Archive for February, 2006

2/28/06

What's Your Name? Because I'm ImpressedDear Nora...

What's Your Name? Because I'm Impressed

Dear Nora & Casiotone For The Painfully Alone "Hot Boyz" - If a song could look you in the eyes, this recording would be wearing sunglasses and looking just over your shoulder. It's very difficult to suss out the intentions of this Missy Elliott cover - homage or critique, parody or self-parody? It's really hard to tell, and it's most likely somewhere off between those margins, though the male cameo does seem to tip in favor of academic irony. But regardless of what they meant it to be, it's a mesmerizing and genuinely effecting affectation, recasting Missy's brassy sexuality in the context of flat-voiced, stoned Liz Phair lo-fi in which every line is delivered with air quotes, five pages of foot notes, and the nagging sense that the singer is totally consumed by a self-doubt completely at odds with the lyrical content. Also: Beware the one-string guitar solo of total emotional desolation! (Click here to buy it from States Rights.)

Linda Lamb "Twins" - Ah ha! Here's another ideal song to be played at that hypothetical Rob Liefeld post-Apocalyptic dance party. Just imagine a bunch of Liefeld women in skimpy spandex leotards with huge hair, gigantic shoulder pads, and massive swords swaying wildly to this song's harsh beats, or as much as they can without having their top-heavy torsos snap off at their freakishly tiny waists. This selection is from a compilation which also includes a P Diddy/Felix Da Housecat collaboration, but trust me, this is a lot better even if the curiosity factor is much lower. (Click here to pre-order it from Soul Seduction.)

Elsewhere: Happy baby boy with bubbles and Neu!

And: The annual WFMU marathon has begun! Please help to support the best freeform radio station on the planet.

10 Comments

2/27/06

Our Little Castle Is A House Of CardsMarit Larsen...

Our Little Castle Is A House Of Cards

Marit Larsen "Don't Save Me" - It's remarkable how much that ABBA-esque ringing piano refrain adds to this song, kicking it up from being a lovely acoustic-based pop ballad to something far more classic and epic without being particularly melodramatic. This is quite simply one of the best, most masterfully composed pop singles of the year thus far. Rightfully, this track is blowing up in Norway at the moment, but with any luck, this should spread well beyond Scandinavia over the course of the year. (Click here to buy it from CDON.)

Dresden Dolls "My Alcoholic Friends" - It's a strange thing. I listen to quite a bit of music that doesn't have much of a connection to my own experiences and lifestyle, and 95% of the time, it doesn't really make a difference to me one way or another. Dresden Dolls falls into the remaining 5% - I can't help but feel as though I'm listening to music that is meant for someone else, and that I'm some sort of subcultural intruder for putting this song on repeat even if it's basically the sort of jaunty cabaret/glam tune that ordinarily wouldn't be so out of place on this site. It's catchy and clever, but man, I just feel like I'm surreptitiously reading some teenage goth girl's livejournal or something. (Click here to pre-order it from Amazon.)

11 Comments

2/23/06

The Death of a Ladies ManCasey Dienel "Doctor Monroe...

The Death of a Ladies Man

Casey Dienel "Doctor Monroe" - The most immediately striking thing about Miss Dienel's first album is that it is so incredibly low-key and unpolished that she makes writing these wonderfully catchy songs with clever lyrics seem nearly effortless, which is definitely not the case for most people. On the surface, she's like a much much much less precious version of Nellie McKay, but the melodic sensibility is closer to that of Ben Folds, and the lyrics seem vaguely Steely Dan-ish to me. This is all rather startling for someone who is only 20 years old!
(Click here to buy it from Hush Records.)

Product 01 "Hot (Electro Vox Mix)" - You know how some people have a "type," and they can't help but melt whenever they meet a person who falls into that type? I'm like this with these glammy, sexy electro vamp songs, whether it be by Goldfrapp or Richard X or whomever. There's really not that many people doing this sort of thing, so it's still fairly exotic and it kills me every time, and I'm not sure if I can totally explain why. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

10 Comments

2/22/06

I'm An Ice Skater's Bruised KneesThe Fiery Furnaces...

I'm An Ice Skater's Bruised Knees

The Fiery Furnaces "Police Sweater Blood Vow" - Since they are the sort of band that clearly takes a lot of glee in messing with their audience's expectations, I was a bit nervous that the Fiery Furnaces would do something to mess up the studio recording of this song, which I had fallen in love with on the strength of the acoustic KEXP session version posted on this site last spring. Though there's a bit of overdub overkill as the song progresses, this Bitter Tea arrangement basically plays it straight as a jaunty Dylan-esque singalong, placing the emphasis firmly on the melody and the lyrics. It's an amazing, highly accesable song, and surely the sort of thing that will win back listeners put off by the bizarre excesses of Rehearsing My Choir.

