I wish blogger's youtube searcher could provide more videos, but I had to hyperlink most of these.
And oh yeah, warning: There's some song title language here.
For Sale? (Interlude) Kendrick Lamar
This is possibly the most important song on To Pimp a Butterfly. The music on here is STELLAR. It sounds like a straight-up Herbie Hancock jam; add a hint of Stevie Wonder synthesizer utopia and beautiful background vocals. I have no idea what time signature this song is in, but it must hard to rap to. He raps the verses in this old man voice, accenting "s" sounds with a "sh" and rasping his vocal tone. The 3 minutes in, he helps solve the puzzle of the album: Amid the songs crazy-go-nuts second verse, he says "I am Lucy." And the awkward heavy breathing placed at the beginning of the song? It means what you probably think it means. Hear the whole album, you'll understand.
Lucette Stranded on the Island Julia Holter
This is the song that sold me on this album. Julia's vocals have always switched from "beautiful" to "lazy," but we get tastes of both here. From the first second of this song, the instrumentation is full and beautiful; orchestral strings, flutes, the harp, the tin can harbor bell. The vocal effects are hypnotic, with the thick reverb sung "The birds can sing their song" repeated between the spoken-word, vague storytelling lines.
Holy Shit Father John Misty
Tillman says he wrote this song about his wedding day: “The way that I felt on my wedding day was just so, so wild. To make a decision like that based on something you believe in — to get out of the morass of ambivalence, to live according to endless contingencies and potential mishaps, potential unhappiness — is just huge for me.” It's a beautiful song with perfect lyrics, listing every worldly thing that could possibly depress a man and wrapping it up with "What I fail to see is what that's gotta do with you and me!" I guess I could have written about any of this album's love songs, but this one needs some extra press.
WTF (Where They From) Missy Elliott (ft Pharrell Willaims)
After many, many, many listens, I've decided Pharrell's verse on this kinda sucks. Fun, but cheesy. However, he did a perfect job producing this song. And Missy Elliott is still ridiculously talented. Therefor, I've given this track many, many, many listens.
Know Yourself Drake
Probably my favorite Drake song. Not like that means much, but it's true. "Man I'm talkin' 'bout way before hashtags," great line. The inserted samples of what sounds like a foreign bazaar fit in delicately. For 5 minutes, I actually believe Drake is cool.
Why a Bitch Gotta Lie Death Grips
This song just makes so much sense!
GREAT SONGS MY DAD WOULD LIKE
Depreston Courtney Barnett
I accuse this album of being too dry. I love this song, yet it's the driest track on there. Unlike other tracks on the album, I think Courtney meant for it to sound like this.
Half Life Crisis Jim O'Rourke
This song sounds like Harry Nilsson contributed to Steely Dan's Pretzel Logic.
Them Changes Thundercat
It's hard to critique funk, so to be brief, I like this song and it is a funky song.
Bangkok Destroyer
First time I heard this a front-to-back listen to the album. It began and I thought, "I hope this isn't a piano ballad, because this album's already become pretty boring as it is." Then there's this interesting flute part about 1 minute in. And you learn that has nothing to do with the rest of the song, as the second half turn into this long, climactic New Orleans swing destined to make you smirk. And somehow, with no percussion, it's super easy to dance to! ...sexily, of course...
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