The Turner Music Prize 2007, vol. 3

I get a bit dizzy perusing the titles that came out in 2007. And this is only a tiny selection!

TURNER MUSIC PRIZE 2007, Vol. 3 [.zip file]
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1. Lockett Pundt: «Whiteout» (a.k.a. «Glass Snake»)
Make me feel safe.
From http://deerhuntertheband.blogspot.com/
2. Atlas Sound: «Only Love Can Break Your Heart»
Every once in a while, the memory of a fling or affair will fill your thoughts with shame or regret—perhaps a sadness that the two of you are no longer on speaking terms. Indulging your nostalgia, you may fancy yourself blue (drama queen that you are), but it’s at self-pitying times like those that you need to keep a firm eye on Truth and tell yourself—in the words of Neil Young—that after all, «only love can break your heart.»
From http://deerhuntertheband.blogspot.com/

3. The Cave Singers: «Seeds of Night»
I like this song.
From Invitation Songs

4. Kyle Tomzo: «Bicycle»
Sometimes you like something despite yourself. The gaye naïveté of this song is kind of
repulsive, but I just can’t help myself—that slide guitar sends me into some manner of micro-ecstasy.
From Uncut Magazine’s Devendra Banhart-curated compilation Love Above All

5. Akron/Family: «Lake Song/New Ceremonial Music for Moms»
Devendra Banhart once said he makes albums for the «yoga mom
demographic,» but it seems Akron/Family just upped the ante: Gypsy guitar, tribal drumming, New Age housewife chanting, the Family’s own harmonies, whoops’n’hollers, «la-la-la»s, an exquisite vibraphone melody … order and chaos… This song has it all. Listening to this you swirl up into the sky, only to fall back down again, miraculously all in one piece.
From Love Is Simple

6. Deerhunter: «Wash Off»
A song for speeding and—by the time of the vocal-free «chorus»—crashing your car. A triumph of rhythm track over song structure. Impossible to sit still while listening to this.
From «Fluorescent Grey» EP

7. Antibalas: «Hilo»
Flawless groove here that evokes sadistic computer games, right-on political activism, quality pot and vintage porn, all at the same time.
From Security

8. The Budos Band: «Origin of Man»
Music to stalk Hollywood celebrities to, whilst confusedly imagining you're a '40s private eye stuck in the '70s. But then, if you're stalking someone you're bound to be a little confused…
From The Budos Band II

9. Edwyn Collins: «You'll Never Know (My Love)»
All soul, this song. Listening to it, all you can do is wait for summer and anticipate the next time you fall in love. Sometimes innocence isn’t repulsively idiotic, but sublime, like some forgotten truth.
From Home Again

10. Mark Ronson feat. Amy Winehouse: «Valerie»
The Dap-Kings show us how it’s done with their accompaniment to this great, typically wry, Social Realist Brit lyric, originally by the Zutons. And of course, Amy Winehouse effortlessly puts miles and miles
between herself and all the insipid little would-be soulful schoolgirls that have crawled out from underneath the rocks she's already left far behind. Her voice is just a medium, and from where it comes and to where it goes all the well-meaning simpletons going on about «poor druggie/alcy Amy» will never understand (which is precisely why she can’t be imitated—or surpassed). Long after her tabloid popularity's a thing of the past, the seemingly effortless star quality of Winehouse's singing will remain an off-handed «fuck you» to mediocrity everywhere and through the ages… In the meantime, leave her the fuck alone.
From Version

11. Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings: «100 Days, 100 Nights»
The Dap-Kings’ various retro soul endeavours often sound a bit anonymous and samey, but once in a while they come up with a bull’s eye. Despite the best efforts of bland British schoolgirls and soulless American R&B divas, soul is alive!
From 100 Days, 100 Nights

12. Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons: «Beggin'» (Pilooski
re-edit)
Speaking of soul being alive, Pilooski masterfully remixes a track that didn’t really need remixing, but once he did it, the DJ just added a smidge of tasteful psychedelia. And that can only ever be a good thing.
From «Beggin'» single

13. Blonde Redhead: «23»
Coming out from the Blonde Redhead gig, with everyone ecstatic and on their way to the next watering hole to wind down from the
satisfaction of seeing the band live, just hold on to that frail thing beautiful and brittle singer Kazu Makino's voice comes from (and to which it speaks)—that sultry sadness, all sexy rhythm and melancholy melody, that only Blonde Redhead seems to be able to tap into—by simply going home. Because what to do or say? A misplaced word will only disrupt and vanquish it. End the day, go to sleep.
From 23

14. Menomena: «The Pelican»
One of the interesting things about music—and especially experimental music, less geared as it is towards achieving a calculated response from some target audience—is the possibility to express several unrelated (and maybe even contradictory) feelings, all at once. I don't know quite what I feel whenever I hear this song, but feel good it does. (In a «hurts-so-good» kind of way.)
From Friend and Foe

15. Grizzly Bear: «Shift» (alternate version)
The home recorded version of «Shift»—slightly more violent than this stark rendition—was the high point of Grizzly Bear's debut album. Perhaps no surprise, then, that this is the high point of their EP of studio re-recordings. Doesn't come much more naked than this.
From «Friend» EP