GOOD THINGS | NO. 1

// SOME GOOD THINGS FROM AROUND THE INTERNET //

1. Apparently there was something called the Youtube Awards, and bands created music videos live at it. Cool. Spike Jonze shot a video for Arcade Fire's "Afterlife" off of their new album AND it involved Greta Gerwig dancing. How many great things can you pile into one video before my head will explode?

2. I realize that I am super late to the game on this (I'm not as obsessive a blog reader as I was a few years ago) but I finally stumbled upon the truly fantastic blog Note to Self. I may have read through the whole blog in a couple of days...

3. So this weekend, while watching too much TV, we found a special on Nat Geo called "The Secret Life of Dogs." It was so fascinating. Seriously, I could bore you for hours with all of the cool things that I learned, like the fact that dogs might be able to smell cancer. Smell freaking cancer. Mind blown. I love dogs. 

4. I'm sorry to break it to you, but I am 100% one of those awful annoying people who officially gets excited for the holidays as soon as November hits. Feel free to hate me. But first let me tell you how much I love hot chocolate (via Cupcakes and Cashmere), peppermint flavored things, wreaths, holiday movies...

5. My favorite track off of the Chvrches album now has a weird, dark futuristic video. Watch it. 

CHARMING NOISE | COVERS

Anybody who says that they don't like pop music is a damned liar. We all love it, even if we act like we're too cool to even know who Lana Del Rey is (you know that you've done something similar, don't lie). The thing about a lot of pop artists is that they're all persona, and sometimes we can go so far as to call it performance art (Lady Gaga). It's all contrived, even if it's brilliantly executed. Many mainstream artists either have their songs written for them, or co-write with somebody else, and because of our own biases against the performer, we miss out on some great songs. I'll admit that I've probably missed out on a lot of good music because of my own musical snobbery. It's for that reason that I'm so incredibly happy that some of my favorite artists have been covering some pop songs lately, and the results have been pretty damn stunning.

I finally listened to the original version of this song last week, and while yes, the video is a little ridiculous, I couldn't help but get the song stuck in my head. While I don't think that Miley Cyrus is nearly as "provocative" and "controversial" as everyone else seems to, I do think that she seems to try too hard to be pushing boundaries. I was pretty excited when I saw that Haim had covered this track with a little more of an electronic sound to it and with, of course, their beautiful vocals.

Low is one of those bands that I love every single time that I listen to them, but I often forget about them in terms of daily music rotation (except I could never forget the the horrifying spectacle of this video. Just try to look away). I was really happy when I stumbled upon this cover of Rihanna's "Stay." It's has such potential to be a sad, haunting song, and Low is the perfect band to take it to a darker place.

 

I know that you're probably incredibly tired of hearing me talk about Chvrches, but they just so happened to time their album coming out with this cover of Whitney Houston's "It's Not Right But It's Okay." Chvrches really know how to do electro-pop, so it's pretty much a match made in heaven.

CHARMING NOISE | CHVRCHES

After being sick for the past three days with a damn head cold (the kind of thing that makes you feel awful, but not awful enough that you can really excuse yourself to be completely bedridden, but if you try to exert yourself in any real way, you feel like you're going to pass out), so I decided that it might be time to do something useful and make some soup. Since cooking is one of those activities where I initially feel like "Ugh, it's going to be hard!" (much like working out), but once I get started, I'm like "Look at me! I'm so useful! I'm so talented! I made something!" I find that throwing on some music usually really helps me ease into the activity. A couple of weeks ago, the melancholy sighs of Sharon Van Etten were really doing it for me ("I'm unemployed and sad. Sharon gets meeeeeee."), but today I was looking for something more upbeat. Lo and behold, I found Chvrches' debut album on NPR's "First Listen," because life is sometimes not cruel and things work out (I'm realizing that this post is coming off as somewhat bitter and sad. I apologize. Kind of).

I've been anticipating this album ever since I heard "Recover" earlier this year and immediately wanted to purchase the album. Alas, there was only an EP out at the time, but September 24 is the official magical date when The Bones of What You Believe will be released. It's the kind of fairly ornate electro-pop that Purity Ring brought to our ears last year, but, dare I say it, it's a lot more fun. I can dance to this stuff, and believe me, I will. But it's not an album full of mindless dance tracks; there was some serious thought put into the lyrics, the arrangements, the textures, and the overall sound of the album. Sure, you could dance to the perfectly orchestrated builds in tracks like "Lies" and "Under the Tide," but you could also just sit with your headphones on and really listen purely to appreciate the thought and artistry that went into every track. In reality, to really understand their electronic talents, all you really need to do is check out their cover of the Game of Thrones theme. 

Check out the preview by heading over to NPR.

WINTER IS...STILL COMING

Oh heyyyy winter. You're still here... I was kind of expecting that you'd only be crashing here until late February... March at the latest. But you're still here? That's cool, I guess. 

Be warned: winter is still coming, guys. Because of that, you should probably listen to CHVRCHES' cover of the Game of Thrones theme song.