Mis-Shapes is a club in New York. By now, perhaps everyone has heard of it. Maybe it's a good club, maybe it's not. I don't know. This post isn't about the club. It's about the song.

Last night at Underground, Dia played "Mis-Shapes" and it was one of best dancefloor moments of the night. At one point, this Pulp number was a Brit pop staple. Dia, Chris B., Larry and I all played it probably more times than we can count. As for me, I always liked to play "Mis-Shapes" late in the night. It has the sort of slow intro that lets the crowd think that you might actually be giving them a chance to rest (as if, dude, we're there to make sure you can't walk the next day), then it burts into a pogo-hopping call to action.

"Brothers and sisters can't you see, the future is owned by you and me. There won't be fighting in the street/they think they got us beat/but revenge is going to be so sweet."
-- Jarvis Cocker

After the song, we were sitting outside, talking about Brit pop in Los Angeles. I had brought a new friend with me, a Rockit writer who has lived in the city for less than a year, and Anthony and I were telling her about how the Brits ( and Scots, Welsh and Irish) pretty much dominated the underground from the time we were kids until a few years ago. Even bands as obscure as The Divine Comedy had a club hit in Los Angeles ("Generation Sex"). Now, the L.A. indie club scene is a completely different place.

"Did I tell you that Supergrass cleared the floor for me last week?" I asked Anthony.

His jaw dropped.

Okay, so "clear the floor" is an overstatement. Still, it didn't do that well, paricularly considering that "Alright" was always a no-fail club selection.

We started to tell my friend that the we knew the Brits were losing the stranglehold on Los Angeles a few years ago. At that time, Pulp, Blur and Placebo had all released new albums, all of which essentially tanked on the dancefloor, save for a remix of "Trees" from Pulp that I always played at the very end of the evening. Since then, well, there's basically Bloc Party and Franz Ferdinand and that's about it. I still wonder why it is that people are now more inclined to dance to tunes they can hear on the radio at any given moment than freak out to import singles that might make a splash a year from now. There is nothing more shocking to the ears of discerning music fans than the knowledge that Justin Timberlake will do better on the indie dancefloor than The Futureheads. [End rant.]