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DEMOS WITH DYSON

The Falling Idols(three track demo)

Now this is a clean, unexpected, hit. Like a midget leaping to chin Peter Crouch, the opening riff of I am I can I will would have the most cynical giant applauding their nerve.

 The guitars are as spiked as a tray of drinks on a Pete Sutcliffe-themed club night. It's a grubby brick-a-brac of gutter sniping British rock. A faultless knees up in fact. Until the chorus. Break. Whatever you want to call it. Basically, the song is ruined by a talking bit. It sounds like a drunk turning down your favourite song and rambling on incessantly about fish. They probably think it's akin to Ian Dury or the combined biting lyrical genius of Pete Doherty, Alex Turner and Jarvis Cocker. It isn't. The rest is good, though. 

Exit TahitiFamiliar Space

Exit Tahiti. Now this is puzzling. Why would anyone want to leave Tahiti? A spiralling unpaid bar tab? An elaborate heist, involving contraband, a bloody shoot out and a rip curl of suicide, surfing terrorist strippers? They haven't merely left Tahiti. They have made an exit. And whatever way you approach it, the reasons ought to be nothing short of thrilling. And for that alone, this demo is disappointing.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with the songs. Any of them. In fact, at times they are quite marvellous. It's the aural equivalent of a pleasant stroll. Slowly strolling away from a tropical bay with warm , ethereal, twinkling starlight lullabies. It's just not that exciting. 'Why did you leave sodding Tahiti ?' we scream. And what do we get? A shrug. Which is fine. I suppose. You might even tap your foot or start swinging in your hammock to the pattering drum rolls. In short, this ideal music for a beach holiday. Ticket to Tahiti anyone?

Heartwear ProcessMean Season(Velocity Recordings)

Stumbling out of the shadows stinking of blood and death, Heartwear Process do a very convincing murder ballard. The bass of Mean Season saunters out of the dark like an axe wielding assassin to eerie, rattle snake swipes of the tremello bar. Then the chorus comes pounding out of nowhere like someone launching an surprise attack on The Coral . There are all sorts of mutterings about genocide, depravity and paedophiles but all with the decency of a killer melody.

Imagine the sort of twilight town where you might expect to see Nick Cave holidaying with a paperback and a bag full of severed heads. Well, this is what he'd be listening to. On his entrail-encrusted I-pod.  Hotter than a cemetery furnace.

The WakeHolly

Slicker than an oil coated swan, The Wake are the sort of people you'd expect to live by the ethos: 'If you're going to do a job do it properly'.

Boasting both immaculate production and savvy graphics, Holly is quite rightly touted as a single rather than a demo. Sounding something like a grizzly troubadour dressed in his Sunday best, backed by half of Bloc Party and members of The Earlies, it originally sold a good 800 copies last year.

Even the B sides have been whipped into line. At times it all seems a little too perfect and would somehow benefit from the odd bum note or ten. Still, with more recording planned and a tour set before the end of the year, they'll soon be an example of any bleary-eyed, repeat offender of the 'snooze' button. Plus, time on the road will probably transform them into crack-addled zombies who record snarling vocals into vomit-coated Dictaphones. One suspects.

TemposharkIts Better To Have Loved(Paper And Glue)

This is a bit like the bookish New York electronica of The Postal Service in that it makes the vaguely subdued, slightly aloof and terminally dreary glitches of modern living sound incredibly cool. 

It's Better To Have Loved could easily be and probably is the title of every ballad that universally induce the thought 'please shove two pencils up my nostrils and ram my head against the table to make it stop'. Yet with a desolate little drum machine, introspective verses and the right amount of synth it becomes high art.

Meanwhile, Not That Big is not that good or at least not as good. Still, any remix which sounds like an introspective indie troubadour dueting with Girls Aloud over the theme tune to 80's kid show Lets Pretend deserves a medal. Or at least a badge. Plus the single comes with a free sticker. And everyone loves stickers.

King Billy And The MarvellousDemo

In John Peel's box of most treasured cds, The White Stripes nestled comfortably next to albums as unlikely as Boards Of Canada and, erm, Bill Oddie. It is a diverse taste stretched to its glorious, mind boggling conclusion. At least it would be if King Billy hadn't taken things one step further by attempting to put it all into one song.

