motel de moka

Moka is preparing a big end of decade list, so I thought I make few companion lists along with it. A look back and summary for where MdM has gone.

Ani DiFranco - Cloud Blood
To the Teeth (Righteous Babe. 1999)

To the Teeth is the last album I remember buying because I heard it on radio. I had been driving all day when this song come in and air changes. It is not just another tune, but somebody shared her work about a journey, something that I was doing too. In a way it was the classic story about how a song connect and moment sneaks up. Around this time internet Amazon started selling CD and mp3 rages over the net, first generation of portable mp3 emerged and people start writing about music online. How recording music reaches me changed forever. Music on radio never has the same impact anymore. A new era begun.

Feist - Gatekeeper
Let It Die (Arts & Crafts. 2004)

A beautiful song with pure lyricism and honest instrumentation. Gatekeeper is an intensely detailed small room acoustic piece. Maybe it’s a bit nonsense to claim that the blog made this song. But I think the blog played significant part spreading Feist’s work. It appeals to everybody because in the early days of mp3 blogging, so many of mp3 bloggers were starting musicians or people who works in recording community and this type of delicate sound with lyricism was missing in radio and television. She is a media darling now.

Sufjan Stevens - Casimir Pulaski Day
Illinois (Asthmatic Kitty. 2005)

Not many people know that this earnest folksy song was cover of Big Black, a hardcore punk from Illinois. Sufjan Steven interpretation defied expectation. He captured what a lot of people think was not offered by mtv and the like. A delicate work on deceivingly simple daily subject instead of Britney Spear or Mariah Carey mega media drama. Sufjan Steven was a legit blog favorite because of that and a superstar for all that matter. Everybody posted and talked about him endlessly around 2005 and 2006, people gives loves to smaller recording labels output like Asmatic Kitty, Fat Cats, Domino. The mp3 blog scene was born. Songs were not merely reaction to the airwave, but distinct preference.

Chavela Vargas - Macorina
Chavela at Carnegie Hall (Wea Spain. 2003)

Moka lifted her eyebrows when I posted this. But I thought what Vargas work and what she is saying is exactly what need to be on the blog. Breaking boundaries and explores all corners of music. It’s celebratory and grand. The crowd roars.

Ray LaMontagne - Crazy
online unofficial released? (2006)

The year was 2006. The british TV found Gnarls Barkley - Danger Mouse and Cee Loo duo - hip-hop soul piece. And it quickly spread across the atlantic. Before long St. Elsewhere was released. I have deep suspicion Gnarls Barkley started the elaborate online viral marketing for themselves. In between that time Moka posted Ray LaMontagne cover of Crazy. MdM traffic trippled that day and MdM was inside 20 top mp3 blogs. Gnarls Barkley won Grammy and was a legit hit of mid first decade of 21st century. In the meantime we still don’t know if Ray LaMontagne cover can bought officially somewhere or what crazy costum Gnarls Barkley will come up next.

Cat Power - The Greatest
The Greatest (Matador Records. 2005)

Heart breakingly pretty song by blog darling Cat Power. Around the time of this album release the biggest of mp3 blogs are actually influential enough to push an album along in a chart. People pay attention because the blog consistently pointed out interesting works for the mp3 era. The industry started sending people. The second biggest indie label group Beggar Banquet begun interacting actively with blogs while trying to sort out the legality mp3 files for promotion before later joining an industry cartel group dealing with music online. MdM decided to hard ban all major labels work and put a break on all BB output along with them.

Nouvelle Vague - Guns Of Brixton
Nouvelle Vague (Luaka Bop. 2004)

When they kick out your front door. How you gonna come? With your hands on your head. Or on the trigger of your gun? You can crush us.
You can bruise us. But you’ll have to answer to. A fun cover of Clash’es punk classic, in bossa nova acoustic no less. I thought this innocent Parisian project captures perfectly what the blog was doing. The rebellious independent energy of early punk. Earnest fun tunes, high sophistication, wrapped in simple idea in layers of styles. There is nothing new in what the blog is doing, except following what people has been doing for ages. Sharing fun ideas.

Animal Collective - My Girls
Merriweather Post Pavilion (Domino. 2009)

Here we are at the last year of first decade. Another blog favorite that never makes sense to radio because it sounds so terrible on 96kbps. A lo-fi folktronica with musical root in psych rock and late 60’s highland country side. Like in the early days the big public suspicion is that it’s all a big insider joke started few bloggers instead of interesting work ahead of its time.