As an addendum to yesterday’s Passion Pit post, I present the PS22 chorus. These are the uplifting children’s voices you hear on the chorus to ‘Little Secrets.’ Silly kids — always so full of hope, and love, and music and blecchh, enough already before I puke.

No, this is really great stuff (and check out those Bad Brains-style t-shirts to boot). In fact, the sounds of innocent children singing makes me forget, for just a moment, how grim my life really is now that I am a ‘grown-up’ and have to face ‘real world problems’ like when the guy from the deli gives me my sandwich on a roll instead of a hero (like I’d ASKED FOR) or when one of my shoelaces is just about to break so I have to sort of stuff the shoelace ends into my shoe and it’s uncomfortable, kind of.

A few examples below from The Little Choir from Staten Island That Could.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2p5augniQA 540]

[youtube:httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_tcE4rWovI 540]

And, above, see the lovely faces of PS22 at work in-studio with Passion Pit, making magic happen.

I know we’re not scooping anyone here. It’s just that we really love it.

I ran into Jackson at the store the other day and, in between hearing about his recent Per Se and Jean Georges exploits (fancy, isn’t he?), we got to talking about Passion Pit. I thought I’d squared away my record of the summer, but after last month’s release of Manners my whole game’s thrown. I know, too much good summer music– a tough problem to have, ay? Where’s my Dark ‘n Stormy?

The whole record’s a killer, but it’s the second track, ‘Little Secrets,’ that caught me off guard this week while waiting for the subway. As upset as I am with the song for making me prance by all bouncy and bubbly  past the Monday morning commuters, who I’m confident were strangling me with their eyes, I can’t be mad for long. It’s audio Zoloft. This will just be how I walk now.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxL9Hod_qCY

Just listen to it. The little synth bursts punctuating each phrase. The ‘Hard-Knock Life’-style children’s choir on the chorus. Even the lyrics –

Let this be our little secret /
No one needs to know we’re feeling /
(Higher, and higher, and higher)

But I feel alive and I feel it in me/
Up and up I keep on climbing/
(Higher, and higher, and higher)

Come on. If this doesn’t make you smile, you’re a joyless sack of crap. No, we’re just kidding. But, really, your heart is a fist-sized lump of coal and you should probably get that checked out.

Toronto based photographer Ian Pool has reimagined the private lives of superheroes and supervillains through a new series of photographs capturing the extraordinary men and women doing some very ordinary things.

The very creative set features everything from the everyday (Batman eating at a small diner) to a naughty, albeit not unbelievable, side of Wonder Woman.

My personal favorite is Doctor Octopus as a teenypopper reading magazines and mooning over the Jonas Brothers. Geddem the rest of the images over at his site.

Remember Muxtape.com? If you never had the pleasure, what you missed was the best music-sharing platform designed for the web so far — most aesthetically-pleasing, easiest to use, unmatched in its ability to retain the aspect of human connection so central to making and sharing mixtapes in the first place.

As always, the good die young and Muxtape fell victim to a swift RIAA crackdown. But it didn’t stay dead for long.

The new Muxtape is up-and-running, as I discovered the other day after typing in the URL in a fit of nostalgia. But the outline has changed. So their first problem was with facilitating the illegal distribution of copyrighted material? Now, they’ve gone the opposite direction; as a platform for bands, all the material belongs to the distributors.

Until now, Myspace had still been the best way to connect with bands on the web. In fact, that’s about all it’s been good for after Facebook came along to show us that social networking doesn’t have to be ugly and clunky.

Muxtape may be a better answer. It does look promising, offering artists a chance to go beyond simply connecting with their fanbase. With features like the ability to present HD quality video, it feels like there’s less being compromised. And with bands like Sigur Ros, Grizzly Bear, Yacht and others on-board, it’s off to a very good start.