12/10/15

"I'm here reaching out again,
Lead into the wind on my knees
My fear is a memory
It's a reverie and I'm free
I wanna take this crown from my head,
I wanna build something with my hands
I will send a transmission home
To say that I've been out here too long alone
And I wanna come down now
I will send a transmission home
To say I should have called in so long ago
And I wanna come down."
~Transmission Home
Yellowcard, Lift a Sail 
Barring any unforeseen circumstances, I am going to have the privilege of seeing Yellowcard this Saturday, checking off a 12-year concert goal from my ever-growing, never-shrinking list of artists I hope to see live.

A lot of people know Yellowcard from their "Ocean Avenue" days - their true breakthrough in the scene back in 2003 - but I've kept an ear on them since and they're almost a more influential band to me now, in my late 20s, than they were in my teens. Sure, I played the hell out of "Only One" back in the day (and I still do!!)  but the added depth and maturity of their later work is really worth digging into.

Their sound has evolved into one that's much fuller, and less catering to the (expertly done) fiddle trope they built their reputation. New Yellowcard is an unfiltered brand of rock music, but one that's rooted in a very emo and scene place, enough to be warm and familiar and more melodic than what you might find on the radio or wherever that boring brand of rock music lives (you know, the kind for large men with pick-up trucks and arm band tattoos. I'm generalizing, but you get the idea).

Last year's "Lift a Sail" has grown on me so much - it's a record that definitely needs some time to familiarize with because at first it does feel very "collection of songs" and therefore easy to dismiss. But I found myself seeking out their hooks and choruses and key changes. As much as I've grown to appreciate its solemn reflection and anthematic choruses, though, this isn't my favorite record of theirs. That goes to "Paper Walls," a record I've played more in the past year than I have in the previous seven. Why it took me so long to get attached to I cannot say, but "Fighting," "Shadows and Regrets" and "You and Me and One Spotlight" are now some of my favorite songs in their catalog. I can't wait to see if they're still in the band's rotation.

I'm hoping to get a new appreciation for their musicianship - but most of all I'm just hoping for that feeling you get at concerts sometimes, the one where you know the songs before they start, sing too loud, get lost in a crowd, and feel like you're home. Coming from a band like this, that I discovered years ago in a different place but will always associate with the place I am now, that feeling is as timeless, freeing and grounding as you can hope to find in a life full of moving parts and morphing attitudes.



"I heard, heard myself
Say things I take back
If I could, could retell
And make these stories last
I see, see shadows
Of who you'll always be
I drive, drive these roads
Made of memories
When we were only kids
And we were best of friends
And we hoped for the best
And let go from the rest
Shadows and regrets
We let go from the rest."
~Shadows and Regrets
Yellowcard, Paper Walls

12/7/15

In this noisy, terrible modern world, where everyone shouts or shoots or hates, I still do what I always used to do: Put on my headphones, lower my eyelids, and try not to weep openly at the fact that life is a gift and we are so good at wasting it, so busy busying ourselves with differences that we lose the utter sameness we ought to celebrate.



"It's getting weirder
Than I projected
It's saying something
In all directions:
'I held the fear in my mouth
I choked it down and now I'll never let it out.'"
~Redbird
Kevin Devine, Bubblegum

12/4/15

Post "Coming Home" New Found Glory records are all sort of a noisy blur to me, I never paid much attention, but I am unashamed to admit how much I enjoy it when "Vicious Love" comes on YouTube. Impossible-to-ignore chorus, solid harmonies and those sweet, sweet Chad Gilbert progressions. (Also, how have I never, in all these years, tagged New Found Glory before?!)



"I could have given up a thousand times
In the past that was so easy
When the thought came to my mind
There was no convincing me
Plant my feet to face it all
Side by side or a phone call
Living in tension with you
Still feels better
Better than I’ve ever known.

We’ve got a vicious love
We mix our tears with blood
No clock will stop for us
It ticks by
We fight as hard as we love
We’ve got a vicious love."
~Vicious Love
New Found Glory, Resurrection

11/30/15

Now I've been given the gift of persistence
But it's become a curse
Unraveling backward
In the distance I heard a dirge
I can see a man
On his face there's no trace of time
There's a strange and mad idea I must find

If I try to change direction
I might not find what I'm looking for
But this bitter disposition
Well now must surely run its course

~Mizzy C

City and Colour, If I Should Go Before You

Timing is a blessing sometimes, in the sense that you happen to click with an album two days prior to hearing its headlining tour. No surprise that it is from City and Colour, in the cleanest and smooth and almost jazzy-ish we've heard from them yet.

Dallas Green's voice is as fragile yet shimmering with a confidence as always. There's an extra boldness, maybe coming from the extra back-up of a full band composing these songs together. I love the emphasis on guitar solos, plugged-in ones on full, retro Gibsons.

This coming from a listener who is still wowed by "The Hurry and the Harm" all the time. I'm so so excited to see him perform for the first time at a great venue Wednesday night....and even more excited to find I may be able to make it to an in-studio live session tomorrow!! Private!! My heart may literally may explode,and I couldn't be any happier to see fireworks.

I’m looking for a way out
For a place that no one knows
Please take me away now
Somewhere it don’t feel so cold

Troubles on my mind
Troubles on my mind
For the rest of the days I’ve cried
For the rest of the days I’ve cried

I’m searching for a paradise
That I just can’t seem to find
I’m searching for a paradise
For the time of my life

I’m searching for a paradise
That I just can’t seem to find
I’m searching for a paradise
Gonna go where the spirit guides
~Paradise

City and Colour, The Hurry and the Harm

11/25/15

I don't like Adele. I don't! Never have. Found her annoying from the start. But, she's apparently the newest record-setter for album sales, I don't really care for her voice, or her sap, but goddammit if I wasn't hypnotized by this performance (which I only found because I was reading about a producer on The Fader during my lunch break).



I gotta give it up for this. And I have to watch it again. Her vocal ability is spot-on as she nails every high note and run-on melody. The song is less annoying lyrically than some others, and the setting of simple gutiar parts and back-up signers in the studio is exactly the way ballads should be recorded live. I also love the little two-note guitar part that starts before the pre-chorus, the way it builds into something more. Her change-up of lyrics it the final chorus has a peel-back-the-curtain effect. And, in full disclosure, earlier today I saw a recording of her performing that too-ubiquitous "Hello" single w/Jimmy Fallon and The Roots as one of their rather clever classroom instrument renditions, and it was pretty impossible to not enjoy it, if only for noticing the great instincts and reactions of the band around her song and performance.

Ugh, so, am I changing my tune on Adele? Meh. I am not going to purchase "25." I'm not!! But maybe I won't mind as much when she comes up in random playlists, knowing that her performance skills are so incredibly strong, and her sense of romance in her lyrics maybe isn't all radio cliches after all.

"Let me photograph you in this light
In case it is the last time,
That we might be exactly like we were
Before we realized
We were sad of getting old
It made us restless
I'm so mad I'm getting old
It makes me reckless
It was just like a movie
It was just like a song
When we were young."
~When We Were Young,
Adele, 25