The Cribs - Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever
After Ryan Jarman's hilarious appearance on Never Mind The Buzzcocks - during which he admitted drawing cocks on photos of Snoop Dogg - the band he'd formed with his two brothers in Wakefield, Yorkshire stopped being indie's best-kept secret. Suddenly, everyone knew who they were but relatively few had heard their music. As a result, 2007 belongs to them if they want it. Newcomers and diehards (this is their third album) will find much to enjoy here. The key is Alex Kapranos's tight production which recalls the direct, sharp pop sound of The Undertones and The Fire Engines. The other step forward is in the quality of the songs, which all succeed in being as catchy as they are sardonic, with plenty of straightforward new wave thrills - it's not a complicated formula, but it works a treat on Men's Needs, Our Bovine Public and Girls Like Mystery. And, proving they're not just about three-minute wonders, Be Safe is a largely spoken word piece with Lee Ronaldo of Sonic Youth that recalls peak period REM. Wonderful.
Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever is on Wichita
Rufus Wainwright - Release The Stars
Mika may well be 2007's most extravagant superstar but, compared to Rufus Wainwright's, his ego is like a teensy dolls' house nestled beside the grandest cathedral. After the flamboyance of Want One and Want Two, this was intended to be Rufus Wainwright's stripped-down, casual album. That was never going to happen. A testament to being unable to restrain himself, Release The Stars is lush, epic and ambitious, rich orchestration and delicious arrangements backing Wainwright's operatic songs of thwarted love, desire and dogged romantic pursuit - with a soupcon of Shakespearian family tragedy thrown in. Much attention will be focused on Tulsa - a song very obviously about the Killers' singer Brandon Flowers ("Your suit was the whitest since you know who") whom he met in that city. Particular mind will be paid to the opening line, "You taste of potato chips in the morning". But the song that stands out is the bawdy Between My Legs - a track which has the potential to be the most lascivious number one ever. Pop music can't really get much more ornate or fantastic.
Release The Stars is on Geffen
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Baby 81
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club have never been about originality - their uncompromising wall of guitar noise and dark monotone harmonies can be easily traced to The Jesus and Mary Chain (another gang keen on leather trousers). But in a climate where so many rock bands are laced with irony, the straightforward nihilism of Baby 81 feels honest rather than laughable. It builds on their strength of mixing darkness with killer melodies: Window thrillingly incorporates a hammering piano alongside the squalling guitars; 666 Conducer channels the heavy riffs and power of Led Zeppelin; Weapon Of Choice is a pile-driving anthemic indie metal beast. And, like all great rock albums, Baby 81 ends with a slightly overblown symphonic epic - All You Do Is Talk. Comeback of the year? Until Radiohead, anyway.
Baby 81 is on Island
Battles - Mirrored
Until this debut album Battles' EP tracks have rejoiced in such minimalist titles as B + T and IPT - 2. Now, though, they're using words, sort of - is Ddiamondd a word, for example? Conservative rock fans and those suffering from ADHD (the condition, not a Battles' song title, by the way) should approach with caution, for here we are entering deep into the world of egg-headed math rock. There's no better catch-all term for what Battles do - each track progresses in speeding, maddening rhythmic circles, baffling guitar patterns and occasionally some frenetic shouting or high-pitched singing (as on the fantastically nuts single Atlas) that's not unlike Mickey Mouse, only at a higher and more annoying register. Although any attempt to describe Battles makes them sound terrible, there's such attention to precision detail and frenzied creativity that you can't help but be sucked in eventually. Either that or you'll think it's the most mentally disturbing music imaginable.
Mirrored is on Warp
Bjork - Volta
Bjork's sixth studio album takes you to places other artists don't bother with and, like each of her solo albums, it presents the listener with a challenge - this isn't music that sounds good on the iPod nano when you pop out for a pint of semi-skimmed. It demands attention and devotion. That said, Volta does include moments that come close to accessible. The opening track, Earth Intruders, is one of them - beginning with the squelching of an insect army, it accelerates into a marching, dancing beast that's up there with the finest moments from the Gudmundsdottir back catalogue. Like several tracks (the fierce, muscular electro jerks of Innocence and the womb-like fuzz and Japanese strings of Hope) it's a collaboration with Timbaland, with both artists bringing the best out of each other. For all the album's wild experimentalism, fun and sonic brinkmanship, the stand-out track is the most simple and stripped-bare: Pneumonia features mournful brass, rain and Bjork singing a funereal ballad for the end of the human race. Difficult and magical.
Volta is on One Little Indian
Travis - The Boy With No Name
Before the arrival of Travis, the British album charts were a sunny, chirpy place that, bar the occasional visitation from Morrissey, included little that could be described as indie or miserable. But with The Man Who album in 1999, and in particular the hit Why Does It Always Rain On Me?, this Scottish four-piece ushered in a whole era of maudlin, bittersweet balladry that culminated in much greater recent success for Keane and Snow Patrol. Back after a three-year absence, little has changed in the band's outlook and on 3 Times And You Lose, Closer and Big Chair Fran Healey's sleepy falsetto has been dulled to bland perfection. Battleships provides the album's mobile-phone-in-the-air tune, while several songs (Selfish Jean and the 'secret track' Sailing Away) veer towards the shambling pop that earned them their original fan base. A bit more breeze and a bit less wind would help enormously.
