This week's Fingertips MP3s: free and legal downloads from Stereolab, Tokyo Police Club, and Oh Darling

"Three Women" - Stereolab
     The semi-legendary, relentlessly inscrutable Stereolab--with their sexy vocalist, arcane musical references, and Marxist leanings--may never hit the big time, but they sure know how to entertain the left of center. Perhaps the first band to be called "post-rock," back in the early '90s, this British-based outfit were spinning out intellectually giddy genre-mashups when today's laptop-rockers were in preschool. As I'm not a long-time or super-knowledgeable fan, I always find myself surprised by how sunny and accessible a lot of Stereolab's music sounds at the simple level of listening--never-minding the underpinnings of influence and philosophy. You really don't have to know what they're doing--intermingling krautrock, lounge music, funk, jazz, '60s pop, and contemporary classical minimalism, among other things, leaning on vintage electronic instruments in the process--to like what you're hearing.
     On Fingertips, we last visited with vocalist Lætitia Sadier not too long ago, as her side project Monarde was featured in February; here, she sounds just as sultry-sophisticated (she sings in French again, as she often does), but a bit more light-hearted, as the music this time bubbles along with great pep and texture. Launched off a classic R&B groove, "Three Women" features a sneaky, meandering melody and a bright instrumental coalescence--I'm hearing Farfisa organ, marimba (or, perhaps, vibes?), trumpets, maybe even a celesta--that effortlessly evokes some other time and place without it being quite clear what time or place that might actually be. Sadier purrs, the music rolls along, and if we really have no idea what she's saying or why, well, this is Stereolab. Absorb the vibe, observe the craft, and enjoy the download.
     "Three Women" can be found the band's forthcoming CD Chemical Chords, not due out till August, on Duophonic UHF Disks/4AD. MP3 courtesy of Beggars Group.

"In a Cave" - Tokyo Police Club
     Buzzy, driven, incisive indie pop from a Toronto quartet with a knowledgeable vibe and the added attraction of having a singing bass player (discussed when last we met these guys). This songs strikes me as very smartly constructed--elements added at just the right time, pieces interacting with a casual sort of precision. Example of element added at just the right time: those unexpected, shouting background vocals that chime in at 0:49; example of casually precise interaction: the almost feedbacky guitar line that enters at 0:40 and, first, mimicks the melody line as it's sung but then continues even as the melody moves on (right into the shouting vocal part in fact).
     And what are they singing about? The cave is metaphorical, to be sure, and there's that nice touch about reversing the effects of being in the cave once deciding to leave ("All my hair grows in/Wrinkles leave my skin"), which is skillful way of extending the metaphor; beyond that we get a skittery atmosphere, both musically and lyrically, and we're left to figure out exactly what's going on on our own.
     As per last week's comment about web writers who disparage music when it's not "new" enough, TPC is likely to catch some flak in this regard--and already have, in fact: "Tokyo Police Club aren't smashing templates or changing lives," proclaims Stereogum, "but this stuff is catchy [as hell], easily digestible fun." Here's a clue for you to take around the web: anyone who does that "damning with faint praise" routine is revealing more about their own insecurities than about the subject at hand. Either like something, don't like it, or, even, partially like it--just do so clearly; ground it in observable fact. Is that so hard? "Easily digestible fun" means "this isn't really 'cool' enough for me to like but I like it anyway." Humbug. "In a Cave" is from TPC's debut CD, Elephant Shell (the phrase comes from this song; listen carefully), and is another sign that these guys mean business. It was released last month on Saddle Creek Records.

