On the 11th March 2002, the BBC launched its first new national music station in 32 years. That station was BBC6 Music, and with it came a slogan: “Closer To The Music That Matters”. The station was to be a sister station to Radio Two, and was supposed to provide an alternative to the more mainstream, youth orientated Radio One. Often featuring archive recordings from the BBC’s extensive collection, or championing new talent in live sessions, many saw the station as carrying on the tradition of the great, sadly missed John Peel. The stations reputation quickly grew, with presenters who were consider knowledgeable in their field, be it funk, reggae, indie rock or ska. As it approaches it’s 6th Birthday listening figures are at a record high, showing an increase of 110,000 year on year. As digital radio receivers become cheaper, these figures look set to continue to rise. Yet beneath the surface, it appears all is not well with the station.

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Out of nowhere there seems to be a wealth of female singer-songwriters and performers. After the female musician went the way of the Dido, it’s been dominated by faceless and multi-national brands of artists like Norah Jones and Katie Melua. The underground has woken up though. They’ve started to rebel and the wealth of talent now immerging from the depths is being headed by Laura Marling. She’s got friends in the right places, having been a backing singer for such highly regarded acts as Noah & The Whale and the Mystery Jets.

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February… one of the shortest months and yet, in 2008 at least, it’s been one of the most interesting. We’ve had a right ol’ mix of sounds grace the TLOBF stereo recently and we’ve picked the very best to share with you. From new material from one of our favourite new acts, Frightened Rabbit, through the perfectly formed Americana of The Acorn to the spaced out wonder of Fuck Buttons. If there’s anything we’ve missed, let us know!

End Of Radio: TLOBF February 2008 Playlist
1. Frightened Rabbit - The Modern Leper [download]
2. The Whigs - Right Hand On My Heart [download]
3. Throw Me The Statue - About To Walk [download]
4. Beach House - Gila [download]
5. The Acorn - Flood Pt. 1 [download]
6. Bon Iver - Skinny Love [download]
7. Fanfarlo - Sand & Ice [download]
8. Blackstrap - Winning Speech [download]
9. Fuck Buttons - Bright Tomorrow [download]
10. Los Campesinos! - Death To Los Campesinos! [download]
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As a child, he could play practically anything he turned his hand to. However, rock music caused Mick Ronson to move away from his beloved cello into murkier waters, making his stage debut as a guitarist at the age of 17. Born in Hull, he made the inevitable trip to London in 1965, playing in a succession of bands, before disillusionment drove him back to his home town. However, he made enough of an impression for drummer John Cambridge to make the trip north to recruit him for a band called The Hype. This band was formed to provide backing for David Bowie, featuring Tony Visconti on bass. From here on, Ronson would enjoy a long association with Bowie, becoming a Spider From Mars and providing exhilarating guitar work for some of his finest work. Continue Reading

We’ve had The Black Keys album for a couple of weeks now and I’m loving it… Attack & Release, which is out on 31st March, is everything you could hope for in an album bringing together the blues-rock of The Keys and Dangermouse’s ambtious production.

So, what better way to celebrate this than to catch them live in May!

19 LONDON – Astoria
21 MANCHESTER – Academy
22 GLASGOW – ABC
23 LEEDS – University
28 BIRMINGHAM - Academy

Pop back to the main page to have a look at the video of The Black Keys and Dangermouse working in the studio….

Pete Murdoch, Emily Siddall and Ben Winn met when playing samba, they formed Sargasso Trio and have released their debut album Burnin’ Burnin Burnin’ on Boy Scout Recordings. The three play numerous instruments and often share vocal duties on a set of songs that burn and yearn, but lack variety. Continue Reading

One of my hotly tipped acts for 2008, Fuck Buttons are the missing link piece in a jigsaw of Sonic Youth, Mogwai and Portishead. Creating wonderfully evocative swathes of music, their debut album Street Horrrsing is due for release on 11th March via ATP. I managed to fire off our, unchanged for 2008, 20 Questions to Andew Hung and Benjamin John Power to discover their views on advice, hangovers and how ridiculous our ‘Stoat or a Goat’ question is… Continue Reading

So I’d never been to Koko’s in Camden before. What a lovely venue. I’d heard plenty of grievances about poor sound, but none of that was in evidence tonight as the NME Awards Shows hit the capital. Tonight’s line-up saw the relative new comers of MGMT, followed by the more established Sons & Daughters and finally, headlining, the wondrous Band Of Horses. Continue Reading

Earlier this month, the bods up at Myspace HQ did some number crunching, analysing various visitor data and coming up with various trends that will be ‘hot for 2008’. Apparently a new trend to hit the streets will be ‘double dressing’: the act of dressing identically to your friends. With regards to music, the frankly made up sounding genres of toystep/joystick jungle (that will be DJ Scotch Egg then), Bassline and Tapemusic will all be big this year. Somewhat surprisingly IDM or ‘intelligent dance music’ (basically a euphemism for dance music that you can listen to without having beer tipped over you are being leered at in a hideous high street disease-pit/nightclub) also featured in this list. Although it isn’t likely that Rob Brown and Sean Booth have ever indulged in double dressing, a resurgent interest in IDM would be good news for them, as Autechre are seen by many as pioneers of the movement. 15 years into their recording career, Quaristice sees Brown and Booth still able to bring something new to the table.

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Stephen Malkums and The Jicks have announced a UK Tour for June 2008 (dates below).

