The Brit Awards 2016: from A to Zzzzzz

You know, I was tempted to simply repost last year’s article, seeing as this year’s Brits line-up appears to be little more than a regurgitated hybrid of the past few years. I haven’t done that, however – I still respect you, even if the organisers of the Brits don’t.

Last year, I wrote what was effectively a chronological breakdown (in every sense of the word) of 2015’s audio-visual atrocity. I could easily have done that again, but it’s kinda self-defeating when you’re trying to criticise the rehashing of old ideas, so instead I’ve lovingly compiled the highlights (in no sense of the word whatsoever, in many cases) of this year’s ‘spectacular’ in the form of an A to Z, for no particular reason.

And yes, some of them are pretty tenuous, but work with me here…

A is for Adele, who probably does the most interesting thing of the entire evening by dropping an F-bomb approximately 85 minutes in after Major Tim Peake announces (from space and everything!) that she’s won yet another fucking award for her godawful caterwauling. That said, if you think she sounds bad on record, her speaking voice is something else entirely – in an alternate universe, she’d be running the caff in EastEnders or gaining meaningful employment as a human burglar alarm.

B is for Bieber. The first artist to simultaneously hold the number one, two and three spots in UK chart history, apparently, which is odd as it all sounds like number two to me. He rather predictably wins the International Male Award (which I’m sure had absolutely nothing to do with the fact he was in attendance) and gives a speech lifted straight from one of those bullshit pseudo-inspirational memes about life being a journey and how we’re all on our own individual journeys. That’s true – after hearing that, I went on my own individual journey to the bathroom to reacquaint myself with my dinner.

C is for Coldplay, who demonstrate the truly wretched state of mainstream British music by being named Best British Group. They also open the show with a performance so reserved that it may as well have a German beach towel slung across it. Chris Martin plays his battered old piano whilst rocking back and forth like someone who swats imaginary pigeons, the drummer looks like he was rudely awoken just seconds beforehand and the other two decide to alternate between playing their usual instruments and a set of additional drums, for no apparent reason. I would wager this is what the producers think passes for an explosive, on-point show opener these days and yet the end result is probably one of the most underwhelming, by-numbers performances yet at any Brit Awards ceremony, as Coldplay slip ever further into predictable self-parody. One question: do you think the other three members of Coldplay actually know they’re in Coldplay?

D is for Dec and Ant, also known as Ant and Dec. It’s their third (and thankfully final) year of hosting and this means we have to endure a whole evening of two excitable Geordie foreheads in designer suits harping on about “upping their game”. Not sure what their game was, exactly, or how they think they’ve upped it, but tonight they could have beamed in a hologram of any Ant and Dec hosting job from the past decade and no one would have noticed the difference.

E is for ecstacy, as in something which might make sitting in that audience even vaguely enjoyable.

F is for fire – and lots of it. That’s literally all I can remember about Justin Bieber’s performance. While he’s undoubtedly as popular as ever (maybe even more so), he’s really not doing anything that Justin Timberlake hasn’t already done a hell of a lot better.

G is for Gary Oldman, who comes on to accept the Icon Award for David Bowie. It’s clearly an emotional occasion and no one can blame one of our nation’s finest actors for wanting to pay tribute to one of our nation’s finest musical legends, but you can’t help feeling everyone in that arena is wondering how long Oldman’s speech is going to go on for…

H is for hairy, which could be used to describe Jack Garratt, winner of this year’s Critics Choice Award, who has a rather alarming hair and beard combo, giving him the appearance of a graphic design student who works part-time in Urban Outfitters. He sits there taking advice from last year’s winner, James Bay, who tells him to ‘keep doing what you’re doing’, by which I assume he means keep folding those jeans and hand in your coursework on time. On paper, he sounds like he should be an interesting proposition (“brilliantly talented multi-instrumentalist”) but in reality he sounds exactly as you’d expect someone who’s won both the Brits Critics Choice and BBC Sound of 2016 accolades to sound: relentlessly pedestrian.

I is for International Female, deservedly won by Bjork who has the honour of being the only winner of the night not to be present at the ceremony (I’m obviously not including Bowie here). Instead, she sends an acceptance video in which she appears to be wearing melted plastic over her face. Unlike Lady Gaga, Bjork’s kookiness never feels contrived. Treasure her.

