git ssb

title: “But You've Gotta Know Their Lies” (the 2006-05-12 Friday Fetch-it) date: 2006-05-12 19:41 series: the Friday Fetch-it

tags: 7/4 (Shoreline), Broken Social Scene, Death Cock, Feist, Kevin Drew, Stars And Spit, the Flaming Lips, the Pipettes, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots

<p>Since I actually physically own this week's song as a single on a compact disc (I bought it on Wednesday), I'm gonna write a little bit about its B-sides first.</p>
<p><a title="Broken Social Scene – Stars And Spit" href="http://www.last.fm/music/Broken+Social+Scene/_/Stars+And+Spit">Stars And Spit</a> sounds like it was recorded in the middle of a busy street, while the microphone was drunk. It has the same sort of wooziness as a lot of <a title="The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" href="http://www.last.fm/music/The+Flaming+Lips/Yoshimi+Battles+the+Pink+Robots">Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots</a>, particularly in its vocals.</p>
<p><a title="Broken Social Scene – Death Cock" href="http://www.last.fm/music/Broken+Social+Scene/_/Death+Cock">Death Cock</a> is really chilled. Stars and Spit was chilled, but this is catatonic. And it's a waltz. Waltzes are good. Part way through, the music comes to a coda and someone says “That's it”, but the song starts up again and carries on for another few minutes. Maybe they only eventually stopped because their instruments got too dusty.</p>
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<p>I always like songs in unusual time signatures. I especially like that <a href="http://www.last.fm/music/Broken+Social+Scene">Broken Social Scene</a> haven't bothered trying to be cool about it – they even named <a title="Broken Social Scene – 7/4 (Shoreline)" href="http://www.last.fm/music/Broken+Social+Scene/_/7%252F4+%2528Shoreline%2529">7/4 (Shoreline)</a> after its time signature. And parenthesised subtitles are always good.</p>
<p>Like its first B-side, Shoreline is a mid-tempo light-rock-stylee driving song, great for cycling through York in the summer. Each vocal line starts half-way through a bar, so it flows into the next one; the whole thing progresses smoothly. There's even a car's interior in the video – what more could you want from a driving song?</p>
<p>Since it's driven by the rhythm section, it sounds far worse on speakers with crap bass. The melody, however, is held solely by the vocals, led by <a href="http://www.last.fm/music/Feist">Feist</a>, accompanied by one of the other fifteen band-members ...a male one. You can tell from the video. The sort of richness in sound you'd expect from a song performed by sixteen people is there; it'd be inaccurate to call Shoreline's sound “layered” – it's more like spaghetti than lasagne.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, there are several reasonably-well-defined categories of noise present: the rhythm section (comprising the driving bass and drums); the vocals; several lead guitars and other guitarage; and lots of miscellaneous other sounds. Most of the noise lives in those last two layers, with the first two holding the song together.</p>
<p>Feist's vocals make the song. It'd be a great song with someone else singing her bits, but her performance adds that extra embellishment that makes it a classic.</p>
<p>And she doesn't even sound like <a href="http://www.last.fm/music/The+Pipettes">The Pipettes</a>. <strong>If you download one track this week, make it <a href="http://gkn.me.uk/thefridayfetchit/20060512.mp3">Shoreline</a>.</strong></p>
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<p><ins>(The other (male) band member is probably Kevin Drew.)</ins></p>