The Singles Bar: 05/03/12

Now we’re into the third month of the year, the biggest festivals are starting to reveal their line-ups. With no Glastonbury in 2012, there’s a chance for an act at one of the smaller events to make a late surge and soundtrack the summer. To do that, you need a good build-up, and perhaps by releasing a top quality single, you’ll win No Ripcord’s Single Of The Week award, and all your dreams will come true. Let’s see who’s aiming for the summit this week.

Turnpike Glow – 1986

We begin the first Singles Bar of the month with Anglo-Italians Turnpike Glow. Instantly, the keyboard riff brings MGMT to mind, particularly Kids, but from that point on it’s enjoyable, punchy indiepop with elements of shoegaze fuzz. Reportedly inspired by a Guardian headline, 1986 is a slick track that has the hooks of a band far more renowned and established. Turnpike Glow may not be tearing up the rule book, but who cares when the sugar-coated melodies are this strong and addictive? On the production side, it’s a bit too lo-fi for its own good at times, but that’s the only thing from stopping 1986 being a bona fide power-pop classic. Turnpike Glow are most certainly a band to watch. 8/10 – SINGLE OF THE WEEK

Dot Rotten – Are You Not Entertained?

It’s a joke that could get old fairly quick but, for the time being, I still find it pretty funny that an MC has named himself Dot Rotten. It’s a fairly aggressive lyrical attack that sounds like a turbo-charged, UK grime version of Mos Def’s Oh No. There’s a real edge to Are You Not Entertained? but Dot Rotten seems to have found the perfect meeting point between hard grime and chart-friendly pop and, as a result, the track manages to remain exciting while appealing to a wide audience. The buzzing bass propels things along and as Dot (or should that be Mr. Rotten?) half-sings the chorus, it’s difficult not to get swept along by the whole shebang. If someone like Labrinth can be hugely successful in the UK (though he is signed to Syco, admittedly), there’s no reason Dot Rotten can’t reap similar rewards. 8/10

Enter Shikari – Arguing With Thermometers

I was on the verge of pronouncing Arguing With Thermometers the most ridiculous song title of all-time, until I noticed there’s another track on the Enter Shikari album called Gandhi Mate, Gandhi. Arguing With Thermometers is a bizarre song, starting out as screaming hardcore before morphing into bouncy Latin-inspired rock and then a dubstep-influenced spoken word piece. If this all sounds like a complete mess, that’s because it is. It’s the Lostprophets meets Funeral For A Friend meets Hadouken! mash-up that the world didn’t really need. There are flashes of melody and a tune, but they seem accidental really. Overall, Arguing With Thermometers is messier than an Eton Mess that’s been dropped on a messy floor and then been trodden on by Lionel Messi. 3/10

Jakwob – Electrify

Fans of nominative determinism are sure to love Jakwob, as it appears to be the noise that’s synonymous with dubstep (go on, say it, “ja-KWWWWOOOOOOOOOBBBBBBBBBB!”). Actually, although there are dubstep elements to Electrify, it owes far more of a debt to the dance sound of the early 90s, particularly breakbeat and rave. It’s a fairly non-specific kind of track that doesn’t push the kind of extremes needed to make it anthemic, affecting or particularly memorable. It’s a 21st Century reading of an older sound, but if you’re in the mood for this kind of thing, you wouldn’t listen to Jakwob. No, you’d dig out your Baby D and Livin’ Joy records and have a whale of a time with those instead. 4/10

Black Stone Cherry – In My Blood

Oh, please no. It appears Black Stone Cherry are the kind of over-earnest, country-based rock that does well in America but, thankfully, rarely troubles the UK. Yes, Americans, in our wondrous land of plenty, hardly anyone’s even heard of Creed, and Lady Antebellum can barely get arrested. That said, the dull Southern rock of Black Stone Cherry did apparently reach the UK Top 20 album charts, so perhaps I shouldn’t be so smug. This is still the first I’ve heard of them though and, hopefully, the last too. It’s a bit Nickleback, a bit Kid Rock, a bit Kings of Leon and is the kind of derivative, say-nothing music that can sap the life out of you at a rate of knots. Thanks, but no thanks. 1/10

