Another weekend slips away, and summer sighs its last. It's a cool Sunday eve, and lethergy is working on me. Tonight i feel like feetgazing.
The Shocking Pinks make music so perfect to me sometimes. It's messy and loose, minimal and lo-fi, swimming in melody and hooks that too much production would kill its raw perfection, the very thing that makes these ache with longing so much. These could play on repeat in Lost In Translation and i'd be happy.
Beach House have come on since their first album. I liked that a lot, but i love this. This is another melodic overload, the breathy hhhaaas and warbling guitar are just perfect.
The Radio Dept. have been a favourite of mine since i lived in Vancouver. This is a song that i played over and over on the skytrain watching people, windows, signs, houses, cars, parks, and skyline slide by, a heady fuzz coaxing away a hard day, a daydream about someone else. Pet Shop Boys meets My Bloody Valentine.
Grandaddy are a band i will miss. They wrote some catchy fun songs, and they had the capacity to write the most beautiful sad songs. The Software Slump is still a favourite of mine all these years later; the theme so valid, its songs so strong. Jed was the key to the album for me, the character to the idea, and this is such a great video to him.
The XX came to my attention in the Glastonbury highlights. I'd read about them a long time ago, but the name failed to pull me in to give them a listen; lo and behold they fit like a cruel velvet glove.
That is all for this lazy eve. Enjoy.
Friday, 27 August 2010
Friday, 20 August 2010
The Long Escape
So long.
Time was something i always seemed to write about; when i wrote about things. Time gets too grand to spin down, the last grains can't tell the whole story that fell down before. Start afresh. It always takes time before that penny drops. Time = Gravity and all that.
Calexico - Black Heart
Some old favourite rekindled, Calexico can be the uncomfortable night, the dark corners, the shadows in dusk light. But don't forget passion in it's push and pulls, it's ache and drive. Cinema, sex, drink, smoke from cigarettes in heavy air. They never fail to take you somewhere more intense than the now.
Murder By Death - Spring Break, 1899
Dark and villainous, the song dresses characters out of books and old films, a dark stranger, heeled boots and tired clothes, furrowed brow over short drinks, the efforts to forget. The demise and swan song, the getaway; plumes of dust trail to the border with a sweated brow, a nervous glance behind, tired lies and no alibis.
Beirut - Gulag Orkestar
The freedom of escape; landscapes slide by under a big blue sky, the air dry and a salty thirst on cracked lips, the unknown at fingertips drumming an idle knee. The nearest town is run down, beaten iron and weathered skin, small eyes that have seen this tide; known to care free for the passing. Rolling by, spirits on the rise as the otherside drifts behind, quenched in golden dust, as day turns to dusk, a voice grows aloft in song as joy finds a long forgotten soul. The first quiet night dawns a new time.
Time was something i always seemed to write about; when i wrote about things. Time gets too grand to spin down, the last grains can't tell the whole story that fell down before. Start afresh. It always takes time before that penny drops. Time = Gravity and all that.
Calexico - Black Heart
Some old favourite rekindled, Calexico can be the uncomfortable night, the dark corners, the shadows in dusk light. But don't forget passion in it's push and pulls, it's ache and drive. Cinema, sex, drink, smoke from cigarettes in heavy air. They never fail to take you somewhere more intense than the now.
Murder By Death - Spring Break, 1899
Dark and villainous, the song dresses characters out of books and old films, a dark stranger, heeled boots and tired clothes, furrowed brow over short drinks, the efforts to forget. The demise and swan song, the getaway; plumes of dust trail to the border with a sweated brow, a nervous glance behind, tired lies and no alibis.
Beirut - Gulag Orkestar
The freedom of escape; landscapes slide by under a big blue sky, the air dry and a salty thirst on cracked lips, the unknown at fingertips drumming an idle knee. The nearest town is run down, beaten iron and weathered skin, small eyes that have seen this tide; known to care free for the passing. Rolling by, spirits on the rise as the otherside drifts behind, quenched in golden dust, as day turns to dusk, a voice grows aloft in song as joy finds a long forgotten soul. The first quiet night dawns a new time.
Monday, 6 July 2009
july july
summertime and singing. let the harmonies ring through the haze. give in to optimism for once, let yourself hope. maybe just let yourself go.
department of eagles - no one does it like you
classy. jazz, soul, a skip and swing. a breeze in an old sidesteet cafe, little cups of sweet coffee, remembering and regretting a loved one, fingers tied in a sad solo waltz. if only it was easy.
grizzly bear - all we ask
harmonies. simple golden harmonies. loose, french, jazzy. a paris cab driving round london, a world in a world.
my morning jacket - touch me i'm going to scream (pt 2)
jim james/my morning jacket are just awesome. i love this, i love the bleeps, the slides, his haunting vocals; the sense of muggy nights full of fireflies and crickets, a night full of mystery and edge, some luring realm so easy to slide into but hard to escape from. he looks like a mage aswell. i just find that funny.
ryan adams - sinking ships
so in sync. it's night, but its cornfield rushing by, it's nothing but horizons and straight highways. it's heading west, whatever that may be. stuff like this is why i listen to so much old music, and yet some are doing it now and doing it so well.
sufjan stevens - the mistress witch from mcclure
sufjan makes me want to play the banjo. really bad. something so honest about it, so homespun, something to confess to when writing, something to tell a stroy to. he writes the sweetest songs, some of the saddest summer songs.
department of eagles - no one does it like you
classy. jazz, soul, a skip and swing. a breeze in an old sidesteet cafe, little cups of sweet coffee, remembering and regretting a loved one, fingers tied in a sad solo waltz. if only it was easy.
