Five Songs I'm Loving This Week

Okay, yeah, so that little experiment I did last week? Incorporating the songs into my random rambling instead of creating proper paragraphs about each song? Yeah, that kind of sucked. It took almost as long to do the post and it ended up reading like I was composing the post while being threatened with death by plunging from an airplane.

So, this week I'll do a proper post. Tomorrow, I'll probably do a podcast. I meant to do it today, but I've messed around too much today. Laundry, cleaning, etc. I'll try to do the podcast tonight, but if not, I'll aim for tomorrow.

Hope everyone has a great New Year's Eve!

Asobi Seksu, "New Year's Eve"

This is from their latest album, Citrus, and I can't think of a better time to post it than now. Every New Year's needs a song, just as it needs a ball to drop somewhere, just as it needs a stuffed bear with a top hat, a mini-suit and a cane. Just as it needs...okay, so I'm describing almost every New Year's Eve I've had. The song is new, though. What a bouncy song, too! Makes me wish I were seeing a band like this live instead of watching Dawn of the Dead and drinking raspberry beer (hey, we all have our own ways to celebrate).

Oh, and don't tear your hair out trying to figure out what she's says, unless you know Japanese. The band's from Brooklyn, but she's originally from Japan.


What a gorgeous picture! Asobi Seksu's Myspace and Website.

The Ballet, "I Hate The War"

This is a very cute song about a very serious subject. It's hard to say that anything relating to Iraq is cute, but maybe we need a little levity when referring to such a heartbreaking, seemingly never-ending situation. I certainly prefer something like this to something heavy-handed, written by 20-something year-old hipsters who've barely ever left their home coffeeshop, trying to earn street cred. I don't know how old these guys are, but it doesn't seem like they wrote this for any cred. Like the actual art of ballet, this song is elegant. The lyrics are amazingly simplistic: "I can't believe this thing is still going on". I'll lift my glass of raspberry lambic beer to that sentiment, and let's hope this time next year any war involving us will be past-tense.


Dude! The guy in the white shirt totally looks like what the doctor on Lost will look like after about three years on the island, if he never finds another berry or piece of food again.What a nice website The Ballet has! Gotta love anything with "Pirateship" in the title. They also have a Myspace.

Benoit Pioulard, "Palimend"

In the "I get what I deserve" department, I had a paragraph written about how this doesn't sound French, it sounds more North American, ya da ya da. I compared him to Canadian bands such as Arcade Fire and The New Pornographers. Heh-that's what I get for writing before Googling. The dude's not French! He's from Michigan! Explains why it doesn't sound like a French song.

The comparisons still remain, though. He belongs with some of the really good Indie bands coming out today, such as the bands I just mentioned. He's got some cool polaroids on his website too; I guess they're just random locations he took pictures of.


My name is French for Thomas Meluch. Pioulard's Website, Myspace and Wiki entry.

Radio 4, "Save Your City"

There's no doubt this band is a New York City band. Something about the sound is intrinsic to that city. It's the same energy The Secret Machines have, and they're New York (by way of Texas, which I believe is a great route to take--the best of both worlds). This song livens up any place it plays. It livens me up even on the draggiest of days, and that's saying a lot.


Fedoras are always awesome. Radio 4's new album is called Enemies Like This; they have a website and a Myspace.

We Have Soldiers, We Have Guns, "Songs That No One Will Hear"

Despite the name of the band, I wasn't going for a theme. These are honestly songs I've been listening to this week. I've been listening to this one for a few weeks, actually. The lead singer sounds like she could be in Asobi Seksu or The Aisler's Set. It sounds more like a lullabye than anything involving guns or soldiers. I can't understand the lyrics (part of the casualties of a sing-songy lullabye), but the overall sound of the song isn't confrontational. It's the type of song I could go to sleep to, and dream dreams of new years and new possibilities. Of course the only lyric I can understand-- "let's keep singing songs that no one will hear" isn't overtly positive, but her voice turns it into something hopeful.

Heh! How meta! On their website, they say their favorite song at the moment is Asobi Seksu's "Thursday". I guess the bands I like are all related to each other in some way. We Are Soldiers, We Have Guns new album is called To Meet Is Murder. Nice misanthropic take on The Smiths' Meat Is Murder! I bet Morrissey would be proud.


Soldiers' Myspace. I love how they describe their music.

Happy New Years, everyone!