Not our words, but the words of Jason Derulo. This is just one important piece of information which we gleaned from his biography on his Myspace. We also found that:
- He is being feted as the new Ne-Yo, because he writes for other people as well as having his own career. Ne-Yo, if you recall, is the new Usher. Taio Cruz is the British Ne-Yo. Ne-Yo has never been described as the American Eoghan Quigg. We'd draw a venn diagram if we weren't so pushed for time.
- He was discovered by JR Rotem, who is a big American producer and not to be confused with AR Rahman, JRR Tolkein or LTJ Bukem.
- He was "raised in a two-parent home in Florida". Is that really so unusual these days that it earns a place in an artist's biog? What's the world coming to etc etc.
Anyway, his single 'Whatcha Say' is really very good. It uses a big vocal sample from Imogen Heap's 'Hide and Seek' which works far better than you might think, and is generally a damn sight more interesting than the RnB-by-numbers which the charts have been overrun with lately.
Come with Love Machine as we tell you the story of the best band of the last five years (yes, even better than Razorlight) that you've never heard of.
That band had the, let's face it, terrible name of Lorraine, but lo, they were an incredible band. A 3 piece from Norway that sounded exactly how you'd expect a 3 piece from Norway to sound: warm washes of glorious synths, skyscraping melodies, icy synth riffs. They had at least 9 hit singles.
The problem was, they were 4 years too early.
Like Clive Sinclair and his C5, the world was simply not ready for Lorraine (ed-Lorraine were also much better than the C5 which wasn't very good) - for this was a time when the Pigeon Detectives reigned supreme (yes, we'd erased that from our minds but it is worth reminding ourselves what humanity is capable of at its worst). Their record company also didn't help matters by filming a video, the cost of which could have settled several 3rd World Nations' debts and going on an all-or-nothing campaign which, seeing as radio stations were only playing songs with loud spiky guitars in and Borrell and Doherty-a-likes, resulted in nothing being the outcome.
So, they went away, and lo, we have The Blackroom (so named after a fire in their rehearsal room which destroyed most of their equipment). They have toughened up their sound, gone a bit more Depeche Mode and a bit less A-Ha, but they are none less incredible than before.
The world is ready, and the world (well, at least Love Machine and all of our friends) will be at their first London gig at The Water Rats in King's Cross on December 7th. Come join us.
In the meantime, check our their songs on MySpace (there are loads more to come) and here is a little Youtube teaser thingamajig:
FYI, the second Love Machine clubnight last Friday was INCREDIBLE. Waterloo, AT8 and Same Difference were all brilliant, and our guest DJs David Oh, Talia and Bright Light Bright Light were a bit too good and have been warned to be at least 15% less good next time to make us look better.
The problem is that it was SO good, The Fly is now closing forever. But fear not - we will be moving to THE MONARCH in Camden for our Christmas Special, on THURSDAY 17 DECEMBER, before announcing our permanent home for next year.
We'll be announcing our December line-up very soon, but until then amuse yourself by checking out the photos from Friday in our Flickr gallery.
These boys from Montreal know how to write massive songs. Their new track 'Just Don't Feel The Same' reminds us of late 80's supergroup Electronic (Bernard Sumner, Neil Tennant & Jonny Marr) which is a big thumbs up from us.
They are in the UK on tour so we are hoping they might pop in for a 'Cheryl' or two tomorrow night at our amazing club night...!
We are currently getting very excited about the next Love Machine clubnight - taking place at The Fly this time next week - not least because the marvellous Waterloo are coming along to play some songs for everyone.
Waterloo describe themselves as "the lovechild of The Feeling meets The Saturdays with a touch of reggae thrown in for good measure", which sounds pretty bloody good to us. They have been 'hotly tipped' in various places and happen to be exceptionally good looking, so imagine our surprise when we sent over some questions and they turned out to be pretty damn witty too. But, as our mum always says, can they cook?
Hello Waterloo! How are you?
Luke Juby (Waterloo): Just fine and dandy, thank you for asking... how are you?
We have a bit of a cold actually, but don't wish to go on about it. What is the back-story of Waterloo? How did the band come to exist and what have you done so far?
