The Contenders Vol. 6: The songs we can't stop playing this week
NPR Music
NPR
4.3 • 3.3K Ratings
🗓️ 2 April 2024
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Featured artists and songs:
1. Gustaf: "Starting and Staring," from 'Package, Pt. 2'
2. Mustafa: "Imaan" (Single)
3. Adrianne Lenker: "No Machine," from 'Bright Future'
4. Charlotte Day Wilson: "Canopy," from 'Cyan Blue'
5. Gary Clark Jr.: "Maktub," from 'JPEG RAW'
6. Nourished by Time: "Hell of a Ride," from 'Catching Chickens'
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This message comes from NPR sponsor Organic Valley, a co-op of small organic family farms dedicated to producing food that promotes respect for the dignity and interdependence of all life. |
| 0:12.0 | Discover their milk at ovie. |
| 0:13.9 | COOP slash ethically sourced. |
| 0:17.2 | So a number of years ago we did this episode |
| 0:19.8 | that we called Just Sing the Damn Song. |
| 0:23.0 | Just Sing the Damn Song. |
| 0:24.4 | It was basically this debate over Speak Singing. |
| 0:28.4 | You know, Speak Singing versus more melodic singing. |
| 0:30.9 | You know, I've always preferred really strong melodies. It's melody is the thing that I come to first. |
| 0:35.8 | I don't really like speak singing. I like rap, but I don't like that sort of monotone |
| 0:42.0 | speak singing. You hear like in a lot of 80s new wave music, you know, that's sort of that da da da da da da da da da da da. |
| 0:49.1 | You know, I always come to melody first, then maybe production and progression and then like lyrics last. |
| 0:54.0 | Sheldon Pierce, where do you come down on this great divide? |
| 0:58.0 | Yeah, you know, I think it has its place. |
| 1:01.0 | Squid is one of my favorite bands and I think Chays Lons by Wetleg is probably one of the best songs of the decade so far. |
| 1:09.0 | So I'm partial to the practice. |
| 1:11.5 | I can see how it can be very annoying especially if you're looking for a |
| 1:16.6 | certain kind of thing out of your music but I also think it can be disarming in a |
| 1:21.2 | way that is sort of really affecting for a certain kind of song. |
| 1:26.6 | It has to be deployed just right obviously. |
| 1:29.9 | And sometimes a hint of irony can help, but generally I'm all for sort of letting artists like probe that side of their brain. |
| 1:39.2 | Yeah, I think one of the reasons it started to emerge is, know somebody did it first and other artists |
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