Due to some confusion, it’s a bit late, but we have our first non-Dave/Andy/Adrian version of a cover contest song. It’s from Alan and it’s right here, a cover of “Shape of My Heart” by the Backstreet Boys. It’s not going to be on the voting, but take a listen.
Two days left on “Consequence” if you want to do a version of that.
So I’m thinking about starting an mp3 blog. Maybe brandnewcanada.com. I think it’s be fun. I don’t currently have the bandwidth, I don’t think. If you happen to be overflowing with bandwidth and wouldn’t mind hosting a blog and the mp3s, then let me know. Or maybe I’ll set up freshmaker as a server again.
Meanwhile, here’s a good mp3. It’s a Portland, OR band called Jaime and Becky (though I think they’re originally from Minnesota). We got their CD at the station. This is a standout track. Nice arpegiatted guitar, great vocal melodies and harmonies (and blending of the two voices and the whatnot). Some totally kickin’ cello and glockenspiel parts during the chorus. The chorus is really really good. I don’t usually like female fronted bands (with a few exceptions, e.g. Cat Power), and two female vocalists seemed like it’d be too much, but these two pull it off really well.
“Midwest” by Jaime and Becky.
You can also listen to this song (and a couple more) at their myspace site.
I’d like to write such a song for western PA.
A guy at work really loves eating peanut butter. He keeps a bottle in the fridge and will eat spoonfuls at a time. (He’s also on a high protein/ fat, low carb diet, so even if he didn’t love peanut butter, it might still be a viable snack that he would have.) He says it’s like candy for him.
I gave him crap for it, but he said that everyone has their thing that they just love.
I was thinking that there’s no better snack than peanut m&m’s and a dr. pepper, but I don’t know if there are any foods I have a total weakness for. I think maybe my brother‘s may be chocolate cake. If a restaurant has a chocolate cake, he’ll probably have it.
So what are your weaknesses? Anyone have any odd ones?
This guy has compiled a bunch of mp3s of indie darlings doing top 40 hits. Some are pretty great.
(I don’t know if any will be as good as Andy’s version of Shape of My Heart—not to show favorites or anything).
I was thinking about some CDs that I used to listen to lots at the MIT music library. I’d listen to a whole lot of fiddle music. One was called My Love is in America and was the recording of the Boston College Fiddle Festival which had some of the greats like Kevin Burke and Liz Carrol on it. I couldn’t find it online, but then I checked the label, Green Linnet, and not only did they have it, but it was $4. You can listen to it streaming on their site too. It’s lower-fi than I remembered, but it’s got a ton of energy and some great songs.
Another great CD was Green Fields of America Live in Concert (with a lot of great Irish American musicians). It’s also on Green Linnet, but I couldn’t find it on their site. I called them up and it turns out that they have about 5 copies left. I got that for $10.
And currently they have free shipping (for standard shipping at least) so two CDs for $14 is pretty good.
The songs for this week was Shape of my Heart by the Backstreet Boys. (Original here).
The entries are as follows:
Some good stuff there.
Listen and vote.
The song for covers contest #7 is Consequence by the Notwist. (Original mp3 here).
The results for last week’s votes (for covers of Flying Pizza by Swearing at Motorists).
Best Cover:
Adrian 1
Andy 1
Dave 2
Most Original Cover:
Adrian 3
Andy 1
Dave 0
I’d like to point out that Andy did not submit a cover so even though I left him in the poll (out of sheer convenience) whoever voted for his cover is dumb.
In other news, Dave and I are the big winners, though Andy was apparently more original than dave when not submitting a cover at all. OH SNAP, dave!
I went to see Sufjan Stevens at Great American Music Hall two nights in a row on Sunday and Monday. This may be the first band/ artist I’ve seen two nights in a row…I tried to see the Polyphonic Spree twice in a row at Slim’s but the second night was sold out.
The shows were fairly similar but different enough that I got new things out of each of them.
The material was mainly (almost entirely—I think the first night it might have been entirely) from Illinois. This was fine with me. There’s certainly enough good material on that disc to put together a good set. I liked the softer songs a lot: “John Wayne Gacy, Jr.” and “the Predatory Wasp of the Palisades” were both played both nights. The would-be-singles “Chicago” and “Come on Feel the Illinoise” were also played both nights. He also finished the main set both nights with a song I didn’t like too much on the album but liked live “the Man of Metropolis Steals Our Hearts.”
I’d forgotten how good Sufjan is at instruments. He’s a good enough guitar player. He writes interesting guitar parts and plays them flawlessly, but they’re not incredibly hard. He’s a fantastic keyboard player, though. He’ll just plow through a fast solo on a song or play some of the rhythmically difficult things he writes in 5/4 or other strange time signatures without a hesitation. He’s also a great singer.This latest album he uses his falsetto a lot to good effect.
He’s fun to watch on stage. During the Michigan/ Seven Swans tour, he told lots of (made up) stories about the origins of the songs and whatnot. He didn’t really talk much about the songs but he did do cheers. The whole thing for this tour is Illinois cheerleaders (or Illinoisemakers); like for the last tour his back up band was the Michigan Militia, dressed in little boy scout-like uniforms with American flag hankerchiefs around their necks. So do go along with the cheerleader outfits they wore, they did cheers for some cities, like Peoria and Metropolis (which rhymed Metropolis with “Balki Bartokomous“). They were mostly under-prepared and sometimes forgotten. They were endearing in that way.
The second night the encore consisted of his cover/ version of “Star Spangled Banner” and “Romulus” both, apparently, by request. Those are two of my favorite Sufjan songs so I was pretty pleased with that.
His former bell player and back up singer, now just back up singer, is still really cute!
One major complaint was that I think there was only one or two songs with banjo and John Ringhofer (of Half-Handed Cloud) who was playing as part of the backup band, did the banjo playing, not Sufjan. Dylan and I tried to start the chant “B-A-N-J-O” (same cadence as “B-I-N-G-O” was his name-o) and I was tempted to yell “More banjo!” and later “Put away the damn guitar and play some banjo!” I encourage you to yell these things or to start the “B-A-N-J-O” cheer if you see him later this tour.
it’s really just a side note that there’s going to be a hockey season later this year.
meanwhile, we’ve got from four major sports to three and a couple fringe sports like hockey, soccer, arena football, etc.
Last week’s cover song was Suspicious Minds by Elvis. The voting went like this:
Best cover:
Most original:
Andy and Dave are the big winners.
This week’s song is Flying Pizza by Swearing at Motorists (Original mp3).
The entries:
*like many of my covers, but particular with this one, listening in stereo is better.
Listen to them and vote for the best and most original here.
Next week’s song is Shape of My Heart by the Backstreet Boys. (Original mp3) (Note: this is Dave’s choice and the owner and proprietor of adrian is rad and adrianbischoff.com disavows any association with the choice of this song.)
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