Stella Chiweshe - "Njuzu"

Stella Chiweshe, the Queen of the Mbira, sings in Shona, a language I don’t understand, so I can’t say for sure that her lyrics ask the question that her music begs, i.e. Who plays video games in the middle of a construction site? but I can say for sure that her song is as sad as a manatee is mammalian, a ‘mom’ palindromic. Ancient sounds are thrown against an electric fence, while, in fugue, the vocalist debates herself, takes losses in direct proportion to victories. [Buy]

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El Perro Del Mar - "I Can't Talk About It"

Usually, the purpose of speech is to communicate a message, so it is therefore generally undesirable to say the opposite of what you mean (irony excluded). It’s somewhat perverse then that in “I Can’t Talk About It,” that salty sea dog El Perro Del Mar sounds like she’s singing, “I can really talk about it,” as if she were a western European medievalist preparing to answer a question on the Bayeux Tapestry. Though the intention is somewhat more depressive and dispossessed, the woman sounds like a braggart, a braggadocio, full of bravura, if not like a bravo, some bracken, a broadside. For fans of modern-day Motown, latter-day Christmas, Xanax, Zoloft, etc. [Buy]