The Not-Pop Jukebox

I was working on my lens about Kirsty MacColl's In These Shoes? yesterday and the song has been stuck in my head ever since. That happens to me every time I listen to it, so I thought I'd share the enjoyment with the rest of you. The Cuban swing, the horn section, and the saucy lyrics all combine to make this an earworm that you won't mind hearing over and over. Beware, though. You may catch yourself moving your hips while reading labels at the grocery store when you've got In These Shoes? exerting its evil influence.

You can't buy In These Shoes? on its own at Amazon, but you can get the Kinky Boots Soundtrack which includes the song, as well as some other great music like Whatever Lola Wants, Mr. Big Stuff, and I Put a Spell on You.

In listening to Keb' Mo' and his song, Soon As I Get Paid, I was struck by how many more people can sympathize with this song than would have a few years ago. I thought I'd post it, for those of you suffering from the economic downturn. If you don't like the song, you can put a clip of it on your voice mail for the benefit of collection agencies who don't seem to understand that, “I have no money,” means, “I cannot pay you today or tomorrow (or any of the other seventeen times you will call me over the next week).”

For those of you who just like a good, bluesy jam and have not found yourselves between an electric bill and a hard place yet, Keb' Mo' is just a great musician and songwriter. In fact, that holds true even if Soon As I Get Paid does remind you uncomfortably of some recent conversations.

Buy Soon As I Get Paid

I find the great majority of club-type, bass-heavy songs to be repetitive in the extreme and thus as dull as can be after about a minute and a half. I’m happy to share with you an exception to that rule, HeavyFeet’s We Gettin’ Crunk. It’s got enough variety to sustain nearly four and a half minutes with very few words, a retro synth-line, and some bass. This track would have gotten me on the dance floor, in my bar-hopping days, with enough bounce for dancing and a simple enough sound to allow conversation. Were I to have a rent party, this one would definitely make the play list.

Since I don’t do those things any more, I’ll be listening to HeavyFeet and dancing around the living room with my children. So, too, can you enjoy the beat-infused sound for free. HeavyFeet has offered a thumping pile of free downloads on their MySpace profile, including We Gettin’ Crunk and a bunch of remixes. Scroll down and look under the “Sounds Like” section on the left side of the screen.

My first introduction to Miles Mosley and his terrific band was their Voodoo Child video. I've seen that one posted and tweeted, and I was suitably impressed both by Mosley's skill on the upright bass and by the energy of the horns. In truth, I thought there was a bit more showboating than was strictly necessary, in all of the videos in this series. I still like the sound and the energy, however, and I love how much fun everyone appears to be having in this one, Photograph. I wish I could have found a "music video" for a single, but mostly what I saw were live shows with horrid sound quality, so do yourself a favor and listen to some Miles Mosley.

No sooner had I selected my Music of the Month than I discovered yet another band that has been almost completely ignored: Teeny Grownups. The name caught my attention, but the sound kept it. They're sort of post-punk indie, despite the descriptions bandied about and the various indie band names thrown at the sound in an attempt to define it. Belle and Sebastian, a very "indie" reference, shows the jangly potential of Teeny Grownups, but not the fuzzy guitar found in some of their other songs.

Not that I could find many other songs for the band. Their MySpace profile offers four songs and a quick run through my usual resources shows me a band that's been around for several years and has only 42 plays on Last.FM and naught but two live videos of crappy quality on YouTube. Amazon offers only one song, John, on a compilation album. That seems almost unbelievable, to me. So take a listen to Teeny Grownups's Belle and Sebastian, Smile, Merry Ferry, and whatever else you can find, then go buy some of their music and make other people listen to it. Alternatively, you can post a comment telling me that I'm full of hooey and that Teeny Grownups stink. I can take it.