Thursday, May 23, 2013

Serious Contenders: INXS, "Need You Tonight"



What a bizarre come-on: "You're one of my kind." Sometimes, I'll read lyrics and just think, "How do they get away with this?" And it's all in the delivery. Michael Hutchence, whether you dug INXS or not, had this ability to completely transform what is, on the page, a whole bunch of nonsense and nonsequitors, into a come-hither beckoning. It's a sexy, unashamed down-and-dirty pickup/hookup song, completely unashamed of its nature and the dubious methods it uses to express itself. And it works, as good music does, when you have the right mix of elements, that minor, but not detached, instrumentation striking the right slinking tone behind Hutchence's vocals.

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Cover: Natalie Maines, "Mother"



Until a few weeks ago I never thought much about Natalie Maines. Then for whatever reason I read an article a while back about how it had been a decade since her infamous "We're ashamed of George W. Bush" comment. Criticizing a Republican sitting President is a pretty ballsy thing to do when you're a country singer. It's one thing for Ted Nugent to talk about wanting to murder Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton, or for Green Day to release American Idiot, but Natalie quite simply bit the hand that feeds. It was a potential career killer, and even though their next album went multi-platinum, nobody seemed to wonder too hard when they went on hiatus. Politics in the United States have become even more radicalized, if that was possible, two of the Chicks became Court Yard Hounds (from what I can tell, far removed from pot-stirring statements like "Not Ready to Make Nice.") And Maines seemed to disappear altogether, only resurfacing now with a workable album of covers with Ben Harper. She has a good ear, picking mostly obscure tunes, including one from the venerable Dan Wilson, and doing a fine, fine job with Jeff Buckley's "Lover, You Should Have Come Over." But it's the title track, the Pink Floyd cover, that will get the attention.

Maines' situation does indeed resemble that of Roger Waters' Pink character from The Wall. Having violated the unspoken contract between the performer and audience, the singer becomes isolated, searching, seeking the comfort of the womb and building the wall. Natalie sings it more beautifully than Waters could (not hard,) warming up the detachment and really hammering the spirit of the song home. This cover, this album, is a great statement of self, a release from the cocoon of former country divadom and into the world of mature adult mainstream rock - the cathartic breaking down of the wall. People should hear it.

Monday, May 20, 2013

The Vaccines: What Did You Expect From the Vaccines?

This is my dumb review blog, so I'm going to tell you something about my dumb life for this dumb review of The Vaccines' very good first album. Every so often, my family has a boozy night. Sit around, rehashing old stories, reminiscing about dead pets and old houses and the 90s and old times. This is a recent development. My family never used to care about old times. There weren't any old times to care about. Now I guess there are, and some of them relish the chance to drudge it all up, telling all the old stories like they contain profound revelations that haven't been rediscovered dozens of times in the last year. The tone of these nights is so sincere and so earnest and so desperate to feel. And I'm not one for those. I sit there while members of the family force themselves to feel deep and think about how profound it is that we've been through such things... and I just shrug. I roll my eyes. I'm not into it. Maybe it's because I don't happen to be drinking. I chip in a sarcastic remark every now and again when things get too intense, just to insinuate myself and undercut the melodrama and maybe, unsuccessfully, deflate the scenario to a level that I'm comfortable with. That's me. For all my big talk on the blog, in my day to day life I'd rather be living my day to day life, complete with snide remarks and an acknowledgment that my pain is pretty mundane. I'm a heartless bastard.

I see myself, that part of myself, in The Vaccines. If an album can be as snide as I tend to be at family dinners, this is. There are big grandiose movements in the music: intense punky energy, operatic U2 moves, power pop, the whole shebang, and then Justin Young undermines the whole thing with his vocals. I don't know how to describe it, his delivery is so bored of emotion, so unconvinced by emotionality, he's the reverse Bono. He makes the music work to win him over. He sneers, "What did you expect / From post-break-up sex?" and it sounds more revolutionary than anything I've heard in the punk section lately. The opening track, "Wreckin' Bar (Ra Ra Ra)" is a lie. He brings this proper dry British sensibility to the music, this stiff upper lip punk that simply will not give. So removed.

Meanwhile, the music itself is quite great: there are hooks, there are riffs and licks and rhythms worth banging one's head to. It's just all disrupted, happily, by the clash between the sound and the voice. The message and its delivery.

And yet it's not cold. It's not like an icy Canadian indie pop album, not a whimpering postpunk, not a brash garage band. It's something more difficult to classify, more difficult to read. It's so flummoxed at the idea of feeling and dealing with other people and searching for that profundity that everyone else seems to access so easily, looking hopefully for things to get so pumped about, as on "If You Wanna" or to be anthemic about on "Wetsuit." It's the audio equivalent of a Greg Daniels TV show: sincere and earnest and whimsical at times, but willing to accept that sometimes things are worth observing because they're so normal. And normal things include meeting people, falling in love, having sex, being bored, getting your heart broken, moving on and wondering why it happened. For all the capacity pop music has to make these events into golden coins, here's one that seems to reveal them, to me at least, as the basic plain bricks that build our lives. When he urges you to "Blow, blow, blow it up" it sounds more like a polite suggestion than a command. When he cries out for "E-e-elenor" it's less pleading and desperate than it is casual and curious. Is there anything worth getting worked up over?

It mashes together the observational quality of The Hold Steady with the Gen-Y passivity of Tokyo Police Club and the "show me something" restlessnes of the Strokes.

Normalcore. What an innovation. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe it's just me, maybe I'm just looking for a way to normalize and understand my own situation, but I think it's worth noting that I got this out of this album, and that that feeling feels so unique. Unique, and yet... ordinary.

PS Guys please don't ever tell my family I talked about them in a music review, I don't want to have that conversation either.

Buy this album now:iTunes Canada // iTunes USA // Amazon.ca // Amazon.com



Thursday, May 16, 2013

Best Song Ever: May 2013 (Round 3)

Here we are with our third round of trying to answer the unanswerable, trying to compare the incomparable, trying to do the undoable. No, wait, I mean impossible. This was not an easy round to judge, but I felt like each of them came to a definitive clear-cut conclusion. In a couple of cases, though, it wasn't the one I thought I'd get going in.

Sloan, "The Answer Was You" vs. Van Halen, "Running With The Devil"
Winner: "Running With The Devil"

Who, "Love Reign Over Me" vs. Barenaked Ladies, "The Old Apartment"
Winner: "Love, Reign Over Me"

For Sloan and BNL, it looks like quirky, observational, albeit sincere and often sweet, power pop just reached its limit against the classics. "The Answer Was You" is one of the most heavenly cuts off The Double Cross. And "The Old Apartment" is welcome on my radio or iPod anytime. But ah, the bombast, the pathos, the old workhorses, those direct statements, deep in their own right and towering in their power.



Weezer, "Say It Ain't So" vs. Temptations, "Ain't Too Proud to Beg"

Here we have a last-minute reversal. Originally we had three power pop gems falling to classics of the 60's and 70's, and "Ain't Too Proud to Beg" is one of the best of the Motown canon, built on a rollicking piano and a sweet and sour vocal. But it's just not enough for this heavily 90's rock-leaning blog. I love the sonic atmosphere of this song, as if inviting the intended subject, an estranged lover, back to a party she has walked away from.

But, man, I love the contradictions in "Say It Ain't So." That opening riff is so funky and assured, but it also bears well the menace and suspicion and fear and betrayal and hurt in the lyric. Again, it's like a party, but not one that anyone wants to still be at. It's a song that is about, in an elliptical, pop songwriting way, the cycle of addiction and the toll it takes on loved ones. Headier stuff than "Ain't Too Proud to Beg," and executed in a spot-on way that reveals that Rivers Cuomo used to have some nuance, some sophistication in his songwriting. I still like a lot of post-Green Weezer stuff, but very little of it is at this level. Little of anything is.

Winner: "Say It Ain't So"



Belle & Sebastian, "Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John" vs. Led Zeppelin, "When The Levee Breaks"

In deference to the above, I actually kind of wanted Belle & Sebastian to win. Unlike the above matches, they came at the legend with not mere pop hooks and crafty cleverness, but with sincerity, melody, and heartbreak, three facets that I find truly underrated. I wanted that to be enough because this is such a sweet, sad song, so vulnerable and wounded. But then two bars of John Bonham drumming into "Levee" and I forget I ever felt anything. Rock can be such a powerful anesthetic.

Winner: "When The Levee Breaks"



Hold Steady, "Lord, I'm Discouraged" vs. White Stripes, "Stop Breaking Down"

Probably the easiest call of the round, I hate to say. Much respect and love for Jack White, but what he's doing here, this electric blues freak-out, still can't quite measure up to the ballad of its generation. In the context of this tournament, this Hold Steady song is a steamroller.

Winner: "Lord, I'm Discouraged"

Oasis, "Wonderwall" vs. Toadies, "Possum Kingdom"

Early on in the tournament I wondered how far the venerable dormroom classic "Wonderwall" could go based on its reputation, its aura. It makes you feel good to hear it and be part of it. That's sort of the appeal of Oasis. It drove them past an excellent Arctic Monkeys song and a very, very good new David Bowie one. So you might be surprised to see the buck stop here, with a piece of genuine brilliance in Toadies' "Possum Kingdom."

I don't have even half a clue what either song is about or how I'm supposed to feel about either of them, quite honestly, but the beauty of pop music is that it hits you and you take what you can from it. Whether or not "Possum Kingdom" is indeed about a murder, a vampire, a ghost or an alien, I know it's amazing to listen to. I know that staccato guitar riff grabs my attention immediately, and I never wander all the way through the end, once he has declared, emphatically, cathartically "I WILL TREAT YOU WELL, MY SWEET ANGEL, SO HELP ME JESUS!" It's a statement unlikely to be found anywhere but a hip rock song, and thus its power.

Winner: "Possum Kingdom"

Arcade Fire, "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" vs. Gary Clark Jr., "When My Train Pulls In"

Let me establish off the bat that I really do believe in the Arcade Fire. This is a pretty fantastic composition, and they have behind them the strength of an army of sound and the whole orchestra put-togtherness of Funeral. Sometimes we end up thinking of indie rock musicians as false idols or charlatans, who tricked us into feeling something just by being different. But every time I listen to an Arcade Fire song it comes utterly to life. Every track on Funeral offers a window into a new world, one I had never encountered before that album and have never encountered outside of it. "Neighborhood #1" is no exception and that was almost enough. Almost.

But much like the Led Zeppelin example above, just a few opening seconds of that riff, shuddering like Atlas under the weight of the world. Hot dusty blues. For a few listens, I thought it was a done deal, like "Okay, it's just a cool blues song, it's not Arcade Fire." But the point of this dumb little exercise is to prove that, all things being equal, an excellent example of one thing can be on equal footing with an excellent example of something else. Indie rock isn't inherently better than a hardcore blues R&B jam. And there was a moment beginning in he midst of those transcendent solos that I was reminded of that. With no words but six strings, Gary Clark takes his song form to the limit and comes out the other side.

Winner: "When My Train Pulls In"

Rolling Stones, "Gimme Shelter" vs. Nirvana, "Heart-Shaped Box"

Two different models of rage. There's the outward, personal 90s histrionic, and the slow-burning simmering 1969 protest. My track record suggests I go for the 90s, and I very passionately argued in favour of "Heart-Shaped Box" last week.

But ladies and gentlemen, here's Merry Clayton to show you why the Rolling Stones take this one.

It's a tough call, man. In many ways, "Heart-Shaped Box" would be the easier pick. It is loud, it is angry, it is hateful, it is choked with bile and rage that feels earned, as Kurt channels all his stress and disillusionment with rock stardom and retreat into parenthood. It's probably one of the best songs he wrote.

The Nirvana song is so appropriately disruptive, but the Stones one is so sinister. It has takes Sixties try-anything spirit and applies it to the suffocating, stifling apocalyptic panic that must have been the Vietnam era. "War, children, is just a shot away." That was not an idle lyric, there was a real-ass war on, and it could have gotten a lot worse if either the States or the USSR decided they didn't like the looks of their opponent. To take that and try to stuff it all into a 4-minute song for the radio... it's a daunting task, and I think Jagger and Richards never quite did a better job of it. Clayton, for her part, hammers it all how, squealing unabashedly, "RAPE! MURDER!" disappearing into the din, the crushing smog of this song.

And then Mick gives us something Kurt doesn't: a bit of relief. Pop hadn't quite outgrown the need for something sweet, or maybe he just sensed the song was incomplete, leaving off with "Love, sister... it's just a kiss away..." Is it cold comfort, or genuine naivety? Or is is true? Is love enough? Could Mick Jagger possibly have believed it, or did he just want to?

There are no two better-matched, complementary songs in this tournament. You have to be really good to make it further than this.

Winner: "Gimme Shelter"



Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Matt Mays: Coyote

Truism: Find an album with a good title and half your work as a reviewer will be done already. Matt Mays called his 2012 album Coyote, a figure often invoked in Native American tales of mischief and magic, but also a perverse kind of wisdom and savvy (if I've got my Thomas King right.) Mays' music seems to come from a hot, dusty, sunset desert landscape, half a continent away from the pastoral fields of the Sheepdogs' version of a throwback, the steel and glass of Gary Clark's blues, or the swamp of Alabama Shakes. Like that collection of retro artists, Matt Mays' music seems to come from another era, a remixed and refined version of 70s outlaw rock, with a hint of otherworldly vision. It's a whirlwind of thundering guitars, brutalist riffs, and rasped missives from a dimension soaked in peyote. It isn't really about showing off or songform, it's about tapping into another state of mind. There are solos buried underneath thick hurricane percussion of "Take it On Faith" but it's hard to grab ahold of it. The music never really stops for you. It pushes you around, commands you, and requires repeat visits.

There's some really great rock on here, in addition to that bracing track, we get the swaggering curtain raiser of "Indio" (named for a border town: the album situates you in geography by calling up other disparate corners like Santa Fe and Portland Street, which is in Matt's hometown of Dartmouth, NS.) "Ain't That The Truth" whirs with menacing organs and a pleading vocal: "He said to me the devil can't get you 'cause he ain't got proof / And I said aaaaaaaaain't that the truth." He sounds like someone who's be somewhere and seen something, and he's trying as hard as he can to explain what, exactly, it was. There's the jangling, unsubtly named ode to San Francisco "Stoned" and the towering, Chris Bell-era Big Star-like "Zita." There's the electric eel of a riff that opens "Drop the Bombs," where he sermonizes, "Brothers and sisters hear what I say / Drop the bombs on yesterday!" before exploding into a wild storm of sound. You nevr know when this album is going to freak out, as when "Drop the Bombs" becomes the wild "Rochambo," or "Airstrike," the frantic bridge between "Indio" and "Ain't That the Truth." On the throwaway "Madre Padre," he seems to channel Beck.

You don't see a lot of this distance, this rock and roll mystique anymore. Most artists want to either reveal as much of themselves s they can via stripped-down confessionals, or gloss over it with shiny pop pieces and pastiches. With this album I always feel like the truth is an elusive thing, that it's not put out there for me to absorb, but off on the horizon for me to search. Here's an album for a wandering heart.

He's got a great skill with the ballads, too, using steel guitar the way it was meant to. There's the shattering "Loveless," the somber "Dull Knife" and the weary, dim closer "Chase the Light," which sees the album off into the distance, set for parts unknown. All of them seem sincere and vulnerable, but never betray Mays' outlaw outcast loner preacher searcher imagery. It's intuitive, not obvious.

It's all pretty effortless, but based in a tactful deployment of Mays' rock philosophy. He knows when to barrel on and when to ease off and let the sound take over. It's a journey, not a destination.

Buy this album now: iTunes (Canada) // iTunes (USA) // Amazon.ca // Amazon.com

Monday, May 13, 2013

The Sound of the Week Readers Survey

To the two or three of you who read this blog, I have a few questions, if you wouldn't mind spending a minute or two answering in the comments, through e-mail, or on twitter:
  1. Who are you?
  2. How did you find out about this site? How regularly do you read it?
  3. What kind of music do you like? (Favourite artists, albums, genres, eras?)
  4. Do your tastes overlap with the content of this site, or are you just being polite?
  5. Have you ever bought something because it was recommended by this site? At the very least, did I nudge you toward buying something you were already thinking about?
  6. Does it seem like I know what I'm talking about?
  7. Where else do you get musical recommendations?
  8. How much music did you buy in the last year?
  9. In what format do you prefer to buy music: individual songs or full albums? Do you only download or do you buy physical CDs?
  10. If you buy physical CDs, do you order them online, or do you shop in brick-and-mortar stores?
  11. Where do you listen to music, and how?
  12. Any further comments?

Friday, May 10, 2013

Mixed Results: Scott New York (Spring 2005)

There are some questions we may never know the answer to... who built Stonehenge? What killed the dinosaurs? Why so much KoRn?

Okay, in all of those cases, we can at least make an educated guess. It was Spring 2005 and I was assembling a Mix CD to bring with me on a school trip to New York City. For whatever reason I deemed it appropriate to create only one 17-track disc featuring the songs that, for whatever reason, I would absolutely need to hear over the course of the five-day trip. Some of these songs are bona fide classics. Some are then-recent faves. Many are bizarre entries that just fascinated me at the time. And three of them are by KoRn.

As I've said before, prior to starting this blog, I was a bit of a musical scavenger. I wasn't plugged into any scenes, especially not in high school, and in many cases I actively avoided listening to the music that my friends liked. Part of the listening experience was that sense of discovery, that moment when you heard a song that you knew you needed over and over, after hearing it somewhere, anywhere, in the world. In many cases, the source of the song was the radio: the classic rock station my dad always played in the car. Even then it was rare to hear anything for the first time on that station, so one morning when I heard the precious, self-important piano plinking and somewhat overwrought, melodramatic delivery of Bob Geldof in the Boomtown Rats' "I Don't Like Mondays," I was intrigued. Learning the story behind it, that the title was a quote from a girl who had shot up a playground (the event being summarized by the song) sealed the deal, because I was a sucker for a good backstory in a song, it helped reaffirm that a real weight could be borne by lyrics and melody. To this day it's the only Boomtown Rats song I've ever heard. I don't think I need to hear another.



Likewise, "For Your Love" was the first Yardbirds song I ever heard, despite hearing them get namechecked in every biography of Eric Clapton and Led Zeppelin (and other bands they influenced, like Aerosmith.) It didn't really carry the rough-hewn blues sound I expected, being a dark, ominous pop song built around a thundering harpsichord and a chirpy-yet-nervy harmony vocal. This was not a band that seemed comfortable being pop stars. Still, it's a weirdly dynamic tune. Then there's U2, who I was trying somewhat seriously to start liking after years of feeling they were overrated during their All That You Can't Leave Behind era. I still can't tell half of their pre-Achtung Baby songs from each other before the chorus, but I got a kick out of "I Will Follow," their first single. I liked the idea that the first thing they did was also the best. The song also has a couple of big brothers on the record: the undoubtedly great "Comfortably Numb," and "She Sells Sanctuary," which was at the very least familiar to me from car commercials, but I don't know why it was on my mind in 2005.



There are earnest, high-spirited moments on the mix, like The Spoons' "Romantic Traffic," a delightful bit of 80s Canadiana Pop Fluff that was always being played on MuchMoreRetro, and Paul McCartney's "Maybe I'm Amazed," which I can't even remember having a particular fondness for, but also there was a great deal of misery in the mix. There's the gloomy "So Far Away," one of my favourite Dire Straits songs (as it invokes a mood without trying too hard to tell a story.) Then at the end comes the Zombies' enigmatic "She's Not There," a tune I didn't realize I had been looking for since my youth, after hearing it remixed in Kill Bill Volume 2, and at the beginning is those is "We Gotta Get Out of this Place." I first heard this lesser-known Animals track in, of all places, Fahrenheit 9/11 the previous summer, where it was used for comedic effect. This is such a cool, beaten-down song, a perfect Animals vehicle. It's striking how many of these songs relate to place, travel, or distance. This is almost certainly not intentional.





