AC/DC - Back In Black

How good are AC/DC? I'd say they were about 12 good on the good scale.

Everything about them's just perfect.

The name: AC/DC. It's literally about power, for crying out loud.
The look: Angus Young, the guitarist, dresses like a schoolboy - no-one knows why. The singer, Brian Johnson, wears a flat cap.
The sound: Relentlessly upbeat. Relentlessly noisy. Relentlessly unchanging. That last one's the key. Why change when you have perfected music to such an astonishing degree.

All the whinging, juvenile US rock bands who are practically in tears the whole time for no immediately apparent reason should go and see AC/DC at least once.

I'd be mightily surprised if they didn't all immediately think: 'Hey. What are we so upset about? We own guitars. We should do THAT. We should do what they're doing as soon as we get back to daddy's studio. We should wipe this make-up off our faces, because it makes us look like girls. We should conceal our lank, greasy hair beneath flat caps and maybe one of us could dig out our old school uniform.'

The same goes for anyone thoughtlessly doling out soulful R'n'B. Are you seriously telling me that if Boyz 2 Men went to an AC/DC gig they wouldn't be swayed by 'Hells Bells' or 'Shake A Leg'? Anyone would be swayed by 'Shake A Leg'.

Boyz 2 Men would say to each other: 'How stupid we've been thoughtlessly doling out this soulful R'n'B. I was first swayed by 'Hells Bells' and even more so by 'Shake A Leg' Now: Who's still got their school uniform?'

Black Eyed Peas - Monkey Business

I know what you're wondering: If this album were a song by Carter USM, which would it be? The answer, of course (and for once this actually makes sense), is 'The Music That Nobody Likes'.

You can read the titles of these songs and that's too much for most people.

Pump It - Maybe 'pump' means 'punch' in the US and maybe 'it' means Fergie's face.
Don't Phunk With My Heart - The only thing I'll be phunking with, is, well, nothing. You know why? Because 'phunk' isn't a phucking word.
My Humps - Nobody knows quite what she means when she sings this. Whichever bits you're talking about, they're not 'lovely'. They're syphilitic and cancerous.
Dum Diddly - What? Right, we've really got to come up with something here. We have to DO something.
Feel It - You're just desperate now, aren't you? Fortunately, I'm not.
They Don't Want Music - Marvellous. Now we're getting somewhere. Let's dwell on that thought and subsequently address it as best we can.
Bebot - Looks a bit like an anagram. Isn't.
Ba Bump - Is this a close relation to 'Dum Diddly' or 'My Humps'? Or are you, in fact, a load of wordless, infantile chumps who have failed to acquire language?
Audio Delite At Low Fidelity - Dee-Lite got away with it. You can't.
Do What You Want - That, I think you'll find, is legally binding. I have been given explicit permission to suffocate each and every one of Black Eyed Peas with a bin bag, chop them into pieces, boil them, stamp on them, burn the ensuing dust and then offer it back to them to smoke (somehow).

Alternatively I could just get someone to steal their microphones. That should do the trick.

See the cleverest joke on the whole of the internet here. One of 'Da Peas' is the subject.

Avril Lavigne - The Best Damn Thing

I know what you're thinking: If this Avril Lavigne album were a song by Carter USM, which would it be? The answer, of course, is 'Look Mum, No Hands!'

So, according to Avril Lavigne, just what IS the best damn thing? I haven't looked at the tracklisting yet and I'm almost bursting with excitement at what might await...

Track one is 'Girlfriend' so I'm going to take that as Avril's answer, which is weird because I didn't realise she was, you know, one of those, you know... with the... and the... who likes...

But what kind of girlfriend is Avril after? Track 10: 'One Of Those Girls' - which presumably means, one of THOSE girls; one like Avril; a 'you know'; a girl's girl.

It's nice that Avril's being realistic. No point mooning over some girl, if you've got no chance is there? I mean 'mooning' as in that teenage habit of being all lovelorn and preoccupied. No wait, I've changed my mind. Let's have it as the other meaning. If you're Avril Lavigne, there's no point exposing your buttocks while situated above a heterosexual girl.

