Although it may be a little too early to call, I’m willing to bet that the song that will have annoyed me the most during 2006 will be Crazy by Gnarls Barkley. It’s not a bad song, by no means, but Christ, it’s everywhere, and infuriatingly catchy. So, I won’t be mentioning it here, of that you can be sure.

Turning up first on my radar is Ladyfuzz, who aren’t all ladies and don’t appear to be at all fuzzy. Bouncy Ball was the first I heard of them and I’ve since purchased their debut album Kerfuffle which is just as good. I don’t know much about the band besides what is written on their website — so, I can tell you that they ‘have an unholy interest in the number 13’ but I can’t tell you who they are or where they come from (though I’m guessing partly from England and partly from Germany).

Broken Social Scene are made up of several established Canadian bands such as Stars and Do Make Say Think. They’ve been around for a few years but I’ve spotted them now due to a collaboration with the excellent Feist on their new self-titled album. Hard to describe what they sound like — with at least ten key members plus guest artists it can be a bit of a mixed bag, but it’s generally all good.

Morning Runner is a band formed while in Reading, presumably on the grounds that there wasn’t anything else to do while in Reading. They’ve since supported the likes of Ian Brown, Coldplay, Bloc Party, Magic Numbers and the Pogues and have recently completed their debut album, Wilderness is Paradise Now. They have a sort of Strokes-lite feel about them, with Gone Up In Flames being quite bouncy, but occasionally they veer worryingly towards a Keane/Athlete sound which I’m hoping they’ll avoid.

Falling into the ‘quite pleasant to listen to, really’ category this time around is José González who you will have heard already on the excellent Sony Bravia advert with all the coloured bouncing balls. His album Veneer is short — barely half an hour — but it’s enough; any more and I imagine you’d start getting bored.

I wanted to mention Vincent Vincent and the Villains but at the time of writing their site is down, so I can’t remember why I’ve noted them down here. They might be awful, who knows?

Finally, I’m looking forward to properly listening to music by Matt Costa, who I don’t think I’m going to appreciate until the hot weather is here — he has a very warm, cheerful acoustic style. Hard to listen to now as the sleet batters my window pane but give it time.

Further listening

I also recommend looking at Colly’s latest Music Monthly where the wonderful Nouvelle Vague gets a mention, and there’s also a lovely picture of Karen O.