Before I begin talking about this month’s “Band of the Month” I would first like to explain how I came upon this group. Recently I have started training at WUVT, (90.7 Blacksburg) the student run college radio station at Virignia Tech. Every Friday my co-host Roland and I have an hour and half show in the practice studio at WUVT (pronounced Whoo-Vit). By next semester we should have our own shown that will be broadcasting on the air and online. When we have our own live show, we will have full control over what we will be playing but at the moment we do not. Every training DJ is required to play 9 songs from the rotation of the newest albums the station has received. At first I was skeptical about playing music during our show that neither my co-host and I have ever heard of. That was until our first show while we were rushing to find a CD to play we threw in the newest Beach House album and went with track one.
Our first show was honestly a mess, we got to the studio five minutes before we were supposed to start, meaning we never had time to pick out music what we wanted to play. During our show we spent most of our time trying to find more music to play rather than listening to what we were playing. Before we randomly put in the Beach House album to fit our nine rotation albums requirement, Roland and I barely even got to sit down to even listen to our music because we were always rushing to find more. Once we put in Beach House’s new self titled album, everything stopped. The rush of Beach House’s dream-pop musical styles filled our studio and instantly brought peace to the bustle of our show. Somewhere along those lines I believe that’s exactly what Beach House intended their music to be, a mindless escape from the bustle of life. You won’t find any fast paced tracks on any of their albums but what you will find are a pool of slowly developing tracks that will force you to stop whatever you’re doing and simply enjoy the nostalgic of state of mind their music puts you in.
[Beach House - Zebra]
Normally I would write a little review about this months “Band of the Month” but I still can’t decide if I really like Daniel Zott. I’ve listened to his double disc album, one that you can stream for free on his website [ Disc 1 : Disc 2 ], multiple times and I still can’t decide on a verdict. There are points of originality but then songs like “Caught In What You’re Doing” and “Ya Lek Tyn” come on and sound almost exactly like Elliott Smith and Sigur Ros respectively. Who knows, maybe he might be one of those guys I would have to see live to get a full understanding of. I imagine his live shows would be a lot of fun, especially if he plays the acoustic Hip-Hop covers “Low” by Flo Rida and “Crank Dat” by Soulja boy” that are on his Myspace page.
[Daniel Zott - Living A Lie]
Published on January 7, 2010
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Here is my schedule for next semester, no classes on Friday!
[Spoon - Change My Life]
While reading the album review for Passion Pit’s debut album “Manners” from Rolling Stone, I found Will Hermes’s description of the progression of the indie music world spot on.
From Animal Collective’s psychedelic collages to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ punk disco, electronic music has been invading the indie-rock world lately, as bands mix dance-floor science with do-it-yourself hooks and histrionics. [Will Hermes - Rolling Stone]
One of my favorite things about indie music is the uniqueness of every band. Unlike music genres like Country or Hip-hop where the majority of artists sound very similar, it is impossible to find two indie bands that sound the same. I am always stumped when my friends ask me to describe bands that I like with the question “Who do they sound like?” Even with the expansion of the indie music world from more folk rock bands like: The Decemberists, Sufjan Stevens, and Andrew Bird to electronic bands like: Phoenix, Peter Bjorn and John, and Crystal Castle. The new wave of bands still carry the essence of indie music in the fact that although they use more electronic styles there is still a large amount uniqueness making each one different. Passion Pit, January’s band of the month, is no exception to the rule.
[Passion Pit - Sleepyhead]
About a year ago I promised that on this blog I would have try to have a “band of the month” deal. After one post the idea faded away until now. What I am basically going to do now is just post one song a month that catches my eye from either one of my favorite indie bands or a new one I discover. This month the band is “Great Lake Swimmers,” I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
[Great Lake Swimmers - Moving Pictures, Silent Films]
Published on December 17, 2009
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Done with my Chemistery final and I’m going home for a month.
[Switchfoot - Chem 6A]
Published on December 3, 2009
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So you see that long haired guy throwing a pink disc in that banner up there? Well that long hair doesn’t exist anymore. Actually it has been gone for a while but it’s still kind of neat seeing photos of how different I looked before.
2005 – When I first grew out my hair
Spring 2009 – Basically how I looked for the past 4 years
Fall 2009 – How I look now
[Pavement - Cut Your Hair]
Published on November 27, 2009
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Thanks to my college roommate who enjoys playing Taylor Swift songs while he is working I now know the majority of the lyrics to her most popular songs. Normally this embarrassing knowledge hasn’t been a problem until now. While I was shopping at Models today for basketball shorts, Taylor Swift’s hit song “Teardrops On My Guitar” started playing. Apparently while I was going through one of the clearance racks I was singing the song loud enough that the person restocking one of the table of shirts across from me could hear me. I didn’t realized I was singing the song until I noticed that she stopped working and was awkwardly staring at me. I suppose she liked the song so I simply continued humming the rest of the song.
[Taylor Swift - Tear Drops On My Guitar]
Published on November 26, 2009
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Howdy readers,
I have finally fixed my gallery, unfortunately no photos are up right now. After about a month of trying to fix my blog I finally got the gallery to work but it won’t load my old photos. Nevertheless it’s back and most importnatly I’m back. Except finals are coming back so I’ll write more later!
[Pedro The Lion - Fix]
Published on October 22, 2009
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Today I decided to wear my Sufjan Stevens “Come On! Feel The Illinoise!” t-shirt around campus. Back home I can count all of the Sufjan Stevens fans I know on one hand with three fingers chopped off (meaning two?). While at tech I can count all the Sufjan fans on a perfectly unaltered hand (meaning five?). With a college campus of about 23,000 there must exist other Sufjan fans because while in high school I was one of two fans among the 3,000. Today I found out my theory held true and I was stopped by 4 random people today commenting on my t-shirt. Three of them knew who Sufjan was while the fourth thought I was from Illinois and simply thought my shirt was really cool. Unfortunately I was late to class each time someone stopped me so I was unable to befriend them. Oh well, there will come another day when I will wear that shirt around campus, hopefully I will get the same reaction again.
[Sufjan Stevens - Come On! Feel The Illinoise!]