunting. With sound and vision, he cast the ocean and the rocks across the venue, and it was so very stunning. "Keep Your Head Up", also, was a moment of such unity for everyone in the room.

Ben finished with "The Fear", one of his biggest singles, and that was a really amazing moment, everyone along the front rows singing and dancing and proving that folk music can and does rock out a lot.

He and the band left the stage. The lights stayed out. The crowd cheered and cheered for an encore.

They returned, to an overwhelming raise in applause and in happiness. He played "Black Flies", one of the more sorrowful tracks from "Every Kingdom", the sort of song you find new things in each time you listen to. The main guitar riff just runs right through your chest, pulses through your veins when it's that loud and atmouspheric around you.

Ben followed this with "Promise", the last song of the night. I love this one because it's not a pop song in the sense that it lacks structure, it lacks choruses and verses, it's just a beautiful train of thoughts set to melody.

"Meet me there,

Bundles of flowers, we'll wait through the hours of cold."

In his lyrics, Ben Howard brings nature alive in a way that I haven't heard anyone else. His music is the woods, and the deepest parts of the sea. Through his show, visuals on a screen at the back painted pictures of travelling along dark roads, crashing waves at seasides, forests. But I think those images were there anyway, with Ben Howard's beautiful words bringing about these settings just through sound. And I think provoking the imagination is one of the most powerful things music can do.

"how she haunted our homes, how she haunted our homes"

"POMPEII" - Bear's Den

Bear's Den are a band signed to Communion records, making the kind of folk music that will appeal to lovers of Mumford and Sons, Ben Howard and probably early Noah and the Whale. It's natural and simplistic, shown especially in the video above, an acoustic performance for Bands In Transit.

"Pompeii" is one of the most beautiful songs I've come across in a while. It tells a story of childhood naivety, grief and acceptance. A soft and simple guitar riff, and the vocals of ex-Cherbourg singer, Andrew Davie, it just instantly touches your heart, in the most impromptu and unexpected manner, exploring and explaining grief honestly and from all four corners.

"Don't cry,
Hold your head up high,
She would want you to,
She would want you to."

On Halloween: Six Spooky Songs

I know that several of these are likely by the same artists and bands. I have these few that I relate with Halloween, with the night and the fear and the unexpected and several of their songs came up at once.
But I won't apologize, because all of them are great.
Ghouls and ghosts and knives and touchy subjects



"THE KILLING TYPE" - AMANDA PALMER & THE GRAND THEFT ORCHESTRA
A rock song. Morality, what it means to kill, and a video filled with blood and guts.




"THRILLER" - (MICHAEL JACKSON COVER) - IMOGEN HEAP
One of the most famous pop songs of all time, but softer and slower and creepier than you've ever heard. Just her voice and a piano. Kind of fascinating.




"JENNY WAS A FRIEND OF MINE" - THE KILLERS
A song about a murder, a trial and guilt, one that will shake your head and your heart. "She couldn't scream when I held her close." Heavy, pure rock music.




"MY SECRET FRIEND" - IAMX & IMOGEN HEAP
IAMX as a band are so gothic in style, and so uncensored in the way that they use instruments and write lyrics. Any of their music videos could have fitted with the Halloween I suppose - they're all a little spooky, a little dark, a little twisted - but this one especially, with Chris Corner and Imogen Heap both dressed in drag and creeping around an empty old house.




"MONSTER" - AUTOMATIC
A song that will have you headbanging, a sticky-glue guitar riff and a chorus I'm sure you'll remember everyone singing the few years ago when this was released. "What's that coming over the hill, is it a monster?!"
A thank you to my friend @CallMeKTown for submitting




"MISSED ME" - THE DRESDEN DOLLS
A duo of piano and drums, the Dresden Dolls are two percussionists and this gives so much weight and dynamic to their music. From the point of view of a psycho-girlfriend, "Missed Me" is haunting and a little bit hilarious, it grows verse by verse.

Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra - Wednesday 24th October 2012 - Manchester Cathedral

When I was eleven years old, I stumbled across the Dresden Dolls on the Internet. I was maybe too young at the time, but it did me no bad, and Amanda Palmer and Brian Viglione's music opened my mind at a time it needed to be opened. A little later, I bought Amanda's solo album "Who Killed Amanda Palmer?", and this year her new release, "Theatre is Evil", with her new band the Grand Theft Orchestra. On Wednesday, I went to see her play at Manchester Cathedral for the very first time.

I arrived at the Cathedral that afternoon way too early, and walked around inside for a while to kill some time. When I got outside I knew I hadn't done something stupid by arriving at three o clock, because people were already there and they were unmistakeably Amanda Palmer fans. They were dressed up, in bright lipstick and dramatic eyeliner and a lot of black lace and tattoos, with more ukeleles than I think I've ever seen in one place.

I don't quite know how it happened but ten or twenty of us ended up assembled in the gardens outside the Urbis museum. People played ukeleles whilst everyone sang together, a girl dressed in steampunk attire recited poetry and every so often random passers-by would stop, kind of confused about whatever it was that went on.

When doors opened at seven o clock, the crowd assembled around the small stage, in the centre of the crucifix that beautiful Manchester Cathedral is shaped as. And then, unexpectedly, a brass band started to play, and the whole audience swivelled to face the back of the building where they appeared from. They were the Horndog Brass Brand, from Edinburgh, and it was a such a perfect opening to the loud and theatrical nature of Amanda Palmer's show.

