February Round-Up

Hey hey hey,
Even though February is only two days fewer than half of the other months in the year it just feels so much shorter. This month I wrote two #thinkpiece type article things; one about females being snubbed for awards this season (HERE) and the other about why I think anyone can and should start a music blog (HERE). If you haven't checked them out already, it would be cool if you could have a read (once you're done here, of course).

February Playlists

YouTube / Spotify / Deezer

Album of the Month

The Subways - The Subways
I don't know about you but the new self titled album from The Subways seems to have fallen a fair amount under the radar. This is a such a shame for their fourth full length release, self-produced by frontman Billy Lunn. I've missed a couple of chapters of this band's story but 'The Subways' makes me feel as though I'm picking up right where I left off. 'My Heart Is Pumping to a Brand New Beat' followed by recent single 'I'm In Love And It's Burning In My Soul' get this album off to a flying start. Other standouts include their more pop take on rock 'Dirty Muddy Paws' and 'Pet Boy', and slightly 90s-esque 'Good Times'. The worst thing about this album, and quite possibly it's only downside, is the short 33 minute run-time with all but two tracks being shorter than three minutes long. It's hard to stress just how great this album is from start to finish. It's also quite frustrating to see a band like The Subways who are bringing out music like this, and have been for ten years, yet haven't achieved complete world domination yet. I implore you to listen to this album, especially if you've ever liked anything they've done before. You won't be disappointed.

Other Releases That I Thoroughly Enjoyed This Month:
Jack Savoretti - Written In Scars
Misterwives - Our Own House
Youth Club - Brothers EP 

Gig of the Month

Prides and Model Aeroplanes at Heaven, London
This gig was fairly impulsive for me but incredibly forthwhile. Prides were on a eight date run around the UK with fellow Scots Model Aeroplanes. As support acts go, Model Aeroplanes were a pretty good fit, an upbeat catchy indie band with songs that you can't help at least nodding your head along to. The only downside is, this isn't them at their best. These four Dundee lads are young and they've got a hell of a load of potential. Party tune and set closer 'Club Low' is an excellent showcase of what they are capable of. It'll be exciting to see them again in a years time because I've no doubt their progression and rise to the top will be anything but slow. On to headliners, Prides. I've seen Prides once before, last year, supporting Blink 182 at the first of Blink's two sold out Brixton Academy dates. For me, Prides overshadowed Blink by a stupid amount so it's fair to say I had pretty high expectations for this headline show at Heaven, their largest headline show to date. The trio opened with 'Cold Blooded' before bursting into crowd favourite and sing-a-long hit 'The Seeds You Sow'. From then on the room was packed with energy and it was full steam ahead. Their set also featured new single 'Higher Love', 'I Should Know You Better' and, 'Out Of The Blue', along with some new tracks that we could potentially hear on their debut album before the year is out. Prides were also joined by special guest Lauren Aquilina who lent her vocals to 'Strong Enough'. Just when you thought it couldn't get any better, Prides' encore left the room astounded. Their '2014 Mixtape' (a mashup of songs including Taylor Swift, Ryn Weaver, and Nick Jonas) followed by the anthemic 'Messiah' accompanied with confetti and blue and white balloons was the perfect end to this more than memorable evening.

Other Gigs That I Had A Good Time At This Month
Moose Blood at Sticky Mike's Frog Bar, Brighton
The Kerrang Tour 2015 at O2 Academy Birmingham
Max Raptor, Yearbook and Swim Good at The Boileroom, Guildford
Fightstar and Moose Blood at Brixton Academy, London 

Top Five Tracks of the Month







Mighty Fine Eateries of the Month

This month was super lucky and won not one but two competitions with the prize being glorious food! First was Epic Bakes' Valentines competition where I received a tray of Valentines themed brownies, and I also received a massive box of Tuckey's biscuits for my office! Working in Soho comes with the bonus of more mighty fine eateries than one can imagine but a real bonus is Rupert Street's Street Food Union market on Fridays. This month I sampled an amazing sausage and bacon burger from Pigger and Better as well as an incredible samosa chaat from Lili Chutney.

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ICYMI - This Week on WIIHAMB - 2015 Week #7

In case you missed it - You shouldn't have, but just in case you did.

I'm currently experiencing the worst bout of internet connection ever so forgive me and my pathetic posts this weekend.

Keep up to date with all of the daily goings-on over at WIIHAMB Daily.

Sunday
I don’t know how credible it is to post Our Last Night but it’s too late for that. I definitely rate Our Last Night’s covers higher than their original stuff and this one is no exception.


Lust Game is producer Scott Quinn’s beautiful debut EP featuring six stunning downtempo RnB tracks. AND it’s up for pay-whatever-you-goddamn-please download on Bandcamp. (I posted this for I’m In Love but The City is just as good if not better. Fuck it, it’s all great.)


Monday
Bad Luck, to me, are this great band who never release songs and never play shows outside of Scotland. Well this past weekend, one of those things changed as Bad Luck released new double A side single Ghost/Blind. I preferred ‘Blind’ so here it is in all it’s excellent glory.


Tuesday
Something upbeat to pull you through the latter part of Tuesday (i.e. by far the worst day of the week) in the form of ‘Tears’ from upcoming Midlands based producer duo TC4. I was proper into this as a right joyous vibe until I realised that the lyrics are all about crying… either way Onyda absolutely smashes the whole vocal thing.

This is awful? Correct. But it’s embarrassingly horrendously incredible at the same time? Correct. I don’t really know what’s going on here or why this song exists or why Charli XCX and Tinashe have been roped into it. BUT after the sheer shock of the first listen, it squares (you know, as in multiplies by itself) itself in greatness each listen thereafter.


Wednesday
Shy Girls has teamed up with Tei Shi for this track, ‘Arrest Me’, which features on his new free to download mixtape 4WZ. I’m not massive into Shy Girls or Tei Shi separately but together they’ve created this dreamy three minute piece of RnB.


Throwback Thursday
A little different Throwback Thursday today in that this version is pretty new but the two tracks MNEK has refixed together are pretty throwback. The young pop soul genius has mashed up his own version of Vanessa Carlton’s ‘A Thousand Miles’ with The B-52’s ‘Love Shack’ and it sounds pretty good.


Friday
Francesca Bergami, better known a Lyves, does beautiful “ambient alt soul”, demonstrated perfectly by new track ‘Shelter’. This is the first song to be taken from her upcoming EP due for release this Spring.


Saturday
Really into this 80s vibe female vocal thing lately, probably a lot more so after seeing Ekkah live last month. Pr0files seem to almost be the LA based male/female equivalent. Look, anyway, the point is, if you want to put something cool on at a party that will suit the mood pretty effortlessly, this is it.


February playlists so far: YouTube / Spotify / Deezer

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ICYMI - This Week on WIIHAMB - 2015 Week #6

In case you missed it - You shouldn't have, but just in case you did.

Apparently Drake released an album this week or something? More importantly, Record Rewind Play included me in their album of the year 2014 combined list extravaganza which is just like the coolest thing. You can see the full list here and my own lil section here.

Keep up to date with all of the daily goings-on over at WIIHAMB Daily.

Sunday
Kwabs is back with a new single taken from his forthcoming debut album ‘Love + War’. ‘Perfect Ruin’ showcases Kwabs’ powerful vocals whilst the video sees him travelling through beautiful vast snowy landscapes.


The debut single from 21 year old London based Melissa Griffiths is quite the force to be reckoned with. ‘Powertrip’ is interesting, that’s the best thing about it, for a debut track you’re hooked until the end by Millie’s voice which has this sexy near effortless tone.

Monday
I completely missed this song first time round and when I finally got around to listening to Cathedrals’ debut EP at the end of last year, ‘OOO AAA’ was by far my favourite track. Luckily not all is lost for WIIHAMB because rapper/producer Tunji Ige has remixed the hell out of it. This version has kept a lot of the core vocal elements but stripped the rest back to become much more haunting than the original.


"Oh there’s another JMSN video up, I should probably post that, right?" - Me every month. ‘Score’ might be my favourite song from JMSN’s latest self-titled album, but in fairness the majority of the tracks on that album could be my favourite. A London show appeared the morning after I posted this, wouldn't like to suggest I had anything to do with that.

Tuesday
Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'
The other day, I read an article on a blog that gave the impression that you shouldn’t start your own music blog unless you’re 100% sure everything you do is going to be entirely unique. I disagreed and wrote about why I started my blog and why I think anyone who wants to should start a music blog too.


Wednesday
Emerging artists like Raye are so refreshing and exciting at the moment. This south London based singer is heading up a new generation of BRIT School alumni set to take over the UK music scene. Raye’s smooth vocals over R’n’B beats with a hip hop influence on ‘Flowers’ make for a catchy pop track you just want to listen to over and over again.


