The obligatory year-end post

Ok, fine, secret's out: the only reason I keep this music blog online is because all I really want to do is write a year-in-review post. I mean, obviously, or else I would've updated this thing between April 23, 2007 and December 23rd or just deleted it that day in June when we discovered that some random site in China was downloading the 10 songs I had uploaded to this thing over and over and over again.

I've gotten distracted by my various other blogs (here, here, oh there's this, and um, Facebook, and Livejournal too), but what's important is that here we are now, together, for the holidays. I know we missed each other, but like old friends we slip back into the old familiar routine, no awkward pauses, just comfortable silence. And, oh, I forgot to say something about your new haircut: you look fabulous.

2007 was a good year for me, all round. A sort of transition year - quitting my job, starting a new one, easing myself back into the kinds of projects I had been dreaming about for awhile. Writing, cooking, even just the practice of chilling out.

Music-wise I'm finding that I'm falling into that bad habit where I get lazy about the music I seek out (one of the things about "growing up" that I should rail against really. So, New Year's Resolution here I come), but nevertheless, there have been nice music memories in 2007. Like, that late summer/early fall Sunday we lent our accordion to Okkervil River for their show in Montreal. I've listened to Okkervil River so much since then. They're amazing, their lyrics kill me. That evening Andrew and I drove down to Ottawa to watch an Eric's Trip reunion show before skipping the country for a Thanksgiving roadtrip. It was October and still warm enough to walk to the bar in a t-shirt. The Rilo Kiley show I went to in Montreal, the way I felt when they had a sing along to "With Arms Outstretched"? It was exhilarating. The weekend I visited Toronto and drove around in my father's car, listening to Young Marble Giants and stopping in the parking lot on the Lakeshore to look at the dirty Lake Ontario water. Those train trips between Montreal and Toronto, always starting it off with "Ys" on my Ipod, a ritual I still haven't given up. Neil Young in the car on the stretch of the Thousand Islands, off of the 401, looking at those little islands. How I now associate Stars with the first snowstorms of December. Something about the clumpy snow and cold, the warming music. I clearly remember that afternoon I walked out of theatre after seeing the Ian Curtis biopic, "Control". There was this huge rainbow stretching across St. Laurent. We walked home, stopped to buy chocolate to eat in Parc Lafontaine. Etc.

This little collection of favourite songs from 2007 has a kind of breezy, summer feel to it, like sitting out on the balcony at dusk with a bottle of white wine and good company.

LETS MAKE THE WORLD'S STUPIDEST STAND AND TRULY MEAN IT

1) I'd Rather Walk Than Run - Herman Dune

2) Plus Ones - Okkervil River

3) Helpless (live) - Neil Young

4) Microphone - Wooden Stars

5) See America Right - The Mountain Goats

6) Take Me To The Riot - Stars

7) Give A Little Love - Rilo Kiley

8) Eating Noddemix - Young Marble Giants

9) Transmission - Joy Division

10) The Park - Feist

11) Open Your Heart - Lavender Diamond

12) Goin' to Acapulco - Calexico and Jim James

13) Oh, My Darling - Basia Bulat

Love is a mix tape

There's that stereotype of white, male twenty/thirty-something rock critics: they are assholes. Not meathead jock assholes, but the kind of persistent, high-pitched-annoying-guy-that-likes-to-tell-you-why-they-are-right asshole. Sometimes it can be squeezed into something charming, but this is usually in monthly magazine column format. An entire book can be trying. Music writing is so hard, I think, because it's so easy for it to sound too cool or too cheesy or too sloppy. But sometimes it's good because of those things. Rob Sheffield's Love Is A Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song At A Time is probably a bit sloppy at parts, and there are equal doses of cheesiness and coolness, but it is also sincere, which matters most. Maybe you've already read this book - apparently it was New York Times bestseller - but I picked it up for the first time this weekend. It's about the progression of Sheffield's relationship with his wife Renee Crist, from the first time they met to the afternoon she died suddenly of a pulmanory embollism after having been married for almost 6 years. Their relationship was studded with mix tapes, each chapter of the book starting off with a track listing. They fell in love to Big Star's "Thirteen", fell asleep to "Angel" by Aerosmith, got marriage tips from James Brown. There is a heart-breaking description of Sleater-Kinney's "One More Hour" after Renee's death that made me consider that perhaps it is the saddest SK song ever, and not "A Quarter to Three".

