apologies, for losing my cool

a certain vintage never gets old

How did the duo from Bird And The Bee meet? well according to allmusic they met one day by accident when sweet eyed Inara George needed a pianist for an album she was working on. A friend started to call in contacts, and in walked Greg Kurstin.

You know how sometimes, in very rare moments of time, you meet a person who shares so much so with you, be it poetry or chainsaws ( who knows?), that for the next two hours both of you can do nothing but talk and amaze each other?

Well it was like that between Inara and Greg, just that it was all exchanged in music. and as quoted from their myspace:" nerded out for a couple of hours playing every song they knew.. and then wrote and recorded a record together."

It is always the things that you dont expect that bears the most surprising fruit, that I always never fail to continue to discover. A bit of initiative on your own part cant be lacking too of course. The Smiths would never have formed if Morrissey did not one day decided to go up to Johnny Marr's door and knock just like that.

Anyway the Bird and the Bee would probably fall somewhere into indie electronic/pop ( which im so much more comfortable with than the headbanging type). So if youre a fan of frou frou/ sia/ feist/ psapp/ ivy and the like you probably already have a sort of idea. Just a couple mornings back I managed to sneak The Bird And The Bee onto the shopfloor's airplay and this girl suddenly asks me whether that was Lily Allen playing, I never really thought of both them the same way, but I guess you can call them similar if you are really so inclined to with the quirky and stylized electronic beats.

The album and EP are really starting to grow on me as the year draws to an end. It's not too heavy nor pensive, neither is it too light and sugar sweet. Furthermore a fair amount of the songs are solid gems, far too many for me to post up here but are terribly memorable nonetheless. It kinda captures the ' indie sound' well ( whatever that means), a particular blend of laid back intensity that is really very attractive to be around and with.

Be sure to check them out on their myspace for more of their songs, and feel free to ask me online for more of their stuff.

The Bird And The Bee - Polite Dance Song

and yeh, im definitely saving up for when they come to Singapore some early next year. Them and feist. Perhaps KT tunstall too if I have enough to spare.

wont you open your eyes

For awhile I thought " Dear Prudence" was a Siouxsie & the Banshess original. Well awhile was a couple of years, until one day I leafed through the liner notes and found * written by lennon/mccartney. It did not change the way I liked her version of it, though I have not listened to the Beatles's original until just last week when I got the White Album.

The lyrics are simple and straightforward, a persuasion of a kid to come out of the house and well, just play in the garden. But with Lennon's deft pen and perhaps a coincidence of the young girl's name to be Prudence, the lyrics take many a level if one is so inclined to read it that way.

As a mark of a truly good cover, Siouxsie does not simply imitate but she does it her way. One may expect the fuzzy overlay of electric guitars to be chaotic and smothering, but it never really does tip that way, and with her voice the simple sincerity, which I think was what the original was about, goes along very nicely.

So why did I not see that in Prudence of 'Across The Universe' until Jas pointed it out after the film? Sure she may not exactly be completely essential to the plot, but some things exist because they just are like that. I suppose sincerity is not simply about reducing things to a bit that *what* really matters, though in a sense it is; a lot of it, perhaps most of it, is from an understanding of *why* that one last bit matters from all the other things around it and this is what is expressed to another.

So Prudence may actually have no bearing on any of the characters in the film. But that's not the point really is it? For people like her really do exist, and if you are so inclined, but im still not fully convinced, you can take Jas' view that she's there as a sole bastion of unrequitedness in a film that bursts ( like strawberry) from so much of everything else.

Siouxsie And The Banshees - Dear Prudence (Cover)

there's a light in your eyes and it never goes out

right enough about the electronica. I've come to realize that I kinda do enjoy house dance music like Daft Punk and the softer kind like Goldfrapp, but there is no way I can stand up to the pounding pulses of the real club stuff that the dance maestro colleague of mine likes to put on in the evenings at hmv. It got so bad that I actually had a headache come on, and it is kinda seriously distracting to devote half your brain to damping down the pulsating beats while helping out the next customer. Hm.

I suppose im simply not the hard clubber kind of person, the sort more who rather much prefers just settling down for a warm drink for the night and just talking till that magic 3am time where everyone starts blabbing no matter their real shell in the day. And this I just did last night, with three of the most memorable people I've met while at work. Grace, Jenn, and her sister Jasmine. I did mention in my last post about writing up the interesting people I've met at work, and the reason why it has taken so long is because well, it was already baked and done in my head, but as things go I was not expecting two people to walk in late one night just last week asking to try out the Apples In Stereo, Arcade Fire and Rilo Kiley ( was it her? i cant remember you have to jog my memory) and well, one thing just led to another. Thankfully we were winding down for the night then, so I could just hang around the counter. It's not everyday you meet someone who takes in so readily to the sparseness of Taken by Trees and the liveliness of Camera Obscura so equally.

