What's On My IPod III: I'm Already out of Witty Sequel Subtitles

Pic courtesy the awesome Catswholooklikehitler.com

16. Eluvium - Amreik: The leadoff track from the best album of last year, Eluvium's 'Copia'.

17. Stars of the Lid - Another Ballad For Heavy Lids: God, there's gonna be a lot of these. SOTL are a really gorgeous ambient band, but their songs are pretty much undistinguishable from each other. This is one of them.

18. Stars of the Lid - Apreludes (In C Sharp Major): and this is another one.

19. Elvis Presley - Are You Lonesome Tonight?: I've never been conviced that this is actually real, but it's hilarious, nonetheless. The story is Elvis was getting burnt out on playing this song all the time (That and he sounds pretty hammered here, too) and he just goes off. The song starts off normally enough, but suddenly after singing the line "Do the chairs in your parlor seem empty and bare?" instead of going with the usual "Do you gaze at your doorstep and picture me there?" he follows up with "Do you stare at your bald head and wish you had hair?" then breaks into laughter. He spends the rest of the song laughing his ass off as the band plays on and his backup singers sing. He tries to get it back and sing again before breaking up into laughter and saying "That's it, man, twenty years down the drain." Also, Elvis kind of laughs like Hank Hill, which makes it even more awesome.

20. Eluvium - Area 41: More Eluvium.

21. Stars of the Lide - Articulate Silences Part 1: More SOTL

22. Stars of the Lide - Articulate Silences Part 2: Yet more SOTL

23. Eluvium - As I Drift Off: Have I told you lately that I love Eluvium? Oh yeah, just three songs ago.

24. The 6ths - As You Turn to Go: Featured on the terrific indie comedy Pieces of April. The 6ths is the guy from Magnetic Fields third or fourth project where he has guest artists singing for him (This one is with Momus, whoever, or whatever that is) and is just a simple little love song, gently plucked guitar (Almost sounds like harp) and simple singing over top. I love the catch in the singer's voice when he sings "As you turn to go" it almost sounds like he's breaking into tears as he sings it.

25. R.E.M. - At My Most Beautiful: I've never listened to this song, I think I added it by accident. One day I will listen to it.

What's On My IPod II: The Return

11.The Watchmen - All Uncovered: This was a minor hit in Canada many moons ago. I never liked a single other song by them but this is such a beautiful song. Gorgeous even though I have no idea what it's about:

"Lying in bedrooms is easy It's not like it's five years ago Lately you're over
my body 'Cause that's just the place that I want you to be Look at the pictures
you've gotten They're like signals from oncoming cars We're covered and caked
from the last time I know it sounds weird, we collect it in jars "

12. Love - Alone Again Or: I'm trying to figure out where I heard this. I was sure it was in some Wes Anderson film, but now I don't think so. Love is a funny band in that they're completely overhyped and underhyped. Music geeks talk them up too much, well the general public is reasonably apathetic toward them.

13. Air - Alone in Kyoto: One of the most beautiful songs I've ever heard. After seeing Lost in Translation, I bought the soundtrack one morning before school, put it on my stereo and when this song hit I was just in awe over how painstakingly gorgeous it is. Still moving every time I hear it.

14. The Album Leaf - Always For You: I don't think I've ever listened to this all the way through since putting it on my Nano, but I always listen to a few seconds. Has a really persitent beat and the vocals are surprisingly hypnotic.

15. Brian Eno - Always Returning: Sadly, I was introduced to this song by a Playstation 3 commercial. I had no idea who it was, but really loved the song. Hearing it in a theater once before seeing "Apocalyptico" was quite an experience. This is off "Apollo" which is Brian Eno's soundtrack to a space mission. I can imagine this playing in some smart sci-fi movie as the hero is floating in space.

What's On My IPod

An Attempt at regular content.



This is what it looks like, except this one is charged unlike mine which is almost never charged

So, since the death of my computer last summer, I've been unable to change the songs on my IPod,(my forays onto the internet come courtesy of my all-too-accomodating sister(I swear I'll get their songs off there ASAP!)). Having the same songs on your IPod for 6 months, you come to know most of them quite well. So, in an attempt at getting back into this regularly, I thought I'd go through them all alphabetically and offer up a description: why they're on here, why I love them, why I don't etc. etc. It's self-indulgent as hell, but it's something to do.

1. Bobby Womack - Across 110th Street: Like probably a great portion of people out there, I found this song because of Quentin Tarantino's shockingly underloved Jackie Brown (Which is easily QT's best film). It's played at a crucial moment in the film (Might even be the climax but it's been a while since I've seen it) and is a really gorgeous soul jam from another film which shares it's title (Wiki says it's also featured in American Gangster). It's really great.

2. m83 - Addicted to Self Mutilation: A b-side from one of my favourite working band's singles. It's a good electronic, bordering on ambient track that would've fit in great on either of his last two albums, though the repeated "We are the children of tomorrow" is a little corny-sounding.

