Just a quickie, as Beyonce has dropped her new single Standing On The Sun, just as I head out the door to Glastonbury. It's as if she's saying: "Ahem... I still own that".
Standing On The Sun is the same song that briefly appeared on her Jonas Akerlund-directed H&M advert. And if you like your summer songs scorching, this is one for you: "When you touch me I feel the flames licking at my feet," trills Mrs Carter over a frenzy of clapping hands and an insistent piano thrum.
If the rest of her long-gestating album is this good, it'll have been worth the wait.
The very first time I came across Janelle Monae, she was performing a tribute to Prince, who was just about to get a lifetime achievement award from BET. As I noted back then, he visibly detested the entire event (and, to be fair, Alicia Keys' performance of Adore was about as exciting as a slumber party at Ed Sheeran's house). Except, that is, for Janelle's loop-de-loop "somebody should really me in a straight jacket" rendition of Let's Go Crazy, which raised a brief but genuine Paisley smile.
Clearly, The Purple Prince recognised a kindred spirit, and he's been keeping tabs on Monae ever since. She was the support act for his Welcome 2 Chicago dates last year, and he reportedly returned the favour by duetting on her album. We won't get to hear that until September - but in the meantime, Prince has remixed Janelle's recent single Q.U.E.E.N. - and he's made a pretty good job of it, too. Sure, it's the same turgid drum beat he's been using since Emancipation, but the rump-shaking booty-quaking head-gyrating funk-making groove is solid Minneapolis gold.
Pinboard says it was first played during Prince's 3rdeye TV stream a few days back. They've isolated it and bunged it up on Soundcloud (hence the rapid fade-out at the end). Expect it to last about 24 hours before Prince's legal team rip it down like bad wallpaper.
Warning: The following information might make you feel sick. Every member in today's featured band was born in the 1990s. Their drummer, aged 14, is not old enough to remember the Spice Girls first time around. Combine their ages and the total is still four years younger than Mick Jagger.
They cannot buy beer, they cannot rent a car, they have never lived in a world without Playstation. But you'd better get used to it, because there's a very high possibility that Echosmith are going to be inescapable.
Formed in Toluca Lake, Los Angeles, they are a real-life Partridge Family: Four clean-living siblings who just happen to be incredibly musically gifted. They are Jamie Sierota (19, guitar), Noah Sierota (17, bass), Graham Sierota (14, drums) and Sydney Sierota (15, vocals).
"We can be really straightforward with each other," says Sydney of being in a band with her brothers. "We let each other know if we really hate an idea. Nobody's being too sensitive here."
Of course, being teenagers, their entire life has been documented in exhaustive detail on Facebook. Here's their story so far, plucked directly from their timeline:
1) "Hey guys, let's start the band right here"
2) The early, brattish era (aka The Hanson era).
At this point, Echosmith were called Ready Set Go.
3) Early lesson: Never have a press shot taken on a moving escalator.
4) The awkward teenage years.
5) The moody teenage years.
6) Signing a deal with Warner Bros.
7) Becoming quite good at concerts now.
8) Styled, coiffed and ready for world domination.
Aw, bless their little cotton socks.
The band have just put a free EP up on their website - inspired, they say, by the likes of The Smiths, New Order, Fleetwood Mac and The Killers. To me, it sounds like super-polished indie pop: Somewhat polite but exceptionally catchy, like Foster The People.
The lead track is called Cool Kids which, says Jamie, is "about a boy and girl who want to be like the cool kids that they see around them." He adds, sagely: "It may seem hard to believe when you don't fit in, but the truth is nobody is really cooler than anybody else."
Actually, the headline pretty much tells the whole story. The song is called Love Is All We Need, and the official credited artists are Adam J feat. Amelle & Nightcrashers. It's formulaic, juvenile and pointless - but, on the plus side, it contains the best lyric LOL of the day.
You can listen to it below, if you are so inclined.
Last time we heard from The Vaccines, young Justin was in a right old strop. "I get angrier with age," he snarled on the searing Bad Mood - sounding every bit as taciturn as Andy Murray looks when he's doing his special frowny face.
So what's going on with the band's new single? Because Melody Calling is a washed-out, windswept California dream. Justin sounds like he's on mood stabilisers, singing sotto voce about... well, I'm not quite sure what, but he rhymes ocean with motion, so it's probably best not to delve too deeply.
A cross between The Smiths and REM, by way of The Eagles, this is sure to sound perfect on the Pyramid stage this Friday, where The Vaccines are sandwiched between Professor Green and Dizzee Rascal, for some reason.
Well done, everyone. By the looks of this afternoon's iTunes chart, it looks like the inexplicable 14-month delay has done nothing to harm the chances of Icona Pop's shouty pop monster, I Love It.
(We'll just ignore that the sex-pest anthem of the summer is still number one, shall we?)
But now that we've got that out of our system, we need a new cause célèbre. To which end, allow me to nominate Icona Pop's countrymen NONONO. Fronted by Stina Wäppling (amazing name) and backed by Astma and Rockwell (whose credits include Icona Pop, natch) they describe themselves as urban-indie, which essentially means they make pop music for bloggists.
It is also worth noting that Stina has not exactly been hit with the ugly stick.
In the normal course of things, NONONO would make it onto the B-list at 6 Music and sell about 34 records. But if we can make Icona Pop proper chart stars, we can do anything. ANYTHING! (maniacal laugh)
Their latest single is called Pumping Blood - but you could take your pick from any of the songs they've uploaded to Soundcloud.
