If you haven't clicked on yesterdays bonus song you should, still on repeat. It's a beautiful life. Man last night post improv bar was so-so. I was kind of bummed on my solitary walk home. Moral of the story is you can never be depressed while riding a BMX. Seriously though, I need a slumpbuster. But before I bust my slump I have clean my room. The other day my moms woke me up and was amazed by the mess. She is a nurse that worked in AIDS care for years. She sometimes had to go with the social worker to patients' houses. A lot of them being heroin addicts. She goes "iain your room looks like a god damned shooting alley" I laugh it off and with a real concerned look in her eye she goes "no I'm serious, I've seen them before and this is exactly what it looks like". So yeah, I'm pretty sure I have to clean it up there. No theme.
Up first is T.I.'s first big single RUBBERBAND MAN off 2003's Trap Muzik. One of my favorite songs from that time period. Can't go wrong with lines like "wild as the taliban". That taliban sure is wild and I'm sure they appreciate the shout out. Osama I see you, capo status, you already know what it is.
Revisitin THE JESUS AND MARY CHAIN. Last night as I was bummingly walking back home after escorting a real mean girl back to her university residence (HAHA) this song came up on shuffle and made more depressed/happy. I love these guys and I love this song. I hate people trying to copy them though. Trying to copy the greats just makes you look like an idiot. Check out Joseph Smith when he made up Mormonism. Come on bro you ain't jesus or mohammed.
And we're going to wrap this up with the DROPKICK MURPHYS one of my top 5 bands ever. I seriously don't care what peole think about that. I know a lot of dumbasses like them moreso now that they haven't gotten really big. Fuck it, they make great and original music. This song is THE WARRIOR'S CODE about the great boxer Micky Ward. A guy who has lost a lot but is probably the most gutsy and courageous fighter ever. His trilogy of fights with Arturo Gatti is legendary. Their first fight gives me goosebumps every time I watch it. This song is a real depression buster for me. ENJOY.
Bonus time:
I was once called a modern day James Joyce not because I was good at writing but because I was a drunken asshole. So I'm going to hit you with the folk song that inspired the book Finnegans Wake. When I die I want a funeral in my house (or in a bar) with tons of booze and my corpse well exposed. My late grannie tried to keep my seanair(grandfather in scots gaelic) in her house but the stupid municipal council wouldn't let her. Jeeze I loved my grandparents. I would just sit down and listen to them telling me stories for hours. A lot of them had to do with whisky. It's in my blood, I have to drink. The song has a really good intro, hook it up. Happy Fridays children!
Showing posts with label Scotland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Scotland. Show all posts
Friday, November 14, 2008
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
every morning when I wake up
One of my heroes plays on my dad's soccer team (which is almost entirely comprised of Scottish immigrants). The man is in his mid 60's and is still a very good soccer player. He's also a union man who swears like you could not believe. His secret to this health is that he drinks (at least) one pint of beer a day, takes one good shit a day and only eats one meal a day(!). Today I have started this diet. I'm gonna try to do the one big meal a day thing, snacks are for the weak. The theme today is pretty damn somber and I think I am bummed out just by thinking about. The best artists to have been murdered...
If you know me as a human being you KNOW who I am going to start with on this post. I have posted about this man before and I will most definitely post about him again. Christopher Wallace a.k.a. THE NOTORIOUS B.I.G. . This guy is one of my favorite artists. Bar none the greatest rapper to have ever lived. I saw a tshirt on the internet that said "If Biggie were still alive most rappers would be working at McDonalds" this is true. Every rapper on TV today owes him everything. Many people think of Tupac as a "deeper" artist. I would disagree as Biggie was heavily introspective. He has a song about suicide which is a HEAVILY taboo and stigmatized topic amongst the african-american community. The song today is PARTY AND BULLSHIT which at first glance seems to be simply about partying but he really takes us into that whole high school house party world. Painting a picture of the epic events of adolescence. His posthumous album was already called Life After Death before he was murdered by drive-by shooting in Los Angeles 15 days before it was released. His murder remains unsolved to this day.
R.I.P. May 21, 1972 – March 9, 1997
A band I got into towards the end of my high school was THE GITS. A Seatle punk/grunge band that was active from 1986 to 1993. When you listen to them its truly Mia Zapata's voice that reaches out and gets you. She was apparently a huge influence on Bikini Kill/Le Tigre's Kathleen Hannah. She sings about hopelessness and alcohol. Their music really strikes a chord with me. Mia Zapata was brutally raped and murdered in 1993. Her murder was finally solved due to new developments in DNA analysis. I know I joke around a lot but it makes me really angry that a woman still can't feel safe walking home at night. The song is called SEAWEED and if ever you have the time you should check the lyrics as they are really beautiful.
R.I.P. August 25, 1965 – July 7, 1993.
Everybody has favorite genres of music but I'll be damned if you can't appreciate a true ARTIST. A person who's talent seems to be infinite. One of these artists is MARVIN GAYE. He was the most popular artist on Motown during the 60's and he went against the grain big time in refusing the song writing formula at Motown at the time. He made the creative process a collaboration between songwriter, producer and artist. In high school my friend Sam's grand father gave him his car once he was too old to drive. It was a huge Oldsmobile. Sam installed a thumping sound system in that thing. Marvin was a staple in the cd player. Marvin Gaye was tragically shot dead by his own father. You can't write stuff that sad. The song is SEXUAL HEALING.
R.I.P. April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984
The final person is probably the most culturally important. JOHN LENNON. I haven't ever really been big into The Beatles. I think this is because everybody loves them and I never liked to be on the winning team. Lennon though has the same birthday as me (9th of October) which always got me interested in him thinking we had some ridiculous connection. Having recently read an interview with him I think he quit The Beatles for the same reason young Iain never wanted to like them, not wanting to be in the majority. The song is WORKING CLASS HERO. I think it's easily my favorite of his. Green Day should have never touched it. Lennon was sadly shot in the back 4 times in New York City.
R.I.P. 9 October 1940 – 8 December 1980
If you know me as a human being you KNOW who I am going to start with on this post. I have posted about this man before and I will most definitely post about him again. Christopher Wallace a.k.a. THE NOTORIOUS B.I.G. . This guy is one of my favorite artists. Bar none the greatest rapper to have ever lived. I saw a tshirt on the internet that said "If Biggie were still alive most rappers would be working at McDonalds" this is true. Every rapper on TV today owes him everything. Many people think of Tupac as a "deeper" artist. I would disagree as Biggie was heavily introspective. He has a song about suicide which is a HEAVILY taboo and stigmatized topic amongst the african-american community. The song today is PARTY AND BULLSHIT which at first glance seems to be simply about partying but he really takes us into that whole high school house party world. Painting a picture of the epic events of adolescence. His posthumous album was already called Life After Death before he was murdered by drive-by shooting in Los Angeles 15 days before it was released. His murder remains unsolved to this day.
R.I.P. May 21, 1972 – March 9, 1997
A band I got into towards the end of my high school was THE GITS. A Seatle punk/grunge band that was active from 1986 to 1993. When you listen to them its truly Mia Zapata's voice that reaches out and gets you. She was apparently a huge influence on Bikini Kill/Le Tigre's Kathleen Hannah. She sings about hopelessness and alcohol. Their music really strikes a chord with me. Mia Zapata was brutally raped and murdered in 1993. Her murder was finally solved due to new developments in DNA analysis. I know I joke around a lot but it makes me really angry that a woman still can't feel safe walking home at night. The song is called SEAWEED and if ever you have the time you should check the lyrics as they are really beautiful.
R.I.P. August 25, 1965 – July 7, 1993.
Everybody has favorite genres of music but I'll be damned if you can't appreciate a true ARTIST. A person who's talent seems to be infinite. One of these artists is MARVIN GAYE. He was the most popular artist on Motown during the 60's and he went against the grain big time in refusing the song writing formula at Motown at the time. He made the creative process a collaboration between songwriter, producer and artist. In high school my friend Sam's grand father gave him his car once he was too old to drive. It was a huge Oldsmobile. Sam installed a thumping sound system in that thing. Marvin was a staple in the cd player. Marvin Gaye was tragically shot dead by his own father. You can't write stuff that sad. The song is SEXUAL HEALING.
R.I.P. April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984
The final person is probably the most culturally important. JOHN LENNON. I haven't ever really been big into The Beatles. I think this is because everybody loves them and I never liked to be on the winning team. Lennon though has the same birthday as me (9th of October) which always got me interested in him thinking we had some ridiculous connection. Having recently read an interview with him I think he quit The Beatles for the same reason young Iain never wanted to like them, not wanting to be in the majority. The song is WORKING CLASS HERO. I think it's easily my favorite of his. Green Day should have never touched it. Lennon was sadly shot in the back 4 times in New York City.
