I am uncertain about how to pronounce Menomena, and I sort of like it that way. I hope it's pronounced such that it almost rhymes with "phenomenon," which is how I like to let it roll off my tongue. If it's not, and it's actually something that sounds like a child's chant about a bully, don't tell me. I don't want to know.
While we're on the topic of my own insecurities, I am also uncertain that I'm actually smart enough to be listening to this group. They're sort of the musical equivalent of what Winston Churchill said the one time about Russia.
One thing I am certain of, however, is that this group will always produce at least one song that I find to be perfect on each and every album they put together. On their last one - you know, the one with the puzzling cover art - it was "Running," which could be about exercising too much, or could be about starving in a post-apocalyptic landscape while being chased by cattle. You just can't be sure.
On the new album, Mines, there are plenty of options to choose from - including the second track, Taos, which I'd swear I just heard a Followill brother running naked through. But my personal favorite is "Intil." (Until? Intel?) It's a little bit the piano; oh, that marching bit that kicks in at 2:30 or so. But only a little bit; the vast, vast majority of my affection for this song is lyrics-driven. Or lyric-driven, if you prefer, since it's really just the one sentiment, repeated over and over until it penetrates passive listening mode, maybe not until the very end of the song, when, just as it concludes, you think, "Wait! What?" And listen to it eight times over again, in a row.
"Sometimes I say too much. I never thought I'd lie."
Mines is streaming at NPR for another few days. Intil is the last track.
Black holes sing in B flat. Apparently, in basso profondo B flat.
Johnny B. Goode is a famous song in B flat. And, as NPR (which seems to be even more obsessed with B flat than I am) tells us, the opening guitar lick in "Welcome to The Jungle" is in B flat.
Thanks to YouTube's new vuvuzela button, which may possibly be one of the top 10 worst best ideas ever, you can now overlay vuvuzelas on top of these tracks. Just click the little soccer icon at the lower right of the video screen. You have to go to the YouTube site, it doesn't work with the embed code.
BLK JKS' "Zol" should be - probably will be - a sure-fire World Cup hit. It's obviously geared for that: they're from Jo-burg, the lyrics are futbol-y, there's a call-response thing going on, the album drops two days before the World Cup starts, they're playing at the opening ceremonies...and for the first 15 seconds or so, it's, yeah, instant theme song.
But all the BLK JKS I've listened too (full disclosure: not much, just a handful of songs) has sounded a little minor key, a little discordant, and I'm hearing that here, too, once the lyrics kick in. Is there not something a little off about this song? Is that guitar line not a little too insistent, almost as if it wants to be in a different song? Are the lyrics not intentionally a bit flat at times? Is it an ANTHEM, yes, in all caps, like the band?
It's so subtle, I start to doubt myself. Is it me? Is my hearing and judgment finally starting to go? So I go and listen to something else, something major key, something sunny and Katrina and the Waves-ish...and then I come back to this...and...It's not me. I don't think.
Is it just that this is how the band plays, anthem be damned? Or is it on purpose?
This song expresses my own mixed emotions towards my adopted home so well it's almost creepy.
You got that nice slow phrasing from Gil Scott-Heron, evocative of the southern transplant making their way (and I'm not from Jackson TN, but it is eerily close to the family homestead).
You got the New York patter from Nas, so fast you can't totally follow it, as fast as the city itself, loving the city, but hating it a little too - a more realistic representation than the Beastie Boys' paean.
Yeah, I too can see why some get up and move where it's slow. New York, have mercy on me.
Most summers, there's an album that makes me wish I had a car, so that I could drive around, windows down, stereo blasting, and share my musical tastes with all those around me. Because I suffer from that same delusion of so many other Brooklynites, namely that everyone wants to know what my musical taste is, particularly as I drive past them, and will be forced to agree that, yes, (insert name of band I hadn't known of previously here) is amazing.
Last summer, there wasn't a summer album like that. Of course, there wasn't really a summer, either, in New York, so perhaps it was fitting.
