-Music Videos on my Mind- Tuff Love’s “Slammer”

“THEY’RE HEADED FOR THE BIG TIME,” scream Metro. “[Tuff Love] GRAB C86 FUZZ POP BY THE SCRUFF OF THE NECK AND GIVE IT A DAMN GOOD RUFFING (sic) UP,” yell The Guardian.

Hype, hype, hype and more hype. The British music press is the world’s greatest at over-inflating the importance of bands they want you to like. This often means that when other countries take notice they ultimately feel underwhelmed, most often it's  the American music media that start taking pot shots at our ability to take something pretty routine and present it as revolutionary. Likewise, no other press has the terrifying knack for building up things only to destroy them like the UK media does.

In the case of Scotland’s Tuff Love, one believes that Julie Eisenstein (guitar, vocals) and Suse Bear’s (bass, vocals) handy tribute to American alternative lo-fi guitar music may prove attractive to the international market, especially to the country which developed and then largely abandoned this sort of thing.

It’d be grand if Tuff Love became massive. One can never have enough white girls’ with guitar bands around, and we so desperately need a paradigm shift when it comes to pop music.

-Music Videos on my Mind- LoneLady’s “Groove it Out”

One is convinced that if an advanced alien civilization is monitoring activity on Earth then they’ll make additional efforts to tune into our sound waves.  It’s at this point they’ll focus greater attention on the astounding sonic frequencies emanating from Manchester, England, and will make it their prime objective to somehow get there. Should that happen then they’ll be in for the most astronomical of anticlimaxes because instead of the cosmically hip environs they thought will greet them, they’ll be confronted with urban privation and monumental grimness.

Nonetheless, our alien admirers will most certainly keep their faith in Manchester being the greatest rock city in the world. LoneLady (our kid, Julie Ann Campbell) is another of Manchester’s sonically gifted daughters who, if she keeps on making tracks like this, is going to be huge. LoneLady is an adequate stage sobriquet for Ms. Campbell because she records and produces everything herself. She is the ultimate bedroom artist and demonstrates just how amazingly effective and accessible modern technology is if the person using it has proper talent.

Groove it Out is a giant of an alternative pop song, though; this ongoing trend for not commissioning cool music videos is most frustrating. Wrap Records, who actually also make movies, ought to have realised that this track is destined for European domination and should’ve put together something pronto. Our alien mates won’t be impressed by their laziness.

-Music Videos on my Mind- Bahamas’ “All the Time”

Bahamas is more than a paradise holiday destination; it’s the stage name of a Canadian nu-folk artist called Afie Jurvanen who makes happy-clappy pop songs swimming in blissed-out grooves and melodic eccentricities. Jurvanen is in the UK at present and one hopes that his heavily British influenced sound will score well with Blighty audiences. After all, All the Time has ELO written all over it, though, lest we forget, ELO happened to be one of those rare British bands that were massively popular in the States and pretty overlooked at home.

Here’s hoping Jurvanen’s success works in reverse and the UK warms to his cast ashore soundscapes and sun-kissed harmonies.

-Music Videos on my Mind- Rozi Plain’s “Jogalong”

It’s surprising that a song featuring such a bizarrely amateurish music video has become a BBC radio hit. Shows as varied as prime time middle-aged evening slots, to Saturday seriously early morning alternative club culture wind down shows, have chosen Rozi Plain’s soothing Jogalong as their tune of the moment.

London based Rozi is another addition to the ever popular genre of music I call nu-folk. Nu-folk is positively crap at the best of times, but it’s Rozi’s no-frills approach that is most welcome in this era of rubbish stadium embracing banjo acts like Mumford & Sons and The Lumineers. Rozi, for now, is keen for her songs to take centre stage, eschewing the desire to incorporate stylised professionalism and grossly heightened levels of theatrics. This is simple and honest song writing that mines the interesting interior life of its creator.

