According to the BBC, Manchester’s Hurts are “Tears For Fears as shot by Anton Corbijn”. A quick glance at the video for single ‘Wonderful Life’ and you’d be forgiven for dismissing Hurts as a slavish pastiche of moody 80s electro-pop. Surprisingly, with ‘Wonderful Life’, the duo of Theo Hutchcraft and Adam Anderson has crafted a genuinely engaging and beautifully atmospheric debut release. Hurts’ minimal aesthetic and refusal to give out much in the way of information is also a refreshing antidote to the usual deluge of record label sponsored hyperbole surrounding new acts. Love the video too!

Ok! This is the first of a new regular feature on the HWD blog. We’ve been emailing some of HWD's friends and collaborators to ask them to send us a Top 5 list of…absolutely anything they want! First up, our good friend and ‘Take My Picture’ remixer, B-Xentric, who has sent us his Top 5 songs and sounds which are inspiring his sound for 2010. In his words this is “a small window into what I listen to”. Check out the tracks below, along with B-Xentric’s reasons for the tracks making his Top 5.

1. Retrovox – ‘Midnight Star’ – “It’s all about the rollin bass for me on this track.”



2. Carmen – ‘Time To Move’ – “I love the great pop voice of this vocalist along with the great synth stabs.”



3. Cerrone – ‘Give Me Love’ – “Bongos will be making their first appearance on my tracks all because of this track.”



4. Dam-Funk – ‘Galactic Fun’ – “I love the good vibes this creates with its lead melody and good vibes are important in a track for me, I wanna make peeps smile not gurn.”



5. Chic – ‘Le Freak’ – “Pure disco track, on this I’m listening carefully to the guitar as I now have a guitarist for my productions.”


Visit B-Xentric on MySpace
Follow B-Xentric on Twitter
Get the B-Xentric remix of ‘Take My Picture’ here

Happy new year from HWD! We hope you had a great holiday and that going back to work this week hasn't been too much of a struggle.

Since the release of the Love Technology album in June last year we've been busy in the studio and rehearsal room coming up with loads of new tracks and fresh sounds; we wanted to keep progressing and not just kick back and make our second album Love Technology II. We decided to release the 'Take My Picture' single as an indication of where we're going and have been really excited by the reaction - thanks! If you missed it, you can watch the video here and buy the single here.

We have decided to start a new regular blog we're going to update as the second album develops. You can keep up with the blog on it's own dedicated site here, or you can just keep checking back right here on our website as we will update the posts here too. We're going to post our favourite new records and other things that are inspiring us. We're also going to start posting videos of us in the studio/rehearsal room and taster clips of the second album very soon. Please feel free to send us comments and/or your own favourite new tracks for us to check out!

To get us started, here's HWD's Top 10 songs of the last decade - click on the link for a ready-made Spotify playlist! In no particular order:

'Emerge' - Fischerspooner
'Aerodynamic' - Daft Punk
'Toxic' - Britney Spears
'Drop It Like It's Hot' - Snoop Dogg
'Hard To Explain' - The Strokes
'Hey Ya!' - Outkast
'This Boy's In Love' - The Presets
'One Armed Scissor' - At The Drive-In
'Waters Of Nazareth' - Justice
'Can't Get You Out Of My Head' - Kylie Minogue

We've done a few radio interviews over the past couple of weeks to talk to people about the release of Take My Picture. We'll get them all up here for you to listen to over the next few days, but for now, here's what happened when we went to speak to Alan Raw on the BBC Raw Talent show!



If you're not from the UK and wonder what the hell we're going on about when we talk about Phoenix Nights, here's a clip from the show. This may clear things up, or you may be even more confused. Yes, us Brits are an odd bunch.

Here's a great video of Don Diablo dropping his remix of "When The Sirens Sound" at Matrixx In The Park 2009. Check out the foam cannon action - we want one for when we play live!