Songs you may have missed: The Duffy comeback edition

Songs You May Have Missed is a semi-regular round-up of music that's slipped through my fingers over the last seven days. This week's candidates include Duffy (yes, that Duffy) and all these other goodies:

1) Selena Gomez - Same Old Love
This Charli XCX cast off riffs on Gotye's Somebody That I Used To Know, and was apparently intended for Rihanna before Selena nabbed it. It's Rihanna's loss. And Charli's. Gotye will be seeing the lot of them in court.





2) ZHU ft AlunaGeorge - Automatic
You might not recognise the name, but Zhu's Faded was one of the biggest club crossovers of last year (you'll probably recognise the hook - "baby, I'm wasted, all I wanna do is drive home to you...").

His new track enlists the Aluna half of AlunaGeorge for a similarly dark take on deep house. Stick around for the sax solo at the end. Very INXS.




3) Hailee Stanfield - Love Myself (acoustic)
A competently delivered performance of one of the year's toppermost pop songs.





4) Roman GianArthur - No Surprises (ft Janelle Monae)
Roman GianArthur is a member of Janelle Monee's Wondaland Arts Society, whatever that means. He's just released an EP of Radiohead covers (listen here) of which this is the absolute standout.

It takes the original's depiction of anaesthetised suburban life and turns it into an irresistible nu-soul duet. Radiohead fans may hate it but - judging by the time I saw Thom Yorke grooving away to Mary J Blige - he'd give it the seal of approval.





5) Aquilo - Good Girl
Aquilo are Ben Fletcher and Tom Higham, two neighbours from the Lake District who have previously specialised in tasetful, ambient electronica. But they seem to have found the emergency chorus button on their laptop, with this slinky little single, which is out on Island records imminently.





6) Rachel Platten - Stand By You
I was surprised to find out that Rachel Platten was 34. Not that there's anything wrong with that - it's just that I can't remember the last time a record label signed a pop artist who predated YouTube.

This song follows up to the UK number one Fight Song, and is a similarly percussion-driven arms-akimbo pop stomper. "It's a love song at its core," says Rachel "and it's about being the hands to catch someone if they need to fall. I'm honestly obsessed with this song. Is that okay to say?"





7) XY Constant - Do It Well ft Tom Aspaul
Falmouth-based producer XY Constant plays out the summer with this chiming and catchy - if somewhat undemanding - tropical dance track. As every blog under the sun has noted, it sounds exactly like Years & Years.






8) Duffy - Whole Lot of Love
Eagle-eyed cinemagoers may have spotted Duffy popping up in the new Tom Hardy movie, Legend, when it came out last weekend. The Welsh warbler cameos as US singer Timi Yuro in the Kray twins biopic - and this tambourine-tanged track is one of the soundtrack's standouts.

It'll be interesting to see if Duffy can orchestrate a proper comeback off the back of it... And if you're wondering where the Rockferry singer has been for the last six years, this article on Music Business Worldwide tells a cautionary tale for anyone entering the music business.





9) Halsey - Maida Vale session
Pop's shootingest star descended on the BBC's legendary Maida Vale studios last night to perform a couple of songs from her 4-star debut album, Badlands. You can hear Hurricane and New Americana at the start of this 28-minute segment - but stick around to the end for a rather astonishing mash-up of three songs: Her own Young God, The Weekend’s Often, and Justin Bieber's What Do You Mean?




10) Kendrick Lamar - Album medley (live on Stephen Colbert)
Kendrick Lamar was the final performer on Comedy Central's Colbert Report last December. On Wednesday night, he became the first musical guest on Stephen Colberts new show - The Late Show - on CBS.

It's a masterclass in how to perform rap live. Energetic but controlled, with a pin-sharp live band, Lamar runs through four tracks from his To Pimp A Butterfly album in just six minutes.

If you watch nothing else in this megapost, make it this.

