Charts – 9 December 2012
Well, hmm, yes.
There was meant to be a podcast up this weekend, but as Al explains elsewhere, it’s apparently completely inaudible, so we’ll be doing another one… ooh, probably midweek, the way things are looking. And since I’ve been working this weekend and haven’t received some of last week’s books either, the reviews are going to slip too.
Fortunately, though, the great thing about the midweek chart is that it lets you write a big chunk of these chart posts in advance, so let’s do this instead. We’re still in the quiet period pre-Christmas, when the regular release schedule is winding down and the seasonal releases aren’t out yet. That means a dearth of activity at the top end of the chart, some oddities floating around the lower end, and a bit of a disaster for the career of Tulisa Contostavlos.
39. Burns – “Lies”
Before we get to the oddities, an ordinary record pops its head around the door.
Even Further Housekeeping
Folks, we’re really sorry, but the episode of HtA which we recorded yesterday is a complete audio disaster. We’re going to have to re-record the entire episode, which means it won’t be until next week some time. We’ll keep you up to date with when we’re going to be going live.
Further Housekeeping
Paul and I are both seriously snowed under with work at the moment, to the extent that it’s been close to impossible for us to coordinate a time to record, hence our silence this week – our best guess is that we’ll be recording on Friday evening UK time, but it could be as late as Sunday. Bear with us; we’ll be back with you as soon as we can.
Charts – 2 December 2012
The regular music industry is already shutting down for Christmas. Coming up: Christmas records, a charity record, stuff promoted on X Factor, and a handful of actual regular releases.
Covered on X Factor last weekend, and since it’s not that well known to the general public, it’s the sort of record that sees real benefits from that. “Wires” was Athlete’s only top 10 hit, making number 4 in 2005. The group are still together, but haven’t released any new material since 2010.
You may have noticed that X Factor hasn’t had quite the same impact on the charts this year, though it’s cropped up here and there. They also mercifully spared us the annual charity single. With the producers keen to avoid another unedifying squabble over the Christmas number 1 slot, the final is actually next week, so that the winners’ single will be on sale on 9 December to (they hope) be number 1 on 16 December. Much of the media coverage is centred on whether a chap called Christopher Maloney who has been panned by the judges since day one might actually win, which would apparently be some sort of disaster – though bear in mind that most stories of this sort actually emanate from the producers working their own angle.
The X-Axis – 2 December 2012
I’m taking the opportunity presented by the current wave of relaunches to make the jump from print to digital as each book comes round for a relaunch. This is fortunate, as I’m still waiting to receive the books from this week that I ordered in print, but by this point, that’s just Gambit and X-Treme X-Men, neither of which is exactly the focal point of the schedule. What we do have is the second issues of no less than four Marvel Now titles. Oh yes, and an annual.
A+X #2 – The first issue of A+X sold remarkably well, inheriting the top ten sales of AvX: Versus, of which it is ostensibly a continuation. I’ll be fascinated to see how long that lasts, considering that (notwithstanding Jeph Loeb’s vague gestures at foreshadowing in issue #1) it now seems pretty clear that this is simply going to be an anthology of self-contained stories united solely by the theme of team-ups between Avengers and X-Men characters – a line which is getting increasingly blurred anyway. In quality terms, this is probably for the best; A+X is simply a playpen in which creators can do whatever they feel like for a few pages, and the format here is far less restrictive than the very limited Versus. But books like this don’t have a track record of sales success, so it’s hard to imagine A+X sales holding up once readers and retailers figure out what the book actually is. If, somehow or other, it bucks that trend – well, more power to it.
Housekeeping
No episode of the podcast this weekend unfortunately – various life things have gotten in the way. We’re hoping to record mid-week, and we’ll keep you updated.
Charts – 25 November 2012
One Direction get elbowed aside after a single week by perhaps the most boring number one of the year. But first, rock classics on iTunes.
40. AC/DC – “Highway To Hell”
You might not have realised this, but AC/DC apparently weren’t available on iTunes until this week. The charming luddites have finally succumbed, and so a bit of a cherrypicking of their back catalogue is going on this week. There’s one more coming up.
The X-Axis – 25 November 2012
Happy Thanksgiving, or Black Shopping Day, or whatever it is they call it by this point in the weekend. Despite the holiday, Marvel have several of the Marvel Now! relaunch books out this week (and I’m sure we’ll talk about some of the more interesting ones on the next podcast). There’s also a batch of X-books, and while it’s be fair to say they’re not exactly the central focus of the release schedule this month, we’re not exactly marking time here either.
Well, except on Wolverine. That one’s kind of marking time.
Astonishing X-Men #56 – Hey, Marvel – if you’re going to do a plot twist where you fake Iceman dying, don’t spoil it by sticking him on the cover. I know nobody was ever going to buy it, but let’s at least go through the motions of pretending otherwise, hmm? (Come to think of it, why does the cover of this issue have Iceman throwing cards in the style of Gambit? What’s that got to do with anything?)
House to Astonish Episode 95
It’s an absolute epic of an episode this time round, with two hours of chat for you – we’ve got news on MCM Scotland, the cancellation of Hellblazer and the launch of Constantine, the Marvel Now! radio ads, the Age of Ultron, the latest Marvel teasers and Tony Harris’s cosplayer rant. We’ve also got reviews of Great Pacific and X-Men Legacy, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe gets the chop. On top of that we’ve got interviews with Mark Waid and Kieron Gillen (the latter of which is an epic taking in Uncanny X-Men, Iron Man, Journey Into Mystery, Young Avengers and Death’s Head). All this plus the Valkyrior Territorial Army, the dorkiest state in the US and a special guest comics creator… who’s topless.
The podcast is here, or on Mixcloud here, or accessible via the player below. We’re also available via Stitcher.com or their free iOS and Android apps. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page.
The X-Axis – 18 November 2012
Better late than never…
All-New X-Men #1 – Regular listeners to the podcast won’t be surprised to hear that I was bracing myself for this to be terrible. It’s not that Brian Bendis is a bad writer by any stretch of the imagination; I think he’s written a lot of good stuff for Marvel over the years. But he has been consistently bad on books with large casts, showing no real grasp on how to juggle them. His Avengers has been a bit of a mess, shall we say.
