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Underground > Radio & Music >

Franz Ferdinand

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The Return Of Rothkoid

21:48 / 18.01.04

Just caught the video for "Take Me Out" on the weekend, and am a hopeless sucker for line-art anim. But the tune behind it was ace, too - though I detect distinct snatches of '70s period McCartney embedded therein.

I gather they've got the Next Big Thing tag. Can someone tell me more? Loves? Hates?

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

21:53 / 18.01.04

I liked their first single. They're good. Not Great or excellent, but good.

Matthew Fluxington

22:01 / 18.01.04

I saw Franz Ferdinand open up for the far superior Fiery Furnaces back in November, and it was the first time I'd ever heard them. They were just really mediocre "angular" post punk, without much character or flavor. They do what they do alright, but it's just really lacking. The only song I've heard by them that I like is the b-side "Shopping For Blood," which sounds like they were working overtime to sound like mid-period The Fall, right down the riffs, lyrics, and vocal deliverary.

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

22:10 / 18.01.04

Yeah, I don't get it. I mean, I don't get how this band can come out of nowhere having nothing discernibly better than any of the other countless similar guitar bands and get a high place in the chart, y'know?

I don't mind their songs, it doesn't pain me to hear them. Some of the one's I've heard remind me terribly of Britpop of a lesser variety, and Space.

I was thinking about starting this thread, too! Their new single's ok, but it really doesn't seem to... well, be worthy of it's sudden success, especially when compared to similar bands who have no doubt brought out better singles. Have they just got really good PR?

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

22:12 / 18.01.04

We got to fight the powers that NME!

(fight the power)

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

22:20 / 18.01.04

I didn't think anyone read the NME anymore? Not people that buy singles, anyway... wait, who buys singles anymore?

22:34 / 18.01.04

A conversation overheard on the Glasgow Tube on Friday night:

"So have you heard Franz Ferdinand yet?"

"Who?"

"You know, that new rock band. They're supposed to be the saviours of culture or something, I dunno."

"Any good?"

"They're alright. Nothing special though."

It's not an unfair evaluation! They really are spectacularly generic. If the song comes on the TV or radio, I don't go channel hopping, but I can't really ever picture myself ever actually wanting to listen to them either. It's a cliche to say this, but for me it's 100% accurate in this case.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

22:36 / 18.01.04

God I hope the NME goes under soon

And Zane Low gets fired from Radio 1

The Return Of Rothkoid

22:42 / 18.01.04

Surely the NME folding is reliant on the Dark Lord finding some other type of employment?

There's been very little said about the band over here (Australia). The clip was on Rage's new music night (Friday) and I believe it's one of the first times it's played over here. As I say, I kinda dug the tune, but it's all I've heard of theirs - and the clip probably aided that a lot. Still, be intrigued to hear what else they've done. What's similar, then, bearing in mind that the whole elctro/angular thing doesn't seem to get much reportage over here.

(Well, maybe it does, and I'm just looking in the wrong places?)

23:05 / 18.01.04

Have they just got really good PR?

If this thread is any indication of the ‘buzz’ they’re generating, then no, they haven’t. I almost feel sorry for the poor dears, if the best reactions they’re able to drum up for a *debut* single are ‘okay’, or ‘nothing special’. Of course, I haven’t actually heard the record. It’s probably much easier to feel sympathy that way. And I’m surprised to learn the NME’s actually still going. Can’t be much longer now, though. Is there a thread around here where we can just slag the NME? There should be.

Oh and, damn you Suedehead! I’d managed to forget all about Space! God, they were an ugly band.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

23:10 / 18.01.04

Space had great tunes though, right? Am I the only one who still thinks this? Female of the Species was fucking ace.

Matthew Fluxington

23:17 / 18.01.04

bearing in mind that the whole elctro/angular thing doesn't seem to get much reportage over here.

Unless they've rerecorded their record, I can't imagine what's particularly electro about them. Angular, definitely, but they are a postpunk-style rock band, and little more.

The Return Of Rothkoid

00:09 / 19.01.04

Flux: Electro/angular get pretty much the same shrift over here. It's a relatively small market, you know.

11:23 / 19.01.04

The kids over at the Careless Talk Costs Lives messageboards are so swooning over Franz Ferdinand, and their tastes are generally pretty good, but to echo others in this thread, I really don't see what the big deal is.

Admittedly, I've only heard one of their records once, but it just seemed like really mediocre post-Rapture/Radio 4 kinda stuff with a sloppy UK indie twist.. shrug.

(Just like the Ladytron-style electroclash stuff, it's amazing how a style that sounded like a breath of fresh air 18 months ago can get to sound so generic and dull so quickly..)

I admit to utter bafflement as to what they're doing at the top of the charts, but then I'm used to that.

