Just as a sop to new readers, who may be doing their Blaugustian duty, trying to read everything everyone posts, like I am at the moment but it's only three days in, so who knows how long that will last? I'll mention that music posts here get about half the views of anything else.
Even regular readers skip them and you can, too. Don't feel obligated. We can't all enjoy everything or even understand it. I know I'm certainly not going to be reading all the tech/code posts coming at me over the coming month.
Of course, if you do tap out you're gonna miss some
superfine songs and some stimulating visuals. Also some of my
louchest, loosest prose because syntax dissolves in music. I probably ought
to content warn for some of it,too, although just what I can't specify. I
don't know what I'm going to run with yet. Probably best say all of it.
I don't know what'll make the cut but I do know what's in the long list and there's for sure some mildly NSFW stuff in there, although god knows if you're reading this somewhere you can play music videos with the sound up while you're working, it's a fair bet no-one's going to call you on anything I'm likely to link.
Also, where the hell is it you work and are they hiring?
Introductions over. Time for the tunes.
Guess - Charli XCX feat. Billie Eilish
Oh, come on! It couldn't have been anything else, now, could it? Getting a slight and utterly ridiculous pushback that had Finneas coming all big brothery over, which was sweet as hell. Charli being Charli, so perfect, but Billie's the revelation.
Watch her deliver. She sells every line. The way she moves, looks, prowls. Such presence. And her phrasing. Wow.
All that and I didn't even say Brat Summer once. Oops...
Did I blow your speakers? Sorry about that. I guess it's all about that bass
now. We like it.
The upcoming album is called Baggy$$. This sounds like it came straight from a mid-90s Chemical Brothers session, which makes it post-Baggy by about four or five years at least in my timeline. Maybe that's not what they mean. I'm guessing they're not actually big French Connection fans, either.
Superstar - Hinds
Everything sounds nineties now, doesn't it? I mean, I keep reading we're in the eye of a 2010s revival, first half of the decade anyway (Honestly, there are people seriously and genuinely nostalgic for the early 2020s now. I wonder just how fast the drum can spin?) and yet I hear pre-millennial boom and drone in half the stuff I listen to, even if it was made last week or last month.
Just a year ago Every. Goddam. Thing. sounded like it was dug out of a crate
at the back of record store that went out of business due to lack of customers
in 1982. We've moved on and about time. Can't say I miss
that trope.
Not, you understand, that I'm complaining. Music has turned into something
strange and wonderful, loosed from time, disconnected from culture, just pure
sound again. Celebrate it even if it drives you crazy trying to label it.
Rockstar - Lisa
See, now, this is pop music. It must be. It's on the charts and Lisa's a pop star. From one of the planet's biggest pop bands (Blackpink, which I did not need to tell you.) And yet, is it?
If this is pop then pop is not what pop was and also not what pop will be.
That's what so great about it and why you should never stop listtening to it.
I did, once, but I got over it.
Also, who could resist programming Rockstar after Superstar? Not me, apparently.
Kate Spade - Coco & Clair Clair
And obviously the last two ought to be followed by something called Popstar but I only know one good song called Popstar and that's Pop Star by Coco & Clair and I already ran that one.
Pop Star is a much better song, too. I don't think Kate Spade is their best work but even a regular-quality Coco & Clair is a joy to have and we should all be thankful when a new one drops. Still, I wouldn't blame you if you clicked through to listen to Pop Star again instead. That's what I'm doing right now.
Money & The Drugs - Party Dozen
There's a strong strobe warning on this one which I want to re-iterate before
we go on. Content and trigger warnings are nice but this is something that
could kill you.
I was chatting with Mrs Bhagpuss the other day (She might characterise it as arguing...) about something Richard Osman said in the podcast he does with Marina Hyde, which Mrs Bhagpuss watches (Yes, watches. It's on YouTube so how it's a podcast escapes me...) and I am going to but haven't gotten around to yet. Osman claimed (With research to back him up.) that almost no groups ever get anywhere in the British charts any more, not this millennium, pretty much. It's all solo acts.
This may or may not be true. I asked Gemini to do the math for me but as usual, when you ask an AI to do pretty much anything that requires some actual research, it copped out and told me I'd be better off doing it myself. Anyway, my point - and, yes, I do have one - is that for quite a while now, duos have been characterized as groups.
I suppose they always have been. Medicine Head was a group with two
people in it in the 1960s. So was the original Tyrannosaurus Rex. And
The Carpenters, now I think of it, and The Proclaimers, which is
hopefully the one and only time they'll get a mention on this blog. The
Proclaimers, that is, not The Carpenters. I love The Carpenters, as
does any right-thinking person.
No-one ever called Simon and Garfunkel a "group", though, nor
The Everly Brothers. I wonder how those labels get hung? Is it just if
you make up a name and don't use the ones you were given? Or is it iof you
both only sing and maybe hold a guitar but someone else does the actual
music?
Most two-person groups these days are a drummer (It's always a drummer.) and
either a guitarist or a bass-player. You don't see many with a drummer and a
sax player, especially one who uses the sax as a mic.
This is too much now. I need to make a post about two person groups. Noted.
Lucky (Stripped) - Halsey
That I should be so lucky to live to see a time when Brittney Spears is a revered artist and an inspirer of work like this. That we all should.
Stay well, Halsey.
Là je suis saoule - Clio
I have a bit of a thing for French chanson. I may not have mentioned that, mostly because I know nothing about it and I don't want to embarass myself. I know I like rooftops and stripey shirts, though.
One more soft one then a couple of bangers and we're done, I think. Don't want to overstay.
Your Drive Home - Tough Front
Doesn't start out soft but give it time. Not to give out spoilers but it goes into what ought to be a middle-eight about a minute or so in and never comes out the far side. I guess the drive home went into a tunnel. Brave.
I love the video. So much work went into it. Try getting an AI to do something like that. See? Nothing to worry about.
Coke and Mentos - Harmony
She is the Harmony from Buffy, isn't she? Got to be.
If you thought Buffy ended when the TV show stopped, you have to read the comics, by the way. Sooo good.
And finally...
Call Me - The Last Dinner Party
I was saving this for my next Covers post but I have an absolute ton of covers stashed away now and who knows when I'll ever get around to sharing them. This is far too good to hide away in a folder. It's positively imperial. Their own stuff is top class but they really excel at covers and they have impeccable taste - as in they cover songs I both know and like...
Plus if you made it all the way to the end of this post you really deserve some kind of reward.
Posts
I really should be paying more attention to The Last Dinner Party.
ReplyDeleteThey're turning out to be quite a big deal over here. Not sure how far that's going to to travel.
Delete"If this is pop then pop is not what pop was and also not what pop will be. That's what so great about it and why you should never stop listtening to it. I did, once, but I got over it." Same, Bhagpuss. Same.
ReplyDeleteGosh Haley's got such a gorgeous voice. I really should read/listen to that Britney Spears memoir, actually. I hear it's being made into a biopic.
The whole Britney phenomenon mostly passed me by at the time so I could do with catching up on the story, too.
Delete