After the cathedral's reverend (!) came on to ask for donations and tell everyone to have a good time, Amanda introduced Jherek Bischoff, of the Grand Theft Orchestra, the second support act. Jherek was a bass player accompanied with strings, conducting them not with his hands but his entire body as he moved about the stage, lurching from side to side. He went from bass to ukelele, very song he played was radically different from the one before.

Amanda came on to introduce the next of her opening bands, and in attempt to "loosen up" the quiet and respectful audience, instructed everyone to close their eyes, turn their head towards the ceiling, throw their arms open and on 1, 2, 3,  scream.
We all did. All at once. And being surrounded by chaos I think it was one of the most relaxing moments I've experienced.
The band she was introducing were The Simple Pleasure, an electro-punk band, their set made up of sparkly costumes and thrown around flamingo sculptures, a lot of dancing and audience interaction.

And then Amanda Fucking Palmer came on.

She appeared above the stage, singing down from a balcony, the whole place dark except for a spotlight on her. It was very Phantom of the Opera, as she sang completely acapella, surveying the cathedral, an old English folk song.

Amanda descended to the stage as "A Grand Theft Intermission" was played, big and striking and drastic, and she and her drummer threw out bunches of flowers to the audience. She made every song an anthem, the whole audience dancing and singing along with the words as if it were all that they believed, teenage kids and men, and women in lipstick and coloured wigs.

Her band, the Grand Theft Orchestra, were individually so talented and perfectly woven together as a whole, and you could just tell each of them shared everything about Amanda's ethos and attitude to music. Amanda herself was so passionate, slaying piano and at one point caressing the hair of the guy in front of me during "The Killing Type" when she stood up to sing, leaning right into the crowd and holding eye contact.





















"Smile" was amazing, every member of the audience singing along, on the tips of their toes, and "The Bed Song"  beautiful and heartbreaking, but the show was as playful as it was serious and intense. During "Missed Me", Amanda and her band would freeze like dolls, then spring to action and run across the stage to trade instruments between each verse, going from piano to bass to drums and back.

Amanda Palmer is one of the most hardworking and honest musicians I can think of, and as she went past the venue's curfew it wasn't possible for her to play an encore. She shrugged this off, of course, as no problem and told the crowd she would find somewhere "Probably legal" outdoors to finish the show. This ended up being the gatepost of the cathedral gardens, where most of the crowd gathered around outside to listen to her play "Oasis", an ironically cheerful song about abortion, "Creep", a cover of Radiohead's classic and "Ukelele Anthem" on her ukelele, singing along with every word.
"Stop pretending art is hard."

Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra are back in the UK in March next year, and touring the world between then and now. If you go to her website you can look at tour dates, or buy her new album, which is also avaliable for free download if you're broke.

And I can't really think of a better way to conclude this, than saying how I have never witnessed more of a sense of mutual love between absolute strangers, than over something such as an Amanda Palmer show. Because more than the perfection or the chaos, all that art boils down to is the ways that it brings people together.

Athlete - Sunday 14th October 2012 - The Crown Hotel Ballroom, Nantwich

Athlete are an indie-rock band from London, made up of Joel Pott, Carey Willetts, Tim Wanstall and Stephen Roberts. They had a lot of success in the mid 2000s at the same time as bands like Snow Patrol and the Kaiser Chiefs, when music like this was becoming "cool" again. You've probably heard of them for singles "Vehicles and Animals and "Superhuman Touch" - a song I first heard in 2009, then lost for a while. Literally, I lost it, I could hum the chorus but didn't know the name or who it was by. A few months ago, I rediscovered it and I'm so happy I did.

I found out they were playing here about a month ago and was surprised to say the least. Nantwich is where I live, a small, kind of dreary town in the flattest county in England. It's full of Tudor buildings and independent shops, places full of trinket type gifts and old-style sweet shops, a tourist town, and apart from a few local folk bands, I'm sure you can imagine it definitely isn't the sort of place live music is abundantly alive.

This week, the Words and Music Festival has challenged this lingering sense of absolutely nothing that the town holds, though the only show I managed to get down to was Athlete at The Crown Hotel Ballroom on Sunday night, the last night of the festival. And as I normally go to Manchester, Liverpool or London to get to shows it was really nice to just walk about fifteen minutes from my house.

The opening act was Fran Smith, a piano playing singer-songwriter who's about to support folk musician Thea Gilmore on tour. She was young and nervous and smiley, but completely relaxed as she played and sang lovely compositions in a vague Yorkshire accent, dawdling between what sounded sometimes like Gaelic folk music ("We Will Have No More Marriages" in particular) and what was closer to pop music (a song I think was called "1013 Days"). Fran finished her set with "Orion", a beautiful song about two lovers, one who sleeps through the day and at night is the stars, the other goddess of the morning.

During the break, organiser Nigel Stonier came out to talk to the crowd about turning phones off. A raffle was drawn. It felt very close to home but also I knew I was at a concert, a strange juxtaposition.

And then they came on stage.

It was only Joel and Carey tonight, a stripped back acoustic set to fit the venue, a small ballroom with a bar at the back where people were drinking and talking a little too loudly during the support act.


Their music, normally entwined with a lot of keyboard effects, was just as lovely in a stripped back setting. Joel Pott switched between acoustic and electric guitars, whilst Carey Willetts did a little of everything; he played guitar, he played keyboards, sang backing vocals and used a laptop during a few songs for drum noises.

