Music
This has to be one of the most impassioned vocals of all time, Nelson Sanders’s sobbing, heartfelt interpretation of the song title – I’m Lonely.
I don’t think I ever heard the name Levi Stubbs until Billy Bragg wrote and sang a song in the mid-Eighties called Levi Stubbs’ Tears. Even then I doubt I realised who he was.
Not just a deep cut – this psych-garage gem is positively subterranean. And I’m only posting it for the title. It’s rubbish, of course, but I’m intrigued by what little I know of the perpetrators, The Driving Stupid.
How great is this soul ballad?! That organ! Those vocals! You can just picture a disco at the end of the night in the late Sixties with young men awkwardly trying to smooch embarrassed girls on the dance floor as the DJ drops this tune.
Tom Verlaine of Television has died, aged 73.
Earl Van Dyke was never a household name but he was one of the key figures in the success of Motown in the Sixties.
I first heard The Tonettes on a vast box set anthology of Stax/Volt singles… though they were called The Charmels at that point. This was their first single – and the second to come out on Volt in early 1962.
The Undisputed Truth were Norman Whitfield’s Motown laboratory for his psychedelic soul constructions, testing out songs that would end up with The Temptations. This was their only hit.
When it comes to emotionally intense vocal performances, you don’t need to look much further than James Brown singing The Bells.
This isn’t the best thing the provocatively named Canadian band Fucked Up have ever done. Because that would be when they took part in the self-explanatory Festival of the Fuck Bands in 2008.
There they performed alongside their fellow provocateurs Fuck, Fuck Buttons, Holy Fuck, Fuck The Facts and Starfucker. Where was this festival held, do I hear you ask? Why, there could only be one place… the Austrian village of Fucking.
This is their latest tune, I Think I Might Be Weird. The video, intended as an ode to OCD, is funny, surreal, slightly disturbing – and certainly illustrates the song title.
Fucked Up, who formed in Toronto in 2001 (Canada seems to be home to many, if not most, of the F-word bands), have released close to 100 singles, EPs and albums and are known for live shows lasting up to 12 hours: a long time to listen to grinding guitars and rasping vocals.
They’ve taken the opposite approach for their latest album, One Day, with the whole thing written and recorded in 24 hours, with each band member working remotely while adhering to the rule.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- …
- 98
- Next Page »