Mike's Mad4these
Choice new music - w/c 8 Nov 10
1 1 MILES KANE Inhaler new single 22 November 2010
2 - THE VIEW Sunday new free download single 1 November 2010
3 2 JOHN LEGEND & THE ROOTS Wake Up from the new album 'Wake Up' 18 October 2010
4 - THE NAKED & FAMOUS Punching In A Dream new single 6 December 2010
5 3 THE STAND I'll Be There new single 25 October 2010
6 4 GRINDERMAN Worm Tamer new single 22 November 2010
7 5 WILDER Skyful Of Angels new single 22 November 2010
8 7 THE VACCINES Wreckin' Bar (Ra Ra Ra) / Blow It Up new single
9 8 THE BARBARELLAS Body Rock new single 31 January 2011
10 9 NELLY FURTADO Night Is Young new single 16 Nov 2010
10 10 AUTOHYPE Makes You Go new single 8 November 2010

This week's post ...

Afro Jack & Eva Simons
Take Over Control new single 28 November 2010
23 year old Dutch DJ master Nick van de Wall has a winner here, a top dancefloor tune, some great electric melody making, a female vocal bang on the button, hopefully top ten. Here's the pr... Afro Jack is the Dutch dance music star that’s taking over the world’s dancefloors. His single, ‘Take Over Control’, is currently one of the hottest club anthems on the planet, not least in the UK where it’s been championed by Radio 1’s Annie Mac, Pete Tong, and Mistajam, plus Kiss, Galaxy and 1Xtra’s specialists. The track has also hit No.5 on Cool Cuts, No.7 on the Music Week Club Chart Breakers, No.2 on Hype Machine and over 1 million youtube views!
At 23 years old, Afrojack aka Nick van de Wall, has had phenomenal success in Holland, crossover smashes like ‘Drop Down (Do My Dance)’, ‘Math’, ‘Don’t Be’, with numerous club anthems including ‘Bangduck’, ‘Pacha on Acid’ as well as producing for the likes of Estelle, David Guetta, MADONNA and upcoming single for THE BLACK EYED PEAS have ensured he’s the Dutch talent everyone is talking about. As befitting his position as the leading figure of the Dutch new wave, his success stretches far beyond his home turf; 2010 has seen him become one of the most in demand DJ/producers of any nationality. With a peerless reputation in the USA, Europe, Asia and beyond, his signature style is bringing him the kind of remix requests (David Guetta feat. Akon ‘Sexy Bitch’/ Lady Gaga ‘Pokerface’) that most dance artists will only ever dream of. Gig-wise, he’s rocked the World’s biggest floors including Wonderland Ibiza, David Guetta’s FMIF parties and Electric Daisy Carnival in LA. Afrojack’s rise to fame has brought him a roll call of A-list champions – from Pete Tong to David Guetta, and Josh Wink to Fedde Le Grand - and along the way he’s since collaborated with Guetta, Diplo (Pon Di Floor), Kid Cudi, Laidback Luke and Steve Angello, amongst others.

Bashy & NAPT
Make My Day new single 6 December 2010
Great video... kinda Flashdance meets Beat It... and 'Pump Up The Jam', Technotronic's Euro-pop was regarded by many as trashy disco twenty years back and here we are in 2010 and Brit School graduate Bashy has recycled this old chestnut and given it a grimey Roll Deep 125bpm feel.... a pounding dancefloor sound with the obligatory reference to haters... I don't know if that may include me but put this alongside the content of black music's fine history of social commentators like Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye and back 100 years to the original blues singers I'm not sure where Bashy and this bling bling get rich quick loving recipe for unhappiness would stand, perhaps around Howlin' Wolf's knee caps or Ray Charles ankle's. This'll be a great record until the next hater hater comes along... surely Top Twenty

Enter Shikari
Destabilise new single 29 November 2010
The first new ES track since February's 'Thumper' will be released as a very limited edition 7" back with their live fave 'Motherstep/Mothership' recorded at the band's Hammersmith Apollo show back in Feb. It'll be available only from indie stores from the end of the month to coincide with ES support for 30 Second From Mars.

