Don’t ask me why I obsessively look to rock ’n’ roll bands for some kind of model for a better society. I guess it’s just that I glimpsed something beautiful in a flashbulb moment once, and perhaps mistaking it for prophecy have been seeking its fulfillment ever since.
- Lester Bangs
‘War Child: Heroes’ is an unprecedented collaboration between music’s most heralded legends and the finest current artists.
We asked 15 ultimate icons to select a favourite song from their classic back catalogue and to nominate the new act they most trust to create a unique interpretation of that hand-picked track.
This album is the result: 15 exclusive and breath-taking cover versions.
The album was released in the UK by Parlophone and internationally by EMI on February 16.
I think I would have shamed my patron saints of rock n roll, The Hold Steady, tonight. I broke my own cardinal rule. I dropped the ball. I went negative.
My whole reason for starting this blog(aside from it being a fun way to kill time while at the office) was simply to share songs that I love with as many people as possible. No advertising, no agenda, no real game plan. I just wanted to sort of use this as a soundtrack to my life. A sounding board for my thoughts, in the most literal sense. Everything I do, everything I think, everything I feel has a song attached to it...for better or worse. I am forever thinking in song lyrics and my mind instantly attaches a song to any situation I find myself in. It's a blessing and a curse. Actually, it's all blessing.
But every now and again I find myself in mid-sentence, bad mouthing a band or a song, and that should never happen here. Sure, there are bands I don't like. But I don't need to broadcast it here. Stay positive.. Those two words are now officially my mission statement. The Hold Steady almost taught me. I should NEVER doubt Craig Finn. Ever.
And since I am on the subject of the blog, I just wanted to say a gigantic THANK YOU to anyone and everyone who has stumbled across this site and taken the time to read these ramblings. And an extra special thanks to those who take the time to comment. Even if i am too scatter-brained, or otherwise unavailable, to respond...I appreciate the comments so much. There is just SO much stuff floating around here on this interweb we got...so to think that anyone takes the time to come and check out what I have to say...means the world to me.
So we had a few colonies of wasps in our backyard. The Fire Dept wouldn't take care of them so we went after them with soap and water sprayer. Minimal stinging. We got them all and they're frozen and well-preserved specimens....about 3 dozen i guess. I have pics. You can have what my G/F doesn't dissect.
I have to admit, I am not feeling especially compulsive this year...not feeling the need to list things songs and albums and the like, I just don't think I have the energy for it this year.
So...I just wanted to give an official blog 'Album Of The Year' award to The Hold Steady for 'Stay Positive'....shocking, I know! They have my heart, what can I say. Even in this year of amazing music, it was their new record that I listened to the most...without a doubt. Craig Finn's words bounce around inside my head at all hours of the day. I really don't know how I would have made it through the last five years without these Hold Steady songs...and that is not at all an overstatement.
As for the rest of the year...it was awesome! Here are 15 of my favorite tracks from the past year...in no particular order...just click the link:
This video is brought to you by boredom and my love of the Hold Steady. Reason number #429 that I love this band so much...Craig Finn graduated with honors form Boston College and still moved back to Minneapolis to start his band...sidestepping the road more traveled. For my money, he is the most intellectual rock star on the planet...and just when I thought I couldn't love the guy anymore, i read this quote:
"When I started Lifter Puller it was some of my earliest singing, and I set out to create a vocal style that was very close to my speaking style. That seemed natural. I hate nothing worse than when vocalists sing in a voice entirely different from their real voice. Dave Matthews comes to mind, unless he talks like that. I doubt it."
What a great time to be a music lover, huh? Go to a show...a few days later it is all immortalized on youtube for you! Which really comes in handy at Hold Steady shows, where much drinking takes place. The audio on these are not great, but I hope you get a sense of why the Hold Steady are my favorite band on the planet. Craig says at the end of every show, 'There Is So Much Joy In What We Do...' and these clips totally back that up :-)
What a beautiful night of rock and roll at the Fonda Theater. Excuse while I get all 'hippie' here for a moment, but I just love the communal bliss that I feel at a Hold Steady show!
Singing along with a few hundred new friends...never ceases to make me happy. Just a great show on Wednesday night! Art Brut were amazing as well, and hearing 'Moving To La' IN Los Angeles was pretty cool, I have to admit...they totally worked the crowd into a fever pitch, which Craig and the rest of the Hold Steady somehow raised even a few notches higher!!
Got to hear three new songs...which were all incredible...can't wait for the next album! And This was the 4th time I have seen the HS and this was the most radically different setlist they have played yet...but of course they still closed with 'Killer Parties'...which OF COURSE brought the house down...just an amazing night...totally justifying their status as my favorite band!!!
