Tag Archives: bird

#944: The Beatles – Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

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The Beatles’ ‘Norwegian Wood’ is a tale of infidelity… going wrong? Not that infidelity is the best situation, but in John Lennon’s case he was ready to go until seemingly being mislead and left hanging. Affected by the ordeal, he wrote what became the second track on 1965’s Rubber Soul. Worked on together with the input of the other three guys, it became the first track of its kind to incorporate an Indian instrument into a Western rock recording through George Harrison’s work on the sitar and essentially started the whole India craze in music that lasted for quite a while in that decade.

So, yes, Lennon was gonna cheat on his wife on one occasion, with whom it’s never been revealed, but as we can assume from this song nothing happened leaving him frustrated. He’s invited in, admires the decor, thinks things are going somewhere, the lady has other ideas and leaves, Lennon wakes up from a bath and finds out she’s gone, and whichever way you interpret the ending, he lights a fire and continues admiring the house or burns the whole place down as revenge. The things men think of doing when blue-balled, eh. But the story is delivered in a calming setting, aided by Lennon’s soft vocal, his strong acoustic guitar work, and of course the sitar by Harrison. It’s all so innocent sounding, like a cool breeze, which I think helps in giving the lyrical content another angle. Sometimes you get so lost in the instrumentation that a read of the words would bring on some different feelings. But for me, once that acoustic riff starts it off, I can only ever feel relaxed and not the least concerned about anything else.

I don’t think I knew this song existed until the release of The Beatles: Rock Band in 2009. Rubber Soul was released on the game as DLC, allowing players to go through the whole album with “dreamscapes” included which provided some nice visuals. Probably the closest thing the song could have to a music video. I’m guessing the track was a highlight for me from that point on, but there are a lot of things from when I was 14 that I can’t quite remember clearly. What matters is it’s been a mainstay for all these years. Nice how these things turn out.

My iPod #97: Pezz (Billy Talent) – Bird in the Basement

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“Bird in the Basement” is the title of this song by Billy Talent when they were in their Pezz phase, but the phrase doesn’t appear at all. It’s not sung by anyone, no one in the studio says it or anything. It’s the same for the rest of the songs on the album. Maybe it’s a phrase that only the members of the band are able to get. They probably won’t play any of “Watoosh!” any time soon though, so we’ll never know.

I mentioned how I came to own “Watoosh!” in my post for “Absorbed”, the last track of the album. However, I knew about the album since I was about ten years old. A Billy Talent fan uploaded the songs on their fan site but they were in terrible quality, and were eitther in wma or wav files. I just didn’t listen to this song until my sister bought the album for me in 2009. I think the link for it was broken.

As for the meaning of the song, it’s quite hard to say. I’m thinking it’s about a relationship where the couple feel that ‘everything is fake’ around them even though to other people, they are the problem. They are oblivious to the whole situation though, and look forward to sticking with one another when everything turns to crap.

This is my one hundredth post. Hooray! To anyone who reads this, thank you. You are the reason why I feel like I haven’t been wasting my time since February, when I started this thing.

Until tomorrow.

Jamie.

My iPod #81: They Might Be Giants – Bee of the Bird of the Moth

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Oh, hello again! Nice to see you.

“Bee of the Bird of the Moth” is a track from They Might Be Giants’ twelfth album “The Else” released in 2007. I didn’t listen to it until very recently, only because I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to listen to the album or not. It was released during the period when the band had developed their children’s music albums, with “Here Come the ABCs” preceding it, and the two other “Here Comes…” coming afterward, so I had my doubts on whether the sound of the ‘adult’ album would appeal to me.

I was wrong to doubt. “This Might Be a Wiki”, the information centre dedicated to the band allows its members to rate their songs out of 10, and out of 84 ratings it has an average of 8.83/10 which isn’t band considering it’s above songs like “You Probably Get That a Lot” and “Weep Day” which are just examples of two other songs that I like. I’m thinking that that’s the actual reason why I listened to the song in the first place. It has a high rating in the TMBW song list. That sounds quite bad 😦

I don’t regret it though. If I hadn’t done that, then there’s the possibility that I may not have given “The Else” a chance. “The Else” is a great album. I’m biased though ’cause They Might Be Giants are one of my favourite artists, but it’s proudly in my iTunes library where I can listen to the songs everyday.

In John Linnell’s words: “This is a song about a hummingbird moth, which imitates another creature, which imitates yet another creature. It’s completely fucked up and can only be explained in song!”

What more can you say?

Until tomorrow.

Jamie.

My iPod #38: The Beatles – And Your Bird Can Sing

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1966 was a good year for England. The football team won the World Cup, Tony Adams was born, and The Beatles unveiled their seventh album to the world. Except for the USA, who wouldn’t hear the album in its original form until the remastered CD in 1987.

Revolver. My favourite album by The Beatles. One of my favourite albums by any band.

Where can I start? I think that everything I would say about it has been said by almost every reviewer there is. I’ll leave it to you lot to find out what they say.

Upon seeing the Beatles light in 2009, I went on any site where I could download their whole discography. ‘Revolver’ was one of their first albums I downloaded, and then I didn’t know what to think of it. I’ve said many times that it takes a few listens to appreciate each song individually, resulting in an accumulated appreciation for the album as a whole. This was another of those times.

I think the fact that the songs were so short was something that made the album seem really quick to me. I would be listening to a song, and then it would finish and it was onto the next one. It was hard to get into something when the last chord faded out before your ears.

‘And Your Bird Can Sing’ was one example. Barely over two minutes, it’s one of the shortest songs.

Listening to it again and again though, I finally understood why the song was so sick. Sick is good. Now, it’s come to a point that when I see the cover, I either think of the fake countdown at the beginning of ‘Taxman’ or the introduction of this song.

It’s actually one of the more ‘basic?’ pieces of the album. A straight-forward rocker written by Lennon, with dual-guitar solos by both George Harrison AND Paul McCartney, Ringo doing his stuff on the drums. It;s just a really cheerful song, with hubris at its finest in the lyrics:

‘You tell me that you’ve heard every sound there is
And your bird can swing, but you can’t hear me
You can’t hear- MEEEEEEE.’

It’s just a huge ‘You suck. I’m great’ message. It’s brilliant. It’s everything you want musically and lyrically, and it’s only done in a short amount of time.

Then ‘For No One’ starts. Then you need to get the tissues. For drying your eyes.

It was clear that the band was a world away from their mop-top mania stage and had already embraced their dive into the unknown. That’s why they’re so great you know? They changed their sound on every album and they still sounded good! JESUS.

Revolver forever.

Until next time.

Jamie.