Top Of The iCharts 7/23

1) Flo Rida - Whistle
2) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
3) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
4) Jason Aldean - Take A Little Ride
5) Fun. - Some Nights
6) P!nk - Blow Me
7) David Guetta and Sia - Titanium
8) Ellie Goulding - Lights
9) Cher Lloyd - Want U Back
10) Owl City and Carly Rae Jepsen - Good Time

Anther week down and I've managed to avoid listening to that Pink song. I know I should just for "journalistic" purposes, but I feel pretty good about it so far. I listen to a fair amount of top 40 radio thanks to my job, Elvis Duran and the Morning Show is sort of the standard morning show that people listen to where I work. I don't mind it, they're fun enough. The problem is that I don't listen to it on Z100 (WHTZ), their home station out of New York City, I live just out of their broadcast range, a more local station broadcasts at about the same frequency and pushes them out. So instead I listen on Max 106.3 (WHCY) out of Sussex NJ, which seems to be the most poorly run radio station of all time. They'll run their own promos directly over the Z100 promos read by the hosts, so you can't understand either of them. They'll play a song, but that won't line up with the Z100 feed, so they switch back halfway through another song. There's dead air, but more annoying is what they use when they know there will be dead air. They run announcements saying "The show will return in 2 minutes" or whatever over the soulful strains of "Mah-na Mah-na." That is way too much of that song. Enough about shoddy radio though.

As much as I try to ignore Flo Rida or just write him off as a hack, he keeps finding ways to make me have to pay attention to him. Radio is often significantly behind the charts, especially the iTunes charts so this song isn't really in full rotation yet. This song's about girls. You knew that ahead of time, it's a Flo Rida song, not some John Berryman Dream Song. The lyrics are kinda gross and delivered in the exact same way as every other Flo Rida song. The tempo's a little slower though, so I guess that counts as artistic growth.

The weird thing about the iTunes charts is how people like Jason Aldean can hang with the likes of David Guetta and Katy Perry. He's been wildly popular on the country scene for years now but you'd never hear him on top 40 radio. Country has long been the highest selling genre of music, Aldean has had multiple platinum albums, but still it's really the one type of music completely segregated from mainstream radio. For those wondering, it takes 27 seconds for the song to mention trucks.

I Know I'm late to the Rayman Origins Party.

Well, it's that time of year again. The Steam Summer Sale is here for a limited time only. Steam is the most prominent platform for buying digital copies of PC games. They run big sales around most major holidays, but their most famous sale comes in the summer doldrums. There aren't many new games coming out, so they give you amazing deals slightly older games. I've spent about $40 and gotten a whole slew of games, so I'm super happy. One of those games was last year's Rayman Origins.

I had known that I wanted to play Rayman Origins for some time, but I thought the standard $60 price point seemed a little steep. I'm pretty sure that was the wrong call after playing it for about 3 hours. For those that don't know, it's the same type of game as the Super Mario Bros. games. You jump around from platform to platform, making hard jumps, avoiding or killing enemies along the way. The difference is instead of being weird and Japanese, it's weird and French. It's a great game, the controls are tight, it's fun and looks incredible. But I don't write video game reviews. The music, folks, is incredible.

Right off the bat, the opening cinematic lets you know what kind of music you're in for. It has Rayman, his oafish buddy Globox and a few little creatures called Teensies sleeping rhythmically in a tree known as "The Snoring Tree." The racket they create with their snoozing annoys something evil, so it tries to wake them up. This however, just makes them snooze in double time. It's rhythmic and awesome, much like the rest of the game.

But that only plays the first time you boot the game up. The every subsequent time you're treated to a barrage of mouth harp, didgeridoo (spell check helped a bunch with that one) and assorted bongos. It all adds up a to a quirky symphony that you just don't hear in video games or really anywhere else. I just turned up the volume on my computer and let that play while I made coffee this morning. It was the most rhythmic coffee I've ever had.

Most of the game is all ukuleles, strange percussion and gibberish singing. But, there's a level in the second world called "Best Original Score." They're not wrong. I'll admit, I'm a sucker for when something reminds me even a little bit of modern composer, Steve Reich. The backing track is all wooden xylophone and Drumming inspired drumming. Where you can really tell the composer listened to a lot of Reich is when the violin comes in for just a brief cameo that sounds like it's a sample lifted directly from Music For 18 Musicicians.


There's no denying that Rayman Origins is a great, great game. The music though might be the best music in a game this generation.

Top Of The iCharts 07/16

1) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
2) Flo Rida - Whistle
3) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
4) P!nk - Blow Me
5) David Guetta and Sia - Titanium
6) Wllie Goulding - Lights
7) Cher Lloyd - Want U Back
8) Fun. - Some Nights
9) Owl City and Carly Rae Jepsen - Good Time
10) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know

I really don't want to listen to that P!nk song. I also don't want to type "Pink" that way anymore because it's annoying so I'm sticking with standard spelling. She's done nothing to deserve nonstandard characters in her name. I've never liked a Pink song. I think her attempts at party songs are annoying and her attempts at ballads are hokey and/or maudlin. What I hate more than anything is the way she throws around how edgy she is. She's a pop star, nothing more. She's not some badass because she has tattoos and dyes her hair or swears sometimes. Most people hear her songs on the radio anyway. No one hears that. In her most recent hit, she even said how normal people "don't get [her] hair." In 2010. If Max Martin helped write your song, there is no edge anywhere to be found, so just stop trying. Long story short, no I have not heard "Blow Me" so I have nothing to say about it. I'm going to try to avoid hearing "Blow Me" for as long as possible because... jeez. You named your song "Blow Me"? I guess I can't expect that much from the artist behind "U + Ur Hand".

I give up for today. There are other songs. New Fun. song. I like that one.

Albums Of The Week 7/13

Choice Of The Week

Dirty Projectors - Swing Lo Magellan

I guess you could call Dirty Projectors a pop band. But it sounds like pop from the mind of a maniac. None of the melodies are easy to sing along to, they meander seemingly aimlessly. They soar and nose dive at random. The guitars sometimes sound like they're being played back on an unreliable record player. All the chaos that is typical of The Dirty Projectors is here and more. My first experience with the band was 2009's Bitte Orca and I'm getting the feeling I should check out more of their stuff.

Doug Benson - Smug Life

Doug Benson is a great comic who loves marijuana. There are times, like on his podcast where he really leans into the fact that he's a great comic. On this album however, he really leans into the fact that he loves marijuana. He recorded the album on 4/20, as is his tradition and the premise is that he does his first show completely sober then the second show high as hell. It has its moments, but it's not the best Doug Benson you can get though.





Classic Pick: 

David Bowie - The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars

I haven't used my record player in a while but I recently bought a few things on vinyl so I cracked the lid for the first time in ages. Bowie's best album of the 70's is widely debatable, but this is my choice. It has some of my favorite Bowie songs ever. "Soul Love," "Starman" "Ziggy Stardust" they're all classics. And I own it on vinyl so that's where the first part of the story comes in.

Look Back: Rick Springfield - Working Class Dog

Originally Released: February 24, 1981

Recently, I've become oddly infatuated with Jonathan Coulton's "Je Suis Rick Springfield." I don't exactly know why, but I heard it in passing one day and it sounded incredibly familiar. I honestly thought it was a cover, but in French. After doing a little research, I found out that it's just Jonathan Coulton being smarter, funnier and a better songwriter than anything I could ever dream of being. He just wrote a song that sounded so much like Rick Springfield that it had me completely fooled. And then did the song in French.

This song led me to think about Rick Springfield more than I thought I ever would, or should. Sure, I know and love "Jessie's Girl" and know him as one of those seminal 80's pop icons, but that's about it. I wanted to find out more, and decided to start with the album that has "Jessie's Girl" on it. I could have gone the easy route and picked a Greatest Hits album or The Essential Rick Springfield or something like that, but that's no fun. You can only really judge an artist by the strength of their album cuts, not just the singles. And I've had good luck going back to super popular albums from the '80s, like with She's So Unusual from Cyndi Lauper.

This album is not She's So Unusual in any sense, really. Whereas that album indulged in the very sense of the new wave in the '80s (tons of synths, wild fashion sense) none of that had really started in early 1981. Because of that, the album sounds more like a product of the '70s in some ways. Make no mistake though, this album, like Lauper's, is a pop album through and through. The hooks are big and catchy, the songs are breezy and fun. Only the last track, "Inside Silvia" goes significantly over the 3 minute mark. There are attempts to rock, but those are kept in check, any guitar solos are workmanlike at best.

