Dead On Arrival, The 90s Revival

Paris Angels “Perfume (All On You)” – No, sorry, that isn’t an error: there’s a song name there but no link. You see, the server we use at Freaky Trigger can’t sustain many MP3s, so we’re going to have to be selective. Or rather – you’re going to have to be selective.

When Matthew asked me to be part of the Fluxblog All-Stars I knew I had to do something themed. At the weekend, during a conversation with my brother, it came to me: the 90s Revival. There’s no point in denying it, we all know it’s on its way: the cycles of pop and memory demand no less. But what is going to be revived, and by who? It’s best to be prepared, after all. So from Monday to Saturday I’m going to be talking about six ripe-for-resurrection genres, with an example from each for the curious to try and track down. And on Sunday I’ll (finally!) post an MP3, from one of the six genres, as picked by you. Without further ado, we start with BAGGY.

Baggy was a parochial English pop moment that hit in ’89 and had vanished by the end of ’91. It was also known as ‘indie-dance’ which gives you a fair idea of its priorities: “indie” i.e. bad singing, meets “dance” i.e. the funky drummer sample. I was 16 in 1989 though and to me this stuff was a major breakthrough, a call to all the kids to drop their tribal loyalties and groove on together. I still love a lot of the music.

One of the strange things about revivals is how very hip people and very unhip people move in chronological step. The rise of punk-funk Gang Of Four knockoffs and the turn back of clubland to coke’n’dresscodes is roughly contemporary with the rise in ultra-naff ‘school disco’ club nites playing Duran Duran. When the 90s come to this parting of the ways most baggy records will be firmly on the school disco side (The Farm’s monster “Groovy Train” springs to mind). Paris Angels’ “Perfume (All On You)” though might make the jump to hip approval: it’s fairly obscure, it’s very good and its ideas weren’t strip-mined quite as ruthlessly as the more generic shufflers of the era.

The brackets are important – “Perfume” without them is an un-rocking 7″ plod; “(All On You)” is a 12″ remix and is also a wave machine in a pool of champagne. The Extreme Makeover remix treatment (then still a daring novelty) for once produced a real gem: jangling guitars mix with twinkling sequencers, a love-in between supposedly clashing sounds that suddenly twig that they’re beautiful together. And the stretch from four to six minutes gives the song room to uncurl and impress, the rough-cut vocals changing before your ears into something hopeful and tender. How could it come back? Well, if the dance-rock crew decide to go for ‘beautiful’ on those difficult third/fourth albums, they could do worse than start here.

I’m not some little puppet, alright?



Hello and welcome to amateur hour at Fluxblog. I do hope we don’t disappoint…

Nio – “No strings” (Calypso mix) – Words and meaning aren’t always the same. It’s a neat trick to say one thing, mean another and still have your listener understand the hidden meaning rather than the obvious one. Often people that can do this are called “witty”. Saying one thing and meaning another is done pretty often on the internet because it’s a universal get-out clause if you’ve said anything stupid and/or offensive. One of the nice things about Flux is that he’s very capable of this kind of wit (unlike many of the practitioners), but mostly he just says what he means instead. That’s disciplined and shows a nice lack of ego.

This song is massively sonically inventive and I could talk for ages about that, and about how mixes like this one only ever appear on 12 inch singles and that’s one of the joys of the format. But I won’t. I’ll just say instead that although he’s singing about freedom, you get the sense from this song that Nio is actually telling somebody that he wants to commit to them, that he wants to be bound. He’s just doing it in a kind of roundabout way. Which isn’t witty, but is terribly moving.

You can buy this, and a variety of other Nio singles at Juno.

Lady Sovereign – “A little bit of shhh!” – On the other hand, Lady Sovereign is witty as hell. It took British people about 10 years to crack rock and roll. It seems like hip hop was a trickier beast, as it’s taken at least 20 years, but now the UK is motoring.

