Thursday, June 30, 2011

SYTYCD Top 16 Results Open Thread

My first wishlist of music was a little, how you say, a deliberate pisstake filled with songs that mostly aren't danceable. (Yet, I somehow refrained from including any IDM -- I'm so proud of myself.) But I've been reconsidering a more "realistic" set of indie-damaged songs (not "realistic" in the sense that they might appear on the show, but music that's inherently danceable), and since I love lists, why not:

  1. The Pipettes - "Pull Shapes"
    Only the happiest East Coast Swing/Lindy ever.
  2. Autechre - "Lost"
    A tricked-out b-boy routine, which might be fitting considering that Autechre started out as a b-boys. (And isn't it startling that British breakers tended to create some of the most pretentious dance music of this generation? You definitely wouldn't expect any of the guys in Quest to come up with this.)
  3. Cocteau Twins - "Donimo"
    Only the most massive gossamer group contemporary filled with filigree and lace and shadows and heaven could do "Donimo" justice (Wade).
  4. Ladytron - "Destroy Everything You Touch"
    "International Dateline" is my favorite Ladytron track from Witching Hour (and maybe my favorite Ladytron track period), but "Destroy Everything You Touch" is a more obvious choice for, say, Sonya to do a big stomping jazz to, or for a particularly creative hip hop. (Given their profile in the UK, Ladytron have a much higher likelihood on being featured on the British SYTYCD.)
  5. Mogwai - "Sine Wave"
    I'm picturing a mournful techno-jazz (or possibly contemporary), nay, a post-apocalyptic funeral march.
  6. Boards of Canada - "Pete Standing Alone"
    An unusually sad, introspective, and nostalgic hip hop. No, not NappyTabs (unless they can get Comfort back) -- Dave or Christopher Scott.
  7. Electrelane - "Oh Sombra!"
    Wildest, most exhilarating and joyfully unhinged tango ever.
  8. Yann Tiersen - "La Noyée"
    Hybrid American/Argentine tango. (I should know, my teachers tried to turn this into just such a routine for me. Joke was on them because "La Noyée" makes me cry every time I hear it.)
  9. Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band - "Mountains Made of Steam"
    In truth, any of the "six busted waltzes" from Horses In The Sky could be the basis of a Canadian crypto-anarchist waltz.
  10. Slowdive - "Avalyn 1"
    Contemporary in an epic mood, simultaneously colored by gothy/teenage melodrama. Stacy on her best night, perhaps, or Mia.
  11. The Raveonettes - "You Want the Candy"
    Coked out jive. Lots of Raveonettes tunes would make great ballroom numbers, too -- "Ode To LA," "Lust," "Aly, Walk With Me" all make excellently sleazy, paranoid rumbas (well, not "Ode," pretty straight rumba there), while "Blush" and "Bang!" beg to be jived/swinged to.
  12. Dum Dum Girls - "Baby Don't Go"
    To be honest, having the Raveonettes would generally render Dum Dum Girls redundant (loud abrasive retro swinging girl-group/doo-wop songs), but the Dum Dums get a lot more ethereal here, thus a melancholic contemporary number, or maybe an alternate-universe Broadway (no Tasty please, goes without saying), given its Sonny Bono-penned narrative.
  13. Labradford - "S"
    A moody contemporary, and its cinematicness warrants another big group number.
  14. Joanna Newsom - "Good Intentions Paving Company"
    This has always felt like it'd be at home in some Off-Off-Off-Broadway musical.
  15. Orbital - "Satan (Live)"
    Garry Stewart provides faceless contemporaries for all your aggro '90s techno jams.

2 comments:

momo said...

Well, it was a hell of a lot more interesting to imagine dances to these songs than it would have been to watch the results show, which I skipped.
I like how they are called the piPETTES and not the Pipe-ettes.

Ana said...

Old songs I like!
Old songs I like but didn't know the name of!
New songs I like!

Thanks for the list ^_^ .

I want to hear somebody use Vitalic's Trahison, at least in an audition. (Or Vitalic's anything, really, especially from the OK Cowboy album.)
Or Oppenheimer Analysis's - Devil's Dancers.