Apparently, yesterday was ‘Quit Myspace Day’, or at least one hardy soul was trying to make it thus. An analyst would say that it ‘gained moderate traction‘, and then rest of us would say, ‘who cares’?

Quitting Myspace seems as pointless as joining Myspace. Like most people, I’ve hated Myspace from day one, for all the same reasons everyone always lists – it’s ugly, it breaks, the music streaming is specifically designed to make you angrily pound your head into the keyboard, etc.

WE // ARE // ANIMAL – Black Magic

The counter argument doesn’t really need mentioning. Myspace, despite the infinitely more useful Bandcamp and Soundcloud, is still the de facto music source for listening to new bands. Maybe it’s a quirk of social acceptance that something ugly and useless is at the top of the pile. Perhaps we should gain hope from this, rather than hatred.

Oh, and every band that ever emails me asking for a review always has a Myspace link. Just like the one WE // ARE // ANIMAL sent me, which meant I discovered Black Magic, a song that slips quietly away from their usually bracing rock bluster by way of twitchy, spasmodic guitars and a vague air of social disconnection.

WE // ARE // ANIMAL, just like every other band for the last 30 years, want to rock like Thin Lizzy, but need to find another way of doing it, lest they are treated as yesterday’s men. Their chosen method of alchemical differentiation is to imbue their songs with a feeling of alienation and of removal.

This may possibly related to their geographical isolation – they hail from the hills of Wales – or it may not. Either way, they use it as a means to rock. This is as good a reason as any. Great.

www.myspace.com/weareanimal