'Lavigne' is a stupid name and it's hard to spell.

Various Artists - Disco Kandi - The Mix

I love the Hed Kandi albums. Which of the cartoon women do you fancy?

On this album cover, I think I'm going for the one on the right. No, wait - the one on the left. Definitely the one on the left. She's not smiling as much.

Not the blonde one though. Never the blonde one.

The other great game you get to play is 'which artist has got the stupidest name'. This is a box set of three CDs. There are 14 tracks on each CD. I barely know anyone who appears on it, but the names - oh, the names are heaven-sent. It's even better if you imagine exactly what these people will be like in person.

Teddy Douglas - least cool name in the history of house.
Kid Massive - not 'Massive Kid'.
Dennis Christopher - second least cool name in the history of house.
Wez Clarke - that Z can't save you Wesley.
Dave Spoon - more people should have this name. Many more.
Freak 'n' Funky - they've called themselves that.
Dogsax - don't really know what to say about this one.
Mr Groove and Vergas - they've called THEMSELVES that. 'Mr Groove!'

Panic At The Disco - A Fever You Can't Sweat Out

Track one: Introduction. There's how to get in my good books. I'm even moved to overlook the complete absence of punctuation in the song title 'London Beckoned Songs About Money Written by Machines', which really, really needs some.

There are some other intriguing titles on this album, but I'm going to ignore them all. All bar one:

'Build God, Then We'll Talk'

Build him! Build him now! Use stickle-bricks or Lego. Use sand or snow. Use wood or steel. Build him with know-how. Build him with brawn. Build him to last a thousand years.

After that we can have a conversation. We can talk about HOW YOU BUILT GOD! Or maybe we could talk about lacrosse. You probably don't want to talk about lacrosse though, do you? All you're interested in is building God. It's like an obsession with you. I'm sick of hearing about it.

'First we did this, then we did that'. God, God, God. Is there NOTHING else in your life? I'm leaving. You can sit and talk to God, if you're so proud of him.

Oh, and one more thing - God's arms are crap. Did you know that? Crap. Where did you learn to build God? Down at the blind school?

Curtis Stigers - Real Emotional

What is a Curtis Stigers?

It seems so familiar, but yet I now realise I know almost nothing about it. What is a Curtis Stigers?

Even the face it's using seems unrecognisable. I thought that it looked like a Michael Bolton, but that's not so distinctive as a Michael Bolton. It looks bland. As soon as I look away, I've forgotten its appearance.

The album by this Curtis Stigers is entitled Real Emotional. The emotions I'm feeling are confusion and faint nausea. Is nausea an emotion? I'm too confused to decide.

My advice to you is make your own Curtis Stigers. Make a good one. Fill it full of love and then send it out into the world to do something memorable. If you can make a Curtis Stigers which can punish a malfunctioning vehicle with its bare hands, people would remember that.

The Bees - Octopus

The music world's very animal-centric at the moment. That's a good thing though. I like creatures. I know loads about creatures.

So here are some facts. An octopus can climb inside a jar, if it so chooses. Or maybe that's a squid. I can't remember. I'm not sure what size jar either. I suppose it depends on the size of the octopus.

Here's a bee fact. Bees can fit inside a jar. Several in one jar, if need be. You can use a honey jar if you want to make it homely for them.

These Bees wouldn't fit in a jar, however. They're humans masquerading as bees. Hippies to be precise. At least they look like hippies and what else do you need to go off other than hair quantity when identifying and subsequently treating a hippy?

That's 'treating' in the medical sense, you understand. You should never buy a hippy sweets or any other kind of treat. It'll eat them and then pitch a tent in your back garden. It'll moan about how you work for 'the man' while living off their sizeable inheritance, doing nothing all day.

'Treat' them. Wash them thoroughly. You'll find they're probably substantially smaller than you thought. Then dehair them. At this point, evaluate their size and maybe - just maybe - you'll be able to fit them in a jar after all.