Fingertips

Free and legal MP3: Tristen

Fresh, snappy, carefree

<h4"baby drugs"="" -="" tristen

The perpetual pop paradox is that we love fresh, snappy, catchy music and yet when it really really works, when it’s super-duper fresh and snappy and catchy, it can spread its joy maybe too widely, maybe even get caught up in a cultural moment, and then the fresh and snappy and catchy gets over-exposed, played to death, and sounds like our worst enemy rather than the best friend it used to be. Think K.T. Tunstall’s “Suddenly I See,” as one example. There are many others; feel free to discuss amongst yourselves.

“Baby Drugs,” from the one-named Nashville-based singer/songwriter Tristen, is exactly this kind of fresh, snappy, catchy, carefree, spirited romp that anyone with a smile in his or her heart would want in a music collection, on a hard drive, in a playlist, coming out of speakers or ear buds, on a bright blue day or a blowy rainy day or anything in between (consult a nearby window to see which applies). Those crisp guitars, that toe-tapping backbeat, those overlapping, descending melody lines in the non-chorus-like chorus. It’s not very complicated, which itself becomes another perpetual pop paradox: a song has to sound simple to stick with you, but if it’s too simple it can seem a waste of mind-space, basically. The trick, I think, is that not everything that sounds simple is actually all that simple. Good pop finds a way to channel sophistication through accessible gestures. Having a voice with a bell-like clarity, as Tristen does, doesn’t hurt. Neither does being two and a half minutes long.

“Baby Drugs” is the backing side of Tristen’s 7-inch single, “Eager For Your Love,” released last month on American Myth Recordings. Her full-length debut, Charlatans at the Gate, is due out in February. ~~MP3 via American Myth.~~

Free and legal MP3: Remate (breezy international indie pop)

There’s something ineffably marvelous about this Spanish-language bit of international indie pop. On top of its lazy, head-bopping beat, we get a fuzzy guitar, a chipper cello (courtesy of Julia Kent, of Antony & the Johnsons), chimey percussion, hand claps, and, among other things, a ukulele played by Stephin Merritt.

“Gigante” – Remate

Ha, so look—the British Sea Power folks have finally moved beyond their predilection for one-name names and they are joined this week on Fingertips by two musicians employing one-name names. Everything connects; you just need the right cords. (Not to mention chords.)

In any case, there’s something ineffably marvelous about this Spanish-language bit of international indie pop. On top of its lazy, head-bopping beat, we get a fuzzy guitar, a chipper cello (courtesy of Julia Kent, of Antony & the Johnsons), chimey percussion, hand claps, and, among other things, a ukulele played by Stephin Merritt. (Merritt was brought into the project by producer LD Beghtol, who had collaborated on the Magnetic Field’s magnum opus, 69 Love Songs.) I like how the song manages to be at once kitchen-sinky and tightly disciplined, and I like most of all Remate’s breezy-breathy-earthy tenor, and how he kind of calls the meeting to order with his laid-back phrasing and the culminating repeated question: ~~“¿Donde está?” Maybe “Where is she?,” maybe “Where is it?” but in any case,~~ “¿Donde están?”—where are they? But whoever or whatever he’s looking for, he sounds actually less concerned than maybe bemused, an affect amplified when the echoing synth line we first heard after the repeated question becomes an almost lighthearted chorus of “la-la-las” towards the end of the song (2:21).

Remate is a Madrid-based musician whose upcoming album, recorded in NYC, features songs that are each about a different adult-movie actress who uses the last name “Luv”—“14 songs of misspelled love or something like William Shakespeare on the porno industry,” in Remate’s words. The album is called Superluv: Por Lo Que Tiene de Romantico and will be out on Everlasting Records in Spain in January; a US release slated for the spring.

Free and legal MP3: Rusty Willoughby (sad & gentle, like a lullaby)

“C’mon C’mon” – Rusty Willoughby

A gentle 3/4-time lullaby, “C’mon C’mon” sways with wistful momentum, down but not out. “How many times must a broken heart still break?” Willoughby sings, in his old-fashioned, Nick Lowe-ian voice. Cue the mournful cello. Keep the background sweet and clean. Pair Willoughby with a singer so in sync—Rachel Flotard, of Visqueen—that her harmonies feel like they’re also coming out of his mouth. This is one sweet sad humble centered song. This is a value judgment against neither gentleman, but consider Rusty Willoughby the anti-Kanye West.