The Boy With No Name is on Independiente
Manic Street Preachers - Send Away The Tigers
With their eighth album Manic Street Preachers have landed - sonically and politically - back in 1998. This, of course, is spectacularly good news, for from the opening title track onwards, Send Away The Tigers rages gloriously - few bands combine grit, intelligence and pop nous so well. Importantly, it's a loud guitar album and James Dean Bradfield, a much underrated singer and guitarist, not giving a damn about fashion, goes for searing foot-on-monitor Brian May glory at every opportunity. Immediately, it's as if Razorlight and Kaiser Chiefs never happened. The strangely heroic dark pop of Your Love Alone Is Not Enough - a duet with The Cardigans' Nina Persson - confirms it. It's the band's finest pop moment since A Design For Life. There's more to cherish, in particular The Second Great Depression, I'm Just A Patsy and Imperial Bodybags, which as well as being visceral, energising songs, remind you that though many bands lend their support to causes, few of them are either articulate or truly angry about them. In Manics we trust - again.
Send Away The Tigers is out on Columbia
Fountains of Wayne - Traffic And Weather
"Puts Coldplay on/ pours a glass of wine/ curls up with a book about organised crime". Seldom has the singleton life been better defined than on Fountains of Wayne's opening track Someone to Love. But then again, on this album we are in the company of songwriters at the top of their game. Echoing early Elvis Costello, Prefab Sprout and Squeeze, Traffic and Weather is so chock-full of neatly turned lines about modern life that you'll find it hard to resist quoting them. It's a huge step up from the last time we heard from this New York band, with their global pop hit (Stacey's Mom) about the perils of fancying your friend's mother. Here the music doesn't lose its catchiness - it's perfect car radio new wave - but comes with added intelligence.
Traffic and Weather is on Virgin
Maccabees - Colour It In
Maccabees singer Orlando Weeks has an uncomfortable tremor to his voice that sounds as if he is simultaneously swallowing plums. His edgy melodies - and the band's choppy guitar shapes - are no more easily digestible, but there's more to reward listeners here than you'll find on the average indie boyband album. As suggested by the album's title, lyrically the band are trapped in the preoccupations of childhood, from teenage crushes (First Love, Dumped) to the tribulations of school swimming day (Latchmere). Elsewhere, Scalextric (Precious Time), the life lesson that "Screaming 'Are we there yet?' doesn't get you there any faster" (Lego) and even the importance of good teeth (Toothpaste Kisses) feature. It's easy to dismiss such nostalgic absorbtion as immature, but the band's eccentric charm pulls them through - and with time could see their character-driven songs acknowledged as the 21st century successors to the Kinks.
Colour It In is on Fiction
Kaiser Chiefs - Everything Is Average Nowadays
Lying somewhere between The Buzzcocks' Everybody's Happy Nowadays and Blur's Modern Life Is Rubbish, the cynical sentiments of this song suggest disillusionment with the fame game and conclude that, to paraphrase the great Lionel Bart, things are like they used to be. Fortunately, in true Kaisers' style, these grumpy sentiments come wrapped in a killer, sing-a-long pop chorus with an even smarter video.
Everything Is Average Nowadays is on B-Unique from May 21
Nizlopi at Glastonbury
Listen up: Best known for their Christmas 2005 hit, The JCB Song, Nizlopi also succeed in summing up the muddy pleasures of Glasto. If you've got a ticket, this fan-made video will get you in the mood. If you missed out, there's always next year.
Tags: Nizlopi Glastonbury Live Music Luke John Human
Ten Masked Men
With the motto "Hit songs in the key of Aaarrgghh!!!" this south London combo claim in their profile that they're a "crack death metal unit that was sent to the underground by a musical court for a crime they probably did commit". As well as wearing rather fetching black balaclavas, their cunning masterplan is to cover cheesy pop songs such as Tom Jones's Sex Bomb and Ricky Martin's Livin' La Vida Loca in a thrilling death metal style with chundering guitar shredding and a vocalist who sounds like a wookie coughing up a fur ball. It works a treat, and the possibilities are endless. They could do a whole album of Abba covers or Keane's finest moments - the fun being that they'll all sound more or less like the same song. Furthermore, seeing as only freaks seem to win the Eurovision Song Contest, how about we quit with the squabbling about political voting and just install these comedians as next year's UK representatives. Who cares if we win?
See more of Ten Masked Men at myspace.com
Summer Festivals
If you weren't quick enough to snap up tickets for Glastonbury, V or Reading/Leeds, fear not: there are still plenty of festivals to choose from this summer. What they lack in star names the smaller festivals gain in atmosphere, with the emphasis on fun rather than corporate sponsorship. Here's a quick guide to the seven best alternative weekenders of 2007. In my purely subjective order of preference, they're Secret Garden Party, Bestival, Latitude, Green Man, Summer Sundae Weekender, Wickerman and Wakestock. Click through for details of dates, bands and general good times. 
Reviews by Johnny Dee
FIRST POSTED MAY 18, 2007
