“Spirit of ’95” – Murdocks
Sunny power pop crossed with something trickier and edgier. I hesitate, however, to use the “punk pop” (or is it “pop punk”?) label, because to me that implies something (sorry to say) dumber and less nuanced that this little two-minute gem. Not that many punk pop bands write in 3/4 time, to begin with. This is no waltz, however–these guys have figured out how to make three-beated measures sound assertive and symmetrical. Punchy verses with an ascending tail alternate with an almost lilting chorus…and that’s more or less the song. The lyrics basically stop less than halfway through; the song has such intriguing momentum one barely notices.
A lot of “Spirit of ’95″‘s edginess is delivered via singer/guitarist Franklin Morris’s no holds barred singing–he sounds perpetually on the verge of screaming, and yet comes across as warm and musical at the same time. Some of that feeling is generated specifically from the chorus, with its attractive, downward-trending, octave-spanning melody. I like by the way how he then uses a guitar break to give us a nice variation of the same line. That’ll really get it stuck in your head.
Murdocks are a trio from Austin that have been playing since 2003, although no longer with their original drummer or bass player. “Spirit of ’95” is from the band’s Roar! EP, which was released in April on Surprise Truck Entertainment.
Free and legal MP3: Mark Northfield (alt-classical ‘pop’ from UK)
“Zero” – Mark Northfield
And now for something completely different. Mark Northfield is a British pianist, composer, arranger, and sometime singer who has here taken his classical training and focused it on the production of something almost but not quite resembling a pop song. Beginning quietly, with voice and piano, “Zero” adds guitar, strings, and, eventually, a choir-like array of backing vocals; the piece evolves gently but determinedly towards two climaxes, the first string-driven, contained, and unresolved (roughly 3:08 through 3:25), the second louder, more fervent, and choral (beginning around 5:06).
Pay attention throughout to the string arrangements, which are expressive but never pushy; the song is half over before he puts the strings center stage, and some of the nicest work comes after their “solo,” when the violins, with restraint, offer high fills between lyrical phrases.
“Zero” is a song from the CD Ascendant, which Northfield released on his own Substantive Recordings label earlier this year. On eight of the songs, Northfield doesn’t sing himself, employing an assortment of guest vocalists, but on “Zero,” it’s him. An important aspect of the CD is that the nine songs are presented in an uninterrupted flow–as Northfield notes on his web site, the album is “designed to be heard (in a shuffle-free world) from start to finish, with introductions to each track lifting re-arranged fragments from elsewhere on the album to create a more or less continuous soundtrack.” And yet Northfield is of course not unaware of how most people listen to their music in the 21st century; he is kind enough to offer seven of the songs in so-called “chopped” mode on his web site, including “Zero.” Thanks to Owen Duff, himself a Fingertips-featured artist, for the head’s up.
New Fingertips Contest: win the Joe Strummer documentary, plus soundtrack
There’s a new Fingertips Contest, now online, with two related prizes: a copy of the movie The Future Is Unwritten on DVD, and a copy of the movie’s soundtrack on CD. The Future Is Unwritten is a documentary about the life of the late, lamented Joe Strummer, due out on DVD this week. Contest details here.
Free and legal MP3: Amy Ray
Indigo Girl, gone solo, kicks ass
“Blame is a Killer” – Amy Ray
Tough, tight, crunchy rock’n’roll from Indigo Girl Amy Ray, who for the third time now trots out her kick-ass side on a solo record. Nothing complicated to report on, just a fast, slashing guitar attack counterbalanced by some nice chords and background harmonies in the chorus.
That said, listen to how concise a sound Ray is working with here–the song rocks hard, but there’s no sloppiness, no stray sounds, no wailing or echoing guitars, no extraneous drum bashing, no casually interacting instruments; “Blame is a Killer” drives forward with the compressed vitality of a Strokes song, leading me to half expect to hear Ray’s voice processed through some sort of filter or distortion. Maybe that’s why the fully sung and harmonized chorus feels especially refreshing after the clipped vocal phrases utilized in the verses.
