Kasabian vs. The World

Unhappy smiley! Everyone’s favourite northerners Kasabian have been at it again of late, this time offing their mouths in the direction of the lovely JustTin/TimberLake, who they accuse of being nothing more than “a midget with whiskers”.

Now, we don’t know many midgets here at HYG, maybe about seven, but the last time we checked, none of them was any more than about 4ft 6in tall. Certainly, none of them was 6ft 2in. In fact, we’re pretty sure that anyone over 4ft 10 in height can comfortably consider themselves to be sans dwarfism, which should make Timberlake, who stands at a height of about 6ft 2in, safe, right? So what can Kasabian possibly be talking about?

Traditionally, Kasabian interviews have been hotbeds for the type of insightful, accurate and rigorous rhetoric you’d associate with one of the country’s premier bands. And, definitely, nothing like old Oasis interviews. But with “The K Boys” (as we like to call them) dropping the ball on the whole midget issue, we decided it was time for an investigation into what‘s gone wrong.

A glance at the full article reveals the true extent of Kasabian frontman Tom Meighan’s rage for The ‘lake. Witness, though, as he makes several critical errors in his assessment:

"He’s just a midget with whiskers."

Not true. Aside from the basic technicalities that prevent him from actually being a midget, JT currently sports a pleasing bit of chin shrubbery, proven to be 98% less patchy than Meighan’s rather sorry effort. Next!

"He’s a puppet in a million-dollar suit."

What he neglects to mention here is that both these facts are actually amazing.

"It’s just money music. You can smell the money coming off it."

Here, poor old Tom fails to spot the exact reason why music is so brilliant in the first place, it smells like money! The smell of money coming off good pop is precisely what makes it good pop! If you don’t believe us, take the test:

1) Would Dusty Springfield ever have turned up for a special in a flea-bitten cardigan?
2) Would Outkast be quite so charming a prospect if they ditched the bling and made a low-budget live album with some Atlantan hookers?
3) Would Bob Dylan have been better if he’d had Pro-tools from the beginning?

The answers are: ‘No‘, ‘Double No’ and ’Almost Certainly, Yes’ respectively, thereby proving the positive correlation between money and the quality of music that is produced. And besides all which, this is very strange coming from the lead singer of a band who were given half-a-million pounds by a “mystery benefactor” to spend all summer on a farm recording their debut album.

Clearly, Tom’s having a bad day. But wait! Someone’s been to comedy classes, for here we have bassist Chris Edwards’ verdict on Justin’s last single:

"SexyBack? More like hairy back. It’s the worst title of any record I’ve heard in my life!"

Excuse us while we realign our entire perception of ‘funny’. He must be popular, with that wit. And this from a band who have brought us such monumentally bad composition titles as ‘Last Trip (In Flight)’, ‘Cutt Off’, ‘Ovary Stripe’ and ‘Orange’. Maybe he was being ironic.

In consideration, it isn’t clear why we’ve come to expect so much truth from Kasabian, when they’ve previously made claims like “We’re the fucking modernists!” (a progressive collection of artists, writers and thinkers from the late-18th, early-19th century); “We’re from the north, man” (100 miles north of London) and “We stand out in the middle of all that shit”.

But what of Kasabian’s new album, Empire, recently replaced at the top of the chart by, incidentally, Justin Timberlake’s latest release, FutureSex/LoveSounds? Is there any more sense to be found there? Sadly, no. It is as absurd and ridiculous as the band who have made it. Guitarist Serge Pizzorno reckons elements of it remind him of “The Chemical Brothers in the fucking sixties”, which is funny because track six, Apnoea, reminds us very much of The Chemical Brothers in the fucking nineties, and most of the rest of it reminds us of other stuff, too: Primal Scream in fucking 1999, Oasis in fucking 1994, or Kasabian themselves, in fucking 2004.

However, like with most things that are absurd and ridiculous, there are things to like about Empire. The title track is a very welcome slab of glam-pop in a distinctly scuzzy time, closer Doberman takes Muse close to the line in the running for best, most hysterically-overblown ending to an album this year, and the bit before the chorus on new single Shoot The Runner, where he shouts “bitch!”, that’s quite good as well, so. The whole thing’s a bit like a real empire: indulgent, guilty of decorating its walls with other people’s culture, bound to leave a nasty taste in the mouth 200 years from now, but, ultimately, something of a guilty pleasure while it lasts.

Still don’t trust a word they say, though.