“Wow they’re so ironic!” armies of teenage girls chirp about the Scouse three-piece - no they’re not, they’re just idiots. There’s nothing ironic about this, it’s just complete and utter shit. Annoying vocal harmonies, gratuitous sleigh bells and grating riffing stuff this Christmas Turkey, dripping with some truly horrendous clichés and duff lines - “it never really snows, it’s more like horizontal sleet”.

“Don’t you just love Christmas” they yell manically at the end of the track - no I don’t. Not anymore. Not if it means this song will infect my eardrums again during Yuletide. I officially hate Christmas now. Are you happy, you band-wagon-jumping-”random”-corporate-indiemongers?

“Whatever happened to our festive cheer” they ask - it’s dead. You killed it, you wankers. Bah humbug.

With a raw and energetic mixture of chugging guitar, drums, bass and subtle synth the song has a crisp sound but never sounds too polished. Robot Bodyrox sounds like a healthy mixture of a number of recent and contemporary Welsh acts. A pinch of Mclusky and a bit of The Automatic, thankfully more of the former, with a sense of simple rocking fun wrapped nicely up with ever-so-slightly daft lyrics and subject matter.

It probably doesn’t quite have the mass appeal of The Automatic despite the presence of an almost catchy anthemic chorus. When it comes to crafting an upbeat, sing-a-long chorus it seems something that a whole host of Welsh bands are very good at. With Mclusky now no more then there is a void for a slightly surreal Welsh rock band that needs to be filled and Viva Machine certainly show on this potential to do that and certainly have enough of their own identity to have greater success.

Well underway on their debut album which has an ETA set for early 2009, the band have forged a sound that, though unlikely to win any Ivor Novella’s for singers Ben and Steve’s writing style, shows the art of the pop anthem is still alive in the age of novelty game shows like The X-Factor. One place that has always been a hit factory for these kind of radio friendly singles is the North of England, and following in the wake of The Beatles, Cast and Scouse funsters The Coral, It’s A Buffalo produce the same kind of work that, though not to everyone’s taste, is hard to dislike.

Bright and uplifting, with rising chorus’ and random shouts of joy over the top of Ben’s vocals, the ballad is played out with the kind of abandon that proves we all have a small amount of carefree youth in us these days, despite the winter gloom. With this their third successful release after a support slot on The Courteeners tour this year, the Buffalo’s may be set to steal some thunder from the blue half of Manchester.

This second release from his album of the same title is a welcome break from the same tired format or overproduction we have grown accustomed to from the industry throughout 2000, and Arms work sounds as though it were cooked up in a miniscule bedsit somewhere in his Brooklyn neighbourhood. He has a gift in understanding how to create music laced with sentiment that exercise the tear ducts more than the gag reflex and though ‘Kids Aflame’ is unlikely to set the world alight, it packs enough of a spark to keep ardent music fans warm through the winter months.

As you’d expect, the Christmas cheer isn’t exactly piled on, as Scott Hutchison’s typically cynical drawl asks “let the rot stop just for one day” and points out how at Christmas “we can be best friends with the people we hate”. As you wouldn’t expect though, the track features a choir, but it’s one that treads a fine, expert line between haunting and happy, the subtle “oh oh” refrain underscoring the song perfectly and never becoming heavy-handed. There’s also some almost cheerful glockenspiel in there. Sleigh bells ring, are you listening?

‘It’s Christmas So We’ll Stop’ is a tender work that envelopes perfectly what this time of year is really all about: grinning and bearing it and pretending you’re actually happy to see your relatives for the first time in 12 months. You can keep Noddy Holder. For realists, atheists and piss-artists, this is Christmas.

Piecing together a handclap backbeat, cheesy-pop bass and R‘n’B “Oh-oh”s, this is a mishmash of everything that is wrong with American Music, all shunted together to form an urban Frankenstein’s monster of a single. Inevitably, it’ll be enormous, with its radio-friendly chorus and sky-scraping vocal shrieks, and inevitably it’ll propel Leona further into the stratosphere of stardom, for we live in a cruel world. The biggest shame however, isn’t that the track is complete bollocks, it’s that Leona Lewis has genuine talent, and it’s an almighty shame to see it squandered on this twaddle. Truly abysmal.