What's amazing about this album is that the structure of the songs never changes until the very end of the album. The vocals are all Rick telling a little story in the verses, then in the choruses, the melody soars a bit and he's accompanied by a whole crew of backing vocals. Same with the guitars, usually staccato and palm muted in the verses then they open up in the chorus. Sometimes there's a solo, but like I said, those are unexciting at best. Even songs that do diverge a bit in the verses, like second wave of ska inspired verses of "Everybody's Girl" has a big wide open chorus with backing vocals and guitars getting a full strum every downbeat. It's sorta a neat trick that it's used to blatantly, but to pretty good effect. It might sound tedious, but when he breaks from the formula with "Red Hot & Blue Love," a bluesy track, that's when the album really starts to drag.

It's hard not to at least have a little love for this album. It's by no means perfect, but it has a lot of what I like from a pop album. The lyrics are occasionally pretty dark like I like. Take "Jessie's Girl" for example how Springfield has a little freakout in the pre-chorus when he sings "She's loving him with that body, I just know it." It's the kind of genuine insecurity that you don't see a lot in music these days. Especially from someone considered to be as handsome as Rick Springfield back in the day. "I've Done Everything For You" (a cover of a Sammy Hagar song) is Springfield complaining about how one sided his relationship is. It's another pretty great song.

For a pop album, there's a surprising amount of cohesion. Perhaps to a fault in the lack of structural variety, but it's a method that works. Maybe it's asking to much for an album like this to be completely interesting and surprising throughout. The ambitions may not be as high as with other albums, but what little it really strives for, it hits.

Top Of The iCharts 07/09

1) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
2) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
3) Flo Rida - Whistle
4) David Guetta & Sia - Titanium
5) Ellie Goulding - Lights
6) Owl City & Carly Rae Jepsen - Good Time
7) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know
8) Maroon 5 - Payphone
9) Usher - Scream
10) Rihanna - Where Have You Been?

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe "Wide Awake" is actually a really good song. It's been climbing the iTunes charts for some time now and it's in the top slot currently. Maybe it's not boring, maybe the lyrics aren't as bad as I thought. It's possible that even though most Flo Rida songs sound exactly the same, the people keep clamoring for more. These songs are all over the radio, if you really want to hear "Somebody That I Used To Know" you can get it for free at least two or three times over the course of a normal day. Sure, the video to "Call Me Maybe" is really stupid, but it has millions upon millions of views on YouTube. Maybe I'm the one that's wrong about all of that.

But this isn't about me complaining about how people ingest their pop, it's about me writing about the pop itself. Owl City became super famous for "Fireflies," a catchy song with some of the worst lyrics on the radio. "Good Time" abandons the way too clever lyrics of "Fireflies" in favor of taking a controversial stance that partying is fun. "Hands up if you're down to get down tonight" sings that Owl City dude. "I woke up at twilight" sings the Call Me Maybe lady. This might as well be a Black Eyed Peas song. It's fine, I guess.

Songs For America!

It's the 4th of July here in America. I suppose it's that date in every country, now that I think about it. Or is it? I have no idea how the International Dateline works. Anyway, here in the USA, we like to celebrate out independence England by mimicking the explosions that set off the revolutionary war. And getting drunk and having those explosions cause the same kinds of injuries as in that war. So here are some songs to set off some illegal fireworks to while drinking watery domestic beer, grilling, and sweating.

Bruce Springsteen - 4th Of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)


There are few acts more American than Bruce Springsteen. His songs tell stories of high aspirations that are destroyed by crippling depression and the weight of the real world. Just like the American dream. His America has always been a dour place full of broken homes and economic woes. Through it all, he always finds a way to have a good time though. Here, he sings about putting aside all his troubles and just watching the fireworks with his number one girl.

X - Fourth Of July


X is an odd band. They're from the first wave of punk back when people weren't really sure what to make of it yet. Mostly their songs are loud and obnoxious the way punk should be. This song however, is a country twinged pop song. It's a quick fun song until you listen to the lyrics which are about a relationship falling apart, but who cares? Fireworks are pretty.

The Rentals - Overlee


The Rentals to many people are just the side project of Matt Sharp, original bassist for the band Weezer. There was a time when I loved Weezer and would try to experience everything remotely related to them, sometimes it worked out great, like listening to The Rentals. The song is mostly about the singer crashing with an old girlfriend, but there's a line that goes "Let's step outside and make out on the 4th of July" and that's a great line, so I included it.

Watch the movie Canadian Bacon


I know, not a song, it's my blog I'll write what I want. Michael Moore is famed for his documentaries that take a hard look at the state of America with a humorous tone. They're usually sorta unreliable because they tend to be completely biased, but entertaining none the less. However, one day he decided to write a satirical farce about what would happen if America got into a war with Canada. It's a story of patriotism gone amok with a really weak 3rd act, but it's still damned entertaining. It stars the late, great John Candy, Rhea Perlman, Alan Alda and Kevin Pollack, so how could you go wrong? Also, it features a smattering of some great, patriotic music while we're at it. "God Bless America Again," "Ballad Of The Green Berets" and a rendition of "O Canada" that breaks out into a huge fight. Truly American.

The Kanye Conundrum

This past week saw the performance of Kanye West's new track, "New God Flow," featuring Pusha T. Chances are, you're going to see this track on the upcoming G.O.O.D. Music compilation Cruel Summer. It's by far the best song to be attached to Cruel Summer yet. The beat is interesting, the lyrics are meaningful. It's the first song that sounds like it could hang on a regular Kanye West album, in fact. The fact that I describe it that way though, leads me to my biggest problem with Kanye West as an artist. His albums are routinely groundbreaking and interesting in ways mainstream hip hop absolutely is not.

I'll point to other G.O.O.D. Music track, "Mercy" as an example. Kanye's last few solo albums have been dark affairs. 808s And Heartbreaks more or less got away from hip hop all together to make a deeply personal album full of heartbreak and regret. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, West's most recent solo effort blended the heartbreak with the rap more effectively and resulted in an incredible album. Just judging by the title and his most recent work, you'd expect "Mercy" to be about begging for mercy from a cruel, unforgiving world that's out to get him. Nope, it's about sports cars. The Lamborghini Murcielago in particular.

It's a boastful song with a bland beat that you could find a dime a dozen on any hip hop radio station in the country. In short, why, when Kanye has really pushed the medium forward, would you go to him for the same damn garbage you could hear anywhere else? This problem persists through any song Kanye's on that is explicitly controlled by him and only him though. He's appeared as a guest in a number of songs, as any hip hop star has in the past ten years or so. In each of them, he's rapping about how rich he is using interesting, but not terribly meaningful, rhymes.

Last year, we all got way to excited for Watch The Throne the long rumored full album collaboration between West and his mentor Jay-Z. This is particularly interesting because you can tell just from the content of West's lyrics exactly which songs he controlled and which songs Hova took the lead on. "New Day" is a dark, dense song with a crazy beat, probably a Kanye song. Directly preceding that though is "Gotta Have It" which drops the names of several NBA players and expensive cars. His recent top 40 guest spots include an insane verse on Katy Perry's "UFO" which is about having sex with an alien for some reason.

Maybe I'm the idiot though. Everything I've said was boring and the same thing as mainstream hip hop garbage sells more than I could possibly ever imagine. Possibly because people like that same garbage they hear on the hip hop stations, possibly because people just like Kanye West. Kanye's lucky because he's able to sell to an audience that doesn't buy a lot of other rap albums, so the sameness is all new to them, really. All I know is that I can't wait to hear what the next album branded "Kanye West" is going to sound like. Or I'll just listen to The Roots for the rest of my life.

Look Back: The Avalanches - Since I Left You

The Avalanches - Since I Left You Originally Released: November 27, 2000

Well, it's an unusually slow week for music, at least for music that I have much of an interest in.  I mean, am I really going to listen to that new Linkin Park album? So it's time to dig back a little bit to 2000's Since I Left You by The Avalanches. The album came out in 2000 in Australia, but held back in other regions to get clearances or replacements for certain samples. No one's gonna deny that this is a great album so anything I write about it would be futile.

