Brandon's Buzz

T’Pau — “Heart and Soul”
(from Heart and Soul: The Best of T’Pau) —

In an attempt to test out the much-fussed-over Shazam app — which purports to identify any song via the five or ten-second snippet to which you expose it — on my new iPhone, I cued up VH1 Classic’s horrifyingly ill-researched series One Hit Wonders on the DVR, and A — who has yapped ad nauseam about this application since he first learned of its existence, and who desperately needs technology such as this, because no fewer than ten times a day , he hears a song (on the car radio, at the gym, in the supermarket line!) that he fails yet desires to recognize — was duly impressed as Shazam correctly identified each tune it heard. And while we were having a nice laugh about the wonders of the modern world in which we happily and blessedly live, T’Pau — a British band named for a Star Trek character and fronted by the crazy-brilliant Carol Decker, whose ferocious pipes should have become feted the world over — came onto the television screen with their one and only American hit, and I knew at once that I had just heard my next song of the day candidate. An unstoppable smash during the unforgettably spectacular summer of 1987, this one — surely one of its decade’s twenty-five best tracks — still brings me to my feet whenever I hear it, and I still know how to blow out my voice singin’ it at full blaring blast. Absolutely a classic.

Nanci Griffith (with Darius Rucker) — “Love at the Five and Dime”
(from The Dust Bowl Symphony) —

Those who are now stunned that Hootie and the Blowfish’s lead singer Darius Rucker is now a celebrated country singer weren’t paying attention when they should have been: just before the turn of the century, Rucker teamed up with that elegantly homespun enchantress Nanci Griffith for a series of combustibly brilliant musical collaborations, most notably this lovely, strings-drenched reinvention of one of Griffith’s early classics, which was recorded with the famed London Symphony Orchestra. Sherry Ann always says that Dave Matthews and Emmylou Harris neither one should never leave home without the other, but if you ask me, it’s these two who should always and forever come as a packaged deal.

Scala & Kolacny Brothers — “Creep” (from Creep [Single]) —

By now you’ve no doubt heard this bizarro rendition of Radiohead’s classic 1993 breakthrough smash playing throughout the trailer and television spots for this fall’s must-see film The Social Network, and it has finally been made commercially available stateside (presumably after phenomenally high demand). Having previously given this divinely dreamy treatment to such classics as Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” Coldplay’s “Yellow,” and even the Divinyls’ “I Touch Myself” (!), Scala — a globally renowned choir consisting of two hundred-plus girls and led by brothers Stijn and Steven Kolacny — dig below the surface here and unearth an unexpected (albeit slightly spooky), almost flippantly charming slant from beneath the icy veneer of Thom Yorke’s chilling words.

Sugarland — “Incredible Machine” (from The Incredible Machine) —

Not since Faith Hill took a big, bold, boxbusting swing with Cry eight years ago has a superstar country act had the guts and gall to gamble with their good fortunes (read: risk, uh, crapping in their nests, and please forgive the inelegant imagery!) in pursuit of creating something more than a hollow-hearted paint-by-numbers exercise. I’ll yield the road for people who are smarter than I to debate the wisdom of that decision, but I will say that stodgy ol’ Nashville could use a few more like Jen and Kris, who have the courage to stick to their artistic guns and, evidently, the clout to convince their record company to play along. We’ll see if the industry follows suit: while no fewer than four of these songs are flat-out fabulous, there’s only one track on the album — the sweet-turn-soaring “Little Miss,” which, if I had to guess, I would say will be the second single — that even sounds remotely like something that radio will co-sign no questions asked. Meanwhile, I listened twice straight through yesterday, and I’ll tell you that, if I were forced to pick just one tune to listen to a third time, it would be the tremendous title track, a lyrical deconstruction of the human heart which I flagrantly found myself whiling away most of Tuesday afternoon and evening humming. However this particular cookie crumbles, I fully expect the commercial fate of this record to be the most fascinating music-related story of early 2011.

A pair of bands who, even though they could not be more distinctly different, are responsible for some of the most compelling and most magnificent music of the past decade face off against each other this week, and though I generally end up with egg on my face whenever I make such bold proclamations, is it entirely impossible to believe that the album of the year waits patiently behind door number…?

