Slate piece by me on Hot Chip and Scritti and that British thing for black American music

i wrote it before they both made the shortlist for the Mercury Prize, but that just makes the pairing even more apt, as does Hot Chip's Alexis Taylor saying in the Independent the other day "I haven't heard a lot of the records, but I'm most pleased that Scritti Politti have got a mention."

it seems vaguely significant that my three favourite albums of the year so far--white bread, the warning, and burial s/t--are by white Britons (well I'm assuming that with Burial, but, well, I'd be surprised if otherwise the case) who have an intense and complex relationship with black street music... i couldn't tell you what the significance is precisely, but it probably ties back somehow to the complaints and worries in this frieze piece

talking of complaints and worries, here's another frieze piece--for their 100th issue they asked people to opine about the state of various forms of arts criticism, and i did the one on pop music writing