Can't remember having seen any mention of Field Music here, which is
surprising. I can't stop listening to their album. It's available on emusic
and they have a myspace page here http://www.myspace.com/fieldmusic where
you can watch a video and hear a few songs.

They are from Sunderland and there are shades of the Futureheads in that
they are inspired by Wire (as an example) but they have much more range in
their instrumentation (strings, piano, various percussion) and at times it's
really reminding me of Eric Matthews (realise there is a stretch there to
link Wire and Matthews but they appear to do it). Basically it's art-pop and
it's bloody great! I would have thought XTC fans would dig this too.

Also, I've meant to post about Figurines for months but never got around to
it. I was in a record shop in Copenhagen at new year and there was a record
playing that really caught my ear. Turned out it was by a Danish band called
Figurines. Sounds more American than Danish so it'll probably travel well,
it's very of the moment in terms of it's sound, Franz Ferdinand and The
Shins being reasonable reference points. Tracks here
www.myspace.com/figurinesdk (also www.figurines.dk). Looks like it's been
released in Canada at least, pretty positive it's not out in the UK but
shouldn't be that hard to find if you like what you hear.

I don't really usually recommend stuff but thought these two were worth
breaking my eternal lurking for.
Best
Mark