Alternate title: I am sick of the old one (but I have nothing new to say, so I will ramble for too long about nothing in particular).


College: going well. I like my classes mostly, and I particularly like the fact that my school is a hippie school that does not believe in your capitalist dogma of tests and grades. How quantitative evaluations of performance are capitalist, I do not know, but I will enjoy freedom from them nonetheless.


Life: also going fairly well. Currently, I'm reading Atlas Shrugged which I have major problems with, but oh well. (Ayn Rand, you are crazy. I am glad I don't live in your world.) Come Tuesday, I will be taking two buses to New York, which will take a total of five hours, holy crap. That is as long as it takes to fly from the west coast.


Music: I have developed a slight obsession with the following. (Listed in no particular order. Maybe chronological.)


1. Brandi Carlile's new CD, Give Up the Ghost. Rock/country singer/songwriters are good times! She's really neither rock nor country--I like to think of her as having country sound (a distinct twang to her voice, ie) with rock sensibilities (her songs are not about oh, woe, her lover left her and her dog died and she will proceed to sing mournfully about this, eg).

And because I like nothing better than being too thorough, let me throw links to the songs I liked at you!

"That Year" : (youtube) (download)
you could have taken some time away / instead of a long drop, instead of a leap of faith

"I Will" : (youtube) (download)
i have to say that i am proud to know you / that i'll never be the same because we've met / you might not miss this, but i will

"Creep" : (youtube)
i want you to notice / when i'm not around / you're so fucking special / i wish i was special
(This is not on the CD. But I'm kind of in love with it anyway.)


2. Florence & the Machine's new (debut) CD, Lungs. Digression! So, yes, I know, now it's supposed to be Florence + the Machine, but you know what? On the cover of the EP A Lot of Love - A Lot of Blood there is a very distinct ampersand, so that little + can suck it. Also, I feel that if you mean to say "and" you should use an ampersand because that is what it is made for, goddammit*; + is reserved for mathematical equations. Yes, I know, I'm crazy.

ANYWAY. Florence Welch is awesome and British and perhaps slightly disturbed. Her music tends to atmospheric and accentastic. I'm rather fond of her.

Songalicious!

"Blinding" : (youtube) (download)
no more dreaming of the dead as if death itself was undone / no more calling like a crow for a boy, for a body in the garden / no more dreaming like a girl so in love with the wrong world
(Ignore the weirdness of the vid.)

"Bird Song" : (youtube) (download)
i picked up the bird and above the din / i said, "that's the last song you'll ever sing" / held him down, broke his neck / taught him a lesson he wouldn't forget


3. Bat For Lashes' cover of "I'm On Fire." I don't know! It's slow and sad, and I like that the way that it's sung makes a difference in the way the lyrics are interpreted. (As opposed to Bruce Springsteen's original version.) No, I don't know what's going on with the Youtube vid. It was the first one I could find that featured the right version of the song. Apparently Bat For Lashes did a couple? Anyway, this is the one I have.

(youtube) (download)
sometimes it's like someone took a knife, baby, edgy and blunt / put a six-inch valley through the middle of my soul


4. Marina & the Diamonds' "I Am Not a Robot." I don't know about this one either, to be honest. I'm sensing a theme here, though, what with women singers and mellow songs. Whatever, they're awesome, shut up. Also this vid is pretty strange, too, sorry. D:

(youtube) (download)
you've been hanging with the unloved kids / who you never really liked and you never trusted / but you are so magnetic / you pick up all the pins


And to make this a nice round number...

5. We Are Scientists' Brain Thrust Mastery. It is a strange album title. I know. On the bright side, yay, I broke the trend of women singers! Go me! Unlike Give Up the Ghost and Lungs, however, I tend to listen to this in bits--one song at a time, instead of just on repeat as a whole. Right now, the songs I'm listening to are:

"Let's See It" : (youtube) (download)
i know that evidence is gonna suggest / that i would let you down, alright / given our history, what can you expect?
(This one isn't even mellow! Also, the vid features lots of pictures of the band in varying degrees of shirtlessness, so... Be warned.)

"Spoken For" : (youtube) (download)
listen, it's best that we avoid misapprehension / this is something that i never had intended / well i should tell you, I've been spoken for
(This one is. But on the plus side it goes really well with something I'm in the middle of writing! The same warning about degrees of shirtlessness goes for this vid.)


And I think that's more than enough. Uh, sorry about all that, folks. I have a bad tendency of going overboard when I get started on music. IDK, I'm not even a music aficionado or anything. I just...get really long-winded.


*Okay, one last digression, re: ampersands. Do you know what the ampersand really is? It is a stylistic representation of et, which, as you all should know, is the French "and." Look at it. Et. &. If you just kind of make the E a little more loopy, tilt it to the side, and look for a t--OMG.

And now you know.

But while we're on the subject, the dollar sign should really be represented with two vertical strikes because it was derived from a superimposed U on an S, because this is the US and it is our currency. U. S. Not fucking IS. We're not the Ited States, we're the United States.