here they are:
"Lightning Bolt" by Jake Bugg: Like Jake's previous hit, "Two Fingers", "Lightning Bolt" is full of musical homages to the 1960's, which is incredibly unusual for someone who's only 18 years old! "Lightning Bolt" has a bit more of a fast, rock-y feel to it than the folk-y "Two Fingers" did, and it almost sounds like a White Stripes style cover of a Bob Dylan song circa 1965. At only two and a half minutes, Jake Bugg packs a powerful punch into "Lightning Bolt", with both the steady, catchy beat of the song, and Jake's fast-paced, rambling vocals. Not a hard song to perform by any means, but it still takes an awful lot of skill to pull a song like this off!!
"Never Wanted Your Love" by She & Him: The third record from Manic Pixie Dream Girl, Zooey Deschanel, and her quieter backing singer, M. Ward, is finally out!! The record's first single, "Never Wanted Your Love", is a catchy song, like most of Zooey's material tends to be, and it has a "retro" flavor to it with its somewhat rockabilly inspired beats. The rushing, mariachi influenced sound of the violins in the intro also make "Never Wanted Your Love" a memorable song in the She & Him catalog. Then again, though, what She & Him song isn't?!
"The Ceiling" by Wild Feathers: While roots-rock has come to be a defining feature so far of 2010's music, there have only been a handful of bands (Black Keys, Alabama Shakes, Dawes, etc.) that have gone more for the electric side of the genre than the acoustic side. Enter Wild Feathers. Their debut song, "The Ceiling", proves that the band have somehow managed to be a TRUE "folk-rock" band for the second decade of the 21st century, placing equal emphasis on electric and acoustic guitar, and they also have a vaguely bluegrass-y sound that, amazingly, does NOT require a banjo or mandolin! The freewheeling, unabashedly retro style of Wild Feathers might bring to mind bands like The Black Crowes. Ha! Crows, Feathers!! I wonder if there's a connection there?! Well, like they say, birds of a feather flock together, and Wild Feathers certainly know how to do so!!
