Belinda Carlisle - Voila

Belinda Carlisle's got a record out! In French!

I just don't know what to say. For one thing, how the hell do I categorise it? It's Belinda Carlisle, but it's not pop. And it's French songs. French songs fit no clearly identifiable genre except 'French music' and there's no way I'm taking the trouble to add that. Just how many French records am I likely to be reviewing?

Someone - some philosopher - once said that even if a Lion could speak English, you wouldn't understand it. His point being that your worlds are so far apart, you'd have no common ground. Your values and reference points bear such little relation to each other that you'd be mutually incomprehensible, despite speaking the same language.

It's the same with the French. For all that I admire their food and their sniffy attitude to the US, at the end of the day, just what do they spend their time listening to and why? Belinda Carlisle seems to think that she knows, but she doesn't. Rest assured, behind her back, the French are going: "She has it all wrong. She takes no pleasure in the misery and she doesn't do enough ambiguous shrugs".

Killswitch Engage - As Daylight Dies

"Engage the killswitch!"
"I... I can't find the killswitch."
"It's there... over there... next to that lever..."
"Wha... Oh... What this?"
"Yes, that. Engage it... Engage it!... Engage the killswitch."

Lord knows what Killswitch Engage means. I know what they're about though. They're about looking serious and playing guitars and never EVER being happy.

Track one: 'Daylight Dies'. Why? Why does daylight have to die? The sun's life-giving rays are what permits life on this planet. Without daylight there's nothing.

Track three: 'Arms of Sorrow'. How miserable do you have to be to feel it in your arms. Arms should be used for waving and positioning hands so that people can see you're giving them the thumbs up.

Track 11: 'Reject Yourself'. That's not a 'can-do' attitude.

The campaign for more songs about teddy bears having adventures continues.

Ghostface Killah - Fishscale

I know what you're wondering: If this album were a Carter USM song, which would it be? The answer, of course, is 'The Only Living Boy In New Cross'.

I've got to get myself a cool G name. Ghostface Killah's a cracker. You could easily go wrong with the [something]face bit. You don't want to go around with a name like knobface or cockface or prickface or penisface. Ghostface is pretty cool though. Clever.

Then there's the 'Killah' bit. It's basically 'killer' but he's changed the ending. Again, he's got this right. He could easily have gone for 'Killog' or 'Killen'. I mean the latter's a real surname. Wouldn't that have been embarrassing down at the squash club, when it was pointed out to him by a fellow rapper/racquet sport enthusiast?

There are some good song titles too. 'Return of Clyde Smith' - this song alludes to the little-known period immediately following the time when Clyde Smith went away. 'Shakey Dog' - this is about a dog that does a mean impression of Shakin' Stevens.

Other classics include, 'Ragu', the baffling '9 Milli Bros', 'Jellyfish' and 'Ironman take over'.

Roxy Music - Best Of

I'm not entirely 100% certain why I'm doing Roxy Music. I don't particularly like them. They haven't got a record out and I don't believe in Best Ofs. Not that I don't credit their existence - I just think they're a bad idea.

Bryan Ferry's dad looked after pit ponies up in Washington, Tyne-and-Wear. He was not, as you might imagine, the fourteenth Earl of Winchester, indulgent of his young son's high society, playboy lifestyle; at once suave and debonair, yet aware of his family's rich heritage.

It's Bryan Ferry's fault you think that, because he always swanned around with models, sipping Martini and wearing cravates. He spent his studio time crooning away from the sanctity of his chaise longue with a flunky popping olives into his mouth during the middle-eight.

Weirdly, prior to this, Roxy Music were a rock band. An actual, real-life, make-a-bit-of-noise rock band - albeit quite an experimental one, which actually makes them better still. This was primarily down to Brian Eno. He's bald and a sort of rock-boffin.

We've just read this back and we're none-the-wiser as to why we decided to 'do' Roxy Music today.

Bloc Party - A Weekend In The City

Bloc Party once said that the absence of a 'k' from 'Block' was purely for aesthetic reasons. Well, you know what? You don't get to make the sole judgement on the aesthetics of the word bloc/block. It's my turn and I think it looks shit. I think it looks much better with the 'k' on, which is how it's supposed to be. Don't reinvent the wheel, Bloc Party. 'Block' works. Stick with it.

I think that Bloc Party are supposed to be all modern and broad-minded, but I get the opposite impression. They seem to inhabit the same world as the London music press and no-one else is much bothered. They all go to the same venues and listen to the same music. The press tell us that they're revolutionary, but everyone else is fairly ambivalent.

Being 'quite good' isn't normally the path to greatness. Nor is being better than a handful of other bands who are quite similar. Singing 'East London is a vampire' is quite insular. Writing a whole album about the capital, more so. 'Waiting For The 7.18' is a song about commuting on the underground. Most people don't do this, including, lest we forget, Bloc Party.

If you commute to your record industry job on the underground, maybe this is the album for you. For everyone else, get Captain Beefheart's Safe As Milk for an album you can really identify with.

Britney Spears - Greatest Hits: My Prerogative

Okay. I'll level with you. I think all good reviewers should reveal whatever affiliations and prejudices they hold at the start of any related reviews.

I am prejudiced against Britney Spears because she's got one eye on the side of her head and the other slap bang in the middle of her forehead. She looks like Sloth from the Goonies. Only Sloth's more appealing because he offers fleeting glimpses of the capacity for rational thought.

This view is backed up by track 18 on this album 'I'm Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman'. So what are you then Britney? What foul beasts copulated to create so abhorrent a monster? My guess would be that she received the eye-on-side-of-head genes from some weird bird, like an osprey or an emu and the front eye genes from one of those fish that trawls the sea bed waiting for things to float into its non-closing mouth.

The other day Britney was photographed wearing no pants. Why wasn't she wearing pants? Call me Joe Uncool, the dorkiest man to like staying in writing things on the internet more than parties, but pants serve a purpose. Pants are a must. Pants are mandatory. Particularly if you're a girl and you're wearing a really short skirt.

It's almost as if she did it on purpose. I'll have to form that into a new prejudice. It's a form of irresponsibility, I reckon. There could be children perving over celebrities on the internet. It's not right to expose them to such things.

Get Cape Wear Cape Fly - Chronicles Of A Bohemian Teenager

Now you're talking: Get Cape, Wear Cape, Fly. There's a name for a band.

Who cares what it sounds like. This fella's clearly got at least a rudimentary grasp of what's good and what's shite. 'Chronicles Of A Bohemian Teenager' isn't good, mind, but that's more than outweighed by Get Cape, Wear Cape, Fly.

Then there's track 11: 'If I Had A Pound For Every Stale Song Title I'd Be 30 Short Of Getting Out Of This Mess'. I'm not making this up. Don't be fooled, because it is just the kind of thing that I do make up. It's a genuine song title.

I'm particularly enamoured with the 'mess' bit of that. It's not enough to have a song title that refers to shit song titles and it's not enough to have a song title that's ludicrously lengthy. He's also alluded to how miserable everyone is all of the time.

There's no sensible category for this, but adding 'Nu-Folk' would pretty much devalue the entire site, so I'm going to shoe-horn it into inappropriate genres like I normally do.