The "X" Hitmakers TS: Richard X vs. Xenomania

Richard X's work seems a little more in tune with my brain, but then again I'm also not an auto Girls Aloud worshipper. Perhaps I would need to be British. ;-)

Probably, since I don't like Texas. But this has not been released yet, right?

Right now i'd go with Xenomania

So Xenomania, then, though I still haven't heard what they've done on the new Saint Etienne record.

I think the likes of 'Rock Jacket', 'You Used To', the extended 'Some Girls', 'You Better Let me Love You', the 'Hands Up' remix and his general multilayering tactics go some way to countering this. Whereas, you could be talking about most Girls Aloud songs if you swapped out a name in that there statement.

If anything, Xenomania have always reeked of "too clever by half" for me. On average, their work feels forced, lacking any of the naturalness that certain Japanese favourites of mine and the likes of the Dust Brothers exude in their own combinant and retro-updating pop productions. They seem to generally operate at about 35% of the liveliness I'd expect from a hot pop prospect - if there was ever a Girls Aloud track barring 'Love Machine' and 'No Good Advice' that I thought I could dance to, it should've been 'Grafitti My Soul' til Tom played it last week and all the old feelings of "why bother?" came flooding back (and talk about no changes in dynamic, though that doesn't usually bother me outside of electro house).

Richard is a lovely guy who doesn't strike me as a major cynic, and even if he is, it's probably what's giving his work the required bite. He's brave enough to give his pure pop work the nuttiness it needs to stand out in the charts. Xenomania sound far too safe in comparison. And on a related note, Basement Jaxx's more pop-oriented style of late is also playing it safe in the production stakes (compare the two Singles...singles to JC Chasez's 'Shake It'), but they also beat Xenomania via better sounds and danceability, plus the hooks aren't bad either.

I've started writing an answer to this thread and then it deleted it twice - a tough one to answer!

Popjustice just e-mailed me to say that Basement Jaxx are in fact looking for an act to produce an entire album for, taking them one step closer to "becoming Britain's best pop producers". Also, RX is still looking for that girl group and 'Crazy Boys' is Rachel's next single.

i predict a reynolds girls revival any day now.

You see, for me it's the other way around. Richard X's output (possibly excluding his work with Liberty X, possibly not) has always seemed to be music you "appreciate" first, and dance to later (if at all). Xenomania are a lot more, well, fun.

both of them rank similarly in terms of overt cleverness though, I don't see how either are any worse/better than each other in that regard.

From a performance perspective "Being Nobody" would have likely been the same no matter who produced it. Its distinctiveness arises from the contrast between the performance's declaration of love and satisfaction and the groove's mechanistic hollowness - there's a friction between them that creates a strong sense of pathos.

With Xenomania the grooves are generally less "subversive" in and of themselves: they are merely a component of a cohesive song-as-statement, and it's at the song level that the art-pop claim is staked. So you get stuff like "No Good Advice" or "Love Machine" where the music, the lyrics and the performance all seem really intricately but seamlessly connected.

There are of course moments of convergence: "Some Girls" and "In The Middle" seem to borrow from both approaches, for example.

I wonder if there's a case to be made for this convergence being an increasing trend rather than momentary blips - since 'Some Girls' RX seems to have been emphasising the song-as-statement more ('Chewing Gum', '10 Dollar', 'Crazy Boys') while Xenomania were last seen toying with incredibly dominating deliberately un-pop grooves which backed songs which were barely there in the conventional sense ('Graffiti My Soul').

'Negotiate With Love' seems to be the ultimate incidence of convergence so far, so much so that I can't tell who actually produced it (I haven't seen the credits). Haha I bet it was neither of them.

"Tim I note that you have cleverly sidestepped the issue of which you prefer!"

I think I might lean towards Richard X but that might be because I come from a slight dance-music perspective.

Re those recent Richard X productions: with Annie and M.I.A. might it be a case of working with artists who have a more specific idea of what they want to do and be? (ie. who wrote the lyrics to "Chewing Gum"? It wouldn't affect the tune's quality either way but it's interesting in terms of artist/producer interaction). Haven't heard "Crazy Boys" yet - anxious to though!

this is true! er, wasn't 'Sweet Dreams My LA Ex' also written by a third party?

I suppose Xenomania's equivalent of the RX/MIA and RX/Annie works would be their stuff with St Etienne - and then again, it's song-as-statement rather than groove-as-statement, except obv it's St Etienne's song this time even though it's recognisably Xenomania (haha in the same way that 'Negotiate With Love' is "recognisably Xenomania").