Tweet

A picture of Duffy

BZZZZRT! A press release announcing Duffy's new album has just landed in my inbox. "NEW DUFFY PICTURE ATTACHED" it declares. Let's take a look at her drastic new image:



Yes, Duffy has thrown the baby out with the bathwater. She has avoided repitition like the plague. She has recklessly abandoned all her principles.

She has, er, swapped her bicycle for a moped. How very Italian. Ciao!

We're hoping that, by album number seven, Duffy will be driving a tank or straddling that gigantic truck from Ciara's Work video.



In other news, Duffy's album, Endlessly, has been written with Albert Hammond. No, not the one out of The Strokes, but his dad, who penned The Air That I Breathe for The Hollies. It is out on 21st November.

PS: Using the EXIF information on the jpg file, I can "exclusively reveal" that the above picture of Duffy was taken on 14th August, using a fancy-pants Phase One medium format camera. You heard it here first.

Tweet

Brit nominations curated by Radiohead

"No alarms and no surprises"

Best British male
Ian Brown
James Morrison
Paul Weller
Will Young

Best British female
Adele
Beth Rowley
Duffy
Estelle
MIA

Best British group
Coldplay
Elbow
Girls Aloud
Radiohead
Take That

Best British live act
Coldplay
Elbow
Iron Maiden
Scouting For Girls
The Verve

Best British single
Adele - Chasing Pavements
Alexandra Burke - Hallelujah
Coldplay - Viva La Vida
Dizzee Rascal/Calvin Harris/Chrome - Dance Wiv Me
Duffy - Mercy
Estelle Ft Kanye West - American Boy
Girls Aloud - The Promise
Leona Lewis - Better in Time
Scouting for Girls - Heartbeat
X Factor Finalists - Hero

Best British Album
Coldplay - Viva La Vida or Death And All His Friends
Duffy - Rockferry
Elbow - The Seldom Seen Kid
Radiohead - In Rainbows
The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing

Best British breakthrough act
Adele
Duffy
Last Shadow Puppets
Scouting For Girls
The Ting Tings

Best international album
AC/DC - Black Ice
Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
Killers - Day & Age
Kings of Leon - Only By The Night
MGMT - Oracular Spectacular

Best international male
Beck
Neil Diamond
Jay-Z
Kanye West
Seasick Steve

Best international female
Beyonce
Gabriella Cilmi
Katy Perry
Pink
Santogold

Best international group
AC/DC
Fleet Foxes
Killers
Kings of Leon
MGMT

Critics' Choice: Florence and the Machine

Outstanding Contribution To Music: Pet Shop Boys

A few things to note:
1) There are only four nominees for Best British Male, which has now overtaken Best British Female as the ceremony's joke category.
2) M.I.A. is the sole artist in this list with a semblance of edge or controversy. Jay-Z is welcome, but hardly surprising now that he's gone corporate.
3) Our predictions for the night's big winners are Elbow, Duffy and Kings of Leon.
4) Fuck Scouting For Girls Up Their Stupid Asses.
5) Girls Aloud are performing on the night, which means they have a bigger-than-normal chance of picking up a prize. No-one would dare give them best group over Coldplay, but Take That aren't in the running for best single this year, so maybe, just maybe...
6) We would love to see a performance by poprawk supergroup Kings Of Leona - a mash-up of Sex On Fire and Bleeding Love, perhaps?
7) Poor old Goldfrapp :(

Tweet

Top 10 Discopop albums of 2008

Happy New Year! Here's what happened on my stereo in the old one...

1) Goldfrapp - Seventh Tree

Goldfrapp's detour into folksy acoustic ballads may have lost them a few fans, but Seventh Tree is a near-perfect album - from the muted opening bars of Clowns to the hazy coda of Monster Love. One of my musical highlights of the year was simply lying back and listening to this album in the middle of a field in Devon - it's truly the perfect soundtrack to a lazy rural day. As long, that is, as you ignore the (excellent) lyrics about brainwashing cults, suicide attempts and boob jobs.

2) Ladyhawke - Ladyhawke

Maybe its down to the fact that she has Aspergers Syndrome, but New Zealander Pip Brown recreated the very best bits of 1980s synth-rock with unnerving precision on her debut album. On Oh My she sounds like Stevie Nicks, on Another Runaway she is Pat Benatar, on Better Than Sunday she channels Debbie Harry... it really is that good. Only one of the four singles (My Delirium) was a hit, struggling into the top 40 at the end of 2008, but this atmospheric, ballsy pop record deserved more recognition.

3) Lykke Li - Youth Novels

Like fellow Swedish starlet Robyn in 2007, Li Lykke Timotej Zachrisson rewrote the rules on what a pop album could sound like. Rather than slapping you about the face with a broken toilet seat going "this is catchy, goddamnit", Youth Novels worked its way into your heart with a series of subtle, genteel ditties. Produced by Björn Yttling (of Peter, Bjorn & John) it is almost entirely acoustic, even down to the inventive, skittering drum lines composed from hand claps, wooden blocks and mallets. Lead single Little Bit was the most affecting love song of the year, while the driving I'm Good, I'm Gone paired sinister, percussive verses with a sweet release of a chorus. Don't believe me? Listen to this acoustic perfomance of the song:



4) Elbow - Seldom Seen Kid

Here are some adjectives that have been used to describe Elbow's fourth album: stunning, lush, bittersweet, exquisite, epic, majestic, uplifting, poetic, impeccable, tender, wondrous, unbearably lovely. Get the picture? The Seldom Seen Kid is a modern masterpiece. It opens with Starlings - two minutes of hushed harmonies and muted marimbas that suddenly explodes into a cacophony of trumpets. It's designed to make you sit up and pay attention to the following suite of lovingly-crafted ballads. Guy Garvey is unapologetically romantic throughout - "I was looking for someone to complete me. Not anymore, dear, everything has changed. You make the moon a mirrorball" is just one lyrical flourish in an album full of poetry. Simply perfect.

5) Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes

Who'd have thought a beardy five-piece vocal harmony group from Seattle would produce one of the best albums of the year? Not me. But Fleet Foxes produced an instant classic with their debut CD - full of haunting choral lullabies, which took as their inspiration starlings, swallows, mountains, snow falls and river banks. The music owed a clear debt to the 1960s folk-rock of Simon and Garfunkel, or Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - but its presence in the hustle, bustle and bombast of 2008 provided a reassuring oasis of serenity.

6) Duffy - Rockferry

Possessor of the wildest vibrato since Snow White, Duffy owned 2008 - selling more than 4m records around the world by the simple act of combining Amy Winehouse with the girl next door. Her album is rather unfairly derided as boring in some quarters, but Rockferry is stuffed full of heart-rending ballads, seductive pop hooks and stirring choruses. As the Welsh 24-year-old's confidence grew throughout the year, she transformed from a sweater-wearing wallflower into a slinky seductress pouring herself into Jessica Rabbit strapless dresses. Maybe she's not just a cuddly Winehouse after all...

7) Camille - Music Hole

Painstakingly constructed from samples and loops of her own voice, Camille's album is probably the most audaciously ambitious record on this list. With the exception of a lone piano, every sound is produced by a human using one of their many "music holes", according to the blurb. It could have been a tedious intellectual experiment, but France's Camille Dalmais possesses a great big vat of soul - which lifts her songs above mere gimmickry. Highlights include the playful Gospel With No Lord, the (literally) barking Cats & Dogs, and the Mariah Carey-baiting single, Money Note. Mental in the good way.

8) Ting Tings - We Started Nothing

The Ting Tings broke America when Shut Up And Let Me Go was chosen to soundtrack an iPod advert - but there couldn't be a worse device to listen to their album on. Those massive drums and growling bass lines need a hefty pair of nerdtastic hi-fi speakers before they really come to life. The shouty party songs - We Walk, Great DJ, That's Not My Name - are the best, but Katie's sweetly melodic turns on Traffic Light and Be The One show that the band's got more than one trick up it's sleeve.

9) Girls Aloud - Out Of Control

Out Of Control, or A Drop In Quality Control? Girls Aloud's fifth album seemed a bit rushed - with precious little of Xenomania's usual sonic invention and off-the-wall song structures. But there were still five or six stand-outs: The Pet Shop Boys-penned The Loving Kind is a four-minute slab of moody synth genius, while Miss You Bow Wow is the sort of deranged throw-everything-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks pop gem that the band probably think they've outgrown. Not their finest hour, but still head and shoulders above anything else a mainstream pop act produced in 2008. Five heads and ten shoulders, to be precise.

10) Emiliana Torrini - Me and Armini / Kings Of Leon - Only By The Night / MGMT - Oracular Spectacular / Santogold - Santogold

Bloody hell, I can't decide between these ones... Emiliana Torrini wins points for combining acoustic rock (like Sara Bareilles) and being utterly bonkers (like Bjork). MGMT did the student disco party anthems, with three absolutely stonking singles and a shockingly poor live act. Kings Of Leon were the only band who really rocked in 2008, while Santogold took MIA's trademark soundclash and made it listenable. And I haven't even mentioned Laura Marling, or Kanye West, or Vampire Weekend, or Q-Tip - it really was a vintage year, wasn't it?

Postscript: Not albums of the year
1) Madonna - Hard Candy
Madge opened a sweet shop but it only sold aniseed balls - hard and indigestible with a horrible aftertaste.

2) Various Artists - Mamma Mia! OST
Abba karaoke. Literally my worst nightmare.

3) Britney Spears - Circus
Is this really the best music money can buy? Cripes.

4) Portishead - Third
When the end of the world comes, this will be the soundtrack.

5) Jonas Brothers - A Little Bit Longer
Actually, I take that last comment back. This will be the soundtrack to armageddon.

Tweet

Top 10 Discopop Singles of the Year

Hello! I'm back... and it's time for the annual countdown of my top 10 singles of the year.

It's been a weird 12 months for the singles' chart, with a pretty high turnover of quality songs at number one (Basshunter's Now You're Gone was the only real stinker).

This presents something of a problem for my top 10. Usually, one record stands head and shoulders above the rest as my favourite track of the year - but this time round it's a pretty even field. The chart is compiled using my iTunes play count, and I've done my best to make sure recent tracks get a fair placing. This involves the application of maths - I knew I'd find a use for it one day.

The downside of this system is that I've had to leave Sex On Fire off the list, because I only realised how awesome the Kings Of Leon were about three weeks ago. Shame on me.

1) Goldfrapp - A&E

Goldfrapp ushered in their new acoustic incarnation with this - the prettiest song ever recorded about attempting suicide. True, the middle eight is a bit muddy and the video was a load of nonsense, but the song rose above it all like a dove of peace soaring into the twilight sky. After slitting its throat.

2) Estelle - American Boy

Home to Kanye West's most inspired lyric of 2008: "Dressed up like a London bloke / Before he speak, his suit bespoke". Awesome, even if it nicked the backing track wholesale from a will.i.am album track.

3) Janet Jackson - Feedback

Heralding what should have been Janet's big comeback, this ended up being the only single released from her underperforming Discipline album. But what a single - three minutes of thumping electronic pop, with those trademark Jackson harmonies and a stonking space cadet video. We'll politely ignore the lyric about her menstrual cycle, though.

4) Goldfrapp - Caravan Girl

The third single from Seventh Tree, this was the moment when Goldfrapp stopped being all spooky and sinister and set off for a Summer Holiday with Cliff Richard. "We'll run away, we'll run away you and me," sang Alison accompanied, for no good reason, by a 12-piece choir. A highlight of their live shows, the only problem with Caravan Girl is that it fades out at least three minutes too early.

5) Girls Aloud - The Promise

I'm actually surprised at how high this has reached. It's certainly not my favourite Girls Aloud song ever (Biology, in case you're interested) but it seems to be the public's - The Promise is still in the top 20 four months after it was released. Hitching a ride on the 1960s bandwagon, the band played to their strengths by channelling the Shangri-Las instead of Aretha Franklin. Now, if only they'd cover Leader Of The Pack.

