My sister has long named Lyle Lovett as her desert island artist (with the rather fanciful prerequisite that all of his future material would be delivered to the island as well).
Given Lovett’s spotty output over the last decade, that “future material” provision might not count for much anymore, but that doesn’t diminish the extraordinary quality of his first several albums.
Scott Bradlee’s instrument of choice is the piano, and he has a particular specialty in the ragtime style. He even posts YouTube tutorials on how to play ragtime piano riffs.
This clip, a “vintage” version of Carly Rae Jepsen’s ‘Call Me Maybe,’ shows off those piano chops particularly well.
Everybody and their sister has recorded a cover of ‘Blurred Lines’ this year. I even dedicated a week of posts this summer to some of the more amusing ones. So I guess it was inevitable that Postmodern Jukebox would take a stab at it.
They opted for a bluegrass/country-and-western approach which serves the song pretty well. Of course I’m a pushover for this sort of instrumentation in any song.
I first encountered Postmodern Jukebox (whom I referenced in yesterday’s post) through this doo-wop performance of Miley Cyrus’ ‘We Can’t Stop.’
I was impressed by the arrangement, the performances, the visual style and most of all the concept. Scott Bradlee, the mastermind behind Postmodern Jukebox, says that he was dismissive of modern pop music until he really dissected it and approached it from a more classical perspective. Then he was smitten.
Speaking of ‘Royals’…
Last week a cover version of the blockbuster Lorde tune was released by a musical project called Postmodern Jukebox.
The brain child of mega-talented musician Scott Bradlee, Postmodern Jukebox reimagines modern tunes in older styles — a doo-wop version of a Ke$ha song, say, or a lounge band version of Kanye West. Bradlee usually plays piano on these tracks and brings in an assortment of guest vocalists.
Meet Me In Montauk 