This spring, I think summer's come early. This spring, I may just rent a car and drive around blasting the new Sleigh Bells album, and in particular this song, for a week or so. Because I'm especially convinced that YOU will thank me for it. Yes, that's me, driving around the block over and over again in my $20 rent-a-wreck.
Manhole covers exploding! Three-alarm fires! The threat of carbon monoxide poisoning! If it were any other band, I would have had doubts that the actual Atoms for Peace show could top the random events that came before it.
I emerged blinking and mildly disoriented, as one does, from the 7th Ave. B subway stop a little after 6 p.m. Tuesday, hoping to pick up my will call tix for Atoms for Peace from Roseland quickly and grab a bite to eat before the show. The only warning of the chaos awaiting was the comment by a tourist type to her companion as they exited in front of me: "Well, we found the fire."
Sure enough. Some random only-in-New-York transformer-blowing-up-manhole-cover-exploding thing had just happened, right smack dab in front of Roseland. 52nd Street was blocked off, along with several blocks of Broadway. Hordes of firemen were standing around in full gear. Dazed groups of tourists were sitting on their suitcases pondering the likelihood of being able to check into their hotels. The line to get into the Atoms for Peace show was winding along the back of Roseland along 53rd, rather than the front.
After fending off somebody who wanted to know if I was in line for Jersey Boys (later canceled) and hearing that there would be no word on whether or not the show was a go until 7 p.m., I opted not to torment myself by standing in line, and toddled off to dinner. There, I irked my companions by puttering around on my Blackberry trying to figure out what the hey was going on until a kind gent at a nearby table let us know that his friend, in line for the show, had tweeted that it was ON! but delayed half an hour (finally, I see the utility of Twitter...).
Back to Roseland, where the club had shifted their box office to a folding table outside the 53rd Street entrance. Chaos, yes, but organizedly so, with everyone basically filtering in through one small back door.
Inside, perhaps strangest was how normal everything was. Thom Yorke, looking as if he had climbed out of bed and wandered straight onto stage, addressed the day's events in normal understated fashion, declaring, "Well, that was an interesting afternoon." He and Flea and those other guys in the band then proceeded to create a cocoon of sound that blocked out every last New York distraction.
I was most curious at this show to see how Flea's hard-driving vibe would fit in with Thom's subtler one. While there were a few moments of "This Is Flea. Playing Bass. Watch, And Learn," it worked well for the most part. In fact, some of those bass licks on the Eraser seem made for him. The two men even dance sorta the same weird half-crazed way, making for an odd stage spectacle.
But the highlights of the show for me lay elsewhere. One came on "Skip Divided," where Flea used a blow-organ to lay down the harmony that Thom hums on the recorded version, leaving Thom to half-rap the lyrics and try to figure out what to do with his arms. Reminiscent of Amnesiac-era Radiohead, I came away with a new "so THAT's what that can sound like live" appreciation of the song.
The other was the solo version of "Everything In Its Right Place" that Thom did during the encore. Radiohead tends to swing through New York towards the middle or end of tours, as I recall, when the band is a little grumpy and Thom's voice is wearing down. But with this particular show on night two of the tour, Thom's voice was the purest I have heard it (I'm not sure I'd want to hear him attempt the opening notes on "Hollow Earth," for instance, even a few more shows into the tour), making everything, but "Everything In Its Right Place" in particular, sound like it was being beamed straight from heaven.
Was it Radiohead? No. But definitely the next best thing.
Videos from someone awesome named AllBearsRule's YouTube channel, embedded below.
I'm still dubious that Wall Street II: Money Never Sleeps is going to be able to meet the high bar set by its predecessor, but this rather clever preview does give me hope. It seems like it's not going to take itself too seriously, from the shot of the mobile phone (I REMEMBER that phone!) to Gordon Gekko getting outclassed by a random drug lord.
I also like the ominous driving music in the background. The wonders of Google quickly told me it's a song called Ricochet, by Shiny Toy Guns, whom I know nothing about since I ain't no club kid no mo'. It works better without lyrics in the preview, but the opening line's pretty appropriate for the movie, too: "Welcome back to where I'm gonna have you..."
