Welcome to the Black Motherfuckin’ Parade

I got a gift from Wife today: the new My Chemical Romance album The Black Parade.

I've listened to it just the once so far, but it sounds really good. Different to the previous two albums. Darker, more restrained and deliberate-sounding, as would befit its title. I'm looking forward to hearing it several more times in the coming days. Thanks missus!

My Chemical Romance

You ever get one of those moments when...?

Okay, a couple of weeks back, this comment was made about me by someone who doesn't know me:

I think youre one of those guys that likes the original no matter what, so people will think youre "old school" or something along those lines. You liked it before it was famous. I bet you'll stop listening to music if a lot of people like it dont you?

My own response was that most art is better before the artist becomes too successful, and so, yes, I do tend to go off artists once they get big, saying something about how they were better before they were big (which isn't necessarily the same as selling out).

I came to the My Chemical Romance party a little late in the day myself. Wife and I saw the video for "I'm Not Okay (I Promise)" at about the time it was released, and she quickly bought the album, which was the band's second one. I listened to it more than she did, though, and so she gifted me the debut album a few months later, which at that time was not easy to find, because I guess it had been pressed in fairly limited numbers.

Since that time -- probably the best part of a couple of years ago now -- MCR have become pretty bloody huge. So huge, in fact, and this may surprise some US readers, that their current single "Welcome to the Black Parade" is at No.1 in the UK singles chart. Click the header to check out the promo vid over at Wife's blog.

Last week I spoke to my brother. My brother likes some really bad music. He likes Jason Mraz, for fuck's sake, and KT Tunstall (Cuntie Ton o' Stool, as I like to call her), and Sting, and probably James Blunt and all that faux singer/songwriter shit produced by fakers for the masses. He told me how much he liked the new My Chemical Romance track. I could have died. I could have burned my CDs right there and then. But I rose above, clinging on to the hope that he will forget all about them in a few weeks. Let's hope.

But this sort of thing always reminds me of that line in the Adam & The Ants track "Don't Be Square (Be There)": You may not like us now, but you will.

A non-blogging day

Happy First of July to you all!

I'm not going to be doing any blogging today. The reasons for this are threefold and nothing to do with it being the first day of the month:

1. I really need to knuckle down and do a bit of work.

2. I have kind of used up a lot of the time in which I could have been blogging by fiddling with my template instead. There is much that I want to do, and I know that if I don't get it finished soon, I'll get bored and end up leaving it as it is.

3. If I were to blog, it would probably only be about how much I hope the Eng-er-land do as well this afternoon as the Azzurri did last night. Truth is, when it comes to footie, I have very little faith in "the ingles", as we like to call them (rhyming with shingles, rather than being pronouced "in-gles"). I fucking hate Sven. He's a proper boring cunt who, I believe, has done almost nothing of any worth for our national team, and I can't wait to see the back of him. Not that his replacement looks any better...

So, those are the reasons that you'll not see anything new from me today. Well, you might; but right now I ain't promising anything. And so to work.

Listening to: I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love, My Chemical Romance

A rocking good time

I enjoyed The School of Rock with Jack Black - thought it was fun.

I tuned in to watch Gene Simmons bring his own version to UK schools in both series of Rock School, too. The first series was a posh school; the second was a comprehensive. Both shows were compelling.

So it was inevitable that I would watch the US documentary film that is also, somewhat confusingly, called Rock School. I suppose there are only so many variations of names for a show or film about a school that teaches rock.

This latest effort is rather interesting. Where Black was a fun faux teacher, and Simmons was a No More Mr Nice Guy cut-the-shit type, Paul Green, the tutor and founder of the rock school in the documentary, is a bit of a psycho. And not a particularly likable psycho, either.

He's not supposed to be wholly likable, of course. He kind of tries to keep in with the kids by swearing and shit like that, but he comes across as a bit of a nerdy paedo type. And he basically forces the kids to listen to the music he likes: Zappa. I'm not familiar with Zappa, although I was pleasantly surprised by what I heard.

