Ten years ago: The Kooks Inside In Inside Out

Ten years ago today, The Kooks released Inside In Inside Out. It is such a solid album that is still among my favourites when the songs come up on my iPod. The Kooks' début shows them to be a highly accomplished group of musicians with an original yet infectious sense of song. There are influences from generations of guitar rock and pop mixed with danceable beats and delivery with just the right mix of ragged and polished.

Here are my favourite tunes from The Kooks' Inside In Inside Out:

"Seaside"

"See The World"

"Sofa Song"

"Eddie's Gun"

"Ooh La"

"You Don't Love Me"

"She Moves In Her Own Way"

"Matchbox"

"Naive"

And Lily Allen's cover

"If Only"

Pic from Amazon.

Five-by-Five: Great UK bands

Why does the UK have such a stronghold on freaking awesome bands? I was grooving to a playlist of 5-star songs and I heard Radiohead, The Kooks, Biffy Clyro, Hard-Fi, and Maxïmo Park. Rule Britannica!

"High And Dry" by Radiohead from 1995's The Bends

"Naive" by The Kooks from 2006's Inside In Inside Out

"Saturday Superhouse" by Biffy Clyro from 2007's Puzzle

"Hard to Beat" by Hard-Fi from 2005's Stars of CCTV

"Graffiti" by Maxïmo Park from 2005's A Certain Trigger

Kooks have a new album out - Junk of the Heart

The Kooks are a great pop rock band from the UK.  Their first album, Inside In Inside Out, was awesome, their second album, Konk,  was really good and they've just released a new album, Junk of the Heart, that I haven't spent much time with yet.  Here's the video for the first single, oddly titled "Junk of the Heart".  It sounds cool and laid back.  Easy sounds for the end of summer.

Arctic Monkeys: New Album On It's Way

Arctic Monkeys is one of those bands that grabbed me. When I first heard Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not when it came out in 2006, I was instantly hooked. The band was tight, the songwriting was instantly appealing while being unique, and the way the stories were told was engaging. I remember their awesome performance on SNL, too. I still love the album and it certainly has one of the largest number of five-star songs from one album in my iTunes library.

In fact, 2006 was a gigantic year in music for me. Many British groups were on heavy rotation that year including Bloc Party, Kaiser Chiefs, The Kooks, Muse, Kasabian, Maxïmo Park, Klaxons, Lily Allen, The Automatic, and Boy Kill Boy, to name a few. By the way, if you follow the link to Muse's web site today you'll see they're counting down to something exciting. I for one will be checking back tomorrow to see what it is. Their new album The Resistance is due out September 14th. Update: Muse published a major site overhaul July 13.

Favourite Worst Nightmare came out in 2007 and although it had a massive success to follow on, it was a great album, too.



Their new album is called Humbug and the first single is "Crying Lightning". The single's available from iTunes right now and the album is due out August 24th in the UK. Probably means that we'll see it in North America on the 25th.



Check out the tune below.



Arctic Monkeys will be touring North America in September and October. Dates are below.

SEPTEMBER
14th September - Soma, San Diego
15th September - Hollywood Palladium, LA
16th September - Fox Theater, Oakland
18th September - Wonder Ballroom, Portland **FREE SHOW**
19th September - The Showbox @ The Market, Seattle
20th September - Malkin Bowl, Vancouver
22nd September -In The Venue, Salt Lake City - w/Airborne Toxic Event
23rd September - Ogden Theatre, Denver - w/Airborne Toxic Event
25th September - First Avenue, Minneapolis
26th September - Eagles Ballroom, Milwaukee
28th September - Newport Music Hall, Columbus
29th September - Kool Haus, Toronto
30th September - Electric Factory, Philadelphia

OCTOBER
2nd October - House of Blues, New Orleans
3rd October - House of Blues, Houston
4th October - Austin City Limits Festival, Austin
5th October - The Palladium Ballroom

And for your listening and viewing pleasure, here's a gem from the first album - "A View from the Afternoon".



Edit: July 16. I just finished reading a great article on Arctic Monkeys and thought it turned out better than my article, primarily because the writer had access to the band themselves. Enjoy.