I've always been fascinated by music built out of beats and samples. The Avalanches have said that Since I Left You has over 3,500 samples. Just to demonstrate how staggeringly high that number is, Paul's Boutique, The Beastie Boys earlier landmark in sampling used just over 100 samples. Most of that is thanks to The Dust Brothers, really though. That album has been mired in legal trouble ever since it was released though. Same with Thunder, Lightning, Strike by The Go! Team. That album had to be modified for American release because of all the problems with rights in the samples. Amazingly though, Since I Left You hasn't really met the same fate. I guess if you use that many samples in such a short time, you can't really tell whose is whose anymore.

It's surprising to me that you don't see more music created from samples like Since I Left You in the internet age. Sure, there's The Go! Team and Girl Talk, but that's about it. The both of them have really gotten away from the "kitchen sink" aesthetic that makes sampling such an intriguing genre.

Sampling is easier than ever these days. Every Mac computer comes with Garage Band. FL Studio is relatively cheap over on Windows. Millions upon millions of samples are available with a quick search on the internet. Sure, you may have to go through some nefarious to get them, but sampling has never really been about legality anyway. It's about putting things together from a wide variety of media in a way that makes it into something entirely new and interesting. Why is it then that something like Since I Left You only comes along once in a great while?

"Frontier Psychiatrist" also has a great music video, for what it's worth. I've always loved music videos and it's a damn shame that these days, they've been pushed off to the side. Vevo is doing good work trying to bring them to the forefront, but they just don't have the complete roster of artists that you really need to be something special.

I have Garage Band and the tools to acquire varied samples, maybe I should give it a shot...

A Very Nice Debut Indeed: Review of The Hale And Hearty

Philadelphia artist Heyward Howkins released his debut album this week. It arrived in my inbox a few weeks ago and I knew nothing about him, but I decided to give it a listen and was instantly surprised. I've known the Philadelphia music scene to be mostly just the DC hardcore scene mixed with some pop punk. The days of Philly soul are long gone. That guy from The Hooters still plays "And We Danced" on local radio stations from time to time. The Philly scene has been quiet on the national stage for some time. That's why when Howkin's album turned out to be dreamy indie pop, I was surprised. When it turned out to be pretty good, doubly so.

There are no rough edges on the entire album. It's spare, to be sure, but the few components to each song seem to fall perfectly in place, the album's never over produced though, because that would be the worst. You can still hear fingers slide across strings of a guitar, sharp inhales getting ready for the next verse. I hate it when people try to get music down to just the music and get rid of all the other little things like that. Hearing the singer breathe makes it feel more personal, like someone just trying to put his or her feelings out there. It lets you hear the music and not the production all the time.

Howkins' voice is light and gentle, but never fragile. You've probably heard a voice like his before, and you probably liked it. It's very easy to listen to and matches his musical style. The guitar sounds are spare, but textured. If you play guitar, it sounds like the notes, wherever possible, are played on low strings, but high frets. It makes them sound throatier and thicker than if you play it on the thin strings. That's a good analogy for Howkins' voice too.

Sometimes, he does venture into a more fully orchestrated song, like later in the album with "Plume And Orange" it has full drums, affected as to not offend the ear with their incessant banging, guitars, piano, a brief appearance by a wurlizter organ (or fake wurlitzer organ). It's a wide departure from "Thunderin' Stop", the first track on the album, The Hale & Hearty has enough in between to link the two so nothing feels out of place.

Clocking in at just over half an hour seems like another way this album tries to be as nice as possible. No song overstays its welcome, averaging about 3 minutes for each, considered to be the perfect length for a pop song for years. If you like nice, The Hale & Hearty is very nice. If you don't like nice, what's wrong with you? Who hates nice?

Heyward Howkins debut LP The Hale & Hearty can be purchased on his Bandcamp page, here:
http://heywardhowkins.bandcamp.com/

Top Of The iCharts 6/25

1) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
2) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
3) Maroon 5 - Payphone
4) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know
5) David Guetta and Sia - Titanium
6) Ellie Goulding - Lights
7) Pitbull - Back In TIme
8) Usher - Scream
9) Maroon 5 - One More Night
10) Rihanna - Where Have You Been?

Two new songs this week. The first from French dance music man David Guetta featuring Sia. I have no idea how Sia became the guest star du jour but that's where we are now. She used to be a real downtempo pop singer, frequently collaborating with Zero 7, now she's been featured in two top 10 hits. It's understandable, though, she has a great voice that fits in well into today's radio. She sounds familiar, but not too much like anything else on the radio. I just don't know what happened when she went from having released several albums in relative obscurity to being on the radio every hour.

The song, "Titanium" is a disjointed mess though. It starts out with just a guitar, which as far as I can is a real guitar. Real instruments are something of a rarity in David Guetta songs. The comes the chorus which is all synths and a drum machine, but it builds to that so at least it makes some sort of sense. Then after the chorus is just straight club banger because the only thing David Guetta has less than range, it's restraint. It's a damn shame though, if he had just held back a little bit and let Sia really wind up and go for it, he could have something sorta thrilling. His production on the vocals shows he knows how to do interesting stuff. When she sings "I am titanium," her voice soars high and sinks into the background, blending with the synths in the background. It's a great effect, ruined seconds later by thumping beats and the same synths you've heard a thousand times.

"One More Night" by Maroon 5. I don't want to write about Maroon 5 anymore. I don't think they're a good band, I've never thought they were a good band. This one has reggae guitar. Also, I thought this band had a real drummer, why are they always using a drum machine?

Feels like 19-Something-And-5 again, review of Class Clown Spots A UFO

Here we are again, a new Guided By Voices album. Most band reunions these days result in a tumultuous tour and whispers of maybe an album that's in the works, but that never ever comes out, but you can't expect Robert Pollard to not release way way too much music. This is the second GBV release in 6 months, downright nuking the trend. January's Let's Go Eat The Factory was a surprisingly solid album too. It had some really great songs, some real snoozers and an overall feeling of "Classic Guided By Voices," or to use their term, it gave you the "Gee-Bee-Vee-Bees." It was a sort of Mag Earwhig level album that you'll listen to plenty, but is unlikely to be anyone's absolute favorite.

So now, Summer has arrived and so to has Class Clown Spots A UFO. 21 songs in 39 minutes, clearly a classic lineup ratio right there. While Let's Go Eat The Factory felt like the classic lineup never left, this feels like a significantly different album. Back when they released the first single, "Keep It In Motion" you could tell something was going to be different about this album. It's a fun song, but doesn't feature any guitars. It wouldn't fit anywhere in Bee Thousand or Propellor. It's interesting to wonder how the classic lineup would have evolved had they stayed together, so it's neat that we get this glimpse at what that might be.

Tobin Sprout has always been the secret weapon of Guided By Voices, and he's here in full force on Class Clown Spots A UFO. He and Pollard have always been kindred spirits in songwriting. Quick songs with lyrics that make little or no sense, Sprout especially on the lyric front. While Pollard does his thing overtop loud guitars, Sprout has songs like "They And Them" and "Forever Until It Breaks." Both of these songs are way quieter, and they're both weirdly hypnotic. Pollard isn't afraid to slow it down a bit though, like the previously mentioned "Keep it In Motion" and "Fly Baby." 

So yes, this does in fact feel like a classic GBV album in the ways that matter. It feels like they're evolving all these years later though. GBV never felt stale towards the end of their run, hell I think Earthquake Glue and Half Smiles Of The Decomposed are two of the better albums. You can certainly look at Robert Pollard's solo work and see aimlessness, though. Class Clown Spots A UFO is pointed though, it feels vital. It keeps me excited to listen to more Guided By Voices, which if rumors are to be believed will be in October-ish.

Top Of The iCharts 06/18

1) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
2) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
3) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know
4) Maroon 5 - Payphone
5) Usher - Scream
6) Pitbull - Back In Time
7) Rihanna - Where Have You Been?
8) Ellie Goulding - Lights
9) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend
10) One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

There's something I really like about "Lights" by Ellie Goulding. The backing tracks are really great, especially during the chorus. I've never been the biggest techno fan, but I've grown an appreciation for it in recent years. The techno trappings here are clean and polished, though, and I like my techno a bit dirtier than this. The vocals are a total turn off though. More interesting vocals and this song wouldn't feel too out of place on the fantastic soundtrack to the movie Drive. Instead, her voice is generic, singing a melody that's fun enough I guess, but doesn't stand out at all. There's no confidence in the production, throw the voice way forward, slam the bass, do something that would make it more than just a pop song with a cool synth track.