The New York-born Willoughby has operated from Seattle since the ’80s, having fronted a series of well-regarded, left-of-center bands over the years, including Pure Joy, Flop, and Llama. “C’mon C’mon” is from the new album Cobirds Unite, released last week on the Seattle label Local 638.

Free and legal MP3: Roman Ruins

Electro pop w/ bashy beat & odd beauty

“The Comedown” – Roman Ruins

Spacious, stately electro pop with a bashy beat and a swirly sensibility. The vocals land in that nether space between reverb and mud, lending a DIY-ishness to a song that is nonetheless precisely if mysteriously crafted. The long instrumental section that begins at 2:25 and pretty much closes the song out seems on the one hand the kind of meandering mush I steer clear of and yet on the other hand is a weird kind of compelling, unfolding into something oddly beautiful. For instance, there’s something in the layering of synthesizer and noise that goes on between 2:53 and 3:00 that feels careful and deep. And then there’s the casual return of those heavenly vocals (3:14) that we heard previously but then had disappeared. Take beauty where you can find it, my friends.

Roman Ruins is a side project for Graham Hill, who at this point is better known as the touring drummer for the bands Beach House and Papercuts. “The Comedown” was released as a 7-inch single in July on the Oakland-based label Gold Robot Records. The single actually began as a Kickstarter project, a collaboration between Hill and an artist named Hunter Mack, delivering both a vinyl record and a limited art print to fans who funded it. MP3 via Gold Robot. Thanks to the blog My Eyes Are Diamonds for the head’s up.

Free and legal MP3: Bad Books (punchy power pop, w/ lyrical vigor)

“You Wouldn’t Have To Ask” – Bad Books

Sounding like something the Breeders might have recorded for Beatles ’65, “You Wouldn’t Have To Ask” hangs its musical hopes and dreams upon that left-field chord we hear first at 0:07 and then keep waiting to hear a few more times. But this song is so sturdy and succinct we actually hear it only once more, with emphasis (1:06), in the instrumental run-through of the verse. It’s a set-up chord, a place you go to but can’t stay at, so what we’re really waiting for is not the chord again as much as the payoff. Said payoff is delivered via that very Beatley chord progression from 1:39 to 1:41, which in turns sets up the equally Beatley set of concluding chords from 1:46 to 1:50. The song ends there on a dime because, well, it’s done its job.

And that would be enough already, but “You Wouldn’t Have To Ask” is much enhanced by its off-handedly brilliant lyrical conceit, which provides a truly great pop songwriting moment: the titular phrase is a powerful way of communicating both the connection and the disconnection between two people. If I had what you’re looking for I’d give it to you, the singer says: “You wouldn’t have to ask.” But a darker side is implied, since theoretically the other person knows this too; “You wouldn’t have to ask” may, therefore, be either pledge (“I’d give it without your asking”) or accusation (“You know I don’t have it, so why are you asking?”) and most likely a complex blend of both. Even in this short song, the complexities of the phrase are developed and deepened; I find the last iteration especially haunting, with the singer at the end now saying, “If I could help you/You wouldn’t have to ask.”

Bad Books is a project fronted by Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter Kevin Devine and Andy Hull, of Atlanta’s Manchester Orchestra; other members of Manchester Orchestra comprise the rest of the band. “You Wouldn’t Have To Ask” is a song from the group’s self-titled debut, which was released digitally last month and physically this month on Favorite Gentlemen Recordings, a label founded in Atlanta by members of Manchester Orchestra. MP3 via Favorite Gentlemen. Thanks to the blog Eardrums for the lead.

Free and legal MP3: Telekinesis (buzzy power pop)

The Seattle-based one-man-band Telekinesis is back with more of that chunky, buzzy, power poppy goodness.

