Category: MP3s

Free and legal MP3: Old Canes(drum-fueled folk rock)

“Little Bird Courage” – Old Canes

It’s unusual for a song that feels like some kind of folk rock to have this much percussive appeal, but “Little Bird Courage” is all about the drumming from the get-go–we pretty much don’t even hear anything else until almost 20 seconds in. And this is in fact how Old Canes front man and master mind Chris Crisci envisions his songs—he records the drum tracks first, and builds the songs up from there.

Everything ends up feeling rhythmic and propulsive as a result. With its vibrant but informal energy, spurred by relentlessly strummed acoustic guitars and accentuated by Crisci’s mixed-down vocals, “Little Bird Courage” has the vibe of a happier incarnation of Neutral Milk Hotel, an impression accentuated by the homely chorus of trumpets that appears halfway through, just when the whole thing seemed to be grinding to a halt. While it’s hard to pick up a lot of the lyrics, I get the impression of something transcendent and triumphant here; the title alone speaks volumes.

Chris Crisci is perhaps better known as a member of the Appleseed Cast, the Lawrence, Kansas-based band usually identified as being a “post-rock” pioneer; Old Canes has been a side project of his dating back to 2004. “Little Bird Courage” is from Feral Harmonic, the second Old Canes album, slated for release next week by Saddle Creek Records.

Free and legal MP3: Rainbow Arabia(stylish, engaging world music admixture)

“Harlem Sunrise” – Rainbow Arabia

This one morphs before your startled ears from a vaguely Middle Eastern sounding dance with an electro-beat and kitchen sink percussion into a vaguely Caribbean steel-drum-inflected shuffle with some African guitar thrown in for good measure. Too much pastiche for its own good? Or is “Harlem Sunrise,” rather, an audacious 21st-century stylistic mash-up? I vote for the latter. Nothing this warm and welcoming can be disparaged, in my book, nor something that manages, for all its sonic salmagundi and home-built vibe, to proceed with an air of the timeless about it. Even singer Tiffany Preston’s slightly pouty and distant voice, artfully reverbed and tweaked, works better here than it maybe should.

And I in any case am entirely in favor of major-key songs with minor-key introductions. That’s a nice songwriting trick you don’t hear much of in modern pop.

Rainbow Arabia–and the band name kind of immediately hints at what they’re up to–is a L.A.-based husband-wife duo (Tiffany sings and plays guitar; Danny does the keyboards and electronics). “Harlem Sunrise” is a song from their Kabukimono EP, which was released in July by Manimal Vinyl, also based in L.A. (Manimal Vinyl, by the way, is a name that does not hint at what they’re up to; the label does in fact release things on CD and digitally in addition to vinyl.) Thanks to Linda at Speed of Dark for the head’s up on this one. MP3 via RCRD LBL, and note that the link is not direct; just click “Download MP3” and it’s yours.

Free and legal MP3: Wiretree (power pop with ’70s roots)

“Back in Town” – Wiretree

Brisk, spangly power pop from an Austin-based quartet. Equal parts mid-career Wilco and early (or late; who can say?) Traveling Wilburys, “Back in Town” is a friendly, xylophone-flecked burst of tunefulness, anchored in singer Kevin Peroni’s pliable, evocative voice. What he sounds like, in a nutshell, is the ’70s–Harry Nilsson, George Harrison, and Jeff Lynne rolled up into one. Works for me.

And if there are a few relative oldsters out there who recognize the chorus of the Indigo Girls song “Jonas & Ezekiel” in the chorus of “Back in Town,” well, I’m always kind of tickled rather than irritated by inadvertent melody transference like this. First off, it’s a heck of a good melody–I might dare to call it anthemic except I fear that word has been neutered by years of overuse. Second, the songs don’t otherwise have anything to do with each other. I don’t mind greeting an old friend in a new outfit.

“Back in Town” is a song from the band’s second full-length album, Luck, ready for release next week on their own Cobaltworks label.

Free and legal MP3: Cameron McGill & What Army (straightforward sound, wonderful song)

“Madeline, Every Girl” – Cameron McGill & What Army

A truly wonderful song from beginning to end. But a funny thing: every time the tempo falters, because of how the song is constructed, I find myself almost annoyed because of how much I was digging the forward-moving energy that’s now interrupted. And it happens in the chorus, just when I might be expecting more rather than less motion. But then each time the tempo picks back up with the new verse, I realize that maybe I’m enjoying the faster-paced section precisely because of the repeated way it pulls back. Life is like that too. Oh, and check out how, the second time we hear the chorus, McGill picks up the tempo before the end (2:00). Feels very satisfying somehow. But the third time is the best–he kicks it up for just a moment (3:22), and somehow that’s most satisfying of all.

