it's toxic

gang, i am loving this folked-out cover of the dame britney classic "toxic" by french & israeli singer/songwriter yael naim, who slows the pace, forgoes the synths & studio beats and puts a touch of feeling behind the words. check, check, check it out:

yael naim - toxic

naim has gotten some recent, and deserved, attention from apple's choice to feature her breezy single "new soul" in its ads for the thin-ass macbook air laptop. if this causes folks to check out her self-titled album, which officially came out in the states yesterday and which features songs in english, french and hebrew, well, more better.

yael naim - new soul

you can catch naim playing a show in the bowery ballroom in ny tonight before she heads back for shows around france and belguim and germany in coming months. details, and streams of additional tracks, on her myspace page.

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and while we're speaking of toxic issues and new souls, hopefully most of you have read or heard barack obama's speech on race in america in its entirety. if not, please make immediate preparations. the speech is thirty seven minutes long and is best taken in one sitting. pretend for a moment that this matters and watch the whole durn thing: