I was watching music television one day. I think the channel was The Amp -which was a really good music channel; I don’t know why it got removed – and I watched the video for it.
But you know how it goes. Time moves on, and songs get older and older until they eventually fade away and are hardly ever played again. I never forgot about the song though. I wasn’t able to watch the video again until sometime in 2010. I downloaded the song, and I can have it on repeat whenever I want.
It’s got that “Rush of Blood” Coldplay type vibe. Apparently it influenced Chris Martin to write songs with Coldplay for “X&Y”, so obviously it must be good.
The song was released as the band’s second single from their debut album “Wilderness Is Paradise Now”. Their debut was also their last as the band then split in 2007. People may also know this band for “Gone Up in Flames”, a song in FIFA 07 and the theme song for “The Inbetweeners”.
Until tomorrow.
Jamie.
P.S. I created a Twitter account, so if you want to follow me please do @JamieKManteaw.
The end of the ‘A’ section that is. It’s been a good two months.
When I first came onto Blogger, I didn’t have anything in mind that I wanted to get off my chest. The first thing I had was just talking about things that were interesting to me, or events in my life that I had regrets about or whatever.
When I changed my mind and decided to focus on ‘My iPod’, I never thought I would be able to continuously talk about a song and why it meant so much to me for fifty-six days straight, and yet here I am about to post about another one.
I have exams. Those are very important, so I probably won’t be posting on here as regularly. Maybe something will pop up here and there, but for the moment ‘My iPod’ won’t be back until June.
And so, the song today is ‘Awaiting on You All’ by George Harrison, another one from his triple album, ‘All Things Must Pass’, in 1970.
Beatles fans will know that out of the four, George was the most religious. Or at least the one who most believed that there was an almighty, higher power who cared for the world and the people who inhabit it.
Any of you guys who also own ‘All Things Must Pass’ will definitely know the song, ‘My Sweet Lord‘. That song was George’s first single as a solo artist, and topped the music charts worldwide upon release in 1970. It got to number one in the UK again after his death in 2001.
‘My Sweet Lord’ is a very religious song, for obvious reasons. But for those who haven’t heard it, Harrison incorporates the use of the “Hare Krishna” mantra and chants of hallelujahs which build up as a countermelody whilst Harrison sings, building an epic climax which eventually fades out. With Phil Spector’s ‘Wall of Sound’ production technique, there is this gigantic albeit very echoey atmosphere.
‘Awaiting on You All’ is quite religious too, and if ‘My Sweet Lord’ is the music that plays on the organ in church when the service is starting, everyone is sitting down and the pastor or whoever is up on the stage announcing what will take place, then the former is when the first hymn starts and everybody is up on the feet, yelling rejoice to the heavens, bellowing the lungs to the skies above and break dancing in the middle of the aisle. Maybe I’m thinking of The Blues Brothers, but that’s what it reminds me of.
‘Awaiting’ has more of a political message to it than My Sweet Lord. Harrison desires to experience spirituality directly whilst rejecting organised religion as well as political and intellectal substitutes. That is basically what it says on the song’s article on Wikipedia. He criticises the Pope, and includes jibes at John Lennon and Yoko Ono about their week in bed.
“THE LORD IS AWAITING ON YOU ALL TO AWAKEN AND SEE. BY CHANTING THE NAMES… OF THE LORD…. YOU WILL BE FREE!”
HALLELUJAH, TESTIFY!
Come on, that sounds like something a guy would say in church, am I right? Or am I right?
Oh well. That’s the end for now. You won’t be hearing from me for some time. Got work to do.
‘My iPod’ will be back in June! When the ‘B’ series begins!
I don’t particularly know why or how. As a child I saw the video for ‘Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)’ on the TV. The band wasn’t in it, and it only showed clips of children running around in a playground interspersed with the walking hammers that are seen in the film. Of course I had no idea what I had just witnessed, and was left quite confused by the whole thing.
I watched the movie for ‘The Wall’ when I was 13, and I guess I was just hooked from then. Bob Geldof was actually a good actor, the concept behind the album was enthralling and obviously the music played a big part. I ended up getting the double album for my fourteenth birthday.
‘The Wall’ is up there for being one of Pink Floyd’s most popular albums. However, ‘The Dark Side of the Moon’ is the one that most people agree on for being their finest piece of work and one of the greatest albums ever.
‘Any Colour You Like’ starts rather abruptly; the song before it named ‘Us and Them’ segues right into it. There are no lyrics as it is an instrumental, but it’s really funky and upbeat. David Gilmour, Nick Mason, and Richard Wright wrote the song, making it one out of three tracks that Waters did not contribute on.
The first minute or so is a synthesizer played by Wright, panning and echoing from one channel to the other. That then segues into a guitar solo, and the whole band joins in with additional scat singing.
I would think that most people would skip this song, but please reconsider. If you have this album, where the songs segue into each other (except one time), and you don’t have this song… Well then, that just messes everything up doesn’t it? It’s also very important in the album’s overall concept. Pink Floyd had a thing for concept albums.
All You Need Is Blood! Get it? It’s almost like that Beatles song.
Test Icicles certainly weren’t the band who sounded like they were influenced by The Beatles. Again, they were a band, but unfortunately the music that made was not the music that they were particularly interested in. They formed in 2004, and later split two years later in 2006.
The album this track was released on ‘For Screening Purposes Only’, was released to positive praise on Halloween 2005. Test Icicles were the next biggest thing in dance-punk indie rock terms. Considered to be ‘bigger than The Beatles’ by NME and ‘all cobra’ by Pitchfork Media, the album indeed is very eccentric and filled to the brim with bursting energy, backed up with crazy guitars and a booming, yet pre-recorded, rhythm section.
My sister went through a period around 2005/06 when she started borrowing various albums from her friends. She borrowed this one.
Test Icicles had three main vocalists who all brought their own sound to the table. The main vocalist on this song is Devonte Hynes, though you may know him better as Lightspeed Champion. In fact, Hynes only sings this song and the mindfuck that is ‘Catch It!‘ Sam Mehran sings part of the chorus and pre-chorus too.
I don’t know what this song is about to be honest. You would have to listen to it for yourself to try and get something, but you don’t have to understand a song to enjoy it.
Look out for the backwards rap at the end of the song, also done by Sam Mehran.
If you want to know how the rap sounds like forwards, click here. That’s my video 😀
The song ends. Then, out of nowhere, a bass riff starts. Reminds you of Jaws doesn’t it? It hypnotises you, sets you in a real mysterious, foreboding mood. It leads right into the next song. That’s for another post.
The Music in My Ears 