In July, Scotland’s Kathryn Joseph was awarded the 2015 Scottish Album of the Year for her superb debut album, Bones You Have Thrown Me And Blood I’ve Spilled.  It’s taken us another six months since to get our thumbs out of our ears, but we’ve become ardent fans of the talented Ms. Joseph.  Joseph isn’t your average musician or storyline (which you can read more about HERE).  Though she first had a record deal at the age of 23, after a subsequent lifetime of trials and tribulations (including the unimaginable loss of an infant), she finally released her debut album at the age of 40.  Joseph reminds us of the best of Kate Bush, Rickie Lee Jones, and PJ Harvey, with a dollop of Thom Yorke-isms.  In other words:  incredible and moving song-making and singing to match.  Check out a couple of songs from the album below, as performed for the BBC.

What are the chances? We were late to discover one of the Best Songs of 2015, Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment’s Sunday Candy.  Only one week later, the song’s composer, Chance the Rapper, appeared on SNL and gave a stirring performance of the song.  Chance is winning hearts and minds everywhere these days, and we’re all in.  He also emphatically performed superb new track Somewhere in Paradise, throwing in some dazzling dance moves in the last minute.  Watch both stellar performances below.  Here’s to 2016 being the Year of Chance!  “See you in church on Sunday.”

Once again we’ve missed the boat. But we’re all better now. We’ve finally caught the Julien Baker bug going around and are loving her symptoms. Baker just turned 20 years-old and is a singer-songwriter from Murfreesboro, Tennessee.  She recorded her haunting debut album, Sprained Ankle, at Matthew E. White’s Spacebomb space in Richmond.  Check out below the official video for the album’s title track.  We love the spare, affecting lyrics (see below) and desolated visuals to match.  Add spare guitar harmonics to the beginning, and we are all in.  So much of it reminds us of Sharon Van Etten, which is highest praise in our book.  No wonder Van Etten has been singing Baker’s praise.  The apple doesn’t fall very far from her tree.

Sprained Ankle:

“Wish I could write songs about anything other than death
I can’t go to bed without drawing the red, shaving off breaths
Each one so heavy, each one so cumbersome
Each one a lead weight hanging between my lungs
Spilling my guts
Sweat on a microphone, breaking my voice
Whenever I’m alone with you, can’t talk
Isn’t this weather nice? Are you okay?
Should I go somewhere else and hide my face?
Sprinter, learning to wait
Marathon runner, my ankles are sprained
Marathon runner, my ankles are sprained”

We don’t usually pop too deeply into the pop realm, but we recently stumbled upon Sweden’s Natali Felicia and her song Easy Ride.  Between the well-wrought, arching song, the official video therefor and the KPO Remix thereof, we will confess to being hopelessly mired.  The official video is a visual stunner, and alone worth your time. Check out below all of the above.

To commemorate the 10th Anniversary of Spoon’s release of their breakout album Gimme Fiction the band and Merge Records are releasing (on December 11th in time for your Spoon-fanatic friend’s holiday needs) a deluxe, re-mastered version of the album together with the song’s home demos.  We are oft-fascinated by demo releases since they provide a great vantage into songs’ beginnings and subsequent evolution to recorded versions.  Go over to NPR HERE to hear side-by-side studio/demo versions, coupled with Britt Daniel’s descriptions of the songs’ evolutions.  If you can’t be bothered or need more immediate satisfaction, check out the driving demo version of Was It You? below.

About Was It You?, Daniel told NPR:

“[This one] came fast, too. When something lucky happened, it was usually after long bouts of nothing good coming. And this one was one that I’d had this little idea with just an acoustic guitar and the two main verses and it was maybe 60 seconds long and I’d never tried anything with it. Then at the end of a long day where I’d been trying to write a song and nothing good was coming, I thought I’d just start drinking. I don’t mean I got plastered. Just something to change the mood. I just had a couple of beers. And then all of a sudden I was feeling a little lighter. And it became a lot more fun. So, last ditch effort I figured I’d throw out an idea I had lying around. And instead of making it an acoustic song I thought I’d turn it into a drawn-out dance thing. And somehow it just happened. There was the thing I’d been hoping for all day.

I like the demo a little more. I think it’s just grittier and more direct and urgent. The album version is way more laid back and sort of spacey. And the demo version is a little more funky and on top and aggressive. You might like the version on the album more because it’s what you heard first. But the version I got hooked on was the one on the demo. And we never even tried to record it that way.”

We agree with Daniel that the demo version is preferable! Talking Heads meets Prince with Daniel’s quintessential rock vocals.  Perfect!

Go HERE to pre-order the deluxe Gimme Fiction.

We’ve been long-time fans of Joanna Newsom, the twee singer-songwriter-harpist from Northern California. Newsom recently released the critically-acclaimed album Divers on Drag City, and last night made her first US TV appearance since releasing the album. Watch below as Newsom performed song Leaving the City on Colbert’s Late Show.  In all honesty, we have been slow to delve into Divers, but Newsom makes a stellar argument in support of the song and album in the performance below.  Time to dive deeper into Divers’ waters.