grizzly bear - all we ask
harmonies. simple golden harmonies. loose, french, jazzy. a paris cab driving round london, a world in a world.
my morning jacket - touch me i'm going to scream (pt 2)
jim james/my morning jacket are just awesome. i love this, i love the bleeps, the slides, his haunting vocals; the sense of muggy nights full of fireflies and crickets, a night full of mystery and edge, some luring realm so easy to slide into but hard to escape from. he looks like a mage aswell. i just find that funny.
ryan adams - sinking ships
so in sync. it's night, but its cornfield rushing by, it's nothing but horizons and straight highways. it's heading west, whatever that may be. stuff like this is why i listen to so much old music, and yet some are doing it now and doing it so well.
sufjan stevens - the mistress witch from mcclure
sufjan makes me want to play the banjo. really bad. something so honest about it, so homespun, something to confess to when writing, something to tell a stroy to. he writes the sweetest songs, some of the saddest summer songs.
Sunday, 14 June 2009
(finally) another night in
been a bit of an excellent exhausting weeekend, one of matrimony and last dances, barefoot walks home on country lanes, dawn breaking as you find the door. success and excesses. sunday night songs are needed; the lazy ones that bask in recollection and smiles.
yo la tengo
are one of these bands that hook your eyelids closed, push you off to dreams. they write some of the sweetest love songs i've ever heard. maybe you're not meant to hear.
Justin Vernon
forecast for emma... for all to hear when noone was listening. With an old keyboard and Nebraska sending him to sleep when that beer has done the job. The video for this is a blurry take on it, those drives you take at night to think things over, when all you hear is that record and relive all the clues.
Tindersticks
smokey bars, dark eyes, dirty beds, a scandel or two, all dressed in strings and that baritone voice that swoons and pleads. cinematic, sexy. videoless but listen.
The National
have been in my pocket of life for the past few years. almost everywhere. i love this video. french, bohemian, red wine and countryside, the acoustic harmonies dancing in the dark. i want to make videos like this.
I am happy for my friends successes this weekend. If they read then they know who they are.
bon soir.
yo la tengo
are one of these bands that hook your eyelids closed, push you off to dreams. they write some of the sweetest love songs i've ever heard. maybe you're not meant to hear.
Justin Vernon
forecast for emma... for all to hear when noone was listening. With an old keyboard and Nebraska sending him to sleep when that beer has done the job. The video for this is a blurry take on it, those drives you take at night to think things over, when all you hear is that record and relive all the clues.
Tindersticks
smokey bars, dark eyes, dirty beds, a scandel or two, all dressed in strings and that baritone voice that swoons and pleads. cinematic, sexy. videoless but listen.
The National
have been in my pocket of life for the past few years. almost everywhere. i love this video. french, bohemian, red wine and countryside, the acoustic harmonies dancing in the dark. i want to make videos like this.
I am happy for my friends successes this weekend. If they read then they know who they are.
bon soir.
Tuesday, 9 June 2009
take me away
music has always been important to me. solice. joy. love. loss. the way out. the way in. a blog is always something i've meant to begin.
live music videos seem to be pleasing and inspiring everyone these days; those french inspired take-away shows from blogotheque.net have been amongst the most fantastic captures of modern musicians i can think of.
here are a small selection of some favourites.
bon iver
i came across him when my relationship was falling apart. seams popping silently. its sad beauty, those golden harmonies, his soul baring fragility brought me some comfort, and,down the line, became a big influence on me.
priscilla ahn
beautiful. everything is beautiful about her; her music, her voice, this song. In that slight breeze and late sunshine, she even makes L.A look lovely.
sigur ros
a rather sweet acoustic session compared to their grandious sonic shows.
my brightest diamond
she reminds me of classical singers, with that sweetest of old style voices, of old towns with oak shutters and cobbled streets and sunday markets with a dust that never settles, that gentle music box chiming sweetly out a high window you can't see in.
margot & the nuclear so and so's
i do love this song, even at the time it became so apparent, even now in the after. i wonder how many people stumble through relationships with that void.
low (alan sparhawk)
there is such soft determination here, a hint of vitriol that these quiet pretty streets dapple and contain but can't hide, like the best of low's music.
live music videos seem to be pleasing and inspiring everyone these days; those french inspired take-away shows from blogotheque.net have been amongst the most fantastic captures of modern musicians i can think of.
here are a small selection of some favourites.
bon iver
i came across him when my relationship was falling apart. seams popping silently. its sad beauty, those golden harmonies, his soul baring fragility brought me some comfort, and,down the line, became a big influence on me.
priscilla ahn
beautiful. everything is beautiful about her; her music, her voice, this song. In that slight breeze and late sunshine, she even makes L.A look lovely.
sigur ros
a rather sweet acoustic session compared to their grandious sonic shows.
Sigur Ros - Við spilum endalaust - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.
my brightest diamond
she reminds me of classical singers, with that sweetest of old style voices, of old towns with oak shutters and cobbled streets and sunday markets with a dust that never settles, that gentle music box chiming sweetly out a high window you can't see in.
margot & the nuclear so and so's
i do love this song, even at the time it became so apparent, even now in the after. i wonder how many people stumble through relationships with that void.
Margot and the Nuclear So & So's - As Tall as cliffs - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.
low (alan sparhawk)
there is such soft determination here, a hint of vitriol that these quiet pretty streets dapple and contain but can't hide, like the best of low's music.
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