Paul McCartney - hope of deliverance, 1993

"A soft, acoustic-anchored arrangement clips along at a breezy pace. Spanish cultural influences and handclappin' rhythms gives the track a unique and refreshing vibe that will please programmers at pop, AC, and album-rock levels. Like a visit from a dear old friend."

Muzz - red western sky, 2020

"‘Red Western Sky‘ is a track taken from Muzz’ debut, self-titled album that was released back in June. It’s a dark track with a forlorn, yearning edge to it. ‘Red Western Sky’ is expansive with various intricate, even delicate brass parts which add a more tender side to it. Something sounds familiar about the track, you say? Muzz are a a “supergroup” comprised of Paul Banks (Interpol), Matt Barrick (The Walkmen) and Josh Kaufman!"

Club 8 - kill kill kill, 2013

“We stole the song title from McCarthy,” says songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Johan Angergård. “As much as I love them the topic of “kill kill kill kill” (yes, we settled with one “kill” less…) felt really wrong. They were offended by animal right activists caring more about animals than people. Which, of course, is not true. I believe most would be happy if animals were treated as animals in opposite to dead, manufactured products.”

The Project - romero, 2012

"The Project is an extraordinary musical endeavor born out of love - love for the Church, love for music and, perhaps most importantly, love for friends."

Sufjan Stevens - mercury live, 2017

"Planetarium is a collaborative album featuring Bryce Dessner of the indie rock band The National, drummer James McAlister, contemporary classical music composer and arranger Nico Muhly, and singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens."

REM - the one i love, 1987

"I've always left myself pretty open to interpretation. It's probably better that they just think it's a love song at this point."

Neil Young - powderfinger live, 2016

"Powderfinger" opens the second side of Neil Young's classic Rust Never Sleeps album, heralding the record's shift from the delicate and elegiac acoustic approach of the first half to the desperate, corrosive sound of Crazy Horse in full electric stride; it's a sudden, almost blindsiding metamorphosis, which is entirely the point -- it's the shot you never saw coming. As the centerpiece of Young's epic meditation on history, mortality, and violence, "Powderfinger" is, like so many of the album's songs, an epitaph. Set in the Old West, it tells the story of a young man left virtually alone to defend his family and frontier settlement against attack, sacrificing his life not in a blaze of glory but in the paralyzed grip of indecision and fear. Although "Powderfinger"'s vividly poetic first-person narrative evokes traditional folk storytelling, Crazy Horse's performance is pure, incendiary rock & roll, with Young's riveting guitar solos expanding to mythic proportions as the song builds toward its harrowing climax. "Just think of me as one you never figured/Would fade away so young/With so much left undone," the fallen hero sings from beyond the grave, echoing Rust Never Sleeps' central and oft-quoted maxim that "It's better to burn out than to fade away"; of course, for better or worse, rock & roll guarantees your immortality either way."

The Cure - friday i'm in love, 1992

"Robert Smith, the song's primary writer, described it in 1992 as both "a throw your hands in the air, let's get happy kind of record" and "a very naïve, happy type of pop song."

James - moving on, 2014

"Booth directly addressed his mother's death in "Moving On", though the chorus had been written before that event. It opens with a loop section done by Davies and Dingel, which Booth likened to funeral bells. The track was compared to British Sea Power, while during the chorus Booth channelled James Dean Bradfield of Manic Street Preachers."

The New Pornographers - champions of red wine, 2014

“Champions of Red Wine” is uptempo and brilliantly played and produced, with a powerful, anchoring vocal chorus that builds up to the entry of the song’s lead singer, American singer-songwriter Neko Case, and fills spaces between her early lines then revisits later as a kind of tagline for the piece. The song starts with an electric guitar and arpeggiated synthesizer (plus a tambourine), and the melody kicks into gear once the drummer comes in. (Interesting sidebar: in a 2014 interview with the American non-profit National Public Radio, Case and songwriter Newman talk about the album Brill Bruisers and how, during the recording of the song, he was singing lead and Case was backup; in production, he removed his vocal from the mix and felt her singing was much better for the piece). The meaning of “Champions of Red Wine” is unclear."

REM - so central rain, 1984

"i don't think it's about anything so specific...just about feeling guilty for things that were never in your hands to begin with...or not having the foresight to see an opportunity pass until there's no turning back..."

Beirut - at once live, 2015

"This is gonna sound like a romantic story, but when I was in Paris I saw this band of kids that all bought pawn shop instruments like busted up tubas and trumpets and stuff, and they would all wander around Paris, playing. They weren’t great musicians or anything, but it sounded awesome and was a lot of fun. I kind of wanted to mimic that idea. That’s why I’m working with…basically we are all amateurs. No way in hell could I ever revert back to a guitar-bass-drum kind of band. I can’t write for that. I don’t really even like the sound that much."

Father John Misty - god's favorite customer, 2018

"in remaining tight-lipped, this taciturn new aspect to Father John Misty might be his most genuinely sincere, and his most profound"

Muzz - knuckleduster, 2020

"Exclusively discussing “Knuckleduster” for American Songwriter, Josh Kaufman says that the track “was the first track we recorded and the last one to get finished. We re-cut it several different ways only to end up with the first take. This song feels like a flashback of old love, in the middle of a speedy new life adventure. Also, the drumming is exquisite.”

Paul Weller - on sunset, 2020

"an album on which he gamely attempts to meld the competing desires to be the keeper of musical traditions and a modernist in the original sense of the phrase: if you were looking for a spiritual forebear in Weller’s catalogue, you might alight on 1980’s Sound Affects, where the influence of the era’s wilfully jarring post-punk was overlaid with his obsession with mid-60s Beatles."

Slowdive - sugar for the pill, 2017

“Sugar for the Pill” is something entirely different—a disarming heartbreak ballad led by singer Neil Halstead in a surprisingly gentle mood. Sparer than their early, fuzzy compositions, and warmer than the equally minimalistic tracks on Pygmalion, “Sugar for the Pill” is simple and delicate, but never frail. The song’s greatest surprise is a smooth, catchy ‘80s soft-rock chorus—a considerable risk for a band that rarely indulged in straightforward pop. But icy needles of guitar and Rachel Goswell’s ghostly backing vocal balance out any hint of effusiveness. An undulating melody and underlying thrum of steady, persistent bass and drums imbues its sad story of a dissolving relationship with a sense of acceptance. It’s gorgeous, but grounded. In their newest incarnation, Slowdive have traded the abject longing of youth—an emotion that suffused so many shoegaze classics—for the wisdom of maturity. Every great band should age so well."

The National - nobody else will be there live, 2017

"Extremists are going to eat the Republican party alive....They're losing their moderate people."

The Beatles - long tall sally cover, 1964

"The Beatles were admirers of Little Richard, and regularly performed his songs during their live act. "Long Tall Sally" was the most durable song in their live repertoire, lasting from their earliest days as the Quarrymen in 1957 through to their last public concert in August 1966. As with the majority of their Little Richard remakes, Paul McCartney sang lead vocals, as he could closely imitate Richard's vocal style."

REM - you are the everything, 1988

"Falling asleep while voices are talking somewhere in the house brings to mind the total trust and feeling of safety we lose as children."

The Smith Street Band – death to the lads, 2017

"I'm not hiding from anything, I said some incredibly hurtful things that I completely regret. I ask that you make up your own minds based on what has actually been said rather than form an opinion based on someone else's version."