Does your band need a name? Turns out, I’m your guy. Who knew, right? Here are a few band names that popped into my head over the last 24 hours. Take them and do what you will, but most importantly, ROCK ON! Continue reading
Boston’s Stereo Telescope (who I’ve written about before) have dropped their first full length album, and it rocks VERY HARD. I’m sure Oprah thought she was all pimp with her book club, but On and Running is the first official CreativeJamie.com music pick!
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Posted in music reviews
Tagged indie music, music pick, music reviews, picks, stereo telescope
I know I’ve promised you more Better Know Your Hitchcock, and I promise, it is coming, along with a bunch of other movie reviews. Until then, please enjoy this slightly menacing picture of birds eating fruit from a tree… As opposed to flesh from your bones!
Posted in music reviews
Tagged Alfred Hitchcock, Better Know Your Hitchcock, movie reviews
(Are you) A True Regular? is the debut recording (a five track EP) by The Regulars of Boston, MA.
The Regulars possess a large, warm sound that recalls Queen, The Beatles and a zillion other bands that are awesome – and yet, The Regulars don’t exactly sound like any of those bands, they just… I don’t know, almost reference other bands without really sounding much like other bands. You just can’t put your finger on it, but there is something comfortable about The Regulars, like an old hoodie you lost but found again and it still fits and it’s still in like new condition. It’s warm and comfortable and exactly what you were looking for but new at the same time. OK, I’m rambling now – just listen here.
(Also, BandCamp needs to add a volume control – is it just me? Am I missing something?)
You can’t pigeon hole this sound any more than you can deny it. It’s fun, uplifting and smooth. I can’t wait to hear what they do next. Check them out on Facebook here.
Posted in music reviews
Tagged indie music, indie rock, music, music review, the regulars
You can say whatever you want about Michael Jackson, but that dude could put out some tunes. In 2003, Epic put out Number Ones, a collection of his songs that all hit that magical mark on the charts, and you’d think that’s what I’d want to hear, but I was surprised that not only did this include songs of his I didn’t especially like, there were songs I didn’t even know. In the end, I realized I needed a much smaller collection to satisfy my Michael Jackson needs.
CreativeJamie.com contributor Nurse Becky asked me what my favorite song of all time was and I was completely and totally unable to answer the question. Not only that, but I couldn’t even pick my favorite song by a particular band. Instead, I sent her a list of 10 songs I liked with no more than 1 per band.
Here we go: Continue reading
Posted in music reviews
Tagged a day in the life, ben folds five, favorite songs, hail hail, Handyman's honeymoon, heart of the sunrise, hotel california, karma police, led Zeppelin, muse, music review, narcolepsy, pearl jam, Radiohead, Ramon and Jessica, red barcheta, Rush, Screenplay, stairway to heaven, take a bow, The Beatles, the eagles, the unauthorized biography of reinhold messner, Yes
New York City has a rock station again… and they’re playing old Silverchair songs. This is better than not having a rock station, but in all honesty, this is not exactly filling the new music void just by playing “Tomorrow” or Fun’s “We are Young” three times a day. Anyway, let’s dig into this… this… song. I guess it’s a song. Continue reading
I’ve been hearing “We are Young” by Fun on the radio a lot lately, and I really like how it sounds (although it’s intense redundancy can only be tolerated for so long), but I have no idea what the hell it’s about – or exactly what is being said. To remedy that, I looked up the lyrics. Continue reading
I’ve complained (at length) about Alanis Morissette not knowing the definition of the word ‘ironic’ already, but I’m glad to know I’m the only one who’s pissed. Whoever writes music reviews for the United Airline inflight magazine had this to say while dropping two sentences in reference to the fact that she has a new album coming out:
The singer-songwriter who catchily muddled the concept of irony for an entire generation is back with her first album in four years. It’s a gentler affair this time, featuring the single “Guardian,” an anthemic ode to motherhood.
“Muddled” is the writer’s way of saying, “Alanis doesn’t know what she’s talking about,” just as “gentler affair” is a nice way to put, “I don’t like the new album at all,” and dropping “anthemic” is code for, “The single sucks too.”
Posted in music reviews
Tagged Alanis Morissette, Alanis Morissette Ironic, jagged little pill
If you haven’t heard it in a while, take a list to “Even Flow” by Pearl Jam from their 1991 debut album, Ten. I’m not even going to ask you what this song is about – let’s just focus on what in the hell Eddie Vedder is saying. This is a typical problem when it comes to Vedder’s vocal styling, but I have always felt that this is the best example of his yammering. Adam Sandler agrees.
Today, I listened to Genesis’ hits album, starting with “turn it on again.” What in the hell is that song about, anyway? Let’s take a look at the lyrics and try to figure it out.
I’m a sucker for Will Smith – I always have been and I probably always will be. I just like the guy and I’m lucky he doesn’t sell used cars or something, because I’d have a whole fleet of 1997 Plymouth Prowlers cramping up my driveway. (Big Willie Style lends itself quite naturally to a product tie-in with Trojan. This seems like a missed opportunity…) But we’re not getting as much Will Smith as we used to.
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In the world of musical copy write, there are things you can and can’t do – specially, you can copy write a melody, but not a chord progression. I understand that if you could copy write a cord progression, the lawsuits would fall like raindrops, but I still think people stretch this point to the breaking point. Here are 12 songs that are, in my opinion, really only 5 songs.
My understanding is that Huey Lewis was tapped to write a theme song for Ghostbusters (all movies had title songs in the 1980s… Better Off Dead and Pretty in Pink spring to mind), but it didn’t work. They turned to Ray Parker Jr. and later settled out of court when Lewis sued them for blatantly plagiarizing his melody. [Wikipedia]
Even a Beatle can screw up. George Harrision and Ronnie Mack battle it out here, and for some reason, it took a court ten fucking years to decide that Harrison subconsciously copied the tune and paid out $587,000 in damages. [Wikipedia]
I saw a commercial for Phantom of the Opera, jumped out of my chair and ran to the computer to pull up Pink Floyd’s “Echos” and sure enough, the internet was all over it, as seen above. This might count as a chord progression, but… I don’t know. I still feel this one is really blatant.
Lots of songs use this chord progression, but this one really hit home to me as I’d only been playing guitar for a short time when these two songs came out and learning my friends favorites was still something I was willing to do – this was a nice to-for-one – learn one song, transpose to a different key, call it a day.
This one came to slowly over time; in this instance in what I guess is another case of shared cord progression, George Harrison is the victim. Chicago, Led Zeppelin and finally Green Day all went out and grabbed a piece of the pie and jammed out to one of the most iconic progressions in rock. Pick your favorite version – I’m somewhere between “Guitar” and “Babe.”
Wow, that was fast. This greatest hits CD is already sitting on cashier counters, ready for impulse buying. I know sales always shoot up after an artist dies, but it seems shady to me when a store that doesn’t normally sell music has a big Whitney Houston display right next to the register – kinda like when the super markets made a big deal out of the release of the last Harry Potter book.
Edited by Jamie Insalaco
The most pretentious name on the web!
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