Music Diary, Vol. 33

For the rationale behind this mad effort, the initial post is here. The full series of Music Diary posts are here. The full playlist is above, and also here.

Week of Aug. 19-25, 2024

LYRICS: Hoagy Carmichael (w/ Frank Loesser), "Two Sleepy People" 

SONG: I would rank k.d. lang’s sleek, ardent cover of this Chris Isaak cowboy tune as one of the great album openers of all time (it kicks off her peerless SHADOWLAND). Listen for the way her voice mimics a steel guitar—the sound of a swoon.

ALBUM: This brassy, poppy Elvis Costello record suffers by comparison to its immediate predecessor, the masterpiece IMPERIAL BEDROOM, but I’ve always loved it. What I still hear in it is an artist at his peak having a blast.

LYRICS: Charli XCX, "Everything is romantic"

SONG: This mesmerizing lament to an absent lover by Lhasa De Sala is a quiet whirlpool of need, grit, resignation, and resilience, marked by the faintly menacing knell of chimes.

ALBUM: I once heard the great Madison Cunningham order her musical priorities as songs first, then guitar, then voice. As her debut record* amply proves, she needn’t choose; she’s tops at them all. (*She has a previous record worth seeking out.)

LYRICS: Joni Mitchell, "Free Man in Paris"

SONG: I don’t know quite how Syd makes this track feel both dense and airy, sadly needy and delightfully coy. It’s a breakup song you can groove to, right up to the irresolute conclusion.

ALBUM: In the mid-aughts a Balkan brass-besotted teenager in Santa Fe, Zach Condon, somehow made (most of) this folk-orchestral classic in his bedroom. “Postcards From Italy” is the obvious standout but the level of commitment throughout is stunning.

LYRICS: R.E.M., "So. Central Rain"

SONG: Proof that a song can be both utterly chilling and sexy as hell: this simmering, bossa-adjacent Bill Withers ode to an abusive lover. Listen for the final turn during the fadeout, in which he casually admits it may be a two-way street. Stunning.

ALBUM: Poulenc could pack so much yearning, drama, humor, and surprise into song form, as this Felicity Lott collection with Pascal Rogé amply proves. Sunshine, clouds, dark nights of the soul, soul-lifting dawn—all here.

LYRICS: Diana Ross & The Supremes (Wilson/Sawyer/Taylor/Richards), "I'm Living in Shame"

SONG: The high point of Rubén Blades’ 1986 record AGUA DE LUNA, inspired by García Márquez stories, is this epic treatment of a philosophical quandary, with the ecstatic chorus “Despiértenme a la hora de la verdad” (“Wake me up at the moment of truth”).

ALBUM: At least half of what makes Sylvain Chomet’s droll, sui generis animated sports thriller LES TRIPLETTES DE BELLEVILLE great is Ben Charest’s tasty, polymorphous score, an irresistible mix of hot jazz, French folk, and musique concrete.

LYRICS: Bob Marley, "I Shot the Sheriff"

SONG: Like many of the best tunes by Felice & Boudleaux Bryant, this early Beatles ballad has both a world-beating melody and a vocal harmony inextricably fused to it—you can sing the first without the second and it sounds beautiful but incomplete.

ALBUM: The combo of guitar grit and unembarrassed tunefulness, spiked with the occasional odd tangent or inspired dissonance, on illuminati hotties’ sensational new record reminds me of vintage Charlotte Hatherley, which I mean as the highest compliment.

LYRICS: Elvis Costello, "God's Comic"

SONG: Another gorgeous, quietly intense spiritual from the peerless Porter’s Gate collection.

ALBUM: I can find almost no info online about this lovely collection of ancient Chinese music, with titles like “Mountain Spirit” and “Wine Frolic” and the sounds of chimes, flutes, and pipa, but I can say I’ve returned to it many times with pleasure.