“Blame is a Killer” is a track from Didn’t It Feel Kinder, Ray’s third album as a solo artist, which will be released in August on Daemon Records, a not-for-profit record label founded by Ray back in 1990.
Laura Marling has a free and legal MP3 (18-year-old British singer/songwriter, with depth)
“I’m a Fly” – Laura Marling
Here’s one young British import who a) doesn’t sing with an affected “street” accent, b) understands the utility of two names, and c) is interested in more than regaling us with tales of her dysfunctional love life, thank goodness.
Everything about this short, precise song is warm and appealing, from its harp-like, folk-infused ukelele work through its subtly effective instrumentation and Marling’s clear and compelling voice, both musically and lyrically. Listen in particular to how her backing vocals (it sounds sometimes like multi-tracked humming) are used almost as part of the rhythm section, adding a wonderful, organic sort of texture to a song that accomplishes the unusual trick of sounding traditional and post-modern at the same time.
All of 18 years old at this point, Marling released her debut album, Alas, I Cannot Swim, to much acclaim in the U.K. in February. Astralwerks will be releasing the CD in the U.S. in August. “I’m a Fly” is a newer song, not from the CD; it can be found as a b-side on an EP released in the U.K. in June. MP3 via music.download.com.
Free and legal MP3 from Paper Rival (Shins-ish folk rock, w/ fiddle)
“Cassandra” – Paper Rival
The mournful fiddle melody and the crisp tom-tom beat, playing through alternating major and minor chords: what we have here is one smart and engaging introduction–and (better luck!), a song that lives up to its intro’s promise.
A mysterious reimagination of the cursed prophet of doom, “Cassandra” chugs along with a bittersweet, Shins-like sort of vibrancy, its leisurely melody lines unfolding against an unobtrusive but carefully constructed percussive backdrop. The fiddle is central to the vibe, its disconsolate strain standing in for the prophet’s voice, in a tone reminiscent of the gypsy violin Scarlet Rivera brought, memorably, to Bob Dylan’s Desire album back in the day.
Paper Rival is a quintet from Nashville that did business as Keating until discovering that another band had the rights to the name; they chose their new name as a good-natured nose-thumbing to the gang that got to the Keating name first. “Cassandra” can be found on the band’s debut full-length CD, Dialog, released in early June on Photo Finish Records. MP3 via Insound.
Free and legal MP3: Jessie Baylin (smartly put together singer/songwriter pop)
“Was I On Your Mind” – Jessie Baylin
“Was I On Your Mind” has the hallmarks of a great pop hit—hooks, craft, canny performance—and yet is unlikely to be anything of the sort here in 2008, just because who the hell knows anymore. The music market is as unhinged as the oil market. History teaches us, however, that craziness is always an aberration in the long run. There is no reason to assume that a song as crisp, well put together, and engagingly sung as this one won’t again find favor with the general public, but, alas, it’ll probably be too late for Ms. Baylin.
Fingertips, of course, exists in a sort of alternative universe in which what matters is the song, the spirit, the intelligence, the ineffable spark of human-to-human connection. So as far as I’m concerned this song is already a hit—an incisive example of how it’s really really okay to apply polish and know-how to songwriting, at least when such things avoid cliché and are grounded in a voice, both lyrically and musically, that’s feels real, solid, true. With her dusky alto and nimble delivery, the New Jersey-born, L.A.-based Baylin sounds to me, fetchingly, like Shawn Colvin doing a Sam Phillips impression; to the insistently upward, yearning melody of the chorus, she adds a textured presence that pretty much melts me. I like too how even in the context of this smartly produced number, little quirks can be found, including how the end note she hits repeatedly on the word “wrong” strikes the ear as unresolved, and how she breaks the songwriter “rule” of making the title the most repeated phrase in the song (which in this case would be “Tell Me I’m Wrong”).
You’ll find this one on Baylin’s new CD, Firesight, released this week on Verve Forecast. Produced by Roger Moutenot (Yo La Tengo, Sleater-Kinney), this is the 24-year-old’s second album; the first, You, was an iTunes-only self-release.