Deaf Havana – Leeches

Quick check – are we still in 2012? I’m only asking because for Enter Shikari, Black Stone Cherry and now Deaf Havana, it’s like the last decade or so never happened. I never thought I’d be saying a track sounded like Funeral For A Friend twice in one week but here we are again. However, on the positive side, Deaf Havana clearly have a way with a tune that made some of FFAF’s earlier stuff genuinely great listening. I’m sure those cheeky ruffians with silly fringes and flesh tunnels you see hanging around precincts will lap this stuff up and fair play to them – there’s a professional quality to Leeches it’s hard to deny. Also, Deaf Havana are from King’s Lynn and, having been there, anybody who can make something of themselves coming from somewhere like that deserves a pat on the back. 6/10

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Look Around

After the success (you’re right, I do have an odd way of defining success) of Florence + The Machine bingo a few weeks back, I’ve developed a Red Hot Chili Peppers version, so dobbers at the ready, everyone. Reasonably high-pitched, wah-wah style guitar accompaniment? Check. Needlessly complicated funk bassline? Check. Nonsense, semi-rapped vocals? Check. House? No, not quite because, surprisingly, there is not a single mention of the state of California in Look Around. Sorry, better luck next time. As for what it sounds like, well, you’ve heard a Red Hot Chili Peppers song before, right? It sounds like a Red Hot Chili Peppers song. There’s a bit more substance to this one than most though; it somehow burrows into your subconscious and sits there poking the bit of your brain that responds to musical stimuli. Yes, despite being opposed to all the elements of this track, I somehow quite like it. 6/10

Marcus Collins – Seven Nation Army

Somewhere in the world, there’s a person who thought, “You know what? That Joss Stone faux-soul cover of Fell In Love With A Girl worked really well. Her career’s gone from strength to strength, she’s a permanent fixture on end-of-year best-of lists. No-one at all think she’s a complete laughing stock. Let’s repeat this sure-fire trick to critical and commercial success.” Pity that person, because it’s probably not mathematically possible to be more wrong. Former X Factor contestant Collins has wrung all the good things out of the White Stripes’ original, replaced it with an oddly staccato rendition of the signature riff, borrowed Mark Ronson’s horn section and warbled all over it. Even if you didn’t like this song in the first place, you’d be hard pressed to argue this hasn’t made it worse in every conceivable way. Awful, awful stuff – I’d rather listen to a song by Justin Lee Collins than this. 0/10

Estelle – Thank You

Although according to music industry insiders (i.e. Wikipedia), Estelle’s been steadily releasing material for the past few years, she hasn’t really been on the radar since 2008’s fantastic, Kanye West-featuring American Boy. Thank You is a smooth, soulful ballad that’s a world away from the hip-hop MC we’ve seen in the past. However, it seems Estelle is that rarest of things – someone who can both rap and sing with considerable skill. Thank You isn’t the most dynamic or exhilarating of songs, but Estelle manages to place real emotion and depth into the vocals without feeling the need to resort to talent show histrionics. There’s the odd touch of autotune, which sadly dehumanises the track in parts, but overall, Estelle has shown real star quality to transform something merely average into something great. 7/10

Loverush UK! feat. Bryan Adams – Tonight In Babylon

Presumably, Loverush UK! (no, me neither) saw the success Chicane had when they teamed up with the Canadian AOR-peddler and thought they’d get in on the action (over a decade too late). The effect is largely the same: a forgettable Euro-trance song with the familiar blues-inflected vocal stylings of Bryan Adams over the top. They make for incongruous bedfellows and – Chicane precedent aside – it’s difficult to see why these artists have paired up. This might well sound “well amazing” when you’re “pilled up” in an Ibiza club but it’s March, it’s cold and dark outside, and this kind of music tends to bring me out in hives. So, while Adams might be spending, “to-naaaaat in Baaaabylowwwwwwwn”, I’m going to bid you adieu, eat my dinner and hopefully never be subjected to this song again. 1/10

Sticks + Stones

Cher Lloyd - Sticks + Stones
released 7 November 2011 on Syco

In a recent interview, boy-band JLS revealed how devastated they were that, after finishing runners-up on 2008’s X Factor behind Alexandra Burke, Simon Cowell passed up the opportunity to sign them, despite the fact they practically begged him to. “As soon as the show finished, we asked him to give us a deal,” said the sensitive one; “he just point-blank refused,” cooed the non-threatening one, non-threateningly. “But,” pouted the pretty one, while simultaneously doing a backflip and lifting his t-shirt to show a sculpted six-pack, “it turned out to be the best thing to ever happen to us!” “…”, added the one who no-one outside of his immediate family realises exists.

