A classic, from one of the best live albums ever. So loose, so confident, and that guitar line could all but cut through prison window bars.
Art Ensemble of Chicago - Thème de Yoyo
Like Carl Perkins' guitar seemed on the verge of breaking the confines of the San Quentin prison in the former, so every instrument, and the lyrics, here seem to rail uncontrollably against the limits of whatever form they've been poured into.
Your head is like a yoyo, your neck is like the string, Your body’s like a camembert oozing from its skin. Your fanny’s like two sperm whales floating down the Seine Your voice is like a long fart
that’s music to your brain. Your eyes are two blind eagles
that kill what they can’t see Your hands are like two shovels
digging in me. And your love is like an oil-well Dig, dig, dig, dig it, on the Champs-Elysees.
Jay Jay Johnson - Jay
The happiest of jazz. Shuffle along to those giddy bongos!
Duke Ellington - Bluebird of Delhi (Mynah)
The Far East Suite – what an album! A life companion. The pure swag at 2:13! Duke 4ever!
Cat Power - Silver Stallion
Better than the original. Better than most. Chan is probably one of the best interpreters of other people's songs that there is.
I had enough songs for one sad list and one fierce list. I went with the latter.
Vince Staples - 65 Hunnid
What a banger. Are the words augmenting the beats or are the beats augmenting the words? Either way their concerted effort is to yank my head back and forth from beginning to end.
Dizzee Rascal - Pagans
No pop left. Just relentless fire.
Arca - Vanity
A fractured kind of beauty is often the best kind of beauty.
LV - Work
Recommendation from Manon. Already feels like I've listened to it for years. Hypnotic beats, a mean mantra.
Zarelli ft. Leonard Nimoy - Smoking, Waiting
I love BBC6 on Sundays. First Jarvis, then Freak Hour. Freak Hour's the best. Brought me to this fantastic album of Ray Bradbury prose combined with a crescendo of electronica.
Add to these selections, first, K Dot's amazing J- Cole remake:
Here's your starting pistol. A drumbeat shot, the dogged lumbering along of a bass, and there's the trumpet; already dancing across the goal-line. The heat was rigged; over before you could even savour its elegance.
Pusha T - Numbers on the Board
I think I could listen to this beat for hours without getting tired of its stunted glory.
Forest Swords - Thor's Stone
A melody being sucked backwards into a vacuum.
Earl Sweatshirt ft. Vince Staples - Wool
Rhyme patterns like that wallpaper from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Bob Dylan - Tombstone Blues
In the ongoing series 'songs I've listened to a million times but which suddenly come back to floor me again' it's time again for a Dylan tune. Was letting Highway 61 Revisited wash through my head with all its familiar twists and turns, and suddenly it struck me: "What the fuck kind of way is that to begin a song?" It's like the acoustic falls into it, in the middle of a chord, and the band has no choice but to jump off the cliff with it. Which led me to listen more closely to the beat. Listen to it! That crash cymbal is ridiculous! Brilliantly ridiculous. It's like you can hear the barefoot mother stressed limp across the factory floor. Another favourite bit: the way Mike Bloomfield's guitar leaps with relief into the air in the final seconds. I've gotta get me the new Bootleg Series Volume asap!
The most paradoxical song title. How can life be dull when you listen to this brilliant riff?
Nina Simone - Mississippi Goddam
One of the all-time fiercest political songs. On an album full of humorous sociopolitical ditties, Nina bluffs with some upbeat piano, and the audience initally laughs along with her joking interludes. But by the time she starts singing about school children sitting jail, you realise with a shiver that she really does mean every word of it. And after owning up to her bluff – "made you thought I was kidding, didn't I?" – the thinly veild anger trembles under every word. And by the time she brushes aside any reformation tactic – "doing things gradually, will bring more tragedy" – the righteous rage is absolutely tangible. And yet racial discrimination is still rampant in the states... Fuck it. Stand up and be counted with all the rest!
