I refused to give in to the hype of season three because exceptional TV shows are usually cursed to peak by the third season and dismally peter out. This was admittedly somewhat difficult as I was confronted by promotional posters with various steely glares that followed me in tube stations, but in a bid to remain objective I forced myself to enjoy the adverts for the new Jeffrey Archer novel instead. At the end of season two, I came to the realisation that Game of Thrones was just so much better without all the magic crap of the white walkers. The show attempts to include too much material in order to hook viewers from across all genres, when in reality all the viewers really want to see is nudity and violence (sometimes at the same time), and lots of it. However, on a nice Saturday night, curled up ready for the carnage, I pressed play. The first five minutes were stylistically tense and eerie, but then they cued in the music for the title sequence, and I got all excited (I’m a big fan of theme tunes; The Big Bang Theory was my alarm for the longest time). But that’s about all the excitement there was.

Thinking back about what possible spoilers there could be, I realise rather bemusedly that nothing actually happens in this episode, so no spoilers could be given no matter how much I wanted to ruin your life and your viewing pleasure. If you want a shiny new season to be epic, you want there to be some sort of narrative intrigue. Unfortunately, all that this episode offered was a semi-recap of last season: the time difference between the two seasons being so short (only a matter of hours) that nothing novel was introduced. Unlike the bridging from the first season to the second, there was no horrible aftermath to be dealt with, so the series could focus on emotion rather than action. However, the primary problem with the semi-recap was that aside from the three or four main characters, my memory of everybody else was non-existent. Consequently, subplots involving lots of old, bearded men conspiring against some regime were completely lost on me. The overall effect was that the first episode was slightly bland and lacklustre in plot; dwelling too long on irrelevant parts of the narrative. It may also be the fact that there was not enough man-candy time in the form of Jamie Lannister or Jon Snowe for it to be a stellar episode, or that an hour is inevitably too short for scriptwriters to inspire the hatred for King Joffrey that had sustained my anger throughout the last two seasons. Never judge a season by the first episode though, and there is still the potential for writers and producers to salvage what appears to be a disappointing start to a widely anticipated season.

Every so often, a groundbreaking series comes along which captures the zeitgeist, challenges the existing world order and defines future generations. Made In Chelsea is not that series.

There is scarcely a receptacle on earth large enough to contain my excitement at MIC’s return, except perhaps the chasmic vacuity of the cast. No but srsly, I love it. Scorn if you will, but I care for the characters as if they were my own obscenely wealthy estranged half cousins. Their joy is my joy. Their sorrow is…well also my joy, come to think of it.

The first episode of series five began with a fake party, for as the old adage goes: ain’t no party like an MIC fake party. This was followed by an initial uncomfortably staged scene, with Jamie being reprimanded by a financial advisor for squandering the Jaffa Cakes fortune. But the real focus of this series soon became clear. Spencer (eternal tool and feudal lord of Chelsea) is livid with Francis (former vassal and everyone’s favourite diamond millionaire) for revealing his infidelity to girlfriend, Louise (meh).

This poses a problem, as manchild Jamie and crucifix earring enthusiast Proudlock must decide which fellow ‘boi’ to live with. The conflict reaches its crescendo in a tense stand-off in the estate agent’s, with Spencer shrouded in a giant Ugg boot. Throughout the course of the episode, Spencer succeeds in establishing himself as a deeply vile human, manipulating Louise and convincing her that she is of minimal worth: ‘You think I’m desperate? Remember who the fuck you’re talking to. Have you lost your mind?’ I actually quite like Louise, and I feel sad that she hasn’t yet grasped that maybe the fact she cries in every single episode is a reasonable indication that she’d be better off without Spenny. The sight alone of Spencer Matthews’s smug little chops makes my ovaries convulse with fear. 

Yet amidst the emotional rollercoaster of Louise and Spencer’s arguments, viewers were reassured with familiar, comforting sights. Close-ups of obscenely expensive cocktails between every scene. Rosie wearing a hat. Millie unable to open her lips more than three centimetres. And silences so richly nuanced that even Samuel Beckett would be proud.

In other banal news, cheeky chappie Andy and twelve year old Stevie introduced us to the three new faces of the series: Fran, Olivia and Phoebe. Fran has been to ‘loads of gigs this week’, which apparently means that she works in the music industry. In fact, they go to a gig together for Andy’s birthday, which I swear falls at least every month. Surprisingly, it also seems as if self-confessed playa Lucy has now been fully integrated into the group via her friendship with Binky. Will she be replacing dear, sweet, interfering Cheska? Perish the thought. Perish!

This is going to be a series as packed to the rafters with drama as its predecessors, and despite the frequent guilt and disgust which accompanies my viewing of each episode, I for one will not be missing any of it. To conclude, I hereby refer to the eternal words of Mark-Francis Vandelli, whose sentiments best reflect my feelings for the show: ‘I don’t like it; I love it; it’s hideous; take it away from me.’

Zomby – W I T H L O V E

If you haven’t been following Zomby’s twitter, you probably should be. Along with chatting the most breeze about  Givenchy and Saint Laurent this side of hurricane Katrina, you can catch him performing a one man job of producing more beef than Tesco. A real spectacle. Well at least he still finds the time to write tunes, as this is a glacially slow jam with some of the best nostalgic vinyl crackle that can be found outside of Burial’s discography. A teaser for the album to come, supposedly out this summer on 4AD.

Deniro Ferrar &  BSBD – This is It (feat. Child Actor)

Production duo Blue Sky Black Death have been consistently sick the past year or two, but this sees them leave famed partner Nacho Picasso for North Carolina rapper, Deniro Ferrar. His somewhat less raspy voice lends itself better to the production, and the Vevo account seems to suggest Ferrar’s got something good going here. Time to sit tight and wait for something that isn’t released on bandcamp. In the meantime, check his single from earlier this year.