While Cameron McGill & What Army often play music with a definite folk-rock or folk-pop feel, “Madeline, Every Girl” is, in this age of micro-genres, maybe too straightforward for any workable label: it’s just guitar and bass and drums playing together without any particular fuss or special flavor. Some songs depend upon their instrumentation and arrangement for their very existence, and other songs, like this one, exist so strongly as things unto themselves that you could probably play them on a toy xylophone and they would still shine through.

Cameron McGill is a Chicago-based singer/songwriter who released an album called Warm Songs for Cold Shoulders, his fourth, back in April on Parasol Records. “Madeline, Every Girl” is the a-side of a three-song digital single released last month called Two Hits and a Miss, which is available via iTunes. MP3 courtesy of Parasol.

Free and legal MP3: The Black Hollies (groovy neo-garage rock)

“Gloomy Monday Morning” – the Black Hollies

A deeply groovy shot of neo-garage rock, “Gloomy Monday Morning” is both steeped in nostalgia and alive with freshly-minted energy. Sure, there’s a big-time Animals/Zombies/’60s-Kinks vibe at work here, but it’s almost like this New Jersey quartet is using the bygone sound as an instrument they’re playing rather than as a straitjacket limiting their buoyancy, if that makes any sense.

The song consistently works at two different, typically contradictory levels. For instance, while blatantly backbeat driven and cymbal heavy, “Gloomy Monday Morning” also employs subtle keyboard accents and a frisky bass line to catch the ear nearly below the level of conscious awareness. Even the backbeat isn’t as straightforward as it seems, working with a kind of stutter that both accentuates and deflects the two and four beat accent. Listen, also, to how a simple maneuver–that upward turn of melody that we first hear at 0:49 in the chorus, and then also in the third line of the second verse (1:08)–serves to break the song open. And what’s with that cymbal sound? It’s so persistent during the chorus and the bridge that it sounds less like an organically played cymbal than a sample played from a keyboard, and is used as a sort of wall-of-sound whitewash at that point more than percussion–a tactic that is, characteristically, somehow, at once heavy-handed and enigmatic. Even the title seemingly contradicts the song’s groove.

“Gloomy Monday Morning” is from the band’s third full-length album, Softly Towards the Light, which was released this week by the Brooklyn-based Ernest Jenning Record Co. MP3 via EJRC.

Free and legal MP3: Morningbell (spoke-sung verses, vigorous rhythms)

“Marching Off To War” – Morningbell

Equal parts character and commitment, “Marching Off To War” props itself on top of some seriously good-natured drumming and never looks back. The verses–all two of them–involve some smiley, spoke-sung lyrics that serve as gatekeepers to the body-shaking rhythmic attack of the chorus, in which singer/guitarist Travis Atria wails the repeated line “Marching off to war” in full Perry Farrell mode. Is there a disconnect here between the jolly sounds and the somber words? I’m guessing that’s the point. Note the way the chorus ends with a line that comes across as a throwaway–“I don’t care what you say anymore”–but may indeed be the fulcrum of the song.

Because that’s exactly what happens when human beings are rallied to act against their own better natures: they must be jollied up to the point where they don’t want to know there’s another way to look at the situation. Don’t bother me, I’m marching off to war. My head’s full of happy nonsense. Whatever the latest war is. (The war against health care reform will do.) “I don’t care what you think anymore,” is how the line goes later in the song.

Named after the Radiohead song (and why not; Radiohead too made a one-word name for themselves from another band’s two-word song title), Morningbell is a quartet from Gainesville. Travis’s brother Eric plays bass (and, Radiohead-ishly, theremin), and Eric’s wife Stacie plays keys. (The exhilarating drummer, not related, is named Chris Hillman, of all things.) The band was previously featured here in May 2007. “Marching Off To War” will be found on their fourth and forthcoming album, Sincerely, Severely, slated for release on the band’s own non-profit label, Orange Records, in December.

Free and legal MP3: Spider(quiet, simmering)

Spider

“Petal Song” – Spider

This may not sound at first like a song that’s going to kick out with a minute-long Pink Floydian guitar solo, but how often, actually, are things exactly what they seem? (cf. “Things are not as they seem. Nor are they otherwise,” as per the Buddha.)

“Petal Song” may well begin quietly but there’s something simmering from the outset–most notably Jane Herships (aka Spider) herself. Some vocalists with quavering voices sing like it’s all they can do to make an audible sound, the quavering in this case being a sign of near exhaustion. The quaver in Herships’ voice, by contrast, has the feeling of someone holding back something mighty. She shakes from the effort of keeping contained. In that context, the electric outburst at the end is maybe even inevitable. Before you get there, however, be sure to sink into the subtly gorgeous melodies Herships has crafted along the way–in both the matter-of-fact verse and the swaying chorus–and the engaging, shifting ways she sings them.