Their latest, subtly titled single, ‘Devour’, begins with a militaristic drum beat which is joined by nasal guitar buzz and then, oh yes, Extreme Doom Piano. Next thing you know we have the prerequisite head-bangy thrash bass and thickly grated vocals that could easily have been delivered by Ned from South Park (the guy with a throat implant and a gun). I honestly thought this sort of thing died out in the late 90s but apparently there is still a market for it - Camden Lock for example. What more can I say… Y’know Slipknot’s stuff? Well, it’s basically the same idea only Shinedown cite Otis Redding as a musical influence (my condolences, Mr. Redding).

It’s not that it’s not pleasant, far from it. It’s a lovely ditty, Emmy’s voice is homely and sweet. But it’s utterly, completely forgettable, despite the provocative subject matter (the clue is in the title). It’s a shame really, Emmy’s voice is worthy of better, and you need not hunt out far to find it, just buy her ‘My Bad’ EP. It’s just not affecting enough to earn anything more than half marks.

The track sees Guetta team up yet again with mate and fellow DJ Chris Willis, and between them the pair have created a slick & sexy groove-monster of a dance tune. It’s undoubtedly far cooler than last year’s magnum opus and lays further proof of David Guetta’s knack of churning out consistently great crossover dance records.

Barrage your local DJ for this, it can’t wait till tomorrow.

In short, ‘Close The Lid’ is a brilliant song. Perfect inter-group harmonies swoon over a fine mix of life-affirming acoustic guitars resonating honest and quality folk-rock to the hill. Singer Van Pierszalowski introduces us to his affectingly personal lyrics, highlights being: [i]“I’m not afraid to die, as long as your by my side”[/i] and [i]“Go on make me a liar, it was just friendly fire”[/i], his latter refrain surely being a departing spit towards Dub-ya.

It was time for that lid to be closed, now go and open up Port O’Brien’s box of treats.

The longing chorus has more in common with bands like Ash than the indie pioneers they seem to emulate, and sometimes the vocals get lost in the mix, but they’re not needed to carry the song at all. Perhaps the drums are a little too loud and the keyboard does get a bit annoying, but these are only minor gripes. The song itself is under three minutes in length and is a short stab of energy and fun. Released earlier, this could have been a summer anthem. Maybe next year guys.

However, when the breakdown kicks in, the song turns from melodic, uplifting metal (especially the chorus with almost Queen-esque guitar work), into a discordant mess of samples and fuzz. Anybody familiar with The Wildhearts’ controversially messed up and noisy ‘Endless, Nameless’ album will hear the similarity in sound. This short break really does ruin the flow of the song, which is a great shame.

‘We Can Breathe in Space, They Just Don’t Want Us to Escape’ is going to appeal to all the old Enter Shikari fans out there. Maybe in places – everything from the rancid breakdown to the title – they sound a little too much like they’re trying too hard to seem “out there” but in the end it has worked well for them this far, so why should their success stop now?

‘Walking Man’ is just an alright song, the like you’d hear from a busker on city centre streets- but I guess that’s the charm- isn’t it? You have a pleasant Guardian-reader-head-nodder of a verse, during which time you begin to think, great he’s not talking about being fucking homeless again. “My name’s Steve and I’m a walking man”, he coos in that gravely voice of his like he’s at a Hobos Anonymous meeting. It’s all very familiar. We get the picture Steve, you used to be homeless. Congrats.

This is a really catchy pop song that people will absolutely fall in love with. The backing vocals are possibly even more fun to join in with than the main vocals, and the chorus is a shoutalong, jump-around masterpiece. This is the sort of song I’ve wanted to hear from an indie-rock band for absolute ages. An honest-to-goodness, catchy song with a bit of attitude, for listeners to connect with on more than one level – I genuinely cannot wait to hear what else Red Light Company have in store for us!

It starts with sweet poppy feel, courtesy of Singer Yuki Chikudate’s dulcet tones and some whale-like noise protruding from a guitar. Noises which are followed by some relatively clean guitar work but the familiar grunge/shoegaze aspects are soon here to stay. This is glorious track blending the spaced-out atmosphere and all-encompassing warmth of shoegaze and the chirpy innocence of a good old fashioned pop song. It’s a song that wastes no time in firmly planting itself inside the head and bones, urging heads to be nodded, moves to be busted and fools to be made.

It is a track with everything. It’s a song of contradictions. It’s being propelled forward at a significant rate of knots, yet it seems to last much longer than the 2:53 it does. It’s compact, yet there are acres of space between instruments in which the listener can roam, taking the time to listen to and enjoy each guitar, bass and drum individually. It’s got vocals that are at times difficult to decipher (however by shoegaze standards they’re pretty much crystal) but will be sung along to almost universally.

A very good song by a very good band.