Free, legal MP3: Afternoons (orchestral, neo-hippie vibe meets solid songwriting)
“Say Yes” – Afternoons
This one carries the wacky, group-sing, neo-hippie vibe of the Polyphonic Spree but with the added benefit of really solid songwriting.
“Say Yes” unfolds with a jaunty, trumpet-led rhythm augmented by a loopy backing vocal that brings the Star Trek theme song to mind. In the indie world, lots of songs pretty much end there–quirky, big-ensemble intro, and that’s all we get. To its credit, “Say Yes” develops resoundingly beyond its minute-long intro, presenting us next with a verse featuring a non-repeating melody that stretches out for more than 40 seconds, incorporating 18 measures of music. That’s all but unheard of in a rock band, but then again, Afternoons are an idiosyncratic rock band at best, being a seven-piece ensemble that includes two drummers, a trumpet player, and a classically trained opera singer. Three of the seven players were in the L.A.-based band Irving, which has been put aside now that that band’s side projects have apparently overshadowed the main act (another Irving offshoot is Sea Wolf).
The chorus, by the way, is nicely thought out too, and an apt counterpart to the extended verse: simply the words “say yes,” architected into the bouncy trumpet refrain of the introduction. For something this big-hearted and loose-limbed, “Say Yes” is a pretty tight composition. It will eventually appear on Afternoons’ debut CD, which is recorded but seems to lack, thus far, a release date. The band has been selling EPs at shows in L.A. but that’s about it so far. MP3 courtesy of Irving’s web site. Thanks to Filter for the tip.
Free and legal MP3: William F. Gibbs (dreamy yet incisive piano ballad)
“Operate” – William F. Gibbs
He’s got a name like a character actor or a middle school principal, but he’s got the dreamy voice of a romantic troubadour, a guy who’s seen enough to abandon his dreams but hangs onto them anyway.
A steady, unhurried piano ballad with an immediately engaging melody, “Operate” comes alive via a combination of Gibbs’ singing (don’t miss the phased harmonies at 1:47) and some lovely, understated guitar work. From the outset, an acoustic guitar plays in tandem with the piano, but often just at the edges of awareness; sometimes you can hear fingers moving along strings more prominently than the actual notes, which adds to an interesting sort of tension the song sustains between movement and languidness. Best of all are the dreamy slide guitar licks that get a little showcase from 1:06 through 1:32, returning in only the most whispery way through the rest of the song.
“Operate” is a track from My Fellow Sophisticates, Gibbs’ debut CD, released earlier this month on Old Man Records.
Free and legal MP3 from Joe Pug (Dylanesque youngster with heady lyrics and a big heart)
“Hymn #101” – Joe Pug
Had the Bob Dylan haunting the Greenwich Village folk scene in 1961 and 1962 augmented his sociopolitical preoccupation with a wide-eyed spiritual awareness, he might have composed a spare, literate neo-folk marvel such as “Hymn #101.” Carefully written and plainly presented (just guitar and voice, thank you), “Hymn #101” glows with humanity and intellect, its simple Dylanesque melody hosting any number of unexpected observations and descriptions, delivered with a voice that channels not only the great one from Hibbing but multiple generations of “next Dylans” as well, from John Prine to Steve Earle to Josh Ritter and then some.
While a potent cultural critique is layered into the song’s semi-mysterious lyrics, what moves me the most here are the moments when Pug reveals a metaphysical depth not often encountered on the indie scene. The conclusion he works up to is all but breathtaking: “Will you recognize my face/When God’s awful grace/Strips me of my jacket and my vest/And reveals all the treasure in my chest.”
“Hymn #101” can be found on Joe Pug’s debut EP, Nation of Heat, self-released in May; MP3 via his web site. And by the way, can this be his real name? Joe Pug? His biographical information is so scanty that I suspect he’s intent on another Dylanesque maneuver: romantic obfuscation of his past.
Fingertips 