The tour, which sees the band play London, Shepherds Bush Empire Empire on 5 June, follows the 3 March 2008 release of the band’s new album ‘Real Emotional Trash’, which was recorded in Montana by TJ Doherty whose credits include Wilco and Sonic Youth. The dates are:

June 
05 London Shepherds Bush Empire 
07 Manchester Academy 2
08 Glasgow Oran Mor
09 Dublin Tripod

Look out for our interview with Stephen Malkmus next Tuesday and our review of Real Emotional Trash.

TICKET DETAILS:
LONDON:
Eat Your Own Ears presents
STEPHEN MALKMUS AND THE JICKS
plus special guests 
Thursday 5 June
Doors 7pm
Shepherds Bush Empire, Shepherds Bush Green, London W12 8TT 020 8354 3300
Tickets £14 advance from:
www.shepherds-bush-empire.co.uk
www.ticketweb.co.uk
0844 477 2000
www.seetickets.com
0870 264 3333

MANCHESTER:
www.gigsandtours.com

GLASGOW:
On sale fri. 29th feb 9am
b/o : 08444 999 990 / www.gigsinscotland.com

DUBLIN:
www.ticketmaster.ie or ph: 0818 719 300
Venue is www.tripodlive.ie

A quick disclaimer first.  Normally I would like to take a few weeks to get to know an album reasonably well before reviewing it.  I’ve often found that something that I’ve written off on one or two listens has ended up winning me over and becoming indispensable by listen five or six, or equally, an album that is enjoyable enough when you first hear it can end up boring you.  I’ve only had Oracular Spectacular, debut album by Brooklyn boys MGMT (pronounced “em gee em tee”) for about three days, and despite some intensive playing and re-playing , I still feel that I haven’t yet quite totally got its measure.

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The Smiths may have wished you an “Unhappy Birthday”, but we hope that’s not the case today as The Line of Best Fit celebrates its 1st Birthday! Woo hoo!

It’s been a mad and hectic year - we never thought it would quite take off as it has done. So, thank you to all our readers for clicking on us and thank you to all our contributors over the past year who’ve helped enormously.

Here’s to the next 12 months!

May 5th 2008 sees the return of Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan with their second album, Sunday at Devil Dirt on V2 / Cooperative Music.

Sunday at Devil Dirt is the follow-up to the critically-acclaimed Ballad of the Broken Seas which received a Mercury nomination in 2006.

Apparently it continues to “mine the same rich seam of alt-country, folk and blues of their debut” but the new record also embraces a “dusty southern gothic, while a sultry, jazzy feel is evident on a number of tracks”. Sounds intriguing… I just hope it’s a bit more uptempo that the debut…

As with their debut, the album has been written, produced and arranged by Isobel Campbell, with Lanegan providing lead vocal duties.

The small town girl from Wisconsin, Stephanie Dosen, walks on stage and instantly you can see the aura that surrounds her. Whether it‘s the white 1920’s dress or the pale skin that captivates her mystic innocence, she wins the affection of the audience before she opens her mouth.

The flutter of her eyes, the quiet apologies and the plucking of strings introduced the opening lullaby ‘Somerset’. From then on the hearts of both males and females alike have melted and stay transfixed all the way through to her thank you and goodbyes. Drifting through tracks from last years debut A Lily For The Spectre, she provides an instrumental sound that, although not particularly original, is as comfortable as your favourite chair on a Sunday afternoon. It is her lyrics and voice though, that provides the individual touch. ‘Owl in the Dark’, her most nerve wracking track to perform, she informs us, draws her wide range of vocals out in harmony with the violins that are supporting her. Continue Reading

News so exciting that I nearly fell of my chair. Big Star have just confirmed a one off date at London’s Shepherds Bush Empire on August 28th! The current lineup includes Alex Chilton, Jody Stephens, Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer. Support will come from Robyn Hitchcock. Sounds like a pretty good night huh? Tickets are priced at £17.50 and are on sale now.

So, there’s been a Lion’s head rearing its head in Shepherds Bush for the last 2 weeks, much to the confusion of the local press and bystanders. It turns out to be the cover art for the debut album, Postcards, by the Aussie indie-popsters Sparkadia. Who’d have thought it…

Anyway, this could quite easily be seen as some viral marketing campaign were it not for the fact that they’re actually rather good. So good in fact that The Guardian named their debut release their Single of the Week… Their take on the well worn threads of indie-pop see’s them embrace the more expansive side of things, bringing to mind Doves and latter-day Police. I like ‘em.

Anyway, the album is preceded by the new single: ;Too Much To Do’, which comes out March 17th and you can see what all the fuss is about as the band headline the Metro tomorrow night (Feb 27th).

In the meantime, enjoy the tunes on the Myspace page.

Zach Rogue. Photograph by Gregory Franklin.

Not knowing quite what to expect, TLOBF met with the band that the word ‘unfortunate’ doesn’t quite do justice to describe. For Rogue Wave (Zach Rogue, Pat Spurgeon, Gram LeBron, Patrick Abernathy and new man Dominic East) the idea of playing London’s Scala, alongside Nada Surf, must have seemed somewhat of a distant, if not, irrelevant dream not so long ago.

The last few years would have individually, dismantled each section of any other band (Zach had back surgery, their drummer had a kidney transplant, the guitarist had a bereavement in the family, their ex-bassist died in a house fire and their record deal with Sub Pop came to an end) but for Rogue Wave, they live up to their name and just keep coming back to shore. The band is back up and flying with their new album Asleep at Heaven’s Gate, soon to be released in the UK. But how? It was time for TLOBF to delve a little deeper and take off our hats to such a miraculous comeback. Continue Reading