David Smyth predicts big things for Liverpudlian Candie Payne, talks about Kanye's latest hook-up and lets us know all that's new in online music.

Candie joins the girl's club

Being tagged the new Amy Winehouse is quite the poisoned chalice, suggesting a career of overdoses, cancelled gigs and horrible-looking tattoos to look forward to.

But Liverpudlian sweetheart Candie Payne, 24, doesn't seem one for the more sordid trappings of her imminent fame. “I'd be feeling self-conscious about it if I thought I really was the next Amy Winehouse and had completely ripped her off. But I know that's bullshit, so I'll just get on with doing what I'm doing,” she tells me.

Even so, she admits that if it wasn't for her recently hospitalised peer, she wouldn't be next in line to pretty up the charts. “I couldn't even get a manager until Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen took off. Now it's a completely different story. The door has been opened.”

Payne's sound has the retro feel, but less of the spiky attitude of the two current queens of pop. It's swinging Sixties soul that recalls Dusty, Petula and even Cilla.

It has not been a meteoric rise. Payne's musical partner, Simon Dine, failed to attract much attention when he tried something similar over four albums with his band Noonday Underground — and Payne's debut album, I Wish I Could Have Loved You More (Deltasonic), has yet to chart since its May release.

But that is set to change when she reveals her secret weapon. Payne's song One More Chance has been re-recorded and polished considerably by Mark Ronson, the producer responsible for the horn-packed sound of Amy and Lily. It's a blatant
attempt to get it on the radio, and I would cry foul did it not sound so fantastic: a yearning break-up anthem stuffed with strings, church bells and a chorus that soars off into the stratosphere.

It will turn out to be the hit she's been waiting for when it's released on 3 September. “I love what Mark has done with it,” she enthuses. “He's made it sound really Christmassy, like Phil Spector.” Payne has the looks for stardom.

Having worked for three years in a vintage clothing store, she would look like she had stepped out of a David Bailey photoshoot whether or not she was trying to make it as a singer. She has an indie background, with brothers in both The Zutons and Scouse also-rans The Stands, and professes to have higher priorities than fasttrack fame.

“It was more important to me to get the good reviews I got than to get straight into the top 10. What's happened to Kate Nash seems too quick to me.”

Nevertheless, she'll be up there with Nash and the rest of the girls' club very soon. And whether she ends up tagged as the new Amy or the new Dusty, she deserves the success on her own merits.

An early listen to... Hard Fi

Once Upon a Time in the West (Atlantic)

Rabble-rousers Hard-Fi were the archetypal firework band in 2005, coming from nowhere (or Staines, which is much the same thing) to sell nearly a million copies of their debut album and quickly managing an almost unheard-of five-night occupancy of Brixton Academy last May.

The quartet are preparing to release the follow-up on 3 September — but is what went up so spectacularly about to come down?

Leaving aside the hilariously misguided sleeve design, which will ensure that millions believe that it's actually called NO COVER ART, there's nothing here to scare away their existing fans.

The danceable beats and dub harmonica are still there on tracks such as I Shall Overcome, and their knack for a stirring anthem remains intact on Tonight and Television, probably their catchiest chorus to date. It's a bigger sound, with lots of massed vocals and horns on Can't Get Along, but overall it's more of the same.

Time will tell if they've done enough to stay relevant.

Kanye whistles to a different tune

Talk about building momentum slowly. The song Young Folks, by kooky Swedish trio Peter Bjorn and John, first scraped into our Top 40 a year ago, but after 12 months of gradually swelling ubiquity, it's coming out all over again on
17 September.

It has even made the trio Kanye West's new best mates. You know it, even if you haven't heard of them. It features a clattering hip hop breakbeat, the dreamy tones of former Concretes singer Victoria Bergsman, and whistling. Lots of whistling.

It has long been cropping up on television incidental music almost daily, has been turned into a gorgeous bluegrass lament by country singer Dawn Landes, and in May was augmented by a Kanye West rap on a mixtape produced by the American superstar.

It's an unlikely hook-up, but one which will come to life this weekend when West performs at Gothenburg's Way Out West music festival with Peter Bjorn and John as his backing band.

“He's going to rap on a song and we're going to play along and I'm going to dance,” elaborates the band's Peter Morén, who seems happy about the exposure despite the fact that the rapper hasn't given them any money for sampling their music.

When Kanye professes love for anything other than himself, that's good enough.

New on the Net

The recently departed Lee Hazlewood will be much missed, not just for his talent, which led to collaborations with Nancy Sinatra, but for his marvellous, tar-like voice and a way with a bleakly funny lyric.

The blog tributes are pouring forth, pointing those yet to fall for Hazlewood's psychedelic brand of country towards a few career highlights. Visit http://adeeper shadeofsoul.blogspot.com and http://somevelvetblog. blogspot.com (named after his finest three minutes, Some Velvet Morning) for starters.

Now that Apple has launched a phone to go with iTunes, it was almost inevitable that phone manufacturer Nokia would strike back with a download store of its own. The word is that Nokia will be making a big announcement about this in London very soon, and may even be selling downloads here before Apple's phone launches in Europe.

The Foo Fighters are starting the buzz for their sixth album, released 25 September, with the ownload-only release of lead single The Pretender on Monday. Expect high quality riffage as always.