An infectious jam session

I only recently got on to the LP bandwagon. Well, only really Your Song, again via U.Blog, which from my limited Love Psychedelico sample size, remains my favourite track. Still, there are any number of solid, laid back jam session tracks. It has all the common traits: catchy guitar riff, plenty of texture in the riff, snug backing vocals in the chorus, strong rhythm everywhere. So why Your Song in particular?

The vocalist is bilingual and really sounds like she has an english inflection in her japanese singing. While intriguing, it's only a point for novelty. The real answer, is this:



There's just something deal sealing about an awesome live performance. I've been sold on Hikki's Distance/Automatic work when she went Unplugged. Ditto FictionJunction YUUKA when they performed in a studio session. Basically the artists that have received the most play on Winamp are solid live performers.

This Budokan 2005 performance of Your Song features a sharper guitar, an extended solo section to close off the song, and the obvious enthusiasm of the audience. The vocalist sounds strained and nasal, especially after the first verse, but the song isn't really about her. It's a jam session, after all. Nor does her singing take anything away from the fact that the band is having a blast.

This isn't a song about perfection. It's about performance. And what a monstrous performance at that.