i've heard voices through the floor

It's been so long.

I miss writing.
I miss expressing how much I love a song.
I miss catching up on all the awesome music.
I miss the thumping beats.
I miss the hazy synths.
I miss the melodious pop hooks.
I miss the freedom of not going to school.

Here's a playlist I cooked up couple weeks back, when I was getting the feeling and well, I just had to do it. Check it out here!

we're bound to wait all night

I was sitting across from the rotating sign
For the Liberty Brass Turning Company

Automatic Screw Machine Products


And brooding about our fathers
Always on the make to make more money

Screw Machine Products Automatic


Tender wounded brassy unsystematic
Free American men obsessing about margins

Machine Products Automatic Screw


Selling every day of their God-damned lives
To some Liberty Brass Turning Company

Products Automatic Screw Machine


Until they were screwed into boxes
And planted in plots paid and unpaid

Automatic Screw Machine Products


- LIBERTY BRASS by Edward Hirsch




Menew - Don't Give Up On Us Now
I've got to give much props to the music supervisor, a certain Alexandra Patsavas, of Chuck. She makes the most awesome song choices, totally apt for the situation, emotions, amplifying everything that the scene is trying to portray many times over. Take this song for instance, it cues at the instance when Chuck is tossed into the van after getting caught. He was utterly distraught at seeing his dad being shot by Shaw and everything seems bleak for Team Bartowski, as he says "There's no one left to save us." A glimmer of hope beckons as Devon asks Ellie if she's ready to do this (to save Team Bartowski), to which she firmly agrees. It's very apt in that while Chuck has all but given up, a glimmer of hope came from Ellie, Devon and Morgan, who haven't given up on saving them.

Miike Snow - Billie Holiday
Here's some Miike Snow who seem incapable of doing anything wrong in their eponymous album. Said track was supposedly exclusively available only on the CD release in Japan. It's got Miike Snow stamped all over it, the electro-reverbs with groovy synths coupled with really poppy hooks.

Broken Bells - The High Road
Broken Bells is a collab between Danger Mouse of Gnarls Barkley fame and James Mercer of The Shins. Beautiful soulful indie rock song, marrying obscure(?) lyrics about drugs with a touch of electronica to produce a charming song that speaks volumes about the prodigious talent these two have.

School of Seven Bells - Babelonia
Definitely a different direction as compared to Alpinisms. While still featuring the hushed lustre of the twins' vocals, it feels more textured and less dreamy, the expansive soundscape serves as a wonderful medium for their vocals to express themselves.

every house not a home but dare do i roam

It's a pretty fine day, and for me a fine day is where the weather isn't sweltering, hot and humid. A layer of stickiness and ickiness all over isn't my idea of fine. So anyhow, I'm just sitting here now wondering how come I never did mention Band of Horses' first single for "Cease to Begin". And where from comes the impetus, but an episode of Fringe?

Band of Horses - Is There A Ghost
It's an awfully lovely song, melancholic and melodramatic all at once. And just how do they do it with two simple lines "I could sleep when I lived alone/Is there a ghost in my house?" - beats me. Nevertheless, I love the eerily random yet curiously funny video where it's an almost literal explanation of the lyrics, and the video slowly evolves to quite the hilarious ending, but amidst all, the female protagonist provides the best of turns.

Band of Horses - Blue Beard
Good ol' slow rock. Grand orchestration with such meaningful lyrics, it makes me feel warm and secretly good on the inside. Ben singing as the song chugs along slowly, allows the lyrics to sink in and come alive in your mind. The white snow outside the house, a blanket of soft whiteness. Neon glow of the bar sign hanging lazily on the outside.

Band of Horses - Neighbor
I've got this attachment to their new songs for some reason. It's like on first listen, you feel as if you've heard the song a million times, and it's buried deep inside your head. Or maybe it's the strong imagery their lyrics evoke. I really love it.

we will triumph again

I have to apologise for the lack of posts of late, as preparations for my upcoming eurotrip have taken up most of my time. Also, moving forward, there might be no posts for the next 5-6 weeks, as I'm still unable to find a guest writer.

Caribou - Found Out
Get a feel of his organic-sounding music, as he seeks to expand his boundaries. "I got excited by the idea of making dance music that's liquid in the way it flows back and forth, the sounds slosh around in pitch, timbre, pan...dance music that sounds like it's made out of water rather than made out of metallic stuff like most dance music does," Snaith said in a press release. Found Out evokes this sort of sloshy feeling - part psychedelic, part liquid - like a kaleidoscope of lights from the surface of the sea, seen from high up above.

Bear In Heaven - You Do You
A tight mix of indie rock plus electronica that defines this song. The song feels endless, spacious, such that it makes it seem like you're but a small speck amongst this sonic vista. A little intrigue, a little of pulsing synths, a little of many things; you feel distant, maybe right in the world of the Watchmen.

City Breathing - Rain and Revolution
It's inevitable that they draw comparisons to 65daysofstatic or Explosions in the Sky, but whatever the name drops, their brand of slow-rock is mellow and dramatic, making full use of subtle reverbs that echo into space, one feels that their band name is a little apt, the heartbeat of the city like such.

City Breathing - A Place to Bury Old Mistakes (mp3)
Beautiful instrumentation that tugs your heart.