6) Elbow - One Day Like This

AKA The one that should have been number three. More emotionally honest and joyful than any other single released in 2008, Guy Garvey's tale of domestic bliss is one of those songs that will soundtrack montages of great sporting moments for the rest of your life. But don't let that put you off. Here's their triumphant Glastonbury performance as proof of how life-affirmingly brilliant this song is.



7) Lykke Li - Breaking It Up

With its music hall piano, children's choir and deranged woman shouting down her absent boyfriend through a megaphone - this should have been an almighty mess. But, no, it was one of the most infectiously bouncy, unselfconciously quirky pop songs of the year. Nice remixes, too.

8) Duffy - Mercy


Judging by her performances at the end of the year, even Duffy got bored of this song. But come back to it in six months' time and you'll realise what a timeless piece of pop writing it really is - from the yeah, yeah, yeahs to the cheeky guitar twang that announces the arrival of the final chorus.

9) Elbow - Grounds For Divorce

You know, the one that goes woah-oh-woah-oh-woah-oh-woah-oh-woah-ah-oh-aooooh.

10) Dizzee Rascal ft Calvin Harris - Dance Wiv Me

I've always thought Dizzee Rascal's "unique" rapping style makes him sound like Zed out of the Police Academy films, thereby lending his attempts to chat up some bird on the dancefloor an unintended air of slapstick comedy. Still, you can't argue with that bassline (it's a non-sentient musical concept, you idiot) and even Calvin Harris's singing isn't all that bad. This acoustic version is enormously awesome, by the way:



So that's that. Tell me what your top 10 was in the comments box (or pop in a link to your own blog countdown, if you have one). The albums list comes next...

Tweet

The worst singles of 2008

Our annual totally unbiased rundown of the top ten singles and albums of the year is due between Christmas and 2009 - but here's something new: Five terrible singles from the last 12 months - chosen with extreme prejudice and complete subjectivity. Stinkers, the lot of them.

Duffy - Rain On Your Parade

Clearly a cast-off from the Rockferry recording sessions, this was repackaged as a single to promote the "special" edition of Duffy's album. Still, even that wasn't as cynical as the video's attempt to rebrand Duffy as a sex symbol (She gets her legs out! She's absolutely in her 20s and anyone who says otherwise is just jealous! Your dad definitely would!) They should have released Distant Dreamer instead.

Blackout Crew - Put A Donk On It

Amazingly, this song is not intended to be a joke.

Sugababes - Girls

The Sugababes spend a lot of time prattling on about how they're the "credible alternative" to Girls Aloud and other pop acts. So why did they base this single on a ropey sample from a commercial for a high street chemists? Because they wanted to have a number one. It backfired. Ha!

Avenue - Last Goodbye

Dear Universal Music Group: If you are going to spend a lot of time and effort "reinventing" the boyband, it would be best not to rely on all the clichés that seemed hackneyed in 1999 (There's a pretty-but-sexually-ambiguous one! There's a bit of rough! There's two who can dance! And a minger on the piano! They'll appeal to teenage girls and the gays!). Thank you, bye bye.

Beyoncé - Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)

Okay, it's not that bad - but I had to do something to counter Rolling Stone, who named it the best single of the year. What a load of old guff.

:: Agree? Disagree? Put your nominations in the comments box!

Tweet

Random collection of links (aka: It's Friday)

:: The website for Pixar's next film, Up, gives nothing away but manages to make me laugh heartitly. [Pixar.com]

:: The more Starbucks a country has, the more likely it is to be facing economic downturn [Slate.com]

:: I love Davey's Dance Blog [daveydanceblog.com]



:: CSS remix Keane's Lovers Are Losing, making it sound even more like Nik Kershaw, as if such a thing were humanly possible [Free download on Popjustice]

:: A new biography of Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz reveals "his one regret was that he never once let Charlie Brown kick the football held out for him by Lucy". [Times]

:: Janet Jackson thanks fans for their support during her illness with a cringeworthy Youtube (youtube) video. The best bit is where she and Jermaine Dupri discuss being sick on each other. [Youtube]

:: Fed up with Scientology? Then why not "Say Hebbo!" to Taarvu-ism. It's so easy to join. [Tarvu.com]

:: What is going on with Duffy's lips in her new video?? [Youtube]
(By the way, is there anyone out there who actually believes that Duffy is 24?)

