Yes, co-signing with what everybody else with Internet access this past week has already screamed at you probably a million times over now: Cee-Lo‘s “Fuck You” is brilliant/ genius/ amazing/ the true song of the summer we’ve been waiting for/ one of the greatest records of not only this year, but, perhaps, all time.
An expletive-laced diss at an ex-flame/ gold-digger and her big ballin’ new man packaged as a cheery ’60′s Motown-pop romp and delivered through Cee-Lo’s heaven-sent soulful belts? With all of these elements involved, of course “Fuck You” was going to stir some deafening Web buzz; but for us what makes the song’s near-instantaneous universal embracing even more special is that, just like with the similar viral explosion response to that early leak of Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy”waaaay back in 2005, it re-positions Cee-Lo as the hottest pop and soul star in all of music land, an awesome reality to digest when you look at the comparably insignificant assembly-line bots most of the major labels are desperately pushing to have in those roles these days.
Fingers are crossed that when “Fuck You”‘s parent album, the Cee-Lo solo outing The Lady Killer, drops on December 7th, it’ll feature more of these modern classics to keep him perched atop that throne where he rightfully belongs.
Cop the single over at Cee’s website, then after the clip, snatch up Emynd‘s killer B-more club remix as well as an old Cee-Lo-featured fave.
In an effort to prove that we’re not completely out of the loop when it comes to what’s been making waves within the music blog scene in recent weeks, enjoy this quick run-through of some of the more high profile new videos/ releases we’ve missed out on commenting on due to…uh, we’ll just say “real life” (and a few WordPress issues) getting in the way:
Sleigh Bells “Tell Em”
Anything you’ll ever read about this Brooklyn boy/girl noise-pop duo (vocalist Alexis Krauss and songwriter/ guitarist/ producer Derek E. Miller) is bound to note the band’s love for insane volume levels just as much as it’ll hype how crazily infectious the tunes hidden beneath all the ear-punishing distortion are.
Believe these words on both accounts.
“Tell Em”, the first single from the Sleigh Bells’ debut album Treats (due May 11th on Mom + Pop/ N.E.E.T.), may lead to one having early deafness, but bet you won’t be able to resist repeat doses of it’s rat-a-tat drum, turned-up-to-eleven guitar riffage and laser sound effects assault, nor Krauss’ pureform coos sweetly encouraging today’s young’uns “you can do your best today” betwixt it all.
Last summer’s chillwave/ glo-fi movement taught us the glories of music that was meek-sounding, of shitty quality and awesome; expect the upcoming warm weather season to be all about start-up bands/ acts co-signing the equally awesome louder-than-loud and shitty quality formula of the Bells.
We’ll politely decline from adding to the increasingly tiring “Is she copying Gaga?” rattle concerning Aguilera‘s new (meh) one, and just say this: when it comes to desperate slutty Christina, we’d rather give “Dirrty” a re-spin.
Is it bad that we wish we could just fast-forward to the next Aguilera album era already?
Christina’s Bionic drops June 8th.
Ciara featuring Ludacris “Ride”
Looking to get her career back on track after the commercial fumble that was her last album (2009′s Fantasy Ride), Ciara smartly hearkens back to a previous career highlight on new single “Ride”, re-heating the winning, “seductive ‘crunk & b’ crawl + Ludacris cameo” formula of “Oh” with an extra slathering of naughty sex kitten on top of it.
“I can do it up and down/ I can do circles/ To him I’m a gymnast/ This one is my circus,” she sings, nicely illustrating such bedroom talents with a slew of eye-popping body gyrations (amongst other “I’m not a little girl anymore” visuals) in the accompanying video.
Yeah, the hook claims it’s the “beat” that she’s riding “like a mother-[bleeping] freak”, but a ten-year-old could figure out what she’s really talking about.
Eminem “Not Afraid”
Capping months of track-owning guest appearances on joints alongside Drake & Kanye West, Lil’ Wayne and B.o.B (not to mention the killer freestyle track “Despicable”), Em‘s “Not Afraid”, the first taste off his next full length Recovery, lands as another lyrical stunner, with him surprisingly coming across as equally compelling when preaching positive about living a “clean” lifestyle as he does when he’s flexing his more loony and murderous-minded material.