I read the book while in Toronto, in my childhood bedroom, surrounded by all my old tapes. Unlike Sheffield, the casette tape is my least favourite audio medium - I had too many tapes wear out from overplay or get chewed up in my tape player. But it's true that the making of a mix tape implies a certain level of commitment that doesn't exist with mix CDs. (The first mix Andrew ever made for me was on cassette, and I have it in a box somewhere, but no casette player to listen to it on. It was a good mix. I remember it had "Car" by Built to Spill, and R.E.M. singing "First We Take Manhattan", a gorgeous version of Kim Deal and Robert Pollard singing "Love Hurts" and the worst Red House Painters song, "Summer Dress", which is also the best Red House Painters song to put on a tape for a girl you have a crush on, so all was forgiven.)

And so maybe I'm just feeling nostalgic in general, but it's been ages since I've even made a mix CD for anyone. It almost seems unnecessary now that you can fit albums onto one CD in MP3 format, now that you can just download the songs you want for free or, if you're too lazy to look for it, for 99 cents on Itunes. But I miss thinking about song listings and coverwork and if anyone wants to do a real mix CD trade, i.e. one with thought put into it, please let me know. I also came home with a stack of 7"s, so it's back to the basics for me these days.

Anyway, no MP3s in this entry, but I do recommend the book.

A warning: parts of the book might make your face screw up all funny, and your significant other might look over at you and ask "what's wrong?" or maybe an even more delicate "what's your problem?" and you might do something like burst into tears and say "please don't die!!!" and they might think you're a little off your rocker, but it's okay, it's a normal reaction. Not that I'm speaking from experience or anything.

Some days last longer than others

Oops, I've been away. First I was in Mexico. Then I was back in Montreal celebrating my 28th birthday. For awhile I was lamenting the wintery weather. And then, finally, now, enjoying the summery weather. First meal on the balcony! First bottle of wine on the balcony! There is something about this blooming of spring, the shedding of winter layers, the melty piles of dirty snow in back alleys. It's palpable.

Feist "1 2 3 4"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8Z-DIAthbM
You've probably already watched this a million times, but watch it again.

Snailhouse "Salvation Army"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zAqAWY9oH8
Another beautiful, watery Super 8 video by Jon Claytor.

Rilo Kiley "With Arms Outstretched"
I listened to this song a lot in Mexico, shuttling in buses between cities. Most memorable was that afternoon we took the bus from Playa del Carmen to Tulum, and the bus was so full that Caroline, Lesley and I were stuffed at the front. Lesley and I curled ourselves into the ledge in the windshield, and Caroline stood in front of us, holding a bar. If the bus had gotten into an accident, we would've been the first to die, but we weren't too worried. I listened to Rilo Kiley and looked out the window and things were just good.

Some people work very hard and still they never get it right.

It's not often that I get an excuse to post songs about quitting my job. And I do start a new job on Monday, so there will not be much wine in the morning and some breakfast at night, nor will I be set free somewhere in the middle of Montana. There won't even be much boo to the business world. But it's okay. The weather has taken a turn for something more pleasant and anyway, I will be in Mexico in a week.

Sometimes there is nothing better than a change.

Lazy Line Painter Jane - Belle and Sebastian

Big City - Merle Haggard

Maggie's Farm - Bob Dylan

Beginning To See The Light - The Velvet Underground

Back.

February is always an odd month – cold and claustrophobic. Regimented. It is the time of year where I survive on lists: what to do at work, what to do at home. There was room for one day of rest during the week and on that day I would try to cram it full with wine and good food and friends. And then throughout the week I’d try to squeeze in some other kind of luxury like, I don’t know, reading books. Mostly I would end up sleeping early and watching American Idol. There were good parts to February, like driving to Quebec City with Andrew on a Friday night, the narrow two-lane highway, listening to R.E.M. Or skating on the best rink ever at the Parc Lafontaine, just down the street from our place. But mostly I am so glad February is over and that now it’s March, and while there may be ice clinging to the asphalt, spring is in the air. It didn’t get dark until 7 today. More than anything I am ready to start the year over again, to get things up and running, and I think that yes, now is the time.

February/March – transition months. I quit my job, got a new one. I’ve been planning vacations to warm places. I’ve been looking for a typewriter. And I guess I’ve been listening to songs that calm me down a little.

