2007 has seen, and will continue to see, some truly excellent dance albums work their way into the light of day from the not-so-dead of night. We had !!!, back in March, which switched on the pilot light for a summer of fiery raving in fields, forests and front rooms; in the coming weeks we’ll be blessed by floor-filling LPs from Simian Mobile Disco and Justice – both well worth their respective asking prices. And then there’s LCD Soundsystem’s Sound Of Silver, sure to be battling it out with Battles come December for a high position on DiS’s end-of-year best-of run-down.
Which leads to a pretty simple question: why the fuck does anyone need this, the debut album from Dumfries-based 23-year-old Calvin Harris? Indeed, why does he need to release an album, at all? A pair of singles – the all-over-the-radio ‘Acceptable In The 80s’ and its sound-alike follow-up ‘The Girls’ – have paved the way for a future (presumably big-money) collaboration with the queen of everything camp-pop, Kylie. Surely he can see out the rest of his career as a producer... please?
Said singles are tolerable enough, truth be told – they come on the transistor and few bat an eyelid, let alone twitch a knee – but 14 tracks of exactly the same shit? Come on, Harris: this is a joke, right? Oh, wait, it can’t even be that. We’re not laughing.
You might be the biggest fan ever of I Created Disco’s preceding standalone offerings, but you’ll still be numbed statuesque by this slab of soulless, cheap-as-chips, Amiga 500-toned monkey-funk pleb-dance toss. Surely you’re meant to be able to dance to dance music? Equally surely, Harris has failed to recognise this simple equation, instead filling his first – and most probably last – long-player with beats that vary precisely not at all from song to song, vocals straight out of a Xanax-chomping teenager’s YouTube monologue about the state of, y’know, trivial shit, and an overall tone that’s consistent only in one respect: it’s consistently annoying.
“Stop me if I’ve said it before,” utters our would-rather-be-elsewhere (based on all the enthusiasm in his voice) protagonist on ‘Neon Rocks’, presumably unaware that nearly everything he’s ever had to say with his music was over and done with only a minute in to ‘Acceptable…’. This is a repetitive, patience-bending, mind-crippling, shit-shovelling slice of beyond-basic drivel. And, more importantly, you can’t dance to it. Unless you’re one of those battery-powered flower-in-a-pot things, with a crappy plastic guitar and huge sunglasses. Then you have no choice. Sorry.
Fucking shite, then, and as har har funny as getting stabbed in the eye by an old tramp’s decaying cock. Buy everything listed in that first paragraph and leave this to collect dust in the bargain bin. Or, better still, the bins out the back of HMV.
Is this Milo
under a different name?
Tis a bag of shite who/whatever it is.
Worst review ever
And I'm replying below a man who knows a thing or two about them.
Has Freddy Eastwood
gone yet?
:(
Mylo?
That is a really vulgar and spiteful review
Not that I'm a fan of Harris or anything, I think he sucks. But God, that just makes for vile, scraping-the-bucket reading.
With or without
a "y" it's still horrible.
Yourcodenameis?
Please don't compare
Mylo to Calvin Harris. Destroy Rock n Roll (the album) is ace!
And Mike, thankyou for the Amiga 500 mention. You've almost made me want to bask in nostalgia and pull out Stunt Car Racer, The Secret of Monkey Island and Defender of The Crown.
Stunt Car Racer
Man that takes me back. How hard was that game! Don't forget 'Another world' and 'Flash Back'.....
'mon the Stunt Car
and 'Flash Back' - oh yes, you are a man of taste sir.
Another World!
My god. With those slugs that you had to kick at the start. Genius. Sigh.
Calvin Harris is a c*nt and makes me ashamed to be english...
...and he sexually molested my hamster
Bash the flavour of the month time?
It's really not that bad, and the two singles are the worst tracks. 'Colours' is the pick of a better-than-this-claims bunch. Pure pop, done well. Comparing it to genuine dance albums is about as relevant as putting McDonalds up against Gourmet Burger Company.