Tim Vocals – Next

This is some seriously tight hood R n B. Tim Vocals croons over The Weeknd’s ‘Next’ with a whole lotta heart. What’s more haunting is the context – the lyrics relate to what may or may not be Vocals’ personal problems with the feds, (getting busted for a dime bag – bummer), and the video shows him literally walking to the police station. Real shit. And whilst Tim Vocals’ twitter assures us he’ll be back in a few months, he still stops to ask for something to read.

Lil Durk – Everything All White (feat. Yo Gotti)

Apparently ‘All Black Everything’ is pretty 2012. (Or 2010 in Soulja Boy’s less fortunate case.) Lil Durk’s keepin it fresh with ‘Everything All White’. Only 20 years old and an album coming out at some point this year on Def Jam, Lil Durk looks here to stay. Peep the video at 3:02 for a funny shot of Lil Durk holding a baby. This vid was obviously ripped direct from World Star though, so I guess Lil Durk can’t officially be blown up if it’s not going direct to youtube/Vevo. So, uh, I guess you heard it on the Cherwell first.

Pharmakon – Crawling on Bruised Knees

NY based Pharmakon is the ‘power electronics’ project of Margaret Chardiet, and she’s pretty great at what she does. Which is getting synths to make really loud noises. Fans of melody steer clear. This is 6 and a half minutes of computers sounding like planes crashing. And it’s fantastic if you’re into that sorta thing.

★★☆☆☆
Two Stars

Hayley Williams’ January claim that her band’s new album was influenced by Alt-J, as barefaced an attempt to cling to the relevance of a nearby Mercury Prize winner as could be imagined, cannot have been taken very seriously by many. Furthermore, Paramore’s lacklustre performances at Reading & Leeds must have convinced most that Williams should have taken the hint in 2010 and finally disbanded this ageing relic of the pop punk era when founding members Josh and Zac Farro left, claiming that the singer was treating the band as her own solo project. It seems like a distinctly classless move on her part to make an eponymous album when the band is barely recognizable as the same group of musicians who produced hit album Riot! in 2007.

Perhaps we could forgive her that if Paramore was anything but a few professional musicians going through the motions while their flame-haired lead singer tries to delude herself that her dream is still alive. First single ‘Now’ was disappointing, with Williams noticeably doing nothing more than trying to sound the same as she always has and sounding completely at odds with the oddly grungy guitarwork. This is evident throughout the album, except during three inexplicable ukulele interludes which serve no purpose other than to confuse the sound of the work. The other supposed hit, ‘Still Into You’, seems to display a glimpse of self-awareness as Williams moans “I should be over all the butterflies” (the cover art for Brand New Eyes featuring a butterfly) and also makes a vague attempt to justify her Alt-J pretensions with some electronic noises jitter around in the background. But the song doesn’t even manage to provide a catchy hook, once a reliable staple in a Paramore song. Only on ‘Proof’ does Williams come close to the joyful choruses of the band’s past, injecting energy into the chorus as she cries out “the only thing that I need/Is you”.

For those who manage to make it through this astonishingly long album, ‘Future’ provides a more stripped down sound, and something of a glimpse into Williams’ true feelings as she moans “We don’t talk about the past”. It begins to look like this might actually be an interesting point in the album, with wide-ranging guitars and slowly building riffs extending to a massive soundscape at which a belted, heartfelt chorus from Hayley Williams, who if nothing else has seemed vocally proficient, would put a high note on a severely pointless album. However, somewhat predictably, Paramore aren’t really sure what to do with the cacophonous crescendo they’ve created and so instead it fades out, fades back in again as if desperately begging for us to give it more time and then stops.

★★★★☆
Four Stars

Right now, Peckham seems to be making a concerted effort to shed its sheepskin-wearing, chandelier-dropping reputation with a cluster of emerging artists. Hot on the heels of downtempo electro-whiz kid Deptford Goth, here’s Filthy Boy, whose debut LP Smile That Won’t Go Down dropped last week.

Filthy Boy’s shtick is an endearing brand of brooding post-punk which dwells on the sleazier side of growing up in one of London’s less glamorous neighbourhoods. While the anti-romantic vibe is undoubtedly a well-mined topic in rock music, Smile’s collection of sordid little ballads are performed with a panache that sit comfortably alongside, say, Franz Ferdinand’s first two albums, or even Nick Cave’s early solo stuff. ‘Waiting on the Doorstep’ is a window into an over-accommodating lover’s exclusion from his girlfriend’s lascivious sex-parties (“Don’t mind me fellas! / Here if you need anything!”), while ‘Jimmy Jammies’ is a hilarious romp through an older man’s ham-fisted seduction technique.

In each giddily carnivalesque vignette, frontman Paraic Morrissey’s drawled vocals carousel around dissonant, Joy Division-style guitars. Morrissey has a knack for a good line befitting a man burdened with a surname such as his; yet the wit in his turn of phrase lies closer to Last Shadow Puppets-era Alex Turner than to his namesake Stephen: “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re thinking”, he snarls on ‘Naughty Corner’, not long after crooning “No matter how hard you try / You’ll still have my pupils dilated in size” on album opener ‘In The Name Of’. Best of all, though, is the menacing tone he takes on ‘Charm of the Dangerous Minx’ as his alter-ego salivates over a childlike lover “with spaghetti-hoop stains on her T-shirt” who’ll “thumb-suck her way around you”.

But all those name-checked influences are indicative of the fact that Filthy Boy struggle to be more than the sum of their parts; the lack of innovation in Smile’s rattling guitar-jabbing leaves the band’s sound feeling derivative, and rightly so. If you can get past that, however, the lyrical quality of the band’s songwriting richly rewards repeated listening.