This tune has all the things you’d expect from a grime tune – the flat planes of bass, the atonal squawks and the slightly ramshackle beats. And as you’d expect the delivery of the MC oozes London-ness. But forget all the genre signposts – what makes this special and different is that it’s packed with little gags, little “ohhhh shit!” moments and far more personality than you’d credit possible to someone so tiny (she’s 5’1″ and likes to wear Adidas). Which is why ‘grime’ is such a terrible name for a genre as it appears to preclude the possibility of any sort of fun. Which is clearly not the case. Also, this tune has pianos, as they are careful to point out. But “don’t joke with us small folk”, kay?

The video to this song is on her website.

Also available at Juno.

Courtesy of Laces

Is It True That Honky Dory Means OK?

Burka Band “Burka Blue” – The Burka Band are the world’s first all-woman Afghani electro band, apparently put together by a German record label who were holding music workshops in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban. The authenticity of this is somewhat questionable, and I’m not entirely sure whether or not this is for real. Either way, this is a fine novelty pop single, functioning well as both a curiosity (or joke) and as a song. The single includes some video files, and remixes by Barbara Morgenstern and A Certain Frank which are both fine, but lack the charm of the original mixes. (Click here to buy it from Atatak.)

The Married Monk “Tell Me Gary” – At their best, The Married Monk sound like an intriguing cross between late-80s The Fall and mid-90s Pulp filtered through an effete French sensibility. “Tell Me Gary” has a great sense of self-aware, tacky faux-decadence; setting up a tense, sinister groove with low-budget keyboard brass and orchestra hits like something out of a tv movie. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

I’m going to be taking a brief vacation from regular posting on this blog next week so that I can recharge my batteries and take it easy. In the meantime, I’ve put together an all-star team of guest bloggers who will be filling in starting on Monday. As it stands right now, the Fluxblog All-Stars include Mike Barthel, Joe Macare, Jacob Wright, Sasha Frere-Jones, Maura Johnston, Fred Solinger, Keith Harris, Douglas Wolk, Chris Conroy, Jessica Hopper, Ben Dietz, Hillary Brown, Grant Balfour, Ben Hoh, Mark Slutsky, Tom Ewing, Tom Scharpling, Julianne Shephard, The Professor, Geeta Dayal, and Paul Cox, plus a few more people yet to be confirmed. It’s going to be crazy and fun, so don’t miss it.

You Will Be Hazed, You Will Be Amazed

The Mae-Shi “Power To The People” – Spazzy art punk is such a tricky and underrated thing. It often seems that for every gem of the genre, there are literally thousands of other attempts which either don’t quite work or miss the mark entirely. This normally comes down to a lack of discipline on the part of the bands – they’re usually amateur musicians with limited technical skill who are just fucking around and aren’t totally concerned with songwriting so much as the physical and emotional release of performance. There’s nothing really wrong with any of that, but it definitely makes cherry-picking the best songs from art-punk records a somewhat tedious chore at times. The Mae-Shi are definitely above-average in this respect. Several tracks from their album Terror Bird click, but “Power To The People” has just the right balance of song structure and physical momentum to make it the obvious highlight of the record. (Click here to buy it from Buy Olympia!)

Air “Alpha Beta Gaga (Mark Ronson vocal mix)” – Against all odds, a celebutot DJ (Mark Ronson) has remixed a lite pop tune best suited to being the background music at a boutique (Air’s “Alpha Beta Gaga”) with vocals by one of the most unfortunately named rappers of all time (he’s called Rhymefest! for real!) and the results are actually quite good; a definite case of the sum being greater than the parts. Rhymefest makes up for his intensely lame moniker by delivering a strong vocal performance similar in style to that of the GZA and Kool G Rap, and Ronson reshapes Air’s original arrangement into something falling halfway between contemporary mainstream pop and old school hip hop. (Click here to buy it from Amazon UK.)

