Monthly Archives: April 2011

T-Shirt Weather

I live in a country where any hint of sunshine is welcomed with open arms and greeted with smiles on even the grumpiest of faces. The weather has been particularly fine this month and it’s given me a chance to hang up my cheque shirts and jumpers and dust off my large collection of t-shirts. Warm days and uncloudy skies also give me an excuse to dig out sunny tunes and songs about sunshine. When I’m happy I listen to a lot of ska and reggae, but also catchy pop songs with jangly guitars. T-Shirt Weather by The Lucksmiths is a typically summery piece of pop from down under that breezes along in less than three minutes. The singer’s mood has been elevated by the reappearance of the sun, his laundry has dried and he’s happy. The warmth of the sun has the same effect on me and sunny songs like this one are the perfect soundtrack to t-shirt weather

T-Shirt Weather – The Lucksmiths

30 Day Song Challenge Archive

Don’t Look Back In Anger

Today’s selection in the 30 Day Song Challenge is a song I listen to when I’m angry. I must admit that this topic was one of the more challenging ones for me. I didn’t find it difficult to choose a song. You see, I rarely lose my temper and hardly ever get angry. It is true that I get frustrated from time to time, but I’m pretty easygoing so it doesn’t bother me too much. Occasionally, certain people piss me off. Instead of getting mad, however, I just get all sarcastic with them. Also, I admit that I’ve been known to listen to aggressive music and that it gives me some form of release, though I’m never angry when I listen to it. I doubt that I’d even listen to music if I ever found myself losing my temper. I think I’d be more likely to listen to something that made me calm down instead of music that matched my foul mood. Don’t Look Back in Anger is not such a relaxing song in its original version, but Devendra Banhart’s cover of the Oasis tune is pretty chilled

Don’t Look Back In Anger (Oasis cover) – Devendra Banhart

30 Day Song Challenge Archive

The Right Profile

It’s an awful lot easier to pick a favourite album than it is to choose a favourite song. There are fewer albums than there are songs as the vast majority of long players tend to feature at least ten tunes. Also, we hear songs everywhere and may actually have favourites that we’ve forgotten about. Listening to a whole album, however, takes a lot more effort and it may often take a few listens before a certain album reveals its charms. Personally, there are hundreds of albums that I consider to be great, though there are only a few that I consider to be truly essential. London Calling by The Clash is definitely one of those and, at the moment, I would consider it to be my favourite one. I had gotten into loads of punk bands over a decade after the fact and the first LPs by the Pistols and The Clash were the two I liked the most. Even on their first record, The Clash sounded less punk than their contemporaries and even incorporated elements of ska and rock & roll into their sound. I wasn’t a big fan of its follow-up, Give ‘Em Enough Rope, and particularly its production that made the group sound like so many other hard rock bands

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One More Song the Radio Won’t Like

Kathleen Edwards is a Canadian singer-songwriter whose music blends country and rock in the style of Lucinda Williams. She has released three album so far and I’ve chosen a song from her debut record as one I’d like to hear on the radio. One More Song the Radio Won’t Like was the second single taken from 2003′s Failer album. I’m sure her choice of title is ironic as it has quite a catchy tune and could even be described as radio-friendly. I’ve a feeling that it wasn’t given a lot of airplay in Europe, though it must have received a few spins on country-rock stations in North America. Edwards is currently working on her fourth album. Let me know if you hear any songs from it on the radio

One More Song The Radio Won’t Like – Kathleen Edwards

30 Day Song Challenge Archive

Yesterday Once More

Today’s 30 Day Song Challenge choice is meant to be one that I often hear on the radio. Nowadays I only ever listen to talk radio, so I’ve chosen Red Kross‘s cover of a song from the 70s that looks back nostalgically on listening to the wireless. It can be found on the brilliant If I Were a Carpenter tribute album