I Blame Coco
The Constant new album 8 November 2010
I know Sting's her dad but there's enough evidence here to suggest Coco will be around for the long haul and with a song-writing paternal genius like Sting as a father figure you know there'll be plenty of potential for brilliance.... I particularly like 'In Spirit Golden'. Top notch

Jagga
Modern Day Romance new single 6 December 2010
Well I like this, there's a certain soulful desperation to Jagga's wailing vocal, and this is resembling a song which always helps in the memorability stakes... Jagga should raise some ear brows and eye-holes in a kinda Kanye stylee.. top tune deserves to crash the 40! Here's the pr.... ‘Modern Day Romance’ is the debut single from London’s Jagga, a new musical hero emerging at the tail end of 2010. Heavy rolling basslines intertwine with Jagga’s unique delivery to present the opening of a new chapter in British music. Jagga’s net of influences is wide, drawing from a multitude of genres, but never imitating, it’s a record that could only have been concocted in the UK and is proof that he’s going to be a force to be reckoned with heading into 2011. A sense of time and space permeates his music, with epic vocals and percussive crescendos, with textured, deep tones. What’s more, they are combined with real melody and echo drenched vocals that make for a brilliant atmospheric and infectious debut. Jagga has already written with Zinc, Starsmith and Magnetic Man and will be supporting M.I.A cohort Rusko on a number of tour dates in November. See below for more live dates.

Jamie Woon
Night Air teaser tracks
A mellow jiggling soulful and unusual blues presentation... a stand-out track which could set a new sound for 2011.... good tune shows off some soulful vocals and a superb arrangement with it's semi wandering bass sound... and it's a song... Top start Here's the pr... Jamie Woon is a special talent who will carve his blues n’ bass infused pop songs into your brain and leave them there forever. You might not have heard of him yet, unless you've been tapped into the eerie, soulful end of dubstep, but it’s a name you will be hearing a lot of in the coming 12 months. Written and produced by Woon, Night Air is as dark, sweet and seductive as molasses, an irresistibly understated combination of Jamie’s uniquely supple voice, his subtly compulsive beats and a sky full of atmosphere. A melancholic ode to the urgency of the night, it’s a future soul vision taken further into orbit with a dancefloor-winning refix by up and coming techno/dubstep crossover don Ramadanman. But you have to go back a few years to find the seeds of his new sound. In 2007 he released his version of traditional standard 'Wayfaring Stranger' with a remix from secretive and ultra selective producer Burial on the flip. It turned people like Gilles Peterson and Mary-Anne Hobbs into full-blown Woon fans. The release also recalibrated his musical mind and inspired him to re-think his approach on music. Woon is now primed to be one of the most exciting artists you're likely to hear all year, a man who is populist but always inventive, a modest and understated 27 year old who's making hugely ambitious music that you'll be filing somewhere, between your favourite Four Tet, Richard Hawley and D'Angelo records. Singer, songwriter and self-taught producer Woon made his name by playing live. He's got hundreds of gigs under his belt, from endless spots in front of the microphone with just his guitar, an effects box and that unmistakable voice, to supporting Amy Winehouse. He's played in a full band with dubstep DJ and producer Reso on drums and he's taken stage at Sonar. He has now made the music that will let him switch between intimate gigs to stages with a bigger reach. The new sound fuses his future pop songs with '80s reverb, ultra-tight beats and acres of bass and they cleverly carry the intimate emotions of his early sound into a whole different room; bigger, badder… heavier. Watch out for his debut album in spring 2011…

