Thirty Days of Music Day 04 - A Song That Makes You Sad

I really struggled to pick one song for this category because there are so many really incredible sad songs.  For a while I toyed with Konstantine by Something Corporate, but I feel its message isn't actually sorrowful even if the melody is.  I also thought about Winter by Joshua Radin and Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley, but these seemed a tad predictable.  In the end I was stuck between My Love Has Gone by Josh Rouse and Kingdom of Rust by Doves and I went for the latter.

The song itself is not classically, or stereotypically, sad - it's not slow, lilting and soppy, it's not quiet and gentle and it's not about doomed love.  Doves have created a song that is driven and progressive that also exudes earnest emotion and paints a bleak, beautiful picture of England.  Williams' vocals are simple in melody but they encourage contemplation.  He sings out 'My God/ It takes an ocean of trust/ It takes an effort it does' and it feels like the song could be applied to any part of our lives.

The video that so beautifully accompanies it is an almost perfectly appropriate interpretation of the song, and together they make one of the most moving pieces of art I've ever seen.  The shots of England are absolutely stunning and the conclusion of the video seems so genuine - it's as if the director has invested great personal and emotional experience into its creation.

Even though I have little other experience of Doves, this song alone gives me great respect for their songwriting ability and I would also recommend Caught by the River. 

Come back tomorrow for a song that reminds me of someone.

Thirty Days of Music Day 03 - A Song That Makes You Happy

Sufjan Stevens' Chicago has the power to warm just about anyone's heart - it provides you with six minutes of unadulterated happiness and has some intagnible quality to it that just inflates the euphoria within your chest.

When Illinois was released in 2005 it stunned critics with its orchestral grandeur, ambitious scope and evocative lyrics.  It was ranked highly on multiple Albums of the Decade lists, including a #1 from Paste magazine, and has been both critically and popularly acclaimed.  The whole album itself is so emotionally balaced - treading the fine line between sorrow and euphoria - and Chicago sits in the soul of the album, epitomising everything that it has come to represent.  It's filled with joyous trumpeting, swooning violins and uplifting lyrics.  The song seems to carry forward in a rush of released energy, and the lyrical content is uplifting without being cliched.  Sufjan sings out 'I made a lot of mistakes' without regret or anger but with a reminiscent fondness - the song revolving around the idea of rebirth from past experiences ('to recreate us/ all things grow, all things grow').  It works so well, just like the album as a whole, because the song seems to take happiness from sorrow - for every trough in emotion, there is a larger peak of joy that seems to heal the wounds.

The video above is a great live version - Sufjan puts on such an incredible show and the whole band are insanely talented.  His new album, which I've reviewed on here, was released a few weeks back and hopefully he'll be coming to Europe sometime next year.  I can't wait for it.

Thirty Days of Music Day 02 - Your Least Favourite Song

I made a small change to the rules for this category, and decided to choose only from songs that are in my music library.  I admit, there was a large selection of songs in my library that really disgusted me for various reasons - from the period in my life they represent, to the values they hold, to the pure ugliness of their sound.  I spent a long time debating all of these songs, toying with the idea of putting up some Slipknot, some Nightwish and 50 Cent, but in the end I couldn't help but choose Operation Ground and Pound as my least favourite song.

This isn't because I have an unquenchable hatred for Dragonforce or because I hate the actual song - in fact, I quite like the song as a stand-alone track - but because I hate what the song represents.  I have great respect for the sheer skill it requires to play such ridiculously fast guitar and drum parts, and I know that I will never be able to attain that level of proficiency, but I feel that it is putting forward an ideal that suggests music can only be good if it is extremely difficult to play.  Dragonforce seem to only write songs that require mind-numbing finger speed, and don't even try to play anything else.  While this is a commendable ambition, I find it bordering on elitist and it suggests to budding young musicians that the skill of being in a band lies solely in technical skill.

This, of course, is not true. 

If we look at bands such as The XX and Foals it is clear that good songwriting and originality are the keys to success - these bands play songs that aren't particularly challenging, but that have pushed the boundaries of modern music and that are musically coordinated and coherent.  Bands like these are both critically acclaimed and widely popular and show that raw finger speed isn't everything.

Furthermore, Dragonforce epitomise the idea that if you like or play a specific type of music then you must look a certain way.  In the same way that emo bands encouraged this a few years back, and indie is to a certain extent now, it almost forces listeners into social stereotypes regardless of whether these suit the person's character.  This is not the way that music should affect its listeners - it should be a release from any kind of social constraints, a chance to escape (to a certain extent) the conformity of day-to-day life.

I'd like to reiterate the point that I'm not trying to personally attack Dragonforce, and I don't want to suggest that they have limited songwriting ability and that they aren't original.  I just feel that they have been producing the same kind of music for far too long and they are too stereotypically representative of the stereotypical metal/ power metal band and listeners.

