The Song

Gillian Welch – The Way It Goes That’s the way that it...

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 23:56:00 +0100

That’s the way that it goes
everybody’s buyin little baby clothes

Gillian Welch is in as fine a form as ever. The train’s moving on, let’s not get all sentimental about it.

Talk Talk – Such A Shame There’s something about a song...

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 23:43:00 +0100

There’s something about a song that comes in pieces like this, a song that doesn’t quite gel (until it does). It’s at once too camp and not camp enough, teetering on the edge of some larger sophistication but not quite sure why. And then the hooks, and it doesn’t matter.

Wouldn’t have touched this with a ten-foot pole a decade ago, but here we are. Thank you, London.

The Mills Brothers – I Got Her Off My Hands I’m up with...

Tue, 21 Jun 2011 22:14:00 +0100

The Mills Brothers – I Got Her Off My Hands

I’m up with shadows playing hide and seek

The Mills Brothers were something special. Here they are in 1951, singing about when things don’t go exactly to plan; as a bonus you get some mouth trumpet and “now I’m the crying-est kind.” Yeah, this.

The National – All Dolled-Up in Straps My head plays it over...

Sun, 12 Jun 2011 16:11:26 +0100

The National – All Dolled-Up in Straps

My head plays it over and over

“Are you trying to make me cry?” she asked. Probably. But things get away from me after this much one-track repeat. Where have you been?

Don’t interrupt me

Metric – Calculation Theme Metric’s “Old World...

Thu, 14 Apr 2011 00:29:18 +0100

Metric – Calculation Theme

Metric’s “Old World Underground, Where Are You Now?” is nearly ten years old now but of course this is the one I can’t shake. It’s in my muscle memory permanently, my right hand playing the synth line on any available keyboard but it never comes out quite right, Emily’s never there to poke her head around the corner and sing. “But it’s for the best.”

Cold as numbers but let’s dance

Twin Shadow – Tyrant Destroyed And who was I to think that on a...

Sat, 26 Mar 2011 18:15:00 +0000

Twin Shadow – Tyrant Destroyed

And who was I to think that on a Saturday night
That you would really bike home alone

Unrequited teenage love that finally culminates years later, then collapses horribly? Sure, heard it. But not with shape like this.

This is how to open an album.

The Lucksmiths – The Cassingle Revival Because you promised...

Sun, 20 Feb 2011 19:13:00 +0000

The Lucksmiths – The Cassingle Revival

Because you promised when it happens / you’ll return

Earlier today I was checking out an album by Jeremy Messersmith and noticed that, like many others, he’s selling cassette tape copies next to the downloads and the vinyl.

The Lucksmiths of Melbourne had our burgeoning tapestalgia pegged way back in 2002. But instead of another sly dig at what, even then, must have seemed inevitable, by its last verse this song becomes something altogether more wistful.

This is the soundtrack to every sun-dappled hipstamatic photo of city treetops you took last year, and as usual I didn’t understand the weight of that until much too late.

(The way they sing “noticing” in the opening line still hurts.)

The Stone Poneys – Different Drum “They’re not...

Thu, 13 Jan 2011 13:43:00 +0000

The Stone Poneys – Different Drum

“They’re not oldies,” she said. “They’re classics.”

Songs that open albums in my parents’ record collection, part thirty-seven. AM gold.

Sibylle Baier – Forget About oh it’s beautiful the way...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 05:56:00 +0000

Sibylle Baier – Forget About

oh it’s beautiful the way you wear your shirt

Shimmering Stars – Sabians “Sabians” is by...

Wed, 27 Oct 2010 04:31:00 +0100

Shimmering Stars – Sabians

“Sabians” is by Shimmering Stars, a Vancouver band who make the sort of spring-reverbed throwback garage pop we seem to need right now.

They have other, catchier numbers (try them with some video accompaniment here and here), but “Sabians” finds them at their most run-down. It’s the end of the night and a dozen of us are left in the cavernous gymnasium; the band are tired and want to go home.

But we’ll press together, they’ll sing, and at the last possible moment we’ll wring out some sweetness, barely.

Also, hey. “Back to the Future” is in theatres again.

Orange Juice – Rip It Up “Rip It Up” still feels as...

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 13:43:00 +0100

Orange Juice – Rip It Up

“Rip It Up” still feels as casually, toe-tappingly anthemic as it must have done in 1983. Open a window. Rip it up, and start again.

