Move Over - Janis Joplin

Move Over - Janis Joplin

3:43

Pearl, 1971

Written by Janis Joplin

These songs have Vs!

A terrific bluesy rocker, with Joplin's scratchy vocals belting out the lines.  The band is chugging along making sure you know it's there, with the bass and organ up top, but they don't detract or distract from Joplin's powerhouse voice. Janis wants the guy to make up his mind.  Stop playing around, be her man, or let her go.  She whoops, her voice soars and commands.  No subdued pleading here.

As I Love My Own - Aaron Freeman

As I Love My Own - Aaron Freeman

3:11

Marvelous Clouds, 2012

Written by Rod McKuen

These songs have Vs!

Is this the album that helped hasten the breakup of Ween?  No, probably not.  Why a collection of Rod McKuen songs?  Why not, I guess.  To my amazement, the poet and songwriter released several dozen albums.  And Frank Sinatra commissioned a whole album from him!  But I digress.  This song has very little of the Ween "brown," those distorted tones, homages-cum-parodies, and put-on voices that turn off some listeners and endear the band to their fans.  The arrangement is more or less straight '60s adult pop, and Freeman's voice twinkles along, playing the schmaltz ("Your body, moving down to mine / Is like the coupling of the pale November clouds") straight.  In a way, playing this stuff straight, for Freeman, is itself a transgression of form.  Maybe that's why I like it.

Love's Not Enough - the Mysterines

Love's Not Enough - the Mysterines

3:48

Love's Not Enough, 2020

Written by the Mysterines, I guess

These songs have Vs!

Another band totally new to me.  British alternative foursome plays grandiose, grunge-influenced rock.  But Pearl Jam, not Nirvana.  This song is no growled exercise in introspection, but a booming anthem to losing love despite it all. Singer Lia Metcalfe belts out stirring, brooding vocals in a lower register over big crunchy riffs.  The narrator bemoans an imploding relationship.  "Please take it back to where we began."  But we can't.

Spy Vs. Spy - The Spinto Band

Spy Vs. Spy - The Spinto Band

3:20

Nice and Nicely Done, 2005

These songs have Vs!

Another band new to me.  A six-piece from Delaware with two male lead singers playing quirky indie pop.  I hear some British Invasion and some '90s indie influences.  Nice harmonies soar over the insistent, jittery synths and guitars.  The lyrics are quirky too; a love song, but coming at you from an oblique angle.  "And I can't sleep without no one else / but you so don't let me leave me / when I say our love is true / and even if we got no money / we've got love and love is plenty."  Well!  That clears things right up!

Knockin' On Heaven's Door - Antony and the Johnsons

Knockin' On Heaven's Door - Antony and the Johnsons

4:14

single, 2019

Written by Bob Dylan

These songs have Vs!

Antony is one of the great upper-register voices.  Not quite male and not quite female, but ethereal.  His take on the song is a slow dirge, and it is very haunting and beautiful, but I don't think he adds much to the crowded field of Dylan covers.  He does a terrific job, but he doesn't make the song into something else.  I do like how he uses the "wipe the blood from my face" lyric from the Before the Flood version.

Advice For Young Mothers To Be - the Veils

Advice For Young Mothers To Be - the Veils

3:25

Nux Vomica, 2006

Written by Finn Andrews

These songs have Vs!

Another band entirely new to me.  This song has Gothic rock vibes.  The singer has a honeyed voice, reminiscent (albeit a faint shade of) Hamish Hawk's, with a delivery copped from Nick Cave.  It seems to be about a single mother deciding to keep her baby, admonished by her friends and the community ("The vicar said it's wrong but hey what does he know / He said it's wrong but that the Lord forgave me") but proud and dismissive of their opinions ("No man alive has earned the right to save me").  Bold, literate lyrics and great music. 

We Don't Believe What's On TV - Twenty One Pilots

We Don't Believe What's On TV - Twenty One Pilots

2:57

Blurryface, 2015

Written by Tyler Joseph

These songs have Vs!

I don't know anything at all about this band.  I learned that they are a duo, and they are known for playing a sort of emo-electronic-indie rock blend.  This song was on the Power Rangers soundtrack, but I don't know anything about that, either.  I like the horns and the bass.  Tyler Joseph has one of those emo voices that yelps out the lyrics but has a high-register catch that makes him sound sort of self-effacing at the same time.  I like how he says, "All right, second verse!" after the "yeah! yeah! yeah!" chorus.  This is a frenetic love song.  He wants to grow old, now that he's met her.  He seems to like her hair an awful lot.

Fantastic Voyage - David Bowie

Fantastic Voyage - David Bowie

2:55

Lodger, 1979

Written by David Bowie and Brian Eno

Listen for the silent E!

An almost serene, crooning ballad, art-rock style, from the master.  The lyrics are oblique.  It seems to be about a nuclear war, but it could apply to a love turned bad?  The narrator fears we'll never get old, presumably because we've been blown to bits.  "Remember it's true, dignity is valuable / But our lives are valuable too... I'm still getting educated but I've got to write it down."  Are we recording it so we don't have to relive history's past mistakes?  It may be too late.  What a beguiling, disarming song.  Its softness belies its true nature.  An overlooked gem.

Where Is the Machine - Jeffrey Lewis & the Voltage

Where Is the Machine - Jeffrey Lewis & the Voltage

2:34

Bad Wiring, 2019

Written by Jeffrey Lewis

Listen for the silent E!

This guy is a recent discovery for me and I love him.  His bleak, cracking, whiny voice is a great match for the multisyllabic, erudite waterfall of lyrics that flow from his pen.  Often he's introspective, pondering our place in the geopolitical arena or the universe.  This song asks why, if we have so much great technology, we can't use a machine to tamp down our feelings.  Lewis is one of the very few songwriters who will send you to Google: "We got blueprints for rockets that defeat gravitation / With combustion hydraulics and discrete calculation / Of where the Kármán line snaps and the sound wave convulses."  The Kármán line is the boundary pointe between atmosphere and space.  Bonus points for "discrete."

Crazy In Love - Eminem

Crazy In Love - Eminem

4:02

Encore, 2004

Written by Marshall Mathers, Luis Resto, Ann Wilson, Nancy Wilson, & Roger Fisher

Listen for the silent E!

Over the hook from "Crazy On You," Em rap/sings about the woman he can't get enough of, when he hasn'y had enough of her.  It's a love-hate relationship, and it could be about drugs, or fame, or anything else that someone is attracted to but would like to be able to walk away from.  This isn't the best track on the album, and the album isn't one of Eminem's best.  One of the cleverest rappers in the game and with one of the quickest tongues, his lyrics don't exactly shine here ("The only way that I am able to stay so stable / Is you're the legs to my table").  Nor is his rightfully lauded wordplay at work ("They say that every man grows up to marry his own mother / Which would explain why you're such a motherfuckin' bitch").   Eminem can be insulting and hilarious, but this song doesn't hit the mark.  Sprinkling metaphors that are either flat and tired or bizarre ("you're the ink to my paper," "the reason for my existence"), he sounds kind of tired.