It was, I suppose, a pretty "tough crowd" - well-dressed people in their forties dawdling around getting drinks, kind of acting like they were at a bar instead of a concert and I hadn't wanted to go with the very teenage attitude of expecting people in the town I live in to be that way, but that was just how it was. Until Athlete came on stage, during which I was really pleasantly surprised. It was during "We Got the Style" that at one point Joel stopped singing and the whole crowd echoed the chorus:
"Woah, it's getting hot in here, must be something in the atmousphere."
And it made me laugh and smile so so much.

The whole show was so relaxed and the two of them clearly so comfortable on stage after all these years of doing it. There were a couple who requested a song for their wedding anniversary, stories about how recently Carey "nearly died" after epiglottitis, jokes about Westlife and much more audience interaction that I'd have expected from these weird conservative avoid-your-eyes-in-the-street people I have grown up around.

Highlights included "El Salvador", which with just a keyboard and guitar sounded so different to the album version, "Half Light", and gorgeous "Superhuman Touch", completely acoustic and so pure-sounding.

They finished with "Wires", a song about the first night of a child's life spent in hospital, "Running down corridors through, automatic doors" and it's incredible. The whole room were singing and seeing as I was there on my own and sat next to strangers it was easy to be unashamed about the fact that tears were streaming down my face, until the woman next to me turned and looked at me a little awkwardly once the song was over, all was out. But she didn't frown or look disapproving, there was no "Kids, these days." She just sort of smiled and nodded like she understood. And for once I didn't have to take a train a long way to find music and people that could restore my faith in humanity.

After ten years, a lot of hits and an Ivor Novello award, Athlete are finally winding down now, so catch them while you can - they're playing a few shows around London at the start of next month I think, then supporting Alanis Morissette on her tour in November.

An Interview with Samantha Hale

Map the Music happened when, inspired by the comfort she found in going to concerts after her father’s death, Samantha Hale started taking a video camera around with her to see the likes of Imogen Heap, Tori Amos, Carey Brothers and Zoë Keating. The result is a really beautiful documentary investigating the incredible ways that music affects people’s lives.

I asked Sam some questions about the film and its upcoming sequel.

**

You didn’t go to film school, but was film-making something you’d thought about doing before having the idea for Map the Music?

Actually, no. Ever since I was little I wanted to be an actress. I thought that was what I was meant to do. I was still pursuing it when my dad passed away, and the only reason I stopped was because it was such a difficult time for me. I had already planned to go to several of Imogen Heap’s shows before he passed, and I almost didn’t go. My friends convinced me to go and I wound up going to about 10 or so shows that tour. When Immi announced she was doing another tour later that year I decided to go again. At first I thought I would bring a little camera just to have a video blog, but then I realized there are so many people out there who use music as therapy (like I was doing,) so I thought why not document other people’s experiences as well. And that’s how it started. I kind of made it up as I went along and learned how to use the camera equipment as I went along as well…

How is Map the Music 2 going to be different from the first film?

 Well I definitely knew that I wanted to make it different than the first one. I am a bit more ambitious with this one, in the sense that I want to expand on everything really. I am interviewing a larger variety of musicians – different genres and age groups. I am interviewing people on streets in various countries – not just the USA. I am trying to show that music and love are universal. I am travelling more and working harder to get the most unique possible footage and stories that I can get. And when it comes down to it, love is a powerful, emotional and broad concept. Plus I would like to think I have grown a bit since making the first film, and it will be even more personal.

Map the Music was inspired by your dad’s death and the comfort you were able to find in music, but Map the Music 2 will be about how music ties in so closely with love. What happened in your life to make you want to focus on that?

I can laugh about it now, but it was difficult to admit at first. I got the idea for this film after having my heart broken by a man I met while filming the first MTM. Being that he is a musician, I started having a really hard time listening to some of my favorite music because some of it reminded me of him. I realized I was hearing music more intensely – both when I was with him and feeling bliss, and when I wasn’t with him and was hurt. I just blindly began filming a few months later not really knowing what I was trying to say with the film. It took me a year a filming, but I finally figured it out, and am very proud of where this film is going…

Interviewing so many people with this “addiction” to going to concerts did you notice any common answers? Is there a universal thing that keeps people coming back?

Hmmm. It’s hard to put it into words. I guess that goes hand in hand with why the power of music is so hard to explain. The most common thing I see is when I ask people about concerts, love, and music…is that their face lights up and they smile.

Do you think it’s healthy for us all to hold on to music this much for support, is it safe to depend on and have so much faith in? And how is that different with being invested in a song and invested in the person who writes it?

That’s a great question and something I absolutely address in the film. It’s a big part of the ending. It’s one of the most important themes actually. So maybe let’s talk more about this after the film comes out ;)

What’s the most ridiculous thing you have done to get to a concert? (e.g spending lots of money, travelling far, giving up something?)

Flying all over the world to Tori Amos play with a full orchestra. Totally worth the experience though. It’s a great way to see new cities with a group of friends, then everyone comes together to go see the show and it’s a beautiful experience.

Finally, best gig you’ve ever been to? (It’s totally okay to pick like, five)

Oh man. You are going to make me pick? I have been going to shows since I was 12! My first big concert was a radio station Christmas show and there were about 12 bands playing….No Doubt, Garbage, Bush… It was 1995 and I wanted to go so badly because Alanis Morissette was playing. I wound up sneaking in to the pit and got to see her right up close. I was so excited and thought I was so cool for sneaking up there!

**

Watching Map the Music was one of the most reassuring experiences I have ever been through… amid how interesting and informative it is, it’s also just like being told “Oh hey, so it turns out you’re not a complete weirdo for feeling like this" - admittedly, the first time I saw at it was very late at night, feeling like I was the last person in the world awake, and I cried and cried. Music and going to concerts are a huge part of people’s lives, it unites people, and I’m so glad someone’s bringing this to attention.

