Happy Birthday Mini!

Today is the 50th Anniversary of the Mini! It's a fantastic little car, one that has been revolutionary in terms of engineering and marketing, with broad popular appeal. As usual with things like this, I've done a writeup here.

I absolutely love my car, as I’ve written about before. The entire experience of driving it differs from anything that I’ve driven before, and I often will break out into a grin when I’m driving along. I love throwing Maxine into corners at speed, accelerating along straits and simply enjoying owning a car. I don’t believe that a car should be boring, or simply just to go from point A to B during commutes. That just seems dull, and that just seems like a waste.

Happy Birthday Mini. Here’s to another 50 years.

Here's a playlist of some good driving songs that I've collected for the occasion. I've always seen the Mini as fast and quirky, and I think that these songs fit the Mini's character quite well.

The Shock of Lightning - Oasis
Mercy - Duffy
She Sells Sanctuary - The Cult
Shuffle Your Feet - Back Rebel Motorcycle Club
Queen Bitch - David Bowie
Young Folks - Peter Bjorn and John
Venus - Shocking Blue
You Get What You Give - New Radicals
This Time Tomorrow - The Kinks
Hazey Jane II - Nick Drake
On Days Like These - Matt Monroe

Hype - Drive

It pours, man, it pours

It's raining today, and the weather of late here has been very dreary. It's one of those days.

Come Wind, Come Rain - Vashti Bunyan
Have You Seen The Rain? - Creedence Clearwater Revival
It Never Rains in Southern California - Albert Hammond
Rainy Day People - Gordon Lightfoot
River Man - Nick Drake

Hype - Buy - Look

Winter Acoustic

Winter is finally here in Vermont. For some reason, I'm equating winter with acoustic rock, so here you go.

Hazelton - Bon Iver
Westward Bound - Fairline Parkway
Love and Some Verses - Iron & Wine
Rages of Babylon - Joseph Arthur
Northern Sky - Nick Drake
I Still Care For You - Ray LaMontagne
Saro - Samamidon
Falling Stars - Sarah Siskind
Hazy Shade of Winter - Simon & Garfunkle

Hype - Support

Artist Evolution: Nick Drake

I'm going to do something that I haven't done in a long time - an Artist Evolution Feature. The artist that I'm choosing for this is the late Nick Drake, one of my absolute favorite musicians of all time, and one whom I hold in especially high regard. Drake first captured my attention when I listened to the Garden State soundtrack when that was released. At first, I didn't really pay much attention to th song, and it wasn't until a couple years later, when I came across a couple other songs that I really began to listen to his works.

Drake was born on June 18th, 1948 in Burma, where he lived until the age of two, when his family moved to England - Tanworth-In-Arden. He played music from a fairly young age, but it was when he turned 16 that he turned to the guitar and began writing his own music shortly there after. He attended college in Cambridge where he was noticed and encouraged to sign to Island records, where he began to tour and record music. During this time, he was reclusive, and stopped performing in public in 1970. His first record was Five Leaves Left, released in 1969, which was followed up by Bryter Layter in 1970.

Drake was a troubled young man, and after submitting Pink Moon in 1972, he claimed that he was done with music. A year later, however, he began writing again, but a year later, in 1974, he was found dead in his bed, apparently of an overdose of anti-depressants. A collection of his music was released in 1979, Fruit Tree, and in 1994, Way to Blue, a best-of collection was released. Finally, in 2007, a collection of rarities and masters was collected and released in a two disc set called Family Tree.

Drake's music has been extremely influential to a number of artists, and has found a resurgence in the past couple years, thanks to the use of his music in commercials and the aforementioned Garden State Soundtrack. One of my earlier features, Artist Comparison, featured Nick Drake against newcomer Alexi Murdoch, and I suspect that Jose Gonzalez and numerous others have been influenced, while artists such as Tim Reynolds, My Morning Jacket, Denison Witmer and Norah Jones have all covered his songs.

Five Leaves Left contains some of my favorite Drake songs - Time Has Told Me, River Man, Day Is Done and Way to Blue. This introduction features somber vocals and lyrics, and the delicate work with his guitar. I'm really reminded of a rainy day when I listen to this, but I'm never put in a depressed mood while listening to it. This album seems down, but it always keeps me positive.

Bryter Layter has quite a different feel from its predecessor. There's a lot more emphasis on strings right from the get go, with Drake's guitarwork cutting right through in an elegant fashion. There's horns, electric guitar and and overall richer and more energetic sound. There's more life here.

Pink Moon is more of a return to the sound of Five Leaves Left - Drake recorded it solo, and there is an incredibly stark and lone feeling to the entire album. What hasn't changed over all of the albums here have been the level of songwriting - there is an incredible unity between the vocals and guitar work, the culmination of his prior albums and the peak of his career.

The remainder of Drake's music is mixed, with several collections being released after his death. I'm particularly fond of Made to Love Magic, while I'm not terribly thrilled with Family Tree. There are several very, very good songs here, but others, unsurprisingly, aren't finished, and are merely demos that have an incredibly rough feel to them that doesn't nearly match up to his other works. What it does do, however, is give some insight into his personality, when he speaks, or when he sings with his mother.

It's a shame that he died at such a tragic, young age. Drake, in my opinion, was not just one of the world's greatest singer-songwriters, he was a great poet, and with his death, we only saw a glimpse of his potential.

