Who needs an eye?

Two open proposals to Grand Pocket Orchestra:

1. Make a limited run of GPO action figures. Of all bands that have ever lived in Ireland, none would make a better set than you. And it's not even like people would just want the singer or anything. Everyone in Grand Pocket Orchestra has a distinct, fruit-flavoured air. There could even be two Paddys, one with a guitar and one with a mic lead wrapped around himself, eyes bulging, face looking blue from lack of oxygen, doing the Wii skiing action that he does. I would buy them. If Of Montreal can sell their album as a paper lantern, GPO's album could easily be action figures with secret USB ports where you can get 1/4 of the album.

2. How deadly would a Monkees-style mini-series about life in a fictionalised Grand Pocket Orchestra house be? They could all get into half an hour of mischief, before introducing guest stars or something, and they could open and close with a song. There could be puppets in the kitchen who only talk to Bronwyn or something. Imagine it though... *ding dong* "I wonder who's there?" (Noel Edmonds style), then the door opens to canned applause and Fight Like Apes appear. The fun is doubled.

So the in-store itself in Tower was fun. Grand Pocket Orchestra are getting better and better as time goes by and any initial reservations I had about a second guitarist drowning the tweeness are completely gone by now. The balance that seemed like it was slightly tipped when Flesh first joined is restored, and the songs are getting complex and nearly chin-strokingly thought-worthy while staying in the same Kinder Egg world. It was disappointing that there weren't more people there to get a copy of Make Happy War, which is the older, better brother to the young, fun first EP.

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About as much use as a cuntless whore

Okay, the title is a little strong. Fight Like Apes releasing Something Global in Tower Records. It's pretty much a consensus opinion from people I've talked to that the single is bad and sounds like sickly polished pop-punk. It sounds like that live too. Even their good songs (including the one that contains the line this blog is named after) are losing edge and gaining polish. I really, really, really did not want to be sitting here saying "I liked their early stuff" before the album even came out. But it's hard not to.

Their best songs have been the same ones since way back when. Jake Summers and Lend Me Your Face. They're still good, but the bite's not there any more. It used to seem like May Kay was going to climb off the stage, grab your skull, put a foot on the wall for leverage and rip your face off whether or not you wanted her to. It's not like that any more.

Without the roughshod, grinning lunatic side, they're just another band. Just another Hooray For Humans. That minute change in mood makes the kitschness and the pop culture pillaging seem more contrived than inspired.

I assume the album's going to sound like Something Global, production-wise, and have the boring songs (i.e. anything not on the first EP or some of the second EP) on it. There's still a chance they could write 10 great songs in the next year or so and come out with a good second album, because all the things that made them so good are still hanging around somewhere underneath the Mr. Muscle approach. But as it stands, I don't know. I'm really sad about making this post. But whatever.

Grand Pocket Orchestra, you're up.

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