Japanese Pop Stars
Let Go new single release date to be confirmed
JPS have the X-Factor with this track 'Let Go' a simple but effective dance floor destroying bass heavy electro beat, "You're trying to hard to keep control, just relax and then let go...". Check the moving Joe Will Ask Mix - Daft Punk for the new Millenia decade deserves Top 40, top tune.
Here's the pr.... In between live shows at BBC Radio 1’s Ibiza Weekend, Reading, Leeds, Bestival, Rockness, Creamfields, and beyond, The Japanese Popstars are finishing their second album. They’ve just remixed Gorillaz’ ‘Melancholy Hill’, and are drip-feeding a series of club tracks to satiate those eagerly awaiting the long-player’s release in early 2011. Following the ‘Destroy EP’, a sonic appetiser that saw them joined by Jon Spencer (he of the Blues Explosion), the next release is ‘Let Go’, featuring the madcap legend that is Green Velvet. First leaked online earlier this month, ‘Let Go’, has picked up praise from a range of blogs. Hailed as the rightful heirs to Underworld, Leftfield, The Chemical Brothers, and Orbital, The Japanese Popstars’ debut album, ‘We Just Are’ was championed by The Guardian, Word, Artrocker, NME, Clash, Popjustice, Mixmag, DJ, Radio 1, XFM, and beyond. The singles earned the support of Soulwax, Benny Benassi, Zane Lowe and the rest of the electronic elite. Recent key shows have included Radio 1’s In New Music We Trust and Ibiza weekend live events, Parklife, Benicassim, Rockness, Club NME (they return on 8th October to Koko), their support slot for Tiesto and Pendulum in Victoria Park, London, and many more. The band will shortly embark on a French festival tour.

Japanese Pop Stars
Destroy new single to be confirmed
Well this is one of the best records of the year... really scary. Each mix is staggering mainly because the concept of the band and the track is so overwhelmingly strong... quite brilliant and deserving of massive success. Both the vids for Destroy and Let Go are quite captivating in visually completely different ways, Excellent and then some!!!

Liam Bailey
Your Heart's Not Safe three track demo
Liam's howing off quite some soulful talent and a voice that will shine so brightly on a fully produced set. One to watch... big hit potential!!
Here's the pr... Listening to Liam Bailey – to one of his songs, that is, like “You Better Leave Me” or “ It’s Not the Same” – you’d be forgiven for thinking that here’s someone who’s lived more than just a little bit, that here’s someone who sounds like they’re a true soul singer of the old-fashioned (and best-possible) kind. It’s not just the style of the music (although anyone old enough or enough of a connoisseur to know that R&B once meant something more than just today’s-quick-fix-pop-filler will recognize the hallmarks of classic soul, given a contemporary twist); no, it’s also that there’s a quality that’s rare in music today, and that’s simply that you believe Liam when he sings.
Listening to Liam – to “Save Some Love” or “Stranded”, say – you might well find yourself saying to yourself that you didn’t think they made them like this any more. And then, after the music finishes – once the needle is lifted clear, as you might imagine it – you’ll surely wonder: well, who is he then?
Or even: who the hell does he think he is?
The answer to these questions doesn’t come quickly, because one thing you realize when you listen to this 25-year old singer-songwriter – listen to him speak, that is, over a pint in the pub or over a very late breakfast that follows in a greasy spoon – is that the making of him has taken some time for good reason.
Words tumble out of him and stories unspool that veer between the simply daft to the blackly comic and all points in between and beyond. He is wearing a black polo neck, and sports a fine afro – a timeless look, but he doesn't try to play it too cool. Rather, you'd be hard pushed to find someone more down to earth or bursting to get his message across.
“My mum’s family is English born and bred, Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire,” his tale begins. “My dad’s Jamaican, well… British. My grandparents came over in the Fifties in that first big wave. My dad’s family were Jehovah’s Witnesses. But he wasn’t, he was kicked out the house…” Perhaps that was a sign of things to come.
