because I meant to mention 'The School Song' here

Flyboy says:
hey, have you heard 'the school song' by black box recorder?
Kicking_k says:
no - from new album? it good?
Kicking_k says:
it DANCEFLOOR?
Flyboy says:
yeah, it is a bit dancey
Flyboy says:
they've gone a bit electropop
Flyboy says:
which is interesting
Flyboy says:
can't work out if that's a great move or whether it just makes them a poor man's Ladytron
Kicking_k says:
good. they shouldn't worry about fashion - jus use the best tool at the time to deliver the lyrics/attitude.
Flyboy says:
I think their best dancefloor song is still 'uptown top ranking'!
Kicking_k says:
that's really good, yeah.
Kicking_k says:
she sounds like she's onmorphine - in a steel-pressing factory
Flyboy says:
it almost sounds like tricky
Flyboy says:
hey! ever thought of playing whale's 'hobo humping slobo babe'?
Kicking_k says:
i wish tricky still sounded like tricky.
Kicking_k says:
hmmm... and 'suds & soda' by deus?
Flyboy says:
are you taking the piss?
Flyboy says:
i like the song, but...
Kicking_k says:
i do love both those songs - but they're welded to a particular time and place for me.
Kicking_k says:
in the past, unfortunately.
Flyboy says:
the indie disco, 1996
Kicking_k says:
some of my best ever dancefloor experiences have been to 'suds & soda'.
Flyboy says:
you wore an orange and green long-sleeved tee, she had slides in her hair
Kicking_k says:
we play 'eurodisco' by bis (went down really well)
Kicking_k says:
and the mikey track.
Kicking_k says:
ha!
Flyboy says:
thanks to you i now have 'they don't care about us' stuck in my head at least one day a week
Kicking_k says:
it's a killer.

(This was a conversation with one of the It Came From The Sea superstar DJs.)

congrats! you are the worst fucking indie fuck that
can ever fucking exist. you are not only better
then everyone but arent afraid to show it. your
taste is perfection and you are loved.


what type of indie fuck are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

The worrying thing is there were at least two questions I just didn't fuckin' unnerstann at all. I'm really hoping this is some transatlantic lost-in-translation thing, but it could be that I'm just getting old.

(Via achren, to whom I owe mail.)

God, but what would I do without Get Your War On?

peace is good and war is BAD! / I got a trust fund from my DAD!

Everybody's favourite wealthy white Manhattanite rappers, the Beastie Boys, have written an anti-war anthem.

"Now don’t get us wrong ‘cause we love America
But that’s no reason to get hysterica"

Now, granted, I haven't had the chance to actually hear the song 'In A World Gone Mad' yet, but the lyrics are bad. Very bad. If I'm 100% honest, there is no difference in *quality* between this swill and Poets For The War - obviously, I agree with the sentiment of the Beasties' effort and not the latter, but they are essentially two sides of the same deeply embarrassing coin.

The question is, what else did anyone expect? Writing songs with an overt political message is always a tricky business. Those who can pull it off tend to be people who give the sense of being deeply politically involved and aware on a day-to-day basis - whenever otherwise relatively apolitical artists decide to make a song about a Big Issue, the result is bound to be embarrassing. And the Beastie Boys are essentially an apolitical band - every now and again they make tiny little gestures, and there's the whole Tibet thing, sure (though oddly, they've never mentioned Palestine), but they're very much grounded in a safe, middle-class, hippy-ish form of liberal/left-wing politics - nothing too radical, nothing too confrontational.

I think the Beastie Boys have made some fantastic music when they've stuck to doing what they do best - dumb fun, whether of the variety of 'Fight For Your Right...', 'Hey Ladies', or the better parts of the last two albums. They're like a living argument against letting your politics define your taste in music (although there are ways in which even Mark 2 of the Boys, the supposedly right-on version, can be objected to on political grounds).

I find it hard to believe anything in this song is news to the majority of their listeners... but maybe I'm wrong. I'm sure there *is* a case to be made that this song has political value regardless of the success of its execution - I'd like to hear it.

Oh - and if you want to hear some good political rap, you should be checking The Coup.

No, I've not just been listening to The Slits album on repeat for a week. It would be good if I had though...