Taylor Swift- Teen Icon

As a teenage girl, I understand what it's like to be a teenage girl. I understand stress of high school, feeling insecure at high school, and wanting to impress, kiss, and/or punch boys...at high school.

While my music taste falls into the indie rock category, there are many deviations. These deviations range from my immense appreciation of 80's and 90's hip-hop to my inability to resist catchy Top 40 tunes. One deviation, country music, used to be a much larger portion of my palate. While I still have a soft spot for the Dixie Chicks, I no longer scout country tracks and find most of it, sorry, nauseating.

There is, however, one country singer that my teenaged estrogen and I can't resist: Taylor Swift. Yeah, her songs are pretty generic and not in the least as innovative as the music bands like Grizzly Bear or Vampire Weekend are cranking out. But here's the thing: everything she croons about shoots directly to the lovestruck ventricles of girls my age. In interviews she chats casually and candidly like that girl from biology class who was always so friendly to everyone and you felt like you could be best friends with.

As I said, her songs are simple. They follow the same verse-chorus-bridge-verse-BIG CHORUS! structure and 90% are about boys. The way I see it, there's nothing wrong with that. She's nailed what appeals to her demographic and hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Fearless, released yesterday, is only Swift's second album, but the teen beauty is already primed to be an icon. For the past few weeks, I couldn't leave a class without hearing a girl hum a chorus from "Love Story" or "You're Not Sorry," two of her new singles. Today there was a abundance of shared iPod earbuds as doe-eyed damsels in adolescent distress bonded with Swift's ballads. I can't think of a comparable teen heroine from decades past, but for this millennium, Swift fits the position of female paragon just fine.

Home sick, posting out of boredom!

Hey all! I'm home sick with a sinus infection, so this post is just going to be lists and videos and blurbs...

Room
I'm redecorating/organizing my room! I'm adding bulletin boards above my desk so I can post up pictures and magazine cut-outs and other inspiring garbage, and I got a Wilco poster (see above) to go above my bed. I also got frames that fit LP covers, so I'm going to pick out a few records with cool covers to put up. Suggestions?

Thanks!
I got an extremely friendly and flattering email from Marissa over at The Anti DC, as well as a shout-out in her Dan Deacon post. It's feels great to get some feedback on my writing as I'm trying to practice for a future career! Also, I don't know if many people read this at all so it's nice to know that these posts aren't lost in cyberspace.

I Leave You With This:

Dan Deacon- Live Show Review

Dan Deacon finally assumed his post beneath his signature “trippy green skull” at an equipment-littered table an hour after his 9:00 set was scheduled to begin. The crowd, while frustrated, couldn’t stay mad for long. After leading his fans in a stretching routine that involved kneeling on the floor and extending their index fingers to the sky as slowly as possible, Deacon began a New Year’s Eve-worthy countdown and pronounced it time to dance, launching into his hyper single, “Okie Dokie.” The then appeased audience forgot all qualms and began to jump and move with hyperactivity that rivaled that of the song.

Deacon, a Baltimore-based DJ who founded the city’s Wham City artist collective, is known more for his insane live shows than his albums. His most recent release, the stellar Spiderman of the Rings, showed up on many Best Of 2007 lists, but his raucous performance at the Hirshhorn Museum as part of its After Hours program completely overshadowed any of his records.

The show played out like the best Bar Mitzvah ever, with Dan Deacon playing the part of the DJ, party-starter and guest-of-honor. His pre-show stretch was only the beginning of the activities he would guide his fans through. Within the first forty minutes, Deacon started a dance contest (encouraging participants to “dance with sass”), set up a race around the perimeter of the outdoor Hirshhorn atrium (a venture that brought the wrath of an unhappy police officer, who threatened to shut the show down, eliciting jeers from the crowd), and devised a man-made tunnel that the audience was instructed to run through and then re-form at the end, resulting in a human burrow that snaked around the entire atrium.

Deacon’s frenzied show, complete with games and beats that made citizens of the notoriously reluctant-to-dance D.C. shake and hop with caffeinated intensity, fit the setting of the Hirshhorn, which often house curious modern art, perfectly. As proven by his distinct live show, Deacon is something of a curiosity himself. Living up to his citizenship of Charm City, Deacon won over a crowd that was initially irked by his tardiness with flying colors.

