The Cranberries - Linger [rock]

Prolonged bouts of concentration have always been troublesome for me to maintain. I just keep recalling silly things I've done in the past and I can't help but cringe a little and rebuke that old self for its ignorance. Luckily, these inconvenient surfacings can be avoided by simply listening to music, which can be done pretty much everywhere. The one exception is when I'm trying to practice playing an instrument. This was a major problem back in the day when I (half-assedly) played the violin and it still seems to be a problem today when I play guitar.

Quite fittingly, I was trying to play "Linger" by The Cranberries from their 1993 album Everyone Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?. The chords aren't anything, it's just D->A->C->G, I just can't sing and play simultaneously for the life of me. But, no matter, I can't seem to do it right now anyway.

BELLE GHOUL - (Out Of) The Neighbourhood [rock]

"Half-Light" by Trembling Blue Stars came up on my iPod yesterday. So it got me thinking about something a little strange about that music video (there's a post about it a while back): the channel that had posted it is Elefant Records, a Spanish music label. What on earth is a UK band doing there? Well, I'm not too aware of what actually goes on in the music biz so this may actually be super standard.

Well, on the same day that I had made that post, I also perused over a bunch of the other uploads on that channel and I was really quite impressed with a lot of them. Here's one of them: "(Out Of) The Neighbourhood", a single released a couple months ago (I think..) by BELLE GHOUL. The duo itself consists of Christopher Tait, of numerous acts including Electric Six, and Jesse Smith, daughter of Patti Smith (!!), and cite their influences to include Scott Joplin, The Zombies, and Fleetwood Mac.

Ok, since these guys are obviously American (Tait from Detroit and Smith from New York), it may not be that out of the ordinary for bands to be registered with foreign record labels. And, oh, two Belle's in a row, how pretty (now that's witty)...

Belle and Sebastian - I Want the World to Stop [rock]

Well, after listening to Amy Macdonald, I felt compelled to look up more Scottish artists. The first one that came up with that tag on Last.fm was Belle and Sebastian and the first video on the page was the one below "I Want the World to Stop" from their 2010 album Write About Love.

Coincidentally, this is a song that I had heard on CBC Radio 2 during their Drive program (as I was driving, how witty). I had wanted to look more into this song/band but, for whatever reason, just never did. Well, glad to have made its acquaintance, then, once again.

The man stops talking at ~0:30.

Amy Macdonald - Slow It Down [rock]

The past couple of weeks have been pretty rough and it's really starting to put a strain the relationships I have with those around me. I'm very thankful that they are not petty people and that they've all been very accommodating to this (hopefully) transient state. One of the few things that are keeping me from bursting at the seams is, as cliché as it may sound, music, specifically, the ready wealth of music that the Internet has made assessible.

So, almost twenty years after its release, I finally checked out the debut album from The Cranberries, Everybody Is Doing It, So Can't We?, and I'm definitely going to file this album under the "should've gotten this years ago" category. But this post isn't about The Cranberries. It's about the musician that was listed under "Similar Artists", Amy MacDonald (albeit with "Lower Similarity").

Amy MacDonald is a Scottish singer/songwriter who cites her influences as Travis and The Killers. Her first album was released in 2007. This particular song is "Slow It Down" from her third album Life In A Beautiful Light, released earlier this year in June. According to her Last.fm entry, this song is about her being a petrolhead (car enthusiast). Thanks be to Last.fm for allowing this blessed encounter.

The Nightwatchman - Black Spartacus Heart Attack Machine [folk rock]

I think one of my earliest CDs was The Battle of Los Angeles by Rage Against The Machine (I don't think my mom quite realized what kind of music it was...). Although RATM itself dissolved about a year after I started getting into them, they nonetheless featured rather prominently in the stuff I listened to throughout high school.

Having taken a particular liking to the style of guitarist Tom Morello, you could imagine my excitement when I first heard about Audioslave (RATM members minus Zach with Chris Cornell). Of course I was disappointed when Audioslave too had called it quits. But, that is the inevitable fate of most (if not all) supergroups, I suppose.

Sometime later, as I was loitering in some store, I was inexplicably (well not that inexplicable) drawn to a magazine dawning the familiar face of Tom Morello that had an article about his folk-rock side-project The Nightwatchman. This was initially an outlet for his political views that couldn't, at the time, be channeled musically due the apolitical nature of Audioslave.

The Nightwatchman breaks away from Tom Morello's more signature electric guitar in favour of an acoustic, his voice (I don't think he had ever sung in any official capacity within RATM or Audioslave), and occasionally the harmonica. Well, four years after his first album, Tom Morello is still at with his third LP release World Wide Rebel Songs released in 2011. This is "Black Spartacus Heart Attack Machine", a song with great energy and a solid message.

To end off, in the great words of Nardwuar (well, Neil Young), keep on rockin' in the free world, Tom!

The Battle Of Land And Sea - You Are A Sailor [folk]

The Battle of Land and Sea is an acoustic folk duo consisting of Sarah O'Shura and Joshua Canny. This is "You Are A Sailor" from their eponymous release from 2008.

Personally, I do find water to exhibit a calming effect (not unlike this song's tone and lyrical content). Being the dedicated city slicker than I am, I rarely frequent significant bodies of water. Whenever I do, however, I'm reminded that the world is bigger and so big enough so that my first-world problems may not be as pressing as I may initially perceive them to be. 

Golden Gardens - Transparent Things [dream pop]

Golden Gardens is a Seattle duo that creates soothing dream pop with beautiful harmonies (vocals at times reminiscent of Cranes) as well as drums and bass that readily keep a steady rhythm. This is the fourth track, "Transparent Things", from their LP released back in November this year, How Brave The Hunted Wolves.

I'm still considering buying their album on their Bandcamp but the cautious part of me thinks maybe it'd be better if I wanted til I'm employed again. Luckily, the album's fully streamable so maybe that'll be sufficient for now.

This Will Destroy You - Happiness: We're All In It Together [post-rock]

I don't know if it's just me being biased because they were the songs that started getting me into post-rock in a big way, but I take particularly well to all the material on This Will Destroy You's 2006 EP Young Mountain. Even listening to it now two years later, the seemingly simple arrangement of these pieces help get me into a place that I wish I could stay for longer than the mere duration of the songs. But, alas, it seems our collective fates are to reside here, in this shared, well-defined reality, until some external agent finally calls out to us and we drown.

Anyway, this is "Happiness: We're All In It Together Now" from This Will Destroy You's Young Mountain EP released in 2006.

Trembling Blue Stars - Half-Light [rock]

I probably haven't been as zealous as I usually am in my voracious consumption of novel music in the past few weeks, undoubtedly in no small part due to the exhaustion of being (slightly) overworked. Not that that's particularly necessary. Since however long ago that I had begun making a conscious effort to find new music regularly, I've amassed a modest and comfortable collection that I can go to (and now with the netbook, that collection has become more accessible than ever ...better than that 8gig iPod, ugh).

The song is "Half-Light" by London-based Trembling Blue Stars from their 2011 album Fast Trains and Telephone Wires (there's another post with another song from this album somewhere in this blog's depths). I think it conveys very well that sense of lethargy that has begun clogging my mental machinery lately.

**EDIT** Just wanted to point out the oddity of this video by a UK band being put up by Spanish music label Elefant Records... that is all.