Thirty Days of Music Day 01 - Your Favourite Song

Heartbeats shot Jose Gonzalez into fame in 2005 when it was used in the Sony Bravia ad (above).  A cover of Swedish band The Knife's 2002 release, it is a beautiful two-and-a-half minute lament over a lost night of love.  I have spent many hours in wonder of the sheer genius of the guitar part that Gonzalez composed for the cover - it's honestly one of the best acoustic guitar phrases I have ever heard.  Unlike other songs that have tended to occupy my attention in phases - coming and going within weeks - this song has remained a favourite of mine for the last few years and now reigns supreme ,with 153, at the top of my most-played list.

Veneer, the album from which Heartbeats is taken, was Gonzalez's debut released in late 2005. It's a melancholy, tricklingly timid collection of songs that embody the style of a true singer-songwriter.  Gonzalez's gentle, placating voice is perfectly suited to this style of music and I can't stress enough how great this album is.  It may not be groundbreaking or experimental, but it's easy to spend hours listening to it.  Veneer is the perfect album to be woken up by on a lazy Sunday morning - it will coax you ever-so-delicately awake - or to chill out to after a busy day.  It's one of those albums that honestly feels like it does your soul good as you listen. 

Sony Bravia are almost single-handedly responsible for Heartbeats' fame - their famous San Francisco bouncing balls is an absolute masterpiece and is as good as the song itself.  Without using any special effects, Sony made one of the most beautiful ads of all time - the images and audio work perfectly together.  If you can't appreciate the beauty of this song, and this video, then I don't think I want you reading my blog...

Thirty Days of Music

I saw this challenge on the My Music Geek blog and thought I'd have a go.  Bearing in mind that lots of my choices for these categories change weekly, here's the list of days:

Day 01 - Your favorite song
Day 02 - Your least favorite song
Day 03 - A song that makes you happy
Day 04 - A song that makes you sad
Day 05 - A song that reminds you of someone
Day 06 - A song that reminds you of somewhere
Day 07 - A song that reminds you of a certain event
Day 08 - A song that you know all the words to
Day 09 - A song that you can dance to
Day 10 - A song that makes you fall asleep
Day 11 - A song from your favorite band
Day 12 - A song from a band you hate
Day 13 - A song that is a guilty pleasure
Day 14 - A song that no one would expect you to love
Day 15 - A song that describes you
Day 16 - A song that you used to love but now hate
Day 17 - A song that you often hear of the radio
Day 18 - A song you wish you often heard on the radio
Day 19 - A song from your favorite album
Day 20 - A song that you listen to when you're angry
Day 21 - A song you listen to when you're happy
Day 22 - A song you listen to when you're sad
Day 23 - A song you want to play at your wedding
Day 24 - A song you want to play at your funeral
Day 25 - A song that makes you laugh
Day 26 - A song that you can play on an instrument
Day 27 - A song you wish you could play
Day 28 - A song that makes you feel guilty
Day 29 - A song from your childhood
Day 30 - Your favorite song at this time last year

Laura Marling Cover

This is mine and Emma's attempt at Laura Marling's song Blackberry Stone.  The video and audio quality is pretty poor, but it could be worse (I hope).  We gave it our best shot.

The Age of Adz - Sufjan Stevens

I have been a big Sufjan Stevens fan for a long time and I am yet to dislike an album he has released. The critically acclaimed Detroit-born artist has long been a cult favourite, and to me (being part of the aforementioned cult) has been unwavering in his high quality output of music. The Age of Adz only consolidates his position in my mind, as it is another album of immense scope that he has pulled off immaculately.

Taking elements of the banjo-laden, acoustic tracks of Michigan and the orchestral grandeur of Illinoise he has mixed them with a myriad of electronic beats and synths - creating probably his most experimental album to date. It is very different to his previous work and even though you can still pick out trumpets, violins, guitars, piano and the other instruments we expect from him, they are often carefully layered or hidden behind an electronic haze. This dramatic change could shock some die-hard fans, but if you invest your time generously into listening then you will see the true beauty of the songs and arrangements.

Lyrically, Sufjan has taken a different approach to his previous albums - before, the emotion in the songs would be rooted in geographical or historical context, whereas in Adz we tend to see the raw feeling untempered by context. This is neither enhancing nor depreciating to his music - it is just, perhaps, a hint as to how he is evolving and experimenting. How he is not willing to stay static for too long.

The first single I Walked is an electronically emotional lament with Sufjan’s gentle voice rising and falling over the beat. It’s catchy yet meaningful, each layer combining to drive the song (gently) forward. However, there are some album tracks that far surpass it. The title track is a writhing, dramatic number where you see all of the usual orchestral components combining with heavy beats, cascading synths and a catchy chorus-sung hook. I Want To Be Well maintains a swift tempo yet slowly builds into an emotional crescendo - the chorus repeating the title and Sufjan, as far as I know, swearing for the first time on a track : ‘I’m not f***ing around’. There is something so earnest about this that it seems to exude emotional charge.

Impossible Soul, a twenty-five-minute tour de force at the end of the album sums up the collection as a whole. It may seem like a large investment at first, but you will find yourself more and more willing to return - each listen granting you new revelations.