From scienceline.org [Credit: Len Radin, Flickr.com]
Interesting and entertaining podcast describing the evolution, environment and prospects of the Musk Ox. Their story is a fascinating one and, as one year turns into another, the contributors' big-thoughts-in-deep-time theme gives a timely dose of perspective to our own selfishly introspective species.
Only the children can save us now.
I've been listening to On Point for a long time and rarely have I heard Tom so fricken excited! I'd encourage everyone to listen in to hear a great broadcaster in full flight on what turns out to be a disarmingly intriguing topic.
Just back from a lost weekend in a hotel in ......Dublin. We've done that before, hit Dublin as tourists, but never as tourists with children. It's lots of fun and highly recommended for those of you out there who have ambitions to see other European cities with kids but haven't gotten round to getting those tiny travellers their passports yet. The occasion for our staycation this time was Christmas Lights/Christmas shopping and also because it's the last weekend before I start a new job.
Highlights were :
D's first ever gig...
...the Christmas lights (of course), the Christmas markets, gingerbread lattes, Christmas carols (piped and live), buskers with trumpets, homemade Macaroons... Sweeties from Greece, train rides (the luas and the German merry-go-round), family movies on king-size beds, hotel breakfasts (the girls had rice krispies, fried eggs and Dan O'Chocalade - M had the best mushrooms she's ever tasted), Diego as gaeilge, my first walk down Talbot street since I got my confirmation suit in Boyers, snowsuits and spacehelmets, and like any good Amish family hittin' the city together, new shoes for everyone.
Some of the more forgettable moments included surreptitious, un-clean, pink plastic gifts to the girls from troubled Luas passengers and a massive wasabi malfunction where D tried to ingest a golf ball sized lump of wasabi on the QT before her head exploded and gave the game away.
Welcome aboard the bipolar express, a musical trainwreck on a 5-stop continuous loop between the twin stations of elation and deflation. I've had plenty of time on my hands recently but I've still failed miserably in my editorial duties and this bloated tradition continues to expand its tasteline year on year. But my hope is that the scope creep should make things a little more interactive. Feel free to self-edit and build your own sub-compilation of favourites from the 89 samples contained here.
Same rules apply :
- Play Loud
- Sing Along Where Appropriate
- Skip The Ones That Make You Uncomfortable
All of the songs on this first one were indirectly chosen by a set of (nearly) 3 year old ears and an even fresher set of 18 month old ears. These are the songs which the girls have responded to in some small, sometimes imperceptible way, singing along, asking for it to be turned up, nodding their heads along silently in their seats, asking me to play it again, asking me who it is or what's the name of the song or in some cases what instrument is jumping out at them. And two fine sets of ears they are - D's party piece is "name that tune" and she can generally out-gun anyone. For example the first 45 seconds of the Freelance Whales song is just random plumbing noises barely audible when the car is moving - within 5 seconds D always pipes up with "Are we ready?" preparing us all to sing along once it kicks in.
We're like an indie-rock Flanders family driving around the back roads of west Wicklow, hail rain or shine, pretending we're outdoorsy with the heating cranked up full and the stereo belting out dodgy hipster experiments. So this collection has been truly road tested and these songs are guaranteed to provoke in-car singalongs and wild 4-part family harmony experimentation in all trajectories of the nuclear family in motion.
