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.

Spoon @ Prospect Park

Last night I made it off of work with just enough to make it to Spoon at Prospect Park. They put on a good show, though once again the all-ages (read: mostly teenage) audience drove me nuts and I retreated to the VIP sections at the side and back (why is it that the VIP sections have a worse veiw? Shouldn't they rope off the front like they do for the free shows?). Anyway, it was a beautiful night and they had a good energy, so all in all it was a good show. They of course played audience favorite I Turn My Camera On and The Underdog, among others. I wanted to beat the rush so I left before the encore finished (I worked a 12 hour day yesterday before I went straight to the show, so forgive me for wanting to get home). I'm so glad I made it though for most of the show. It was a good ending to a long day.

The Underdog [mp3] - "Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga" (iTunes)

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Currently on repeat

So I didn't end up going to Spoon last night because it was pouring and thundering beforehand so I thought it might be canceled (that and I just wasn't in the mood to get soaked). From the sounds of it, it wasn't actually canceled after all. Oh well, que sera sera.

Tonight I have decided (rather than pay $30 to see The Pierces, despite how much I love them) to go see Ron Sexsmith for free. While I have never actually really heard any of his music, he is featured on the song "Song No. 6" by Ane Brun, which is one of my favorite songs of the moment. The fact that this song is currently on repeat on my playlist actually says a lot about it. It takes a lot more for me to like calmer songs than upbeat songs lately. This song is very calm, but it is just so sweet and romantic. It's a song about singing a song about the person you love. I really like the rhythm of the chorus. That's actually what made me give the song a chance in the first place. I found this song on a Paste Magazine music sampler. If you don't know Paste Magazine, you should get on that. It comes with a free CD of up-and-coming music every month, and usually a DVD with videos on it too.

Another song currently on repeat is the song "Apres Moi" by Regina Spektor, from her 2006 album "Begin to Hope". I have this bad habit where I tend to listen to the same 50 songs on repeat (what the 50 songs are changes as I go through different phases of finding new music and getting sick of old music) despite my 30 gigs of music on my iPod. In an effort to expand my musical horizons and stop experiencing music ruts and feel like I'm not wasting valuable computer space, I have begun to listen to my entire music library on shuffle. Somehow, this amazing song had gone unlistened to until a few days ago when it popped up on shuffle. It has been on my iPod since at least December and I didn't even know it. The title of the song comes from the famous line "Apres moi, le deluge" (English translation: after me, the flood) by King Louis XV of France. That's really interesting that he said this because 15 years after he died was the French Revolution, so he was definitely right. Anyway, the song by Regina Spektor is one of the most haunting (I know I use that word a lot but apparently I love haunting music), dramatic songs I've heard in a long time. This song has pretty much everything I love about music - it's dramatic, it builds, it has an awesome piano part and there are string instruments. It also stood out to me because a lot of her music is very sparse sounding - very few instrumental parts and her voice. Don't get me wrong, I like a lot of her songs and the sparseness works, but this song is so full and rich. It has a heavy piano part plus a ton of other instruments. And it builds. I love songs that build. For a lot of the beginning it is just her and her voice (though the piano part is not so sparse as in some of her other songs), but toward the end more instruments come in, the piano part gets even heavier and backup vocals come in too. Really, the perfect song by my standards.

Even though I didn't go to Spoon, I'll include one of my favorite Spoon songs (and one of their most popular, I know. I'm running low on time today to really look and think about what song of theirs I should put up), which I also got off a Paste Magazine music sampler too. "I Turn My Camera On." Ok, that's all for today. Tata dahlings.

Song No. 6 by Ane Brun ft. Ron Sexsmith - iTunes
Apres Moi by Regina Spektor - iTunes
I Turn my Camera On by Spoon - iTunes