the taste makers

oh well - agreeing with Ross is something i will just have to get used to from time to time i guess

you all laughed at me for putting aluminium foil inside my baseball cap, but i was right all along!! they won't get me with their mind-manipulation devices!

mind you, they ain't never made the mind manipulation device that would be so powerful as to make me think the Arctic Monkeys are remotely worth listening to.

Hannibal says: I think 2006 is the year that funk is going to come back in a big way. Look out for new releases by Jamiroquai and the Arctic Monkeys.

Face says: The biggest buzz in 2006 will surround the hundreds of remix compilations and mixtapes that idiots will post on the web in the misguided belief that anyone will be fooled into thinking that it’s a new Kanye album. Expect big things from Sway, Tupac and the Arctic Monkeys.

Howlin’ Mad Murdoch says: The breakthrough act in 2006 will be the Arctic Monkees, a tribute band from desolate northern Greenland featuring the original Mike Nesmith in a parka.

BA says: That cup of tea will have to have a whole mess o’ crack in it before I listen to any of this Arctic Monkeys shit.

I must assume that when everybody in a gatekeeper position agrees that a band is great, then they mut actually be, you know, really hot shit. :-/

Norman, you're such a romantic. I think you'll hate them of course, but you can hear for yourself; Atci Monkeys - Mardy Bum.

The music was pleasant but utterly unremarkable, the singer sounds like someone doing a comedy impression of ian brown, sort of. Why is this exciting? Are they great live, or something?

I heard a new Strokes track on the radio the other night. Somewhat to my surprise, I liked it. Perhaps 3 albums in, the Arctic monkeys will get better.

i can therefore only assume that it's laziness caused by supreme arrogance that the best that they can collectively come up with is the fucking Arctic Monkeys. Parky is the only guy there that I have any respect for after reading that article, and he's claiming Cullum!

"the arctic monkeys are so hot right now.

Lee OTM about chain, but is this site any different?

Ummm. How exactly are people with "popular taste" not being served at the moment again??

Isn't the problem that people with un-popular taste (anything outside of dour nu-indie, jazz for 20-somethings, bland guitar singer songwriters, Ministry Of Sound approved dance music, US billboard hits ... and anything not R'n'B related that got shuffled over to 1Extra) aren't being represented AT ALL anymore due to the overwhelming conservatism & self-congratulation of these fuckers?

"We were the first people to play R Kelly's Ignition, we've been playing Damian Marley's Welcome to Jamrock since April"

Finding the hottest talents from the underground there alright.

Fake Tales of San Francisco
Echo through the room
More point to a wedding disco
Without a bride or groom

There's a super cool band yeah
With their trilbys and their glasses of white wine
And all the weekend rockstars in the toilets
Practicing their lines

I don't want to hear you
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear, you know
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear you
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear you
I don't want to hear your...

Fake Tales of San Fransisco
Echo through the air
And there's a few bored faces in the back
All wishing they weren't there

And as the microphone squeaks
A young girl's telephone beeps
Yeah she's dashing for the exit
And she's running to the streets outside
"Oh you've saved me," she screams down the line
"The band aren't very good
And I'm not having a nice time"

I don't want to hear you
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear, you know
(Kick me out, kick me out)

Yeah but his bird thinks it's amazing, though
So all that's left
Is the proof that love's not only blind but deaf

He talks of San Francisco, he's from Hunter's Bar
I don't quite know the distance
But I'm sure that's far
Yeah I'm sure that's pretty far

And yeah, I'd love to tell you all my problem
You're not from New York City, you're from Rotherham
So get off the bandwagon, and put down the handbook
Yeah, yeah, yeah

Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook

Yeah

A: Shedloads of demo MP3s freely available on P2P before any major releases. Thus is the fan-buzz created.

What does surprise me is that this ploy HASN'T been seized upon and exploited more than it is.

The song they play in the video on their website sounds rockier.
It's all remarkably unremarkable. But I think the singer looks like Donnie Darko.

But I don't think I would ever have been desperate enough to be driven into the arms of the Arctic Monkeys. "And all the weekend rockstars in the toilets / Practicing their lines" WOW DID YOU SEE WHAT THEY DID THERE?

[Question, being Dutch I don't know these things and I'm genuinely interested: how many readers does the NME still have?
And how much of an actual influence on ppl's tastes do you reckon they have?]

There is an important point somewhere behind the article, but it overestimates the media's power to micro-manage our taste. If my own taste was reliant on Parkinson, Ross and the NME, I wouldn't spend my time listening to Lloyd Cole, the Sundays and the Pines rather than Jamie Cullum, Kaiser Chefs and whoever the Arctic Monkeys are.

"WHATEVER, TELL IT TO YOUR BLOG"

should be the chorus to this song.

Wanting to be known for breaking K T Tunstall is like wanting to be known for being the person who initially spread AIDS or something.

Isn't the problem that people with un-popular taste (anything outside of dour nu-indie, jazz for 20-somethings, bland guitar singer songwriters, Ministry Of Sound approved dance music, US billboard hits ... and anything not R'n'B related that got shuffled over to 1Extra) aren't being represented AT ALL anymore due to the overwhelming conservatism & self-congratulation of these fuckers?

That's why i run my music news blog because the mainstream centric establishment as indicated above don't represent my music interests.

All the people represented in The Guardian article just conform to the niche expectations of their respective roles.