RETURN OF WHITE RABBIT

Ash

Ash used to be like everyone else - make an album, promote the album, lift three or four singles off it, rinse and repeat. Sometimes, adversity can force you to rethink what you’re doing and when their last album bombed rather spectacularly (along with the accompanying singles) they decided that professionally, Ash and album releases were done. To compensate, they’ve decided to replace the outdated album concept with the let’s-release-one-new-single-every-fortnight-for-a-year concept, which is a) remarkably brave and b) going to ensure that their next Best Of is going to go on for so long you’ll need a calendar to work out the running time. Mind you, if this is how they mean to go on they could be onto something. The old, stagnating Ash has gone and in its place we have a band that’s discovered disco, bass, blippy noises and recovered all the energy and fun that made them so enjoyable to listen to when they started. It’s so different you wouldn’t know it was Ash unless you were told, so here I am telling you. Best of all, this is a free download - they’re giving this song away. There’s no getting around it - this is a great song.

THIS KISS

Kissy Sell Out

A guitar that sounds like it’s being strummed by somebody who, if you asked them what the last song they listened to was, would probably answer "New Order’s Ceremony, 27 times in a row", noises that sound as if they could only come from a keyboard in the middle of being castrated, a riff that sounds as though it’s found a new home after moving out of Animotion’s 1985 classic Obsession, singers who bring an interesting new dimension to the musical sphere marked "Vocal Talents" - given all that, it’s no surprise that this is thoroughly terrible with absolutely no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Like I said, terrible... but actually... it’s not. This song is really good, which comes as a shock because there is absolutely no reason why it should work, and yet it does and more than that, it’s really good fun to listen to as well. I can’t help feeling that if just one of those elements I mentioned earlier was missing the whole thing would fall apart like a house made with Battenburg cakes instead of bricks, but to hell with it. Ash’s new song is great and so’s this. I hope all this positivity isn’t getting you down or anything.