Everything’s Unreal

Freeform Five “Strangest Things” – The Freeform Five have a genuine gift for writing ‘evil’ boy band songs, foregrounding the subtext of that genre into something openly seedy, lascivious, and intensely physical, while sounding essentially the same on a surface level. This is everything that JC Chasez tried and failed to accomplish on his solo record, primarily because he didn’t have the tunes, but also because he seemed so desperate to shake off the old context, rather than play with it and use it to his advantage the way Justin Timberlake has. The Freeform Five exude the same kind of cocky charm as Timberlake, whereas Chasez’ solo music is smarmy and in denial of its own insecurity, like a creepy dude who will hit on every woman in a room until one of them says yes. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Seelenluft w/ Jim Reid “I Can See Clearly Now” – Yes, that Jim Reid, the one from the Jesus and Mary Chain. It’s kinda funny how J. Spaceman and Jim Reid’s vocal deliverary are so similar now that this track ends up sounding more like a danced-up version of Spiritualized than JMC. Either way, it’s as druggy and dronetastic as you would expect. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Also: MP3Blogs.Org is an excellent new site designed to help keep track of all of the audioblogs with feeds on a daily basis. It has a very simple design and interface, and is covering most everything of note. I’m all for this sort of thing, though the wget leeching that’s been going on elsewhere raises my hackles quite a bit. To me, the written aspect of the mp3 blog is a major part of the appeal, and to shut that out is both rude and ill-advised, since context counts for so much, especially when it comes to rare music.