New ways, Death Cabs, and a song for Bobby

Welcome to “Senses Working Overtime,” where the grass is green and the girls are pretty. Actually, since I am writing this at 2 a.m. in an airless office building, there is no grass, although if I squint very hard the roaming security guard develops vaguely girl-like qualities. No amount of squinting will make him pretty, however. Anyway, on with the music.

Cutie in Manila

So it’s official: Death Cab for Cutie is playing in Manila on March 5. Twitter was all a-twitter with the news, though the concert comes at a strange time in the band’s history. And by strange I suppose I really mean boring, though perhaps the adjective is a bit harsh.

Don’t get me wrong; their back catalog bristles with amazing songs, and I’m sure people are happily stumbling across their work for the first time every day. I’m probably not alone in thinking, though, that DCFC hit their height (creatively, though probably not commercially) with 2003’s “Transatlanticism,” That was a big album in the office of Pulp, the music magazine I was working for at the time; one of our graphic designers would, at least once a day, start singing The Sound of Settling at his desk, filling us with something that vaguely resembled musical appreciation crossed with a strong streak of twitchy murderous impulses.

But time and major labelhood and Zooey Deschanel have eroded DCFC somewhat, and that indie feel that made devotees of us way back when has been piecemealed, parceled, appropriated and adulterated… Ah, who am I kidding? I’ll be there. And I will scream “BEN GIBBARD, I LOVE YOU” while wearing a cardboard Zooey Deschanel mask. Just to mess with him.

Don’t Die (The Demo)

Most songs, great or otherwise, have some sort of story behind them, even if that story is something as stupid as “I was picking my nose and it suddenly struck me as the perfect metaphor for one’s search for true love.” Whole books have been built around these song-stories (case in point, XTC: Song Stories, about the songs of XTC, still my favorite band of all time), and they are always a treat for music obsessives.

Don’t Bogart The Can… man!: Their new song is about friendship, the passage of time, and the necessity of leavetakings. Oh, and drugs.

Music obsessive that I am, it was even more amusing for me to be an actual witness to the events behind the newest offering from indie pop act Don’t Bogart The Can… Man! It’s a great little song regardless of the backstory, but there is an added layer of appreciation that comes with knowing it was inspired by a happy slice of the local indie scene, a despedida for a Berlin-bound friend, and a drug trip gone horribly awry.

Listen to Bobby, Don’t Die at http://dontbogartthecanman.tumblr.com/

New Ways To Fall Apart

So, after a few months of not making any mixes (we’ve been busy over at Esquire magazine), I finally found the time and inspiration to piece together a year-ender of sorts, with songs ranging from one end of 2011 to the other. Some of them may be overly familiar by now, some of them may be new to your ears, all of them make for good giddy listening.

It’s got Frank Ocean on it (Strawberry Swing takes us back to spaceship liftoff childhood daydream days — nostalgia ultra indeed); The Damnwells, with a fun, sexy, barroom jukebox dance-along of a song (She Goes Around); the band with the un-Googlable name of Fun, who enlist — and underuse, but it’s okay — Janelle Monae in a mighty burn-bright anthem of a song (We Are Young); Hiding Tonight by Alex Turner, a lovely little heart-bender from the Submarine soundtrack; and Lupe Fiasco rhyming about the end of the world over M83’s Midnight City — among other, no less worthy tracks.

Get it while you can, at http://bit.ly/sensesmix01 — needless to say, I am abiding by the credo of most music bloggers, offering this mix for purposes of promoting good stuff and encouraging y’all to get the actual releases. Happy listening!