PS: Nice recommendations, but the SMD album is very disappointing.
idk
what to hate more...his music, or his name
Crash and Burn
Fantastic acerbic honesty. Quality
You used to write good reviews...
i fucking despair of this place sometimes
I mean, how predictable a review score is this? We get it.. you don't like pop, you're above all that pleb shit, you like 'real' music.
and to anyone who says "god, he's allowed to not like something, subjectivity blahdeblah" i say "well durrrr", but i reckon it goes way beyond that. This sort of pop bashing stance is getting to be quite ridiculous really. I understand writing scathing reviews is pretty fun, but if you want to do it better pick someone nobody here is gonna stand up for. Pop it is then. Either that or (more worryingly) you want to align yourself with what you deem to be your readership, creating an "us vs them" attitude. Or you just came in to the review with a set of preconceptions about Harris, which is pretty shoddy journalism as well.
Bottom line is this: all the negative points you've mentioned in the review would be glossed over or explained away for a more 'credible' band. But you don't like Calvin Harris, and neither do we. So fuck him.
Yours sincerely
Smezzer
DiS's Premier Pop Apologist
lol
me and my girlfriend saw him at a free festival in newcastle. we walked out after two songs.
an absolutely hateful cunt.
.
i originally thought this review was over the top in its malice. but i've just seen his new video and it really is the most abominable piece of shit song i've heard in christ knows how long. 'absolutely hateful cunt' is right.
i mean, its twenty to three and i've just turned on the computer because im so offended i had to write it down.
as for the review, its repetitive and not really necessary (who on DiS was going to buy this album anyway?) but if i had to listen to this utter utter cunt for 14 tracks, i'd be spewing bile too. in fact, i already am. fucking shit.
Go Smezzer!
If Calvin Harris was french or if he had some interesting back story involving rebelling against a mormon upbring in Uganda, DiS would LOVE him.
You might not think Acceptable in the 80's is a very good example of commercial dance pop, but I have a feeling you people think DISCO by Justice isn't commercial dance pop at all.
this you can dance to
as opposed to D.A.N.C.E.which is really much too slow. Mr. Harris isn't breaking any ground and shouldn't win any awards but Merry Making, Girls and 80's are great on a dancefloor.
...
Why waste time writing about music like this? unless there's some incentive from their label to make you do it? Ah Well. Least it got some coverage for the poor old Amiga, i remember a game called ABP which was brilliant...wish i could play it now *sigh
Just what is this 'it'
that was so acceptible in the 80's anyway?
Tom Hanks
Worst. Sentence. Ever.
'Fucking shite, then, and as har har funny as getting stabbed in the eye by an old tramp’s decaying cock.'
accurate though.
.
accurate enough review...
this album is just awful, I agree in the aspect that he should stick to production for Kylie and Madonna and such. Terrible in comparison to the majority of electronica albums released this year, in which there was an abundance of quality releases in that genre, for a change.
to be honest.
this review is just as dubious as this calvin bloke. i know it's mainstream but come on.
The album can't be that bad
- it managed to avoid zero.
(...and judging by the score, it contains 1.4 good songs (or at the very least 0.7, if we were rounding scores up very generously).)
...
"repetitive, patience-bending, mind-crippling, shit-shovelling slice of beyond-basic drivel"
Mike Diver is the new Charlie Brooker - I enjoyed the review, its probably over-zealous in its criticism though, don't turn all NME now!
An amusing review
Diver can review as many shit pop albums as he likes as long as he keeps writing some good reviews from time to time.
I don't think he's made me go out and get a record since his Wires on Fire review a bit ago, so he's due.
what the fuk is
wrong with being mainstream?
a good song is a good song.
who cares if its in the charts? i think some people try pretending like theyr too good for the masses like.
i wud understand if u were bitchin about the cheeky girls (or even mika) but calvin has some decent songs
theres better music makers on myspace anyway.
has any1 heard of Kash or partyshank?
amazing
www.myspace.com/kashlondon