“You’re the reason why I’ll move to the city/Or why I’ll need to leave…” With those words, Sharon Van Etten has captured the hearts of myriad urban dwellers. As a friend noted, “she sounds like a better Cat Power.” And although I won’t venture into that arena, I will say that SVE’s harmonies, seemingly hanging off a cliff ready to take flight at every note, make me feel like she’s captured something fundamentally raw in her being.

The Independent in San Francisco and picked up tickets relatively easy. But mark my words: that will not last long. Below, the track “We Are Fine” with guest vocalist Zack Condon from Beirut.

This song is “Hidaway” from the movie’s soundtrack. Karen O And The Kids is responsible for this lullaby. Whitney doesn’t want to listen to the album yet because she doesn’t want the songs to influence her take on the film. I agree with her, but it’s impossible to not listen.

Image [via Strange Glue]

Telekinesis is frontman Michael Benjamin Lerner‘s brain child and the band strums their power chords from the rain-soaked roadways of Seattle, WA. They’ve also proven to inspire major air guitar participation. Maybe you should stretch before listening to this song.

More Song Of The Day here.

Telekinesis Bio [via Last fm]

This artist comes by way of road warrior foodie dudette Blue Cheese Highways, and will be my anthem for the rest of the day. I also plan to dance around like Little Ms. Pogo Stick on the video below because I think they won me over. Enjoy.

More Song Of The Day here.

I remember seeing Leroy and his glossy eyes, a fifth of Jack flowing freely through his bloodstream. He smiled. “You’ve gotta listen to this, fool. Shit is great.”

There, under a suburban night sky, a melodic echo, something akin to chamber music, but with a hip-hop beat, came careening out my car speakers. “Insight/Foresight/More sight/The top of the wall reads a quarter past midnight…” I didn’t know it then, but I was going through a musical revolution; the turn of the century around the corner, and a world of music about to shape my next decade.

“Good Morning Sunshine…whole new ball game…whole new day…” More music followed and my catalog bulged to include genres, sounds and compositions I never knew existed. These tracks are a mixture of songs that shaped me throughout my late Teens and early Twenties. In fact, they’re tracks I can’t live without today. The Manu Chao/RATM transition is gonna F#*$ with your head.

• Quasimoto – “Good Morning Sunshine”
• Moby – “Porcelain”
• Deltron – “3030″
• Manu Chao – “Luna Y Sol”
• Rage Against The Machine – “The Ghost Of Tom Joad”
• The Roots – “Act Too…The Love Of My Life”
• DJ Shadow – “Midnight In A Perfect World

Image: “Lay Down The Needle”
Prenzlauer Berg, Germany 2007
[via]

Hunter S. Thompson used his loudspeakers in Aspen, CO to blare out “Mr. Tambourine Man”. He’d shoot his .357 Magnum too, but I’m not investing in gunpowder. I’ll just stick to acoustic guitars and harmonicas. In the case of The Doors, let’s allow Ray Manzarek to shoot the hilltops, shall we? Blue skies hovering above thrusting mountain peaks inspired this compilation.

No tengo lugar/No tengo paisaje/Yo menos tengo patria.

• Chris Thomas King – “Hard Time Killing Floor Blues”
• The Doors – “Riders On The Storm”
• Bob Dylan – “You’re A Big Girl Now”
• Silvio Rodriguez – “Sueño Con Serpientes”
• The National – “Fake Empire”
• Bon Iver – “Blood Bank”
• Kings Of Convenience – “Misread”
• Blind Pilot – “The Bitter End”
• Tom Waits – “Romeo Is Bleeding”
• Fleet Foxes – “Blue Ridge Mountains”
• Unknown – “Nací en Alamo”

Is it me or are Grizzly Bear member’s eyes really huge in this video? After a sudden dose of multiple viewings of Grizzly Bear’s newest video from their recent album “Veckatimest”, I couldn’t help but try to close my eyelids one at a time and sweat profusely. Didn’t really work. The Fader points out that Patrick Daughters directed this video. The same directors are responsible for Feist’s “1234” video and Yeah Yeah Yeah’s “Maps.” I’d be up for a “Veckatimest” series a la “Flying Club Cup.“

Passion Pit released “Matters” this week and are soaring to new Indie heights with a tour throughout the US and Europe all summer. Since I’m currently based in Los Angeles until June 15th, I’ll be hitting up their Echoplex gig Friday May 29th.

KCRW‘s Jason Bentley provided Los Angeles with a glimpse of next week’s show when he invited the band to play an in studio performance where they played signature hit “Sleepyhead”, and also cut a great performance of “Moth’s Wings” and “The Reeling.” Both the Troubadour gig and the Echoplex gig are sold out, but get your disheveled selves out of your bunks and buy a ticket from a person who broke it with their significant other an hour before the show. It happens all the time. You can listen to the archived broadcast of the performance here.

It was only 24 hours ago that I muttered to the homie that MGMT’s “Weekend Wars” was one of the best songs to wake up to. But after sleeping in a bit today, and not sippin’ on an Americano five minutes after I wake up, Passion Pit’s “Sleepyhead” is the perfect jolt of energy to start the morning. Pass on whatever it is you listen to in the morning. I desperately want to know.

Detroit’s image can be drastically marred by its economic downturn, high-crime rate and horrible baseball team. But the city is ripe for angst-driven beats and rhythms ranging from hip-hop to Rock. And power-punk 70′s band Death is just another notch on the legacy Detroit has established in the 20th Century.

The New York Times wrote a piece about the trio last month, but I recently listened to what most of my closest peeps have been listening to. I’m sure I won’t be the last to write that these cats were genuinely ahead of their time. Imagine MC5 opening up for Death, or vice-versa. Their EP “For The World To See” is available on iTunes. Check out the track “Where Do We Go From Here?” because I swear Bloc Party were directly inspired by this track. I’ll leave it open to discussion.

Death Was Punk Before Punk Was Punk [via NYT]
Image [Tammy Hackney]