SOUNDTRACK: VAMPIRE WEEKEND-“Blurred Lines” (2013).
Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” is a huge hit (with a NSFW video). And I gotta say that I find it insanely catchy, too. It’s pretty irresistible. So why not cover it?
Vampire Weekend’s new album is less formal than their first two–relaxing styles and adding a bunch more humor to their sound. And they make a surprisingly good cover of this song. Their version is quite faithful to the original (even mimicking the sound a lot). But at the same time, the band is having a lot of fun with the song as you can tell primarily from the backing vocals.
You can tell hear it’s Vampire Weekend, but it also doesn’t quite sound like them–a neat trick.
Check out their cover (which is not a live concert track, but was recorded for BBC’s Live Lounge (so it sounds good)) at Stereogum.
[READ: July 15, 2013] “Firebugs”
This was, I think, the longest story I’ve seen published in The Walrus.
It begins with several paragraphs describing fire–physical, psychological, intense descriptions. Since I didn’t realize the story was so long, I actually wondered if the whole story would be like that–if there were going to be no characters in it. But there are, and quite a few. And the story is focused on two of them.
Blake Kennedy Jr was a firebug as a kid. Then he became a fireman (seems this is not so uncommon of a history for firemen and may stem from the desire to control fire). After many good years, he was injured during training and had to get a desk job. Now he investigates suspicious fires. Perhaps coincidentally, there was a rash of arson during the year he was born. Those fires were technologically set–the arsonist used the spark from a telephone to ignite a can of gasoline. Of course, the killer would place the call when he was far enough away. And he was never found.
This year’s arsonist’s is much more simple–a milk jug of gasoline with a homemade wick left on the front porch. It is a slow burn, with the gasoline not exploding. It’s actually the fumes that catch fire, not the liquid. So, when the wick burns down, the whole thing doesn’t ignite until the milk jug melts and the gas spills out.
Blake is investigating the death of Detta, an older woman who tried to run out during the fire (the state of her feet must have been incredible, he determined). (more…)
I Just Read About That... 