By Request- Ryan Adams

When reading anything about alt-country singer-songwriter Ryan Adams, you will see the word "prolific." In an age when it's rare to see musicians release an album even every two years, Adams has released ten over the past eight. There are solo albums such as the artist-defining Heartbreaker as well as albums recorded with his band, the Cardinals (such as Cardinology, released just yesterday). Adams & the Cardinals are going to be on tour starting next month with Oasis, should be quality.

By request, here's a rundown of some of my favorite Ryan Adams songs.

"New York, New York"- An Adams essential off his breakthrough album Gold. Released two weeks after 9/11, "New York, New York" became the soundtrack to many a TV montage due to the final line of the chorus: "I still you you, New York."
Best line: "Lived in an apartment out on Avenue A/ I had a tar-hut on the corner of 10th/ Had myself a lover who was finer than gold/ But I've been broken up and busted up since."

"When the Stars Go Blue"- Often thought to be written by either a star of the CW's "One Tree Hill" or by country mega-star Tim McGraw, Adams is actually the genius behind this sleepy, gorgeous song. In my opinion, the aforementioned singers butchered the pleading original.
Best line: "Where do you go when you're lonely? I'll follow you."

"Dear Chicago"- One part love letter, one part lullaby, and ten parts gorgeous; "Dear Chicago" is perhaps one of Adams's most achingly beautiful songs, both melodically and lyrically. The strummed acoustics complement the forlorn lyrics perfectly. As is embodying the lyrics "Happy and sad and back again," when the lyrics turn hopeful ("I think that I've fallen out of love with you") toward the end, the guitars do the same with escalating chords and a singing violin.
Best line: "I've been thinking some of suicide, but there's bars out here for miles."

"Come Pick Me Up"- In this sardonic and sarcastic break-up song, Adams invites his ex-lover to screw him over in multiple ways (stealing records, screwing his friends). Even with his sneer, Adams sounds painfully sincere, as if despite these sins he still does want her back.
Best line: "Come pick me up/ Take me out/ Fuck me up/ Steal all my records/ Screw all my friends behind my back/ With a smile on your face/ And then do it again."

"Damn Sam (I Love A Woman That Rains)"- A standout track from Adams's debut. Lyrically it's difficult to decipher, but one thing is for sure: it's a love song, probably asserting that constant happiness (even in a woman) is dull.
Best line: "I'm as calm as a fruit stand in New York and maybe as strange."

"Let It Ride"- One of Adams's more country-leaning tunes. Sounds like something written by a roaming cowboy fueled by tobacco and alcohol.
Best line: "I wanna see you tonight, dancing in the endless moonlight/ In the parking lot, in the headlights of cars/ Someplace over the moon where they moved the drive-in theater/ Where I left the car that I can't find that I still got the keys to."

"Wonderwall"- A cover of tourmate Oasis's hit 90's single. Adams turns the britpop ballad into a haunting acoustic echo of a song.
Best line: Duh. "I said maybe, you're gonna be the one who saves me/ And after all, you're my Wonderwall."
"Burning Photographs"- An upbeat song about a dying relationship off of Adams's pop-leaning record, Rock N Roll. If any song had mainstream radio potential, this would probably be the one. Naturally, it has too much sould to be embraced by the FM waves.
Best line: "Pretty pictures in a magazine/ Everybody is so make believe, it's true/ I used to be sad now I'm just bored with you."



As said before, Ryan Adams is a prolific songwriter, so picking a few songs to share was a daunting task, but I think I chose eight that span the corners of his career. Hope these songs spark a love of the artist!

Sorry!

Haven't posted in a bit, but I promise I'll be back in a few days! This week and the next few days has been/are jam-packed, so I haven't had time to sit and crank out worthwhile posts.

Jim James- "Steam Engine"

My love for alt.country is no secret. My favorite band is Wilco, and I adore Uncle Tupelo, Ryan Adams, Son Volt, Whiskeytown, Fleet Foxes, Blitzen Trapper, etc. One of my favorite releases this year was My Morning Jacket's stellar Evil Urges. One of the factors that makes me love MMJ so much is Jim James's haunting voice. It's an unforced falsetto with such a pure and balanced tone, and a titanic range. Here's a video of him performing a solo acoustic version of "Steam Engine," from MMJ's 2003 release It Still Moves.