You can learn more about the movies and buy the Map the Music DVD right here, and the next film is due for release next year.

Autumn 2012 Playlist

I did one of these at Christmas last year, but I feel like Christmas definitely isn't the only time for music that's season-appropriate (it's still not okay for my dad to put "A Spaceman Came Travelling" on in September). Autumn seems like one of the saddest times of year to me, especially October time, with the sad return to real life after summer, approaching of the cold and still far away from Christmas. So, what better thing to do than wrap up by a bonfire or just go out on a long walk on your own, and listen to some really good sad music?

"The Suburbs" - Arcade Fire

Arcade Fire's album "The Suburbs" is all about the chains of middle-class, caged birds and teenage rebellion, this title track is also nostalgic and echoes love. A good back-to-school one. They're one of the best rock bands to emerge in the last couple of years.

"Panye's Bay" - Beirut

"Headstrong, today, I've been headstrong." Beirut are a great band. They're from Santa Fe and their music has always had an aged European feel to it, but their most recent album touches on home.

"Indian Summer" - Jonsi and Alex

Their music is like nothing I've heard before - I like listening to "Riceboy Sleeps" when reading because it's so subtle it doesn't interfere with your train of thought. At the same time, you can just shut your eyes and listen to these odd and beautiful falling sounds and have it completely hold your attention.

"Scar" - Lucy Rose

A folk singer, Lucy Rose's music is mostly acoustic but not afraid to rock out a bit and her new album "Like I Used To" is brilliant. "Remember how lovely we were?"  - "Scar" is soft and peaceful, a song about heartbreak. She supported Noah and the Whale earlier this year and is currently touring with Pete Roe I believe, so definitely go if you can.

"The Fire" - Imogen Heap

The crackling burning noise behind this gorgeous piano piece was recorded as Imogen threw a piece of wood that had been in the family home since childhood onto a bonfire. 

"Make It Gold" - Ohbijou

A Canadian band I was introduced to recently, this song just sounds like dreaming. It swirls and lifts around and between your ears, they remind me of Florence or Ellie Goulding a little. Beautiful strings and beautiful lyrics.

Musicians Are Human Beings

I've wanted to write about this for a few weeks now, just because of something I've been noticing on Twitter. And I want to say that this isn't especially about any particular case, there've been a few instances I've seen where people have criticised celebrities for not replying to tweets, for "ignoring them" or favouring others or whatever.

This makes me really sad.

I see cases of people telling someone they're a fan of that they're excluding them for not replying to things they say on Twitter. People being upset with other fans for being "closer" to artists than they are, or taking personal offence for not having a question answered or a "hello" responded to.

And here's the thing. I think it's important to remember that we love these people because of the music they make, essentially. Because we heard a song and it made us feel something that made us want to invest in them. The things that come after, the learning about their personality through Twitter and Facebook, that's an addition and it's great being able to connect. Absolutely amazing. That the opportunity to tell your favourite band that their art has changed your life is not just something offered for people that have the privilege of being able to go to shows, but anyone with internet access.

But these people we're interacting with are essentially musicians. People doing their jobs That is the main thing. Not the ways that they do or do not commit to their fans using social media. You found the music first, not the character of the person that made it and 99% of the time I think that's what artists want. We love these people and invest in being a part of their fanbase in the first place because they make music. And sometimes they're kind. And sometimes they're beautiful. And sometimes they're hilarious. But they are not perfect, and they have flaws, and it's unfair and insulting to expect any of your heroes to be a fountain of knowledge or anything other than a human being with a life and with feelings. Calling them "angels" and "gods" is expecting a lot. It is a lot of pressure to be a role model. It is a lot of pressure to be somebody's hero.

From the perspective of anyone famous enough to get thousands of messages a day, replying to any of that shows a lot of kindness and commitment. I'm not suggesting for a minute that using social media to communicate with fans is completely unselfish, people have lots of reasons for doing it, but it's also very brave. It could be so easy to shut up in a studio making albums, or run to a tour bus and hide after shows, and that's fine too, that's completely allowed. Anyone putting in that extra time and effort to connect with fans on Twitter should be respected for doing so, not given criticism or put under stress for occasionally missing a message, or forgetting to reply to something. Social media is completely crazy, your time will come, it's no reason to feel excluded. And there is so much to take from being an intense part of a group of fans than just a relationship with a musician.

"Babel" Day Craziness

So today, Mumford and Sons second album, "Babel", is released out into the world.

I am just one devoted fan that's been waiting two years for this, and although there's been a lot of early versions of new songs going round on YouTube and Tumblr etc for the last two years I held back. I wanted to do the traditional thing; go out and buy a physical copy and listen to the whole record from start to finish, having heard none of it before.

I semi-cracked tonight: I listened to Ben, Ted, Winston and Marcus' Q&A with Geoff Lloyd on Absolute Radio, during which they played some of the new record ("Below My Feet", "Lover of the Light", "Hopeless Wanderer", "Whispers in the Dark" and new single "I Will Wait".)

I lay in bed in layers of jumpers, with wet hair, lit candles all over the room and just sat in peace with my eyes closed and listened.

And I was worried a little about "second album syndrome".

But it is so beautiful.

I'll write a review, maybe in a week or two, but for now that's all I can summon. Just... complete state of wonder. Sorry for being so inarticulate.

