Free Single of the Week Category

The Naked and Famous are a five-piece band from New Zealand. Their single Young Blood is featured as the Free Single of the Week in the U.S. iTunes store this week. The song was released in June 2010, and debuted at #1 on the New Zealand charts. The first artist to do so in over three years. Their album Passive Me, Aggressive You followed in September.

Young Blood picked up the Silver Scroll for Song of the Year in the 2010 APRA Awards. Previous winners of this prestigious award include Missy Higgins (who I mentioned in my last post), Kasey Chambers, Ben Lee, Alex Lloyd and Powderfinger.

The Naked and Famous - Young Blood (2010)

Posted by: zeefritz

The song has been featured in a number of television series, including Covert Affairs, Chuck, Gossip Girl and The Almighty Johnsons, not to mention as a promo for the UK series Skins. Oh, I almost forgot; and in the trailer for the Disney movie Prom. Another of their singles, Punching in a Dream, was recently featured in The Vampire Diaries.

The video, directed by Joel Kefali & Campbell Hooper, has "the quintet leaping into water, skating, running, dancing around sparklers, and beating up cars in a display of deliberately youthful, nostalgic imagery with front-woman Alisa Xayalith wailing longingly over melancholy, bass-driven synth pop." If you love the FREE single, BUY the album.

The Naked and Famous - Passive Me, Aggressive You (2010)

Posted by: Joybrata

The iTunes Free Single of the Week is My Body by California alternative rock band Young the Giant. The single is from their debut self-titled album (right), which is scheduled to be released on CD by Roadrunner on January 25, 2011. The album is currently available as a digital download on iTunes and Amazon.com. The band was formerly known as The Jakes.

The cover art for both the single and the album employ a bright, collage-style illustration. I was not able to find a credit for the artist or art director for the project.

As regular readers know, I like to see artwork for an album and the associated singles that look as if they are part of the same project. I think it makes it easier for consumers to identify an item when they are shopping.

The cover for the My Body single is not a detail of the album cover. However, it is obvious that it is related to the album. This is particularly important for the first single from an album.

For the past few weeks, iTunes has been featuring holiday songs as the iTunes Free Single of the Week. This week, the single is Christmas This Year by contemporary Christian music artist tobyMac. The upbeat Christmas song also features Leigh Nash.

Meanwhile, the UK iTunes store is offering the single All I Want for Christmas is New Years Day by the electronic music duo Hurts.

For the last couple of weeks, iTunes has been offering holiday music as their Free Single of the Week. This week's single is Wish List by Neon Trees.

The cover for the single features Christmas ornaments decorated with images of the band. It is an interesting concept that works well for a holiday song.

The artwork for the iTunes Free Single of the Week is actually worth writing about this time. The single All I Want is from What Separates Me from You (right), the latest album from American rock band A Day to Remember. The album was released yesterday by Victory Records.

The cover art for the single (below) ties in with the the image of a man trapped in an hourglass that appears on the album. I really like it when this kind of attention to detail can be seen in a project.

The cover for All I Want is a continuation of the story told in the illustration on the album. It appears that the man trapped in the hourglass has managed to break out of the trap, but the results are not good. His seemingly lifeless hand lies in a pile of sand and broken glass. I guess he should have stayed inside.

The art direction for the album is credited to the band's lead vocalist, Jeremy McKinnon. Two illustrators are credited, Mike Cordata and Rob Dobie. I am sorry I do not have the time to do more research.

The iTunes Free Single of the Week is Pretty Girl Rock by R&B singer-songwriter Keri Hilson. It is the second single to be released from Hilson's forthcoming album No Boys Allowed. The album is scheduled to be released on December 21, 2010.

The artwork for the single is the photograph that has been used for the promotional image for the album (right). The photo shows Hilson sulking in a graffiti-covered alley wearing clothes that look like they came out of a Goodwill grab bag. Her hair and make up are horrible. It takes a lot of ineptitude to make a gorgeous woman like Keri Hilson look so bad. The hunched pose and the styling are as terrible as the tacky location.

Maybe it is just me, but I think a single called "Pretty Girl Rock" should feature a girl looking pretty on the cover. Instead, we get more of Hilson's armpits than we really need to see and very little of her pretty eyes. I guess this is an attempt to make Hilson look more "hood" than high fashion. However, at 27 she's a bit past being able to pull off the street kid look.

The iTunes Free Single of the Week is My Heart Skips a Beat by country duo The Secret Sisters. The single is from The Secret Sisters' self-titled album (right) that was released last week.

The photographs for both the covers of the album and the single were taken by popular music photographer Autumn de Wilde. The photographs do an excellent job of communicating the retro country sound of the duo. 

De Wilde photographed the cover of Beck's album Sea Change. Her numerous subjects include Eels, Death Cab for Cutie, Willie Nelson, Tegan and Sara, and Fiona Apple.

Don't Look Now by Far East Movement featuring Keri Hilson sounds a lot like Livvi Franc's Now I'm That Bitch. The single is from the group's current album Free Wired (right).

Like the Livvi Franc song, Don't Look Now is a story about a romantic relationship. It just doesn't have the unhappy ending or the same quality of vocals. Auto-Tune has been stretched to its irritating limit.

I like the cover art that has been created for this project. There are a few different versions of the album cover floating around the Internet. They all feature strong neon type effects and a photograph of the group.

The cover for the single also features a photograph of the group. It is a good choice for an iTunes Free Single of the Week. It will give millions of people who are not familiar with Far East Movement an idea of who they are and what they look like.

The iTunes Free Single of the Week is The Ballad of You and I by California alternative rock band Mêlée. The song is from the band's current album The Masquerade. It was released on August 18, 2010.

I like the artwork for the single. The band has a very 1980s retro sound reminiscent of U2 from the era. The cover for the single conveys that image.

The iTunes Free Single of the Week is Second Chance, a track from the album Brand New Me by country singer Cory Morrow. It is definitely worth downloading.