This wasn’t what I expected. It’s got a retro style label, no middle, a fifties title, a sixties girl group name, and it sounds like, err, the White Stripes. Kind of. It’s a pretty decent single, but the b-side is miles better. More exciting, more original, and with great words. “Throw your TV out the window/Love your record player” is the best advice you’ll get this year, so follow it. Speaking of TV, I believe it’s going to improve from now on, because a couple of weeks ago I saw it hit the bottom of the curve. Claire Sweeney, doing a makeover of Jade Goody’s mum’s council flat. The only way is up. (Baby.)

There are a lot of picture discs about at the moment, and this one has Japanese people on, all with their eyes covered. Again, a decent a-side with a kick-ass (do the young people still say that?) b-side. Said track is “JHOUT - WIRE” a remix my Colin Newman. Did he used to be in theincrediblyoverrated Wire? If he did then this is the best thing he’s ever been involved with. It’s mental, very Japanese, and has someone playing (I think) a recorder.

A pretty, red and blue seven which rather reminds me of one of those layered cocktails. Nine bands contribute tracks, my favourite being by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, the only band I’ve heard of before. They also the best name, though Oscillating Innards run them close. It’s all weird and electronic, and sounds rather German to me, though I doubt anyone is.

I’m very skeptical of the 99p single. I mean, it’s 99p for a reason, right? Because if it wasn’t then nobody would buy it? With this in mind, I don’t really know why I bought this. It’s Jack White’s new band, and I think the White Stripes are okay at best, and it cost 99p. Nothing to say really. It’s neither here nor there. I imagine it’s one of those records bought exclusively by people who intend to put it straight on eBay.

A rather earnest sounding double seven inch, perplexingly with one black and one coloured disk. Why do people do that? Either have two black ones or two coloured ones. Black and white maybe is acceptable, but black and that crap mostly-opaque clear? One day I’ll get round to writing a guide to packaging seven inch records properly, and the world will fill with sunshine.

The Immediate certainly get stuck in, and play it like they mean it. They’re probably all very thin and great live. There seem to be a lot of bands around like this at the moment – Transgressive release a single by a new one every week – but The Immediate sound better than the average to me. It’s hard for me to think of anyone they particularly sound like, which is always a good thing, and the songs are good and varied. Once again the b-side is better than the ‘a’, Tomorrow’s Zero being my favourite of the four and, being frank, I could probably have got along fine without the second disc.

I have a problem here. Those bands where the singer shrieks or growls in a daft voice - I just can’t listen to them. Well, I can listen to The Locust, but that’s about it. The music here is cool: complicated, clever, engaging; but there’s some loon squawking like that bloke out of Police Academy III, and it ruins it. He doesn’t do it on the other side, and that’s ace, if Slinty. Please, anyone who wants to screech in a high voice, or grunt in a low voice, IT SOUNDS STUPID. Honestly. It’s not just me that thinks so.