Social networking site, MySpace has completely transformed the way we discover and listen to our music. Aspiring musicians are uploading their music everyday to an audience of over 100 million people, worldwide. It’s famously known for assisting in the launch of artists such as Lily Allen and Arctic Monkeys and this week, MySpace has chosen to reveal the eight most popular musicians on the site for this year.

So, who reached the number one spot? Well, unusually, it’s an act that’s not released any material since way back in 2005. The band in discussion are also non-human. Guessed yet? Well, Damon Albarn’s virtual band, Gorillaz (pictured top), is the act that’s surprisingly topped the poll, beating the likes of Amy Winehouse, Oasis and Coldplay. The animated group, who’s hits include ‘Feel Good Inc’ and ‘DARE’, have had a crazy 11,498,760 hits on their MySpace page and boast of 682,875 friends.

Coming in second place is Welsh metal band, Bullet for My Valentine, with an impressive 596,885 mates. Comments on the seemingly worshipped band’s profile include “i will never get over how aswome u guys r!” and “OMG I LOVE U GUYS U RULE U WILL ONE DAY RULE THE WORLD”. The ‘Hearts Burst Into Fire’ band are currently preparing to embark on a tour around Australia and New Zeland, take parting in the awesome ‘Big Day Out’ festival.

Check out the complete list compiling MySpace’s eight most popular acts of 2008, here:

1. Gorillaz (682,875 friends)
2. Bullet for My Valentine (596,885 friends)
3. Amy Winehouse (542,268 friends)
4. Coldplay (525,110 friends) (pictured top right)
5. Lily Allen (462,159 friends)
6. MIA (399,858 friends)
7. Oasis (353,484 friends)
8. Imogen Heap (351,484 friends)

Ok, I admit it, I am absolutely obsessed with The Beatles. I guess then, being the Fab Four-nut that I am, I’m kinda biased in thinking anything that comes out of Paul McCartney’s brain is an act of pure genius. And in my eyes, his latest release is no exception. ‘The Fireman’ originally started out about 15 years ago. Combining forces with dance producer Youth, Macca has since released 2 albums under the pseudonym, and this week, The Fireman are back with their third – ‘Electric Arguments‘.

Intrigued? Well, if you’ve yet to come across The Fireman – do not expect any ‘Yesterday’s and ‘Let it Be’s here. The Fireman are as far from the puppy-eyed ballads of the 60s as you could get. Rather, The Fireman duo are an experimental electro project , both edgy and ambient, set to thrill and stun. It’s undeniable the latest Fireman release is a great deal more commercial than the previous two releases (1993’s ‘Strawberries Oceans Ships Forests’ and 1998’s ‘Rushes‘) – for starters, it’s the first of the three albums to have lyrics actually sung by McCartney. While Electric Arguments is still a fair distance from the music that made McCartney the legend he is today – it’s pretty exciting when listening to rocking Helter Skelter stylee tracks such as ‘Nothing Too Much Just Out of Sight’ and Wing-esque songs such as ‘Sing the Changes’.

Generally, Electric Arguments really is an incredibly exciting, and at times very beautiful, album. You can’t wait to hear what colourful surprises the next track is going to offer you. The best thing is, each new tune that comes along on the CD never does disappoint. It’s a peculiar, fantastical trip of an album – a highly recommended one too!

Tracks to check out : Nothing Too Much Just Out of Sight, Sing the Changes, Sun is Shining

Electric Arguments is currently being streamed for free over at The Fireman’s MySpace. You can pre-order the album, set to be released on Monday from Amazon here.

So I know a lot of readers of TGTF are avid MySpace users, and quite a few of you are still at school… so did you know about the MySpace School Invasions?

It’s basically a popularity contest for schools, with the school with the most votes from the MySpace School Invasions page winning an exclusive party.

The prize includes an all-expenses paid party with live performances from rock band Fightstar and DJ sets from Kate Nash, The Wombats, and DJ Ironik. The school that receives the most votes on the profile will host the event.

As well as winning their own exclusive party, the school will receive £10,000 worth of music equipment and a music masterclass with an established band. As part of the workshop, the band will share tales of how they got started and offer tips and advice about getting into the music industry.

Interested? Why not log into your myspace account, head on over to the School Invasions MySpace.

last.fm is just my favourite sort of company. It’s a new-ish, young, hip technology company that uses social networking to find new music for people. Just about all my favourite topics. (Yes, how geeky, I know!)

I’ve been using last.fm since December 2003, making me distinctly older hat than a lot of members. For an explanation of the site, Wikipedia is our biggest help to explain it simply:

“Last.fm builds a detailed profile of each user’s musical taste by recording details of all the songs the user listens to, either on the streamed radio stations or on the user’s own computer or iPod. This information is transferred to Last.fm’s database (“Scrobbled”) via a plugin installed into the users’ music player. The profile data is displayed on a personal web page.”

Since their early start back in 2002, the folks behind Audioscrobbler (the technical backend) and last.fm (the pretty, social networking front end) have worked tirelessly (even camping out on the roof of their offices when money was so low that they couldn’t afford accommodation). They only completely merged in 2005, and their growing popularity often caused database overloads, with close to 10 million tracks being “scrobbled” each day.

Their original roots had the site as a simple way to show your listening tastes on screen, and use the last.fm radio to listen to new bands their recommendation engine believed that you’d like. Since merging the two sites both the forward-looking social networking crowd and the geeky graph lovers have praised their innovative site.

This year they’ve gone from strength to strength, thanks in part to the explosive growth of social networking sites like Myspace and facebook (their facebook widget is one of the most popular new facebook applications). The mainstream British press has (in part) jumped on board, with the Guardian heralding it as one of the top 10 UK dotcoms to watch. Big agreements with the likes of Sony BMG that are mutually beneficial have helped grow the site, and finally their sale to US conglomerate CBS has meant that they’re right up there with the main web 2.0 players.

Thanks to staying true to their roots (the founders have committed to keeping their multi-nationality workforce in London for the future), and maintaining their sense of humour (their staff page makes for some amusing reading. Notice The Hoff at the bottom…). last.fm is one of my favourite companies of recent years – granted, they haven’t got the ethics commitments of Howies or Innocent, but they are pioneers in their area, and completely unique.

For more reading, there’s an interview with the founders over at Media Guardian.

The awesome Irish indie rock band Ash will will warm up for their set at Isle of Wight Festival with a performance at the Year Zero club night at Camden’s Proud Gallery.

They’ll be supported by The Films and Goldspot.

Tickets are available to their myspace fans, competition winners on XFM and Radio 1, and also to those who queue up (though I’d probably start about 5pm tomorrow – its sure to be a big one!)

All the information is available here.

Photo of Tim Wheeler of Ash is taken from Justin Kent’s flickr stream.