Phoenix From The Flames

One of my favourite bands have returned with a leak from their forthcoming fourth album.

Phoenix are a French group who channel their country's soft rock sensibilities and add funky basslines and electro twists. Members of the band were once in a group called Darlin (great name) with the Daft Punk guys.

Have a listen to Funky Squaredance and all of their second disc Alphabetical. Singer Thomas (who is the partner of Sofia Coppola) once said that their lyrics worked better because English is his second language. He said it meant he didn't sing about 'the kitchen sink.'

GET PHOENIX- 1901 HERE

A Guilty Pleasure?

Is it wrong to be a Black Eyed Peas fan? On the evidence of their new tune Boom Boom Pow probably not.

Hear the track here

Will.I.Am is a very underated producer. It's only in recent years that he's had props from the hip hop community working with Nas, Common and The Game. Lest we forget he also produced Estelle's house flavoured American Boy- definitely one of the tunes of 08.

Boom Boom... continues the electro theme (also currently favoured by Pharrell). There's a real booty bass feel to this single and it's especially great when Fergie screams "WILL.I.AM DROP THE BEAT..."

Kid Cudi- Day & Nite- The Real Video

Here we finally get the So Me directed video for Kid Cudi's Day & Nite. The rapper was unimpressed with the video Ministry made for the Crookers remix and this is much better. Very much looking forward to the full album which is coming out on Kanye West's label later this year.

Talking of Kayeezy he's got new Yeah Yeah Yeahs, T.I and MF Doom tracks over at his blog. And a vid of him and Cudi freestyling. Dope. Check it here....

Ophelia

Discovered Tate Britain is a 15 minute walk from my house this weekend. It was well worth a stroll in the sun if only to see John Everett Millais' breathtaking Ophelia. Find out more here...

Dre Goes Topless

Dr Dre (Andre Young pictured here in 1984) turned 44 this week and a track called Topless leaked to the web. It's possible ths song (with verses by T.I and Nas) will be on his THIRD album Detox but also entirely possible it won't.

Get the MP3 at one of my favourite blogs Nah Right

One theory on the net is that T.I- who is really growing on me- won't be on Topless at all and has just ghost rapped and written Dre's verses. The Nas verse and production are pure fire. As they say.

I cannot wait for Detox and pray it comes out in '09.

You Might Win Some...

Heard this in a club recently and rapped along happily. The Miseduation Of... is one of the albums of the 90s no-fucking-contest. Shame the second album never appeared.

"The second verse is dedicated to the men/ more concerned with his rims and his tims than his women."

I Love Lily

This week my faith in the record buying public has been restored. The Prodigy look set for the Top 10 and in the US Eminem's fun comeback single Crack a Bottle (ft. Dre and Fiddy of course) has gone to number one.

Lily Allen's smart pop record It's Not Me, It's You has had incredible first week sales and will be number one on Sunday. Deservedly so.

Everyone's At It is a cool critique of drug users and drug problems- which somehow doesn't sound hypocritcal. 22 sees Lily hitting back (gently) at her media critics and justifying her behaviour. While Who'd Of Known is an equal sequel to Littlest Things and also rip off of Take That's Shine.

In short it's the best album of 09 so far. And she's just a bit cute too.

Dubstep Takes Over

I was in Berlin the other week as you'll see below. The Germans have very specific music tastes. To my mind they love very minimal techno, scary metal and cheesy euro-dance.

And at a club called Maria I realised you can add another genre to that list. The UK's own Dubstep. I leave Brixton to go to Berlin and end up at a stonking Dubstep night. Bizarre.

Benga and Skream were supposed to play seperate sets but decided to go back to back and of course killed it. Biggest tunes were Benga's own Crunk, this remix of The Streets and the above La Roux remix. Sorry about the DJ, but it's so big I had to post it. Wait for it to kick in at 4mins.

GET A CLEAN MP3 AT HYPEM

Berlin Buildings

Just got back from the German capital and really fell in love with the place. The modern architecture beats London hands down. After the wall came down every big architect seems to have designed in Berlin- Zaha Hadid, Renzo Piano, Richard Rogers and Frank Gehry are all there somewhere.

My favourites though were Brit Norman Foster's reworking of the Reichstag (including the psychedelic dome above) and Daniel Libeskind's Jewish Museum. The latter is disorientating, challenging, uncomfortable and well, just scary. See below.

NO-NO-NOtorious

A few weeks back I wrote this hoping that the new Biggie biopic was worthy of the poetic rapper. It is not. Jamal Woodward is great and gets Big's flow right. But there are a lot of problems with Notorious- not least the script and glamourising of guns, drugs, bitches and bling.

At first it feels like Everybody Hates Chris with Crack Cocaine. There is even a hilarious moment when Biggie's mom throws away a plate of the drug cos she thinks it is mashed potato! Puff Daddy says clunky lines like "You have to change yourself before you can change the world." There are many more problems with the film- not least the portrayal of women.

Save your cinema money and buy THIS and THIS. Oh and watch the above. "And if you don't know/ Now you know..."