Only problem is, while we’re excited to hear he’s become aware of how awful the various “accents” and pop star/ tabloid staple-spoofing had become, “Not Afraid” feels less and less interesting with each successive listen (maybe it’s that ’80′s arena rock-styled hook), and we’re not necessarily sure we’re ready for an entire album of Eminem getting all uplifting on us.
Surely Kim has done something scandalous in recent years to inspire at least one Recovery song that throws back to his bat-shit crazy rhymes.
Josh Ritter “Another New World”
From the critically-acclaimed folk singer-songwriter‘s newly released sixth set So Runs The World Away (currently streaming in full over at NPR.org), a seven-minute-long story song set atop beautifully sedative acoustic guitar pluckings and dreamily sirenic muted horns about an Arctic explorer and his crew and the tragic horrors that befall them in the midst of a voyage in search of the “new world”.
Doesn’t sound like your cup of tea? Take a chance and hit ‘Play’ and you’ll be surprised how misty-eyed you get once it gets to the part where the protagonist is forced to set fire to his beloved ship in order to stay alive.
Most attention concerning this final single from the nearly two-year-old I Am…Sasha Fierce will more than certainly fall on it’s strange, but definitely sexy, retro-themed video (with Bey once-again rocking the Bettie Page ’50′s pin-up look) rather than the song itself; but the cut (co-penned by sister Solange) manages to be somewhat fascinating in it’s own right with the steely-voiced diva turning herself inside-out trying to figure out why a man would choose to willfully bypass such a catch (especially one with “beauty”, “class”, “style” and, most importantly”, “ass”) to a tightly-wound ’60′s soul strut.
Just like the rest of us, Estelle has probably grown tired of waiting around for Missy Elliott to emerge from whatever studio she’s been secluding herself in to bless us with a new crazy club banger. Here’s the difference between us and her, though: whereas we would have simply…well, just kept waiting for “Misdemeanor” to re-emerge with some heat, Estelle has gone one better and decided to simply unleash a Missy-esque track herself…and boy are we happy she did.
Rocking an immediately grabbing hook chant (“I can be a freak-every day of every week”) and a taut, B-more-styled fashion house strut (helmed by the increasingly everywhere David Guetta) that’s damn near impossible to sit still to, Estelle’s new single “Freak” finds the singer/ rapper boldly expressing her S&M-loving side while pushing the rest of the female population to embrace their inner-naughtiness as well.
“Don’t be scared, don’t be shy/ Yes, you gotta let it breathe,” she preaches, assuring the ladies that “he wanna see you handcuffed up/ he wanna see your leather gear” and using an interpolation of Soul II Soul’s deathless “Back To Life (However Do You Want Me)” to stress her bedroom-spicing ideas further. Repping for all men everywhere, featured guest Kardinal Offishall can only respond with a major case of the byoing-yoing-yoings (“I pitch a tent with an XL Magnum on the cover!!”).
Missy, we DEMAND you make an appearance on the inevitable remix…
Purchase the track through Estelle’s website. Expect Estelle’s third album, All of Me, later this year.
Not to beat a dead horse, but it’s still so amazingly dumbfounding how Nina Sky continually release such great material with none of it ever able to bubble into commercial success. This past year alone they’re unleashed at least two well-acclaimed tracks (“On Some Bullshit” and their heavily remixed Major Lazer/ Ricky Blaze collabo “Keep It Goin’ Louder”) that are deserving of topping some pop single chart somewhere in the galaxy instead of just being the blog-crit/ club sect sensations they are.
Really, what do these girls have to do to score another over-ground hit? Could nicking an old hook from the Hall & Oates’ platinum-lined catalog be the answer? Probably not, but if it’s any consolation, “Here He Comes”, the “Maneater”-biting third single from B-more club hero Tittsworth‘s 12 Steps, has quickly risen up the rankings of our own personal Hot 100.
Tailor-made for a club-set scene in a CW tween soap, with Tittsworth’s light R&B-house thump carrying a distant bump as if to illustrate it’s source being outside the central camera shot, “Here He Comes” hones in on the inner-thoughts of Nicole and Natalie Albino, who are quietly going nuts as their crush casually brushes past them. “Tense up my body/ Can’t talk about it/ These feelings got me, got me…”, their forlorn harmonies trail off, the breathtaking appeal of their favorite boy so overwhelming, they’re rendered speechless.
The track carries such an alluring overall mood, that the fact that it breaks no new ground for the twins stylistically (these girls have managed to successfully marry every single human emotion possible to a “in the club” setting over the years), or that fellow featured guest Pitbull somewhat mars things with his needless misogyny (“I spread legs like a gynecologist”), don’t even begin to matter…all of which only makes it a bigger shame that “Here He Comes” likely won’t ever reach the massive audience it deserves.
You can sample the original below (in addition to a bonus Tittsworth remix of a beloved ’90′s R&B classic), but don’t forget to also cop the complete single EP, featuring remixes from AC Slater, Nadastrom, Stretch Armstrong & Jaimie Fanatic and Rico Tubbs & Will Power.
During the summer of ’96, you couldn’t go anywhere without the inviting anonymous female vocals and giddy booty bass bump of Ghost Town DJ’s “My Boo” being blasted from some passing vehicle or neighborhood window. And even if it was heard close to two million times a day, nary a complaint was made, because the song was THAT GREAT.
Fast forward a decade and some change and this one-off smash has lost none of it’s feel-good appeal, especially when updated with a choppy B-More stutter-swing courtesy of the consistently solid remixer DJ Solly.
With “I’m The Ish/ Shit” (and it’s manystar-ladenremixes) continuing to pierce the hearts of dance, hip hop and pop lovers alike around the globe, the song’s creator, DJ Class, now seems intent on maintaining this new plateau of mainstream-edging fame.
Class’ newest cut, no-brainer future club staple “Dance Like A Freak”, sees him cooking up a near-overwhelming ear assault of minor key taps, Prince-like drums and blurting synths as continued inspiration for the sexy dancefloor babe who’s got every set of male eyes in the spot fixated on her every sensuous shimmy.
Her choreography is so hypnotizing, it’s turned the robo-vocalled Class into a stalker-ish fool, invading her headspace with nosy digs into her personal info (“Lemme get your phone number…”; “Tell me where you stay at…”) before quickly moving to bank account-denting promises of whisking her and her friends away on a trip through the skies. And just in case she’s not easily swayed, he makes clear she fully understands how legit his big baller status is, matter-of-factly adding “No I don’t fly Delta/ We charter up at ‘Million-Air’”.
The perfect successor to “Ish” (the uber-annoying Ron “Jumping Out The Window” Browz should take notes; this is how you do Auto-Tune-enhanced club anthems right), “Dance Like A Freak” should have plenty of bodies following it’s titular order long enough to sustain DJ Class’ appeal until his new album, Alameda & Coldspring, drops later on this year.
Can’t wait to see what rapper jumps on this one first!!
“Okay Yeezy/ You know I had to touch this/ It feels so…so European”, giggles Estelle, the latest artist to attach her name to DJ Class‘ increasingly popular “Bmore club”-turned-nationwide anthem “I’m The Shit”.
Giving us a little “American Boy” reunion by embedding herself into the Kanye West-assisted version (alternate takes include guest contributions from Lil’ Jon, Pitbull, Jermaine Dupri and Trey Songz), the self-tagged Stelly-Stelle gets appropriately braggalicious against “Shit”‘s delirious dancefloor workout, dishing out boasts of a fierce fashion game that’s got all the “fashion papers talkin’”. But the winner of Best Line would have to go to this verse-concluding lyrical middle finger to all those gossip-page haters: “Got these gold-bottomed braces just to match my Grammy, bitch!!”. Three snaps up, Estelle.
As nice as it is to get free music, think of how much better your soul would feel if you purchased it the old-fashioned way.
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Come on, use Amazon or iTunes and help support your favorite artists so they can continue to give us the great sounds we love.
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(MP3 posts are for promotional and/ or previewing purposes only; if any artist or their representation wish to have the links removed, contact me and I will happily comply!)
Yes, co-signing with what everybody else with Internet access this past week has already screamed at you probably a million times over now: Cee-Lo‘s “Fuck You” is brilliant/ genius/ amazing/ the true song of the summer we’ve been waiting for/ one of the greatest records of not only this year, but, perhaps, all time. 
Not to beat a dead horse, but it’s still so amazingly dumbfounding how 
During the summer of ’96, you couldn’t go anywhere without the inviting anonymous female vocals and giddy booty bass bump of 
With 
“Okay Yeezy/ You know I had to touch this/ It feels so…so European”, giggles Estelle, the latest artist to attach her name to
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