A SONG A WEEK

We are a music blog with a simple concept: to bring you one song every week that we personally enjoy, and hope that you will too. We don't specify in any genre or musical period. We strive to upload every Monday. Here are some of the music we like: Björk, Kate Bush, Austra, Grimes, Crystal Castles, David Bowie, Arcade Fire, Jack White, The Smiths, The Cure, Janelle Monáe, Beyoncé, When Saints Go Machine, Jenny Hval, CTM, Shiny Darkly, Bat For Lashes, Beach House, David Sylvian, Beck, Goldfrapp, Efterklang, The Knife, The Magnetic Fields, James Blake, Lykke Li, Savages, The Beatles, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, PJ Harvey, Soap&Skin, The Raveonettes, Siouxsie & The Banshees, The XX, Velvet Underground, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Warpaint, Jenny Wilson, IAMX, Radiohead, Tame Impala, Frank Ocean, Joy Division, Baby in Vain, Chelsea Light Moving, Foxygen etc. Follow our spotify playlist to be sure not to miss a song Also, you can suggest a song that you really like and maybe we'll post it if we like it too.

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Week 41

According to Alice Glass’ facebook page, the electronic darkness that was Crystal Castles is no more. Crystal Castles have released three studio albums (Crystal Castles I, II and III), and were widely acclaimed for their wildly energetic and chaotic live shows. Thank you for the madness, we hope to hear more from the hands of Ethan Kath and Alice Glass and whatever projects they may devote themselves to.

  Artist: Crystal Castles

Song: Baptism

Album: Crystal Castles (II) (2010)

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Week 38

September’s here again…

  Artist: David Sylvian

Song: September

Album: Secrets of the Beehive (1987)

Listen if you like: songs about September that aren’t by Green Day

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Week 37

How about some 90’s pop? I feel like we could all do with some 90’s pop right now.

  Artist: Madonna

Song: Ray Of Light

Album: Ray Of Light (1998)

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Week 36

Who knew that Neneh Cherry fronted a post-punk band in the eighties? I sure didn’t. That being said, even though all sources of information classifies Rip Rig + Panic as post-punk, this is the jazziest post-punk I have ever heard, with some of their later songs almost leaning into R’n’B. Actually, I don’t really know what the post-punk elements are supposed to be. It’s heavy on trumpets and bass and light on guitar. Nevertheless, Rip Rig + Panic is definitely worth a listen.

Artist: Rip Rig + Panic

Song: Storm The Reality Asylum

Album: I Am Cold (1982)

Listen if you like: Neneh Cherry, Siouxsie & the Banshees, jazz

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Week 35

This song is freedom. This song is breathing. This song is mountain scenery. This song is being surrounded by enormous space and being able to control it. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Swedes know how to make pop. Or in this case, dream pop. What sounds like an organ in an empty church (which if the video is correct, it is) intertwines with a simple drum pattern, and careless vocals being slung out in the open.

Artist: Anna Von Hausswolff

Song: Mountains Crave

Album: Ceremony (2013)

Listen if you like: Beach House, Kate Bush, Zola Jesus, M83

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Week 34

Blonde Redhead has always been a very peculiar band to me, one I cannot seem to pin to any one genre or style. Same thing goes for the latest release from their upcoming album, where they show themselves from a side rarely seen, one of tenderness and an acoustic sound (some of the song anyway). ‘The One I Love’ opens with delicate string play and Kazu Makino’s frail voice, only to evolve into a pathos-filled chorus. Along come flutes and vocal layers, and the whole thing ends with what sounds like aero vehicles made by an unknown species flying way too close to earth.

  Artist: Blonde Redhead

Song: The One I Love

Album: Barragán (to be released September 2, 2014)

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Week 33

I apologize for the fact that it’s been ten weeks since weeks since the last song, I decided that the blog needed a holiday, and the holiday got a little out of hand. Meanwhile, stuff’s been sizzling in the music biz. For example, Grimes released a new song with Blood Diamonds, a song originally meant for Rihanna who unfortunately turned the song down, which is a shame because I for one would have loved to have heard Riri’s vocals on this electronic art piece of a pop song. The break has got Rihanna written all over it, and who can resist that ‘Woo!’? If this is what Grimes’ upcoming album will sound like, there’s an absolute masterpiece in the making.

  Artist: Grimes feat. Blood Diamonds

Song: Go (2014)

Listen if you like: Rihanna, Disclosure, MIA, Crystal Castles

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Week 23

I don’t know why nobody thought of sampling Doorbell by The White Stripes for a hip-hop song ‘cause holy fucking shit it works.

  Artist: Jurassic 5

Song: The Way We Do It

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Week 22

I am a huge fan of Pixies and of former Pixies bassist Kim Deal’s band The Breeders, so I was thrilled to find out that Kim Deal also release music under her own name, and even more thrilled to find out that what she releases is great. It’s a lot more calm and sweet than her work with her bands. She has released a series of solo works on vinyl that are lazy, dusty little songs that sound like the Breeders on tranquilizers and with half of their gear stolen.