R.I.P. 9 October 1940 – 8 December 1980
Sunday, August 24, 2008
I'm just gonna concentrate on you
I went to a good house party last night. You know I'm not gonna lie I started drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon just to look cool but god damn does it go down easy. It's like drinking spring water that gets you nice and toasty. Granpa likes his juice. You know I'm like a scrap booking maniac but instead of scrap booking I love drinking. Ooh la la. Today being the lord's day I wanted to take it easy and not think of a theme. As I got into grabbing songs I got sucked into theme-ery. Today we look at the video work of legendary director SPIKE JONEZ. I'd love to have his job, too bad the video medium is dying. No more videos on MTV, MusiquePlus or Much just reality tv shows about hulk hogan's son fucking up kids with his car.
Alright, let's attack this in chronological order. 1992, Spike's 2nd major video. 100% by SONIC YOUTH. To me, this video more resembles his film work than the rest of his music video oeuvre. This is Sonic Youth at the beginning of their major label career at the time they were getting Nirvana some attention as well Spike Jones himself. This wave is a bit more accessible than their older stuff. The song is supposedly about the murder of Joe Cole who was Henry Rollins' BFF. Current big time actor Jason Lee is in the video as well as Kim Gordon's bass was borrowed from Keanu Reeves! there's some trivia for you.
1993, Scottish band TEENAGE FANCLUB. The video is probably one of Spike's least cool. No weird concept or nothing. The band is pretty sweet but the album this song is off of got destroyed by critics. This was probably due to the fact that they got way too much critical love earlier in their career. Like bukake levels of critical jizzing. Their previous album "bandwagonesque" beat out Nirvana's Nevermind in Spin's year end record of the year poll. Whatever, this song (HANG ON) is good. I also gotta rep my Glasgow set.
1995, now we move into the big budget shit. Sweet french house groupe DAFT PUNK. DA FUNK is the song. And the video is a fucking MAN DOG chilling in NYC. Nuff fuckin said.
1997. Another NOTORIOUS B.I.G. song, SKY'S THE LIMIT. Probably one of the best video's ever. A posthumous Biggie track. Little kids fill in for lil cease and co. Just seeing children having fun in the hip hop high life kinda evokes the childhood dreams a young Christopher Wallace had of leaving his world of squalor. This shit is inspirational, get inspired.
bonus shit:
A colin theriault quote: "THREE JEWISH BOYS FROM NEW YORK RE WRITING THE RULES OF RAP"
Weezer have always been WAY overrated in my eyes, like Lil Wayne overrated. This video is still a mental concept and the song is nice, maybe half chubb worthy.
Spike Jonze = best video director of all time.
Alright, let's attack this in chronological order. 1992, Spike's 2nd major video. 100% by SONIC YOUTH. To me, this video more resembles his film work than the rest of his music video oeuvre. This is Sonic Youth at the beginning of their major label career at the time they were getting Nirvana some attention as well Spike Jones himself. This wave is a bit more accessible than their older stuff. The song is supposedly about the murder of Joe Cole who was Henry Rollins' BFF. Current big time actor Jason Lee is in the video as well as Kim Gordon's bass was borrowed from Keanu Reeves! there's some trivia for you.
1993, Scottish band TEENAGE FANCLUB. The video is probably one of Spike's least cool. No weird concept or nothing. The band is pretty sweet but the album this song is off of got destroyed by critics. This was probably due to the fact that they got way too much critical love earlier in their career. Like bukake levels of critical jizzing. Their previous album "bandwagonesque" beat out Nirvana's Nevermind in Spin's year end record of the year poll. Whatever, this song (HANG ON) is good. I also gotta rep my Glasgow set.
1995, now we move into the big budget shit. Sweet french house groupe DAFT PUNK. DA FUNK is the song. And the video is a fucking MAN DOG chilling in NYC. Nuff fuckin said.
1997. Another NOTORIOUS B.I.G. song, SKY'S THE LIMIT. Probably one of the best video's ever. A posthumous Biggie track. Little kids fill in for lil cease and co. Just seeing children having fun in the hip hop high life kinda evokes the childhood dreams a young Christopher Wallace had of leaving his world of squalor. This shit is inspirational, get inspired.
bonus shit:
A colin theriault quote: "THREE JEWISH BOYS FROM NEW YORK RE WRITING THE RULES OF RAP"
Weezer have always been WAY overrated in my eyes, like Lil Wayne overrated. This video is still a mental concept and the song is nice, maybe half chubb worthy.
Spike Jonze = best video director of all time.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
hail hail the celts are here.