3. Maritime - Adios: The Promise Ring is a lot like Sonic Youth, The Juliana Theory and Sensefield in that I seem to own an abnormally large proportion of albums in relation to how much I like them. Very Emergency and Wood/Water are kind of fun, and I really like the album/EP/Rarities collection The Horse Latitudes but I don't think I've ever even listened to the other four CDs I have by them. But this is a really fun song, arguably better than anything on any of those albums I do own, because I don't own this. It's upbeat and has lots of horns. Yet I almost always seem to skip this when it comes on.

4. Eluvium - After Nature: If I stick with this through to the end (And I almost certainly won't), I'm going to have to figure out how to write about a lot of Eluvium because I'm pretty sure I've got their whole discography on here. This is a very pretty song, strings and synths. More of an interlude really as it's under two minutes. Would be a great transition track on a Mixtape.

5. Aphex Twin - Alberto Balsam: Such a great song. A friend of mine was going on about how great Aphex Twin was when I was in grade ten so I lent him a tape and got him to tape it for me. I don't know what he did, because it was all out of order and weird, though maybe that was because I bought all my blank tapes from Thrift Stores (I believe this one was something about Dieting) and I just put tape over the busted tabs. Anyways, the first song was one of AT's more acidey ones with him growling "I want sex" every few seconds but I was brave, struggled through it and this song was my reward. For years, I thought Alberto Balsam was a shampoo designer like Vidal Sasoon (And I'm now reminded of a Dilbert cartoon where the cartoonist explained that someone told him Alberto Balsam was quite a street tough in his early days which is really neither here nor there, just something weird I thought I'd share...which rhymed for some reason) but actually Alberto Balsam is a type of nourishing conditioner. It's just a simple sunny little melody with a solid beat.

6. Velocity Girl - The All-Consumer: An ad in the back of a Spin magazine for Velocity Girl's Gilded Hearts and Zealous Stars (Or is it Zealous Hearts and Gilded Stars?) made a friend and I big fans of Velocity Girl though never having heard a note of their music, I think my friend even hung the ad in his locker and never actually did hear a note of their music, he believed that they could never be as good as the ad. He probably wouldn't have liked them, actually. Years later, I found a used copy of Simpatico! and sometimes I really love it and sometimes I don't. The appeal is definitely Sarah Shannon's voice, but sometimes that's actually what drives me away. Sometimes I feel like her voice is completely unsuited to the music and soars above it, because it's really just very simple indie rock. But that voice! When she sings "Please don't take me seriously/Please don't take me to heart" it's enough to make an indie boy worth his salt weak in the knees. But when she echoes "I'll be standing by and watching you" on the verse, it sounds almost forced sometimes. Today, though, it just sounds great. You know, I really should hear Zealous/Gilded Hearts/Stars, Gilded/Zealous Stars/Hearts some day...probably should hear Shannon's solo stuff, too.

7. Bjork - All is Full of Love: The first time I noticed this song wasn't by Bjork but actually the Death Cab For Cutie cover which is pretty good. Then I saw the video for it and was finally blown away by the Bjork version. So I bought Joga which I didn't own for some reason and was...let down. It's not that the album version isn't good. It's just that it's not as good. But then they included the video version on her greatest hits and it's amazing what a massive difference the weak little beat adds to the song. Just an amazing soaring song. Makes one feel all gooey.

8. Calexico - All Systems Red: God this song is good. Maybe the best so far. I'm trying to remember if the whole last Calexico album was really good, or if I just remember it fondly because this was the last song. It's a sad little quiet song about small towns..well I thought it was, but re-reading the lyrics now, it's clearly an Iraq War protest but don't let that turn you off. The appeal is universal, especially in the way that builds and builds to a loud shouting ending with the lyrics "Hear your heart that's breaking without choice". So good.

9. Eluvium - All the Sails: This one's not ringing any bells off the start but it's Eluvium, so it's a gorgeous, ambient piece. Actually, it's really gorgeous, with all the background ambiance to a simple foreground that ebbs and flows like the tide licking the shore. I need to pay more attention to this one, not knowing it is criminal.

10. Jets to Brazil - All Things Good and Nice: If I am struck down tomorrow, never to rise again, someone email my family that I want this song played at my funeral. Especially the parts where he goes "I love my mother, for all the things she's not, but mostly for who she is/ I love my father for all the things he's thought, but really for the things he did" and "I love my brother, he's always taken shit, he's just not like the other kids/I love my sister for always making things, she even made a brother out of me, sweet kid/I love this feeling I've got something to give", plus the opening sounds like a funeral dirge. They can probably cut it off before he starts thanking his band ("I love my drummer and all the things he plays, I wrote it in half-time *thump...thump* just to say thanks") which I love but isn't really applicable to my life. It's such a crime that Blake Schwarzenbach doesn't make music anymore and teaches English, but it's also strangely appropriate. I hope he's finally found some peace, because it's clear he's been searching for it in his music for years.