There's definitely no sequencing going on here. I think this list was assembled by literally going down the list of my mp3s alphabetically. The reason there are two Rolling Stones songs separated by the Cult is that "Honky Tonk Women" was probably listed as being by "Rolling Stones" while "Rocks Off" was listed as "THE Rolling Stones." As I said, I was all about first impressions back then, and I still remember the first time I heard "Rocks Off" (again, in my dad's car.) Not only were those raggedy, lopsided horns striking, but it was memorable because there just weren't that many Rolling Stones songs you were likely to encounter out in the world for the first time. You'll hear "Sympathy For the Devil" a hundred times before "Rocks Off" once.



All told, this mix CD represents every decade from the 60s to the then-current 2000s, in the form of a recent Beck song, the speaker-busting, booty-shaking "Epro" and a tune off the Killers' debut album. I was slow to embrace the Killers, maybe I haven't even, but I first heard "Mr. Brightside" when I was traveling for a funeral. That shit sticks with you. That context makes everything seem deep and poignant. You know what else I once heard on the way to a funeral? "Reelin' In The Years" by Steely Dan. How's that for a mindfuck?



(Note that the "Mr. Brightside" I wound up with was a weird, stripped-down alternate version, because that was a thing that happened back in the early days on downloading. Not that I ever knew the difference, until last year. I like mine better.)

Which brings me to the KoRn issue. They already had a whiff of "been and gone" by 2005, when I was 17. They were popular with angsty teens in the late 90s, when my older brothers and cousin needed something loud to blast. And I went along with them, like the bratty little brother. But when you're 17, and your sense of the passage of time hasn't fully evened out yet, anything more than a few years old is fucking OLD. So when I was in the car with my friend Josh, and he popped KoRn's Greatest Hits into the CD player, I thought he was fucking kidding. I may have been an angsty teenager (as angsty and acne-prone as they come!) but I had standards.

But, like most angry music, it was a convenient thrill: something loud and abrasive and faux-deep I could plug into my ears to drown out the world. It's not like I was suddenly a baggy jeans wearing nu-metalhead, a convert to the gospel of Jonathan Davis, I'm not sure if I ever decided whether I thought "ADIDAS" was meant to be a joke or not. But as a pure listening pleasure, I had no problem putting it in there between Dire Straits and Pink Floyd and Paul McCartney and the Spoons. It was a concrete thing, not a trend I was following. I made a choice to reach back and pull them forward into my 2005 mix. (Besides, I've already praised their "Word Up" cover elsewhere.)



The fucked up thing is that it largely all seems to hold together. Listening to it all now, it has a strange mix of the cool, the overblown, the ragged, the quirky, brutal and the soft. What I like about this mix, exemplified by that weird fistful of KoRn in the middle, is that this is the music that a teenager chose for himself. It has very little to do with the year 2005 (and the songs from that year held up quite well.) It has no care at all for the original context and contradiction between the various songs. It's just a bunch of shit I picked up, like a musical magpie, and kept in a bag together, whether they sat well or not.

Nowadays, I get music from word of mouth, from internet links and workplace buzz. And it's helpful... but boring. There was such a treat in having a private stash for myself.

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Does it Rock? Atlas Genius, "Trojans"



One of the things I've realized since starting this site is that there are a lot of different ways to enjoy music. Sometimes it's as an old favourite, something that you've known your whole life and enjoy because it it's familiar and it calls up fond memories, even if it was "before your time." Sometimes it takes the form of a new fixation: something that, when you discover it, you need to know as much of it as possible. A new favourite singer or band can do this, something that impresses you on every level, from songwriting to performance. I've been blessed, since starting this site, to find a lot of great items for that latter category, from Hollerado to the Hold Steady, Arctic Monkeys to Arcade Fire. Things that I can feel like I can love, but I didn't know about before 2010.

But you can't love everything. Everything can't be excellent, anymore than everything can be terrible. There are a million billion songs floating around the atmosphere right now, and there are reasons all of them got made, but sometimes that reason is just to make music. It becomes the music that fills the background of our everyday lives, that we don't think much about, that is pleasant enough when it's on but maybe not worth obsessing over, but that we still like to hear. I love the Foster the People album, but I don't think much about it when I'm not listening to it. Same with Phoenix. Imagine Dragons is a capable band, I don't need to listen to them when I get home from work but I haven't gotten to the point of turning them off if I hear them. This may also explain the appeal of Mumford & Sons, the Lumineers, Of Monsters and Men and the dozens of bands following that path, to those who aren't into it.

Not everything needs to be a 10/10 to be "good." I don't even have to recommend buying it for it to be good. That may sound, on the face of it, to be a shitty, cynical thing to say, but it's a realistic way to reconcile the fact that there are things you love and things you don't. I don't love Atlas Genius, but I like that it's floating around out there. I think this is perfectly fine music for a summer afternoon, and it will probably be blaring from car windows all summer, so I might as well.

I bought this album. I haven't unwrapped it yet, and I feel like if I do, I won't end up saying much more about it than I already have here. It's a passive pleasure. Some music is just like that, and it isn't the same for everyone, but I think we can all agree it exists. And that's not a bad thing.

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Best Song Ever: May 2013 (Round 2)

Black Keys, "Howling For You" vs. Toadies, "Possum Kingdom"
Winner: "Possum Kingdom"

Gary Clark Jr., "When My Train Pulls In" vs. Lissie, "Record Collector"
Winner: "When My Train Pulls In"

Strokes, "Reptilia" vs. Rolling Stones, "Gimme Shelter"
Winner: "Gimme Shelter"



Led Zeppelin, "When the Levee Breaks" vs. Joel Plaskett Emergency, "Somewhere Else"
Winner: "When the Levee Breaks"



Temptations, "Ain't Too Proud to Beg" vs. Robbie Williams, "Rock DJ"
Winner: "Ain't Too Proud to Beg"

White Stripes, "Stop Breaking Down" vs. Stella Ella Ola, "Summerette"
Winner: "Stop Breaking Down"

Sloan, "The Answer Was You" vs. Rentals, "Move On"
Winner: "The Answer Was You"

Van Halen, "Running With The Devil" vs. The Doors, "Love Her Madly"
Winner: "Running With the Devil"

Feist, "How Come You Never Go There" vs. Who, "Love Reign Oer Me"
Winner: "Love Reign Oer Me"

R.E.M. "Sitting Still" vs. Barenaked Ladies, "The Old Apartment"
Winner: "The Old Apartment"

A weird thing started happening in round 2 of this tournament: the matchups started becoming a lot less outlandish, a lot more even. Not even in the sense of, "How do I choose between these excellent songs," but even in the sense that many of the songs are comparable, and a fairly easy case is to be made why one might be better than the other. I love the Strokes, and there are superficial similarities between them and the Stones, but no-way-no-how is "Reptilia," excellent, bracing, exciting song it is, better than "Gimme Shelter." Likewise, I'd pick Sloan's symphonic power pop pleasure over The Rentals' symphonic power pop pain, the White Stripes' simplicity over Stella Ella Ola's, Van Halen over the Doors... and so forth. There's no shame in Joel Plaskett being felled by that Led Zeppelin song, and while I love Lissie's work, it just has no counter for the gripping guitar work in Gary Clark's.

