Monthly Archives: November 2014

My iPod #398: 30 Seconds to Mars – From Yesterday

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The song doesn’t properly start until two minutes in. If you’re here just for that, then skip to that time. Otherwise, enjoy the seven and a half music video.

Though I’m not the biggest fan of 30 Seconds to Mars, I do think all of the singles released from “A Beautiful Lie” are great. Around the time that their music videos started appearing on TV, I was just starting my first year of secondary school. There never seemed to be a moment when one of their videos wasn’t showing on MTV. If, let’s say, “The Kill”‘s music video stopped playing because the single was getting old and didn’t need to get into the charts then the band’s newer video would start playing instead. It was mad stuff, though they had to be heavily edited due to the band’s tendency to make their videos as short films. “From Yesterday”‘s video did not differ from this, as you can see. Apparently there’s a thirteen minute version.

The track is the seventh on the band’s second album, and from looking at it’s lyrics I can only suggest that it’s about….. the President?…. maybe? You can contest me on that one. Generally, hearing it nearly every day either after coming home from school, or in the mornings when getting ready pretty much forced me to remember its melody and  everything else. Though it wasn’t a song that I found annoying or repetitive, so I wasn’t bothered. Still, doesn’t bother me today. Nice to hear it when it pops up on the iPod now and again. Reminds me of being in year 7.

My iPod #397: Arctic Monkeys – From the Ritz to the Rubble

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Like “Fake Tales of San Francisco”, the version of “From the Ritz to the Rubble” I listen to can be found on the EP “Five Minutes with Arctic Monkeys”. There aren’t any major differences between that version and the re-recorded take on “Whatever People Say….”. The only one I can think of at the top of my head is the ending bass. Even so, the version you can hear above was the one I was listening to waaaay before the album was released and therefore I got used to seeing that as the official version. Though both tracks were recorded in a totally different label, I have to say that I feel “Five Minutes with Arctic Monkeys” contains the better takes of both songs.

Though the majority of you may recognise the track as the penultimate offering of Arctic Monkeys’ phenomenal debut from 2006, “Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not”, an album about a Saturday night out in Sheffield. Although “A Certain Romance” brings the album to a close, I consider “From the Ritz to the Rubble” to be night-out concept’s ending, coming from a person who wakes up on the Sunday morning thinking ‘what the fuck was that all about?’. Though not before a recalling of events involving a power-mad bouncer at the entrance of a club, which funnily isn’t all that important as Turner shrugs it off claiming it as ‘a story to tell you’.

The song’s main message concerns how people reflect on the things they’ve done on a drunk night out, and how amazingly different things appear to be the morning after. It is also one of the most energetic tracks on the Monkeys’ debut; many cymbals crash, a lot of alternating guitar lines occur which pan from one ear to the other, and plus it has a groovy bassline which you can never go wrong with. One to get the blood rushing.

My iPod #396: Nick Drake – From the Morning

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“…listening to this album, with headphones to be isolated of all exterior noises, with eyes closed, is a unique experience. Because at the end, the last song you hear is FROM THE MORNING, and this song is so positive! After all an album of a beautiful darkness, you finish on this moving celebration of life, telling you that another day starts after this tormented night, all starts again with a beautiful morning, that everything is possible with the rise of the sun. It’s at the opposite with the whole rest of the album, and it ends like that. I’m telling you, you can’t arrive at the end of PINK MOON with your eyes dry. That’s why this song has a particular saviour. And you need to know that FROM THE MORNING was his parents favourite song, proof that it has a positive reflect, and that’s why they chose a quote of this song as epitaph on his gravestone “Now we rise, and we are everywhere”.

That is a comment under the lyrics of “From the Morning” on songsmeaning.net. And I actually couldn’t put it better myself.

“Pink Moon” is the album to play during the hours of a cold winter night; its bare atmosphere and depressing lyrics matching the dark, silent environment. You walk around wondering where to turn.

But then “From the Morning” begins just as the sun rises, the skies turn a pinkish colour, the birds start to sing and you realise you’ve been bugging out over nothing. Everything will be alright. Another day is here. Time to learn something new.

The track’s presence wipes the sadness and desolation present throughout “Pink Moon” away, and as the last song ends the album on a happy, positive note. Sadly he would pass away only a few years later, but at least his official discography came to a definitive conclusion with this highly-spirited tune.

My iPod #395: Linkin Park – From the Inside

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“From the Inside” is from Linkin Park’s second album “Meteora”. It’s my favourite track on that album, too. It was released as its fourth single in 2004, physically in Australia and the USA whilst it was download only in the UK. It’s a track of the band’s that isn’t really overplayed so I never feel as if I can ever really get tired of it, say like “What I’ve Done” or “In the End” or something. This is an actual track I can really get into when that siren-like keyboard melody begins.

“From the Inside” adapts that quiet verse/loud chorus dynamic that is typically used in grunge music. Chester Bennington softly sings alternating with Mike Shinoda’s raps in the verses, before Bennington lets loose and the trademark Meteora wall of guitars enter for the chorus. Bennington screams a lot during the bridge too, which excites any Linkin Park fan.

Not much else I can say about it. It’s a very heavy tune about being betrayed and not knowing who you can trust anymore, with a waltz time signature. Cool stuff.

My iPod #394: Faith No More – From Out of Nowhere

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I don’t listen to Faith No More. Not because I don’t like the group’s music. More because I’ve never really tried to listen to it. Though the three songs I know by them are ones that are actually very good. The cover of ‘Easy’‘s astoundingly smooth, and “Epic” is the complete opposite. It lives up to its name. Though the video confused me a bit when I first saw it. What did that poor fish do to deserve such treatment?

Though “From Out of Nowhere” is the track that I’ll really go into. It is the opener, and was the first single, from the band’s third album “The Real Thing” in 1989. And what a way to start things off to. Barely a second goes before a charging power chord surrounds your ears and gets the track’s momentum going. Honestly, that introduction feels like a unstoppable train thundering down a track at a tremendous speed which then pummels through a solid brick wall when the drums kick in.

The track seems to be about a brief encounter between Patton and a perfect stranger, though the brevity of the meeting hurts him deeply. The song’s music written by the group’s bassist, Bill Gould, and keyboard player, Roddy Bottum seem to perfectly fit the lyrics’ theme of wonderment and incredulity.

Its booming rhythm section, roaring guitars, glorious synthesizer and not to mention Mike Patton’s passionate vocal delivery  got to me quite a bit when I watched the video on MTV2 a few years ago. It’s easy to understand why it is a popular one amongst Faith No More followers. Great track.