The Arctic Monkeys are without doubt, the biggest band in the UK right now. Their albums sell in huge amounts around the world, and their gigs sell out in hours, if not minutes. So it comes as a bit of a surprise to learn that they have chosen to release a single under a different name.

A band called Death Ramps have a 7″ vinyl single listed on Domino Records website (Arctic Monkeys record label) which includes the songs The Death Camps and Nettles. The reason we all know it’s the Arctic Monkeys is the not so subtle clue under the listing which says:

Unfortunately, we’re not allowed to tell you the true identity of the Death Ramps but needless to say they’re a band with A Certain Romance (wink, wink).

A Certain Romance is of course the name of one of the Arctic Monkeys songs, which appeared on Whatever You say I am, That’s What I’m Not.

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The Carling brand has become synonymous in recent years with live music, the academy clubs up and down the country, and the Reading and Leeds festivals, which they have sponsored for nine years.

Today it was announced that that partnership would be ending, with both parties ending it gracefully by mutual consent.

In a statement, Festival Republic’s Melvin Benn said:

“This marks a happy turning point in the festival’s history with Reading Festival reclaiming its name after the Carling Weekend association.”

This seems a shame because Carling, rightly or wrongly, have been responsible for a definite upsurge in popularity of live gigs, and these two festivals have done well as a result.

The Reading and Leeds festivals will be going ahead as normal, over the August bank holiday weekend as always, and the details and line up are expected to be announced soon.

I’m considering changing the name and nature of this blog to ‘Amy Winehouse Music Scene’, as there just seems to be so much news about her at the moment.

I know she’s a big druggie, and her problems have seemed to converge with her career going skywards but not a day goes by when I couldn’t put a troy up about her.

Over the last few days we’ve had Liam Gallagher going to town on her, and accusations that she killed a friend’s hamster, but I just couldn’t bring myself to write about them. Instead, maybe there’s some good news in the offing for Ms. Winehouse.

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Oh dear, that is not a good look. Even if Amy Winehouse didn’t have some mysterious white substance lodged in her nostril, she still wouldn’t be happy with this shot. As it is, with the white powder clearly on display, this becomes one of the most shocking pictures of her I’ve seen in a while.

This was taken by some lucky paparazzo as Winehouse emerged from her gig at the Empress Ballroom in Blackpool. She had had a successful gig, and was on her way out to greet fans, including a beehived 12 year old who she gave a pair of earrings to, when this less than glamorous shot was taken.

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The Spice Girls may have had a very successful comeback in terms of ticket sales for their world tour, but their comeback single ‘Headlines’ bombed, despite being in aid of the Children In Need charity, and they got some heat last week for miming rather than singing live on television.

Now, John McClure, lead singer of the Reverend and the Makers has launched a scathing attack on the group, questioning their motives for returning and flinging some quite personal insults.

He told the Daily Star newspaper:

“The Spice Girls are in it for the money. They’re totally devoid of talent and everyone knows why they’re back. All these reunions of old codgers like them is f**king rubbish.”

“The Spice Girls look like d**kheads, walking around in PVC like grandmas.”

Hang on a minute, they’re not THAT old, although I agree that Posh Spice looks like a drag queen, who has been dressed by blind midgets, in the video for ‘Headlines’.

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Radiohead, or at least portion of them (Thom and Ed) were interviewed by Steve Lamacq at BBC6 Music on Monday. They spoke about the new album ‘In Rainbows’, and various theories surrounding it.

We also heard Thom talk about his solo effort, and his plans for the future. Most intriguingly, Thom revealed that, like so many of the band’s fans, he actually paid nothing to download the album.

The main two theories, which web dwelling people with lots of time on their hands, and probably tin foil on their heads, have come up with go as follows:

The ‘Binary Code/Tens Theory’

In a nutshell, this one tries to explain everything by assuming the band were obsessed with the number 10 during the making of the album. The album was indeed released on October 10th, or 10/10; ‘In Rainbows’ is 10 letters long and has 10 tracks; and posts on Radiohead’s website featured phrases like “March Wa X” and “Xendless Xurbia,” all using the roman numeral X, which is 10.

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X Factor 2006 winner Leona Lewis has broken another record, this time for the fastest selling British début album of all time.

She already held one record previous to this week, after her debut single ‘A Moment Like This’ was downloaded 50,000 times in the first half hour of its release last December and sold 600,000 copies in its first week.

Her new album ‘Spirit’, sold 375,000 copies in its first week on sale, beating former record holders Arctic Monkeys by 12,000. They have held the record for over a year with ‘Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not’.

Lewis is now sitting at the top of both the singles and albums charts, and is set for a bit of a domination of the British charts in the run up to Christmas.

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Yesterday, a few of the bloggers here on the b5 music channel decided we couldn’t hold it in any longer, and the time was ripe to embarrass ourselves. So we each revealed our top ten guilty pleasures, those songs which although we love, know most people think suck.

You’ve read my post, which contained ten British songs that I just can’t bring myself to stop listening to, despite knowing they are shite, and here are the rest of the joys on offer. Have fun…

A Head Bangers Guilty Pleasures. 10 “Headset” Songs from Metal Martyr

My Top 10 Aussie Guilty Pleasures from Oz Music Scene

10 Songs I Love That I Know I Probably Shouldn’t from Our Digital Music

Guilty Pleasures: 10 songs to listen to alone from Big Apple Music Scene

My Top 10 Guilty Pleasure Songs from She Plays Music

Guilty Pleasures: Confessions of The Good Musician

The top 10 songs I sing in my car, alone from Ear Sucker

When you’re this cool… ten embarrassing songs… from Hippie Sounds

Guilty Pleasures…. GET OFF IT! from Industrial Addiction

10 Songs That I Should Be More Embarrassed About Liking from 52 Bands

We all think our music taste is the best, and most of us try and somehow inflict that taste on out friends, or in the case of blogging, on total strangers.

I am very confident in my music taste, thinking it is solid, with artists who are talented, and definitely acceptable to most people’s ears. But, everyone, including me, has those little gems hidden away somewhere, that they may not be quite so proud of.

Call them what you will, but for the means of this post, we are referring to them as Guilty Pleasures, and here are my Top Ten British Songs which I love, but maybe will get stick for…

They’re back, they still mime after all these years, and their songs are cheesy as hell, but I love this song. It may be sentimental claptrap but there’s something magical about it that I never get bored of.

Everyone loved this song at first, but then they turned, and started to hate it. The problem is, I didn’t follow them, and instead carried on adoring it. It’s a gorgeous song, with great lyrics, and I don’t even mind Blunt’s whining voice.

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At the beginning of October, Radiohead rocked the music industry by offering their new album ‘In Rainbows’ as a download only, and allowing the fans to pay what they wanted for it. If that meant 10p then so be it, although most people tended to pay more like £4 for it.

Now they have announced that the album will be getting a physical release through XL Recordings on New Years Day 2008, and have released the artwork which will go on the cover.

So now you can see what the album will look like sitting on your shelf or on top of that big pile of CDs you never play any more since buying an mp3 player.

It’s a bit weird to say the least, and can I suggest a bit amateurish?! I suppose it is in keeping with the experimental nature of the album, both in content and delivery.

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