The kids are really cool, though: they definitely make the movie worth a look. It's quite amazing how talented some of them are; and watching 8-year-olds doing Ozzy impressions has got to be worth the video hire price!

Overall, a good movie. It's only 85 minutes, too, so you can squeeze it in before Prison Break on a Monday evening or something.

If I was a rock-school teacher, though, I'd have the kids learning something a bit more contemporary. This is my current pick (with help from Wife) of what "da kidz" should be listening to and learning to play. Here you go, Camie: you kind of asked for this.

This list is based on bands that still exist today, so the kids can relate. Of course, if we're talking the annals of history, that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish...

Alkaline Trio	Fall Out Boy	Franz Ferdinand
Funeral For A Friend	Green Day	Interpol
My Chemical Romance	Panic! At The Disco	Razorlight
System Of A Down	Trivium	Weezer

Today I'm listening to: From Under the Cork Tree, by Fall Out Boy

“Old people” dig music, daddy-o

There's an interesting story on the BBC news site today. Under the wonderful headline "Music-loving mums rock CD sales" the article tells us how "older people" – i.e., those in their 40s – are buying more music than their teenage children. And within the article we are treated to pictures of Neil Sedaka and Barry Manilow.

Now, hold on for just one doggone minute here, please. I'm four years away from 40. Wife a little closer (I hope she covered her eyes at that bit). And we buy a goodly amount of music. But the latest stuff we have bought includes the likes of Alkaline Trio, Bright Eyes, Funeral For A Friend, Aimee Mann, My Chemical Romance, and Trivium. We're not parents, but we are still almost in the age range that the article is talking about. And frankly I don't see our tastes changing so much that we'll start buying Neil cunting Sedaka CDs within the next five years.

(At this point, I should mention that Wife has a soft spot for Manilow, so we have a couple of his CDs here and we've seen him in concert twice. And she'd love to see him during his current Vegas stint. What can I say? He's a good entertainer.)

Furthermore, on a recent shopping trip – I think the one when I bought Trivium – I saw a "young" lad of about 18 leaving the store pleased as punch with his purchase. And what was it that he'd spent his hard-earned money on? Well, I know because I saw him proudly showing his girlfriend. It was a double pack of Phil Collins CDs. Phil fucking Collins!

It's a fucking good job that "old" cunts like us are out there buying music with balls, cos the young cunts coming up behind us are about to destroy any sort of integrity the music scene ever had.

Time for a coffee break

It's one of those seemingly interminable days today. Admittedly I got to my desk a little earlier than usual, so by now it's already feeling like 6pm when it's really only just gone 5. Added to that, I am (slowly, oh so slowly) drawing to the end of a slightly uninspiring chunk of work.

So I've grabbed a coffee and put Hours by Funeral For A Friend on the old iTunes. Wife swears by it, so I'll give it a go. The first song just sounds a little too much like stuff from the first My Chemical Romance album, though. Not that there's anything wrong with that, to borrow a Seinfeld phrase; just it'd be nice if it sounded a bit more original.

Still, I'm gonna leave it playing and get on with my work. I don't usually work with music playing, but it's not so bad if it's music that I'm not very familiar with. It prevents me from singing along and therefore losing concentration on the job at hand!

Wish me luck, I'm going back in.

American Idol

I like American Idol. However, the songs they sing on the show are invariably incredibly bad – largely because Americans are so hung up on R&B and Country. We are thankfully spared such inanities most of the time in our own UK-based Pop Idol, X Factor, and the like. But last week American Idol sunk to a new low: the music of Stevie Wonder. Am I the only person in the world who sees no value in this man’s work? It is so god-awful; to me, he’s a washed-up talentless hack. All we can do is take it in our stride and patiently await the shows that feature the music of My Chemical Romance, Trivium, and Arch Enemy – especially if they spend as much time trying to capture the subtle nuances of Arch Enemy’s Angela Gossow’s vocal stylings as they do those of Mariah Carey and the other squawking, vibrato-ridden buffoons that pass as pop stars these days.