So what constitutes a contemporary British soul singer?
Sure there was the influence of the pop charts when he was growing up, on an estate in Beeston in Nottingham. Liam's dad used to tape Top of the Pops for him, “so I could watch Five Star and Michael Jackson…he was the only reason I started singing.”
“There’s that drive in you to do something –you’ve either got it or you haven’t – and because I never got everything I wanted when I was younger, I think that might be why my ambition was a bit bigger,” he laughs. “Not getting everything you want and being in love with Michael Jackson.”
But equally? Like others who grew up in the Nineties, inspiration arrived from a very different direction – a development presaged by his family moving out of Nottingham to the nearby village of Selston.
“I got away from some of the potential hazards of the city for a simpler way of life,” he says, “although I’ve always been in a position of being threatened. In Beeston there was a lad in the council estate who’d bully me… until I got the upper hand on him. Then when I went to Selston I’d get it again in the form of racism. There were only one or two other kids in my school who weren’t white. I was always in trouble at school. Always. But I got into Oasis then. Before them, there was no-one who made you feel it was all right to be who you were, wherever you came from.”
Liam remembers singing R Kelly's “I Believe I Can Fly” at a Stars in their Eyes show at school, and girls screaming at him for the first time. But he couldn't play guitar, too, if he wanted to be an R&B act – or so he thought. Instead, like others of his generation, he formed an indie band. Problem No 1, as he tells it, was that in Nottingham, no-one wanted to know.
“The only guy with a hit single I ever met,” he remembers, “was the drummer out of this 1970’s pop group. He had a club out in the middle of nowhere. It was Phoenix Nights. He’d come to the bar and because he wanted to manage us, he'd say 'these lads can have anything they want.’”
If there was something that was on offer, though, that was an education in different schools of music. It was at local clubs that Liam met “mad old guys who'd seen Hendrix play” and where he'd hear contemporary folk acts – older figures like John Tams, and younger musicians like Sam Genders from Tunng and Sam Carter. Little wonder that he describes himself as a “proper folk head”, equally au fait with the soundtrack to the Wicker Man and the lyrics to the suggestive “Gently Johnny” as he is with the chart hits of today.
Not that Liam Bailey isn't a threat to the charts. Since moving to London, he's known dark times – not least because his move down south did nothing to corrupt his accent, but it did see him split with his on-off girlfriend. He admits himself that he started seeking solace elsewhere, in the bottle for a while. “This city does that to you. It’s not good for everything, but it is good for alcohol,” he says. But out of that bleakness came the material for the record that he's now made. “I was listening back to it the other day,” he says with a grin, “and it's all about her!”
Perhaps that's always been the way with the best and truest soul music. The good news for Liam was that others felt his pain, too. Producer Salaam Remi was planning on taking a break after working with Amy Winehouse on Back to Black and winning a Grammy with Jazmine Sullivan, but then he came across Liam through a friend and decided to produce his forthcoming album as a labour of love.
Others might want to box Liam in as the male equivalent of those singers, but what Salaam Remi found was someone who could mine a deeper seam that brings to mind classic folk as well as classic soul singers.
The result then? The sort of record that you could describe as sounding timeless – from the sort of young talent who could never have come from a TV talent show. Spend any time with Liam and you're bound to be charmed, and certain to find yourself laughing. The stories he has to tell are endless – but there is one thing certain that you can be sure to hold on to. And that is that Liam Bailey is a singer who's very much found his own voice.