Yep, possibly the same person who did "Negotiate With Love"? I don't think this is surprising actually: considering the fact that Richard X and Xenomania pretty much define the field when it comes to non-R&B UK pop, it makes sense that attempts by 3rd parties would end up taking cues from both.

tim, why do you think the human league groove on 'being nobody' "contradicts" the vocal line?

Richard X has no talent for writing songs. Xenomania have. Fact.

The Xenomania hit factory have a weird approach to lyrics - always fishing about for a killer line, not caring *at all* how those lines all hang together (a couple of exceptions: "Hole In The Head" for instance).

"I Beg Your Pardon" is fast becoming a Poptimism standard.

Negotiate With Love is (IIRC) Swedish electro-pop types Vacuum.

My favourite X track is still "Some Girls". My favourite Xenomania track is either "No Good Advice" (whose ending is probably my favourite moment this decade!) or V's "Hip To Hip".

i think stevem, barima and ver lex have ALL put 'danceability' at the heart of their arguments.

You're wrong about me. I put sonic cohesion at the heart of mine. Rx's electro production seems to result in better sounds than Xeno's alleged dance-meets-rock efforts. It may be unfair to crit Xeno for not being panning maniacs or synth crazies or a tricksy multilayerer like Richard is, but that doesn't mean I should be happy Xeno exist anyway when they sound about as vital as Steps did. PJ and Duncan's musical backing is far more exciting than most of Xeno's. And what always baffled me was critics feverishly peter pulling praising Xeno's "crossbreeding". 'The Show' was much better when it was the instrumental break in a certain unreleased JC Chasez single and 'Sound of the Underground' was the sort of thing Cornelius knocked off in 1997 with more class, skill and futuristic sheen.

And as far as writing goes, well, RX is upping his game. Admittedly, it's via teaming up with Xeno writer Hannah Robinson, who we should note as the center of our little Venn diagram here, but 'Some Girls', 'Crazy Boys' and 'Me Plus One' are contenders through and through, and even older stuff like 'Lemon/Lime', 'Just Friends' and 'You Better Let Me Love You' were foreshadowings of a better pen hand to come.

Obviously, Tim is otm, esp. where mentioning RX's groove properties. He's gotten a little better with non-generic vocal performances post X-Factor ie the remix of Tiga's 'Hot In Herre' and 'Some Girls', which, I maintain, does not quite work without Rachel.

"Talking to you is like talking to a computerrrrrr" (or, yes he does actually!)

No Crazy Leak yet, Tom.

Sonic cohesion is worthless if what's being held together is a lump of shit.

"Contradicts" is probably too strong actually. I think I might have said "contrast".

A standard but effective trick in clever-clever pop is to have (if we can artificially break them down for a moment) the song (as expressed by the vocals and lyrics) and the groove expressing a different emotion, or a different intensity of emotion, and those differences create a distance between the two which is then resolved by reading one component through the other. This seemed to me to be one of the main functions of the Girls on Top bootlegs - eg. reading Whitney's declaration of desire through Kraftwerk's brittle electronics makes Whitney's desire seem more desperate, less likely to be fulfilled.

The switch from "I Want To Dance With Numbers" to "Being Nobody" is one of extent: "Being Nobody" is more slick than the Girls on Top bootlegs or the Sugababes' "Freak Like Me" because the of process creation is allowed to quietly creep up on you rather than broadcasted as the song's primary attraction. The "song component" survives the stitch-up intact, but also changed - eerier, colder, harder, the passion of the song leached away or purged... it's a gleaming android to the bootlegs' Robo-Frankensteins. No accident the singers looked like robots and sang in a factory in the video clip, although their vocals don't actually court this image: through the action of the groove the entire feel of the song becomes one of a soulless exchange of dependency, need as a commodity, desire as a computable compulsion.

This space of pathos can be created by precisely the opposite construction of course: manically blissful music and then lyrics and/or singing which shadow the music simply by being incommensurate - Saint Etienne's "He's On The Phone" or Kylie's "Better The Devil You Know", for example.

also you do hear these songs as 'clever', i don't think there's a felt contrast, it's more like 'dys he has taken 'soul' music plsu 'machine'' music. even among fairly casual listeners i think 'cleverness' is what you get off the records (nothing wrong with that).

isn't saying that on 'being nobody' "the passion of the song [has been] leached away or purged" just the flipside of classic rockist 'faceless techno' arguments -- taking the same polarity but valorizing the 'soullessness' fwiw i don't think you have to hear the 'being boiled' groove as cold or inhuman, just funky.

