I’ve seen The New Pornographers live before but I don’t remember them rocking out quite this hard.

What I love about both of these tracks is that, first of all, they sound even more epic live. The New Pornographers put together such incredible songs, building instrument upon instrument and building them together in such a seamless way. That sound is made even more incredible live, especially when you can see all the pieces performed and see how they all fit. It’s neat. Second, I love the incredible energy in these performances. You can tell that they’re having fun, you can see just how much they love making music, and it’s awesome. David Letterman’s little, “Ooo-wee,” at the end of the second video says it all.

It’s a two-for-one because I can possibly pick which video I prefer more.

Crash Years (on “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon”)

Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk (on “Late Show with David Letterman”)

I’ll be honest with you.

When Ben Folds Five released their break-through album, Whatever and Ever Amen, I was in Grade 7. At the time, my friends and I were largely into the kind of music that was popular at the time. I won’t even name names because it’s too embarrassing, but suffice to say, we were not cool enough to listen to Ben Folds Five. Not really, except one friend. Sure, he liked a lot of the same kind of music that we did but somehow he lived slightly outside of the headspace of the rest of us preteen boys. He loved Ben Folds Five and, of course, we teased the heck out of him for it. We thought it was boring piano music, nothing like the raging guitars and screaming vocals that filled up the rest of the music that we liked.

In hindsight, it was music like Ben Folds Five that’s endured. Politics and religion aside, Brick is a story, for better or for worse, and it’s a great story. Ben Folds has always been a masterful songwriter and I’m glad that even though it took some time and some growing up that I’ve come to appreciate his music. He’s a talented guy and Bob, you were right.

Brick (1997)

This favourite track is brought to you by the highly eclectic, highly danceable Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.

I don’t think I need to say anything more, either you love them or you hate them. I love them, and this is one of my favourite tracks.

The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth

It’s not often when a band can take a track and make it sound so much better live than it did in the studio. In the case of Talking Heads that’s exactly what they’ve done here, and why this track is so worthy of a mention as one of my favourite live tracks.

In 1984, Talking Heads produced a live concert record and movie, Stop Making Sense. In many respects, the film and album were ground-breaking and the production quality is absolutely outstanding. The stage and set design, the concert production, and the well-directed scenes were enough, in and of themselves, to make the project important and worth a look but beyond that, the music is incredible. Incredible.

Here you have David Bryne, the New Wave genius, dressed up like a computer programmer from IBM, strutting the stage like a chicken and delivering his lyrics with an obvious, honest passion. He’s into it. And he isn’t alone. It’s incredible how much energy they can pack into this relatively anti-climactic song. The quality of music, the arrangement of the song, the passionate delivery, really sells this track.

This is probably my favourite Talking Heads song and to hear it done so well, live, is an absolute treat.

This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)

Rarely do I agree with the kind of people who comment on YouTube videos but in this case user slipismm has put it quite poignantly,

“[To] those 83 people that missed the like button… may God have mercy on your soul.”

He was referring, of course, to Regina Spektor’s music video for the song Us. And his sentiment is spot on.

There are so many things that make this song a favourite track that I don’t know where to begin. It’s infectious, to start. It’s frenzied pace, coupled with Spektor’s absolutely acrobatic vocals results in a down right stunning sound. She sings, “it’s contagious” and she’s right—and do you think she knows it?

I get the feeling that Spektor’s pop sensibilities are so finely attuned that she can manage to do nothing more than bang a bunch of keys and make it sound like a beautiful work of art. But that’s the beauty of a song like Us, I think. It’s really uncomplicated, perhaps even unmusical at times, but it sounds great and it works so well. It’s lyrics, a kind of end-of-the-world love theme, fit perfectly with the collapsing and expanding sound of the piano and her voice. I love it and anyone that doesn’t, I’m certain, must be already dead on the inside.

Us

Yes, I like Fatboy Slim. He was pretty much all I listened to that one summer when I worked at Costco. Remember that summer? It was the last time the World Cup was on, in Germany. What a summer that was!

Besides being a fun, well-written and catchy song the video, like many Fatboy Slim videos, is really interesting. Oh, and I absolutely love the juxtaposition between the vocal acrobatics and the physical acrobatics on screen. Wonderful. Just you go ahead and try not to dance.

That Pair of Old Jeans

I admit, I’m a ravenous fan of The New Pornographers so heading into this album I knew it would take a lot to disappointment. But Together does not disappoint, not the diehard fan and, I would suggest, not someone with brand new ears either. If you’ve never listened to The New Pornographers before, perhaps here is a good starting point.

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