Classic D Man

The D Man first heard The Stone Roses' lightning-strike brilliance on his brother's killer compilation from MTV's 120 Minutes. "Fools Gold," a bonus track on the 1989 American release of the band's self-titled debut, was dark, slinky, and had one of the best in-the-pocket guitar grooves imaginable.

From there, The D Man may have been the only kid in junior high tripping out to the likes of "I Wanna Be Adored," "She Bangs the Drums," and "Waterfall." Not surprising, considering that the The Stone Roses' first album stopped the music world and left some wondering whether the band would not only surpass The Smiths as the greatest thing to ever come out of Manchester, but whether Ian Brown and company could challenge The Beatles' throne as the best British band ever. The songs were so strong, such thinking was not sacrilege.

While listening to "Elephant Stone" this morning, another bonus track on the American release, The D Man noted that it still captures the mystery and excitement of this great but short-lived band. There is still serious magic in the opening weave of the guitar line, the half-submerged vocals, and the out-in-the open admission, "Seems like there's a hole / in my dreams." The D Man comes back to "Elephant Stone" again and again, and it has crept into that treasured realm of songs that will never grow old and play on forever in some corner of my mind.

By the time The Stone Roses second (and last) album was released in 1994, the momentum from their debut had diminished and the critics had since fallen in love with others. No matter. Consistently named as one the best British albums of all time, The Stone Roses is well worth repeated listens twenty years later.

Surfer Blood

Surfer Blood rides a wave from their Florida home to California on their first album, Astro Coast. The band's massive power-pop with wait-for-it hooks bodes well for anyone who likes the West Coast sunshine, The Pixies, Weezer, or even the fuzziness of Japandroids (their recent touring partners). The D Man is seriously digging this stuff and is happy to be listening to a great guitar album this early in the year. Check out obvious first single, "Swim (To Reach the End)."

Song of the Week

"Think I finally know what I want / I want to be two places at once." "Yellow Wings" embraces duality: with an exciting blend of both eighties stadium grandeur and vocally insular indie rock, the Brooklyn-based Keepaway has probably produced the best song of January (well, aside from about every track on Vampire Weekend's sophomore effort). With easy and somewhat overzealous comparisons to Animal Collective, this song from the band's self-released debut EP, Baby Style, deserves much more attention to critical detail, let alone the rolling drum progressions, layered sonics, and clever use of electronics.

Musical Relief

The people of Haiti certainly need our help--our time, energy, and resources. Our music? The D Man is not so sure. I suppose if the recent Help Haiti Now telethon can encourage a few more dollars to go to the island, then it is well worth the effort. However, the entire exercise still seems strange to me and some of last night's performances appeared a little self-indulgent, almost as if certain artists couldn't wait to watch their career retrospective twenty years from now and have this be their humanitarian Live Aid moment. "In 2009, Beyonce performed a stunning version of 'Halo' to bring attention to the plight in Haiti."

The D Man still feels inclined to give you his random thoughts. So it goes.

• Coldplay did their Coldplay thing.
• Just happy Stevie Wonder didn't play "Superstitious" for a record twenty-ninth straight television appearance.
• Taylor Swift wore the same dress that she has worn for the past two years. That's about all I noticed about her performance. Although she was so nice on that telephone call, right?
• Christina Aguilera was understated (for her) and quite good.
• Sting played an excellent jazzed-up version of "Driven to Tears" with the help of Chris Botti and The Roots.
• "Haiti, I can see your halo." I suppose the fact that I made The Mrs. laugh after saying it over and over tells you enough.
• Keith Urban, Sheryl Crow, and Kid Rock. Yup.
• Madonna totally grossed The D Man out and he was waiting for her skin to rip apart at any moment. Mrs. D Man wondered if the black choir (which they always can get at the drop of a hat, right?) already performed "Like a Prayer" each week at church. Scary.
• Less Matthews, more Young, please. Thankfully, Neil's fantastic performance of "Long May You Run" on Conan O'Brien's final Tonight Show erased all memories of Dave attempting to hog the acoustic spotlight.
• Rihanna looked like she showed up to make a music video and just found out about the earthquake. Seriously.
• The D Man was waiting for The Edge to open up a sonic boom with his guitar after about the third verse of the Jigga Man's supposedly epic rap. Would have made things much better.
• Justin Timberlake and Matt Morris (a former Mickey Mouse Club cast member that recently signed to Timberlake's label) actually performed a quite-nice rendition of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah," with obvious reference to Jeff Buckley's exquisite version.
• Jennifer Hudson was fine. The D Man couldn't help but wonder that "full-figured" black women have it much better in the entertainment business than their Caucasian doppelgangers. So sue me.
• Wyclef added some needed color and one could sense his genuine concern for his homeland.
• Regardless of your musical tastes, donate some money or find a way to help.

