14 posts tagged “music”
Last Friday to celebrate the end of summer / Labour Day weekend we had a corn roast at work.
My co-worker Christ sang and I accompanied on my guitar. We only had two days to practice and I hadn't played so much guitar in three to four years. We only did three songs, but I believe in quality over quantity.
These are some other videos posted on YouTube from some of my co-workers. Wow, multiple camera show!
the format is stolen, but the views expressed are mine ;-)
.:What I'm Listening Too:.
Sloan: Parallel Play. What can I say, I've been a fan of Sloan since High School (which for some reason keeps getting farther and farther away) and they are pretty much the only band I'll buy an album sight unheard.
That said, it's not their best album but there are some stand out songs.
They funny thing I'm usually a Patrick Pentland kind of guy but with Parallel Play most of my favorites are Jay Ferguson's songs (Sloan fans will get it). Great songs like Witch's Wand, Cheap Champagne, Believe In Me and The Other Side make great additions to the Sloan set list.
Sloan is a band that evolves and changes and Parallel Play is no different. As apposed to their '70's rock heavy past few offerings Parallel Play leans to an almost light rock late '60's & '70's feeling and even Dylanesque on Down In The Basement. Though there are a few rock ones like I'm Not A Kid Anymore for the faithful.
One thing I have to say I completely hate about the album and this goes for all of my musical purchases is that I don't want no demo's, live versions or reprises. This ain't high school and I don't want no double or triple spaced albums. You only have 13 songs? Great put those on, it's okay if it's a short album. But please no padding.
All in all a good Sloan album and one that pushes them out their safety zone of musical creation.
Creature: No Sleep At All. It's always nice to rout for the home team.
Montreal's Creature released their first album a few months ago and I got a free track from either iTunes or music.download.com, I can't remember. Either way, I got it and have really been enjoying the album.
They've been compared to Blondie and Talking Heads, but never really listened to them so I can't tell if that's a good comparison.
Personally I think they've got a bit of Elastica, a pinch of Daft Punk's sound and '70's & '80's funk and rock. That's the closet I can get, you just have to listen to them yourself.
I'd like to point you where you could hear them, but unfortunately there is not many places to catch them. iTunes seems your best bet to at least get a sample of the entire album. Their MySpace page would be better to hear some full length songs.
Most of the album is up tempo dance / rock songs with the second half slowing things down a bit. Not that there's anything wrong with that, just personally I would have liked a few more fast songs. It's still all good.
One thing I totally love about them is that they don't take themselves too seriously and like to fool around. They have the first four steps of their 12 step program to get your inner freak on posted on YouTube (along with another half dozen video sites) . My personal favorites are step 1 and step 4.
I like seeing Canadian bands making great music like Sloan and Creature.
.:What I'm Watching:.
Wall•E. It must have been 10 years since I've seen a movie opening weekend.
I don't know who was looking forward to the latest Pixar film more, me or ET.
As usual a great film from Pixar. They did an excellent job telling a story when the main characters don't talk and can only emote though limited facial and body gestures.
The inclusion of live action footage was a little strange but certainly not the end of the world.
One little thing, if you've been watching the trailers you'll notice the catchy song used. Well, it's not on the soundtrack because it's not from Wall•E but Terry Gilliam's film Brazil. It's called Central Services / The Office.
Also check out Buy N Large's official site for more info on the Wall•E universe. And the free demo of the PC game.
Indiana Jones: Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull. If it's been 10 years for me to see a film on opening weekend, then I have no idea the last time I saw two movies in two days.
The movie was okay and since it's been out for months I'm probably the last to see it .
What i did like, it gave Donna and I a chance to get out for a few hours alone. Now that's been a few years.
I hope I get one of those free faceplates that Activision is sending out to those of us who actually part with the game for a month. Yesterday I was at BestBuy and thought about picking up a second guitar but what's the point, I can't play it for at least 3 to 4 weeks.
My wife got me a Star Wars a day calendar this past Christmas. I've been enjoying a small piece of the Star Wars universe residing on my desk at work for far this year. Much better than dogs and or cats in my opinion.
The strangest one I've seen so far is a painting of the main characters preforming as a live 1970's rock band. Of course it would have made perfect sense in the 1970's glam rock era.
c|net's download.com has this track as a free un-DRMed mp3, or you could always buy it on iTunes for 99¢ un-DRMed AAC file.
I should really start watching the HBO show.
The question made me think and here's the main reason I came up with. Buying an item emotionally invests you in it. You'll look after, cherish and protect it. Of course I should also point out the major selling that has stopped me from purchasing music online up to now has been DRM. iTunes Plus will do for now but I'm really waiting for the Amazon MP3 store to come to Canada.
There are two main drawbacks to me for buying music. One, I'm completely out of the loop when it comes to "what the kids are listing too" and two, my disposable income can be better spent elsewhere.
So here's my solution, download legally free music. You might have to do some leg work to get them but no more than you would do running Limewire or Bittorrent.
Believe it or not my knee jerk first choice here is iTunes. I've mentioned this to people and very few are even aware that iTunes has a free single of the week. Ok, it's DRMed, and only works on an iPod, but it's free and if you don't like it delete. That will get you 52 free songs a year. In the past year I even scored a free audio book!
Your second choice is Puretracks. They have a free MP3 of the week also but unlike iTunes it's an unDRMed MP3 encoded at 192kbps versus a 128kbps AAC file. That's another 52 free songs a year for you.
The mother load for free music is download.com. They have a free song a day, no DRM and encoded at 192kbps. There are over 111,000 free songs on their site and you don't have to be a member or be located in the USA for get them. A plus for me. So there's an additional 111,000 songs for you (coincidentally, that's 37 times more songs than my current music collection).
Of course this is just scratching the surface when it comes to free legitimate music. Many independent artists and labels have free songs. Armed with time and Google I'm sure you could certainly find more, who knows you might already know of some. And if you do why not let me know. Thanks. I can't think of a better serendipitous way to discover new music.
With so much free music out there it not only makes me wonder why people download music illegally but why anyone pays for it either.
UPDATE: Dan of we love music passed along another site that offers free downloads.
Some old friends came by tonight, I just had to find them. ;-) What the hell was I thinking?!? 96kbps. Yikes!
What's your musical horoscope? (Put your player on shuffle and write down the first 10 songs that come up.)
- The Way I Feel Inside - Zombies - The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou Soundtrack
- Saving Metroville - Michael Giacchino - The Incredibles Soundtrack
- 1-10 - John Barrowman - Torchwood - Another Life
- Square One - Coldplay - X&Y
- You Dont Know My Name - Alicia Keys - Billboard Top 100 of 2004
- Prophet 15 - Supergrass - Life on Other Planets
- The Old Apartment - Barenaked Ladies - Disc 1- All Their Greatest Hits (1991-2001)
- Refugee - Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers - Greatest Hits
- Wide Open - The Crystal Method - Legion Of Boom
- I Think I Started A Trend - Brad Sucks - I Don't Know What I'm Doing
Music-wise, what was the first 45, single or download you bought?
Submitted by Paddy Melt Wagon.
This was the first single I bought. I got it at Zellers on a cassette. It's funny how you get different things out the of the same song at different points in you life.
My former co-worker pointed me to his daughter's Marie-Claude's MySpace page. It's pretty good, even thought I only catch every 3rd word. But if anyone who knows my musical tastes they'll know I'm a sucker for women musicians with a guitar. She plays pop/ folk so check her out. If you like that kind of stuff that is.
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