There is also something admirably UK about it all in that it’s dour and dowdy. That’s meant as a compliment because there’s something so truly British about keeping things depressingly simple. Also, Jogalong’s melody harkens back to the type of music featured in 1980s educational programmes, which perhaps explains why the BBC is all over it.

Music Videos on my Mind- Slaves’ “Hey”

Slaves are a two-piece band that comes from Kent, England. They are loud, like seriously angry and loud, but it’s done with such self-aware gusto that you smile at the comedy of it.

The music video for Hey is drenched in swathes of lacquered black humour, instantly registering as one of the most entertaining clips to be produced by the UK music industry this year. Its tongue is firmly in cheek as band mates Laurie and Isaac accost some smugly suited thirtysomething in a demented assault of verbal and visual intimidation.

Think of it as counterculture millennials getting their own back on the Gen X sell-outs.

-Music Videos on my Mind- Young Fathers’ “Low”

A year and one day ago, Scotland’s Young Fathers released the music video for their song Low to little fanfare.

366 days later, we’ve seen this odd music outfit go from tiny steps to big treads. Their album Dead is nominated for the prestigious Mercury Prize and the power trio has acquired the novel description of being Britain’s first "Liberian/Nigerian/Scottish psychedelic hip-hop electro boy band".

This is where the uncommon oddness of Young Fathers is further accentuated. Drawing heavily on the African heritage of members Alloysious Massaquoi and Kayus Bankole ('G' Hastings is the third non-African contributor), Young Fathers mesh the urban realism of their surroundings in Edinburgh with the faraway vibes of Soweto's Shangaan electro dance scene. It’s mad but somehow it works fantastically well.

This is highly original British hip-hop, with smatterings of fuzzy shoegaze reverb and mainstream pop hooks thrown in for maximum rhythmic effect.

Hollywood Adult Blockbusters Deserve Respect

Legendary European director Paul Verheoven is making another movie next year. In January 2015 the Dutch auteur will film Elle, an adaptation of Philllippe Dijan’s novel Oh…, a psychological victim-to-vindicator thriller in which a violated businesswoman plots revenge against the assailant who stalked and raped her. The film stars Isabelle Huppert and will be Verheoven’s first feature since 2006’s sensational Dutch thriller Black Book, becoming his debut French-language production. The pulpy premise seems entirely fitting to Verheoven’s skill set, and the casting of Huppert reminds us just how much the filmmaker is able to recruit big stars in controversial projects.

Those with a passion for cinema will know that even though Verheoven is a European director who made his name making provocative films in his native Holland, it’s his work in the 1980s and 1990s as an A-list Hollywood director that resonates most strongly. Verheoven’s canon of adult blockbusters during this period, some being the most expensive movies produced at the time, were cultural sensations drenched in ultra violence and explicit sex. Yet what was wondrous about his output is how layered the movies are: on the surface obscenely entertaining but functioning on another level imbued with highly intelligent political, ideological, psychological and theological subtexts. Not every movie Verheoven made in Hollywood struck gold, but when he did it created an impact, consequently auguring millions for studios. RoboCop, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Showgirls and Starship Troopers are just some of Verheoven’s classics.

Things changed in 2000 with the release of Verheoven’s Hollow Man, a state of the art loose reimagining of H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man, the film thematically playing on Plato’s Ring of Gyges conceit whereby the philosophiser posits the notion that powers of invisibility may compel even righteous people to commit felonious crimes. The movie cost a fortune ($95 million), the budget mainly devoted to stellar visual effects. Hollow Man was Verheoven’s biggest hit since Basic Instinct ($190 million worldwide), but neither the filmmaker nor Hollywood was entirely satisfied. The mood was changing. Adult blockbusters were proving too expensive and risky to produce. Verheoven returned to Europe and Hollywood limited its commitment to adult blockbusters.

