I Was Going To Post A Song From The New Sonic Youth, But...

...it would be a waste of my own webspace, since almost the entire Rather Ripped album has been posted on mp3 blogs (see the Hype Machine).

That, and I sorta don't feel like being sued today.

Anyway, however you felt about SY in the past, definitely listen to Do You Believe in Rapture?, which is here. It's easily one of the best songs of the year, from what will probably be my favorite album of the year. You know what, do yourself a favor and listen to Incinerate, too, if you can find it.

Since I'm not posting Sonic Youth, my substitute is..........

Dizzy Gillespie (of course!)

From Sweet Soul Live (LIVE) :

Getting Down (mp3)
Soul Time (mp3)
Soul Mama (mp3)

Babe We're Gonna Take it to the Top

It's a little creepy: just last week I was telling the Keoki about my first audio cassette purchases, in the year of our lord 1980, with my own money. The first batch of tapes I ever bought were The Brothers Johnson's Light Up The Night and Stevie Wonder's Hotter Than July. I wore both of them out.

Light Up The Night was 80 cents, in a bargain bin. It was produced by Quincy Jones, it featured Michael Jackson on one track, Stomp was all over the radio, and even made it as background music for an aerobics scene on General Hospital. The funk was majestic. Of course I had to buy it. I think I picked up a copy of Omni magazine the same day.

Anyway, I saw that their Strawberry Letter 23: Live became available on iTunes yesterday, and thought that was creepy.



From Strawberry Letter 23: Live:

Stomp! (mp3)
Word Up (Cameo Cover) (mp3)

From Light Up The Night:
This Had to Be (With Michael Jackson) (mp3)

Lap Steel Gospel

And on the sixth day, He created the electric lap steel guitar, so He had something to listen to while relaxing on the seventh.

Feel it:

Don't Let The Devil Ride - Sonny Treadway (mp3)
Franklin D. Roosevelt, A Poor Man's Friend - Willie Eason (mp3)
Praise Music - Aubrey Ghent (mp3)

From Sacred Steel: Traditional Sacred African-American Steel Guitar Music In Florida

Salad of Subconscious

Chas Mtn's Hugs is a multidimensional hypervolume of various states of consciousness. What the hell, you may ask, is that. Exactly. It plays like a workshop of subconscious minds, where a strange scientist grabs a couple of talented young men, throws them into a room with some instruments, tells them to make sixteen songs, on their backs and with the lights out, and they can't come out until they're done. And so you get a gentle 21-second 4-note daydream called We're Evil, We're Jazz to open the album, followed immediately by the relentless acoustic strum of Deep Safety, which layers instruments into an urgent vocal climax, and then you're greeted with buzzing flies (or are they bees or mosquitos?) in the mystical Leveled Mez. Then you get Wheels of Space, which is...forget it, I'm not even going to try. And so the whole album goes. Put it on random, and it will retain its splendid incoherence. But there is a thread there. It's just an invisible one, just underneath the conscious mind.

The one recurring theme, ironically, is the buzzing or chirping of insects, a disturbing symbol of awareness.

Chas Mtn mp3s, from Hugs (out today):

Deep Safety
Salad of Flies

Georgie James may sing of Cheap Champagne, but sound like Really Good Bubbly.

Take the tragically underknown solo artist Laura Burhenn's vocal and melodic talents, add the rhythmic pop sensibilities of Q and Not U's John Davis, and you get damn good ear candy from a D.C. Dream Team called Georgie James.

Mp3 bloggers know they've got a good CD in their tray when they torment over which songs to post from it. I want you to hear the entire Demos at Dance Palace EP, which you should be able to pick up from their live shows. But since I'm a mostly well-behaved blogger, I can't give you a taste of each delectable little pop bon-bon, from the opening drumbeats of the dance-along pop gem Need Your Needs, to the melancholy songwriting of Long Week (All of the fortune tellers say/It's gonna be a long week, a long week/Cause you've gotten used to the upswing/The feeling of a winning streak...), to the driving pop pulse of Cheap Champagne, which reminds me of the Primitives at a peak they never achieved. And did I mention that voice?

Fortunately for you, four of the demo songs are available at their myspace. And here's one that's not there, as well as an mp3 of Cheap Champagne, because you're going to need it for your mp3 player.

Georgie James are still unsigned, but they plan to record and release a full-length in the near future.

From Georgie James' Demos at Dance Place:
Cheap Champagne (mp3)
Places (mp3)

See them at DC9 on May 25th.

By the way, thanks to the Keoki for keeping the Smudge populated while I was in San Antone!

Texas Bound

I'm headed for San Antonio for the next two weeks, so the posts will be somewhere between sparse and absent. I leave you with my two favorite songs of this week.

Guy Davis - Po' Boy, Long Way From Home (mp3)
(from Skunkmello)

Meshell N'Degeocello with Chris Dave - National Anthem (Radiohead cover) (mp3)
(from Exit Music: Songs for Radio Heads)

The Smallest and Least Visible Details

In the reign of Harad IV there lived at court a maker of miniatures, who was celebrated for the uncanny perfection of his work. Not only were the objects of his strenuous art pleasing to look at but the pleasure and astonishment increased as the observer, bending closer, saw that a passionate care had been lavished on the smallest and least visible details. It was said that no matter how closely you examined one of the Master’s little pieces you always discovered some further wonder.

