Category Archives: Music

#796: Kid Cudi ft. Kanye West & Common – Make Her Say

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‘Make Her Say’, a song by Kid Cudi featuring Kanye West and Common, leaked in the early months of 2009, I remember that happening quite well. I was in Year 9, couldn’t tell you the US equivalent, and my friend who was always visiting websites for new music ended up downloading it. He showed it to everyone. When you’re 14 you’re trying to impress anyone you can. That he was able to get this download was a big deal for him, I guess.

Anyway, ‘Make Her Say’ was originally titled ‘I Poke Her Face’, reflecting the sexual content in the lyrics and also as a nod to the Lady Gaga sample that is heavily featured in the track. The title wasn’t appropriate for radio, thus the change in name. It features Cudi, West and Common rapping about having their eyes on women and detailing their own sexual fantasies about them. It’s all in good heart, even if it’s all a bit dirty. Talk about threesomes and spitting/swallowing is all in there, but the main act that’s highlighted is fellatio and how satisfying it is.

The track is actually very minimal in production, I’ve realised. I think this video is what Kanye took the ‘Poker Face’ sample from, and he just spliced it up, put a drum beat over it and made it a new song. Work’s greatly, though. Especially the way that Gaga’s vocals pop up here and there and work alongside the verses from Cudi, West and Common. The original leak had a full minute of Lady Gaga singing at the end; that’s the version I still listen to today. That was cut down for the album for reasons I don’t know.

#795: Pavement – Major Leagues

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No kidding around here. I think Pavement’s ‘Major Leagues’ might be one of my favourite songs of all time. Every time that first kick drum comes in with that blanket of reverberated piano, guitar and all the rest, I’m just taken to another place. Terror Twilight is one of my favourite albums; ‘Major Leagues’ comes near the midway point of it, and it continues the mellow and very chilled vibes that the album establishes from track one. I’ve written a whole post dedicated to that record. Have a read when you have the time.

Like many other Pavement songs, it’s one where no one but Stephen Malkmus could explain what it truly means. For me, I think it’s a track about relationships, taking them seriously or not taking them seriously at all. Not being afraid to take things on to the next step and looking at the bigger picture, which I think the whole ‘bring on the major leagues’ refrain refers to. But then there are lyrics about magic Christians and kissing wine that can leave you clueless. It’s typical Pavement/Malkmus stuff, and it always works so well. “Lip balm on watery clay/Relationships, hey hey hey” is one of the best opening lyrics to a song too. Just want to say.

Its music video, directed by Lance Bangs, is also up there on the list in my head of favourite music videos. It features Stephen Malkmus miming to the song, and is intercut with footage of the band playing mini-golf and practising in the studio during the making of Terror Twilight. I had to know more about the making of it, so I contacted Bangs on Twitter. He told me that the scenes with Malkmus were filmed in the Mima Mounds Natural Preserve in Washington State, while the mini-golf scenes were filmed in Portland on 82nd Street, at a place that “closed/went out of business”. So there you go. You want to travel to places associated with Pavement, there are two for you. Whenever we are able to travel again. There is another official video for ‘Major Leagues’ which has a boxing theme; I don’t think that one is as good.

#794: John Linnell – Maine

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Another great one from John Linnell’s State Songs. ‘Maine’ seems like an obvious choice for single if it were placed in the hands of any other artist/band/whatever. It wasn’t in this case, and ‘Montana’ was. But ‘Maine’ is a definite ear-pleaser from the second it starts, and something of an ode to bands from the 60s like The Monkees and The Beatles.

I’ve always enjoyed ‘Maine’ just for the way it sounds. Linnell delivers his vocal very calmly over the top of it, and relaxed while these cascading piano lines support the track in 12/8 time. It’s all in triplets. But I’ll try and consider the lyrical content just for you people. It’s something of a love song, but it’s not, and it seems that the main subject is duality (‘the heaven below’, ‘the hell from above’)…. a bit like ‘Hello, Goodbye’ by the Beatles. You see, 60s. There’s also a reference to ‘Daydream Believer’ in there too.

‘Maine’ was released on State Songs in 1999, but had already been recorded five years prior. It was released in a different mix on an EP, and that version is below. It’s all the same goodness. I’ll even put the demo on here too because I like the song so much.

#793: Blur – Magpie

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Originally, ‘Magpie’ by Blur was released as a B-side on their ‘Girls & Boys’ single in 1994. Years and years later in 2012, the band released their whole discography and a few other discs of bonus stuff in a boxset commemorating the 21st anniversary of their first album, Leisure. Each of their albums received a second disc of B-side material. Parklife, the album that ‘Girls & Boys’ can be found on, included ‘Magpie’ in this new form. Just like its A-side counterpart is the main album opener, ‘Magpie’ is the introductory track to the B-side disc.

The song goes back to the days of late 1992, when the band were in the midst of recording their second album Modern Life Is Rubbish. It was worked on again during the Parklife sessions, but Damon Albarn couldn’t get some great lyrics down. In the end, he sang the words of a poem by William Blake called ‘The Poison Tree’. The chorus is made of only one original line, in which the title is sung. If you hear this track and really like, you may think, “Well, why was this left of Parklife?” I don’t have an certain answer that would please you. I would say that it would have probably sounded a bit out of place. If the song had been completed in time for Modern Life though, I think it would have been a shoo-in for the final tracklist.

There was a point in 2013/14 where I was constantly listening to this track. Dave Rowntree’s Bonham-esque drumming performance always got me hyped up. The cymbals and snare sound much louder than everything else in the mix. Plus, it’s almost a monoaural track where the instruments and vocals are all bunched up in the middle. It makes the track sound just a lot busier and messy which I’m into. The rhythm stops and starts in the verses, Alex James plays a very groovy bassline in those. Graham Coxon introduces it all with a soaring guitar riff that plays throughout. And with a minute to go, there’s this huge freakout where Rowntree just goes mad on the drums and Coxon closes things out with a wandering chord progression. It’s a definite ride. It, along with many others, showed me that Blur weren’t too bad on the B-sides either.

#792: They Might Be Giants – Madam, I Challenge You to a Duel

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Back in 2015, They Might Be Giants revived their iconic Dial-A-Song system, but delivered it in a very different way. Starting from the first week of January, the group released one new song every week. When they were done, the majority of the 52 songs were released on three albums: 2015’s Glean, Why?, and the following year’s Phone Power.

‘Madam’ was the second song in that 52-week run. It was an exciting time for a They Might Be Giants fan. I vaguely remember listening to the track on the day of its initial release thinking it was okay. It wasn’t until I gave Glean a full listen some time later that I truly appreciated it. Here’s a song in which John Flansburgh, who takes on this viewpoint of a very formal person, challenges a lady to a duel which you’re not really meant to do as a person of a high status. The band have always been good at building narrators up one way and then suddenly switching the narrative to make them look like terrible people.

This is a majorly piano-led track by the group, which is a bit rare for them. I think that’s what got to me when I originally heard it in 2015. Flansburgh sings with a breathy, kind of deep tone to his voice, which he would employ a lot of times on older albums, but I guess aging would affect your vocal range. The song just sounds good, you know? It’s like a soundtrack to a quaint ball, or something. Out of 910 songs on This Might Be a Wiki, the track is rated #488 by TMBG fans. That more or less categorises it as one of the average They songs. A bit unfair, I would say. I enjoy it a lot.