Daft Bodies (male version, Simpsons version):

Daft Hands (6x speed version):

Dwarfed Punk:

Groovy Dancing Girl:

Also don't miss The Daft Punk's Console by najle.com.

Steal This Comic. Happy Rocktober!

This is for every life story
Every detail
Ex-dot com millionaires
With shitty jobs in retail
Every ingrown toenail
Pile of junk mail
Driving test fail
Vain search for the Holy Grail

Every move you make
Every breath you take
Every 12 inch record your dumped girlfriend decided to break
And all the underachieving geezers getting more leaning and
Piza on melon Bacardi Breezers and skinny plastic cached reefers
And every impotent porn star
And the girls with the red lights on doing tricks with Mars bars
And all the ravers wishing they were back in '89
'Cos everything was so much better the first time

Jack Jack Jack Jack your body

And all the buskers looking for change in the station
Every money grabbing musical collaboration
And every last member of the X generation
Addicted to the internet, drugs and masturbation

Forget me this is all about you
Forget us this is all about you
Forget we this is all about you
We're just the siphon the sounds come through
Forget me this is all about you
Forget us this is all about you
Forget we this is all about you
We're just the siphon the sounds come through

This is for every life story
Every chapter
Every memory stored
And photograph captured
Cause even the most mundane things can shine forth like a beacon
Make your palms sweaty and knees weaken
Well there's an awful lot of false gods speaking
We're scratching in the dark for something true to believe in
Just keep breathing
And hope that in the long run
That's a real hand you're tightly squeezing
This is for everybod' who got cussed down in the playground
And every bad boy who shit it when his mates weren't around
And all the bedroom DJs perfecting their skills
And every girl with a complex and a handful of slimming pills

Forget me this is all about you
Forget us this is all about you
Forget we this is all about you
We're just the siphon the sounds come through
Forget me this is all about you
Forget us this is all about you
Forget we this is all about you
We're just the siphon the sounds come through

This is for every life story
Every intertwined tale of guts and glory
Course some of them are nice and bright and corny
And some of them will shake your hand less warmly
Outlook still stormy
Every sweeping saga from the here now to the here after
Tall tales around the campfire
Tragedies of fallen empire
And everything that will and won't transpire
Sometimes it's just too diabolical

Carrying our stories like DNA in hair follicles
Lugging chronicles like baggage handlers
I'm not sticking around
I'm shipping out with the ramblers
Collecting chapters of fractures and raptures
High on a cactus with a bunch of backpackers
Toasting Bacchus with a shot of Cachaca
But that's another story
And I'll tell it if you let me
But in the meantime just remember to forget me

Forget me this is all about you
Forget us this is all about you
Forget we this is all about you
We're just the siphon the sounds come through
Forget me this is all about you
Forget us this is all about you
Forget we this is all about you
We're just the siphon the sounds come through

They were a support act substituting for Simple Plan who had pulled out. Apart from enjoying the catchy Cash Machine ("There's a hole in my pocket, my pocket, my pocket"), I thought nothing much of them and spent more of my energy on enjoying the 65,000 crowd with a camera in one hand and a beer in the other. They were to release their debut album a month later.

And they've since grown on me to the point that they're currently one of my favourite bands.

They formed in Staines, England (the home of Ali G, aaii) in 2003 and have two studio albums: Stars of CCTV and Once Upon a Time in the West (an interesting read concerning the cover art, or lack thereof, including those for the singles).

Hard-Fi's musical style is a mix of post-punk, indie and a Clash style of punk rock. They also take inspiration from other genres such as ska. On Stars of CCTV, they had a very raw sound, loud guitars, and frequent use of guitar, in contrast to Once Upon A Time In The West, on which there is a lot more orchestration, the use of strings is very apparent, most notably in the song "Watch Me Fall Apart".

And an obligatory YouTube pick from the hardfiband channel - 'Suburban Knights', the first track off their second album:

You might also enjoy fellow Brit bands:

• Kaiser Chiefs
• The Fratellis
  
• Athlete
  
• Razorlight
  
• And NYC's The Bravery (I always thought they were British too...)