The most notable matchup above, which were all fairly easy choices for me, was The Black Keys against Toadies. Both are creepy, semi-sexy, sneering, lustful rock songs, but while "Howling For You" is straightahead blues rock (and all the better for it,) Toadies has that 90s quirk, that something extra that every band in that decade needed to survive. I salute it.

Below, however, things started getting trickier. A lot of these are still similar, but a lot harder to pick.

Arcade Fire, "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" vs. The Beatles, "Happiness is a Warm Gun"

An argument could be made that John Lennon was as good on accident (as on the rather tossed-off "Happiness is a Warm Gun") as Arcade Fire is on purpose, but with sheer heart and grandeur, I give it to the new kids. Stunning upset.

Winner: "Neightborhood #1 (Tunnels)"

Weezer, "Say It Ain't So" vs. Smashing Pumpkins, "Tonight Tonight"

Both products of the 90s, both great, but inverse: Weezer was doing rough-edged pop, Pumpkins were doing sweetened art. I think in this case, "Tonight Tonight" is a feeling, and a good one, but "Say It Ain't So" is an emotion: a concrete statement.

Winner: "Say It Ain't So"



Oasis, "Wonderwall" vs. David Bowie, "The Stars (Are Out Tonight)"

If it weren't for the fact that I have to put Nirvana against Radiohead down below, this might be the toughest pick. On the one hand, "Wonderwall" seems really easy to dismiss. It's fluff, it doesn't quite come together, it glides through the mind like the hooky radio pop-via-feels that it is. And the Bowie is rather sophisticated both in its lyrics and its arrangement. Twenty years on, I might be tempted to reject Oasis just based on their reputation, but we never truly do understand our addictions, and there are many ways a song can inject itself into us.

Winner: "Wonderwall"

Belle & Sebastian, "Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John" vs. Exploding Hearts, "Sleeping Aides and Razor Blades"

Here's just about the perfect snapshot of the breadth of "what I am willing to listen to (and love.)" One of these songs features a sultry-sweet guest vocal from Norah Jones. One of them rhymes "so hard" with "retard." And I have trouble choosing between them. It's true! Do I submit to my weepy, twee, chamber pop craving, or fall back on my instincts that everything must rock as much as possible. The perfectly fine-tuned, or the perfectly imperfect?

One of these songs grips me while I'm listening, but one lingers in my bones when it's over.

Winner: "Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John"



Stars, "Wasted Daylight" vs. The Hold Steady, "Lord, I'm Discouraged"

This one was not that hard, per se, and I'd like to renew my warning that my personal affection for this Hold Steady track may ultimately overrule every single other song in this tournament. We'll see. But these aren't without comparison. The Stars song is a wonderfully restrained, depressed, deflated vocal from the lovely Amy Millan, and a very minimal production, even when it "gets going." I would like to praise the whole aesthetic of "Wasted Daylight" as embodying most of what I love about Stars. What the Hold Steady song brings, aside from a perfect evocation of despair that comes close to the brink but never steps over the line into exaggeration and caricature, using tried and true rock methods like a light piano touch and a ringing guitar. It's a staggering giant.

Winner: "Lord, I'm Discouraged"



Radiohead, "Let Down" vs. Nirvana, "Heart-Shaped Box"

Is "Heart-Shaped Box" just a grunge song? Just a lot of sound and fury and distorted guitars? While "Let Down" is a symphonic, dreamlike, or perhaps nightmarish, piece of artwork, a slow-burning rage inside the mind? It's the kind of suppressed fury and outright suspicion at the modern world seeded through the whole of OK Computer, through "Fitter Happier" and "Karma Police." The way it sparkles and lilts as Thom Yorke mumbles, "Don't get sentimental / It always ends up drivel... Let down and hangin' around / Crushed like a bug in the ground..." it's as smart and well crafted as any alt rock song ever was, an elevation of the art form.

But perhaps "Heart-Shaped Box" is something even more rare: it is rage given form. There is something so perfect - a word not to be used lightly - about Nirvana, when they were on. It begins with that deliberately struck chord, notes falling from the sky like bombs. Nirvana's music is not the triumphant ode to swaggering rock and rollism, it's a rejection of everything that's supposed to be good: hate of the world, the culture, the self, the body. Hate of love. Kurt delivers the verses like a prisoner beaten down, the choruses like a revolutionary, with a fury that has never been matched by any vocalist. Guitars wail unprettily, unpreciously, behind him like malevolent demons howling from the pit. It's not for show, it's not a put-on, a pretense for a wicked solo or a snappy hook. He doesn't want you to like it, he wants to troll the fuck out of you. When was the last time you loved a song that hated your guts?

I don't know if I'm right. I don't know if Kurt Cobain would agree, disagree, or even give a shit about my reading of his music. All I know is that he gave it up, he gave it to me, and to all of us, when he killed himself nearly 20 years ago. He left it, and we took it, and I'm keeping it.

Winner: "Heart-Shaped Box"



Monday, May 6, 2013

Feist: Metals

I think it’s pretty neat that, when Feist was ready to capitalize on the popularity of her appearance in an Apple commercial, she went and released an album like this. Specifically, it sounds to me like a Feist album, although it’s the first one I’ve ever listened to, it’s exactly what she should be doing. If there was any pressure to write another giddy-in-love pop tune like “1234,” she didn’t bow to it. And at a time when big voices and big production are the big ticket for female vocalists (as if they ever weren’t?) Leslie Feist releases a soft-focus, broken-down, weepy, whispery lo-fi affair that shows off the unique skillset she’s got, that no one else on the scene really approaches.

It’s got the courage to be quiet, the strength to be sad. And not grandiose, melodramatic, “Someone Like You” sad, although that has its place (as the market has proven!) but quiet, contemplative, sulky, sullen sad, the kind familiar to moody teens and adults alike. She evokes this with her voice that creaks when she pushes it, her phrasing and lyrics, which are the kind of poetry that could easily line notebook margins: all concerned with desolate nature and weather and the world around. There’s also the very, very well-done instrumental arrangement of soft horns, light strings, and discordant olde blues guitars that twang and blare at just at the right time. Sometimes, Feist’s voice disappears right into it. “Undiscovered First” is built around a tambourine that hisses like a rattlesnake, before building to a hymnal war chant. You can tell she comes from the indie world and not the pop one because she’s not afraid to let her songs develop beyond a traditional “hook.”