“Car Crash” – Telekinesis

The Seattle-based one-man-band Telekinesis is back with more of that chunky, buzzy, power poppy goodness. “Car Crash” starts with a thin, AM-radio sound and a rich, NRBQ-ish melody. Roughly 30 seconds in, the full sound hits—and a bottom-heavy sound at that, all fuzzy bass and driving percussion—but hang on a second, what’s he actually singing about?: “Will I die alone?/You know, I’m so concerned/You know, I’m so confused/Like a lost child, a little lost child.” This is surely not what the music is telling us, so yeah, this is one of those “sad words/happy music” juxtapositions that can be so strangely appealing. Let’s not forget that this zippy, sing-along-y confection is called “Car Crash,” after all. And while it may be reasonable to imagine the end of love as a car crash, I think I’m hearing here the equation of a car crash to the random, uncontrollable, confusing beginning part, too: falling in love as car crash.

Telekinesis is the work of 24-year-old Seattle-based singer/songwriter/drummer Michael Benjamin Lerner. Like last year’s self-titled debut album, the new Telekinesis album was produced by Chris Walla (Death Cab For Cutie) and performed largely by Lerner. He is however taking two band mates on the road and has intimated that Telekinesis may be in the process of turning into an actual band (a “power trio,” in his words). The forthcoming album is called 12 Desperate Straight Lines and will be released on Merge Records in February. ~~MP3 via Spin.com.~~

Free and legal MP3: Young Galaxy (dreamy pseudo-tropical groove)

Sleek, sultry, and groovy—as in, it has a groove—“Peripheral Visionaries” sounds like dance music for the sleep-deprived: you kind of want to move around, but maybe not as much as you want to nurse one last cocktail and just kind of zone out, with a blurry smile on your face.

“Peripheral Visionaries” – Young Galaxy

This one’s all about sound construction, about how sounds of different tone and fiber interact. Listen, first, to whatever it is that sounds somehow like an electronic accordion—you hear it first in the introduction at around 0:10—and then listen to how, underneath the male vocal in particular, it produces an Auto-Tune-like effect, but far less awful, thankfully. (Unless that is, also, Auto-Tune and I’m god forbid getting used to it.) There’s a definitive way this sound adds something visceral to the song that is nevertheless neither rhythm nor volume nor melody. Then there’s that plucky, rapid-fire synthesizer (I think) that builds interest and character against the more languorous beat. Those two sounds, weaving in and around each other, are the backbone of this deceptively easy-going piece; together they create an almost palpable sense of…breathing, somehow. Like the song is breathing itself. And okay, maybe I’m the one who is sleep-deprived.

With its dreamy, pseudo-tropical lilt and its studio-crafted textures, “Peripheral Visionaries” is the end result of an unusual collaboration between the Montreal-based Young Galaxy, a quartet previously known for a shoegazy kind of dream pop, and the Swedish producer Dan Lissvik. Apparently, the band completed the album, their third, and sent it off to Lissvik, who twiddled and tweaked and softwared the thing into something quite different than what the band had recorded. The album, appropriately enough, will be called Shapeshifting; it’s coming out on Paper Bag Records in February. MP3 via Paper Bag; thanks to Largehearted Boy for the head’s up.

Free and legal MP3: The Salteens (sparkly, guitar-free ensemble pop)

Check it out: there are no guitars in “Last Train From London,” which could make it the first train song in pop music history that cannot rely on a guitar to create the train vibe.

“Last Train From London” – The Salteens

Check it out: there are no guitars in “Last Train From London,” which could make it the first train song in pop music history that cannot rely on a guitar to create the train vibe. No worries, however—a percussive piano motif does the trick, with a complementary bass and drum part; some well-timed hand claps help too. Even the horns manage to get in on the act; spurred by the chugging percussion, they do, also, contribute to the train-iness of the music, in a subtle and unexpectedly Burt Bacharachian way.