With three singers, ten thousand ideas and the savvy to somehow make it danceable, they make the term 'eclectic' sound as bland as it is lazy. The four tracks here range from a sort of twilight version of The Coral (Shakedown) to floor-stomping crooning blues. And Wrap A Doobie sounds like Tom Waits gate-crashing a wedding and leading a funk band into a spontaneous sing along. It's brilliantly silly, unfathomably infectious and totally unexpected, like the knowledge that Bill Oddie use to be a comedian.

RememberDemo

There is an  episode of Peep Show where the two protagonists think to themselves: "This is good idea, there  is no way that this is not a good idea".  Inevitably, this results in a series of awful ideas. The same lunacy must have plagued Remember when they decided to give their songs titles like  Alien Dirge and Pig Riff.  Luckily, the Hungarians didn't go the whole , and excuse the pun, 'hog', and use farmyard animals to record the demo.

The combination of radio friendly metal riffs and dark pop harmonies sounds more like the sort of band Josh Homme would invite on tour rather than hoofed sows  attempting to play guitars. When they get all playful with the stop start synths  on Can't Stop Bragging it's like a remix of the  Pixies doing a Skittles advert. And, like their song titles, this is nowhere near as bad as it should be.

New HighsDemo

In this cynical age where the very act of yawning seems somehow outdated, calling a band New Highs is an act of supreme optimism and almost certain delusion. It is like calling a football team 'What could possibly go wrong? FC' and playing home games on a minefield. Under the rock descriptions act, to avoid a self-inflicted wound to the foot, this has to be upbeat .

The Rest Will Follow doesn't quite have the altitude-inducing choruses you'd hope for but is still a hefty star jump of hands aloft pop. The guitars are a bit like a sugary My Chemical Romance and the urgent vocals should really be accompanied by slow motion footage of High School underdogs rabbit punching the bully or winning at sports. Things nose dive into a plodding come down of rock standards on Turn Out The Masses and We Get On. However, stripped down to an acoustic guitar, they finally hit that high note with Watch The World Go Round. Chris Martin would probably salute this and a horde of boy bands desperate for that indie cross-over would undoubtedly do a lot more. It's not new but it's still a good mile above most
chancers.

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JensenEP

This is made for the great British summer. Alright, strictly speaking we only have a truly great summer once a decade. Or two. Jensen have optimistically half-filled their glass with the quintessentially English riffs and chipper sounds, in a tradition which many a band aspire to but rarely pull off. Think Small Faces, Supergrass, T-Rex and you'll probably think the chances of them sounding half as good are as remote as a hosepipe ban without the customary weeks of July drizzle.

With opener Oh, you'd be entirely wrong. It succeeds with a gloriously simple and upbeat chorus. The 'oh' is obviously more along the lines of 'Oh, I've found fifty quid down the back of the sofa and remembered that it's the bank holiday' than a 'Oh, it's raining. Again'. Despite being two words too close to a Supergrass classic, You're Only In It For The Money similarly holds its own with strutting little guitar cuts that feel like a new flavour of Jam (the band, that is) and is sure to have you dancing over the Eaton Bridge. In some of their more delicate and forlorn moments they are a little off the mark. However, this is too upbeat to get you down.

Like a disposable barbeque, it might be rusting in the garden come winter but right now, this is essential.

Plain EnglishThe Human Language

If I ever have to hear another lo-fi synth pop album, recorded on a collection of charity shop keyboards by a dueting, transatlantic couple from Bracknell and Manhattan I'll be, erm, surprised. Quite frankly, who wouldn't be? And if it sounded half as good as this I'd smugly claim to be the instigator of an incredible new scene. Of course, I'd by lying. It has nothing to do with me.

The driving force is the musical friction/fusion between Katherine and Bill. The angelic English belle switching harmonies with the hedonistic New Yorker. It's like a beered-up Beck arguing with a classical singer over whether they should go to the Ballet or break dancing in the car park. Threaded throughout are rye lyrics about ladies looking 'so much cuter on my computer' (Much Cuter on My Computer) and instantly danceable songs which sound like a plea to encourage your girlfriend to swear (Mild Profanity). With metronome beats, off kilter bleeps and the growling bass of a piano, the pull of different ideas has never sounded so funky. She says 'tomato'. He says 'to-mate-ooh'. In plain English: it's a strange fruit but it works.