At the end of the radio show, "Lover of the Light" came on and my room smelt like pine. And singing along I felt a lump in my throat. And I realised I felt something I hadn't in years: I felt like it was Christmas. Like a kid on Christmas Eve. I don't even know, either.

I'm going to hold back from downloading it now, and going to the nearest record store forty minutes away straight after college tomorrow. But you can go on iTunes from right now onwards and get your copy, or buy one in most shops.

I'll talk about "Babel" properly after I've bought it tomorrow but I just wanted to document how happy I am right now.

Happy Babel Day, internet. xxx

On the Amanda Palmer, Steve Albini Scandal

In the development of her new record, “Theatre Is Evil”, Amanda Palmer opened up a KickStarter project to fund it and donations came in to $1.2million. On her upcoming tour, Amanda has invited fans to play with her and her band, the Grand Theft Orchestra, each night.

Producer Steve Albini said on an online forum about Amanda that if “"you are forced by your ignorance into pleading for donations and charity work, you are then publicly admitting you are an idiot.”

This just shows a complete lack of understanding of what the internet is doing to music, how things are changing. Amanda Palmer hasn’t “demanded” anything from her fans.

Asking fans who play instruments to play with her on tour is not cheap, it’s offering someone an opportunity, and from what I’ve seen on Twitter there are no horn-players that feel exploited or cheated out by this, the people that actually have a right to. It’s open minded, innovative and brave. These are musicians who are probably unprofessional, being offered an opportunity to play on stage with one of their favourite bands.  The people volunteering will do so because they love what they do, not because there’s money in it. And if they have a problem with being unpaid, they won’t volunteer. Absolutely no-one is being hurt in this process and it fails me to understand why someone could have a problem with it.

Albini commented on the fact that after the KickStarter donations project, she must have enough money lying around, and that the Grand Theft Orchestra, Amanda’s band, will be paid salaries. Here is the thing though: I am not suggesting for a minute that the musicians that are fans playing on stage with her are not hardworking and dedicated and deserve reward, but playing for one odd night on the tour in their hometown is completely different to a band of professional musicians giving up months of their lives to tour the world and do nothing else.

In her song “Map of Tasmania”, Amanda sings that “We are the Media” and I feel like this just completely sums up this situation. With the manifestation of the internet, musicians and fans aren’t closed off from each other anymore and art is open to everyone. Teenage boys can record a single in their bedrooms and post it online. Rockstars can chat to fans about their lunch. There are people out there that love music, and understand art is not about money.

"#3" - The Script

The Script are Danny O'Donoghue, Glen Power and Mark Sheehan, friends from Dublin that met in 2001 and have had a lot of success in the UK since the 2008 release of "We Cry". Their third album was released last Monday.

"#3" doesn't seem like the most inspired title for a third album, especially with the manifesto of "hashtags" but to The Script it means much more than that. First, there are three of them. The album was recorded in Studio 3, 3rd October is lead-singer Danny O'Donoghue's birthday. But more importantly, "#3" is a concept of what they see as the three most precious components of their music: head, heart and feet. Music with lyrics that make you think, make you feel, and you can dance to.

The record kicks off with "Good Old Days", and in terms of the aims talked about above it ticks all the boxes. "Good Old Days" is about a pub crawl, talks of smoking cigars and dancing in the rain and more than that, it's about music bringing a room full of people together. From the burst of life that is the introduction to the chorus you can't help sing along with, this song is so strong and it fills you right up. It just really sums up this band and all of what is unique about them and their background, and it's nice to see them venturing outside of what I think they know they do best, which is a really big break-up ballad.

Having said that, the second track, "Six Degrees of Separation" is exactly one of those, but it's great to hear a song from them that stems from just an acoustic guitar and drums, and reminiscent of their older music. "Hall of Fame", the first single from the album, is about "Ordinary people doing extraordinary things", and perfect for London's Olympic summer. It unexpectedly features the vocals of will.i.am, but The Script haven't let this shove them too far in the direction of being too heavily produced or commercial, though definitely more than their other stuff.

"If You Could See Me Now" is the song that Danny O'Donoghue and Mark Sheehan wrote because they felt a hole in the record, a song that was missing about a topic they hadn't been ready to touch yet, and this one, about the deaths of their parents, has been brewing for years. It's so honest, personal and brave; reflecting on the loss of a father and negative as well as positive life developments since his passing away, pondering achievements and fuck-ups. O'Donoghue said somewhere that "Art is the only justification that there is for pain." This just puts that into action: it is brave, honest and one of the best on the album. Mark Sheehan has said about it; "I can't even picture playing it live because it is so personal." On three intimate tour dates this week, they have proved they found the courage for this.

Listening to the lyrics of "Glowing" it is a ballad in the traditional sense - a story - and it's so abstract and confusing that it's almost a choose-your-own-adventure in whatever way you apply it, which I suppose which is a good thing, because as listeners we make lyrics belong to ourselves. It is about a girl running away, because she is being chased. "Give The Love Around" is a track that wanders definitely towards the ground of R&B and rap music, but the organic nature of The Script's music isn't taken away with this - you won't find any autotune or heavy synth parts on this album and I kind of like that they argued with a stereotype this way. They have lost no integrity. "Broken Arrow" stems from an acoustic guitar and instrumentally, it's more like their earlier two albums than this new-found genre, but again features Mark Sheehan's rapping. It's about healing, and grows and grows throughout, the vocals and the string arrangement are both full of power.

