The Young Knives are a British band who are unlikely to ever cross over to the mainstream, but are brilliant nonetheless, or maybe even because of this. They are classy, kooky, and more than anything, just downright fantastic.

They’ve been around in their current form since 2002, but have been getting increasingly more attention from the press and public since then. In 2007, they were one of the bands nominated for the Mercury Music Prize for Voices of Animals and Men.

Their new album, released on March 10th 2008, is called Superabundance, and received some brilliant reviews in the mainstream music press. None of the singles from the album have so far managed to make it in to the top 40, but maybe this, their new single, will change all that.

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The Feeling are a band who are never going to be cool, never going to get on the cover of NME, and never going to be the next big thing.

But you know what? None of that matters, as they put out some incredibly well written, and well composed pop songs, and after seeing them live, I know they’re fantastic in the flesh too. I’d even go as far to say they push Muse for title of Best Live Band in the UK right now.

This is actually the second time I’ve seen The Feeling live, the first being in the Manchester Apollo early last year, when the band were touring on the back of awesome début album Twelve Stops and Home.

This tour is their first since second album, Join With Us, was released last month, and if anything, they were even better this time around than last. I suppose that’s what touring constantly for a year does to you.

I entered the venue excited, and that excitement was paid back in full by a group at the absolute top of their game. From the moment they came on stage, the whole band had the crowd eating out their hand, with front man Dan Gillespie Sells being the main conductor of the 3,000 strong audience.

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Prince is American, always has been, always will be, I know this, you don’t need to tell me. So why then am I reviewing his new album Planet Earth on a British Music blog? Well, although I’ll be mainly covering British bands and singers, I reserve the right to occasionally review or talk about bands from other countries, especially if something they are doing has had a big impact on the British Music Scene. That is exactly what this album has done, causing debate around the world about the free give away of it with a Sunday newspaper. So let’s see if it’s actually worth paying for or is actually only fit as a freebie.

I’ve never really been a fan Of Prince although I respect him as a musician immensely. I thought the decision to break with the normal record business and give his album away free with a newspaper was a brave and bold move, which could result in a evolution of the music industry. I certianly don’t think he’ll be the last artist to do such a thing.

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This is Bloc Party, with their fantastically good new single ‘Hunting for Witches’ which came out on July 9th. The band have seemingly been everywhere in the past 2 weeks, with both Glastonbury and Live Earth performances under their belts. I think this song comes across really well both live and on record, and it’s my favourite song off 2nd album ‘A Weekend in the City’.

The song is highly political, with lead singer Kele Okereke making references to September 11, the London terror attacks, and The Daily Mail, a right wing British newspaper. Kele spoke about the song in an interview and said…

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