Tag Archives: my ipod

My iPod #482: Larrikin Love – Happy as Annie

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You want to listen to a band who wore folk/country/indie influences on their sleeves but still pulled off a decent album of enjoyable and exciting music? Larrikin Love is the band for you. Too bad that they haven’t been a band for almost ten years now. “The Freedom Spark” was the only album they released during their short spell in 2006 before the members went their separate ways the following year; the good thing is that it is worth a listen if you have the time.

With an upbeat tempo accompanied by sprightly violins and banjos, the lyrics concern a narrator who takes an innocent stroll in the fields on a summer’s day, where the birds are singing and flying through the skies, to get away from the city. But he wails that he is ‘choked with fear’ in the cathartic choruses in which, after a split second of feedback, the roaring guitars kick things into another gear. Why does he feel like this? Well, things take a dark turn in the final verse. I’ll leave it at that.

I haven’t listened to this song in a long time. It’s a song that I was very much more into when I was eleven. The music doesn’t sound dated (at least not to me), but there’s something about it that takes me back to that age. It is still a knee-slapper after all this time.

My iPod #481: Orson – Happiness

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Never was into Orson that much. The band somehow got to number one with “No Tomorrow” back in 2006, which to me is still one of the most random chart toppers this country’s had, released an album in the same year that I guess people cared for a bit due to the success the single got, followed it up the next year with another that people didn’t care for as much and then split up because of it. The group’s existence was a bit strange.

Though the group didn’t make my kind of music, I did enjoy “Happiness” a lot. Still do. The track was released as the third single from Orson’s debut album “Bright Idea“; it just about got into the top thirty when it came out continuing a trend of a steady slide down the charts whenever they released a new single which is quite disappointing. I do consider it to be a much better track than “No Tomorrow”, not that I think it should be a number hit or anything, but it just because it’s a lot more modest. It gets its message out without being too full on. A mid-tempo feel good pop-rock track about the happiness (that happens?) when the one you love is around.

My iPod #480: Queens of the Stone Age – Hangin’ Tree

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It’s been a while. It’s time to start things up again. It was very lucky that the last post was able to be written at the time it was; the past month or so has been a bit full on in terms of university work. But that’s all done and gone. Could I have a done a few update posts here and there? Maybe… But you don’t wanna know about me, you’re just here for the music.

And the first song of the “H” section is “Hangin’ Tree”, a song on the album Songs for the Deaf by Queens of the Stone Age that always has me wishing that I knew how to play the bass or the drums, preferably both, because the rhythm is too much for me to handle. I can’t help but move and bob my head to the 5/8 (5/4? I don’t know) time signature.

The lead vocals in “Hangin’ Tree” are performed by Mark Lanegan, and after being screamed at for a minute and a few seconds by former bassist Nick Oliveri in “Six Shooter“, it sounds too good when the man’s trademark low and rough voice drags out the first words of the song. Mm mm mm.

I remember this track being one that I would always skip over when I listened to the album for the first time almost a decade ago. That was at a time when I was only into the singles, and didn’t care that much for deeper cuts. But actually getting past the opening bass riff one day immensely opened my eyes and ears. It’s been one of my favourite tracks from the album for a while now.

Here’s the original version of the track released a year prior to its release on SftD, it’s a bit slower and misses that little extra beat that much more pronounced on the album. It’s still the same song, all that matters.

My iPod #479: The Dismemberment Plan – Gyroscope

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I got round to listening to The Dismemberment Plan’s cult classic Emergency & I sometime in late 2013, and it was another one of those times where I listened to an album the whole way through for the first time and thought: “Yep. That was a good one.” Probably one of the quirkiest albums about modern life and growing pains to exist with keyboard-heavy tracks and syncopation present in almost every song, but the way they are delivered along with Travis Morrison’s passionate vocal delivery make each subject matter touched upon in the twelve tracks seem so real and easy to understand. A really good album, you should hear it.

“Gyroscope” is track eight on the album and observes two people who go out for a date. The first verse describes the lady getting ready for it whilst the second appears to describe the male’s feelings after the ordeal. This being set to an irregular time signature that is very hard to get your head around, still is for me today, with minor sounding chords to set the uneasy tone. That is though before suddenly bursting into major key, keyboard-filled, sing-a-long chorus that’s bound to get you off your feet. I always liked that for the final chorus the lyrics then turn their attention to the listener, making it more personal and relatable. And it all sounds so happy until all the instruments stop playing, leaving Morrison to sing the track’s final words on his own just to reinforce that anxious feeling.

Great song. And with that the G’s are done. Thanks for reading. Don’t think I’ve had as much likes for posts for the other letters as I have for G, I appreciate it. Will be back to cover the songs beginning with H soon.

My iPod #478: Animal Collective – Guys Eyes

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A Panda Bear-penned track that had been around and heard in a much more mellow and calming form circa 2007 with the name “Song for Ariel“, “Guys Eyes” came to be the final result of the Animal Collective treatment the original track underwent and was placed as the seventh track on the group’s 2009 album Merriweather Post Pavilion.

The song sees Noah Lennox singing about his desire to please ‘[his] girl’. She isn’t there. And at the end of the song it is suggested that he has pleased himself instead of waiting for her.

In its new form the track possessed a bouncier 12/8 rhythm, weird pitch-shifted vocals that are buried in the mix, forceful stop-starting bass drums, flickering percussion and glorious counter-melodies. And those are only in the first few verses of the thing. About 1 1/2 minutes in, the song builds into this hypnotizing groove as Avey Tare and Panda Bear repeatedly sing the words ‘need her’. The walls close in all around as the tension continues to build as these two words are burrowed into your mind, until you’re snapped back into reality once returning to the melodies established in the opening verses for the closing moments.