Pancake City

Easy pick this week. I first heard Amber Rubarth’s witty song about breaking up on NPR’s All Songs Considered. It’s great–you really will love this song.

Hip-hop this week. Sage Francis’ “Makeshift Patriot.” See sidebar.

I’m not a huge fan of Aphex Twin or electronic fan, but some of it is pleasant even for casual listeners. “Heliosphan” is from his earlier work (see sidebar for download link)

The Coup, creators of “My Favorite Mutiny“, is a hip-hop band with a lot of funky bass lines and hooks. It sounds like intelligent, independent hip-hop, but I can’t really say because this is the only song I’ve heard from them so far.

Oh, cassettes. Why won’t you listen? The SotW is “Large Radio” by Cassettes Won’t Listen.  This is one of those seemingly straightforward songs that I can’t easily describe.  I felt a flash of bittersweet happiness at the 1:30 mark, like it reminded me of something buried deep in my memories that I couldn’t easily access. I get hit by a lot of odd emotions out of the blue, and I can never figure out where they are coming from. At least the moments of deja vu have subsided over the years–those drove me crazy.

That’s all besides the point though. This one is from a “Song of the Day” podcast, so I’ll leave the link up.

By Swedish vocalist Lykke Li. See the sidebar for the linky.

I had a hard time choosing the Song of the Week. I heard a handful of very good songs recently, but none of them stood apart from the rest. I ended up picking “Fire Escape” by Fanfarlo. It’s a catchy melody that makes me feel good but not happy, if that makes sense.

I found out about the group on NPR’s All Songs Considered. There’s another artist on one of the recent shows that deserves mentioning, Toumani Diabate.  He plays the kora, an African harp-lute. You can listen to his song, Cantelowes, at NPR’s ASC web site. Is it my imagination, or is he referencing “The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly”in the first 10 seconds?

I’ve listened to this song dozens of times so far. It is smooooth. Considering the soulful crooning behind the lyrics, it’s odd that they are emotionally detached at parts, like he needs to convince himself he should fall in love. “Being in love is good for your health”. “Now that I’m in this club, I might as well.” Charlie Wilson is 65, and perhaps a weariness or pragmatism about falling in love comes with age.

Regardless, this song has been pleasantly stuck in my head for the past few weeks, and still hasn’t got old. Download link in the sidebar.

It’s “Kids“, a catchy, high-energy song by MGMT. Just curious, does anyone like the “Song of the Week” feature?