Mona
Trouble On The Way new single released 13 December 2010
Attention grabbing fast and furious... bodes well for some serious airplay for Mona... hit potential
Here's the pr... On December 13th Mona release their thunderous second single ‘Trouble On The Way’. The Nashville based band who recently signed to Island Records in the UK will make the track available through their own imprint ZionNoiz Recordings. ‘Trouble On The Way’ will be released as a digital download. A limited edition 7-inch with the b-side ‘Brick Shoes’ will also be made available through Rough Trade and other Independent Stores.
‘Trouble On The Way’ is a statement of intent from a band who looking to take 2011 by storm. The track is an unrelenting, fearless, out and out vintage rock song. The single is the follow up to Mona’s unyielding debut single ‘Listen To Your Love’ which was released in early September.
Since the band’s debut release they have played their first London shows, to rave reviews, and have announced a UK tour in December. Mona will also return
to the capital in November to make their exclusive first UK t.v appearance in the last of the current series of Later with Jools Holland.
Mona will play all the major cities in December. The tour will begin in London on December 7th and take in Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, Nottingham and Brighton.

My Chemical Romance
Na Na Na new single released 8 November 2010
"Doctor Death Defying..." Nice and a seemingly upward progression from 'Black Parade'... it's a UK hit already in at 11 this evening and headed upwards I'm sure. Top track

The Naked & Famous
Punching In A Dream new single 6 December 2010
Look out for these Kiwi chart-toppers, yep sound good right away - interesting mix of electro and heavy-ish guitar, like it - should do well
Here's the pr... “Fervent, infectious and highly hummable, this is a band armed with songs to fall in love with.” – The Fly
Hotly-tipped New Zealanders The Naked & Famous release their debut UK single ‘Punching In A Dream’ on 6th December on Fiction Records.
Having topped the charts in their homeland with debut album ‘Passive Me, Aggressive You,’ the quintet are all set to take the UK by storm with their perfectly arranged nuggets of spiky, ambient indie pop. ‘Punching In A Dream’ is a three minute master class in modern, psychedelic guitar music, all pulsating synths and addictive melodies - its sharp verses soaring into a massive chorus.
Formed in various Auckland bedrooms by David Beadle, Thom Powers, Aaron Short, Jesse Wood and Alisa Xayalith, The Naked & Famous took the DIY approach, writing and recording the majority of their music in those very same suburban houses. Its loving, careworn aesthetic was preserved as the tracks were mixed and mastered in the US before release.
Their single ‘Young Blood’ became the first #1 debut in the New Zealand singles chart for three years as well as the first kiwi song to do so since the early 1990s. The album soon followed, shooting to the top of the charts in September this year. That same month ‘Young Blood’ was released here as a 7” on New York-based indie label Neon Gold.
Its release led to early interest from radio, with Fearne Cotton and Nick Grimshaw giving the track support on Radio 1 along with a daytime Playlist on XFM. ‘Punching In A Dream’ has already followed it onto the daytime list at XFM. The Naked & Famous recently featured as the lead band in NME’s Radar section and The Fly’s Ones To Watch pages. The Guardian’s New Band Of The Day column also heaped praise on the band, labeling ‘Young Blood,’ “ecstatic, uplifting, thumping, pumping psych-dazed, rocked-up synth-pop that is all about affirmation.” NME called their music “enraptured, velveteen synth-pop wonderment.”

The View
Sunday new free download track 1 November 2010
A fine return to form and a free download, sounds like they've sharpened up their act plenty since their second album so hopefully there'll be another 'Same Jeans' on the way. Here's the pr... The View have announced details of a free download that will be made available to fans via their website www.theviewareonfire.com. The band will be giving away new song “Sunday” on Monday 1st November which will feature on their new album, set for release in Spring next year. The as-yet-untitled album was recorded in London with producer Youth. The band head out on a UK tour next month where they will showcase tracks from the new record. The tour will call at the following venues:
Monday 15th November – Aberdeen Lemon Tree
Tuesday 16th November – Bathgate Room At The Top
Wednesday 17th November – Stirling Fu Bar
Thursday 18th November – Glasgow QMU
Saturday 20th November – Sunderland Independent
Sunday 21st November – Preston 53 Degrees
Monday 22nd November – Leicester Academy 2
Tuesday 23rd November – Gloucester Guildhall
Thursday 25th November – Tunbridge Wells Forum
Friday 26th November – Oxford Academy 2
Monday 29th November – Exeter Cavern
Tuesday 30th November – Yeovil Orange Box
Wednesday 1st December – Bournemouth Academy 2
Thursday 2nd December – Swansea Sin City
Saturday 4th December – Hemel Hempstead JJs
Sunday 5th December – Peterborough Met Lounge
Monday 6th December – Norwich Arts Centre
Tuesday 7th December – Derby The Venue
Thursday 9th December – Sheffield University Fuzz Club
Friday 10th December – Stoke Sugarmill
Saturday 11th December – York Duchess
Sunday 12th December – Liverpool Kazimier
Monday 13th December – Wolverhampton Slade Rooms
Wednesday 15th December – Hull Welly
Thursday 16th December – Hartlepool Jax Bar
Friday 17th December – Carlisle Brickyard
Saturday 18th December – Dunfermline Velocity

