1. Scott Mescudi Vs The World (feat Cee Lo) – Kid Cudi – That is one weird sample -like a Hawaiian guitar being hit on the head by a saw. Cee Lo sounds like Cee Lo on the chorus -maybe a touch more echoey than usual.
2. Untold Stories – Buju Banton – Recently released on bail from his drug distribution charges, I think when you can write songs as great as this fiscal nightmare on the streets of Kingston, you should be allowed to deal toot. Like how the native Americans can sell tax free smokes.
3. O Children – Nick Cave
4. The Deil – Robert Burns And Mike Ogletree – Robert Burns is the great poet, Mike Ogiltree the former drummer with Simple Minds. both are Scottish, both are great. One is a friend of mine. So keep that in mind when you read my opinion of this dance song: a complex rhythm that moves thru the poem about the devil and movement and excitement. It sounds like a Scottish quadrille married to a rabid drum machine. When the bagpipes come thru around the two thirds mark, all bets are off. And if you’ve read the poem, the way Mike turns the opening lines into a chorus is a wonder.
4. Hold My Hand (feat Akon) – Michael Jackson – I think Randy Jackson is wrong. It isn’t that there is no MJ vocals out there, it is that they are hoarding em for future sales. They dollop it out in tiny morsels. Like here. this isn’t MJ it is Akon. really. How do they have the audacity to make this the opening salvo off the album? there is no there there. Oh, and the song sucks.
5. Cemetery Rain – Minks
6. Tragic Girl – Weezer – you see, Pinkerton is all of a piece so Rivers couldn’t figure out how to put this on the album. It is good enough in its own creepy way, the middle 8 is pure Pinkertime, but it missed out thematically. Good to hear it now.
7. 1901 – Phoenix – Like a Phoenix raising up from the ashes, I know what’s good but I know what trash is. Martin Fry said that in case you were wondrin’.
8. Cheerleader – Grizzly Bear – No, gloomy Gus
9. Up Out My Face (feat Nicki Minaj) – Mariah Carey – This is so deeply eccentric it is just waiting on MJ and Kid Cudi to join in
10. Knocked Up – Kings Of Leon