11:28 / 19.01.04

Is there a thread around here where we can just slag the NME? There should be.

Do a search dude, there's like a million threads where we slag the NME. It's becoming a popular passtime.. I think it should be undetaken as a competitive sport - there should be contests and stuff..

11:45 / 19.01.04

Do a search dude, there's like a million threads where we slag the NME

Hey, I’m not completely lazy, man. I dragged my scrawny arse down to the search function already, but came up with nothing for either ‘NME slagging’ or the more general ‘NME’. If you curazy kids really are spending thread after thread gleefully picking at the nation’s favourite, then you obviously haven’t been paying due care and attention to your topic abstracts. Punk.

Regrettable Juvenilia

13:32 / 19.01.04

I quite like 'Take Me Out'. 'Tis catchy. I can't work out if it really reminds of something I can't quite put my finger on because it really does sound like something else, or because it's a great pop song and that's what great pop songs do. Anyway, nice stuff. So far, it's this year's 'Bandages', although of course if they keep having hits then that won't be accurate...

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

16:25 / 19.01.04

Oh, I quite like it, but then that's just the thing, isn't it?

18:47 / 19.01.04

I love the way "Take me out" changes rhythm after 40 seconds and goes from being a Strokes-like pop song to a Radio 4ish discopunkfunk tune - and never changes back!

Well it surprised me.

19:10 / 20.01.04

When I saw them live I was pretty disappointed, thinking they were good-not-great. In fact, everybody I knew at the gig thought they were pretty rubbish. Having said that, they were playing at The Social in Notingham, a venue with, like, the worst acoustics, which really didn't help their 'angular' (© every music critic writing about FF, evAH) sound.

I am, however, massively impressed at the fact 'Take Me Out' went into the charts at a 1994-tastic three. Evidence that indie bands are back in and the NME has, once again, started to influence the nation's music? Or just that flip all else is released in January?

09:27 / 26.01.04

Among other things: they're better then Snow Patrol, who have also come from nowhere (although in their case, a multi-albumed nowhere populated by emoting manchildren telling me that they've been fans for years and the pop industry is killing (their) music and numerous other phrases that all have, as a barely-audible subconcious plea in the background if you listen hard enough, please end my meaningless, patheitc existence now).

Also, they have pleasent bauhaus stylings, that amusing foot thing when they play and are a bit catchy. Also, when was the last time Domino had a top-three single? (that's an honest question, not a rhetorical devise secretly implying that not like Franz Ferdinand is exactly the same thing as not liking every single band on every independant record label in the entire universe)

10:44 / 26.01.04

they're better then Snow Patrol, who have also come from nowhere

Yeah well, if that was all it took to be good, everybody in the entire world except Elbow would be number 2 in the charts..

..actually, not entirely fair.. Snow Patrol did a single years ago that I really liked.. 'Alan's a Starfighter Pilot'? It was fuzzy and mysterious and cool. Everything since sounded awful though. Also see: Grandaddy.

Thinking over bands signed to Domino I very much doubt they've ever had so much as a top 40 single, with the possible exception of Pavement..

A

03:14 / 27.01.04

I've heard the song a grand total of once, and all I know is that that one-note-bass/hi-hat rhythm bit is fucking cool.

A

03:17 / 27.01.04

(...oh, and I also like the fact that they're named after the obscure archduke whose assassination triggered the First World War...)

14:33 / 27.01.04

Folk Implosion were Domino, weren't they?

I like the single rather a lot, in a skronky Talking Heads kinda way.

My pal plays 'alarm guitar' on Snow Patrol's first album. they used to be called Polar Bear, ya know. But I call them Snowbadoh, in snippy reference to their major influence.

18:08 / 27.01.04

Yeah, like everyone else, I just don't get it. What strikes me as sad about the whole situation is the way the minute that anyone in the music biz currently seems to think of a halfway " original " idea, ie someone new to rip off, then the next thing you know there's a hundred other bands doing exactly the same ? I mean Gang Of Four, " angular " vaguely dancey, and so on... You can hardly move for tripping over the fuckers. So are these groups really all that careerist ? Or are they just stupid ? I mean it's only going to work out for two or three of them, tops. Then again, got the NME the other week for the first time in ages - Have heard people slag it all music fan life, but these days, Jesus, it's REALLY fucking bad

Regrettable Juvenilia

07:46 / 28.01.04

Yeah, like everyone else, I just don't get it.

"Everyone else" presumably excluding all the people who've said in this thread that they like the tune, then. Nice blinkers.

