TAW-RAN-CHEE-LAH

Pendulum, "Tarantula" (feat. Fresh, $pyda & Tenor Fly) - I tend to think of drum 'n bass in much the same way I think of prog rock, i.e. not often and not highly. It's not so much the aggressiveness or the pretension that bothers me (hell, if it did I wouldn't listen to Black Dice) so much as the fact that my involvement with the actual music pretty much extends to examining the compositional skill and stops dead. Given the choice between something incredibly good and something incredibly fun, I will invariably go with fun. This is probably why "Owner Of A Lonely Heart" is the only Yes song I can think of without consulting Allmusic - I mean, it's the one with that break and that cowbell and that chopped-up guitar and all that other awesome shit. Basically, it's the one where you absolutely cannot possibly miss the hooks.

Well, the d'n'b version of that phenomenon is "Tarantula" - it's the one with all those buzzing, vamping synths and those smoldering moments when it stops itself up and then bursts right back out of the gate and - of course - all that ragga stuff, specifically the single most holler-able chorus of the year. I hasten to add, of course, that stuff like this is hardly the exclusive domain of "Tarantula" any more than cowbell or drum breaks belong to that Yes song; it's just that it's one of the rare cases where you're not also forced to endure a lot of the tedious bullshit that comes with the genre (I mean, Miraculous' "Can't Hold Back" tops it in terms of arrangements however you want to look at it, but GAWD does it take a while to get going). Pendulum's entire Hold Your Colour album is pretty much rich with stuff like this; if you can get past the hyper-aggression characteristic of d'n'b in general, you're in for one of the most exhaustingly jam-packed-with-hooks album of the year, like a super-hardcore sexually-apolitical Scissor Sisters or something. I wouldn't be surprised to catch myself placing it really high on my insufferable and eternal end-of-year lists; albums this good are rare enough that it's worth the effort of overcoming the genre. I mean, "TAW-RAN-CHEE-LAH" is just about as satisfying as lyrics are getting this year - well, except for "I've seen her naked! Twice!", but that's some fine company to keep. (Click here to buy Hold Your Colour from Amazon.)

The Pernice Brothers, "Here Comes The Sun" - In which we all find out what those Coldplay songs sound like played at 45 rpm instead of 33, much like how Coldplay allowed us to hear what it would sound like if Bush were to cover Air Supply. I should probably admit that my attitude towards Coldplay is, shall we say, slightly played up for effect, since I absolutely like a couple of their songs and my ears tend to perk up when I'm browsing through the indie section of Piccadilly and stumble over their name. Music isn't necessarily bad simply because it's bland and reactionary; it may not be great art, but then again I wasn't humming "Warszawa" all day like I was with this song. (Click here to order Discover A Lovelier You from Ashmont Records.)