Smile!!

On the way home from work this afternoon I couldn't decide what to listen to, so I put my iPod on shuffle.  After System of a Down ("Chop Suey") and Train ("If It's Love") had their way with me Counting Crows took a shot with "Long December".  Naturally, I burst into tears.  It's just one of those songs.  That got me to thinking about the songs that have that effect on me and why.  Some of the reasons I can pinpoint, some of them are more vague, none of them are anything I want to talk about.

So, I decided to share with you some music that makes me smile.  Every. Single. Time.  There are just some songs, some voices, some combinations of song and voice that just make my heart a little lighter when they pop out of my speakers.  These songs aren't necessarily associated with some great event in my life, some of them don't even make any sense, but all of them work for me.

"Mercy" - Matt Nathanson - Modern Love
I love the shit out of this song.  Then again, I love this entire record (hell, I love every single thing I've ever heard him sing), but that isn't enough for this list.  I love "Kiss Quick" more than this one, but that one doesn't make me break out in a full face silly-ass grin every time it comes on.  I'm not 100% certain why it does that to me, but I think maybe it's because it's the first song I ever heard him play live (and he opened with it again in Nashville) so it transports me back there a little bit every time.  Here, see if it makes you smile too (I'm sure it will):

"Waste" - Aaron Tap - Bronchitis

I found this song via Aaron Tap's blog.  I fucking love this song so much I can't even tell you, but my favorite part is the guitar playing.  Holy shit.  I would love more than anything to watch him play this one live.  I just want to watch the guitar magic happen (it fascinates me if you haven't noticed...probably because I don't know how to do it).  Plus the lyrics are so clever and unique, I mean, he uses the words "cupidity" and "hasten" in a song...it is not possible not to love that.  Anyway, even if you never take any of my suggestions and if you think I'm totally full of shit, please just click this link and listen to this song - you will not regret it.  Then, if you're ever at a Matt Nathanson concert with me (like, in Louisville in February for instance) yell this song out until you're blue in the face and maybe we'll get Aaron to play it!

"In Light of Your Less Complicated Life" - The Paula Kelley Orchestra - Airports EP
Honestly, just hearing her voice makes me smile, but I love this song in particular.  I think because I understand that I got extremely lucky in finding my husband with his ability to really, really know me and still love me and this song just makes me appreciate it all that much more.  Besides her voice, this song has horns and piano and a brilliant arrangement.  Just awesome.  Here, you can listen to it on Soundcloud.

"Fuck You" - Cee Lo Green
Honestly, I think this one speaks for itself.  How could the opportunity to sing "fuck you" repeatedly for three and half minutes not make you smile??

"Steal My Sunshine" - Len
The summer that this song came out, I hated it.  Hated it I tell you!  I tried to avoid it which was completely impossible because every radio station and music channel on earth played the shit out of it.  About a year after it came out, I finally gave it.  It was firmly embedded in my brain, I finally learned the words, and now I love it.  Sure, it's super tacky and probably not a very good song, but that doesn't stop me from busting out a big old smile and cranking it up when it comes on.

"Blister in the Sun" - Violent Femmes - Violent Femmes
If the opening to this song doesn't make you perk up, crack a smile and prepare to clap out the drum beats - you are dead inside.

"Get Gone" - White Arrows - Get Gone
This is one I found through my "New Music Mondays" adventures.  I'm not sure exactly what it is about this song.  It's not the normal kind of sound that I'm drawn to.  It's too techno sounding or something, but love is blind (and deaf, apparently) and I love this song.  The vocal is unique, the lyrics are catchy and it makes me smile and that's enough for me.

"New Age Girl" - Deadeye Dick - New Age Girl EP
This song is made of awesome. It contains the word "septuagenarians"and the line "she don't eat meat but she sure likes the bone!" Tell the truth, it's your favorite song now, right? Check it:

Modern Love - ON VINYL

Right this very moment (yes, at 2:29AM the morning after Christmas) I'm listening to Matt Nathanson's Modern Love on vinyl for the very first time.  It is incredible.  I keep expecting to look up and see that a stage has been installed in my living room and that he's on it. 

