Missy Elliott - "Wake Up" feat. Jay-Z

My favourite track on the uneven This Is Not a Test - I guess it reflects my predisposition to 'conscious' hip-hop, but I think what I dig most is the subterranean sonar production, the submarine swimming among sharks. Dizzee Rascal's cold-cold-steel sound is too alienating for me, but this - less cruel, more human - is endlessly appealing. Hov's solo is kinda phoned-in, but the blurred and echoing "wake up! up up" that closes it makes it all worthwhile.

Isobel Campbell - "The Breeze Whispered Your Name"
Isobel Campbell - "The Cat's Pyjamas"

Two cuts from the new Isobel Campbell record, Amorino. It's her first album since she quit Belle & Sebastian, and also her first that doesn't bear the Gentle Waves pseudonym. Better yet, it's the best record she's recorded, and is indeed (I think) as good as, if not better than, Dear Catastrophe Waitress - though very, very different. Amorino lives and breathes a luscious 70s filmscore aesthetic, sometimes noir, sometimes pastoral, but endlessly surprising. The instrumental bits are even more successful than the vocal ones - trumpet, violin, flute, brushed drums, bass... "The Breeze Whispered Your Name" blushes with a jazzed guitar backbone, Campbell singing like a wisp. Where it becomes marvellous is at about 3:30, when Isobel's quit singing and instead pulls out a trumpet, sliding into the song like a knife between ribs, a sharpened Cootie Williams.

"The Cat's Pyjamas" opens with a dark piano tinkle, breaking into a delightful Dixieland surprise. It's upbeat and gay and sounds just like someone having fun. Which is a good sound, on a Monday morning.