I wish I could send you The Shortwave Set album.

isn't saying that on 'being nobody' "the passion of the song [has been] leached away or purged" just the flipside of classic rockist 'faceless techno' arguments -- taking the same polarity but valorizing the 'soullessness' fwiw i don't think you have to hear the 'being boiled' groove as cold or inhuman, just funky.

First up, I suppose you could substitute "groove" for "funk" anyway, as we're aware of the danceability in most RX tracks. Second, I'm in two minds of the "soullessness" issue: sometimes it feels that way, other times, it seems to be soul in spite of coldness (ie 'Finest Dreams'), though neither view seems to corroborate with the soulfulness of old Human League or Tubeway Army records, or something like 'Digital Love' or the Cut Copy album ("a collection of 12 digital love letters").

At which point, I guess it does come down to the singers. While I can see the point Tim makes working for something like 'Being Nobody', it doesn't necessarily ring true when held up against something as carnal as 'Freak Like Me' or as gleefully girly as 'Me Plus One'. There's even a kind of paradoxical warmth to the two Bertine Zetlitz songs.

With "Freak Like Me" it's much more of a collision of different parts where they don't undermine eachother so much as hang together compellingly, hence "robo-Frankenstein".

http://www.kuci.org/~brianm/lancelockarm/

(Underneath the June 12 2005 entry on the right. Trust me.)

I think there's too little to choose between them at the moment but grudgingly I think Marcello has a point. The RX album is great but a little too cool. Xenomania's productions seem a little more eccentric and surprising and much more English in it's approach.

Having said that the 'some girls' extended mix is about as good as pop music gets.

musically it is an unimaginative derivé of "Rock & Roll Part 2" via Goldfrapp.

lyrically:
"Footloose and fancy free/My baby waits for me." Well there's a profound insight into the human condition!

stevens is too boring to be a pop star.

and worst of all, it was a record for charidee.

"musically it is an unimaginative derivé of "Rock & Roll Part 2" via Goldfrapp."

Pop music in using pre-existing stylistic trope SHOCKAH! Why stop at mentioning Goldfrapp? Schaffel is of course a full-blown subgenre so presumably every glammy schaffel track including Goldfrapp's are tarred with the same brush here?

1) The fact that "Some Girls" is similar to "Rock & Roll Pt 2"/"Strict Machine" is an interesting point to make but hardly a compelling criticism unless you can argue that:

a) the "Strict Machine" approach itself is bad
b) this approach has been done to death and is per se boring/unimaginative
c) "Some Girls" brings nothing new to the table.

To answer these:

a) You don't appear to be arguing the former. I could mount a defence of this approach but I'll assume for the moment that this is not necessary.

b) the approach hasn't been done to death - while the "Rock & Roll Pt 2" groove as such is a standard manouevre in rock its electronic equivalent has been until recently limited to isolated incidents - Human League, Doctorin' the Tardis, Goldfrapp, 2 Raumwohnung, T. Raumschmiere and a few other Kompakt-y schaffel tracks, and related electro-house stuff like Captain Comatose and Alter Ego (you could point to something like "Personal Jesus" as well but that feels rather different to "Rock 'n' Roll Pt 2" (as does, say, Whigfield's "Was A Time" or Rachel's own "Sweet Dreams (My L.A. Ex)"). It's notable that most of these have only arisen in the last few years: this makes "Some Girls" part of a general trend of reviving and expanding electronic glam, and as such this entire trend rises and falls with your criticisms. I have yet to see you acknowledge the existence of this trend Marcello so I don't know what your opinion of all this music actually is.

Significantly, of these only Goldfrapp and 2Raumwohnung have combined the sound of the groove with sighing female vocals in a pop song form, and then on only four tracks in total (and 2Raumwohnung's postdate "Some Girls" unless you include a T Raumschmiere remix of an earlier single).

While the combination does not have an endless lifespan in terms of appeal, it can shoulder the burden of at least this handful of tracks.

c) Furthermore, Goldfrapp's tracks did not include the two things that transform "Some Girls" from merely good into spectacular: the marvellous bridge, and the rhythmic chants of henchmen towards the end (a nod to "Rock & Roll Pt 2" maybe, but a wonderfully transformed and distinct one).

It seems therefore rather arbitrary to decide that this particular rather novel example of a limited tradition of songs is one-too-far - surely the same logic would as easily apply to, say, Amerie's "One Thing" (vis a vis "Crazy in Love")?

