CL - The Baddest Female

There’s something about these K-Pop/Hip-hop records that always reels me in. When I first heard The Baddest Female, I dismissed it as little more than a bunch of incongruent noise. To a lesser extent, I thought the same about G-Dragon’s One Of A Kind and Crayon, which turned out to be two of my favorite songs of 2012. Maybe it’s the fact that it’s (mostly) in another language, or that all those seemingly incongruent elements seem to blend into one sickeningly catchy refrain -- but I think what it really comes down to is the utter charisma these stars bring to the table. As leader of girl group 2NE1, CL is the most recognizable of her bandmates. The same thing could be said of G-Dragon and Bigbang. I’m kind of obsessed with the weird, snarly accent with which CL spits out the Korean/English lyrics. She spent many of her formative years in France studying--among other things--English, so I feel like her entire persona is a cool hybrid of east and west. One thing’s for sure: she’s a force to be reckoned with. Rap isn’t really my genre, but I can’t stop playing this.



(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Buy 2NE1's albums here. Follow me on twitter and facebook.

Magnus Carlsson - Glorious

"We're feeling high on life"

We pretty much know what to expect from Magnus Carlsson, don't we? This isn't gonna be some serious, laidback singer-songwriter affair. This is a balls-to-the-wall, campy as hell schlager anthem. And really, that's all we want from Magnus. Few artists can get away with releasing this kind of music anymore, and even fewer outside of Scandinavia. Thank god for Sweden! Honestly, it might be a little too much for even me, but I feel like the music industry needs to stop taking itself so seriously, so I'm happy to feature a song as ridiculously over the top as this. (It's still not a patch on his epic Live Forever, which I doubt whether he'll ever surpass)



(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Buy the EP here. Follow me on twitter and facebook.

A Preview of my Leading Candidate for Album of the Year

In pop music, it seems like albums are a dying format. It's sad, but I'm noticing more and more that when the end of the year rolls around, I have no problem compiling a list of my favorite singles. But when it comes to featuring entire albums that are as strong, I struggle. That's why it's such a nice treat when something comes along like The Sound Of Arrows' debut a couple years back -- something where a lot of effort went into the entire package, rather than only the singles. By all accounts, Studio Killers' upcoming album sounds like it will be that rare, cohesive batch of songs. It helps that they've been working on this for years and have teased us with four singles that only seem to get better. But listening to the album preview (below), I think it's safe to say that this is going to be well worth the wait. I'm counting down the days.



(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Preorder the album here. Follow me on twitter and facebook.