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Sigur Rós is a name I’ve been seeing for a while – immediate references would be Radiohead meets Enya but bands from many different genres reference them as influences. I’d made a mental note to check them out and found myself last week on youtube watching – Glósóli. If you’re not in a rush and you have 6 or 7 minutes to spare – check out the video below – I think the music and video are stunning.
If you want to put a huge smile on your face and you have another 5 minutes – check out Hoppipolla – it leaves me grinning and full of hope.
I believe that music is good for you; quite literally, that just having it on within earshot is like a primer that juices your brain and helps you do things. The most prevalent type of music in society today is a 3 or 4 minute long idea that is designed to catch and hold your attention, which is great a lot of the time, but not always.
One of the ideas behind music2work2 is that I can find song lyrics distracting when I’m reading or writing – not all the time, but when I am creating something new or absorbing a particular idea, it’s those words that I want to focus on – not the singer’s story. I like the idea of longer form music, of having a theme that is continuously developed, that changes dynamically and which evokes emotion. The beauty of Sigur Rós is that the lyric is in Icelandic, incomprehensible to me and therefore perfect music to work to.
Of course, up until recently it has been hard to learn about and find music like this – it’s not designed for the current music industry. But things have changed; my music discovery has little to do with radio, nothing to do with television and everything to do with my computer, the one radio show that I do listen to (WMBR's ZoëRadio) I often end up catching the podcast. I get my music through email, from RSS, from websites and of course friends. If you dig Sigur Rós – tell someone about them – write your own post or tweet this one – you’ll be doing them a favor.
Fallen in love again - definitely one of my favorite things to do.
This time it's Lauren Zettler - you can check her out at:
http://laurenzettler.com/
http://www.myspace.com/laurenzettler
I'm digging the voice - she has this whole Susan Vega / Shawn Colvin / Alanis Morissette / KD Lang / Nanci Griffith thing going on - complete with high register vocal moves that Michael Jackson (may he rest in peace) would recognize. All this is a good thing. She has a seriously nice instrument and sounds like herself. The music is accessible and cleverly delivered, the guitar work particularly tasty - also, you just gotta love a glockenspiel every now and then - listen to Shapes.
The reason I found this music? Back in november of 2008 I came across the following tweet:
It struck me as just funny - it paralleled my own experiences and so I started following the author - turns out that Cameron Mizell is a guitar player: he practices, he plays out, he loves his family, he's hipped me to new information and he's made me laugh - he reminds me of Jazz Pianist Noah Baerman who is definitely one of the good guys.. I caught something in his stream recently about going out on the road and had a moment to see what the gig was - which of course led me in turn to Lauren Zettler.
If you like the names referenced at the top then you're probably going to dig Lauren - you get a free download when you join her mailing list - a killer cover version of FleetWood Mac's The Chain - it's very good. otherwise, go buy her two EPs - hell at under $7 each they didn't break the bank and here I am - listening to her music on rotation while I'm writing this!
I love living today and right now I love Lauren Zettler - but in a way that my wife would be ok with ;-p
---------------- Now playing: Lauren Zettler - Persevere