Whilst the agonising wait for Laura Welsh’s debut album ‘Soft Control’ continues (the release date has been pushed back to the start of March) we’ve been treated to this beautiful track featuring none other than John Legend. Welsh and Legend are a musical match made in heaven. If this song is a sign of what else is to come from Welsh’s debut we are definitely in for a treat.


Throwback Thursday
I think I’ve said this about a few bands, but Thrice were one of the first bands I ever “got into” by myself just because I thought they were great. I was 13 years old when I walked into HMV and bought Vheissu for a whopping £17. It was absolutely worth every single penny. I’m not sure whether I realised that at the time but I definitely appreciate it now.


Friday
I don’t know, there’s something more special about Adam French than your typical singer-songwriter. ‘Silhouettes’ is far more piano heavy than previous tracks ‘Ivory’ and ‘More To Life’ which were more of a one man and his guitar vibe. It’s atmospheric though, ‘Silhouettes’, it builds, in fact it turns into something pretty big.


Saturday
It’s Valentines Day. The original song is on the Fifty Shades soundtrack. I saw Prides live this week. So everything is pretty topical really isn’t it? This remix is a lot more similar to the original than your standard remix but the Prides spin is hard to miss.


February playlists so far: YouTube / Spotify / Deezer

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Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'

[Inspired by this blog post on Haulix. I don't disagree with the facts in the slightest. This is just my opinion in response to parts of it.]



"...we are all about promoting driven young creative minds. That said, we have also become incredibly aware of just how many people with nothing unique or interesting to say believe launching their own music blog will somehow further their presence in an already overcrowded industry."

The other day, I read an article on a blog that quite frankly baffled me. Retweeted by the editor of another blog/site/zine/thing, I became quite disheartened by what I was reading. The quote above is taken from the first paragraph of the article in question. It's as though others in "the industry" are discouraging people from doing something revolving around a topic that they love and that they could become really passionate about. My understanding is that the original blog post is essentially saying don't start your own blog unless you're 100% sure everything you do is going to be entirely unique.

An Overcrowded Market
Imagine we were talking about bands, for a second. Don't start a band unless you're sure that no one else is trying to do what you're doing. Don't start a band unless you have your own sound and don't draw upon your peers or influences for inspiration because then you won't be unique. Nuts that, isn't it? I completely sympathise with the fact that there are thousands of music blogs in existence right now, but just because a market is over-saturated, doesn't mean you aren't allowed to get involved in it. It's true that there are an extremely large array of music bloggers, many of whom don't post entirely original content, but who are we stop anyone from giving it a go?

Emerging Artists Don't Drive Traffic
Has anyone stopped to think that maybe bloggers don't just write about things they're passionate about for hits? I've written countless posts that have taken a stupid amount of time to research and time to write in English more advanced than that of a five year old that haven't had the response I've wanted. Posts on the daily site actually get very few unique hits. So what am I supposed to do, stop writing about new acts and topics I find interesting just because I'm not getting a huge amount of readers on every post? New music is what I'm passionate about and whilst I entirely accept that music lovers don't often purposefully venture out to blogs to look for new acts all the time, it's not going to stop me posting about them every day.

Blogging To Be a Journalist

Maybe here is where I differ from your typical music blogs. I didn't set out to become a music journalist with What If I Had A Music Blog. Is here a good place to explain where this blog came from? As good as any, I guess. What If I Had A Music Blog started as a tag I used on my personal Tumblr to post about new music I liked, as I would have done if I'd had a music blog.  (I've just had a flick through and there's a lot more here than I thought there was.) That then became an entire separate side blog which is now WIIHAMB Daily. I did next to no writing on that site for a year and a half simply because I didn't really like writing. In May when I decided I needed a larger outlet for things I wanted to do with WIIHAMB, I started this site. I'd like to think my writing has improved a little since then and I now know what I enjoy writing about and tend to focus on those topics. So this blog isn't about me being a music journalist, very far from it, it's just about me sharing music that I love in the hope that somebody else comes across it and loves it as well.

The conclusion from the article I've been drawing upon was to write for other publications unless you believe that your work would not fit in anywhere online apart from on your own site. I couldn't agree less. By all means write for other well-established publications but don't let that stop you from doing your own thing. Start a blog if you want to share something you love with the world. Start a blog if you just want to keep a public journal. If you want to start a blog just fucking do it. Do it, publish two posts and never touch it again, who cares? Do it, grow to have thousands of followers and make a living from it. Do it because someone told you to. Do it because someone told you not to. They told you that you had nothing to offer and you didn't give a toss because it's what you wanted to do.

