Finds: Dylan demo revived, Horror movies for kids, Favorite running songs, Pure and pleasing Nigerian vocals, Unsolicited relationship advice

Simi, Contemporary Nigerian R&B with hints of retro highlife. Her voice is pure and pleasing. I would like to find more music like this. 

Unissued excerpt from Duck Rock (Malcolm McLaren). Sung by Malathini & the Mahotella Queens (uncredited, unfairly on the original record). It’s too bad this song was never issued as an individual track, but you can hear the source on youtube. Mr McLaren is better appreciated as a DJ-curator-cultural influencer than an original musician. Start at 34:02.

I’ve endured, I’ve endured, How long can one endure. I heard this song in a documentary about a famous moonshiner. But isn’t the point of moonshining to not be famous? 

I can’t leave her behind. One of my very favorite Dylan demos, famously sung with Robbie Robertson ad hoc in a hotel room. This youtube guy polished it up and made it into a full track. 

A music video with a planetary vision and one of my very favorite running songs. This Jamie XX song that samples a rare 90s jungle mixtape. The layering of texture and rhythm gets me. There’s an epic sense of dilation that the music video captures. And here’s yet another music video for Gosh. 

A horror genre movie for children. I watched Night of the Zoopacolypse with my 7 year old son. There are a few of these types of movies out there — Paranorman, House with the Clock in its Walls — and as far as kids movies go, it’s pretty entertaining. The movie is a post-modern take on horror movies. The script has self-aware plot devices and cliches, which appeals to the grown ups in the room. Visuals are Cronenbergian — there’s a lot of dismemberment, gross and squishy sound effects, and more generally, body (or zoo animal) horror. It's all very silly, not intended to provoke real scares. Like in most horror movies, there’s a morality tale — the selfish individuals are punished. This movie is a straight-to-streaming kid’s movie, which I mention only because this movie is so much better than just about any kid’s movie released to theater in the 80s or 90s (most kids movies from those decades are cringey and difficult to watch). Talent and technology are so concentrated now, it’s easier to make a great kid’s movie. I’m not saying that this is an enduring work of art (it’s not), but it’s visually inventive and quite watchable. Are we in a golden age of children’s entertainment? (Yes, yes we are.) 

Spend time with their mother. No one asks me relationship advice, but if they did, this is what I’d say. Aside from the obvious genetic component, it’s revealing to see how people get along with their family. Spending time with their mother gives you the ability to see into the future.