Back then there was a clear distinction between what movies offered and what television provided: the two mediums strangely swapping places in recent years. Almost fifty years ago the Motion Picture Association of America campaigned to do away with the puritanical enforcement of the 1930s Hays Code in favour of a more modern film ratings system which is still in operation today. The argument was that conservative limitations imposed by the Hays Code infringed America’s right to freedoms of expression and compromised artistic integrity, though it more likely had a lot to do with American cinema’s perpetual fear of competing with television. Television was a threat and the only way around it was giving audiences something they couldn’t get at home. The 1970s to 1980s saw Hollywood produce movies rife with style, sex and violence, all in the service of catering to a more liberal viewership than previous eras. Even though these films were adult-orientated, the rating systems weirdly enough allowed people under the age of seventeen permission to watch adult movies if accompanied by a grownup. The aim was to maximise Hollywood’s income and this new system ensured that. Adult blockbusters were for everyone, regardless of whether it was appropriate.

The adult blockbuster was a powerhouse at the American box-office. Audiences flocked to see movies that revelled in heightened aggression and machismo. This is best demonstrated by Rambo: First Blood Part II which blitzed The Goonies at the summer box-office in 1985, the former making almost double what the perennial kids’ classic achieved during its run. American audiences wanted to see things suited to adult sensibilities; demanding movies loaded in excess but executed with serious attitude.

Even up until fifteen years ago Hollywood was still keen on producing adult blockbusters made with sizable budgets. The Matrix, Fight Club, Sleepy Hollow, Eyes Wide Shut, The Insider and The Green Mile were all major studio productions, none budgeted at less than $60 million each (unadjusted for inflation!), released intact with adult skewing certifications. Hollywood had thrived on adult blockbusters for the past thirty years and the assumption was that families stayed at home to watch cutesy things on television but came to theatres to see stuff broadcasters wouldn’t dare commission.

Fifteen years ago also saw the theatrical release of American Beauty and the television series The Sopranos air on HBO. American Beauty was a studio produced adult drama that won Oscars and made over $350 million internationally, while The Sopranos became an adult drama that was referred to as the greatest television series of all time, winning even more plaudits and changing our expectations of television’s dramatic capabilities. Watching American Beauty today one can safely assume that it was the last of its kind; a Hollywood adult blockbuster which would now be more at home on television rather than produced as a standalone feature film. Television has become the home of adult drama while cinema has courted family attendance by providing expensive animated films and pricy PG-13 action flicks. The adult blockbuster has been thrown under the bus in favour of four-quadrant movies.

The last few years has seen Hollywood engage in a system of insipid sequels and creatively bereft reboots. Brands have become vital signifiers, the notion being that recognisable cinematic products generate greater revenues than untested original ideas. Paul Verheoven’s original adult blockbusters like RoboCop and Total Recall have been remade as PG-13 family-friendly products. The remakes are just as violent but the depiction of blood and gore is limited to facilitate a more dishonest vision of brutality, all the while eradicating intelligent subtext to appease less demanding tastes. Even Verheoven’s seminal sci-fi epic Starship Troopers, which used fascist imagery to cleverly point out certain aspects of jingoism in American society, is undergoing a brainless remake proposition that will remove political satire to accommodate a more patriotic agenda.

The Hollywood adult blockbuster cannot die just yet, not if studios fail to recognise the fact that society is getting older and those with economic prospects are choosing to delay starting families. This ought to mean that the demand for adult blockbusters should be booming. The last month saw the release of a rebooted The Equalizer and crime thriller Gone Girl, both bona fide adult blockbusters, but they’re hardly ushering in a cycle of similar studio-backed titles. Hollywood’s focus remains on creating broad sweeps: films that at once target those in the Midwest as well as those in developing countries, thus producing features which abide to strict codification and uniformity.

Hollywood really missed a trick by not approaching Verheoven to direct next year’s adult blockbuster in-waiting, Fifty Shades of Grey. Rather than the corporate, restrained, anodyne soap opera we’ll probably get that’s designed to placate share holders, the studio had a chance to give the film an identity shaped by someone with cinematic personality as opposed to making the movie―one expects, judging by the trailer―imaginatively redundant. Rather than bringing on board people who can elevate the project to loftier heights, the studio has attached personnel to follow lustreless boardroom orders.