LALI PUNA
Remember [Our Inventions, 2009]
♥♥♥♥♥♥
MASSIVE ATTACK
Paradise Circus ft Hope Sandoval [Heligoland, 2010]
♥♥♥♥♥♥
Image: David Lynch and Isabella Rossellini
Photographer: Helmut Newton
singer island has become my secret and favorite location
a place covered in blue, with luxury condos all along the atlantic shore
known as the beautiful beach pictured on every floridian postcard
most of the balconies overlook right inside the ocean
it’s almost as if your sleeping with the sea
this is where i’m landing
my perfect fantasy
♥♥♥
listen: four tet – angel echoes
[there is love in you, 2010]
For Valentine’s Day, I created my own special necklaces to remember and celebrate the very idea of love and elegance.
Red Swarovski Crystal x Valentine Locket Necklace
Featuring elegant black glass pearls that surround a silver heart locket embellished with red Swarovski crystals and a black satin ribbin bow. Locket opens to hold two of your favorite memories! Clasp ends in a silver-plated guardian angel and heart. Measuring 18″ in length.
My Bloody Valentine x Red Swarovski Crystal x Floral Cameo x Choker Necklace
Featuring a black lace choker embellished with a large black filigree hanging pendant, red Swarovski crystals and ivory flower cameo. Adjustable 14-18″ in length.
this has been a difficult week after the earthquake in haiti.
when something real happens it makes the whole world stop.
usually people can relate to one another but at this time, it is different.
the united states seem to be doing all in their power to keep it strong.
and you wonder what can you really do? but hope and pray
that things will get better and let those that don’t know
everything will be okay.
♥♥♥
listen: stranded (Haiti Mon Amour)
by jay-Z, bono, the edge & rihanna
donate: www.hopeforhaitinow.org
images: boston.com
video: coldplay :: a message :: hopeforhaitinow
a beautiful southern place is calling to me
palm trees, sunshine and soft sand that surrounds the oceans
driving, running, swimming along to the rush, and the sounds
a never-ending vacation of strength, peace and happiness
rediscovering old talents and letting them be heard
as time shifts here, it will all be documented
thank you as always for being there ♥
listen :: hercules & love affair – raise me up
.i open up my tender heart.
|
heart skipped a beat ♥ the xx with every heartbeat ♥ robyn heart and soul ♥ joy division why does my heart feel so bad ♥ moby this heart will swallow us ♥ joseph arthur the last beat of my heart ♥ devotchka yr mangled heart ♥ gossip if i had a heart ♥ fever ray metal heart ♥ cat power |
Arizona’s Dear and The Headlights create intense and emotional indie rock music. In February 2007, the band signed to Equal Visions Records, released two albums of demos and started touring with bands like Jimmy Eat World, Paramore, and with the Warped Tour. Although it never made the final cut to either of their releases, Dear and The Headlights original song “Daysleeper” was made during the beginning of their musical journey of performing with each other, and showcases the true strength of the band.
this year, i intend to:
1) restructure my character
2) be a bit more like a dictionary (informative, reliable, good speller) and less like a thesaurus (repetitive, offers too many explanations, sounds a bit like a dinosaur)
3) get to grade 2 saxophone
4) learn to drive
5) consider the fact that change for the sake of change isn’t always necessarily a good thing
an early contender for album of 2010 is “IRM” by beck and charlotte gainsbourg. the dark, soothing melodies have a strange wave of effects; the vocals are distanced, yet warmed by the strings. and not only have the pair produced a great album, but great photography as well.
beck has written and produced the album, whilst co-writing the lyrics with charlotte. so it feels like a beck album, which is obviously a good thing. but charlotte’s voice truly adds an extra dimension, whereas beck’s intentionally emotionless voice can sometimes lose momentum; there is a curiosity to her voice, and i don’t know how intentional it is, but it requires repeated listens.
LISTEN:
Beck & Charlotte Gainsbourg – Le Chat du Café des Artistes
~Happy New Year~
Let’s hope this year brings us peace, happiness and love.
It’s time, don’t you think?
We’ve all been working so hard, we deserve it.
LISTEN ♥ Fleet Foxes – White Winter Hymnal
IMAGE ♥ NerdyGirl
and if you don’t love me
let me go
The Decemberists – The Engine Driver
Aimee Man – The Engine Driver (Cover)
(From the 2005 album “Picaresque”, The Decemberists created their song The Engine Driver as catchy and meaningful as can be. Escaping throughout the chorus is a longing shared within a heartbreak and like all great lessons learned, sometimes it is truly better to love than to never have loved at all.)
