The Sweet Snob

I’ve been listening to the new P.O.S. album Never Better for a few months now, and Pearl Jam‘s recently reissued Ten for a lot longer than that.  Why Go? has always been a song that strangely caught me back in the day, and I find myself involuntarily beginning to sing the song while I walk alone down the street.

She scratches a letter / Into a wall made of stone
So maybe some day another child / Won’t feel as alone

It’s just got that feeling to it like you’re about to start singing something serious or something, and it’s well within my comfortable singing range, so a dozen years later it’s well burned into my neural pathways.

That’s why I’m so impressed to see P.O.S. knock out a quick loop on a synthesizer and effortlessly sing this song much better than I ever could.  One thing I love about his version is how much more he enunciates the punchline to this bitter little song about a kid in a mental institution:

What you taught me, put me in here.  Don’t come visit.

There’s a no-commercial version on YouTube but the sound and video quality on this one makes it worth sitting through the commercial:

Then, just to remind you… don’t underestimate the power of the scrawny, apoplectic young Vedder himself doing the song in his heyday:

And lastly, if you’re curious what kind of music P.O.S. really makes, it’s kind of smart, ascerbic rap.  This is the track I’m really impressed by from Never Better called Savion Glover: