Not a mashup

And we finish off the ESL series with Federico Aubele. He's from Argentina; given the 70's vibe of the video, and the nasty business going down in Argentina then, you can understand the vaguely menacing vibe in the track. Solid respect to the tango influence in the style of the accordion as well as the singing.

It's like a mashup between some old-school Portishead or Massive Attack and some choice tango and Latin American protest-folk.

It works better than it sounds.

Federico Aubele
"Postales"

Pa Nueva Yor'

Off to New York today.

As one might expect, there's a vibrant Latin music scene in New York, from old-school salsa bands to latin-inspired afrobeat and rock bands that just happen to sing in Spanish. Mostly. Pacha Massive is part of all of this, a part that is almost too smooth for my tastes. Almost. It's hard to overestimate the appeal of a lively, lovely Colombian bassist with a voice like soul made sound.

Looking forward to seeing them play around and about the five boroughs.

Pacha Massive
"All Good Things"

The following is brought to you as a public service

Today our friends at ESL bring us pure camp, with a video full of stern warnings about inappropriate lifestyles and a tune that sounds like just the sort of thing that might be playing in a good-times 60's flick.

Only better.

Chris Joss
"Danger Buds"

Dancing, happiness and vinyl

And we continue our ESL journey.

More dance-y and less lounge-y this time, also more of a bossa-nova/funk feel.

One of these days, when mass and volume are less of a problem I'm going to buy vinyl. That would be very silly given present circumstances, but not as silly as the question, "Do you want to dance and be happy?"

Seriously..

Nickodemus
"Funky in the Middle"

Beat that!

Still on the ESL vibe.

This is not an expression of deep emotion, nor is it a song protesting injustice. Nossir, this is straight ahead, bouncing--at-a-club, check-your-brain-at-the-door dance music.

Remember big beat? Fatboy Slim, Chemical Brothers, et al?

It seems the sound is back.

Ursula 1000
"Hello! Let's Go To a Disco!"

Coconut. No lime.

As a kid, I remember visiting Puerto Rico and my mother's uncle climbing up a tree with a machete to cut down fresh coconut for us. Tasty as all hell. This seems to have been filmed in South Asia somewhere, but the coconuts are quite similar.

This week we present videos from the DC-based Eighteenth Street Lounge (ESL - clever, no?) record label. The one associated with Thievery Corporation.

Nice loungy tune to have, oh, I don't know, maybe a pina colada to...

Ocote Soul Sounds
"Coconut Rock"

Preacher-man

Jimmy Smith, the master of the Hammond organ, shows us the soul.

Halleluya, brothers and sisters.

Jimmy Smith
"The Sermon"

Jarred

I'm not exactly sure what this song is about, and they certainly don't break any new musical ground - this is straight-ahead light-indiepop here - but it's an interesting idea for the video, and they pull it off with consummate cuteness.

With extra adorability as everybody dances at the end.

Immaculate Machine
"Jarhand"

Experiments in consciousness

Duchess Says
"Black Flag"

I have no idea what the video is about, but it captures the retro early-80's electro sound of the track (dialed up to 12) most beautifully.

Choose life

It's my birthday today.

It's my birthday and for some reason I feel compelled to post this video. The performance by the actress would have been enough to win it a post, but in...well, not quite celebration, but in recognition of the shit that can happen if you don't keep yourself grounded, it seems appropriate to post it on the day that I view as a celebration of life and living.

I like to think that there's a third ending, the one that actually happened, the one where the guy stays grounded, the one that then allows him to make this video. The one in which he, in fact, chooses life.

If you only watch one video this month, this is the one to watch.

Cinnamon Chasers
"Luv Deluxe"

These Birds can sing

Just a stripped-down, bare-bones, and absolutely beautiful version of an old Motown standard from another Aussie band.

Birds of Tokyo
"Heard it Through the Grapevine"

Dancing in Barcelona

"Fugaz" translates to something like "fleeting" in English.

Kooky and cute with a metallic sheen the Pinker Tones sound kind of like Daft Punk taking a load off. The video features Barcelona, their hometown, and made me ever-so-nostalgic for my study-abroad days there.

(1:19=priceless!)

The Pinker Tones
"Fugaz"

Old-time sound

Once upon a time three siblings, all under 20, listened to a lot of vinyl. This then inspired them to grab an RCA mic, plug everything into an 8-track and set it all down on some of their very own vinyl.

Nothing too surprising. Except that this tale does not unfold 1950's US South, but rather modern-day Kentish Town, London, England.

Oh, and their mother was a drummer for The Raincoats.

Baby don't you want to go?

Kitty, Daisy & Lewis
"Going Up to the Country"

It's love, you see

It's MLK Day in the USA, and there will (appropriately) be a great deal of commentary about how far the struggle for equality has come, and how far the struggle still has to go.

This video is not about that. It's about this MLK quote:

"Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it."

Plus today is the birthday of somebody who is most fond of jazz & the Little Prince.

Vero, esto va para ti.

Nat King Cole
"Nature Boy"

Listen to Johnny

This is what Johnny Depp thought of the 13th Floor Elevators in 2005:

"Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators...[t]hey were basically the first psychedelic-rock band. 1965. And if you listen to old 13th Floor Elevators stuff—Roky Erickson especially, his voice—and then go back and listen to early Led Zeppelin, you know that Robert Plant absolutely copped everything from Roky Erickson. And it's amazing. And Roky Erickson is sitting in Austin, Texas; he's just there. And Robert Plant had a huge hit. It always goes back to those guys, you know? I love those fucking guys."

