Once a week we'll be featuring a post from CardboardSmile.com, the internet home of our good friend AMitch. Check his site out for his humor and insights, not to mention great music. Thanks Mitch.
If you’ve been looking for a summer song to get you pumped about sunny Sunday brunches and swimming pools, I think I’ve found a good one. Tennis released “Petition” earlier this year, and Vacationer came along with a little sugar boost to make it dance worthy. Thanks to both parties. I’ll be on the roof with a hula-hoop.
PS. If you haven’t heard my favorite Tennis song, or my favorite Vacationer Song, just click those links.
It's a celebration people. Amitch, one of our best buddies and creator of the upcoming Jamandahalf shirts, comes by with a true gem. After almost a year of giving him shit for his first post, Mitch comes through with his trademark wit, humor, and great taste in music. We hope the jams keep coming. Enjoy.
I first heard the Cold War Kids in a hospital bed in Memphis, Tennessee. I traded CDs with the nurses, attempting to spread indie rock through the South via cute 24 year-olds with fat diamonds already sitting on their ring fingers. I felt like God, or an American in a small Brazilian village handing out technology that would revolutionize their way of life. I didn’t always get good music in return - that was until I met Stacie. Nurse Stacie has a husband who was/is on point with new indie tunes. He probably writes a music blog and torrents b-sides and live shows, sucking all that a song offers out in couple plays, like they are otter pops in a never-ending Costco box. Needless to say, Stacies mixes were fresh to death. Not literally, I’m still alive.
During my re-acquaintance with the Cold War Kids this last summer, I fell in love with We Used to Vacation, an eerie song that tells the story of alcoholic father who fails his family. The lyrics are real, everyday, and unglamorous. They build a circumstance you can imagine might affect anyone: drunk fuck ups – with a family to apologize to. Yet when the drums slow and the guitar sits idol for a chorus that states, “I told my wife and children I’d never take another drink as long as I live/Yet it sounds so soothing, to mix a gin and sink into oblivion,” I get nersty case of goose bumps. And then a subsequent bridge that feels like a horror show guitar solo, paired with a rattlesnake maraca that reminds me of the wedding massacre in Kill Bill I.
I can’t always handle the voice of Cold War vocalist, Nathan Willet, but in this song, his predicament and jarring portrayal of apathetic sincerity seals a deal with suburban alcoholic fathers from Vancouver, Washington to Claremont, California. Hence: Jam and a Half.
And we're back! After a brutal couple weeks, we have made our triumphant return to keep the jams coming. We got some great ones on the way, and a design change or two, so keep checking back for only the best of jams. Love, Moose and Leks
This first decade of the 21st century was one of turmoil and excess: excessive profits on Wall Street, excessive body counts in aimless wars, and most relevant to this blog, excessive music. What we saw this decade was an emphasis on mega-producers, altered vocals, and beats which either wanted to dazzle you with their intricacies, or purposefully lose you in their muck. This is changing. With the recession hopefully reining in Wall Street and all the CMC grads making crazy bank to a more realistic and legitimate level, we also have seen a backlash against some of recent trends in music. Jay Z announced that autotune was dead, and there seems to be a reawakening of music with an importance on the music itself.
Bon Iver is a perfect example of this new sound. Over a simple but haunting acoustic riff, he sings about the loss of losing his love, his pain and sadness; but nothing in the song is overdone. All the excess has been cut away, and we are left with a stirring moment of time. Bon Iver’s debut album, For Emma, Forever Ago, is a staggering album, and has jams for days. It’s statement lies in its understatement, its beauty in its simplicity, and re: stacks is a ideal introduction to his music.
Bon Iver made a classic jam and half, and this song provides the perfect backdrop for our good buddy AMitch’s video project for a class of his. Composed of over 2,000 pictures in stop motion, Shark Bite Luv Frog tells a story that we will never forget. While I will let the video speak for itself, it is clear that Amitch’s creativity has no bounds, and this guy is going places. I am proud to call him one of my closest friends, and although cancer might have taken away some of his hair and slowed his first step down a little, nothing can take away the strength and soul of this guy. While we miss seeing him balling on the court, we're looking forward to seeing even bigger things that will, and have, come off of it. Enjoy.
