Outkast – “She Lives In My Lap” (from Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, 2003)

There are so many great songs on Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, but this is probably my favorite. Reminds me of “The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker,” which is my favorite song on Prince’s sprawling double album Sign O’ The Times. Good guitar work, the synths are subtle and tasteful, the pitched-up vocals are TOTALLY Prince.

Rufus Wainwright – “Vibrate” (from Want One, 2003)

Rufus finally totally embraced his operatic tendencies with Want One, and I was super into that. This song is super simple, but the arrangement makes you forget that. Really neat treatment of 3/4. The accents make it seem like it’s in some weird time signature, but it isn’t. Plus, great lyrics. Want One is likely my album of the decade. I listened to that album SO MUCH.

Chromeo – “Fancy Footwork” (from Fancy Footwork, 2007)

Chromeo do what they do really well. Super authentic and faithful 80’s party songs. The instrumental jam out from 2:29 on out makes this song great. Also goes to show you that you don’t have to go crazy with the synth bass.

Cursive – “Art Is Hard” (from The Ugly Organ, 2003)

I never had a huge emo phase like a bunch of my friends did, so I was late to Saddle Creek game. I admire Tim Kasher’s ability to be so forthcoming in his lyrics without being too lame. Congrats, Good Sir.

Jon Brion – “Bookstore” (from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind Soundtrack, 2004)

The score to Eternal Sunshine is “the shit,” so it has to be mentioned. That backwards tape sound in the background paired with the orchestration is such a good idea.

Maroon 5 – “Nothing Lasts Forever” (from It Won’t Be Soon Before Long, 2007)

The hook to this song is also the hook to Kanye’s “Heard ‘Em Say” but I prefer Maroon 5’s treatment. Sounds like America covering a Tin Pan Alley song, with white Stevie Wonder singing. That’s what it sounds like.

Johan Bergström, Site of Disappearance, 2006

I met Jerry Fuchs once when I was playing guitar with Thunderbirds for a really short period of time. I can’t remember the 3rd band, but it was TAN and Turing Machine at the Lager House on a weeknight. Recently Julian and I were talking about how nice he was, and how even after meeting him once we were both floored over how COOL that guy was. Genuinely interested in you, genuinely enthusiastic about everything: genuinely enthusiastic about playing the Lager House on a weeknight.

And that is that no matter what interior horizontal line I chose to isolate for attention in that way at any point in the performance, and no matter how dense or complex the surrounding counterpoint, that line was not only articulated perfectly and at the proper dynamic, but played with such perfect effortlessness it was as if it were being played by a pianist who had nothing else to do with his fingers but play that single line alone.

Read the rest here. I’ve been spending some time with the 1981 Goldberg Variations over the past few months and agree. That said, how much of that effortlessness stems from the compositions themselves? The Gould recording of GV from the 50s, while different, still incites a similar feelings of WONDER. And that is probably my favorite part about Bach’s keyboard work: it’s confusing.