My favourite tracks are the sultry “How Come We Never Go There,” which like the best points of the album is built around restraint, the mesmerizing “The Bad in Each Other,” the rhythmic “Comfort Me,” and the dusty, willowy “Graveyard.” In general, I like how increased exposure only made Feist want to keep writing Feist songs, being Feist, doing Feist. It’s not easy to be this defiantly yourself. This is some heady stuff and it will not be for everyone. It reminds me of the Low album I reviewed last year, C’mon: it takes patience and intense listening, although it also works in the background as well.

Buy this album now: iTunes (Canada) // iTunes (USA) // Amazon.ca // Amazon.com

Best Song Ever: May 2013 (Round 1 Part 3!)

Lenka, "Heart Skips a Beat" vs. Rentals, "Move On"

While the Lenka song may seem to stand out even amongst my esoteric tastes, I have a lot of respect for good bubblegum pop. It has its purpose and it can be as hard to hit it in all the right ways as it is to make a good rock or indie song. I tweeted a while back that although it's not usually my beat, I would recommend it to anyone looking for that kind of lightness in their life, and I may even do a full write-up of it in the future. And while it might actually be better at what it does than "Move On" by the Rentals is at what it does, I fall for that gentle Moog hum every time.

Winner: "Move On"



Van Halen, "Running With The Devil" vs. Styx, "Mr. Roboto"

"Mr. Roboto" by Styx is a song about a rock musician named Kilroy - specifically Robert Orin Charles Kilroy ("ROCK") who escapes imprisonment by an evil, anti-rock lobby group in the future by disguising himself as one of the ubiquitous robotic janitors present in this future setting. Anything potentially symbolic about this premise is undercut by the incredibly literal lyrics, which go from describing the plot of the rock opera, Kilroy Was Here, to sermonizing its point, in the opening track. I also think Styx might not be the right band to extol the virtues of rock as a voice for rebellious youth, "Renegade" or no. The opposition is a genuinely defiant rock statement demonstrating the true virtues of rock and roll: running with the devil.

I mean, "Mr. Roboto" is still a lot of fun to sing in the shower, but come on.

Winner: "Running With The Devil"



Tom Waits, "Underground" vs. Doors, "Love Her Madly"

I kinda regret not getting much further into the Tom Waits catalog, as of yet, than Swordfishtrombones. I really dig this twisted piece of cabaret, primally-grunted imagery of a literal underground village that brings to mind cave dwellers but also the freaks of the night, the "underground" folks in Waits' audience... I think. The Doors themselves are no strangers to bridging the cap between the center and the outsider, and have probably made more jocks and nerds alike take up recreational drugs than most bands. Is there anything particularly demonstrative of that in "Love Her Madly?" It's a jangly piece of 60s rock, but it still has that Doors bite to it.

Winner: "Love Her Madly"

Pretty Girls Make Graves, "Something Bigger Something Brighter" vs. Feist, "How Come You Never Go There"

Not an easy choice, between the twisted, hyperventilating, high pyrotechnics of PGMG and the slow burn of Feist. I think Leslie Feist just uses her vocals and her arrangement skills for best effect all over that album and that song in particular.

Winner: "How Come You Never Go There"

Stevie Wonder, "Signed, Sealed, Delivered" vs. Who, "Love Reign Oer Me"

With my particular tastes, the choice seems pretty clear but I want you to know it wasn't as easy as all that. I hate the idea that "Signed, Sealed, Delivered," or any Motown hit, is "merely" a good pop song. That's all they set out to do, not win irrelevant internet contests or reach decades of acclaim, and they did so perfectly. What an ebullient pop single, wrapped around the premise of crawling back to a partner, on hands and knees, and offering yourself right up to them. It feels like a spiritual experience, like all great music does. But the Who, as they are always in their best moments, are so grandiose, so inescapable. I don't think you have to be a larger-than-life rock epic to win this tournament, but it helps.

Winner: "Love Reign Oer Me"



Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds, "Dream On" vs. R.E.M., "Sitting Still"

It almost feels like Noel Gallagher shouldn't be permitted another song in this tournament, since we've already had Oasis. But no, on a technicality, this is a "different artist," and a damn good song. Noel knows his business an every inch of his solo debut seems calculated to be the best, most immaculate possible version of his music. And that's cool, I liked it, I'd recommend it. I'd also recommend R.E.M., for pretty much any time and place. Their classic 80s sound was so organic-sounding that it sounds like they grew them, and picked them when they were ripe, rather than wrote them like anyone else would.

Winner: "Sitting Still"

Barenaked Ladies, "The Old Apartment" vs. Dum Dum Girls, "Yours Alone"

Much love to the Dum Dum Girls, whose glossy garage sound is something fresh. They've got the tunes and the attitude and the lyrics to back them up. Personally, I've just always been way into Barenaked Ladies, who are kind of a "you dig it or you don't" prospect. I like how they express their perspective on this, that skewed sensibility about relationships and human quirks, habits, hangups. The narrator of the song is hung up on the past: not an ex-lover, but literally a different time in his life when he was still with that person, just living in a different place. It's a weird form of nostalgia and self-examination (or avoidance thereof) that isn't often seen in pop music, and done in that attention-grabbing three chord bash out. These guys were just great at what they did.

Winner: "The Old Apartment"




Saturday, May 4, 2013

Best Song Ever: May 2013 (Round 1 Part 2)

The bottom half of the Best Song Ever (May 2013) tournament was even more vexing than the top, and I still haven't reached a verdict on the last batch. But I was determined to get some content up tonight, so I fought my way through what I could. As with last time, we'll be using the video component to take a look at a few of the losing numbers in this one.

Flaming Lips, "Fight Test" vs. Weezer, "Say It Ain't So"

Funny, how the Weezer song is a heavy examination of a son's relationship with his father, and the Flaming Lips song cribs from a Cat Stevens song called "Father and Son." The Lips do an admirable job, creating a dreamy soundscape on which top hang their lyrics, but this Weezer song shows a very particular skill at marrying a catchy, memorable pop tune to a sincere yet still skewed lyric.

Winner: "Say It Ain't So"



Fang Island, "Chompers" vs. Smashing Pumpkins, "Tonight Tonight"

This is more of a tossup than I would think, given the cred behind "Tonight Tonight." There are a lot of arguments against everything Billy Corgan's ever done, and "Chompers" is quite frankly and excellent exercise in Fang Island's transcendent riffage. But I do have a weak spot for the times when I believe Corgan got it right, and his sense of composition, of production, of putting every damn thing in the exact right place is in perfect work here.