Mastodon - Blood and Thunder
Continuing my metal-autumn in the studio. Don't know why, but I feel a real urge for some bone crunching guitars and screams about one monomaniacal man's vendetta with a white whale... And that pounding at 3:27 - best possible way to end this track.
Peaches ft. Kim Gordon - Close Up
I'd almost forgotten about Peaches, and to be honest I wasn't much of a fan back when she surfaced. But this bass is amazing, and Kim Gordon is as untouchably cool as ever.
Elvis Costello - I Want You
I actually first became familiar with this tune through Fiona Apple's performance of it, and I still feel like it was more or less written for her to sing. But even in its original form, the desperate, obsessive indulgence of it is frickin amazing. And I love the little reference to that quintessential traditional cold hearted lady, Barbara Allen.
This week I'm also fascinated with the video for this slippery new tune from Chairlift:
It's been a while. School start and so on. Not gonna apologise (to whom?) just gonna post an uncompromising studio top 5. If you don't listen to this loud on decent speakers, you might as well not bother at all.
Antipop Consortium - Conspiracy of Myth
The things that seemed most important aren't.
Battles - Tricentennial
An album to loose track of time with.
dEUS - Pocket Revolution
The anger at the neoliberalisation of higher education is bubbling.
Can you heal it? It's gonna take a revolution now To get through to you You don't know what you're destroying
TV On the Radio - Poppy
This is a beautifully stupid song with backing vocals that will be on repeat in the back of your head for the rest of the day..
We are not some rutting pair of wild boars We're just psyched so psyched So psyched so fucking psyched That's what the geese are all roaring about That's what their hearts were all open about
Deafheaven - Luna
Who would've thought one of the most beautiful albums of the year was going to be a metal epos?
I'm back in London, and suddenly I feel so very Swedish...
Kanye West - Black Skinhead
Let's just get going with some 'fuck up your whole afternoon shit'. How can you argue with this? Irresistible, iconoclastic, megalomaniacal production.
Kent - Du är ånga
The story of adulthood as a sickness. And the cure is not nostalgia; it's a new dream.
När vi var små så sköt vi kåda, bark och stål
Hank Crawford - Wildflower
The rain comes in bursts. I am in my bed, trying to write a to-do-list. London is grey and damp. And then a smooth 70s saxophone whirls around the room, gradually settling like a fallen garland out of season. Autumn slips a shoe in.
Håkan Hellström - Det är så jag säger det
Dedicated to Göteborg – no matter how much of an annoying, faultfinding emigrant I turn, my love for my hometown continues to grow with the years. I was on a late summer ferry-ride in the archipelago, watching the city-mouth from the sea, and was listening to this; the most disarmingly straight forward message of love set to a Mercury Rev pastiche that there is. My heart swelled with the waves.
Lee Marvin - Wand'rin' Star
But... you gotta keep moving. I've bought myself an uncertain future, and pushing on through the bogs of sentimentality and nostalgia, I still consider it a wise investment.
I've never seen a sight that didn't look better looking back...
Meow The Jewels is on its way! And when a piece of music has you simultaneously laughing out loud and gasping with awe, it is worth the wait:
I also discovered I've got more than 1500 tracks in the Top 5-archive now, which means I've done at least 300 of these lists! (Actually quite a few more, since I didn't have an archive for the first year or two we made these lists, plus a lot of tracks have been taken off Spotify which were put on lists earlier)
Dungeon Family - Crooked Booty
Everything crooked here. The stuttering beat, stumbling over itself and into barricades of horns; the screeching, hurried, nasal voices pushing out southern slang; the slummy conditions papered over with a bit of gravy acting. Yet, if it's all so crooked, how come it feels so right? Might be cause you've got a crooked booty too...
Ghostface Killah - Metal Lungies
That high pitched sliding tone (a trombone?) that haunts the verses til the very end; on and on it repeats the same imitation of a squeaky door closing or opening. Or maybe it's just the furniture sighing? Cause these are heavy men. These are heavy blows, dealt with a heavy swing of a heavy arm.
