After undertaking a Bourne/Bauer/Bond-esque hunt to find some decent new acts that deserve your attention (and almost driving myself insane in the process), I managed to come up with a cast of 10, half of which are Scottish. You should be relieved to hear The Pop Cop's 'ones to watch' list is a dubstep/chillwave-free zone, although whether any of them will ever write a chorus as magnetically infectious as Shine A Light by McFly is debatable. ANDREW DAVIE [...]
The Controls frontman Jack Jones; Photo: Robert Adam If you've never heard of THE CONTROLS then you're far from alone - even those with a healthy interest in Scotland's music scene know very little, if anything, about them. At the time of writing, The Controls are so new they have no official band photos and no custom website or MySpace page - so how did this group of four teenagers from Glasgow sign a major record deal with Columbia last month before they'd even played [...]
Stuart Murdoch comes on stage wearing designer specs, a scarf wrapped around his neck and the collars raised on his sharp shirt. Since when did Belle & Sebastian's leader - who inherited legions of social introverts with lyrics that spoke of how "the fashion brigade look with curious eyes on your raggedy way" - turn into an indie hipster? In the space of one song, however - the Sarah Martin-sung opener I Didn't See It Coming - Stuart manages to discard all three garments one by one, leaving him in the more familiar plain T-shirt look (and possibly [...]
It's the last Music Alliance Pact of the year so feast your senses on these free, downloadable treats from around the world. All of the 35 artists below have been hand-picked and written about by the blog representing that country, with the entire list simultaneously posted on all of the websites. This month, The Pop Cop invites you to love the angelic, Carrbridge-dwelling, gravity- defying, SXSW-bound, genuinely sweet RACHEL SERMANNI . To download all 35 songs in one file click here [...]
"Stand up, please stand up," are the first words ARCADE FIRE frontman Win Butler utters into the microphone to those with the misfortune of having seated tickets, and the majority of those at the back of the venue are more than happy to comply. I have to admit my expectation levels for this gig were fairly low given how underwhelming their previous show at the SECC was three years ago and how dull I find their latest album The Suburbs. Matters aren't helped when they begin [...]
The previous post served up this website's favourite albums of 2010, and now it's time to share with you the songs that have soundtracked the year for Team Pop Cop . It seems a bit unnecessary to describe what each individual track sounds like since it would be just as quick for you to hit the play button and find out for yourself, right? Admiral Fallow - Squealing Pigs (available on Boots Met My Face album [...]
Which method should you use to determine what makes an album the best in any given year? Artistic merit? Originality? Or perhaps you can just divide the number of songs you love on an album by the total amount of tracks it has and see which one comes out with the highest rating? When it came to choosing Admiral Fallow's debut album Boots Met My Face as the best of 2010, I just went with my heart. I first got my hands on a copy of [...]
This must be how it feels to wave off your eldest child on the day they move out of the family home. The fact that this gig marked the first of two sell-out nights at the 1,900-capacity Barras meant that, on a personal level, there was a mixture of poignancy and pride in realising FRIGHTENED RABBIT are no longer my (or anyone else's for that matter) favourite 'wee band'. Frightened Rabbit were one of the main reasons I started The Pop Cop in 2007, so [...]
For the past two years The Pop Cop has thrown down the gauntlet to photographers to compete for our Best Scottish Music Photo competition and it's time to launch the search for 20102s star. Legendary Scottish photographer Harry Benson has come on board again to cast his eye over this year's submissions after taking such pleasure from judging the 2009 entries - I'm not kidding, he doesn't get paid to do this! The 2009 winner, Su Anderson [...]
If you've been a long-term follower of this website you'll know I'm more fond of THE NATIONAL than any other band on the planet, so it's fair to say I was humbled when the band took up The Pop Cop's cause back in May, a couple of weeks after High Violet was released to huge acclaim. Their sell-out gig in Glasgow was kicked off by fellow Brooklyn-based act PHOSPHORESCENT , who make a promising first impression. It's Hard To [...]