“The Petal Song” is from Things We Liked To Hold, Spider’s new, self-released CD. MP3 via Last.fm, where you can listen to the whole thing, and also download four other free and legal MP3s. Spider by the way was previously featured on Fingertips in 2006, and was also one of the stars of the late, lamented Fingertips: Unwebbed CD.

Free and legal MP3: Sea Wolf (agile, subtly orchestrated)

“Wicked Blood” – Sea Wolf

A dreamy wash of tingly synthesizers leads us into an agile, subtly orchestrated tune with a mixed-down piano vamp (itself intriguing; mostly when someone is pounding a piano, it’s just about all you can hear) and a hint of portentousness. When Alex Brown Church starts singing (and hm, we have two solo performers this week who record using an animal name), that sense of something impending, even prophetic, in the air is further accentuated both by his slightly husky but resonant baritone–it is a voice ready to pronounce something–and by the elusive stream of words he sings. The words resist a narrative throughline but are full of concrete images: veils and curls and mountains and chandeliers and waterfalls and such. Ever since Dylan went electric, this has been a surefire way to sow intrigue and anticipation in a pop song: give us lots of good nouns. We don’t know how that ember got in those rafters, or where the rafters even are, but we emotionally respond to the threat.

Church first gained indie notice as a member of the LA band Irving, which formed back in 1998. As he began writing songs that didn’t seem like Irving songs, he started performing on his own, as Sea Wolf, in 2003. (So you know, Irving has spawned at least one other side project–Afternoons, who were featured here last year; Irving itself is on hiatus at this point.) “Wicked Blood” is the lead track off White Water, White Bloom, the second Sea Wolf album, which came out last week on Dangerbird Records. MP3 via the good folks at Better Propaganda.

Free and legal MP3: Basia Bulat (charming shot of rustic exuberance)

“Gold Rush” – Basia Bulat

Eager youth and venerable tradition is a compelling combination, and a perpetual argument against sourpusses who rise with foolish predictability, in every generation, to proclaim that good music ended at some lamented moment in the receding past. Good music never stops arriving; good listening frequently grinds to a halt, however.

“Gold Rush” is a particularly charming amalgam of the old and the new. The old registers in the exuberant, rustic vibe embodied by a stringed managerie that includes fiddles and Bulat’s signature autoharp; the new is all in the song’s energy: in Bulat’s freewheeling vocals, in the galloping percussion, and maybe best of all in her innate sense of drama. This young Canadian knows just when to pull back and when to let loose–listen to how well, for instance, the song’s rollicking momentum is set up by the opening section, with its deliberate series of staccato fiddle chords; check out, also, how she clears space for those out-of-the-blue but abruptly perfect harmony vocals in the bridge (1:42). And she wraps up this spirited rollercoaster ride in a nifty three and a half minutes.

“Gold Rush” is the first song made available from Bulat’s upcoming Heart Of My Own, her second album, scheduled for release in January on Rough Trade/Beggars. MP3 via the Beggars Group.

Free and legal MP3: Land of Talk (powerful return of Fingertips fave)

“May You Never” – Land of Talk

Another song with an introduction that’s sparser and slower than the song it introduces, “May You Never” starts with spacey/chimey sounds, a semi-pentatonic piano riff, and some ultra echoey vocals from smudgy-voiced Lizzie Powell over a doleful kettle drum. It sounds all indie-mystical, but at 0:51 the beat kicks in, and the guitar grabs the piano’s motif so effectively that you see you’ve been set up all along. The song is sharp and powerful, and driven by Powell’s mysterious way with a melodic refrain.

This is Land of Talk’s third time on Fingertips, and it is apparently impossible for me to talk about them without mentioning Powell’s crazy-delicious guitar playing, so here I am again, telling you not only to tune in for the short but sizzling solo (at 2:00) but to keep your ears on what she’s up to in and around the rest of the song, including how she starts the coda with a literal bang (3:30) and ends it (if you listen carefully) with an echo of the song’s very first notes.

“May You Never” will be one of four tracks on the band’s forthcoming Fun and Laughter EP, slated to arrive next month via Saddle Creek. The band is meager with bio info, so I’m not sure how many people are playing with Powell at this point; the bigger news in any case is that she appears to be fully recovered from vocal cord surgery in January that sidelined her just when the band was geared up to promote their last CD. MP3 courtesy of Saddle Creek.