"Kaleidoscope"... "Kaleidoscope" has me dancing. It's like nothing they've done before, opening with an electric guitar playing arpeggios that sound just the right amount of fuzzy, and is one of those hopeful, perfect, unashamed love songs that fill you with euphoria. That's all I can say about it, it's just one of those songs that you can't help but dance to, the kind of song that you set as your alarm and hop out of bed smiling on the worst of days. Danny's vocals really climb here, thriving in his upper falsetto. The next song is "No Words", a song about love and devotion, another one with a rhythm sounding vaguely like an R&B/pop song.

And "#3" finishes in a full circle, with "Millionaires", back stumbling out of a bar - "Singing our hearts out, standing on chairs, spending our time like we are millionaires." It's proof that however much they've been able to adventure into new genres, they're still able to make music that sounds just like it could've been from one of their earlier records - The Script aren't afraid of growing and changing, but they haven't left their roots behind.

"#3" is different to their other stuff, no doubt. It's a little more mainstream and commercial, which I think there'll be people that are angered by, but another development they've gone through I've noticed is lyrically this third album is just so much more adventurous. The first two albums, "The Script" and "Science and Faith" have been heavily based around romantic love and relationships falling apart. "#3" is different. It touches on family issues, emotional healing, work and motivation, and more than anything, they sing about the values of friendship - "Good Ol' Days" and "Millionaires" particularly just remind me of being warm and drunk and laughing, singing along to something, ridiculously out of tune, and clinging onto friends' arms for support.

Yes, it's maybe more commercial but The Script haven't lost the elements of their music that come most naturally. Their music is more mainstream but it isn't cold, really, it is full of life and soul and, in fact, everything they aimed for - "#3" is music for the head, heart and feet.

"These Streets" - Paolo Nutini

For me there is some music that is always attached to personal experience, whether that's a place I listened to it in, an experience I went through while it was there, or sometimes, the person that introduced me to it.

The boy who gave me Paolo Nutini's "These Streets" was never one of my close friends. We never went to see Paolo Nutini together, we never talked about the lyrics or sang along in the car or anything. But he was a friend my dad and I met on holiday in Kenya, his mother and mine bonded when I was eleven and lost and shy. He was five years older than me, I remember quite charismatic and loved music , had wild curly hair and my dad thought he was the most charming person in the world I think.

His name was Harley, because of the motorcycle on which he was conceived. I'm not even kidding.

We left, there were a few emails and then we all lost touch, but this person will never realise how much they influenced my musical taste... at a time it was very easily influenced and fragile. Harley gave us a whole stack of CDs, and I can't remember what all of them were but it included the Fratellis first album. And one of them was Paolo Nutini's "These Streets".

Paolo Nutini is a singer/songwriter from Scotland, most famous for "New Shoes" and "Candy" but "These Streets" starts with "Jenny Don't Be Hasty", closer to a rock song than the rest of his stuff, a story about a girlfriend leaving him because he lied about his age.

"Last Request" and "Rewind" are both beautiful, soft songs about the ending of a relationship. Both are gentle, acoustic guitar led pop songs. The concept of "Last Request" is stunning and hurts a little, a song about knowing and accepting that it's over but pleading her for one last night with him, and "Rewind" reflects over a better time and wonders why it can't come back, with a chorus that is both catchy and full of soul.

"Million Faces" is a grower, and "These Streets", the title song, is wonderful - a song, like a few of Paolo Nutini's, about growing old and confused, and being lost in a familiar city, with a gorgeous string arrangement.

"New Shoes" was the first single from this album I believe, and it's gleefully carefree, the sort of song you walk down the street to on a really sunny morning and throw in a dance step on the pavement when you don't think anyone's looking. "White Lies" starts with a beautiful high pitched melody plucked on a guitar, another one about lost love. "Loving You" is full of energy, yet gentle and flirtatious, one of those on the album where Nutini's vocals really thrive.

"Autumn Leaves"... in the first few years of high school I would tell people it was going to be my funeral song. Maybe it still will be. Just his voice and a piano, a song about the death of a family member, but it's bittersweet rather than just gloomy, it ponders over a life, the good and the bad.

No song on the album tells a story quite as captivating as "Alloway Grove", with a refrain of "la la la la la's" that will have you singing along, it tells the story of chasing a promiscuous lover, of needing them in a way that they don't need you, and I misinterpreted the story in a weird way at 11 (for whatever reason, I thought she'd committed suicide but now realise she had just run away to London. You'll get what I mean.) The song fades, the simple chords strummed on an acoustic guitar bleeding into heavier, electric power chords. This leads into the second part of the medley - "Northern Skies", which is gorgeous, melancholy and quiet.

"These Streets" is a brilliant collection of songs and, equally importantly, stories, and in my opinion he didn't quite find this with second record "Sunny Side Up", where some of it seemed a little cutesy and Jack Johnson-esque. "These Streets" is a brilliant stripped back, acoustic folk-pop record, touching on both Nutini's Scottish and Italian routes and I really recommend it - as I'm sure Harley would too.

Imogen Heap's Listening Chair

Tonight, Imogen Heap is playing at the Royal Albert Hall with Eric Whitacre as part of the BBC Proms.

If you've been reading this for a while, you'll be aware how much I love Imogen Heap, and that I saw her play at the Royal Albert Hall in 2010, a beautiful venue filled for the most deserving of artists. This will be her second time here.