My father is a Scottish immigrant. Most of my relatives live in Scotland. I have been there many times. I think I feel another theme coming along! AWESOME SCOTTISH MUSIC!!!!! I find it very ironic that for a country (and more specifically the city of Glasgow) that is known for toughness, shitty weather and religiously affiliated gang violence has very very very soft sounding musical stand outs. I guess that's what a lifetime of rain will do to you, sad songs and fighting.
Starting with a more recent group, Belle & Sebastian. Kinda obvious if you are into music but whatever I'm not that guy, the music douche. I'm more of a jack of all trades douche who is lovable and pragmatic. That being said they are pretty legit, 2 of their founding members were named Stuart which makes them pretty Scottish. They also pulled an upset when they won best new group at the Brit awards. The front runners were 5ive. So props to fucking up 5ive's dreams. The video is Lazy Line Painter Jane a nice 5 minute jam. I really like the female vocalist.
My second pick is rapidly becoming my favorite Scottish band the legendary THE JESUS AND MARY CHAIN. Stoners and pussies in way too tight jeans that I hate really fucking love them which would normally make me hate them but they are so good that they rise above that! They might be skinny weirdos but they have huge Glaswegian mouthes on them, they talk a gang of shit and it rules. I saw an old episode of The New Music from the mid 80's and they had random kids breaking in to their dressing room from a small window and they were completely apathetic like the shit was supposed to happen all the while the interviewer is like WTFFFF. The song I chose is JUST LIKE HONEY. This shit literally moves me. I'm so bonered for this tune that I'm paying my friend to paint a visual representation of the song. I wish I was kidding.
Now for the last selection I could have went for something more obvious like Mogwai or something but I decided to keep it 80's. I picked ALTERED IMAGES (a group that Jesus and Mary Chain dissed a lot). A new wave group that went from John Peel's and NME's darlings to big time sellouts. The song is called HAPPY BIRTHDAY and it was one of their biggest hits and the beginning of their transition from punky new wave to all out commercial pop. I would say it's a fun song but I really hate it when people say a song or a band is fun. It's like you don't want to say it's good cause you're an asshole. So I'm gonna say that the song is good, damn good.
BONUS TIME:
As you might know Scotland is not an independent state and it's something a lot of people want to see. The Corries are a really old folk group that wrote a song (FLOWER OF SCOTLAND) that became the national anthem. All Scots got sick of Scotland The Brave because it was tacky and it's the song everybody always plays on the bagpipes. Flower of Scotland is so much better. It's soft but it really gets you riled up. When will we be a nation again?
Starting with a more recent group, Belle & Sebastian. Kinda obvious if you are into music but whatever I'm not that guy, the music douche. I'm more of a jack of all trades douche who is lovable and pragmatic. That being said they are pretty legit, 2 of their founding members were named Stuart which makes them pretty Scottish. They also pulled an upset when they won best new group at the Brit awards. The front runners were 5ive. So props to fucking up 5ive's dreams. The video is Lazy Line Painter Jane a nice 5 minute jam. I really like the female vocalist.
My second pick is rapidly becoming my favorite Scottish band the legendary THE JESUS AND MARY CHAIN. Stoners and pussies in way too tight jeans that I hate really fucking love them which would normally make me hate them but they are so good that they rise above that! They might be skinny weirdos but they have huge Glaswegian mouthes on them, they talk a gang of shit and it rules. I saw an old episode of The New Music from the mid 80's and they had random kids breaking in to their dressing room from a small window and they were completely apathetic like the shit was supposed to happen all the while the interviewer is like WTFFFF. The song I chose is JUST LIKE HONEY. This shit literally moves me. I'm so bonered for this tune that I'm paying my friend to paint a visual representation of the song. I wish I was kidding.
Now for the last selection I could have went for something more obvious like Mogwai or something but I decided to keep it 80's. I picked ALTERED IMAGES (a group that Jesus and Mary Chain dissed a lot). A new wave group that went from John Peel's and NME's darlings to big time sellouts. The song is called HAPPY BIRTHDAY and it was one of their biggest hits and the beginning of their transition from punky new wave to all out commercial pop. I would say it's a fun song but I really hate it when people say a song or a band is fun. It's like you don't want to say it's good cause you're an asshole. So I'm gonna say that the song is good, damn good.
BONUS TIME:
As you might know Scotland is not an independent state and it's something a lot of people want to see. The Corries are a really old folk group that wrote a song (FLOWER OF SCOTLAND) that became the national anthem. All Scots got sick of Scotland The Brave because it was tacky and it's the song everybody always plays on the bagpipes. Flower of Scotland is so much better. It's soft but it really gets you riled up. When will we be a nation again?
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