Another Form of Relief

It’s probably a song everybody knows at this point, but I’m on something of a Postal Service kick for the first time in over a year. On the off chance that you have been living under a rock for the past few years, enjoy!

Did you know that this is post 199 on this blog? No? Well it is you know. Not that that is particularly exciting given my slowdown over recent weeks. It also means that there won’t be anything special for post 200. Not because I can’t be bothered (well, a little of that), but mostly because there’s a lot of fun list type posts coming in December. All of which will be very exciting and have lots of fantastic music contained within them. Hell, there might even be an advent type thing through the month to celebrate the onset of Winterval. Maybe.

MP3 Brakes – Jackson (expired) (Johnny Cash)
A quick guide to how I can be musically ignorant: When I first got hold of the Brakes album, I had no idea that this was a cover. It had a vaguely familiar sound, but that was about it. This story actually gets worse thanks to way I discovered that it was. No, I didn’t suddenly come across the original version of it or even have some nice, musically minded person inform me of the fact. No, I discovered the fact as I was watching ‘Walk The Line’. Which is pretty awful. Both film and reputation wise. As such, I have no idea what the original version sounds like, only how it sounds via Joeaqueeniahiem Pheonix and Reese Witherspoon. Which wasn’t all that different to the version here. The important part is that this Brakes one is very good. Yay Brakes. Even if they do look scarily like Coldplay in that picture.

MP3 Iron & Wine – Such Great Heights (expired) (The Postal Service)
Presenting part 17 of our 435 part series of ‘Such Great Heights’ covers, we have Sam Beam’s attempt at it. You’ll never guess what he does with it either. He slows it down and makes it all acoustic. I bet you didn’t see that one coming, did you? Mocking aside, it’s a fantastic version of an already fantastic song. Much as I love all of these covers that keep surfacing, none of them seem to hold a candle to the original. This one comes across as far more laconic and mournful, probably thanks to it being far slower, allowing the lyrics to smack you round the face far more strongly than the original. I think it was also used to advertise M&Ms. That isn’t so cool, but it’s a fun fact.

MP3 Eric Metronome – Salute My Shorts! (expired) (Rilo Kiley)
Eric Metronome is a guy who just seems to love doing covers. He’s recorded a truckload of Elliott Smith ones, and is currently embarking on a project that sees him covering a different song every week for a year. This includes covers of The Beatles right up to more contemporary fare like Bright Eyes and Sufjan Stevens. This also includes a wonderful little cover of Rilo Kiley’s ‘Salute My Shorts!’. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a lovely, reflective Blake song that has a very silly title. There’s a long story behind that title, but it comes from the song not having an actual name on the album and fans giving it this absurd thing for a reason I forget. Either way, it’s a great song, and Metronome covers it nicely without being too daring with it. It’s a safe cover, but one that his voice seems to suit perfectly. Which isn’t surprising given he covers Elliott Smith, and Blake Sennett sounds always sounds like he’s auditioning for an Elliott Smith tribute band. Not that that’s a bad thing, I’m just saying.

Only three songs for the “leftovers” section this month. As we head toward the end of the year, the number of indie releases seems to wind down making finding new material a little harder than usual. Still, this brings the advantage of letting me go back over some of the great records I may have missed over the course of the year. Any recommendations for small albums that I may have missed over the past year?

MP3 Pocketbooks – Cross The Line (expired)
I first wrote about Pocketbooks more than four months ago and I still haven’t been able to find a picture of them in the time since. I’m starting to think they may not actually exist, or that they are cartoons like Gorillaz or something. Anyway, who cares what they look like when they throwing out top notch low-fi twee indie pop? ‘Cross the Line’ is the first song released from their new batch of recordings, and it’s easily cemented itself in place as one of my favourites of the year so far. Full of lovely imagery (it opens with “I’m asleep on a train on the Zone 2 boundary”) and basically continues as a back and forth conversation between the male and female vocalists. This takes on a nicely self-aware twist when she starts calling him on the honesty of his lyrics (“As a kid I would run through the fields and orchards” / “What about your hayfever though?” / “I’d climb the branches to the top” / “What, with your vertigo?” / “Look, I’m making all this up”). Extra points also have to be awarded for being the first song I’m aware of that actually slots in the term “Oyster card” without being entirely tacky.