2) Complaining about the lack of human insight provided by "Some Girls" implies that:
a) human insight is a necessary component in pop music; or
b) "Some Girls" holds itself out as containing human insight; or
c) there is nothing of value in "Some Girls" lyrically.

The first two of these are obviously incorrect and I respect you enough to assume you weren't arguing these.

As for the third, I would say that there is value in the lyrics for "Some Girls" but it lies not in their "human insight" so much as the enjoyable combination of typically pop evocative-sounding-but-meaningless phrases ("footloose and fancy free") with a veiled attack on the pop music industry and (although this might be my own interpretation here) her own audience. "HEY! STOP! You made a promise to make me a star!"

Lyrically, "Some Girls" is neither an attempt at personal expression nor an entirely generic pop song, and nor is it simply in the middle somewhere. My opinion changes regularly on this but at the moment I read it as a deliberately generic pop song roleplaying an attempt at personal expression. It might, if I am to make a bold and tenuous claim, be an attempt to deal with the fact that music generally is never a medium for undiluted personal expression; there's always a component of roleplaying, performance, generic (as in, of a genre) lyrical or vocal or musical tactics. Rather than attempt to suppress this knowledge, "Some Girls" plays it out with a juxtaposition of apparent personal expression and a certain vacuous formalism; this is part of what makes its lyrics notable and perversely enjoyable.

3) The fact that it was released for a charity might anger you Marcello but I would have thought the fact that most people on ILM who like it probably downloaded it would assuage your anti-charity feelings sufficiently.

"Rock & Roll Pt 2" groove

Don't you mean riddim ;-)?

a) You don't appear to be arguing the former. I could mount a defence of this approach but I'll assume for the moment that this is not necessary.

you should never assume anything with me. "strict machine" is junk. goldfrapp is an overrated session singer with ideas above her station. in general i would point to the continuing Stasist conspiracy which is ready to absorb imitations of gary glitter while continually attempting to write the originator out of history.

b) my approach is that the approach is boring. it doesn't matter how many examples exist of it. though at least human league and klf owned up and covered the template directly. they had sex, imagination and wit, none of which i see in any of your other examples.

c) stop nitpicking. you're deliberately swerving around the point. it's like saying "lyla" is avant-garde because they added a fifth bar to the bridge which lennon & mccartney didn't do. that doesn't make it anything other than a reproduction antique, and therefore qed worthless.

surely the same logic would as easily apply to, say, Amerie's "One Thing" (vis a vis "Crazy in Love")?

no because there is a different rhythmic dynamic to the two. crazy in love/one thing differential is the same as catwalk/slalom. one is straightforward in its anticipation, the other carefully careers down the slope. you can't compare the chi-lites to the meters.

2) As for the third, I would say that there is value in the lyrics for "Some Girls" but it lies not in their "human insight" so much as the enjoyable combination of typically pop evocative-sounding-but-meaningless phrases ("footloose and fancy free") with a veiled attack on the pop music industry and (although this might be my own interpretation here) her own audience. "HEY! STOP! You made a promise to make me a star!"

not richard x pimping her and asking us to pretend that we can't see the joins, then? the whole thing is typical of richard x. a wire/'80s nme reader who actually HATES pop (go and reread his comments in that bootleg piece the wire did 2/3 years ago) and perhaps should just shut up and go back to making loops for basil kirchin tribute albums or something.

Lyrically, "Some Girls" is neither an attempt at personal expression nor an entirely generic pop song etc. etc.

yeah yeah, excuses excuses, the same old postmorley postmodern shit. maybe i'm just tired of it after quarter of a century of it being shoved down people's throats. maybe i just prefer people who actually MEAN what they sing or play, it doesn't matter if it's bill fay or dizzee, instead of this useless old meme of inverted commas pop which is nothing more than a waste product of digital Kapitalism.

3) The fact that it was released for a charity might anger you Marcello but I would have thought the fact that most people on ILM who like it probably downloaded it would assuage your anti-charity feelings sufficiently.

in an ideal dynamic ai kollektivist state, we wouldn't of course need charity, or lawyers come to that.

i notice you didn't answer my third point at all. does that mean you agree with it?

I don't know anything about Stevens beyond her songs as UK pop as a rule isn't released in Australia anymore. I think her performances on all these songs are really good. That's about as much as I can say!

"goldfrapp is an overrated session singer with ideas above her station."

This doesn't invalidate the approach of the song though. The fact that you're wrong about Goldfrapp is another matter of course.