In addition to its relatively normal arrangement, "Police Sweater Blood Vow" also rates as being one of the most easily relatable songs in the Furnaces catalog with its frank, straightforward lyrics about the troubles of a long distance relationship. On the verses, Eleanor sings several lines about memories and places that are so specific that they seem dense and cryptic, but the lines that dig in deepest are the most obvious and matter-of-fact: "It's only you who effects me," sounding more like a diagnosis than a confession. "That's not right babe, you're here and I'm there," the words falling flat from futility. "Tell me, babe, what time is it now?," muttered on a cell phone to a person in some far-off time zone. (Click here for the official Fiery Furnaces website.)

23 Comments

2/21/06

How To Get To Purest HellThey Shoot Horses, Don'...

How To Get To Purest Hell

They Shoot Horses, Don't They "Lowlife" - With a pulse-pounding beat and jittery horns, They Shoot Horses... evoke the fun sort of paranoia, i.e., the kind that does not directly involve yourself. This is more like the vicarious thrill of watching characters get put through the wringer in pulpy genre fiction, safe from the possibility of actually being the person at risk of being knifed by a lowlife in some noirish scenario. (Click here to buy it from Buy Olympia.)

Mark Ronson with Alex Greenwald "Just" - With the help of the horn section of the Dap Kings and the singer from Phantom Planet, DJ Mark Ronson foregrounds the R&B grooves that were always present in the Radiohead original, resulting in the very best Radiohead cover (with vocals) that I've heard. The transposition of Johnny Greenwood and Ed O'Brien's lead guitar parts to trumpet and saxphone is particularly inspired, and though I do wish the vocals were more soul/R&B to match the rest of the arrangement, Greenwald does a fine job. It's definitely a lot better than my performance of "Creep" with the Super Karaoke Fun Time Band last night! (Click here to visit Mark Ronson's MySpace page.)

11 Comments

2/20/06

I Flit, I Float, I Fleetly Flee, I FlyMax Tundra...

I Flit, I Float, I Fleetly Flee, I Fly

Max Tundra "So Long, Farewell" - The first time that I heard this, I spent the full duration of the song with a slack-jawed look of giddy disbelief on my face. I'm not kidding or exaggerating at all! It's kind of amazing how perfectly this Rodgers & Hammerstein classic from The Sound Of Music suits Max Tundra's distinct aesthetic. Tundra infuses the familiar showtune with the hyperactive cheer and sunny electronic textures of his 2002 classic Mastered By Guy at the Exchange, bringing out the best in the song and in his production style. (Click here for the official Max Tundra website.)

Simon Bookish "Terry Riley Disco (Max Tundra Remix)" - This sounds about as much like "Terry Riley Disco" as that Stereolab song sounds like "John Cage Bubblegum," which is to say, it's much closer to the second half of the imaginary genre assignment than the first. Simon Bookish speak-sings about his "mixed-up genre for a mixed-up world" in a tone and accent reminiscent of Klaus Nomi when he wasn't in opera mode over an inspired track by Max Tundra that begins as a mesmerizing slow burner before shifting into something far more manic and explosive around the halfway point. (Click here for the official Simon Bookish site.)

12 Comments

2/17/06

At The Risk Of AbsurdityHot Chip "Arrest Yourself...

At The Risk Of Absurdity

Hot Chip "Arrest Yourself" - No matter how much funk they sneak into their keyboard grooves, there's just no way that Hot Chip can avoid sounding drowsy with those diffident, dispassionate vocals. This is no complaint, mind you. There's a rather appealing tension in their mix of seductive beats and lackadaisical vibes. It's like "back to mine" bachelor bad music for the terminally indecisive. (Click here for Hot Chip's official website.)

Tender Forever "The Feelings of Love" - The song is awash in a sea of laptop melancholia; pulled down deep by the undertow of bittersweet nostalgia for the passionate early days of a romance; and lifted up by gentle hand claps and sweet self-harmonization. My first thought upon hearing it was to wish that I had posted this track on Valentine's Day, but now I think that it's much more appropriate for it to pop up a few days later. (Click here to buy it from K Records.)

11 Comments

2/16/06

Here Is Where Time Is On Our SideTalking Heads "...

