1. Fantmas, “Twin Peaks, Fire Walk With Me”
Mike Patton and the avant-garde Fantmas have re-arranged, scrambled, dyed, distorted, genetically engineered and amplified old movie themes for their album “The Director’s Cut.” The Twin Peaks theme stands out as the highlight for me, divided into an eerie and silly jazz section with a double bass cameo, which implodes into a dark and dreamy beat with signature Patton vocals. Beautiful.
2. Behemoth, “Ov Fire and the Void”
Behemoth is a blackened death metal band from Poland. “Ov Fire and the Void” is the single from their latest album “Evangelion,” and it’s one big injection of chaos and cosmos with heavy, head banging riffs, technical drum beats and epic vocals and lyrics that seem to capture the chaos of the beginning and end of time in three minutes. Just try this song live, it’s really a lot of fun.
3. Brazilian Girls, “Die Gedanken Sind Frei”
This band from New York features Sabina Sciubba who, having been born in Rome and raised in Nice and Munich, sings in five languages. This song is taken from an old German socialist anthem, turned into a groovy, jazzy number, with her beautiful and sensual voice melting all over. If you still think German is a harsh and commanding language, this song will immediately change your mind.
4. Mondo Cane, “Il Cielo In Una Stanza”
Mike Patton again. Here he covers and rearranges old Italian pop songs from the ’50s and ’60s, this number originally by Gino Paoli. As Patton says, this is music for anyone with a fucking heart in their chest: unique and catchy arrangements with Patton’s beautiful voice belting Italian that will fill any room lucky enough to have it playing.
5. Nile, “Permitting the Noble Dead to Descend to the Underworld”
Technical death metal with Egyptian themes, this certainly isn’t going to immediately appeal to anyone unfamiliar with metal – but it’s a catchy song with incredible riffing and insane, machine gun drums that reach speeds faster than any Star Wars vehicle.
6. DeVotchKa, “El Zopilote Mojado”
DeVotchKa’s sound draws from countless styles and cultures from Greek, Slavic and Bolero music to American punk and folk. Nick Urata, their lead singer, has a beautiful and eerie voice that dances between languages, bending and flowing like delicate cursive. This song means “the wet buzzard” in Spanish, and is a more light-hearted, fun instrumental.
7. Little Joy, “Brand New Start”
Little Joy was started by The Strokes’ drummer Fabrizio Moretti and Los Hermanos’ singer Rodrigo Amarante. The album is full of cleverly written love songs with a warm, ’50s pop music style that anyone can appreciate.
8. Estelle and Kanye West, “American Boy”
I just really like this song.
What’s on your iPod?
