8/27/12

Since Thursday until about 7 p.m. today, the only album I played in my car is The Menzingers' "On the Impossible Past."

I try not to write about the same band two posts in a row, but I have barely absorbed anything else.



"Remember the days when I had a conscience? Yeah, me neither./And I'm warning, I'm warning, I'm warning you./And I'm warning, I'm warning, I'm warning you/That I can't seem to tell, I can't seem to tell, I can't seem to tell if it's my head or the earth that's spinning around." ~ I Can't Seem to Tell, The Menzingers, On the Impossible Past

I've concluded that "Gates" (see previous post) is their "please-play-me-on-the-radio" song, and I love it immensely. Beyond "Gates," the album shows to be grittier, grungier. Nothing I would classify as screamo, it's very melodic, but there's definitely some vocal chord tearing going on here and there. Love it. The title track is fascinating, a dirge-like memory of a car crash, that serves as a 1:33-long intro into "Nice Things," which is somewhat of a social commentary on how to not be a tool with a vocalist switch.

There's hints of an overarching narrative, something about American muscle cars and dating waitresses, passing mentions of drinking and drug use. Paints a pretty good picture of where this is coming from. A lot of it is just really sad, really desperate, yet really alive.

"And I'm pretty sure this corner of the world is the loneliest corner in the whole world." ~Sun Hotel, The Menzingers, On the Impossible Past

Many of the guitar parts remind me of songs a friend back home writes, a friend I look up to despite (or maybe because of) the fact he is a total fucking outlaw. I've also concluded this album feeds everything in me that loves punk bands, though. For example: really triumphant guitar solos in the face of falling faithless, really despondent tales of drinking while feeling said feelings, varying levels of begrudging maturity, screaming out a girl's name to the fates that fucked it all up, doubletime.

Take this hook, for example. If that's not what I want to hear on my way to work, I don't know what is.



"We stumbled and stared at the carnival lights that lit up New York City,
From a rooftop in Brooklyn that was covered in bad graffiti.
And then I let a thousand splinters pierce right through my spoiled liver,
Or whatever that was left of it.

'Cause I've cursed my lonely memory with picture-perfect imagery.
Maybe I'm not dying I'm just living in decaying cities.
But I'm still healthy, I'm still fine,
I've been spending all my time reading the obituaries.

But I will fuck this up,
I fucking know it.
I will fuck this up,
I fucking know it.
I will fuck this up,
I fucking know it.
I will fuck this up,
I fucking know it."
~The Obituaries
The Menzingers, On the Impossible Past

8/22/12

Holy fuck, all hail The Menzingers. A great choice on a day like today, when "fuck it all" seems to feel like the mantra no matter what the world tells me. Not winning, not losing, not even really feeling, so pop punk it is.


I love this song, in particular, one of the more uplifting tracks with a really dancey guitar melody. I've been checking out "On the Impossible Past," which the newest LP from the Scranton-bred pop-punk group, and it's incredibly authentic, incredibly defeated. Really powerful chords, dark-hearted lyrics and equally fitting bridges...really into the style of the lead vocalist who has a unique drawl that reminds me a little of something 90s. They manage to sound drunken and thrashy without sacrificing a literary license, a balance I must applaud.

Something about this album makes me miss home, then I remember how badly I wanted to leave home before I wound up here. Fuck it all.

"I am the pain that beats through your temples
Every morning when you wake up.
I am the boy with alcohol poisoning
From all the parties Chris was throwing
That summer they took us in
Like every other American
For getting drunk around back of the Lion's Club
Waiting for the shitty bands to finish up.
And some kids played hacky sack,
while the others just got high.

It's not hard to fall for a waitress
When you both smoke, smoke the same cigarettes
You'll get seated as diners or lovers
You'll get the check as friends for the better
You'll carve your names into the Paupack Cliffs
Just to read them when you get old enough to know
that happiness is just a moment

So I'm marching up to your gates today
To throw my lonely soul away
'Cause I don't need it
You can take it back

So I'm marching up to your gates today
To throw my lonely soul away
'Cause I don't need it
You can take it back

And they will make examples out of us
Like when they caught you in the CVS parking lot
But I fed the liars
Everything I got in my cabinet brain
of canned thoughts
Everything I've got
It was everything I've got
In my cabinet brain

So I'm marching up to your gates today
To throw my lonely soul away
'Cause I don't need it
You can take it back

Yeah I don't need it
You can take it back"

~Gates 

The Menzingers, On the Impossible Past

8/22/12

"I saw that mountain burn, or was it in my head?
I'll track down the words, if you dig up the dead.

Well I have never been free,
but I have always been cheap.
No, I have never been free.

But nothing in my bones can say just where you've been.
Nothing in my bones can let me start again, I'll start again.

