Blog: What's Wrong With The Mainstream

Richard Hawley has been revealed as the finale headline act for the No Direction Home Festival to be held at Welbeck Abbey this summer (see here for a blog post on this). Richard is a bloody good musician, with a great and long track record, and he just so happens to support the best football team in the world as well. An excellent addition to the line-up if you ask me. The Schönbergs will be attending the festival, if you want to join us, visit http://www.nodirectionhomefest ival.com for details and tickets. Richard [...]

Do you know, it seems that there is a good reason to write a music blog. Jal has hundreds of emails from bands and labels offering tracks and albums up for review. Some of them are pretty good, others are quite colossal. Band of Skulls release their much-anticipated second album exclusively on iTunes on 7th February, and then everywhere else a week later on 14th February. In order for me to take advantage of having the album a full week before the general public I've given it quite a few spins over the last couple of days, and here's what [...]

• Band Of Skulls - Sweet Sour

It used to be a long-standing tradition for WWWTM to produce a quality end-of-month playlist of juicy mp3s that were gracing the iPod of our founding father, Lord Jal of the Shire. This short list of what's been doing the rounds on the Schönberg turntable over the last month is by no means a replacement for the classic WWWTM playlist, just wanted to log what I've been listening to. Enjoy (or otherwise)! Field Music - A New Town Friends - Friend Crush Allo Darlin' - Capricornia Standard Fare [...]

Did anyone catch Concrete Knives at the Thekla in Bristol earlier this week? If not, pity. This French indie pop band have just finished a (very) mini tour of the UK and are now safely back in their motherland. Their biography says that they are the rightful heirs to the B52s, but I would say that they sound like a poppy version of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, or even a de-folkified Polyphonic Spree. Anyway, have a listen - I'm sure they'll be back to these shores in the near future...

I haven't posted much in the last week. This is not because I'm getting bored of posting, but rather because I've been listening to a few new albums that I've acquired in the post-Christmas, early new year lull. They're mainly albums that I've missed out on over the last year, and one of them is so good that I've decided to review it for you. Out of Sight, Out of Town is the second album from Sheffield Indie-popsters Standard Fare. The album was released under the radar just before Christmas and so did not get enough of a [...]

The time has come for Mr and Mrs Schönberg to indoctrinate the Schönberiños by subjecting them to their first music festival. Actually, what I mean is first festival in a field with tents and chemical toilets and stuff like that, because they've already experienced the rather excellent Tramlines festival held in downtown Sheffield. And really, this festival will be nothing like my first experience of a festival all those years ago at Reading. The No Direction Home festival is an off-shoot of the family-friendly 'End of the Road' a boutique festival held each year in Dorset. No Direction Home is [...]

On the 4th January Marc Riley, on his 6music evening show, played a world exclusive of the new Fanfarlo single. Entitled 'Shiny Things', the track will be taken from the forthcoming second album by the group 'Rooms Filled With Light', and has already been showcased with new album material on the band's recent tour. Fanfarlo, in my opinion, are the quintessential band for this blog. Mainly ignored by the mainstream in favour of other folk-rock combos such as Arcade Fire, Fleet Foxes, Mumford and Sons, etc., the band's debut album in 2010 was an absolute triumph. It seems [...]

... Long live the Guitar Band? A recent interview with Jim Chancellor, MD for Fiction Records, revealed that record companies are scared to sign up guitar bands, preferring to invest in other forms of music. The reported interview can be found on the BBC Newsbeat website here . Apparently there was only one debut album in the top 35 of 2011 from a guitar band (The Vaccines). The interview also cites the fact that only one guitar band made the top 15 shortlist for sound of 2012 as reason to panic. Shaun Keavney [...]

Following in Schonberg's footsteps I attempted to buy 12 albums during 2011. Did I do it? Well as I type this I honestly don't know, so together let's have a look at the albums I bought and see how I got on. As I think it will be close, I'm going to count all albums I bought, whether they were released in 2011 or not - I may revise this if I easily make it! [...]

It's unlikely that I will get to see any bands play live in January, so to compensate for this I'm already booked to see three gigs in February. Next month will see Field Music play at the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds, Grouplove play the Leadmill in Sheffield and this lot (Allo Darlin') play a little-known venue in Sheffield by the name of The Shakespeare. I'd never encountered Allo Darlin' before, I decided on a ticket after finding out that the support would be provided by Sheffield favourites Standard Fare and Leeds new-comers This Many [...]

So, David Bowie is now old enough to claim his state pension. The guy is true pop royalty, inventing and re-inventing himself many times over his long career. I didn't always like what he had to offer (reaching musical puberty in the 80s, my first encounter with new Bowie releases was China Girl...) but looking back through his extensive catalogue reveals some absolute greats, which sound as fresh today as they probably did on release. Here's my favourite. Many happy returns. David Bowie - Queen Bitch by rslblog.com [...]

Urrrrgh, the first day back at work after a long Christmas holiday. I'd almost forgotten what my alarm clock was for until this morning, and as the radio clicked on at 6 am there was no way I was going to be moved from under the covers. Well, not until this track was played by Jon Hillcock on 6music, standing in for Chris Hawkins. I've since done some investigative work and found Bleached to be a sister double act from Los Angeles. Electric Chair is the b-side to a 7" single 'Searching Through The Past' they put [...]

The Schönbys are fictional, made-up awards for me to let you know what I've enjoyed listening to during 2011. Winners and nominations are drawn from music I have seen, heard or bought during the preceding 12 months. 2010, to me, seemed a poor year for music. When it came to choosing my top albums of the year I struggled to come up with a top 5. Was it a general dearth of good music, or just the fact that having a young baby meant I had other things on my mind? Maybe both these things transpired to cause [...]

The Schönbys are fictional, made-up awards for me to let you know what I've enjoyed listening to during 2011. Winners and nominations are drawn from music I have seen, heard or bought during the preceding 12 months. 2011 has been a great year for the single, so great that I came up with 15 songs for my top 5 singles of the year. It really was difficult to choose, my first attempt at picking my favourite 5 resulted in an all-female line-up. However, I don't want to be accused of sexism like the Sports Personality of [...]

This is a pre-recorded post, so please don't get in touch as I'm not here. So it's Christmas day, and I'm guessing that by now you're sick to your back teeth with The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl, The Waitresses and Jona Lewie, so here's one of my favourite 'alternative' Christmas songs, kudos to Billy2Tails for introducing me to this great track. Merry Christmas and a music-filled New Year to all of our listeners! Space Christmas by Shonen Knife

In order for me to attempt to get some use out of my (increasingly) neglected iPod, I tend to put short playlists together of tracks that I'm currently listening to, so that I can turn the radio off on the way to work and enjoy some cool tunes without the banal chat you tend to get in the morning. My commute is less than an hour, so between 10 and 20 tracks does it perfectly. So that I can keep up my promise of at least one post per week, I've decided to post this playlist to keep [...]

• Black Lips - Raw Meat

The Schönbys are fictional, made-up awards for me to let you know what I've enjoyed listening to during 2011. Winners and nominations are drawn from music I have seen, heard or bought during the preceding 12 months. The next award is for best new artist, but what is a 'new artist'? I can't profess to ever being there at the beginning of any band, so my definition of 'new' is a band, possibly unsigned but not essential, who have released their first official recording in 2011. As I said before, crystal ball gazing is not one of my [...]

I've made my first iTunes purchase with my recently-redeemed voucher that I told you about earlier this month. I made my purchase after dreaming about the song last night. I say dream, what I mean is it was the song going round my head at 3am whilst sat up listening to my young boy babbling to himself. Lonely Boy is the first single from the seventh album released by The Black Keys earlier this month. I would have bought the whole album, but you can't go doing rash things like that this close to Christmas, can you? If [...]

The Schönbys are fictional, made-up awards for me to let you know what I've enjoyed listening to during 2011. Winners and nominations are drawn from music I have seen, heard or bought during the preceding 12 months. The second award is Best International Act. Here's the measily list I had to choose from; gigs from Band of Horses, Warpaint, Phosphorescent and Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, albums from White Denim, The Strokes, Foo Fighters and Airborne Toxic Event, singles from Beastie Boys and Friends. I must admit that I've been fairly non-plussed by the overseas showing [...]

The Schönbys are fictional, made-up awards for me to let you know what I've enjoyed listening to during 2011. Winners and nominations are drawn from music I have seen, heard or bought during the preceding 12 months. The first award is Best Live Act. Here's the list I had to choose from; Goldheart Assembly, Mojave 3, Band of Horses, Oxo Foxo, Laura J Martin, Jonny, Warpaint, Fiction, Metronomy, Yuck, Phosphorescent, Ash, Los Campesinos!, Futureheads, Dananananackroyd, Standard Fare, This Many Boyfriends, Fear of Men, Dutch Uncles, Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, Ringo Deathstarr and Outfit. Notable commendations [...]