SONG OF THE DAY (#203)

'cheater's armoury,' by hanne hukkelberg

all the way from konsberg, norway comes hanne hukkelberg. she released a new album, 'rykestrasse 68' this year, the follow up to her great debut, 'little things.'

she's a tough one to peg, that hanne; but in her case it's totally fantastic. she's part cabaret singer, part torch singer, part jazz musician, part tin pan alley purveyor, part indie snow goddess. add it all up and you get a pretty unique and eclectic sound [take 'little girl,' for example. it sounds like a video game with a banjo accompaniment. as odd as it sounds, it works]. i can't really think of anyone off the top of my head that she sounds like, and in this day in age of recycled musical genres, copy-cat 'artists,' and generic songwriting, it's nothing short of spectacular. 'cheater's armoury,' aside from being a terrific song title, is a terrific little song that'll the charm the pants right off ya. or shirt. or socks. or whatever you happened to be wearing. there's a lot more going on in this song than is immediately apparent. i'm pretty sure there's a cowbell buried in there somewhere, which is, of course, awesome.

if you like the cardigans and regina spektor [that's about as close as i can come to comparisons, but they really aren't that valid], i'm pretty sure dig hanne, too. here are two samples from her newest album and one from her first. i dare you not to fall for her. double dog dare.

happy weekend, all...

→ hanne hukkelberg: cheater's armoury / video
→ hanne hukkelberg: the pirate
→ hanne hukkelberg: little girl

SONG OF THE DAY (#202)

'your song,' by the streets [elton john cover]

my friend stuart tipped me off to a pretty cool new compilation of covers the other day. it's called 'radio 1: established 1967' and features a pretty wild and varied collection of contemporary artists covering songs going back to 1967. as with any compilation, there are hits and there are misses. it's pretty cool, though, to hear lily allen's take on the pretender's 'don't get me wrong,' keane's version of 'under pressure,' and hard-fi's fuzzy, amped up version of britney's 'toxic'; but as fun as those songs are, there's one song that stands miles above the rest. it's the crown jewel of the entire collection: the streets' version of elton john's and bernie taupin's classic, 'your song.'

'your song' is one of elton john's finest [if not the finest] melodies and mike skinner is probably the least likely person to cover sir elton's classic, but this version is so many kinds of awesome that i can't even count them all, but there's at least 34 or 35. maybe 36. i was expecting a two-steppy, dancy sound a la 'weak become heroes' or 'fit but you know it,' so it's a bit surprising that mike stays fairly faithful to the original, musically speaking. i would've loved to hear a two-step version of it, but the fact that he didn't makes it all the more brilliant and unpredictable. mike skinner's marlboro-man, staccati vocals are an excellent counterpoint to the flawless melody and the fact he pronounces 'live' in such a way that it could rhyme with 'spliff' is extraordinary. that mike's version of 'your song' works as well as it does speaks to the song's transcendence and trans-generational appeal. some might cry foul or make claims of heresy [indielondon says mike 'murders' it--that's precisely why it's so great], but in this dood's opinion, it's a revelation.

→ the streets: your song
→ ewan mcgregor: your song [from the 'moulin rouge' soundtrack

Arcade Fire's Cryptic Message

the nme is reporting...

'arcade fire have posted a cryptic message online. on their neonbible site visitors click on a closed eye to see it opening and revealing a message. the message reads: "Be oNline B October 6th.' [BNBO? what does it mean?]. clicking the message, visitors are sent to beonlineb.com. the website features the words 'october 6' eleven times.

so on saturday, make sure you go here: http://www.beonlineb.com/

what could it be? a new song? a live album available for free download? it's gotta be something big if they built a website for it.

let the speculation begin. post your theories below.

SONG OF THE DAY (#201)

'don't let him waste your time,' by jarvis cocker

during the last 20 years there is perhaps no other front man in british music more iconic than jarvis cocker [except the mozfather, of course]. with his black-rimmed coke-bottle glasses, foppish hair and biting wit, jarvis was the perfect anti-hero, the pied piper of mis-shapes, mistakes and misfits, the voice of the disillusions, disheartened and disenfrachised. and, of course, there was the incident at the 1996 brits. [anyone who moons the king of pop is a-ok in my book]. man, i love jarvis.

sadly, we haven't heard any new pulp for several years now. i sincerely hope we haven't seen the last of them. i never got to see them live and that's my biggest concert regret. ever. so in lieu of a proper pulp album, jarvis released an excellent solo album last year in the UK and this year in the US. though age seems to have mellowed the man just a tad, he's lost none of his wit. with song titles 'fat children,' 'disney time,' and 'i will kill again,' jarvis shows that nothing is off-limits. if you haven't heard pulp or jarvis yet, you've got quite a back catalogue to dive into. here's a taste.

→ jarvis cocker: don't let him waste your time / video [and what a video!]
→ richard x featuring jarvis cocker: into you [mazzy star 'cover'/'mashup']
→ william shatner: common people [pulp cover]

SONG OF THE DAY (#200)

'journey from a to b,' by badly drawn boy

damon gough [a.k.a badly drawn boy] is one of the most, if not the most perplexing artists working today; a man capable of moments of pure rapture and others of pure frustration. case in point: after back-to-back classic albums [the mercury prize winner 'hour of the bewilderbeat' and the soundtrack to 'about a boy'], badly drawn boy took a step backwards with his next two albums, 'have you fed the fish' and 'one plus one is one.' sure, they were fine albums with occassionally great moments, but they were bloated, over-produced affairs [not to mention excessively long gigs -- 2 and 1/2 hour gig at DV8 a while back] with overwrought arragements in which gough seemed to want to be everyone but himself. i was hesitant to give his newest album, 'born in the u.k.' a listen simply because i was afraid to see him slip any futher.

thankfully, 'born in the uk,' while not matching the strength of his first two, is certainly a welcome return to form. 'journey from a to b' carries a lot of the same winsome charm of badly drawn boy classics, 'a minor incident' and 'silent sigh.' the go! team remix is, per usual, outstanding and actually ends up sounding more like a go! team song than a badly drawn boy song. here's hoping 'born in the u.k.' serves as a springboard and launches damon back into the ranks of england's finest songwriters.

→ badly drawn boy: journey from a to b
→ badly drawn boy: journey from a to b [go! team remix]