Author Archive

HAAi featuring Jon Hopkins “Baby, We’re Ascending”

“Baby, We’re Ascending” sounds like a rave in a wind tunnel, implying a submission to powerful outside forces in two different but complementary ways. The music feels urgent but Haai’s vocal is very peaceful and grounded, describing an epiphany that makes her feel as though she’s moving towards grace and the sublime. The lyrics are vague enough to mean whatever you need, but it seems to me that she’s talking specifically about music here. She’s experiencing a moment of transcendental beauty through someone else’s music and realizing she has the power to commune with it, or make her own – “I could be the whole symphony.”

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Hot Chip “Down”

Alexis Taylor has a nice voice, but it runs a bit cold – a little distant, a little introverted for a guy fronting a dance band. That unlikely fit is a big part of what makes Hot Chip interesting, they’ve certainly cornered the market on making dance music by and for sensitive nerds rather than the sort of sexy extroverted people that a lot of dance music is implicitly for. “Down” contrasts Taylor’s voice with a much bolder vocal sample from an obscure Universal Togetherness Band funk track that was reissued by the Numero Group a while back. That vocal is hot and passionate – “you sure know how to break it all down!” – and it provides a hook and something for Taylor to react against. He’s basically taking the common trope of “working it” and pushing it to a self-aware extreme, of being willfully run ragged by a demanding partner. But it’s no complaint. This is a very subby song, and he’s absolutely loving it.

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Belle & Sebastian “Working Boy in New York City”

I’ve been fascinated with how Stuart Murdoch integrates Christianity into his lyrics for a long time now, particularly as he’s become emboldened to do this quite overtly as his career progresses. Murdoch’s version of Christianity focuses on the most kind-hearted and optimistic elements of the faith and jettisons pretty much everything else, mostly just extrapolating the good ideas into the praxis of being a decent and empathetic person in the world. “Working Boy in New York City” is a great example of this. This is a light and groovy number in which Murdoch addresses a gay guy who hasn’t been open about his sexuality with some people and basically offers generous words of support and affirmation. It’s a sweet little pep talk of a song with a chorus that zooms out from this particular person’s issues to speak to a wider audience – “everybody gets an even shot at making heaven, wide is the gate.” It’s such a sweet sentiment for a song, and all the more so given that it’s set to one of Murdoch’s prettiest melodies in years.

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Cuco “Caution”

Most of Cuco’s vocal parts in “Caution” are very sing-song in that very ambiguous genre-agnostic Gen Z way where there’s some familiar elements of rap, R&B, indie rock, and latin pop but it’s not really any of those things. Those parts of the song express exactly the sort of sentiments you’d expect of this sort of thing – he’s neurotic about a relationship and battling his issues, and just trying to play it cool. The song would be very good if it just stuck to this part, but then it goes sublime with this gorgeous wordless harmonized vocal refrain that’s punctuated by blunt rhythmic utterances of “hold up” and “stop.” That last bit adds a bit of friction but doesn’t really get in the way of the raw beauty of that vocal part, which brings a blissful grace to a song that would otherwise be lost in an angsty spiral.

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Sorry “There’s So Many People That Want To Be Loved”

This sweet little song is a bit of curveball from Sorry, a band that up to this point has been on the icy and unsentimental side. But that inclination is part of what makes this vulnerable and open-hearted song about wanting to love and be loved so poignant. Asha Lorenz sounds reluctant to be saying any of this, and in the first verse she’s grounding the sentiment in a situation where she’s annoyed with the person she’s addressing. Once the song gets going she focuses her attention on what matters – a genuine empathy for all the lonely people in the world, but especially for the ones who are truly open to love. She feels like she is, but you get the sense she knows she can be self-sabotaging and is trying to stop herself from being that way. The core feeling here isn’t love, it’s frustration – in getting in your own way, of how difficult it can be to find something so simple and good, and in knowing that so many of these people who want to be loved are not going to get what they want or what they need.

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Miranda Lambert featuring The B-52’s “Music City Queen”

Miranda Lambert is a genius and force for good in this world because she wrote this song, had the somewhat improbable but totally correct thought “this could use some Fred Schneider,” and then actually got The B-52’s in the studio to make it happen. “Music City Queen” is a sunny, campy country rock tune in tribute to “flashy and trashy” nobodies living it up in spite of not making it in proper show biz. Lambert, an arena-filling star for nearly two decades, isn’t condescending here though she is funny – if anything she sounds jealous of all the no-frills fun and absolute shamelessness. The song doesn’t sound like The B-52’s but the band’s three vocalists are so perfectly suited to the sentiment and feel of it. Cindy Wilson and Kate Pierson add their signature sugary harmonies spiked with a little attitude, while Schneider does some ad-libs and call-and-response with Lambert that makes him seem like a beloved eccentric bar regular in the context of the song. Can they get John Waters to make a video for this and really complete the bit?

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Viagra Boys “Ain’t No Thief”

The lyrical conceit of “Ain’t No Thief” is that Sebastian Murphy is a guy getting accused of stealing someone’s stuff, but it’s just a coincidence of owning the same things. But Murphy plays it as comedy by making the supposedly stolen items extremely specific and his explanations totally absurd, so he ends up sounding like a flagrant liar. But given the sheer force of the music, Murphy’s raw charisma, and the boldness of his claims, you end up siding with him. It’s just like, if this guy is this clever and shameless, maybe he earned this weird commemorative lighter? It’s like the fun version of gaslighting.

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Faye Webster “Kind Of (Type of Way)”

The previous two released arrangements of “Kind Of” play the song as a low key country song, but this orchestral version has a melodramatic old Hollywood sensibility that is well suited to the delicately fluttering melody in the bridge and chorus. Faye Webster keeps her vocal phrasing mostly the same rather than going big, keeping to her sweet spot of casual, somewhat self-effacing vulnerability. This particular song really demands that approach to – she’s singing about falling in love with someone and having that stir up anxieties and emotional impulses that make you feel like someone else. There’s an unrestrained neediness in this song, a powerful tug towards codependence that she’s reasonably wary of, but she’s also not afraid of giving in to it.

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Blunt Chunks “BWFW”

You can feel the big fuzz alt-rock chorus coming in the first verse of “BWFW,” and not just in terms of genre convention expectations. The song starts pretty clean, like it could definitely go in some other musical direction, but there’s just this menacing thing looming in the background that finally makes its way to the foreground to crush everything in sight. Caitlin Woelfle-O’Brien is singing about having a bad time with someone she’s barely even in a relationship with, and while the lyrics are addressed to someone else it’s pretty clear that they’re not listening and wouldn’t care. That tension really works for the song, where it seems like the real point is her realizing she’s stuck in a dead end.

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King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard “Kepler-22b”

Michael Cavanagh drums on “Kepler-22b” like a man extremely eager to get sampled. He’s dialed into tight pocket groove but he sounds relaxed, so the beat never feels stiff and the fills just tumble out with ease. You’ve definitely heard versions of this beat before and the familiarity is part of the charm here – there’s something so satisfying about the way Cavanagh hits the marks, like an itch getting scratch. It’s possible that the rest of the music was written before the drums were worked but it sounds very much like the King Gizzard crew are following the rhythm’s lead into jazz/R&B territory. It’s still in their spacey comfort zone and that’s actually literal when it comes to the lyrics, in which Stu Mackenzie sings about a kid obsessed with a distant planet that’s theoretically capable of sustaining human life.

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Earl Sweatshirt featuring Armand Hammer “Tabula Rasa”

Theravada and Rbchmbrs pull off one of my favorite sample production moves, in which a tiny sliver of another song is manipulated so the bits of notes and chords become an entirely new and different piece of music that feels totally natural but also is something very unlikely to be composed by someone actually playing piano and bass guitar. When it’s done as gracefully as it is done here it just feels like magic to me. Earl Sweatshirt and the members of Armand Hammer take the late night melancholy tone of the track as a prompt to get introspective – ELUCID pondering authenticity and people who “talk like they never got punched in the face,” Billy Woods delivering a densely written verse that’s mostly morbid, and Earl searching for balance and peace.

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Fly Anakin “Sean Price”

Fly Anakin raps with some worry and hurry in his voice, as though he’s trying to spill it all out while under duress. This is a sharp contrast with Evidence’s track for “Sean Price” which seems to move in slow motion, but they fit together as two different ways of feeling very present in a moment. It also gives this character study some dimension – he’s stressed out, sure, but also seeing things very clearly.

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Pusha T featuring Kanye West “Dreamin’ of the Past”

Good for Pusha T for managing to get a bouncy classic 00s style track from Kanye West in the 2020s – doesn’t seem easy these days? Or cheap, given that this one is built around a sample of Donny Hathaway singing a John Lennon song. Pusha T is definitely not going to surprise anyone with lyrical subject matter at this stage but there’s a few particularly clever lines here – I like “Kevlar in his Balenciaga jacket lining” and “on the bikes like Amblin.” West shows up for a brief verse near the end though his voice sounds a little off, I actually just thought it was someone else until I looked it up. I should’ve known, though – the line about almost buying the Fresh Prince of Bel Air mansion but hating the kitchen design is so very him.

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Tha God Fahim & Your Old Droog “Wall Street with Briefcase”

Here’s another presumably pricey sample, I’ll let you figure it out or look it up. But maybe I’m just “looking at expensive shit with the cheap face,” as Tha God Fahim says in the chorus. The sound of the track is lush and gentle, you could put the instrumental on a chillout mix. I like the cranky tone of the vocals though, particularly in the second half when Your Old Droog comes through and sounds like he’s casually shit talking in an assured but peevish tone.

