Music related

17/11/2010

Sexy new headphones

Have been dying for some new headphones ever since my Shures died on me six months ago and I’ve defaulted back to Apple’s crappy iPhone ones.. which is OK for very short periods.. but I use my headphones a fair bit (at work, at the gym, on the way to work and back) and the lack of quality sound gets to me especially when I’m playing Pearl Jam really loud..

Found these super Marshall ones today:

They are from the makers of the infamous Marshall amps.. it can’t be bad with such a heritage and I really like the look of them.

Marshall Major & Minor headphones available here.

And I found these Platten ones from Urbanears that are a major style upgrade to the crappy iPhone ones that comes with a mic and volume control. Plus they are foldable and have a ‘Zound’ plug that allows a friend to plug their headphones into yours to listen to whatever you are listening to – sounds great in theory! But they look really cool in a range of mono colours.. this is the Platten in Red:

Available here.

Yep they both ship to Australia :)

I was tempted to get some Skullcandy ones before but I think I’ll wait for the Marshall Minors to restock.. they are already sold out within 48 hours of release!

Absolutely Fuzzy

2/11/2010

Low, live at the Factory Theatre

One of my favourite bands dropped in on Sydney last month – a rather unassuming trio from Minnesota that pioneered the ‘slowcore’ genre. They were in the country for the Melbourne International Arts Festival, though lucky for me they dropped by this way.

Low played a mix of tracks from previous albums – Drums and Guns, Things We Lost in the Fire and The Great Destroyer including one of my fav songs Silver Rider; such an awesome track – listen to it here covered by Robert Plant, lead vocalist of Led Zeppelin.

I really enjoyed hearing the haunting vocals of Low live – Alan Sparhawk, Mimi Parker (above), husband and wife founding members – it is actually quite different from the record. Not better, not worse, just different.. but just as haunting.

And of course they played Monkey!

And closed with Dinosaur Act

It was actually a really good crowd; as the boy observed the people there were a good mix, and slightly older than the average gig crowd. Also it wasn’t packed out, which was great. We found a good spot at the back to chill out with our beers.

I didn’t manage to take any good pictures, but here’s one of them all together:

Would have been nice if they had played this song (Slide) though unlikely since it was from 1994! Still, brilliant, and Mimi Parker still pretty much sounds the same:

Steve Garrington, bassist.

Glad I got to cross Low off my list. I only have a handful of other acts I want to see live – on the top of that list is Radiohead. Can someone please bring them to Sydney? Pretty please?

21/12/2009

I can’t pretend I need to defend some part of me from you

This has got to be in my Top 10 favourite tracks of all time.

Can’t take credit for finding this – nickfong introduced me to their Bright Lights album a while ago. This track in particular has been played just a little over 200 times on my iTunes over the last two years. Haven’t listened to this in a a few months but just dug it out recently and fell in love with it all over again. Highly underrated, The New has one of the best basslines I’ve ever heard on a track.

There is so much texture and emotion in this song. Lyrically it is simple, but musically the plaintive beginning tells a story of love, heartbreak, regret, possibilities which slowly becomes more discordant and at the end the repetitive tonal guitar riffs and drums come together in an outburst of sadness and frustration. Lately I have been feeling a lot like this. And Paul Bank’s voice is just sublime, comparable to the beautiful haunting sadness that Radiohead master so well.

The rest of the album is pretty stellar. Plenty of mad bass, relentless drumming, stunning tonal shifts and more of those amazing vocals. Have come to appreciate the drumming so much more since I started picking up drums. Am also in love with Untitled, Obstacle 1, Obstacle 2, PDA, Leif Erikson, NYC and the rest of the album are always on repeat when I put it on. Also, Paul Banks has released a solo album earlier this year under the name Julian Plenti called Julian Plenti Is…Skyscraper which sounds a lot like Interpol. I’m just so in love with his voice!

Anyway. These are the lyrics:

I wish I could live free.
I hope it’s not beyond me.
Settling down it takes time.
One day we’ll live together,
and life will be better.
I have it here yeah in my mind.
Baby, you know someday you’ll slow grow.

And baby, my heart’s been breaking.

I gave a lot to you.
I take a lot from you too.
You slave a lot for me.
Guess you could say I gave you my edge.

But I can’t pretend I need to defend some part of me from you.
I know I’ve spent some time all lying.
I can’t pretend I don’t need to defend some part of me from you.
I know I’ve spent some time all lying.

You’re looking alright tonight.
I think we should go.
You’re looking alright tonight.
I think we should go.

10/12/2009

Life at 00:41

In the midst of packing away my Winter gear and pulling out more Summer stuff. My living room is in complete disarray despite me spending 3 hours cleaning up the apartment yesterday. Argh. I have no idea where to put all the extra stuff I seem to have amassed, and my apartment despite being a good size for one, has a massive lack of storage. Of course there isn’t anywhere to put my shoes either, so the extra bit of storage I have has been taken up by my shoe racks. It is kind of baffling, I’ve only been here for 18 months! Looks like I am headed to consignment outlets and St Vinnie’s tomorrow. Good thing I have a day off from work.

Today was my last djembe class for the year. Some people have asked me about these drum classes I’ve been taking. This is the website and I’m plugging this because of how much fun I’ve had in the last eight weeks! I was first introduced to these drums at a workshop at RWMF, then subsequently by a friend in KL. It’s a great introduction to percussion, and they operate Australia-wide. If you’re making a new year’s resolution to try something new, check it out :)

Speaking of music, so the bass player I mentioned in the last post hit me back this morning. The first line of this email reads: “WOW that IS random!” (LOL). He informs me that the band are no longer together, however he is still playing so that is also awesome.

20/10/2009

November Rain

I heard a guy playing this tonight at Hyde Park while waiting for some friends. Came home to listen to it again but for some strange reason I seem to have misplaced the MP3.

This song means so many things to me and it is bloody epic!