With the recent announcement that The National will not release a new album in 2016, the National news has gone dark.  However, the band recently pointed to video of their performance of I Need My Girl, as accompanied by Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry. at this October’s Treasure Island Music Festival in the Bay Area.  Check it out below.  Brrrr….

Oh to have been in Paris the last two nights (any time, really).  On those nights U2 rescheduled their shows cancelled in the wake of the Parisian terrorist attacks on November 13th.  On Sunday U2 brought with them Patti Smith to help sing her version of Gloria and also the apropos anthem People Have The Power. And tonight U2 brought out Eagles of Death Metal (who were the headliners at the Bataclan on that fateful night in November) to perform I Love You All The Time (which artists have been covering as requested by the band in support of the Parisian victims) and People Have The Power.

Check out those powerful, heart-stirring performances below.  Along the way, Bono said to the Parisian audience: “Grief is like a wound that never fully closes. I am still feeling it and I was 14 when my mother left me but she left me as an artist and this wound became an opening into another world and I found these three (pointing to his band). Rock n’ roll saved me, these men saved me, you saved me.  We can’t save you but our role tonight is to serve you. We have the privilege to be your servants this evening.”  As an introduction to Eagles of Death Metal, Bono graciously said: “They were robbed of their stage three weeks ago. We’d like to offer them ours tonight.”

The concert was filmed by HBO and will be broadcast tonight.

Where have we been?  Once again we have slept through a sonic boom.   We refer (this time) to having missed the sonic delights delivered by Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment via the ensemble’s album Surf.  The group is shepherded by trumpeter Nico Segal (aka Donnie Trumpet), but a main force behind the project is the multi-talented Chance the Rapper. Surf also features guest artists Janelle Monáe, Erykah Badu, Frank Ocean, Big Sean, BJ the Chicago Kid, Busta Rhymes, J. Cole, and Raury.  We’re just now delving deeper but were introduced recently to the group via their sweet, single-shot “short film” (video) for the song Sunday Candy (lyrics at bottom).  Both song and video are absolute top shelf! Check it out below.  And praise be for grandmothers!

The entertaining video was written by Chance the Rapper and directed by Austin Vesely, Ian Eastwood and Chance The Rapper.

Sunday Candy:

“She could say in her voice, in her way that she love me
With her eyes, with her smile, with her belt, with her hands, with her money
I am the thesis of her prayers
Her nieces and her nephews are just pieces of the layers
Only ones she love as much as me is Jesus Christ and Taylor
I got a future so I’m singing for my grandma
You singing too, but your grandma ain’t my grandma
Mine’s is hand made, pan fried, sun dried
Southside, and beat the devil by a landslide
Praying with her hands tied, president of my fan club, saying to her
Something told me I should bring my butt to church

You gotta move it slowly
Take and eat my body like it’s holy
I’ve been waiting for you for the whole week
I’ve been praying for you, you’re my Sunday candy
You gotta move it slowly
Take and eat my body like it’s holy
I’ve been waiting for you for the whole week
I’ve been praying for you, you’re my Sunday candy

Come on in this house, cause it’s gonna rain
Rain down Zion, it’s gonna rain
You better come on in this house, cause it’s gonna rain
Rain down Zion, it’s gonna rain

I come to church for the candy, your peppermints is the truth
I’m pessimistic on Monday if I had tweaked and missed you
You look so good with that hat on, had to match with the shoes
Came and dressed in the satin, I came and sat in your pew
I come to Christmas for dinner, fifty rolls on my plate
Hella holes in my stocking holding your pockets in place
I like my love with a budget, I like my hugs with a scent
You smell like light, gas, water, electricity, rent
You sound like why the gospel choir got so tired
Singin his praises daily basis so I gotta try it
You’re my dreamcatcher, dream team, team captain
Matter fact, I ain’t seen you in a minute let me take my butt to church

Come on in this house, cause it’s gonna rain
Rain down Zion, it’s gonna rain
You better come on in this house, cause it’s gonna rain
Rain down Zion, it’s gonna rain

You gotta move it slowly
Take and eat my body like it’s holy
I’ve been waiting for you for the whole week
I’ve been praying for you, you’re my Sunday candy
You gotta move it slowly
Take and eat my body like it’s holy
I’ve been waiting for you for the whole week
I’ve been praying for you, you’re my Sunday candy
You gotta move it slowly
Take and eat my body like it’s holy
I’ve been waiting for you for the whole week
I’ve been praying for you, you’re my Sunday candy

Come on in this house, cause it’s gonna rain
Rain down Zion, it’s gonna rain
You better come on in this house, cause it’s gonna rain
Rain down Zion, it’s gonna rain”

As mentioned earlier today, Thom Yorke and Flea were in in Paris for tonight’s Pathway to Paris concert.  Watch below as Yorke performed a few songs solo, at least one of which might be a new Radiohead song (Silent Spring in the first video below) since he mentions “this is Jonny’s [Greenwood’s] part.” Obviously an homage to Rachel Carson’s seminal book of the same title, it quietly seethes in an apropos Neil Young-vein.  The second song is apparently entitled Desert Island Disc.  Bring that new album on.