Rilo Kiley - Portions for Foxes

Link.

Favorite lyrics: 'Cause you're just damage control for a walking corpse like me - like you.

Rilo Kiley is the flint spark that starts a bonfire - she's not synonymous with girl lead singers like Colbie Calliet, who is a great vocalist but lyrically predictable; instead, she quietly starts a kind of musical flame. Rilo Kiley puts an edge to her songs and voice, and adds a badass angle to her work, which is added to the syrupy, generally great vocal genre of female musicians like Florence and the Machine. Her great voice is what you hear on the radio a lot, but her adaptation of her own music - the extra breaths, the sarcasm, and the tangible feel of a certain kind of feeling - makes her stick out.

Reminds us of: Laura Veirs
Listen to: while shopping for makeup and testing lipstick (unless you're a guy, in which case, better luck Thursday.)
Glitter Pox rating: 78% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Miniature Tigers - Cannibal Queen

Link.

Fav lyrics: Comin' for your heart like a cannibal
Oh, she lets me right in and I fed 'til I'm full

There's a lot of humor in this song, but it has a rooted seriousness that's lightened up with upbeat notes and sarcasm. This one's all about words words words, but the way it flows musically makes those words hold even more impact, while keeping a fun vibe.

Reminds us of: Fun.
Listen to: while building sandcastles.
Glitter Pox rating: 87% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Love Me Chase Me - Carney

Link.

Fav lyrics : Madness can't contain me. If you love me, chase me.

This song is partially about letting go, but the way it's sung is so seductive that it's contradicting, working into a kind of pleading. The raspy, slow quality to Carney's singing only makes you fall into the off-kilter music even harder. There's a lot of back-and-forth dejection and liveliness in this song, a kind of side-by-side wanting and scorn that is absolutely perfect together.

Reminds us of: a molasses-voiced Kings of Leon
Listen to: while walking in slow motion and destroying things
Glitter Pox rating: 90% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Little Comets - One Night in October

Link.

Favorite lyrics: Oh, this dashboard's so hard
Can't cushion the beats of my heart

UK music has gotten more popular in America, but Little Comets has their own rhythm that separates them from the same stylistic sound. One Night in October is definitely dancing music, but there's some marrow in the bones of this song that gives it more flavor. It has anger, spice, and good guitar, which is a perfect combination backdrop for a voice that has more energy than a Red Bull struck by lightning.

Reminds us of: The Wombats and Hot Hot Heat
Listen to: one night in October, falling asleep in your car
Glitter Pox rating: 65% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

The Lonely Forest - We Sing in Time

Link.

Fav lyrics: Let us pretend we’ve got it together.
Let us ignore the coming sun.

The center of this song is time - the fact that, in time, everything will die, but also there's a simultaneous hope that time will recover everything for us. In time, things will get better. But it's also ironically saying that we use time as an excuse. It's full of things that are wrong about the world, but for some reason the songs with the most wrong in them can be the ones that make you feel the most human.

Reminds us of: Death Cab for Cutie
Listen to: at a bonfire
Glitter Pox rating: 70% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Lady Lamb the Beekeeper - Between Two Trees

Link.

Fav lyrics: Are you a predator?
Are you a huntress?
Are you just a girl?
Or are you some sort of bird, some bird turned lioness?

There's something about Lady Lamb the Beekeeper that's incredibly vulnerable. There's no restraint between singer and listener, and it pushes past good laid-back music into a genre that's there for connection. You can tell she appreciates and loves music; it speaks loudly in the way she sings.

From her website:

"I sing because I need to sing and I sing because life is a mess and music is the most beautiful means of communication and self-expression for me both personally and with humanity.
Think about the first vinyl you ever bought, the first cassette you rewound & rewound. The albums that you've cried to, & regained your strength to. The albums that have shaped you & continue to shape you. The albums you blast in your car on long drives or play quietly as you fall asleep. The albums that make you happy and hopeful & empower you simply by entering your ears. There is a grace and uniqueness between humans making connections with one another through the intricacies, the delicacies, the rhythm & words in a song."

And that's what music should be about. Raw. Shaky. Edgy. Something that stirs you. And that's what this song does.

Reminds us of: Holly Conlan
Listen to: while laying on the pavement
Glitter Pox rating: 84% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Pomegranates - Everybody Come Outside

Link.

Fav lyrics: Everyone here, living or dead
I'm learning something from something someone said

We saw these guys when they opened for Young the Giant a few months ago and they were quietly haunting. Soft, but definitely memorable in sound. This song is nostalgic of life away from technology, and it has kind of an ancient principle (All our lives have just always been/Paintings in a cave/Hunting Buffalo) but a modern sound - so while the song makes you want to step outside and get the hell off your computer, you can still listen to it on your ipod and not feel like a fraud.

Reminds us of: Foster the People
Listen to: while running in the park
Glitter Pox rating: 80% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

William Fitzimmons - The Tide Pulls from the Moon

Link.

Favorite lyrics: You hide your
Filthy hands from all of us

Reading the lyrics of this song, without the music, is an experience by itself. When you hit play, the melody only pushes the performance of those words - almost like the performance of poetry - into an articulate anthem. It's very simple in both words and music, but it's the kind of soft simple that ends up a lot louder than bigger radio productions. It also has a slightly dark, creepy edge to it, but the tenderness and vulnerability in the vocals results in a song that hits your ears the right way.

Reminds us of: Sufjan Stevens
Listen to: when you're lying in a dark room
Glitter Pox rating: 68% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Sophie Hunger - Shape

Link.

Favorite lyric: Stamp on the ground and the ceiling falls in

Shape is a schizophrenic mismatch of mind-spinning lyrics and organized music. It blends any kind of meaning with nonsensical words and then puts a very sane, very graceful sound behind it. Very Sylvia Plath.

Reminds us of: Agnes Obel
Listen to: when your mind is fuzzy
Glitter Pox rating: 70% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox