“Connected” – Stereo MC’s
(Words/music: Robert Birch, Harry Wayne Casey, Richard Finch, Nicholas Hallam, available on Connected, Island Records 1992)

I’ll be the first to admit that I sometimes lose sight of the reason why I write this blog.  In the most general terms, it’s a place to share and discuss music, but I also really like the idea of learning something about my taste – not just offering songs that I like, but trying to figure out why I like these songs.  Sometimes this requires a little backstory (or a personal digression), but largely the focus needs to be on the songs.  That being said, as I tried to brainstorm a song for tonight, I thought about the process for picking songs.  I often end up picking some less than obvious choices (I haven’t written about a lot of my favorite bands yet) because I see value in looking at the edges of one’s taste.  If I’m going to truly learn about my taste, then these “fringe” songs – whether they are songs I normally might not like or things that are pushing my boundaries – might yield insight into why I like them.  It would be easy to post something classic and fall into the trap of “this is important” or “this is timeless” without going any deeper.  In some ways, I feel like it might be harder to get to the root of why I like something like the Beatles without falling into that trap.  Maybe that’s why I’m more interested in the oddities in my collection.

This brings me to “Connected.”  I never have a burning desire to hear this song and I don’t own anything else by the group.  I even had to make sure that the apostrophe in their name wasn’t a typo (Allmusic and Wikipedia both have it that way).  I’m glad to have it in my collection and more often than not I don’t skip it when it comes on.  I particularly like the way they build this slow groove out of a disco sample (from a song co-written by KC of KC and the Sunshine Band fame).  A heavy beat dominates the song, holding everything together like a sturdy nail hammered in tight.  Around the defined drum and bass, the other elements of the song float in orbit.  The keyboards sound light and airy, the sampled horns feel lifelike, and even the vocals feel playful.  I’ve never really paid much attention to the words, but they don’t really matter to me.  The song’s groove – this blend of heavy and light – sucks me in every time.  Even if it’s about a minute longer than it should be, it almost always comes as a welcome guest.

More on Stereo MC’s: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm