For our column Jams We Love, we're turning you onto the songs that keep us going every day. Today, a playlist of epic artist collaborations.
1. Ty Segall & White Fence, "I'm Not a Game"
We finally got to hear the collab album Hair by the Bay Area's Segall and LA's White Fence, and what can we say? We love it. It's gloriously acid-fried and is indebted to John Lennon's zaniest work during the Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour era.
2. Motorhead & Girlschool, "Please Don't Touch"
It was a total coup for a girl group to get recognition in the metal scene back in the day. Heck, it still would be (Metal is mostly a boys' club). And what better group to get that big fat stamp of approval from than Motorhead? This song (likely about delirium tremens, let's be honest) has the kind of rockabilly swing that Motorhead's mastermind Lemmy loves, with just enough punk edge from the double guitar solos from Motorhead's Fast Eddie and Girlschool's Kim McAuliffe. For more badassery, check out their EP St. Valentine's Day Massacre.
3. David Byrne & Brian Eno, "Help Me Somebody"
Their 1981 collaboration album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts is cited as one of the most groundbreaking of modern times, thanks to its use of sampling (in this track, for example, you can hear Reverend Paul Morton in a broadcast sermon from New Orleans, in June 1980) and its savvy mish-mashing of electronics and African music. Few albums have ever captured the work of two musical geniuses working so seamlessly together.
4. Jay-Z & Kanye, "Who Gon Stop Me"
One of the most anticipated and high profile musical collaboration albums of the past few years, Watch the Throne remains a much-debated, hulking slab of beats and lyrics exploring opulence, fame, materialism, power, and the burdens of success–in an era where most of us can barely conceive of any of those things. In a few decades, we'll either look at this album and laugh at its naivete, or admire its boldness for being created and released during a particularly rough era for most of the world.
5. Velvet Underground & Nico, "All Tomorrow's Parties"
Before going on a heroin-fueled tailspin in the 70s and 80s, Nico was the icy German chanteuse who hung around Warhol and the epitome of 60s New York cool, the Velvet Underground. Her low, flat-toned delivery perfectly channels the chilled-out ennui of the Factory artistes, while the shadowy, Far East-inspired music hypnotize and bring the old heart rate down a few notches. It was Warhol's favorite from the epochal Velvet Underground a& Nico album.
