I Am Not A Placeholder, No Sir

Kid Creole & the Coconuts, "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy" - It really feels like I should have more to say on Kid Creole & the Coconuts' "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy", a song which might lead you to investigate not only one of the truly great compilations of a single label ever but also the work of one of the most sorely underappreciated auteurs ever to work in music. You're familiar with August Darnell's work, of course (there's this little song called "There But For The Grace Of God Go I" he had a hand in writing and producing and arranging), but probably not with his weirdness, let alone the pitch-black contempt for humanity that tends to come out in his better songs, and this is a shame; humans are pretty reliably forthright when it comes to reasons to bare your teeth at them as a race, and it's always a pleasure to stumble over such a riotously soundtrack by which to do it. And in a lot of ways, he never came closer than he did on "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy", a cod-soca disco interloper which might well be the most vibrant and exultant that a song can sound and still be about a guy promising to abandon his illegitimate daughter again. These are all fine reasons to listen to "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy", as is the as-yet-unspoken one that you'll need the Jaws of Life to get it out of your head once you've heard it.

Unfortunately, my own head isn't making quite such rigorous demands of me; all I know is that Mark Ronson and Lily Allen have conspired to throw me into a musical k-hole at the moment, and August Darnell's overlooked masterpiece seems to be the only hand extended to help me get out. It helps, of course, that "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy" transitions not just out of Allen's "LDN", but into Ronson's "Ooh Wee" with the kind of grace that doesn't even feel remotely accidental. Even more remarkably, they don't just match up in terms of beats or keys; "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy" feels in many ways like the perfect formulation of both Allen and Ronson's aesthetics, since both Darnell and Ronson seem to be fellow-travelers in the school of making consciously dated music and Lily could scribble the whole rest of her life away without ever coming up with a couplet as incendiary as "See if I was in your blood/Then you wouldn't be so ugly", a sentiment which manages to only grow colder the more closely you attend to the lyrics. And let's not even get into how sharp the relief into which Allen and Ronson's alleged "weirdnes" is called by Darnell's - I don't care what example of either's left-of-centrism you want to bring up, it's just not going to top a children's chorus chanting "ONA-ONA-ONAMATAPOEIA" for reasons which still elude me.

Still, I'm finding "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy" to be a particularly hopeful song at the moment; having been burned over and over and over and over and over (and over) by momentary obsessions which never gain the forward momentum to sustain themselves (WHITE ROSE MOVEMENT, I TRUSTED YOU), it's unimaginably reassuring to discover some aesthetic sticking point which actually allows me to look backwards for once. If I learned one lesson about music from last year, it's that the past is always a more reliable indicator of the presence of substance than the future, no matter how promising it may look; what with records leaking like Scooter Libby these days (OOO TOPICAL), the value of The Future is pretty much at an all-time low despite (because of) our ability to involve ourselves in it directly being at an all-time high. That's not to say that I'd been blissfully unaware of the existence of immaculately-formed pop music packaged with a snarl before - q.v. my favorite non-Steve Reich record ever - but that doesn't make it any less welcome to be able to draw such a bold, direct line between the two points. Not bad for a record that ends with the narrator doggedly rueing a lost chance for incest, huh? (Click here to buy a used copy of Mutant Disco from Amazon.com)

Herbert, "Moving Like A Train" (Smith N Hack remix) - Goddammit, I had half a whole thing written up excoriating the Coachella promoters for their indefensible decision to expand the festival to three days and dilute the competitive undercurrent that made last year's such a blast (not to mention their poetically unappealing choices for headliners - what, was Staind too busy to commit? Would that even be possible?) only to turn around and point out the correlative salutary effects their choice would have on the dance tent, and then I had to go and notice that they dropped the single best reason to go this year from the dance tent's lineup. After the Long Blondes, Erol Alkan is probably the artist I'm most singularly interested in seeing in the world right now, mostly because I can't imagine anyone else actually playing out some of the records he plays (fuck, I'm not even sure I've ever heard a record he's produced played out, which is kinda odd since I do go to hipster indie-dance nights and ER UM FULWOOD BABYLON but whatever). For instance, I hear he's been caning Smith N Hack's magesterial remix of Herbert's "Moving Like A Train" like a red-headed stepchild lately, and with good reason - I'll admit that this song might not be The Modern All-Fucked-Up Disco Track For Everyone since it demands a little more patience and willingness to cooperate from the audience than, say, "Annie I'm Not Your Daddy", but my God is it ever relentless in the best way possible, up until That Bit With The Horns happens of course. So yeah, way to rob me, nameless Coachella organizers; given that I consider myself chosen by God himself by virtue of having heard "House Of Jealous Lovers" played in more than one club in my life (stupid culturally reactionary megatropolis, WHY DIDN'T I FILL OUT THAT APPLICATION TO COLUMBIA BACK IN THE DAY etc), I'd put the odds of me ever hearing this track out kinda sorta suck a thousand dicks.

Having said that: of course I'm going. And I can't imagine a better soundtrack to the long walk back to my car than the sound of Rage Against The Machine fading out in the distance. (Click here to order the "Moving Like A Train" 12" (featuring a remix from Jamie Lidell on the flip) from Forced Exposure - it's the last item on the page)

(They Came From The Stars) I Saw Them, "(Are You Searching For?) The Motherlode" - As if it weren't transparently obvious enough already, I've been in something of a musical holding pattern lately, blame for which I see no reason not to place squarely on the shoulders of the British mail system. In a perfect world, after all, I'd be able to buy records like (They Came From The Stars) I Saw Them's (surely the most unwieldy band name ever - I mean, come on) "It's Time" in the stores and not have to wait by the mailbox praying that the postman doesn't magically appear to attempt to jam my latest grip of singles diagonally into my mailbox (seriously, WTF) while I run out for a Dr. Pepper or something. But no; apparently it was written that I need an ongoing lesson in patience, and as a result I'm forced to scramble for content while the stuff that's REALLY got my attention makes its inexorable way to me. Luckily, by this point I've assembled enough crap that I don't necessarily have to dig too deep - "(Are You Searching For?) The Motherlode" (jeez, guys, lay off the parentheticals) (er I mean you know), for instance, remains more compelling than anything else on "It's Time", no mean feat considering the b-side consists of one big-ass epic Optimo remix. Hell, there's an easily argued case that tarring "Motherlode" with the "filler" brush is more than a little unfair; I've held off on posting it over these last few weeks because even with that precipitous moment around a minute into the proceedings where everything just drops into place, it's still one of those songs that demands a little effort in order to properly sell random internet folx on it, and giving myself an easy way out of situations like that are precisely the reason why I lined up for thirteen hours for a Wii in the first place, but that hardly diminishes the song's undeniable quality (to say nothing about the impeccable credentials of that aforementioned moment). But oh well; alea iacta est, and we're all the richer for it now. (Click here to buy "It's Time" from This Is Not An Exit)

Lefties Soul Connection, "Organ Donor" - There exists, I hear, a substantial contingent of the human population which doesn't think there's any room to improve DJ Shadow's "Organ Donor", thus ably proving my thesis that everyone other than me is wrong about everything all the time forever. I have no idea who Lefties Soul Connection are or why God would want to make me live in a world where I'd have to be nearly 26 before hearing their record Hutspot, but frankly after the Mother of All Cowbells comes in after the breakdown I don't really know much about anything other than loudly declaring myself King of the iTunes Selectors to the unresponsive void that fills my apartment. I mean, at this point, Shadow's version is all but dead to me; may God have mercy on us all if they ever decide to take on Portishead's Dummy. (Click here to buy Hutspot from Juno.co.uk)