Here Is Where Time Is On Our Side

Talking Heads "Road To Nowhere (Early Version)" - Little Creatures is such a frustrating record. Even though it is home to three of David Byrne's finest songs, I reckon that it signifies the beginning of the Talking Heads' decline even moreso than the similarly uneven Speaking In Tongues. Even still, it's a fascinating record, the sort of thing where even the weakest tracks are strangely compelling thanks to the car-crash magnetism of tacky mid-80s production, clever lyrical themes, and the sort of keyboard settings that I can't imagine ever sounded cool, even in the context of 1985. The album's aggressive tastefulness and intentional retreat from the experimentalism of the band's work with Brian Eno took it to the top of the 1985 Village Voice Pazz & Jop critics poll, though as Robert Christgau notes in his corresponding essay, it was mainly due to that year being alarmingly short on great records, much less albums that could garner any sort of critical concensus at the time.

The dvd side of the dualdisc reissue presents the music in pristine surround sound so crisply articulated that even an ape-eared non-audiophile like myself could notice the superior quality of the mix on standard television speakers, though I'm not sure if it did much other than to call attention to my misgivings with the album's production aesthetic. "Stay Up Late," the world's greatest song about babysitting, and "And She Was" benefit the most from the dvd audio treatment, though that could mainly be because those two tracks are so strong that the super-clean production only brought out the best in the compositions, whereas lesser tracks like "Creatures of Love" and "The Lady Don't Mind" are swallowed whole by regrettable arrangements and horribly dated guitar tones.

Of the bonus tracks, the main draw is the early version of the album's third great song, "Road To Nowhere." Stripped of its backing vocals and reduced to a comparitively spare arrangement, the demo feels noticeably lonely, standing in stark contrast with the inclusive feeling of the final version, with the new context changing the meaning of the song considerably by forcing the impression that Byrne is using the royal we when he sings "we're on a road to nowhere." (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Talking Heads "Fela's Riff" - Only five years earlier, the Heads were up to something a lot more exciting, resulting in a surplus of strong material that has now resurfaced as bonus tracks on the reissue of their finest album, Remain In Light. I posted the early version of "Once In A Lifetime" recently, but that track seems rather tame in comparison to "Fela's Riff," an intense Afrobeat/krautrock instrumental that now ranks among my favorite recordings by the band. It blows me away that they would dream of ditching a track like this. Bands go their entire career hoping to capture something as magical as this, and they opted to leave it on the cutting room floor. Going on the title, I would guess that the band felt that the song was overly derivative of Fela Kuti, but man, that is just no excuse! The four outtakes would have made a brilliant stopgap EP.

The videos of "Crosseyed and Painless" and "Once In A Lifetime" being performed live on German television on the dvd side of the dualdisc are just as jaw-dropping. The band is at the peak of their powers and augmented by several additional players, jamming for a couple minutes before launching into a jerky, sublime take on the former song that outdoes the quite remarkable LP version. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

20 Comments

2/15/06

Beautiful And Broken At The KneesThe Streets "When...

Beautiful And Broken At The Knees

The Streets "When You Wasn't Famous" - ...and now we shall all wait patiently until this song inevitably turns up in an episode of the next season of Entourage. This new single finds Mike Skinner bored with the fact that he can easily pick up girls now that he's famous and resolving to hit on other pop celebrities since that poses the same challenge as when he was a nobody. It's snotty, smug and self-absorbed, but his characteristic wit and attention to narrative detail saves the track from seeming like a cut-rate English Eminem. And of course, the ridiculously catchy chorus does not hurt at all. (Click here for the official site of The Streets.)

Blitzen Trapper "Whiskey Kisser (Kittenz Remix)" - It's interesting how whenever these pimp strut basslines get mixed up with cartoonish country affectations, the result is that the funk mutates into this weird, wobbly bounce. This track in particular makes me imagine Reed Richards or Plastic Man dancing while warping their super-elastic limbs to the beat. (Click here for the official Blitzen Trapper site.)

15 Comments

2/14/06

You Feel It In Your Legs And In Your HeartJenny...

You Feel It In Your Legs And In Your Heart

Jenny Wilson "Love Ain't Just A Four Letter Word" - On a Valentine's Day when the sentiment of my own heart is closer to that of "The Classical" than most any earnest love song, this bittersweet art-pop/cabaret ballad from Jenny Wilson sits in a comfortable middle ground between cynicism and romance that feels like some kind of emotional truth to me at the moment. I've posted this song before, and my estimation of it has only improved in the time since I've found it as it has become a playlist staple that feels just as right on both good and bad days. (Click here to buy it from Rabid Records.)

Dreamdate "The One I Need" - This is a song for those of you who may be feeling some kind of romantic bliss on this day. Oakland's Dreamdate are the next in a long line of indie pop bands who specialize in one of the genre's best selling points - sweet, extremely low key love songs ideally suited as a soundtrack for cuddling after exchanging flowers and chocolates. "The One I Need" sounds a little like Unrest, and a lot like Electrelane with a crush. (Click here for Dreamdate's MySpace page.)

16 Comments