  Artist: Kim Deal (feat. Morgan Nagler who, to be honest, I have no idea who is)

Song: Range On Castle

Album: The Root b/w Range On Castle (2014)

Listen if you like: Pixies, The Breeders, Kimya Dawson

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Week 21

It is practically summer, and what better way to celebrate that than with the Canadian version of Best Coast. I’m sorry, I know how annoying it is to be compared to another band, but really they just do sound a lot like Best Coast. Even though they’ve jumped on the annoying trend of substituting letters with letters that “kind of” look like other letters (looking at you Chvrches), Alvvays are just a really charming ensemble from Toronto.

  Artist: Alvvays

Song: Adult Diversion

Album: none

Listen if you like: you guessed it! Best Coast

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Week 19 & 20

We realize we’ve been a bit slow these last couple of weeks, so here are two quick songs you should listen to:

Otha Fish by Pharcyde, 90’s hip hop at its best

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wA0IUwtKwhE

Holy Contagion by First Hate, ice cold electronica from the north

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iux-CFTLHf0

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Week 18

When Macklemore released the track "Same Love" about gay rights it became a world wide hit. While Macklemore undoubtedly had only good intentions with the track, it received a lot of criticism, becuase why was it, that a song about gay rights had to come from a stright white male, the least oppressed person globally? The New York born pansexual (attracted to people of all gender identities) rapper Angel Haze has now released a remake of the song about what it is actually like to be LGBTQ* and not just what it's like standing outside the madness going "that's too bad". In our opinion, so much more relevant, even though we still don't care much for the production, which hasn't been changed.

Artist: Angel Haze

Song: Same Love (2014)

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Week 17

Due to illness and holidays A SONG A WEEK hasn’t been posting the last to weeks. For that I apologize. But the good thing is, that because of illness and holidays I have had a lot of time to listen to music, and now feel ready and recharged to run this blog.

Angel Olsen is currently a music critic darling, and has a viral hit with the noisy little country thing ”Hi-five”. The kind of bleak humour in the lyrics to this song is a great representative for her latest album Burn Your Fire For No Witness. The songs range from tragically comic to just plain dysphoria triggering, like on this weeks song. This weeks song starts out by setting the mood with the line ”Everything is tragic/it all just falls apart”, and continues to get darker and darker with sublime lyrics like my personal favourite off the entire album ”I heard my mother thinking me right back into my birth/I laughed so hard inside myself it all began to hurt”. The song is a beautiful little oasis of despair in an otherwise up-tempo rocking album

Artist: Angel Olsen

Song: White Fire

Album: Burn Your Fire For No Witness (2014)

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Week 14

When it comes to pop and electronica, Sweden is one of the most relevant countries there is, with The Knife taking the lead since 2001. This week's artist Karin Park is without a doubt heavily inspired by the works of the Dreijer-siblings. She makes darkly skewed, yet poppy electronica.

  Artist: Karin Park

Song: Shine

Album: Shine EP (2014)

Listen if you like: The Knife, Disclosure, Kate Boy, Niki and the Dove

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Week 13

This song will give you strength. The second release from Lykke Li's forthcoming album I Never Learn, a release that promises to let as little light into the ever despairing heart of Lykke Li as her last album Wounded Rhymes of 2011.

Artist: Lykke Li

Song: No Rest For The Wicked

Album: I Never Learn (to be released May 5th 2014)

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Week 12

Like a lightning from a clear sky, like a cannonball through your living room window, this Friday Kate Bush, the legendary singer/songwriter/producer, mother of all present pop stars, announced her first live concerts in no less than 35 years. They are to take place at the Eventim Apollo in London, 15 concerts from late august to late September. I am full to the brim with excitement and wonder as to how these concerts will be. Will they be extravagant and filled with costume changes and choreography like her only tour in 1979, or more intimate and downplayed like her latest albums have been? Will she play all the hits and songs from her whole carrier, or focus on the later stuff? Nobody knows but we are dying to find out. Let’s celebrate with a Kate classic shan’t we?

Artist: Kate Bush

Song: Running Up That Hill (Deal With God)

Album: Hounds of Love (1985)

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Week 11

Karin Dreijer is mostly known for the brother/sister duo The Knife, but she also made a sole record under the moniker Fever Ray. The record came out almost five years ago and there has not been any talk of another Fever Ray album. There should though. Just listen to the track I’m Not Done that starts quietly and suddenly bursts into higher altitudes, leaving you unsure of whether to dance or gaze into the night sky. We hope that there will be more mystique from the hands of Fever Ray in the near future.

  Artist: Fever Ray

Song: I’m Not Done

Album: Fever Ray (2009)

Listen if you like: The Knife, Björk, Austra