For all the over analytical semi brooding ( must be the weather) observations in the last post, the people who walk town arent all just like that. It's always amazing how much a person opens up just as soon as one decides to make just a bit effort and take a small interest in their interests. If not then perhaps I 'd not have had met that 80s music loving fair air stewardness who really did not look like she was was from abu dubai. You know she's someone special when she brazenly leans over the counter and exclaims " Smile! Stop frowning!" to a colleague of mine who I think, is sort of hardened after close to a decade helping people from the other side. Hah and even now I cant stop myself from smiling when I remember her humming the tune to UB40's " red red wine" in a game of guess the tune.

Or how about that old man who walked in asking for our selection of karaoke hits and me finding out that the reason he was looking for " quando quando quando" was it was requested at a pub/club he frequented because he just loved taking the stage on open mic nights and singing for the whole fun of it. His wife attested personally of his singing prowess to me while he went off to the toilet, and that I believe is proof enough.

Maybe I'd not have met then, Scott the American who was more than happy to share his love for the Beatles when I on a whim, decided to ask which album of theirs he would recommend to someone who has never really got into their music before. " Ah," he says, " there's no doubt it's this.", showing me the album I just hunted down for him on the first floor. He told me how he owns the original vinyl for the Beatles' "White Album", one of only 2000 in the world, with the original cover showing Lennon and Ono *completely* naked from the front and them from the back on the back sleeve. Since it has never been opened before and is in perfect mint condition he reckons an estimate of 100,000 usd. He remembers the first time he saw the Beatles when he was six, how he couldnt hear anything for the whole crowd was screaming, and how he described the whole Beatles experience for him in his life. " It was just - wow!- so different from anything we've ever heard before." before puffing out his cheeks and widening his eyes in an expression that I just remember, I find so familiar because old Mr Lofthouse from tsd did *exactly* the same when we spoke of it once before.

Then there's the Tokio Hotel sisters; the aunt who was looking for songs for her 6 yr old niece to sing at her compeition; the small kid who listens to terrifyingly heavy metal; the indiepop couple; the techno-trance-music only tatooed guys; the Japanese mom and daughter. Well you kinda get to meet all sorts. Everyone from the Malay mom in conservative headscarf who was totally lost in the heavy metal section while looking for a present to get for her son whom she knows like listening to that kind of music, to the ang mo lang girls who walk in and simply open boxes of shirt one after another with an air of "ooh I dont care because the world owes me a favour". There is just something within me that gets me extremely pissed off when people, no matter who they are, start acting like that. No exceptions.

Funny. Seems like my stint over at hmv will not be defined by the music around me like I initially thought, but more by the people I meet along the way who can be so much more unpredictable and interesting than any song can ever hope to be. But perhaps you are right Jas, people are like songs, in a way I guess.

In a way.

ok look, Grace, Jenn, and Jas. This song's for you. The Lucksmiths vibe kinda fits.

The Lucksmiths - There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (Cover)

written by Morrissey from the Smiths fame, for a random stranger he met and struck him so.

it really didnt make sense/

Daft punk live shows -
apparently a feast not only for the ears but also the eyes

So. I wonder if this new found fascination with electronica is here to stay, but really let's enjoy it as much as we can whatever may happen after that no?

I borrowed cobra starship's first album and sigur ros's hvarf/heim last week just to see why both are so high on the charts. I can see why cobra starship is kinda popular, for they deliver rather infectious tunes that are kinda guiltily pleasurable, but not really for sigur ros though. But perhaps it's just hard to reconcile that with the electronic streak im in right now.

Funny isnt it? A friend told me once to face it, that there is a hip hop/ urban/ rnb kid hidden inside me, and she sent over a couple of mia songs that were good but I just couldnt *catch*. I could see why they were good, but something in me just could not latch on to them for long. Of course there are exceptions though, recently that amazing track from Timbaland, especially the live mix from the Shodown album that finds rather often airplay on the hmv shopfloor. It's " The Way I Are", and I force myself not to have it anywhere on the computer or player for fear that I will overplay it too much and kill the magic.

Could it have been an an inner electronica kid inside all the while then? hah. The seeds were probably sown by listening to some Black Box Recorder on the sides while I was in secondary school, maybe a little bit of Air too and dashes of Goldfrapp for good measure. So for this week I borrowed Daft Punk's " Alive 2007", a near perfect transcript of their show that ran in Paris in July this year. I've often read about their live shows online, and suffice to say even listening to it on CD impressed me enough.

Of course there's their most famous song which seems to have recently reignited interest in the Parisian duo who have been steadily mixing crowd firing music since the early 90s. " Bigger Better Faster Stronger" was sampled in a recent hip hop song that was extremely popular but I never did really catch the name of. But what interested me the most was the version here of " Face to Face", a song which I've heard from them before, and possessed much more, and actually more meaningful lyrics than the cursory rudimentary words that passed for " lyrics" in typical crowd dancing tunes. I wasnt disappointed at all, and plugging these album in as I make my way through the evening crowd on the streets of town past the filtering crowd of holiday shoppers is utterly enjoyable.