This one features Owen Reynolds and Sean Gandini of Gandini Juggling - the world's leading group of juggling specialists.

It was developed by MetropolitanRepublic and The Jupiter Drawing Room for MTN Business, like last year's catchy MTN Handclap ad.

On the Handclap ad, I enjoyed this comment:

That's cool. But seriously: what does it have to do with cellphones? Still - I guess it's nice to see MTN putting content ONTO youtube for a change - instead of just taking it off ;-)

The commenter is of course referring to MTN's confusing OK Go ad (on Cherryflava), which sparked some conversation in the comments around... what would you call it, "brand association"?

Co-branding is also an interesting concept.

Back to the juggling ad. Via BizCommunity's Greg Gray directs new MTN "Jugglers" commercial:

According to Paul Warner Executive Creative Planner for MetropolitanRepublic, "We used a visual metaphor of juggling to illustrate the power of two in business. This involved scouting the world for the top juggling duo to pull this off."

Director Greg Gray of Velocity Films and Warner then worked with the juggling duo to develop a specific sequence for the ad from the juggler's repertoire of juggling “formations” before shooting began. In the edit process an interesting sound track from RJD2's Deadringer album was secured to complement the engaging juggling routine and the result is a striking piece of film that successfully highlights the benefits of a partnership in business.

RJD2's music has been featured in a number of global advertisements - locally, you'll hear Smoke and Mirrors (also off his "Deadringer" album) in J&B's "Connect" ad (what's your 1.618?). The only version I can find of it is a small and low quality version here.

And if you're still feeling uninspired, MetropolitanRepublic have a really nice site. Execution flaws aside, it's a simple and strong concept that I've never seen before. Love it!

Despite them being my sole reason for attending, and sound-engineering issues aside, Lark's performance lacked the energy, enthusiasm and passion that I'd become accustomed to and was hoping to experience one last time. And even then, it was overshadowed by the two days of aural hell that was the Ramfest music festival itself.

I just came across the official "Why" interview by Evan Milton, first published in the Weekend Argus: 'No larking about as Lark goes', having missed Apartment's post in my feed reader at the beginning of this month.

Despite winning a South African Music Award, establishing a growing national fanbase and releasing two highly acclaimed albums, boundary-pushing "glitch-opera" alternative four-piece Lark have announced that they are to disband - but not before they've set the record straight as to why.

Continue reading through the wrath of comments that ensue. If you're not on FB (as if), here's a mirror.

Dos.
Last week I was a little closer to home, at MyPepsiFest, where I caught one of my all-time favourite international bands play their first gig on our shores. Muse, along with the Kaiser Chiefs, were the sole reason for my attendance at the day-long festival. Their set was mind-blowing, right from the moment when they opened with my favourite track off BH&R.

Tres.
And then there's Prime Circle, the most overrated band ever. I purposefully arrived late to said day festival to avoid hearing them. Have you ever wondered where they borrowed that disturbingly-forced, North American-accentuated and boringly-formulated sound of theirs? Take a listen to Default. It's uncanny.

Catorce!

And digging Miss Kate Nash...

According to Last.fm, my Top 10 Tracks (ie. most played) for the last year are:

• Imogen Heap - Hide and Seek
• Yellowcard - How I Go
• The Fray - Over My Head (Cable Car)
• Nelly Furtado - All Good Things (Come to an End)
• Yellowcard - Down on My Head
• Farryl Purkiss - Better Days
• John Mayer - Waiting on the World to Change
• The Shins - Phantom Limb
• Justin Timberlake - What Goes Around.../...Comes Around Interlude
• Regina Spektor - On the Radio

Fairly accurate I think! My Top Albums and Top Artists charts are pretty similar (aside from the JT, hah), although they're not entirely reflective of what I've enjoyed most since I run the Last.fm client across multiple machines with different music, and listen to a lot of other stuff in my car too.