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Vince Staples “When Sparks Fly”

I’ll admit that it took me a while to get that this isn’t a regular love song, but rather Vince Staples doing his own take on Nas’ “I Gave You Power” – the lyrics are from the perspective of a personified gun, and this time around it’s a romance. Staples is clever enough to make this work perfectly well as a single entendre but his lyricism really shines in the double meanings, particularly in the extended protection/glove metaphor midway through the first verse. Frano’s track is all atmospheric sensuality and sex though, so I wonder if Staples felt a little too self-conscious about writing a straight-up love song. It’s more interesting and certainly more macho as the gun thing, but I feel like the song is actually more resonant without that layer of ironic distance.

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Banks “I Still Love You”

“I Still Love You” is a song that explores the cognitive dissonance that comes from when you go from extreme intimacy with someone to becoming total strangers. She’s yearning to reconnect with them but seems mainly interested in the small details – what’s their current favorite song, do they still smoke weed, do they have any bruises on their body right now? Banks sings in a fragile tone at the top of her register, sounding as though she could break into tears at any moment. But she’s more nostalgic than sad here, and the piano figure at the center of the piece signals a touch of brightness and optimism. She’s just looking for a similar level of connection and this relationship is simply the last time she felt something she craves. She acknowledges the “issues” with this other person, and I think that’s her way of reminding herself that she might be better seeking out what she actually needs with someone else. The song sort of knows that it’s a momentary indulgence.

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Supershy “Happy Music”

Tom Misch’s debut as Supershy is a lush disco track that superficially resembles The Avalanches’ classic “Since I Left You,” at least in as much as both song expertly evoke the idea of some glamorous 20th century party you can imagine but never attend. The song bangs and thumps in all the ways you’d want it to but the main attraction is definitely in the more delicate aspects of Misch’s arrangement, particularly in his deftly harmonic use of vocal samples. This works as a straightforward piece of…well, happy music… but there’s just enough melancholy lingering in the atmosphere of the mix to emphasize that this is, for most of us, an impossible nostalgia.

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Bruce Horsnby, Ezra Koenig, and Blake Mills “Sidelines”

The lyrics of “Sidelines” make some direct references to life in the early phase of the pandemic but even if Bruce Hornsby’s words stayed focused on the opening images of a judge heading to Salem it would sound very much like a quarantine song. It’s in the odd stillness, the cautious twitch in the rhythms, a stunned and dazed feeling that permeates the track. Hornsby’s lyrics are a scatter of images and ideas that suggest a mind trying to piece together a situation through stress and distraction, and then through some filter of vague paranoia. Hornsby and Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig find some grace and beauty in this odd moment, singing a slightly jagged melody that pushes upward like a prayer at the end of the chorus. We’re far enough away from this moment in time to recognize what this grace and beauty actually is – it’s the sudden authentic humility of truly having no idea what’s about to happen and allowing yourself to feel that scary but sort of freeing feeling.

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Keshi “Limbo”

The first third of “Limbo” is a delicate and meditative sequence in which Keshi sings wordlessly in a gorgeous falsetto over very gentle acoustic guitar and piano. It opens the song in a very placid sort of melancholy before the beat comes in and his vocal switches into a semi-rapped cadence, and he starts laying out exactly why he’s so upset. It’s a little like spotting a guy brooding on his own, and then going up to him like “hey, you want to talk about it?” Keshi really lets it all out here – mostly he’s wrestling with competing feelings of hyper-confidence and self-loathing, and struggling with a drinking problem that he doesn’t seem to have fully treated just yet. The best part of the song is when he switches back to pure singing for a post-chorus hook where he admits “this is all that I am, I only show you the best of me.” But of course, in writing and singing this song he’s allowing himself to show the mess in his life while still holding on to grace and beauty.

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Wet Leg “Being In Love”

The magic trick of the Wet Leg roll out is that while the songs on their record were written around the same time, they were fed to us in a sequence that filled in the character of the band and made it look like real-time creative growth. They were introduced as inscrutable and mischievious weirdos with “Chaise Longue,” but as the songs came out the lyrical POV became more apparent – they’re writing songs about being young women who want to have a good time but keep running into all the odd and annoying ways a good time can be spoiled by other people. There’s a raw vulnerability in a lot of their songs that wasn’t apparent on the aloof and opaque “Chaise Longue” but the playfulness of that song carries over to even their most fraught heart-on-sleeve numbers, so it all clicks together nicely.

