ice cold

it has been a very long time since i was buying NME week in and week out, i'd had a long love affair with the magazine, keen to find out what was new and what was happening in the world of music

but with the proliferation of music blogs and the rise of the internet aiding tastemakers instead, NME has become increasingly stunted, the medium being no longer relevant as the only place to turn to for information on new artists, gone are the days when NME could tell you that 'so and so' is the next big thing and generate all of it's own hype until it had proved itself right

it obviously didn't help that NME stopped employing journalists, instead they seemed to be manned entirely by a staff of list makers, and every single issue carried another excuse for a list, to the point that there was nothing at all worth reading

and the epitome of this dire practise of repeated list making was NME's annual Cool List, even at the point that i was shilling out for the magazine every week, i still found the Cool List to be a completely cringeworthy idea, in that a magazine that the cool kids read and told you who the cool bands are, would actually make a conscious decision to determine just how cool all of these cool people are, as if it would actually be cool to be vying for a high position in the Cool List.

and the reason i mention this, is my long arse way of getting round to talking about Janelle Monae, who graces the cover of this weeks NME (above) and weighs in at number 2 in the prestigious Cool List and who i had the pleasure of seeing back in september, after being turned onto her by a couple of completely separate friends, fuelled by intrigue and knowing that there was no way they could both be wrong about her i gave the latest album a spin on spotify and jumped at the chance to see her live when the opportunity arose via glasswerk.

and as something of an underground buzz artist coming out of the leftfield, i thought i would also knock out an article for The Enfield Advertiser as a bit of a heads up on someone to keep an eye out for, to try and mix it up a little with the features on local bands, as well as using the opportunity to flex my musical knowledge for the whole of Enfield to see.

of course, that was before the profile raising stint on a recent Jools Holland show and the NME cover, so by the time it actually sees print Janelle Monae may seem a bit like old news to some people but i am glad that she is getting the attention she deserves.

the album, ArchAndroid, is a unique offering in these days when 'popular' music is exceedingly bland and most songs a merely a mimic of the last pale imitation of an already un-inspiring chart-topper and i'm sure with an ever growing fanbase she will soon be living up to the immense promise she has already shown.



Janelle Monae - Cold War stream only



credit where it's due:

mp3 stream by Atlantic Records
and i was tipped off onto Janelle Monae by Cortz's Blog