I can’t stop listening to this and thought you should enjoy my addiction.

Russell

Welcome to an evening edition of Five for Friday. Let’s limit the normal preamble type stuff, cut loose five jams, and head out into the night. Hey, you can even bring these with you. I’m in a hurry and wrote very little, which should please our ADHD subscribers. Follow the sendspace link to retrieve your prize. Hat tip to the new people.

1. Rafter – No F*cking Around

54Fri endorses not f*cking around. It will be part of our corporate charter if we ever get around to writing one. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, that is our corporate charter. Rafter aren’t f*cking around either – just listen to that beat. They use the song title as a mission statement, bringing sexy back to IDM with a Daft Punk squawk box and R. Kelly slink.

2. Big Boi – Shutterbug

Stripper poles of the world – be very afraid.

3. Male Bonding – Crooked Scene

And now, two and a half minutes of brilliantly shredded punk. It’s going to scare the sh*t out of your girlfriend. She’s going to tell you to turn it down. And that’s OK…this is rock and roll, kids. You need f*ck-all glee in your life, the kind of f*ck-all glee your girlfriend’s precious Taylor Swift can’t deliver. To quote your favorite anti-itch cream: apply this liberally and often.

4. Delorean – Come Wander

From Delorean’s Subiza, which comes out in June – the album of the summer. This song is an inhibition-chucking dance blowout…just like their live show.

5. Yeasayer – O.N.E

Somewhere George Michael and Madonna are dancing to this song in their underwear, and now you can join them.

Cheers,
B

First we have Bowling Green, Kentucky’s Cage The Elephant and a song called “Back Against the Wall” from the CD Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked.  Then the lastest from MUSE. whatever you do don’t call them “THE” Muse some guy tore me a new one for that slip up on the radio a few years back. People really get up in arms over some of the silliest things and to think he found it so offensive that he called my boss at the time and said I should be fired for such an assault on his favorite band. The new Muse CD is in stores as of this past Tuesday and is called The Resistance. Next is JET followed by the second single from the lastest Depeche Mode album. And finally a Fine Young Cannibals song from before they had a hit “Johnny Come Home” . Enjoy.

Let us know what you think.
Cage The Elephant – Back Against The Wall
Muse-Uprising
Jet-She’s a Genius
Depeche Mode-Perfect
Wolfmother-New Moon Rising
Fine Young Cannibals-Johnny Come Home

It was the only way you found out about new albums from your favorite artists or to discover new music from new sources. We still obviously discover new music this way but it’s not the only way.

Radio lives in the world of advertising so it is bound to playing familiar music to keep people listening for extended periods of time. Sprinkled in with the hits you will still find new music (on some stations). Keep in mind that the average station plays 10-12 songs an hour and among those songs 2-3 are considered new.

So where do we discover new music?

I for example am still too close to radio and friends I have made over the years in the music industry so I can’t answer that.

Most people have thousands of songs on their iPod. Of those many are your favorite artists. But what we want to know is when you put a new artist in your library where did you learn about that artist.

Well when you think about it, this very instant music is being performed, recorded, reviewed, written, scored, played and even destroyed by someone in a karaoke bar and it will always be that way. Too often people like to say that their mp3 player holds the soundtrack to their lives. As much as I hate that saying (I’m still not sure why it bothers me) but in a way it’s true. Music is a trigger for ones memories both good and bad. Music goes with us in all facets of our lives. Music brings people together and pushes them apart. Music is used in the church as a form of worship or by a government introducing a head of state. Our favorite TV shows have themes; products are sold by some of the most annoying forms of music around. It can be invasive and obnoxious or subtle and covert. We give music as a gift (my favorite form would still be the mix tape). We celebrate our happiness with it and mourn our losses with it.

I still believe the one thing that music does best is to relate to the listener.

Now I can’t possibly expect to give you all of that from an online discussion but I hope myself and the collection of obsessed music people I have met in my bizarre life and convinced to share their inner ramblings will at least add to the discussion and maybe help connect people to music they didn’t know about.

Please note that I didn’t say new music. Now don’t get me wrong we will be talking a lot about new music but there’s a large amount of music that has been buried, missed, underrated and thrown into the clearance racks of life. We will definitely be talking about that music too.

We will also be talking to people making the music: artists, producers, song writers and engineers. As well as the purveyors of music: club DJs, radio personalities, music store owners, venue owners and anyone else that has anything to do with music.

No boundaries, no genres, no clicks (unless it’s the subtle clicks on a wonderful piece of vinyl) and no formats. Forget the class structure that we all know too well and just listen to music.

It really is the hardest working art form around.

That’s why MUSIC NEVER SLEEPS.

Mash-Ups are becoming more and more popular, most recently DJ Earworm www.djearworm.com was enlisted by Annie Lennox to compile a mash up from her masters. The end result Backwards/Forwards can be found on DJ Earworm’s site as well as Annie Lennox’s. It truly is amazing and the YouTube video shows off her many incarnations through the years quite nicely. DJ Earworm also managed to get to #58 on the Billboard Pop chart with “United States of Pop ’08 (Viva La Pop)” this can also be found on his website. 

United State of Pop unbelievably contains all 25 of the top songs from 2008:

 (Flo Rida Featuring T-Pain – Low, Leona Lewis – Bleeding Love, Alicia Keys – No One, Lil Wayne Featuring Static Major – Lollipop, Timbaland Featuring OneRepublic – Apologize , Jordin Sparks Duet With Chris Brown – No Air,  Sara Bareilles – Love Song , Usher Featuring Young Jeezy – Love in This Club, Chris Brown – With You, Chris Brown – Forever, Ray J & Yung Berg – Sexy Can I, Rihanna – Take a Bow,  Coldplay – Viva La Vida, Katy Perry – I Kissed a Girl, T.I. – Whatever You Like, Rihanna – Disturbia, Rihanna – Don’t Stop the Music, Natasha Bedingfield – Pocketful of Sunshine, Chris Brown Featuring T-Pain – Kiss Kiss, Ne-Yo – Closer, Colbie Caillat – Bubbly, Mariah Carey – Touch My Body, Madonna Featuring Justin Timberlake – 4 Minutes, Pink – So What and  Finger Eleven – Paralyzer.)

Obviously in the Annie Lennox case she sought out and provided DJ Earworm with her masters.

But what of all the other bootlegs and mixes readily available online? Are they even legal? Many people think that it is merely theft of the artist’s intellectual property. While others find Mash-Ups to be a tribute and a natural extension of the creative process.  Are they just the evolution of sampling that began in the 80’s?

As you can see I am a fan of Mash-Ups so I will leave the discussion to you.  I have posted a few of my favorites for enjoyment or to be picked apart as only the denizens of internet can do.

DJ Lobsterdust  - Blondie vs. The Temptations
“Call Me Already”
Call Me Already

DJ Earworm - Top 25 Billboard songs from 2008
“United States of Pop 2008 (Viva La Pop)”
United States of Pop 2008.mp3

Party Ben - Green Day vs. Oasis vs. Travis vs. Aerosmith
“Boulevard of Broken Songs”
Boulevard of Broken Songs