Some things are best left in the past. In the case of musicians who go on to find any modicum of success, that usually means crimes of fashion, 'what were you thinking' haircuts, embarrassing live performances and atrocious early band names. If you've ever had the misfortune of stumbling across YouTube videos of Travis in their previous incarnation as Glass Onion ( here or here perhaps?), you'll know what I mean. There are often unusual, fascinating or quirky stories behind why bands and even solo artists decide to change their stage names, so here's The Pop Cop special [...]
This isn't the first time I've seen JIMMY EAT WORLD at the Barras so I know the drill - generous doses of devilishly catchy guitar melodies, thrashy rock and thoughtful ballads. The Arizona guys do each of these things equally well, which is why their fans don't tend to be pigeonholed to genres such as indie or emo or rock. The problem, one which is common to bands with the longevity of Jimmy Eat World, is that their seventh album Invented, released two months ago, just isn't on [...]
FRIGHTENED RABBIT have signed to major label Atlantic Records , ending the band's three-year association with FatCat , who released their first three albums - Sing The Greys, The Midnight Organ Fight and The Winter Of Mixed Drinks. The Scots will now be label mates with the likes of Paolo Nutini, Metallica, Missy Elliott, Bloc Party, Plan B, Death Cab For Cutie and James Blunt. Frightened Rabbit frontman Scott Hutchison wrote on his Facebook page on November 10: "Just signed on the dotted line. No... wait. It's actually a solid line. [...]
When I first saw BROKEN RECORDS play in February 2008, I was absolutely convinced it was only a matter of time before they would be filling arenas. The music was too grand to be bottled up in basement venues, too orchestral to stay in the domain of indie know-it-alls. And when I spoke to a couple of the band's members afterwards, a real competitive streak came across that made it clear they'd never settle for remaining in the role of supporting cast, as they were for Okkervil River that night. [...]
There are two very well-known Scottish musicians whom few people realise are actually connected to one another so I figured a post on The Pop Cop would be the perfect place to share such wisdom. That was the inspiration behind the family tree of Scottish musicians and the great irony is that when I was sitting on my living room floor at 6am drawing increasingly groggy lines on the back of Christmas wrapping paper, I came to the conclusion that their association was not strong enough to merit a direct link. However, all is [...]
The album chart has always held a strangely magnetic charm for me. Flawed though it may be, there is still no better gauge of a new release's popularity with the people – all the people, not just the ones who read music blogs. Since I use The Pop Cop as a platform to publicise talented artists who are often underappreciated or have a cult following (such a conveniently indeterminate phrase, don't you think?), some folk might think it futile to analyse where such music fits in the mainstream. However, I disagree and I'm sure [...]
Click on the picture above to see The Pop Cop's family tree of Scottish musicians in all its glory. It's handmade, goddamit, so excuse any wonky lines. There were various titles I considered for this post, here are some of them: - What do you mean the Scottish music scene is incestuous? - It's not what you play, it's who you play for - If the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon became the Six [...]
There are only so many guitar bands lamenting about their emotions in indecipherable metaphor I can muster up the energy to listen to and tell you about. Therefore, in the interests of sanity, I decided to give both of us a bit of respite by getting out of the city and into the fantastical setting of THE ENCHANTED FOREST , an annual tourist attraction in Pitlochry which sees Faskally Wood transformed into a stunning sensory feast of light and sound for a fortnight. [...]
Most capital cities in Europe run free walking tours, usually lasting at least a couple of hours. The guides are always knowledgable, engaging and witty. "If you don't like it we'll give you your money back," is a favoured one-liner. In the same city, another walking tour is advertised, only this time there is a charge of 10 euros for the guides' time. Guess which one makes more money? That's right, the free one - the appreciative tourists lap it up so much that by the end of the tour they can't put their hands in [...]
The Pop Cop
Bison - Quill
Neutral Milk Hotel- Aeroplane Over the Sea
Shinichi Osawa – Big Beach Mix 2012