"in general i would point to the continuing Stasist conspiracy which is ready to absorb imitations of gary glitter while continually attempting to write the originator out of history."

Who exactly is writing Gary Glitter out of history? Goldfrapp? Richard X? Rachel? Me?

"b) my approach is that the approach is boring. it doesn't matter how many examples exist of it. though at least human league and klf owned up and covered the template directly. they had sex, imagination and wit, none of which i see in any of your other examples."

So it's the actual sound of the groove that bores you? This is a more meaningful-sounding statement, though again it's a fairly broad argument which invalidates a whole swathe of music.

"stop nitpicking. you're deliberately swerving around the point. it's like saying "lyla" is avant-garde because they added a fifth bar to the bridge which lennon & mccartney didn't do. that doesn't make it anything other than a reproduction antique, and therefore qed worthless."

I never said "Some Girls" was avant-garde! Just that it wasn't unimaginative or entirely derivative.

I was hoping that you might discuss how all the other schaffel tracks (which, sonically, Richard X is taking his cues from far more obviously than Gary Glittler) fit into yr argument - is this entire style a set of reproduction antiques?

"no because there is a different rhythmic dynamic to the two. crazy in love/one thing differential is the same as catwalk/slalom. one is straightforward in its anticipation, the other carefully careers down the slope. you can't compare the chi-lites to the meters."

Okay but what about all pop songs based on a house/disco beat ever? Are they all by definition unimaginative? Again I'm not sure how the fact that the schaffel beat is an established dance music style works with your criticisms.

"yeah yeah, excuses excuses, the same old postmorley postmodern shit. maybe i'm just tired of it after quarter of a century of it being shoved down people's throats. maybe i just prefer people who actually MEAN what they sing or play, it doesn't matter if it's bill fay or dizzee, instead of this useless old meme of inverted commas pop which is nothing more than a waste product of digital Kapitalism."

Nice K-Punk impression, but this doesn't really square with liking Xenomania and not "Some Girls" does it?

4. the charidee aspect had no effect on Antipodean listeners, as we weren't given the option of paying money for the record anyway (I didn't even know about it until now!). any future listeners to the record are going to come to it without any baggage of its worthiness or cynical attempts at same (what was the charity?), so at this point it's only fair to evaluate it on its own terms.

3. I don't know anything about Stevens apart from: a) she has made some great pop records and some not-bad ones, and b) she used to be in a girl group. Dunno what she looks like, how smart or dumb she seems on saturday-morning telly, who the redtops say she's shagging - I just like some of her singles enough to want to hear more of them.

2. shallowness of emotion or insight in the lyrics is surely (or can be written off as!) the point, since it's sung from the perspective of a vapid/naive popstrel more concerned with achieving fame than the effect of same on her character.

1. the beat is Glitteresque, but there's more going on than that - I haven't heard it in months, so can't go into detail about the tone or middle eight or whooshy noises, but certainly the melody is original, and written to slink around, in and out of counterpoint to, the derivé rhythm: so unimaginativeness is refuted, at least for the point of this argument (if not overall - you realise "Rock & Roll Part 2" via Goldfrapp is hardly a damning criticism though!)

missing out important details - that's no way for a trainee lawyer to act.

I don't know anything about Stevens beyond her songs as UK pop as a rule isn't released in Australia anymore. I think her performances on all these songs are really good. That's about as much as I can say!

oh come on, that's not good enough, the image is ALL in pop, that's the creed, isn't it, reality vs simulacra, what good is pop if it's just a circle of vinyl, a slip of silver, an intangible megabyte?

"goldfrapp is an overrated session singer with ideas above her station."

This doesn't invalidate the approach of the song though. The fact that you're wrong about Goldfrapp is another matter of course.

i don't think that i would like being represented by a lawyer incapable of distinguishing between fact and opinion. can you try and sort this out in general. i'm fed up with having to point it out. if you think i'm wrong about koldkrapp then that's your OPINION, not a FACT. fact. don't make me have to point it out to you again. and if you think i'm wrong, tell me why, "another matter"'s not good enough.

Who exactly is writing Gary Glitter out of history? Goldfrapp? Richard X? Rachel? Me?

the media in general, and the digital Kapitalist slavedrivers who run it.

So it's the actual sound of the groove that bores you? This is a more meaningful-sounding statement, though again it's a fairly broad argument which invalidates a whole swathe of music.

i told you not to use the word "groove." try and pay attention will you.

