A GOOD PLACE TO GET SOME THINKING DONE

'Buzz' is a strange thing, it seems like a very hasty element of the music industry, however, it's actually very gradual. The cool kids and underground tipsters pick up on a band, they fall into the hands of the PR people, it falls into the hands of the media, it falls into the hands of the listener and then into the hands of the slightly 'slow on the uptake' tipsters; all in what can be a space of about a year. A band can be 'hyped' for a good 18 months nowadays without any damage to their reputation if they take their time with releases etc. so a band that's seemingly been around for ages can be seen as fresh by the next guy.

One band that seem's to have been in the spotlight for ages is Titus Andronicus who are one of those Los Campesinos!-No Age-Animal Collective type of bands hailing from New Jersey. Their name seems to have been absolutely everywhere at the start of 2009 and they've been regular names on Radio 1 and 6Music tracklistings in the past few weeks. Maybe a re-issue of their debut could end up becoming something pretty essential this year!

Listen to: Titus Andronicus - Landscape with Icarus (myspace)

FALLEN ON INQUISITIVE EARS

As I scan the musical highway that is MySpace, for fresh blood, I find my journey is littered with mediocre artists seemingly only in a band for the sake of it. There's also the case that a lot of the bands are quite simply just damned awful, so when a band comes my way that's listenable I find myself throwing myself head on into their sound. One such band who have impressed me on my search are Sharks who hail from my old hometown of Royal Leamington Spa. You'd be right in saying that they sound a heck of a lot like The Clash but with an unmistakeable vibe of the sort that seemed to surround the C86 movement of the 1980's. On first listen you're unlikely to pick that up, yet when you really listen there's an element of The Boo Radleys (when they weren't soundtracking GMTV) and it's only the singers gruff voice and the distortion on the guitars that makes you think twice before comparing them to the likes of This Poison or early Orange Juice. Not a cert for success but definitely worth your attention...

Listen to: Sharks - Fallen on Deaf Ears (myspace)