Joe Theobald, aka DJ Captain Wormhole, looks at all things vinyl

In 1997 New Labour swept into office, the grey waters of post-Thatcherite Conservative Britain parted and Tony Blair surfed the crest of a ruby wave right in to Number 10.

The toned down, clause IV-less Labour party of the early Blair years was full of hope and mirth, it was a joyous new era for the soft left in British politics, and they had a soundtrack; a terrible, terrible soundtrack.

Before Professor Brian Cox was all over your televisions talking about millions and billions of stars, and standing on the top of waterfalls in order to illustrate the humdrum characteristic gravitational pull of the Earth or flinging Antarctic snow in the air to demonstrate light refraction in the beautiful ancient snowflakes (millions of them), or perhaps demolishing an entire supermarket to hammer home the second law of thermodynamics, all the time wearing a different waterproof jacket and the same deadening, inane grin... he was in a band called D:Ream.

D:Ream were responsible for Things Can Only Get Better, a wholeheartedly sickening, saccharine sweet summery anthem adopted by Blair’s rebranded party to help waft them into government.

With the nations of the United Kingdom thrust into their third act of universal (unless you’re under 18) suffrage in as many years, I think one small mercy we can all be grateful for is the lack of political party endorsed pop drivel clogging up our ears. Corbyn, May, Farron and the rest can all be commended for that at least.

In other news, James Murphy of reformed LCD Soundsystem fame has just this week confirmed that their new album is now completed musically and the master is on its way to the pressing plant.

With pressing times and artwork demands it is estimated that we can look forward to tearing the cellophane off a nice oily new slab of wax sometime around early August :-)