"Shoulda Never" - Oh Darling
     This one clicks for me in the chorus, at the end of the second line, when the melody steps slightly down, into that unresolved place, and just stays there (around 1:11). Goes to show yet again that you never know where a hook is coming from, or why. And this sort of thing doesn't happen in a vacuum--the whole reason that unresolved detour sounds so apt is because of everything that's come before it. For a relatively new band, these guys have recorded something that glows with preternatural charm and know-how.
     Right away note the juxtaposition of that staccato bass-and-guitar intro, a reliable implement in the rock toolbox at least since the Cars came along, and lead singer Jasmine Ash's pure, almost child-like tone--an intriguing blend that pulls us into "Shoulda Never," establishing the song's subtle push/pull of soft and hard, naive and experienced, female and male (the quartet features two men and two women, and includes a mixed-gender rhythm section--male drummer, female bass). Familiar-sounding in appealing ways, the song also offers its share of subtle surprises, one of my favorites being the whistly, almost flute-like synthesizer that creates a kind of lost-world ambiance, first heard in the instrumental break at 1:24.
     Formed in 2006, Oh Darling self-released an EP at the end of last year. The band's full-length debut is expected out this summer, on Nice Records. "Shoulda Never" can be found on both discs. MP3 courtesy of the band's wonderful-looking web site.

Fingertips CD Review: Fireproof, by Dawn Landes

Fireproof
Dawn Landes
Cooking Vinyl Records

Fireproof is an unassuming, sneaky sort of record, performed with such casual, comfortable intimacy that it seems as much like an overheard impromptu house concert as much as a studio recording. And Landes herself is an unassuming, sneaky sort of singer, in the unadorned, plainspoken tradition of Suzanne Vega, but with a subtle quirkiness that brings Jane Siberry, occasionally, to mind. Her music, while not overtly odd in any way, eludes precise description, probably because of the offbeat but uncluttered mix of instruments she's engaged here, which include a banjo, harmonica, pedal steel, organ, optigan (this being a strange, organ-like instrument made by Mattel in the '70s), bells, and toy piano.

Most of the songs take a while to sink in, both musically and lyrically. Some saunter by with an Americana-ish, by-the-campfire aura ("Tired of This Life," "Twilight," "Dig Me a Hole"), while others exploit Landes' eccentric musical landscape in divergent ways: the Waits-ian carnivalia of "Picture Show", the tinkly tranciness of "Goodnight Lover," the stripped-down urgency of "Private Little Hell," the languid, semi-surreal banjo-funk (?) of the mysteriously alluring "Bodyguard." She sings often of dreaming and darkness and nighttime, and her lyrics make discomfiting leaps in both thought and image. Listen to how she uses her quirky chamber group to great effect on her affecting cover of the traditional (and yet, strange) song "I Don't Need No Man," with some of the percussion playing, it would seem, across the room, while burbling synth sounds frolic with the fast-strumming hoedown of guitars and mandolin. Another highlight: "I'm in Love With the Night," all lonesome-prairie torchiness and fugitive heartache.  [buy via the Fingertips Store]

(See more Fingertips CD reviews on the Album Bin page of the main Fingertips site.)

Free and legal MP3s from Fingertips: The Awkward Stage, Trevor Exter, Reeve Oliver

"Animé Eyes" - The Awkward Stage
     This one has the driving grandeur of mid-'70s Roxy Music, but with the arty quirkiness replaced by power-poppiness: "Animé Eyes" positively rings with clarity and catchiness. And yet there's more going on here than might be immediately apparent. Inspired, I imagine, by the subject matter, the verses are based on a pentatonic scale, the five-tone scale historically associated with Asian music. The pentatonic scale has an inherent sing-songy nature (at least, to my Western ears), which serves the goal of a pop song nicely, even as it also lends a slightly exotic je ne sais quoi to the musical setting (especially since the pentatonic underpinning here is subtle; no jokey musical cliches--think "Turning Japanese"--for these guys).
     In the chorus, the music shifts subtly but firmly back to a Western orientation, even as there are now some Japanese words being sung--another sure-footed but subtle touch. The guitar break that comes at 2:16, however--all pentatonic. Songs that mix straight-ahead, simple-sounding pop with behind-the-scenes craft strike me as close to brilliant most of the time. It helps, I think, to have as charismatic a singer as Shane Nelken, the mastermind behind the Awkward Stage, whose voice has the sort of melodramatic gravitas we heard a lot of back in the New Romantic days of the early '80s, but floats along with less pomposity--he even distorts it through some sort of filtering that keeps him from sounding too full of himself.
     "Animé Eyes" is from the CD Slimming Mirrors, Flattering Lights, to be released next month on Mint Records.

"Strawberry Wine" - Trevor Exter
     Finger-picking and generally slapping around a beat-up cello, Trevor Exter makes music that is both seriously unusual and thoroughly, pleasingly accessible.
     First off, dig the long, funky introduction. I don't usually like long, funky introductions, but I have never before heard one coaxed and charmed and pulled and plucked out of a cello before. In Exter's hands, the instrument generates a soft, incandescent groove, neither bass-like nor guitar-like--nor especially cello-like either, given his unconventional technique. It's kind of mesmerizing, and gets even friskier once the singing starts (after two and a half minutes) and the cello is used as punctuation, in a variety of creative, textured ways. Then again, once the singing starts, it's hard to keep one's ears entirely on the cello, since Exter has a grand instrument right there in his throat--a lithe and buttery tenor, full of soul but light as air. Never before (I don't think) have we heard a cello and a voice perform so intimately and knowingly together, since the cellist and the vocalist are usually two different people. The galvanizing impact on the fabric of the song--the way the cello riffs and rhythms work so tightly in and around the vocal lines--is hard to overstate. And let's not overlook the song itself, which is more than just a pleasant groove; he's written a spiffy hook in there as well (the "trembling, shivering, I am under your spell" part).
     Exter grew up, home-schooled, in upstate New York, found the cello at an early age but never took to classical music, and eventually spent a lot of time in South America absorbing a rich array of Brazilian pop into his psyche and repertoire. He's come and gone from New York City over the years, but is currently back there, gaining a following for the crazy, lovable thing that he does, playing both solo and with a band. "Strawberry Wine" is a song off his CD Flying Saucer People, which was self-released this year. MP3 via Exter's site.

"Yer Motion" - Reeve Oliver
     And then there remains, even now, much power in the simple formulation of "rock band," just three or four folks banging and strumming and hitting their regular ordinary guitars and drums and maybe a keyboard. Reeve Oliver is, in fact, a band--a trio, from San Diego. "Yer Motion" has nothing unusual going for it except that it happens to be a great song. (And are you tired yet of writers and bloggers who act like music that isn't somehow "new" is somehow bad? A great song is always a revelation.) So let me rephrase this: "Yer Motion" sounds really different than most songs because it's good and, well, a lot of the 7.8 trillion songs currently circulating online (that's an exclusive Fingertips estimate) do not actually qualify as "good."
     Why is it good? Energy, arrangement, performance, and (always the kicker, for me) melody. One thing "Yer Motion" does exceptionally well is build on itself: the verse is immediately engaging, with its alternating major and minor chords; then we get a second section that grabs the ear even more, and it turns out to be merely a transition into the chorus, which to my ears is the melodic climax of the song, with its sophisticated twists and tight tight harmonies. Nicely done.
      Reeve Oliver has been around since 2000. Signed by Capitol Records in 2006, they were among the bands that were summarily dropped when Capitol merged with Virgin early last year. "Yer Motion" can be found on the band's Touchtone Inferno album, their second full-length, which was self-released digitally at the end of 2007, and is now coming out on CD. A bonus: the album features a great retro look, from the font to the design to the cool B&W photo. Also nicely done.

* Don't forget to visit the all-new Fingertips Store. There you'll find both current releases and back-catalog classics--and, what the heck, even some DVDs and books, too. The Fingertips Store is designed as a boutique; the point is to offer only highly recommended items, not to get you lost in choice overload. The store is basically a small, customized slice of Amazon, and there is no extra cost to you at all; you'll buy items at standard Amazon prices, and still support Fingertips in the process.

Fingertips returns, with free and legal MP3s from My Brightest Diamond, and more

"Inside a Boy" - My Brightest Diamond
     Shara Worden, once again up and running as My Brightest Diamond, has the uncanny ability to create the most expansive musical landscapes within the bounds of what seems merely to be a three-minute forty-second pop song. "Inside a Boy" shimmers, boils, drives, plunges, and aches with an idiosyncratic zeal that should thrill Kate Bush fans, and appeal to anyone with curious ears and an open heart. After an ethereal opening section, featuring a twinkling electric guitar line underneath a heavenly wash of sound, the song finds its central motif--a dark, diving theme that acquires a fierce, orchestral feel as it recurs throughout the piece. Worden produces and arranges her songs, and one of her signature talents is integrating inventive string arrangements with some serious rock'n'roll drumming and, when it seems a good idea, some noisy electric guitars as well. The end result is curious and satisfying.
     For all of the musical drama unleashed, the song is more lyrically sparse than it might seem, given the inherent theatricality of Worden's elastic voice. The words, instead, arrive like poetry, and pack a metaphysical wallop: "We are clouds, we are vistas/Like fawns and shape shifters/Our ages can never be found out/No our edges keep moving further out."
     The song can be found on the CD A Thousand Shark's Teeth, an album with a number of other jewels to be discovered. It's scheduled for a June release on Asthmatic Kitty Records.

"Fire" - Alibi Tom
     Rapid-fire handclaps play off a crisp guitar lick for a series of quick measures and then--bang: I feel like I'm smack in the middle of a full-grown, fully-developed song--as if I opened a hallway door and discovered a band playing behind it. The verse presents an interesting aural contradiction: it feels very active, with a jumpy melody and the continuation of the crisp guitar line, but chord-wise, we're pretty much standing still--as far as my ear can pick out, the entire verse revolves around one chord. (And if it's not precisely one chord, the verse feels harmonically in one basic place all the way through.) The net effect is of serious anticipation, because whether we're aware of it or not, our ears, when listening to music (pop music, specifically), continually anticipate the next chord, as each chord arrived at becomes its own center on the one hand yet implies its displacement on the other. There's always another one coming, and we know it.
     This is no doubt a good part of why the chorus, when it arrives (at 0:39) seems so wondrous--it comes after 25 seconds of this paradoxical sort of itchy-standing-stillness. Also, it's a pretty great chorus, all effortless melody and breezy harmony. Now that I think about it, the idea of matching a dynamic melody to a single chord strikes me as the equal-but-opposite effect of having a one-note melody over a changing chord pattern, which is a well-established rock tradition (classic examples being "Subterranean Homesick Blues" and "Pump It Up"). Note, by the way, how, after the chorus but before the next verse, the song fully incorporates the introductory section (handclaps and guitar). This speaks to attention to craft; I always like that.
     From Gothenburg, Sweden, the five-piece band Alibi Tom used to be the six-piece band Out of Clouds; as Out of Clouds, they were previously featured here on Fingertips in September 2006. "Fire" is from Scrapbook, the band's debut as Alibi Tom, slated for release in Europe next month on a new British label called Leon. MP3 via the band's site.

"Right Away" - Pattern is Movement
     Songs rarely manage to be simultaneously catchy and unusual, but the distinctive Philadelphia duo Pattern is Movement has done it with this odd amalgam of noise, cabaret, and glee. Launched off a fuzz of sound that sounds like a sustained accordion (but probably isn't), "Right Away" hooks me, um, right away--as soon as the singing starts, with the lovely, harmonized melody that becomes the backbone of this sturdy, crazy little number. The oddities are too numerous to list (don't miss the cartoony violins that arrive like meddling relatives to punctuate the lyrics), but topping them all is probably the piano solo at 1:45--just past the midpoint of the song, right where a more traditional band would put the blazing guitar solo, we get instead a muddle of notes such as might happen if you put your hands down anywhere on the keyboard and just sort of let them sit there while you drummed your fingers in place.
     Speaking of drumming, sort of, pay attention to the percussion here. Despite an overall rhythm that is nearly mechanical in its one-two-three-four-iness, Chris Ward's drum work is continually creative, utilizing all manner of pitch and accent to keep the texture interesting. Some of this has arisen out of necessity--the band used to have five people in it; down to just a drummer and a keyboard player (Andrew Thiboldeaux, who also sings), Ward has found it useful to be more ingenious. If in so doing he accentuates the duo's overall vibe of purposeful but wacky vigor, all the better.
     "Right Away" can be found on the band's third CD, All Together, which is due out next week Hometapes Records.

* News from the web site: The Fingertips Record Shop has been metamorphosed into the Fingertips Store. You'll now find there a larger assortment of CDs, both current releases and back-catalog classics, along with DVDs and books and maybe some other odds and ends over time. It's still boutiquey; the point is to offer only highly recommended items--the selection is expanded but not enough to get you lost in choice overload. To make this change possible, and a much easier thing to create and maintain at my end, the Store is now an all-Amazon affair. There is no extra cost to you at all; you'll buy things there at standard Amazon prices, and still support Fingertips in the process. Check it out when you have a chance.

Fingertips Top 10 update

Since last we checked into the Fingertips Top 10, some changes have been made. As of April 22, here's what it looks like:

1. "Beyond the Door" - 13ghosts
2. "Boys" - the Autumns
3. "Neal Cassady" - the Weather Underground
4. "Cat Swallow" - the Royal Bangs
5. "Bodyguard" - Dawn Landes
6. "Torn Blue Foam Couch" - Grand Archives
7. "To Be Gone" - Anna Ternheim
8. "Big Sound" - the M's
9. "One, Two, Three!" - I Make This Sound
10. "Buildings and Mountains" - the Republic Tigers

There have been six changes in the chart since the last blog post about it in February, the most recent addition being Anna Ternheim's lovely "To Be Gone." As Fingertips only features high-quality free and legal MP3s, you really can't go wrong with anything written about on the site, but the Top 10 is my way of pointing you towards ten especially wonderful songs at any given time. Songs remain in the Top 10 for a maximum of three months, before they are retired to the Retired Top 10 Songs page, logically enough.

Fingertips says: Take a break!

Fingertips declares Spring Break! In honor of Earth Day and Turn Off Your TV Week, there will be no official "This Week's Finds" selections this week. The Fingertips Home Office will be open all week, so site updates are otherwise likely. Fingertips invites you, meanwhile, to ponder this: we do not, as a culture of educated human beings, generally benefit from filling up all available time and space simply because the space and time seems there to be filled. The mainstream media has proven that beyond argument this election year, with its microscopic idiocy and macroscopic myopia. The blogosphere, alas, proves it everyday. Fight the demon of space- and time-filling and remember to breathe, turn off your screens, and say hello to a nearby tree or two. It won't talk back; it has nothing but time. We might learn a thing or two.

Free and legal MP3s from the Royal Bangs, Anna Ternheim, and the Acorn

* Check out a new feature on the Fingertips web site: the Fingertips Flashback, which takes you back to a free and legal MP3 featured somewhere in the deep dark recesses of "This Week's Finds" history, and still currently available online. This time the song receives an aural introduction, courtesy of Outshouts technology.

"Cat Swallow" - the Royal Bangs
     A potent display of ramshackle rock'n'roll that brings the Replacements to mind both for the sloppy-tight ensemble playing and for lead singer Ryan Schaefer's simultaneously offhanded and passionate voice, which is agreeably Westerbergian. The Bangs aim for a glitchy sort of sound, but only at the very beginning and at the very end are these glitches electronic in nature; otherwise, the band achieves its goals via a squeakily insistent, oddly memorable lead guitar line, cymbals-heavy percussion, the well-timed use of phased vocals, and, eventually, a clickety-clackety sound that might in fact be electronic after all but feels organic even if so. All in all there's a certain wild grandeur at play as the piece shambles and swings along. I like how a searing instrumental break suddenly finds the band backing off, at 2:44, to offer a wonderfully subdued bit of guitar work that sounds completely different from what they've been doing but also, somehow, seamlessly part of the whole.
     A quartet from Knoxville that is an outgrowth of Schaefer's previous band, a trio called the Suburban Urchins, the Royal Bangs have been together since 2004. "Cat Swallow" is from the band's second CD, We Breed Champions, due out next month on the Akron-based label Audio Eagle, a high-spirited outfit with the unambiguous message "Buy our fucking records!" on its home page.

