Gal Friday

Today in music*:

* Does not necessary indicate "new" music, as in "available to the average person not on or who knows someone on a promo-copy mailing list" -- "new" to me is simply "hey, interesting stuff! Am I the only one who didn't know about this?"

1. Mika -- "Life in Cartoon Motion" (2007)
I remember skimming Amazon for upcoming releases and being drawn to Mika's album the same reason I'm drawn to any album on the 50+ pages of upcoming releases on Amazon: the flippin' awesome cover art.

The mix of "Yellow Submarine" and "Reading Rainbow" screamed at me to check it out, and boy was I glad I did. I got my first listen to "Grace Kelly" on his MySpace, and I rejoiced a few weeks later when I found the mp3 on a blog. Somewhere thereafter I found out his song "Love Today" was featured in a Verizon commercial (can't find it on YouTube... try this promo for "Grace Kelly" instead), and I got to have an "I called it!" moment (the same moment I had when I heard The Fratellis on that iPod commercial after having been a fan for about three months. I love my iPod, and my MacBook, but I hate Apple for being so damn good at marketing "cool.")

So, having worked in the media for a while and being able to get my hands on free music basically whenever I wanted, I haven't quite gotten back into the habit of buying music. I mean, I want musicians to know I appreciate their work, and I want them to be able to eat, but ... well, my excuse for now is student loans. So I picked up "Life in Cartoon Motion" from a friend, and while "Grace Kelly" is clearly the standout track as least as far as memorability, it's a solid debut album, and Mika (aka Michael Holbrook Penniman, of London by way of Lebanon) has a gorgeous voice with great range. He seems to have the personality and creativity to back up his musical talent, plus all the airplay he's gotten on TV and movie trailers, so unless this album is a total fluke, I don't think he'll be going away anytime soon.

2. The Dears -- Gang of Losers (2006)
I've been a Dears fan for a few months now. I interned at NPR, which was my first exposure to the wonderful world of free music goodness, plus I got to write about music, too, and the Dears were one of my projects.


I associate them with Midlake, since I got hooked on both groups at about the same time, but the Dears have a much more endearing sound, an ethereal but still very solid "please love us" quality that you can't help but tapping your foot to. (Not to dis Midlake -- more on them later.) I've found I can use the phrase "There goes my outfit" in a myriad of ways: when someone fucks my shit up and there's nothing I can do because it's usually my boss; when I'm late for something and the elevator in my apartment stops at least seven times before I get down to the lobby; and when my hamster pees on my jeans and I have to change. Here's the video for "Ticket to Immortality."

3. The Good, The Bad & The Queen -- "Live from SoHo" (2007)
Three cheers for Damon Albarn. The man behind Blur and The Gorillaz finds somewhere in his giant musical brain fresh material that is both reminiscent of the best of the rock part of the Gorillaz and some new/psychedelic/orchestral/guitar-laced crooning that just blows my mind.

"Herculean" isn't my favorite track on the full-length album (self-titled: check it out; it's awesome. As is the video for "Kingdom of Doom."), but it's by far my favorite on "Live from SoHo," an iTunes-exclusive EP of songs recorded at a rare U.S. performance.


*****


Some words on words

You've heard by now that writer Kurt Vonnegut died Wednesday, April 11 at the age of 84. I had the great privilege to see Mr. Vonnegut give a lecture in 2000 in Kansas City -- the thing that sticks out most in my mind is some baby crying continuously throughout, and KV breaking his spiel for a second and yelling, "Would someone shut that kid up?"

I went on to read "Slaughterhouse-Five" for my sophomore English class in high school, "Slapstick" while I was supposed to be applying to colleges, and "Cat's Cradle" for a Post-Modern American Fiction class my last year as an English major. I further went on to write a 15-page paper discussing Vonnegut's use of Swiftian satire in "Cat's Cradle." Then I graduated from college and started TiVoing "LOST." Sometimes I worry about the quickly deteriorating state of my life.

From an essay by Douglas Brinkley on Mr. Vonnegut:
(T)hen Vonnegut started coughing, clearing his throat of phlegm, grasping for a half-smoked pack of Pall Malls laying on a coffee table. He quickly lit up. His wheezing ceased. I asked him whether he worried that cigarettes were killing him. "Oh yes," he answered. "I've been smoking Pall Mall unfiltered cigarettes since I was 12 or 14. So I'm going to sue the Brown & Williamson Tobacco Company who manufactures them. And do you know why?" "Lung cancer?" I offered. "No. No. Because I'm 82 years old. The lying bastards! On the package Brown & Williamson promised to kill me. Instead, their cigarettes didn't work. Now I'm forced to suffer leaders with names like Bush and Dick and, up until recently, Colin."

Vonnegut of course made this memorable appearance on "The Daily Show."

Basically, the man functioned as a harbinger of doom for the human race, writing about pain, war and the end of the world, but he also wrote about love, regeneration and the goddamn unquenchable hope for mankind. He had the kind of mind that puts him on the same page as Mark Twain and Jonathan Swift himself. And within a minute of being in the same room with him, you could tell he had a heart of gold. Mr. Vonnegut, you will be missed. Let me join the chorus of Americans as we say: So it goes.