-from IN THE REIGN OF HARAD IV, by the great STEVEN MILLHAUSER, in this week's The New Yorker.

The Smooth Van

Van Hunt is smooth. Here's visual proof:



Van Hunt also makes smooth, deep soul that will dig into your bones. Here's aural proof - a track featuring Nikka Costa from his new CD:

Van Hunt feat. Nikka Costa - Mean Sleep (mp3)

From On the Jungle Floor.

The Smudge Strokes You

Hey, did you miss The Strokes' recent performance on Letterman? Me too. But here's a not so recent vid of the Strokes on Letterman, playing Take It Or Leave It.

The Strokes - Take It Or Leave It (Live on Letterman)(.mpg, 38MB)

When Ah Die

Yeeee Haaawwwwww! What're Y'ALL gonna do when Y'ALL die?

I'm gon' throw on th'overalls 'n live again.



Doc Watson Family - When I Die (mp3), from The Watson Family



The Dickel Brothers - When I Die (mp3), from The Dickel Brothers, Vol 1

George & Friends

There are times when George is my favorite Beatle.

George Harrison with Bob Dylan - (All I Have To Do Is) Dream (live@Columbia Studio B, NY) (mp3)

George Harrison with Eric Clapton - Something (live in Japan, 1991) (mp3)

Georgie James Podcast

Georgie James, a duet consisting of Washington D.C.'s own Laura Burhenn, and former Q & Not U drummer, John Davis, were recently interviewed by the Washington Post. You can download the podcast, which features songs from their demo EP, here.

I'm so Flipping Special, and Chrissie Hynde is a Creep

Thank. God. It's. Friday.

Have a great weekend, and enjoy a couple of live mp3s.

The Pretenders - Creep (Live) (mp3) (from Pirate Radio)

Joseph Arthur - In the Sun (Live) (mp3) (from the UNCUT compilation REM Presents: The Michael Stipe Collection)

Yeah Yeah Yeahs Video: Live on Letterman 3-29-06

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Gold Lion (.mpg)

NOTE: I condensed the file I uploaded to YSI earlier, and saved it to ezarchive. This link should work.

Top Ten Reasons To Visit The Smudge: And Number One Is...

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs brought a punishing thunder to the Letterman show about a half hour ago. This is what they sounded like:

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Gold Lion (Live on Letterman, 3-29-06) (mp3)

The video is uploading on YSI as I type. I'll link to it on my way to work.

Stipepearances

I wish Michael Stipe would appear on my cd. When I make one.

Faultline with Michael Stipe - Greenfields (mp3)

Stephane Pompougnac with Michael Stipe - Clumsy (mp3)

Billy Bragg, Bingo Hand Job, and Michael Stipe - Tom's? (mp3)

And on the 4.6 billion and somethingth day God created Art Brut, and lo, it was good.

A mere two hours after the Belle & Sebastian set, KEXP aired a live performance from Art Brut, who put out one of my favorite albums of last year, Bang Bang Rock & Roll. Post Soothing Out is a new non-album song they've been playing live. And the words to Emily Kane are different - he's now seen her at Christmas and realized he's not in love with Emily. He's in love with the idea of being in love with her.

Art Brut (Live on KEXP, 3-25-2006) (mp3s):

Formed a Band
Emily Kane
Post Soothing Out
Good Weekend

Belle & Sebastian Live on KEXP 3-25-06

This Saturday on KEXP, Belle & Sebastian treated us to a live in-studio performance of a couple of classics, a cover, and a song from one of my favorite albums of the year, The Life Pursuit. This version of A Century of Fakers, from the 3-6-9 Seconds of Light EP, is fantastic.

Belle & Sebastian (Live on KEXP, 3-25-06) (mp3s):

A Century of Fakers
She's Losing It
To Be Myself Completely
Anything You Do

Watch the video for The Blues Are Still Blue.

Dan the Destroyer is the New Dylan

His voice is too weird, his music too glittering-strange a species of rambling glam-folk for mass consumption. Bejar is a queer duck and a critic’s darling, and queer duck and critic’s darling he’s likely to remain.

That’s too bad, because that seventh album, Destroyer’s Rubies, is not only his best by far, it’s also a bona fide masterpiece of opaque genius bullshit—overblown, overwrought, and all the better for it. It’s Bejar’s rare gift to be able to spring beautiful lyrical booby traps, startling non sequiturs that somehow perfectly set off all the instrumental glitz surrounding them, mined from such diverse influences as Ziggy Stardust/Aladdin Sane–era David Bowie, Neil Young, French pop, mellow West Coast rock circa 1972 or so, and, of course, Dylan himself, acoustic and electric versions.

...

It’s genius; it’s bullshit—which means that some heedless music critic will inevitably dub Bejar the new Dylan and end up looking like an idiot. Well, Bejar is the new Dylan, and I’m that idiot.

From Sense You Been Gone, in Friday's Washington City Paper.

Made You Listen

She's [still] watching him with those eyes.
She's loving him with that body, I just know it.

Rick Springfield - Jessie's Girl (acoustic) (mp3)

From Karma.