Wretch 32
Traktor new single 16 January 2011
"Explosive, terrorist style..." MIA's got competition here and I particularly like the "feel like a train, choo choo..." the infectious mellow Sean Paul type jiggling eat does make this rather infectious and plenty of references to the best things in life, women, women and more women make this a stand out track. Top call for a first outing, with a little luck Top 40 maybe
Here's the pr... ‘Part of this exciting moment in time, pushing the scene forward, absolutely great!’ Zane Lowe
With performances across the country and Europe at huge events like the BBC Weekender, Glastonbury, Orange Rock Corps and supporting breakthrough superstar Tinie Tempah on his recent tour, Wretch 32 joins the elite pack of UK Urban Stars! Wretch comes from the true UK underground as a respected artist independently amassing over 2 million views on Youtube and selling over 15,000 mixtapes. Before signing to MoS/Levels he was already receiving heavy rotation on MTV Base, Channel AKA and Flava TV with his songs Be Cool, Ina Di Ghetto and Superhero. His dynamic lyricism has also led him to receive awards from BBC 1Xtra, Touch Magazine and at the Official Mixtape Awards. His first release ‘Traktor’ coming through Levels Recordings/Ministry of Sound is already building up an unstoppable momentum with Zane Lowe calling it ‘Stupid Fresh’ making it his Hottest Record In The World, Mistajam making it his Jam Hot Record, Annie Mac scheduling him for a Minimix ,plays from Nick Grimshaw, Trevor Nelson, Ras Kwame and Seani B who are already making it an essential tune for their shows along with it being added to 1Xtra’s B List!! Respected within the scene Wretch recently featured on Chipmunk’s repackaged ‘I am Chipmunk’ album on the track ‘History’ along with features on the official remixes of latest releases from Labrinth and Professor Green. Having previously worked with the likes of The Streets, Tinie Tempah, Bashy and Scorcher. It looks like he will follow in Tinie’s footsteps with Traktor already developing a huge ground swell in the same way that Tinie’s breakthrough track Pass Out did...Expect BIG things from Wretch 32 over the coming 12 months!!!!

new trax
our weekly a to z of new cd review's is listed below

this week
Afro Jack 28/11/10
Bashy 6/12/10
Enter Shikari 29/11/10
I Blame Coco LP 8/11/10
Jagga 6/12/10
Jamie Woon demo
Japanese Pop Stars tbc
Liam Bailey demo
Mona 13/12/10
My Chemical Romance 8/11/10
The Naked & Famous 6/12/10
The View 1/11/10
Wretch 32 16/1/11

1 Nov
The Barbarellas 31/1/11
Chase & Status 8/11/10
The Drums 13/12/10
Grinderman 22/11/10
Katy Perry

25 Oct
Autohype 8/11/10
Awolnation
The Count & Sinden 8/11/10
Dirty Heads
Hans Island 8/11/10
Kid Adrift 15/11/10
Miles Kane 15/11/10
Papa Roach 29/11/10
The Stand 25/10/10
Twin Sister 22/11/10
The Vaccines
Wolf Gang 22/11/10

18 Oct
Boys Like Girls 22/11/10
Example 14/11/10
I Blame Coco 1/11/10
James Blunt 25/10/10
John Legend LP 18/10/10
Katy Perry 15/11/10
Linkin Park 14/11/10
Mirrors 15/11/10
Nadine Coyle 8/11/10
Nelly Furtado 16/11/10
Tinie Tempah LP

11 Oct
Stereophonics 18/10/10

4 Oct
The Concretes 18/10/10
Fenech Solar 20/9/10
Foals 4/11/10
Huski v Arcade Fire 27/9/10
Klaxons 25/10/10
3OH!3 to be confirmed

27 Sep
Innercity Pirates 4/10/10
Pure Reason Revolution 11/10/10
TingTings 10/10/10
Robbie & Gary 4/10//10

20 Sep
Chapel Club 11/10/10
Devlin vs Kid Adrift
Spokes
Wilder 22/11/10

13 Sep
Carl Barat 4/10/10
Black Soul Strangers LP
Foals 13/9/10
Gyptian 31/10/10
The Lines 23/8/10
Mona 13/9/10
School Of Seven Bells 27/9/10

6 Sep
Chapel Club 11/10/10
Clinic 20/9/10
Dinosaur Pile-Up 27/9/10
Dutch Uncles 11/10/10
Ed Drewitt 25/10/10
Grinderman 6/9/10
Mr Fogg 23/8/10
We Are Scientists 11/10/10
Yeasayer

30 Aug
BoB & Rivers Cuomo 25/10/10
Chiddy Bang 11/10/10
Placebo 27/9/10
Professor Green & Example 3/10/10
Tinie Tempah 27/9/10