I BELIEVE IN LOCOMOTION

Hatchet – Low

Migrations – Christine Fellows

It’s Gonna Take An Airplane – Destroyer

You Are My Face – Wilco

Swan Pond – Julie Doiron

Goodnight Irene – Tom Waits

Love, etc.

I am not a huge Valentines Day kind of girl, but I like the candy that comes with it, and I like the pink and red, and I like the hearts, and I like how it's a good excuse to leave work early in the middle of the busy season. The first Valentines Day I spent with Andrew was at a gay club in Halifax where we watched drag queens lip synch "My Heart Will Go On", and it was probably one of the most romantic nights I had ever had at that point in my life. Love is, you know, absurd and silly like that. And it often results in good music. One of my favourite Magnetic Fields lyrics is, "The book of love has music in it /In fact that's where music comes from/ Some of it is just transcendental /Some of it is just really dumb." So, in honour of the upcoming February 14th, here are my favourite transcendental/dumb love songs. My Valentine is in Toronto for work, so I'll listen to these songs to maintain that warm and squooshy feeling for the precious, stupid holiday (by "warm and squooshy" think: the consistency of a handful of cinnamon hearts getting melty in the bottom of your coat pocket).

WE WERE NEAT AND WE LOOKED COOL

Les Etoiles Secretes - Ida - Because driving around listening to music is still probably one of the top 5 most romantic things I like to do on dates.

I Found A Reason - The Velvet Underground - For awhile I preferred the Cat Power version, but I have completely flipped sides, mostly for those "ba ba ba"s.

This Will Be Our Year - The Zombies

There Is A Light That Never Goes Out - The Smiths - I once wrote a story that revolved completely around the two main characters listening to this song. It was an awful story that you will never read, but the thought of it is kind of funny.

Like Dylan In the Movies - Belle and Sebastian - If your heart doesn't turn into a puddle when Stuart Murdoch sings, "Yeah, you're worth the trouble and you're worth the pain", I feel sorry for you.

A Girl Like You - The Troggs - I cannot put into words how sexy I find this song.

A Case of You - Joni Mitchell - I am linking to a performance of the song from YouTube - her voice sounds amazing in it. It's still sweet, but the years of smoking have started to take their toll on her vocal chords. It's just enough to make her sound a little more whiskey + honeyed. Oh Canada.

La La La Song - Low

and finally:

Beautiful - Broken Girl: This song is early, early Julie Doiron, when she used to go by the painfully endearing moniker of "Broken Girl". I remember hearing it for the first time on a Saturday evening on that defunct CBC radio show "Real Time". I was 18, which is very close to being 10 years ago. I taped it onto cassette. I still love this song in all of its naive, sweet glory. That last line, "We were neat, and we looked cool, and somehow it was beautiful" is to this day one of the dumbest and most perfect ways to summarize the best parts of a relationship.

Goodnight Streetlight

I just got this email, and I wanted to share it with all of you.

"Hello my dear friends and acquaintances,

Raoul here.
This mass email starts with an apology: I apologize for this mass email.

I'll keep it as short as i can:

My experimental electronic-pop persona Goodnight Streetlight has released a new full-length titled "The Curfew Bell" and this is an invitation to check it out. You can read about it at the
goodnight streetlight website here where you can also download a couple free
mp3s.

For those faraway, the cd is available to order here at cdbaby.com.
If you live in vancouver, and want a copy, i'd encourage you to go to Red Cat
Records (4307 Main St.) to pick one up. It'll be available at Zulu Records on
4th probably by tomorrow. Getting one from me in person is also an option that
i'd encourage as well, especially if you are one of the friends i've been bad
and keeping in touch with. um, coffee?

i've really put a lot of work into this album, as has my
friend Aaron, (who produced it) and i really want to get it out to ears of all
shapes and sizes. so don't hesitate to forward this to people, share mp3s, buy a
copy for your great aunt, etc.

ok, a few more links then i'm
done.
myspace.com/goodnightstreetlight
the goodnight streetlight livejournal/blog

thanks for your
time!
yours,
raoul"

Raoul is a sweetheart**, and his music is amazing, so order this!

** Proof of him being a sweetheart - he invited me to sing on a track on one of his earlier albums, and uh, 99% of the population would not ask me to do so.