You Used To Be So Pretty, But Now You're Just Tragic

Vampire Weekend by Vampire Weekend

Insound

The majority of music these days are dressed in fuzz and distortion. Unless the music is high-brow, pretentious and "sophisticated", a clean sound is utterly unpalatable. We want our musicians to look like hippies, we want them to sound distorted and scuzzy. Vampire Weekend disregards both of these things, choosing to make completely unpretentious pop music, keeping it clean and direct.

In fact, as Koenig and Co. would themselves say, "Through the pain, I always tell the truth".

Most people I know either love Vampire Weekend and everything they do, or they don't. For those that love them, their "Afro-suave" pep and clever lyrics (managing to sing about Dharamsala, referencing Lil' Jon and Peter Gabriel, kefir and keffiyeh) are a source of unbridled enjoyment; for those that hate them, their clean sound, obviously college-influenced lyrics and "preppy" image seems a little too Ivy League.

Their honesty is perhaps the reason they're so clean; you don't have to hear Ezra featured on The Very Best track "Warm Heart of Africa" to know their influenced by Afropop. Vampire Weekend manages to be adorably unpretentious despite the World Civilizations lingo and Ivy League learning precisely because they do what they're good at, and leave the rest behind. This translates to a lot of sonic space, the guitars, bass and drums so completely refined that it feels spacious.

Generally, the songs explore themes of materialism and life. In "Mansard Roof", Ezra finds himself describing mansard roof through the trees while "the Argentines collapse in defeat". "A-Punk" is a clever little song about a punk (aha!), and "The Kids Don't Stand A Chance" seems to be a song globalization as imperialism. However, on the other side of things, "Oxford Comma" hits on a more personal note in which we wonder, "Why would you lie about anything at all?". "I Stand Corrected" is the standout, a serious apology ending with the lines "Lord knows I haven't tried/I'll take my stand one last time/Forget the protocol/I'll take your hand/Right in mine/I stand corrected".

When I first heard Vampire Weekend, I kind of blew them off (mainly because of "One (Blake's Got A New Face)" distorted on the car radio was not very appealing), but I stand corrected.

I Need Some Video Games

It's been a very long time since I just wrote crap, just put down my crappy thoughts here. Not the less-crappy thoughts that I dress up in sloppy metaphors, but the real verbal crap, like what I'm spewing out right now.


I simply cannot attempt another album review, because I feel that my last three have been pretty sub par. My mind feels like mush, I've been bruising my brain, beating it against these impenetrable albums that I want to say something brilliant about.


Why am I just blathering like this? Because I worry that the blog is getting further away from me. Further away from the reality of me. 90% of everything I say on any given day is verbal garbage. In most conversations I have (online, of course, because I rarely have real human interaction) I am either laughing or screaming "aaahhhhhhh". And in reality, that is pretty much the same inside of my brain.


On nights like this, when I'm bored to death, I kind of wish I had some video games.


Okay. In order to validate this being published, at all, here is a little playlist of the songs I've been enjoying.


Animal Collective - "Daily Routine (Phaseone Remix)"
Casiokids - "En Vill Hest"
Cults - "Go Outside"
Cults - "Most Wanted"
The Russian Futurists - "Precious Metals"
Vampire Weekend - "Giving Up The Gun"


And for laughs: RAAAAAAAANDY and Dave Sitek - "Baby Baby (ft. DJ Ol' Youngin')"
Watch the video for this on Pitchfork.




So here ends the reminder that I am just a crappy little person eating my crappy little peanut butter and jelly sandwich for dinner, bored out of my mind.

Explanation Mark

Today I am enjoying the glitches and voice samples that is The Books. I'm not exactly ready to blog about them quite yet, though. I've taken quite a few breaks from the project in the last few days, but I feel that this will be the last break for a while.

The day was spent trekking through the Botanical Gardens. I originally intended on walking from the Lake Hills library to the small botanical garden (or is it a nursery?) that is tucked away that can only be accessed by a trail through a small forest. I haven't been back there in four years, so it's very likely I would not have found it at all. Today I'm just thankful for my friends who make time for me even though I rarely want to crawl out of the house.

I feel that it would be cheating not to share any music yet again, so here are a couple of songs that I have been enjoying lately.

"My My" - Menomena

I specifically enjoy this song for the lyric: "What if I sold everything I own/And ran away from everyone I know/Could I make another place my home?". At the time when I heard it, I was sitting on the bus with my ipod on shuffle, reflecting on how I had decided to push away every single one of my friends, and wondering how far this isolation could take me. Serendipity.

"The Purple Bottle" - Animal Collective

It's hard for me to keep track of all my favorite Animal Collective song, there are just way too many. Nobody does a love song like Animal Collective. The first time I heard it, my favorite lyric was "I wear a coat of feelings and they are loud", but as I listen to it again and again, other lines jump out at me, like "Can I tell you that you are the purple in me?"

"Giving Up the Gun" - Vampire Weekend

Of course I have to put some new music here. I've been listening to Contra too much (almost), and "Giving Up the Guns" immediately caught my attention because of the lines "When I was 17 I had wrists like steel and I felt complete/And now my body fades behind a brass charade and I'm obsolete/But if the chance remained to see those better days I'd cut my cannons down".

"Rainwater Cassette Exchange" - Deerhunter

"Two weeks of misery/Capture my heart and destroy me/Destroy my mind and my body/And make like a disease/And conquer me". Who can resist that?!

"Wrestlers" - Hot Chip

I just enjoy the fact that they would sing about wrestling.

For the rest of the week I don't think that I will take any breaks from the 365 project. Which means next up will be, The Books' The Lemon of Pink, The Thermals' The Body The Blood The Machine, Vitalic's OK Cowboy and Arctic Monkeys' Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not. I have to make quite a few skips because I haven't been able to find quite a few albums on my list.