The Relatives - It's Coming Up Again
After sampling a few I've finally found the show to fill the void after both Mad Men and Justified concluded. The show is Fargo. A pure dead brilliant homage to the Coen Brothers and a series that's got pretty much everything, including awesome closing music such as this song, which I know nothing about except that I will forever associate it with a beat up Martin Freeman. Say it loud. It's coming up again.... , sing a whole bunch of men who sound like they might be wrinkly southern baptist pastors from the early 1900s. Wah-wah guitar solo ensues. Funky basslines and muted rhythm guitar flutters up from some hidden Motown vault.
Kate Bush - How To Be Invisible
The sound of late summer floating on a colder breeze into early autumn. Is that a storm in a swimming pool?, she asks. There's no time to stay and inspect. Someone is whistling in the faraway. Or was that an echo from the past? Nostalgia envelops you, but there is no mooring to take here. On and on the guitar-lines sweep you.
Battles - The Yabba
The art of arranging disparate components. After adding what appears to be one too many ingredients the track seems to give up and wither away completely at 4 minutes, only to come back, throwing a cacophony of grooves at you. The second fade out is almost as satisfactory as the first, except that by then, it's really over...
A barbershop call to arms from the kings of melancholy.
Rise if you're sleeping, stay awake
The Impressions - Fool For You
On the radio, in the car, on our way to some hard manual labour, came a reminder that I should seek out some more early Curtis Mayfield... Just listen to those stabbing horns, and look at those protruding teeth!
MC5 - Looking At You
Just random iTunes, picking out a song that I never thought much of in the context of the album, and showing me how tall and proud it stands on its own. That ascending guitar riff, shooting off out of nowhere! The whole song twisting and grooving claustrophobically. Like a tornado in a glass jar.
Cortex - 8-Oct-71
Thanks again to Run The Jewels for turning me on to odd tracks in their weekly radioshow.
bob hund - Bob Hund (live)
bob hund does everything right. Even the old cliche of a rock band performing with an orchestra is made into something brilliant.
I was given a free pass to the last day of the Way Out West festival...
Sun Kil Moon - Richard Ramirez Died Today of Natural Causes
...I hurried into town to catch the first concert of the day. When I got into the tent Mark Kozelek was just leading the audience in a singalong to the last minutes of Carissa. Later on he screamed his way through this little narrative and still later he covered The Weeping Song as a tribute to Nick Cave and his family in the wake of the death of his son. A heartbreaking, death-tinged way to start a festival-day...
Matias Aguayo - Me Vuelvo Loca
(Matias Aguayo did not play at the festival, but in my headphones while I was digging up the floor in my sister's basement today)
Todd Terje - Svensk Sås
...After Sun Kil Moon I went to cheer up a bit by dancing to this lovely Norwegian. One of the best moments (except of course, Inspector Norse) was this fitting track with live flute and bongos and all!
Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels
...When Patti Smith had played her way through almost all of Horses, I felt I had to go to the tent again to get my dose of El-P and Mike. I think I did right. After all, there is no better concert opener than this.
Ride - Seagull
...As my free festival day was drawing to a close I stood looking at First Aid Kit for a few songs, but felt it was a little too nice. I decided to go and at least get a taste of Ride; a band I've never really listened to, except for a few tracks. And man oh man, was that the closer I was looking for! The polar opposite of First Aid Kit, this was all uncompromising loudness and screaming lights. By the time they played this killer I was hooked. Should be experienced live!
So, there you have it. My WOW-experience. Remains only to enjoy the new Chvrches-video and give Glasgow a thought.
Fuck the xenophobic winds blowing across Europe. Fuck you right wing scum.
Jens Lekman - Pocketful of Money
When in Gothenburg, listen to Gothenburgian music.
Aimee Mann - Momentum
The difficult task of discipline in summertime. No art created, no momentum in sight. Oh whatevs. As another songwriter put it: I spent a summer wasting, the time was spent so pleasantly
Janis Joplin - Try (Just a little harder)
Still. I'm trying to kick myself into gear. I will succeed. Just gotta tryyyyyyyyyy a little bit harder.
José González - Hints
Another Gothenburg classic. Listened to Veneer at work the other day. Still a pristine album.