J is for James Bay. This year’s George Ezra, I guess – he sounds like every over-ambitious busker on every city centre street corner and you’d probably struggle to name more than one song. The only real difference is that Bay looks a bit like Jack White, if he’d been styled by River Island and the Amish. He wins British Male Solo Artist and duly accepts his gong from Kylie before rotating on the spot, apparently unsure which direction to face (a common problem tonight, thanks to the circular stage in the centre of the arena). To his credit, he seems humble enough, but there’s no escaping the fact that his win is exactly what’s wrong with this year’s awards.

K is for K-hole, as in you’d probably need to be stuck in one to enjoy much of tonight’s ceremony.

L is for Lorde. The rumours about who would be taking part in tonight’s Bowie tribute hadn’t been promising – Noel Gallagher and Chris Martin (with whom Bowie had famously refused to work) were among the names touted. In the end, it was Lorde who stepped up to perform ‘Life On Mars’, accompanied by Bowie’s own backing band. A beautiful, subtle and, above all, fitting tribute.

M is for Mark Ronson, who still irritates the living shit out of me for reasons which have yet to become entirely clear.

N is for Nick Grimshaw, who comes on with Cheryl Whatever-Hernameis to present the award for British Breakthrough Act. It goes to the appallingly named Catfish and the Bottlemen (I’m sure there’s probably some ‘hilarious’ story behind it but frankly I don’t give a shit) but all I can think about is the fact Grimmy’s head appears to be at least four times the size of Cheryl’s. Feeling slightly disturbed.

O is for One Direction, who, despite technically not really existing at the moment, manage to win the British Artist Video of the Year Award. Two boys in suits who look like they’ve drawn crude beards on their faces in felt tip accept the award. It’s good that they’ve given the work experience kids something to do.

P is for Pam Hogg, who designed this year’s statue and thankfully succeeded in ensuring she didn’t repeat Tracey Emin’s mistake of making 2015’s trophy look like an ornament in your gran’s downstairs toilet.  

Q is for: “Quick, Adele’s about to swear, press the mute button... oh, never mind.”

R is for Rebekah Brooks. Oh no, wait, sorry – it’s Jess Glynne. If I’m honest, she’s not been on my radar at all and I’m pretty sure I’m not in her key demographic. That aside, she has one of the least pleasant-sounding voices I’ve heard since Sam Smith. Still, if the music career doesn’t work out in the long-term then she could probably make a pretty reasonable living recording those warning klaxons used when bin wagons are reversing.

S is for Simon Le Bon, this year’s token Veteran Pop Star Who Looks Like He Doesn’t Really Know Why He’s Here. Good of him to take time out of his undoubtedly hectic schedule to be here tonight.

T is for Tame Impala, who scoop the International Group Award. Pleasant surprises (or indeed ANY surprises) at the Brits are few and far between, but this is definitely one of them.

U is for underwhelming, which is exactly what British music SHOULDN’T be, right? Maybe the bigwigs at the Brits missed the memo?

V is for varying degrees of mediocrity. Fifty shades of Bay, if you like.

W is for white, as in: “Wow, the Brits seem overwhelmingly white tonight – I wonder why they chose to overlook the many innovative black artists who made fantastic music over the past year in favour of yet more homogenised River Island balladry from skinny, long-haired, hat-wearing white boys with guitars or miserable, watered-down blue-eyed soul from whining white women who’ve been ploughing the same stale creative furrow for the best part of a decade?”

X is for xylophone jazz-wobble tech-hop, a genre woefully under-represented at this year’s Brits, to the point where there were no xylophone jazz-wobble tech-hop artists nominated at all. I’m writing a very strongly worded letter to my MP as we speak.

Y is for years and years. Not the awful pop three-piece of the same name, but the amount of time I feel is passing with each excruciating second of Adele’s closing performance. I note she’s playing it safe by not wearing a cape.

Z is for Zzzzzzzzzzz. Wake me up when LEVELZ are nominated for Best British Album, okay?

Going all the way to the top

Hip Hop Hump Days #10: 

LEVELZ – LVL 11 (2016)

Yeah, that’s right – 2016. I’m using a column that is (with the exception of the Rough Trade compilation I reviewed last time) normally reserved for revisiting classic hip hop albums released in years beginning with ‘19’ to write about a mixtape released JUST LAST MONTH.

