2005 Best Singles, Pt. 2

Black Mountain-No Satisfaction
A wonderful single on an amazingly not single-friendly album; this song is wonderfully psychedelic (what is that instrumental? a recorder/song flute?) The mix of vocals is one of the best things in Black mountain, sounding like an impromptu rock happening like you hear in the 60s. The girl sounds like Janis Joplin, which helps; this also helps the best of the Pink Mountaintops. This song makes me feel like I'm in a different time, which is helpful sometimes.

Art Brut-Emily Kane
Despite their absence on my year-end top 25, I do love Art Brut; they are wicked funny. I think their songwriting is neat, too; a little simplistic, and I HATE the comparisons to Jonathan Richman (am I missing something?), but I like it. This song, though, stands out; it is fun, funny, and somehow heartfelt in that I'm making a joke-but-something-about-this-is-real sort of way.

De Novo Dahl-Big Ol' Buttons
This is from the remix portion of the album, the "Kittens" side of Cats and Kittens. Overall, I think the remixes are soooo much better than the originals; they give the band the edge that they need. This song is weird, spooky, goofy, and sexy, all at the same time; I love it. This is why I think we are entering the remix-era; bands can record something, and immediately make variations on it that may or may not be better than the original.

Feist-Let it Die
I gave this CD to my mom for mother's day, telling her: "she's like Norah Jones, but cool." I still believe that; this album is full of Barnes & Noble friendly coffee songs, but somehow they sound good, not too yuppie. This song, too, is beautiful in a way that Norah must wish she could be; it sounds heartfelt and pretty, and still somehow acceptable for a Sonic Youth fan to listen to. Maybe that's because she's on the new Broken Social Scene album, but I don't think that's it.

The Apes-Imp Ahh
Like I said on my album list, the Apes won my song of the year last year with "Tapestry Mastery," an insane rant of a song that drove me a little madder everytime I heard it. This song is great too, if not quite as epic; the riff is angry and great, and the shouting/chanting is a creepy as ever. The song title says it all; something that a human might say when acting like an angry monkey; that's what the Apes are.

Heikki-Still you don't know Me
I bought this CD when I heard about the Concretes-Heikki connection, and read the glowing review on allmusic. Although the group doesn't sound at all like Concretes 2, the album is great, filled with heartfelt Byrds-ish Swedish retro psych-country hymns. This is the saddest and the best of these songs; I think that Heikki captures Americana sound better than almost any Americans could, a la Kinks Muswell Hillbillies. I wonder why the Europeans can do such a better job?

M.I.A.-Galang
Galang, galang, galang. 'nuff said.

Jackson 5-I want you back [DJ Z-Trip Remix]
When I opened the box for Motown Remixed at WGRE, I was excited but concerned; this could either be really great or really horrible. It was the former; whoever put it together did a great job of getting some of the best hip-hop DJs in the biz to do these songs; all of them are wonderful. I thought about putting this in my top 25 albums, but it wasn't really new music per se. Anyway, Z-Trip is the best of the best with mainstream hip hop, and he does a masterful job putting more modern funk into this great pop song. DJs at the station fell in love with the Motown songs I put on the air, and it restored my faith in the power for good music to be popular; it just has to be old.

Tom Vek-If You want
Kyle played Tom Vek's "C-C" NONSTOP in our duplex for a couple weeks. He claimed it as some sort of personal anthem; in spite of the lyrical content; I can see the connection. I really like that song, but "If You Want" is more for me; it's fun, dark, sexy, and borderline nonsensical. That's what I want out of good dance/party songs, as this list shows. I've put this song on all kinds of mixes. It makes a good album track; it isn't too flashy, but it takes you to the next song, entertaining you all the way.

Architecture in Helsinki-Do the Whirlwind
I'll get this out of the way early; this song is definitely in my top 5 singles, probably top 3. When I heard this song on the band's website, I got really, really excited. The album didn't let me down at all, but this song remains the best song on the album, and, I'm guessing, perhaps the best song they'll ever make. It's hard to reach this sort of peak again; listening to the bliss of this anthem, I got the same feeling I had when listening to The Shins' "New Slang" back in'01. They haven't gotten to such heights since then, although I hope they will. The same, I fear, will happen to AiH, although I'm holding out for them. Nevertheless, this is a song to remember. Wow.