General Miggs - "Broken Hoof"

When I listen to unsolicited submissions I try to keep an open mind. I try to approach them optimistically. I've been on the other side of the equation; sending my music out into the abyss, to be discarded, or worse. But, realistically, the chances that I will like any particular submission are relatively slim. Often submissions are well conceived, competently executed, or widely appealing, but just don't speak to me (take note: I require songs to address me directly). So when a song as good as this one is submitted to me by a band I've never heard of, I cry for days on end, inconsolable for having realized that I am so lucky, while others suffer in a variety of ways. I am, after all, a deeply modest man.

"Broken Hoof" is unrelentingly catchy. Through verses, bridges and choruses it never loses its momentum, never loses its strict shuffle. The drums and bass play at chaos like clowns play at being drunk: pretending to fall over each other though they are in complete control, pretending to be crude and clumsy though they are supremely elegant. During the first bridge, at 1:23, a steel drum is introduced and manages to sound simultaneously exuberant and aching. The same could be said of the brilliant vocal performance, an unadorned and persistently energetic presentation of the melody. [Info]

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Think About Life - "Serious Chords"

Think About Life manages, through outstanding vocals and solid pop songwriting, to find tenderness in the Heart of Darkness (i.e. among abrasive keyboards and a house beat). [Info]