Pop-Eye 20/5/01

Its as if all the record company execs did not have this week on their release schedule. Leaving the way open for Geri and Sclubs to battle it out though they have both been knocking around for weeks. Whereas you look at next weeks schedule and its jam packed with jostling potential number ones.

Ah yes, the mighty Up Middle Finger. Mr Oxide and Mr Nutrino finally moving on from their dodgy rip-off roots (Bound For The Re-Load and No Good For Me were lazy bits of opportunity) to finally show us their true class. UMF hato discern of but unlike many a dance hit the sentiments expressed by the title are exactly the sentiments expressed by the music.

This weeks pop entries are surprisingly lame, the BB Mak track is what we expect from this most worthy of boy bands, but Upside Down is a disappointment. You think they might have learnt something after doing all them Abba covers, but this could easily be the third Tweenies record.

And so for the tirumphant return of the Stereo MC's. Not particularly Deep Down - but the boys are still Dirty after all these years. I suppose its good that the ten years out has not changed their style or groove, its just that the rest of the world has moved on and - as Mark b and Blade show - if you want to do a bit of shambolic rap over your record that record better be faux nu-metal. Blade has been knocking around for years, I remember the last time he was championed was for bung C90's in the post cos he couldn't get a record deal. Put it like this, You Don't See The Signs is not embaressing and it sounds better than Papa Roach. Not harder, just better. (If you could damn with faint praise as a living they'd fly me to Holland to sort out their flooding problem).

And finally we have returned to the days of the early nineties where getting an indie single in at number 30 is a triumph. So hooray for King Adora. And that Neil Hannon song about the bloke who doesn't give out poncey choclates at his embassy. Still I suppose this weeks chart slowdown has given us time to draw breath and do that funky Sclub vocoder sample again. And shows that teamwork beats cheaters every time.

You won't be able to read it cos they've sealed it in a bag as usual (mmm turquoise CD holder) but the 'lyrics' printed in Smash Hits purporting to be those of UMF are very funny. Rather than use the old NME c___'s trick of lots of underlines, they've just missed the rude bits out which makes both O & N and their Garage Snob foez seem very reasonable. "I asked him why / He gave me a reply" etc.

"Up Middle Finger" is a terrific record. The authentic sound of teenage something-or-other as I would probably embarrassingly say if I was a broadsheet commentator. Can you actually dance to it?

"Up Middle Finger" is ace indeed.

The *original* version of "Ya Don't See The Signs" is, too. Any attempt to rejig it to sell to nu-metal kids can only be embarrassing. You really should have got _The Unknown_ last year, Pete.

I think I only like the A*Teens...nice perky pop. I've heard 30 seconds of Oxide and Neutrino, that was probably too much. So glad that Geri's album only got to number 5!!!

I really liked The Unknown late last year (one of thos edarn foolish release things where they slapped it out at Christmas so it barely troubled the charts). I'm still trying to work out what Mark B does though, or does he rap too? The problem with You Don't See The Signs is not that it isn't good (though its not stupendous) but it reminds me too much of collision pop (TM NME '94). And we all know what that means... "Music, it is the universal language, but can it manage to....."

Mark B's the producer.

Ah it all becomes clear.

Up Middle Finger: It feels like Mash Up Da Venue's punishing beats got a bit mashed up themselves, and came out chart-ready. I'm fairly certain that the "No no no" bit is a purposeful rip from Jay-Z. The production is so down low and rough that it feels like the anti- garage, with sort of insignificant beats buried beneath ugly samples, strings and horns. Rather than one sample, pop culture references, half directed at O&N themselves, scatter the song. And the terrible "mil-li-on" rhyme with "num-ber one". And isn't that humming kicking off the track a rip from Jay-Z's Snoop Track as well?

Finally Generation Mook has produced something I can endorse.