The other new song on the list is Usher's "Scream." I'm not a huge fan of Usher, but I've liked his music enough in the past. He recently performed this song as part of Microsoft's press conference at the gaming convention, the Electronic Entertainment Expo (better known as E3). What was surprising is that the crowd ate it up. Much of the talk afterwards was about how great a performer Usher is, how he can sing and dance really well together. Sure, that may be true, but I was surprised more people didn't just see it as a cheap ploy to grab headlines, which is pretty much all it was. That doesn't really have to do with the music, though. The song's okay I guess.

Music Of Mad Men Part 3

Last Sunday was the season finale of Mad Men season 5. It was a hell of a season, no doubt. One of the best from arguably the best show on television right now. It was for the most part, a really good episode, right up until the final minutes. There's a shot of the 5 partners of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce(?) each standing in front of a different window of their newly expanded offices that's perhaps a little on the nose. Even more on the nose though is the final montage, ending the season.

It all kicks off with Don, waking away from his wife. He had just gotten her an acting job on a commercial his firm is producing and he walks away down a long, dark hallway. The montage ends at a bar with Don drinking alone when another woman comes on to him. Don, in his previous marriage to Betty, had quite the career as a philanderer, but he gave all that up when he found Megan. The theme of the season was these characters that we had all known as miserable in their individual ways getting what they want, but still not being satisfied.

In the latter parts of the season, the long suffering Peggy Olsen takes a new position at a different firm. Pete Campbell, throughout the season, tries his hand at sleeping around with disastrous results. Roger Sterling divorces his wife. All these characters are shown in the montage. Set to "You Only Live Twice." For a show known for subtlety and tact, this is awfully heavy handed.

I get that it was the most recent Bond Film at the time the show takes place. I get that the show goes through pains to make sure the music is historically accurate. I get that the show has tried before to get a song from a Bond film into the show, but the historical accuracy got in the way. Okay, Casino Royale maybe isn't really a Bond film, but "The Look Of Love" is absolutely a Bond film song. I know that it's fitting, but I can't help but expect more from the show.

It's been a great season of Mad Men both as a television show and a great showcase of the music of 1967. Smart money is on the next season being primarily racially focussed, being that it could pick up right with the shooting of Martin Luther King Jr in 1968. It's also the year that saw the end of The Yardbirds, the creation of Led Zepplin and The Beatles travel to India. The last part could be especially interesting. It was the proper start to the psychedelic movement. The show has never shied away from drug use, between Peggy smoking weed in the office and Roger's life changing LSD experiment. Even though the final minute of Mad Men's finale left a bad taste in my mouth, I'm still really excited to see more Mad Men.

Kelly Hogan Keeps herself in pain, me in bliss

Alt-country is a horrible term. It just shows how far country has gone astray from its roots. There was a time when country wasn't the stereotype it has become. Somewhere around Garth Brooks, it all went wrong though. Country, these days, is one of the top selling genres across all forms of music, but the mainstream variety is almost completely unlistenable. In a world where "Save A Horse, Ride A Cowboy" and "Honky Tonk Badonkadonk" become unironic hits, it's sad that a term like alt-country has become necessary. It doesn't even make sense anymore to lump Wilco in with Travis Tritt. My reservations about classifications aside, Kelly Hogan's I Like To Keep Myself In Pain is an alt-country album, and damn good one at that.

It's been a long, long time since Kelly Hogan last released an album. Because It Feel Good came out all the way back in 2001. In the meantime, she's been making a lot of friends in high places. Thanks to that, I Like To Keep Myself In Pain features a veritable who's-who of songwriters. Andrew Bird, Robyn Hitchcock, Vic Chessnut, Stephin Merritt and many more all contribute songs they had written specifically for Hogan to sing. Only one song "Golden" was written by Hogan herself. This leads the whole album to have a different feel from song to song, but never feel disjointed. It all stays grounded thanks to Hogan's voice.

The easy comparison points directly to Neko Case, with whom Hogan has worked has worked for some time. They both have great voices, make country influenced music and are surprisingly active on Twitter. Given that Neko Case hasn't released an album since 2009's fantastic Middle Cyclone, these comparisons are far from a bad thing. They should, however, only be used as a reference point and not as a direct analogy.

Whether on bigger, poppier songs like "Sleeper Awake" and "Haunted" or on quieter songs where her voice barely rises above a whisper, Hogan is comfortable and confident. It's easy to see how she got such an all star roster to write songs for her. I know I would want Hogan's lovely voice to sing songs that I wrote as well.

Top Of The Charts 06/11

1) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
2) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know
3) Maroon 5 - Payphone
4) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
5) Pitbull - Back In Time
6) Rihanna - Where Have You Been?
7) Luke Bryan - Drunk On You
8) One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful
9) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend
10) Flo Rida - Wild Ones

Just as I had gotten used to talking about the iTunes top 10 being more dynamic and faster changing than the Billboard charts, they go ahead and deliver something that's shockingly similar to the Billboard Charts. Sure, Gotye remains number 1 on there and the songs aren't entirely similar, but I wouldn't say they're different in any way that's actually good. Consumer demand is the only thing driving these charts, so maybe my speculation that the radio industry is actually half the problem is unfounded. I would have thought that anyone that wanted to hear that Gotye song would have heard it enough by now. It's in rotation once every two hours or so on top 40 stations, along with "Call Me Maybe"

The newcomer to this list is "Drunk On You" by Luke Bryan. It's hard to get behind pop/mainstream country music when just last week Kelly Hogan released I Like To Keep Myself In Pain. It's an album that carries the pain and heartbreak that the original stars of country set forth. I don't really listen to a lot of this sort of music, as a rule usually. I find it corny and predictable, no excitement to it. "Drunk On You" might be the best mainstream country song out there, but I'll just keep listening to Kelly Hogan.

Albums Of The Week 6/8

Choice Of The Week: Kelly Hogan - I Like To Keep Myself In Pain

Kelly Hogan is a name that you might not know, unless you're active on Twitter. (Follow her, @hoganhere and follow me! @DepthsOfJosh !) If you're a fan of Neko Case's music, you're sure to like I Like To Keep Myself In Pain. It has the same sort of country twinged, americana feel with a smooth, entrancing voice at the front. It's fitting that the two frequently work together, I suppose.








The Hives - Lex Hives

The Hives have been mostly silent since 2007's Black And White Album. I've been a fan of the Hives for a while now and there's no denying that that album was underwhelming in many ways. This album is still more Black And White than Barely Legal but it's a step towards the more exhilarating, fun albums of old.

Rez Is Techno Music In Video Game Form

It's that time of year again. It's The Electronic Entertainment Exposition, better known as E3. For those that might now know, E3 is the largest event in the world of video games. Press conferences, big demonstrations, swag swag swag, booth babes. Everything that's great and terrible about video games is on display for a week in Los Angeles. But this is a music blog, so I'm gonna write about music and there's nothing video games is gonna stop me, dammit.

Wait! Rez, of course! I can write about music and video games! Rez originally came out ten years ago for the Dreamcast and Playstation 2. More recently though in 2008, it got a significant overhaul for Xbox 360. Higher resolution, better rendering, etc. It was great. It's a game with a strong sense of style, and the better visuals made a huge difference. The game is the vision of Sega's Tetsuya Mizuguchi who has gone on to create PSP classic Lumines and the recent spiritual successor to Rez, Child Of Eden. 

Typical Rez gameplay

Rez is a weird game. The story involves something about you being a hacker trying to shut down an artificial intelligence that has learned every piece of information in the world. You do this by flying an avatar through a crazy space-computer world, shooting missiles at enemies, other missiles, collectible items and bosses. The game play is super simple and not much of a challenge. There's even a way to just turn off death entirely and just soak it all in.

The trick is the sound. Your missiles locking on has a sound, their shots have a sound, every impact has a sound. Each level is described as a track with an artist and song title attached to it. And it's all techno as hell. If you're reading this, thinking you might want to give Rez a shot, know that you really have to be way in the mood for techno. Japanese techno.

The game does something completely genius to make sure everything lines up to the music just right. Instead of hitting a button to fire missiles, you hold down the button, drag a cursor over your targets and let go of the button. This allows there to be some latency between when you want to shoot and precisely control your rate of fire. It might make the game feel a little wonky in places, but it's all in service of the sound.