The sound is so warm, so real, so alive. 

"Kiss Quick" is playing right now and I have to say, this is a close second to hearing it live.

So (even though I'm sure they won't ever see this), I'd like to take this late night/early morning moment to thank Matt Nathanson, Mark Weinberg, Aaron Tap and everyone else involved in the making of this record for creating this moment in time.  It is truly amazing.

Now I have to go flip the record...awesome.  :-)

So Excited.

How has it been 2 1/2 hours and I haven't mentioned this yet??

I just bought tickets to go see Matt Nathanson at Headliner's Music Hall in Louisville, KY on February 24, 2012!!!!**  I got 4 tickets as my sister and her husband (of vinyl donation fame) will hopefully go with us. 

To say that I cannot wait would be a gross understatement. 

Also, I'm not sure if I mentioned, but my 2nd copy of Modern Love came in the mail the other day and it's red too!  There is a tiny flaw on the cover though, so this one will be my useable version.  Hopefully I can have him sign the other one at the show in Louisville - that would be pretty fucking sweet. 

**I was just re-reading this post and realized that what it was missing was exclamation points. (!!)

"Modern Love" - Live at The Cannery Ballroom

At the urging of my niece (who thinks that he makes "beautiful music") and because my sister has high speed internet and I don't and I just so happen to be at her house tonight, I finally give you my video of Matt Nathanson (and band) performing "Modern Love" - November 5, 2011

The Cannery Ballroom, Nashville, TN

Sorry for the poor picture quality, I wasn't looking at the phone at all while I filmed this.  Also, sorry it cuts off abruptly, I was too 'in the moment' to be concerned about that (now, of course, I wish I had the entire concert filmed!!) I just wanted to capture a little bit of it to keep for when my memory fails me (which happens a lot!).

By the way, "and band" consists of:
Aaron Tap - guitar (check this guy out - *super* talented in his own right)
Shiben Bhattacharya - bass (good grief, I hope I spelled that right!!)
Konrad Meissner - drums
James Farrell - keyboards

More "New" Music, A Gift for Me

After someone inquired about my red vinyl copy of "Modern Love" recently, I did some looking around and found that not everyone who bought one got a red see-thru copy like mine.  So, because I'm a nerd like that, I have ordered myself another copy.  If this one is red too, then sweet, I'll get to watch the beautiful red vinyl spin on the turntable.  If not, then I'll play the black one and hide the red one away for safe keeping!  I would love to someday have the red copy signed (the cover, not the vinyl), we'll see if I can ever make that happen.  Oddly enough, even though I already own a copy, I'm still excited to get this one in the mail.  I wish I could go to an actual record store and flip through the stacks until I found it and buy it (there is just something cool about that), but nobody around here is carrying "Modern Love" on vinyl, so I have to click-and-wait.

This morning, while doing my usual VH1 and cereal routine, they played "Run Away Train" by Soul Asylum!  It's not even my birthday or anything!  I can't even count the ways in which I loved that song when it was new (and for about, oh, 3 years after it was new), but somehow I had never seen the video.  I'm guessing that was because we didn't have any music channels (or weren't allowed to watch them, I'm not 100% certain which), so the only videos I ever saw were at friends' houses or on Night Tracks on TBS - which, sadly was no longer on the air by the time 'Run Away Train' came out.  So I got to see the video this morning and that was cool, and only 17 years late.

Speaking of Night Tracks - did you ever watch show?  (Are you old enough to know what I'm talking about?) My dad used to let me record it (yes, on VHS...can you believe it??) and I would wear those tapes out.  My favorite episode had 'Dead or Alive' by Bon Jovi, 'One' by Metallica, and 'Fire Woman' by The Cult.  Man, that was awesome.

Matt Nathanson - Modern Love

Album: Modern Love
Artist: Matt Nathanson
Release: 2011

Ok, I just bought Beneath These Fireworks and it has inspired me to go ahead and review Modern Love.  I've pondered this record since I first got it in August.  After many, many plays, I've determined that it is not an exaggeration to say it is perfect.  I thought I would wait until I had a favorite song on the record before I reviewed it, but that hasn't happened.  As soon as I think I like one best, another one says, "Hey, what about me??" and I flounder.  They're just all so freakin' good.  Some of my favorite lyrics I've ever had the sheer pleasure of singing (badly) in my car are on this record.