A new Joanna Newsom album! After five years. A NEW JOANNA NEWSOM ALBUM. The world will be a richer place.
A belated tribute to the amazing Clandestino festival I went to last weekend. Never before have I been to a festival where there wasn't a single disappointing gig.
Al'Tarba - Just Like Ants
I've not danced this much since like forever.
BKO Quintet - Kongo Kono
I've been on my way to Bamako. But never reached it. One day I will have to make the trip, properly, because of Mali-music like this.
Alsarah & the Nubatones - Soukura (It's Late)
Insanely talented musicians. Insanely great groove.
Selvhenter - Stirb Langsam
The first concert of the festival, and one of the very best. Danish noise-jazz. It doesn't translate completely to record, but that heavy distorted rumble = the best use of a trombone I ever witnessed.
Hailu Mergia - Hari Meru Meru
An Ethiopian master. With the tightest drum/bass-backing I've ever had the honour to witness.
Left London sizzling. Arrived in a Gothenburg, drizzling.
David Sylvian - Waterfront
A masterpiece of gorgeous nostalgia.
Is our love strong enough?
Iron & Wine - Sodom, South Georgia
A song of death and birth.
Animal Collective - Also Frightened
A song that gave me happy shivers when I was walking on side streets in a sundazed Brockley. Asking someone if they're also frightened seemed like such a beautiful plea for solidarity.
The Byrds - It's No Use
How did I never get stuck on this amazing guitar-riff before? Not to mention the amazing little miniature solo at 1:20.
Cornelis Vreeswijk - Movitz Med Flor Om Armen
And now I'm home. Listening to Swedish 18th century ballads. Again about death and birth.
I wasn't gonna be seduced by Apple Music, but then St. Vincent, Ezra Koenig and Run The Jewels got their own radio shows on Beats. What better way to start a party day than tuning in to El-P and Killer Mike play hip hop classics in the early morning hours?
The Isley Brothers - It's Your Thing
Did a short, and confused DJ-set in a vegetation patch at Goldsmiths for our Interim Show. Went all brass, funk and soul to begin with.
Michael Jackson - Workin' Day and Night
...segued into this from Hot Chip's Night and Day. Thought it a clever mix.
Joe Tex - Ain't Gonna Bump No More
Offensively amazing bass!
Ray Charles - Georgia On My Mind
And then you wake up the day after. The head is sore, the garden is warm, the kitchen full of bread and herbs. And in a few days I'm going to Sweden. My Georgia.
And if you feel just like a tourist in the city you were born Then it's time to go And define your destination There's so many different places to call home
Electric Light Orchestra - Do Ya
ELO at their cheesiest. Which is exactly what you want on some sunny days.
Spoon - Do You
See what I did there?
This video is awesome.
Andrew Bird - Imitosis
We were all basically alone And despite what all his studies had shown That what's mistaken for closeness Is just a case for mitosis
Modest Mouse - I Came As A Rat (Long Walk Off A Short Dock)
I've fractured my elbow. I've got hayfever. I'm listening to this:
Yusef Lateef - Delilah
Love the contrast between the heavy, stumbling bass solo and the elegant, swirling flute melody.
John Coltrane - Alabama
This album, and the way it uses empty space. Just listen to that void at 1:22...
Charles Mingus - Duet Solo Dancers (Hearts' Beat and Shades In Physical Embraces)
The tempo changes!
Alice Coltrane - My Favourite Things
One of the craziest jazz tracks and album openers ever? A standard gone cosmic. Psychedelic organs, freejazz bass solos, oriental strings, heaving dissonances, and of course, swathes of heavenly harp. These are a few of my favourite things.
Tom Waits - Nighthawk Postcards (From Easy Street)
I've been looking for some kind of an emotional investment with romantic dividends
Alright, so I have missed a week. Sue me (no don't). This is really last week's list, built on essay hand-in and barbecues. This week I've been mostly listening to jazz, which I'm sure will colour next week's list.
Kendrick Lamar ft. MC Eiht - m.A.A.d city
My essay was called The City Was A Forest...