Tetsuya Mizuguchi has always had one foot in the video game business and one foot in the music industry. In his free time, he has what Wikipedia describes as "A musical and visual project." They're a band, but like the Gorillaz, they don't really have a physical presence. Instead of scary cartoons, they have Lumi, a girl born on the international space station in 2037.  They, like Rez are techno as all hell.

Rez, Child Of Eden and Genki Rockets are clearly not for everyone. The games are fun, but if you're coming for the game, you're coming for the wrong reasons. Lumines is one of the few things Mizuguchi has created with a broad mass appeal. It's a genuinely great puzzle game that also features some fantastic music. Rez and Child Of Eden are out for Xbox 360, Lumines is out for pretty much every modern thing you can possibly game on.

The Walkmen make their best album yet

The Walkmen have, for a while now, been masters at any speed. They may have first rose to fame thanks to songs like "The Rat" from Bows And Arrows and "In The New Year" from You And Me but it became apparent with their previous album Lisbon that they also knew how to slow things down and keep it quiet for the majority of an album. Heaven shows how deftly the band can switch between these two modes.

Right from the start, "We Can't Be Beat" starts with a lone plucking and Hamilton Leithauser crooning with some other light backing and that's it. It's light and calming, but gradually grows. The harmonies in the background get pushed forward, the Leithauser gets louder and stretches his range. By the time the whole band gets in there, it's essentially the same song at the core, but the feeling is entirely different. That goes for the whole album really. The songs are the songs you expect from The Walkmen, but each of them have different textures.

"Love Is Luck" features a touch of that yelling-his-fool-head-off style that was so great about songs like "In The New Year" and "The Rat" but he never over does it. You can hear flashes of this sound throughout the album. Other songs, like "Line By Line" are intimate in a way that The Walkmen have never really been before. Just a guitar and voice, it's spare and haunting. Leithauser's voice has always been one of the greatest things about The Walkmen, and it's front and center on "Line By Line" like never before, really.

Right after that song though, is "Song For Leigh" which is not only probably the best song on the album, but one of the best songs in recent memory. It's strange to hear a love song played so straight in the world of indie rock. Usually, feelings are obfuscated behind layers of flowery poetry and metaphor, but here the feelings are right on the table. The chorus repeats the line "I'll sing myself sick about you." It's a great line and the repeated sibilance is fun to listen to and sing along with. It's hard sometimes to say what you want to say in a song and still have it fit within the meter of the lyrics, but they absolutely nail it here.

It shouldn't be much of a surprise at this point that The Walkmen have made a really great album here. They've been making really great albums for a number of years, and those years are starting to show. It's a mature album, some people even go as far as to call it "dad-rock." I wouldn't go that far, most people that's an awful, reductive term. It's a rich album, with a lot of different textures on it. If dads like songs like "Line By Line" their kids may like the surf-rock styles of "Heaven," Mom might like "Dreamboat" and the dog could be tapping its paws to "Heartbreaker." What I'm trying to say is that album has a lot of really great songs, and it's a great album.

Top of The Charts 6/4

1) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call me Maybe
2) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know
3) Maroon 5 - Payphone
4) Pitbull - Back In Time
5) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend
6) Fun. - We Are Young
7) Rihanna - Where Have You Been?
8) One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful
9) Katy Perry - Wide Awake
10) Flo Rida - Wild Ones

Still on the iTunes top 10 for the time being, I think it'll stay that way for the foreseeable future.

 That Pitbull song from Men In Black catches my eye here. It's all the way down at 14 on the Billboard charts, but seems to be lighting it up on iTunes. I've never been a fan of Pitbull, even thinking up the horrible nickname "Shitbull" (get it?) as a way to deflect his popularity. His music is annoying, repetitive and boring as all hell. There's no catchy melodies, the beats are uninventive and frankly, I have no idea why people like him. His insistence on the name "Mr. Worldwide" is awful too. Here, he samples Mickey And Sylvia's "Love Is Strange" which, in itself, is strange. Most people know that song from Dirty Dancing so to co-opt it for another movie seems like an odd choice. Hell, pop rapper B.o.B. used the song as part of his B.o.B. vs. Bobby Ray mixtape in 2009, so it's not like it's even new to hip hop. So, you know, Pitbull is uninventive. Not really news to anyone.

A notable absence from the top 10 is that Phillip Phillips song, the American Idol one. You can never judge an Idol winner's career from their first single, though. It's always an awful song, a contest winner if I'm not mistaken. Again, I don't follow the show at all, so I don't even know what his style is. It's fairly safe to say that with the lack of fervor over the contestants and the declining viewership, that Phillips isn't going to be the megastar that some winners are (Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood) but only time will tell if he will be a big a flameout as, say, Taylor Hicks who can't give tickets to his shows away in some cases.

That Katy Perry song is sorta interesting too. It's not her usual pop bombast. It's a slower, much quieter song. It's a song you've probably heard a thousand times before, but it's weird to hear her try something different. Different from her usual, not from what's usually on the radio. That said, I tend to like what Katy Perry does, her songs are fun and catchy. This is mostly boring and generic. Without the singalong melody, it really brings to the forefront how horrible her lyrics usually are. I guess I'll just go back to having "T.G.I.F." stuck in my head for the next few months until she releases another single.

Andrew Bird's video for Eyeoneye is craft-tastic

Recently, music videos have been making a big comeback, I feel. MTV and VH1 have long since abandoned the business that originally buttered their bread, for better or worse. Thankfully, there was Youtube to pick of the slack and now dedicated sites lie Vevo have given a home to videos from 3 of the big four record companies (Sony, EMI and Universal. Warner Brothers signed a rival deal with MTV). I've always been a big fan of music videos, I have fond memories of digging through the internet to find videos after the dedicated channels started distancing themselves from videos. Vevo is a pretty great site all told. Sure, they have edited versions of songs which sucks and their selection isn't as wide as it could be only having big labels, but the quality is high and their apps for the iPhone and Xbox 360 have been really great.

Another thing I love is Andrew Bird's latest album Break It Yourself. I've liked Andrew Bird here and there before, but this is his first album that I've listened to a bunch of times front to back. So given that these are two things I think are pretty great, Andrew Bird releasing a music video has me really excited. And he released it on Etsy somehow. I don't really know how that works exactly, but it's fitting. The video has the homespun charm that you'd expect from Etsy a fun little animated bit with a construction paper aesthetic.

Hannibal Buress tells comedic jokes on Animal Furnace

Comedian Hannibal Buress is one of those guys you hear about a lot if you're a comedy nerd. If you're not deeply invested in comedy though, you might not know him. He's written for 30 Rock and Saturday Night Live and appeared on a wide variety of late night talk shows but he's not nearly as ubiquitous as the elder statesmen of the comedy scene. That's not a knock against him, he's still relatively young and extremely talented and there's no doubt that one day he'll be as popular in the mainstream as some of those guys.

His second album, Animal Furnace is as good a place as any to get to know Buress. He starts out fairly low key, but his energy level ramps up as the show goes on. Fortunately, his delivery works well on both ends of the spectrum. Whether talking about brushing his goatee in preparation for his special or impersonating his teenage cousin whom he has just accused of masturbating, everything he says has a distinct tone. It's impressive that he's found such a strong voice at a fairly young age.

The jokes on the album are almost universally strong. A particularly great bit has him taking down a college newspaper in Indiana that did a write up of his show. The writer clearly had no real clue about Buress or his comedy, or really how to write about a comedian, using terms like "comedic jokes" and how Buress brings "diversity" to the campus, fleeting though it may be.

Bits like this are angry and he has a few other jokes that are about how easily he gets angry at people for small reasons. I'd hesitate to call Buress an angry comic though. There are touches of the surreal mixed in with his anger. Not to give too many jokes away, but in one instance he talks about getting angry at a guy who talks on his phone hands free but isn't doing anything with his hands, so he wants someone to throw a pumpkin at him.

Weirdly, probably the weakest bit on the album is his closer. It's good and all, but doesn't really end the set on the strongest note. There's also a bit about people asking about his name that appears on the previous album almost untouched. There's not a lot else to hold against Buress though. Animal Furnace, a title that's never explained unfortunately, is a remarkably strong album and hard not to recommend to anyone that's serious about comedy.

Top Of The Charts 05/29

Back from Memorial Day, instead of looking at the Billboard Hot 100 like I normally do, I'm going with the slightly more dynamic iTunes top 10 singles for today.

1) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe
2) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know
3) Maroon 5 - Payphone
4) Justin Bieber - Die In Your Arms
5) Philip Philips - Home (American Idol Performance)
6) Pitbull - Back In Time
7) Rihanna - Where Have You Been
8) Fun. - We Are Young
9) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend
10) Flo Rida - Wild Ones

Man, I should have switched to these charts ages ago. First of all, that god awful Train song is in the top 10 of the Hot 100 and is nowhere to be found on the iTunes top 10. Also, it's easy to see and parse the iTunes chart. The Billboard website is, frankly, awful. Everything's too big, has too much useless information and you have to click to see each new group of 10 entries on the chart. On iTunes, all you have to do is scroll down a touch and you see the top 10, click through and you see the top 200 in an easy to read format. But enough about reading the charts, this is more about the contents.

Only six of the top ten are the same between the two charts, and none of them are in the same positions. It's inevitable that Jepsen will overtake Gotye in the coming weeks on the Hot 100, but it's already happened here. In addition, there's also that American Idol song, awful though it may be (those songs always are) and that only came out this past week. I don't follow American Idol at all so I really don't know anything about this guy, but American Idol has produced a lot of really interesting careers, though perhaps not the best careers.

It makes me wonder just how much longer the Billboard charts are going to be around. I'm sure many other people before me have had this same realization, but it's one of those industry stalwarts that is going to be pushed out by the digital age. Their charts are static, even when there's an influx of new talent and songs, at most they change once a week. I don't know how often iTunes updates their's, but there's no reason the chart couldn't be updated on a minute to minute basis if they so chose. Billboard, however, has an insane process of working their charts. There's a week and a half of tracking airplay and sales, so by its very nature, it can't move as fast. Hell, they took years to even figure digital sales into the formula at all. We've seen multiple industry waver and fail due to a lack of foresight into the digital age, and before long, this is going to catch up to Billboard as well.

Look Back: Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual

Cyndi Lauper's She So Unusual has been oddly written off by time. Whether it's the fact that it's really the only album she released that's listenable front to back or the fact that people just focussed on her style or people just heard "Time After Time" far far far too often over the years, it's been written off almost entirely. The album, Lauper's first, came out almost 30 years ago. The singles, especially the first four that were released, are indelible parts of the pop culture landscape. Thanks to the resurgence of synth based pop the album has actually aged surprisingly well. Having a singer as talented as Lauper at the front doesn't hurt either.

The first track, "Money Changes Everything" acts as a declaration of intent for the rest of the album. On the surface, there are big synth heavy pop hooks, and Lauper belts the lyrics with her trademark nasally enthusiasm. There's some serious stuff going on though and underneath the fun candy coating is actually a really bitter song. I always love a secretly dark pop song, and She's So Unusual is chock full of them.

"Girls Just Want To Have Fun" comes next, the first single to be released before the album came out. I've long said that "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" is one of the best pop songs ever written. The lyrics are great, the melody is unforgettable and that guitar riff is instantly recognizable. Also, if you ever doubt just how talented Cyndi Lauper actually is, check out Robert Hazard's demo version of the song.

Enough has probably been said for the big hit singles that you don't need to read any more about it. "She Bop" is great in that same subversive way and "All Through The Night" is the sort of amiable dreck that litters the radio. I've never held any reverence for "Time After Time" but I understand that many people do. Okay, got those out of the way.

More interesting are the other songs though. "Money Changes Everything" was released as a single, but never really went anywhere, unfortunately. Even more unfortunate was the fact that the next single, "I'll Kiss You" never even hit the Hot 100. Lauper's insane vocal gymnastics are just great fun to listen to while the synths freak out in the background. It's one of those songs that you can tell the artist had fun making.

She's So Unusual is daring in a way that pop albums just aren't anymore. From the sheer darkness of many of the songs to the crazy annoying voice Lauper adopted for "Witness" (later, she'd also use the voice in her live shows) it's just something that's not done these days. It's also a complete album, something not a lot of pop acts can boast. Also, it has "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" which I think I'll just listen to on repeat for a few hours now. And try to forget about Captain Lou Albano.

Top Of The Charts 5/21

1) Gotye - Somebody That I used To Know

2) Maroon 5 - Payphone

3) Fun. - We Are Young

4) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe

5) Flo Rida - Wild Ones

6) Nicki Minaj - Starships

7) One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

8) The Wanted - Glad You Came

9) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend

10) Train - Drive By

A new song this week in the top 10. Not exactly a new song, "Drive By" has been on the airwaves for some time now. I always dread every time I hear a new Train song. Their lyrics are awful and the music generic. They're clever for no reason, people love them though because they're clever. The Magnetic Fields have clever lyrics, lord knows "Weird Al" Yankovic has the cleverest lyrics around. Why then, does Train get all the attention? They started their career as a fairly standard 90's guitar band, shortly after the term "alt-rock" lost all its meaning and suddenly Nine Days and Tonic were considered alternative. Since then, they've had a string of hits that sound absolutely nothing like the mediocre but amiable days of "Meet Virginia". They're bound to have more hits that sound exactly like this one.

Maroon 5 is sure to challenge Gotye for the top spot next week. He's been there for close to a month (maybe more, I haven't been counting) and he can't stay there forever. Maroon 5 has been itching to climb up the charts since they debuted "Payphone" at number 3. They knocked fun. down a peg this week and I'd put money on them hitting the top next week. Then they'll be there a few weeks and maybe by then we'll have a new contender. Someone's gotta release a new song by then, right?

Music Of Mad Men: Part 2

Last week, I wrote a piece about the music on Mad Men. It focussed mainly on the season 5 premiere episode. There was a significant amount of music in there and it was fairly meaningful. However, it was written before last sunday's episode (Season 5, episode 7 "Lady Lazarus") had aired, much as this one has been written before episode 8 airs. I stay a few days behind the show for technical reasons I won't get into, but it sure came back to bite me in the ass last week. I mentioned how the show never really tackled the Beatles, despite them being the biggest band in the world in the time period of the show. "Lady Lazarus" however, had an entire subplot about choosing the music for an ad and not only mentioned the Beatles, but Megan Draper buys her husband a copy of The Beatles Revolver and licensing fees be damned, they play "Tomorrow Never Knows." This reportedly cost a cool quarter million to license. Possibly why you just don't see them too often.

"When did music become so important?" Draper asks as the search for the perfect song for the ad continued. Of course music was important before The Beatles, but with them it was moved to the center stage. Draper feels completely out of touch because he doesn't really care about the band. Out of touch is really the last thing you want to be if you're an ad man, so when his wife gives him the record, he puts it on without hesitation. A bit of confusion maybe, but not hesitation. 

"Tomorrow Never Knows" is really weird track to choose for a lot of reasons. First, it's a weird track. It's renowned for it's use of layers and layers of effects. Looped tapes, backwards guitars and psychedelic lyrics. It's an album full of songs instant recognizable to even non-Beatles fans. "Elenor Rigby," "Yellow Submarine," "Got To Get You Into My Life," the list goes on. Instead, Megan said to start with the last song on the album and the song that would transition straight into the sound of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. For a man who feels stuck in the past, she opted to show him what the future will be.

But that's the end of the episode, what about the song that company chose for their ad? The ad is for Chevalier Blanc and the Hard Day's Night style hysteria it might cause. The company says that they want the fun and craze of The Beatles without the lofty price tag. Their choice is "September In Th Rain," a song written 30 years prior to when the show takes place. The Beatles had in fact recorded, but never released a demo of that song in 1962. The song does sound like the band, but in their early days. this makes the choice of "Tomorrow Never Knows" all the more relevant. Just 5 years prior, which is within the time frame of the show's earlier seasons, this was what the biggest band on the planet sounded like. By this time, however, the band had moved so far past that period that they no longer even sound like the same group.

The world is moving forward, a common theme on the show. For the first time though, we're seeing a crack in Don Draper's armor. The superstar of the advertising world can no longer connect with the people he is marketing to. Interesting stuff.

