IT'S TARTAN TIME (Part 2)

When I've a bit more time, I'll find some of the more obscure Scottish band and artistes and shove stuff up here. But I'm racing out tonight to go St Vincent, and this will be my second live show while in Toronto.

St. Vincent is the band of singer-multi-instrumentalist, Annie Clark (who has played with or toured with The Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Steven - neither of whom do anything for me). Her superb debut LP, Marry Me, has just come out and is on heavy rotation here in Toronto Towers. There's stuff on the LP that reminds me of loads of other great female singer-songwriters that I like such as Kate Bush and Regina Spektor, and I'm looking forward to seeing if the complex arrangements will come out in live context.

If it's a bum show, I won't be too bothered as the tickets cost just $10 (that's a fiver in UK cash), and its a show at the tiny Horseshoe Tavern. I'll try and post a review over the weekend.

In the meantime, here's the debut single and b-side of a band that burst onto the scene three or four years ago and have already suffered a bit of a backlash at the hands of the critics. And no, its not Travis:-

mp3 : Franz Ferdinand - Darts of Pleasure
mp3 : Franz Ferdinand - Shopping For Blood

I first heard this when battling insomnia and lying on the couch with mtv2 on at something like 3am. It was the video that first caught my eye as I realised that it was filmed in Glasgow. I recall thinking the tune was half-decent, so I went out a bought it the following day. And while I liked the single, I was more attracted to the b-side which takes the piss out of media darlings - something that ironically the band went to become.

If FF had stayed on the fringes of stardom, these two tracks would be lauded as lost classics, and would be discussed at length all over blogland. But because they are highly popular with the masses, there's an inverted snobbery that is just not healthy.

Enjoy the music for what it is - catchy and infectious guitar-led pop tunes that sound just as great on the car radio as they do out of your Bang & Olufsen speakers.

Ich heisse Su-per-phan-tas-tisch.