Music Videos: "EAT IT LICK IT SNORT IT FUCK IT"

I'm a little annoyed that I'm posting about Britney Spears twice in a row, but this Myspace gem leaves me no choice. I would a be a terrible music blogger if I didn't. If you give two fucks about pop culture, you've probably heard that when a reporter asked Britney how she was doing, she replied, "Eat it, lick it, snort it, fuck it". For no reason. At all. Now that phrase has become a camp phenomenon, some brilliant genius put together a parody music video of a dance remix of BS's new slogan. It also gets in some jokes about "It's Britney, BITCH". Smart, smart, stuff.
Eat It, Lick It, Snort It, F--k It

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BTW, if Daft Punk ever decided to make this a real song, it would be hotter than hell.

Covers: Hard-Fi does "Toxic"

Why does "Toxic" cover so much better than 99% of bullshit pop songs? We've already talked about the versions by Mark Ronson and Shawn Lee and haven't even gotten to the Chapin Sisters' cover, and here we are posting a fourth great cover. Who would have thought a pop-trash gem like "Toxic" (we mean unironically, we seriously love that ridiculous song) would make a really cool Brit-punk track? Not us, which is why we were totally surprised when we heard and approved of Hard-Fi's cover (which features a little sampling from "The Clash").

Music Videos: Semi-Precious-Weapons

Justin Tranter and Co now have a video for "Magnetic Baby" out, and it's catching on thanks to being pimped out by Perez Hilton. I'm a little proud of discovering them over a year before Perez got to them. I don't why. Anyway, the video is one of the most fucked-up MVs of the year, and you need to watch it. Now.

Music Videos: Jenny Owen Youngs' first video!

It's about fucking time! I've been in love with "Fuck Was I" for over a year (Ever since it was played on the second season premiere of "Weeds), and now there's finally a music video! The one that's posted on Youtube is tragically censored, but you get the idea.

Live Music: Against Me

Don't you fucking dare call them sell-outs. Sorry, sensitive issue. "New Wave" was one of the best albums of the year and it pisses me off that people are bashing it just because it made money and had a famous producers. Pathetic elitist indie snobs who hate change for no rational reason strike again. Here's a live performance of knockout single "Thrash Unreal". This guys voice is so amazing live. Just amazing.

Live Music: Ryan Adams goes punk rock

Found an MP3 of Ryan Adams performing a punk rock version of "New York New York" live in February of '06. It's so stupid and ridiculous, but I love it for some reason.

Covers: Stereophonics live Goldfrapp cover

Can't say that I saw this one coming. One of my favorite covers of the past year was Stereophonics performing Goldfrapp's inescapable "Ooh La La" live on stage, recorded for their "Rewind" EP. "OLL" transfers surprisingly well from slick electronic to rough rock, and Kelly Jones totally owns it here.

Random Track of the Day: "With Arms Outstretched"

I've had a fucked-up day and I need some Rilo Kiley to get me through the rest of it. I always loved "With Arms Outstretched" from "Execution of All Things". The instrumentation is simple and the vocals are far from perfect, but Jenny puts miles of charisma into it and makes the song really endearing despite how flawed the technical aspects of it are. Check it out.

Music Videos: Serj Tankian

If you ever wanted to know what a drunk acid trip in video form looks like, just watch this video for "Empty Walls". You don't even need to watch it with the sound on.

Acoustic: Merit's "Locked From the Inside"

Finding out about the band Merit is #3 on the list of reasons that I'm glad to have Keith and the Girl in my life. Merit can tear a stage up with an angry, relentless lyrical bitchslap of a rock song (see: "Man on a String", "40-16", "FUDR") and can also make you pump your fist alongside an emotional, hurting, but still raw electric guitar (See: "Blue Bedroom"). But they can also sit down behind an acoustic setup and just play a song that packs a punch despite how quiet it is. Their acoustic version of "Locked From the Inside", from their self-titled album, is the best example.



If you like this side of them, buy "Morning Breaks", the closer from "When We Fight". You won't regret it.

Covers: Shawn Lee's "Toxic" Instrumental

Holy shit, y'all. This is amazing. Shawn Lee, the R&B-funk producer and solo artist behind underground hit "Kiss the Sky" (Which got some impressive screentime on "Damages" a couple months ago) has a cover album that was released in the US today. The album tackles hits like "Hey Ya", "Get Ur Freak On", "Rehab", and "Can't Get You Out of My Head", and several of them are purely instrumentals. Basically, what Mark Ronson did with "God Put A Smile On Your Face", but more dynamic, and more successful. The best track on the album is the overhaul of "Toxic". He kidnaps the song, drags it off the dancefloor, and dumps it somewhere in the jungle, and the result is ten times cooler than anything you'd expect. Well played, Shawn Lee. Well played.