Winner: "Tonight Tonight"

Temptations, "Ain't Too Proud To Beg" vs. Locksley, "One More Minute"

The easiest pick of this lot was the Temptations vs. Locksley. And I love Locksley, guys, they're a top-notch power pop band with old school leanings, but I think in future rounds, we will get a lot of opportunities to extol the virtues of this singular masterpiece that is "Ain't Too Proud to Beg."

Winner: "Ain't Too Proud to Beg"

Robbie Williams, "Rock DJ" vs. Cage the Elephant, "Aberdeen"

I really like "Aberdeen," for a 2010s-era alt rock romper, but the gloriously to-the-limit production of this Robbie Williams song kind of reminds me why people listen to pop music to begin with. (Although to listen to it nowadays you'd mainly have to be a weirdo with a 90s obsession. Hi guys!)

Winner: "Rock DJ"



Stars, "Wasted Daylight" vs. No Doubt, "Hey Baby"

Some songs, man. Some songs transport you to a whole different time and place. "Wasted Daylight" brings me back to the very beginning of this blog, in January or February of 2011. I was slogging through the slush on the University campus, doing last-minute readings for English Lit courses between classes and napping at the library and living in the isolating fluorescent light of a train or the isolating mass of a University lecture hall. "Hey Baby," meanwhile, takes me back to Grade 9, and... man, that's just about all you need to know.

Winner: "Wasted Daylight"

Darkness, "I Believe In a Thing Called Love" vs. Hold Steady, "Lord I'm Discouraged"

It's not true that any vaguely sensitive tune will beat out any rock song. I want you to know that. But this is not just any song, honestly, I think "Lord I'm Discouraged" might be the dark horse favourite to win this whole damn thing, it's that good.

Winner: "Lord I'm Discouraged"



White Stripes, "Stop Breaking Down" vs. Deer Tick, "Electric"

Case in point - Deer Tick put up a really great tune that blends a softly-struck electric keyboard with strings, but I've got to give it up for Jack White's soul splintering Robert Johnson cover.

Winner: "Stop Breaking Down"

Stella Ella Ola, "Summerette" vs. Dan Mangan, "Post-War Blues"

While I appreciate what Dan Mangan does, I think there's such pure joy in Stella Ella Ola's music that they should at least pass through to round two.

Winner: "Summerette"



Coral, "Precious Eyes" vs. Sloan, "The Answer Was You"

The Coral's Nightfreak and the Sons of Becker album is definitely something that's bigger than the sum of its parts, a bunch of ragged, hardly-produced, barely-even-written tunes that capture a lonely, haunted mood. Sloan's The Double Cross is also bigger than the sum of its parts, but its parts are so good.

Winner: "The Answer Was You"

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Best Song Ever: May 2013 (Round 1 Part 1)

Unexpectedly, last month's Best Song Ever tournament had a beneficial outcome besides giving me a way to wring a few more drops of precious content onto this site. It caused me to start thinking about songs in a new way. What started as an idle exercise, the kind you do when you're a teenager hanging out in a basement ("Zeppelin or Who?") caused me to really think about these songs and what their respective merits were: what I wanted out of them, and what it means for one to be "better" than another. As I said last time, it's pointless to rant works of art and entertainment: ideally, they all succeed on merits that have nothing to do with each other. It's not a competition. Or at least, it's not supposed to be.

But it is. It's a competition for your attention, your interest, your passion. Every song you've got in your library is fighting with every other song to be your go-to tune. Every album vying to for that first position. Whether it's because of brilliant lyrics, catchy hooks, artful arrangement or nostalgic memories of a time and place (never take that out of the occasion) every song has something going for it against all the others.

These tournaments are obviously far from definitive, and there will always be a chance that the winners only correspond to "this day and time." That yesterday I might have put one song over the other instead. Indeed there are many close calls here, and as I'm writing this, several that I'm undecided about.

There are a couple of notable changes from last time, besides the fact that I've expanded out to 64 entrants (because I hate myself.) There are no duplicate artists: I wanted to get the playing field as wide as possible, so if an artist was selected by the randomized playlist more than once I simply chose which song of theirs I wanted in. No songs from last month's tournament were included either, for obvious reasons, although I would have included one that didn't make it out of the first round if it came up. Like I said, it's a random selection from my personal playlist, so there will be songs I have covered in the 2.5 years of SOTW, or intend to cover in the upcoming, as well as many great tunes you may or may not be familiar with, and random bits that either you didn't know I was into, or mean absolutely nothing to you. I hope some of the dialogue on these songs, even the losing ones, inspires you to check something out, because in general I think it's fair to say I don't listen to anything that isn't awesome. That's what makes it so much fun to do this, in the end.

It's always hard to pick these things, but the funny thing is that when the time came to crown last months' Best Song Ever, "Once in a Lifetime" by Talking Heads, I don't for a second doubt that it deserved it. "Behind Blue Eyes" maybe could have won, too, both were worthy opponents, but I wound up with a song that could genuinely be called the Best Ever. This tournament served its purpose.

I also learned not to post videos from songs that won, since hey, they'll still be around. So intermittently, we'll be taking a look at the songs that didn't win.

Oasis, "Wonderwall" vs. Arctic Monkeys, "From the Ritz to the Rubble"

I hate this tournament already.

I love the Arctic Monkeys. I do, and this song flipping rawx. Not to mention, "Wonderwall" is more than a little bit of a cliche, played out over the years to the point where it's shorthand for "douchey faux-sensitive acoustic guitar playing hipster." But I myself once made the argument that the song had indeed made its impact, and that cliches become cliche for a reason, and listening to it, or attempting to, with fresh ears, bears this out. Every inch of fame and infamy this song has, it's earned. It has a place in the culture that this particular Arctic Monkeys tune doesn't quite (although the album it's on certainly does.) This is enough to send Oasis through to the next round, but maybe not much further. We'll see.

Winner: "Wonderwall"



Aerosmith, "Hangman Jury" vs. David Bowie, "The Stars (Are Out Tonight)"

And now I really hate this tournament. Because it's so easy to say "Oh, this is a new Bowie, it hasn't had time to ingratiate itself, especially compared to this Aerosmith song." And don't let me be misunderstood, this is quite the Aerosmith song. This is Aerosmith channelling the bluesmen of yore and covering Lead Belly, with flourishes of the 80s pop-metal that they were peddling at the time to show why exactly they were so great at what they do, why they were allowed a type of comeback that few bands have ever pulled off in history of pop music. That slide guitar, that swampy vocal, that voodoo mystique... it all adds up to a handy explanation why I initiated a side-project extolling this band's virtues last year. Although Permanent Vacation, their 1987 comeback that featured this, was an imperfect album, this was a pretty perfect Aerosmith song.