The Bleeding HeartsYou Bring Me To My Knees

In an ideal world, people who formed indie bands would devote as much obsessive thought to penning perfect songs as they did to memorising the sleeve notes to limited editions singles and the last argument they had with their long departed girlfriends. As such, The Bleeding Hearts address the wrongs.

From the start, the taut lyrical wit balances on the right side of heartbroken. The arrangements sift the quality from ten years of undervalued guitar bands with the precision of a musical surgeon. It's all rounded off with a magnificent chorus and outro from a band who not only know every note of every Wedding Present and Smiths single, they know what made them so special in the first place. Like a bacon sandwich with HP Sauce. as it should be.

SpyhopThe Waters Edge (4 track demo)

Apparently, the ocean is soothing. Yet, only a madman could unwind by watching turds and hypodermic needles wash up onto a pebble beach. It's a theory which simply doesn't fit with the British coastline. Likewise, this is electronica which doesn't fit into the blissed out to bland compilations, played on adverts and bought (presumably) by the mentally ill. And it's all the better for it. Imagine Zero Seven if they weren't so dull or Mogwai with a neurotic songstress who owned a laptop. It's enough to make you want to get in a dingy and chill out for a couple of hours in the North Sea.

Broken JackThe Becoming/You Gave Me Nothing

Someone discover a new continent for Broken Jack. It's the only way they'll have enough space to indulge their tendency to do things on a somewhat grand scale. Playing small, local venues must be like squeezing a vulture into a budgie cage. The Becoming is a continuous riff, ushered in with the sort of swagger which needs the Grand Canyon just to give it room to swing its arms. You Gave Me Nothing takes a more subtle route but clocking in at seven minutes and fifty two seconds, it is no less ambitious. Each minute is re-wired with a different take on avant garde guitars.  Monumental stuff.

Naked In BlackJump Sh!P/Running After/Just Part Of The Ride

This would make a great soundtrack to a low budget film. It could have been recorded in the boot of a car by a semi-conscious engineer with a dictaphone strapped to his bloodied head. Everything is muffled, but in a good way. Intentional or otherwise, it gives it a brooding quality like the musical equivalent of a young De Niro, before he beats the s*** out of someone in Mean Streets.

Jump Sh!P would be the opening scene with the cocksure bass and controlled little riffs driving the victim out to the desert. Judging by the free flow of conscious lyrics, it's hard to tell who's in the boot. Singer, Luke, has beef with everyone from a possible ex to unscrupulous politicians. We cut back into a high octane second act with Running After. It would be lots of cut scenes of men in suits and aviator shades running about with sawn off shot guns. Some one would have to be thrown out of a window. A poker table would be upturned. As the drums crash, you hope, so would a couple pf cars in a fitting explosion.

Our protagonist is in reflective mood as the threadbare piano of Just Part Of The Ride soundtracks his grisly end. The lyrics say it all: "The credits roll, no time for another scene". Clearly the best original musical score for any young, angry filmmaker with a two penny budget.

My LuminariesAll I Really Want/ The Mess We're In

There is a difference between having a simple idea and a simple idea that works. In this respect, My Luminaries are virtual loners in a ragged line of hopefuls who want to make danceable guitar hits as instant as cheap coffee.

All I Really Want has hooks sharp enough to slash your face off and a chorus more infectious than an outbreak of MRSA in an NHS hospital. The lyrics might be neurotic fears of failed romance but the panic attacks are kept at bay by the three piece harmonies. Meanwhile, the thunderous bass of  The Mess We're In  brews up a storm of taut melodies. We're left happily punch drunk with the edgy jabs of stop-n-start riffs and machine gun drums. It's another knock out blow that will leave you happily humming along for days.

So like an indie A-Team, the Kingston and Reading underground can breath a sigh of relief as the plan well and truly comes together. The line just got one shorter.