After 2 and a bit years, we’ve decided to move Unreality Music to a new location – our new community site, Unreality Shout.

I’ll be running the site as Community Manager for want of a more high-fallutin’ title. Maybe I’ll think one up eventually. In the meantime, let me tell you a little bit about Shout and invite you to join the community:

• Great for music fans – create a fan group for your favourite band or singer and invite other fans to join and chat.
• Start your own blog – you can write about anything entertainment related: music, movies, TV shows, books and more.
• Contribute to wiki pages – are you the ultimate authority on a band, an actor or a TV show? Share your knowledge by contributing to wiki pages on your favourite subjects!
• Buddy up – you can invite your friends to join in the fun and build a network of friends and obsessives on Shout!
• Share pictures – got any pictures from gigs you’ve been to recently? You can upload them and share them with the world!
• Earn points for contributing – each contribution to the site earns you Shout Points which earn you a placement on the list of most active members!

As for me, I’m excited about growing the new community. I’ve been blogging for easily 4-5 years now, and Unreality Shout is our way of giving fans and bloggers a platform where they can share their opinions about their favourite subjects.

Anyway, I hope you’ll join me over on Unreality Shout – and if you need any help getting started, we have a help forum where you can ask for assistance!

For RSS subscribers, stay tuned – the feed will automatically start showing new music posts from Unreality Shout in a day or so.

OK, it’s the first I’ve heard of this so-called rock supergroup named Chickenfoot. And I’m guessing you’ve missed the newsflash too.

Chickenfoot is a band made up of guitar-whiz and Coldplay-litigator Joe Satriani, ex-Van Halen members Sammy Hagar (vocals) and Michael Anthony (bass). And long-time Red Hot Chilli Peppers drummer Chad Smith. It seems to be a strange, giddy mix, as evidenced by the video on chickenfoot.us, their official website.

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Chart watchers will be pleased to know it’s safe to come out now – Alexandra Burke and Leona Lewis have left the top 10.

Nothing against those two wonderful vocalists, of course, just that the whole Christmas period is drenched in X Factor generated schmaltz. I lose all faith in popular music when shows like X Factor dominate the charts. Oh look, you got a number one after being promoted for 13 weeks on primetime television! Hallelujah indeed.

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Actually, don’t answer that…

The reason Unreality Music’s been so quiet is a combination of a couple of days being sick and a weekend in lovely Prague.

There don’t seem to be any Czech pop stars, or I would devote a post to their work. Needless to say, the place was very beautiful and very cold.

Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled programming. I’ll repeat the call for contributors yet again – if you love music and you can write witty, interesting words about it, get in touch with me. We’re always looking for other bloggers to help out on the blogs.

For the last week or so, we’ve been running a poll on Unreality Music asking who you think will win the Best British Group award in this year’s Brits. Among the bands nominated are Arctic Monkeys, Editors, Girls Aloud, Kaiser Chiefs and Take That.

Pundits are predicting a big year for pop acts in this year’s Brit Awards, and the voting so far implies that Take That are on course for the gold. If you haven’t voted yet – now’s your chance!

You might have noticed a lack of posts from me on Unreality Music this week. I’m uninspired. The radio seems to be playing the same insipid songs on heavy rotation, and even the random blatherings of Chris Moyles and Sara Cox at the start and end of the day have me switching off.

Where’s all the good music?

It’s not in the charts. Much as I love the pop charts, sometimes they bore me to tears. The most exciting band I’ve heard this year were the Diablo Swing Orchestra. They pretty much blew everything else out of the water for me.

Anyway, I’ve decided to try and find more good music online. Which is where you come in.

Friends

In the immortal words of Led Zeppelin’s Friends:

Without a friend, there’s no denying,
You’re incomplete, they’ll be no finding
Looking for what you knew.

I usually hang out around a number of social networking sites focused around music. If you’re on any of the following services, look me up and give me your recommendation for new music:

1. Virb.com
2. PureVolume.com
3. MySpace.com
4. Last.fm

So come on dear readers…enlighten me with some good new music that won’t make me feel like the whole scene’s a-crumblin down. Blues, rock, metal, opera, pop, hip-hop, gangsta rap. I don’t care. As long as it sounds fresh, let me have it.

Otherwise, I’ll just have to look for myself….

Ugh. I’m back today after roughly a week off sick. I’ll spare you the gory details, but I’m feeling a lot better now, thanks very much!

Because of my absence, this blog hasn’t been updated in over a week.

I’d like to make sure that doesn’t happen again – if you’re interested in becoming a contributor to Unreality Music, then drop me a line to gerard at unrealitytv.co.uk.

Well folks, she underwhelmed with her last single When You’re Gone, but can Avril Improve with new single Hot?

In Hot, she’s taken the tempo up a bit and dabbles a bit in S&M lyrics – “I wanna lock you up in my closet” etc. Apparently, the song’s a dribbling tribute to her new husband Deryck Whibley (of Sum 41 fame).

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I think legally no publication in the UK is allowed to criticise the Gossip or Beth Ditto at the moment. Ditto seems to have become an overnight sensation and media darling in the UK. It’s not without substance either, because while you’ll read a lot about her view on weight issues, she’s a disarmingly funny and entertaining personality. I watched her guest stint on the Friday Night Project, and loved her sense of humour.

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I came across a great site on my travels across cyberspace this evening. The Filter is a music discovery website in a similar vein to Pandora that helps you to find music you’ll like based on your favourite artists.

As well as being able to search for music via the website, you can download a piece of software that plugs into your iTunes or Windows Media Player and it’ll give you recommendations based on your MP3 collection.

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