When I make you mine

Like I said, when Marvin's got you in his web, there's nothing to do but lay back and enjoy the vocal silk. I noted that I most enjoy his lasciviousness when paired with fairly dubious claims of piety and vice versa. There's not much God talk in this one; it's all about getting down to business. And what with me getting married in a mere 2 days (!!), I think the tender lechery of this track makes a fine transition to the tenderness of a wedded life.

In nerdier matters, I still can't decide if I prefer the awesomely basic drum machine and plastic guitar picking of the album version (where he does actually thank Jesus for no particular reason) or this more fleshy one here. Why should a man have to choose?

Marvin Gaye - My Love Is Waiting

Love divine

There are times in any self-respecting man's life when he becomes captive to the sound of Marvin Gaye's voice. When that happens, it's best not to fight it. Just let the records play. 

Of those records, What's Going On is the obvious champ (although there are many pleasures to be had in his more hedonistic later albums). He's probably most interesting when working through his church/flesh dichotomy, but this album track version is just poignant as all hell. I like how the music harkens back to the Motown sound even as it's being shed by that classic work. 

Marvin Gaye - God Is Love (B-side version)

The orchestra is dreaming

Several years removed from their '90s indie rock flag-bearing days, it's nice that Sea and Cake frontdude Sam Prekop can still provide a perfect soundtrack for a hot summer spaceout. Like a palm leaf fanning you as the sun pulls up the water from a cool pool dip, this tune holds attention for exactly the short time it needs to and then politely recedes into the blue sky. And you bask in day's drift until the calendar reclaims your time.

Sam Prekop - The Company

Say you don't know me, I'm your native son

I'm mostly unqualified to hold forth on Willie Nelson's music, beyond a general affection for his nasally pipes and an amusement over his very public stoniness. But his lovely version of this paean to the faded railroad life of America sends a not so patriotic chill up my spine. Which alone makes it a totally suitable tune for this Memorial Day weekend. (And I'm pretty sure Willie will be firing up more than a grill on Monday.) Meanwhile, see you back on Tuesday.

Willie Nelson - City Of New Orleans

Tea party

I used to turn a very snobby nose up at funky jazz, soul jazz, and 'most any kind of jazz that didn't honk all over the place. More mature ears understand the value of getting hips shaking and lips loosened. Although if this song title is any indication, Charlie Hunter is looking to take the party to a much more uninhibited place.

Charlie Hunter Quartet - Teabaggin'

Me again kiss again kiss me

One of the coolest and most maddening things about Arthur Russell's catalog is how nothing ever sounds finished and everything begs to be rethought from a different angle. In that spirit comes a mind-bending re-interpretation of the classic "Kiss Me Again" which evolves through various psych-y, drone-y, beautiful passages that refract elements of the original and, as far as I'm concerned, could go on slowly unfolding for a happy forever. Here's an edit I made that amps up its most straight-up pretty aspects.

Polmo Polpo - Kiss Me Again And Again (Songblague edit)

Gravely epic

Big endless gray rainy ominousness up above demands a song of equal vastness, preferably one as puffed up as all that nimbus. I remember a few years ago when these Danish dudes had the blogs aflutter with pop epics as earnest as only imitators can make them. Dug out their hit album over the weekend, and enjoyed it with fresh ears. Maybe you will too.

Mew - Why Are You Looking Grave

Cloudless

A couple days of no clouds in the sky puts me right in a mind to crave jangly New Zealand pop. Especially when the feel is totally at odds with the lyrics. Case in point — this breezy little number about a murderer contemplating the dead body in the river and his comeuppance is going to go down. Ah, summer is surely in the air. And then it rains...

The Bats - Jetsam

Spazzy awakening

Finally starting to feel like myself again after a long sickweek. Like shaking the blood back into a leg that's been asleep, it's a burst of awkward energy. Here's a song to match that spazzy awakening, courtesy of some Spanish synthpoppers who were probably never mistaken for anyone famous.

Metal y Ca - El Ultimo Superviviente

Maybe sunshine and maybe rain

It's a cliche that certain r&b songs crystallize the most profound truths and acts of deep philosophical questioning in simple terms bereft of bullshit and well under 3 minutes. How nice when some of those songs make you appreciate that trick as if for the first time.

Marion Black - Who Knows

Soundtrack to anticipation

Well, this is probably the only time you'll ever see anything resembling Tom Cruise's mug on the 'blague. I don't have many associations with Risky Business, but this tune from Tangerine Dream's soundtrack (yes, them again) really put me into a frozen contemplation when I realized how deeply engrained it is in my brain. Since I can remember, this exact tune has played in my head in those quiet, abyss-facing interludes before big life moments of consequence, the ones where you are totally and painfully aware of the loudness of your own breathing. It spans nearly every variation of that experience across my memory. Which is both amazing and a little sad that I'm only now becoming conscious of it. Anyway, another good reason to keep TD on regular rotation.

