Tuesday, October 22, 2002

WHALES TAPDANCING: Why, when the BBC has the beautiful Music site does the team at BBC News Online feel the need to try and run a critical piece on new rock? Hung on the not especially topical discovery of a two month old issue of Rolling Stone proclaiming 'Rock is back' (on this basis, expect BBC News to be running 'Women make music' sometime round Christmas), the nme's James Oldham claims that the musical landscape has changed. Oh, if only... But the nugget reviews of the bands shows that the landscape hasn't changed at all, or at least not yet. (If it had, then why would there be a news story suggesting that mainstream music has morphed? Surely it'd be as redundant as reporting 'It rained in manchester?'). "Did the music for an advert with Kylie in", "supported the Rolling Stones", "spawned a top 30 single", and "does head-stands on stage" are amongst The Best Things They Can Find To Say. Yes, these bands are excellent, yes, they're doing great things - but there's no seismic shift yet. Otherwise you'd not fall back on saying "the nme writes about them" - it'd be "they're on the cover of Newsweek/ never out the Mirror."


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