When did this win me totally over? When the (dreamy) lead singer sings, "We'll still be best friends when all turns to dust," and hits that unexpected note at "all," that's when.
Warning: You will not find Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors, or Grizzly Bear on this list.
(Loses 99/100 of potential audience...)
Now then. Here are 25 songs that I adored in 2009, in no particular order.
Mexican Chili Taco Fiesta - Tamales Oaxaquenos (via KEXP). If you had told me that I would include a mostly instrumental song about Oaxacan tamales, where the only lyrics I can understand are the title words of the song, on my year-end mix, well, I might not have laughed at you, but I would have been skeptical. But then again, yum, tamales oaxaquenos.
The Dead Weather - Hang You from the Heavens. Take Jack White and his affinity for dirrrrrty blues and side projects that obliterate other people's main bands. Add Alison Mosshart, the lead singer of the Kills, whose albums I could (and have!) listen(ed) to on repeat infinitely. Insert a simple guitar riff and some bass drum. Rinse. Lather. Result: this, my favorite song on my favorite album this year. Repeat.
K-Naan - America. He says it better than I can: that shit was cool in English (especially the Chali 2na bit, all you people pining for Jurassic 5), but give me that Somali verse.
Spinnerette - Ghetto Love. The hip online reviewers, they did not like this album. Me, I can't stop rocking out to this song.
Tuneyards - Sunlight (via Pitchfork). It's pretty rare, when you get to my doddering age, to stumble across music that is unlike anything heard before. So, Tuneyards - also, incidentally, unlike anything capitalized before. So much so that I'm not even going to try it.
Justin Adams & Juldeh Camara - Fulani Coochi Man. For the first 15 seconds, this is just a typical blues song, which, you know, yawn, just give me some Muddy Waters instead. But at 0:15 exactly, something extraordinary happens, and all of a sudden this is something new and fresh, and at the same time, so, so old.
Beyonce Ft. Lady Gaga - Video Phone. Oh Beyonce. I try, how I try, to keep your songs off my year-end lists, to retain some minimal sort of indy cred. But always, always, you end up making something amazing that I cannot ignore. The fact that it is a duet with Lady Gaga? Doubly insulting and even more ignominious. Curse you!
Muse - Uprising. This is an excellent anti-whatever-is-keeping-you-down anthem (You hear me, Beyonce???). They will not control us. We will be victorious. Handclap. Hey.
King Midas Sound - Darlin'. This song whispers of seduction like twilight in the tropics.
Mos Def - Quiet Dog. Making the best old-school hip-hop hands down year after year in and out without even thinking about it is Mos Def. Which I like to think is what the title of the song is all about.
Whitley - Poison in Our Pocket. And the winner of the Grammy for best depressing song expressed optimisticly is...Whitley! Wait a second, wait a second...What do you mean there's no such category? Well, invent one.
Petracovich - Heaven Help the Day. I already wrote this once, but I can't say it any better. I like this. I like the tinkling way it starts, the dissonance of the lonely lyrics and the warm music, the unexpectedness of the guitar strumming when it kicks in, the way she turns the tables, the acceleration into a torrent of fierceness, the emphatic full stop.
Ramona Falls - Russia(via Pitchfork). When this song, from the lead singer of Menomena, comes on, it sweeps me up and sends me soaring over the world, with cherry blossoms blowing in my face.
Here We Go Magic - Only Pieces. The jittery guitars sound exactly like my mind feels, skimming the surface of the questions this song asks.
Blakroc - Coochie. Why yes, yes, this is the second song on the list with Coochie in the title. No, no, it wasn't planned. Yes, yes, I do see some sort of rhythm and rhyme to it.
Das Racist - Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell (via Pitchfork). This song is completely, utterly ridiculous. It reminds me of every pointless summer job I ever had, of every pointless quest I ever went on just to kill time, of time wasted, junk food eaten, of cruising the strip.
Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll. This album didn't grab me as instantly as the Yeah to the third's previous efforts have. But ultimately I installed a disco ball in my brain and embraced the glam.
Florence & the Machine - Cosmic Love. Because the music and lyrics match so perfectly.
Chris Brown - I Can Transform Ya. I feel vaguely queasy about including a Chris Brown song on my list, at least without some kind of balancing "I will survive" anthem from Rihanna, but I HAVE TO. I sing along, I shimmy, I am transformed from a human to a Carter, without any reluctance at all.
Fresh Espresso - Big or Small (via KEXP). If they did a remake of Saturday Night Fever, whoever tried to fill Travolta's shoes would dance to this, and not just because of the Stayin Alive sample.
The XX - Crystallised. Have you ever heard something so simultaneously simple and complicated?
Bat for Lashes - Daniel. A friend says this reminds him of Imogen Heap's "Glittering Clouds," which I had not heard before. So in some ways, this was like finding two great, gloomy, ominous songs in one.
Frankel - Anonymity is the New Fame. You had me at minor chord modulation number one. The lyrics are just the rose tied to the satellite.
Kurt Vile - Inside Looking Out. This song reminds me of trains. But not of actually being on a train. Instead, more like sitting at a railroad crossing somewhere that still qualifies as the wide open spaces, with the bars down and the red lights flashing and the train moseying by, not in any hurry, and neither are you, and neither is this song, and when the song is over maybe the train will be too, or maybe you'll listen to the song again.
Richard Hawley - Don't Get Hung up in Your Soul. Good advice for a new year.
I'm working on a pop record in my bedroom, says this Aussie named Whitley on his blog quite some time ago. Oh heaven's no, anything but that, says a rather grumpy respondent. Thank heavens he persevered, because Go Forth Find Mammoth, from what I can glean, sings.
I like this. I like the tinkling way it starts, the dissonance of the lonely lyrics and the warm music, the unexpectedness of the guitar strumming when it kicks in, the way she turns the tables, the acceleration into a torrent of fierceness, the emphatic full stop.
Maybe it's just because I've stopped listening to the normal airwaves radio because NYC radio SUX, but has there been no real summer jam this year? There's a few indie things, sure, like maybe Das Rascist's Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell (via Pitchfork) or The Temper Trap's Sweet Disposition (video), but what about the mainstream stuff? Where's the Lil Wayne Lollipop of this summer? Kid Cudi? Really? And that Flo-Rida song...first, it's nowhere NEAR as good as Low, and second, Eiffel 65??? Maybe Boom Boom Pow...maybe She Wolf (video) - it's got a nice throwback feel...but I don't know, nothing is really grabbing me.
But here's a fall jam you can get behind. This song reminds me of Menomena. Hmmm, maybe that's because Ramona Falls is a Menomena offshoot. Well, never mind, I'm a sucker for the picked strings and sweeping globetrotting epic. And any band which lists its influences as "chocolate, mostly" on its Myspace page.
And finally: because I ALWAYS KNEW that there was hope for the bassoon as an indie rock music. Yeah, that's right. All you mariachi trumpet players ain't got nothin' on me.
I like every side project of Jack White's better than I like the White Stripes themselves. His latest, the Dead Weather, is no exception. Primarily because I'm a huge fan of the Kills (last summer I listened to "U.R.A Fever" about 30 times in a row while stuck in Holland Tunnel traffic) - and this takes their punk-blues sound even down deeper and dirtier.
In honor of the release of their album, the band is doing playlists yesterday and today over at woxy.com. Great music (how sexy is that Captain Beefheart song?), and a couple of humorous nuggets on how they got together:
"We were playing a Raconteurs tour and I was losing my voice...the Kills were warming up and we asked Alison to come out and finish some of my songs because I couldn't sing 'em...so we could, you know, get paid (Alison: so YOU could get paid without working)."
Favorite song so far off the album is "Hang You From the Heavens."
