This is TERRIBLE

'I know you like electro', says a brand new E4 Music-botherer called Master Shortie. Well of course he does, and so does the A&R guy who patched together such a lacklustre single and video. This is music-by-numbers at its very worst. The checked shirt, the 'skinny jeans' references, the beat that sounds a little bit like Banquet by Bloc Party (but not enough to necessitate royalties) - it's all there. It won't surprise you at all to learn that Shortie spent some time at the Brit School. Hopefully this doesn't wash with those who've experienced nightlife first-hand.

But I worry about the Skins generation. At the risk of sounding completely ancient, when I was about 16/17 you could go clubbing with a fake student card and/or some unconvincing facial hair. Now we're all forced to carry around a passport or driving licence - even those of us who couldn't possibly be underage. But that's another rant waiting to happen. My point is that sixth-formers now have to spend more time tasting nightlife vicariously. If all you really have to go on is stuff like Skins and Hollyoaks, you're likely to be carrying around all kinds of misconceptions about clubbing by the time you hit legal adulthood.

You might even think that commodified drivel like Dead End sounds cool. Worrying times ahead...

Five decent tunes by bands that you're not supposed to like

5. The Rakes - When Tom Cruise Cries (mp3)

I don't know what happened to The Rakes. 22 Grand Job used to get played in all the indie clubs, but now their name is like Voldemort to the wizarding community. Maybe their last album was too overtly political, I don't know. But this tune is class. Look out for the mobile phone interference mid-way through.

4. The Pigeon Detectives - I'm Not Sorry (mp3)

When these lads first got famous there was nothing wrong with liking them. They were probably the most energetic act to grace the music festivals of 2007. A bit of bad PR about a wet t-shirt contest later, they're more FHM than NME. (Maybe more Nuts and Zoo than FHM.) It didn't help that their second album is almost completely shit, I suppose. But I'm Not Sorry is a massive tune. If the singles market was still relevant to the over-12s, this would have been at the top of the charts for a long time.

3. The Kooks - Eddie's Gun (mp3)

By all accounts, Luke from The Kooks is loathsome. Once you've seen him interviewed, it's hard to feel sorry for him when you hear the songs that were inspired by how he loved and lost Katie Melua. But you've got to have some strange admiration for a man who sings about erectile disfunction, haven't you?

2. Razorlight - Vice (mp3)

Johnny Borrell is a kind of loathsome that Luke Kook will never become. That's because not only does Borrell think he's a musical genius, but he also thinks he's the new Bob Geldof/Bono/Jesus (depends on the amount of coke he's had). As part of his plan to save the universe, Razorlight's new music is nothing but insipid. But their first album had some great upbeat songs. It's one of those albums that got crafted over a number of years of touring tiny, sweaty venues. More bands should take a leaf out of The Cribs' book and stay that way for longer.

1. Coldplay - See You Soon (mp3)

Let's be honest, these days Chris Martin is nearly as much of a hate figure as Blair and Bush. But before he got a Hollywood girlfriend and named his child after fruit, Coldplay made some genuinely nice music. It was delicate, sad, quiet music. Many said it was depressing. Then all of a sudden he wasn't a virginal student, so he was singing about nothing in particular (with the help of a terrible, terrible rhyming dictionary) and showing off some terrible dance moves. It's a bit like how Oasis had nothing to say as soon as they were off the dole. Ah well, See You Soon is still lovely. It's like Fix You with the twat-factor cranked down from eleven to two.

Censorship is for c*nts

Apart from listening to her music, I hadn't been paying a great deal of attention to M.I.A. After all that talk of retirement, why would I have? Then Paper Planes ended up on the soundtrack to some film called Pineapple Express. So far the single has flown (see what I did there?) as high as #4 in the US Billboard charts. All of a sudden it looks like M.I.A. has a big opportunity to reach a much wider audience. Personally I'd really like to hear another album from her. Her messages are great. The beats are fun without compromising on richness, and vice-versa.

But here's the problem: MTV absolutely butchered Paper Planes. This is old news, to be honest, but I'm ranting about it because the censored video has only recently been getting UK airplay. M.I.A. was understandably livid when the edit first dropped, saying 'I WILL NEVER CENSOR THIS SONG' on her YouTube channel last December. But someone else did, and now it's stuck. There's still a lot of infectious elements in the song - from the sample of The Clash's Straight To Hell to the 'swagger like us' lyric that almost every US rapper has been sampling over the summer. But they got rid of all the gunshots! Apparently we the public are far too stupid to understand the sound effects as anything other than a glorification of gun crime.

The massive, massive irony is that this kind of paranoia is exactly what the song tries to highlight. I pity the suit-wearing pillock who put two and two together and came up with 'OH DEAR GOD, IT'S AN IMMIGRANT WITH GUNS!'

I was thinking of posting the butchered version as a point of comparison, but here's some unadulterated stuff instead:

M.I.A. - Bird Flu (mp3)
M.I.A./Diplo - Pop (mp3)