Matthew Herbert ft. Mara Carlyle - Nice Dream
Not many radiohead-covers around that make a lot of sense, but Matthew Herbert can make anything his own.
tUnE-yArDs - Real Thing
Holly Herndon - An Exit
It's less than a year since I saw her, without knowing who she was, in a small room at the opera as the very last act of the Way Out West-festival in Gothenburg. Suddenly there's an album, and what an album it is!
Krzysztof Penderecki - Polymorphia
I need you all to sit through this. And then be redeemed by the mighty final chord.
My brain is fried. No explanations. These are good tunes.
Nicolas Jaar - The Three Sides of Audrey and Why She's All Alone Now
The maestro is back to show how it's done. Too much genius in one piece of music here.
Broken Social Scene - World Sick
It's getting heavy. Again. The world is too big and problematic. Cannae deal.
Panda Bear - Crosswords
Studio tune.
The Cure - The Lovecats
Going home from the studio tune.
Nina Simone - Love Me Or Leave Me
I'd like to know how it feels after you've nailed a recording like this. It must be shocking. Just, "wow, there's no room for improvement here". Every lyric and every note is as tight and pregnant as can be. Noone will ever top this.
It's summery. I'm pottering in the garden. Fooling myself that I'm done. That I've accomplished something. Let me rest in this illusion for five songs longer.
Donovan - Hurdy Gurdy Man
Each spring he resurfaces in my playlists. Like a little tussilago.
Cat Power - Fool
Another safe haven to return to.
Linda Perhacs - Chimacum Rain
New discovery, from Ali's collection. A song for spacing out on the lawn.
Pentangle - Train Song
Can't even grasp all that goes on in this song.
Love is a basket of light
Stromae - Tous Les Mêmes
Second week in a row that Jo influences the list. DJ-battle in my kitchen in London this time,
After some hectic but wonderful days in Glasgow I'm finally back in my own room. Four crazy intense weeks it's been.
Electric Light Orchestra - Long Black Road
Me and Jo made the exact right choice for a post-opening wind-down picture on Saturday. American Hustle; a brilliant film. With ELO on the excellent soundtrack.
Latyrx - Lady Don't Tek No
We also had a short, classic DJ-battle in Jo's kitchen.
Action Bronson - Actin Crazy
Opportunity be knockin'....
Beastie Boys - Egg Man
Those who get it, get it. Those who don't can still enjoy the beastie boys at the top of their game.
Marvin Gaye - Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)
Back in London. But it doesn't make me wanna holler. Maybe it took some going away to start feeling at home. Like the way Marvin returns home at 4:30. Sooooo good.
Fleetwood Mac - Dreams
Let's start from the beginning. Heading out from the airport at sundown in a rented car, with the sea behind us and arid mountains ahead. Listening to maybe the ultimate roadtrip band; the Mac.
Kate Bush - Hounds of Love
A happy shivers moment. Leaving the house on the final morning, sunshine and fantastic views all around, we're all singing along to the "do-do, do-do, do-do" at the top of our lungs.
Joni Mitchell - Dreamland
A song for Jochi - teammate and spreader of joy.
Johnny Cash - Drums
We went to the desert. Amongst cacti and deserted adobe-houses we listened to Johnny and felt very very wild wild west.
Taken By Trees - Day By Day
Wen the day's been long and hot and the eyes tired and aching after squinting at eagles in the sky, one needs a soothing homewards song.
I wish I knew what it takes to make you stay My feelings for you growing stronger day by day I could hold you for a hundred years Take away your greatest fears
Back from Glasgow. Heading to Almeria tomorrow. Feeling strong. Feeling good.
Marianne Faithfull - Monday, Monday
Tomorrow morning (Monday) commences 8 days in a farmhouse in Spain, with good friends, good wine, and maybe even some peace of mind. Monday. Monday.
Hyetal - Phoenix (Fantastic Mr. Fox Remix)
Don't know what to say about this, except that it's awesome and it just gets awesomer as it goes along.
Airhead - Pyramid Lake
Some of the most physical music I've heard lately. Feels like hanging over a cliff, swaying in the wind. In a good way.
Suede - Down
Suede's most underappreciated. The whole sound of this takes me back to my late teens/early twenties, but it's not just nostalgia. There's something truly awesome and original about that bass, that guitar line and that cyclical melancholic descent.
Pentangle - Will the Circle Be Unbroken?
Finally getting into Pentangle, after having listened to Bert and John for a long time, and after both of them died. Don't know what took me so long.
An intense week in the almost empty Lauriegrove Baths, trying to prepare as best as I possibly can for three crazy weeks ahead. Install in Glasgow Tue-Sat, Spain residency Mon-Tue, install and opening(s) in Glasgow Thu-Mon. But don't worry, I've got three lists lined up already, so Top 5 won't suffer. Here's the first:
Supertramp - Logical Song Clinical, intellectual, cynical... Save me from myself.
Davy Graham - Maajun (A Taste of Tangier)
My sister was in Morocco a few weeks ago, and my housemate is there at this moment. And I wish I could go there again too.
Shye Ben-Tzur - Daras Bin
Crazy heaving crescendo after 4:00. Yes, please.
YACHT - Psychic City
Cities, within cities, within cities. That's where my head's at atm.
Saramba Kouyate - Toumbou
Turn the volume UP! Oh, the underappreciated GENIUSES of music production hanging out in little studios in Bamako. Rolling, tumbling, slithering, biting; this track layers all its movements into an unstoppable beast!
Oh and Chance the Rapper is winning my heart, bit by bit. First it was the verse on Baby Blue, and now this:
My grandma passed away early this morning. I don't think she ever listened much to music. I don't really have any songs I associate with her. But these are for her.
Devendra Banhart - The Body Breaks
Aphex Twin - Avril 14th
Nils Frahm - Four Hands
Miles Davis - Some Day My Prince Will Come
Oh to end with a snap of one's fingers.
A second term at Goldsmiths done, and I'm posting a list from Glasgow.
Father John Misty - Holy Shit
Maybe love is just an economy based on resource scarcity What I fail to see is what that's gotta do with you and me
Fela Kuti - Highlife Time
Spring break. What time is it? If your answer is anything else than "highlife time!", it is wrong.
Amadou & Mariam - Pauvre Type
I love, love, love the brass after 1:50. And West African french is one of the best french accents there is. Il est fatigué!!
Action Bronson ft. Chance the Rapper - Baby Blue
This is currently my favourite song, thanks to its video, and thanks to Chance the Rapper's instant classic line:
I hope you never get off Fridays,
and that you work at a Friday's,
that is always busy on Fridays.
Bert Jansch & John Renbourn - After the Dance
Now they're both gone. RIP John.
Kanye West - All Day
I almost wish I didn't like this. Not because it's Kanye. No no. For all his antics, I still have a fair amount of respect for him as a producer of music. But Sir Paul... *facepalm*. What are you doing Paul? I mean, I guess I was always in the John camp, but even then, Band On The Run is part of my life, and I just wanted you to not grow this embarrassing. I mean, it's so transparent! You're contributing nothing musically! Strumming a guitar and whistling. Strutting around making 'cool' faces while Rihanna fails at buttoning a simple denim jacket. From Kanye's perspective, you're obviously just there as a cultural marker. From yours... a desperate, desperate attempt at being hip with the kids.
Nevertheless. Since the live performance of this, I can't get it out of my head. And I'm not sure I want to.
Kendrick Lamar - King Kunta
New contender for song of the year. It just gives giving and giving. We do want the funk.
Annie are you ok? Annie are you ok?
Dr. Dre ft. Eminem and Xzibit - What's the Difference
Ok. You need to really, really ignore what they actually say. Then it's really, really enjoyable. Because the production is ace.
Panda Bear - Boys Latin
I was lying on the floor in my studio with the lights off. This elevated me.
Master Musicians of Bukkake - People of the Drifting Houses
A discovery in the wood workshop. Amazing 70s prog vibes from this. But... that is a terrible, terrible band name.
Pink Floyd - When the Tigers Broke Free
Continuing last week's Floyd revival. This still gives me a chill. It's really fucking angry.
PJ Harvey - The Words That Maketh Murder
Considering how well this connects with the previous track one could always conceive of me as planning a themed list. But no, these are just great albums I listened to this week.
Tinariwen - Tenhert
The beauty of language.
Bugge Wesseltoft, Henrik Schwarz & Dan Berglund - Valiant or Anouar Brahem - Leila Au Pays du Carrousel
Two tracks for to sooth all hangovers. The former was on Spotify but not on Grooveshark. The latter was on Grooveshark but not on Spotify. So they became each others' substitutes.
Matthew Herbert - August 2010
It's an album about a pig's life, mostly made of pig's noises (or in this case, noises of people eating pig), and well, it's bloody brilliant. Can't believe I forgot to listen to this til now. Matthew Herbert is a mad genius.
Pink Floyd - Echoes
Finally took up running again, and as I jogged across the top of Hilly Fields park one early Sunday morning, with the rooftops of Lewisham spreading out to the east of me, Roger's voice resurfaced in one of Pink Floyd's very best moments:
Cloudless every day you fall upon my waking eyes Inviting and inciting me to rise
Dusty Springfield - Anyone Who Had a Heart
Excellent use of saxophone, strings and sadness.
Primal Scream - Rebel Dub
When you listened to a song enough times, you don't really need to hear the vocals anymore; the sentiment remains. Sunshine and revolution and a better world for all.
The O'Jays - For the Love of Money
"That's a pretty, pretty good bassriff we've got going here. Should we just keep at it for 7 or so minutes?"
"YAS"
Music what is like made for this sunny/rainy Sunday.
Kris Kristofferson - Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down
Maybe the most ultimate hangover-song ever.
Derrick Harriott - Let Me Down Easy
I've said it before: when it comes to subtle, too rarely celebrated vocal performances, Jamaican music is full of them. The way he sings "Give me tii-iiime"! It's like SATIN. It's so beautiful. And then that wonderful callback:
'Cause the fall From the top To the bottom Is such a sudden drop
Bob Dylan - You're a Big Girl Now
What does it feel like to listen to Blood On The Tracks? Like a corkscrew to my heart. Enough said.
José Gonzalez - Stories We Build, Stories We Tell
Yet another revelation of beauty on this week's list. José's new album is sublime. It sounds exactly like José, yes, but somehow he's managed to perfect his already perfected sound and bring the whole thing up a tiny, tiny notch on the emotional scale.
Viktor Vaughn - Mr. Clean
It's been months since I had Doom on a list! Some say his language is way too outlandish. Well, I don't. I find it just outlandish enough.
Just wanted to share some superb music with y'all.
Aphex Twin - 54 Cymru Beats
Have you ever heard so many fantastic sounds on top of each other? The final minute especially, is such indulgence.
Badbadnotgood - Can't Leave The Night
Cause they just released that collaborative album with Ghostface, and I thought the single from that was kinda awesome, so I thought I'd like check if their earlier stuff was too. And it was. Awesome. Too. The beat drop at 1:15. Maaan.
Einstürzende Neubauten - Youme & Meyou
They turn houses into homes where earthquakes live with car alarms mature mild-mannered catastrophes
Hot Chip - Look At Where We Are (ft. Tori and Reiko Kudo)
Well, if there was one thing that could make Hot Chip ballads even more lovely, it was always the option of reinterpreting them as Japanese duets.
Lee Scratch Perry & The Upsetters - Bionic Rats
I will never get tired of the backing vocalists going "Satan! Satan!" Also, the guitar solo, the superfat bass, and pretty much every other sound – all earcandy.
I think I'm already giving up my genius new format. Short comments only this week.
amiina - Lóri
Cradled to sleep
Sigur Rós - Death Announcements and Funerals
The post-rock revival in my studio continues.
Primal Scream - Exterminator
Still a great album. Blunt, angry and unapologetic.
