What if I told you I possess a leaked track of Jerry DeCicca on vocals from a forthcoming project. I have no idea if this is the Black Swans or affiliated with La Société Expéditionnaire but it seems like a demo for a 2009 album. I like the electric southern blues direction of this.

This track is shrouded in utter mystery. The song may be written by a Tucsonan that the Ohio musician discovered late 2008 [tip thanks to Mr. Allen from the local radio station]. It could also be possible that someone overdubbed his voice in there, because the Black Swans don’t normally use such a distorted guitar. Is this a collaboration with The Warm Inventions (Hope Sandoval’s latest band after Mazzy Star). And who is the background singer? Whatever the story, it’s a good one.

Premiere of “First Time”

Cover art just release for the album which is self-titled, along with a title track. The song is the only publicly performed on this record as heard on Colbert Report and played for some recent live shows.

This could be a cover for a potential single?

The tracklist came out too:

1. Wilco (the song)
2. Deeper Down
3. One Wing
4. Bull Black Nova
5. You And I
6. You Never Know
7. Country Disappeared
8. Solitaire
9. I’ll Fight
10. Sonny Feeling
11. Everlasting Everything

Included on the new LP is a duet with Feist, and that’s the track “You and I.” The whole CD should be ready for the masses on June 30, 2009. And guess what? The album leaked. And Wilco responded by allowing streaming from their homepage.

I was going to do a Top 10 list, but I honestly don’t listen to that many albums to narrow down from a single year. Chances are I’ll discover numerous albums from 2008, but until then I’ll point out some that I ended up listening to
.

1. Bon Iver – For Emma, Forever Ago

Busting out with something great, Bon Iver surprises everyone with a distinctive voice and beautifully arranged mid-fi indie folk. The singer was part of a band called DeYarmond Edison, a band with a more rootsy folk sound. Check out “Skinny Love.”

2. French Kicks – Swimming

This band has been putting out stuff for a while, but this one doesn’t disappoint. The first song, “Abandon,” is a sonically pleasing harmony of voices akin to a matured Beach Boys sound. The production is nice too. The noticeable, but fitting reverb of the guitars and vocals mixing reminds me of the signature sound of the Walkmen, but with a subtler far-away reverb (sounds more distant instead of echo/twang common in surf music).

3. City and Colour – Bring Me Your Love

A heartfelt album of emotional immersion. Despite my lack of following the associated band Alexisonfire, I can enjoy what has come of this. City and Colour is a side-project of Dallas Green of Alexisonfire. The former is a contemplative, acoustic music; The latter is a screamo blend of poppy singing and screaming combined with dynamic hard and soft instrumentation (post-hardcore). This album is something special, stripped and honest.

4. Girl Talk – Feed the Animals

When you highlight and condense musical pop culture for the generation of impatient, A.D.D.-blessed, hip, and postmodern culture of America, you are an automatic winner. Contemporary rap rhymes, the greatest dance beats, classic anthems, epic instrumentation, and mastery of DJing and mashups is what composes Girl Talk. While others have put there efforts in the same basket (other good artists include The Hood Internet or The Avalanches), Girl Talk consolidates a handful of great bits into a seamless stream of mini-samples.

5. Vampire Weekend – Vampire Weekend

Light, happy, and ethno-tropical feeling of joyous punk mixed with a hint of the trendy coastline is Vampire Weekend. While it may get downplayed as being overly hipster indie snob stylistically, it surpasses the shallowness of trying to define itself as elitist. Call them cheery preppies, but they manage to create an atmosphere with unique propositions (think Beach Boys at their overly cheesiest, then the Beatles on vacation in Jamaica making a complimentary album for the White Album, then an African group form a punk band, all while raindrops keep falling on their heads).

• Runner up: The Walkmen – You & Me

This is a great album. I haven’t decided if this one matches my three Walkmen favorites Bows + Arrows, Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me is Gone, and A Hundred Miles Off. There is nothing wrong with the album entirely, but I haven’t found that lasting punch. It’s a bit softer, more nostalgic, and just as pleasant as any of their previous works. I just haven’t tripped on the secret ingredient. But it tastes extremely delicious.

Apologies for this being posted so distant from the New Year. I had this written in January, but never got around to polishing it for publishing.

December was busy. Plenty going on, plenty to listen to, plenty of plenty. I didn’t capture much to mixtape this month, and it didn’t help that a good portion of the stuff I collected have no documentation other than rarer recordings or the are just too unestablished to have a music video or performance. I didn’t include any standard Christmas songs, but I’ll consider it next year. Things were just so crazy that it didn’t feel like Christmas until it was over. And I run out of time. But I gave some to you:

“The Wrath of Marcie” by The Go! Team
I’m amazed by the different elements that make this song what it is. The urban youth chant mixed with the samples of catchy horns from what sounds like the 70s topped off with a hint of Asian girl pop background vocals with a healthy dose of indie rock to slap it all together. Certainly danceable and full of goodness.

“Under Control” by The Strokes
Sets the perfect mood. Cool. Not arrogant. Got some crooning action going on. Move over Sinatra, smooth garage rockers have come in town. They have been out of the pop media for a spell, but that isn’t a bad thing.

“Vincent O`Brien” by M Ward
There aren’t many videos for M. Ward, and I was hoping to get one of Archangel Tale, but there is nothing close to it. This makes for a good replacement, although it comes from a different album and has a different flavor. Not all is lost though. I like this just as much.

Keep Reading the Rest…

Searching for free music – I’ve done it before, but things change and I get smarter (hopefully).

Trying to get a digital copy of a song or album? Look no further. I’ve found the latest and best online tools to get you right to your goal. Instead of previewing 30 second samples or scrounging through the lost and found known as the internet, you can pretty easily obtain or dip your ears in future music purchases. Do you want to discover that band, but your local music store doesn’t have it and you don’t know anyone or any website that offers sampling capabilities? With the right help you can just search for the latest release or the undiscovered gem you’ve been craving or retrieve downloads that you have legal access to. In most cases, downloading albums for permanent archiving is illegal, so be aware of copyright laws. These searches are powerful and can scrape legal and illegal mp3s and archives. Be respectful of songs and albums and know when they are rightfully free and available. Now choose your route depending on whether you want a song or an entire album:

SONG-ORIENTED

Dilandau
Convenient and thorough search with easy listening and download access.

hypemachine
Covers a lot of ground from mp3blogs and collects in into one giant site. Snippets of posts under the easy-to-read artist/song titles. Friendly play button to the right of the title and link to the original post for the download.

skreemr
easy interface. good in-view listening and quick download option.
Like hypemachine, but not as pretty and a bit more instantaneous. Clicking the search result automatically opens the mp3 and the referring website/blog.

mp3realm
A bit more clicking than necessary, but decent catalog with convenient download after choosing the song.

SeeqPod
A little heavy on flash, but a feature-rich internet player/music search engine that can suggest songs in a manageable playlist fashion and allows for new searches while your playlist continues playing. No straight download button, but it reveals the url. There are a couple ways to download it, but it’s not cake.

sideload
Chock full of the latest in music. There’s a nice little player that can preview songs too. Not a whole lot of rare stuff, but plenty of up-and-coming bands that are definitely recognizable. Right now, the front page features Corinne Bailey Rae and Sigur Ros among many others. Everything is downloadable once you click on the track title, but it’s a bit discreet (download this track)

eSpew
eSpew is a search engine for mp3s. Plain and simple (maybe a little too much) with occasional non-working links. A last-chance effort if all the above fail.

ALBUM-ORIENTED

albumhunt
A community of people that show albums that have been put up on file hosts. Requires registration and quite ad-heavy with a couple clicks too many, but a decent collection all in one place.

mp3locker
There are many music blogs that randomly link to album downloads, but it isn’t organized. It’s usually tailored to a specific taste or it’s half-hazard. In this version, all artists are displayed on the sidebar as tags, and if you are digging then head for the search button.

Straight up Google to span multiple file hosts for Albums.zip
This is by far the strongest way to find an album. If the album is a generic title, try the artist first or do a combination. Remove the quotes within the search if it could have different spelling or wordings. An even better idea is….

Googling albums from file hosts [Firefox Search]
The firefox search plugin I made for your searchbar so you don’t have to type out the advanced google search parameters and the file hosts like mediafire, rapidshare, megaupload, zshare, and badongo. Just slip in your artist or album of choice and you should have results if they exist on the internet.

November was a jam-packed month. And December is surpassing the busyness. Well all is good here. This month by chance got invaded by upbeat songs from more recent times. Not much early blues and older-than-oldies that I sometimes get hung up on.

Versus – “Eskimo”
Think of the coolest musical catches and a spurt of 90s noise rock. This has some great backbone to it too with the on-the-verge electro drums. They are not popular enough to have a music video, so enjoy the free download.

Pras Michel feat. ODB & Mya – “Ghetto Supastar”
Mya has such a captivating melody and her delivery is exceptional. Sometimes the rap interjections are distracting other than main verses, but this song managed to get stuck in my head without complaints. No reason why Mya’s vox get plugged into remixes and mashups.

Alicia Keys – “No One”
She can sing this well live and I am impressed. If you are a radio junkie or just have some passing knowledge of pop music, you’ve been bombarded with this song. I love it despite my usually negative encounter to mainstream radio (I thought this song was mistakenly put on hip-hop radio after they surprisingly played the Temptations). It sounds just as great with a backup band. The beat is strong, but the digital-bubble keyboard is a bit on the cheesy side yet extremely functional. There is a old-school R&B vibe mixed with a contemporary crispness. I can listen to this with ease and I even remixed this song with the Walkmen (see previous posting for a listen/download). It’s becoming one of my favorite songs of the decade.

The Rolling Stones – “Happy”
These fellers have some good songs and a few tacky songs. This one’s a classic. A winner. It has spunk.
video [embed disabled]

City and Colour – “Sleeping Sickness”
A perfect discovery per recommendation of a friend. A soft and intense artist and song. Unlike the admiration for the song, it tells that “…this misery will suffice.” A nice solo project by a band I never gave the time of day. Alexisonfire, in which one member comprises City and Colour, is described as post-hardcore/screamo. I am open to this style, but I can’t really handle the end delivery.

City and colour – “Waiting”
Sad but intriguing. Good composition with acoustic guitar and instrumental additions. “Hold your head up high [...] We’re all just waiting to die.” Nice interlude. By the way City comes from the man’s name, Dallas, and Colour from his surname Green, Dallas Green.
video [embed disabled]

Silkworm – “(I Hope You) Don’t Survive”
Think if the Pixies were a little sloppy “And ‘I love you’ means I hope you don’t survive the night.” The recording of this sounds 200 times better than this video and you can make out a female harmony that works like the Pixies do.

Uncle Tupelo – “No Sense in Lovin’”
Wilco came from country roots. The alt-country sounds of Uncle Tupelo can be comforting. This video is actually performed by early Wilco (so no Jay Farrar), but this was released under Uncle Tupelo’s best Anodyne, with this song being sung in both instances by Jeff Tweedy. This even looks early.

Pinback – “Manchuria”
I like when multiple notes are played as often as words are sung. Sounds like Modest Mouse squiggly sound with a guitar-meets-voice that Pinback is known for. Fresh composition here.

Rites Of Spring – “All There Is”
Cruddy recording. I am not that big of a fan of this band. From what I have heard of the band (an album) is a bit repetitive. This song stands out though. A hardcore punk sound as a precursor to the new emo.

Led Zeppelin – “Going To California”
The well-known band can get overplayed, but some songs are worth listening to. “Someone told me theres a girl out there with love in her eyes and flowers in her hair.” This is a pleasant relaxing song.

Estelle – “American Boy” ft. Kanye West
I have never payed much attention to Kanye’s stuff, but I decided to hear out his 808s album and wasn’t as impressed as some seem to be. I’m sure I’m not the only one who would like to hear him without super-robot key correction. He sounds wonderful here and it compliments Estelle like a charm. I hear the UK tinge that Corinne Bailey Rae has. It’s charming.

And I’m noticing that I am warming up (or at least introducing myself) to more hip-hop/RnB influenced female singers.

Damien Rice – “Delicate”
Good minimal orchestration of a precious number. Certainly delicate in its own right. I wish Rice had more songs in his repertoire, and matched this greatness.

