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Scouting For Girls are releasing another identikit single on April 10th called Heartbeat. Oh boy, I can hardly contain my excitement or, indeed, my bladder.

And why should I hold back the putrid waves of urine? Because Scouting For Girls are surely taking the piss with this blander-than-bland nonsense. Simon Reynolds over at DS poses an interesting question:

how long can Scouting For Girls push this factory-line indie sound before their fans tire of it?

The thing is, there’s not even a pretence of coming up with an original song. Each single they’ve released over the last few months has been a watered down regurgitation of the one before it. Heartbeat is just awful, and no amount of positive spin can change that.

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The Futureheads are one of the plethora of Indie bands that splurged onto the scene a few years ago and I’m not ashamed to say I can’t tell them apart from all the other guitar-wielding Indie kids of the time. Other chart watchers seem more familiar with them though, and they seem to think their sound isn’t what it was.

Sometimes having no point of reference is a good thing, though. Because I can’t thumb my nose at The Beginning Of The Twist. It’s a riotous slab of Indie-rock and no mistake, guv.

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We were not expecting this. A few years ago, the Observer Music Magazine was trumpeting Guillemots as the next big thing. Thing is, they never really hit the mainstream. And judging by how absurdly offbeat they are, I didn’t really expect them to hit the mainstream anyway.

And the story should end there. Except they went and unexpectedly released Get Over It.

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Yes, MGMT are one of those bands on the big hype list for 2008. So my bullshit radar is off the map even before I’ve started.

Things don’t start well when the song begins with some weird-ass sound effects. Then we have possibly the lowest-budget music video in decades. I can’t even begin to describe the horror of those special effects!

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Sometimes good things come out of running a telly blog. A couple of Fridays ago, I got the opportunity to go to Bristol and meet a bunch of participants in the BBC’s Upstaged competition.

One of those folks was Elle Williams, the lead singer with Bristol-based indie band HiFlyer. Now, I’m normally discovering new music via my computer, so it was refreshing to meet up with Elle and have a bit of a chat. It wasn’t until I got home that night that I checked out HiFlyer’s music and was totally blown away. So much that I’m recommending them to you, dear reader…

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The Wombats return with the awesome Moving To New York, proving that they didn’t exhaust the supplies of Indie-juice with their last single.

I know I’m late to the party with this one. I always find that I forget to review the singles that I like the most. Like Jay-Z’s Roc Boys. Loved it. Still haven’t written about it.

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I read an hilarious review of the Scouting For Girls album over on Drowned In Sound today that riffs on about ‘Mondeo Pop’: described as ‘indie with a mortgage’.

The reviewer, Carrie Bradshaw Layfield lays into the band in a big way, and puts her many points across with an enthusiasm and flair which I just had to share with you guys.

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Martin emailed me yesterday to let me know about Irish indie band, Dark Room Notes.

The Dublin based quartet are our first recommendation for 2008, and you should go and check out their MySpace (just as soon as you’ve read this page!). They’re really quite excellent.

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Hot on the heels of She’s So Lovely, Scouting For Girls deliver yet another up-tempo indie anthem.

Let’s forget that those thick Northern accents drive me psychotic at the moment and concentrate on the song. It’s virtually identical to the last one. Except with a different chorus.

No matter what the subject matter, Scouting For Girls seem to play to an upbeat, cookie-cutter style that has nothing to do with the lyrics. Their unshakable belief in big dumb repetitive choruses is obvious in both Elvis Ain’t Dead and She’s So Lovely.

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Toothpaste Kisses is our first encounter with The Maccabees here on Unreality Music.

It’s a very old-sounding, stripped down song. Apparently the normal Maccabees sound is a much more lively punk noise. Instead, Toothpaste Kisses is a simple track mostly focusing on singer Orlando Weeks’ vocals and an understated mostly acoustic backing.

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