Theme Thursday - Flu

So for the first time in my life, I have the flu. It has not been pleasant. Thus my update for today will be quick. But out of curiosity I typed "flu" into my iTunes search bar to see what songs would come up. This was the only one that came up, but it's a good song. Anyone else got any good ones for "flu"? Not the easiest theme I've ever picked...

Bird Flu [mp3] - MIA - Kala (iTunes)

Workout Music for you New Year's Resolutions

Yes, the comic was the first thing that popped up when I googled "workout." I recently joined the gym, and I know that with New Year's coming and resolutions in the air, many of you may not be far behind me. Music really helps keep me going through my workout, so I thought I would post this workout mix.

Freak Of Nature [mp3] - Anastacia - "Freak of Nature" (iTunes) - Start out with this slower, sexy song to get yourself warmed up. It's a good tempo for doing crunches or starting off slow.

Ghosts [mp3] - Ladytron - "Ghosts (Single)" (iTunes)

12345678 [mp3] - The Hard Lessons - "B&G Sides Vol. 3" (iTunes) - A song that makes you want to yell along with it (and which you can, instead, use to channel that energy into your workout).

Love Shack [mp3] - The B-52s - "Cosmic Thing" (iTunes) - A classic to energize you as you speed up your work out and get your heart pumping.

Jique [mp3] - Brazilian Girls - "Talk To La Bomb" (iTunes) - A sexy song to remind you of your sexy results as you continue to increase your work out intensity.

Worked Up So Sexual [mp3] - The Faint - "Blank Wave Arcade" (iTunes) - You are now reaching the peak of your work out, so the next few songs are super fast-paced and full of energy.

Dancing With Myself [mp3] - Billy Idol - "Billy Idol's Greatest Hits" (iTunes) - This is one of the best work out songs ever (and best dance songs ever).

Deceptacon [mp3] - Le Tigre - "Le Tigre" (iTunes) Just doing the dance in this music video is a really great workout (albeit a short one).

10 Dollar [mp3] - MIA - "Arular" (iTunes) - Basically any MIA song just about would work here, but we're going to start slowing it down a tiny bit as you prepare for cool down, while still keeping it fun and upbeat.

That Great Love Sound [mp3] - The Raveonettes - "Chain Gang Of Love" (iTunes)

Ghost Under Rocks [mp3] - Ra Ra Riot - "The Rhumb Line" (iTunes) - This one slows it down a little more and has some drama to push you through to the end of your work out as you start to get tired.

I Am In Love With You [mp3] - Imogen Heap - "Speak For Yourself" (iTunes) - Slower still, but with some attitude and a dash of sultriness.

Spoon [mp3] - Spoon - "Gimme Fiction" (iTunes) - And a slower but bouncy fun finale to a work out well done.

Lists lists lists

This is the time of year when music bloggers compile lists - best albums, best songs, best new artists, etc of 2007. But I'm not going to compile these lists because I didn't start doing this until July. So next year I will compile more extensive lists, but this year I will just rattle off a few albums from 2007 that I really liked in no particular order.

Awesome Albums from 2007
"Thirteen Tales of Love and Revenge" - The Pierces (iTunes)
"The Reminder" - Feist (iTunes)
"Balance Between" - Ippazzi (iTunes)
"Marry Me" - St. Vincent (iTunes)
"im on to you - EP" - Ian Axel (iTunes)
"Baby 81" - Black Rebel Motorcycle Club (iTunes)
"Kala" - MIA (iTunes)
"Don't Make Me Wait" - Locksley (iTunes)
"Random Spirit Lover" - Sunset Rubdown (iTunes)
"And End Has A Start" - Editors (iTunes)
"Get On With It - EP" - Shoot the Messenger (iTunes)

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Videos from the radio stars

I'm feeling in a cinematic mood today (maybe it's because of my awesome new camera that I'm slowly figuring out how to use...!), so I'm going to post some music videos. Hoorah!

Paper Planes - MIA - "Kala" (iTunes)

Not the best video but I love MIA anyway.

Big Girl (You Are Beautiful) - MIKA - "Life in Cartoon Motion" (iTunes)

As great as this video is, it's not quite as great as the video for Love Today, which Universal Music Group has disabled the "embed" feature on, so alas I can't post it here. I also find this video kind of ironic because Mika couldn't be skinnier (or gayer...)

