( chime)

Oh dont you just love the rush of spontaneity and the weird detours it can lead you to take?

I was at the first floor of hmv today for most of the morning, busying myself with nothing much other than just the odd tidying up of the stray cd case and random digging around on amazon ( what was a front page link to kayaks that initially caught my eye ( yeh damn imagine if I can fit one of those in my packs and cycle. Paddle? eh) somehow led to a ' Equipment For Everything From A Disaster To A Zombie Invasion' guide list which in turn led me to this book which I'm really interested in now and woah ok im sidetracking. You get the idea. )

Anyhow a customer came up to the counter clutching a magazine and a book. It turned out to be the Other Boelyn Girl, and that piqued my interest because I just had a running argument with js at NUS the day before about Portman and Johansson in the film. I asked whether she watched it already or not, and yeh she said she did, and asked the same about me too. Nope I have not, I replied, and heh she scowled a bit when I told her that I wasnt going to watch the film because word of mouth goes that it is not that good. So she said that maybe it was a ' girl show', and that you have to go ' deeper' because of the politics and rivalry etc to which I expectedly I went wha?

But no, the clincher is this. She then asked whether I knew a bit of the backstory, and upon me saying yeh she said this:

" I watched the show with my sister, and it was kinda weird because I do have a love-hate relationship with her too."

Huh.

Wow.

I never really thought of it * that* way, but really wow. You know certain times where a lightbulb just suddenly switches on in your head and for that brief instant of time you are completely floored by the sudden realization as to all the other scenarios out there with doors that just opened? All due to a pivot that suddenly turned and just for that small second, that wisp, you feel like things have to be thought in a different way in light of this new development..

I may not be really clear, and rereading the above paragraph I realize I'm not exactly doing it justice, but yeh just that one statement made by a random passerby. Makes you think doesnt it?
I mean a second and a half after she said it, an image of her and her sister beside leaning back on their seats at the cinema, flicking wary glances at each other while watching a *period* piece about the rivalry between two siblings, flashed by. I wonder what her thoughts were then. I wonder what her sister's thoughts were then. I wonder about the awkwardness. I wonder how they felt later.

Here's a song from another period piece I watched before that stunned me so too the first time I heard it. It is a piano tune by the Aphex Twins. Go google them up, and perhaps you may understand why put their name in italics, and why that particular one is worthing posting.

The show was Marie Antoinette.

Aphex Twins - Avril 14th

/ that left my heart in a mess

Attn:

Next time, do not be shocked if you ever see what seems to be a guy with a turtle back, skipping home as if without a hell in the world at eleven pm plus around the serangoon or kovan areas.

Try to stay calm, for past observations report that he means no harm, in fact he seems completely oblivious to the world around him. Closer surveillance has found that he has a pair of earphones plugged comfortably into his ears, but it is anyone's guess what could he be possibly listening to with such a slight grin and a step.

Tantalizing clues have, however been discovered that may shed further light on this mystery.

Through superior use of technology we have intercepted signals from the subject's small black zen player, which seems to be capable of so much more but just suffers from the singaporean mentality that foreign is good, and thus suffers from being heavily intimidated by the Ipod.

Initial transcripts of said intercepts have revealed the origin of the signals to be from a band named THE MYSTERY JETS. More intelligence on this nefarious influence will be released in due time as our sources unearth more. Early reports of a very retro sound with dastardly irresistible jangly guitars have attributed the resultant catchiness to the band built around the core duo of the lead singer being the son of the lead guitarist, who had undoubtedly brought the best of the 60/70s rock and roll melodies to the present.


Such simple indie neo-psychedalia rock should pose no threat on its own though, but reports of a fantastic female singer named LAURA MARLING being featured in the song too should be taken very seriously. Though she may be two years younger than even the mysterious turtle-backed subject, her own songs have been known to bring a smile to even people who have been caught completely fucked in the middle of a sudden downpour that has been battering this island with increasing frequency lately.

We have attempted to write up reports of our earlier contact with her tunes before, but all have ended up half done and unready to be published for every one of our agents have been reduced to a perky idiot babbling something about her quietly matured lyrics that bring her so much above the rash of recent ' indie' female singer-songwriters like yael naim, kate voegal, sandrine, fine frenzy, sara bareilles, duffy etc etc to have emerged all over the world and started stealing so much shelf space at HMV.

We hereby advise all to beware of her semi folk debut album ALAS, I CANNOT SWIM that has been making its way around unsuspecting targets. Do NOT be fooled be her sanguine voice for beneath it hides MALICIOUS and ultimately SOUL EATING wry lyrics laced with traces of darkness.


Young Love could be this year's Young Folks. Remember that blasted 2006 tune that infiltrated even local radio airplay and infected so many pretentious twats that thought it glorious all because it sounded so ' fresh' and ' different' from everything else on the radio? Well it could happen again. And with your help, we can stop this from sweeping the general populace again. Like dengue, only the symptoms ( easy going happiness/ off key delightful humming/ skipping) of listening to such music can be dealt with small doses of depression and rain. No known cure, even heartbreak or prolonged boredom, has been successful in killing the root virus.

Remember, it could strike even YOU!

Clear your house of still water too. Dengue is terrible.

Thank you.

Mystery Jets - Young Love

careful and quiet/ but who would call it cautious

There's really so much at hmv that im considering staying past the May/June deadline I set myself. The till isnt really that bad actually, and besides you get to mess about with the airplay while at it. Rotating shifts on the first floor is terrible though. Reduced to nothing more than a glorified receptionist, directing people upstairs or just using the computer. You dont really get to help people find the music they want.

Anyhow im afraid that i've allowed myself into a whole deluge of new music that i've previously never got a chance to listen to because they were a) impossible to download b) expensive and risky for $30. I do not think im giving sufficient listening time to everything, and I may be falling into ' skipping to the singles' tracks of each album. I think by the time I leave the store I will have more than enough music to last me through university. Haha a fleeting thought of thinking of a way to soundproof my future hostel room came to mind.

There are really lots of songs I want to write about here, but really I think im too lazy at times. In fact when I started this post I had another band in mind, but screw that. So here's a song from a new cd that came in just a few nights back, from a band called I Was A Cub Scout. Their sound is a bit like a cross between Snow Patrol and Pinback, with slight tinges of catchy syths layered over a semi blase male vocal. To tell the truth it's a bit ' teenagerish' kind of music, however saying it like that is very prone to misunderstanding so I shall just focus on the song here.

" Lucean" is friggin gorgeous. It's probably those tingling piano chords that echo throughout. The real thing that caught me was how the many instruments used were layered and introduced in, bit by bit, and entering a harmony that is really wow. Im usually doubtful of trumpets, but here it's actually quite nice. I can keep this song on repeat, just to listen each time when each instrument is brought in, and completely just focus on that weave.

It's such a song you would expect to be at the end of an album, a song that takes time to catch on and show its true colours, plus I was impressed too that I Was A Club Scout chose to track this as number three on the disc. Nothing else on the album struck me as much as this, or maybe it's just the ' skip to the singles' trap again.

A good song to listen to on the train.

I WAS A CUB SCOUT - LUCEAN


random: I think cat steven song covers as soundtracks are good. Just watched Charlie Bartlett and If You Want To Sing, Sing Out featured prominently. So as I told xj the similarities to ' Rushmore' are really quite a few, including a cat stevens cover it seems.