Do it because you might fall in love with it.

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ICYMI - This Week on WIIHAMB - 2015 Week #5

In case you missed it - You shouldn't have, but just in case you did.

Does anyone care for or read these little weekly anecdotes that I've started slotting in at the top of each ICYMI post? In comparison to how my diary looks for March, February looks pretty blank but I was reunited with my one true love, Five Guys this week so it's not all bad.

Keep up to date with all of the daily goings-on over at WIIHAMB Daily.

Sunday
I don’t know if it’s a personal connection to the ‘Homewrecker’ lyrics or the fact that it’s downright incredible that has led me to have it on repeat all weekend. Emily’s songwriting is in a league of its own and her vocals just fit so perfectly telling her story with the right amount of emotion in exactly the right places.


Monday
The best thing about a new month is that it means there’s a new Oh Wonder song. The hype that Oh Wonder have built up around themselves speaks volumes with 46,000+ plays and 100 comments on this song in less than 24 hours. Piano led ‘Lose It’ slots itself perfectly into Oh Wonder’s catalogue of dreamy electronic indie tracks.


Sounds Of Now included Youth Club in their Ones To Watch post a couple of weeks ago and I fell in love with this song. I thought I’d post this today as their new EP ‘Brothers’ is released this week and this song is on that EP so everything ties in quite nicely. I absolutely love pop/rock/indie bands who make it feel like it’s summer all year round and ‘People’ is a contender for the catchiest song I’ve heard so far this year.

Tuesday
‘Higher Love’ is another slice of electro infused indie rock that we’ve come to love hearing from the Glaswegian trio. No doubt this track will be making an appearance during Prides’ live set on their UK tour which starts this week!


Wednesday
Eyes On The Prize
There has been a lot of talk over the past couple of months about female artists being snubbed at music awards this season. This was my take on it and why I don't think any of it really matters.

Throwback Thursday
Good old Alicia has been randomly cropping up a lot recently. This video is another classic case of “pop star works at diner and isn’t having a great time of it”.


Friday
A few Fridays ago I posted The Wombats’ new single ‘Greek Tragedy’ and this Friday I present to you Bastille’s remix of said single. This version is a little more ‘Other People’s Heartache’ than the usual Bastille lark but they’ve definitely rubbed off well on this track, giving it more of an atmospheric feel.


Saturday
I don’t know why it’s taken two weeks for me to post this but I’ve had it on repeat all morning. The Californian trio are back with another catchy chill pop/electro hybrid track. Excited for what else 2015 has in store for these guys.


I hope Hit The Lights keep drip feeding us songs from their forthcoming album ‘Summer Bones’ until its release at the end of March. ‘The Real’ seems a bit more mature than other Hit The Lights songs, although that’s not particularly hard, but it still features the “catchy riffs” (apologies for the use of the word ‘riff’) that we’re accustomed to hear from this Ohio five piece.


February playlists so far: YouTube / Spotify / Deezer

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Eyes On The Prize

Disclaimer: I am female, and I just wanted to put that out there. That doesn't mean that you can't disagree with what I'm saying, but I wanted to make it clear I'm not a man harping on about how women complain about everything... although we do, it's a fact.

As we rounded off 2014 and strode into 2015 we've been bombarded with award ceremonies and prestigious lists about this, that and the other. There's nowhere to hide from them. We're at the height of the award season chaos with the Grammys at the end of this week and the BRITs around the corner. With all of these awards and prizes, comes the inevitable scrutiny of who did and didn't make the cut. Most noticeably for the 2014/2015 this has focused a lot on gender.

So let's cast our minds all the way back to November when the three nominees for The BRITs Critics Choice award were announced: Years & Years, James Bay and George The Poet. So that's a whopping three acts and none of them are women. If that's "shocked" you, you better brace yourself for the rest of this post. If we have a look at the previous Critics Choice winners, very few of them have actually been male artists. Although men have won the award for the last two years, it was won be women for each of the five years prior to Tom Odell claiming the prize in 2013. Five out of eight is pretty alright isn't it? We'll visit some more BRITs nominees in a bit.