"To Be Gone" - Anna Ternheim
     Sad songs don't always have to be slow, nor do pretty songs. Both sad and pretty, "To Be Gone" nevertheless moves at a steady, initially slinky, and ultimately almost finger-tapping pace, while Ternheim's accented but clear and open-hearted singing style suggests, I think, greater pathos in this hardy setting than most singers convey who seek a melancholy ambiance through hushed tones and drowsy pacing. None of that mush for Ternheim here; "To Be Gone" is a firm-footed beauty, combining a keen if ineffable nostalgia with crystalline presence in the here and now. While there does seem to be something very late '60s- or early '70s-like going on here, the effect is peripheral--listen directly and it disappears.
     At the heart of this song is a gorgeous, melancholic moment in the first line of what appears to be the chorus (although the lyrics shift from one iteration to another): it's when the melody pushes forward but the chords lag behind, going seemingly in the opposite direction of where your ear seeks resolution. You can first hear this at 0:36 and then again, somewhat more clearly, at 1:13. I can't completely describe this but the effect of the entire line is almost breathtaking.
     Ternheim is from Stockholm, and released her first CD in Sweden in 2004 to great acclaim. "To Be Gone" was available on that CD, and is also now on her first U.S. full-length, Halfway to Fivepoints, coming out next week on Decca Records. The CD features mostly songs from Ternheim's 2006 Swedish release, Separation Road, along with the older single "To Be Gone" and a few other songs from EPs and/or bonus discs from Sweden.

"Crooked Legs" - the Acorn
     Opening with an appealing if unassuming bit of finger-picking, "Crooked Legs" begins like pretty much any 21st-century indie rock song written by someone who listened to a lot of old Paul Simon records (him again!; see last week). Except...listen carefully to the background percussion underneath the acoustic guitar. It's syncopated, with a distinctly non-rock'n'roll flavor to it. That's hint number one that this song may not end up where it appears at first to be going.
     Hint number two: the trumpets that glide in at 0:48. There is some musical force seeking to enter here from beyond the realm of either standard-issue indie rock or gimmick-driven blog rock. You can hear it come to full expression at 1:09, when the complex, polyrhythmic percussion kicks in and we find ourselves in the middle of a genuine musical adventure. Which is only fitting, given the real-life adventure on which this song (and album) is based. "Part biographical narrative, part surreal fairy tale," as the band describes it, the CD Glory Hope Mountain was inspired by the harrowing story of Gloria Esperanza Montoya (her name roughly translates to the CD's title), mother of the Acorn's singer and songwriter Rolf Klausener. Barely surviving a childhood of poverty and abuse in her native Honduras, Montoya eventually found her way to Montreal without any money or contacts and slowly made a new life for herself.
     Writing a concept album about your mother is however not the best way to win over your bandmates, but the power of the story, and the accompanying music, got everyone on board. The Ottawa-based Klausener researched the history and mythology of Honduras, and listened to recordings of the country's folk music; he became particularly inspired by the rhythms of the Garifuna music indigenous to the area, which developed from a blending of native traditions with music that came over with slaves who arrived from West Africa. The final product was less specifically about Montoya than a dream-like musing on the individual's struggle to live a meaningful life.
     The Acorn began as a solo project but ultimately became a band when Klausener decided that being a bedroom rocker wasn't all that much fun. There are now five members. Glory Hope Mountain was released on Paper Bag Records in Canada this past fall, and saw its official U.S. release last month. MP3 via Paper Bag.