Leave All The Things That Haunt You

The Concretes “Diana Ross” – I can barely resist young Swedish pop groups under normal circumstances, so obviously I cannot help but to adore this swoon-inducing girl group bolero about listening to Diana Ross records. This song is a selection from the band’s self-titled album; a lovely, wintery pop record which works best on the upbeat numbers, but loses my interest somewhat when they veer off into Velvet Underground-style balladry. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Improved Sound Ltd. “Leave This Lesbian World” – This peculiar little song was written and recorded for the soundtrack of the German film Engelchen macht weiter – Hoppe, hoppe Reiter back in 1969. Though I do understand that the film was about beatniks and hippies living in Munich, I cannot imagine what the context of these lyrics could be, unless that film presaged the plot of Chasing Amy. It seems to be a song written from the perspective of a man who is interested in being with a woman who he believes has become a lesbian because she has been raped and traumatized in the past. He is apparently urging her to leave her “lesbian world” so that she can, um, be with him. I’m not sure whether the lyrical content of this song is misogynistic and homophobic, or just very dumb and misguided, but it’s still a pretty good song nevertheless. (“(Click here to buy it from Juno.)

From My Telescope I Can See You Grinning

The Sunshine Fix “What Do You Know?” – If I ever get to make a film in which there is a scene set at a psychedelic saloon in the middle of a desert (which is very doubtful, but you never know), I really ought to use this as the soundtrack for that sequence. The Sunshine Fix is led by Bill Doss, formerly of Olivia Tremor Control, who were the best of all of the Elephant Six bands as far as I am concerned. The new Sunshine Fix record isn’t quite as “let’s make our own Beatles record!” as OTC’s best work (I’m not exaggerating – Dusk At Cubist Castle is such a thorough aping of late period Beatles that there are even fake George Harrison songs!), but it’s still stuck in the late 60s, in terms of style and influence. I don’t have much of a problem with that, though – aside from The Shimmer Kids Underpop Association/The Society Of Rockets, no one else pulls off neopsychedelia as well as the Elephant Six folks. (Click here to buy it from Spinart.)

The Shimmer Kids Underpop Association “Black Heva Vs. The Ruby Satellite” – It seems wrong to mention the Shimmer Kids and not also post something by them, given that they were/are so obscure and underrated. “Black Heva” is a lost classic; an epic sci-fi love song which sounds like the musical equivalent of Jack Kirby comics from the mid-60s. Unfortunately, this recording has never been properly released, and was only ever available as an mp3 and on a limited edition cassette EP.

Nonsense In Extensia

The Fiery Furnaces “Quay Cur”/”Straight Street” (Live on East Village Radio, 6/26/04) – This is a solo acoustic recording taken from Eleanor Friedberger’s appearance on the radio program “Gay Beach” on East Village Radio from only a few weeks ago. Eleanor only plays the slow acoustic section of “Quay Cur,” and explains to the DJ that that part of the song is mostly in Inuit. At the time, I had no idea that it wasn’t in English – I had just assumed that she was mumbling!

Thanks to Grant Balfour, I have come upon this excerpt from Richard Hakluyt’s Voyages in Search of The North-West Passage, which includes a glossary containing nearly all of the Inuit words included in the lyrics. It seems that this book was very likely a source of inspiration for the song in general.

This is a basic English translation of the Inuit passage:

half hour sandglass / seven saker round shot/ ice for the moonshine / and chichsaneg / kiss me, kiss me, kiss me, don’t say no / tie tight my coat /

in comes the fog / fallen down in the sea, go fetch / look yonder / get out my knife / I mean no harm, I mean no harm / weave us on shore / give it, give it to me / will you have / and I gave a bracelet / kiss me, kiss me, kiss me, don’t say no / tie tight my coat / in comes the fog / fallen down in the sea, go fetch

“Chichsaneg” is the only word that I cannot find anywhere online – my guess is that it is some kind of food or beverage. Also, I am not sure if a “sasobneg” is strictly defined as being a bracelet. I suspect that it may be a reference to the lost locket from the beginning of the song.

For more detailed analysis of “Quay Cur” (and very soon, the entirety of Blueberry Boat), I strongly recommend visiting Clap Clap Blog frequently over the next few weeks.

(Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: Spizzazzz ‘s 40 Days Of Spizz Blends is currently in progress, with each new day bringing us a brand new homemade mash-up courtesy of E Crunk. So far, this highly ambitious project has yielded some nice material, including remixes of Trick Daddy, Ludacris, Usher, and 50 Cent. My favorite, unsurprisingly, is their mix of Ce’Cile “Hot Like We,” which is just ridicously great, especially when the music from “99 Problems” kicks in. Hats off to the Spizzazzz folks for taking the audioblog format in different direction. It’s a bit like the old days of Boom Selection, which was one of my biggest inspirations for starting this blog.

There’s Something You Don’t Want Me To Know

Stimulator “78 Stimulator” – How ’90s is this? It’s like a half pound of Garbage, 2/3 cup of pureed Elastica, a teaspoon of Veruca Salt, and a pinch of Shampoo. I have a major soft spot for artists who make music which would have gone over very well in a previous era, but it must really sting for these guys, to be highly proficient with a style which was huge only seven years ago. This single could have at least have been as big as that one Republica song, you know? (Click here to buy it from CD Baby.)

Shakedown “Love Game (Mousse T Vs. Eraserhead 313 Dub)” – Though this is the same Shakedown which gave us the brilliant single “At Night” from two years ago, this really doesn’t sound much like that song at all. That’s a bit of a let down for me, but this is still a fairly strong track. This particular remix sounds as though the producers wanted to ape The Rapture’s (or, I don’t know, one of the hundred other bands who sound like The Rapture) style, which may have yielded some very predictable results were it not for the contrast with the singing, which is more typical of house music. It’s a refreshing change of pace to hear this type of music without the customary squawking atonal man-pain vocals. Ten years from now, this track is going to seems as “early 00s” as the Stimulator song is “late 90s,” but don’t let that bother you too much. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Also: NYC area Fiery Furnaces fans should note that tickets for a September 25th show at the Bowery Ballroom are now on sale.

After The Beep

These answering machine excerpts are taken from old episodes of WFMU‘s The Audio Kitchen, a program which showcases a wide range of found audio. The archives containing these particular calls are no longer online, but the most recent season of the program (summer 2003) is available on the Audio Kitchen website.

Mark’s Answering Machine – This is from the answering machine of a man named Mark, who was apparently heading out on a trip to England following his birthday, which passes over the course of this collection of messages. The tape is notable for a set of messages left by a woman who seems to be Mark’s jilted ex-lover. Her calls become gradually more intense and emotional, revealing a devastating mix of impotence, rage, and pettiness.

Toby’s Answering Machine – Toby apparently belonged to some kind of dating service, and this excerpt from her answering machine chronicles three calls from potential suitors. The first caller seems to be a confused mess; the second man calls in spite of the realization that they have absolutely nothing in common; and the final call is from some dude from Rome.

Bizarre Answering Machine Tape – This is the entirety of a microcassette which was found in a dump and restored to the best of the ability of both the Professor and the original finder. As a whole, it seems like some kind of bizarre audio collage combining incidental room chatter, automated messages, distorted ring tones, typical messages, inexplicable music, weird gibberish from children, an irate foul-mouthed matriarch, and some drama involving an extremely depressed, lovesick guy in a hospital. (Please note that all expletives have been omitted and replaced with electronic noise, so that it could be aired on the radio.)

Also: Could this be the best dvd set of all time?

Everything’s Unreal

Freeform Five “Strangest Things” – The Freeform Five have a genuine gift for writing ‘evil’ boy band songs, foregrounding the subtext of that genre into something openly seedy, lascivious, and intensely physical, while sounding essentially the same on a surface level. This is everything that JC Chasez tried and failed to accomplish on his solo record, primarily because he didn’t have the tunes, but also because he seemed so desperate to shake off the old context, rather than play with it and use it to his advantage the way Justin Timberlake has. The Freeform Five exude the same kind of cocky charm as Timberlake, whereas Chasez’ solo music is smarmy and in denial of its own insecurity, like a creepy dude who will hit on every woman in a room until one of them says yes. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Seelenluft w/ Jim Reid “I Can See Clearly Now” – Yes, that Jim Reid, the one from the Jesus and Mary Chain. It’s kinda funny how J. Spaceman and Jim Reid’s vocal deliverary are so similar now that this track ends up sounding more like a danced-up version of Spiritualized than JMC. Either way, it’s as druggy and dronetastic as you would expect. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Also: MP3Blogs.Org is an excellent new site designed to help keep track of all of the audioblogs with feeds on a daily basis. It has a very simple design and interface, and is covering most everything of note. I’m all for this sort of thing, though the wget leeching that’s been going on elsewhere raises my hackles quite a bit. To me, the written aspect of the mp3 blog is a major part of the appeal, and to shut that out is both rude and ill-advised, since context counts for so much, especially when it comes to rare music.