Hmmm....I am always curious as to why someone posts a missed connections entry when they do. Like this guy for example. This festival was at the very beginning of August...at least I think it was. The three days of heavy alcohol consumption has sort of clouded my brain...and in fact I was so drunk when Pearl Jam played, I may have actually talked to this guy and told him my name was Megan...i honestly couldn't tell you. Well...to help relive that great weekend, and since the Hold Steady show is this week...i will post my Lolla slideshow from this past festival.
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Lollapalooza 2007 - m4w - 30
Hi there, looking for Megan from LA, who was at Lollapalooza with a friend, we met there and watched Pearl Jam together. we were born at same date. 31st of august 77. i was enough stupid for not getting your phone number. she was a teacher.
No, really...this little tale did in fact take place at band camp.
The band camp of my Freshman year in high school to be exact. For band geeks, the first band camp was like being reborn. And I don't think I am overstating this when I say being reborn. In my middle school, if you were still in the band by the end of the 8th grade, you were officially a b-lister at best. It wasn't up for negotiation or debate. Band = not so cool. So you can imagine how happy I was made by the utopia that I had found in the summer of 1989. It was the summer before my first year in high school. So imagine if you will, taking a very shy, very awkward 14yr old and dropping him into a pool of equally shy and awkward girls, only some of them were 2 or 3 years older. It was a social trainwreck...really.
Enter Julia. I will never forget her name. I am going to date myself here, but oh well. In my neurotic, hormone driven mind she looked SO much like Alysa Milano. And at that time...the daughter on 'Who's The Boss?' was about as hot as it got.
The marching band Gods brought us together. There is no other way to explain it. I played the baritone, which if you are not down with the lameness that is high school marching bands, is like a small tuba. Julia played the clarinet. So you see, there was really NO reason for us to ever cross paths. But for whatever reason the formation that our band was trying to master always had Julia and I right next to one another.
So for those two weeks(which in 14yr old terms may as well be 3 months) we bonded. She talked about her love for all things Motley Crue, while I just agreed with everything she said because for the first time in my life a pretty girl was actually making conversation with me. I remember making up the lamest excuses to ALWAYS have a reason to be near her. That first love buzz is a killer...its almost like you lose total control, like you become an entirely different person. But when the time arrived to actually act on my feelings and ask Julia to the social event of the season, the big band camp dance that was held on the eve of the night that we headed home, I dropped the ball.
My crippling shyness kicked in and I chose to just stand with my back to the wall in the corner that seemed to be reserved for all of the guys who shared my condition. Fleeting eye contact was made a few times...but I was never able to actually work up the nerve to walk across what at the time seemed like the biggest room on the planet and ask her to dance.
Band camp ended, and we once more settled into our regular lives and our regular cliques. I don't think I ever said more than 'hello' to Julia for the rest of the year...although I thought about her all the time.
Fast forward to 2007 and I laugh out loud when I think about those couple of weeks. Not because of the outcome so much, but because of the whole process. SUCH a huge part of growing up...unrequited love is the preeminent theme during our high school years I believe. Without it we wouldn't be able to appreciate the reciprocated kind.
...or my email is anyway! Hey, it's me Blair...the Certain Songs staff of one. I just do this for the love of the music and am in no way trying to rip anybody off, so if you are an artist or a record label and you are not happy that I am promoting your music, or you want me to take a song down, just shoot me an email and I will most definitely oblige.
And please support the artists I post here in whatever way you can if you do download a song...go to a show, buy some merch, buy an album...these songs are the soundtrack to my life and I just love to share them. But I can only do that if the insanely talented artist responsible for said songs are able to eat.
I also love hearing new stuff...so any submissions can also be sent to my email, I will try my bestest to listen to everything and get back to you all...peace,love,rock n' roll.
csmusicblog@gmail.com
Monthly Mix Tape
Mission Statement
I guess you're old enough to know. Kids out on the east coast. Roughly twenty years old. Got coaxed out by a certain perfect ratio. Of warm beer to the summer smoke. And the meat loaf to the billy joel. Certain songs they get so scratched into our souls.
She goes low on the seats when she gets high in her car. She looks shallow but shes neck deep in the steamy dreams of the guys along the harbor bars. She's pulling out her shirttails and jacking up her socks. Stern and stoned and confident, coming up towards the jukebox. Born into the only songs that everybody finally sings along. B-1 is for the good girls. It's only the good die young. C-9 is for the making eyes. It's paradise by the dashboard light. D4 is for the lovers. B12 is for the speeders. And the hard drugs are for the bartenders and the kitchen workers and the bartender's friends. And they're playing it again. Ellen Foley gives us hope. Certain songs they get scratched into our souls.
I guess you're old enough to know. Kids out on the west coast are taking off their clothes. Screwing in the surf and going out to shows. They get high and ride around in gtos. I guess you're old enough to know. CERTAIN SONGS THEY GET SCRATCHED INTO OUR SOULS. - The Hold Steady
