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  • The Daily Awesome – State of the Union Edition: James “Sit Down”

    Who knew, when the six man Manchester band called James released their 1991 single “Sit Down” (a re-recording of a song they’d initially released a couple years earlier), that they had just delivered the perfect theme song for the fledgling 112th U.S. Congress – shell-shocked, grief-stricken and deeply divided – on the occasion of the 44th U.S. President’s third State of the Union address:

    “Those who feel the breath of sadness, sit down next to me
    Those who find they’re touched by madness, sit down next to me
    Those who find themselves ridiculous, sit down next to me
    In love, in fear, in hate, in tears…”

    This is a song that, in its studio version, offered a lot of solace to my financially-desperate, socially-inept, lonely, frightened, freshman-in-college-age self. But seeing this gorgeous live version from a 2001 farewell show, seeing that massive crowd singing its lyrics together like one great, glorious “me too” is at least as uplifting as two congresspeople from opposite sides of the aisle making a point of sitting down next to each other for the President’s speech – as if that’s so damn hard.

  • The Daily Awesome – January 6, 2010: Kelly Rowland “Rose Colored Glasses”

    Kelly Rowland ”Rose Colored Glasses”
    You gotta root for Kelly Rowland, having grown up almost literally in Beyonce’s shadow, as the perennial #2 of Destiny’s Child. Though she’s already put out two solo albums, and scored a couple of minor hits, she hasn’t put out that definitive record yet, and you have to wonder just how much her career has been helped or hindered by her association with longtime manager (and Beyonce’s dad) Mathew Knowles – an association that finally ended in 2009.

    While Rowland, who turns 30 in February, is still readying her third album – her first for UniversalMotown – for release later this year, she put out a cluster of great singles in 2010, including “Commander”, with frequent collaborator David Guetta, and the sassy, Ne-Yo co-penned “Grown Woman”.

    But my favorite of the bunch so far is “Rose Colored Glasses”, a grand, heart-wounded ballad about a relationship that looks good on the outside, but is rotting from within. Co-written by Ester Dean and Swedish pop mastermind Dr. Luke – the man who gave us Taio Cruz’s “Dynamite” and virtually the entire Ke$ha oeuvre – it’s an uncharacteristically emotionally raw song that, both in terms of sound and subject matter, seems like it might have been intended for Rihanna. But, let there be no doubt, Rowland owns this song, delivering it with enviable strength, stunning elegance, and an honesty devoid of self-pity that she projects both outward and inward, telling herself as much as she’s telling the listener: Everything seems amazing when you’re looking through rose colored glasses – Take ’em off.

  • The Daily Awesome – January 5, 2011: The Vaselines “Sex with an X”

    The Vaselines’ ”Sex With an X”
    Scottish indie-popsters The Vaselines got their biggest break a couple years after they broke up, when Nirvana featured a cover of the group’s song “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me for a Sunbeam” in their classic MTV Unplugged set. Formed around singing-songwriting duo Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee, the Vaselines’ entire recorded output, summarized neatly in a 1992 compilation called The Way of the Vaselines, amounted to little more than a couple of EPs and a single full-length album called Dum Dum. Their songs – which boasted titles like “Oliver Twisted” and “Monsterpussy” – were as adorable as the Japanese ceramic figurines you might find in any given antique shop, and just as cracked as their glazes. (Sample lyric: “I’m gonna skin it and wear it as a hat, every day.”)

    Like the earliest episodes of South Park or Pee Wee Herman’s original stage act, The Vaselines’ music is delivered with rudimentary technical skill, a formal vocabulary geared towards kids (South Park’s goofy animation, Pee Wee Herman’s goofy costume and voice, The Vaselines repetitive, elementary singalong melodies), but with content deeply inappropriate for that audience. That’s absolutely the case with the group’s 2010 reunion single, even if the title track from their 20-years-after-the-fact sophomore album Sex With an X isn’t half as lyrically as naughty as its title would suggest. The first time I heard this – Feels so good, it must be bad for me – I thought, “Wow, these guys could be writing for Barney or The Wiggles.” Thankfully, Kelly & McKee use their powers for good and not evil, and they also deliver a great little video playing an indie rock duo who left indie rock to become sunbeams for Jesus (err – a nun and a priest), but ultimately return to their musical and spiritual roots. Amen to that.