Week One - Chaz

Eight for oh-eight. My favorite thus far.

1. “Single Ladies” – Beyonce
If you’ve listened to Top 40 radio for ten minutes in the past few months, you’ve heard this insanely catchy song. The music video sold me, seduced by the delusional notion that I might one day be able to move my body as frenetically/gracefully as does Sasha Fierce. I’m also a sucker for an alter ego.

2. “If I Was Your Girlfriend” – Prince
Here’s another alter ego, Prince as Camille. I listened to this track all summer (it was on the lone mix CD in my car), driving around St. Joseph, Missouri during a reporting internship. In the song, Prince/Camille wants to be your best friend, and, you know, do what girlfriends do, things like dressing one another and initiating oral sex. I’d prep for interviews while Prince/Camille crooned, “Listen, 4 u naked I would dance a ballet/ Would that get u off?/ Then tell me what will!” My answer: this creepy cool song.

3. “Two” – Ryan Adams
Ryan Adams is pretty hit-and-miss, but this lovely, mournful song never fails to soothe. Although it’s about a more serious addiction – “it takes two when it used to take one” – this track paired well with my morning coffee. In early 2008, my roommates would blare “Two” while knocking back Diet Cokes and wailing about the unfairness of schoolwork.

4. “Playground Lover” – Air
This song unfairly made its way onto many of my innocuous “studying” playlists in 2008. It’s a great, sexy song, and the pulsing introductory (marimba?) notes over sustained strings give it an especially insistent, hypnotic feel. Listening feels like floating.

5. “Chemtrails” – Beck
Another summer driving song, particularly for the times I’d gaze through my windshield, lost yet again in St. Joseph and dazed from driving in circles. Spare, careful verses (synth, bass, vocals) spill into throbbing, drum-heavy choruses. All the while, Beck’s voice is distant and serene: “Down by the sea/ So many people/ They've already drowned/ You and me watching a sea full of people/ Try not to drown.” Beck’s “Eleanor Rigby,” perhaps?

6. “Look After Me” – Hot Chip
This is a kind of electronic pop samba detailing the anguish of an estranged couple. Hot Chip’s vocals quite often quaver pleasantly, but the English voices on this track seem especially fragile. “Every time I see your face I break down and cry/ I see it in your family as they walk on by.” Swelling strings after this confession – pathos!

7. “Whole Lotta Love” – Tina Turner
With a phenomenal backing band, Tina does it better (and ten times hotter) than Led Zeppelin. The arguably best moments of the song come during a sexy, funky intro long before Tina even opens her mouth.

8. “Gray or Blue” – Jaymay
This track evokes padlocked diary confessions, a quality that usually irritates me, but nursery rhyme catchiness redeems all. Straightforward and saccharine, it’s irresistible as spun sugar.