1. Karen O and The Kids | All is Love"L.O.Beep.Beep" is how this is sung in our house. Had no idea these guys were responsible for the Where The Wild Things Are soundtrack. This features whistling, clapping, counting, spelling, ooohing, and simple lyrics wrapped around a great tune. A huge favourite with the under 3s in our family. 2. Edward Sharp and The Magnetic Zeroes | Home
This one goes back a while - a guaranteed full house on the dance floor. Has been known to inspire wild experimentation in dance moves....and the girls generally follow suit. 3. Air Waves | Shine On 4. The Avett Brothers | I and Love and You 5. Bill Callahan | Sycamore This guy is phenomenal. Listened to him a lot as Smog in the mid 90s but lost touch a little. His voice is incredible and his off kilter song writing and willfully unscientific song structures always keep you guessing. His ability to gnaw feeling from the most inert subjects is praiseworthy - here for example he's singing about a housing estate in Naas and it's like, soooo evocative! This is amazing :
6. Boat Beam | Rain Pauly D loves this..... she sings "See The Rain...... Falling"This is also her first exposure to a cello in the wild. And she appears to have developed a peculiar affinity with the instrument. Having shown her a couple of youtube clips of girls playing cellos, she now hilariously plays air-cello (very seriously) along with this song during our Kitchen Discos. 7. Dixie Cups | Iko Iko I believe this is an old New Orleans marching song. This version was recorded in the foyer of a recording studio as they waited their turn to record. The drumming you hear is drumsticks on an ashtray. The version was good enough to keep and they added some additional instruments in the studio and the rest as they say is fun for kids.
8. Freelance Whales | Generator ^ First Floor The first song Jolly Small ever sang along to. Jolly Tall scarily knows most of the words. 9. Midlake | Jungler
10. The National | So Far Around The Bend From the Dark Was the Night compilation. 11. The Notwist | Boneless
This will get ridiculous as we move through the rest of this year's compilations. Here, the 2 Acher brothers appear together, in the one band, amazingly enough. I've been listening, enthralled to The Notwist for years. Everyone should own a copy of Neon Golden.
12. The Saw Doctors | Red Cortina
Anyone who remembers dancing in a shed or a community centre as a child at a "disco" with "the light still shining through the winda" will relate to this. Anyone who has a daughter, listen well.
13. The Shins | Saint Simon
The complex, intertwined, multilayered vocal and guitar lines in the last minute of this are the equivalent of an ice cream headache for the ears. In a good way.
14. The Softpack | Answer to Yourself
No idea what it is about this piece of new-wave self-help which D relates to but excessive reason has been known to result in the "Universe being thrown out with the bath water." So lets not over analyse.
15. The Strokes | Is This It
16. Thao | Bag Of Hammers
D does a great rendition of this featuring a random tumbling-out of kiddie syllables all finishing with "ice cream".
17. Those Darlins | The Whole Damn Thing
I call this the vegtarian guilt song.
18. Wintersleep | Weighty Ghost "I got outta bed today, swear to God I couldn't see my face." A classic example of puffy smushins in the wild. These guys were chewing tinfoil on last year's compilation if you cast your mind back. The missing link between dairy products and depression. I have this tic where, without even being conscious of it, I stare at strangers and generally within seconds, superimpose on them the first draft of my version of their life story. I was in The Oval on Abbey Street with Herr Doylee before the Wintersleep gig and there was a group of boyos drinking in the corner, looked like they were school friends from Kilkenny, combat jackets, bad hats covering bad haircuts, probably hooking up for a regular Friday night pint and a chat. Turns out they were from Halifax, Nova Scotia and they were called Wintersleep :) How rare and refreshing a thing in this age of media saturation not to have any kind of awareness of what a band you're dying to see live looks like or whether the lead singer is a bearded giant or a bald dwarf. How rare and refreshing a thing also in this age of media saturation for a band not to have addressed the bad hair and combat jackets as a going stylistic concern. I'm sure there's a lesson in there for me not to be so judgemental of Kilkenny people. But tics are tics and I won't be told, even if I'm a million miles off every time. 19. Wisely | Through Any Window
D learned her colours with the help of this song and a wall-hanging in our kitchen so it has a special place in her heart and ours.
20. YACHT | Psychic City The dance floor filler at our Saturday morning discos.
21. Andrew Bird | Oh No Teaching children all over the world how to whistle. 22. dEUS | Everything is the Same (Except No One Believes Me)
A Bside. The chords, the words and the main vocal line on this are pretty simple. So my job is easy. M has been known to make the high pitched shrieking refrain her own. Not so easy, but she has earned the permanent respect of her children and her life partner through her efforts. These are the things that matter.
