[fingertipsmusic] [CORRECTION!, w/ song links] March 20: The Fireworks, Angharad Drake, Work Drugs

From: Jeremy Schlosberg <fingertipsmusic@xxxxxxxxx>
To: fingertipsmusic@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sat, 21 Mar 2015 13:26:33 -0400
*[Wow, two mailings in a row with required corrections. Apologies again.
Must be my snow-addled brain.  Anyway, Visitor Ian was kind enough to point
out that the email earlier went out without two song links. And so, this
correction....]*




*FINGERTIPS*
*March 20 <http://www.fingertipsmusic.com>*


[image: The Fireworks]
<http://fingertipsmusic.com/wp-content/uploads/thefireworks.jpg>
“RUNAROUND” – THE FIREWORKS
<http://www.magnetmagazine.com/audio/Runaround.mp3>

A blistering, buzzy shot of punk-ish pop (or, perhaps, pop-ish punk),
“Runaround” is a brazen reminder that digitalia only gets you so far in a
world that still exists in three dimensions (so far). There’s a chunky
permanence to the guitar-bass-drum attack of The Fireworks that renders the
knob twiddling that dominates 21st-century pop music sound like a kind of
quaint sideline. Music that does not depend upon physical vibrations of
physical objects in the physical world is still music, of course, but
that’s my ongoing point: there are different kinds of music, and engaging
instances of all these different kinds can and must each be encouraged and
celebrated, rather than one kind being dismissed as somehow “un-hip” while
another kind experiences a bubble of over-production. Coming to a classic,
melodic, three-chord headbanger from the vantage point of the year 2015, to
my ears, automatically makes this new and different from whatever past
bands you’d like to cite as progenitors of this style. (Me I hear a kind of
Elastica-meets-Ramones vibe; what could be bad?)

The song’s simple, crowning achievement is the relentless downturn at the
end of each verse line. Classic pop would often give us a downturn at the
end of the first line, balanced by an upturn at the end of the second line.
Here, the downturn at the end of the second line not only fools us by going
down at all but goes down to kind of an off note (first heard at 0:18),
surely not the note our ears were expecting. “Runaround” takes us three
seven straight downturns (alternating four of the first kind and three of
the second) before the last line of the verse becomes the beginning of the
chorus, with the long-awaited upturn at the end of the word “Runaround.”
Through it all, lead singer Emma Hall finds an effective middle ground
between blasé and excited, letting the hugeness of the guitar sound swell
her forward without giving her much pause. I always liked best the punks
who weren’t too in love with their toughness; they were the ones to count
on for melody. And still apparently are.

The Fireworks are a quartet from London. “Runaround” is the second track
off the band’s debut album, *Switch Me On*, which was released last month
on Shelflife Records. You can listen to it as well as buy it via Bandcamp
<http://thefireworksgopop.bandcamp.com/album/switch-me-on>.

MP3 via Magnet Magazine <http://www.magnetmagazine.com/>.



[image: Angharad Drake]
<http://fingertipsmusic.com/wp-content/uploads/adrake.jpg>
“SWING” – ANGHARAD DRAKE
<http://insomniaradio.net/audio/dailydose/irdd-angharaddrake-swing.mp3>

Lovely and unassuming, “Swing” acquires gentle power from its soft,
triplet-based accompaniment, which as the song unfolds does indeed give the
listener the sensation of being on a swing—you can just about sense the
leg-pumping momentum, the giddy semi-dizziness of leaning straight back
into the pendulum energy. Listen to the swing of the chorus—“If I could be
anything/I’d be your darling”—in which Drake achieves the almost impossible
trick of employing an awkward scan for both musical and metaphorical
purpose: the “incorrect” emphasis amplifies the swinging sensation while
also capturing the ambiguous command of one on a swing, where you are in
control but also not really. And you are by necessity alone.

Through it all, “Swing” carries with it the force of Angharad Drake’s
clear, tranquil voice, combining an intimate tone with unexpected potency
when the moment calls for it. Young singer/songwriters don’t often write
and sing with this much authority, and compound the problem by too
obviously attempting to compensate. Drake glides easily into her simple
sonic landscape of guitar and voice, drawing only as much attention to
herself as is required, leaving us with the satisfying sense of having been
visited more by a great song than a particular personality. This will serve
her well in the long run. We grow far more easily weary of personalities
than songs.

Drake is from Brisbane; her first name is not as difficult as it
looks—accentuate the second syllable and it becomes pleasantly easy to say.
“Swing” is the title track from an eight-song EP, her second, that she
released in September. You can listen to and and buy it via Bandcamp
<http://angharaddrake.bandcamp.com/>. Thanks to Insomnia Radio
<http://insomniaradio.net/> for the head’s up.



[image: Work Drugs]
<http://fingertipsmusic.com/wp-content/uploads/workdrugs.jpg>
“CHASE THE NIGHT” – WORK DRUGS
<https://s3.amazonaws.com/fingertips-free-legal-mp3s/2015/Work_Drugs-Chase_the_Night.mp3>

Recycling the slick grooves of the late ’70s and early ’80s through
21st-century digital noodling has given birth to an entire (sort of) genre
which has in recent years been as cutting-edge hip in pop music circles as
the original music has been deemed hopelessly passé for a good 20 years or
more. Funny that.

But there’s no denying the allure of this stuff, and “Chase the Night”
strikes me just about as irresistible as chillwave comes. Equal parts
sultry beat and soaring melody, the song transcends the genre’s robotic
drift via some canny songwriting chops: both the verse and the chorus have
two distinct sections, the second in each case building on the first in
subtle but ear-grabbing ways. In the case of the verse, the melody changes
from ascending to descending at the midway point and now comes at us in
double time (0:30); the chorus, meanwhile, likewise goes double-time about
halfway through, adding a lower-register counter-melody (1:03) after
opening more anthemically.

And the boys of Work Drugs aren’t done there. We get a short, foggy bridge
that floats near a kind of vocal manipulation that tips its hat towards
commercial pop, but fades as quickly and curiously as it arose, and then
leads into the song’s last two, disarming sections: first (2:35), the
chorus, now presented in a new, minimal setting that accentuates the appeal
of both the melody and of the human voices singing it; second (2:55), an
out-of-the-blue, honest-to-goodness guitar solo, which sounds beautifully
in context even as it was the last thing I might have expected. (Repeat
listens to the song have since revealed a guitar hiding in plain sight in
the back of the mix in the chorus, but without the closing solo, I’d never
have picked it out.)

Work Drugs is the bizarrely prolific Philadelphia-based duo of Thomas
Crystal and Ben Louisiana. They have been recording since 2011, and their
forthcoming album, *Louisa*, will be their seventh full-length. I’m not
even sure how that happens. The band performs live as a five-piece. “Chase
the Night” is from *Louisa*, and can be downloaded as an MP3 in the usual
method, above, or you can visit the band’s SoundCloud page and grab it
there as a higher-definition .wav file. Lots of other songs available there
as well. Thanks to the band for the MP3.









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[fingertipsmusic] [CORRECTION!, w/ song links] March 20: The Fireworks, Angharad Drake, Work Drugs

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