I'm So Tired Of Repeating Myself

Jamie Lidell, "Multiply" (Gonzalez piano version) - I would have put down money - American money, even - to bet that Jamie Lidell's original version of "Multiply" would have been the most I could have possibly been surprised by that song; even months after the fact, I can't hear Lidell's star-making turn as Otis Reddingcito without wondering what part of all that Super_Collider racket I had been ignoring. Well, thank god bookies don't take my ridiculous bets, because here comes Jose Gonzalez taking the song to its (in retrospect) obvious conclusion, as the difference between the Gonzalez version and the Lidell original is as pronounced as the difference between Cody ChesNutt on the Roots' "Seed 2.0" and, well, any other Cody ChesNutt song ever. The biggest stroke of genius at work here is the simple trick of wrapping the song up in bustling-room ambience; it's not that I don't have as much love for All That Piano as you might expect from someone raised since birth on a steady diet of Billy Joel, but throwing the song in the middle of a busy room suddenly refocuses my interest from "Hey, check out how much Jamie Lidell likes Al Green" to "HOLY JESUS, LISTEN TO THAT GUY GET THAT SONG OUT OF HIM". Bonus point: it's also the greatest First Song On A Mix CD since god only knows when. (Click here to buy the "Multiply" single from HMV)

Fans of Kate, "Tape 23" (Simian remix) - This isn't the first song I've posted from Fans of Kate's "I Don't Know What To Do With My Hands" single on this blog, but in light of St. Etienne accidentally making a hell of a point about the diminished power in buying singles when their "jinxed" single made the charts in spite of selling a maximum of three thousand copies, I think I'll be okay. Anyway, the most important thing at the moment is to get this monstrous storming nugget of electro-thrash-cut-up-funk as out into the world as it's capable of getting; I can't say I've heard the original song, but color me shocked if the vocals can even possibly sound half as good when they aren't being buttressed by chest-caving bass kicks, and let's not even get into how perfect the vocal cuts are for that soaring chorus. In my mind, this is a gigantic pop radio hit, although to be fair my mind's pop-radio radar is probably better suited for Toon Town from that Roger Rabbit movie. (Click here to buy the "I Don't Know What To Do With My Hands" single from HMV)

ELSEWHERE

- Oh balls. (thanks Brian)