My eyelids falling down, 

All my dreams in black and white.
I see so clearly now I won't ever get it right.
But I don't wanna be free. 

I don't wanna be me.
I don't wanna be free.

You want me scream at your ex-girlfriend.
But I wanna be much better than I am.
You want me scream at your ex-boyfriend.
But I wanna be, and I don't think I can.

Nothing in my bones can say just where you've been 

Nothing in my bones can let me start again 

I'll start again, I'll start again, 

I'll start again."

~Dig Up the Dead
Mansions, 

8/21/12

A Pandora find from today...something about this song makes me think of someone heading west. Maybe it's the harmonies, slightly Southern-gospel, mixed with syncopated string-plucking, echoing like howling desert wings. Maybe the simple train allusions.

Mission accomplished in updating a retro tune and making it accessible to new audiences (the original is soooo 60s hippie-chick, if you're into that). It's got a little more sultry soul, without sacrificing a delicate dignity, and it works.

Original or updated, the song tells a familiar story. I like that it describes a very specific moment that says so much about what's to come, a moment full of hype and overanxious nerves. Do we ever know what draws us to someone, in a moment or after years? Not really ever, no, but that feeling lurking somewhere past your lungs will send you all kinds of places, if you're willing to listen.

"Travelling north, travelling north to find you
Train wheels beating, the wind in my eyes
Don't even know what I'll find when I get to you
Call out your name love, don't be surprised

It's so many miles and so long since I've left you
Don't even know what I'll find when I get to you
But suddenly now, I know where I belong
It's many hundred miles and it won't be long
Nothing at all, in my head, to say to you
Only the beat of the train I'm on
Nothing I've learned all my life on the way to you
One day our love was over and gone

It's so many miles and so long since I've met you
Don't even know what I'll say when I get to you,
But suddenly now, I know where I belong
It's many hundred miles and it won't be long

What will I do if there's someone there with you
Maybe someone you've always known
How do I know I can come and give to you
Love with no warning and find you alone?

It's so many miles and so long since I've met you
Don't even know what I'll find when I get to you
But suddenly now, I know where I belong
It's many hundred miles and it won't be long

It won't be long
It won't be long
It won't be long"

~Train Song,
Vashti Bunyan, as covered by Feist and Ben Gibbard, Dark Was the Night compilation 

8/21/12

How many days pass you by before you notice nothing is changing?

What a poignant song this is. You almost instantly begin to feel the need to escape...but it makes the point, clearly, dramatically, that it is not simply about living in a broken system.

It's about what you do with it.


"six billion backs against the wall 
now do we walk or run?
this puzzle's falling into place.
once more around the sun,
remember when you were a kid?
those days were all so long.
but if we don't do this,
somebody else will.

three billion backs against the wall,
A prayer for everyone.
we saw the changing at the sea,
but not a thing was done.
remember when you could rely?
those days are all but gone 

and if we don't do this
somebody else will
if we don't do this
somebody else will
somebody else will
one billion backs against the wall
at least our feet were dry
I was an honor to myself,
this storm would pass me by
remembering the things I did,
I knew I would survive

but if we don't do this
somebody else will.
if we don't do this.
somebody else will,
somebody else will.

one billion backs against the wall,
now do we walk or run?
one thousand backs against the wall,
now do we walk or run?

one hundred backs against the wall
now do we walk or run?
it's just your back against the wall,
now do you walk or run?
remember when you were a kid?
those days are all but gone.
if we don't do this,
nobody else will.
if we don't do this,
nobody else will,
nobody else will."

~The Sea Change 

Turin Brakes

Many blame the government. But is that really fair? What makes them so special to get the credit, or the blame? More than I ever, I see so much wrong in the way people, people of society, treat each other and talk about each other. You're either someone's enemy or their pawn, or trying to make them one of yours. There seems little in between, especially from those who talk a big game about change while spouting "You're wrong, so I'm right," fallacies. They are wading through toxic swamp water, saying if you drink near them, you're safe.

Elsewhere, the ego pervades: "Listen to me, look at me, love me," they cry online, "make it easy for me!"  And "Wouldn't I be so much happier," they wonder surrounded by family, "if I had more stuff?"  

Since when did getting attention become the only way to self-satisfy? And since when did it become such a fucking chore to care even a little bit for the rest of society? Don't tell me it's not related. I have seen the results of living irresponsibly, and no, it's not pretty, but I don't think it would be so bad if we knew how to treat each other as equals, if we let go of some of the judgement.The blinders we've managed to secure so tightly on our self-obsessed skulls consequentially constricted the blood flow to our hearts and our heads.

In our society, I can't help but see what I see as obvious:

The less you treat people like humans, the more like animals they're going to become, and then I don't think your numbers will mean shit.