Song of the Week

Beach House's glimmering ambient pop is on full display in "Norway," the first single from the forthcoming Sub Pop release, Teen Dream. The duo of Victoria LeGrand and Alex Scally replace some of the dreamy and drawn-out atmosphere found on 2008's Devotion with a greater sense of light-filled urgency. Stunning stuff.

Warm Heart of Africa

On hot days while walking through Katutura, Namibia, The D Man heard the popular sounds of Africa blaring from homes and shebeens. Refugees from Congo or Angola. Hip Owambo kids. Old men and women. They all shared a passion for the rhythm-heavy and key-board inflected sounds that pulsed throughout the continent during the turn of the century. The music was alive, even subversive, and stemmed from a common ancestry in highlife (see: here), Afrobeat (see: here and here), and other far-flung derivations. In South Africa, kwaito beat over the townships during the peak of its commercial success and offered the youth a sense of danger and empowerment, not unlike Southern California's rap scene from the late eighties and early nineties. Music was a public and (dare I say it?) primal aspect of African culture and connectivity.

Given these dalliances with the Motherland, The D Man is a sucka for Afro-pop and is happy to share the splendid album Warm Heart of Africa by The Very Best. Every year there is usually one album that The D Man overlooks and actually feels bad about it--not just that he let his readers down or that his own sense of the musical canon abandoned him--but he feels like he owes the artists something of an accounting, or at least a simple explanation or apology. So it is with The Very Best.

Esau Mwamwaya, an ebullient Malawi-born singer, met up with the Belgian DJ/production duo Radioclit in London. Apparently, Mwamwaya was running a second-hand furniture shop and sold a bicycle to Etienne Tron, whose studio happened to be just down the street. Mwamwaya ultimately teamed up with Tron and Johan Karlberg to create a project called The Very Best. The group released a mixtape that became an underground sensation and on their proper debut album, The Very Best revels in a warm celebration of expansive Afro-Western pop music, with bright-eyed vocals from Mwamwaya and impeccable samples and production by Radioclit.

Check out the new video for "Warm Heart of Africa" featuring Vampire Weekend's Ezra Koenig. It is precisely what an Afro-pop video should be for a song that fuses multiple styles and raises thousands of smiles. This is not "world music"--this is great global pop music in vibrant dialogue with its various neighbors. If this doesn't make you feel good, well, something is really wrong. Get some help.

BONUS: Check out the song "Rain Dance" with everyone's favorite Sri Lankan freedom fighter, M.I.A. You will shake your backside, I promise.

Classic D Man

1988's "Under the Milky Way" is one of the most durable songs of all time--i.e., The D Man can listen to it over and over again without ever growing tired of its allure. In fact, this concept of musical durability deserves its own blog post on another day. Today, The D Man reflects on The Church's wistful retelling of "Two Places at Once," from 1994's Sometime, Anywhere. Unlike many albums from that teenage era, this purchase from the bargain bin has withstood multiple purges of my record collection.

An ode to ghosts, toasts, and boasts, it is a strange little song that gives listeners space to consider the possibility of former lives and former loves--before it hits you with the big, yearning chorus. I've been waiting for yoooouuuuu. The result is a song that sounds like decades have passed, lovers have died, and spirits have long since lingered. We should thank the underrated and long-running Australian band for this musical apparition. They were so bliiiiiiiiiind.

Song of the Week

A New Year is here. The D Man hopes that his loyal cadre of readers had a fine holiday season--and that you also had a chance to hear some good tunes. Need a place to start? The D Man's Top Twenty list (below) offers plenty of excellent listening opportunities.

The final track on Animal Collective's fantastic 2009 album, Merriweather Post Pavillion, is the colorful kaleidoscope stomp "Brother Sport." Written by Noah Lennox to cheer up his brother Matt after their father's death, the song calls for him to "open up your throat" to let all of the inner pain go. A serious subject for an absolutely joyous and harmonic piece of tribal electronica, the video depicts the celebratory abandonment of youth in a trippy, trailerpark, Animal Collective sort of way. This music will lift the January inversion, both inside and out.