Suddenly I’m Miss Beehive 1963

Both songs today come from the new Wig In A Box – The Songs from Hedwig and the Angry Inch compilation, which has impressed me quite a bit. I’d never bothered with the actual Hedwig musical, but as it turns out, there were some really excellent showtunes in that show, and some top-drawer talent have recorded the songs for this new record. I recommend checking it out – in addition to the two songs below, there are some top notch recordings by Spoon, Sleater-Kinney with Fred Schneider of the B-52’s, The Breeders, Imperial Teen, and (surprisingly, since I normally dislike him) Rufus Wainwright.

The Polyphonic Spree “Wig In A Box” – I decided to post the Polyphonic Spree song mostly because it’s an interesting song for them, since it deviates quite a bit from the formula of their album (which I like a lot, by the way), and suggests that they should perhaps seriously look into making their next record more of a showtune-y affair. The style suits them very, very well.

Frank Black “Sugar Daddy” – Frank Black gets the nod for the opposite reason, since this song is a bit of a throwback to his more wild Pixies-era singing than what he’s been doing over the past several years. Lyrically and musically, it sounds as though it was written specifically for him. If I heard this song without knowing where it was from, I can’t imagine suspecting that it wasn’t a Frank Black original.