:: Common's Kraftwerk-inspired new single has singing robots, reference to Technotronic. Slammin' [Youtube]

Hope all y'all have a great weekend!
Mrdiscopop

Tweet

Gig review: Duffy in a Bush

Disclaimer: This review is based on having seen four whole songs, as I also had to see Avril Lavigne at the O2 (and the less said about that fiasco, the better). Accordingly, here are my impressions in bullet point form:

Duffy's hair is entirely independent of Duffy herself

Duffy was wearing ruby slippers like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz.

Consquently, it looked like Judy Garland had been eaten by an Afghan Hound.

Which led to the following image in my Guinness-fuelled nightmare last night:

Nonetheless, the singing Afghan was very good (she didn't bark once)

Set closer Distant Dreamer was the stuff of legend. Proper tingles went up my spine.

It should be the next single, not Stepping Stone or Serious, despite what her record label thinks

I have never seen a crowd leave a venue so quickly in my life. I suspect they had to get home to pay the babysitter before 11.

The end.

Tweet

Duffy's mascara is running

Here is the video for Duffy's new single, Warwick Avenue - probably the best song on her album (except Mercy).

It's a bit "Nothing Compares 2U", with the entire video shot in a tight close-up while tears stream down Duffy's face.

You do not get to see the onions on her lap.

Duffy - Warwick Avenue


It's only 8:30 in the morning and that's made me a bit weepy.

Tweet

Remix corner

In which we find some of my favourite upcoming singles, retooled by some of the nation's foremost knob twiddlers.

:: The Ting Tings - A Great DJ (Calvin Harris mix)
Sproingy disco beats + shouty chorus = arms-aloft party anthem.

:: Duffy - Mercy (Thankful mix)
Better because it is longer.

:: Kylie - Wow (CSS remix)
This doesn't add much, save a few synth noises and a cowbell, but it frames Kylie's vocals much more sympathetically than the original.

:: Snoop Dogg - Sexual Eruption (Fyre Department mix feat Robyn)
Yes, that Robyn! She's turned Snoop's superfly 70s porno talkbox ballad into a europop 90s porno talkbox ballad. "Snoop Dogg, I'm going to sex you up," she trills. Amazing.

:: Janet - Feedback (various remixes)
The R&B one, the dance one, the Timbaland one. They're all here.

Tweet

Duffy Springfield

Let's politely ignore the fact that I've started a minor international diplomatic incident with my review of the Mariah Carey album below and have a look at the new video from Duffy:

Duffy - Mercy


Pretty good, huh?

22-year-old Aimee Anne Duffy hails from Wales, and she's being called the next Amy Winehouse by people who aren't already calling Adele and Kate Nash the next Amy Winehouse.

Truth be told, she's got more in common with Amy than the other two, with her refreshingly sample-free retro soul. You'll probably have your own reference points, but, to me, Mercy recalls Ben E King's Stand By Me mixed with Marvin Gaye's Can I Get A Witness. Amazingly, it is the equal of either of those tunes.

If her voice sounds familiar, it's because it combines the vulnerable power of Dusty Springfield with the gutsy blues of Nina Simone. And again, that's not an unfair comparison...

You might also have heard her on the odd cut by dance gurus Mint Royale (try here if you want to seek out more)

Duffy's debut album, Rockferry, is out in the UK on 3 March, and features collaborations from Jimmy Hogarth (James Blunt), Eg White (James Morrison) and Steve Booker (Natalie Imbruglia). But don't let that put you off.

Oh, and if you liked Mercy, check out the splendidly moody debut single Rockferry on the youtube (youtube).

Tweet