Belgian electro-pop innovators Telex have unearthed a cover of Sonny & Cher’s “The Beat Goes On.” Though Telex officially called it quits in 2008 following the passing of founder Marc Moulin, the cover — re-titled “The Beat Goes On/Off” — is finally seeing the light of day. “The Beat Goes On/Off” is one of two previously unreleased tracks featured on the group’s This Is Telex, a new compilation of Telex music from the seminal electronic label Mute. Continue reading »
Legendary vocalists Billy Davis Jr. and Marilyn McCoo are founding members of The 5th Dimension, the venerable LA-based vocal pop group. As their otherworldly name suggests, The 5th Dimension had a knack for elevating novel tunes to new realms. Davis Jr. and McCoo’s lead vocals imbued hits like “The Worst That Could Happen” and “One Less Bell To Answer” with a buoyant blend of elegance, whimsy and surreal soul. The pair are old-school song interpreters in the most artful sense, illuminating new emotional planes in their powerful performances. Continue reading »
For all their freewheeling tendencies, The Polyphonic Spree have marched forward with an admirable persistence. When the choral art-pop ensemble first made a name for themselves in the mid-‘00s, the group’s massive unison choruses, prismatic visuals, and exultant vibes made them a curious bauble in a sea of jaded indie rock bands. Two decades down the road, The Polyphonic Spree have outlasted many of their iPod Age musical peers, through a stream of global tours, decade-defining needle drops and six studio albums. Continue reading »
Dev Marvelous and The Bird and the Bee’s Inara George are a well-matched creative pair. Though they’re divided by a generation and by geography — Louisville and Los Angeles, respectively — both create similar strains of inviting pointillist pop. Even the pair’s crate-digging influences appear to be uncannily aligned. In a trio of charming at-home performances shared recently on Instagram, Dev Marvelous plays an acid jazz Herb Alpert remix, an off-the-cuff midnight solo Rhodes improvisation, and even a wild Eumir Deodato fusion synth solo. Continue reading »
Soundgarden’s 1994 classic “Black Hole Sun” is one of rock’s titanic singles. The anthem carries an inextinguishable torch for grunge — its generational malaise, its plodding melancholia. Yet the song’s singular beauty arises from the ways it lifts the genre’s massive, earth-bound sounds to new and transcendent heights. In the song’s airy verses, Chris Cornell’s words swirl like gathering storm clouds, brewing power pop melodies and Sgt. Pepper psychedelia into a festering, ominous mass. By the time its final iconic chorus drops, “Black Hole Sun” has soared amid some pretty expansive sonic vistas — heaven, earth and back again. Continue reading »
“I Want You Back” was the Jackson 5‘s first #1 hit and arguably remains the biggest song of their career. The high-energy soul pop song is considered by some to be one of the best pop songs in history, and has been sampled at least 85 times. It’s such a well known song that it’s hard to imagine a cover which lets you rethink it. Continue reading »