Staff pick of the week...
This week...Michael picks it!

Artist: Wan Light Title: Let's Wake Up Somewhere Else Price: $11.48 CD	Tracks on this CD:
	The Strophe #1
	Get It Straighter
	It Doesn't Have To Be In Your Livetime
	Freedom Fighters
	25/75
	Awake, Drunk and Average
	In the Heart Of Sarah Freeman
	Theme From "Night At Roonlake"
	To the Ground
	The Astronauts
	Landmarks and Houses
	Canvas Man
	All Things Go Round
	Kandy Korn
	The Soul Sisters

If you’ve dug in deep into the Parasol Staff favorites of 2003 you have already come across my pick of the week, the Wan Light’s “Let’s Wake Up Somewhere Else.” The first time I heard this album I said out loud to the rest of the office, all epiphany like, “This is what Neil Young would sound like singing over some slightly psychedelic electro pop arrangements!” Everybody else seemed to shift uncomfortably in their seats and think, “Uh, just sounds like they’re trying to be Mercury Rev.” Whereas Mercury Rev evolved from the freaked-out “Yerself Is Steam” and “Boces,” the Wan Light sounds like they flipped on the drum machine, started noodling with their electric piano, miked the first-take “Harvest”-like warble that escaped their mouths, and then made it all pretty. My favorite song? “Awake, Drunk and Average,” though “Get It Straighter” and “It Doesn’t Have to Be In Your Lifetime,” take similar advantage of the formula. “Let’s Wake Up Somewhere Else” was released on Labrador Records, the same Swedish label as Club 8, Acid House Kings, and another of my 2003 favorites, Ronderlin.