MP3 Ben Folds – Such Great Heights (expired)
For the 57th cover of The Postal Service’s ‘Such Great Heights’, Ben Folds decides to take a stab at it. This was actually an in-studio radio performance so the production values aren’t really the highest, but it’s an interesting cover none the less. As it’s Ben Folds, obviously a piano plays a very heavy part in the preceedings, with him almost pounding the poor piano to death over the course of the four minutes. Which unfortunately leaves it feeling a little more overbearing than it should. Other than that, it’s a pretty straight up cover, aside from one odd changing of one of the lyrics to include the word “shit”. Which is just a tad jarring on first listening.

MP3 Via Audio – We Can Be Good
Via Audio are a New York indie pop band who have been making music for about three years but everything seems to be coming together for them now. Chris Walla of Death Cab For Cutie calls them his “new favourite band” and Jim Eno of Spoon liked them so much that he offered to produce their record. That record (‘Say Something’) is still in the mixing stage, but the band have made a couple of songs from it available on the internet. ‘We Can Be Good’ is my favourite of these. It’s a simple pop song about a girl trying to tell a guy that they would be great together. It’s full of lovely harmonies and some instrumentation that borders on precious. These guys will certainly be ones to watch over the next year or so to see what else they come up with.

I Control Music?

Well I probably don’t, but it’s certainly starting to feel that way. Over the past week or so, four of the unsigned artists I’ve written about on Another Form of Relief have signed pretty important record deals. I already mentioned Kate Nash signing to Universal. On top of that, we have Play Radio Play signing to Island, Jenny Owen Youngs signing to Nettwerk and Los Campesinos! signing to.. someone. Of course, my original comment was meant in jest and I have no delusions of grandeur about this place. I think it is somewhat indicitive that blogs in general are (as Frank Debarge would put it) the ‘tastemakers’ now. That or I just have an uncanny ability to write about those who will hit the big time anyway. Either way.

Up until the last few months, I hated remixes. I don’t say that lightly either. I really, genuinely despised them. It’s hard for me to equate that feeling into words, but it was something to do with the destruction of an original work. I know that remixes are usually done with the consent of the original artist, but it always just seemed wrong to me. Kind of like another director re-editing someone else’s film. Recently though, something has changed, and I don’t know what. I started getting hold of remixes of songs I already liked, and while disliking a lot of them, some of them were actually pretty good. Whether this is to do with an increasing tolerance for varied works or my growing appreciation for all things electronic (which most remixes seem to meddle in) I don’t know. I just know that I’m getting a kick out of a lot of remixes lately. So much so that I decided to make a little mix of some of my favourites.

This was largely inspired by picking up the remixes of Of Montreal (hat tip) and The Diggs (hat tip) in the past few days. They got me thinking that there is probably enough of them that I like now to make a little mix of some kind, so I started playing around with the idea. I’m pretty happy with the results. It even includes one remix of a song I don’t even like. I really can’t stand Bloc Party (beyond Helicopter), so it’s a testament to the skills of MSTRKRFT that this version of ‘Two More Years’ is fantastic. You’ll find a bunch of electronic trickery here, and probably some things that will be considered blasphemy by some, but it’s an interesting ride nonetheless.

MP3 Bloc Party – Two More Years (MSTRKRFT remix) (expired)
MP3 Arab Strap – The Shy Retirer (Dirty Hospital remix) (expired)
MP3 Her Space Holiday – Something To Do With My Hands (Arab Strap remix) (expired)
MP3 Bright Eyes – Gold Mine Gutted (Her Space Holiday mix) (expired)
MP3 Beck – Girl (Octet remix) (expired)
MP3 Feist – Mushaboom (Postal Service remix) (expired)
MP3 The Postal Service – Nothing Better (Styrofoam remix) (expired)
MP3 Of Montreal – The Party’s Crashing Us (I Am The World Trade Center mix) (expired)
MP3 The Diggs – Everyone’s Starting Over (Cassettes Won’t Listen remix) (expired)
MP3 Tom Vek – I Ain’t Say My Goodbyes (Phones 12″ remix) (expired)

Other Stuff

The Los Campesinos! gig in London next month (Sep 11, Water Rats) seems to have grown into something much bigger than originally intended. It’s moved from Nambucca to the more central Water Rats and now features a four band line-up, featuring Los Campesinos!, The Hot Puppies, Julian Donkey Boy and The Royal Treatment Plant. It’s also gone up in price to £5. A bargain in itself, but even better for those of us who already had tickets beforehand.

I haven’t pimped this in a while, so it’s time to mention eMusic’s fantastic offer of 25 free mp3s, and this time I even have an excuse! eMusic have just launched their UK service, selling download packages for silly prices, from £9 for 40 downloads per month up to £15 for 90. Which is damn cheap compared to things like iTunes and the such. If I regularly used any kind of download service, eMusic would be it for me. Take the free trial and have a look around at least. Don’t forget that Audio Lunchbox are still offering 50 free mp3s as well.

Anyone who knows me in person will know that I wear Threadless t-shirts pretty much exclusively these days. Well folks, you too can look as cool as me, as they are doing another one of their awesome $10 sales. It runs until monday but I imagine the best shirts will sell out quickly, so get yourself over there and have a look around.

Finally, in relatively local news: Does anyone know anything about the music festivities type things that are supposed to be happening at Bluewater this sunday? The only thing I know is that the good folks of Quadmyre are playing there a couple of times during the day and that it’s supposed to be some kind of music festival, but I can’t find out details out about it anywhere. So on the off-chance that you’re local and have any idea what’s going on, let me know.

I’m tired and want to crawl into bed and continue reading the best book I’ve read in a while. Before that though, it’s time for another batch of randomly selected cover song awesomness!

MP3 Beck – Everybody’s Gotta Learn Sometimes (expired) (The Korgis)
One of the best things about Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind was how damn good the soundtrack was. It says a lot about how well the music worked with the film that I can’t listen to this song without seeing the title sequence where it was playing in my head. I’m going to be honest and say that I’m not familiar with the original of this song, but I just wanted to include it as it’s so damn good.

MP3 The Shins – We Will Become Silhouettes (expired) (The Postal Service)
For their ‘Such Great Heights’ EP, The Postal Service had the inspired idea of inviting both The Shins and Iron & Wine to cover them. This may have been a lazy ploy to avoid coming up with new material, but it doesn’t really matter when the results are so good. Everyone is familiar with the Iron & Wine ‘Such Great Heights’ cover, but this excellent version of ‘We Will Become Silhouettes’ is often overlooked. It’s another great reworking, turning TPS’ end of the world ditty into cheerful acoustic fare.

MP3 The White Stripes – Jolene (expired) (Dolly Parton)
There seems to be a consensus that the Live Under Blackpool Lights version of this song is the superior one, even to the point that it was the one released as a single. I like this studio version a lot more though. I’m not entirely sure why, I just think it sounds much better. Could I be any less helpful in supporting my views? Probably not. Anyways, the White Stripes manage to turn this into an excellent little blues rock song, gender roles be damned.

MP3 Adam Green – What A Waster (expired) (The Libertines)
This one doesn’t really work anywhere near as well as the original (which was flawed itself), but it’s a hell of a lot of fun. It’s incredibly foul mouthed, something made far more noticable by the crisp vocal track that Green has over a simple acoustic guitar. The style of the song does somehow suit him, but it’s far from perfect. ‘What A Waster’ needs to be sung by the kind of dodgy guy that you’d run into a kebab shop on a saturday night who would kick the shit out of you in a second if you looked at him the wrong way. Which is why it seems to work so perfectly for Pete Doherty I guess.

I’m going to go to bed now. I got sent a couple of awesome Scottish bands earlier on today. Scotland’s music scene seems damn good at the moment. Granted it’s not quite Canada or Sweden, but it’s putting out some excellent material. Anyways, I might feature one or both of them tomorrow. Of course now I’ve mentioned it I’ll probably end up posting something else, but we’ll see.