ON REPEAT: Paranmaum, Jessica Pratt, Broadcast, Ozean, Model Child, Laila France, Peggy Gou, Charli xcx, Disclosure
リンダ リンダ! リンダ リンダ リンダ!
This week’s selections build up gradually. We’re heading into peak summer. We’re just hitting the end of JUMPIN JUMPIN JUNE, about to hit SKY HIGH JULY. It’s peak summer and I hope you take advantage! Keep in mind, there’s BALLS TO THE WALLGUST right around the corner.
But also summer is a time to lay back and look at butterflies. These songs are all kinda in either vein.
Here is where I keep all of these in playlist form.
Jessica Pratt “World on a String”
Kicking off the summer vibes with a bunch of flower children slowly making their way through the woods. This is, of course, off the latest album by Jessica Pratt which I’ve been listening to a lot but haven’t talked about much on this.
The folky stuff doesn’t always hit with me, and that’s a “me” problem but I love Jessica Pratt. Her music successfully achieves the "hiraeth" that lots of musicians aim for. Don’t worry I just looked up the word.
HIRAETH (heer-eye-th)
"A deep homesickness; an intense form of longing or nostalgia for a place long gone, or even an unaccountable homesickness for a place you have never visited. A pull on the heart that conveys a distinct feeling of missing something irretrievably lost. "
Another band that accomplishes this feeling is this week’s gold standard…
Broadcast “Valerie”
THE GOLD STANDARD
Broadcast is one of my favorite bands of all time. I have The Noise Made By People album on my wall, like it’s a Fight Club poster or something. This song is off of 2003’s Haha Sound. While they have numerous influences ranging from the 60’s psych group The United States of America, to Can, to the Doctor Who sound effects library, this song’s (and the footage paired with it) is from a 1970 Czech film Valerie and her Week of Wonders.
In the sometimes genuinely-creepy-yet-saccahrine movie, a young woman on the cusp of womanhood (sorry) encounters all sorts of characters and magical earrings. I can’t say the movie is a must-sit-down-and-watch unless you’re a fairy tale sicko (I know a few!) but it sums up the sound of Broadcast well. A lovely innocent voice occasionally traversing through a 1970’s nightmare.
Ozean “Scenic”
Model Child “Overdrive”
I like this song because it reminds me of the bands I’d find on The Deli, a local music blog that played it fast and loose with free mp3s from up-and-coming bands. I was all over it in like, 2007 and for every 20 bands I would “cold listen” to and wasn’t into, there was one that I would totally fall in love with and it would be my own little secret.
The Blue Hearts “Linda Linda”
Maybe you know this song already. I’m surprised I’m featuring a song that has been covered by both Andrew WK and Me First & The Gimme Gimmes. Also, yes, the namesake of The Linda Lindas! I had never heard this song and in fact I didn’t hear the original first.
I recently watched Linda Linda Linda, a movie by Nobuhiro Yamashita that is so “for me” that I’m shocked I didn’t know about it sooner.
It follows a group of Japanese schoolgirls (but not in like, a weird way), some in their senior year of school, as they prepare for a music festival. When the guitarist gets injured and the lead singer quits, the remaining members decide to ask the first girl they see to join to sing. This happens to be a painfully shy Korean exchange student who doesn’t speak fluent Japanese. Excited to make friends, she accepts and practices the song over and over at a karaoke lounge.
Then, they practice. And practice. There’s nothing more to it than that. They have little distractions along the way like romances and fights, as any teenager would, but they are merely distractions from them studiously practicing and bonding. There are a few different perspectives, too. A wistful old teacher tries to share his adolescent experience with a student who cuts him off to ask, “can I leave?” And an incredibly awkward kid who kinda learns enough Korean to ask the singer out, merely gets the reply, “can I leave?” After all, they have work to do!
It rocks. I have never seen a better depiction of “making music” on film. When the band finally starts to mesh, you share in their delight. The stakes are incredibly low, but when you are 16, 17 years old, you’re an adult (some more than others) but you’re still in the bubble of childhood. And everything is so dramatically built up on the road to graduation, you can’t help but feel like the main character in your own movie.
Paranmaum “Linda Linda”
The whole movie is right here you have no excuse ^^^
Laila France “Trashy Like TV”
This one would have fit in nicely on the Vegas playlist that I was trying to fill with that 90’s trance dnb cocktail loungecore music. The project is also in the vein of DOOPEES, who I talked about a few weeks ago.
In 1994, Tokyo singer, photographer and model Kahimi Karie collaborated with Scottish musician Momus on a French pop inspired EP, which inspired more similar projects.
Laila France is the stage name of Samantha Crü. In the nineties, she answered a magazine advertisement placed in the hip Nova magazine by Momus which read: "Girl singer wanted for an album of songs in the style of 1970s Italian soft porn films."
The resulting album, Orgonon is dedicated to Wilhelm Reich:
…who believed that orgasmic energy, correctly accumulated in little boxes, could save the world.
Disclosure “She’s Gone, Dance On”
These are just fun dancepop songs for the rest of it, I’m just gonna speedrun these and maybe you can play them if your BBQ turns into a dance party or whatever best of luck may god be with you happy summer
Peggy Gou “Back To One”
house music all night long
Charli xcx “Von Dutch”
Yeah more like brett summer 😈
This Ozean track rules.