If one person whose musical taste I respect recommends me something, I'll get to it eventually, assuming I can remember what it was for long enough. But if two people whose musical taste I respect recommend me the same something in the space of three days, I'm gonna give it a shot almost immediately.
And so, Brother Ali, the Muslim albino rapper from Minneapolis. An unusual story, an old-school style, and of late some controversial lyrics and killer harmonica about the "United Snakes."
I like his song Forest Whitiker, about being your own person:
Ima be alright You ain't gotta be my friend tonite And Ima be okay You would probly bore me anyway
You can listen to and download some of his stuff here.
I'm listening to KEXP at work, not really listening, you understand, but just on the headphones so I can concentrate, and the DJ comes on and starts going on about a band called Meth Teeth and what a great name Meth Teeth is. And I have to say, I agree. Even more awesomely, they are on a label called Sweet Rot Records. They have a song called "Unemployment Forever." I cannot understand the lyrics. Here is their MySpace page.
I email this band name to a fellow indy-music-loving coworker. He writes back and agrees that it is an awesome band name. Not, he says, like the name of a band he has just stumbled upon, the Brooklyn-based Sleigh Bells. However, I think Sleigh Bells could take Meth Teeth in a battle of the bands. Visit their MySpace page, where you can download some of their stuff. "At The Beach" is my favorite.
Attempting to recover from the cold/cough plague of death that seems to be going around NYC, I spent all day yesterday on my couch watching TV. At some point, I video-on-demanded "Planet B-Boy." I was totally blown away by the creativity of this Ichigeki crew from Japan, and I'm happy that a clip of their full performance is available on YouTube (in the movie it gets edited down to half of this or so).
I really love the part around five minutes in when the b-boy playing the DJ comes out and dances, even tho' it's not the most amazingly physical part of the routine. He's one of the focal characters in the documentary; there's a bunch of stuff in his family's tea shop about his father's death and how he's dealt with it.
According to the movie, this crew disbanded. Sadness.
This album from N.A.S.A., it would appear, features every hip-hop artist you might ever want to listen to, all in one place. Spin tips it as the party album of the year. Can't say I disagree. Downloads at the end of the link, or listen to "Whachadoin" here (via Pitchfork).
These are the songs I found myself listening to over and over again this year, roughly in order from least over-listened to most over-listened. Some of them struck a personal chord. Some are just too catchy to be ignored. And yeah, there's 26 of them, because I just couldn't whittle it down to 25. Enjoy, please!
26. Hazelwood Motel - Break Myself In Two. This song is dead last onto the list time-wise, and probably actually belongs somewhat higher on it listened-wise, but I'm too lazy to redo the numbering. I love its simultaneous loudness and quietness. That when they're done, they end. And of course the driving guitar, which seems to be a theme this year. (Previous post, with info on where to download.)
25. A.A. Bondy - Killed Myself When I Was Young. Whoo, boy, this guy is off somewhere deep in the black forest. This is actually one of his more cheerful songs. Here's the Daytrotter session. Below, something else.
24. Absentee - They Do It These Days. You just don't hear good rock and roll with piano and trumpets and smart lyrics much any more. More driving guitar, too.
23. Ketch Harbor Wolves - So Long To The Ground. Download their album - the whole peaceful thing - for free here.
22. Yoav - Yeah The End. This is a gorgeous mellow song on a gorgeous mellow CD that resides in my top five list this year. Listen to it here or check out a stunningly good live set that doesn't have this particular song on it here.
21. The Cotton Jones Basket Ride - Chewing Gum. This is an ambling, shambling tune, "Feeling softer than the velvet sky, longer than the sun." Download it here.
20. The Mae Shi - Run To Your Grave. I like the directness of this song. Here's the beat. Here's the chorus, yelled. Here's, err, some driving guitar. Here's the rest of the song, also yelled. Here's a video in primary colors.
19. Kanye West vs. Radiohead - Reckoner Lockdown. I thought Kanye was the bomb on the MTV music awards when he did this song with those crazy taiko drummers in the background. However, I hate the album version/just not a fan of vocoder. But this remix with Radiohead got it halfway back to decent again. Not to mention that I can't possibly have a year-end list that doesn't somehow have Radiohead on it.
