Single Reviews 18/09/06

Well hide our shampoo and order us a Kronenbourg ‘n’ black! This week’s Single Reviews are all proper, like, bands! With guitars! And drums! And, in drastically varying amounts, credibility! It’ll be like Radio 1 in 1995 when even Crapital FM shat all over it.

Edit: we’ve just noticed that bloody Janet Jackson’s back, and she’s brought Nelly with her. Is it too late to swap the lager ‘n’ black for a Shakeaway?

Let’s begin at the bottom, which surprisingly isn’t Janet ‘n Nelly. Snakes On A Plane by Cobra Starship (what are the chances?!) is less the soundtrack to a Hollywood blockbuster and more the thud of a bad-ass rival group during a Battle of the Bands in an episode of California Dreams. Even the mere existence of a movie entitled Snakes On A Plane has shaken our belief in the entire film industry, and we saw Spiceworld at the cinema. Twice.

Jet herald their second album influx with the below-par Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is. By no means unpleasant, but there’s a noticeable whiff of sweaty endeavour to carve out a classic. In this case, ‘classic’ has come out the other side as ‘dated’, and sadly not dated enough to be an intentional throwback.

High time we stopped delaying the inevitable and tackled Janet Jackson. Not literally, mind – heaven forbid her nose fell off or bejewelled tit popped out. Call On Me doesn’t quite convey the impact required to proclaim the return of a speedily-maturing diva, with the attendance of Nelly barely even registering. It’s all sludge and twinkles, nowhere near enough to carry a melody, let alone a greying career.


And so we come to the contenders for our Single of the Week, and it’s a tricky dispute. Three bands we love, three first rate songs – if we knew enough about horse-racing we’d churn out a dirty great euphemism in the style of John McCririck. However, we only know him as a Diet Coke-snaffling mutant Womble, so it’s on with a regular review. The Zutons just miss out through no fault of their own – Oh Stacey (Look What You’ve Done) is a radiant rock-lite treat, but having played the album to death it doesn’t get us in quite the same high spirits as its competitors. Similarly, the prodigious Recover by The Automatic has been rinsed through the Sloppy Dog speakers, and while it’s withstood the repetition, we’ve decided to leave it in the shadow of Monster to aid our deduction.

Finally, When You Were Young loudly pronounces that The Killers are back, with the hype-o-meter already set to ‘Lily Allen’. Good points? Fucking awesome band. Tremendously vast indie anthem. Fit singer. Bad points? Unspeakably shit moustache on fit singer. Impossible to get tickets to gig. Summary: Shave, put us on the guestlist, and assuming you comply, we’ll award you our blessed title. Congratulations! Provisionally.