I think my favourite album this year (so far) has been Brutalism by IDLES - they're a punk band from Bristol. For a debut album, Brutalism is so coherent as an album - there's a weird off-kilter ambience to its basic and brutal - ha! - viciousness (and it's vicious as anything at points) that I'd really recommend.…

There was a review I read of the End of Time which hypothesised that RTD came up with that god-awful "Master Race" pun and wrote the entire two-parter around it. I'm a lot less down on the End of Time than a lot of people, but that moment is just the worst.

Whisper it but (for myself at least) AHS: Hotel so far has actually hit the dizzying heights of "quite good". After the utter wank that Coven and Freak Show splattered across our planet's television screens, Hotel's been entertaining as all fuck by comparison. It's still not quite at the mad brilliance of Asylum yet,…

I splashed out on the 423-disc edition of Adore a few months back, and while it's ludicrously self-indulgent - there's only so many takes of For Martha you can hear - it's really fascinating to hear Corgan's evolution as a songwriter. There's some utterly lush outtakes on it too, which helps - the Rubin-produced Let…

Forgive me, it's been a while since I've read it, but there was a review of (I think) the Siamese Dream deluxe reissue where the critic wrote a compelling argument as to why Cherub Rock's opening minute was the greatest opening minute of any album ever. I wish I could find it, because it's really well-argued -…

Despite all your wage, you are still just a bot in a cage.

I've always felt that the problem with Bullet With Butterfly Wings is that the only way that you can ever listen to it without immediately dying of laughter the minute the chorus kicks in is if you first hear it when you're fifteen and you've just been grounded for something you, like, didn't even do but even if you…

Fuck yes (an ode to your great point, ho ho ho), Zero's solos are absolutely savage - in my opinion they're a big reason why the song works. The whole thing's a bit too mechanical and detatched sound-wise up until that point, and Billy Corgan's "woe-is-me" lyrics threaten to overpower the song's killer riff and push…

Adore's an album you have to forgive a fair bit to get into. Arguably it's more bloated than the preceding double album, which is absolutely ludicrous. But its high points are just so damn good - the melancholy of Perfect and To Sheila, the pulsating qualities of Ava Adore (if not its awful-even-by-Corgan-standards…

See, that's what I love about Soma above all else - the way that it's got a million little guitar tracks noodling about that suddenly snap into focus for that monster distortion chorus and the solo.

To piggyback on your point about Corgan's ability to structure a song, I reckon that his ability as a guitarist - and in particular as a soloist - warrant a mention in this regard. Every solo of the songs during the Pumpkins' peak was more than just a way to show off how great Corgan was at playing the guitar, they…

Objectively, Mellon Collie is a big sprawling mess - it's the musical equivalent of a fifty foot gold statue of Billy Corgan with the words "I AM A GOD DAMN GENIUS LOVE ME" written at the base in diamonds. Diamonds that are on fire. Siamese Dream is more emotionally resonant, and Adore is far more interesting and…

Texas

It's not really my favourite, to be honest.

That'd be nice - but considering the utter toxicity of the Parliamentary Labour Party, I give it three days before the Mail's running "Out of touch Corbyn faces backbench rebellion over lack of dead pig fucking, claims Shadow Cabinet minister."

It's been a long time since I've watched this one, and I remember that it started off alright - it had the whole "we're OWL exterminators" bit which was pretty great, a relatively decent plot, etc. Unfortunately it completely ground to a halt when the story shifted to Cornwood, and became a slog pretty much straight…

Good for you.

I'd go with Captain Irving from Sleepy Hollow, just for the fact that he was willing to be strung along with any old bullshit that Abigail would bring him.

[makes tired satirical jab about religion, hates self for doing so]

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