A: If This Is Love
B: What Am I Gonna Do
Buying physical singles can be a bit of a struggle in Dublin these days. HMV Grafton Street only seem to stock the Irish Top 16 (?), and a few vinyl 7" which tend to be old stock they can't get rid of. So yesterday I had to scour Dublin's city centre for a copy of the debut single by The Saturdays. It's called "If This Is Love" and it is ace. Admittedly this might be down to the fact that musically it is entirely based on Yazoo's ultra-ace "Situation". It sounds great even through the crappy €15 earphones I had to buy for myself yesterday when my usual ones packed up.
They're not very famous yet, The Saturdays. A Google Image search for them throws up pics of Girls Aloud and Sam Sparro, but not a decent pic of The Saturdays themselves. They have toured as support to Girls Aloud though, and they have been a presence on daytime TV in recent weeks. There is also a lengthy thread about them on the Popjustice forums, but I'm not sure how accurate a gague of their popularity that actually is. They're signed to Fascination which is Girls Aloud's label and which was set up as a sort of "pop" counterpart to the revived Fiction imprint. In the end I managed to find one copy of the single in HMV Henry Street. I'm in two minds as to whether to upload it now. I want you all to go out and buy it, thereby sending it up the charts. But even if you wanted to you wouldn't be able to find it as I seem to have the only copy! And besides you can probably download it from iTunes or something. A combination of no credit card and no computer literacy precludes me from using such internet services. Also I like to leave my house and browse in record shops for a while returning home with a record I can hold in my hand. Pop has never been just about the music (maaaan!), it's the artwork, the gentle whir of the CD in the CD player, the sight of the stylus hitting the vinyl. I suspect I'm the last man on earth who still buys CD singles? I've bought a few singles this year, some of them have been 7"; Goldfrapp's "A&E", "Happiness" and "Caravan Girl", Sam Sparro's "Black and Gold", Mystery Jets' "Two Doors Down", Girls Aloud's "Can't Speak French", Annie's "I Know UR Girlfriend Hates Me", The Long Blondes' "Century"...I can't remember what else.
At the risk of finding out just how few people read my blog, I thought I'd ask any of you readers what the last single you bought was? Leave your answers and other comments in the comments section below.
P.S. The downloads I've provided are AAC files this time, sorry if that's inconvenient for anyone.
The Saturdays' Official Site
