The Singles Jukebox

There’s an elf in front of you…

[Video][Website]
[4.60]

Mark Sinker: In which Nogbad the Bad meets THIS (never forget) as the mumblecore Queen draw back the curtain on the pre-Anglian gap years aka THE DARK AGES, long before the United Kingdom was United. Ivar the Boneless is unexpectedly historical: a Berserker, he possibly suffered from osteogenesis imperfecta and was carried into battle on the back of a shield. He also (possibly) ordered the assassination of Edmund the Martyr, who thus became patron saint of All England for a long while. Who these guys should look at next is HARALD HARDRADA, who sailed to the edge of the world and possibly America, definitely worked as a mercenary in Russia and an imperial guardsman in Byzantium, and very nearly combined Norway Denmark and Britain into a single Viking entity kingdom (and thus clearly TOP NATION) just days before the Battle of Hastings (you know how that turned out). Also Harald’s son was known as Olaf the Flashy. All of which is way funnier than The Darkness, especially Nogbad the Bad, and also more interesting. 
[5]

Scott Mildenhall: Still the biggest thing to happen to Lowestoft since continental drift, and with a sound progressing even slower. Looking back over their hits, though, they had more hooks than a Mark Twain convention, even into the second album. That was central to their power, and as “Barbarian” has none, they are shorn of it, wielding only riffs that just about transcend nondescript early-level Guitar Hero fare.
[4]

Micha Cavaseno: These muppets are back? The first single was ass! I’m pretty sure that’s a Stone Temple Pilots riff, and he doesn’t even have the stupid pixie falsetto anymore. God, get this fucking weirdo away from me. He smells like Monty Python skits.
[2]

Thomas Inskeep: Justin Hawkins is oddly toned-down, yet the lyrics are like something out of a D&D fantasia, while what sounds like circa-’98 Stone Temple Pilots grind on behind him.
[1]

Edward Okulicz: This might actually be too legitimately heavy to work as well as the early Darkness singles did. There is that feeling of high camp and lightness that is missed. But the falsetto yowl is funny and effective in at least the same way that those early singles were.
[6]

Mo Kim: Pure acrobatics, all of it: the guitar riff alternating between two notes; the antiphony between the vocalist’s measured lines and the guitar’s noodling; the solemn delivery of the verses positioned against the goofiness of the chorus. Sometimes entertainment is best taken as entertainment.
[6]

Brad Shoup: It’s “Immigrant Song” crossed with “Run to the Hills,” filtered through “Enter Sandman”. I really thought the math would turn out differently.
[4]

Zach Lyon: They’ve traded the spaceship for an unadorned suburban basement with beige carpet and a single table covered with Pathfinder bestiaries and plastic figurines. Guys, you aren’t supposed to sound like that on purpose.
[3]

Iain Mew: The way the chorus boils down both metal crunch and Justin Hawkins’s squeal to their most basic appeal is great. The awfully unfunny monologue does rather kill it, but I wasn’t expecting to be surprised or pleased by anything about a new single from The Darkness, so they still come out ahead.
[6]

Kat Stevens: In Asterix and the Great Crossing the Gauls are rescued from North America by a troop of Vikings with names like Herendethelessen and Steptøånssen. Their dog Huntingseåssen (a Great Dane, of course) makes friends with Dogmatix! ‘Barbarian’ is to “Immigrant Song” as Huntingseåssen is to Scooby Doo, i.e. a delightful piss-take that is funnier and more enjoyable than the original. If the video contains looping gifs of kittens I’ll upgrade it to a [10].
[9]