Nope, we're not shutting up shop, k?

Time flies when you're....

* in a new job
* entertaining visitors from overseas
* busy running errands
* playing records
* errr....

But hopefully normal service will resume this weekend. Scouts honour!

Meanwhile, I'll be playing records all weekend.....yes yes. Come down to Catch on Friday where I'll be coming off the subs bench to play alongside sioux-elin at Vinyl Glamour from 9.30pm (get well soon Lazy L!)

Saturday? After a kip and some quality time spent in the kitchen, it's off to the always lovely Defectors Weld (8.30pm till 1am). It's a bit of a warm up set for Sunday - the closing party of this year's Raindance Film Festival at Sound nightclub in Leicester Square. Hanging out with the next bunch of Spielbergs , Fords, Scotts, Capras...um.....Bolls? No matter, it'll be pretty fun.

Until this weekend's proper bumper comeback post, I'll leave y'all with this clip (gold!), and this thought....how much would you pay?*

* I went the whole hog and got the discbox. And apparantly, I'm not the only one it seems.

Animal Collective / Fill your boots with Phil!

* Shhhhh....I really shouldn't be saying this, but what the hey. One of my favourite not-so-secret second hand stores, the Oxfam store on Kingsland Rd in Dalston, has just been split into two. The old store continues to sell clothes, toys, furniture and what not, while the new fangled store (situated just a few doors down) is solely devoted to records and books. Myself and Codename Sparrow are going to visit it tomorrow to look for bargains (unlike the wonderful sitemaster of Dalston Oxfam Shop whose discoveries are of a different nature, though no less important!). Still, if you ever need twelve copies of No Jacket Required, you know where to go.

* I'm off to the land of moose and trolls on Friday, but if I wasn't then you'd probably find me at these two pardees this weekend. The lads from West London's finest hip-hop night, Yo Yo at Notting Hill Arts Club, are headlining this Friday's Modular party at Ditch. Joining Seb Chew and Leo Greenslade will be the peeps from the mighty fine FACT magazine, Faggotronix, the Modular DJs themselves, and some special guests (nope, don't have the foggiest who they be....don't ask me, I won't be here!). Anyway, here's the fwyer.



If the hip to the hop ain't your bag of kittens, then why not have a night off (pfft), and rest up for Saturday's Vive La France secret warhouse party. Starts off at The Horse & Groom before heading to ...well, you guessed it, a secret warehouse. But the line-up is aceness indeed. David K, Muriel Moreno, the Girlcore ladiez, and more. Details below.



* The delightful Animal Collective are playing tonight at the Coronet in Elephant & Castle, playing songs old and new, the new being tracks from their upcoming Strawberry Jam album, out September 10. If they play this then I'll probably giggle like a school girl. Check the gorgeous clip below as well.

Animal Collective - Fireworks



* Finally, I didn't get to go see one of Trousersnake's shows at the White Eleph...sorrry, Millenium Do...sorry, 'behemoth phone company' Arena, but my man Beez from 16 33 45 78 did, and his review hits the nail right on the head. If you ever want to blow money on a pop concert with the works, checking out the Snake is highly recommended. More on the moro.

A bonafide House Party selection

Last Saturday night I had the pleasure of playing at Harley Moon's very fine house party, while this Saturday I'm at home blogging, and possibly still recovering from said party (yeah, it was a tad messy). After a frenetic tag team set between the pair of us, Mr Moon dazzled the kids with a fine set of his own. Listening to his latest podcast reminds me that sometimes you don't always have to whip out what every blogger or indie/electro DJ is playing, when a well crafted selection of well known tracks and forgotten treats will do the job too.


Mr Moon - Podcast 6

Catch the curly haired lad at Mindie's 1st birthday bash on May 11 at 93 Feet East.



* Spoon have a new record coming out(hurrah!).
It's called Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (wha?).
And Jon Brion's produced a track on it (hurrah!).
But you'll have to wait until July 10 to buy it (hurrah! Hang on, that's not right...)

So maybe if you play both of these together you'll get an idea of what it sounds like. Or maybe not.

Spoon - Jonathon Fisk (from Kill The Moonlight)
Jon Brion - I Believe She's Lying (from Meaningless)

*Bonus Brion cut? Oh, why the hell not.

Aimee Mann - Superball (from I'm With Stupid, produced by Brion)

It's all a Blur really...

Now, back to our regularly scheduled blogging.


* While the quest to fill all 30 GB of my newly acquired Pod of Joy continues, I began uploading Blur's 1999 10th anniversary Singles box set. Yup, all 22 CDs of it. What has surprised me while listening to many of the odd's and sods that accompanied the band's CD1's and CD2's are the hidden gems that wouldn't have sounded out of place on Modern Life Is Rubbish or Parklife. For every hodge-podge instrumental or Kinks rip-off, there are genuine moments of quirky brilliance or thrilling live cuts that make you realise that Blur may have been a tad under-rated, especially on the commercially slept on 13. Here's some of the best cuts.

Blur - Mr Briggs (from the There's No Other Way single)
Blur - Bonebag (from the For Tomorrow single)
Blur - My Ark (from the Chemical World single)
Blur - Young & Lovely (from the Chemical World single)
Blur - Magpie (from the Girls And Boys single)
Blur - To The End (French version) (from the Parklife single)
Blur - The Man Who Left Himself (from the Stereotypes single)
Blur - Popscene (live at Peel Acres) (from the On Your Own single)
Blur - Tender (Cornelius remix) (from the No Distance Left To Run single)

* Simian Mobile Disco are playing in your house, your house....that is if you enter the competition on their website. You can also check out the mighty fine 'Sleep Deprivation' (the opening track to the duo's debut album Attack Decay Sustain Release) on the site's media player.