Top Of The Charts 5/14

1) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know

2) Fun. - We Are Young

3) Maroon 5 - Payphone

4) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe

5) Flo Rida - Wild Ones

6) The Wanted - Glad You Came

7) Nicki Minaj - Starships

8) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend

9) One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

10) Kelly Clarkson - Stronger

Well, I mentioned last week that the top 10 is even more stagnant than ever. Well, you outdid me Billboard Hot 100. This is just getting silly at this point. I guess I should mention that I have warmed up considerably to "Call Me Maybe". It's typical pretty white lady pop ephemera, but it's pleasant enough and catchy as all hell. Better at least than recent pretty white ladies. I'm looking at you Colbie Callait.

Last week I realized that it's hard to say who's to blame for the fact that the Hot 100 has barely changed in the past 2 months. It'd be easy to blame the record companies. They've been the de facto bad guy in the music industry for over a decade and there's really no reason to stop that now. They're over the hump of the "Sue every pirate!" tact they took after Napster nearly destroyed them and have settled in pretty nicely into the digital age. It took them far too long and they took lots of really terrible missteps along the way, but the outlook is strong. The problem with them now is infrastructure. They're still set up the same basic way as when they were making money out the wazoo in the golden age before Napster. Now they're becoming more and more obsolete because artists, once the make a name for themselves, no longer need them at all. They can just release albums on their websites and circumvent the entire process. Though we've really yet to see that from a major act, you can feel it coming. The moment Lady Gaga puts out a pure digital release, it's over for them and they know it.

There's another problem though. The record companies are figuring out how to move forward, but the erstwhile radio industry really isn't. For a growing contingency of people, radio isn't necessary. Everyone has an MP3 player. Every new car comes with a jack that you can hook your MP3 player into, some even come with a hookup to Pandora. Even people who like hearing what the DJs have to say or enjoy listening to the local morning show, they have podcasts. Radio is still making tons of money for now, but who knows for how long. Being as worried as the radio industry has to be means there's no way they're taking risks on unproven acts. What was the last one hit wonder that you remember? Gotye, fun. and Carly Rae Jepsen might be on their first hit right now, but you know that's not the last you'll hear of them. 

Well, maybe next week.

Albums Of The Week 5/11

Choice Of the Week: The Cribs - In The Belly Of The Brazen Bull

This is by no means the best Cribs album, but there's still plenty to like here. I have a long history with the band, so I guess I can't help but be a little let down by an album that's really best described as aimless. There are songs that are obviously singles, and there are songs that are obviously filler, like any album really. The singles are really great, but the filler really does nothing for me. Check it out.

Damon Albarn - Dr. Dee

When you see that the guy from Blur wrote an opera, it's hard to keep your your expectations in check. You know that it's not going to be great, but you can't help but hope for some of the charm and fun of Parklife or Modern Life Is Rubbish. It's pretty good, and nothing if not ambitious. Ambition on this scale will often lead to spectacular, fascinating failure, but I wouldn't it's quite that. I definitely want to spend more time with it before making a firm decision on it.

Classic Pick: The Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique

The untimely passing of MCA, Adam Yauch, is a damn shame no matter how you slice it. Even if you didn't like The Beastie Boys, he seemed like a genuinely nice guy and the world is a worse place without him. If, like me, you've listened to more Beastie Boys than just about any other hip hop, his death hit you especially hard. Paul's Boutique. There's no reason for you to not own this already. It's a great, great album that with the way litigation and sampling has gone, can pretty much never happen again.

Review Of The Cribs - In The Belly Of The Brazen Bull

When Men's Needs, Women's Needs Whatever was released to critical acclaim, it felt like validation for the longtime Cribs fan. We loved their first album, we tolerated The New Fellas, then people caught onto them and we felt fantastic. It was a great album, no doubt helped by the production of Franz Ferdinand's Alex Kapranos. Since then, it's all been a little fuzzy. The brothers Jarman who had comprised the group since its inception were joined by Johnny Marr, guitarist for the legendary Smiths. The Smiths' sound was defined by Marr and after doing some quality work with Modest Mouse, many were sure that The Cribs were destined for great things.

But Ignore The Ignorant wasn't great. Sure it was okay, and had some good songs, but the staying power just wasn't there. Marr's guitar, like his image in any of the band's promotional shots, stood out in the foreground and felt unnecessary. The songwriting has certainly matured since the Cribs' early days, but to little end. That brings us to In The Belly Of The Brazen Bull.

The songs here sound much like Ignore The Ignorant, but without Marr's guitar. The shout laden choruses, the wandering melodies, even the production sounds lifted from the previous album. That's not to say that it's entirely a bad thing. The singles are still a lot of fun to listen to. "Chi-Town" and "Come On Be A No-One" are fun standouts that could stand proudly with the best of The Cribs. It's the other tracks that feel particularly aimless. There is simply no world where "Back To The Bolthole" makes any album better.

Aimless is a word I've thought about using a lot for this album. There's no real push to it. It feels like an album that was released for the sole reason of releasing an album. It's a problem without an answer really. It's plagued some of my favorite performers ever. Guided By Voices, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, the list goes on. Bands pretty much have to release an album every two years or risk people forgetting about them. When that timer runs out, you pretty much just have to put out what you've got and that's what this feels like to me. This is all sounding way more negative than I mean it to. I do think this albums is pretty good, better than most even. A little more drive and this could have been something special.

The Music of Mad Men: Part 1

Mad Men is probably the best show on television right now. There are those that would say Breaking Bad, there are those that would say Community, both of these are great answers, but when push comes to shove, few shows in history can hold up to Don Draper and company. It's ostensibly about an ad agency in the 60s, but over time it has become a chronicle of where it all went wrong. Everyone looks back at the idyllic '50s as the last time America was really great. Those people are lunatics, mind you, but there's no doubt that it all seemed so much easier back then. All you had to do was shut your wife up, hit the kids and everything was okay. Mad Men, with its advertising backdrop shows how America's preferences change and shows the old guard getting pushed out for new, progressive ideas. Like a female copywriter or truly artful advertisements.

But why would I, a music blogger, chose to write about a TV show? It's pretty interesting the way the show has been using music this season. In a way, music on the show has always been interesting because of how it features music frequently, but only has passing mentions of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, two of the biggest acts in history that were in their heyday during the period the show is set. Take a look at the first episode in this season, "A Little Kiss." All anyone talked about the next day was Megan (Jessica Paré) and her performance of French song "Zou Bisou Bisou." It was a sultry performance meant to perk Don Draper up a bit on his birthday. It backfired because Draper's an asshole, but damn if it wasn't memorable.

What really caught my ear though was the song that ran over the credits. Dusty Springfield's "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me" thematically fit the show, as it's about a woman desperate to receive just an inkling of the devotion and care that she shows towards her man. Megan threw a big extravaganza for Don and all he did was say that she "embarrassed" him. [Side note: Originally, Dusty Springfield's "The Look Of Love" was supposed to be in the episode, but was cut because it didn't come out until 6 months after the episode took place]

it's also interesting to note that Dusty Springfield is one of the most popular artists of the Blue-Eyed Soul movement. It was a term that denoted white people singing traditionally african-american songs. Dusty even recorded a version of "Can I Get A Witness," a classic song performed originally by Marvin Gaye and written by the most famous african-american songwriting team in history: Holland, Dozier, Holland.

What makes this more interesting is the racial tension that has been bubbling under the Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce offices this year. Earlier in the episode, the lobby of the firm was filled with african-americans responding to an ad that said that SCDP  was "An equal opportunity employer." This was meant at a jab at another firm, but it led to the hiring of Dawn, a black woman, as a new secretary. Previously on the show, the only characters that has been anything other than lily white were The Drapers' maid/nanny and the firm's cleaning personnel. Given the way the timeline has been going it's not a stretch to say that the show will deal with Martin Luther King Jr's shooting before the season is up.

I don't know if this was meant intentionally or not, but it certainly says something that the show had two different attempts to to squeeze Dusty Springfield into the season premiere. In a show that's starting to tackle the racial issues of the day, it's telling that they went with a white woman singing songs that ape the styles of african americans of the time. This isn't the last I'll be writing about music in Mad Men, stay tuned for further articles that dig way deeper than they probably should.

Finally, a review of Master Of My Make Believe

Santigold's first album, back when she was known as Santogold, was a surprise smash hit. Singles like "L.E.S. Artistes" and "Creator" made her name on the scene. She wrote what were essentially pop songs, but with dashes of strangeness that made the songs way more interesting than straight pop. She became more famous when her song "Lights Out" was featured in a Bud Light with Lime ad. The beer may be an atrocity, but the catchy, breezy summer jam stuck in many people's heads for years. Partially because they've been running that commercial for years. I guess other artists have actually tried Bud Light with Lime and want nothing to do with it.

