Wolf Parade - "Cloud Shadow On The Mountain". Jack Gala had been hitting home-runs for so long that when on July 28th, a Wednesday, he stepped to the plate and struck out - he was as happy as a pig in shit. His teammates sagged, the coach drooped, fans across the stadium were rending their clothes. But Jack Gala was tossing his cap, high-fiving his rivals, leaping and whooping and lifting his face to the sky. He skipped the press conference. He ran out the arena's back door, jumped on his motorbike, threaded the boulevards til he was home. "Jackie, let's get married," he said to his girlfriend. He called his mother: "Ma, it's me." He walked up and down the block, paying for all the neighbours' kids' college educations. Jack Gala was reinvented. Jack Gala was free. [buy Expo 86]

Lucien Midnight - "Major Tom". It's taken me a couple years to track down this cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity". We heard it in a rental car, across the radio. Google was not very helpful. These many months later I am gratified to uncover the song and still find it very good. I am wary of covers. They must justify their existence. You will find none of Seu Jorge's anemic Bowie retakes on this blog. You will not hear the inane acoustic versions of "Paper Planes" or "Since U Been Gone". These can be fun in the moment, round the campfire; but they are blown bubbles, potato-chips, knock-knock jokes. Covers are interpretations, and some interpreters are better than others. Some mark the material, some mimic it. Some rekindle the songs in their own way. Lucien Midnight does not just recreate Bowie's "Oddity" with acoustic guitar, evening air, crickets. His Major Tom is a different character. There is more anger, submerged; more love for his "blonde" back home. He is not just stranded out in space - he says he is fucké, ben' buzzé, stoned. Some of this is in the lyrics, loosely & brilliantly translated. But mostly it's in the everything. An old song, telling a different tale. Just slightly different. It's lovely. If only it didn't end so abruptly. [MySpace]

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