Now that the summer is over...

I'm driven so much by music. When summer vacation rolls around, one of the things I really look forward to is being able to listen and discover more music than I can during school. It always seems that certain bands or albums get to me each year...last summer was full of Weezer's blue album and Catch-22's Keasbey Nights (both fantastic efforts if you're unfamiliar). This year has been a bit more expansive, however. I wasn't listening to anything in particular. I was listening to everything I could.

Here's something of a summer mix tape.

They Might Be Giants: Don't Let's Start

For a really long time, They Might Be Giants was little more than the guys who played "Constantinople" and the Malcolm in the Middle theme song. It kills me knowing that I thought of them that way for so long. Songs like Don't Let's Start are intoxicating to me. The start-stop beginning is an immediate catch. Then John Linnell's nerdy (for lack of a better word) voice comes along. It's so different compared to the average alt-rock croon. It's beautifully odd. Then, the words he's singing are incredibly clever and different from anything else.

"When you are alone, you are the cat, you are the phone, you are an animal...the words I'm singin' now mean nothing more than meow to an animal..."

John Flansburgh's guitar playing fits around the other elements perfectly. His guitar, Linnell's voice, a little synth, and a drum machine. So little creates so much.

It would be easy to say that They Might Be Giants were immediately great for me. For a little while after I got some of their albums, they were just a band that had an occasional great song (I was obsessed with a tune called Doctor Worm for a spell). Then I paid attention to Don't Let's Start. This song was a gateway into all of TMBG's music, in that it helped me really realize how amazing they are.

They're now my absolute favorite band.


Dance Hall Crashers- Othello

This may seem familiar, but it took me a really long time to find out about the Dance Hall Crashers. I knew they had a cool name, and a shout-out in a blink-182 song. Something compelled me one day, and I checked out The Old Record, and this song was the one that greeted me with open arms.

"Sooner or later I'll wake up and wipe the sleep out of my eyes, later that day when you wake up you'll be in for a big surprise..."

I can't imagine why people think music on the radio is fun. THIS is fun music. I listened to this song so many times I can't even imagine how I still love it. After realizing DHC's greatness, I went and looked up their history. It makes me feel horrible that I didn't know that this band was a project started by members of Operation Ivy after they broke up. Then those members from Op Ivy left to make Rancid, and DHC moved on and thrived with a pair of fantastic female vocalists (Karina Deniké and Elyse Rogers). More females need to be involved in Ska (or Ska-Punk, whatever), honestly. The horn section is tight, and the song's guitar solo oozes with...well, fun. There's no better word.

The Ergs!- Introducing Morrissey

I always thought Morrissey had a cool voice, but I never understood how people rabidly loved his music. I liked it, but I'm much more impressed by a very pretty song by a very special band (a little) about him.

"The last album I loved the whole way through was by a band that had formed in 1982. I was barely alive, I had some thinking to do, but once I figured it out I was in love and I knew that I...would be in love forever."

Punk rock has always been a primarily simple genre. Three chords, two and a half minutes, and some "singing". I love it when a really band does that and manages to give you the same feeling you had the first time you heard The Ramones or The Clash. Mikey Erg is a great drummer. He's an even better lead singer. How he manages to do both, I have no idea. The Ergs! simply are an amazing band. It kills me that I found them just after they broke up.

I was not expecting to write so much about those...but I guess that's what a really good song makes you do.

With fortissimo,
AJKazlouski