Pull Shapes - The Pipettes - "We are The Pipettes" (iTunes)

I wanted to post their video for Because It's Not Love (But It's Still a Feeling) but once again, Universal has disabled the "embed" feature. Really not understanding why they would shy away from the free publicity of people re-posting the video all over the internet...?

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MIA's "Kala"

Yesterday, MIA's much anticipated album "Kala" was released. Making this album wasn't easy for MIA due to visa troubles with the US (we wouldn't let her back in the country for a while, stupid US). However, she made the best of it and recorded bits and pieces of the album all over the world, therefore achieving a pretty sweet variety of sounds - sampling everything from Brazilian samba to Jamaican dancehall to Australian Aboriginal to disco. While she has said the album is less political than her debut album "Arular," it's still pretty political (I'd even venture say it's not any less political) and I've heard it speculated that MIA's visa struggles may have been a small influence. I've also heard people say that the political messages of this album are more mature than in, "Arular." I can see where people would think that. The thing that stood out to me immediately though as the biggest difference between "Kala" and "Arular" is the sparseness of the music. At first, I have to admit, it's kind of off-putting, but the more I listen to the album, the more each song grows on me despite the scantness.

I think my favorite song is probably Jimmy, the Bollywood disco remake and one of the less sparse songs on the album. Although I also really love the kids on Mango Pickle Down River, and her deep, monotone rapping and the slightly haunting whispering in XR2. I would say her songs are generally less catchy than "Arular" because of the minimalism, but that doesn't make them better or worse - it just means there are not really many obvious "hits" that I can pinpoint right now (besides Boyz, which is also less sparse). I mean, there's not a single song on the album that I dislike, there just aren't many that stand out as "above the rest" (which, again, is not a bad thing). Overall a very strong album and a great follow-up to "Arular." One thing is for sure, the girl still makes me want to get up and dance.

Track List:
1. Bamboo Banga
2. Birdflu
3. Boyz
4. Jimmy [mp3]
5. Hussel ft. Afrikan Boy
6. Mango Pickle Down River ft. The Wilcannia Mob [mp3]
7. 20 Dollar
8. World Town
9. Turn
10. XR2 [mp3]
11. Paper Planes
12. Come Around ft. Timbaland

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Dance Party - 8.10.07

A few things I'd like to say before I jump to the dance songs for the weekend. Number one, I would like a better name for this blog. So if you have any ideas, let me know. Particularly those of you reading this that know me. Because I would like it to kind of reflect me in some way, as well as having some connection to music and maybe (if possible) film. I'm kind of thinking something along the lines of "Guilt-Free Pleasures" because I like pop culture, and I often refer to it as a "guilty pleasure" because of all my indie friends giving me crap, but I've come to realize that no pleasure should be guilty pleasure and I'm not ashamed of liking popular things. Thoughts would be appreciated.

Number two, I realize I have a lot of trouble putting my thoughts about music into words. I know that might make this semi-stream-of-consciousness blog hard to read, but hopefully you're here more for the music anyway. The thing about music for me is that it's such an internal thing and it's really hard for me to explain (or even know for that matter) what specifically I like about songs. That's why you'll often see me talk about a band's energy and performance if I go to a concert, more than the actual music they play. This is going to sound cheesy, but music has always pulled more at my heart than at my head, so it's hard for me to explain things sometimes. It's more about feelings. So there's a lot of "this song is funny, this song makes me want to dance, this song is haunting" in my blog because it's hard to verbalize those feelings past that kind of vague level.

I think you'll find that I approach this blog more as if I was DJing than if I was writing about music. I post songs that I like that I think are appropriate for whatever the purpose of the entry is and that I think other people will like. It isn't all brand spankin' new or stuff you've never heard before, but it's also stuff that you haven't listened to in a while, or a lesser known song by an artist you already love, or even a really popular song of the moment that I love along with everyone else. And I'm probably one of the most eclectic people you'll find on the internet. Just look at the list of labels on the left and see all the different artists I've posted about in my one month of having this blog My tastes vary in range from Britney Spears to Atmosphere to Simon & Milo to Julius C to The Pierces to The Hard Lessons to Regina Spektor to The Beatles to Mozart. So hopefully, if you read this blog, you appreciate the variety of songs that I post, even if you have already heard of the artists.

Ok, so now for the music. Some dance tunes to get you grooving this weekend:

Alala [mp3] - CSS - "Cansei De Ser Sexy" (iTunes). Because when I wrote about their concert at Studio B on Monday, I had for some reason forgotten how much I love the song Alala and didn't post that one. I think this might actually be my favorite of theirs. Oh, and if you tried downloading Let's Make Love and Listen to Death From Above from that entry and it didn't work. I apologize. I fixed it, so feel free to go back and get it again.

Defcon [mp3] - Supersystem - "Always Never Again" (iTunes). This song is a frenzy of energy that never lulls.

Creepin' Up the Backstairs [mp3] - The Fratellis - "Costello Music" (iTunes). This song has an old feel to it. Maybe 1940s/50s? Not that I know how to swing dance or jitterbug but I imagine some type of dancing along that line would be fitting for this song. But at the same time, it has an updated rock twist. I'm a fan. In fact, this is rapidly climbing it's way up my list of favorite songs of all time.

And a music video, just for fun (MIA's new Jimmy, originally a Bollywood song apparently)


So there you go. Hope everyone's weekends are off to a great start. Tomorrow I will post a concert review of last night's Celebrate Brooklyn (The Teenage Prayers, The Big Sleep and The Hold Steady), which luckily didn't get rained out. Tata dahlings.

Siren Music Festival

I just have to start out by saying that it's awesome that two of my last three days has revolved around live music, fresh air and water. Oh and click the pictures to make them bigger.

Yesterday was the Village Voice's Siren Music Festival. 12 bands, 2 stages, all free at Coney Island. Now, I'm actually kind of disappointed in myself because I had planned to try to hit up almost every band, but that didn't happen. At all. I didn't even make it out there until 2:30pm because I kept getting distracted or getting important phone calls. Plus when I got there, navigating the crowds was hard and energy-consuming, so bouncing back and forth between stages proved a lot more difficult than I thought it would be.

I have to say, the weather was pretty much perfect. It was a little hot in the direct sunlight, but overall it was quite a pleasant day to spend outside at concerts by the ocean. Coney Island is such an interesting place, and even when there isn't a big event happening the people watching is always fun. Even moreso at times like the Siren Festival though. My friend Laura's boss was like "I saw hipsters crying!" haha.

Anyway, so the first group I saw was Elvis Perkins in Dearland. They were pretty good. The band was just so high energy and they all played off each other, which was really great. I love when you know the people are really having fun performing. I would actually have to say though, Elvis probably had the least energy, which is weird since he's the front man. The drummer was the coolest. I was really glad when he picked up a Bass drum and came to the front of the stage and could move around for a song instead of being stuck in the back behind a drum set. I also liked that they played instruments not necessarily typical of a rock band.

When I left Elvis Perkins, I went to find my friend Laura, which was surprisingly difficult and took quite a while. I caught like 2 minutes of Dr. Dog in looking for her. They seemed cool, but I didn't get a very good feel for them since I was focusing on finding Laura. By the time I found her, I was already exhausted from crowd navigating, haha. Laura and her friend were even more exhausted because they had been there since 1:30 working, so we relaxed on the boardwalk for a while and ate. Unfortunately, this meant I missed The Noisettes, who I really wanted to see. We did wander past the stage at one point and it sounded like so much fun though. I probably should've just gone and watched them by myself, but I felt like that meant I would never find Laura again and I'm not so big on the going to concerts by myself thing.

Finally we decided to hit up the mainstage right before Black Lips went on so that we could slowly move our way up for We Are Scientists and MIA. I have to say, Black Lips was really not so memorable. For some reason they just weren't holding my attention. I kind of spaced out or talked to people through their whole show. The only things I remember about them was the way they jumped up and down a lot and, while I can't say they lacked energy, it didn't actually seem like they were having fun - it seemed really rehearsed to me - and how one of their songs sounded very 60s pop-ish (and only that one song really) but yet they looked very... 90s? I dunno. They had awesome mustaches though... Haha. I remember that much.

Next was We Are Scientists. I managed to push my way up a little more as people left between shows, so I could actually see them pretty well. I really liked them a lot. Great groove-able rock music. Kind of reminiscent of The Killers or Franz Ferdinand with maybe a little Eagles of Death Metal thrown in or something. I'm sad that I didn't get any good pictures of them. As you may be able to tell, this one is blurry. Anyway, they were really fun. Another group that you could tell was really having fun performing. My favorite song they did was "Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt." Definitely a crowd favorite and good for singing along to.

Next was MIA, who I love and I'd been wanting to see forever. No matter how much I listen to her music I don't ever really get sick of it. Her music just makes everyone want to dance. My friend Laura was even more excited than I was though, and the second that We Are Scientists was done she grabbed my arm with one hand and used her other arm to literally elbow her way through the crowd. She was like "any bitches get in my way, they're going down!" and one girl nearby kind of laughed and Laura just looked at her and said "you think I'm kidding?" and then proceeded to elbow past a few more people. We got pretty close. I'm glad she was with me because I wouldn't have been quite so aggressive about shoving up. We were in the equivalent of what would've been the 4th row (if you exclude the VIP section). It was pretty awesome. Although for a while I was stuck behind this annoying guy who kept his (fat) arms up the whole time (he kept trying to wave at her or something...) so it was a little hard for me to see and really hard for me to get decent pictures. But the music was good. The crowd was loving it. Even though there was hardly any space, everyone was dancing, at least as much as they could.

MIA is pretty adorable. Every now and then she would stop to talk about getting her Visa and what a bitch that was. Or to talk about how thirsty she was. "I've drank everything on this stage" she joked. At one point her wireless mic went out on her, so she grabbed a wired one, but then she kept walking to far and unplugging it accidentally so she stopped the show and was like "I can't be on a leash!" When she got a wireless mic back, she actually handed the wired mic to some random person in the audience. She's just awesome that way. She goes "now we can have a real conversation." Her backup singer/dancer was pretty cool too. One of my favorite moments was when some random girl somehow ran up on the stage and started dancing for only a brief moment before a security guard grabbed her and carried her off stage, but then MIA actually pulled a different random girl out of the VIP section and onto the stage with her. I think the guy in front of me was livid with jealousy. He was really obsessed. There was this beach ball she was playing with briefly on stage and then kicked it out to the audience and he tried to keep it because she touched it but his friend was like "um, everyone else will kill you." I definitely would've because it was obstructing my view even more than his arms that he never put down.

Last to perform on the Mainstage was The New York Dolls. When all the MIA-ers left, I suddenly was front and center so I decided to stick around, even though I'm not all that familiar with them (but they are kind of legendary, so I mean, why wouldn't I take the opportunity to see them front row for free). By this time though, everything was running late, so they didn't go on until almost 8pm and two of my really good friends were having a birthday party, so I actually didn't end up staying for that long. I stayed for the first maybe 15 minutes of their set. They were fun. The lead singer is kind of... too skinny. Yay drugs! But they still glam-rocked the night away. Gotta say, loved their outfits. My favorite was the guy in the pink. And they seemed like they were having a blast. Too bad only two of the original members are left. Although it has been 36 years and all... I'm pretty impressed that any of them are still performing with the amount of energy they had. I probably would've stayed longer if it weren't for these two really pushy people crushing me from either side. I just got a little claustrophobic and by that time I was exhausted and sore from standing all day, so I wasn't in the mood to deal with it. Getting back out was not fun either though... Yikes.

On my way out, I stopped by the Stillwell stage and caught a few minutes of Cursive, but I didn't have any energy left so I just stood at the back for like 10 minutes. Maybe it was because I was so tired and standing in the back (and couldn't really see because of it) with people who were just chilling out, but it was really hard for me to get into, so I decided to try to get ahead of the crowd and head to the subway.

The line up this year was so great. I'm really kind of sad that I couldn't see everyone. There were very few bands I wasn't interested in seeing. But I still had a very good day, and it's not every day you get to see 5 or so bands for free. Ok, hope everyone else who went had fun too! Tata dahlings.

While You Were Sleeping ~ Elvis Perkins (Ash Wednesday) - iTunes
Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt ~ We Are Scientists (With Love and Squalor) - iTunes
10 Dollar ~ MIA (Arular) - iTunes
Personality Crisis ~ New York Dolls (New York Dolls) - iTunes

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