Track of the Week: Days Go By by Dirty Vegas

This week’s track is Days Go By by Dirty Vegas, off of their self-titled eponymous debut. An older track, from 2002, this album and this track are a great example of turn of the century (fun to say that!) house. Pulsing bass line, plus very low key lyrics that are layered with what sounds like a little auto-tune make this a fun track. The music video is also worth a watch.

Turn of the century context: this song won the Grammy for best dance recording in 2003. To give a sense of the sounds of house and dance at the time, other nominees where Superstylin by Groove Armada and Gotta Get Thru This by Daniel Bedingfield. The Groove Armada track is in the same general genre as Days Go By, but Gotta Get Thru This has all the sounds of a late 90s dance track.

Track of the Week: Wonderman by Tinie Tempah

This week’s (weekend’s) track is Wonderman (featuring Ellie Goulding) by Tinie Tempah off of Disc-Overy. Wonderman is a high octane, bass-thumping synth-jamming track that immediately pumps you up. I think half the reason I picked this track this week is Ellie Goulding — her hook swings the track back and forth between hip-hop to electro-pop and I have yet to find something she’s done that I don’t like. The whole soundscape is uplifting, energizing and a great listen.

Track of the Week: Shot Yourself In The Foot Again by Skream & Example

This week’s track is Shot Yourself In The Foot Again by Skream & Example, a little dubstep ditty I found at the top of Hype Machine’s popular music list this week. While I generally don’t like the really grimey/dirty dubstep, this song is more dance with a little bit of dubstep thrown in. The solid four on the floor thumps through, layered under a melodic synth line. The track tells the story, one so typical yet always gets retold, of priorities between having fun and committing. Unlike most tracks of the week, I find this song a lot more illustrative with the music video. At the breaks the director does a rapid set of flash-cuts which advance the two sides of the story quickly. Great song, and perhaps one of the few “dubsteps” song that I want to listen to over and over again.

Track of the Week: Apply by Glasser

This week’s track is Apply by Glasser off of her album Ring. I’m still not 100% what this album is about, or what kind of music it is, but it’s (a) interesting to listen to, (b) folktronica, and (c) mind bending. Applying layers of tribal drums, beats and haunting vocals Apply is a track that deserves listening to.

Track of the Week: Christmas Sarajevo 12/24 by Trans-Siberian Orchestra

This week’s track is fitting for the coming Christmas weekend, Christmas Sarajevo 12/24 by Trans-Siberian Orchestra, off of their first album Christmas Eve and Other Stories. It’s basically a metal cover of Carol of the Bells, and who doesn’t love metal covers of old folk songs? I think I first heard this song in high school and if memory serves it was one of the first MP3s I ever downloaded (along with Oasis, Ace of Base and Quad City DJs). Every year, come Christmas-time, this song pops in to my heads as timeless and epic.

Track of the Week: Lights by Ellie Goulding

This week’s track is Lights by Ellie Goulding, off of either her American debut An Introduction to Ellie Goulding EP, or her British debut Bright Lights. I first found this track on the Hype Machine twitter top tracks. I’d never heard of Ellie Goulding but a quick set of searches revealed she’s sort of a big deal in the UK, having topped the BBC’s Sound of 2010 chart and some other accolades.

This particular song is a great synthpop (or better yet folktronica!). The track opens with some nice synth tones (best to listen in headphones to get the full effect). It builds slowly adding in the vocals and a drum beat to hold the song together. The songwriting is enjoyable as is the Ellie Goulding’s raspy, reaching, vocals. Her voice stands great alone, and fills out the entire song when overdubbed.

Track of the Week: Tron Legacy (End Titles)

This week’s track is Tron Legacy (End Titles) by Daft Punk off of the Tron Legacy Soundtrack. It’s Tron. It’s Daft Punk. It’s pretty epic. Based on the visuals from the trailers and the epic and soaring music from Daft Punk I’m pretty sure the movie will be a sight to see. The eponymous track is probably the most Daft Punk-y of the tracks with a quick tempo and pulsing beats, and easily has the most single appeal of the tracks of the album. I highly recommend the entire album.

Track of the Week: Bright Lights Bigger City by Cee Lo Green

This week’s track is Bright Lights Bigger City by Cee Lo Green off of The Lady Killer. This entire showing by Cee Lo is fantastic, the album holds its own from start to finish. It’s also apparently done quite well in the charts, and been reveiwed well by music critics, so perhaps I’m a bit late to this one, but the album stands out as an incredible hip-hop/soul/funk album.

This track, Bright Lights Bigger City, starts with a huge synth line all alone before it builds in to percussion, and then vocals. Cee Lo’s distinctive brings the song together, and soars (remixed in) through the chorus. This song stands out to for me, but the album has no shortage of good music.

Bonus Track!

This week is a two-for-one. Also in the mix this week is Dr Dre’s theoretical first song leaked from Detox, named Kush. Featuring Akon and Snoop Dogg, it’s a classic West Coast banger with signature Dr Dre piano lines and thumping beats. If it’s a sign of what we can expect off of Detox, it may have been worth the wait.

Track of the Week: You Got Me by The Roots

This week’s track is You Got Me (featuring Erykah Badu) by The Roots off of Things Fall Apart. This is one of my favorite R&B / hip-hop songs of all time. Co-written by Jill Scott, the lyrics are simple, poetic and potent and weave together to story of a trust and love between Erykah Badu and Black Thought. There are so many good things I love about this song, from how relatable the lyrics are, to the percussion of ?uestlove, to the sound evolving to an Amen-break-esque tempo towards the end, to the live instrumentation that makes the sound warm and enveloping, it’s a fantastic track from 1999 that deserves a revisit.

Track of the Week: Take Me Out by Atomic Tom

I feel like an unwitting slave to a meme and a clever bit of marketing, but this week’s track is Take Me Out by Atomic Tom. This track stumbled across my path when watching the best of YouTube and the incredible video of Atomic Tom playing their entire song on iPhones meant I had to go over to give the band their due credit by purchasing their album. A fun rock/pop album, this song is probably the best. In some ways, I like the YouTube/iPhone version better than the album version. The raw sound of the YouTube track gives it an incredible texture. The actual album was recorded in an apartment, for which it has an amazing sound and spacing. I suggest giving this one a listen, to both versions. You’ll be rewarded with a great meme and a song to match.