Why? It’s simple really - I only heard ‘LVL 11’ for the first time three days ago and I’m already convinced it’s a modern day masterpiece, a future classic in the making. I’m trying to remember the last time I heard a hip hop album as fresh, as inventive, as utterly compelling as this… and I’m still scratching my head.

LEVELZ are a 14-strong collective of rappers, DJs and producers from straight outta Manchester. I know very little else about them, but that’s not important right now because what I DO know is that ‘LVL 11’ not only DEMANDS your full and undivided attention, but manages to hold it through each and every one of its 13 tracks AND leaves you wanting more.

Refreshingly, ‘LVL 11’ is entirely free of those lazy ‘skits’ many hip hops artists rely on to pad out albums. No fillers here – we’re talking exceptional quality from start to finish, an exhilarating showcase of smart, on-point lyrics, breath-taking vocal dexterity (with Mancunian accents in full effect, of course) and crisp, clean production.

This is an album literally bursting at the seams with ideas, which is to be expected when so many different people are bringing something to the table – and yet it never sounds too busy or crowded. Musically, they cover a phenomenal amount of ground, from filthy-but-fresh grime (‘Look Who It Is’, ‘LVL07’) to gloriously hypnotic G-funk (‘King Of The Disco’, ‘Bow Wow’, ‘Slow Down’) through to exuberant dancehall rhythms (‘Rowdy Badd’ – one of the album’s highlights for me) and even Bukem-esque liquid funk (album closer ‘Jazzface’). There’s also razor-sharp social commentary in the form of the fantastically frank ‘Drug Dealer’, while the punchy but humorous ‘Dickhead’ is probably one of the most unapologetically British hip hop tracks you’ll hear this year.

I don’t know what they put in the water in Manchester, but there isn’t a single duff track here – each song bristles with the same boundless energy and enthusiasm: these guys aren’t just fantastically talented at what they do, they actually sound like they’re having fun doing it too.

Astonishingly, for a group who’ve just turned in one of the best albums of the year (and yes, I know it’s only February), it seems LEVELZ are still unsigned. On the one hand, this is utterly staggering because their music very clearly deserves to be heard as many people as humanly possible and yet, for many, it’ll slip under the radar. On the other hand, however, ‘LVL 11’ is an album of pure, undiluted, uncompromising music which its creators have made on their own terms. Crucially, this means it’s free of the curse of major label interference – no one’s looking at pie charts, thinking about market demographics or trying to write a radio-hit-by-numbers. Fuck that shit.

‘LVL 11’ is available to download from the group’s Bandcamp page. You can pay as much or as little as you like. I trust you’ll all do the right thing, because albums this good genuinely don’t come along very often.  

Back to the fusion

Sound Advice #3: 

Cornershop – When I Was Born For The 7^th Time (1997)

Let’s start at the beginning.

It’s a hot July afternoon in 1993 and my 13-year-old self and a school chum have just walked through the gates of a free music festival taking place in the grounds of a stately home in Nottingham. It’s my first proper gig (I say ‘proper’ because my first gig was actually East 17 earlier that same year, but I won’t tell if you won’t) and we’re looking forward to seeing a ‘Modern Life Is Rubbish’-era Blur later, even though they’re not deemed big enough to headline (that honour goes to textbook crusties Back To The Planet). 

Walking past the stately home in question, we head down the hill towards the deep, bass-heavy rumble emanating from the huge tent at the bottom. I can’t yet make out the song being performed inside but as we get closer I recognise the people on stage: Cornershop.

Just two EPs into their career at this point (the excellent ‘In The Days Of Ford Cortina’ and ‘Lock, Stock and Double-Barrel’), the band make deliciously raw post-punk noise-pop reminiscent of The Jesus and Mary Chain. To the side of the stage sits a sitar player, his delicately plucked notes piercing through the dense wall of feedback and crashing drums, seemingly out of place and yet also making perfect sense. It’s chaotic, it’s noisy… and obviously brilliant. To a 13-year-old in a Nirvana T-shirt whose dad will be picking him up at the end of the night, it’s nothing short of a revelation.