Tiny Masters of Today- La La Land

I posted a while back about Bang Bang Boom Cake, the debut album from Brooklyn kids Tiny Masters of Today. BBBC was a really solid and inspiring album, if not because of their age (the siblings in TMOT are 12 and 14) then because of their throwback, lo-fi punk sound.

Now, TMOT have released a single with a politically-charged message. On their site, the sibs said this about the song:

This election is really important. John McCain and Sarah Palin represent more of the same ignorance that has made the last 8 years really bad. Words are important, and this song is made up of other people's words. They are twisted around but we don't feel bad because politicians do that all the time. Grab it before someone sues us or something!

On the new, free single "La-La Land," the tiny masters piece together clips from McCain and Palin speeches a la Wax Audio's "Imagine This." The result is a crunchy protest anthem with punk attitude. Download "La-La Land" here.

Of course, at the end of their message, the duo signed off with a decidedly punk-rock message: "Make music not war."

Amen.

Pigeons & Planes

As evidenced by my previous posts on music sites like Pitchfork.tv and Daytrotter, I check a lot of music websites and blogs. If I find one that is habit-forming, chances are, I'll let you all know about it.

One blog I've been digging lately is the recently started Pigeons & Planes. It's got a simple format, but it's full of good MP3's, videos and news bits. Confusion, who runs the blog, scours about ten music blogs a day and weeds out the best picks from each site for P&P. P&P is updated constantly, which is a nice change from once-a-day MP3 blogs. Proof: The blog began Sept. 28 and there are already over 100 posts.

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

When Juno came out last year, it was embraced for it's quirkiness, smart and hip screenplay and indie-approved soundtrack, which was graced by Cat Power, Sonic Youth and, most prominently, the Moldy Peaches's Kimya Dawson. Dawson grew from an underground obscurity to a center-of-the-radar obscurity. The soundtrack shot up the charts, and Dawson set out for a sold-out tour- including one particularly curious stop on the View. While many were pleased that Dawson was receiving so much praise for old and underrated work, just as many, if not more, hipsters raised their noses in disgust at Dawson, now a "sell-out."

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist, based on a book of the same name, is a thoroughly enjoyable cute ditty of a film. It leaves you smiling, pleased and little more. However, I think that it's fated to reach the same fate as Juno, because of its indie'd soundtrack. On the plus side, Nick & Norah is clearly a major studio film with recognizable stars, so it's not as if its success is unexpected as it was with Juno. But the fact that it is centered around two hipster teens who slave over mixtapes, know what Electric Lady Studios are and spend an entire night sailing through the five Burroughs in search of a secret show by a cult indie band means that the film is geared toward the same demographic as indies like Juno.

The soundtrack counts songs from Vampire Weekend, Devendra Banhart (who also has a cameo in the film), Takka Takka and We Are Scientists, among others, in its infinite playlist. By all means a solid soundtrack, but also one that will surly piss off the hipsters who will no doubt see mall rats sporting Vampire Weekend t-shirts in the coming weeks.

I'm personally neutral to the situation. I really enjoyed the movie and bought the soundtrack because it had songs I like from bands I like on it. Plus, I couldn't think of another way to get the Vampire Weekend song. A friend of mine, and die hard Devendra fan, on the other hand, refuses to see the movie. She thinks that it exploits indie bands by marketing them to the masses who won't appreciate their sound, and will listen to the music only for its shallow, materialistic value.

What do you think?

Pitchfork.tv

While I'm sometimes truly miffed by Pitchfork Media and their overtly obnoxious need to be the "indie" and "obscure" in all of their reviews, I must admit that I am a fan of the online TV channel they launched earlier this year, Pitchfork.tv.

Between interviews with Jay Reatard and Feist, live sessions on the top of buildings ("Don't Look Down") with Department of Eagles and Jose Gonzalez and multi-player bands like the Walkmen and Broken Social Scene crammed into a basement ("Juan's Basement"), Pitchfork.tv not only offers videos of the latest, brightest indie artists, but offers them in creative locales, such as the aforementioned building and basement, or the "random Brooklyn street" on which Jay Reatard was interviewed. These settings promote candid conversation and performance.

Pitchfork.tv also frequently updates their music video library, hosting a broad spectrum of videos, from the atmospheric Animal Collective to lo-fi punkers No Age.


Department of Eagles, "No One Does It Like You," from Don't Look Down