And I hope to God I’m not as numb as you make out

Kate & Anna McGarrigle – Kiss and Say Goodbye I grew up...

Sun, 08 Aug 2010 15:04:00 +0100

Kate & Anna McGarrigle – Kiss and Say Goodbye

I grew up with Kate & Anna McGarrigle. “Kiss and Say Goodbye” is the first track on their 1976 self-titled debut, and one of my earliest musical memories. Being raised in proper Canadian nationalist style, we had no, say, Fleetwood Mac records; instead the McGarrigles were never far from the record player and this was the first thing you’d hear if someone put them on.

This song is about a visiting lover and it’s impossible for me to be impartial about it. I don’t mind the saxophone solo, the backup vocals, I don’t even mind the truck driver’s gear change. Ten seconds of the perfect piano / snare intro and I’m back in the living room, peering my nose over the steadily spinning vinyl and dimly aware that somewhere in the room, my parents are dancing.

Small Black – Despicable Dogs (Washed Out Remix) Lately I seem...

Sun, 11 Jul 2010 13:15:00 +0100

Small Black – Despicable Dogs (Washed Out Remix)

Lately I seem to be collecting songs of walking tempo.

I’m not sure why, because tracks like this Small Black remix (blogneric, natch!) don’t always work so well on foot in London. There are too many distractions, uneven pavements, trick corners, stops and starts.

Songs like this make me want to walk through grass or snow again, methodically, watching a point on the horizon as it becomes slowly but steadily closer.

The Innocence Mission – God Is Love So it’s a hot hot...

Sat, 10 Jul 2010 13:29:00 +0100

The Innocence Mission – God Is Love

So it’s a hot hot hungover Saturday and I came on here to post something with beats, something sunny and fresh you know, some Tanlines or Fol Chen or those Au Revoir Simone remixes or maybe just some pop that screams summer but then I fell over backwards into these new tracks from The Innocence Mission and they disarmed me completely, here is one for you. Against the weather, against songs about God, against every impulse here we are. It’s too lovely can you open the window already.

Lord Kitchener – London Is the Place for Me To live in London...

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 14:29:00 +0100

Lord Kitchener – London Is the Place for Me

To live in London you’re really comfortable
because the English people are very much sociable
They take you here and they take you there
and they make you feel like a millionaire…

Aldwyn Roberts — much better known as Lord Kitchener — emigrated to London from Trinidad in 1952.

One has to suspect that he either wrote “London is the Place for Me” before arriving, or with tongue placed firmly in cheek. On a beautiful summer Sunday morning, though, his exhuberence suddenly makes sense. I want to believe.

Hayden – Let’s Break Up Sometimes you need to cut your...

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 17:20:00 +0100

Hayden – Let’s Break Up

Sometimes you need to cut your losses, get in a car, roll down the windows, and DRIVE.

No Kids – At The Grove When I’m outside in dying lightand...

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:57:00 +0100

No Kids – At The Grove

When I’m outside in dying light
and everything is wrong

No Kids are from Vancouver, but their latest EP feels like they’re looking south to places where you get palms with your salt air; places that remind you that you’re not home.

Today is a hot muggy London office summer, and “At The Grove” is helping me keep it cool. It’s a small song, and not outwardly extraordinary, but nothing gets in the way of its forward motion. Sad songs are easy, doing them like this isn’t.

Ruth – Polaroid/Roman/Photo I’ve spent the last five...

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 19:01:00 +0100

Ruth – Polaroid/Roman/Photo

I’ve spent the last five years slowly realizing that most of what I’ve found fresh and exciting in music was done better in the 80s.

“Polaroid/Roman/Photo” is a track by French new wave band Ruth. Sitting near the end of a minimal synth compilation I stumbled on a couple weeks back, it singlehandedly prefigures everything I liked around 2001–2006. At the time, I was in the throes of Ladytron (synths! sex!), Stereo Total (style! boy/girl vocals!), The Notwist (beats! horns! guitars!) — and they fronted my iPod 1G soundtrack as I left the arctic in a predictably naive search for imaginary jetset euro-cosmopolitan futures.

The song triggers every impulse that brought me to London. But it sits firmly in 1985, blissfully unaware of kitschy post-millenial imitators; it is dirtier, colder, sadder. It can’t touch me anymore, but I sometimes wish it could.

Do wait for the horns.