I also think that when a bunch of bands emerge who have a vaguely similar sound, while a degree of scepticism is healthy, it's churlish to assume that the bands are either "careerist" or stupid. If the media and record companies start hunting for bands with a certain sound, a band who already have that sound would arguably be stupid *not* to take the opportunities when they arise. Additionally, it is an apparent fact of human cultural life that the same ideas become popular with a group of people at the same time - "steam-engines come at steam-engine time", as someone (I can never remember who) put it.

11:15 / 28.01.04

The video looks like it was directed by the same person who did Goldfrapp's "Strict Machine" promo.

12:01 / 28.01.04

flybers is right with that [charles fort] quote

here's another from grant invisibles morrison :

'pop's as predictable as scotland's efforts in the world cup'
'but not half as funny eddie'

so the past year-eighteen months lots of bands drawing from the post 76 punk wastelands, names beginning with 'the', sounding like siouxsie and the banshees (girl singer) or, fuck i dunno, dead kennedys (guy singers)

soon as we flip into 04 the bandz shuffle a little further into the nme archives and start doing 'angular' [third time this thread for that word], self-consciously arty pop with eastern european flavouring taking from berlin-scary monsters bowie and buildings and food talking heads. after last year's cult/cunt hits radio 4, british sea power this trend was very well signposted.

shelf-life of a revival difficult to guess at. could all be done by easter, but we might have to put up with preppy partings, tanktops, distant stares and jerky chicken dances until the very end of the year.

what the blithers should be doing is holding a sweepstake on what next year's will be. i'm thinking that boneo, hedger, barry and the bassist's hard work all them years ago will start to pay off as earnest quasi-celts everywhere start mixing that folk-punk vibe with a stadium flavour, inspirational powerchords and conscious lyrics about the willingness of modern government to ignore its constituents. did any fucker else know that half fully half of utwo aren't even whyrish?
false advertising you sanctimonious sods, false advertising - i'll give you bloody sunday.

so what does anyone else guess bands will sound a bit like in 05?

13:30 / 04.02.04

A conversation overheard on the Glasgow Tube on Friday night:

"So have you heard Franz Ferdinand yet?"

"aye...they are crap...but my gran likes them"

as for 2005 look out for whatever was hip/underground in 2002...is that not how it works?

Regrettable Juvenilia

14:28 / 04.02.04

No.

Welcome to Barbelith!

10:56 / 07.02.04

Rumour has it that Franz Ferdinand are playing in Stockholm next week. Anyone knows anything about this?

00:40 / 09.02.04

Music in 2005. Possibly we're looking at a return to that faux-soul-white-guy receding hairline stuff of the mid-Eighties. Hue and Cry, Phil Collins, that type of thing. There are callow teenagers in parts of this country, sitting there wasted on god only knows what drugs that should never been invented, extolling the virtues of " No Jacket Required. " And the like. But it does have to happen - only when the dustbin of history has been totally ransacked, and surely this period is the most horrible detritus, lying there stinking at the end of the can, will people feel free to do something original...

Well, ok, I suppose I don't think so either, but you travel in hope.

Anyway, initially not sure about Franz F, but am slowly, as usual, being swayed by the hype. It's hard to argue with the good reviews, especially by journos one usually repects. So will no doubt schlepp out and buy the album and so on, in the hope, an hour later, that it doesn't wind up out the kitchen window. I'll see, I suppose. The only thing certain about the future these days, as was always the case, is you're really not sure what it's going to be like. Though a U2 revival seems horribly plausible. And won't they just love it, the lame-ass, bloated, fucking Ch***ian cunts ?

11:56 / 14.02.04

My predictions for 2005; hopefully, more bands with cracking pop singles like Take Me Out, where a bit of a brain is married to a good tune and hits the charts.

I liek Franz Ferdinand. To be honest, while I found them catchy as soon as I heard them, I didn't think they would catch on as much as they would. I've just bought the debut album, and I like it so far... will come back to this thread when I've listened further (probably in about two months, judging by my current frequncy on here)

Definitely: a few good bands will come out in certain genres; due to slight or perceived influences, they will be lodged together into lazy groupings by some music journalists. These groups will then be lodged into a single 'hate file' by lazy music listeners, who will suggest that 'they all sound the same' and are overhyped. Some of these groups will do better than others; probably one or two will suffer so much from the raters and haters that they willsuffer terrible second album syndrome. Others will suggest they were into these bands first, others still will suggest they were into Gang of Four/ Fad Gadget/ Depeche Mod/ Two Tone/ Candi Staton in her gospel days.

Some good music will come out, some bad music will come out, some people will actually listen to said music and try to make up their own minds without wondering if they should like it or not.

Same as ever then. Personally, I'll mostly be watching channel U now I've moved into a house with Sky...

12:02 / 14.02.04

(Damn mispelings. Should have spotted them. By the way, Depeche Mod were a classic band. Daft synth pop, but into scooters and Tamla Motown as well.)

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