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Free and legal MP3: Fanfarlo (sparkly and quirky, a la Talking Heads 77)

“Harold T. Wilkins” – Fanfarlo

Sparkly and quirky-poppy in a way that harkens back to early Talking Heads, “Harold T. Wilkins” shows off this London-based sextet’s capacity to turn its interest in historical obscurities into offbeat but engaging pop. (The band named itself after the poet Baudelaire’s one novella, so they’re serious about this stuff.) Wilkins was a British journalist who wrote on a number of subjects, including the paranormal; one specialty of his was researching ancient flying-saucer sightings. You won’t catch any of that from the song, however, in part because David Byrne-ish singer Simon Aurell sings in that way that lets you hear individual words more than complete sentences. You might wonder why a band would use specific, obscure references only to present in such a way as to keep them obscure, but it’s no different, really, from any song in which you can’t fully understand the lyrics. And I for one would rather encounter unintelligible lyrics about an obscure British writer (he also, it seems, reported on early TV experiments) than about another relationship gone bad.

The song’s full name is actually “Harold T. Wilkins, Or How To Wait For A Very Long Time,” and I’m feeling a strong sense of expectation throughout the song, produced first and foremost by that recurring mandolin motif in the verse–a short, cycling figure that doesn’t resolve as much as set us up for endless repetition. The chorus loses the mandolin and picks up an authoritative beat and some appealing melodic twists, and yet in the end fosters a renewed sense of anticipation via its unusual structure: it features six lyrical lines, following a rough AABBCC rhyme scheme, while the music offers an ABCDCD pattern. Which is to say it would have sounded finished after four lines; the extra two leave us less resolved as we glide back into waiting mode.

You’ll find this one on Reservoir, the band’s first full-length CD, which was self-released last month. MP3 via SXSW, where the band is playing this week, along with 700,000 others.

Free and legal MP3:Bishop Allen (jaunty, curious, and likable)

“The Ancient Commonsense of Things” – Bishop Allen

The Brooklyn-based duo Bishop Allen is one of the most likable bands in the kooky and sometimes unlikable world of indie rock. They are, indeed, likable at every level of activity, from the general vibe of their songs to the individual musical components employed to, even, the band’s sense of graphic design and their collective prose voice.

“The Ancient Commonsense of Things”: even a likable song title, yes? Makes you kind of relax, stop Twittering for a minute and just breathe. We were human beings before we chained ourselves to one sort of keyboard or another. As the lyrics offer the merest of sketches, the music quickly envelops you with its at once cheerful and intimate presence–it’s a soft song that sounds loud, a fast song that feels easy-going. Bright and lively percussion drive the piece–mostly sticks and clicks and xylophone–while the minimalist lyrics compare time-tested objects (a hammer, a clothespin, a cork) to the power of a soul mate. And it works, in part because of singer Justin Rice’s quizzical voice, which does both plain-spoken and buoyant equally well. The song might have benefited from one more verse, but Rice’s repetition of the titular phrase is so simultaneously jaunty and curious that I’m kind of digging the “less is more” approach. And whether that’s a bass solo or a guitar solo there at 1:40, I like its plucked sparseness–just these particular notes, in this particular order, over that clicky-clacky-chuggy-chimey background.

While Rice and Christian Rudder, who met at Harvard, are the two-man core of the group, Bishop Allen performs with other musicians, who are at least informally band members while the recording and touring goes on (a current video shows a band of five, in fact). “The Ancient Commonsense of Things” can be found on Grrr…, the band’s new CD, being released this week on Dead Oceans. MP3 via the band’s site.

Free and legal MP3 from St. Vincent (quirky, orchestral, nostaglic, with shredding)

“The Strangers” – St. Vincent
     Annie Clark, who by herself is St. Vincent, is an elusive talent. Be seduced by her charming, idiosyncratic voice, with tinges of jazz singer about it; be intrigued by her lush, unusual arrangements; be surprised by that wallop of crazed guitar noise (it’s a taste of what is known as “shredding”) that invades an otherwise airy-sounding song two-thirds of the way in. (Then again, she’s repeatedly singing about painting the black hole blacker, so maybe this isn’t so airy after all.) Get to the end of the song and be unsure about what you just heard, but with the feeling that you want to hear it again.
     Clark was inspired on this new album–entitled Actor–by some of her favorite old movies, including older Disney features, envisioning each song as a sort of “secret film score,” according to her press material. There is surely a touch of ’40s cartoonishness about the short vocal/orchestral intro, the (perhaps synthesized) string- and woodwind-flecked instrumentation, and the recurring backing vocal stylings, which sound furthermore as if processed through an old radio receiver. The song slides along with a glistening retro sheen that blithely contradicts the substantive quirkiness underneath, which includes: a melody that refuses to have any part of the beat; unabashed orchestral maneuverings; subtle injections of electronics; and the lack of any particularly recognizable structure. (Note in the melody a sort of deconstruction of the ’20s nugget, “Bye Bye Blackbird”; could this relate to the “black hole blacker” bit?) Clark has said that she wanted to make the songs on the album “technicolor animatronic rides.” Whatever such a thing is, “The Strangers” is surely one of them.
     Born in Oklahoma, Clark, like Bishop Allen above, is based in Brooklyn, surely one of the great hubs of ’00s indie music. “The Strangers” is the first song on the new album, St. Vincent’s second, which is due out in May on 4AD Records. MP3 via 4AD.

