Via Twitter:
@robynkonichiwa Robyn! Even though FF Sings was fake we WILL cover something! I’m obsessed with you and think you’re the greatest!
— Robin Pecknold (@rpecknold) January 17, 2012
Update: Pecknold now says he plans to cover “Call Your Girlfriend.” A fake Foxes cover of Robyn spurring actual Foxes to do a Robyn cover. The future!
So some anonymous bros are recording covers of pop songs in imitation of Fleet Foxes? Why? I have no idea, but I love it. Like, whoever had this idea and executed it would probably really fun to hang out with at a party, is what I’m saying. Three beers in and they’re like, “let’s get our falsettos on and sing Rihanna in the style of Robin Pecknold.” They even managed to fool Robyn with what is actually a pretty great cover of “Dancing on My Own.”
Anyway, the future is weird and we live in it.
Swedish trio covers Robyn’s “Call Your Girlfriend” using nothing but their voices and some empty cottage cheese containers because wait what? (via)
So right now I’m working on a piece about SoundCloud, and when I was interviewing the founders one of them mentioned they were from Sweden. I said to him what I say to everyone I meet from Sweden — namely, “Did you know Robyn?” “No,” he said. “But my co-founder actually went to school with her.”
Hot on the trail of a good early-Robyn story, this morning I spoke with Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud’s co-founder and chief technical officer. (He also records electronic music under the name Forss.) After much discussion of his business, I asked about Robyn. It turns out that he had recently been going through some photos at his mom’s house when he came upon a class photo of he and Robyn taken when they were 7. As one does, he posted it to Tumblr. And sure enough, there she was — young Robin Miriam Carlsson, sitting cross-legged on the floor at the center of the photo, rocking the most spectacular mullet the world has ever seen.
Anyway, this is why when you meet people from Sweden you ask them if they knew Robyn.
“I get mistaken for a lesbian all the time — but I guess I do have the most lesbian haircut of any of the girls in my field. And when I was growing up and I introduced myself to people I’d say, ‘Hi, my name is Robyn and I’m a girl,’ because in Sweden, Robyn is a boy’s name and I had such short hair. My handicrafts teacher thought I was a boy for three years. I tried to tell her I was a girl, but she’d just say, ‘My little boy wanted to be a girl when he was a kid, too.’”
Robyn by Michael Hoeweler, from the Hype Machine 2010 Zeitgeist.
10. “Time Machine,” Robyn.
9. “Hang With Me,” Robyn.
8. “Indestructible,” Robyn.
7. “Don’t F——— Tell Me What to Do,” Robyn.
6. “In My Eyes,” Robyn.
5. “Call Your Girlfriend,” Robyn.
4. “Cry When You Get Older,” Robyn.
3. “Fembot,” Robyn.
2. “In My Eyes,” Robyn.
1. “Dancing on My Own,” Robyn.
UPDATE: It has come to my attention that I accidentally put “In My Eyes” on this list twice. So I just wanted to update this post to say I DON’T CARE.
Did anyone else pretend while watching this video that rather than perform at the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony, Robyn was actually accepting the Nobel Peace Prize? Which reminds me, how do we go about nominating her?
Hint: it involves 1.2 kilometres of transparent plumbing tubing knitted with fishing wire, attached to your body, with 40 litres of glycerol pumping through over a kilometre of tube powered by drill pumps. A fun weekend project! (via)
Hopefully by now everyone has had a chance to illicitly download Robyn’s Body Talk Part 3, which contains five songs from earlier this year and five new ones, one of which is the afore-reblogged and utterly fantastic “Call Your Girlfriend.” In the song, Robyn encourages her new beau to break things off with the girl he’s been dating — because now he’s dating Robyn. In the words of DYFL: “What makes it a Robyn song is that she’s very concerned about your girlfriend’s feelings and wants it to go as smoothly as possible.”
Which — true. But lest there are any guys out there taking this song as sound advice, I have to object to one particular Robyn suggestion for what boyfriend should say. Namely: “You tell her that the only way her heart will mend / Is when she learns to love again.” I hope we can all agree that this is a terrible thing to say to a girl you are breaking up with, as it presupposes that she will be devastated by the breakup and will be unable to move on until the man dumping her gives her permission to date other people as he is kicking her to the curb. “Learn to love again” is one thing to hear from a supportive friend, weeks after the break-up, and quite another to hear from a guy who is simultaneously tell you to clear out the drawer in his dresser that he set aside for your overnight visits.
So call your girlfriend, by all means. Date Robyn — sure. But leave the post-relationship coaching to someone else, because coming from you it’s only going to sound dickish.
Byline on Grantland. I am seriously giddy. Click, read and listen to my Songs of the Week if you are so inclined.
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