My Actressy Romantic Side

This song recently was introduced to me by my musician friend who can play the guitar better than anyone I've ever laid eyes on (and I pray he never ever ever reads this). I can't try and hide the fact that I'm a John Mayer fan (believe me, I've tried). Although some of his songs are very borderline metro-sexual, flamboyant-for-any-man-to-be-singing, and pansyish (i.e. Your Body is a Wonderland), I like many of his sadder songs that are slow and melodramatic. When he swoons and pleads about unrequited love, I relate. So yes, I can appreciate him as an artist and a fabulous guitar player. Plus he's hot.

Like it or hate it, here's a song for you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_KGMmRVPo0

And let me pass on the lyrics as you try to discover why I'd post this song.


"Slow Dancing In A Burning Room"

It's not a silly little moment,
It's not the storm before the calm.
This is the deep and dying breath of
This love that we've been working on.

Can't seem to hold you like I want to
So I can feel you in my arms.
Nobody's gonna come and save you,
We pulled too many false alarms.

We're going down,
And you can see it too.
We're going down,
And you know that we're doomed.
My dear,
We're slow dancing in a burning room.

I was the one you always dreamed of,
You were the one I tried to draw.
How dare you say it's nothing to me?
Baby, you're the only light I ever saw.

I'll make the most of all the sadness,
You'll be a bitch because you can.
You try to hit me just to hurt me
So you leave me feeling dirty
Because you can't understand.

We're going down,
And you can see it too.
We're going down,
And you know that we're doomed.
My dear,
We're slow dancing in a burning room.

Go cry about it - why don't you?
Go cry about it - why don't you?
Go cry about it - why don't you?

My dear, we're slow dancing in a burning room,
Burning room,
Burning room,
Burning room,
Burning room.

Don't you think we oughta know by now?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?
Don't you think we oughta know by now?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?
Don't you think we oughta know by now?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?
Don't you think we shoulda learned somehow?

Sigur Ros

Dear Sigur Ros,

An Icelandic band that sincerely does not get enough credit, I salute you. Going to bed with cold spots in the sheets and the allure of sweet, sweet dreams, several times my promising expectations have had obstacles deter me from my standard REM cycles and 8 hours of recommended sleep. This is when you answer my prayers like rainbows through hazy clouds. You have been my sleeping pill for the last year and I commend you on your ability to dissect emotions like they have been put through a strainer and rinsed with cooling water.


One of my favorite songs, Untitled #1 (Vaka)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0AZIFmkogY

And my other preferred, Untitled #3 (Samskeyti)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRB7fx0QqgA

Vaka is definitely more of a tear jerker while the 2nd is more uplifting and hopeful. Choose either, you'll like them both I can bet.


And for fellow readers who've never experienced a relaxing night in my bed, I give you my 'Sleeptime" playlist.


The Album Leaf - Window
Thrice - The Whaler
The Album Leaf - We Need Help
Sigur Ros - Untitled #6 (E-Bow)
Sigur Ros - Untitled #5 (Alafoss)
Sigur Ros - Untitled #3 (Samskeyti)
Sigur Ros - Untitled #1 (Vaka)
The Album Leaf - Eastern Glow
Thrice - Digital Sea
The Album Leaf - Broken Arrow

The Conveyor Belt-ers

Dear reader,

Do you think bands that are hired to play music at "college bars" are given a strict lineup of songs they MUST play? Example:

Journey - Don't Stop Believing
Neil Diamond - Sweet Caroline
Jet - Are You Gonna Be My Girl
Outfield - Your Love
Garth Brooks - Friends in Low Places
Oasis - Wonderwall
Def Leppard - Pour Some Sugar
Bryan Adams - Summer of 69

I understand I am stereotyping all college bars and cover bands, so let me get into some specifics. Think of sweaty meathead dudes and chicks that are wearing too tight of clothes all convening into one small room with very bad "stage" lightening (i.e. blinking lights and straight-shooters of red, greens, and yellows) accentuating the too small stage in front. The band takes stage making their grand appearance and announces their unique and witty group's name and says they're going to play a real crowd pleaser. Each girl in the crowd starts bouncing up and down almost bouncing straight out of their bras, and the dudes get more excited and even more sweaty, but try to play it off as "whatever".

And there you are, in the middle of all these clones wondering, "How the hell did I get here?"

So in order to ease your pain, you drink more... and more and more and more and more and more.

The band starts their lineup with, you guessed, Jet - Are You Gonna Be My Girl.
(No no no no. They will never start with Journey or the Outfield. They save those songs for their second or third set because they know that the whole crowd will sing, you included.)

