Over the past 15 years, I've listened to very little commercial radio. Podcasts are my thing for interesting dialogue and news, as well as for finding out about new music.

There's a few radio stations across the country that have a 'song of the day' podcast. I will let a week or two of subscription of song of the day downloads to build up and have a very eclectic music mix on my drive to work.

This band, Wye Oak, has shown up in several of these stations' daily song downloads, and each time I hear the singer's voice proud amongst the interesting beats, electronica backing, and beautifully mangled electric guitar - I look up to see who the band is. This has happened a few times, and I decided to purchase their latest CD from Amazon.

There has been a trend going on 10+ years of indie female singers, mis-shaping their vowel sounds, so that it often sounds like a meow for every single vowel. I don't mean that as a crotchety old man, it's the best I can describe their 'formant-replacement-method'. It's as if every vowel should receive every single formant, which is what a cat does with a meow. Huge turnoff for me. There are many male singers in the indie rock world that are doing this as well. Drives me nuts. I want to hear you sing how you talk, not how you think you are being edgy and clever.

Not so with Wye Oak. Gorgeous vocals, provoking lyrics.
http://wyeoakmusic.com/

I hope that they really take off and maybe the female indie artist world will wake up to it and think to themselves that 'Hey, I can sing like I talk AND get picked up by college radio', and this meowing trend will die like the gated snare sound of the 80's.

Another one that I've recently come across is a sister duo from Sweden called 'First Aid Kit'.

Harmonies like only sisters can sing - in mid-west American accents, with modern twists on Americana music.
http://firstaidkitband.com/


As for the podcasts that do the song of the day feature:
https://www.thecurrent.org/collection/song-of-the-day
https://kexp.org/podcasts/song-of-the-day/
https://www.kcrw.com/music/shows/todays-top-tune

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