Well, we all came together through our producers, Topham and Twigg... I'd done some work with them before, Nick had got chatting to Topham (the good looking one) in a guitar store a year or so before and Suzanne waited tables at Hooter's where Twigg (the intelligent one) had a discount card. So that's about it really... except for the bit about Suzanne, that was a lie (but not about Twigg's loyalty card).
Did you disregard Hastings, Bosworth Field and The Somme before settling on Waterloo?
No, but we did disregard Dancing Queens, The Day Before You Came (my favourite), Voulez-Vous and Put On Your White Sombrero
We are very excited about having you along to play Love Machine in November. What can we expect from your performance?
You can expect a tightly fitted top with push-up bra, hair in curlers and I guess what ever Suzanne chooses to wear as well.
How many songs do you have written and ready to roll? Is an album in the pipeline?
133.5, but we're really happy with about 10 so far... you know we could put them all on a CD and call it an album? That's a good idea. It's a pity the whole album concept seems to be dying with digital downloads... a good album is far more than a just a collection of 10 or so songs.
'Sweat' by Inner Circle in 1992. 'All That She Wants' by Ace of Base in 1993. 'Shine' by Aswad in 1994. Would you agree that this was an amazing and hugely underrated period of pop?
Indeed! They are all classics. 'All That She Wants' is a great, great pop song...I'm sure we'd love to have a song where you could mention the title to anyone in any pub in the land and have them sing the tune.
Please give us your projections for 2010, 2011 and 2012.
Aha! This is a question after my own heart. I predict England to win the World Cup in South Africa with South Africa also doing well with the home support. London 2012, I predict that we'll spend a lot of money to find out we're best at the sports we invented that no-one else plays and there to be an unprecedented incident where they put someone through a humiliating public chromosomal test to see if they are a human being or not. What's happening in 2011? I don't have anything in the diary.
Was it a great blow for the band when Eurostar services were moved from Waterloo to St Pancras?
I was actually on the first train into St Pancras from Brussels. They gave us free champagne so... no.
Who is your favourite Saturday?
I'm liking your questions! See, really I know I should try and keep my options open, should any of them have a momentary lapse of standards. I shouldn't burn my bridges. Or maybe I should say whichever one's single to increase my chances as they're all gorgeous obviously? But it has to be Frankie, she's perfect. Or Una. Is this theoretical world based in Utah where I can have two wives?
Thank you Waterloo!
Here is a Waterloo EPK. In case you're not familiar with pointless music industry jargon (see also: rushes, packshots, 'tx' dates), an EPK is a short video in which one member of a band answers questions put to them by an unseen interviewer while the others stare awkwardly at their feet. This is intercut with snippets of music video or live performance. If we ever knew what 'EPK' stood for we've forgotten, but the point is to get 'media' 'on board'.
To be honest we weren't sure about the new Gaga single 'Bad Romance' at first, but we also spent a couple of weeks going around saying that 'Bleeding Love' wasn't that great before its full awesomeness kicked in, so we really can't be trusted. On sober reflection, it is basically everything that made 'Just Dance' brilliant but with at least three choruses. Selfish really, when there are bands like N-Dubz who are eking out the same chorus again and again just to keep churning the singles out.
Here is another new Gaga track, which has either leaked or been made available to get bloggers excited or something, does it really matter these days? At the moment we don't actually think it's very good, but by the time we read this back in January 2010 we will probably have changed our minds and prefer it to Party In The USA, ridiculous as that sounds now.
Some people will tell you it's actually quite good. Others will tell you it's dreadful. If you read the Financial Times review and the CBBC Newsround review that's the main arbiters of popular taste covered.
All we will say is this: there is NOTHING on the album as good as the Moto Blanco Club Mix of 'Fight For This Love'. There is possibly nothing in the history of recorded music as good as the Moto Blanco Club Mix of 'Fight For This Love', although to be fair we've not got all the way through the latest Paolo Nutini album yet so we'd better reserve judgement for now.
Some people will tell you it's actually quite good. Others will tell you it's dreadful. If you read the