From a message board I’m on: Post an mp3 of a song that gives you very strong memories of a specific time in your life, no matter how mundane the memory may seem.

I stuck around for the summer in Kingston, Ontario after wrapping up my sophomore year in college. I had one night class on Media and Society, where we watched horror films from the 80s and related it all back to family dynamics and the changing role of the child as a threat to the American family (Carrie, The Exorcist) or as something to be protected (Poltergeist, Parents). Afterwards a couple of us would drive over to a friend’s place and watch the Leafs game; it’s the only time I’ve ever come close to following hockey during the regular season.

Aside from that, though, there was dick all to do and plenty of time to kill, and on top of all that I was an insomniac. So every so often, after midnight, I’d hop on the bike and ride down to the shore of Lake Ontario, towards the hospital, through all the neighbourhoods with the empty student houses, and back to my tiny little third-storey room with a giant old oak tree by the window. All the while, this album was the soundtrack.

I’ve never had a more peaceful time in my life before or since. I really miss it.

My favorite thing about music is how it triggers memories—not of any particular event, but something more impressionistic, a general mood and atmosphere about a certain period of your life. For me, a lot of music tends to attach itself to a particular season, which is why I don’t listen to a whole lot of Built To Spill during the winter, and generally put away the Mazzy Star when it’s air conditioning season. Dreamer’s Book, Mascott’s second album, came out just after New Year’s 2004. Kendall Jane Meade, the woman behind Mascott, prefers to say “near Valentine’s Day, 2004,” as noted on the Red Panda website. I think she could’ve pushed it further; Dreamer’s Book is the record I pull out when spring is near. The album so perfectly evokes memories of flowering trees and crisp water melting through sidewalk ice, of the first tentative days of jacket-free weather and the first spring bike ride.

Guess what? Today’s the first day of spring in the northern hemisphere. And even though it seems half of North America is still covered in snow, fret not: Kendall Jane Meade’s blissful brand of low-key dream pop is the musical equivalent of a spring thaw. Apparently Mascott has another album in the works, but in the meantime, there’s Dreamer’s Book to keep me company. It was one of my favorite albums of 2004, and it’s still one of my favorites today.

Not enough Neko Case lately, so here’s a contribution you might not have heard. “Bowling Green,” a song Case originally did for her debut, The Virginian. This version comes from a 2000 Peel Session, which impressed the late John Peel so much that he invited Case back for an encore on his show a year later—but not before naming “Twist The Knife” his favorite single of 2000. It’s a bit hard to tell from the track, but she sang the entire set with a cold.

Yeah, she’s that great.

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.

So we’re nearing the end of best-of-year season; the Village Voice Pazz and Jop list (or Jop and Pazz, or whatever the hell it’s called) will be out sometime in the next month or so, but pretty much else has already shot their load. This is bad news for music lovers, because rarely does January have much to offer in the way of new releases. The next Nellie McKay album, set for an early January release, has been set back due to a falling out with Columbia Records, so there goes the one high-profile release on the schedule (at least, the only one I’m aware of).

But all is not lost for January, and that’s largely thanks to Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins. The frontwoman for Rilo Kiley has recorded an album of material without Blake Sennett and the gang, and Rabbit Fur Coat is due out on the 24th. As is the case with nearly everything else these days, the album leaked months ago, and the word is that it’s really quite good. Lewis has, in recent years, transformed as a singer; on The Execution Of All Things Lewis came off as a bit quirky, a bit sardonic, a bit vulnerable. The way she sang songs like “The Good That Won’t Come Out” and “My Slumbering Heart,” it was as if Lewis was this girl you’ve known since grade school, and she would tell you stories in a way that felt like she was letting you in on a big secret, and it was totally between you and her, and wasn’t that kinda cool? It was all very low-key and personal. But now those stories are fleshed out, and Lewis has grown into the role of the Entertainer. She’s a much better singer now, relying less and less on that sardonic voice she used to use. Now she’s telling those same stories to enraptured audiences across the country. And it’s not the same anymore—it doesn’t feel like a secret conspiracy of two the way it did before—but her voice so much more confident, more expressive. She’s a better storyteller now, and you can’t help but appreciate the craft and skill she puts into everything, even as you wish she could still tell you stories as if they were meant just for you.

I’m not entirely sure how much of that story had to do with Jenny Lewis, but I hope you get the idea.

The latest Cardigans album, Super Extra Gravity, may not even be out in Canada yet; as with a lot of albums I heard last year, it’s stuck in a sort of import limbo. You can get a copy, but no one really knows if there’s a domestic release. You’ll probably pay a low enough price for the album that you’ll wonder if it’s from Europe, but still pricey enough that you’ll feel burned if it’s not. Anyways, Super Extra Gravity is an album I have yet to purchase, but have had the opportunity to listen to—just not very often, and not very closely. Until last month, anyways, too late to make the end-of-year review.

On the 2005 review, Super Extra Gravity would probably merit an honourable mention. After the group’s implosion after Gran Turismo, the Cardigans have been pursuing less mainstream audiences—and they’re doing it by playing more mainstream music. No longer in fashion, the Cardigans had settled down nicely into middle adulthood with Long Gone Before Daylight, a subdued effort that went a long way towards erasing the group’s squeaky clean pop image in ways Gran Turismo never could. It was a genuine sounding album, full of warmth and subtle pleasures, and the second half of the album comes together better than any Cardigans effort before or since. Unfortunately, that includes Super Extra Gravity, which never quite coalesces into a unified whole the way Daylight did. To make matters worse, Super Extra Gravity ends with a track called “And Then You Kissed Me II,” which is—you guessed it—distantly related to “And Then You Kissed Me” off of Daylight. The two sound similar enough in melody that you’ll immediately hear the connection, but the new song is inferior. Same goes for “Don’t Blame Your Daughter (Diamonds),” which may not have nicked the hook from “Feathers and Down” consciously, but is much worse off for doing so.

