Michel Gondry has directed a new Björk video, so that's probably all you need to know to check it out. Yeah, it's sweet, two total originals coming together to create a brand new world. Spinner has the video.
[from Volta; out now on Atlantic]
Back in May, Swedish pop maven Kalle J twisted Burt Bacharach's "Make It Easy On Yourself" into the glorious "Vingslag", his collaboration with Johan Tuvesson. He returns seven months later with the equally disco-rific "When You See Me", but the twist here is that there is no twist. The song glides along on a straight sample, which sounds so basic in its disco-ness. All the elements are here: the heraldic horn stabs, the shimmery windchimes, the chipper strings, the percolating bongos, the caffeinated high-hat funk, the strutting bells-- and Kalle J makes them work together in clubland harmony. Okay, so maybe there is a twist: for all its body glitter and flared funk, "When You See Me" is a self-admiring boast, as if flexing a bicep in front of a mirror ball. "When you see me, I hope you know what you're missing" are the only words to the song.
We know, Electrelane are on an indefinite hiatus, but that hasn't kept the Brighton, England band from leaving us a video to remember them by. The all-female four-piece wrote their excellent swan song No Shouts, No Calls in Berlin, which should help explain the title of the video selection, "In Berlin". That's a useful bit of knowledge, because not a whole lot in keyboardist Verity Susman's soft, breathy vocals here is comprehensible without close listens. Susman's oohing vocalese joins frigid violins, crystalline guitars (by Mia Clarke, a music journalist who-- full disclosure!-- has written for Pitchfork in the past), bass, and Krautrock-informed drums in building a track that is more about sensibility than sense. Wait, or is it supposed to be the other way around?
The video for "In Berlin" is just as mysterious, creating a downcast, wintry mood while always remaining a little detached. The members of Electrelane can occasionally be seen standing around looking glum, perhaps anticipating the bummer of hiatus, but mostly the lens spins slowly around a room of creepy CGI delights. A wire chassis-like figure in the shape of a woman sways and raises its hand as the mirrors around it shatter. "You are all that I need," Susman repeats, and whatever else may be going on here, the ache of longing behind that sentiment is a feeling anyone can probably understand. Directed by Cassiano Prado.
[from No Shouts, No Calls; out now on Too Pure]
The apocalypse is a popular choice this holiday season. We already posted soft, light Southern California popsters the Softlightes' cheery "Last Christmas on Earth", but Evangelicals' song of almost the same name sounds a bit more like its title. The Norman, Okla., indie rockers opt for endlessly reverberating, blockbuster-climax bombast on their "The Last Christmas on Earth", which you can download on the band's MySpace page or pick up on Australian label Mistletone's holiday-themed Mistletonia compilation.
Evangelicals sound more Arcade Fire than Christian Coalition, more Jeff Buckley than Mike Huckabee, when songwriter Josh Jones's vibrato-filled tenor calls out to the rafters for Jesus. "You can hear the lovers crying in the street," Jones sings, as a deeper voice harmonizes, bringing to mind that gravelly-voiced muse of Buckley and so many others, Leonard Cohen. The humming feedback and cavernous percussion help avoid the usual Christmas carol production clichés; I think there are some jingle bells in there, yeah, but there's also a helicopter sound at the end. Much more of this holiday doom 'n' gloom and I'll start stressing about Dec. 25 the way some people worried about Y2K.
[from Mistletonia; out now on Mistletone]
When even Fox News does a segment called "Race for the Arctic", about the battle over the oil reserves exposed by the melting polar icecaps, it's a pretty good bet the climate is changing. Although, now that Fox has reported it, I'm not so sure anymore. Regardless, if the scientific community and a certain Washington Post-detested, Nobel-approved ex-pol are to be believed over, say, the Al Roker who invented the Weather Channel, Santa Claus might soon be sitting on some prime real estate. Which I guess is another way of saying there's a chance we're all totally screwed. Um, merry Christmas.