“Christmas is a time when you get homesick
- even when you’re home.”
L I S T E N ♥ Mogwai – Christmas Steps
(From the 1999 album Come On Die Young, Mogwai’s song is not apart of your typical Christmas music, but is so beautifully intense and instrumental that it should be uniquely apart of your favorites list! Enjoy.)
5. Mumford & Sons – Sigh No More
November 2009.
I did nothing but praise this album when it was released not that long ago. I still believe they’re one of Britain’s best ‘new-folk’ exports.
It is unfortunate that this album has seen such a lukewarm response; reviews where good have been with their downfalls, though in general have been as hit and miss as the band’s fanbase. They evolved from a West London scene, whose other counterparts had started to release deadening singles, yet when you hear the dynamic breaks in Mumford & Sons’ ‘Little Lion Man’, ‘White Blank Page’ or ‘Winter Winds’, then you know you’re dealing with something entirely different.
4. Matt Tolfrey & Gavin Herlihy – I Just Can’t (Take It)
April 2009. Cocoon Recordings
Considering quite how permeated with techno and house, my listening preferences are, you’d be surprised to learn that this only escalated to this extent in 2009.
Bloc Party’s ‘Silent Alarm’ drew me further into British ‘indie’ in late 2004, and Matt Tolfrey & Gavin Herlihy’s “I Just Can’t (Take It)” did the same for tech.house. I have always been a sucker for buildups; and the 5 minute long wait until the bassline hums in, is exasperating, and then the vocal kicks in: ‘Just can’t take it, just can’t take it, just can’t take it.” This, for me is the best of the best.
3. George Pringle – Salon Des Refuses
September 2009
It was 2009 that first saw George Pringle get more major-radio airplay, a review in the British music press, and the long-awaited release of her, essentially, self-recorded album.
Her electronic beats breath and evolve from Winter; “Spring is never a good time,” she muses. Strangely, this album feels like a final chapter; her ending to a lifetime of experience. Indeed with ‘We Could Have Been Heroes’, ‘S.W.10′ and ‘Bonjour Tristesse’, a rather epic, apocalyptic state of the world seems to be unravelled and envisioned; the dulcet tone of her music embodies it, and her lyrics, and poetic delivery, can’t help but annotate along the way.
2. Bloc Party – Signs
May 2009.
Before the wave of disappointment that swept over us when ‘One More Chance’ was released, Bloc Party released the crossover Intimacy/Intimacy Remixed single ‘Signs’.
The original, and its iTunes exclusive, piano-led, Gossip Girl-featured masterpiece, were two of the best tracks of last year. Bloc Party love their remixes, and 2009 saw Kele Okereke fall further in love with house and techno (note the band’s advent into the electronic), yet this doesn’t always combine well. While the first two Bloc Party ‘remixed’ albums featured hours worth of fun; they still lacked something that would ever throw the releases outside of indie clubs and pubs, all-nation wide. Yet Armand Van Helden’s electro-house bass-riproaring assault changed all that. Not since Soulwax’s remix of MGMT’s Kids has the world seen such a great crossover remix; and not since Aphex Twin’s ‘Come To Daddy’ have we seen such a great music video (at least according to Spin’s Peter Gaston).
Signs (Armad Van Helden Remix)
1. Florence and the Machine – Lungs.
June 2009.
The choice of Britain’s best 2009 release was easy to make; an artist masked in criticism from the musical and culture elite, her record is an undeniably beautiful pop record.
2009 saw a reinvention of sorts for Florence and the Machine. I welcomed her extraction from the nauseating attempts at punk that she made last year, and as she transcended Kiss with a Fist with musical and emotional capability, she became the most refreshing female voice in British music. Whether its with the (comparatively) upbeat, string crescendos of ‘Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)’, the amorous screams of jazzy ‘Girl With One Eye’, or on the unmistaken genius of ‘Howl’, Florence Welch captivates her listener with exaggerated dynamics, euphoric builds, and melodies that leave you wincing in their aftermath. Her songwriting, orchestration, and structure blends her influences better than many would ever hope for, and her cover of ‘You Got The Love’ seems unanimously to be one of the best covers of the year. This album easily clinches the top spot over any release, and Britain should be proud to have her as an export of 2009.