“Being In Love” hit me as an instant classic the moment I heard them play it at their show at Baby’s All Right in Brooklyn in December. The lyrical conceit is simple but very strong – Rhian Teasdale is singing about a powerful and debilitating anxiety, but deciding that she doesn’t hate the feeling because it strongly resembles the feeling of falling in love. The song, which has an energy halfway between that of Wet Leg forebears Blondie and Elastica, really sells the crush feeling but the lyrics subvert the form by completely removing the romantic element. You could listen to it and make it about a person, but it would be missing the point.

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Maggie Rogers “That’s Where I Am”

The bones and sentiment of “That’s Where I Am” are pure classic VH1 adult contemporary but the arrangement is all blaring distorted bass, huge breakbeat drums, and guitar chords that sound like they’re being played on light switches. I think in its own way it would be bold enough for Maggie Rogers to unashamedly write something along the lines of “Unwritten,” but it’s even more interesting to take that song and push it into this loud, stomping musical territory. She’s basically taking a very inspirational sort of song and reinforcing it with an arrangement that makes it sound like this massive, unstoppable force. It’s a brilliant move for a song she deliberately wrote to convey a triumphant happy ending, and I love that it’s also merging a very femme sound with a very hyper-masculine sound in a way that feels far more natural and complementary than contradictory.

Rogers’ lyrics describe a peaceful feeling on the other side of years of romantic drama. There’s enough plot points here to fill out a pretty solid 90 minute rom-com, and even though the chorus is written from a place of acceptance and perspective, she still sings about the more fraught and confusing moments in way that honors those feelings. The part that really slays me is when she questions how much this guy’s ex knew about their profound connection – “Did she know that we were together somehow? / you never touched me, but I felt you everywhere.” It takes a lot for someone to write a thing like that and sing it in a way that doesn’t sound at all delusional, but she pulls it off.

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Pavement “You Are A Light” (Live in NYC 1999)

Pavement was a restlessly creative band through the majority of their existence between 1989 and 1999, so the previous four deluxe reissues of their albums were stacked with non-album songs and unreleased material that was mostly of very high quality. Stephen Malkmus was moving so fast and with so much confidence that a lot of songs that would be the best thing a lot of bands could ever hope to write were relegated to b-sides or totally cast aside and left unfinished. But with Terror Twilight there’s really not a lot of extra songs and so the extra material on this reissue is very focused on charting the progress of the songwriting from demo to rehearsal to revision, and ultimately how some of the songs changed on stage. It’s very interesting but not tremendously listenable, and certainly not for anyone but the most obsessive fans.

Listening in on process is demystifying, and Pavement is a band that really thrives on mystique. There’s one demo in this set for “Billie” that actually kinda wrecks something I’ve cherished for a long time, a live recording of that song in St. Louis in which Malkmus seems to freestyle an entire perfectly formed verse off the top of his head. But no, it wasn’t off the top of his head, it was just a verse from the original draft that he’d replaced. I guess it’s cool to know that, but the idea that he could improvise so well was both rooted in plenty of other evidence supporting this and also just a fun thing to hold on to. It’s like finding out that sometimes Michael Jordan was getting lifted up on wires to slam dunk.

One of the most interesting songwriting journeys documented on this reissue is the gradual evolution of “You Are A Light” culminating in a live recording from a show I actually attended at Irving Plaza in Manhattan. As a tape collector it’s never been news to me that “You Are A Light” is best as a live song, nor has its origins been a mystery to me – there’s other early versions of the song that are not included here, including one that has the line variation “you..are a Sprite drinker…” that I always sorta anticipate in any version of the song. This set fills in a lot of steps along the way, including an extra long rendition laid down at Larry Crane’s Jackpot studio. I appreciate the lyrical variations as Malkmus improvises his way through rehearsal, particularly “I opened up my mouth, out came the words you despised.” But the magic doesn’t really happen for the song until Malkmus fully works out how the guitar parts fit together and how to really land the solo. By the time they lay it down with Nigel Godrich the song is perfectly formed, but on stage it gets a little more room to breathe. The song truly has some of the most beautiful guitar parts he’s ever written.

“You Are A Light” is one of a few songs on Terror Twilight where Malkmus is obviously sabotaging his lyrics a bit because he can sense the music wants to be more overtly sentimental than he was comfortable being at the time. You can hear him struggling with this in all the variations as he gradually edits out everything that seems like a song about a relationship in favor of telling a story about a weird senior trip abroad and nudging the chorus away from the far more romantic “you are the light becoming the day.” Since this song exists in many forms I don’t really mind that he ran away from the more open-hearted lines even if I actually favor them, and I think shrinking away from sentimentality was very honest and as a relatable impulse in and of itself. He wouldn’t be as afraid of it today, and hearing him be more open in later material is part of what makes having a long term fascination with an artist a fulfilling experience. They grow, you grow, and perspective shifts. I feel like I’ve been on all sides of this song at this point, and I’ve got a lot out of every version of it. I hope they play it on the tour this year so maybe I can get some new variations on it.

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