Hope Springs

Right, after just one post of this blog so far I've already decided that the name is crap and should have been one of the following:

- Ablogalypse Now

- Blogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

- Groundblog Day

- The Blog on the Tyne is all mine all mine

or in memory of everyone's new all-time favourite artist - Don't Blog 'Til You Get Enough

Due to the enormous international reputation and hype that this blog has already generated in it's short existence I feel it would be confusing to actually change the name, but from now on please choose your favourite name from the above list (or create your own, and e-mail me suggestions) and when you're next eagerly discussing it over breakfast with your family, or during breaks with your work colleagues, please refer to it under it's new alias.

I've named this post Hope Springs because I was planning on delivering a scything and hilariously cynical review/rant about a really bad TV programme that was on BBC1 recently, about a bunch of ex-con women who rob some geeza of some money and then escape to a remote village in the Scottish countryside where they start running a pub, and of course the humorous potential is limitless because A GROUP OF FEMALE EX-CONS WITH LOADSAMONEY DON'T BELONG IN THE COUNTRYSIDE RUNNING A POXY LITTLE PUB DO THEY?!!?!! THAT'S BLOOMIN' BARMY THAT IS!!!!! THEY'RE SO UNACCUSTOMED TO THESE RURAL WAYS!!!! Anyway, I was gonna write this thoroughly side-splitting review of this thoroughly un-side-splitting show, and you were all gonna sit at home reading it, chuckling along and thinking, "Oh God isn't TV these days rubbish, I hope whoever created Hope Springs gets knocked off their bike tomorrow, but not in such a nasty collision that it actually causes serious harm, more so that it can just inconvenience them and perhaps disrupt their daily routine in a way that will further compound their misery e.g. making them just slightly too late to get any of the good sandwiches at Boots so they'll have to buy a cheese salad one. SERVES 'EM RIGHT FOR MAKING SUCH A DREADFUL SHOW."

So I WAS planning on writing such a review, but then realised that seeing as it's been quite a while since I watched the show in question I can't actually remember much of it whatsoever. One thing I can remember is that they've got that woman from One Foot In The Grave along for it, and she has an unconvincing accent. So, er, yeh, take THAT Hope Springs! hahahahahahahahahalolololololololgodisn'ttvrubbishthesedaysroflmao.

To make up for that disappointment, I'll write a bit about music. As I'm sure you're aware, the last post caused the global media to report mass internet server crashes as hordes rushed to download what have now been dubbed 'The Server-smashing Seven', i.e. the 7 tracks I made available for download. For those of you half-wits with your heads lodged firmly in the sand who didn't hear about this cyber-phenomenon, I wouldn't bother trying to check the BBC News website or anything like that for reports on the story if I were you, they're probably all still down due to the strain placed on the world wide web by this very blog yesterday. You'll just have to take my word for it. But for those of you that have realised by now that 'The Hardcore and The Gentle' is a blog with attitude, and a bad one at that, you'll know that more system-fucking is just around the corner. Let's just say that if this blog witnessed a petty crime on the street, it would hang around long enough for the police to arrive and begin questioning witnesses, but then flip the policeman the bird (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vgmp4MmfG0) as he politely asked to take down witness contact details, before running off giggling and dropping an empty crisp packet in an area where hedgehogs are known to roam. Dang, this blog would probably have commited the petty crime in the first place. That, my friends, is why there shall be no less than EIGHT tracks uploaded in this post. That's right, a whole one more than the previous post, and I recommend you download them sharpish, before the FBI get involved.

I've just reached a stage in this post that's known as "Blogger's Long & Empty Baguette", whereby you realise that what you've been happily chomping away at for a while actually contains no filling. In other words, I've written A LOT, but at the same time haven't written anything. There's literally nothing there. I've discussed a non-review of a show that I've forgotten all details about, and made up various attributes of this blog and discussed them in a long-winded and rambling manner, without actually doing any proper blogging. If those were my trump cards, the things that I felt I just HAD to talk at length about and make everyone listen, in normal everyday conversation, needless to say I'd be scorned and ignored.

