The Darkness - Get Your hands Off My Woman (single)

This retro rock revival shit's gotta stop. Moronic record company types take note: The Strokes are cool because the style the ape - cbgb-variety new wave - is cool. The White Stripes are cool because bluesy garage rock is cool, the Hives are cool because garage rock in general is cool, the BRMC are cool because the JAMC were cool and so on to infinity. Noticing a pattern here? Because it's the same principle that condemns the darkness; they're shit because the particular style of retro music they aspire to - 70s stadium rock - is, and always was, a complete load of shit. The fact that the darkness wear catsuits (oh yes), have a singer who sounds like the youngest castrato in town and play a style of rock music so derivative that it makes Status Quo look like a troupe of mind-boggling innovators would be forgivable if there was, you know, just the faintest hint of a raised eyebrow in there. But no; "What we do is not tongue-in-cheek, it's not done with a sideways glance," they recently told the Guardian. For what it's worth, the song "Get your hands off my woman" (the title says it all of course. Misogynist? Cheap? Derivative? Unintentionally hilarious? Get your tickets now!) is utter bollox, a boredom-inducing AC/DC cast-off complete with twiddly solos, horrible screeching man-bitch vocals and distorted guitars that have been carefully wrung through the producer's clean machine so as not to offend the tweenie singles-buying market. Yes, you've heard it before. Yes, you've hated it before. Yawn city. Pathetically, the single includes both a "Clean radio version" and a "Profane version" which contains the word (oooh! Rock'n'roll!) "Motherfucker." Precisely what kind of rock band are afraid of the word motherfucker, or more to the point employ the word 'profane' to describe it, is frankly, beyond me. The sensible reader will draw the obvious conclusions. Oh yeah, the b-side sounds like Queen. Only not as good. The Darkness are a sad, embarrassing anachronism without the wit or sense of irony to see their own ridiculousness. The music world needs them like Saddam Hussein needs a big target painted on the top of his head. You see that brutal Marky Mark film, Rock Star? The band he was in? Exactly. Don't encourage the fuckers. Avoid at all costs.

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