"Electric feel" by MGMT

I hate to be so meta that I have to talk about a specific song.

But I do.

I love the song "Electric feel."

If you've ever heard of MGMT, you know that their first single off the album Oracular Spectacular was "Time to pretend." It's okay, but it isn't the best song from the album.

I don't know if I could pick one, I loved this album so much.

But I do know that I love "Electric feel."

The biggest thing it's got going for it is the fact that it's sung in falsetto. Every "pop" song sung in falsetto has this certain....feel...about it. They all seem to be seductive. Creepy, sometimes, but seductive.

This song oozes seduction. And it's lounge lizard vibe kills me every time.

I can't not love it.

This just in: New feature on the sidebar

I decided to keep my at-work playlist in the sidebar. I also decided to list the albums by the week.

So, each week brings a new playlist...

If I'm adventurous, I might even rate them at the end of the week.

Don't hold your breath.

Imogen Heap, or, Mrs. Dude doesn't like electronica

The Dude and I have notoriously different tastes in music sometimes. It's bizarre how much our tastes are either exactly the same or completely opposite.

It can, I think, be boiled down to the fact that The Dude is a music person and I am a lyrics person. Unfortunately, there are precious few times when those two aspects of an artist's work overlap.

My biggest complaint about electronica is that lyrics sometimes get tossed by the wayside in favor of cool musical flourishes. And, in my mind, that simply won't do. If, as an artist, you're more interested in music than lyrics, create instrumental music. No one will think less of you, I swear. Work it out, musically, and add some tracks with lyrics. At least, that way, you don't have to pretend that you care about creating something with lyrical integrity.

The Dude will tell you that sometime last summer, I went on a electronica buying-spree that consisted of me buying two of the albums that he's enjoyed immensely but that I haven't touched. One of them is Speak for yourself by Imogen Heap.

Two days ago, I was scrolling through Black Francis, my iPod, seeking out music that I haven't touched in a while. I wanted (nay, needed) to stop listening to the same three albums over and over again.

And then it happened.

I found Imogen Heap.

I like Speak for yourself. It's atmospheric and ethereal without veering off into the land of Bjork.

For the Bjork fans who might be offended by this statement, ask yourselves, is she not crazy musically-speaking? You know I'm right...

Heap seems to do the impossible--she blends interesting music with complex lyrics. I can listen to the entire album and not get grumpy that she's just mailing-it-in lyrically. And she gives me something interesting melodically.

Brilliant!

So, it turns out The Dude was right. Imogen Heap is something we can both agree on...

Kanye West doesn't care about festival goers

I went to Bonnaroo.

It was awesome.

I could tell you about how I was 20 feet away from Tegan and Sara or how I was 30 feet away from Jack Johnson.

I could tell you how Against Me! made me fall in love with rock and rage.

I could tell you how Drive-By Truckers' early morning wakeup call (It was 12:45 pm) made my heart pound.

I could tell you how Chris Rock made me laugh.

I could tell you how Metallica made me bang my head.

I could tell you how B.B. King wasn't as good as I'd imagine he would be.

I could tell you how Jack Johnson is perfect on a summer evening, as the sun is going down and the breeze is picking up just slightly.

I could tell you how Pearl Jam made me fall in love with them all over again.

But, I won't.

Instead, I'll tell you that what I learned from Bonnaroo is that Kanye West is, pardon my language, kind of a dick.

And how I'm never going to one of his shows again or buying any of his albums or supporting him in any way.

The Dude and I didn't stick around to see the Kanye West debacle. After Pearl Jam (who, by the way, only went over 45 minutes...), we caught a few minutes of Sigur Ros and a few minutes of Lupe Fiasco before trekking back the hour to Nashville.

When we arrived at the 'Roo on Sunday morning, nobody was talking about West's show. Nobody. I figured that that meant that it was either really good or really bad. It wasn't until the next day that I read the Spin story I linked to in the last paragraph.

I'm not sure who's fault it was that things turned out the way it did. And I don't think it was very nice of the artists who played the next day to call him out (I'm looking at you, Rogue Wave and Robert Randolph) without knowing the whole story either.

Then West puts this gem on his blog. I can understand his passion at wanting everyone to get their facts straight, but not once does he say "I'm really sorry that things ended up this way." If he had, I might've been able to retain some respect for him.

Instead, it was just more of the 'it's everyone else's fault! not mine!' we've come to expect from him. It's more finger pointing, more hating, more playing the victim.

More inflated ego.

As Chris Rock said, 'it takes a lot of Kanye injections...'

I can respect West's position--if you have something you do well, you want to the opportunity to do it. Putting West on at 7:45 opposite Jack Johnson was a bad idea for a lot of reasons, not the least of which (as West himself points out) is that you can't do a glow-in-the-dark show in the daylight.

I can also respect the fact that, as mad as they were, the audience had no right to damage West's equipment or his stage. If he is to be believed, the stage was so wet that he risked falling. Think about what a disaster that would've been...

But this whole refusal to take responsibility isn't sitting well with me. West says it's PJ's fault. West says it's Bonnaroo's fault. Bonnaroo refuses to issue a statement taking responsibility. Everyone is passing the buck.

West had the opportunity to mend fences and build bridges and yada, yada, yada. But he didn't. He couldn't be bothered. Bonnaroo simply didn't matter that much to him.

So, yeah...I'm kind of done with Kanye West for a while.

Two books I read recently, or, Mrs. Dude is lazy

I could write a separate post about each of these books. But I won't. And you can't make me.

1. Animal vegetable, miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

It took me all of May to read this book. I'm not sure if that speaks well of Kingsolver's ability to draw me into her story or poorly of her inability to keep me hooked. I enjoyed Kingsolver's story of moving her family from Tuscon to Virginia and, in the process, deciding to spend a year growing as much of their own food as possible and supplementing what they couldn't grow with locally produced food. Each chapter documents a month in her family's life, as each month presents different challenges for the family. Additionally, each chapter contains a short piece by Kingsolver's husband, a biologist, and her eldest daughter, a college student.

I enjoyed the book, but sometimes felt like Kingsolver was nagging me to make better decisions about my food consumption. If you enjoy the book, though, be sure to visit Kingsolver's website for more recipes and information.

2. Lock and key by Sarah Dessen

I love Dessen's writing, and this book is no exception. I will say, though, that it's not the best jumping-off point for those who have never read anything by her. What I love about Dessen's style is its lightness. She is more interested, it seems to me, in exploring the connections that people have rather than the issues they face. In this case, Dessen tries to do both and it doesn't work as smoothly as it could. Still, I found Ruby and her family to be engaging characters. And I was sad when the book ended. I did end up wishing that she'd spent more time working through the plot from the beginning instead of including so much exposition and then racing to finish the story. Overall, though, it was everything I'd anticipated it to be.

Vampire Weekend (by Vampire Weekend)

As a general rule, I'm not that into bands that are critics' darlings. It's not that I want to be a hipster who likes all the stuff that the critics don't like. It's that most of the time, I don't think the critics are right.

As I get older, though, I'm starting to learn that being opposed to critics' darlings means eating my words when I realize that they're actually pretty good.

I'm looking at you Against Me!, Radiohead, Arctic Monkeys, and more that I'm forgetting.

But don't worry, I'm sure The Dude will chime in with more that I've forgotten when he reads this.

Anyway, with our trip to Bonaroo fast approaching, I decided to start listening to the stuff we own by bands who are playing. My approach has been to take artists day-by-day as they'll appear on the lineup. Thurday has MGMT and Vampire Weekend appearing in the evening, so I pulled out the Vampire Weekend disc.

It's fun and quirky. I like it a lot.

No doubt you've heard their single "A-Punk" in heavy rotation on MTV, unless you don't watch MTV. But let's face it, you're as addicted to their America's Next Top Model reruns as I am so you do. Or what about The Paper? Or A Shot at Love 2: Electric Boogaloo?

No? Okay then...never mind.

Ahem.

Anyway, Vampire Weekend's major label debut is fun and channels both Graceland-era Paul Simon and Phantom Planet, you know...that band the kid from Rushmore is in?

Lyrically, it's pretty nimble, though I was glad that there were only 11 songs because it started to sound precious by the end. They don't move much past the experiences that twenty-somethings have, and their songs certainly aren't political. But, they also don't fall into the Maroon5 trap of being sugary sweet love ballads, either. It's just typical, normal, everyday stuff--like a song about a guy who's tasked with killing some vampires.

And sonically, the album shows that Vampire Weekend has a range beyond just a guitar, a bass, and a drum kit. I liked the range they showed.

The album is certainly worth a listen. It's fun, it's quirky, and it's short. So even if you hate it, you're not stuck listening to it for long!

WOXY's Modern Rock 500

I am kind of in love with WOXY. The few times that The Dude and I made our way into Ohio, we longed to get into range of WOXY because it reminded us (well, him really....) of the days when college rock radio stations ruled the world.

WOXY used to be a radio station in Cincinnati. Well, it still is if you have HD Radio.

Mostly, though, it has reinvented itself as a web-based radio station that plays modern rock with the kind of panache and flair you don't see these days in most terrestrial-based radio stations. Music like the kind that WOXY plays is usually reserved for satellite radio.

You can get WOXY in the "radio" portion of iTunes. It's listed under the "alternative" stations, I think.

Anyway, WOXY is having a Modern Rock 500 this weekend to coincide with the running of the Indy 500.

As an aside...I'm from Indianapolis and I've never been to the Indy 500. We used to kind of hide out until it was over since the town is kind of over-run with over-zealous racing fans.

If you consider yourself a fan of modern rock, you should try to catch some of WOXY's Modern Rock 500. It's awesome to hear a song and go 'oh! yeah! I remember that!'

So far I've done that with Big Country, Tom's Diner, and a ton more. Right now? Portishead.

So yeah, check it out.