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.