You’re So So Stup’, It’s All Disrup’

Jonathan Vance “Slyvia The Eagle” – I know next to nothing about this artist. This song was on a promo cd sent to me by Vance’s label, Run-Roc Records, but they have no information about him on their site, and I can’t find anything anywhere. Anyway, this is an interesting little song with driving percussion which implies dance music without actually being very danceable, and punk-inflected vocals which fall halfway between shouting and spoken word. It has a nice simmering intensity to it, but it’s not overbearing. This is set to be released sometime in the near future as a 7″, so keep your eyes open.

The Fiery Furnaces @ Village Voice Siren Festival, Coney Island, July 17 2004

My Dog Was Lost But Now He’s Found / brief improv / I Broke My Mind / Spaniolated / Single Again / South Is Only A Home / Quay Cur (one verse) / Bow Wow / I’m Gonna Run / Leaky Tunnel / Blueberry Boat / Asthma Attack / Crystal Clear / Tropical Ice-Land / Chief Inspector Blancheflower (sections two and three) / Quay Cur (another verse) / Don’t Dance Her Down / Inca Rag/Name Game / Chris Michaels / Leaky Tunnel (reprise) / Quay Cur (final verse)

Of the three Fiery Furnaces shows that I have seen, this is obviously the weakest, though that mostly had to do with the technical problems which plagued their set. The band was pretty sloppy for most of the show, occassionally seeming as though they were just trying to get it all over with. Nevertheless, most of the set was quite fun, but that’s primarily because I love the songs so much – even rushed versions of “Inca Rag/Name Game” and “Chief Inspector Blancheflower” are going to make me flip out with joy. I’m not sure what this set must have been like for the uninitiated. I imagine that much of it seemed incomprehensible and overly weird, particularly “Chris Michaels,” which is already quite difficult but was made less coherant when Matt’s mic was nearly inaudible for several of his vocal parts. Overall, this was a decent show, but I know that they can do much better.

I Call Your #, I Can’t Get Through

Cut Copy “Saturdays” – Sometimes I wish that I had a more technical understanding of music theory, if just so that I didn’t have to make a fool of myself by describing the way certain types of chord progressions sound by using vague references like “80s chords.” This song is loaded with “80s chords,” which is to say that it sounds like early Madonna, or maybe a bit like Prince. This is not accidental; it is clearly the effect that these guys are going for – danceable, light, airy, and as comfortable as the womb for its target audience. The vocals are minimal and seem to be there primarily as a formality, since the focus is on the beat, keyboard chords, and filters, owing more to straight-up dance music than the crossover dance pop that it references. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Cornershop “Valeurs Personelles” – As far as I know, this is the first new Cornershop tune since Hand Cream For A Generation was released and mostly slept on back in 2002. This is taken from The New Mixes, Volume 1, a compilation of remixes of material from the Bill Cosby/Quincy Jones jam sessions which yielded “Hikky-Burr.” This isn’t a typical Cornershop pop song with vocals by Tjinder Singh, but it’s a rather nice retro funk number with spoken word vocals by a French woman, presumably sampled from another source. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

I Knew That He Was A Tiger Right From The Start

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti “Jules Lost His Jewels” – I’ll be the first to state the obvious: Ariel Pink’s Worn Copy is like the second coming of Guided By Voices’ Bee Thousand in both style and substance. This is to say, the album is a collage of muddy, lo-fi recordings of songs which sound like familiar, out-of-time rock classics. It’s like an old found mixed tape with serious water damage and some dodgy dubbing. As with Bee Thousand and its follow-up, Alien Lanes, the stylistic decision to hide beautifully crafted pop tunes behind a contrived patina of age and wear works for the songs, which would otherwise sound quite retro either way. The attention to detail in recording the songs is spot-on – specific vintage sounds and antiquated electronic textures are captured perfectly, making the record seem at times like the musical equivalent of meticulously crafted replica of a ship inside of a bottle. Deliberately making the music sound old and evocative of weak radio signals and homemade casettes maximizes the warm and fuzzy faux-nostalgia effect, and makes the record as much about the tunes as it is about paying tribute to the experience of being a listener/fan. (Click here to buy it from Other Music.)

Guided By Voices “Sleep Over Jack” – Speaking of GBV, I feel that my original review of Half-Smiles Of The Decomposed was too hasty and poorly considered. After having spent some time with the record, I have come around to its charms. This comes as no surprise to me given that almost everything Robert Pollard does takes a bit of time to sink in, which is why his catalog is so dense and difficult in spite of being quite catchy and straightforward most of the time. At least half of my favorite Pollard compositions snuck up on me after I had intitially written them off, leaving me to wonder from then on how I had ever missed something which is now so obvious. As it turns out, Half-Smiles is one of his best records, with a ‘side a’ which rivals Bee Thousand and Speak Kindly Of Your Volunteer Fire Department for consistency and general greatness.

“Sleep Over Jack” is the highlight of the album, and one of the finest songs of Pollard’s career. It’s a sleepy, creepy art rock tune realized with a level of craft that incorporates the studio sheen of post-Mag Earwhig GBV and the adventurous DIY approach to texture and detail of the band’s early 90s heyday. The song skitters along with its jittery, spidering guitar lines and a tense backbeat, building up an eerie tension which finally breaks as Pollard cathartically screams “I know!,” entering the mix as though someone had accidentally switched on a tape deck. (Click here to pre-order it from Matador Records.)

It’s A Thing That You Sing When You Don’t Want To Ring

Annie “Heartbeat” – Frustratingly, I cannot seem to find much information about this track anywhere online, largely owing to the fact that the name “Annie” and the word “Heartbeat” are not specific enough to be Google-friendly. This single was apparently produced by Royksopp, but I don’t fully understand Norwegian, so I cannot be sure. Either way, this is a fine disco single, even surpassing her greatest hit, er, “The Greatest Hit.” (Click here to visit Annie’s official website.)

Datarock “I Used To Dance With My Daddy” – It is only coincidental that both of today’s songs are by Norwegian artists. I’m not trying to prove that I have love for all of Scandinavia, though I certainly do. Perhaps unsurprisingly, this a fine bit of electropop, but there is an odd, distinct goofiness to the vocals which seems both ridiculous and vaguely terrifying, sort of like a circus clown. (Click here to visit the band’s official website, where more MP3s are available.)

I Don’t Mean To Be Bold, But May I Hold Your Hand?

Justus Kohncke w/ Meloboy “Frei/Hot Love” – This is a selection from the recent Kompakt 100 compilation, which features the Kompakt roster of artists remixing each other’s work. Surprisingly, much of the compilation avoids sounding too hermetic and incestuous, though a lot of it sounds overly austere and ambient. Still, many of the collaborations yield results far greater than what the artists have done on their own. This Justus Kohncke/Meloboy track remixes the Kohncke composition “Frei” into a lovely homoerotic schaffel-pop love song which isn’t quite like anything that I’ve ever heard before. The song has a wonderful camp sweetness to it, but is just earnest and musically interesting enough to avoid total kitschiness. (Click here to buy it from Other Music.)

Lo-Fi-FNK “Unighted” – I love you, Sweden. I don’t know how your people are able to turn out so much high quality electro pop every year, but please never ever stop. Though it is true that other European nations are also proficient in this genre, none of them can match the infectious enthusiasm, effortless style, and the subtle tinge of melancholy and world-weariness which is present in the music of your best artists. This Lo-Fi-FNK song is quintessential Swedish electro-pop – a catchy, joyous tune with a jumpy beat which will hijack your body and force you to move. Love it. (Click here to visit the artist’s official website. They have more mp3s, including a Perfect Music remix which just blows me away.)

I Want The World, And I Want It Now – Can That Be Arranged For Me Somehow?

As a result of the Reuters article and the mention in Blender, there’s been a spike in traffic to this site, presumably from a lot of folks who have never been here before. (As it turns out, many of the new readers are from Brazil. Hello, people of Brazil. You are lovely and beautiful.) Anyway, I’m going to go back and revisit a few artists who I have covered recently, but feel deserve a bit of extra attention. This way, the new readers can get a taste of what they had been missing, and the folks who have been around have another chance to be convinced.

Maxi Geil and Playcolt “A Message To My Audience” – When it comes down to it, this site is all about music which is being slept on, and as I see it, the Maxi Geil album is clearly the most slept-on record of the year. I’d wager that at least 98% of all the slumber taking place in 2004 has been upon the mattress of Geil.

A lot of the time, the best indication that I am hearing a great album is when I must seriously deliberate over which song I should post here. While there are a small handful of duds on A Message To My Audience, at least eight of the songs are strong enough to be worthy of your attention. “Now The Music Stops” is an atmospheric, intensely sexual dance tune with a heavy backbeat which stops cold at the end of the verses as if to intensify the physical sensation when the beats return. “Please Remember Me” slickly balances crooning balladry, disco grooves, and bits of heavy rock with a self-aware smarminess akin to that of Jarvis Cocker. “Artist’s Lament” is an epic reverie of insincere sleaze and earnest egomania. “The Love I Lose” is an appealingly narcissistic dissection the power dynamics of the performer and the audience set against an arena rock power ballad backdrop.

Ultimately, “A Message To My Audience” is the best introduction to the band. It’s all self-aware bombast and over the top hugeness – a gallery band playing to imaginary cheap seats. The song is an essay about the angst of the artist, as he struggles with his relationship with his audience and the motivation for his art, vacillating between contempt and dependence of the audience’s approval. (Click here to buy it directly from the band.)

United State Of Electronica “Emerald City” – For me, this summer has been a bit of a let down in terms of mainstream hits. Where are our big summer pop anthems this year? It definitely seems as though 2003 was such a strong year for mainstream singles that we end up being stuck with a bunch of okay (or outright boring) singles from middling talent dominating the US pop charts because all of the big guns are taking the year off. To me, this is the best explanation for the omnipresence of Usher right now – he’s the best any of the major labels can come up with, and even though his current hits lack the urgency, sparkle, and pop of something like “Ignition (Remix)” or “Crazy In Love,” we all have to make do with what we’re given. There are some mid-sized hits of note (Modest Mouse, Franz Ferdinand, Nina Sky, that wonderful cover of “Our Lips Our Sealed” by the Duff sisters), but nothing which commands love, attention, and respect from nearly everyone; something which imposes itself upon pop culture, and demands that we all either fall in line or get out of the way.

I believe that in a better world, “Emerald City” would fill the Force Of Nature Pop Hit role for this summer. It has everything going for it – a novel, modern sound that reimagines Daft Punk as a rock band; an air of intense optimism and resounding joy; a feeling of grand inclusiveness which suggests that everyone in the world is invited to the U.S.E. party. Still, I don’t feel as though this song will ever be truly complete until/unless it achieves some level of mass popularity, because so much of its basic appeal is dependent on experiencing it with others. This song needs communal approval, it demands group participation. Whereas Maxi Geil fixates on what separates the artist from the audience, United State Of Electronica seem focused on the magic which happens when the audience becomes inseparable from the art. (Click here to buy it from Sonic Boom Records.)

Go Kids

Alif “Douta Mbaye” – Alif (aka Attaque Libératoire de l’Infanterie Féministe) are Senegal’s first all-female hip hop group, and have been recording together since 1997. This track is taken from Dakamerap, their first release available in the Western world, which is being issued on the Out|Here label from Germany. As with most hip hop from Senegal, the music is heavily influenced by mainstream American hip hop, but the vocals are mostly in Wolof and French. At face value, this isn’t tremendously different from what you might expect to hear on American rap radio, but the language barrier renders the content entirely abstract, which can be a somewhat peculiar experience given that we are so conditioned to focus on lyrics when listening to hip hop music. (Click here to buy it from Ear-Rational.)