But that was 4 years ago. Now, Santigold released "Masters Of My Make Believe". Right off the bat, you can tell that it's going to be a darker album. Featuring, as many great songs do, Karen O, the first song "GO!" has flashes of the same pop gold that made her first album so damn much fun. It's a great song that'll probably get your hopes up too high for the rest of the album. No other song is as much fun as "GO!", in fact the best parts of the rest of the album are where Santigold slows it down a bit.

The second track, "Disparate Youth" and mid album "The Riot's Gone" are great examples of what Santi White can do when she cools it off a bit. They're smooth, they build an atmosphere. Overall, it just sounds more mature than her first album. Taking 4 years to follow up can do that to a person I guess. It's clear Santigold wanted to make this album significantly different and on songs like this, she does that expertly.

There are other songs though that, though they have a way bigger chance to become hits, just don't feel right. "Freak Like Me" and "Look At These Hoes" just feel like shitty Nicki Minaj ripoffs. Nicki Minaj is huge right now and there are worse acts to bite, but we already have Nicki Minaj and a couple people exactly like her another one is completely unnecessary.

This album took a couple listens to grow on me, but I think I've reached the point where I can say definitively that it's good, not great. Kinda underwhelming, I admit. Sorta like the album itself. Just give it a few listens.

New Passion Pit Track

If you're anything like me, you sure did enjoy like 3 or 4 tracks off of Passion Pit's big full length debut Manners. A lot of people liked a whole lot more than that, but frankly I just found it a little tiring after some time. Those 3 or 4 songs though, those are some great songs. Manners was chock full of summer jams, and as we transition from complaining about how cold it is to complaining about how hot it is, Passion Pit is here to help once more.

The first single from their upcoming album Gossamer, "Take A Walk" has crazy synths and stomp-along back beats that you want from a Passion Pit song. Throw in some lyrical unrest and a bridge dripping with anger and you'll be shouting "Awwww, yeah! This is my jam!" on a hot, sticky day alone in your car, singing your frustrations away.

Top Of The Charts 5/7

1) Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know

2) Fun. - We Are Young

3) Maroon 5 - Payphone

4) The Wanted - Glad You Came

5) Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe

6) Flo Rida - Wild Ones

7) Justin Bieber - Boyfriend

8) Nicki Minaj - Starships

9) One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

10) Kelly Clarkson - Stronger

I'm gonna be perfectly honest here. I had to check 3 times to make sure I wasn't looking at last week's top 10. of all the top 10's I've written about, this has had the least change so far. I've complained about stagnation in the past, but this is just ridiculous. That Bieber song dropped 3 spots, "Call Me Maybe" leapfrogged "Wild Ones", Nicki Minaj swapped with One direction. That's it. The sad thing is that most of these songs are actually pretty good. "Glad You Came" is trash, "Boyfriend" doesn't play to Bieber's strengths and "Payphone" bites other Maroon 5 songs. The rest of the top 10 is at least good if not great.

Now, I don't expect to see Alabama Shakes mixing it up with the biggest stars the pop world has to offer, but surely there are other songs sitting outside the top 10 that are ready for the main stage. 10-20 has a pair of Drake songs from Take Care an album that had no business being as good as it is. Maybe I wouldn't like to see that Train song make it any higher than where it is at 12 though.

The Black Keys are insanely hot right now and at #4 on the Rock charts, the top 2 being the same as the Hot 100, they could easily break into the mainstream charts. I don't know whether it's a problem with the record industry still trying to steady itself in the digital age or the fact that the radio industry sees the future and are desperately clinging to the profits that they are still able to make right now. You'd think they'd learn from what the record industry went through that digging into the old ways will only make it harder to climb out of when the money dries up. More on that another time though.

Albums Of The Week 5/4

Choice Of The Week: Alabama Shakes - Boys And Girls

I think this actually came out last week, but I just got turned on to it. There's a lot to love about this album. The lead singer's soulful yells, the 60's garage feel (complete with hammond organ) and the fact that the songs themselves are exquisitely crafted. This is the first I've heard of Alabama Shakes, but I hope to hear more from them sooner rather than later.

Santigold - Master Of My Make Believe

Santigold's first album made a huge splash, bigger than I think most people would have expected. Thanks to being featured in Bud Light with Lime commercials, people quickly learned about her. This album veers pretty far away from the sounds of singles like "Lights Out." There's no fun summer vibe here. No song has a big enough hook to land another commercial spot and you have to wonder if that's on purpose. I meant to have a review of this up by now, but I was far away yesterday. Sorry for the outage, it should be up later today.

Classic Pick: Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska

I was listening to Justin Townes Earle's new album the other day and it reminded me of the time he covered Atlantic City for The AV Club, it's been stuck in my head ever since. The entire rest of the album is fantastic. Listen to it.

The Moonrise Kingdom soundtrack

Wes Anderson has always had strong soundtracks in his movies. Think back to the first time you watched The Royal Tenenbaums and how much you loved Nico afterwards. Or The Rolling Stones' "Ruby Tuesday." The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou is one of the few movie soundtracks I ever bought. I even bought the supplemental thing that Seu Jorge did of just more David Bowie covers in Portuguese (the best ones are already on the soundtrack). Today, the tracklisting for Moonrise Kingdom, Wes Anderson's new film, was released. It features composer Alexandre Desplat, with whom Anderson worked with on The Fantastic Mr. Fox. Pitchfork has a full listing of the soundtrack as well as a piece from Desplat streaming, check it out.

Also interesting are the choices from composer Leonard Bernstein. The film is about two kids running away together, so it's neat that Anderson has chosen pieces from Bernstein's A Young Person's Guide To The Orchestra. Anderson sure does like his thematic consistency. Shame there's no Rolling Stones on here though. Also, I'm not looking forward to the scene that features "Ramblin Man". Not just because I hate that song, but also because there's only a few ways to use that song and they've all been done before. But hey, I trust Wes Anderson. And Paul Thomas Anderson while I'm at it, he's cool too. But not Paul W.S. Anderson. That guy sucks.

Look Back: Black Kids - Partie Traumatic

Originally Released: July 7, 2008

Hype is a strange thing. People first took notice of Black Kids after the Athens Popfest in 2007, shortly after, they release their first EP for free on Myspace. With The Wizard Of Ahhhs, the hype machine's wheels starting turning just about as hard as they possibly could. The band went from almost unknown to huge success on the strength of their first single "I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance." Most people remember them, however for two reviews from the ever reactionary Pitchfork Media.

Pitchfork gave The Wizard Of Ahhhs EP an 8.4 and the coveted "Best New Music" tag. The pressure was officially on Black Kids. It would have been hard for them to live up to such a strong start in the first place, but now the eyes of the indie music dorks were upon them, waiting to take them down with the heaviest scoff possible. The release and subsequent Pitchfork review of Partie Tramatic saw an historically loud scoff. The review was simple: "3.3" and a picture of two puppies just captioned "Sorry :-/". A computer error led the score to originally be "0.0," but that was quickly changed.

But that doesn't really tell you anything about the music. Everyone who was interested in that album was going to check the Pitchfork review and they decided to be assholes about it, but that's neither here nor there. Right out front: nothing on the album stacks up to "I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You." As a single, that song is almost too good. It's fun, catchy and relatable, add in a shout-along chorus and danceable beat and you have a near perfect pop song.

The second tier of songs are the ones that appeared on the EP, all of which appear again on the album. "I've Underestimated My Charm (Again)" and UK hit "Hurricane Jane" are fun and all, but leadoff track "Hit The Heartbrakes" is one of the few that comes close to INGTYBHTDWY (The abbreviation isn't much shorter is it?) The rest of the songs are solid and fun, but nothing to get too excited over. Maybe "I Wanna be Your Limosine."

Overall, this album is most definitely not a 3.3, but I can sort of understand why they might think that. Like I said, the best songs were already released and reviewed, remove those and you have a solid, but unremarkable album. Anyone that's read Pitchfork for any length of time know that they often reward originality over actual quality and severely punish those that are good, but not great. There are those that would say that Pitchfork shouldn't reflect backlash and that they should review in a bubble, but they're almost like a personality driven site, except the personality is the site itself. Pitchfork is Pitchfork, and Partie Traumatic is pretty good.