A few months back, I got a song in my Soundcloud drop box and loved it. It was a new soulful voice in the world of autotune mania. It was a breath of fresh air in the heartbreak that is 808s. It was Alex Boyd and the song was “Light Up Tonight.” In the months following this song post, I’ve talked to Alex quite a bit and have been able to follow his progression through his ever growing career. Now signed under Jive, he is working on his first album to be released in the future. For those of you lucky enough to be in the West Hollywood area on September 18, you’ll have quite the show to see. However, for those of us who aren’t on the west coast, here’s a small taste of what Alex does live.

Alex sang The Star Spangled Banner and God Bless America last week at a Dodgers game. Unfortunately, his performance was not broadcast. Luckily, we’ve got a cell phone recording of each song. And even though, it’s not television HD quality, it’s all you need to hear Alex win over the crowd with his amazing vocals.

Alex performs the National Anthem

Alex performs God Bless America

Although this song came out 4 years ago, I just heard for the first time fairly recently. From the slide guitar to the hard hitting bass, I just totally dig this song. Lyrically, there’s not much to it but “it don’t matter.” It’s just really catchy with the backing female hook and the 1, 2 hand claps throughout. Sometimes I feel like I’m listening to something that could’ve come out in the 70s or 80s or 90s or today.

Robert Randolph & The Family Band – Ain’t Nothing Wrong With That [YSI]

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Speaking of this soulful, funky music, check out my bonus post today.

Turns out I had this song on my phone for a while now and I don’t think I ever listened to it until this week. Regardless, I don’t know what it is but I really like Chamillionaire’s flow over top of Tom Petty. It’s just mellow enough with an ok message actually. Oh wait but then you watch the video and any positivity in the words just becomes about materialism and everything else that I believe so much mainstream shitty hip hop is about. Regardless, I’ll keep listening.

Chamillionaire – Good Morning [YSI]

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Chamillionaire – Good Morning

Good news! Bridging The Verse is compatible with Mobile Flash for Android. Now you can listen to anything on my site anywhere. I just received my update to Android 2.2 on my Droid today and installed Flash. Lo and behold, my streaming files now play on my phone (tested on WiFi, not sure about 3G).

To celebrate, here’s Mr. Buble describing my mood. As much as I absolutely love Muse and their version or Nina Simone’s smooth, seductive voice, it’s Buble’s version that I felt most appropriate for today and this entire week while I’m vacationing at Myrtle Beach.

Michael Buble – Feeling Good [YSI]

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I know nothing about Lissie except that I really really like this song. And that’s enough for me to post it. I’m still on vacation so it’s just another short post for me today. Time to nap.

Lissie – In Sleep (Live) [YSI]

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Bonus:

♫ Lissie – Pursuit of Happiness (Kid Cudi Cover)

I probably should’ve posted this on Saturday when I was actually road tripping with my 2 6 favorite allies, but things have been busy. We’re on our third day of vacation at Myrtle Beach and I’m not too burnt yet so that’s a good thing. I’m going to try to post daily still but I’m not sure I’ll be able to. So enjoy what I do get posted. Today’s RHCP.

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Road Trippin [YSI]

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Sometimes it takes one artist’s use of a sample to make me even begin to listen to another artist’s work. That’s exactly the case with Two Door Cinema Club’s “Undercover Martyn.” Prior to Hoodie Allen’s most recent release “Words of Wisdom,” I never even listened to an entire song by TDCC. Now that Hoodie blew up once again on the Hype Machine charts, it gave me a reason to look a little further into the music of TDCC and realized how much I really dig the song Hoodie’s sample came from.

Make sure to check out Hoodie’s newest release (link below) if you haven’t already heard it.

Two Door Cinema Club – Undercover Martyn [YSI]

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Bonus:

♫ Hoodie Allen – Words of Wisdom (ft. Two Door Cinema Club)

I needed a good laugh today and this always does it for me. For as ridiculous as this song is, it’s history with me is actually worse. I had originally found this song my freshman year of college when Penn State offered free Napster to all students on campus. Well Napster only actually had the A Cappellas of DJ Assault so for the longest time, I had only heard Assault rapping about asses and titties (in pairs nonetheless). Then one grand day, I got to hear the backing track realized the absurdity of the song as a whole was too much to dislike no matter how bad it was.

As a sidenote, this is actually the second version of the song that was released. He initially released Ass-N-Titties on an EP in 1997. The problem for Assault is that it was only about one girl at a time. Clearly not enough for this guy. So in 2001 he released this new version with the bisexual bitches who do they friends and he loves them hos for lettin’ Assault join in.

DJ Assault – Ass-N-Titties [YSI]

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Heading to Philly tonight to see Manchester United play the MLS team, Union. Really pumped for this because I don’t know the next time I’ll get to see Man U play again. Now if any of you reading are Soccer Hooligans, I’m not choosing any one premier league team over another. I’m just excited to get to see the Red Devils (or any other EPL team) play, period. But oh yeah, I need to post a song today so I’ll guess I’ll go with my favorite band who happens to be English, Muse. Although this is not one of their most popular songs, Assassin is one that I love to drive to and get pumped.

Muse – Assassin [YSI]

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P.S. – If there are any DJs out there who might be interested in remixing this (preferably not dubstep), I’d be all about posting it!

Chiddy’s new album is due for release on Aug 24 this summer, but in the meantime, they have been working on some other things, namely videos for EVERY song off The Swelly Express! They posted the video for Dream Chasin’ on their facebook today and I really enjoy it. With my background in film, I’ve learned to appreciate simplicity done well, and, to be honest, they did it really well (video below, check it out). The video is nothing more than a ride in a cab through NYC yet it kept me intrigued. There were crazy graphics or over the top special effects. It was just them (and some friends at times) riding around chilling, being swell.

Oh, and I definitely have to admit, I am such a sucker for tricky wordplay even more than actual rapping style. From his Harvard/GW Carver/peanuts reference to his Phelps/Lane, Lois/Superman combinations to his subtle MGMT line (“feel fated to pretend”), some rappers can just draw me in with their educated lyrics and combination of words.

Chiddy Bang – Dream Chasin’ [YSI]

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Chiddy Bang – Dream Chasin’ Video