What millennial doesn't like this song? Its perfect for the car. It has some gravity (especially if you watch the video and even cursorily glance at the history it references) but is also just a great jam. My favorite part is the in the percussive wrap up at the end where the drums just flip back and forth. A great part to zen out to watching the concentric circles of the Windows Media Player animations. To imagine someone dancing and flipping their hair back to each beat.
Thanks for reading! If you made it this long then I hope you collected copious data for your masters in Vladivostok.
Sometimes I look at my children and see how they inherent all my flaws and little of whatever strength or knowledge I have. That said maybe my strengths are just neuroses that render some productivity. A deep desire of valuing work over everything else. Fussing over cleaning and paperwork and sorting until everything is just a damn fuck it. At least my son doesn't need to wear glasses.
They have picked up on tics particularly around the insane things I say to preclude any event. Any attempt to work out (any physical exertion tbh) at all and you are going to get
Time to do some push ups....X GON' GIVE TO YA!
Want me to bring all the groceries in on trip? UP A FLIGHT OF STAIRS?! HIT ME WITH THAT JAM!
How I made his connection is lost to history. Victim of way to many songs where this is some intro for a big fight or car chase. Because I am horribly out of shape it usuall is something like X GON' GIVE TO YA. I'VE BEEN DOING THIS FOR NINETEEN YEARS AND.....wheeze....blerg....fuck that is enough of that.
This will be jammed before taking the training wheels off the bike. Or jumping into the deep end of the pool.
Here is a secret, dear readers. I am not writing these in alphabetical order. Some of these come much sooner or much easier so they get drafted before say Q. I mention this in case I already mentioned Kate Bush but fuck it because she is amazing and deserves to be mentioned constantly.
Hounds of Love is a witchcraft collection of an album. Something that shouldn't exist because of its ability to summon the ethereal. I recently read the Harry Potter books and whenever veelas show up I imagine Kate Bush playing in the background.
But, the song for this is kind of a cheat. Brief and spooky, spartan with words but loaded with sonic asides. In Under Ice she sneaks in a sonar ping along with submarine chatter, screechy violin, and an overbearing sense of presence. A fog all around you or hoar frost locking up under the skin. This song always make me imagine myself standing out on the ice and staring down into something brewing below it.
After graduating college I I was fortunate enough to secure a job, albeit a part time one. Still this was a rarefied position in the mid 00s. The job was Community Development Coordinator for a small town in upstate New York. It was not a city planning position or anything so lofty but instead a part time liaison between a citizen group and the village government. On paper I was taking over from a single citizen who spent 15 years advocating and fundraising to redo the village's mainstreet to slow down traffic, increase pedestrian accessibility and beautify the area. This is where I first discovered Blogger since I launched a daily update project for the construction.
I was 22 at the time and had many "first job" foibles albeit looking back at it, I am proud of the overall work. Ever read Dr. Seuss's The Lorax? Made me feel like The Once-ler and everyone else was the Lorax. We killed a video store but I sincerely doubt the sustainability of a town of 1500 with TWO video stores in the year 2006. So...I made a few enemies but last time I visited the town still had the personalized bricks and rippled lamp posts and new trees. In the end it was worth it but I did give up on any pretense of living in said town. Maybe citizens feel differently?
However, at the time I got hired I committed to the gig and place. I asked my supervisor, the Village Clerk (What this person does I am not sure. She cut a lot of receipts), for a list of local landlords. Could I rent a place in town and avoid the 30 minute commute by rural bus?
One person who called back? He was a local slumlord who owned a Christmas tree farm and drove around in a vintage sports car the color of Kinko's canary copy paper. Not a mean guy but the place was a dump. An A Frame duplex house, already a Frankenstein beast, split into 5 apartments. Apartment 5 used to be his son's and the junior had left bric a brac and furniture that then became mine. The place had this videogame RPG vibe to it where you open a cupboard and there was an electric hand mixer. Then a plate. A shaving kit bag. Can I turn this junk into something useful?
Place had an emerald green settee style couch with the ornate wooden legs and loops that had to be a RMS Titanic relic. And heat came from a giant (Thing had to be 4 feet wide by 3 feet tall) gas heater in the middle of the living room. A cast iron pot belly heater/oven with none of the charm.
Place was five minutes from village hall so with no commute and the job plateauing to be an ersatz complaint department (Most days were spent waiting for the phone to ring or someone to email the help line) I sat around a fair amount listening to music on my Rhapsody account. And this is how I found Thursday, a screamo suburban band that seemed to acknowledge that with this jam.