Live Music: Stereophonics

To celebrate "Pull the Pin"'s UK release, here's a live vid of Stereophonics performing "I'm Only Sleeping" with some help from Oasis.



It'll be a while before this album shows up in the US, but the songs are streaming everywhere. My quick take on the whole album: I enjoyed it, but I really wished they hung on to more of the edge they picked up on their last album. The only place where the really try to go back to that sound is "Bank Holiday Monday", and once you've heard that song enough times, it really stops being convincing and doesn't sound as bad-ass as it wants you to think it is. Even though they eased up a little, they're still not nearly as limp as they were on album #4, which is always a good thing. Standouts: "Soldiers Make Good Targets", "Stone", "Drowning", "Lady Luck", and "Crush".

Acoustic live: No Doubt

"Comforting Lie", from No Doubt's album "Return of Saturn", is easily their best non-single to date (Except maybe for "Tragic Kingdom"'s title track), and here's a solid live acoustic performance from a few years back. After all this "Wind It Up" bullshit, it's really easily to forget what an incredible songwriter and lyricist Gwen really is. If you need to be reminded, check this out.

A Day in the Life of Mark Ronson

Awesome 4 minute documentary-style clip of Mark Ronson in action, talking about the discovery of Daniel Merriweather, "Version", and his radio show. Plus, you get to see what a taping of East Village Radio looks like. The poster disabled embedding, so you'll have to go here to get it:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=IRrOcUctR98

Live Music: Riverboat Gamblers

Riverboat Gamblers = the absolute best unknown live band in the world of this decade. There. I said it. Now here's the proof. "Ice Water", live, March '07.



I will not be able to die completely fulfilled until I see these guys live.

Live Music: Hole on Jools Holland, 1998

This is one of the videos I show people to justify why Hole is my favorite live band ever. It's "Reasons to Be Beautiful", easily their most underrated and underappreciated song in my opinion. Fan-fucking-tastic.

Remixes: Arcade Fire vs Daft Punk mashup

Here's one of my favorite mashups of the year. It's "No Cars Go" by Arcade Fire and "Around the World" by Daft Punk. I don't why, but the best mashups are always the ones that you would never expect to work. Huge credit to DJ Tatami for making this work so well.



You can download it from his blogspot (http://djtatami.blogspot.com/) here:

Right click and save

Live Music: The Clash

How is it possible that I've been doing this blog in one form or another for almost a year and I still haven't posted something about The Clash? Well, better late than never, so here's a live performance of "White Riot" from 1978.

Random Track of the Day: Letita Wolf

Sometimes every once in a while I like to post about an artist so obscure that they only have 1600 search results on Google. Leticia Wolf is one of those artists. She may be a complete unknown, but the girl's got talent. "Married to Grunge" is an absolutely chilling song about a band fucking up a relationship. It's got too many rough edges to be a ballad, it's too vulnerable to hard rock, the vocals are too polished to be Grunge, but it's too left-of-center to be mainstream rock. It balances a lot of elements, but it works so well that I don't even care that the last third of the song is basically the same 12 words repeated over and over again.

Covers: Marilyn Manson, Sonique, and Nina Simone do "I Put a Spell On You"

Three people, one song, three completely different tracks.

Let's start with Marilyn Manson. I love this cover so fucking much. Not a popular opinion around fans of the original, but as a rock fan I think it's amazing. MM tears it the fuck it up and it sounds incredible. Some guy made a fake music video using clips from some 80-year-old movie and it turned out decent.



In 2000 Sonique made an almost completely ignored electronica-style cover of "Spell", and it turned out to be way better than I expected it to be. I expected to be totally hollow, as most of these synthed-up covers are (see: "Tainted Love" by Pussycat Dolls, etc), but the electro-production is actually used really well here and creates the same intoxicating effect the original did, but in a different way. It also spawned a brilliantly-shot music video.



The only big flaw is that she cops out with the fade-out ending instead of going for the big finish like Marilyn or Nina. Speaking of...

While I was searching, I found a hotter-than-hell slideshow set to the definitive cover of "I Put A Spell On You", Nina Simone's version. In this song, there's a quality in her voice that I still haven't heard anyone else have.

Music Videos: Regina Spektor

Big week for videos. Regina Spektor's vid for "Better" came out, it's ridiculous. In a good way. It features a crowd of Regina clones running around and stuff. I don't really know how else to describe it. Just check it out, you won't be disappointed.