Free and legal MP3: Kinch (mesmerizing melody, with time signature tricks)

“The Economic Chastisement” – Kinch

This song has a central time-signature complication going on but it took me any number of listens to notice. Which speaks to a songwriting feat I’m particularly fond of: not merely a time-signature complication, but a complication that doesn’t draw undue attention to itself. I like when the unusual is disguised as normal. (A related trick, similarly tasty: disguising the normal as unusual.)

Basically you’ve got an ongoing three-beat rhythm regularly interrupted by one two-beat rhythm–I’m guessing two 6/8 measures followed by a 5/8, but who knows. The more interesting thing is how this asymmetry is adroitly masked. First, notice the pulse-like drumbeat, which for the first minute sounds quite literally like a heartbeat, implying a steadiness that isn’t actually there. Second, for all the implied motion in the song, the melody is focused on one note for a whole lot of the time. It gets kind of mesmerizing, particularly in combination with that cycling, just this side of comical piano vamp that kicks in at around 1:20. Another point of distraction is how the song comes to a near-complete stop during that brief, immobile chorus or bridge or whatever that is between verses. We notice that, but we don’t notice the fact that there’s no way to tap your toe to the song consistently even when the song starts moving again.

Kinch is a four-piece from Phoenix; their name is the nickname given to Stephen Daedalus by (stately, plump) Buck Mulligan in Ulysses. “The Economic Chastisement” is the title track to a three-song EP the band self-released last month. If the title carries with it the weighty suggestion that we’re all complicit in the rearing up of the so-called Great Recession, I have the feeling the band would be satisfied. They themselves are looking for no handout–the EP is available as a free and legal download on the band’s web site, as is their entire first full-length CD, released last year. “These songs are meant to be shared,” the band writes. “Please feel free to send them to anyone you like.” It’s a different kind of stimulus package.

Fingertips Q&A with Joey Barro (the Traditionist)

This month, Fingertips fires off five questions about the state of the music industry to Joey Barro, a singer/songwriter from Southern California currently doing musical business as The Traditionist. When he’s not showing off his extra three arms (note photo to left), Barro is also front man for the Antiques, based in Los Angeles. Season to Season, the debut album from the Traditionist, is being released this month on Better Looking Records. “I Know My Ocean,” a song from that album, was featured on Fingertips in January.

What the Fingertips Top 10 looks like now (10 favorite current free and legal MP3s)

1. “River of Dirt” – Marissa Nadler
2. “No One’s Better Sake” – Little Joy
3. “I Know My Ocean” – The Traditionist
4. “Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh” – Say Hi
5. “The Sun Ain’t Shining No More” – The Asteroids Galaxy Tour

Free and legal MP3 from Say Hi (brisk, brilliantly constructed indie pop)

“Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh” – Say Hi
     Say Hi, which started life in 2002 as Say Hi To Your Mom, has always been lumped into the lo-fi crowd, which seems the fate of anyone who goes the “bedroom rock” route, writing and recording and playing the instruments and fiddling with electronics pretty much alone at home. But let it be stated for the record that Eric Elbogen, Say Hi’s Seattle-based mastermind, is now, even if he hasn’t always been, much more than a lo-fi rocker. This guy knows how to put a song together, and doesn’t mind showing us.
      And yet the cool thing is that “Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh” is sophisticated in what strikes me as a new and impressive way. The music is by and large uncomplicated and yet completely well-rounded, by which I mean the various sounds and sections and rhythms blend to create a whole that doesn’t merely sound like this or that part of it. Too much lo-fi music is maddeningly one-dimensional, sounding as if the creator can’t quite picture the end result while putting the pieces together. Here, Elbogen works with discrete elements–the syncopated horn-like synthesizer of the introduction, a repeating bass drum rumble, crisply recorded acoustic guitar (complete with finger squeakings), a direct, garage-y lead guitar line–and stirs them into a brisk, cohesive, elusive song about an alluring girl and what he may or may not be doing with her. His reverby vocals slide beautifully in and around the precisely constructed landscape, singing a rapid-fire melody that seems more casual than it actually is. The simple repeated syllables of the chorus (and the title) similarly belie the savvy required to weave them into this bewitching little song.
     “Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh” is from Say Hi’s new album, Oohs and Aahs, released this week on Barsuk Records. MP3 via Barsuk.

