Finding New Music: A Challenge
As a music lover, I am always looking for something new to listen to. Why I do this is beyond me. Just with Kpop I have so much new music I can listen to everyday. But that is a topic for another post.
I love Kpop, but as of late, I am yearning for something different. Like when you refresh your palette with some sorbet between meals (in fancy restaurants) — my ears need to be refreshed with English music. That is why I went on a YouTube search trying to find some great new tunes. Now here is where I got really mad at YouTube.
You see, old YouTube had this great feature where you could see all their major categories. In each category you could see what videos were recently updated as well as the ones gaining attention. I could easily browse among freshly posted music videos and find something new. Well, with the change YouTube has done, that amazing feature is gone. Sure, they still have the major categories but it’s all weird now. It just shows you the most popular videos of each genre and some recommendations. Well, that doesn’t help much.
Damn you, YouTube, damn you.
But, after some clever searching words, I scored some new music videos. These were all published between January 2nd and 3rd. I got this crazy idea that I should browse YouTube everyday for new music, but I realized quite quickly that it would be suicidal. The amount of music that is shared everyday via YouTube is too huge… and at the same time, I would love to share good music if I find it. But that means I need to constantly update it. I shall see if I can find a good way I can make this crazy idea of mine work.
With no further ado, some of the good music I found two days ago (this was supposed to be posted yesterday, but yeah :P)!
Scissor Sisters Vs Krystal Pepsy – Shady Love
I love me some old Scissor Sisters. This song is good, but I am not sold on it. It could grow on me, we shall see. But for now, I really just wanted to share it. Not sure what I should say about the video…
The Mariana Hollow – Your Halo
The Mariana Hollow is a female-fronted alternative metal quintet from London. That is pretty cool. This song is pretty cool as well. Easy on the ears.
The music video was directed and edited by Colin Arnold from The Surgery Productions.
To be honest with you, it’s hard for me these days to keep up with new music that is out as I found 2011 to be very underwhelming and uninspiring. There are some good records but my interest lately has been towards more older music as I re-discovered the Cure last year while discovering stuff like Talk Talk and Slint. The stuff I’m starting to get into are acts like Kraftwerk and Spacemen 3. I find that music to be very interesting while earlier today, I just heard the title track to Bitches Brew by Miles Davis which blew me away as I’m still trying to figure out where to start.
There’s stuff I’m looking forward to like new records from Bat for Lashes but that’s kind of it as I’m not sure what to do. Particularly as I’ve become disenchanted with the world of rock music as I’m now officially convinced, despite what some people refuse to believe, that rock is officially dead.
@Steven Flores, I am so far away from the rock scene, I don’t have a clue as to what it’s going on there. Pop-music consumes all my time!
Ever thought of reviewing music? :P You seem to have a variety in music that we on YAM love!
@Julyssa, Actually, I have a music blog called The Void-Go-Round that’s been on and off lately as I’m working on my 2nd favorite albums essay and trying to get back into writing album reviews. I just don’t have much interest in writing reviews of new albums unless it really interests me. I’ve been writing music reviews for more than 10 years when I did that and reviewing films at Epinions.com but I had fallen out with the people at the site about 1 1/2 years ago due to various issues.
I’m more into writing film reviews as I have a hard time trying to find time and energy to write a music review as I still haven’t finished work on the entire discography of My Bloody Valentine. I’m trying to get around to it but I always have something else to work on so it’s been very iffy for me on that spectrum.
@Steven Flores, I see. I will make sure to check out your blog. Here at YAM we don’t just review the latest stuff – we love to talk about and review the stuff that we love. That is what makes us special. I am searching for more music people to our YAM fam, we have way too many movie people xD.
Did you get tired of writing music reviews? I often find it hard to do review because I don’t consider myself a reviewer. I can say what I liked and didn’t like about music, but often with me it’s really simple. I just really like something that sounds good, but I can’t tell you what this “goodness” is becuase I have no clue xD. I am trying to find another way to review but still not review, hahaha.
@Steven Flores, I used to find a balance between writing about films and music but lately, there’s been more of a shift towards films as well as essays on films/albums/filmmakers. Plus, I’ve been on-and-off working on screenplay projects as I’ve finally finished one last November with two prospective projects still being drawn out in its outline stage. it’s hard to find the time to write a music review for me still because of timing as well as enthusiasm. The last album review I wrote was for the soundtrack on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo but that took me 2 days to do because I had to stray from my usual format to writing. It’s still up in the air as it’s something I’m still trying to think about.
@Steven Flores, You seem to be very busy. What kind of screenplays have you been working on?
But I understand, if you can’t find the enthusiasm, then you might as well climb the Everest. They are days that I can’t even bring myself to type one word – but it’s more because I suffer of serous writers block xD.
@Julyssa, Mostly dramatic material on stuff on what I know the current project I’m working is a trilogy of stories about lonely American women in different continents of the world. One will be about an escort in Europe. A politician’s wife in South America. The third (that I’m now working in an outline at the moment) is about a novelist going to Japan exploring the hikikomori phenomenon.
