Sunday, January 30, 2005

Pinback/Trail of Dead/The Current

Pinback - Blood's On Fire (yousendit file. Click on the link, read the directions. Link only good until February 6).

On the way home from work the other day I listened to this song the whole way home. It is brilliant. Lyrically and musically it is the song equivalent to the feeling you get while watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Heartwrenching and beautiful and you keep holding your breathe reaching out trying to help but you know it is hopeless. This song would not be out of place on a No Knife CD.

I love the end of the song:

"You're not outside. You're not inside. You're not anymore. Where did you go?
Here's to the pranks we never pulled. And never will."

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And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead - Worlds Apart (yousendit file. link only good until February 6)

Okay, I never really listened to this band before this song. Pitchfork liked them enough to give their last full length a coveted 10.0. Is it the jangly feel or the slight British accent that is making me excited? Is it that the band slags MTV and then makes this song their single to be played on TRL? (Every reviewer seems to be quoting this line - I think they want the word cunt to be put into print for some reason: "Look at those cunts on MTV with cars and cribs and rings and shit. Is that what being a celebrity means?"). What do those animal noises mean at the end of song? Why do songs in 3/4 time sound like irish drinking tunes? Am I supposed to be sad or happy when this song ends?

Do I like it because this song makes me think? wow, what a concept.

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The Current

This makes me wish I were back in Minneapolis. It's a good thing the internet has progressed to a point where internet radio doesn't collapse all the damn time.

Monday, January 10, 2005

Jimmy Eat World (again)

Click here to watch the video for "Work" by Jimmy Eat World (in Windows Media format)

Jimmy Eat World unseats Usher or whoever the hell else sits atop TRL and stays there until the video is retired. The lyrics to "Work" are quoted in yearbooks across the country and 1 in 5 schools use the chorus as its graduating class's motto/quote.

JEW never bullshitted about wanting fame and selling a lot CDs. That was the point. With their new CD, and now new video, they will acheive even greater fame, and much will be written about the band that is full of personality yet are just average boring dudes and how they came to sell millions of CDs. This video will push them over the edge.

It's so cliche and but it's all fucking true. Featuring teenagers spewing their holden caulfield rhetoric and showing them full of ennui, creativity, passion, and the obligatory angst seems too obvious.

Despite the initial cynical reaction of falseness and idiocy, upon closer look, this is pretty real. I remember when I worked at the video store with my best friend and stole videos. I remember that kiss by the door and then watching her leave and wondering if I would ever know the meaning of "relationship" or when I would have sex. I remember sitting in school and having no clue where I would be 5 years later. I remember feeling stifled by adults, but feeling kinda scared about venturing out on my own. I remember feeling like it would be forever until I would be free from the pains of schoolwork.

"Work" turns out as a rallying cry for teenagers across America. When I first heard the song, I knew that it was about high school, but I tried to deny it and I thought that was kind of dumb. But this song needs to be about high school, and all that bull shit that is being a teenager. It's just the way it is.

Not too shabby boys, not too shabby.