But the new Bowie is a pretty goddamn riveting listen and this is one of the best songs on it. It's a searing, rage-choked indictment of celebrity culture, a piece of mini-drama that is a worthy addition to the Bowie canon. It's classic Bowie. It's excellent. And while the Aerosmith song looms large in my head, and maybe a year from now I won't be so hot on the new Bowie, I have to give it the nod.

Winner: "The Stars (Are Out Tonight)"



Hüsker Dü, "Something I Learned Today" vs. Black Keys, "Howling For You"

I could be cheeky and just pick the Black Keys so I don't have to use the umlauts on Hüsker Dü in future articles, but that's not a dealbreaker really. While "Something I Learned today" has that great, fiery garage punk lo-fi sound, "Howling For You" is a classic slow burn. Like the Oasis, above, it's become something of a cliche now, in ads and movies, but there's a reason why things become that way. Because they just flat out do something right. And The Black Keys became popular for all the right reasons. They were doing something nobody else was doing as well as they were.

Winner: "Howling For You"



Toadies, "Possum Kingdom" vs. Zeus, "Heavy On Me"

"Heavy On Me" is a pretty laudable song, but everything about "Possum Kingdom" is transcendently awesome. "Do you wanna die? / Do you wanna die? / Do you wanna die? / Do you wanna die? / DO YOU WANNA DIE? / DOOO YOU WANNA DIEEEE? / DOOO YA WANNA DIEEEEE???? / DOOOOOO YAAAA WANNNNAAAA DIEEEEE?!?!?!?!?"

Winner: "Possum Kingdom"

Arcade Fire, "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" vs. Black Lips, "Bicentennial Man"

Although not necessarily my favourite Arcade Fire song, "Neighborhood #1" contains all the elements that makes this band great: obscure, poetic, whimsical lyrics, unusual yet affecting instrumentation, a classic indie rock sensibility. Black Lips' psychedelic surf punk is pretty fun to listen to as well, and was one of the real finds of 2011. I am, however, unsure what if any connection this has to the Robin Williams film. Long story short: AF nearly went all the way last time, it looks like they might go even further this month.

Winner: "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)"

Beatles, "Happiness is a Warm Gun" vs. Death from Above 1979, "Blood On Our Hands"

As much as I love the raucous madness of DFA1979, this would be the Beatles' to lose. I happen to have a lot of affection for this White Album curio, which sort of embodies the whole spirit of the album.

Winner: "Happiness is a Warm Gun"



New York Dolls, "Personality Crisis" vs. Gary Clark Jr., "When My Train Comes In"

As I certainly don't get tired of pointing out, Gary Clark's guitar work is absolutely thrilling to listen to. As much respect as I have for the Dolls in the full flight of their mad glam days, I'm going with the new guy.

Winner: "When My Train Comes In"



Marble Index, "I Die" vs. Lissie, "Record Collector"

Here we have two competitors from the early days of SOTW: the intense conclusion to the Marble Index's first album, and the stellar opening to Lissie's. I took issue with it at the time, in the sense that it was a bit less raw than her live covers, but it suits her well, shows off her skills and her band.

Winner: "Record Collector"

Strokes, "Reptilia" vs. Sheryl Crow, "All I Wanna Do"

Perhaps the biggest mismatch of this entire bracket? I probably have an irrational love for "All I Wanna Do." It has a consummate 90s vibe, the idea of throwing your cares away and escaping to a dingy bar and meeting crazy characters and making observations. It's gentle fun. "Reptilia" is just as much a product of its time, a polished early-2000s "don't give a fuck" rocker. Everyone in the band is at their best in this one.

Winner: "Reptilia"

Hollies, "Bus Stop" vs. Rolling Stones, "Gimme Shelter"

I might be the only person who would even have to think twice about this one (the Hollies are underrated!) but I don't think I'm going to lose any sleep over it.

Winner: "Gimme Shelter"

Sam Roberts Band, "I Feel You" vs. Radiohead, "Let Down"

The best song off Sam Roberts' 2011 Collider album is, in its way, Radioheadlike, but maybe a bit more radio-ready, using a towering, inhuman riff to call for human compassion and interaction, with razor sharp, vaguely disaffected lyrics. "Let Down" is an excellent song, too, probably one of my favourites off OK Computer, with its languid, sedated, despairing tones... it sums up the joys of listening to Radiohead as much as "Paranoid Android" or "Karma Police."

Winner: "Let Down"



Nirvana, "Heart Shaped Box" vs. Clash, "Wrong Em Boyo"

The Clash's London Calling is a bewildering, great, varied, globe-spanning album that integrated punk rage into the voice of history and geography: "Wrong Em Boyo" is a ska experiment that tells the American folklore story of Stagger Lee. It's a pretty great song. But "Heart Shaped Box" is one of those quintessential Nirvana tracks for a reason, expressing all the angst and anxiety of love and parenthood (and childhood) in that brutal Cobain imagery. And it's got that great chorus.

Winner: "Heart Shaped Box"

Belle & Sebastian, "Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John" vs. Metric, "Black Sheep"

"Black Sheep" is Metric at the height of their powers, (right before people started hating them apparently?) with all the gripping, pulse-pounding synth-infused rock that entails. Brie Larson performs it as Envy Adams in one of the showstopping moments of the the Scott Pilgrim movie. "Little Lou..." is an intimate ballad where Stuart Murdoch duets with Norah Jones. It contains the line "What a waste, I could have been your lover / What a waste I could have been your friend." It never fails to kill me.

Winner: "Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John"



Exploding Hearts, "Sleeping Aides and Razor Blades" vs. Creedence Clearwater Revival, "Walk on the Water"

I think, first off, that CCR gets too little credit for their trippy, psychedelic funk exploits: Fogerty's voice in particular seems to carry a weightier, out-of-reality tone than the stereotypical "Looking Out My Backdoor" image people have of them. Nobody ever thinks of this song and I only first heard it a few years ago in the form of a cover by Richard Hell & The Voidoids. I bet this one was incredible live. However, in the last tournament, Exploding Hearts did pretty damn well with the brashness and charm, and this is my favourite song by them.

Winner: "Sleeping Aides and Razor Blades"



Led Zeppelin, "When the Levee Breaks" vs. Pixies, "Debaser"

The best Led Zeppelin song over 6 minutes, or an icon of 80s alt rock? Either way I lose. Or win, because I get to keep listening to awesome music no matter which way I go. As much as I approve of the Pixies' shout out to Un Chien Andalou, it's those John Bonham drums that keep me up at night. This is why Led Zeppelin is Led Zeppelin.

Winner: "When The Levee Breaks"

Walkmen, "Love is Luck" vs. Joel Plaskett Emergency, "Somewhere Else"

All due respect to the Walkmen and this very good tune off their 2012 album Heaven, but Joel Plaskett forever.

Winner: "Somewhere Else"