Amplifying the music, books, movies and journalism that matter.
Life is complicated and busy. Did you notice? Keeping up with the music, movies and books that fed your youthful imagination and conversations is harder than ever, but even more important. Here's the good news: there's never been more great new stuff. The challenge is to find it.
So here are my highly opinionated views on sounds, sights and words that will help you keep it fresh and real, and links to the veins where the richest motherlodes can be found.
Even though we know the refined pleasures of a deep, dark Belgian chocolate truffle, sometimes we go right for the Snickers bar: rich, gooey, and full of sugar, just like these tracks that I find irresistible right now.
Echosmith, "Cool Kids" - I swore this was a new Suzanne Vega single. Then I remembered what decade it was.
Pitbull, "Fireball" - What, you thought I didn't know about this?
Caitlin Crosby, "Just Another Day" - Swampy guitar opening, girl group chorus. I have it on repeat.
Nico & Vinz, "In Your Arms" - This one has a light, fluffy center. Wait, ew, somebody took a bite out and put it back.
Mary J. Blige, "Therapy" - Kicking the other divas to the curb.
My first introduction to Luna, was their 1994 release Bewitched, played in nearly endless rotation on WXPN that year. Droning like some lost, less-thrashy version of the Velvet Underground, their
influences were crystal clear even without Sterling Morrison sitting in. For me, it was the beginning of a beautiful relationship and I followed them through the end of the CD era until they wrapped up in 2006. The VU always had a sweeter, pop side (think "Who Loves the Sun?"), and no one captured that essence better than Luna.
I was just starting to miss Luna when along comes Real Estate, their New Jersey heirs. On their last disc Days (a 2011 "Best" for me), their debt to Luna wasn't entirely clear, but their latest, Atlas, plays like a set of lost tracks from the "Bewitched" sessions, with an extra dose of the Ventures and Bob Welch-era Fleetwood Mac. Chiming guitars, metronomic drumming and reverb-muffled vocals -- it's perfect.
No one would have ever called Luna (never mind the Velvets) by the current label "dream pop," but that's what Real Estate gets tagged with. Don't let it put you off; this is lo-fi pop at its very best. See if you aren't hooked by "Talking Backwards":
Taut and nervous, cynical and defiant, They Want My Soul is one of the sharpest sounds of the year. Straight outa Texas, Spoon makes music that for me recalls the smart, angry young men of the British New Wave: Costello, Lowe, Jackson and Sumner (a.k.a. Sting). They and their bands covered a lot of territory, with politics, pain and posturing prominent topics. Their music was rarely the gentle place you went for sodden consolation. Spoon serves up the same jangled energy, the same refusal to mope. This is music about taking action.
On this their eighth album, they are working with some big ideas: who owns our essence? This from the title track "They Want My Soul":
Card sharks and street preachers want my soul
All the sellers and palm readers want my soul
Post sermon socialites
Park enchanters and skin tights
All they want's my soul
Or on "Do You", where the question is what we're looking for:
Do you want to get understood?
Do you want one thing or are you looking for sainthood?
Do you run when it's just getting good?
Or do you, do you, do you, do you...
This is music about how we meet the world when we are young. Some of us need a good long drink of it to recall the taste. It may burn a little going down, but it will warm you up.