No arguments here.

About the only way we could improve this is if, say, we could include Bettie Page somehow...

13th Floor Elevators
"She Lives In a Time Of Her Own"



Yeah. We got that.

That's cold

Officially the album Canadians most heart, it might make sense that this poll was taken in Canada, in December, and this is winter music, pure and simple.

And by that I mean literally pure and literally simple - slow, deliberate yet tenuous, with plenty of space, plenty of ambiguities and a fragile, dark quality most appropriate with dealings with the devil.

Here's to summer, y'alls.

Timber Timbre
"Demon Host"

Fight! Fight! Fight!

Another Australian band with a decent tune, awesome video and excellent title for the track, more of a garage-rock/punk feel with a different kind of vintage this time.

I'm wondering if there's some mineral in the water that makes so much from Australia so awesomely awesome.

The Kill Devil Hills
"Cockfighter"

The pleasant sounds of the apocalypse

A friend of a friend designed a poster for this Aussie band, and I looked into them out of curiosity.

Sometimes it pays off.

The song itself is pleasant enough, but the cinematography is excellent - it's like this song was featured in a movie and they just excerpted clips from it - and "Lullaby for the Apocalypse" is a most excellent song title indeed.

Charge Group
"Lullaby for the Apocalypse"

Feist-y

An excellent, soulful reworking of the original by their compatriot, the inimitable Leslie Feist.

Not sure how I feel about the camera effects. It's good to have two different perspectives, but many of the effects are just distracting.

Good beat. Great voice. Nice video.

Respect to the north, is all I've got to say.

Bonjay
"Honey Honey"

The Lime and Butterscotch

This video is unfinished, which means that this song is much more polished than the video that accompanies it.

Good thing the song is nicely polished indeed. (Almost too polished, actually, making references to the sounds of soul, house and indie without actually committing.)

Good stuff nevertheless.

Drop The Lime
"Butterscotch"

Word.

This goes out to all those jazz-loving word nerds who say tomahto.

We were actually taught phonetic script in my course, and I got the distinct impression that I was the only person in the class who found it fun.

Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong
"Let's Call The Whole Thing Off"

Hometown crowd

Para todos los argentinos, todos los porteños, y todos en la ciudad de la furia!

There's nothing quite like a hometown crowd. Seeing Mos Def in Brooklyn or the Dropkick Murphys in Boston is not the same as seeing them in, say, Houston.

Soda Stereo is the Argentine equivalent of David Bowie, The Clash and The Pixies all rolled into one. Their final show as a band, in Buenos Aires, in the River Plate football stadium was one of those "I was there" shows you tell everybody about later.

I wasn't there, mind you, but I saw Los Fabulosos Cadillacs - another Argentinean institution of a band - in the same stadium and I can only imagine what this show was like.

Soda Stereo
"De Musica Ligera"

Polish. It's nice.

Unlike someone else, I have never seen Man Man live. As such, I can only speculate as to whether this is one of those bands whose music works better as a soundtrack than live.

Nevertheless, as a fan of Alice in Wonderland (and things 1899 in general) I am quite fond of the visuals in this video. More so than the song, which isn't bad but could use some polishing.

Unlike the video, which is so polished it positively gleams.

Man Man
"Banana Ghost"

Wegue!

More kuduro out of Angola-via-Portugal. Portuguese speaking, at any rate.

I have no idea what "wegue wegue" is, but damned if it doesn't look like a whole lot of fun.

Buraka Som Sistema
"Kalemba (Wegue Wegue)"

Shall we dance?

An excellent melding of all the elements of smooth rock (only with a more prominent horn section) and nice surreal visual. (Always loved those Ginger Rogers/Fred Astaire flicks too.)

I want to go to there. With you.

Chin Chin
"Go There With You"

Haircuts in a heatwave

There's a fair amount of automatic respect for anybody who was a founding member of the The Skatalites; there's even more respect for the frontman of one of the bands that was created following the break up.

This song brings a smile to my face every time.

Tommy McCook
"Heatwave"

It's summer in Australia. And Argentina. South Africa too. Sigh.

Your RDA of mellow-dreamy good-time bizarreness.

Yawn.

Neon Indian
"Deadbeat Summer"

Diz is good stuff

With his trademark off-angle trumpet, Dizzy Gillespie demonstrates why he is one of the greatest jazzmen ever.

Straight up greatest.

As in, ever.

Dizzy Gillespie Quintet
"Lorraine"

La lanterne magique

More than a little Magical Mystery Tour, only with an obvious French accent and stop-motion animation.

Old style aesthetic completely intact.

Lucky Elephant
"Reverand Tisley and his Magic Lantern"

Run!

This was shot in Bangkok.

I know because I was a kid there in the 80's and recognize some of the sights, only intensifying the nostalgia of the 80's saturated sounds.

French electro-pop with that French electro feel - intensely felt, stop-and-start, and rich in its perspective.

C'est tres jolie, non?

Pony Pony Run Run
"Hey You"

Black and white style

Nosferatu and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari are both in the public domain, which means The Walkmen were allowed to use the originals for their old-time-style video. And we all know I like to party like it's 1909, so there we go.

I have a feeling that, yeah, 2010 is going to be a good year.

The Walkmen
"In the New Year"