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The Swede Smell of Success – Rebecca & Fiona’s “I Love You Man”

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on February 4, 2012 by admin in Music

Saturday, February 4th, 2012

Whenever I want to dance alone in my apartment, I drive my music snob friends away with some awesome Europop like Rebecca & Fiona

I occasionally find myself a sudden musical outcast amongst my friends. A lot of music lovers I know are frankly arrogant snobs, or so niche-obsessed as to be musically misanthropic, so when I go on a bender with something like Robyn, Die Antwoord, or Lady Sovereign, they just avoid me for a few days, or ask me how my Rebecca Black fan club is doing. Or walk around with their fingers in their ears saying “la la la la” thinking I’ll shut it off or something. Well, it looks like I’ll have some time to myself for a day or two as I keep Rebecca & Fiona on regular rotation. I first heard of them because of this fan video (also below) which is kind of an editing gem on its own. I then went down the YouTube Rabbit Hole for a while, and realized I had to have more, so I picked up I Love You, Man, their latest release. If you liked the Europoppier bands on Pitchfork’s 2007 best of list, and if you like the girly, talk-singy vocal stylings of Norway’s Ephemera, Rebecca & Fiona may find a place on your list. Their slightly derivative sound is part of their appeal to me; it’s sort of like a weird amalgam of 80′s girl bands like Bananarama, the aforementioned more recent Europop, and some particularly smooth looped and ducking-tweaked dance music. Which all makes sense; the Swedish duo found fame mostly via a Swedish reality TV show which followed them as they pursued their budding music/DJ career as hardworking teens. Keep your eyes on these two, they’ve been winning international mixing contests as DJ’s, and getting lots of remix attention as artists themselves. Read the rest of this entry »

Joan As Police Woman’s “The Deep Field” Maintains The Magic

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on January 25, 2011 by admin in Music

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011

Joan Wasser’s band Joan As Police Woman keeps the soulful genius soaring with their new release “The Deep Field”. I just wish I could buy a copy.


Released yesterday. Unless you live in the US.

The fact that I don’t have a copy of my favorite new album – which I listened to twice today – says a lot about the current state of music marketing. More on that further on. First, I just have to say that I’m not sure I have the words to describe the soulful genius of Joan Wasser, and the music she’s been creating with her band Joan As Police Woman, a soulful genius that I’m glad to say she has maintained on her latest release The Deep Field. I tend to agree with whomever it was that said that “writing about music is like dancing about architecture”, and this often misattributed adage is especially fitting in the case of Joan Wasser, because the exacting structure and soaring contours of her work will indeed cause dancing. In your heart, your head, and your feet. The range of expression in her voice – from the plaintively longing, to the wryly knowing, to the joyous and capricious – is a rare treasure in contemporary pop. When you read reviews that use expressions like “full of meditative beauty…ravishing and lovelorn” (Mojo) and “achingly beautiful” (The Word), they really mean it. Wasser’s rich and sophisticated song constructions are the perfect roiling atmosphere for her voice to soar on and dive through, swooping through pain, joy, resurrection, reclamation, ecstasy, anger, and maybe even the occasional coy pout. “The Deep Field” maintains the momentum of her previous two releases Real Life and To Survive, perhaps kicking the overall dynamics up a notch with some perfectly restrained guitar wailing, slightly gritty electric piano, and more dynamic use of horns. The bass work is impeccable too; I was actually relieved to learn that there were five bassists used throughout. I think I would be frightened by a single bass player that could pull off that range of sounds and dynamics. I realize I probably sound like some kind of emissary from The Church Of Joan, so yes, I’ll admit that on top of the tremendous musical admiration, I’m a little crushy on her. How could I not be? The same seasoned but vulnerable beauty that permeates her music is reflected in her eyes and face. She’s like a bluesy neo-classical muse of emotion that can make you smile, cry, wallow in detached melancholy, or nod in knowing agreement at life’s complexly textured revelations. Keep the music coming Joan, I think I may eventually discover bliss via meticulously crafted songwriting if your creation stays on the upward arc it’s following. And the marketing reference I made at the outset? My only disappointment with Joan As Police Woman so far has been that I couldn’t procure the actual album (which I’d been eagerly waiting to do since January 3) yesterday, on what was broadly promoted as the release date. It turns out suddenly that the US release date is February 1 on Amazon, or April 12 if you buy directly from the Joan As Police Woman site. We sent a message to the “Management” e-mail address on the JAPW site yesterday to ask about the yawning chasm between the US and non-US release dates, but haven’t received a reply. I personally listened to the release on a friend’s iPod today, and it was only out of grudging fanboy respect that I said “no thanks” when he offered to let me copy his VBR mp3′s. I’ll be following up with the label to see what gives; this is not a particularly brilliant way to release music in today’s digital marketplace of torrent-happy fans. I myself might even justify paying for the album now, and securing a copy through other means prior to the official US release date. And as I said a few weeks ago, I’m all about buying indy music and not torrenting it these days. But let’s be real – it’s simply common sense that there will be a ton of sales lost in the US because of this, isn’t it?

10 Songs That May Make People Cry

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on January 18, 2011 by admin in Music

Tuesday, January 18th, 2011

Music is magical if only for the fact that it makes humans dance around with nothing more than subtle vibrations of air, but things get even more interesting when it makes their eyes leak salt water. Are there songs that make YOU cry?


This is Anna Karina, after
listening to my compilation.

I’ve often said that one of the reasons I love music so much is that it’s virtually indistinguishable from magic. How else do you explain the fact that by sending subtle vibrations into the air, you can make humans gyrate uncontrollably, tap their toes and fingers, or even march to war. While these audio-induced rhythmic nervous system reactions seem easily explainable as a simple stimulus/response process, you can also use these subtle vibrations to cause less predictable responses, like the release of salt water from their eyes. To me, the latter is perhaps the most intriguing result of these subtle vibrations of air, because although humans usually reserve this release of fluid from the eyes for moments of sadness or physical pain, when a person cries in reaction to a piece of music (unless of course they’re just crying because it’s a really horrible Justin Bieber song) it can be nearly impossible to determine if they’re crying because they’re happy or sad, inspired, proud of their country, or some mixture of all of these feelings and more. I got the idea to compile this list more out of curiosity regarding what makes *other people cry, but once I got going, I got a little obsessed, and perhaps a little embarrassed. I had forgotten, for instance, that I had a playlist called “Music To Hang Yourself By”, or that a song by a band with a name like “Goo Goo Dolls” could make me cry. A lot of more obviously sad songs have little effect on me; frankly, the best way to ensure that I don’t cry when I hear a piece of music is if the tune starts off by saying something descriptively sad in the lyrics. I find it more effective when the singer first claims they’re doing just fine, and then rips it up, implying with plaintive wailing – but never admitting – that suicide will be their only salvation. Below are just a few tunes that are likely to jerk a tear from my eye. I included a few obvious ones like “Hallelujah” and “Crying”, and a few cheesy ones for sentimental reasons, but omitted many, many more, mostly because I’d like to know what makes YOU cry. So give it up. What makes you weepy? Read the rest of this entry »

Gorillaz New Release “The Fall”

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on December 25, 2010 by admin in Music

Saturday, December 25th, 2010

Composed on the road with the iPad as a key instrument, the Gorillaz new release “The Fall” is their Christmas gift to you.

A few months ago we pondered the iPad as a musical instrument, but while we were sitting around on our butts pondering, apparently Gorillaz was busy making an album – while on tour no less – using the iPad as a key instrument. And for an added layer of coolness, they’re giving it to us all as a Christmas gift. Just go to thefall.gorillaz.com, provide an e-mail, and voila! You’re listening to the latest Gorillaz release. Recorded as a “musical tour diary” during last fall’s 32-day North American tour, the album doesn’t feel or sound quite like a full-blown Gorillaz release, but it really isn’t meant to. On their site Damon Albarn says “…I literally wrote everything on the day in each place and there’s a strange sort of sound of America and its musical traditions that comes through. It feels like a journey through America“. And it does indeed capture some ups and downs of the feelings of being on the road. I have to admit I’m a little partial to “Amarillo”, “Bobby in Phoenix”, and “Hillbilly Man”, which all suggest some sort of 21st century vibe loosely reminiscent of “Madman Across the Water” and Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bookends”. Which is really a horribly inaccurate description in the end; this is Gorillaz, and it’s a quirky release. But good quirky. The song “Detroit” is for instance probably one of the happiest tunes you’ll ever hear called “Detroit”, which is a little atmosphere inversion the album repeats with the moody “Shy-Town”. But I’m not going to bore you with a tune-by-tune opinion of the whole release, it’s available right now and for free, for cryin’ out loud. So go unwrap your little Christmas present and decide for yourself. A little side note: The page that streams the tunes wouldn’t work in Firefox on my system, and crashed Chrome on the first try, but worked just fine on the second try. Don’t give up right away if you have any glitches; it may in fact just be a load problem on their server. Read the rest of this entry »

We Mix You A Merry Christmash – Fun Alternatives To Your Usual Christmas Music Playlist Ideas

[ 2 Comments ]Posted on December 15, 2010 by admin in Holidays

Wednesday, December 15th, 2010

After weeks of Christmas songs insinuating themselves into your life, a holiday playlist is probably the LAST thing you want to think about. So we’ve done some thinking for you.


This is not a gratuitous image exploiting
women. We included a clip of Charo singing
Feliz Blah Blah Blah on Pee Wee’s
Playhouse below. Made ya look though.

It all begins around the first of November, when you’re at the market staring at piles of deeply discounted mini chocolate bars left over from Halloween, and suddenly, like some sonic message from the dark side, “Santa Claus Is Comin’ To Town” pokes through the ambient shopping noise. By mid-December, you’ve probably subliminally absorbed so many Christmas songs that you find yourself spontaneously whistling “Walkin’ In A Winter Wonderland” while making love. So it’s natural that so many people groan at the idea of listening to Christmas music on purpose. Which is a shame, because thanks to the thousands of crassly opportunistic attempts to cash in on the Christmas spirit, there are literally thousands of tunes to choose from, in every genre, from several decades. We’ve previously tried to cover all the bases; over the past couple of years we Jewished you a merry Christmas with Oye To The World, suggested some Santastic mashups with Generation Xmas, and with Generation Triple X-Mas we got on Santa’s naughty list. So this year, we thought we’d try to get back on the “nice” list with some actually sane Christmas music ideas, and a few oddities thrown in for fun. If you’ve ever gone searching on the web for some new holiday music ideas, you may have had that Wikiphilia-like experience of suddenly realizing you just wasted three hours of your life mindlessly YouTubing weird Christmas tunes like we did. So we have to give considerable thanks to MistleTunes, Falalalala.com, and Check The Cool Wax for their passion and devotion to compiling and organizing thousands of offbeat and obscure holiday songs. They bring a lot of the spirit back to what should be one of the best parts of the holidays. The music! Hope you enjoy, and feel free to share your own playlist ideas. Read the rest of this entry »

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