River Man - Nick Drake
Hazy Jane II - Nick Drake
Place To Be - Nick Drake
Three Hours - Nick Drake
Blues Run the Game (Jackson C Frank) - Nick Drake

Hype - Buy - Look - Support

My Mix

I can't think of a good title for this mix of songs. I was fooling around with play lists on iTunes - I swear, it's a compulsion sometimes, when I came up with the first five songs, when I realized that I had something good here. When I got home from work, I pulled another dozen songs together to come up with this final list. I think that it's the best play list that I've come up with in a while. Let me know what you think:

Everybody Knows - Ryan Adams
Hang Around - Gregory Douglass
When The Pain Dies Down - Chris Stills
Pagan Angel and a Borrowed Car - Iron & Wine
Hard Sun - Eddie Vedder
Good Man - Josh Ritter
Who You Are - Cary Brothers
Pressure Suit - Aqualung
Time Is A Runaway - The Alternate Routes
Toy Soldiers - Carbon Leaf
See The World - Gomez
Trouble - Ray LaMontagne
Place To Be - Nick Drake

Have a good weekend! Next week, regular features & an announcement for a new feature.

Hype - Buy

The Best ... Best of Albums

This year, there were three albums that really stood out for me for they were some of the best best of compilations and re-masters of some really good artists.

The first one released this year was Nick Drake's Family Tree, a collection of rare takes and alternate songs that have never before been heard. Over his short time working on music, he did quite a bit - the 29 song album is a really, really good insight behind his albums.

Black Mountain Blues - Nick Drake

The second one was the fantastic Dylan, a compilation of Bob Dylan's music over his entire career. This was released in a couple of sets - a one disc release and a three disc release, as well as a special edition with a couple of DVDs. Starting from the beginning and going on to his more recent releases, this one just blue me away.

Subterranean Homesick Blues - Bob Dylan

And lastly, Mothership was just released, right on the heels of a reunion concert from one of Hard Rock's best bands ever. I've only had a chance to go through a couple of tracks, but this is another fantastic gathering of some of their favorites.

Black Dog - Led Zeppelin

Hype - Buy

On the Road Again...

I'm headed out of state again for multiple hours, so here's a mix of some of my favorite travelling-themed music.

On the Road Again - Willie Nelson
Carefree Highway - Gordon Lightfoot
Stop the Bus - Grace Potter & The Nocturnals
Wandering 'Round - Carbon Leaf
Three Hours - Nick Drake
Ventura Highway - America
See The World - Gomez

Have a good weekend!

Hype - Buy

Artist Comparison

Acoustic-Folk has become fairly popular in recent years, with the popularity of the genre getting more noticed as certain singers are picked as the hip thing to listen to, often times, as radio stations pick up on certain tracks or more often, as popular television shows or movies finding some real gems and dumping them on an unsuspecting public. The following two artists have both really surfaced recently due to the media attention. While this is a good thing, as more people listen to them, it's a bit of a shame that they haven't really come through on their own. However, they're out there, so that's a plus.

Both Alexi Murdoch and Nick Drake have come to my attention through soundtracks. Murdock's song Orange Sky was featured on an episode of House, MD (A show with fine music tastes) while Drake's song One of These Things First came to me via the fantastic Garden State soundtrack. (Incidently, Orange Sky was also in that movie, but not on the soundtrack.)
There's a number of similarities between these two. The first is that they're both from the United Kingdom. Drake was raised in England, while Murdoch hails from Scotland. Indeed, this similarity has been mentioned in various articles about the two. Alexi Murdoch is undoubtably influenced to some degree by Nick Drake.

Their sound is amazingly similar to one another. Solo guitarists, with the use of picking on the guitars is their matching style, and their vocal work is also fairly similar - on the mid-high level. A number of their songs tend to be fairly laid back, calm and soothing, the perfect thing to listen to after a long day. I have a fixed mental image of riding home on the train from Oxford set to Three Hours. Similarly, I have the song Orange Sky rooted in my memories that are associated with my time in England.
There are some smaller differences between the artists - they're not clones of one another. Alexi tends to experiment a little more with some songs, such as 12 and Shine. Nick Drake tends to incorporate more insturments into some of his songs. But for all practical means, they're very similar, which is a good thing, as they have a fantastic sound between the two of them. I'm hoping that someday, I'll come across a Nick Drake cover by Alexi Murdoch. That'd be really cool.

Place To Be - Nick Drake

Song For You - Alexi Murdoch

Three Hours - Nick Drake

Orange Sky - Alexi Murdoch

Hype - Buy - Look - Look Again

To Begin

This is something that I've wanted to do for a while, and maybe contribute my own music tastes to the 'net. I've had a chance to visit a number of music blogs over the past year or so, and I've come across some many fine ones, most notably, iguessimfloating.blogspot.com, which I've gotten a couple of ideas from, and mainly seen that as a guide for how to do that. In addition, hypem.com has been a valuable resource for tracking down other artists.
While I'll be placing music online, I do not do so to simply give music away. It's not mine to do that with. But, I do put it online so that others might also enjoy it, and with some hope, get some people hooked on the music that I like and thus add to the contributing pool. If you like the music, go buy it from the artist. Any time I put up a link for a song, I'll also put up a link for the album, and the artist's webpage. If you like the band, tell people about them.
Should anyone have a problem with the music that I put up, legally, please send me an e-mail and I will promptly take the song in question down, within a day or so.
In addition, if anyone has any suggestions for songs or anything of that nature, feel free likewise send me an e-mail.

Beginnings, Chicago - Square One, Coldplay - One of These Things First, Nick Drake

Buy - Hype