Gun metal skies Broken eyes Claustrophobic concrete English high-rise
Stina Nordenstam - Parliament Square
This is no final solution No this is just for today I'm running from London pollution Still cold from the rain These are not perfect conditions No this is far from ideal This is a downcast position At least it is real
Beyoncé - I Care
Guitar+voice-solo! You could listen to it a million times; there is no seam!
A very good week. Almost all the pieces fell into place.
Zs - Weakling Time: Thursday. Place: In the studio. Feelings:Wowowow. Of note: Read a review on Pitchfork in the morning. Put the album on as soon as I got to the studio. Loved it. This week I only wanted weird music, and this is quite out there.
Aphex Twin - diskhat1 Time: Tuesday morning. Place: In the studio. Feelings: Twitches. Of note:Finally treated myself to the new Aphex album, and hardly had I done so before he released another, even better, record!
Swans - A Little God In My Hands Time: Wednesday eve. Place: In the studio. Feelings:Power. Strength. Of note: If you don't listen to this album LOUD and in its entirety, you shouldn't listen to it at all. Which I'm of course contradicting by putting this on a list, but hey, somehow I need to at least refer to the enormous amount of energy I drew from this while finishing up my concrete casts.
Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Mladic Time: Earlier on Wednesday eve. Place: In the studio. Feelings:"I can do anything" Of note: Sometimes I think the main reason for me doing art is so that I can listen to loud muic late at night in the studio. There is hardly anything better than hammering on a bit of concrete while immersed in post rock.
Love - Alone Again Or Time: Thursday morning Place: Walking to the bus. Feelings:A little bit of joy, maybe. Of note: Is this one of the best songs ever? Yes, probably. "I think that people are the greatest fun. But I will be alone again tonight my dear."
Björk - Mutual Core (These New Puritans Remix) Time: Evening after evening. Place: In the studio. Feelings: A detached nostalgia. Of note:I've not listened to the new album yet. I'm saving it for a special moment, to try and relive the pregnant expectations I've experienced with other Björk albums, back when release dates were still special.
Leonard Cohen - Nevermind Time: Tuesday evening. Place: Whitechapel underground station. Feelings:A tired but confident solitude. Of note: Leonard, more contemporary than ever. Who would've thunk it? "This was your heart, this swarm of flies. This was once your mouth, this bowl of lies."
Arca - Thievery Time: Long ago, it seems now. But in fact just a couple if weeks Place: Bus, train, who cares. Feelings:Wonder. Of note: The first thing I could think of when I heard this was Björk's song In The Musicals, and then came the news that he's co-producing the new Björk album, and all came full circle.
Flying Lotus - Coronus, the Terminator Time: Late night. Place: In bed with my laptop on my chest. Feelings:A slight tug at the heartstrings. Of note: The video got me:
Duke Ellington & Count Basie - Wild Man Time: Morning Place: Bus Feelings:Just digging, man. Just digging. Of note: Oh the flute at 5:15. Delish!
Beyoncé - Love On Top Time: Monday 12th, just after having been offered a room in Brockley. Place: In the pub, the Marquis of Granby. Feelings: Elation. Hope. Of note:Yes, I've had it on lists before, but it is one of the best songs of the past decade.
Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way Time: Weekday morning, cold sun. Place: On the bus to uni. Feelings:Determination. Of note: Starting the season with classics for positivity's sake.
Led Zeppelin - The Rover Time: Saturday night, after seeing the excellent Bird Man at the cinema. Place: On a bus through Hackney. Feelings:Inspiration. Awe. Confusion. Of note: That opening chord. Wonderful guitar sound.
Jurassic 5 - Freedom Time: Sunday evening. Place: Walking through Peckham, having looked at a tiny room in a council estate. Feelings:Frustration. Of note: "My culture's screwed cause this word is misconstrued"
Father John Misty - Bored In The USA Time: Often. Place: On undergrounds and buses. Feelings:Loneliness. Listlessness. Romantic melancholy. Of note: One of the best songs of last year, that I completely overlooked in my 2014 summary. The lyrics!