I was hoping that you might discuss how all the other schaffel tracks (which, sonically, Richard X is taking his cues from far more obviously than Gary Glittler) fit into yr argument - is this entire style a set of reproduction antiques?

explain schaffel as i don't know what the fuck you're talking about. never heard of it. tell me why i should hear of it. if you're talking kompakt then that in general is sexless, songless rubbish for hippies pretending to like dance music.

Okay but what about all pop songs based on a house/disco beat ever? Are they all by definition unimaginative? Again I'm not sure how the fact that the schaffel beat is an established dance music style works with your criticisms.

you didn't ask about all pop songs. you asked about two specific pop songs. try and pay attention to yourself.

Nice K-Punk impression, but this doesn't really square with liking Xenomania and not "Some Girls" does it?

you were told the reasons for that several posts upthread.

very poor effort, sonny boy. stick to primary school teaching, that's my advice.

does it actually matter? it's good pop music. good pop music will always be what it is. my daughter likes it. it has reached the rachel stevens target audience. it wins. it also got my daughter and myself an autographed rachel stevens photo, but that's another story.

the girls aloud production team solely rely on plundering different sources for the singles. it's like a pop quiz in 4 minutes. they're very clever with it too. what seems to have been missed entirely is the 'catchiness' factor. both xenomania and richard x have produced catchy singles. catchy has always been the mainstay of thah thing called pop. even if you despise it, can you honestly say it isn't catchy?

Comstock is seeping into Marcello proper

you miss my point. "some girls" isn't good pop music.

see, at least stevem was honest when last we spoke about this. he likes it because he fancies rachel. maybe if people settled for this and stopped trying to theorise it into something it isn't, we'd all be better off.

but the important thing is stevens is too boring to be a pop star, too ordinary-looking, too tory, not good enough.

gary numan to thread.

"missing out important details - that's no way for a trainee lawyer to act."

Actually having this debate the night before an exam is no way for a trainee lawyer to act either. Sadly I'm not a very good one (if I am one at all; I'm currently planning to put that career option on hold indefinitely).

"oh come on, that's not good enough, the image is ALL in pop, that's the creed, isn't it, reality vs simulacra, what good is pop if it's just a circle of vinyl, a slip of silver, an intangible megabyte?"

I don't agree with this. I don't like the way people act as if image is all or nothing depending on genre. I think image plays a role in engaging with all styles of music, but not to the exclusion of the music itself in any of them. Actually there is something I know and like about Rachel - her gloves!

"i don't think that i would like being represented by a lawyer incapable of distinguishing between fact and opinion. can you try and sort this out in general. i'm fed up with having to point it out. if you think i'm wrong about koldkrapp then that's your OPINION, not a FACT. fact. don't make me have to point it out to you again. "

Er, I'll cite as my authority Ned's definitive statements on the matter of implied disclaimers of subjectivity.

"and if you think i'm wrong, tell me why, "another matter"'s not good enough."

I might later; for now I'll forfeit the point to you as a debate about Goldfrapp would immensely expand the size of our argument (hence my initial aside being an aside).

"explain schaffel as i don't know what the fuck you're talking about. never heard of it. tell me why i should hear of it. if you're talking kompakt then that in general is sexless, songless rubbish for hippies pretending to like dance music."

Tell me about schaffel

ned's implied disclaimers are one thing, but i don't like people in debates passing off opinions as facts. it's a crude arsey technique. if i do anything like that on ilx I always put IMO or IMHO as an addendum. this is about who's better, richard x or xenomania - i prefer xenomania and these are the opinions i have which underline my preference. i don't pretend that they're anything other than opinions.

"groove" is a rubbish unsexy word. that's my opinion about that.

You may want to ask a mod to go back and fix all your most recent posts in this thread to make this apparent - evidently some quirk in HTML has rendered them invisible.

I think not.

oh no! pop music enjoyment involving sex shock! oh no!

how is she tory btw?

because she voted for them, is why.

(xpost)

did i really say this? i don't fancy her that much, i thought she looked better in 'Sweet Dreams...' video anyway, and i do prefer that track. i fancy Goldfrapp more, and ahe's markedly more talented imo (i remain unimpressed by haters attempts to locate exactly what she's doing wrong).

'some girls' i have no problem with though. i think it does it's job well, i like what it brings to the table - a little illusion of menace and grime (no not the genre) in the ultra slick pop machine...as with Goldfrapp, elegance not compromised but complimented. i have yet to read a convincing explanation of it's 'flaws'. and this is before taking into account it's meta qualities lyrically and thematically which are quite fun i find, as fun as pop music can be. what cynicism?