By the time the band is in the middle of their second set, you will have cranberry juice running down your nice white shirt and some rando's sweat dripping on you from behind. This dude has been trying to dance with you all night and you've never met him. But it's dark, and your drunk, and he's kind of cute... in the dark when your drunk.

The band has played all the songs that hit the Billboard Top 10 circa 1992, and the whole crowd is gleaming with joy. It's like Kildare's is the only bar on Main Street that has this crazy cover band playing these too rad of songs. Have these people ever been to any other bar? Or a wedding? You are being a cynical bitch. You stop yourself, smile, guzzle down the rest of your vodka Redbull, and pretend like you fucking love the song Champagne Supernova. So does the rest of the crowd, and you've taken notice.

This is when you take a sabbatical in the confines of a stall in the bathroom. You undo your wallet and take your tiny baggie out and make a nice thick line on the back of the toilet seat in the hopes that your night will improve.

You've reentered the dance floor and immediately as you take a step forward, some slutty couple starts making out, tongues lashing against each other. She is an inch or two taller than him making it even more repulsive. But you are now drunk and fucked up, so you continue to part through the crowd that is sloshing around like they are a rowboat in a typhoon.

You make it to your group of friends and as soon as the next song starts playing, you jump and dance around, grabbing your friend's hand and screaming the lyrics into each other's faces. Congratulations, you have successfully become everything you despise. Be Proud.


This is an exaggerated fictional story similar though to what routinely runs through my head when I'm out at bars. And in my defense, my dad played in a band during his early twenties that extended late into his forties covering the same songs.. I've been to his shows and seen him perform as backup singer and bassist and loved each and every minute of it. But here is my critique. When my father was in his early twenties, the only means of music they had was records and the radio. Cd's weren't invented and computer technology was non-existent. They played what they knew and everyone seemed to love it. People still love the songs they played, obviously portrayed in the scenario I just gave you.

As my dad got older and so did his fans, I deemed it acceptable that everyone sing along to the same tired out songs. Maybe I just am tired of hearing (and denying) that we all love these classic bar songs. But still, I can take Journey and Oasis and Jet in tiny increments, not all at one sitting. Yeah when I'm in my car and hear Journey, I'll leave it on since my Ipod adapter is broken and I still don't have a CD player. But when I go to a college bar in Philadelphia (maybe I am wishful thinking) but sometimes I wish people explored other musical outlets enough that coverbands would start playing some of their songs. I'm not saying play Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah or Lykke Li or Kings of Leon, but even The Killers or The Strokes? Come on, they've even hadsome songs that were played on pop radio stations.

My whole problem is more of an inner exstistential crisis I am having. I bitch and complain about the shitty music I hear at these bars and the shitty people I see all around me, yet I am part of it. I sing along and bop around to these songs I can't seem to bear, and wonder if I am alone or if others feel the same. I put myself in situations that I know I'll hate, then when I switch it up and, say, go to a complete hipster bar where all they play is indie underground music, I get annoyed at every asshole with tight jeans and dirty hair that walks past. Maybe I am having an identity crisis internally and can't get my bearings straight.

For the record, I mean no harm venting my thoughts, because like I already suggested, if you do read my pitiful blog you probably are an equally fucked individual. No offense.

All I ask is college kids, get some education with your music and don't fall victim to bar songs always. Next time you request, make it something that's eccentric and slightly less popular so that not everyone is forced to pretend to love the song "American Idiot" by Green Day.

let's celebrate. . .

Mardi Gras!

It's Mardi Gras week in New Orleans. I should've wished on every 11:11 that I could've celebrated the spirit of Mardi Gras in New Orleans. No worries, I'll make it there sooner or later.

Anyway, in order to spread a little cheer up here in the North, I am sharing a link from NPR, who has taken the time to create a jazz sampler of piano legends from this glorious city. So wherever you are, take a break from your stagnant routine, whip up some delicious Jambalaya, break open a bottle of wine with a special someone, and listen to these famous jazz artists on repeat.

Maybe it'll make you feel like doing something spontaneous... or if all else fails, the combo of food, wine, and music might put you in the mood to take it easy with some good-old fashioned fun.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100698685

blood.bank

Today I received a present. A present know one would know to give unless they know me well. The gift was the Blood Bank cd by, who else, Bon Iver. His latest cd following For Emma has definitely lived up to his crooning falsetto voice with the instrumental buildups that make listeners gush.

With lyrics like:

That secret that we know
That we don't know how to tell
I'm in love with your honor
I'm in love with your cheeks
what's that noise up the stairs baby

Is that Christmas morning

And I know it well

[BLOOD BANK]

His voice sheds my exhaustion.