@Steven Flores,
That sound really interesting! I would love to read it if possible ^^
I find it really hard to find music too because there’s so much going on haha. I completely agree about your YouTube complain, I also did that a lot then and find that a lot goes missing now. Even from my own subscriptions, I feel uploads go missing…
There’s never enough hours in my day to keep up with everything, then I remind myself to use YAM as a blog and not a magazine. xD
The problem I have found lately, when I listen to new music is that I can love something and then because there’s so much going on, it just drops from my radar. I have stopped learning song lyrics, and overall… I’m not a very good fan.
@amy, Yeah, the follow-trough has become harder. But if something is really good, then you make sure to save it somewhere . That is why I adore Spotify, it’s so easy to save create a bunch of playslists, keep track of the artist you love and so on. But sometimes they don’t have it all. They don’t have Adele’s 21! I guess it’s some corporate thing but yeah, that is a major cockblock.
@Julyssa, but I do. I save them and I get albums and all, but once that album is out… and a few months pass by, it’s over. I move on to the next thing I like. Except for a bunch of Asian artists, it hasn’t happened with any western music since Marit. LOL
Like, I llike Feist a lot but I don’t think I can sing to any of her songs, and I just began learning Adele’s lyrics because of the concert disc.
Awww…I love me some Mr. A-Z. Though, I guess I could see your point about the cheesy lyrics at times. But I love his spirit and how natural his voice is. He’s just being himself…which is geeky and cheesy…HaHa.
For me, finding new music is easy…I go for what I know and then see those recommendations on the sidebar. If they look interesting, I’ll check them out…HaHa. Maybe it’s easy because i’m so slack…I’ll have to think about that. But, I like this format. A good way for us to find out some good stuff.
@Camiele, Yeah! I shall see how I solve my issue! hehe
I watch less and less MVs nowadays. I try to keep up by listening to podcasts which is much more flexible since I can do other things at the same time (commute, get groceries, work etc).
I listen to Sound Opinions and the Needledrop. You can also find the Needledrop on youtube: the guy is amazing, he reviews a lot of music from a large variety of genres. It’s by listening to his review of La Dispute’s new album (Wildlife) that I decided to give another try to hardcore rock ; a genre that was never part of my radar. I never regretted it.
Other good sources are sputnikmusic (for more reviews and pointers) and Grooveshark (to check out stuff as soon as I hear or read about it).
To me, 2011 wasn’t a bad year musically. I discovered a lot of good music so I have nice memories. I was particularly impressed by the hip-hop releases which have been great and very innovative (cunnninlynguists, das racist, doomtree, shabbaz palaces etc.)
@Echydo, I think that with me branching out to the Asian music scene, the music video has become more important. When it comes to Kpop, they put so much importance to the video – it is meant to be a entinity with the song. Some songs can be a little boring, but once you see the video it suddenly is more interesting.
I will check out your tips. With the vast internet it’s sometimes very hard to find good places to check out stuff :D
@Julyssa, I agree with the idea of music videos enhancing songs, it has that power to do so.
@Julyssa, the Kpop music industry and some indie music videos – since they tend to work with designers in every stage of the process… but sometimes indie MVs are better than listening to the music. LOL
@amy, So true. But I guess that when it comes to indie, seeing as they might have a limited budget then they have to be super creative. If they manage to do a great job, then ofc you will be mesmerized by the video xD
@Steven Flores, Hey, Steven. Firstly I’d like to say you should join the YAM-iverse. We’re really nice here and don’t judge…too harshly. I think we need more voices to add to the mix. Any and all music is welcome here, more so because so many people may not know about a lot of artists and should be informed…HaHa.
In any event, if you’re looking for where to start as regards good jazz…and I mean good jazz…you simply must without hesitation check out Miles’s Kind of Blue. Good God Almighty that album will knock whatever music you’re into right out of your butt! Heartbreakingly beautiful stuff. I dare say one of the top five albums of any kind anywhere of all time.
It also seems like you’re intrigued by good house music. I’d suggest Jazzanova. The band is just wicked. I don’t think they’ve released anything since 2008’s Of All The Things, but a good place to start is In Between…honest to goodness nu-jazz and broken beats. Can’t beat it. They’re always doing remixes; however, their stuff is just bananas.
Anything else, I’d like to talk to you about it. I love music more than just about anything (don’t let my obsession with DBSK fool you, I’m far more versatile than one type of music. I just so happen to also find merits and beauty in pop music…anyway, I digress).
I’m always entrenched in some sort of old school, as it’s what I grew up on. But I try my best to keep abreast of some of the newer stuff from artists I already love. 2011 was a great year for music — if you had the patience to sift through all the bullshit. Just find an artist you love and see what they’ve done lately. That’s what I had to do. I was not disappointed :)