The Flaming Lips

song of this moment:

The Flaming Lips, "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1"

I have been a very bad contributor as of late. My apologies, dearest of all my blogs (well, really, you are the only one. Or maybe I say that to all of my blogs. who can say?).

(sidenote: I really hate the word blog. BLOG. say it with me. see?)

This is the forth day of my very tiny person being much more sick than I am comfortable with.

This is comforting.

Janelle Monae

Theme song of right now:

Janelle Monae, Tightrope

Normally I prefer to post the official videos, but you should watch this clip because it's live.  I can't express that enough.  This is a live video.  No dubbing.  Plus it's making my feet do funny things under my desk.

Ladytron

Theme song of the day:

Ladytron, "Seventeen" and "Burning Up"

thesis writing.  ladytron listening.  coffee drinking.

repeat.

The Proclaimers

song of this day:

The Proclaimers, "500 miles"

I love this song so much more than my internet connection has been loving me lately. deal with it.

The Unicorns

Theme song of the day (all last week):

The Unicorns, "I Was Born (A Unicorn)"

Hipster Alert!  Hipster Alert!  I like this version "I Was Born (A Unicorn)" from "Unicorns Are People Too" than the one on "Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?".  Reason?  This version has the following lyrics:

...lena horne is not a unicorn
(but she's got a great voice)...

we're paper scissors rock (we're crackle pop!)
we want one-ups (not bran flakes!)
we don't got stirrups (we got the shakes!)

i was born a unicorn
and we'll die with wings

we're the unicorns and we read eunuch porn
we're the unicorns and we're people too

don't you stop believing in me!

(quartz crystals put 'em under your pillow)

I like silly and quirky things.  A song that includes people yelling, "paper scissors rock (crackle pop!)" is always a win in my book.

Gogol Bordello

Theme song on the evening:

Gogol Bordello, "Baro Foro"

These guys are insane.  And keep me awake.  I like both of those things.

Peter Bjorn and John

song of this moment:

Peter Bjorn and John, "Nothing to Worry About"

home again, home again.

driving. chocolate peanut butter. music. documentaries.

life is pretty delicious.

so is this.

Animal Collective

Theme song of the day:

Animal Collective, "Brother Sport"

I'm having some weird feeling that I've posted this before... but I'm pretty sure I haven't.  It could be the paint fumes still lingering in my office (I've moved my office three times now since starting grad school- I finally nailed the best one) from its makeover.

This song pretty much is the musical version of what goes on in my head when I snatch up a great thrift store find.  Which, incidentally, happened this afternoon.

Jim White

Theme song of the day:

Jim White, "Pieces of Heaven"

I first got ahold of some Jim White from my friend Steve.  So listening to Jim White always reminds me of Steve, and coffee.  And grading.  And more coffee.  And a little bit more Steve.  But mostly coffee.

And how can you not like an artist that names him albums "Wrong-Eyed Jesus!", "Transnormal Skiperoo", and my personal favorite, "Drill a hole in that substrate and tell me what you see".  And how can you not immediately be friends with someone that listens to brilliant stuff like that?

I think I'm going to get some coffee Steve.  See ya at Coffee Zone in a couple weeks.

Of course, youtube does not have "Pieces of Heaven" and I'm not about to be that girl that loads videos on youtube.  I do too much already.  So enjoy "Static on the Radio" instead.



Oh just kidding! Watch this one! This is great!

The White Stripes

Song of the near death experience:

The White Stripes, " Hello Operator"

I'm finally home after several memorable days that included:

roughly 800 miles of driving

museum date in which we went to the museum three times but never actually saw it

empress chicken

two pitchers of beer

spontaneous 10pm viewing of sculpture garden

tortilla soup dinner with friends at midnight

car sleep in church parking lot

one tiny dog

hour upon hour of chatter

playing, and ignoring, at least 4 movies

observation of late night shakespeare in the park rehearsal

but the award for most memorable must go to driving alone at 2am on the empty, black turnpike, deer in the headlights, swerving, completely losing control of car, spinning in slow motion toward certain death, car screeching backwards to halt just before the ditch, jumping from car to vomit while inhaling burning rubber, all while listening to this.

this will be really funny when the sick feeling goes away.

Alice In Chains

Theme song of the day:

Alice In Chains, "Heaven Beside You"

So I've been going through some serious '90's love for about a week or two now.  It started with Jay and I spending an evening of internetting together (so hot) and playing songs/music videos as we chatted.  That's how I remembered that Garbage existed, and like 5,000 other bands I used to be rabid about.  The thing is, I'm really too young for this music.  Most of that terrific grunge rock came out when I was about 7, jumping rope and forcing my cat into a doll buggy, and I caught on about 7 years later when I realized that there was other music that existed beyond my parent's music collection.  Gasp.

During those formative teen years I listened to a great alternative rock radio station where the DJ's didn't really like playing the alt rock of the late '90's and '00's, and clung to the music of the early to mid '90's like a life raft.  From what I understand, this station is now a Clear Channel station and of course, sucks.  Those old DJ's are probably working at Wal-Mart or playing Jonas Brothers music on their new Clear Channel stations.  What happens to old DJ's anyway?  Do they have a retirement home or something?

But I am re-discovering the awesomeness.  And sharing it with you.  It's sort of nice to remember that I wasn't always such a fucking hipster.

Of Montreal

Theme song of the day:

Of Montreal, "Oslo in the Summertime"

I cannot get enough of this song.  It's been on repeat for four hours while I've been writing my thesis.  I'm thinking that if I were to read what I've written in the past four hours, it will only be lyrics to this song.  I'm okay with that.

Apostle of Hustle

Theme song of the day:

Apostle of Hustle, "Song for Lorca"

I have been a bad daily blogger.  A very very very bad daily blogger.  And when I "come back", I open with a song that doesn't even have a video on the youtube.  Bummer.  That's sort of how this day went too... just a strange series of mishaps and good intentions that resulted in getting odd things done, but not what I had planned.  I have been humming this song all day and finally listened to it about 20 minutes ago.... and hot damn Apostle of Hustle makes a good album.  Now I'm lost in a post dinner-doing-laundry-tired-happy time, and Apostle of Hustle is perfect.  I almost feel like I can see this song when I close my eyes.

But no video!  So here's another Apostle of Hustle song instead.

Or not.  youtube doesn't have "Xerses" either.

Or "Folkloric Feel" (the live video of this song isn't going to cut it)

Ok.  Fine.  Here's "Kings and Queens"  But seriously, go download their album "Folkloric Feel", or at the very least iTunes preview it.

No Doubt

song of the moment (and the entire year of 1997):

No Doubt, "Sunday Morning"

I owe this post to Kelsey's Garbage post and the resulting jog of my memory.

In 1997 my sister had an acquaintance - I cannot remember his name - that would regale her with tales of what I was wearing and listening to, daily (but never interact with me). Public transportation was king in my home town and I rode the bus to cosmetology school. I also listened to my portable cd player (yeah, really missing those) loud, apparently. Tragic Kingdom all day every day. This song is still one of my favorites - were I to do a vh1 style countdown this would certainly rank in the top 40. maybe.

Oh, and it turned out that the kid was obsessed with me because of a resemblance to Shirley Manson.... "with boobs". Score!

Garbage

Theme song of the day:

Garbage, "Vow"

I'm having a really hard time here people.  I have rediscovered Garbage and I can't pick which song I'm liking more at the moment.  But after much youtubing, I was finally able to pick one.  "Vow" was their first single, before "Only Happy When It Rains" came out and they sort of exploded.  But holy shit, this is some great lab music.  I cleaned out the entire fume hood with Garbage on shuffle and hardly noticed that an hour and a half had past (it was a very dirty fume hood).

I'm having quite the High Fidelity moment listening to Garbage and feel like organizing my music autobiographically.  Shirley and the boys fit most prominently in the 1999-2004 range for me, where all I did was drive to dance classes, college, and go through boys like Kleenex.