So to the top of the artists list I'd add The New Pornographers, Athlete, Foo Fighters (how awesome is "Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace"!), Just Jack, The Kooks, Citizen Cope, Death Cab for Cutie and Cold War Kids.

And for good measure, here's a Last.fm playlist consisting of 15 tracks I'm currently enjoying. I've tried to put them into some kind of listenable order. Nice to see Ms Carver's tracks on Last.fm, and a bit of guilty pleasure at #9. ;)

The biggest news, via Oppikoppi, is the nationwide AMPLI5 Tour:

5FM, in association with Jose Cuervo Tequila, is exposing the hottest new local & international bands on a stage near you this August. A fusion of cutting-edge local & international music superstars will set the stage for the nationwide Ampli5 tour - one of the most amplifying platforms the music scene has ever seen!

Local music heroes The Parlotones, Love Jones, HHP, Dorp, Max Normal TV, Gang of Instrumentals and Fokofpolisiekar will team up with international headliners Groove Armada, Jimmy Eat World (!!) and Violent Femmes to get the music grooves flowing for fresh new music talent to hit the stage and prove their worth.

Ampli5 is planned as a long term venture between 5FM and Oppikoppi Productions, and kicks off at the Oppikoppi Festival on 9 August, then travels to the Coca Cola Dome in Johannesburg on 10 August and finally hits the Bellville Velodrome in Cape Town on 11 August.

Jimmy Eat World in Cape Town, sweetness! This is the kind of line-up the MyCrapFest events should have showcased.

Part of Ampli5 is PrintSLAM 2007, an artistic initiative sponsored by Levi's Original Music - "the first ever annual poster art print exhibition in South Africa". Again via Oppikoppi:

In keeping with the progressive, multimedia, fusion arts-approach of the tour, PrintSlam will be travelling along with Ampli5 nationwide. This exhibition - with the aim of supporting new, up-and-coming screen print artists - will feature poster prints relevant to festivals, bands, music and other live entertainment. Close to 30 artists will be selected to display five prints each, of which 10 copies of each print will be made available for sale for the artist's own income at each Ampli5 event.

The closing date for submissions is the 9th of July 2007 - two weeks away - so get those creative juices pumping! Full details here.

UPDATE [27/06]: More info here

Released last year, it was produced by the collective creative talents at Ontwerp (brilliant site) and Humanoid. If you're a late arrival to the party like me, you can download it here (15mb mov) or read more about it at LQF and mvdbase. It was voted "Best music video of all time" on MK89.

After listening to this track while typing up this post I began to draw similarities with the equally-brilliant Muse: Lark's music has been described as "glitch opera", "alternative electro" (I like this description best), "new age trip hop"... among other things. If you're not yet familiar with them, here's a brief bio compliments of MusoSpace and Last.fm:

Lark has been together since April 2003 and is a four piece band originating from Cape Town, South Africa: they are Inge Beckmann (lyricist & vocalist), Paul Ressel aka Humanizer (music production & instrumentation), Simon Fuzzy Ratcliffe (multi-instrumentalist & studio engineer) and Sean Ou Tim aka Mr Sakitumi (drums).

Their music is a groundbreaking blend of electronic beats, audio manipulation and organic instrumentation resulting in a sound that explores new musical territory. Lark's offering is an honest and gritty challenge to the audience to abandon their preconceived ideas about music. The visual presence and style of the band immediately reference the music eclectic, original and unafraid.

In April this year, Lark's debut album 'Razbliuto' won a SAMA for "Best Alternative Album".

They're a true class act if you're ever fortunate enough to catch one of their live performances - as it happens, if you're in Cape Town this week or next, you're in luck.

tttrrrrrrrrr...!

And here's something completely different.

The term incendiary refers to a fire that has been deliberately set. While it is most often used to refer to crimes of arson, it is also technically correct to use it for any fire which has been deliberately started. (via)

Application: "The new Nudies album available on Kalahari.net for only R92.76 is like, totally incendiary, man!"