Another critically acclaimed list from the tail end of 2014 was the BBC Sound of 2015 poll. I've written a lot about both this and the Blog Sound poll already (see here) so I'll keep it short for now. Despite the BBC Sound longlist being more than eclectic in terms of artists, genres, and backgrounds (I wouldn't like to suggest that anyone had anything specifically to do with how diverse this list is), the top five did only include men. Shit, an entire five acts and not one of them is a woman? Mr Make-Sure-That-List-Stays-Diverse has messed up a bit here hasn't he? But hey, if you're a fan of alternative lists, Lapsley won the Blog Sound poll with such a significant amount of votes there wasn't even a top five announced, so that will keep you sweet if you feel that women have been overlooked on the Ones To Watch front.

What really spurred this post was the nominees for Artist of the Year at last year's BBC Music Awards, the first BBC Music Awards ever in fact. All of the artists nominated in this category were men. Six acts, an entire six acts and they're all men? What a travesty! In reaction to a friend saying that he wasn't happy with this list of nominees, I simply responded with "maybe women just weren't that good this year?". I just can't see why it's a big deal to have an equal cross-section of people on something so subjective as music. Music is an art form. It's almost irrelevant, in my opinion, who created that art. Why don't we judge music in the same way that we judge painters or sculptors or ballet dancers?

Following the announcement of the full list of BRIT Award nominations, there was once again, as is what seems to be the tradition for 2014/2015, an inevitable backlash about there not being enough women represented. SURPRISE! Similarly to the BBC Music Awards, the BRITs Album of the Year category only features male artists. The most mindblowing quote for me was a member of Clean Bandit stating that he felt as though the awards were being dominated by "white boys". Funny that, coming from a band made up of middle class Cambridge graduates. Jess Glynne, however, who is nominated for three awards at the ceremony has my back in saying that "Women have ruled [the Brits] for quite a while. It's the men's turn." And quite, would everyone be complaining just as much if every category was dominated by females? Of course not. This isn't about equality or gender bias. It's about objectively judging whose music was better and more successful.

Surprisingly, despite everything I've said, four of my top ten albums from 2014 came from female artists/female fronted bands and that shocked me looking back over those posts this morning. Why? Well, because I hadn't really taken much notice of the artists who'd made the albums. I'd just picked the ones I'd enjoyed the most. I'm not trying to sound high and mighty about this. It's just that having a cross-section of every type of person in everything we do, although to some it may seem ideal, it's simply not realistic. I'd hope that talk about women "not being represented" in music this year doesn't actively affect award ceremonies and prestigious lists next time they come around, but only time will tell.

I'd love to know what you think about women being shunned in terms of awards this year. Or maybe you do feel as though they've been fairly represented? Feel free to leave a comment below.

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ICYMI - This Week on WIIHAMB - 2015 Week #4

In case you missed it - You shouldn't have, but just in case you did.

It's been a fairly quiet one this week. At the time of writing (which at the time of reading will have been yesterday...) I'm getting ready to go down to Brighton for the final date of Moose Blood's current headline tour. This week I also saw my favourite ensemble of the moment, Years & Years, for the first time! So maybe it hasn't been that quiet after all.

Keep up to date with all of the daily goings-on over at WIIHAMB Daily.

Sunday
Female Swedish pop singers have pretty much got this whole thing covered haven’t they? ‘Ego’ is quite a stark contrast to the last time Tove Styrke featured on WIIHAMB with shouty anthem ‘Even If I’m Loud It Doesn’t Mean I’m Talking To You’, in that it’s calmer and smoother but still downright awesome.


Monday
This is the first track taken from Tides’ forthcoming EP “Spare Time” which is due for release in the Spring. Fans of Maroon 5, Rixton and good old The Cab - this is your new favourite band.


Tuesday
I’m not a huge Lucy Rose fan but Ritual have shown just how incredible her songwriting is with their cover of her track ‘Middle Of The Bed’. Ritual are fast becoming WIIHAMB favourites, this cover following the release of their EP ‘The Fall’ at the end of last year.


Wednesday
My Little Empire Records is an independent label formed towards the end of 2014. To celebrate their launch they’ve put together this huge 19 track long compilation. There’s something for everyone on this album. It's available for pay-what-you-want download here.


Throwback Thursday
Never was there a more perfect theme song to a TV show than Gavin Degraw's 'I Don't Want To Be' for One Tree Hill.


Friday
‘Enough’ is a track from two New York based artists, one a producer, the other a songwriter with a pretty rad vocal. There’s something quite early-Marina and the Diamonds about this, or maybe that’s just me…


Saturday

January Round-Up
This features an album of the month from Light You Up, a gig of the month from Nimmo and Ekkah, a video of the month from Childish Gambino, and the one and only Sophia Grace with possibly the best song of 2015.





January playlists: YouTube / Spotify / Deezer

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