Talkin' Death Letter Blues

YouTube is the gift that keeps on giving. Spend 20 minutes on there just clicking on random videos and you're bound to find gems like this. This is an old blues singer called Son House performing "Death Letter Blues" in 1967. The White Stripes redid this song almost 40 years later but I never knew that their version was a cover until now. Though I love the White Stripes, there's just no beating a performance like this. I love how he just stands up there by himself and sings with so much soul and honesty like a prophet of old coming to tell us all to quit our wicked ways. I've always loved how blues and soul speak so openly and honestly about real pain as a way of taking away it's power. It's like the old story about how if you put a name to something then it's not so scary. Except with the blues, it's almost an exorcism, where you sing about it so you can almost relive the pain so you can know for sure that it can't hurt you anymore. Anyway, I'll stop waxing philosophically about the blues and just let you enjoy the video.

Soon

I opened my email the other day to see that I had an email from one of my favorite bands, the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I opened it eagerly to see the following:

That was it. That was the entire email. I guess this is their way of letting people know that their first album in 5 years is soon to come out. But...I already knew that. So, thanks for the email guys but next time send me some new music instead.

High School Is Such A Serious Thing - These Problems Matter

I listen to the Edge every morning and they often have teenagers who call in and want to talk about how hard their lives are. The common complaints are, "My boyfriend is..." or "My girlfriend is..." The guys on the morning show almost always play the song that is at the end of this clip. It cracks me up everytime. Now, you all can sing it to the teenagers in your lives!

The Revival of Folk Music- Fleet Foxes and Monsters of Folk

There is a current trend in music that's been happening over the last 5 years where a lot of bands have started to shift towards folk rock. Two such bands that encompass this are Fleet Foxes and Monsters of Folk. Instead of boring you with my insights, take a listen for yourself (skip the ads at the beginning). The first is a band called Fleet Foxes that have such beautiful harmonies as evidenced by the first song they play (or sing-there's no instruments). The second band is a band called Monsters of Folk that is a super group of sorts made up with four guys that became famous by playing in other bands but shared a common love for folk music. They, too, have beautiful harmonies. Hope you enjoy.

Christina's Song

Christina's Song is a song that I did not write. It was written by our bassist and singer Kevin Darrell and performed by our band Shambala. The bad thing about naming any song after a girl is the fact that if you start dating a different girl, you can't play the song anymore which is why we haven't played this song in a very long time. It's a shame because I always thought that it was one of our better songs. Kevin recorded all of the vocal parts and I've always loved the back-up vocals on the pre-chorus and chorus. If you listen closely, you can hear me whiff the guitar on the intro. We talked about re-doing it but decided we were too lazy and pizza was more important. I'm still a bit embarrassed by it but let's argue that it adds "character" to the song and leave it at that. Hope you enjoy.

09 Christina's Song by iceap12

TV on the Radio - You

I love this video, I'm not sure why. But, sometimes that's why art is so great because it doesn't always have to be explained. It's funny, sad and poignant and I absolutely love the song. My favorite lyric is, "In our dreams, we were making it right." How many times have all of us felt that way? Too many times than we care to remember.

Hope you enjoy the video.

A Part of You

For a very long time now, I've wanted to share some of the music I've written over the years with all of you. Today, I finally see that dream come to fruition. Using a new free service called Soundcloud, I've uploaded one of my personal favorites called, "A Part of You". This song is one of my favorites because I made my wife sing with me on it. I wrote it back in 2007 after seeing Juno, whose soundtrack was dominated by songs that have a similar sound to this with couples seemingly trading verses and coming back together for the chorus. To this day, it's still one of the easiest times I've ever had writing a song. I think I wrote the whole thing in 10-15 minutes. Even the first line that came to me was, in my opinion, the best. "You've got me on/a part of you/that I can't get off/no matter what I do." There's something about the innocence of the lyric that I've always liked. The rest of the lyrics have both of us trading jabs at each other (I tell her she has too much crap, she tells me my skin is rough and I snore too loud-all of which, I might add, were common complaints we had with each other at the time) but then ultimately coming to the realization that despite all of this, we're both still sticking with one another. I hope you enjoy it and look for more music from me in the future!

10 A Part Of You by iceap12