Yesterday Once More (Carpenters cover) – Red Kross

Image taken from here

30 Day Song Challenge Archive

Uncertain

The 30 Day Song Challenge keeps on rolling and today it’s the turn of a song I used to love but now hate. I must admit this wasn’t an easy one for me. I don’t hate any songs I used to love. In fact, I’ve remained quite faithful to all of them. I guess it’s possible that there were one or two songs that I liked in the past that I’m now ambivalent towards. After racking my brain I remembered that I’d been quite enamoured by the first ever single from The Cranberries back in 1991. I was working in a record shop at the time and there had been a bit a fuss about the release as they were a local band and big things were expected of them. We didn’t normally carry singles in the shop, but this was actually brought out as an EP. It was issued in two formats and we ordered a few copies of both the CD and the 12″. Apparently, a total of just 5,000 copies of the Uncertain EP were ever produced and it was never re-issued when the band did become successful. I bought a copy on CD and listened to it a lot and really liked its title track. I even liked some of the band’s subsequent releases, though I find it hard to listen to them now. I actually like their sound and think the musicians in the band are quite accomplished. However, I’m not a fan of Dolores O’Riordan’s vocals and lyrics and that’s the main reason why I no longer listen to their music. I don’t even have my copy of the EP anymore. A few years ago, I met a guy from Latvia who was visiting Limerick for a few days. He told me he was a huge fan of the band and the only release he was missing was the Uncertain EP. I told him I had it and that he was welcome to it. He wanted to pay me for it but I was having none of it. It obviously meant a lot to him to have the CD and I was certain it was going to a good home

Uncertain – The Cranberries

Image taken from A Catalyst For Innovation

30 Day Song Challenge Archive

The Outdoor Type

Today’s selection in the 30 Day Song Challenge is one that describes me, so I’ve gone for The Outdoor Type by The Lemonheads. The band was formed by Evan Dando in Boston in 1983. By 1990, they had released four unsuccessful albums and Dando left for Australia, where he wrote some songs with a couple of Aussies named Nic Dalton and Tom Morgan. Morgan contributed to the title track of The Lemonheads’ next album, It’s a Shame About Ray (1992). He co-wrote half the songs on the following year’s Come On Feel The Lemonheads and was the sole writer of The Outdoor Type on Car Button Cloth from 1996. It’s a very funny song about a guy who reveals that he’s never slept outdoors, can’t build a fire, is unable to swim and is reluctant to engage in physical combat. In addition, he has never ridden a mountain bike, cannot grow a beard and doesn’t want to take part in a rock climbing weekend in case he’ll miss something on the telly. By the way, he’s also afraid of heights. It seems that he’d been pretending to love the Great Outdoors to (successfully) impress a girl. At the end of each verse he reveals the truth: “I lied about being the outdoor type”. I wouldn’t say this is a song that describes me completely. I do possess a bike and I cycle it outside, though not in the mountains. I have a goatee and I’ve slept outdoors a total of three times in my life. On two of these occasions I slept in a tent and the other time I slept on a wooden board in the beautiful German town of Bamberg. Alas, I cannot swim or light a fire and am not known for using my fists. Similarly, I prefer watching television to any kind of climbing, as I am also afraid of heights. Therefore, I can identify with the protagonist of this song and I reckon that The Outdoor Type describes me as well as any song

The Outdoor Type – The Lemonheads

30 Day Song Challenge Archive

If You Could Read My Mind

It’s approaching the halfway point in this 30 Day Song Challenge thing and today’s choice is supposed to be one that nobody would expect me to love. I had toyed with the idea of walking up to total strangers and asking them to suggest a song they wouldn’t expect me to enjoy. Of course, their reply would have depended on the extent of their musical knowledge and their ability to guess what kind of music I’m into. I could’ve asked my friends, some of whom have a fair idea of my musical tastes. I’m sure they’d have picked some unexpected tunes that I like, but it could’ve taken ages for them to stumble upon one I actually love. However, even this would have been a pointless exercise as today’s task is to find a song that nobody would expect me to love. As neither I nor anyone I know possesses psychic powers, I’ve decided to save myself and others a lot of time and heartbreak by simply choosing a song that some people may be surprised to learn that I actually like very much. In 1970, If You Could Read My Mind by Canadian songwriter Gordon Lightfoot was a big hit in his own country and the one directly south of it. It was taken from his Sit Down Young Stranger album and was written about the collapse of his first marriage. In the song, Lightfoot wishes that his wife could see inside his head and later he tries to imagine her thoughts. He compares the results to scenes from black-and-white movies and cheap paperback novels. The song ends on a pessimistic note that is echoed in the lack of hope in the singer’s voice. I think it’s well-written and is delivered in a simple but effective style. Perhaps there’s at least one person out there who’ll actually be expecting me to love this song, but I don’t know for sure. I’m not a mind reader

If You Could Read My Mind – Gordon Lightfoot

30 Day Song Challenge Archive