Thank heaven for snow days.

... I love them so much.

Okkervil River has released a free mixtape of some of some songs they have covered over at their website ( www.okkervilriver.com ), and nobody knows exactly how long it'll be up, so grab it while it's there.

My discbox is going to be arriving in the next few days. [ :-) ]

I really want to see No Country For Old Men, and There Will Be Blood. Anybody from Colorado Springs want to come with me?

{ }

there's nothing quite so inspiring as a blank canvas.

Christmas is here!

Here's some music I recommend to get you into a festive mood.

1. Sufjan Stevens: Songs For Christmas

This is first on the list because it's my favorite. I like every single song on all five discs, which can be purchased as a set for only 20 dollars. I've included the iTunes link, but if you're a Sufjan fan, I strongly recommend getting the physical set rather than downloading it, because it comes in really neat packaging and includes a booklet, a poster, and STICKERS. Oh man.

2. Vince Guaraldi Trio: A Charlie Brown Christmas

This one is a classic. You simply cannot have Christmas without Vince Guaraldi's famous music from the cartoon (which, incidentally, is also a classic.) I'm pretty sure it's against the law... or something. Anyway, get it. I remember last year I saw it at drugstores, Starbucks, and dozens of other places besides the usual record stores. They have it on iTunes, too, so you really have no excuse.

3. This week's free iTunes single

It's a cool indie version of Carol of the Bells, by The Bird and The Bee.

My Radiohead vinyl will be coming in the mail within the next week sometime (GLEE!), I will definitely be posting my thoughts on the album, as well as its companion disc. I still can't believe I decided to wait for the vinyl. Maybe I'll write my thoughts as I listen to it?? Who knows....

pseudo-review: Hvarf-Heim

hi again.

I was going to review the new Sîgur Rós double EP Hvarf-Heim, but I don't really know what to say about it except:

It's incredible.

Hvarf really combines the best elements from their four LPs. 

Heim is six retellings of the songs you already love. Vaka and Samskeyti, in particular, hold some very good memories for me, and I adore the acoustic versions.

All of the new songs are fantastic, but my favorites are:

Hljómalind

Von

Hafsól (which just might be their best song yet)

and I couldn't possibly pick favorites from the other half.

4.8/5

of Montreal concert

so I saw Of Montreal at the ogden last night.

MGMT (opening act #1) pretty much bombed.

Grand Buffet (opening act #2) was much, much worse than MGMT.

Of Montreal then came on, and they pretty much rocked. There's something completely awesome about Kevin Barnes. I like his voice (lots).

The best song was Heimdalsgate Like A Promethean Curse... but they followed it with a THIRTY MINUTE JAM SESSION. Not the good kind, either. This was the kind of jam session where the opening act comes up on stage with them, and play the same two chords over and over again. for thirty minutes.

besides that it was fun.

7/10

( we don't really want freedom... )

...we want distraction.

and that's what we get.

album review : The Flying Club Cup by Beirut

Before I start the review, I'll also recommend Beirut's first album, The Gulag Orkestar. It's really good, and it's built around the foundation of eastern European folk music. Awesome.

Where The Gulag Orkestar uses east Europe as inspiration, The Flying Club Cup uses France. This entire album is an homage to the French countryside, the French people, and French life. Automatically this made me very interested in listening to the album, because.... well, I love France. It also made me slightly worried, because I didn't want one of my favorite musicians to mischaracterize one of my favorite places. Fortunately, I had nothing to worry about. Zach Condon does a splendid job of characterizing France in his music.

  In fact, I didn't even realize what a good job he had done until the third or fourth listen through the album. I then realized that the time I normally would have spent trying to analyse the instrumentation and songwriting style was completely occupied by just enjoying the music. Owen Pallett's string arrangements helped immensely in this area. The writing is so cohesive that I didn't even notice it, and instead the music just enthralled me.

Some standouts on the album are:

• Nantes, a sorrowful chanson about someone seperated from his love
• The Penalty, (embarrassingly enough, I'm not sure what the lyrics are about...)
  
• Forks and Knives [La Fête], which is easily the best song on the album.

On the title track, there is an obvious Sufjan Stevens influence that made me smile, and the

pizzicato / xylophone ending of Forks and Knives is enough reason to buy this album. Absolutely

one of the best of this year.

4.6/5

itunes link

album page, with INCREDIBLE blogotheque videos on it.

heima

as foolish knight already mentioned over in his blog, heima looks like it will be absolutely fantastic. Expect gorgeous cinematography and incredible, incredible music. Also, the cover art for the dvd as well as the cd was taken by a pinhole polaroid, one of my recent obsessions.

trailer

several ( [relatively] contemporary ) artists i like

Brett Helquist

Stanley Donwood

Stuart Hamilton

Robert Vizzini

Emily Golden

Bill Watterson

Emile Bayard

E.H. Shepard

and many others that i'm not thinking of right now

...and of course, less than three hours after i post that, it starts snowing.

curse you, colorado. I will have my vengeance.

( baby, i was born on a train )

hey hey hi.

I considered doing an album review of a pretty awesome EP by They Might Be Giants that I just found, but I don't really feel like it. SO I'll just tell you that it's really quirky and fun. I give it... 4 out of 5. It's called "Why Does The Sun Shine? (The Sun Is A Mass Of Incandescent Gas)".

Seth and I played to-night, and it was undoubtedly our best performance yet. We got lots of applause, and it felt pretty awesome. We just need to make a recording now... and write some more songs.

You should come see us sometime (if you're in colorado).

Fall is magical. It's like the last burst of life before winter....

yesterday i woke up sucking on a lemon

so it's out. feel free to post your thoughts on it, but don't write any huge spoilers, as i'm waiting for the vinyl in december...

music review : an accidental memory in the case of death ( eluvium )

The first thing I noticed about this album is the cover art - a brilliant job by Jeannie Lynn Paske. It captures sort of the essence of this EP, which is a rare accomplishment for the cover of an album.

The music is strictly solo piano, which somewhat melds modern post-rock leanings with minimalist classical ideas. Philip Glass was obviously a huge influence on this album. 

It opens with a piece reminiscent of Mae's prologue to The Everglow. The next song carries this on, as well. From there it goes into darker territory, with the splendid "Perfect Neglect in a Field of Statues", which explores more emotionally driven sentiments. "Nepenthe" adds more dissonance to the formula than we've seen earlier on the album. "In a Sense" parallels the second track, "Genius and the Thieves" in terms of chord progression but augments the ideas and contemplates them more. Moving us back toward resolution is "The Well-Meaning Professor", which builds slowly over seven and a half minutes toward a beautiful climax. A ten-second break between the tracks lets you absorb it, before restating the thesis of the album in "An Accidental Memory in the Case of Death". All in all, a good EP, but it never evolves enough to fully hold your attention.

3.9 / 5

iTunes link

new radiohead album

click here

oh heavens i'm excited.

sketch

An author takes a stroll in central park in september.

j

so i pretty much have a blog now and i will probably delete it as soon as i realize that i have better things to do and no time in which to do them.

so enjoy it while you can?