Happy Valentine's Day from myself, The Duke from The Late Greats and Heather from I Am Fuel, Your Are Friends . We decided to pool our collective love for love songs for you on this coming special red day. Remember these oft-cited words of wisdom for this day: 1 - If you can't be with the one you love, honey, love the one you're with. 2 - Always love. Hate will get you everytime. 3 - Love makes [...]
Well, I'm still battling this sickness, but things are looking better -- in all aspects of life. Lots of news coming up soon, but until then, I'd like to give you a little insight on my daily routine. As I said before, I'm really good at routine and as much as I like to break myself of certain habits, it's hard. Every morning while getting ready for work I tend to listen to the same playlist on my iTunes. It puts me in the right mindset. Even though I have been ridiculed for this mix in the past, I think [...]
Since posting the Yo La Tengo Fakebook source material yesterday, I've received two comments reminding me that Islamoguitarist Cat Stevens originally performed "Here Comes My Baby."
It's unfortunate how Cat Stevens' religious views often cloud his musical past to the general media. The controversy surrounding his religious conversion and name change from Stephen Georgiou to Yusuf Islam has been overblown and overanalyzed to the point where a disturbing number of radio stations have refused to play his material based on his "odd disposition" alone. Honestly, I could care less. He never murdered anyone or hit a child, rather he has given most of his profits towards charitable causes that benefit poor children (along with forming his own charity, Small Kindness ) and organizations [...]
An Other Cup by Yusuf - A new album by (formerly known as) Cat Stevens! Amazon says: Yusuf's (formerly Cat Stevens) first album of modern pop songs since 1978's Back to Earth. On his return to music, Yusuf says "I feel right about making music and singing about life in this fragile world again. It is important for me to help bridge the cultural gaps others are sometimes frightened to cross." My favorite Cat Stevens albums were Teaser and the Firecat and Tea for the Tillerman , which I gave [...]
I know it's been a while since the last post, but who would've ever thought that Rutgers football would be the catalyst to influence my decision to resume posting. As for my absence, I will briefly explain that this upcoming week. Right now, all I want to do is talk about "the game." First of all, that was one of the best college football games I've seen in a while. Probably the best since last year's Rose Bowl game between USC and Texas. Nobody, including myself, gave Rutgers much of a chance. I said all day that the [...]
The Knack have decided to sue everyone who's associated with the song "It's Tricky" for copying their one hit "My Sharona". This includes the artists (Run DMC) producers (Rick Rubin), publishers, and record companies. Online music retailers such as iTunes, Yahoo, Amazon, and Napster are even getting in on the being-sued action . Wait, wasn't "It's Tricky" released 20 years ago? Yes, it was, and it had an awesome video featuring Penn and Teller. But conveniently no one in The Knack knew that the song, which is [...]
Figuring "I'm already on the no-fly list, so where's the harm", Yusuf Islam has had a go at the Pope's deliberate stirring of the Islamic pot . Thinking back to his days when, as Cat Stevens, he was a bit of a Catholic himself, Yusuf shook his head: "At one point, I used to believe that the pope was infallible," Islam said, referring to teachings he received while attending a Catholic school as a boy. The pontiff "should have looked elsewhere if he wanted to quote but we respect the pope [...]
I must be doing something right: today I was asked to take my music off the office stereo not once, but twice. But two more different problem tracks you could not ask for. First on was Cat Stevens, out of respect to the closing track from Extras . Extras is not good. This is a problem, because you watch it hoping, almost expecting that it will be, but it's not good. There's almost an element of hoping that it's intentional, that it's supposed to refer to the sub-standard sitcom that Ricky Gervais finds himself in. But no, it's just [...]
In May of this year, Yusuf Islam told Billboard.com: "There were one hundred reasons for leaving the music industry back in 1979, not least because I had found what I was looking for spiritually. Today there are perhaps one hundred and one good reasons why I feel right making music and singing about life in this fragile world again." And in October - after 28 years, Yusuf Islam, - as reported in the September issue of Mojo Magazine - the Artist Formerly Known [...]
There are no unmissable TV programmes, I like to think. I prefer to believe that I'm not enslaved to a medium sized box from which coloured light emits, with it's happy happy sounds and pretty moving pictures and... No. I say to myself, no, I can miss TV. And for the most part, it's true. I try not to miss Lost, simply because that's an actual addiction, I can give up any time I want though. But one that just shouldn't be missed not because of it's cliffhangers, or the promise of bared flesh or any such sordid, [...]
Things in History that happened on August 28th (from Wikipedia): 475 - The Roman general Orestes forces western Roman Emperor Julius Nepos to flee his capital of Ravenna and appoints his own son Romulus Augustus in his place. 1565 - St. Augustine, Florida, established. It is the oldest surviving settlement in the European United States. 1845 - Scientific American magazine publishes its first issue. 1850 - Richard Wagner's opera Lohengrin premieres in Weimar, Germany. 1884 - First known photograph [...]
If you know me well and haven't seen Harold and Maude yet then I don't like you very much. If I made you watch it and you didn't like it very much; chances are you don't know me well anymore. I rate it that highly. Whilst I know it's terribly superficial to set standards by this sort of thing, I'm fairly certain those who don't love this film are dead inside, evil, or in the case of my father, both. The intention of this blog is to be about music. I know that. The [...]
Seriously, I used to get real bad blues on Sunday evening and Monday morning. For me those were the worst times. Nowadays it is all a blur and everyday ranks just as bad. I have been trying to pull through it but it isn't easy. It's extremely interesting, how we all actually have a conscious choice in the matter. There are basically two ways to look at anything; a positive way and a negative way. It seems that some of us are prone to immediately go to the uncomfortable negative viewing of events in [...]
Some Velvet Blog
The Underrated Blog
Timedoor
Obscure Sound
CybersMusic
Gray Matter(s)
Music For Kids Who Can't Read Good
No Rock And Roll Fun
You Can Call Me Betty
T-Sides
bluets
Songs in Space
Florence + The Machine - Spectrum (Calvin Harris Remix)
Lemaitre – Time To Realize
Alt-J – An Awesome Wave
The National - The Rains Of Castamere [Game of Thrones Soundtrack]
Sound of Summer (v. 3.1)
