(no subject)

[miko2]

Today's Song: Soul Meets Body by Death Cab For Cutie

I have known for several years that Death Cab For Cutie was a popular local band (they hail from Bellingham, WA) but until I downloaded this song from iTunes I'd never actually listened to them. Sometimes this happens -- Sleater-Kinney, for example, is a local band that gets so much critical acclaim that I finally bought one of their cds just to see what they were like, and I eventually became a very big fan. I'm already convinced that this is going to happen for DCFC as well.

Death Cab For Cutie are an alternative pop band. I've seen them described as emo. I've never been very clear on exactly what defines emo music, and with good reason: even the Wikipedia article on emo points out the difficulties in defining the genre and that fans of some of the bands that get lumped into the genre (as Death Cab does) dislike the label or argue that it doesn't fit.

In any case, based on this one song, Death Cab For Cutie remind me of The Shins and perhaps also Idlewild, two bands I really like that make pop music (Idlewild is either pop or punk depending on the cd) with clever lyrics and interesting word-play. So, from this song:

I want to live where soul meets body
And let the sun wrap its arms around me
And bathe my skin in water cool and cleansing
And feel what it's like to be new

'Cause in my head there's a greyhound station
Where I send my thoughts to far-off destinations
So they may have a chance of finding a place
Where they're far more suited than here

What that actually might mean is beside the point, because it's a very fun little alternative/indie pop song with a catchy melody. The lyrics are never boring or predictable, which is also what I like about The Shins and Idlewild, not to mention Laura Veirs or The Decemberists.

Anyway, this is a very cool song that's been stuck in my head all week. The cd it comes from is making its way through the mail to my mail box as we speak. ^_^



I did something this morning that I've often thought of doing, but had never managed to accomplish before: I woke up at 11 am and listened to This American Life via the internet.

Usually I listen to this on Friday night at work, but last night I forgot. This has happened before, or there's been times when they were not broadcasting the show on Friday. I love the show quite a bit and I always tell myself I can get up on Saturday and listen to it, but I either don't manage to get up at the right time or I forget. However, this morning, somewhat inexplicably, my radio came on at 11 am. I say inexplicably because I normally have it set for Monday-Friday and it doesn't turn on on the weekend, but somehow it got set for the weekend as well. It doesn't always get good reception, so it was mostly voices talking through white noise, but I woke up anyway and when I went to turn it off I realized that one of those hard-to-understand fuzzy white noise voices was the voice of Ira Glass.

So I sat down at my computer desk and listened. ^_^

Goals for the day: walk, write, maybe visit a few electronic stores and see if they have the Tivoli iPal I crave for a price that I'm willing to pay to have it right now... although technically I may be able to buy it for much less on Ebay, if I wait a few days...

Oh, I'm being bad again. I'm 2 minutes away from winning an auction for "The Crane Wife" by The Decemberists for less than $10.00 total including shipping. Oops! ^_^ Bad bad Miko!

Ack! Outbid with less than 30 seconds left! Well, there are other auctions for the same cd in the $7-$10 range, so I'll have to try again later.