Prom 62 is Eric Whitacre's (someone else hugely talented) and Immi will be on at 10:15 as a part of his set, showcasing a project called The Listening Chair. The Listening Chair is a collection of hundreds of people's answers, of varying ages, to the question; "What is the song that still needs to be written?" She was searching for the song people needed that hadn't been written yet, for a mood that no songwriter had explored and no music fits. From the answers, Imogen has come up with an accapella piece, based around the idea of a lullaby, sung to a child, that is personalised and changes and grows at different points in life.

Every one of her projects, especially over the last year or so starting with "Lifeline", has been so unique and creative. Imogen Heap is a musician who truly has a balance between being an artist and a scientist - everything that she does turns out beautiful, even those experiments that seem to in her eyes go horribly wrong.

Imogen Heap herself explains the concept of "The Listening Chair" much better here, and you can tune in and listen here at 10:15 BST. If you're in London, tickets are cheap and at time of writing haven't sold out yet so you should definitely get your ass down there, this is a one-off and something really not to be missed.

Less Than Three

Today I was busking, and a girl who'd been asking people for money down the street with a paper cup came and sat near me. She was homeless and kind of grubby looking and admittedly I felt threatened, because I have always been told to around people that look a certain way. Now I feel very guilty for making that judgement. But then she said she was just stopping to hear me play, and asked if I knew "The A Team" by Ed Sheeran.

I played it and it must have been awful. I forgot my capo yesterday so sang it four semi-tones down from normal but she was nice enough to stay and she sang along. Afterwards we talked about Ed Sheeran for a while and admitted to me that "The A Team" was her song, because she was homeless, she was an addict, and earlier on in her life she'd worked as a prostitute. And she was absolutely lovely.

Since being a kid I've been told to avoid homeless people in the street and things and that they're these grubby little human beings nobody seems to think of as humans.

But this was just a girl, who'd like everyone else struggled and had a song that was her comfort blanket, it belonged to her.

There isn't really a moral to this. It just was a part of the list of things that have happened recently that restored my faith in human nature.

I wrote a review of a really beautiful concert I went to a few days ago on here and the response has been so lovely. Those of you who have been retweeting and sending me things on Twitter, thank you so much. Your support has been incredible and I hope to meet you at lots of shows in the future I'm sure we'll all be at! Bo was absolutely "megatron."

Hope you're well, sorry this was not a proper blog,

Lizzie xx

Bo Bruce - Upstairs at The Garage, Islington - Thursday 16th August 2012
Small Warm Up Gig for V-Festival

The first thing you need to know about Bo is that if you're from the UK, you're likely to know her as the girl who came as runner-up on a TV talent show called The Voice, but she's not at all the commercialised sell-out we've come to expect from these things. Bo has been, and will be, writing beautiful songs for years. Her 2010 EP "Search The Night" recently reached #2 on iTunes, showing that she's already developed a fanbase that love her for the art she makes, not just because of hearing her sing some albeit brilliant cover songs on TV.

The Garage is a really small venue in Islington, its upstairs room last night was filled with candles. I arrived stupidly early, having dragged my French exchange sister on a train journey from Cheshire to London and found a place at the very front, about two metres from where the mic stand was poised, deciding to sit on the floor cross-legged and see if the people in the front row did it and everyone else would follow, something I've always wanted to try, and in a sense it almost worked.

Until the support act, Ben Montague, took to the stage, in which the small crowd of around 100 filling up the room. He makes what I would say is folk-pop music, and sang love songs alone with another acoustic guitar player, instead of the full band he normally plays with, but his more stripped back versions of songs had no trouble filling the room. At one point he actually asked the sound guy to turn down the volume, which someone commented was probably the first time a musician's done that on stage. He played brilliantly, the only fuck-up being when he thanked "Jo... wait, Bo!" for having him, and managed to have the crowd singing along during one song.. He's @ben_montague on Twitter, recently got playlisted by Radio 2 and you should definitely check him out.

A while past nine, it was announced that Bo was about to take to the stage and her band entered first: from what I recall a drummer, a guitarist and two keyboard players.* They played the instantly recognisable introduction to David Guetta's "Without You", which was Bo's audition song on The Voice, and she came on and started to sing.

Bo's voice, on stage, is one of the most beautiful and perfect I've ever heard. The only difference between her studio recordings and live performance is the lack of reverb. For those unfamiliar, Bo Bruce has the kind of breathy, "wispy" (a word my friend used to describe her, I quite like it) style of singing that's compared most often to Sinead O'Connor and Dolores O'Riordan from The Cranberries, using glottal strokes and mini-yodels, sliding into tiny gasps of falsetto at the end of a note.

Bo's second song was an original, the thoughtful and haunting "Behind the Gates", followed by "Fighting Arizona" which is also from Bo's EP "Search The Night", an offer of comfort and support to a friend stuck in the cycle of crime and drug addiction.

Then, she sang a gorgeous rendition of Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill", this quiet and respectful three minutes of mutual audience understanding where there was no cheering, no singing along, but a kind of silence and communion.

"Black Ice" is beautiful, and admittedly I spent the entire time trying to watch what the keyboard player was doing as I've been sitting at the piano late at night attempting to scribble out sheet music for a whole week now. It's a song about a broken relationship, where Bo's gorgeous vocals soar in her upper range.

Bo announced her "last song" would be "Charlie Brown", and I almost feel ashamed about the fact that it was one of my favourite songs of the night (actually, it was fantastic) because it was a cover. But the Coldplay song suits her so perfectly and it was the point in the night where confidence that had been wavering at the start had truly soared. The room was full of dancing and smiling, I felt this growing lump in my throat because I can't help but say that when she sings "Charlie Brown" it sounds like rainbows. I'm sleep deprived, inarticulate and slightly crazy right now but it does, it sounds like rainbows.