But when the Cardigans aren’t busy repeating history, they actually do a great job. Super Extra Gravity takes a bit longer to like than Daylight, almost entirely due to the scattershot selection of songs this time around. But a lot of them are keepers: “Godspell,” “I Need Some Fine Wine and You Need To Be Nicer,” “In The Round” and “Good Morning Joan” have little in common except their ability to burrow into your head. Super Extra Gravity managed a bizarre feat few other albums did last year: the songs were catchy enough that I could hum their melodies mindlessly, but rarely did I know which song I was humming, or even who played the song. Have the Cardigans tapped some secret underground well of universal pop songwriting, or are they still too generic for their own good? Whatever the answer, Super Extra Gravity has some superb songs on it, and that’s certainly enough to make it a good album, if maybe not a great one.

[review 2005: the best of the year]

La De Da was a record made essentially on a whim. Plaskett was invited by Bob Hoag, a sound engineer in Arizona and a big fan of his work as the Joel Plaskett Emergency, to come by the Phoenix studio any time to cut a couple of tracks. After touring with his band, the Emergency, to support 2003’s Truthfully Truthfully, Plaskett found himself with a couple of songs that called for a quieter, more contemplative approach. So he emailed his friend the sound engineer and took him up on the offer. When Plaskett asked about studio rates, Hoag’s response was a pleasant surprise: it’s on the house, you can stay with me and my wife, and we’ve got a pool. Who could possibly turn that down?

It kills me that I haven’t had the chance to take La De Da on a roadtrip, because this album’s made for a long drive through back roads and empty highways. Not surprising, since Plaskett essentially wrote most of the album on the drive from Halifax to Phoenix. But he’s always written songs about travelling; “Light Of The Moon,” from Down By The Khyber, is just one of his many songs about life on the road, inspired by the many cross-country tours he’s been on with the Emergency and as the frontman for the late, lamented Thrush Hermit. “Love This Town” is his latest paean, with some choice words for the inhabitants of Kelowna, apparently unable to recognize a great performer when they see one. “Wishing Well,” another favourite, sounds like it’d be right at home coming out of the AM radio in a beat-up pickup truck. And then there’s “Natural Disaster,” which really does act as a sort of travelogue.

La De Da is at its best when it focuses on particular characters. “Lying on a Beach,” about the doldrums of office life, is full of throwaway lyrical gems like “all you star-spangled scanners / trying to photocopy moonlight” and “we never get our hands dirty / but paradise is never this clean.” “Nina and Albert,” based on an overheard conversation between a woman and her jealous boyfriend, was originally conceived as a duet with Neko Case. But even without her talents, Plaskett breathes life into the lovers’ quarrel, imbuing Nina and Albert with vulnerability and longing. It’s a good thing Plaskett uses those storytelling abilities for good.

After the occasionally contrived theatrics of Truthfully Truthfully, it’s reassuring to know Plaskett hasn’t given himself over to arena rock banality. La De Da is a low-key album, and probably the quietest of his career, but it’s a thoroughly rewarding listen. They say that sometimes the best things in life are free. I’m sure Bob Hoag and Joel Plaskett would agree.

[review 2005: the best of the year]

Internet marketing, whether intentional or unplanned, has already produced its share of runaway hits. Entire trees have been felled so that newspapers and magazines could gaze in starry-eyed wonder at Broken Social Scene’s journey to the heavens, propelled on the rocket fuel of Pitchfork praise. There’s that whole Crazy Frog thing, which could never have happened without the internet’s ability to serve cheap ringtones to thousands of cellphones at any time or any place. And then there’s the story of Wilco and Fiona Apple, who both managed to leverage internet support to get their leaked albums released for real—a tactic that worked so well for Wilco that even today, people wonder if it wasn’t all part of some master plan by Warner (whose subsidiary, Nonesuch, eventually released Yankee Hotel Foxtrot).

But if you’re trying to spread the word about your album, there’s nothing better than putting the whole thing on the internet, free of charge and for anyone to download. It’s a trick that Toronto singer/songwriter Tamara Williamson tried a couple of years back; she wrote back then that selling records didn’t matter that much to her, since she made more money as a gardener anyways. Imagine if she’d just waited a few years and put some effort into getting the word out; she could’ve been Monika Bullette. As The Smudge of Ashen Fluff put it, “Monika Bullette has been hunting down all the mp3 blogs and sending them e-mail messages. She’s almost as efficient as EMI.” Here’s a hint to all you starving musicians hoping to use The Internet as a promotion medium: greeting the person you’re emailing by name does wonders. It worked for Bullette, and it can work for you too.

But I’ve said too much about Bullette’s can-do spirit and unusually successful internet campaign. What about her music? The best thing about writing about Bullette is that she’s got a hook (the internet promotion) and she’s got the goods to boot. The Secrets is deliciously ramshackle, seemingly the product of an eccentric musical genius with a large record collection and a penchant for improvisation. Whether it’s the retro garage of “Show Me,” the winsome guitar pop of “What Love Can Do Without” or the eerie industrial dirge of “Uneasy,” Bullette demonstrates a solid grasp of a wide variety of genres. The Secrets never sounds like more than the sum of its parts because the parts are so disparate, but for once this is a forgivable sin; there isn’t a single song on the album that isn’t a great listen. But don’t take my word for it; like I said before, the entire album can be yours for the taking. And just like Tamara Williamson’s internet release, if you end up buying The Secrets, it comes with a pretty hand-crafted cover. How can you lose?