Despite the fact all the quotes in the previous paragraph were entirely fabricated, the story JLS were alluding to very much did happen, and they could well have a point. Simon Cowell may make an obscene amount of money through his myriad entertainment enterprises, but the acts signed to his label, Syco, do tend to be of a certain type. The current buzz around Tinie Tempah acolyte, Labrinth, notwithstanding, most of his acts are bedroom balladeers, and very lucrative they prove for him too. Not all his protégés are overjoyed at this approach – witness the laughable struggle of Matt Cardle and his attempts to realign himself as a credible musician – and JLS have serendipitously avoided the same fate. They’re now free to work with Calvin Harris and Dev, and make chart-friendly dance-pop instead of being forced to become BoyzII Men II.

Which leaves us with the interesting conundrum: what do you do with a problem like Cher Lloyd? The teenage singer, fourth on last year’s X Factor behind implausibly fresh-faced One Direction, Rebecca Ferguson and “Credibility” Cardle, polarised opinion with her brash style and fondness for rapping. All four finalists are currently signed with Syco and of the quartet, it’s Cher who seems to be the least obvious fit. Push her towards lighters-aloft, supermarket-friendly balladry and you risk losing what made her different in the first place. Let her do her thing, and you’re letting an 18-year-old dictate her own career path while going against strongly entrenched Syco policy.

Lloyd’s debut album, Sticks + Stones, starts better than you’d ever dared imagine. Despite her misguided assumption that she’s “got a flow that will make your mother and your father call the cops,” opening track,Grow Up, is an incredibly fun slice of bratty, bubblegum dancehall. Her rap style is raw at best, and the cameo from Busta Rhymes is odd, but there’s plenty of room in the ongoing soap opera of pop for a pantomime, carefree, outspoken, anti-authority teen. She’s following the fine tradition set by artists such as Althea & Donna, Vanilla and Daphne & Celeste. This trend continues with following track, Want U Back, which is packed with hooks and has Cher’s personality stamped all over it.

Current single, With Ur Love, is another good, catchy song, save for a hateful Mike Posner guest spot, which paints him to be the kind of lecherous predator you pray doesn’t take your daughter to prom. However, the turning point of Sticks + Stones arrives with Swagger Jagger; comfortably the most bizarre song to reach the top of the UK charts in 2011. Swagger Jagger is a mess – a brain-melting mix of sirens,dubstep beats, shouty vocals, and the chorus to 19th Century folk ballad, Oh My Darling, Clementine. Lloyd is full of bravado and self-confidence, informing us that we can’t stop “tweetin’ ‘bout” and “YouTubin’” her, but then telling her “haters” (which are apparently legion) that it was “very, very, very nice to meet ya.”

Swagger Jagger will make your mind unravel and, fittingly, the album then begins to do the same. Beautiful People is the kind of syrupy, pointless ballad Syco-affiliated acts specialise in, and completely the wrong kind of song for Cher Lloyd now she’s not preoccupied with trying to win votes from suburban housewives on primetime television. Over The Moon repeats the same “trick” as Swagger Jagger, grafting an in-your-face verse to an ill-fitting, camp chorus to create a genetically-modified monster. And quite frankly, the less said about the 21st Century re-working of Buffalo Stance, here entitled Playa Boi, the better.

After a promising opening trio of tracks, Sticks + Stones wanes badly, and begins to sound more and more like it’s been focus-grouped by industry executives in pursuit of a quick buck until there’s barely any semblance of character left. It’s understandable really, Cher Lloyd is living the dream of millions of girls worldwide and isn’t likely to upset the applecart.

The sad fact is, Cher Lloyd may need a change of direction to achieve any kind of longevity. She’s positioned at the end of the market where her fans will soon grow up and move on and – depressing as this is – she could be on the pop scrapheap before she’s out of her teens. There is a glimmer of hope though; the penultimate song, Dub On The Track, shows the kind of sound she might be wise to pursue. It may sound like a cut-off from the Katy B album, and Cher may sound slightly overwhelmed by the production, but street-smart, urban-flavoured pop could be the way forward for her. Featuring Mic Righteous, Ghetts and Dot Rotten, Dub On The Track doesn’t forge a brave new way ahead for music, but it’s a sliver of hope from an otherwise dispiriting final two-thirds of the album.

It appears Cher Lloyd is signed to a label who have limited ideas of what best to do with her. Counter-intuitive as it may sound, Sticks + Stones bombing and Lloyd being dropped could be a blessing in disguise. Besides, she wouldn’t be the first X Factor alumnus to find success outside of the all-encompassing Cowell media empire.