Tom Ze - "Ave Dor Maria". A revelation of production, a marvel of sound - one song can't do Estudando O Pagode justice. But even in these scant few minutes you'll hear alligators and bikini straps, tobacco roll-ups and clothes-lines, operatic choirs and fenced-in neighbours. At more than 70 years old, Ze is proving he has more ideas in one Brazilian finger than Sufjan Stevens has in his whole rosewater brain. Ze out-Gueros Beck; out-squeaks Psapp; borrows Final Fantasy on strings; and teaches yours truly to dance.

[buy]

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Loki - "Across the Room". The best artists are the ones who leave you swinging round with your finger, trying to track the influences, name the predecessors. The important part is: trying. The best artists are the ones who slip through your fingers, fish for whom you brought the wrong nets.

Loki is an MC from Glasgow. He doesn't camouflage his accent, nor does he inflate it like some parade float for him to ride in on. It's casual, dry, sharp as a straight razor. He sounds like The Street sometimes - Mike Skinner's humanity but never his awkwardness. He sounds like Nas, leaning upside-down into his subjects. And there's even a touch of Aidan Moffatt, of Arab Strap's plain work-a-day melancholy: the tragedy of plain old real life. It's all here.

Although I live here I'm not really fit to say whether this is Scotland's first great MC. I've not been listening. But I love this. I love the mournful circling of piano; I love the plain drumkit beat; I love the way Loki scampers from horny to bored to melancholy, like all these things are beads on the same length of twine. (They are.) I love the way this song keeps lifting itself up and putting itself back down, a raincloud hiding behind chimneys, a sad song that lurks in a playground swagger. And oh, friends, listen to those closing lines. Insufficient, truncated, true.

[info / more info / buy]

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Nothing But Green Lights is the relaunched mp3blog by Mike from Take Your Medicine. It's UK based and excellent, posting only the things that his heart is set on. Mike's also continuing the take your medicine podcast, and the June mix is superb. Beirut, Herman Dune, Robin Allender, my favourite Psapp track - and more.

Marathonpacks' new podcast playlist thing is also v. good if you're looking for 60 minutes of song. Dig the Lupe Fiasco.

Brian says a few interesting words on Live's "Lightning Crashes".

This week's Contrast Podcast is on the theme "I'm the only one who likes this". And so I chose to talk about the Barenaked Ladies' Gordon. This is the ILM thread I refer to, sadly, between snuffles of tears.