The kids down at the front in long-sleeved T-shirts are going wild, naturally. Immediately in front of me, a middle-aged guy sporting a trilby, leather jacket and rucksack leans casually on one of the tent poles, arms folded, swinging his head from side to side in time to each alternate beat as he surveys the swarming moshpit ahead of him – he’s been there, done that, but he’s still having fun.

Looking back, though, one thing is clear: no one in that tent, not even the band, would have predicted that five years later Cornershop would be performing live on Top of the Pops, having scored a number one single. From the very start, the band were unashamedly outspoken and direct in their approach: the name ‘Cornershop’ referenced an all-too-familiar stereotype still prevalent in Britain today, as did the fact they pressed their debut EP on ‘curry-coloured’ vinyl. Their first Melody Maker feature in late ’92 saw them burning a Morrissey poster outside EMI’s offices (Moz’s label at the time) in disgust at the singer’s disastrously ill-conceived flirtation with far-right imagery. They were also notable for being the only all-male band to be embraced by the Riot Grrrl movement. In short, they weren’t about to compromise their politics and principles for anyone.

The original line-up burning the Morrissey poster in late 1992

Fast forward to 1997 – Cornershop now have two albums under their belts in the shape of 1994’s ‘Hold On It Hurts’ and 1995’s ‘Woman’s Gotta Have It’. Both great, but destined to remain cult classics – although the latter did offer a tantalising glimpse of a more funk-tinged direction, as did a handful of low-key 12” releases from side project Clinton, indicating that Cornershop were starting to outgrow their earlier sound.

If ‘Woman’s Gotta Have It’ laid the foundations for a more dance-orientated direction then ‘When I Was Born For The 7^th Time’ represented the crystallisation of those ideas, achieving the simultaneous feat of being both their most experimental and accessible work to date. It felt like everything had now fallen into place: here was a band who had found their niche.

‘Sleep On The Left Side’ still feels like a strong choice of opening track, with its hip hop beats (one of several tracks co-produced by Dan The Automator) and earworm melodies setting the scene for the next hour’s musical journey. ‘Brimful Of Asha’ you already know, of course, but it’s important to remember that this is the original, definitive version, with its warm, reassuring, bluesy guitars building up to a truly gorgeous string-filled climax. I always felt that the Norman Cook remix stripped away a lot of the original song’s soul, but maybe that’s just me?  

‘Butter The Soul’ is one of several (largely instrumental) hip hop-influenced numbers peppered throughout the album, alongside ‘Chocolat’, ‘Coming Up’, ‘It’s Indian Tobacco My Friend’, ‘Candyman’ (featuring vocals from Justin Warfield) and ‘State Troopers’, showing just how far the band’s music had evolved in the two years since their previous album. It’s fair to say some of these pieces wouldn’t have sounded out of place on a Mo’Wax compilation, which is certainly no bad thing.  

‘We’re In Yr Corner’ feels like a logical progression from ‘6am Jullandar Shere’ from ‘Woman’s Gotta Have It’, with Tjinder Singh’s Punjabi vocals sounding like a rallying cry soaring over a sitar-drenched accompaniment. ‘Good Shit' (renamed 'Good Ships' for its single release) and ‘Funky Days Are Back Again’ show Cornershop at their most funky, demonstrating that it’s possible to write decent songs for listeners AND dancers.

‘What Is Happening?’ is an experimental sound collage, layering snatches of spoken word samples (creating a ‘channel-surfing’ effect), scratching and space-age sounds over hypnotic, bubbling dhol rhythms interspersed with affirmative handclaps. ‘When The Light Appears Boy’, meanwhile, features Allen Ginsberg (who died just five months before the album’s release) reading one of his poems while what appears to be a street carnival takes place outside (you half expect Ginsberg to stop reading and stick his head out of the window to tell them to keep it down).

Country and folk influences are also present and correct in the form of ‘Good To Be On The Road Back Home Again’ (featuring Paula Frazer) and a quirky and genuinely wonderful Punjabi language cover of ‘Norwegian Wood’, which closes the album.

Next year will mark two decades since ‘When I Was Born For The 7^th Time’ was released – the same age that ‘Never Mind The Bollocks’, ‘Low’ and ‘Trans-Europe Express’ were in 1997.

Nearly 20 years later, ‘When I Was Born For The 7^th Time’ is still a record worth talking about and, more importantly, listening to.