* Carl Newman, Neko Case and the rest of the insanely talented gang of skilled musicians known as The New Pornographers are back with another smattering of dynamite power pop, with confirmation this week of an August 20 release date for the band's fourth album Challengers. Newman has already hinted to Billboard that the new album will contain six minute songs (gasp!) and, in a longer interview over at Pitchfork, different instruments (string quartets! flutes! trumpets!).

The NP's are playing Glastonbury in June, plus three sold-out club dates in London as a warm-up to Micheal Eavis's country hoedown. The fact that they've managed to reach album number four is quite surprising given the number of projects each band member is involved with outside of NP duties, so those who haven't seen them live before should obtain a ticket by any means possible before the inevitable end (Oh, and peep the Pitchfork interview, if only for the Newman's pull quote suggestion!).

* There goes the last shred of Ben Lee's credibility.

* Wynton Marsalis - is there anything he doesn't hate? If it's not modern jazz (yes, that's you Mr Davis!) it's hip-hop today. Oh dear.

* Shout out to Mr Moon and crew for the ridiculous house party last Saturday night. I've never played in such a small room before to such an up for it crowd. Tune of the night? Well, I'd have to say Ol' Love Symbol's classic was a nice way to end the night.

Prince - Raspberry Beret (12" version)

Now, I'm off to the Tate Modern to look at the Kinshasa 'Populist Party' art exhibition again. Stunning.

16 RPM? You so crazy...

What's so Good about Friday? These things here...

* Welcome back to the tinterweb Mr Beez. Check out his new home at 16 33 45 78. (Yes, there are 16 RPM records out there believe it or not!)

* Teasers from Bjork's new album Volta, if you haven't heard them already, can be found at her dummy Myspace page under the artist name Gerome Voltaire. The album's out on May 7. Bjork + Timbaland = genius?

* July 27 can't come soon enough.


* Vote for The Blazin' Blades at Fist-A-Cuffs!

* Looks like Envelopes have come out of hibernation and become Talking Heads, not that that's a bad thing. Here's the video for new single 'Smoke In The Desert, Eating The Sand, Hide In The Grass' (phew!).



The band are playing coming back to London to play a stack of dates in April, with the White Heat appearance on April 17 (alongside some special secret guests from their label Brille) being the pick of them. Snap up your tickets here.

Oh, and a reminder of just how kookily brilliant Envelopes really are.

Envelopes - Free Jazz

How can this song not make you smile? Even better with visuals too.



And a not so Good Friday when you find out about this...

* Not nearly as good as Revolver and surely a waste of time for all involved just for a ratings boost? Good to see that Radio 2 are still in touch with listeners, eh?.

Where you gonna run too? Ah...the shops to get Lemsip I believe...

Ahem....well, I had promised a post yesterday but I partied way too hardy on the weekend and turned a light cold into something worse, the only remedy being copious cups of tea, vitamin C and bad tv. Luckily though I had something new to distract me (which I can't believe I had resisted buying for so long). So I began filling it with tasty treats like these.



Holy Hail are a band from the States who have just released their new single this week through Adventures Close To Home (in fact, it's also ACTH's debut release too!). Comparisons to Tom Tom Club and a 'make up a genre today' label of 'gospel-hop-electro-country' are wide of the mark, although I can see why comparisons to the former abound. What I do know is that Born Of A Star is by the far the best single out this week, so get your mitts on it now from here or here.

As an added treat, the Adventures lads have turned in a great remix of 'Born Of A Star' that isn't on the 12 inch release. No, it's here instead.


Also high on rotation this week, and straight on to the Pod of justice is Mr Timothy Mosely's new album, Shock Value. It's not all club bangers or bass driven 'where the f**k did he steal that from' sample laden classics, but there a more than enough tracks on there to make it worth shelling out a tenner for. However, it's all about the opening cut for me, with Timbo taking Nina for a spin in his souped up De Lorean DMC-12, and making her fruit turn mighty strange indeed. 'Roads? Nina, where we're going we don't need roads'

Timbaland - Oh Timbaland

No Gat lovin' here. Sorry!

When people hit up Major Leaguer, it's only because they were looking for these tinterweb tidbits.



Gat sex? WTF??? So, so wrong.

* So, so right. Mark Ronson keeps on delivering the goods, in a 'nudge nudge, wink wink' kinda way. Not all of the tracks on Version work, but this is probably the standout cut.

Mark Ronson feat. Daniel Merriweather - Stop Me

Grab Version on April 16 from here.

* If you're out and about tonight then I'll see you here.



*Peter Parker's changed the music on his iPod. Not totally sure about the selections, but anything's better than the hairy one from Nickleback. ('Spiderman vs Muhammad Ali'? What?)

* Who's hungry for Christ?

LATE BRRRRRRRREAKING NEWS: Head over to Chazology for what's possibly the best Soulwax remix yet. A good start to the weekend if ever I've heard one. See you Monday.

Yes, we could be Heroes (just like Conor)

While watching the mighty fine Heroes tonight on the Sci-Fi channel, it suddenly dawned on me why Conor Oberst has been so quiet of late....yup, our favourite indie kid's been saving the world (literally).

King of the hearts-on-sleeve brigade?

Or super hero in training?

Bright Eyes - Four Winds (from Four Winds EP, out now - buy here)