the of mirror eye

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been listening non-stop to a couple of tunes. They all just happened to be from artists/compilations that I’ve featured before, so I decided to put them all together in this post.

* Doris Duke: He’s Gone (6.5 mb)
From Dave Godin’s Deep Soul Treasures Vol 3 : Kent Soul : CDKEND 200

I guess, technically, I haven’t really featured this compilation. I posted some tracks from Volume 2 in this incredible series, instead. But everything I said about Volume 2 goes just the same for this one. In fact, I think all four in this series are totally essential. This track, in particular, really gets me. The track starts off with a simple piano melody with drum accents. Then Doris Duke starts singing. And it’s all over from there. Her voice is magnificent. A deep, dark, sultry voice that gets my heart going everytime. Then, and this is where it starts to get exciting, about 3:40 into the piece, they bring it down a little, just voice, piano and drums. You know something’s gonna happen soon. And at 3:56, things start happening. And I just love when that snare starts up again with it’s constant patter. You can never tell when the drummer is going to emphasize a beat or not. Brilliant. I can listen to that last minute of song over and over and over.

* Devendra Banhart: The Light Come On In The Middle Of The Night (6.5 mb)
From Lille Vega : Oct 15, 2004 : Copenhagen, Denmark

I wrote about Devendra Banhart shortly before I stupidly erased my whole site. So, look here and go to the second section down to see what I thought about him then. This one comes from a concert in 2004 at Lille Vega. This is actually a song by CocoRosie, who also joined him on stage for it. What I really love about this song is that even though they, Devendra Banhart and the gal from CocoRosie (I’m not sure which one is singing here), both have very unique vocal stylings, they somehow manage to mesh perfectly together.

* Guided By Voices: Alone, Stinking And Unafraid (4.5 mb)
From Sokol Underground : Apr 08, 2000 : Omaha, Nebraska

I wrote about Guided By Voices (RIP) very early on and didn’t manage to salvage it after my mass deletion. This band rocks, plain and simple. Robert Pollard (their intrepid leader) manages to come up with song after song of pure rock genius. They’ve unfortunately disbanded, playing their final shows at the Metro in Chicago over New Year’s Eve. But don’t fret, I’m sure Robert Pollard will be releasing albums for years to come. I absolutely love this song. Especially when the chorus kicks in: this was that look > that has driven me > from the parade > left me alone > stinking and unafraid > stinking and unafraid…

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