There are many things that I like about writing about music when I feel like it. One of them is the peculiar thrill I get from seeing our posts on a site called Hype Machine.

Hype Machine is just about the most brilliant music site in the world, ever. What it does is present a snapshot of the music being posted right now to the many thousands of MP3 blogs around the world.

Aside from it being a great place for discovering some fine new music, seeing what everyone else is listening to, and reading what everyone else is writing about (it is NME for the 21st century, really it is), Hype Machine lists all the blogs it features in a handy A-Z format. Handy for bands looking for coverage.

We get quite a few mails this way. Most, you can tell, have just been knocked out to everyone, literally thousands of blogs. And to be frank, the music is crap.

Some mails, even if they have gone to everyone, make you feel special. And everyone likes to feel special now and again, right? Thanks then to Rebecca Mosley off of the wonderful Cogwheel Dogs for making us feel special this week. Nice email.

Cogwheel Dogs are Oxford duo, Rebecca on guitars and singing and cellist Tom Parnell. They make music that tip toes through the daisies one minute (see ‘Breathe’), and is slashing at the pretty little flowers with a big spade the next (see ‘Anticoagulant’). It’s all everso slightly left of centre. And we do like ever so slightly left of centre.

Cogwheel Dogs have a faint shimmer of Dry period PJ Harvey about them, never a bad thing, and there’s a very similar, very strong songwriting sensibility at work here. If we were betting folk (what? Oh), we’d say these two are going places. Ask Alan Mcgee who’s booked them to for his Death Disco night at Notting Hill Arts Club on July 16. If you live in London, check them out for us will you and report back? Thanks.

And doesn’t a cello make a quite gorgeous sound? It does.

More hear…
- A very nice site that actually isn’t MySpace, from which you can download single ‘Cress’ for free.
- Oh, and a MySpace