This was originally meant to be the dumping ground for the noisier, more rambunctious music - so you could avoid them if you were having a non-noisy moment. But as usual, doctors differ and ideas die. So herewith, the mostly noisy neighbours.
1. Electric President | Wearing Influences On Our Sleveless Tshirts
Florida, Morr Music. Tasty. Let me know if I'm starting to sound like Pat Kenny.
2. Ms. John Soda | Hands
More indietronic von Munchen.
3. No Age | Glitter
4. The Beets | What Did I Do?
I love this. Under 2 minutes of well reared noise.
5. Rollerskate Skinny | Shallow Thunder
Yep. Another great original Dublin band. I love the cover on this.
6. Owen Pallett | Keep The Dog Quiet (Simon Bookish Remix)
A fiddle player by trade, this guy wrote the string arrangements for the Arcade Fire's first 2 albums + Beirut's Flying Club Cup + loads of others. He also performs as Final Fantasy and tours with nearly everyone. This song features a nice quirky melody and some odd rhythms. What more do you want?
7. Wolf Parade | Ghost Pressure
Just heard that these guys are going on an indefinite hiatus once they've completed the current round of shows. Sad news indeed. This song rocks and was on heavy rotation round our house this year.
8. Wormhole | Lay It On Where to start with these lads?Some of the noisiest neighbours you could ever hope to meet. One of my favourite Dublin bands ever. Let's start with this (watch out for Waccy Baccy appearing nonchalantly out of a Wendy house to rock the corpo estate in Ringsend) :
And move swiftly along to this :
A definitive history of the band (and a nice general archive of certain bands in Dublin in the late 90s) by Stephen Rennicks is available here. God I love Wormhole. 9. Lali Puna | Micronomic
More Achers.
10. Weekend | Tiara
11. Parts & Labor | Sugar Kane Faithful cover of a great song, even more notable for the absence of guitars. How do you cover a Sonic Youth song without abusing at least 1 guitar? 12. Bot'Ox | Bluesteel
Short and sweet.
13. The Cast Of Cheers | Auricom
Math rock is no longer welcome at breakfast in my house. Jaysis, fair enough I hear you cry. Not sure why I was surprised to discover this band is from Dublin... That artwork defines the special needs genre. Give that man a grant.
14. Cloud Nothings | Hey Cool Kid
Kind of hypnotic no-fi with unintelligible lyrics....but it's got a hook.
15. White Denim | Sex Prayer
Time to lash out my festive denims and do some squat tests, Waccy Baccy style.
16. Obits | Two-Headed Coin Cant be saved and not get spent | It belongs to the governmentBrooklyn but not indie/folk/hipster. This is Rick Froberg's (Drive Like Jehu, Hot Snakes) latest band and they rock like all other bands he's been involved in.
Nice poster from a recent Dublin gig.
17. Harlem Shakes | Strictly Game To all who've had a hellish 2010...and I know that includes quite a few of you. Stay Game. 18. Cut Copy | Unforgettable Season
Pop dressed in noisy clothing.
19. Gruff Rhys | Candylion
Welsh, pure pop oddness. This is from a 2007 album of the same name.
20. The Intelligence | Dating Cops Altogether..."Woo-Woo-Woo-Woo-Woo-Woo-Woo!" 21. Windsor For The Derby | Maladies
A famous gig back in 2000 where Wormhole supported these guys in Whelans. I didn't go but ........I have the flyer?
22. Q and Not U | 1000 Animal Calls
A disbanded dischord band. Gives me an excuse to include this :
Juggling-in-a-sandbox parents of two tots all trapped in a flesh coloured maze on the plains of Leinster. Forever readjusting, some of us catching, some of us launching more and more spinning plates.. Never more than one bobo in elmoo land at the same time. We all share a common admiration for polka dots, pictures, music and words and this seems like the _ideal_ place to share. Feel free to share back.
From scienceline.org [Credit: Len Radin, Flickr.com]
Posts
