Cut Copy - Zonoscope

After finding success in 2008 with their second album In Ghost Colours, it might be considered a brave move for Cut Copy to have waited three years before following up with Zonoscope. Pop music is after all, a fast moving business. Would the moment have passed? Would their sound still be relevent?

Answer - bah, who cares when their brand of new-wave synthpop has hardly been relevant since 1983 anyway? The bottom line is there will still be a market for Zonoscope, just as there has been for their previous, unashamedly retro, releases.

The Go! Team - Rolling Blackouts

The Go! Team are all about bringing the party, theirs is music to dance to. And I don't mean dance well, I mean dance like an epileptic Peter Crouch coked up to his eyeballs and standing under a strobe light. The Brighton sextet's latest effort, Rolling Blackouts is their third, and continues to bring together old-school New York hip-hop, live indie guitars, and brash 70s soul horns, with a childish sense of fun.

80s Movies: Innerspace (1987)

Right, I admit I don't have much of a first-hand recollection of the 1980s (I was 5 when the decade ended) but I do have a cetain fondness for the films of the era. What 80s movies really mean to me is my memories of watching the movies that would come on TV or that we owned on VHS in the 90s, and I can't have watched any more often than Innerspace.

Starring Dennis Quaid (The Right Stuff, Frequency), Martin Short (Three Amigos, Father of the Bride) and Meg Ryan (When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless In Seattle), this peculiar little sci-fi/comedy/action-adventure hybrid was a Christmas tradition in our house for years, always to be accompanied by mince pies and piles of chocolates. It's no wonder I remember it fondly.

It comes with bags of 80s cred too though, in the form of director Joe Dante (Gremlins, The Burbs) and executive producer Steven Spielberg (Indiana Jones Trilogy, ET: The Extra Terrestrial).

80s Movies: Labyrinth (1986)

You remind me of the babe. What babe? The babe with the power... Labyrinth remains one of my absolute favourite movies - and not in a nostalgic way, either. I love it because... well, partly because it's a full-on 80s movie, but also for a million other reasons. Brilliant dialogue, superb puppetry, two of my favourite actors - David Bowie (Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars, Zoolander) and Jennifer Connelly (Inventing the Abbotts, Dark City) - and a storyline that's genuinely unpredictable.

We're talking about a film that is forever in my recently watched DVDs pile - and when I'm not watching it, I'm often listening to Bowie's incredible soundtrack. Majestic, magical, and much-maligned, his compositions might not be totally timeless but they suit the film absolutely perfectly.

80s Movies: The Secret of My Success (1987)

Let's be clear about this - I love The Secret of My Success. It's one of the truly great unsung heroes of the 80s. For a start, it stars not only Michael J Fox (Back to the Future, Doc Hollywood) but also Helen Slater (Ruthless People, Supergirl). For a committed child of the 80s, you don't get many better lead pairings than that.

On top of that, it's good clean fun. Not childish - not all vampires and wizards - but grown-up, clean humour with a smattering of smut. Notable in this respect is the scene with Yello's Oh Yeah as its backing track, in which Fox's Brantley Foster tries to extricate himself from a particularly delicate situation.

80s Movies: Popeye (1980)

Popeye was released in December 1980 - before I was born, in fact. I didn't even know it existed until a childhood visit to Malta about ten years later, when we spent a day at the incredible Popeye Village set in Anchor Bay. Back in the UK, we invested in a VHS copy of the film and I caught up on Robin Williams' first starring role.

If you haven't seen it, you probably should - love or hate Robin Williams, he makes a great Popeye and the supporting cast, including Shelley Duvall as Olive Oyl - not to mention one of the greatest sets ever constructed for a film - bring the cartoon world to life in a way we may never see the likes of again. While researching this piece, I was surprised to learn that Popeye was directed by Robert Altman - whose Short Cuts is as visionary a piece of film-making as I can recall seeing.

DVD & Blu-ray Round Up: Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps

Popsiculture's release of the week has to go to Oliver Stone's Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps. The follow up to his legendary 1987 polemic against the excesses and shady dealings of the American banking industry, Money Never Sleeps could not have had a better real-life backdrop or it's release last year. Following the collapse of the sub-prime mortgage market, and subsequent worldwide economic crisis, surely Gordon Gekko's mantra that 'Greed is good' has never been more contentious.

So the iconic Gekko being released from prison for his former indiscretions, and returning to his old ways is an interesting and timely subject for Stone to explore. Unfortunately though, the resulting film fails to hold interest as it should.

Singles Round Up: Jessie J and B.o.B

A bit of a new feature for Popsiculture today as Bobble and I cast our eyes (and more importantly our ears) over the single releases for the week. Our single of the week to be released on 30th January 2011 is Price Tag, the new track from hot properties Jessie J and B.o.B.

Jessie J and B.o.B - Price Tag
Bobble: The BBC's Sound of 2011 winner (as predicted by POPSICULTURE's Dansquad) teams up with B.o.B on a near-anthemic track that's both laid back and kinda sweet. Not my genre of choice but I like to think that makes it mean all the more when I actually like a song - and I do like this one. Looks like the Beeb got it right this time around.
>> Jessie J on iTunes


Enrique Iglesias ft. Ludacris - Tonight
Dan: That old romantic Enrique Iglesias has fallen in with the wrong crowd on this new collaboration with Ludacris. An otherwise forgettable club track is only given interest by the Andy Gray-esque chorus of "Please excuse me I don't mean to be rude, but tonight I'm fucking you". The Single includes Tonight (I'm Fucking You) and the radio edit Tonight (I'm Loving You).
>> Enrique Iglesias ft Ludacris - Tonight on iTunes

Barbarellas - Body Rock
Bobble: I loved B*Witched and it's great to see the girls releasing new material - even if it is only Edele and Keavy. Sadly I don't think this has the same distinctive personality that B*Witched always had - hopefully their next effort will be better. The video's kinda cool though.
>> Barbarellas - Body Rock on iTunes

B.o.B. - I'll Be In the Sky
Dan: Okay, I'm biased, I didn't particularly expect to, or want to like this, but B.o.B. certainly has a sort of madcap, cartoonish charm about him, and this re-release of one of his back catalogue shows him on good form. Not as commercial as his first few mega-hits, I'll Be In The Sky is a song to chill to.
>> B.o.B. - I'll Be In the Sky on iTunes

The Streets - Going Through Hell
Dan: Mike Skinner jumped the shark a long time back as far as I'm concerned, after building up a massive following and a degree of critical success on his first two albums, he is now largely ignored in favour of the Tinie Tempahs and Chipmunks of this world. For good reason too, Skinner is annoying, his material is dated, and ultimately a bit shit.
>> The Streets - Going Through Hell EP on iTunes

She & Him - Don't Look Back

A video this time, and it's the new single release of Don't Look Back from She & Him, who are of course Zooey Deschanel (pause to sigh...) and Matt Ward for the ladies. He's not bad, I guess.

This is the latest track to come from Volume Two, which was first released in spring 2010 and is still going strong. I actually really like this song, so it's great to see it get its own release - and the video's a lot of fun, too.

Clinic - Bubblegum

If you haven't yet heard Bubblegum by Clinic - the album, that is - then the single release of the titular track is the perfect excuse to familiarise yourself with their work.

Out on January 31st as a digital bundle and 12" vinyl EP, the song and its remixes offer a variety of takes on the track that gives the album Bubblegum its name - a lofty position for any one song to occupy, but one that Bubblegum carries off reasonably well. Read on for a preview of all five tracks and a free download of the Pional "Jump The Gun" bonus mix.