Raw lyrics with the "ashes of American flags" and talking about the joined collective moment of 9/11. Another key Thursday song for me is Understanding in a Car Crash which has the ending of a low rumble repetition of "keep crashing this car, over and over. Keep crashing this car, over and over." I think about that a lot. At work. When voting. When responding to an ask from my wife.
I thoroughly enjoyed Hot Hot Heat's Make Up the Breakdown a 2002 album lead by Bandages that I listened to way too often. Every song is a banger! Then the band sort of vanished. For me and also for the zeitgeist albeit they had more albums
Now Talk to Me, Dance to Me is a song about two people coming together. That sounds really wholesome but for me this song, with the cowbell kickoff, is my go to jam for everything
I find two sticks on the ground and want to act silly in front of my daughter. Well, slap those together and then go "You are my only girl, but you're not my owner girl" and repeat.
Are you banging on your steering wheel while waiting for a light? Well..."You are my only girl, but you're not my owner girl"
What is that weird staccato beat in the background? The shrill shriek of a cicada in the tree? Well..."You are my only girl, but you're not my owner girl"
Listen to it and try it! Perfect any song which maybe isn't a great thing? Since it could be filler.
Considering her discography and influence you think I would pick something else but my Madonna album is Ray of Light. Which, considering my penchant for electronic music it makes sense. It also came out at the right time in the summer of 98 when I watched a ton of MTV so any song that came out between 97-99 is just carbon seared into my mind.
Note, I don't enjoy or remember much of Ray of Light except this song and hence the aforementioned and this post.
Power Of Goodbye has it all for me. The moodiness and ethereal sound that permeate your mood and give me these click clack steam punk vibes. This is a song that always felt to me quite wise and a sort of deep cut to love and emotion but instead its just a leftover song at the end of the album.
I lent a guy name Jnani (pronounced Yanni) my sole copy of The Postal Service's Give Up, an album I adore. An album only made better that they never made a follow up even though fans clamor for it. Songs alternate from moody indie jams to then electronic jams you can run on a treadmill. Then the song here the duet Nothing Better
Such poetry in the words as the two former lovers fight. I never went through such a hard breakup so I can't pine for any empathy but I can appreciate the lyrics and situation. Like forget about cellar doors and never more...give more more of "Don't you feed me lies about some idealistic future/Your heart won't heal right if you keep tearing out the sutures"
What a uniquely American tragicomedy as Kanye West. Maybe by the time you are reading this he is President! Or we are all dead. In any case, you cannot deny he is quite talented and imagine if his rambling and "politics" actually had any substance to it. If he stood for anything besides himself then imagine what could happen.
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is a desert island album for sure. All those tracks are bangers and all the people he brought together is this lovely and lurid tapestry. From that I regularly draw to Monster as my go-to jam. Here Kanye is more of a producer and you let yourself enjoys rhymes by Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Bon Iver and Nicki Minaj. Amazing how cohesive the thing feels considering each individual piece. All virulent and loud power fantasies.
Consensus is the Nicki Minja verse is best but my personal fav is Jay-Z's what with the horror tropes and the clever use of a sharp inhale right at the end.
Bit of a cheat here. Well not so much but doing this from my phone.
Not much cred in being an Offspring fan. Even during the heyday of Americana and Pretty Fly for a White Guy they felt shallow. But everyone loved them and songs were everywhere. Tony Hawk games. The soundtracks of 90s teen movies. Cmon, guys! Its ok to like Offspring albeit its aged like puma shell necklaces.
But let me introduce you to LAPD from the 1992 Ignition album which sounds very un Offspring. Less performance but equally narrative it was song as timely then and now
https://youtu.be/4XZw-sW6G-Y
I can't name any other songs on Ignition, an album I owned after finding it in an FYE while visiting my sister in Virginia (such rarities never came to PR) but this song is Offspring. Very punk and repeatable with a sincere albeit very blunt message.
Its so easy to shit on Linkin Park even during their heyday. Way too many an awful early Youtube animated music video was set to their music. Anime weeb fiends and girls with blue hair that rang around in cloaks liked Linkin Park. This was the glee club without the shows and recitals. These are people who grew up into 40 somethings who hopefully GOT the point of Fight Club, but probably didn't.
Their first few albums always focused songs on some mysterious and overbearing "you" that was impossible to ID but also became a sort of everyman trouble. Recently the Trump re-election campaign set an ad to "In the End" and the band and most fans were aghast. Like, did those dicks ever listen to a Linkin Park song? I doubt they would back anything GOP. But, its an LP song. It is MADE to be layered over something.
But, that said I un-ironically ADORE Linkin Park and when I heard Chester Bennington died I broke a long standing "don't post on FB" rule to pour out just how I felt.
When Meteora, their second album came out, I skipped Intro to Art History 1 class * to walk the three miles to the local Barnes and Nobles to buy it. And listen all the way back needing to swap out for the fresh AA batteries I brought.
That is a Linkin Park memory...walking. My first ever Linkin Park album was (appropriately so) a remix album I bought at this oddball record store (La Casa de los Tapes or House of Tapes) which was tucked away into the back corner of a Sears appliance store. And I had to have what was playing over the store's stereo which was the Reanimation album. It even has this goofy mech on the cover! They made this in a lab for me!
This song has it all. A remix. A cinematic bombast. Those strings and kick off crooning. And I must have listened to it a dozen times walking back home from that record store. Only album I ever bought twice because I had to have this when I got my car (some nine years after its release) and it has a CD player.
*Where I sat behind a very cute girl named Sivam who I almost went on a date with but I at the same time just started dating the person who would become my wife. This was the one and only time that I had such aplomb with the ladies
Listening to 311 makes me realize I am old. If the crappy back and morning cocktail of pills didn't already do it consider that the album Jack-O-Latern's Weather comes from is pushing 30 years but i began listening with the early 00's Evolver and NOW 311 is a kind of lifestyle Jimmy Buffet style band. I mean there are 311 cruises, beers, and vape mixes. So now it is this oddball party band that seems attractive to the North Florida people Jack Donagahy could never figure out on 30 Rock. And during my listening heyday it was a sort of mainstream stoner band which was odd considering my straight edge tendencies. All that said I never felt like I was allowed to be fan even when this band was in its heyday.
But that sound especially from the earlier albums like the "blue" one. Rap and rock and this very quirky Nebraska reference with a surfer vibe.
Jack-O-Lantern's Weather? Well, that is a walking sound. It is a younger me stomping down some grey chilly street in New York state. Go stomping around in Jack-O-Lanterns' weather. I didn't have a car until the age of 25 so my friends called me the "ultimate pedestrian" And, this was the walking song with your backpack on and Discman jamming
Hey, I try to sound smart in these posts. But, really can't say anything that hasn't been said about Beastie Boys in 40 something years of their music. Except that i am brave enough to say that while yes Paul's Boutique is their best album I ADORED Hello Nasty and the premiere single from it, Intergalactic. The humor and elaborate rhymes which all seemed just for the sake of being. They did this because they could and unlike the Youtube scene to come years later it somehow wasn't grating, cloying, or destructive.
Still an amazing video that checked a lot of my person buttons. I remember making bootleg tape recordings of this album for my friends from the single CD in our group that I oh so happened to own.
The band made a remix of Body Movin, also from the same album, and it was 1) by Fatboy Slim and parodied Diabolik, a 60s Italian crime movie which WAS the final movie parodied on the original MST3K! Like this album was made for me.
Goodness do I love myself some throw away girly pop. Because I am man of honor I stopped listening to Ke$ha once I learned the conditions under which she was forced to record "Your Love is My Drug"* but Demi Lovato is my girl.
And, double goodness is this song super cringey even if I wasn't an overweight guy on the Internet. Like, guys, I'm getting a bit flustered and its not because of this song's pure power. Make me wanna wash my hair and bounce them like a basketball. I think you can hear the teeth grinding over the modem.
This song evokes a certain memory of playing Batman: Arkham City. Stick with me, ok? I mean you are reading this blog so you have to be patient. All those Arkham games have this rhythm style combat where you need to mash buttons at certain times and in combinations to dodge attacks and counter enemies. The more you do this the faster the combat goes but the harder you hit. Its tricky to describe without experiencing it but it is immensely satisfying to chain a series of successful inputs into breaking 40 guys in half. And Demi's Heart Attack was in the background the first (and only time) I ever got a 50 combo, a frustrating achievement to secure (at least for me. I am sure i will get bombed by "Get good" comments**) but memorable. And considering this song has a build up into a drop I can imagine it being Batman's boot dropping right into someone's jaw at that moment.
*Would be Y in the ABC. If that dissapoints you (and it does me, to be honest) then remember she was literally tortured during that time of her life And the guy got away with it!
**Or not considering the sole Ukrainian national who reads this may be a real nice guy who says "Great job" But, you know, in Ukrainian.
Write out La Oreja de Van Gogh's Geografia's lyrics and well its going to hurt. Especially if you translate them into English. Major cringe factor akin to that time in the 90s when commercials and shows THOUGHT they knew what rapping meant and had everyone try and spit fire.
I had never seen the vidoe before this and it also makes no sense. For a song that is all about intimacy, its folks having a big jazzy street jam.
I shouldn't be so derisive. I like this song! The lyrics are quite poetic but typing them out...trust me they sound better in Spanish. I mean...
I would like to start a country with you. So words like motherland, flag, nation, border, race or destiny would make sense to me
OR
I would love if our country had, a huge arsenal of cuddles under the sea
OR
Give me your hand so we can take this boat celebrating with a kiss the day that is today
Written out like that they are anime ending song lyrics that make no sense. Cringe factor 100%. Once, I tried to flirt with a girl by asking what color her underwear was and I didn't cringe as much then. Really feel it in your stomach as it falls out.
It sounds better for sure. Don't let any this discourage you from giving a list And even if you can't speak Spanish there is a neat spicy guitar.
No one reads these posts but based on the few metrics I have seen I can tell they are either somewhere in the US and/or Ukraine. I am going to be they may not be a Spanish speaker albeit that is quite an assumption considering how common its in the US. And what do I know about Ukraine?
But, I like to think that anyone reading this assumes any Spanish tracks I have are super deep obscure cuts. Stuff you need to listen to while sitting pointing in a westward direction. And not the "rock en español" version of Aerosmith's Crazy.
This song dropped like a bomb in late elementary school with the bluesy twang and lyrical jamming.
By now, it is fairly quaint and schmaltzy, something your parents listened to. In my case it was my paternal grandfather trying to mimic the chorus but in a low awkward echo. Imagine a 70 year old woman just repeating the words of your favorite song 4 solid seconds after the singer has sung. That was La Flaca by Jarabe de Palo.
Did you think I have taste? I am a guy who writes a blog no one reads where I elaborate on the shoulder fins of mecha and talk about Nic Cage's Firebirds for fun. A favorite food of mine was tacos de sal which is where I would heat up a flour tortilla in a pan with butter and salt. I only stopped because my doctor told me it was hell for my A1C not because I became suddenly that much more erudite.
All that said, here is a cover song which I enjoy much more than the original. Lorde's cover of Tear for Fear's Everybody Rules the World just has that cinematic feel to it. Could this song be a trailer to something? Could it play as you walk into some big work meeting right in front of the board of directors. Does a beat drop before some big boom? Put that right into my ears, please!
No slander to the original which endures for good reasons beyond it is a great song to jam into any villain reveal. These sound like totally different songs with very different feels. The OG one is a court jester poking fun and tilting the king while the Lorde version is actually leading the king to the guillotine
And I much prefer Pale Shelter by Tears for Fears anyway, which could have been P in the ABC but just blew my shot right here, right now.
Libraries re-opened recently so I got the fourth book and the work keeps on going.
***Spoilers down below***
I appreciate that this book begins with something that isn't Harry at the Durnsleys. We are four books in and we are doing something different beyond re-hashing the start. That scene does make Voldemort seem appropriately sinister where to me, the aforementioned four books in, he has come off as kind of a big nothing.
Oh well second chapter keeps the tradition going so nevermind.
I think it is silly that Harry never gave the Weasleys some kind of money considering he is loaded. I know we get a throw away line that "they would never accept it" but doesn't feel earned or truthful.
In the absence of Voldemort is there any evil in the Wizard World. Beyond being a villain he seems to be THE SOURCE of all conflict in the magical world. Like if Voldemort never existed the biggest villains would be Draco's sneer and like the pranks of the Weasley bros?
I enjoyed the spat between Harry and Ron over Ron's very legitimate feelings of being overlooked. I think his own mother loves Harry more so yeah I would be a bit peeved. Sure, should have listened to your pal and assume he is being truthful but don't blame you for feeling raw about those, my boy Ron.
Four books in I care very little about Harry but want more and more of this world. The other Wizarding schools. The cup. The interactions with the Muggle word. With that said, I really liked Cedric Diggory what with his nobility and good lucks and acumen. So, of course he fucking dies. Some serious Duncan Idaho from Dune vibes right there save they brought Idaho back from the dead in Dune because why not bring back the charming, sexy, talented guy? Man, that irks me. But, at least he gets a decent send off. An office crush told me once I should be sorted in Hufflepuff and maybe I should have because feel so bad for this short lived hero.
On that, I appreciate how that house gets a bit more elaboration but what does Ravenclaw do? And their logo is an eagle!? BUT THE NAME RAVEN IS RIGHT THERE!
This books is way too long even with the above stated. It picks up with the Voldemort reveal scene, which DOES feel very earned and foreboding.
I will admit skimming the inevitable villain exposition at the end because these are some complicated 9th degree 3D chess convolutions and the get foiled because Harry is lucky. There are several deus ex machinas here. The one with Harry in the duel is lovely as he coaxes the ghosts of eveyrone Voldermort has killed to protect him but HE DOESN'T DO ANYTHING! It just happens....because it needs to happen! Then the reason is a quirk in wand design. Not because he is pure of heart but because of WAND DESIGN. At least pure of heart would jive better with the epic quest aspect.
The Moody/Barty Crouch sub villain plot is also a Byzantine pretzel of "umm...oks." At first I thought it was going to be this kind of Starscream inspired plot where a henchmen kills the hero to get the one up on the main villain (For a Star Wars analogy kind of like Darth Maul to Vader in all the recent canon) but instead it was all part of the plan! As well!
The last chapter is called "The Beginning." How many more of these books are there?
Knowing that the senior Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle families are indeed evil are their kids also evil? Because at the end if it is pretty frank Draco is saying Harry is going to die now that Voldemort is back.
Reading this book 20 years after its initial printing none of these questions are new or fresh and yeah it would have been fun to argue over these in 10th grade. THis is me putting to paper my first sense of FOMO for not catching the bug earlier combined with the fact JK Rowling has transfigured into an insane toxic monster. At least, I was on the Dune train WAY back when before the movie comes out in December. If it does, that is. Here comes more FOMO
As you read these you will notice much of the choice center around transportation. And reveries set to these little soundtracks. I rarely want to be where I actually am. These jams make everything feel that much more heroic or, at minimum, satisfying. And Disintegration, particularly the instrumental crescendo around 4 minutes in, is pure daydream centered around my "women with swords" penchant. I once told someone (at a much younger and dumber age) that I sometimes fantasized about her fighting others in our share sphere and she responded "That's Ok. I know I kick a lot of ass in them." Bullet dodged and nothing beyond that mere exchange but this is that jam. Note this song is far from it. Its about drugs, addiction, and a broken relationship bust listen to it and imagine yourself stepping into any errand or meeting ready to absolutely win.
To wrap up...this whole bit could be mostly Jimmy Eat World songs but this is the one. And its a fairly "deep track" of their considering it is one random EP record from the mid 00s. The song got played on a One Tree Hill episode which is a show, like my attempt at veganism, I tried to watch to impress a girl, but when you hear it people will often say "Oh, like on OTH!" And if you only knowm Jimmy Eat World from "The Middle" then too bad for you. That song is awful and means nothing, which makes sense why it became such a hit.
Don't know enough about "rock en español" to compare Cafe TaCvba (Not a typo. It is like the U in Chvrches, another neat band. Name is pronounced Cafe TA Cuba) but they have been around forever and changed their sound. Re, the album El Ciclon is on, is the Fleetwod Mac's Rumors of the "rock en español." Every kid had it and every song is a banger. El ciclon is not as manic as others but it has that great nasal rap chord jam and poetic lyrics in which the assert God is female something I never noticed until this re-listen.
What does this remind me of? These seemingly enter summer long weekend trips to family friends in Guanica, a sleep town in an already drowsy part of the island best known for being the point where the US invaded in 1898 Spanish-American War.* At this point the island's edge loops and pits into endless rocky crags and isolated peninsulas surrounded by mangroves and dry rain forest. Here was Gloria's house with the huge indoor courtyard landscaped with hills and snake plants. She was later murdered, found stuffed in a bag miles away. And also Playa Santa where at the end of the bay someone had mounted a concrete Virgin Marry statute into a rocky alcove. Edi and Mundito's house where they kept the washing machine outside and had a pomegranate tree. The third Die Hard movie and Batman Forever.
*This make it sounds MUCH more involved then it actually was. More happened in the background of wherever you are reading this post than what happened in Puerto Rico during the Spanish American War.
