BEOOOOO

Goldfrapp, "Ride A White Horse" (Ewan Pearson Disco Odyssey Parts 1 + 2) (WARNING 34 MB FILE ALERT FIRE IN THE TACO BELL) - Ask yourself: Can a post on this blog really be considered complete if it doesn't feature at least one painful moment of overpowering stupidity on my part? I mean, I certainly hope not; lord knows I already put too much time and effort into last week's Rapture-related post* to go back and excise all the frothing over DangerMouse's contributions to "W.A.Y.U.H." just because it turns out that DM didn't actually do any, y'know, work on the track**. And anyway, why go back and rob the world of Mine Own Deathlesse Prose when I could take the easy way out and give Ewan Pearson, the other primary behind-the-knobs collaborator on the forthcoming Rapture album, some long-overdue space here?

I'm not kidding when I say "long-overdue"; my Blogger account has drafts of me trying to write up his unconscionably epic take on Goldfrapp's "Ride A White Horse" as far back as late February, back when I was calling it hands-down the best thing I'd heard in 2006. I can't in good conscience say that that's still true - not that anyone should feel any shame about jobbing to "Maneater", mind you - but it's certainly still one of the most impressive things I've heard in 2006; I'm a pretty patient guy when it comes to music, but fifteen minutes is one undeniably long-ass time to ask me to spend on a single song, doubly so when we're talking about a song by lil' miss God I Wish Your Music Were Just A Little More Fun herself. Thing is, as far as my ears are concerned, those fifteen minutes just fly by; sometimes it can just be incredibly satisfying to come across a song with such rigid logic, especially when it turns to self-indulgence around "Part 2" when it elects to get your attention with the most decadently hilarious (hilariously decadent?) disco effects ever passed down from on high - I mean, I was throwing it on mix CDs the instant I heard that gigantic, world-erasing sound effect lending its name to the title of this post, but those expecting that particular flourish to be the height of this song's artful preposterousness are in for fifteen minutes of up-ramping surprises. And anyway, it's as much a masterpiece of structure as it is of jaw-dropping trashiness - again, fifteen minutes is a lot of time to fill, so your song damn well better go somewhere worth going or risk ending up on the pile with Paperclip People's "Throw" (yeah yeah yeah). Again, I can't do much justice to how well the song sticks to its course - maybe it's just a side effect of my introduction to music consumption via Mixmag-approved dance music, but GAWD that's an elegantly trashy little excursion through some peaks and valleys. Just a fantastic job all around.

Having said that, of course, I'd be shocked into a coma to find some fifteen-minute epic on the upcoming Rapture album - now that I've said that, of course, they may decide to prove me wrong and add a one-song seventy-minute second disc to the album, but in light of the Rapture's history with producers with a predilection for expansiveness, I'm having a hard time believing they tapped Pearson for this album to spread their sound out. What you can get from this remix which hopefully translates over to the album is a sense of Pearson's gift for musical profanity - all those disco whistles may as well be dubbed over a clip of some dude stubbing the bejesus out of his toe in a really quiet church. I have a feeling that this approach is going to translate really well to the Rapture's sound - lest we forget, the cowbell was just another SNL punchline until they got ahold of one and rocked the fuck out on it, and if the snakey bounce and wound-up synths anchoring "W.A.Y.U.H." are any indication, they shouldn't have any problems figuring out what to do with the cowbell's digital brethren.

Anyway. The bad news, to sum up, is that this album still isn't out yet for some reason, and as such we're just going to have to kill time until we find out what other surprises it has in store (fuck, after last week's revelations, I'm honestly starting to wonder whether Daddy Yankee's going to show up on it). The good news, I guess, is that a fair bit of that time can be killed by playing through the "Ride A White Horse" remix once or twice. Could and should. Excellent stuff. (Click here to buy the "Ride A White Horse" CDS2 from Amazon.co.uk)

*i.e. I managed to shit out one draft before wrapping it up to go on a Burger King run
**THANKS, UNNAMED DUDE WHO LABELED THE FILE "The DangerMouse Sessions". THANKS A LOT.

The Whip, "Trash" - Holy shit, did anyone else see this coming? I mean, I've been on the record as a fan (or at least "enthusiast") of the Whip since their last single "Frustration" started boring holes in my brain, but WOW is this ever a horse of a different color - I mean, maybe it's not that big of a leap from aping New Order to aping Soulwax, but DAYUMMMM is it ever a huge leap in terms of effectiveness. It makes me think that their greatest strength as a band, the one that they should really build their identity around, is their timing; "Trash", after all, may not be the most sophisticated song in terms of reach or content, but it's hard to care when you're faced with a song stuffed with so many moments where so many elements just up and detonate. I'd honestly go so far as to call it the best thing to come out of this whole nu-Manchester scene so far - or at the very least, certainl the song most deserving of becoming a hit. ("Trash" is slated for release in a few weeks; in the meantime, you can buy the Whip's quite-good "Frustration" from Rough Trade by clicking here or visit their MySpace by clicking here.)

ELSEHWHERE

- It seems like I'm making this same speech every other post, but sorry again for all the downtime lately - I'm currently working about thirteen hours a day spread between two jobs, and the blogging just kinda takes a backseat. The good news is that in two weeks, all that shit's over when I start working for the Miracle Job Of All Miracle Jobs, so service should resume as normal then-ish. (seriously, y'all - dream job. I may well be the only person any of y'all know who got their job by making fun of Scientology.)