Songs That Might Otherwise Pass You By

Pash, "Exploding"

There's something elegant and clear about the singer's voice, even as she's daring us to watch her crash. The command in her voice makes her seem totally in control, as though she's going to anything but crash. Perhaps she is crashing, but she's revelling in it--sometimes that's the best way to land. Something bad's going on in this song--she says something is "eroding", "exploding" and 'tearing apart" as someone shuts the door. Still, she says it with such a lovely voice--I can't get too broken up about it.

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Pash eat their own

Frightened Rabbit, "Be Less Rude"

Well, listen to this song! How awesome is this? The guy sounds like he's straight outta the early 80's, but he was really born in the 80's, as was his brother. They used to not have other people in the band, because they didn't have any other friends as awesome as they are (once you finally figure out how their website works, you'll understand what that means). From what their Myspace lists, though, it looks like they added two other people--one named "Flesh". Perhaps he likes zombie movies as much as I do. Anyways, this song is just what's needed to give any zombie lover a jolt--a constant supply of loud, crashing guitar, a keyboard overlay that nicely draws the rest of the instruments together, and...harmonica?!! I think that's harmonica. Makes it all the more cool and endearing.

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Thanks to IODA Promonet for this mp3


Most of Frightened Rabbits' pictures look like this. They're very tired blokes from Scotland.

Courtney Jones, "Ride" (downloadable on Myspace)

She says she gets a lot of comparisons to Sarah McLachlan*, but I would say her voice sounds more like Heidi Berry's, and their styles are reminiscent (and equally unclassifiable). If you don't know who Heidi Berry is, she's a goddess. My music tastes in the 90's started and ended with her, with some other things thrown in between. Anyway, "Ride" has the same qualities of ease, grace and intangibility, especially at the end when she says "I am halfway in between, and don't want to be". This song is seriously halfway between earthly and something beyond earthly.

Don't get me wrong--I found the same otherworldliness in Sarah M's album Solace, but then her music started going towards the VH1 realm, and, well...still love her, though!

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Courtney Jones

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