Free and legal MP3: Camera Obscura (happy/sad reverb rock, from Scotland)

“My Maudlin Career” – Camera Obscura

And speaking of reverb, well, here you are. Camera Obscura has built a sturdy sound around a spacious, melancholy reverb, affecting not just lead singer Tracyanne Campbell’s voice but, it seems, the entire rest of the band as well. Combine this with a knack for nostalgic beats and bittersweet lyrics and we end up pretty much suffused with a happy kind of sadness that only certain kinds of pop songs can deliver. This one carries an extra bonus ironic twist, as the song’s narrator, contrary to all musical cues, insists by the end that she will not be sad again. As the extra bonus ironic saying goes, good luck with that.

The (reverbed) keyboard motif that launches the song and recurs throughout is the spine which supports the whole–ongoing, upward-yearning octaves and near octaves that can almost sound optimistic if you’re not listening carefully, and against which Campbell’s disconsolate purr feels particularly star-crossed. Pianist Carey Lander is apparently playing ABBA’s piano on this track, which seems to me another ironic touch, another way the band is playing with bubblegummy nostalgia but finding their own present-day substance in the process.

“My Maudlin Career” is the title track to the fourth Camera Obscura album, due out next month on 4AD Records (this will be the band’s fourth record label in four tries). MP3 via the band’s site.

Free and legal MP3 from Middle Distance Runner (engaging rock, with stylish drumming)

“The Sun and Earth” – Middle Distance Runner
     Drumming plays a tricky role in rock. Without drums, there’s no rock to be had. You need them. But you also don’t really want to notice them. Because there’s almost no difference between noticeable and too noticeable when it comes to drums, and once they’re too noticeable, the song doesn’t have much of a chance.
      One of the reasons I like “The Sun and Earth” so much is because drummer Erik Dean (also one of the band’s founders and songwriters) has found a way to give the drums a defining place within the song without overwhelming the sound. It’s pretty much all tom-toms here, which is one way to move the sound down in the mix–you notice it more in your gut than in your head. That singer Stephen Kilroy has such an appealing and elastic tenor helps, also, keep the drums in the background, where they belong, even as they remain simultaneously central to the developing vibe. When the pleasing, tumbling tom-toms stop entirely for the quiet bridge at 2:39, and the narrator expresses his bewilderment at being left by a lover, he surely does sound awfully alone.
     Middle Distance Runner is a quintet from Washington, D.C. that may now actually be a quartet (available information appears contradictory at this point). They were featured once before on Fingertips, in March 2007. As noted at the time, these guys put forth a jokey front (check out their web site’s FAQ, for example) but if they are smart enough to know that the Earth is in fact closer to the Sun in the winter (at least in the Northern Hemisphere), and then to use this as a viable metaphor in a song, then they’re not nearly as dumb as they look, as it were. “The Sun and Earth” is a song from the band’s EP (called, it seems, EP), which was self-released in the fall, but getting a renewed push as the band hits the road this spring. Thanks to Filter for the head’s up.

Five free and legal MP3s but no reviews this week

Fingertips is taking a late winter vacation. There will be no “This Week’s Finds” this week. The home office will be shut down through February 28. “This Week’s Finds” will return on Monday March 2 (or, okay, maybe Tuesday March 3).

For those who would like some new music, albeit without the usual commentary, here are links to five songs I’ve been listening closely in recent days (or, in some cases, weeks). Any one of these may yet end up featured with a review, but you can take a listen in advance and see how they strike you:

* “My Maudlin Career” – Camera Obscura
* “Better at the End of the Day” – Sarah Borges and the Broken Singles
* “The Ancient Common Sense of Things” – Bishop Allen
* “Everything All at Once” – the Rest
* “The Sun and the Earth” – Middle Distance Runner

Note that three of these bands–Camera Obscura, Bishop Allen, and Middle Distance Runner–have been previously featured on Fingertips. You can look them up via the Master Artist List. Bishop Allen has appeared twice previously, in fact (note to self: put these guys in the Select Artist Guide already).

And consider taking the time you’re saving this week by not having to read three lengthy MP3 reviews and using it to become a fan of Fingertips on Facebook or, perchance, a follower of Fingertips on Twitter. It’s easy and, apparently, fun.