Nz's Flight Of The Conchords Go From Strength To Strength; Countdown To Local Media Claiming Them As 'Ours' Starts... Now
Posted by Clem Bastow at 2:15 PM on May 1, 2008

Naturally this means our local press, tired of Australians' not succeeding overseas (see: Oscars "disappointment" etc), will soon do a number on Flight Of The Conchords and claim them in much the same way we did Russell Crowe, Crowded House and Whale Rider.
The self-titled album from Flight of the Conchords, who have their own show on cable channel HBO, sold 52,000 copies in the week ended April 27, according to tracking firm Nielsen SoundScan.Top work, eh bros! Stick that in yer chilly bin and, er, smoke it.In the process, they outsold pop idol Ashlee Simpson, whose new album opened at No.4 with 47,000 copies. Bittersweet World marks her first release that did not go to No.1.
Although beating Ashlee Simpson to chart supremacy doesn't really wash with the whole 'struggling musos' aesthetic of their show, who cares? Coldplay have been singing songs about failing and being unlucky in love for years now!



Our complete and utter disinterest in the Grammys has become something of a Defamer tradition, with the mainstream music industry's most celebratory night of public self-diddling requiring of us zero emotional investment, thus greatly reducing the risks being forced to launch a mug of Kahlua at our TV sets after a particularly unjust upset. The Dixie Chicks are the best band on the planet? Sure, why not. That said, the 2008 nominees have been announced: The big winner was Kanye West, whose eight nominations we predict will do much towards reining in the rapper's tyrannosaurus ego, and Motown throwback Amy Winehouse, nominated four times in the big categories, with each opportunity exponentially increasing the chance that the sobriety-averse chanteuse might reach into her beehive and magically produce her speech, an eight-ball, and a hand mirror. Nominated for five each were Foo Fighters, Jay-Z, Timbaland, Justin Timberlake and something called T-Pain, while four each went to Akon, Dierks Bentley, American Idol's Chris Daughtry, Feist, Tim McGraw, John Newton, Ne-Yo, Rihanna and, finally, Bruce Springsteen, for whom surely just knowing he's in the same company as that girl who goes "ella, ella, ella" will come as one of the highlights of an already legendary musical career.