Be-bop Beyonce and five other songs you may have missed...

Is it the weekend again already? If so, it must be time for a round-up of the music I forgot to write about because I was too busy listening to Janelle Monae.

In no particular order, then, this week's guest stars are...

1) Emeli Sande - Crazy In Love
Skiddly dee-bop-a-be-bop: Emeli Sande goes all scat jazz on this Beyonce cover, and we have Baz Luhrman' Great Gatsby soundtrack to "thank" for it. Sande trades the rump-shaking sexogroove of Bey's signature song for a mischievous can-can, but it kinda works.




2) Pet Shop Boys - Axis
The Pet Shop Boys severed their ties with EMI last year after the disappointing Elysium album but, if this honking great dance track is anything to go by, the break-up did them a world of good. A furious, pulsating electro groove, Axis is either the best song Kraftwerk never released, or the incidental music from an episode of Airwolf.



3) Kelis - Jerk Ribs
Forget Solange, Kelis is the most thrillingly experimental R&B artist around. She embraced dance music two years before Rihanna and her mates started sucking up to David Guetta and Calvin Harris, but paid the price of being an early adopter (IE she got dropped by her label).

Undaunted, she's showing everyone the way again: Mixing soca, afrobeat and classic Stax soul in this rousing ode to her upbringing in Harlem. It should be a mess, but it's gloriously life-affirming. Plus, the song is a free download. YES!





4) Daughter - Get Lucky
"Cut them and they bleed cobwebs" said the NME of perma-frowning London trio Daughter. They're being a little harsh - the band's music is mopey, but ultimately uplifting. Their Live Lounge cover of Daft Punk's Get Lucky is a case in point, layering broody guitars and brushed snares over a hushed vocal from Elena Tonra. Who, it has to be said, sings it better than Pharrell.




5) The Wanted - She Walks Like Rihanna
"She can't sing, she can't dance, but who cares – she walks like Rihanna!" This is utter bollocks, of course, but you've got to admire their gumption.




6) Icona Pop - I Love It (Live on Jimmy Fallon)
I Love It may be more than a year old now, but it's currently gobbling up all the competition in the US. Icona Pop's car-crashing revenge anthem hit the Top 10 for the first time this week, and they celebrated with this syn-drum heavy performance on Jimmy Fallon.

Bizarrely, the song STILL has no UK release date, after being pushed back about three times. Presumably they're having trouble getting playlisted at a certain national radio station - which is a great shame, because this officially the best pop record of the 21st Century (and, yes, that includes Call Me Maybe).

And that's this week's pick of the crop. Any suggestions for future editions, you can always drop me a line via the email at the bottom of the page.

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Marina + Diamonds + Charli XCX: Together at last

The last time Charli XCX recorded a duet it was the almighty I Love It (with Icona Pop), so expectations are high for this collaboration with Marina "And The Diamonds".

Just Desserts isn't as much of a knock-down-the-door-and-kick-you-in-the-nuts pop monster as the earlier effort; but it is very good. Twiddly piano figures, huffalumping basslines, and a spooky scary oooOOooOooOoOHHHoooowwWWoooOOoOo vocal from Marina.

Best of all, it's a free download in celebration of the raven-haired pop artistes joint US tour, so you can put it in your pocket and take it on the bus. *Technology high five*

Marina and the Diamonds and Charli and XCX - Just Desserts

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Janelle Monae: QUEEN video

A week later, the Janelle Monae single, Q.U.E.E.N.,continues to be amazing - my new favourite lyric is "I'm tired of Marvin asking me what's going on?"

The video "dropped" (was put on YouTube) last night and it's everything you could have hoped for. A Monochrome choreographic blockbuster set in a museum of cryogenically frozen musical rebels, or something. The best bits look like this...



Janelle had an irrational fear of giant invisible chickens.


Attention: I want me this record player.


This would be a good opportunity to calibrate the horizontal hold on your monitor.


Janelle's backing band were fatally injured in a freak talcum powder accident.


Dancing in a chair: Lazy but impressive.


CHAKA KHAN!


Children, remember to take your Vitamin D supplements.


"You gotta testify / Cause the booty don't lie"

It's better in full, though. If you've got six minutes, press play. If you've got five minutes, press play and skip the nonsense preamble.

Janelle Monae ft Chaka Khan Erykah Badu - Q.U.E.E.N.

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New discovery: Die & Jenna G - 1,000 Soul Songs

Sometimes a song comes along with its arms wide open and says, "c'mon then, bugalugs, give us a hug". This is one of those songs.

It's called 1,000 Soul Songs and it comes from Bristolian drum & bass pioneer DJ Die and a singer he calls Jennalope Gee, whose real name is Jenna Gibbons, and whom the rest of us are supposed to call Jenna G [Sort it out - nomenclature Ed].

Soulful, summery and sensuous, it'll take you back to 1995, when The Brand New Heavies and Eternal and Jamiroquai dominated the airwaves. The difference is (a) it's really good, and (b) the next song you hear won't be Oasis.

1,000 Soul Songs is already on the B-list at Radio 1 Xtra. By the time it gets released in June, expect it to have made the leap across to "proper" Radio 1. Hugs all round, then.

Die & Jenna G - 1,000 Soul Songs

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Daft Punk: How it could have sounded

An email zapped into my inbox over the weekend from Canadian DJ M-Rock, who you might remember for the brilliant, heartfelt Beastie Boys megamix he created in tribute to Adam Yauch last year. He'd been listening to Daft Punk's new single and there was something he needed to get off his chest.

"The thing with the Daft Punk song," he wrote, "is, even though I love the risk they've taken, it doesn't totally knock the room down. I wanted to hear a funky brass band and a section of violinists bending their necks towards their instruments on top. I was picturing a band like this:"

(Flares ahoy: It's Chic in their 1970s heyday)
"So," added M-Rock, "that's what I did."

His funkatronic re-twizzle of Get Lucky is a swift kick to Daft Punk's disco balls. The horn stabs and sumptuous strings are beamed straight from Studio 54 - and the groove is authentic Chic, not studio geek. Above all, M-Rock obeys the first golden rule of music production: If the chorus isn't working, slap on a tambourine.

10/10.

Daft Punk ft Pharrell - Get Lucky (M's Bangin' Disco Mix)

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The most frightening thing to come out of Korea this week + five more you may have missed

And here it is: Your sort of weekly round-up of songs that flew under the radar, until I recalibrated the radar. This issue's starlets are:

1) Psy - Gentleman (live performance)
Earlier this month, Psy performed Gentleman, his follow-up to / carbon copy of Gangnam Style, for 50,000 fans in South Korea. Judging by the footage, it was basically the Nuremberg Rally of novelty dance pop. Confusing and terrifying - much like the song's English translation.



2) Beyonce - Standing On The Sun
Beyonce is a mad genius. Why, she reckons, would you bother completing a song when the average attention span is only 90 seconds long. So we're just getting an album of snippets and excerpts, released online and paid for by H&M and Pepsi. It's modern, daring and risky. Beyonce's next release is called "Beep" and is just a recording of Beyonce saying "Beep" into a cup.



3) Armin Van Buuren feat Trevor Guthrie - This Is What It Feels Like
This sounded really good in the car with the sunroof down on Thursday morning. Listening to it again today, I'm worried it might be a little "Danny from The Script 'goes Ibiza'". What do you reckon?




4) Laura Marling - Once
"Once is enough to make you think twice / about laying your love out on the line." There's something beautiful about the simplicity of Laura Marling's lyrics. And this candid, unadorned performance from Jools Holland's show this week is the perfect complement. Heartbreaking.



5) Lana Del Rey - Young And Beautiful
At the other end of the scale is Lana Del Rey - arch, post-modern, difficult to pin down. Are we listening to the thoughts and fears of Lizzie McGuire or the gutter-dwelling Femme Fatale she's created? In the end, it doesn't matter: This song, taken from the Great Gatsby soundtrack, is every bit as devastating as Laura Marling's.





6) Hey Champ - Comet (ft BeuKes)
Chicago's Hey Champ describe themselves as "Pop Music For People Who Don't Like Pop Music" - a statement which basically screams, "we are preposterously stuck-up dickends". But if we jettisoned every pop star we found objectionable, the charts would be wall-to-wall Jessie Ware [wait a minute, you could be onto something here - Ed]. So, forget about the fact the band "met as outsiders at one of those tea and crumpet parties where everyone wears blazers and laughs through clenched teeth" and enjoy their Giogio Moroder-inspired Slow Disco classic in the making, Comet.

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