Black Sabbath “God is Dead?” / Primal Scream “It’s Alright, It’s OK” / Daft Punk “Get Lucky”

What do these bands have to do with each other, you ask? Nothing, really, except for the fact that in my (not so humble) opinion they are all musical legends who by all accounts could be resting on their laurels at this point. Not content with greatest hits CDs and festival gigs, each is/has released a new LP this year and below you will find singles released from each record.

All songs are from said releases, with each showing that these artists are not ready to be led to the pasture for their musical retirement. “God is Dead?” is from the forthcoming Black Sabbath LP 13 and is a 10 minute hammer that finds Ozzy and the gang still adept at combining pummeling riffs with sinister lyrics, making it seem like 1969 all over again. For those who only know Ozzy as a reality TV punchline, buckle up. This song, and the riffs that come in on the back third of the song, are no joke.

Like Sabbath, Primal Scream go back to the proverbial well with “It’s Alright, It’s OK,” the lead single off their new album More Light. The sunny track would have fit in nicely with the Rolling Stones-meet-acid-house glory days of Screamadelica. Bobby Gillespie still can’t really sing and the songs are a patchwork quilt of other bands ideas, but dammit if Primal Scream didn’t make another song that is tailor made to soundtrack a kick ass party on a warm sunny summer day.

Daft Punk ventured the furthest away from their “sound” of this pack with the analog electronic-soul of “Get Lucky,” which finds the human robots joined by Pharrell and Nile Rogers. The track is a good into to their throwback disco of LP Random Access Memory, which find Daft Punk leaving their trademark EDM sound and paying homage to genres that influenced their creation. The flesh and bone realism of “Get Lucky” really is a good indicator of the direction of RAM, where Daft Punk come down to earth, at least for one LP.