Let's talk about Mika - BBC's sound of 2007

Ghosts used to be a band called Polanski, my friend put out two of their actually-not-bad singles to complete indifference

i really like the sadie ama single, though not as much as some of her r&g stuff; she has a great voice though, hope she puts it to good use.

i will track down mika but nothing i've read about him enthuses me particularly.

pay attention, hip gunslinging French teachers

Lex did you really write this?

seriously though WATCH THIS VIDEO

They really should be called that.

His single just sounds like Freddie doing 'Got To Get You Into My Life'. I'm not sure what void it's filling but it's not, like, hateful

i actually think uk pop is the worst it's been in, like, my ENTIRE LIFE. (not that this matters ONE JOT because foreign - mostly american - pop has been superlative)

three british singles in my top 20 - scritti politti (15), rex the dog (19, is he british even?), amy winehouse (20)

the trouble is the answer is OBVIOUS - better access to artists for the media.

my top 10 singles of last year = entirely american and german.

lily allen and psb didn't make my list because everything they released in 06 was AWFUL. jamelia merely mediocre.

Hi dere Martian Macpherson.

in that case the Hot Chip singles and Akala's 'Shakespeare' would be my faves (tho the latter cheats by sampling German trance-pop ha). favourite British album of last year probably 'The Warning', which is only a C+ really.

either way, definitely a big lull

i like hot chip, but they're so much better remixed.

i think the only british pop artist i have any enthusiasm about for what she is, is amy winehouse.

Year on year album sales are stable, but much more British albums are selling over American albums now.

i am getting into old music now, i am going to acquire the entire mary j blige back catalogue (the ones i don't already have) off amazon marketplace this month

9. The Datsuns
10. Sean Paul

Sure got that one right, huh?

And they have found an unusual fan in 79-year-old actress June Brown, who plays Dot Cotton in EastEnders and has been to several Enter Shikari gigs.

How does this happen? I'm assuming she's related to someone in the band?

The Balls (not since The Isles all those months ago have an outfit fused the genius of Morrissey and Roddy Frame so succinctly)
Philippa Patterson (charming singer songwriter ready to kick Peyroux's face off)
Cream Putsch (like Hot Chip, ON ACID!)
Colonel Hendricks (fresh from supporting Misty's Big Adventure on tour, this drinking chum of Graham Coxon will amaze all with his Bolanesque pop gems avec )
Big Figure (nu-rave phase 2, will be huge this Summer with their ardent battle-cry anthem 'Threadlock Holiday' and it's catchy chorus (something about warhead-related meltdown being imminent)
Nom De Plumes (the Le Tigre of Lothian. have already kicked off a rapidly escalating feud with local rivals Jiggletits who claim to watch BBC Three and actually enjoy it)

I saw Terris live three times and twice they were fucking awesome. I saw them at Northampton Roadmender on that double-header tour with Coldplay and for me they blew Martin & co. offstage. For my mates, Coldplay were amazing. I was distraught.

Who were the other two bands on that tour? Crashland and My Vitriol, right?

Terris were OK but clearly were never going to be big in a pop sense. That first Rough Trade single was pretty good IIRC; must dig it out and give it another listen...

Mind you, at the time I thought Clearlake were going to become massive, so who am I to talk?

Top 100 Albums of 2006 - End of Year

1 Eyes Open - Snow Patrol 1,514,554
2 Beautiful World – Take That 1,144,521
3 Ta-Dah – Scissor Sisters 1,127,332
4 Whatever People say I am.. - Arctic Monkeys 1,112,000
5 Inside In/Inside Out - The Kooks 1,104,000
6 Razorlight – Razorlight 1,076,968
7 Stop the Clocks – Oasis 909,161
8 The Love Album – Westlife 901,643
9 I'm not Dead – Pink 854,391
10 Undiscovered - James Morrison 847,135
11 In between Dreams - Jack Johnson 789,000
12 Sam's Town – The Killers 776,000
13 Corinne Bailey Rae - Corinne Bailey Rae 764,000
14 Under the Iron Sea – Keane 702,000
15 Stadium Arcadium - Red Hot Chili Peppers 684,183
16 The Sound of – Girls Aloud 672,500
17 Love – The Beatles 672,385
18 Twenty Five – George Michael 625,929
19 18 Singles – U2 616,955
20 Siempre – Il Divo 616,000
21 Twelve Stops and Home - The Feeling 597,000
22 Back to Bedlam - James Blunt 588,000
23 Costello Music – Fratellis 560,500
24 These Streets – Paolo Nutini 559,500
25 Futuresex / Lovesounds – Justin Timberlake 550,989
26 Black Holes & Revalations – Muse 545,000
27 High Times –The Singles - Jamiroquai 544,000
28 PCD - Pussycat Dolls 536,340
29 Alright Still - Lily Allen 523,000
30 Breakaway - Kelly Clarkson 506,000
31 St Elsewhere - Gnarls Barkley 489,100
32 Employment - Kaiser Chiefs 489,000
33 Collected - The Best of - Massive Attack 462,000
34 Eye to the Telescope - KT Tunstall 459,800
35 Shayne Ward - Shayne Ward 459,700
36 Rudebox – Robbie Williams 453,000
37 Tired of Hanging Around - The Zutons 446,000
38 Keep On - Will Young 445,700
39 Loose - Nelly Furtado 444,000
40 The Very Best of - Nina Simone 442,000
41 Overloaded – The Sugababes 417,000
42 Demon Days – Gorillaz 413,000
43 Empire – Kasabian 411,500
44 Journey South - Journey South 405,000
45 A Girl like Me – Rihanna 391,000
46 Confessions on a Dancefloor – Madonna 387,500
47 Voices of the Valley – Fron Male Voice Choir 387,300
48 The Singles – Feeder 386,000
49 X&Y – Coldplay 375,000
50 The Truth about Love - Lemar 373,000
51 Stars of CCTV - Hard-Fi 361,200
52 Never Forget - Take That 360,600
53 Hit Parade – Paul Weller 360,400
54 Serenade – Katherine Jenkins 357,000
55 Piece By Piece - Katie Melua 353,000
56 Back to Basics – Christina Aguilera 352,000
57 Angelis – Angelis 344,000
58 Veneer - Jose Gonzalez 340,200
59 Bright Idea - Orson 340,000
60 Amore - Andrea Bocelli 331,000
61 Monkey Business - Black Eyed Peas 328,300
62 B'Day – Beyonce 327,900
63 Still the Same – Rod Stewart 321,500
64 Ring of Fire - Johnny Cash 318,000
65 The Impossible Dream - Andy Abraham 315,000
66 Sanctuary - Simon Webbe 314,200
67 Bat out of Hell 3 – Meatloaf 313,700
68 Smile it Confuses People - Sandi Thom 313,200
69 Back to Black – Any Winehouse 304,000
70 Oral Fixation Vol 2 – Shakira 289,500
71 Keys to the World - Richard Ashcroft 286,800
72 Hot Fuss - The Killers 286,400
73 On an Island - Dave Gilmour 283,000
74 Trouble - Ray Lamontagne 279,000
75 The Back Room - The Editors 273,000
76 The Ultimate - Luther Vandross 272,800
77 The Black Parade – My Chemical Romance 262,000
78 Modern Times – Bob Dylan 256,000
79 American Idiot – GreenDay 254,000
80 From Under the Cork Tree - Fall Out Boy 249,900
81 The Open Door – Evanescence 249,500
82 Voice - The Best of - Beverly Knight 242,500
83 Curious George OST - Jack Johnson 237,700
84 The Voice - Russell Watson 236,500
85 Why Try Harder - Fatboy Slim 233,100
86 Two's Company – Cliff Richard 232,400
87 Taller in More Ways - The Sugababes 229,000
88 A Fever you can't Sweat Out - Panic at the Disco 220,000
89 Curtain Call - Eminem 218,500
90 Greatest Hits - Robbie Williams 215,500
91 Scissor Sisters – Scissor Sisters 215,200
92 This New Day - Embrace 212,600
93 Late Registration - Kanye West 212,300
94 Liberation Transmission – Lostprophets 210,000
95 All Angels – All Angels 208,000
96 Broken Boy Soldiers - Raconteurs 201,700
97 9 – Damien Rice 201,000
98 In My Own Words - Ne-Yo 197,700
99 First Impression of Earth - The Strokes 197,400
100 Piano Man – The Best of – Billy Joel 196,600

This list is awful.

This depresses me a lot more than anything else on the list.

REVELATION

Actually, I rather like the band I saw supporting Misty's, namely KateGoes. They are way, way, way too twee to be inflicting on anyone else, though.

But just in case...

Have I not been paying attention or did I somehow miss the fact that this constitutes a MASSIVE FLOP?!

but they omit to mention that he attended a £10,000-per-year public school. and unlike some (hi dere) he didn't have a scholarship. pity i didn't really get to know him...

and yep new Sophie Ellis-Bextor is a real downer :(

:/

You guys are nuts, Mika's songwriting and singing are top notch. He's not dreary at all, which is very unusual in 2007. There is no question that he knows how to construct a good pop song. Plus a great sense of humour. The rest can go hang, the Klaxons are nowhere near him on any level.

yeah i'm into it, the CD's been in my possession for a while now though, and i haven't really had the urge to listen.

i like the sound but it doesn't REALLY pull me in, intrigue me, too much.

so my friend got comped two tickets to Mika at the Avalon in Hollywood in exchange for a review in XXXX, and she took me because she knew I have no taste in anything. The finale involved hundreds of giant latex balloons, rabbit costumes, "the teddy bears' picnic" on LP, and thousands of streamers. left of me was a 40 year old obese woman with 10 10-year-olds, and right of me was the half cast of gray's anatomy. i'm not gonna lie: i had a lot of fun. it was like a john waters show for disney, with more homoness.

my cock got grabbed a bunch, tho. and i'm getting tubby.

haha miss piggy

i like the two mika songs i have heard.

there.