(xpost x 2)

The Spice Girls?

- no personas
- no realness
- ultimate aim: ahumanism

Crazy Frog Axel F is perhaps a path less travelled in pop, making it appealing to veterans who retain passion and belief in pop, but i can't see much good coming out of it (rockism rears it's ugly head when i find the art does not do anything for me personally at all - CFAF being over the line drawn between what you dislike but still appreciate for me).

Of course Richard X makes pop that SOUNDS like TA, Kraftwerk etc. - often by directly sampling it. This in itself is fine. But would repeating THEIR actual messages be any better than adding this supposedly bland humanist factor found in Rachel/her lyrics?

Side-note: I love how 'Lose Control' or rather Cyobtron's 'Clear' STILL sounds like the future to me even today.

Side-question: Can there BE another globally massive British pop star who would possess the fiery energy of American counterparts or Spice Girls...at all, let alone with an ahuman approach to lyrics and production? I say no, though the latter will come through on it's own, going on to sell fuck all as it always has done.

http://www.undercover.com.au/pics/shed7.jpg

(I was flattered by the references to my implied disclaimers re subjectivity, though. :-) Mind you, the one thing that leapt out at me up above was the 'ideas above her station' thing about Goldfrapp. Er, so who determined her station, then?)

I think Marcello was implying that she's not weird or exotic enough as a real person to justify her arty, pretentious posturing on stage and on record, but I could be mistaken. She's always struck me as an oddball though, having only crossed into the pop threshold this decade after a 90s spent decorating trip-hop and Orbtial tracks with her unique vocal style.

Huh. That's, erm, odd.

Genuine question.

Do you mean "Big Fun" the single by Inner City, in which case you would not be entirely inaccurate, or Big Fun the boy band, in which case you would be entirely inaccurate?

Me, I love the tension between the glitter stomp and Stevens home counties politeness, like when Marianne Faithful first hooked up with the Stones, there's real push and pull in the record which wouldn't occur with a more extrovert and less self aware performer (Geri Halliwell for example ). An artist deliberately expanding her boundaries in a witty and effervescent manner.

If the reference points are a little knowing it doesn't detract, in much the same way Scorcese will appear in his films viewing the scene, a little shiver of acknowledgement for those who know, transparent to those who don't.

we are not here to cater to wilful simpleton peasants, who bring nothing to humanity, take too much away from it and should therefore be eliminated from society.

"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed."

what the function is:
to eradicate spent Kapitalist-enslaved humanism
- to replace with an ahumanist kollektivist ideal which will do away with needless subjective carnality/cannibalism and replace with a cold rationalist model of courtly love
- to replace and finally supplant wants with needs.

Dismantling the organism is the only escape.

The cessation of self-torture and external torture - by force of extreme will - offers the only exit from hell.

Uttunalism will not be achieved by singular Stasist faux-stances.

Subjectified anger and oedipal rage to be dismantled and replaced with uttunal-converting incitement.

give her a decade of living rough and whoring for smack first, be fair!

she sang the lines she was given

marianne faithfull was always too classy for that, right? if she'd done 'some girls' in summer '65 it would have pwned.

any violence used by ahumanists will only be used in terms of the necessity to escape, rather than the urge to confront.

your world will burn by itself while our kollektive has established itself as self-sufficient, dynamic ai-driven, and will therefore endure such that true marxism will be attained.

-- Sociah T Azzahole (stevem7...), June 15th, 2005 11:54 AM.

Still waiting for a proper answer to this btw

Is fun dead in your bold vision of tomorrow's world Marcello? It sounds like it.

There aren't many messages in pop MORE anti-human than 'we are the robots', but yes there was more to it than that.

We have only to view our sad Stasist streets to realise the truth of this. Happyslapping is considered "fun." Rape is considered "fun" by the rapist. Random attacks on one's person, family and/or home are considered "fun" by the degenerate wastrels who commit them.

Fun is to be ejected, its subjectivist crassness having no place in rationalist societal constructs.

"The Robots" by Kraftwerk was not an anti-human statement.

How does ahumanism reconcile with 'instinctive' physical reactions to music? How can one be so interested in the cause but not the effect? This is the great enigma behind Kraftwerk's later output to me.

wot a larf.

"Advantage Xenomania"

What you've described is the B-side.

I'm hoping PJ's review works as some kind of feedback, so that the people behind Rachel consider releasing the older version instead. Maybe I'm being naive.

