Finding New Music: A Challenge
Feliciana – Turn Up The Radio LABI
This song is pretty catchy. It’s your typical electro/pop party song. But something about it speaks to me. Not much info can be found about the singer/group — so if any of you lovely readers have any info. Do let me know!
Devante Fields – Dream
Artists really need to dump MySpace. If they use it, at least add some relevant info. All I can say is that this kid is fly, the song is good and there’s clear potential there. Also, the music video is well done, simple yet nice to watch.
Music video was directed and edited by Jakob Owens
Jason Mraz – I Won’t Give Up (Official Lyric Video)
Sometimes I really like Jason Mraz, other times I don’t like him at all. I feel that he has very cheesy lyrics. Something about him just rubs me the wrong way. But I can’t deny the impact he has had. Oh well, this song is nice and yeah. That’s about it.
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This was really a great way for me to dump a whole lot of music that can’t make it on the main site. Faster way to share! No, but really, if I could I would put them all on the main site. But sometimes, it takes a bit of a time to prepare a small post — must cross-check all the information!
We might not claim ourselves to be professional, but we aim to do things the right way.
Besides that, I really want to share more music. I think this format would be cool, but to do it everyday? That’s asking too much even of myself. Once a week? It could work but the post might be too big, seeing as I can’t control how many music videos come out in a week and how many I will like. After all, I have issues with making up my mind and Amy would kill me if I post over 50 music videos every week. Let’s see if I make something out of this, or if I dump this project.
Let me know what you think!
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 :)