Tim Jonze half-slags off a slew of bands who rip off Joy Division by way of Joy Division imitators in a piece entitled “Songs ripping off songs ripping off Joy Division.” Ha. The watered-down effect is inevitable with iconic bands, but it grows more amusing as the degrees separate further. Editors is to Joy Division as Creed is to Pearl Jam, and so on. Now that we’ve arrived at a point where bands are ripping off Interpol and, God help us, Editors, how big is the gap, musically? I find it interesting that TV on the Radio isn’t given enough credit to be ripping off Joy Division at the source.

Jonze’s best ripping also has to be the lower end of the trickle down Joy Divisionisms:

Like TVOTR, Pendulum mix up a variety of influences both electonic and guitar-shaped. Unlike TVOTR, Pendulum have an almost impressive ability to pick and mix the very worst bits from a platter of some of the least fashionable music genres of all time: commercial techno, nu-metal and rhythmically challenged drum’n’bass. The result belts your brain like a detuned sledgehammer. Not only does it contain more macho bluster than Chuck Norris slaughtering his own dinner, it’s a damn site less appealing to the ears as well. Oh, and before you shout, ‘But Pendulum sound great when you’re off your nut in a rave-soaked festival tent’ remember that so do psytrance compilations featuring bands called something like Astral Hallucinogenic Suntrips.