I think he is a vile creep.

figures. i like music by too many vile creeps for it not to be a pattern!

nb on hols i heard a gary glitter song being used in an advert. marvellous.

we're almost halfway through the year and I have heard of three of the BBC's sound of 2007's ten

anyone top that?

Ditto

I've heard all except Sadia Ama. I assume that means I lose?

sadie ama is the only one who's any good.

mika is vile but surprisingly ignorable.

as just names, they are all pretty bad. even the twang (above)

I've heard all except Sadia Ama. I assume that means I lose?

You're a journalist tho?

that's what the wikipedia entry says

I thought the Wikipedia entry said that despite my surname I wasn't related to fellow Italian national Roberto?

disappointing lack of details re travelling circus days

eh, i think ttc can do a cansei de ser sexy or the knife or something. this is not chart-stormingly big but then i don't think mika will be either

-- lex pretend (lex pretend), Friday, 5 January 2007 09:56 (11 months ago) Bookmark Link

I haven't got Soundscan figures, but this sounds right to me, I'd guess that Mika and TTC have sold similar numbers of records this year.

There's still time for The Twang to overtake them both.

Didn't Hale and Pace used to use "twang" as a comedy slang term for onanism in their skits?

404: Celebrity Not Found

"Hopefully, Hale and Pace will come to realise that life is mostly miserable"

I bet Mika wishes he could have sold as many records as The Knife, though.

"Every so often an artist comes along with hit written all over them and 2007 looks like being Mika's year"

amirite?

How did the Twang fail to become big again? I tend to assume that with enough backing you can throw any old crap at today's indie kids and they'll eventually buy it.

http://www.tix4events.co.uk/imgprods/thetwang.jpg

Looking like a tarmac gang not big in NME.

How big is 'big' in this def'n? They seem to tour uni venues of 1000-1500 capacity pretty regularly

And left them immaculately tarmac-ed.

Whoever thought TTC was gonna make it internationally = out of his mind. Although, Cuizinier did inspire that Yelle song

It's because that godawful "Live and Die In These Towns" track by The Enemy makes The Twang even more irrelevant than they should be.

xp

Timmy Mallett is still touring uni venues of 1000-1500 capacity pretty regularly.

As a buy-on on the Twang's tour

He does the Block Paving.

The Twang, Timmy Mallett, and TTC sounds like a top show to me.

Check dates at yr local uni, Dom.

Probly get Chunnel off Big Brother thrown in for 10 quid.

Man, her VH1 show is bad.

She's still working?

She hosts "Wannabe", where desperate girl group wannabes battle for a final shot at stardom. Or something.

http://images.jupiterimages.com/common/detail/16/17/23311716.jpg

Mika hasn't sold as many records as Hale and Pace either.

TS: Grace Kelly vs The Stonk.

uninteresting fact: The Twang use the hook from Salt n' Pepa's 'Push It' as the bassline on their new single

i think you mean the cars?

http://www.ents24.com/web/artist/92955/The_Twang.html

I overestimated the popularity of The Twang which is easily worth LBZC's imminent derision

lol they're playing the Northampton Roadmender. pwnd

Listening to this record now and damn it if "Love Today" doesn't remind me of Erasure more than anybody since Erasure, and I miss Erasure. And "Love Today" seems to me completely unimpeachable -- maybe partly because it never went anywhere in the US so I've never heard it except on this record, whereas my understanding is that people actually did hear it enough to tire on it in England? But no, people upthread seem to have heard it once, like me, and been uncharmed by it. Strange.

You don't have to miss Erasure, they're still around.

i still think this album is pretty good

also he's lebanese so i gotta represent

oh and he's incredibly hot, i forgot

Ah you Levantines and your clique. (I lie.)

Gotta say, it would never have occurred to me even to check whether Erasure still existed. And you're right, they do! Are they good?

But back to Mika: thinking about it a bit more maybe the best referent isn't Erasure but the Communards. Even if everything went right for Mika I can't see him producing anything like "Chains of Love" but I can see him making the next "Never Can Say Goodbye."

To pursue the above analogy a little further, if Mika were to re-envision and record the definitive version of a 10-year-old R&B track, what would it be?