Also they say 'So Good' is brilliant so whatevs, they're untrustworthy.

I think 'So Good' IS brilliant.

Murder On The Dancefloor
You Get Yours
The Walls Keep Saying Your Name
I Am Not Good At Not Getting What I Want

(Tim, How about "Lover", "Get Over You", "Move This Mountain" and "Mixed Up World" too?)

Extremely excited about his upcoming "Bizarre Love Triangle" mix!

I want to hear this!

If anything, tho', 'Crazy Boys' just handed Richard a bigger edge.

"And yet, Richard X was no real bedroom-bound producer when Virgin came knocking, he was already the writer/producer behind one top ten garage hit (he won’t say which)."

So, which one???

First thing that came to mind was "Girls Like Us", but I was wrong.

- "Crazy Boys"
- Freeform Five, "No More Conversations" (Richard X remix)
- New Order, "Bizarre Love Triangle" (Richard X remix)
- MIA, "10 Dollar"
- New Order, "Jetstream" (Richard X remix)

All of the above are probably somewhere in my top 20-25 songs for the year, and that's not even counting his lesser stuff like the Bravery and Ciara remixes. At the very least, he's definitely at least had a better 2005 than Xenomania (although "Nothing Good About This Goodbye" is godlike and "Biology" could turn out to be a world-wrecker once a CD-quality version surfaces).

Sugababes - "Red Dress"
Texas - "Can't Resist"
Saint Etienne - "Lightning Strikes Twice"

I'd say it's been a pretty great 2005 for Xenomania. (And "Long Hot Summer" despite the "o no! only #7" backlash, is still amazing in a Betty Boo style-ee)

Do we give more points for production work compared to remix work? No, wait -- that would be sort of a rockist mindset.

I will now immediately go track down that St. Etienne album - somehow it slipped under my Pop Production Fireworks Radar. Are there any Jewel & Stone things I should track down? Those two songs turn me into Tyrone Biggums, but I really hated Rachel's cover of "More, More, More".

If I'm right, then, wow, I have no idea why I knew that.

I'd say it's been a pretty great 2005 for Xenomania. (And "Long Hot Summer" despite the "o no! only #7" backlash, is still amazing in a Betty Boo style-ee)

...AND

Kylie's "Giving You Up" and "Made of Glass".

Yeah, RX PWNS.

- Three with Annie ("Songs Remind Me Of You", "Crush", "Two Of Hearts") (Stacy Q cover?)
- one from "a lovely young all-American girl" (no clue who this might be - Gwen Stefani maybe?)
- one from "2 men with keyboards" (what, the Postal Service?)

Are there any others? God let there be a million others.

A brand new Pet Shop Boys track now in the bag for some future release. Speculate away.

Update: No more emails please, it's a new track , not a remix, i'm sure the boys will announce all soon....

I'm thinking that we may as well cede 2006 to him.

(on another note: So that means we've got RX/Trevor Horn/PSB, Epworth/Pearson/Rapture, Black Leotard Front and the "Relevee" single, Just Blaze/Ghostface, and the forthcoming Chinkuzi riddim waiting to drop. I gotta say - super-producer pop is doing a BANG-UP job of keeping my head out of the oven so far this year.)

Seconded. In fact it is my favorite Richard X produced track so far. I wonder what Xeno have been doing in the last couple of months. News anybody?

SOMEONE TELL ME WHAT THIS IS PLZ

This has probably been mentioned here many times before but RX is the perfect person for Haines to work with considering he was making RX & Xenomania-type records before either took off (cf: the superb two solo albums from years back, Oliver Twist Manifesto and the Christie Malry's thing).

Also, cannot wait to hear the other Luke/RX track, "I Am The Best Artist". That is the best song title since disco.

revive!

did everyone hear Nerina Pallot's cover of Steely Dan's 'Peg' produced by X? think it got pulled as a single

Richard X's album is brilliant, absolutely worth checking out. Was "Into U" ever released as a single?

there was a Chrimbo version called Into Yule that was meant to come out but didn't.

So Wikipedia says Richard X's real name is Richard Philips. Discogs says a Richard Philips went under the name of Serious Danger who had a speed garage hit I remember called "Deeper"

Of course that could be a common speed garage producer actual name!

did everyone hear Nerina Pallot's cover of Steely Dan's 'Peg' produced by X? think it got pulled as a single

― blueski, Saturday, 4 August 2007 07:17 (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

no. ysi??

Oh yeah, I'd love to hear it!

http://www.popjustice.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1103&Itemid=279