The thing I've noticed is, is that listening to this kind of music especially alone unphases you a bit. You are drawn very much into yourself, but at the same time you are more aware of things like faces around you. I cant really explain it well and it is probably hard to understand if you do not experience it yourself. You kinda become * colder*, and things which are normally on your mind are pushed away in the haze. I am not saying that this is exactly a good thing, but more and more I find this atmosphere fitting in a town whose streets are the temple for most Singaporeans. A place where we shop, eat, be alone, go with friends, celebrate, flirt, wander and just about anything else. The approaching Christmas is probably heightening all this, but still it's always been there, and just like a temple does blankets everyone with its sense of comfort so much so that most do not admit it.

I hope I do not lose myself by the time Christmas comes round, for though I have not really been the christmas celebrating person what with presents and singings and whatnot, I do sorta find myself looking forward to it this season? Why? I have no idea, I have nothing especially to expect or look forward to, and christmas eve is effectively gone for im working the latest shift at hmv ( god knows how am I to make my way through the crowd once it ends at 11). Perhaps it's just the weather, or perhaps it's just another symptom of me finally coming to understand the malaise that afflicts so many Singaporeans, or people, the feeling of being at once lonely yet seeking the solace of the temple of the streets where noone is alone, and christmas might actually offer the chance of a hope that there is a greater meaning to it this time than what the streets just are at any other time of the year.


DAFT PUNK - FACE TO FACE/ SHORT CIRCUIT


And Im so glad i managed to convince a couple of customers to buy the Concretes album and the doppel live discs from Kraftwerk. The next post will be about some of the most memorable customers Ive seen to, so hang around if you are interested.


I do sound rather alienating dont I? mm hope it passes.

and your kisses at night are replaced with tears

Pakistan born Natasha Khan

Kraftwerk accompanied me for most of Vietnam.

There is something rather therapeutic listening to the German granddaddies of electronic while passing the time in a stranded train that is unable to move due to the mass floods. God knows how many times I've listened to ' Dentaku' and ' Das Model' during that stifling 12 hours. Feist was always over my shoulder, ensuring I never had a dull moment in the long bus journeys on our path through the central highlands. Tullycraft and Log Lady Train added colour to the incessant rain that threatened to kill our explorations many a time.

So there I was then, plugged into kraut and Swedish music in Vietnam, and meeting German and Swedish travelers who were along our way too. I was very tempted to ask the Swedish couple if they knew Victoria Bergsman once they said they lived in Stockholm, but thankfully I managed to stop myself in time.

Oh and music from Vietnam.. we heard everything from the old communist kitsch anthems to the terrible pop music videos that invariably featured the generic ballad nonsense with lots of requisite oohh look im dramatically looking far away into the distance! that gets extremely wearying after awhile. But if you ever find yourself in Saigon, wake yourself up from five plus to seven in the morning and go to any of the many parks in the city. You'll see a sizable group of people, both young and old, lined up in rows doing a morning exercise that is best described as a damn cool synchronized dance routine. To pulsating Viet techno dance beats. A real treat for the eyes and ears. Singapore workout be shamed!

Two weeks at HMV since then, and what can I say. Ill just put it like how I told a friend: " I just couldn't help but suppress a grin when they showed me around the shopfloor after I switched to the ubiquitous black hmv shirt." I have yet to learn cashiering, but I rather it that way, for that means I can spend my time in the aisles rearranging the selections. I am not exactly a file and careful labels kind of person, in most things anyway, but for some reason I find no problem at all being very meticulous when i'm around music. Racking up discs alphabetically, figuring out a way to display the greatest variety in the least space, subtly bringing those I like to the front, it's just like I'm being paid for what I love to do with my songs at home.

And the best part is simply just seeing people when they find what they want. In this case it is *always* satisfying to hunt down a particular song from a few lyrics snippets someone provides. It is against HMV policy to use google and the full arsenal of the internet at the counter computers but screw that.

The pay isnt really *that* fantastic but I do not really care. It's terribly absorbing work for sure, that's another post for another time, and my weekends are all wrecked, along with Christmas Eve it seems now, but really, windows in life for chances like these to do what you like and *get away with it* do not really come often.

A very attractive perk of being a staff at HMV is the freedom to pick any two titles and borrow them for a couple of days. The only catch is that there must be five or more copies of the title on the shopfloor. So for my first week it was Sia's ' Colour the Small One' and Lindy recommended Bats For Lashes' ' Fur And Gold'.

And what a gem Bat For Lashes turned out the be! I have only heard brief mentions of Natasha Khan before, and I regret never really following up on her earlier. " What's A Girl To Do" sounds very Pulpish, what with the spoken lyrics and ominous harpsichords that are simply magic. In fact I can just about imagine Jarvis Cocker doing a cover of this called " What's A Guy To Do?". Plus Khan sounds very much like Sarah Nixey from Black Box Recorder fame, who was my top female singer for sometime before someone else came along. Sarah Nixey + Jarvis = wow.

If you have the time, watch her video linked below too. The only way I can describe it would be it's got the Donnie Darko vibe. If you do not understand then never mind, just click play. You'll be pleasantly surprised, or seriously disturbed at the very least. But cheers for the song.



Bats For Lashes - What's A Girl To Do?



I wonder if this is what is being tried to get told to me, so I'll just leave it be, for yes, I get the point.