As Neko Case once said, “This song is for the lovers… so where’s mine?”

It’s so hard to keep track of what you’re supposed to think of Valentine’s Day. Testament to love in all its forms? Harmless holiday? Fiesta of bitterness? Open season on too-precious-by-half couples in love? An excuse by confectioners great and small to sell lots of product in chintzy red boxes? Tuesday? Whatever the case, the party line is that it has something to do with being in love. And frankly, if it avoids another shitstorm of “War On Christmas” news stories, I’ll go with it.

So here’s a love song, in more ways in one. This is Lisa Marr’s version of “New York City,” a song made popular by They Might Be Giants but first done by Marr’s old Vancouver twee-pop band, Cub. It’s a testament to the strength of Marr’s songwriting that “New York City” works equally well as a grungy cuddlecore song (Cub), a fairly straightforward modern rock song (They Might Be Giants) and a stripped-down ballad (this live version, recorded for WHFR in Detroit). It’s also a sweet song about the sheer awesomeness of giddy teenager love, which I think might be one of the strongest forces in the universe—I swear, you can look it up and everything.

When the White Stripes announced that the rumours they’d be shilling for Coca-Cola were true, there was a bit of an uproar over the matter. That’s nothing new; the commercial jingle sell-out line of discussion is older than dirt. What was different this time around was that the Stripes were going to write a brand new song specifically for the campaign, thus sidestepping neatly their professed policy of never selling off one of their released songs for an ad. This isn’t the first time an artist has written a song specifically for an advertiser, either, but lately there’s been a lot more emphasis on finding just the right obscure indie track to put in your commercials—a Madison Avenue game of who’s got the biggest, coolest record collection. And if there’s one thing Madison Avenue wants to be all about, it’s knowing what’s cool.

Jim Guthrie isn’t the White Stripes; he will probably never be on Coke’s radar, let alone be asked to offer up a custom song for a grand payoff. But if you’re Canadian and watch television, you’ve already heard the song he’s written specifically for an ad campaign: “Hands In My Pocket” is the sprightly little tune playing in the Capital One commercials featuring men in business suits with—you guessed it—hands in the pockets of people without Capital One credit cards. Most commercials are either an excuse to associate another hip song with your brand identity (hello Mitsubishi) or else just in need of generic background music (remember the Civic commercial with M.I.A.’s “Galang”? The music’s been replaced recently with a generic rock track). If you didn’t know that one half of Royal City was also the man behind this song, though, the Capital One commercial would probably fly right past you; like a finely tuned movie soundtrack, you just don’t notice the music as an entity in its own right. It’s just a spectacularly well executed jingle.

And a bit more besides. Guthrie, in his infinite wisdom, didn’t tailor “Hands In My Pocket” too specifically to the commercial. He wrote tightly to the ad’s concept, of course, but not to the ad’s running time. The full-length result, also available on his website, is a better than average throwaway track that you can feel free to enjoy when you’re far away from any television set. It’s also a nice calling card for Guthrie, who might find some new fans thanks to the gambit. After all, it is one of the catchiest tunes playing on Canadian television today.

A friend of mine once described Beth Orton as the folkie electronica goddess, and a couple of years ago that wouldn’t been an apt description. When she first arrived on the scene with Trailer Park in the late 90s, audiences knew her as one of the sirens backing up William Orbit and the Chemical Brothers on various tracks. And while Trailer Park was no big-beat extravaganza, there were enough subtle electronic effects to make Orton stand out from the pack of female singer-songwriters. Turns out she was just slightly ahead of her time; sticking to much the same formula but gradually becoming more ambitious with the arrangements, Orton found herself competing against more and more artists for the same kind of sound. By 2002’s Daybreaker we’d seen and heard it all before, and without any fresh, compelling material to feed off of, it seemed like Orton had come to a crossroads.

Comfort of Strangers, then, would appear to be a sharp left turn; eschewing the electronica-lite backing tracks and the extravagant string sections of old, Orton has pared down to much simpler arrangements, and if she once straddled the line between guitar-based folk and beat-based electronica, she’s definitely chosen a side this time. So immediately you can start figuring out where you’ll stand on her latest album: if your favourite Beth Orton song is something like “Pass In Time,” the delicate ballad she sang with Terry Callier on Central Reservation, chances are you’ll want to give the album a try. If your favourite Beth Orton song is more like “Stars All Seem To Weep,” a dark electronic number arranged and produced by Ben Watt of Everything But The Girl fame, then you probably won’t find as much to like here.

The album comes out next week, and so in-depth apprisals will have to wait. The mere fact that Ryan Adams is nowhere to be found in the credits, however, is enough to give hope to those who found Daybreaker a disappointment.