NW5 Derby County 0.
CDLXXVIII - 9 January 2008
DECLARE INDEPENDENCE
Bjork
I have a lot of time for Bjork. She does her own thing, and it usually works out. Even when she does misfire (It's Oh So Quiet, for example), there's usually a Bachelorette or an I Miss You to make up for it. Unfortunately, this one's a massive misfire. It doesn't do very much for the first couple of minutes, and when it does get going it pretty much degenerates into noise. There's really not very much more to it than that, I'm afraid, there's only one riff and there aren't even any strange warbling sounds from Bjork this time round because she speaks (and sometimes shouts) the words. In fairness to Bjork, this is certainly different, and it's got a strange industrial-stroke-metallic sound to it that I've never heard from her before... but this one doesn't work for me at all.
CONQUEST
White Stripes
Hang on... is that...
trumpets I hear? In a White Stripes song? I suppose I shouldn't really be surprised, seeing as each time they release a new single it bears little resemblance to its predecessor, but even by their standards Conquest is completely and utterly barking. You see, the White Stripes aren't all that dissimilar to Bjork - they tend to release stuff that nobody else would think of, and every so often they put out a dud, which is usually followed up with something much better to even things out. Now, I'm not saying their last single was a duffer, but to my mind the one before (Icky Thump) most certainly was. Right from the off with this song though, it's pretty obvious that Conquest is so far off the mental scale it buries the needle. You see, there's more than a slight Spanish-sounding tinge to the proceedings as Jack White practically pours his heart out... in fact, he does such a good job of it I was surprised to find out that this isn't actually one of his songs. It's actually a cover of an ancient song written by someone called Corky Robbins, but this version is done so well (not to mention barking mad) that it's been brought right up to date. Wonderful stuff.
NW5
Madness
And sometimes, it's nice to have bands treading the same path year after year. Take Madness, for instance. At their height, there weren't many bands around that could touch them, and I don't care who hears me say that. Our House? A work of genius. Shut Up? Fantastic. Uncle Sam? Alright, fair enough, nobody's perfect. Still, it's a strange thing to listen to a band that hasn't really moved forward musically all that much since the 1980s and yet is somehow still capable of coming up with songs as good as this. There's a fairly dark tone to the proceedings here, but you know what it's like with Madness singles, Suggs could be singing about someone having their head ripped off by a crocodile while a deranged monkey goes to work on the rest of him with a chainsaw, but the music is just cheerful enough to leave you with the impression that the poor bloke made a full recovery afterwards. Let's face it, if this lot can have a Number One single that documented a 16 year old boy buying condoms for the first time, then anything's possible. This time round, it sounds to me like Suggs is singing about a parent having to disown one of his / her children because they've turned out rotten, but like I said before, you wouldn't know it from the jaunty little tune that accompanies the lyrics. Madness aren't daft Ð they may sound it on the surface, but when you dig a bit deeper their songs usually have something to say, and that's probably why they're still knocking around now. Good on 'em, I say.
See more!
This review ©2008 Simon Darnell.
