Four words: Daft Punk does disco, as in ’70s disco. Some might think ’70s disco is redundant, since that’s when disco was big, but the hip club kiddies know that there bands making disco music today. Hell, what’s Hercules and Love Affair if they’re not a disco band? (Answer: they’re totally a disco band.) Love the stop-motion photography. It reminds us of that video for Hilly Michaels’ “Calling All Girls,” and we can’t help but be happy whenever that song comes to mind.
Tag: Eat Sleep Drink Music (Page 9 of 31)
I’ve been waiting for months to share this song with you. And if I actually read all of my email the day that I receive it – which is frankly impossible if I plan on getting anything else done – this post would have gone up a week ago. My bad.
From the moment I received the review copy of Disconnect from Desire, the fab new record from School of Seven Bells, I’ve been hounding my label contact about one song in particular: “I L U,” a pitch-perfect mid-tempo breakup song that will make Kevin Shields actually get My Bloody Valentine back together just so they can outdo it (though I doubt they actually could). I sent this song to a fellow UK alt rock-loving friend, and she said, “Wow. I’m 18 again.” Translation: extremely high praise. The vocal is one of those simple, ‘how did no one think of this before?’ kinds of things that many, many other bands could take an example from.
Tired of hearing me pimp the song? Fair enough. Go download it, and tell your friends.
If you want to download a remix of the song, which will hit iTunes September 14 as part of the Heart Is Strange remix EP, you can get one if you’re willing to give up your email address. Go here to check ch-check check check, check it out.
RIYL: hipster bands, watching your kids dance
Landing a cool 10 months after the release of Volume I of Yo Gabba Gabba’s Music Is…Awesome! series, this set rights some of the wrongs of that first album by including some of the bands they overlooked the last time (Jimmy Eat World, MGMT, Datarock, and thank God they finally released the Ting Tings’ cover of “Happy Birthday”). The catch with this set is that the songs by the contributing rock bands are much better, but the songs from the show are, well, not. Yes, “Hold Still” finally makes an appearance, but it’s the lesser of the two versions that have appeared on the show. Meanwhile, the “Freeze Game” song here does not measure up to the ‘you can’t catch us!’ ‘Freeze’ song from another episode. (Perhaps they chose the version they did so they didn’t have two songs that featured Brobee whining about not being able to keep up.) Alas, the Aggrolites’ song “Banana” is still nowhere to be found, nor is GOGO13’s song “Pick It Up” which, years after their debut on the show, are still the two most commonly sung “Yo Gabba Gabba” songs in this writer’s household. Their exclusion from these sets is bordering on comical, if it weren’t so tragic. Still, the Weezer song (“All My Friends Are Insects”) is great, as are the songs by Hot Hot Heat (“Time to Go Outdoors”) and the Apples in Stereo (“That’s My Family”). In the end the album, much like the show, has some moments of genius, surrounded by stuff that you merely tolerate for the sake of your kids. No excuses, guys: put “Pick It Up” and “Banana” on the next set, or there will be hell to pay. (Filter 2010)
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Click to buy Music Is Awesome! Volume 2 from Amazon
RIYL: ’70s soul, really bad fashion, Afro-Sheen
Prior to MTV (to say nothing of the network’s lack of acceptance for soul and rap music for half a decade or so) and BET, or for those of us who just didn’t have cable for a long time, “Soul Train” was the primary destination for soul music lovers looking to check out their favorite artists. Running for over three decades, just about everyone who was ever anyone in R&B or hip-hop stood on the hallowed “Soul Train” stage and performed as dozens of young, stylish dancers showed off their latest moves.
Time-Life has recently opened the “Soul Train” vaults and unleashed a nine-DVD set containing hours of performances, interviews and legendary routines, and even more recently, some of the all-time classic performances have been compiled onto the “Best of Soul Train” DVD.
This 3-disc set contains performances from some of the all-time greats of soul music, and almost all of them come from the show’s first few years, 1971-1979. (Stevie Wonder provides the only content coming from a later date, with a 1991 medley of his hits.) Although many of “Soul Train’s” guests lip-synched, this set is heavy on the rare live performances. They include a sweaty run through “That Lady” by the Isley Brothers, riveting performances of “Use Me” and “Lean On Me” by Bill Withers, an impromptu duet of “Ooh Baby Baby” by Aretha Franklin and Smokey Robinson, and a performance by Barry White and a huge orchestra that must have required Don Cornelius’s production company to expand the Soul Train stage.
In addition to those performances, you get mimed but still incredible performances by the Jackson 5, the Commodores and Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes (featuring a frighteningly dressed Teddy Pendergrass). There’s also interview footage from those shows (worth the cost for the Marvin Gaye segment alone) as well as several dance routines that show how ahead of their time the Soul Train dancers were (in addition to how horrendous some of the fashions of the time were). You also get to see some of the groundbreaking commercials that ran during the Soul Train episodes, among the first ads to feature products geared exclusively towards a black audience. Bonus footage includes interviews with Soul Train creator/host Don Cornelius, the legendary Smokey Robinson, and Soul Train dancer-turned-Grammy winning singer Jody Watley.
As an admitted “Soul Train”-aholic, I’m hoping that eventually the highlights from every episode (up until the mid-Nineties, when I pretty much stopped watching) gets released. However, if you are a fan of soul music in any one of its incarnations, you need to have this DVD in your collection. So throw on your tightest bell-bottoms, pick your afro, and take a ride on the funkiest train in music history. As Don famously stated at the end of each episode, “you can bet your last money that it’s gonna be a stone gas, honey!”
(Time-Life 2010)
Their new album Butterfly House is still one of the top ‘holy shit, we didn’t see that one coming’ moments of the year, and the love parade keeps rolling on with second single and Butterfly House opening track “More Than a Lover.” The video’s another ’60s-ish pastiche of quick cuts, backwards film, and silhouette shots of singer James Skelly against the mooon. And check out that chorus – does anyone else hear America when that comes up?
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