In that event, Southern California-based indie-poppers the Softlightes would be pretty much underwater, so they're as good a candidate as any to sing a holiday tune on the subject. Digital-only charity single "Last Christmas on Earth", benefiting Earth Hour, goes the Phil Spector route with tympani, strings, bells, and ringing acoustic guitars beneath former the Incredible Moses Leroy main man Ron Fountenberry's high, Ben Gibbard-like vocals. Thankfully, the song is light on overt polemic, though the bridge oddly recalls the verse melody from "Tonight, Tonight". "We can dance because it's Christmas, 'cause this could be our last Christmas on Earth," Fountenberry proclaims, over chants of "dance! dance! dance!". If you're wearing green, then Mars is already kind of Christmasy anyway.
[Say No to Being Cool - Say Yes to Being Happy is out now on Modular]
Caroline Lufkin came to Los Angeles via Okinawa and Boston's Berklee School of Music. The ethereal, IDM-accented ambient-pop of her 2006 debut, Murmurs, sounds like it could've been made anywhere. Temporary Residence is following that release with an iTunes-only remix album early next year, including contributions from Lullatone, Saxon Shore half Brightest Feathers, and others. Murmurs' "All I Need" is a languid poptronica weeper that fits in a bit too cozily between Dido and Imogen Heap among potential soundtrack fodder, but Lufkin's nuanced vocals ensure there's still some color.
The remix by Los Angeles producer Owen Vallis goes for a slightly more club-ready arrangement and manages to improve on the original. Synths here squeak and wobble, while the pulsing bass line is, thankfully, a bit more energetic. Scratchy noise also overlays big parts of the song, better highlighting Lufkin's angelic coos than the string, organ, and warm-bass hum of the original. Caroline, yup.
MP3:> Caroline: Allineed (Owen Vallis Mix)"
[from Murmurs Mixes; due 01/08/08 via iTunes on Temporary Residence]
Nellie McKay speaks for the trees-- and every other living thing-- on "Christmas Dirge", a slow, sardonic holiday single that's freely available on her website. It's the kind of carol Stephin Merritt might sing were he a monomaniacally possessed animal rights advocate in a yuletide mood. "Please don't axe another evergreen," the recent Broadway performer sings, all deadpan Barbra bathos, as the bells and schmaltzy strings that are the true reason for the season come in to join her bright department-store piano. There's a personal reason for McKay's Christmas wish, too, beyond the outspokenly political vegan thing. "Spare the little flower as you didn't spare my heart," she pleads, later admitting, "My future's decked in misery." Don't worry, McKay still cheers up enough by the end to exclaim, "Merry Christmas, everybody!" If you're feeling the spirit, you can make a donation to the, ha, Nellie McKay Disaster Fund.
MP3/Stream:> Nellie McKay: "Christmas Dirge"
[Obligatory Villagers is out now on Hungry Mouse]
R. Kelly is still the king, but The-Dream, aka Terius Nash, has quietly owned the year in r&b-- first as a songwriter, coming up with Rihanna's inescapable "Umbrella", but also as a performer in his own right on smooth, summery jams like "Shawty Is a Ten" ("Da Shit", too) and its steamy follow-up, "Falsetto". (The-Dream has had such a good year, in fact, that Kells himself eventually turned up for the perhaps inevitable "Shawty" meta-remix.) "Falsetto" already had us making happy noises when we first posted it back in September: "The-Dream lives on with 'Falsetto', in which Nash (oh yes) fakes a female orgasm. Knowing the guy's track record, we shouldn't be surprised he pulls it off," we wrote.
Definitely click that link if you haven't heard "Falsetto" before, because the expensive-looking but trite video probably isn't the best way to be introduced to it. Sure, The-Dream makes it clear here that he's a ladies man, but he's perilously close to being, well, a Ladies Man-- I mean, there's a rotating bed involved, if not Courvoisier or ginseng. Nash mimes his Herbal Essences oohs wearing dark shades and a baseball cap, posing in luxurious locales or cruising around in his flashy car, while his svelte shawty undulates in various states of undress. At one point she's wearing ear buds, and she seems to be enjoying the song even more than we do. Definitely more than we enjoy the chopped 'n' screwed version, as much as we're sure The-Dream would advocate taking it slow.
[original track from Love Hate; due 12/11/07 on Def Jam]
Could it just be a rhetorical question? "Waving Flags", from British Sea Power's forthcoming third LP Do You Like Rock Music?, doesn't offer much doubt about the answer to the album's title-- the Brighton quartet likes rock, thank you, particularly dour, scruffy post-punk with surging U2 and Arcade Fire anthemics. The video for the song is less immediately comprehensible, involving rapidly changing images of stuff like ocean liners and helicopters, band members hanging around near a staircase, and a guy in some kind of huge bear-like costume out of the cover of My Morning Jacket's It Still Moves. Oh yeah, there are even people waving flags.
Big-room guitars rattle and stab, climbing higher and higher above an even bigger room's worth of rousing backing vocals. The stop-motion special effects are nice, but blink and you could be watching almost anything. And although the band clearly likes rock music's tropes, it's harder to say what they're doing with them. To U.S.-born ears, the lyrics sure seem to discuss immigration, but it's hard to tell whether we're talking Neil Diamond's "America" or Morrissey's "Bengali in Platforms". "You are astronomical fans of alcohol/ So welcome in," Yan sings, lightly and breathily, later asking, "Are you of legal drinking age?" Another rhetorical question? I dunno.
[from Do You Like Rock Music?; due 1/14/07 in the UK on Rough Trade and 2/12/07 in the U.S. on Rough Trade/World's Fair]
Between Ghostface Killah's The Big Doe Rehab and Wu-Tang Clan's 8 Diagrams, all of a sudden there's a lot of new Wu-Tang material for Santa to put in the Clan faithful's stockings this year. While the Wu-Tang record is inspiring particularly heated debate so far over its bug-eyed, spaced-out drugginess, Ghostface's latest should also generate some discussion, albeit on a more modest level. On "Tony Sigel a.k.a. The Barrel Brothers", he sticks to the gritty rhymes and vintage soul samples that have worked for him on his best work, including last year's superb Fishscale. Ghostface touts his ghetto roots, culminating in a memorable line about voting for "Oprah, Obama, and Eric B.", while the higher-profile of his guests, Philly's Beanie Sigel, threatens opponents with death, indulges in tortured cock-sucking puns, and, um... decries Bush's foreign policy? Must be coming up on an election year. The Rik Cordero-directed video doesn't give us much besides choppy footage of the guys rapping on darkened city streets, but it does the job.
(Also, a higher-quality video is posted here.)
[from The Big Doe Rehab; out now on Def Jam]
- Video Premiere: The Mary Onettes: "Explosions"
- Video: Bobb Trimble & the Crippled Dog Band: "Galilean Boy" (Live in Worcester, Mass.)
- Video: Jon Brion [ft. Britt Daniel, Pat Sansone, and John Stirratt]: "I Feel Fine" (Beatles cover; live in Chicago on NYE)
- New Music: Laura Barrett: "Deception Island Optimists Club" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Goldfrapp: "A & E" [Stream]
- Video: Radar Bros.: "When Cold Air Goes to Sleep"
- New Music: Times New Viking: "Drop-Out" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Wiz Khalifa: "Youngin On His Grind (DJ Howlermonkey Remix)" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Bell: "Videotape" / "The Eraser" (Radiohead / Thom Yorke covers) (Live on "Fair Game") [MP3]
- New Music: Nacão Zumbi: "The Carimbæo" [MP3/Stream]
- Video Premiere: Thurston Moore: "Fri/End"
- New Music: White Denim: "Paint Silver Gold" [MP3]
- New Music: Hot Chip: Radio 1 Essential Mix
- New Music: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds: "Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!" [Stream]
- Video: Hella: "The Ungrateful Dead"