Aside from me bragging about Bon Iver (real name Matt Vernon) all the time, this post was to actually discuss the lost era of CD's. Most people in the twenty-first century get great use out of free downloads through Torrents, Limewire, Frostwire, etc. etc. etc., buying cheap tracks through Itunes and other equivalents, or other forms of getting cheap/free music off of the Internet. I think the last time I stepped foot in a music store to buy an actual cd was about three years ago, and it was a gift for someone who was computer illiterate. Regardless, there is a distinct attraction in holding a tangible music product that has the authentic cover and literature on the inside flaps. The artwork, the unique signatures artist's sometimes write, the stories, secrets, and thank you's that litter the inside foldings- it all collaborates together effectively. I've missed the care we take in sliding the cd out of the cover, poking one finger through the middle hole so we don't smudge the shiny plastic, and the manual inserting into a player that leaves a memory.

I didn't know I was missing it until I had rediscovered it.

My new idea is to start collecting my favorite cds, maybe records if I decide to take that route, and display them as treasures. Then when I am older I can pass them over to people who'd appreciate a cd from the past, that maybe others will have neglected to remember.

This gift was by far one of the best. Not only do I love the artist, but someone took the time to dissect a moment and make it a memory.

Thank you for the gift although I doubt you read.

lastf'nfm

http://www.last.fm/user/mikalux


one more time.

Dock of the Bay

Want
to
know
how
much
of a
loser
I am?






http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knymoALfH9o



I love this song; the reason being when I was 12 I read that Leonardo DiCaprio proclaimed this tune as his all time favorite. Back then I wasn't able to appreciate the soft tones and simple words that make it beautifully desirous of everything I could ever hope for in life.

Life is simple
If we allow it

Re: My Excavation

Stolen ideas from Bon Iver. Essentially, I want this to be my excavation. A real book unfolding to the hidden thoughts of my mind, particularly with people I've had to leave behind in my past. I have this one person in mind specifically. In my sweet regret I have decided to keep him at bay. No need to be hurt, torn, saddened, and broken any longer only to have glimpses of beautiful appreciation and acceptance in between lines of mass chaotic confusion; if that makes any sense at all in anyone elses mind besides mine is up for debate. Regardless, here is a few songs that always will remind me of you and our place in time that, as much as I sometimes can't bear to admit, has passed. But I say this with a smile. Wherever you are and if you are reading. I wish you well. And I don't miss you as much as my emotional mind sometimes creates. In fact, if destiny has it for us to bump into each other down the road, may we both adorn harmonious smiles. I'll be wearing flowers in my hair, and you will have that once beloved bandanna wrapped around your free-falling hair. I'll miss us, but not you anymore.


Bon Iver Re: Stacks
Frightened Rabbit Poke
The Album Leaf Eastern Glow
Bob Dylan Girl From North Country
Coldplay Swallowed in the Sea
Dave Matthews Band Stay or Leave

and from an older memory. Beach. Water. Sneak-up. Fall in love.

Jack Johnson Flake


This will be the only time I get sentimental in any sense through a cheesy blog (luckily no one cares enough about anyone else to actually read). But honestly, I'm glad I was able to remember some up and down memories through the use of melody. We all easily relate to music as a trigger to moments past. I hope everyone can rekindle their own memories by scrolling through ancient Itunes that have been collecting dust and the newer songs that have helped heal us in the broken spots. There are many more songs I need to add once I can function with a normal working brain, which as of now, is taking a nap on its own.

Love always

top 3

I must say, 2008 was a fabulous year for indie music. I saw several concerts that were either local indie artists or semi-mainstream in the underground world. If I had to choose my top three albums, they would the albums from the following artists.

3. Fleet Foxes
2. Kings of Leon
1. Bon Iver


That's all for now. Download there latest EP's.

Help, I'm Alive - Metric

I found this song (Help, I'm Alive) on Tumblr. and instantly fell in love with it. This is Emily Haines from Metric, and here is a short interview about her life and music and blah blah blah. I've known about this song for probably a little over a week and have played it 47 times already.

Here is the interview with the solo piano section.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0C9HANU35_s



And here is the entire band performing the record version of

"Help, I'm Alive".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtA7YIFapnY&feature=related

introductionary

I am not a drug addict, do not have obsessive compuslive disorder, and never really get fixated on one certain subject- unless you consider my musical selection of the day. Each day I become so involved with one particular song I feel like a heroin addict looking for my next fix. Sometimes it is a certain artist or band, but many times it's one song. My roommates hate me for it and constantly say how I kill songs/artists for them. Oh well; I don't care what they think.

So here it is, add me as a friend on lastfm. Check out my music [and obsession(s)], recommend new songs you'd think I'd like, and especially take note of all the amazing music I listen to, because yes, I am a connoisseur of incredible music. Take notice.

http://www.last.fm/user/mikalux