18. The Ting Tings - Great DJ. Were it earlier in the year, this would probably be higher on the list, but these guys sort of faded for me. Still, check out the Daytrotter session.
17. Saul Williams - List of Demands. This song was the soundtrack to a shoe commercial that was on non-stop during March madness. I don't remember the shoe, but the song lingers on. The song itself was written some time ago, but this guy is no dummy, so he reissued it on a CD this year. This is an outrageously cool rockin' version from 2005.
16. Catherine A.D. - Carry Your Heart. This is late onto the list. I like the crazy key changes in the chorus. Visit her MySpace page.
15. The Subways - Rock & Roll Queen. This song did not worm its way into my head until I saw "RocknRolla". Since then, I've probably played it an average of once a day.
14. Calexico - Two Silver Trees. If tumbleweeds could sing, this is what they would sound like.
13. The Bug featuring Warrior Queen - Poison Dart. I can't understand a word of it, but I love it. So very fierce. Another album that is in my top five (Via KEXP.)
12. Little Jackie - The Stoop. I love this song because it perfectly reflects how I feel about Brooklyn. So what if I don't have a stoop. NPR live session here.
11. T.I. featuring Rihanna - Live Your Life. The sheer audacity, to sample a not very good song from O-Zone, and turn it into a riotous ANTHEM. Here's the live version from the MTV video awards.
10. M83 - Highway of Endless Dreams. Appropriately named, is what. (On last.fm)
9. Raconteurs - Salute Your Solution. Good dirty South backwoods rock and roll with killer keyboard, some seriously cool reverb, and an even cooler video. Go here to watch it, since their record company no longer allows embedding. Or go here to listen.
8. Lil Wayne - A Milli. Lil Wayne is outrageous. The lyrics on this joint are insane. And the chant of "a milli" is a heartbeat that won't be ignored. I especially love this live version with ?uestlove doing the a millis AND playing the drums.
7. Eddy Current Suppression Ring - Colour Television (download here. All the characteristics of a song I'd love - strong driving bass line, jangly guitars, and ironic pop culture lyrics. Another wheel of fortune. Another million tortured. Acomin' from my color television. Another story televised. Another million hypnotized.
6. Atmosphere - You. Just a good recession-era jam. A late entry into the top five albums.
5. Kings of Leon - Closer. For three hours, I stood crammed like a sardine in front of the All Points West main stage, awaiting Radiohead. Luckily, Kings of Leon was playing for an hour and a half of that. That was all it took for me to go from "meh" to a fan. This song, it oozes sex. (Via Pretty Much Amazing.)
4. Nada Surf - The Fox. I liked this song, but then I happened to be playing it while I was reading Cormac McCarthy's "The Road," and now I love it. Funny how its meaning changed for me. I haven't the slightest idea what this video is all about, and it assuredly isn't the official video for the song, but it is suitably strange.
3. Michael Franti - Remote Control. I saw Michael Franti for the first time at All Points West, and the dude just oozed happiness. This song is an anthem for good, in a year that needed such an anthem. Hey world, you know you got to put up a fight. Download here.
2. The Kills - URA Fever. With driving minor key bass beat, thrash guitar and creepy point-counterpoint vocals, this was a perfect tune for driving along the shore at night this summer. It was also a perfect tune for getting stuck in Holland Tunnel traffic. Second favorite album of the year. (Previous post.)
1. Elbow - The Bones of You. This is my favorite song of the year, on my favorite album of the year. This song is about nostalgia, and is nostalgia. Download it here, and check out a great year-end list while you're at it.
Commentary on stuff I like, which is mostly music, but is sometimes, in no particular order, college basketball, wine, books, pop culture, media, weird business trivia, Brooklyn, good food, and other stoopid stuff. And sometimes, commentary on stuff I don't like, which includes but is not limited to, in no particular order, the MTA, rude people, too much work, and other stupid stuff.
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