Music

I've been finding that my taste in music has been tending towards Alternative/Indie/Rock. To this end, I've been listening to a local station that plays more of this genre of music. The one I could find locally is Evolution 107.9, which is actually a student-run radio station. The students are part of the radio & television broadcasting program at a poly-technical school in town. Let me tell you that I don't tune in for the witty banter. However, I've hear some great music, and some great bands, who, for whatever reason, don't get very much, if any, air time on most other local stations.

However, I feel that there is also a lot of good music that comes out from Europe, and after a bit of searching, I found this London station that plays the same genre of music. The interesting thing is since I'm 8 hours behind London, I hear their late afternoon, evening and late night programming. There is one particular late night segment that features interviews with groups or artists who just so happen to be in London. It's really cool because I get to hear music that I wouldn't normally get to hear. Some of these people have such a small following that I'd doubt the music even gets heard outside of the UK.

Anyways, I've recently become a fan of the Arctic Monkeys, a band from the UK. Here they are performing Teddy Pickers:

New Ultimate Ultimate!

I've been playing this song to death. I like it for several reasons:

1. It happy sounding;
2. I like the synth/pop sound
3. It's got wicked bass riffs, and I would love to see if I can copy it one day on my bass (which I don't even have right now, my friend has it sigh).

I love this video, it's so goofy, and the 70s shorts are a great touch. Here's the new ultimate-ultimate, Here In Your Arms by hellogoodbye

Jane Eyre - Ultimate-Ultimate

Inevitably what happens after a TV or movie showing that people really like, there will be someone out there who makes a music video. Most music video out there are pretty quickly put together by amateurs, which goes to show you that the software is out there to make something pretty snazzy, very cheaply and easily nowadays.

Unfortunately, I find about 99% of them not worth watching. Music, I think is a very personal thing, so how one interprets music and relates it to his or her life is also very personal.

Anyways, I've been watching a great many Jane Eyre music videos, and have actually found some music that I really like. One thing about having people from around the world do these music videos is that I'm hearing music that I've never heard before, which I think is cool.

So I have some new ultimate-ultimates (warning, lots of spoilers below, so if you want to listen to the music, click, then minimize the browser to just listen):

Nara by E.S. Posthumus. I actually like this video, even though the editing is a little choppy (which I will forgive because this is a first-time video), is that it's presented a little differently that many music videos, and the music actually matches the mood the creator is trying to impart on us. I've since downloaded some more music by this group. What's also great about the music is that this music lends itself very well to movies, which is why it works so well in this video. If you actually check out Wikipedia, this same music has been used in several different movies.



Another great group that I've discovered is Within Temptation. They are a goth metal group from the Netherlands. I'm not normally into metal, but they put out some pretty funky stuff. The music video's okay, but I like the music itself more: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1YdTRHW2-8

While this is not an ultimate-ultimate song, I'm putting it here because I like the bass (Everything by Lifehouse): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2s7qwYVbp6U

And for those of you who saw the trailers on TV, the music is by Goldfrapp, an electronica band from the UK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvN4aRILm5s

Weird Al

You know, I never realized that Weird Al is still going strong. A couple of weeks ago, he just release his 12th album. The local radio station played his polka remix from his new album, and I was double over with laughter, it was so well done!

So anyways, here's a blast from the past, one of the songs that I use to love a lot when I was a kid. Enjoy!

"The Ultimate-Ultimate"

When we were younger, we would often go over to a cousin's house to hang out. One of the cousins would always pull my sister aside into her room and made her listen to "The Ultimate-Ultimate" song du jour (in other words, what her favourite song was at the moment). My poor sister had to listen to the song not once, not twice, not three times, but over and over and over and over...

Well, I'm one of those people who listen to the same song over and over and over... On my iTunes playlist, there are maybe 10 songs that I will really listen to, I tend to skip over the rest, depending on what sort of mood I'm in. I never like one artist or group, it's the song itself that get me jiving.

Like today, I played the same song on repeat, for about 3 hours straight at work. With all volume controls turn on HIGH. (Hey, I have a very loud talker on my right and a very loud clicky keyboard behind me, that gets extremely distracting). I will eventually get sick the song and never want to listen to it again, but I'm loving it right now.

"The Ultimate-Ultimate" song? Far Away by Nickleback.

Surprising if you know me. I'm a self-proclaimed non-romantic, so choosing a love ballad would be one of the last things you may expect from me. Maybe I'm more of a romantic than I let on...

But being the geek I am, I was trying to pick out the bass rifts during each successive repeat and thinking how easy it would be for me to figure out on my bass guitar. And I was figuring ways to harmonize with the lyrics. Anything is better than Evil Homework, which is what I'm avoid doing right now. Sigh.