On Modern Love, Matt Nathanson brings all the passion and sexy that I want when I listen to Some Mad Hope and then some.  He takes that one "so right" in "Come On Get Higher" and spreads it out all over the record.  The ups and downs of love have never sounded as entertaining as they do on this album.  The first single, "Faster" explores the human contact side of love.  The actual connection between two people that cannot take place on Facebook or via text message or Skype.  At the same time though, if you pay attention, you know that it also acknowledges the danger of actual connection, "You turn me over and over, till I can't control myself, make me a liar, one big disaster."  Which I have to assume translates to, "Yes, you make me hot, so much so that I lose my head, but you treat me like shit, so I keep saying I'm going to leave you but...you make me so hot!" (Which, admittedly, is a much less...um...lyrical way of putting it.)

Next up is the title track, Modern Love - which was my first favorite song on the record.  I played a groove in the CD (is that possible?) on this one.  It's so damn catchy and clever.  "I'd burn my house down, just to hear 'em scream my name" - how can you not love that??  And seriously, "taco truck"?  Shut the fuck up.  "Modern Love" is followed up by two scrumptious little love songs: "Love Comes Tumbling Down" and "Room @ the End of the World".  Both explore the connection (or lack thereof) between people in this world.  He spends a lot of time on this record exploring that place where the warm, moist, touchable parts of us bump up against the hard, cold, disconnected parts of our society.  And he makes you believe that all he wants is to hole up in a room at the end of the world with that special someone and revel in the human element of love.

"Kiss Quick" is one of those songs that after it plays, you just go ahead and skip back to the beginning because you know there is no way that once is enough.  Even when played loud (trust me) you strain to hear this one.  His delivery on this song is warm and sexy and perfect.  There are few things I enjoy more than being able to hear the artist breathe during a song and there is a lot of that here (really on the whole record, but it is at its breathy-sexy peak in this song).  For some reason, I love that shit.  "Kiss Quick" is slow and quiet and is followed up by the upbeat, peppy "Mercy" which is my current favorite.  I would have to post the entire song (and a link to it) here to accurately portray the awesomeness of it.  I could listen to this song over and over all day long.  I hesitate to admit that I've actually done just that...but it's possible. Never has our obsession with fame and it's fleeting nature been so damn entertaining.

Next up are "Kept" and "Run" - two beautiful, passionate songs that display Mr. Nathanson in all his glory.  Both of these songs are crushing, in the best way possible.  "Kept" is a warm, slow tune about being drawn into and held by a bad relationship by your heart strings.  For "Run", he teamed up with Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush of the country group Sugarland.  It revels more in the sexy side of love.  After these two, he hits you again with another of those upbeat tunes.  This one, "Queen of (K)nots" is about a relationship that, when it's bad, it's horrible, but when it's good, it's mind blowing.  This song, an awesome tune all the way through, has my second-favorite line on the record: "I won't be there, when the luck runs out, no I won't be there when the word gets round, cause you're someone else's baby, yeah you're someone else's crazy now!"  Ugh.  Lyrical genius!!

This gift to eardrums everywhere wraps up with "Drop to Hold You" and "Bottom of the Sea".  The former being a huge, swelling song that builds up around you and wraps you up.  I can think of few better ways to spend 3 minutes and 39 seconds than listening to this song.  Finally, "Bottom of the Sea", kind of peppy, a little quirky, it suggests an alternative location to living on this planet that we've destroyed in a fucked up society.  Also, this song contains my favorite lyric ever: "I'm tired of getting even, let's get odd, odd, baby."  Ok, maybe it's not a soul crushing line, but it is so fucking clever, it is impossible not to love.

My point here is this:  buy this record. I have it on CD, MP3 and vinyl.  If he released it on cassette or 8-track, I'd probably buy that too.  It is just incredible, easily one of the best (if not THE best) records I've heard in 20 years.