- Video: Lupe Fiasco [ft. Matthew Santos]: "Superstar" (Live on "Late Show With David Letterman")
- New Music: Mike Bones: "No Pussy Blues" (Grinderman cover, live at Sound Fix) [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: King of Prussia: "Spain In The Summertime" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: The Magnetic Fields: "Too Drunk to Dream" [MP3/Stream]
- Videos: Jens Lekman: "Into Eternity" / "Radio NRJ" / "Shirin" (Live on the "Take Away Show")
- Video: Ice Cube: "Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It"
- New Music: The Clientele: "Girl From Somewhere" [Stream]
- Video: The Fiery Furnaces: "Duplexes of the Dead"
- New Music: These Are Powers: "Cracks in the Lifeline" [MP3/Stream]
- Video: Black Lips: "Veni Vidi Vici"
- New Music: Sufjan Stevens: "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: The Honeydrips: "Hej Då Karolin" [MP3]
- On Repeat: Cave: "Hunt Like Devil" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Woelv: "La Mort et le Chien Obère" [Stream]
- New Music: White Williams: "In the Club" (Live on "Fair Game") [MP3]
- Video: Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein: "The Perfect Song" (ThunderAnt Episode)
- Video: No Age: "Sleeper Hold" / "Neck Escaper" [Live at Other Music]
- New Music: Dave Gahan: "Deeper and Deeper (Juan Maclean Club Mix)" [Stream]
- New Music: Various Production [ft. Gerry Mitchell]: "Risen" [MP3/Stream]
- Video: Los Campesinos!: "Death to Los Campesinos!"
- Video: Kermit the Frog: "Once in a Lifetime" (Talking Heads cover)
- New Music: Mechanical Bride: "Umbrella" (Rihanna cover) [Stream]
- New Music: Sambassadeur: "Final Say" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks: "Baltimore" [MP3]
- Video: Malcolm Middleton: "We're All Going to Die"
- New Music: Kid Sister: "Pro Nails (Bag Raiders Remix)" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Pikelet: "A Bunch" [MP3]
- On Repeat: Telepathe: "Chrome's On It" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Blood on the Wall: "Junkeee...Julieee..." [Stream]
- Videos: Ike Turner: Various Songs
- Video: The Clientele: "I Had to Say This" (fan video)
- Video: Feist [ft. members of Grizzly Bear]: "1234" (Live on the "Today Show")
- New Music: The Depreciation Guild: "Sky Ghosts" [MP3/Stream]
- Video: Dave Gahan: "Saw Something"
- New Music: Hey Willpower: "In The Basement" [MP3/Stream]
- New Music: Rahim: "The Same" [Stream]
- Premiere: Xiu Xiu: "I Do What I Want When I Want" [MP3/Stream]
- Video: Tone Loc and Peaches: "Wild Thing (Peaches RMX)"
- New Music: Okkervil River: Golden Opportunities Mixtape [MP3]
- New Music: Beach House: "Gila" [MP3]
- New Music: Lily Allen: "Mr. Blue Sky" (ELO cover)
- New Music: The Dodos: "Fools" [MP3/Video]
- Video: LCD Soundsystem: "Tribulations" (Live in Manchester, England)
- New Music: God Help the Girl (Stuart Murdoch project): "Perfection as a Hipster" [Stream]
- Video: John Cage and Rahsaan Roland Kirk: "Sound??"
- Video: Portishead: New Songs (Live at ATP's Nightmare Before Christmas)
- Video: Busdriver: "Casting Agents and Cowgirls"
- New Music: Atlas Sound: "I'll Be Your Mirror" (Velvet Underground cover) / "Cobwebs" [MP3s]
- Video: Dirty Projectors: "Rise Above" (Live on NPR's "Bryant Park Project")
- Video: The Tough Alliance: Roxy snowboard commercial
- Video: Iron & Wine: "Boy With a Coin"
- Video: Amy Winehouse: "Love Is a Losing Game"
- New Music: White Williams: "Headlines" / "New Violence" / "Route to Palm" / Untitled (Daytrotter Session) [MP3s/Streams]
- Video: The Kills: "U.R.A. Fever"
- New Music: Danielson: "Christmas Eve Nite" [Stream]
- Video: The Wombats: "Kill the Director" (Live on Radio Città Del Capo)
- Video: Caribou: "She's the One" / "Sundialing" (Live on the "Take Away Show")