The Go! Team “The Power Is On” – This is an odd little song, mixing cutesiness and martial intensity in such a way that it sounds as though it should be the military theme of the Twee Nation. I can’t hear this without imagining a massive army of kids in Hello Kitty gear marching into combat like something out of the battle scenes in the Lord Of The Rings movies. This is out in the UK as a 12″ at the moment, but a new LP is forthcoming. (Click here to buy it from the XFM Shop.)

The Story Continues

Mouse On Mars “Mine Is In Yours” – This is the opening track from the forthcoming Mouse On Mars LP Radical Connector, which is by far their most accessable and pop record to date. “Mine Is In Yours” is essentially a glam rock song drowning in digital sea of filters, effects, and textures. The vocals are rendered nearly incomprehensible, but retain a humanity and warmth that a basic vocoder would nearly eliminate. Almost everything in the track sounds as though it has been nudged slightly out of place. It’s a bit like a blurred photograph in which the structure of the images remain intact, but the details are either distorted or gain a new quality unto itself. I strongly recommend the album as a whole, as it keeps up a high standard of quality from start to finish, and includes some other songs which rank among the finest music released so far in 2004.

Solid Groove “Now We Got 2 Bump” – This is a selection from the newest Playground compilation curated by Swedish DJs Swellsession and Ste Van B. “Now We Got 2 Bump” glides along on a smooth, loungey jazz phrase and a laid back hip hop beat, with occasional vocal samples from rap records. It’s obviously not breaking any new ground, but its groove is undeniable, and has that lovely crisp, cool sound that always works well for me during this time of the year. (Click here to buy it from Digital DJs.)

Pose In The Mirror, Wiggle A Bit

Smash TV “Queen Of Man” – I’m not sure about how to articulate this, but one of the best things about this sexy, dayglo disco single is that it has this inexplicable aura of classiness. I can’t help but think of attractive people riding around in limos late at night in some megametropolis, but not in some kind of decadent, trashy way. What I have in mind is more earnest, matter of fact, and graceful. It’s a bit preposterous, and I’m probably just half-remembering some music video – probably the one for Joe Jackson’s “Steppin’ Out,” which made an indelible impression on my young psyche. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Also: Those of you with access to p2p networks should seek out the second leaked Fiona song, “Better Version Of Myself.” It’s quite good, though not quite as stunning as “Extraordinary Machine.” (Don’t be alarmed by the fact that I took down that mp3, by the way – I wasn’t slapped with a cease and desist or anything like that. I’m a bit nervous about having that song up since it was mentioned in the Reuters article, and it’s a major label release. I figure that most everyone who regularly reads this blog would have heard it by now, and everyone who hasn’t can head on over to Scenestars.)

Infatuation From A Distance Makes No Sense

Love Is All “Make Out, Fall Out, Make Up” – For some reason, I had been sleeping on this single for months until Maura played it on her show last Friday. I’m not sure why this song didn’t work for me the first time I had heard it, since it seems very immediate and undeniable now. I’m rather fond of this song’s arrangement, which balances a lot of different textures without letting them drown each other out or call too much attention to the individual instruments. It all comes together as this huge, urgent tidal wave of emotion, and leaves you feeling quite drained by the end of it. (Click here to buy it from Midheaven.)

Ulysses (featuring Dei) “But I’m Trying” – Everyone loves a creepy, sociopathic dance tune, right? As the singers try to rationalize premeditated cruelty and infidelity, the backing track shifts from straight ahead dance pop to more chaotic IDM-esque sections with stuttering beats and vocals which imply that another chorus is about to begin, but cut out suddenly. The song plateaus in the middle with the introduction of a colder keyboard theme and a heavily vocodered male voice before returning to the relatively warm quasi-r+b vocals from the first section. It’s a very clever song all around. (Click here to buy it from 33 RPM.)