Full of Glee

I don't get the Glee craze at all. Maybe its because i'm a geriatric man in my thirties who treats all youth culture with disdain and cynicism, but i think its more likely its because it is mind-bendingly awful. With the start of their second series, their latest move in cash-in marketing is to start doing terrible cover versions of Madonna songs, with plastic backing tracks and even more plastic stage school vocals. This follows two equally mind-numbing albums from the first series which featured songs by a variety of artists similarly murdered.

I think the biggest problem here is that it doesn't seem to be reaching saturation point, despite the fact they've knocked out three albums within six months and another will follow later this month. No other phenomenon has ever managed to flog this much shit in such a short time, which i think is an indication of how hype rather than substance is the most important factor to the iPod generation. Glee is a marketing system and nothing else - scripts are produced by battery farmed writers and filmed in a similar way, the TV show promotes the music that you can buy on iTunes as soon as its over, the DVD sets are released as soon as the series finishes and the idiots who are sucked in by it will go out and buy the hoodies, t-shirts, stationery and accessories that go with it. The whole thing just stinks of breeding a new generation of hyperconsumers.

The Real Forced Jollity

Two years ago the NME delivered a review of the Guillemots second album Red. The lead single from it was Get Over It, which they accused of being an exercise in "forced jollity". Now i've always thought it was rather unfair and since lead singer Fyfe Dangerfield has released his solo material, it has gone some way to proving that the jollity was genuine.

Anyway, this review was recently brought back to my memory when i heard the new single by grime goons Roll Deep. Up to this point, Roll Deep's previous chart success had been two singles - The Avenue and Shake A Leg, both released in 2005 and neither of which set the world alight. Nevertheless, Roll Deep member Wiley was quite happy to quote them both as past achievements in his December 2009 single Take That.

Now obviously the grime scene has become massively commercialised since Dizzee Rascal realised he could make some serious cash from it and Roll Deep have been the latest act to capitalise with their weak-as-piss offering Good Times. Songs about clubbing and partying are two-a-penny at the moment, each seemingly less genuine than the last. If Kesha isn't telling us about how she parties until the "Po Po" shuts her down, then its the Black Eyed Peas are sounding bored whilst promoting alcoholism as a lifestyle.

Perhaps its because i'm more tuned in to British productions, but Roll Deep sound as if they're just milking this craze for all its worth. Any session music writer could manufacture this sort of junk, just throw in a few lines about clubbing, some about drinking, a few more about girls looking well fine, a chorus about having a great party and you've got a hit record. Any idiot can do it, and for the moment it looks like they are.