So without further ado, here's a small slice of music-related blogging. Mono-browed German electro master Alex Ridha, who appears to share his name with the protagonist of Anthony Horowitz's Stormbreaker book so wisely often refers to himself as Boys Noize, has made a new album. But he's not gonna give you it until October I'm afraid. However, here's one of the tracks from the new LP - entitled 'Power' - for you to welcome in to your music library: Jeffer

And here's a dubsteppin' remix of one of his own classic remixes: Feist - My Moon My Man (DZ Remix of Boys Noize's Remix)

Now it's time for the ever-popular section I like to call:

Songs That I'm Currently Listening To:

(but will from now on refer to as 'Songs I'm Currently Loving', as the 'listening to' doesn't convey just how down right bad-ass they are)

• Zomby - Mush
• Hudson Mohawke - Overnight
• Birdy Nam Nam - The Parachute Ending
• Moodymann - I'm Doing Fine
• Nosaj Thing - Fog
• Joker & Ginz - Re-up with Tempa T - Next Hype

DRAAAAAPES, GET OUT THE CAR!

A casual introduction to... The Hardcore and The Gentle

First things first, I've just been to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and can now confirm that if Alan Partridge was to model his hair in the style of a German lesbian then he would look identical to Draco Malfoy.

On a lesser note, allow me to welcome you to the latest, and for now almost definitely the worst, addition to what is often named 'the blogosphere'. I thought it wouldn't be appropriate not to name the blog after a somewhat obscure song lyric which is far from instantly recognisable (it's drawn from 'Big Time Sensuality' by Bjork), and for those that were worrying that this blog will discuss songs that are purely either hardcore or gentle then I can assure you that's not the case, as that would be a ridiculous premise for a blog.

Any songs that may feature on these pages will be songs that I consider to be 'just great songs', and won't necessarily be brand spanking new. This is so that I can throw a range of - what i consider to be - mega-dope tunes at you, whether they be old, new, or not even created yet; tunes that I feel will be pleasurable upon your dainty ears, but won't necessarily grant you the opportunity for a self-satisfied smug smile (not a sentence for the lispers, that) whenever a new dancefloor destroyer is dropped in a club, as the crowd around you goes mental but you are able to calmly shrug and smirk, "Huh, this is old news".

For those of you who were rightly not taken in by the previous explanation, the real reason that the songs on here probably won't be particularly new is because I don't have any prestige as a blogger, and therefore no-one sends me their new tunes. They don't even send me their old tunes. Shiiiit, I really need some tunes. For the love of God, PLEASE SOMEONE SEND ME SOME TUNES, ANY TUNES, POST ME YOUR OLD COPY OF 'SPICE WORLD' ON CASSETTE TAPE IF YOU MUST, JUST SEND THE DAMN THING. Anyway, to cover up this fact from now on, the songs will be presented in a special section I like to call: "Songs I'm Currently Listening To". Whilst not a very imaginative title, it does handily dodge the need for the songs themselves to actually BE current. So basically, if you want a blog with a silly and slightly emo-sounding name that sneaks around pretending to be a properly constructed music blog when it is in fact the complete opposite, then 'The Hardcore and The Gentle' is for you. If however you want new, fresh songs, well thought-out reviews and thoroughly researched and insightful background detail, then I suggest you look elsewhere, and get your 'ead checked you wally, you're bloomin' maaad you are!

Right, without further ado, here's the inaugural edition of 'Songs I'm Currently Listening To'. Here's an indefinite selection of tracks (depending on how quickly I get bored of uploading them, it's probably gonna be five) that you can download, listen to, and treasure, and perhaps the next time you see me you'll even feel compelled to proclaim, "Hey, yeah, Jack, loved that tune dude, U DA MAN!" and do this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAopLTK4qVs

(I should mention that these songs won't all be of a particular genre, although I imagine quite a few will be of the electronic variety. Also, if by some incredible turn of events you happen to be reading this and you aren't simply one of my Facebook friends who I'll have sent this to who'll be reading this out of a sense of pity, and are in fact someone important or even more incredibly the artist themselves and don't wish for me to be giving out your material willy-nilly, then just lemme know and I'll take the track down.)

Songs That I'm Currently Listening To:

• Spektre - Pacemaker
• LeLe - Breakfast
• Nirvana - Breed - influenced by 2many djs' storming set at Benicassim
• Sticky K - Bandari Funk
• Flying Lotus - Parisian Goldfish
• JoJo - Too Little Too Late - huge tune. too huge some might say
• Michael Jackson - Earth Song - woahhh and there was you thinking the tunes couldn't get any huger than JoJo