Underrated J - Jump on in, the water is solipsistic.

If you have any artists to suggest, you teeming throngs of readers, let me know. If they are in my iTunes library, maybe I'll be swayed and give them the old one-two. To the right, in the blogroll, my friend Gabe has undertaken a similar project as that which I have, here. Be warned, he rather enjoys jam bands.

Otherwise, the next two float at the margins of of Underrated/Under-appreciated.

Musicians, artists in general, are probably best defined by their idiosyncrasies. It allows listeners to distinguish one voice, one guitarist, one group from another. The question of authenticity is then raised when judging an artist's idiosyncrasies. Are they manufactured for effect? Or, are they character traits and natural artistic choices emerging from an organic creative process?
 

Jamiroquai - "Half the Man," The Return of the Space Cowboy.

Jamiroquai emerged from the UK/European Acid-Jazz in the early '90s as a listenable and highly danceable group of excellent musicians with a super-funky, diminutive sparkplug for a vocalist and songwriter. Jay Kay was clearly an intriguing stage performer, and as Jamiroquai grew more popular globally he began to make his performer persona more weird and out-sized, turning into a striking, but sometimes ostentatious caricature. His disco moon-walk on the moving floor in the video for "Virtual Insanity" is one of the last memorable MTV videos, as far as I'm concerned. And while the song is a pretty clumsy deconstruction of modern life and technology, the video was fun to look at.

The song smacked of the same sort of self-importance and silly sociology found in many of their "socially conscious" songs. I'm all for artists making bold and loud political statements, if they can do it well. Jay Kay's affectations, the very idiosyncrasies he created/accentuated to get noticed, killed any chance of being taken seriously past the dance floor.

Which, in the end was fine, because Jamiroquai was best when they were doing dance tunes and chocolaty-rich ballads. "Half the Man" is one of the latter. A trippy lament about break-ups to make-ups that, if you listen to the lyrics too hard, makes no sense in terms of linear narrative. However, the keyboards play with your synapses like lysergic acid and the vocals are perfect Northern-soul--heart stripped bare, soft and smooth until they become full of brass.

It's not what got them noticed by the masses, but it's what they did best. And this song, compared to their inferior hits, is underrated.

Half The Man - Jamiroquai

Jeff Buckley - "Last Goodbye," Grace.

I'm not going to go too far with Jeff Buckley, because there are people--fans, fanatics, Buckley-completists, devotees, acolytes--who know way more about the guy than I do. I could do the whole Wikipedia thing and regurgitate stuff I didn't really know about him, but Buckley, as a figure, is far too important to lots of people, myself included, to give that kind of treatment.

Suffice it to say, I remember (as many my age do) when he died. I remember having heard Grace at the record store listening station, telling myself that I needed to buy the album when I had a few spare bucks. Several music rags had lavished him with praise, describing his live shows as transcendental, calling his voice a once-in-a-generation gift. And then he was dead, washed away on the banks of the Mississippi River. Craig Finn remembers.

He achieved one of the great feats in music, recording a cover version of a very well-known song by a rock and roll HoFer that surpasses the original. It may well be the saddest song ever recorded.

But what got lost in the Qawwali-inflected, strange beauty of his voice and the fugue-like nature of his guitar-work, was that the kid knew how to write a great song when he put his mind to it. Taking hold of the verse/verse/chorus/verse/chorus structure and placing your personal stamp on a well-composed song is a simple goal, but it is a goal not often reached. Buckley absolutely nailed it with "Last Goodbye."

He was venerated for being unique, idiosyncratic, and mourned mightily for the same reason. His live recordings and semi-finished studio work sold well for years after his death. People hunted for clues as to how someone so talented walks into a river late at night to cool off, and is suddenly gone.

I just wonder if he might've made the perfect song at some point in his life, had he lived. "Last Goodbye," underrated despite the feverishness of those who love him, tells me my hunch was well-founded.

Last Goodbye (Album Version) -...