Music

Songs I Enjoyed in 2016

Posted on January 5, 2017 by Ricky in Music | Leave a comment

shura

Most people write this post in December, but I wanted even more time to reflect on the past year so that this post will be even more awesome. So here it is in no particular order. There is a spotify playlist at the bottom so you know what to do.

Chairlift – Crying in Public
Rarely do I like a non-dancey Chairlift song, but this track off Moth is as tender a ballad as Chairlift can get. The track showcases Caroline Polachek’s flexibility as a vocalist and I love the modern touches in the lyrics. Very good song that’s basically impossible to sing in karaoke, not that that’s a criteria.

James – Nothing But Love
James put out their usual solid album this year, yet they didn’t tour Canada, which saddens me. Nothing But Love is a James anthem in every sense of the way – easy to digest lyrics, a pace ideal for singalongs and a soaring chorus. Some bands would give up an arm and a leg to write a song like this every once in awhile yet James spits these out like it’s free candy. We take them for granted, which is a shame.

Haelos – Cloud Nine
Haelos – Pray
These two tracks off the debut Haelos album are among my favorite of the year – dramatic and dark, they are perfect for that night time drive. Crisp production efforts and just hella moody, hard to believe this is a band in just their infancy stages.

Tegan and Sara – Stop Desire
Opposed to the darkness that is Haelos, this is your get up on a Saturday morning, bust out a workout and drink some milkshake anthem. Impossibly catchy and 80’s inspired, this track will be lighting up indie dance floors for years to come. On par with Closer for the most crowd pleasing Tegan & Sara song.

Allie X – That’s So Us
Speaking of pop songs, this song has got hooks left right and center. I don’t know how this song did not do better. It’s pop candy at it’s best. Maybe it’s too pop.

Bat for Lashes – Sunday Love
We’ll just have to deal with the fact that Bat for Lashes will never top the track Daniel which is fair enough because that’s such a good song. Sunday Love is off what I believe is a concept album (aren’t all BFL albums concept albums?). Natasha Khan makes every song sound kinda epic with her unbelievable voice and this track is no different, although the synthesized harp’s help.

Joey Purp – Girls @ (featuring Chance The Rapper)
This song sounds like a Neptunes rap song from early 2000’s so it’s got that weird new nostalgic feeling to it. It also references Destiny Child, so you know it’s got the late 90s in mind. I liked those young, innocent days. It also features Chance The Rapper who is basically gold these days. Speaking of Chance…

Chance the Rapper – All Night
All night, I been drinking all night
I been drinking all night, I been drinking, ay ay
Everybody outside, everybody outside
When I pull up outside, all night, no
Everybody high five, everybody wanna smile
Everybody wanna lie, that’s nice, no

Probably my favorite first few lines off any song this year. That all night chorus gets you shimmy shaking. What do those words mean? I don’t even know.

Shura – Nothing’s Real
Shura – Touch
Half of Shura’s songs this year would have made this list realistically. I’m a sucker for 80’s inspired disco/pop music. Minor touches like the strings during the chorus of Nothing’s Real elevates this song from standard run of the mill songs, much like how good olive oil take your salad to the next level. Criminally underrated album.

Japandroids – Near To the Wild Heart of Life
Canadian rockers return to us with a song worthy of my 90’s era high school angst. Japandroid has a tremendous talent of melding hard rock with pop hooks and this formula is firing on all cylinders with this song. What a comeback.

Cover Song of the Day: The Chipmunks – Call Me (Blondie Cover) but slowed down to 16 speed

Posted on August 5, 2016 by Ricky in Covers | Leave a comment

chipmunks

Someone posted a slowed down version of the Chipmunks cover album on soundcloud about 9 months ago. I’ve just discovered it and it’s great. Here is a slowed down Chipmunks doing Blondie’s “Call Me.”

SXSW Song Of The Day: SPEAK – Gates

Posted on January 14, 2016 by Gary in Music, Song of the Day, South By Southwest | Leave a comment

A lot of us at Panic Manual are no stranger to Austin, TX, justifiably the “live music capital of the world”. But it always adds a layer of scintillating mystery when you visit musicians and artists at their home base. I usually jump up and down at the opportunity: lyrics and conspicuous name-dropping aside, can one divine some source of spatiotemporally compartmentalized inspiration, be it cultural, historical, or geopolitical that the artists draw on? Well, if you try to parse that out using the Internets, the band that I’m about to introduce will itself introduce a brick wall of googleplex proportions. Looking for “Speak” in “Austin during SxSW” is likely second only to “Sing/song” in same and gives way to some convoluted contextual meta analysis that will delight only academics and self-identified intellectuals. In the past 10 minutes, I have had more instances of “does not compute” than I would from debugging a badly commented Fortran code.

If you haven’t figured out what I’m trying to say yet, here’s a layman’s summary: SPEAK is a band formed in Austin Texas with an unfortunate choice of name, but incidentally very fortunate choices in melody. Synthesized, remixed and sampled pieces typically form the backdrop to which the lead vocalist Troupe Gammage unleashes his talented howls. The synthpop component is never overly long-lasting and the aftertaste is strictly indie rock in a very pleasant manner. And now that I must think about it, there is hardly a detectable trace of Austin in the music. But that would be the difference between locals and tourists, or perhaps regular people and snobs, for all I know.

SPEAK put out a new album called Pedals last year – I particularly like “Congo,” “Gates” (below) and “Nightlight” from that effort. While it seems in all likelihood true, due to the aforementioned, significantly sturdy brick wall, I haven’t figured out whether they are confirmed at SxSW this year. But hopefully we will see them with hometown advantage this spring.

Cover of the day: Disclosure ft Sam Smith – Hotline Bling

Posted on November 10, 2015 by Ricky in Covers | 1 Comment

hotlinebling

You can always count on BBC’s live lounge series to produce quality covers. Even the most hater of haters cannot deny that Drake’s Hotline Bling has slowly but surely taken over our world. I can’t even remember the last time that song wasn’t in my head at some point of the day.

As you would expect with such a popular song, there have been a lot of covers ranging from goofy (see Sufjan) to downright good (see alessia cara)

You could chalk this attempt in the latter category. it seems Disclosure can do no wrong these days and they pair up with their ole steady, Sam Smith to come up with this disco summer version of Hotline Bling.

While this cover doesn’t redefine or reimagine the track in anyway, it does feature Sam Smith’s strong vocal work with some house beats. the results seem prime for the dance floor, not that you wouldn’t dance for the original anyway. Check it out regardless:

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