I probably should spend my limited energy fighting and worrying about the big injustices of the world: y'know, poverty, discrimination, inequality, environmental destruction, Boris Johnson, and the like (please note these are not necessarily commensurate). Yet of late I've found myself getting irate about how the fucking Kooks - the aural equivalent of an out-of-date pack of [...]
Maybe this is a bit parochial (and non-musical) but all the signs suggest that the largest share of Londoners who actually voted for their mayor did so for an upper class homophobic racist. Apart from making the must-be-soon celebration of Thatcher's death in Trafalgar Square much more interesting than it would have been under [...]
As promised (ha), my review of Lowgold's third proper album, Promise Lands. I'm not sure that I expected there to be another album, after all the missiles fate has thrown at Lowgold, but here it is. While some gloomy music - like Micah P. Hinson - makes you reach for the bourbon, Lowgold have always struck [...]
So the last time I almost saw Micah P. Hinson was at Glastonbury last year, when his back injury kept him away. Since then Mr Hinson has snuck back into London at the end of last year to play one of my favourite venues, the Union Chapel, where he publicly proposed to his girlfriend. Was [...]
JKneale is in the US so I thought I'd write about band from across the pond. Actually that's a lie as I've been meaning to write about Little Amber Bottles by Blanche for some time. So not something new (it came out last year), but another blog about an outfit beginning with B...curious. I'm no expert [...]
The Black Dog and I have had a bit of a break from each other. I have no real idea why it has been 13 years since I purchased Spanners and therefore missed out on everything they've produced in between. This is despite keeping in some sort of touch with other artists which, back then, were lumped [...]
Blimey - I get an email saying Lowgold have got a new album out and that I've missed their London gig. What?! I knew they were trying to finish the third (proper) album but I must have missed something somewhere. I will review the new one, Promise Lands, when I get hold of it, but for [...]
Well... my Post-Rock Neighbour persuaded me to accompany him and Muteboy to the Scala to see these Godspeed-affiliated Canadians, and I'm very glad he did. I went in feeling agnostic about the whole thing, waiting to be impressed... and I was. The Scala is an intimate venue and it suited this lot, arranged in a [...]
Sorry, no expletively named combos this time, but... When we started BBO I think there was an implicit assumption that I would write about the electronic blips and bleeps end of the sonic spectrum. Well I've not really honoured that responsibility and I'm not sure why. Anyway, I'll try and rectify that if I can. Further, I [...]
Continuing our theme, here's Holy Fuck, another name guaranteed to catch the eye. The Grauniad was tutting over how the ugliness of the name gets in the way of the music but these Canadians are clearly after more than brief notoriety. The current single 'Lovely Allen' stands out for its euphoric refrain and succession of [...]
I imagine I'm not alone in having my eye drawn to any band that has 'Fuck' in their name. So when Fuck Buttons' Street Horrrsing came across my radar I had to have a listen. They might not be fans, but once turned up loud (it needs to be) my buttons were pushed as follows: 1) Big slabs [...]
I'm very pleased to see that Fanfarlo seem to have had a great time at SXSW, winning fans and positive bloggage despite some technical problems. Backing from the NME too; Fanfarlo are news. This is their cracking single from last year, which I've been whistling for months: mournful indie pop, very classy. Possibly the [...]
Six weeks or more late... Oh well. This was something of a bilocation opportunity for BBO as we saw BSP in our respective hometowns a few days apart; it sounds like I had the best of it, maybe because this was the end of the British leg of the tour. Plus the usual BSP hijinks had [...]
It's nearly our first birthday here at BBO. One of my first (ish) blogging ventures was a Miles Hunt and Erica Nockalls review and here I am again writing on the duo after seeing them at the Roadhouse on Sunday. Miles might not have been in such a jovial mood as a year ago at the Night [...]
They're not easy to describe, this lot. Last year's All Hours Cymbals, is a marvelous mixture of the familiar and the unpredictable. Folk, a bit of prog... but with a touch of Talking Heads amongst the world rhythms and electronics. Live, in the tiny ICA theatre, they're equally not-entirely-what-you-were-exp ecting... while a couple of them looked [...]
As mentioned previously, both BBO correspondents went to Tokyo before Xmas. Unfortunately, music was not a central part of our trip - although we did find ourselves falling in love with a band called Bump of Chicken...well we fell in love with the name rather than the music as, on our return, I found them [...]
It's a very, very rare moment these days when something played on XFM makes me stop and listen. But there I was in the bathroom with the radio on (more detail than that would be impolite) when I thought 'I recognise that voice...hmmm, those guitars sound familiar' and then 'don't I know that song from [...]
Both bars on
Sleigh Bells - Demons (Official Music Video)
The Rains of Castamere by The National
A-Trak & Dillon Francis - "Money Makin'" (Official Video)
DIIV "How Long Have You Known?" (OFFICIAL VIDEO)
Nas - Daughters
Bison - Quill
Neutral Milk Hotel- Aeroplane Over the Sea
Shinichi Osawa – Big Beach Mix 2012
