Last week, whilst browsing ANBAD, I noticed something very disturbing.

No, it wasn’t the a message in bold caps reminding me that browsing through your own website is a whole new kind of stupifying narcissism, but an advert that appeared in that innocuous box on the right of the page.

It was advertising the coming together of two dubious minds: an expensive-food ‘n’ dull-bands conflation that could only be billed under one fear-inducing name: Jamie Oliver Presents the Big Feastival with Alex James.

Yes, “Feastival”. Shudder with fear, all ye who enter. Let’s hope Jamie gets his band Scarlet Division back together for one last hurrah, eh folks?

MIXTAPE!

FIRST! Are you the Queen? Of course you’re not, as anyone who saw a television this weekend. Of course, Alabaster De Plume is the Queen. He’s the Queen. He’s the sodding Queen. Oh, just listen to the song: it may be lunacy, but no more crazy than having a non-elected head of state.

SECOND! Previous New Band Of The Day, Playhouse, have a predisposition for short, to-the-point pop songs. Conor, Oh Burst? is almost lost in a wall of stupendously pillow-soft white fuzz, but not quite. Playlounge know that if a chorus is a good one, it should be either used a) endlessly or b) only once – and they wisely opt for the latter.

THIRD! Joyland sound glum but happy. They also sound confused yet laser-guided. In today’s topsy-turvy world, that’s more than good enough.

FOURTH! The Traps might have made the most luxuriantly swoon-some song of this month, let alone just today. Your Headland is a sonic hand stroking the nape of your neck. Mmmmmm.