And there certainly are horns aplenty here, as the long-dormant Salteens, now eschewing guitars, expanded from five to ten to create their new. brass-infused sound. The energy is sparkly, and yet the horns play with a wonderful delicacy—there’s no blaring, and no self-conscious “cue the horn charts” kinds of moments; the feel is very ’60s, somewhat soulful, and rather British, even though the band is from Vancouver. Front man Scott Walker brings Stuart Murdoch to mind, but sings with more infectious exuberance than Belle & Sebastian’s mastermind.

“Last Train From London” is the opening track on Grey Eyes, which was released in October on Boompa Records. Note that the band themselves started the label in 2003, to release their second album; note too that the label has since acquired a roster of more than 15 artists, while the Salteens themselves released nothing at all. Situation at long last rectified. MP3 via Boompa.

Fingertips Flashback: Eszter Balint (from March 2004)

A few months ago, I finally got around to seeing Jim Jarmusch’s proto-indie-film classic Stranger Than Paradise. It’s some kind of baleful, minimalist masterpiece, and Eszter Balint, only 18 at the time, shines, affect-free, at the heart of it. She did that 20 years before she recorded Mud, which was seven years ago, but sounds like it could’ve been yesterday, or the day after tomorrow.

“Good Luck” – Eszter Balint

[from “This Week’s Finds,” March 29, 2004]

A potent melting pot of scratchy avant-funk and boho folk, “Good Luck” comes from a new CD by the world’s only (I think!) Hungarian-born, NYC-based singer/songwriter/violinist/actress. From the opening syncopation of the brush-tinged drumbeat, I feel myself in good hands here, even as I’m never really sure what’s going on. There’s a bit of Suzanne Vega in Balint’s deadpan spoken-sung delivery in the verses, and a touch of latter-day Tom Waits floating around the fringes of the production, particularly in the odd aural space created by the somewhat dissonant, squonky guitar work, the wash of vibraphone in the background, and the intermittent oddity (alarm clocks?). Whereas today’s music scene encourages the often gratuitous tossing together of sounds, Balint appears to have earned the right to her idiosyncratic mish-mash, given her unusual background as the daughter of Central European avant garde theater artists. Balint’s recently-released second CD, Mud, is available on Bar/None Records.

ADDENDUM: What exactly she’s been doing since Mud is mostly unclear, although she has been playing violin for a number of recording projects, and was a member of Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog– a”free/punk/funk/experimental/psychedelic/post electronica collective”—during much of 2009. Her web site remains seemingly unchanged since ’04, even as her MySpace page tells us a new album is in the works, then refers us back to the web site for more info.

Free and legal MP3: The Concretes (atmospheric indie pop, w/ a dance beat)

“Good Evening” – the Concretes

I am a long song skeptic; I don’t think there is often a very good reason for a pop song to be much longer than four minutes, in fact. Usually things are just repeating themselves at that point, or stretching on without apparent purpose. And yet I’ll admit I’m also a fan of music that might be considered atmospheric, and now that I think about it, atmospheric music almost by definition requires a certain amount of time and space to develop. Do I contradict myself? (My iTunes library is large, it contains multitudes.)

“Good Evening” is six and a half minutes. It takes its time. There is a groove involved. There are interesting sounds (try 0:34 on for size, or 1:22, or those background springy percussion noises at 1:28). A sense of tension is established—a combination of the beat, the restrained instrumentation, and a determination to stay focused on two chords—and extends well past the two-minute mark. This is not something that you can do in a three-minute song. Another thing you can’t do in a three-minute song is take a one-minute recess during which the rhythm and beat stop, most of the instruments leave, and the percussion reduces to something that sounds like swinging, amplified footsteps. Check that out starting at 4:00. Now, admittedly, longer songs are common when there’s a dance beat involved—the club ambiance requiring a totally different musical animal than, say, a radio, or even an iPod. That “Good Evening” manages to bridge that gap, bringing a bit of club-floor panache to something that works as an actual song, is a good part of its well-built allure.

An eight-piece band from Stockholm, the Concretes have been around in one incarnation or another since 1995, although didn’t start recording albums until 2003. “Good Evening” has been making the online rounds for a few months, but is actually from the brand new album WYWH, which was released just this week on Friendly Fire Recordings. It is the band’s fourth full-length. MP3 via Friendly Fire.