The Easy Gramophone

1. Vampire Weekend - Oxford Comma
A song equal-parts spastic and mellow, its singer skating all over the understated drums and organ. "Who gives a fuck about an Oxford comma?" he asks, and he asks why you would lie, and then of course there's a guitar solo like the pretty bow on top. A song that does not try to mimic The Strokes' sound; merely their shrug.
Download at: http://www.vampireweekend.com/

2. The New Pornographers - Myriad Harbour
A new song from Canada's most pop-tacular rock band - a group for whom more is always more, - where all the group's gusto gets tethered to Dan Bejar's mischievous mousy voice. He mutters about wandering in New York City, seein' girls and public schools, his apparent nonchalance ever undercut but the coy shaker, the full-force backing vocals, the glad-slammed drums.
Download at: http://tinyurl.com/2rd2ht

3. Black Before Red - Underneath Gold
Summer made hot and hazy, with the wobble of one too many beers. The words are necessary nothings, - "Yeah / in your head yeah yeah yeah / yeah / oh-oh oh yeah (yeah)", - fitting stuff for the lace of guitar and horns, for perfumed harmonies over a Brooklyn groove.
Download at: http://www.blackbeforered.com/

4. Milo McLaughlin - I Spiralled Out of Control
McLaughlin, an occasional contributor to The Skinny, is here part Ballboy, part Ma$e, speak-singing over bedroom beats. It's the story of being flung into space, cast up and up from Edinburgh, then back to earth, and abruptly into death. The secrets he learns are ephemeral, funny, strange, and the rhymes like fortune cookies. As he hurtles through the galaxy: "I felt like I must have done when I was poor / reduced to the elements of a rudimentary lifeform." Sci-fi synths that could fuel a chip fryer.
Download at: http://www.last.fm/music/Milo+McLaughlin/Disassemble+Me

5. Los Campesinos! - You! Me! Dancing!
The first fruit from Los Campesinos' ongoing recording with Dave Neufeld, the Torontonian Broken Social Scene producer. The new version of You! Me! Dancing! is even more shockingly brilliant, as if the Welsh band's spent four months in song-craft bootcamp. An opening charge of noise, stretched tension, then BAM BAM BAM: guitars and glockenspiel, fearsome squeak, and a pop song for the dancefloor. It's just like they say - "straight into your sneakers," whether or not you "can dance a single step."
Download at: http://tinyurl.com/2awwpl