After calls for an encore, she played an absolutely gorgeous new song called "The Fall", with just a piano, which I expect will be on her new album in October. In the area I was stood there were several people in tears.

After the show, Bo was nice enough to take the time to spend a few minutes with each and every person who waited behind and I think of all the musicians I've seen she might be the one that shows the most care and trust in her fans. She hugged and kissed everyone and was lovely to talk to and very grateful (I brought her some cookies).

Everything about her is original and a work of art - the way she sings, writes, looks and moves about the stage, and I really think there's going to be such a wide market for this girl.

One of the only criticisms I have about last night is how few original songs she played in comparison with covers (although I know doing this is what helped her success) and I have a theory she doesn't quite realise how many people have heard of and love the things she writes, too. Having said that, all three of the cover songs she sang last night were completely perfect.

Bo's career is really just beginning to blossom - she has an album release planned for the autumn, and a UK tour in the winter planned. Intimate, tiny gigs are my favourite and I really recommend you go see her whilst shows are still this small.

***

*Please correct me if I got this wrong and you were there!

Declining Record Industry

This is going to be short because I'm exhaused but okay;

I read something today which made me really sad.

Last week Rihanna was at the top of the UK album chart. She sold less than ten thousand copies of her album "Talk That Talk" and that's the lowest sales figures the chart-topping album has had in over twenty years.

I don't know if this is because of downloads, and because it's so much easier to just collect the various singles and favourites of artists you like from iTunes now. I don't know if it's just because of what's being released at the moment. For years I have listened to people saying the concept of the album is dying and not wanted to believe it, but that's scary.

With the autumn we have new releases from Mumford and Sons, Amanda Palmer and Muse to look forward to, as well as a lot of others which I'll talk about as they come along.

I guess what I want to say is that it's really tempting to just save a bit of money and spent 79p a few times on the songs you've heard on the radio, but there's so much value and love in going out and buying a physical CD, having twelve tracks to ponder over, pouring over the little booklets inside CD cases. Music and the structure of an artist or band is so much more than just the three minutes that gets played on the radio.

We need to revive this somehow. I'm in if you are.

Albums for Summer

I've always been a lover of the album, having one piece of art, a physical CD to hold, where I get acquainted with and find things within every song, the knowing which next opening chord I'm about to hear in the seconds of silence between each track, picking out concepts that flow throughout a record and appreciating differences. I love reading the booklets inside an album. I know singles have their plus points, downloading from iTunes has its plus points (I feel guilty, I do it too, increasingly regularly) but I'll always treasure the concept of one, entire, physical CD and the talk of this being lost over the last few years scares me.

I think summer's possibly the best time of year for buying just a couple of entire records and getting your wear out of them, whether that's singing along with all your friends on a long car journey with the windows wound down or solitary bike rides and trips on the train.

Enough babble, here are some of my favourites at the moment.

"THE IMAGINARY EP" - IMAGINARY FRIEND
The first thing I need to admit about Jesse Epstein's music is that I usually like a song to hit me, hard, and this doesn't do that particularly. What it is is sweet, and soft, and fits summer perfectly. This record features guest vocalist Kina Grannis' delicate harmonies which suit the style of this music so well. It's playful, clean, acoustic pop music, and Imaginary Friend's lyrics offer comfort and reassurance, in songs like "We'll Be Okay" and "In My Sight", and can be more thoughtful and exploratory, such as "Chasing Ghosts". I don't think this is anything industry shaping, but it's honest, forward and really pretty.

"SCIENCE AND FAITH" - THE SCRIPT
The Script are in an awkward place, with music that's a little too "indie" for the "mainstream" and vice versa. I recently re-approached their music, I was a fan in 2008, when their debut album "The Script" came out. A three piece sort-of rock band from Dublin, what I admire about Danny O'Donoghue, Mark Sheehan and Glen Power is that although what I guess they're known for doing best is a really kick-ass break-up song everything they do is an experiment. There's talk about whether their next release "#3" this autumn is going to be too commercial (the single that's avaliable to hear at the moment is a collaboration with Will.I.Am) but I'm not worried about this, this is just another step in a lot of different directions that they're willing to take.
"Science and Faith" in my opinion is better than their first album, though lyrically both are based around love, exploring it and, often, losing it. It has so much atmosphere, particularly "You Won't Feel A Thing" which really impresses me. The lead singer has a great voice, the guitarist isn't afraid to attempt rapping (see "This Is Love") and songs like "For The First Time" and "If You Ever Come Back" are the sort you can't help but sing along with, the kind I imagine audiences fill venues with along with the band. It finishes with, "Exit Wounds", which draws in the chant:
"Loose your clothes,
And show your scars,
That's who you are."

"THE HEAD AND THE HEART" - THE HEAD AND THE HEART
There's a song at the end of "The Head and the Heart" called "Heaven Go Easy On Me" and I don't want to say it's changed my life, but it's certainly been there at a lot of shaping moments. But most of all I think of it as a song that I listen to on landing planes when I'm coming home, and this has happened three times now. The words of this one really get to me.
The Head and the Heart are full of spirit, originality and, well, heart, and their music is completely beautiful. "Cats and Dogs" and "Couer d'Alene" are an energetic opening medley, "Ghosts" as playful and lively but in a minor key and the softer songs like "Down in the Valley" and the infamous "Rivers and Roads" are lovely, and haunting. Their music and their brilliant lyrics linger in your thoughts long after the song is over. Perfect for long drives.