In an attempt to match the caliber of scholarly writing and technical diction, I present you with Prejudice of Music in the Congregation of Song and other Phrasal Groupings.

There are multiple “Audio-Admiring Paradigms” of elitist listening forms and casual listening. The major modalities involved with processing music categorically involve the forms of hook, riff, song, album, artist, genre, and period/setting. The most popular methods of approaching and judging music are through artist, album, and song. Some people are stuck with favorite artists, others feel compelled to landmark albums, and other hand-pick songs or singles.

Lovers of Artists and Albums tend to collide into the same methodology of bodies of work, whether it be a series of songs in a time-limited album or an anthology by an artist and related projects. They savor the commonality and conceptual connection with the delivery of an artist or order of an album. This group will more likely purchase or appreciate CDs, records, tapes, or sets.

Lovers of Songs tend to be selective within artist or album repertoire. The consensus that a lengthy grouping of songs lacks adequate variance is common to the now anciently current radio and moderately contemporary mixtapes, remixes, and playlists. Singles, mp3s, isolated CD ripping, DJ culture, and compilations are served best for this group.

This arbitrary dichotomy can be related to portable music culture. Both groups use iPods and digital music. The hyper-electronic age caters more the the individual customization of selectivity, but options are available to both parties. One can rip entire CD’s or import their favorite tracks. One can heavily sort mounds of playlists or stick with a rigid tracklisting and (primary or insignificantly) intended sorting.

Is it ethical to listen to segments of a concept album? Or are we neglecting the concept song? Or even the concept artist. Maybe one should go as far as not ever skipping songs that are personally unappealing and follow a chronological systematization of EPs, LPs, and live material.

Is it important to appreciate a body or a body part? They seem equally acceptable given enough respect is given to listener’s freedom and artist’s desire as an artistic piece. Artists like DJ-oriented Girl Talk released albums both as a single track or separated. Recent stunts by Paul Westerberg of diverting the price gouging of albums by offering a single-track-gone-full-length-album for $0.49 on Amazon (no longer available) go along with the challenge of what a song or album consist of. Silence in between sound does not indicate a new song. An album can also be a single song. It’s your option to skip songs or to solidify the work into a singularity. In some ways it offers the user the option to choose how to capture it. In other ways, technology gives the artist control of how the user initially takes in their creation.

There is no pure way to receive music. Hear samples, remember that funny vocal phrase, savor the power of a song, embrace the sequential significance of an album, or submerge yourself in the life’s work of a musical entity and associated agents that are contained in it. I manage to skip around, realizing my favorite mode given what I know of the artist and how I respond best to the work. To limit yourself to only one of these modes pigeonholes your possible intakes of fresh perceptions. When these artists perform live, they don’t go through the same set as their latest release. They could, but the artist make a choice to either please with fan-favorites or have some underlying meaning behind their setlist. Having an order is a mandatory element of live performance that differs from recorded formats. One can’t interrupt a band while they perform. Recorded music enables freedom; live music requires community agreement (or band authority).

I’ve always been fascinated with mashups. There are some wonderful songs that mix into an equal or better song than the original. There are also mash-ups that mix two already poor songs into a worse song.

I attempted to contribute my remixing cents into the pot and I chose “No One” by Alicia Keys to dub (acapella) into a more driving rock song. This just so happened to be the Walkmen. I thought that I might fit in there on a whim and there was little to reverse engineer. I slowed Alicia Key’s tempo, while retaining the pitch which matched Walkmens’ “The Rat” perfectly. The intro singing was a bit off and I had to juggle a few bits of the singing to get them to fit. It caused no headaches and was loads of fun to produce. And the lyrics have a nice pull at each other. “No One” is infatuation and “The Rat” is more annoyance and getting through to her. Take a listen.

Alicia Keys vs. The Walkmen – “No One/The Rat” [mp3]

Audacity is capable of producing quality mashups. It’s not easy, but if you stumble on the right song combination you can go through a fairly headache-free process. For the most part, I am making sound easier than it is. There is little in the way of DJ-friendly controls or mashup tools, but it’s free as in no more slavery (and costs nothing).