Tangerine Dream - The Dream Is Always The Same

Little spaces and big spaces

I didn't think Beach House would've had staying power. Or if they had, I expected them to just replicate their candlelit, lo-fi bedroom slow pop for a few albums with a couple cosmetic tweaks. In a sense, they've done just that, but the ways they've chosen to evolve have resulted in music that now sounds equally brilliant booming out of giant outdoor speakers and little headphones in those candlelit bedrooms. Oh, and also as an accompaniment to my cold that won't go away.

Beach House - Other People

Sick daze

Just my luck to get clobbered by a fever on a sweet sunny Sunday. Full body aches and drunkard-style dizziness weren't enough to keep me from a rocking Mother's Day with the imminent in-laws, but I'm down for a few counts now. I figure a regimen of cold remedies demands some tunes with an equally woozy effect, preferably with album covers that are equally baked.

Le Pamplemousse - Gitcha Down

Weekend rub-a-dub

The last few weekends have involved a strange dub craving immediately upon waking up. And my enjoyment usually lasts deep into my second cup of coffee. Could King Tubby's productions actually be the perfect soundtrack for unhurried morning domesticity? Could this pioneer of homespun audio innovations have found a way to remix the the early sunlight hours by removing any desire to leave the house? Here's a test case.

Tommy McCook and The Aggrovators/King Tubby - Bongo Man Dub

Eight ways home

Ah, the romance of the focus group. The dark room, the unseen gazing, the endless M&Ms and stale coffee. If you're going to be trapped in two-way mirror purgatory (or is it one-way?), you may as well try to put yourself the nocturnal cityscape of your mind's escape, here performed by an 8-piece ensemble with more talent than could probably have fit in the studio.

David Murray Octet - Home

Humming along

Evening train rides have an incredible tranquilizing effect on me. Somewhere between drug daze and fetal pre-consciousness. A few minutes into it, and I'm at one with the hum. A work trip has given me the chance to indulge the pleasure, made all the better having synced up with this sympathetic tune.

Al Usher - Lullaby For Robert (Bogdan Irkük Remix)

To get well known like you

It doesn't get much more full-on '80s than the big bright cloying pop of Howard Jones. Despite a name more suited to pushing paper in a government office, this dude is responsible for a fair amount of the bedroom poster pop of my childhood. And addictive stuff at that. Sure, the pseudo-reggae groove is totally plastic and may as well be the soundtrack for the official marginalization of urban poverty in the Reagan era. But no reason to hold that against the man. A man of such vertical hair volume can only be asked to do so much.

Howard Jones - Like To Get To Know You Well

Red and blue

Increasingly, my favorite singers are the ones who polarize. Even if I can't stand them, it's hard not to respect the ones who put a stake in the ground, or at least care enough to give some character to their pipes. 

David Sylvian's solo debut is pretty much Japan without the name, and that's a good thing, even if it does point toward the navel gazing tendencies of his later work. This tune is solid though, with some welcome tightness supplied from his ex-bandmates. Dig the segue from blue notes in the verses to the cherry red swagger in the chorus.

David Sylvian - Red Guitar

A dream he keeps having

Remember when everyone was all gooey about Wilco and how Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was the ultimate avant-garde middle finger to the record industry? With that album having aged like a spring break tattoo and said industry writhing like a stomped cockroach and the band itself functioning like a bored all-star team these days, I look back fondly at the preceding Summerteeth. That album holds up as the confident, colorful, unpretentious set of smart pop it has always been. A genuine pleasure to listen to end to end. Here's an example of its fine craftsmanship.

Wilco - Summerteeth

In the clouds on the ground

Just when I get to a place of peace with air travel, I get on a plane and the fundamental absurdity of it all hits me again. Safety averages be damned, it will simply never seem right to be in a chair in the sky, prisoner to a thousand variables that can fail without warning or logic. What's worse, music that should be an agent of calm just seems to amplify the dread. Happily, time passes and solid ground is always there to welcome. And these audio clouds hold my weight with barely a rumble.

Vangelis - Memories Of Green

Nuyorican party time

Back home from hot hot Louisiana, fortified by Boudin and a headful of Cajun squeezebox jams. But coming home doesn't have to mean the party ends. It just has to head up to Spanish Harlem circa-40 years ago. A little less humid, but just as hot.

Joe Bataan - Riot