‘Tis that time of year once again, as that annual tradition known as the Christmas album rears its ugly head anew. And while you await the imminent arrival of Annie Lennox’s yuletide offering (which must be considered this season’s marquee holiday release, and whose first single is just up at iTunes), you could do a hell of a lot worse than to tide yourself over with Christmas in Harmony, the very first seasonal release from the wondrous Wilson Phillips, who this year — believe it or not! — mark their twentieth year as recording artists. Harmony brilliantly reunites these ladies with producer Glen Ballard (who shepherded their sensational self-titled 1990 debut record to glory), who tosses a handful of holiday-related originals into the mix alongside Christmas classics like “Silent Night” and “Little Drummer Boy.” (Also stepping forward with Christmas albums as we chug toward November: those incredible
Indigo Girls, the sassy Shelby Lynne, and — in a pair of Target exclusives — Sheryl Crow (turning in a slightly revised version of her 2008 holiday record Home for Christmas, which itself was a Hallmark exclusive)
and Lady Antebellum (closing out their preposterously perfect year with
A Merry Little Christmas, a six-track EP of holiday favorites).

(more…)

Matisyahu — “One Day” (from Light) —

I’m either watching the wrong channels or else I’m just incredibly unlucky, because I swear every time I flip on the tube lately, I see a commercial for Waiting for Superman, the new documentary which apparently bemoans the current state of America’s educational system, and every one of those ads is scored by this (admittedly quite catchy) tune, the latest single from the world’s uncontested favorite Hasidic Jew reggae rock god. (And because I’m a total sucker for goofy gems like this, I’m generally singing along, giddily, no more than four words in.)

“The genius chained to the official table should die or go mad, in the same way, as the person with a mighty constitution at sedentary life and modest behavior dies of an apoplectic seizure.”

— a lovely piece of beautiful nonsense which got caught up in the Buzz’s spam filter this morning, courtesy of a “poster” going by the “name” of SumashtDilovf. (The longer I stare at that sentence, the more it starts to make a strange, cozy kind of sense, which could well mean I need a nap.)

Chantal Kreviazuk — “M (Next Train to the Moon)”
(from Colour Moving and Still) —

A baby girl loses her life, and a family fractures from grief, and it’s hard to fathom anyone beyond the utterly captivating Kreviazuk who would have the temerity to reach down into such a scenario and at least try to yank from it a handful of hope.

If you missed any of last week’s tunes — and, looking at this list in full, this might just be the strongest seven-day stretch I’ve programmed since I started this experiment three months ago (if I do say so myself!) — below is a quick recap:

MONDAY: Chris Botti — “Nessun Dorma” (from Italia) —

TUESDAY: Ryan Adams — “New York, New York” (from Gold) —

WEDNESDAY: Ben’s Brother — “Time”
(from Beta Male Fairytales) —

THURSDAY: Emmylou Harris — “Goin’ Back to Harlan [live]”
(from Lilith Fair: A Celebration of Women in Music) —

FRIDAY: Santana featuring India.Arie & Yo-Yo Ma —
“While My Guitar Gently Weeps”
(from Guitar Heaven: The Greatest Guitar Classics of All Time) —

SATURDAY: The National — “Start a War” (from Boxer) —

SUNDAY: Patty Griffin — “Let Him Fly” (from Living With Ghosts) —

Patty Griffin — “Let Him Fly” (from Living With Ghosts) —

Look up the word glorious in the dictionary and you’ll get Griffin comin’ back atcha every last time. Miss Patty appeared on last night’s episode of Austin City Limits — check your local PBS listings if you missed it; the show will repeat all week — to promote her latest record (the gorgeous Downtown Church), and watching it, I was reminded of the last time I saw her on the program, seven years ago, when she tore the house down with a stirring, shattering rendition of this instant classic from her startling, sterling debut album. (PS: If you’re reading these words right now and you’re thinking, Oh, you mean that Dixie Chicks song? then your all-access Buzz pass is hereby revoked.)

The National — “Start a War” (from Boxer) —

You could tie yourself in knots trying to discern what any of this band’s songs are about, or you could just surrender your reservations and lay back into the uncanny, off-kilter beauty they seem to unfailingly produce. With a wrenching, riveting slow build here, a lazy guitar strum opens up into a lush, insistent swirl of instrumentation which gorgeously envelops frontman Matt Berninger’s wondrous, wearily wise baritone stylings. Just don’t ask me what the hell he’s singing about.

Santana featuring India.Arie & Yo-Yo Ma —
“While My Guitar Gently Weeps”
(from Guitar Heaven: The Greatest Guitar Classics of All Time) —

As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, Guitar Heaven‘s extraordinary guest list is what keeps the album from being swallowed whole by the bland, hellish hokum which has demolished covers collections of a similar stripe. Of late, the remarkable Arie has become the queen of the classy, compelling remake, having turned in radiant recent takes on Don Henley’s “The Heart of the Matter” and Stephen Bishop’s “It Might Be You,” and of course she shines like a diamond here breathing brilliant new life into some of the finest words the late George Harrison ever wrote.