Downright Dynamite Downloads Of The Week: Guster, Marvin Gaye, Trail of Dead…

So there we were on a delightful Sunday afternoon. We were eating a delicious cob of corn as prepared by your grandmother, when she confided in us she's a bit concerned about you. She says you may be getting uglier, and could we please help you with that. We said we'd try, mostly out of fear she'd take back the corn, and ordered a 10 gallon drum of botox off eBay. What we're saying is you've a heavy brow, likely from years of not being sure what music's hip and cool. We're gonna make everything better. Please ignore the fact our botox smells exactly like recycled Pennzoil.

The tracks we think'd lift your heavy hearts this week are from Tortoise & Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Guster, Roxette, Marvin Gaye and the Commodores, Eddie Money, and …And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead.  

Stop wiggling, we're trying to help.

Tortoise & Bonnie 'Prince' Billy: Poncho off The Brave And The Bold
(Tortoise & Bonnie 'Prince' Billy sure do like their Mexican friends. We like them too, so long as they keep introducing us to their many wonderful meats. You know this whole album is surprisingly good. Ages ago we recommended another track off it - The Calvary Cross. We still recommend it. And this one. Your iPod'd be lucky to have them.)

Guster: Ruby Falls off Ganging Up On The Sun
(On every album, Guster puts a grandiose track that we just can't get enough of. On Lost And Gone Forever it was Two Points For Honesty, on Keep it Together it was Come Downstairs and Say Hello. On this, their newest album [of which we've already raved], it's Ruby Falls. It's so good it's almost religious. We predict mediocre church choirs everywhere to be ruining it by years end.)

Roxette: Dressed For Success off Look Sharp!
(In the late eighties/early nineties, our collective young minds were blown by this album. It's a perfect pop confection, and we are willing to fight anyone who says it's less than awesome. Except you Lance, as your fat mother might put our arms in a sandwich. It happened in a dream once.)

Marvin Gaye and the Commodores: Nightshift off Anthology
(Nobody can argue with this track, and everyone's heard it at one time or other. It's pretty old, but its coolness is eternal.  There was a time hecklerspray had three different women convinced we wrote it. Our mother and her book club will believe anything if you say it while you're wearing your bunnysuit.)

Eddie Money: Walk On Water off Nothing To Lose
(Eddie Money is so cool. This track is among the best he's ever written, and even though it came out way back in '88, we still find ourselves listening to it on an almost hourly basis. In fact, this was the song going through our head when the judge handed down our prison sentence three weeks ago. Not only that, but… hang on… we'll finish this sentence in a minute.  Teabag Tony needs the internet, and if we don't give it to him now he'll stick us with a sharpened spoon.)

…And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead: Let It Dive off Worlds Apart
(It wouldn't be hecklerspray if we didn't give you at least one monster rock song that your parents will never understand.  This album was arguably the best released in all of 2005. It's the only album that year that featured women and children screaming in horror because they just found their loved ones had been pillaged to death by horny vikings. Well that's our interpretation anyway.) 

Now listen to these beautiful choices via the magic of Napster

[story by Shawn Lindseth]