Me talking about things long after I and everyone else have already kind of gotten over...

The Long Blondes. Been trying to pin down why I like them so damn much, despite their being the sort of band i normally dont care for, for a while.I think the big thing is the fact that they're the first band to do Rock with a singer who can actually sing. Or Pop that doesn't degenerate into someone lipsyching whilst shaking their tits at you. And it also amuses the hell out of me that the guy playing guitar writes most of the songs (though I am led to believe Kate Jackson wrote "Swallow Tattoo", one of the two strongest tracks on "Someone to Drive You Home")So that's what I've come up with. The Long Blondes are fantastic because they did something everyone else seemed to have forgotten was a good song. You don't have to write he song, you just have to sing the fuck out of it. Every song doesn't have to have a whiny, emo bit in the middle. It can be about fucking and drinking and being miserable straight through. And, for fuck's sake, Pop and Rock (and every other genre someone can give a name to) are not mutually exclusive.