Singles: No Doubt, Lianne La Havas, The Maccabees, Example, Ladyhawke and some others!
Published on September 19th, 2012 | Jonny Abrams
Singles! Getcha singles! We got singles! Heeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrreeeee’s SINGLES!
Best Friends – “Surf Bitches”
Sounds like every bloody band in the world right now. It’s tight, catchy and rendered with the kind of obligatory “raw energy” that should get the NME fizzing in their knickers. The animated video is charming but, let’s face it, this song’s been done to death.
Rocksucker says: Two and a Half
Example – “Say Nothing”
If Interpol made formulaic indie-disco pop…well, this is why they don’t. Though it conceivably entailed one gadget that fixed it in an instant, so robotically patched together do Example’s vocals sound that you can imagine it taking a team of scientists and 64 million dollars to fix it. Can anyone – and we mean absolutely anyone – be a pop singer these days? To be fair, Example is sodding David Bowie compared to Professor Green, but that’s no endorsement.
“Oooooh OOOHHH OOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!”
“Don’t speak no more” – couldn’t have put it better, Example. This is going to be massive so we better get used to it; and no matter how much this travesty might compound the shitness of your life, take consolation in the fact that somewhere, right now, Example is probably getting a blowjob. Yay Earth! This relentlessly tonal slice of total disinterest makes Rocksucker want to barf.
Rocksucker says: One and a Half Quails out of Five!
Ladyhawke – “Blue Eyes”
This is pretty good stomping, Garbage-like fare with enough going on in there to retain interest levels, as well as a good old-fashioned la la la chorus rather than the ubiquitous OOOH OOOH OOOOOHHHH!s as wielded by Example and most of the world. No quails for originality but enjoyable nonetheless.
Rocksucker says: Three Quails out of Five!
Lianne La Havas – “Forget”
In our review of La Havas’s Mercury-nominated debut album Is Your Love Big Enough?, we said of “Forget”: “Perhaps the album’s stand-out track, which charges ‘Waste all your time writing love songs / But you don’t love me’ and brandishes a chugging, attitudinal chorus reminiscent of Gaggle’s stunning recent debut LP.” It still sounds flipping fantastic. Hats off.
Rocksucker says: Four and a Half Quails out of Five!
The Maccabees – “Ayla”
Many ticks: crashing, “There Goes the Fear”-evoking drums; big ol’ guitar feedback; upwardly cascading (is there a word for that?) tinkling ivories; breathy, double-harmony vocals; trippy video; brass line for extra lift-off. Splendid stuff.
Rocksucker says: Four Quails out of Five!
Michael Jackson feat. Pitbull – “Bad (Remix by Afrojack Featuring Pitbull – DJ Buddha Edit)”
Yep, Michael Jackson and Pitbull: we did a double take too. In case you don’t know, Pitbull is the dullard that did that “I know you want me, you know I want you” count-in-Spanish mega-hit, the one which is undoubtedly responsible in some way for everything bad that’s happened since. Why have they done this? Somewhere just outside Los Angeles there is a grave spinning dangerously out of control.
Indeed, ‘bad’ is very much the operative word here, and just when it can’t get any worse, it anti-triumphantly does so courtesy of Pitbull’s laughably lumpen ‘rap’ and sex pest posturing in the video. Wow, what a guy!
“I’m so out of this planet, I speak a third language called moontalk” barks Pitbull, apparently boastfully, and technically he is out of this planet as he comes from the very bowels of hell, seventh layer, seat next to Satan. Perhaps what he calls and thinks is ‘moontalk’ is actually him speaking in tongues as he’s possessed by the demon of terrible, terrible music. Pitbull is aptly named: this is an absolute dog of a record.
Have a Dead Quail!
Night Trains – “No More Heroes”
??
Rocksucker says: Seriously: ??
No Doubt – “Settle Down”
This feels disingenuously monikered given that it’s clearly a Gwen Stefani song more than a No Doubt song, even if there is a little guitar in the chorus. Is this a reunion tour interest-igniter? It’s quite odd, and seems to go on forever, but when the initial cynicism subsides its daft ambition does amuse/entertain. See, first you’ve got the big ol’ Latino-pop throwdown; then, after what feels like years of this, a dubby breakdown. Credit where it’s due, this is pleasingly bonkers.
Rocksucker says: Three Quails out of Five!
Pitbull (feat. Shakira) – “Get It Started”
Rocksucker doesn’t understand – who in their right mind could possibly like this guy? Shakira sounds dreadful too, like she’s spent the night in a ditch with only three bottles of whiskey for company. We call Pitbull out as a comedian on a wind-up, in which case have your two quails and be gone, but the overwhelming suspicion is that he is in fact for real, and for this he gets all the Dead Quails we can throw at him
Rocksucker says: Have a Dead Quail!