Quick update and Best Coast article

Those who are eagle-eyed will have noticed that although I've been fairly active on Twitter (Tweeting about anything and everything, it seems), this blog hasn't received the most lovin' as of late. As in getting-on-for-two-months 'as of late'. There goes my 'I'll update my blog regularly' idea. It's because I've been rather busy. Now that I've graduated (strangely enough, my last post was written just a couple days after the big day), I've been embracing what some people like to refer to as 'real life' and, strangely, enjoying it. Over the last two months or so, I've been working at various magazines in big ol' London Town. I started off at The Fly ( http://www.the-fly.co.uk/), which was cool because it was the first time ever I was experiencing office life (the closest I had been to before that was an interview for an internship at Dazed,  http://www.dazeddigital.com/). Then came FHM ( http://www.fhm.com/) - absolutely incredible, had an absolute blast there (as you'd expect). Highlights have got to be going to a typical FHM photoshoot, if you catch my drift (every boy's dream, but keeping it strictly professional, of course?), and not only making an appearance in the magazine itself, but having a whole page of me (albeit ludicrously sweaty) surrounded by the word 'epic' ( https://twitter.com/wgsa_musicblog/status/231316332401016832). Then came FourFourTwo ( http://fourfourtwo.com/) - great fun, especially scoring the last minute equaliser in Thursday lunchtime's office football and what with the new season very much up and coming. Then, lastly, was T3 ( http://www.t3.com/) where I got to write about such things as what should be on Football Manager 2013 and what the ten best zombie video games are (hardly counts as work, does it?). I only finished there on the Friday just gone, and they worked me very hard, so you can see a good lot of what I've written online. T3 was my last bit of work experience of what felt like a summer of work experience, so now I've got a fair bit of spare time I hope to write for this blog a good deal more, in between searching for more longer term things, such as internships and 'real life' jobs.

Thought it'd be good to get some writing on here so you'll find below a piece I wrote for a new magazine called tmrw. Great little mag (the editor, Joe, has just released it's first ever issue, which you can get at http://www.tmrwmagazine.bigcartel.com/) - it's all about new music and men's fashion, which is pretty much everything you need ever. Unfortunately my piece didn't make the cut this time around (Joe and I only discussed me doing a piece literally the night before the print deadline), but hopefully I'll be in the next issue. I gave him a bunch of ideas and he liked the idea of me discussing/introducing Californian surf popsters Best Coast (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y18C089tt9Y&feature=plcp) from a British perspective (our 'great' British summer makes sure surf pop isn't the easiest of genres to relate to) the best, so that's (unsurprisingly) what you'll find below. I've got a lot of ideas flying around at the moment (currently really enjoying music in general), so be sure to check back sometime soon.

'Us Brits do have it hard when it comes to the season that is Summer. First, of course, there is the issue of it being fairly non-existent (kind of essential). Second, when the glorious rays finally feel like hitting our shores, we’ve no music to accompany them! Sure there’s The Kooks but... Well, they’re The Kooks. And then there’s our old failsafe, Jack Johnson, but he hasn’t released anything substantial for a good couple years now. Which means we’re going to have to take the plunge and see what our friends from across the pond are licking their melting ice creams to. Now, given that the beats of the likes of 2 Chainz and Childish Gambino aren’t really appropriate and it’s probably best to steer clear of anything even resembling the catastrophe that is Nicki Minaj for fear of catching something, the safest bet is probably with surf pop. But still our dilemma is not entirely resolved. Take the band who many regard as the face of surf pop, The Drums, for example. First, there’s the lyrics – I might be mistaken, but I’m not convinced much, if any, of our dear population can really relate to Jonny Pierce’s pleas to go surfing (as demonstrated, unsurprisingly, on their 2009 breakthrough single Let’s Go Surfing). And then there’s a few components of the actual music that I feel would not go down so well – given that over the years we’ve produced such gutsy rock bands as The Rolling Stones and The Who, it’s likely that most would prefer to avoid outfits who sound like they’re playing their drums and guitars with sprained wrists (again the reference to The Drums’ Let’s Go Surfing comes in handy). It is at this point I can happily introduce the answer to everything ever, Best Coast. The band over two albums – 2010’s debut Crazy For You and this year’s follow-up, The Only Place – have demonstrated that surf pop doesn’t have to be all flimsy and lacklustre (their breakthrough single, Boyfriend, was even verging on being rather rocky). This is made only more remarkable when it is considered lead singer Bethany Cosentino only has Bobb Bruno on the drums for company. Sure there are a few differences between the band and us, the British listeners, that have potential to alienate (the band’s lead single from their recent LP is an almost three minute long ode to their native California), but what matters is that the band play their instruments with conviction and yet still we can reap the rewards of Best Coast essentially remaining a surf pop band. So not only do we have one over our American brothers in that we get to pick and choose what music of theirs we actually like, our hands do not become all sticky due to our ice creams melting because it’s simply not hot enough. No wonder it’s called the great British summer.'