My House

“I’m gonna take you back to my house
I love the feeling when you touch me baby
It’s not as good when I’m by myself
You know you make me go woohoo oo oo oo”

My House – Kids of 88

When you were younger did you ever split your vegetables into three different categories? There were the ones you loved, the ones you hated, and the ones you were indifferent to. Nowadays, you still love the ones you loved (mmmm carrots) and probably hate the same ones ( I’m looking at you capsicum), but the indifferent ones have again been divided into two categories. There’s the one’s you are still indifferent to (spinach), and that one vegetable you have recently rediscovered and realised tastes amazing and you’re all like WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE (PARSNIPS)!?

The point of this blog was not to get you to like parsnips or complain about vegetables, but rather make you think about that feeling of complete joy when you discover just how good something is when you dive a little further into it. This is the feeling I got a few weeks ago when I heard Kids of 88 live for the first time. This duo has been spinning tracks for quite a few years now, but they’ve somehow slipped under the radar of my musical listening. I knew who they are and I knew some of their music, I have a couple of tracks on my iPod, and I even threw a few into playlists on the student radio last year, but I had never taken the plunge into full on fandom.

Until now. Until I agreed to go to see them at Homegrown a month ago. I remember walking into the Pop Tent at 8:30pm after seven hours of dancing to Luger Boa, Clap Clap Riot, Villainy, Aaradhna and Elemeno P. The crowd were getting tired; they were getting pushy and snapping at strangers and the air, though excited, was a bit tense. This was, however, all forgotten from the first moment the stage lights came up and the duo (well, quadruple) kicked into Downtown. I’ve said it in so many blogs but it is so prominent; nothing is better than that moment you see a band live and you forget everything except for the people on stage and the music they are making. Kids of 88 sucked me into their world for the whole hour and made me dance and sing like no one was watching. I couldn’t believe these guys hadn’t been part of my music listening before.

Now, their music is in my iTunes library and gets blasted out of the car stereo constantly with sing-alongs. My friend and I are scouring the internet looking for their next gig because we can’t get enough of them – we’ve already seen them open for fun. since Homegrown. So, thank you Kids of 88 for your music and your amazing shows and making NZ music fantastic. You are welcome at my house any time. Perhaps for some parsnips?

How You Remind Me

“Never made it as a wise man
I couldn't cut it as a poor man stealing
Tired of living like a blind man
I'm sick of sight without a sense of feeling
And this is how you remind me

This is how you remind me
Of what I really am
This is how you remind me
Of what I really am”

How You Remind Me – Nickelback

Ahh, Nickelback. The band everyone hates, loves to hates, or loves but pretend to hates because everyone else hates them. This is the band with the lead singer described as the ugliest man in rock music, and this is the band ridiculed over and over again in movies and on television and all over the internet.

So how does such a band manage to hold the number one most played song on the radio in the 2000’s? Yes, you read that right – How You Remind Me topped the charts for weeks in 2001 and was the only rock song to take the number one spot on the Billboard charts between then and 2008, when Coldplay’s Viva La Vida was released. How You Remind Me was also named the number 4 song of the 2000’s in the USA, playing more than 1.2 million times between 2001 and 2009, and was nominated for a Grammy - record of the year. To top it all off, in the 2000’s they managed to be the second best-selling act in the USA. Number one was The Beatles. Not bad for a band everyone hates.

So … how does this happen? Sure, it may have been one of their first hits, and certainly their break out hit, but there’s no way this has carried them for most of the 2000’s. They had the rest of Silver Side Up and two more albums during that time – surely someone would have realised Nickelback’s generic rock song and stopped playing How You Remind Me, like, immediately.

To get some answers I googled “why is Nickelback so terrible but How You Remind Me a number one song?” This generated some interesting views but there was one which really caught my eye*. It talked about how Nickelback is the most popular unpopular band there ever was – and he’s right, there is no other band like Nickelback. No one else is this terrible but this popular. Nickelback know they suck – but they don’t care what society thinks because they make so much fucking money.

This blog was neither to stick up for and slam Nickelback – I like a bit of their music and enjoyed their concert a few years ago, but they are far from a favourite band. No, this blog was to get you thinking and see if you can answer the question I am puzzled over: why is this band so hated yet so successful?

*This article was the rather interesting one on this topic http://www.chelsey.co.nz/entertainment/music/defending-nickelback

Let Her Go

“Well you only need the light when it's burning low
Only miss the sun when it starts to snow
Only know you love her when you let her go

Only know you've been high when you're feeling low
Only hate the road when you’re missin' home
Only know you love her when you let her go
And you let her go”

Let Her Go – Passenger (aka Mike Rosenberg)

To make my life simpler and easier I name my blogs after the title song. This blog is technically called Let Her Go – but if I could give it another name it would be How to Confuse Your Audience in Five Songs.

Let me explain. Last Saturday night the gorgeous and talented Ed Sheeran took over Vector Arena with a fantastic performance. Like with most concerts there were the opening acts to sit through. I thought I had my faith renewed in these acts since discovering Luger Boa, Clap Clap Riot and other great Kiwi musicians. Alas, it wasn’t so with this recent event, as Mike – or “Passenger” - came on stage for a quick visit before handing over to the world’s favourite red head.

Passenger started off his set with a new song. It was so new, Passenger informed us, we should bear with him if he got the lyrics wrong or messed up the chords. Okay, not a convincing start. Onto song number two, which was a cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s Sound of Silence. Passenger said he wanted the crowd to be ... silent for the song (I see what you did there, Mike). The cover was, most unfortunately, one of the worst, overdramatic covers I’d ever heard. I just didn’t get it. Song three: a novelty song where the audience was sing along some lalalala thing if you agreed with the things Passenger was singing that he hated. For the record, Passenger hates include racism and pointless Facebook status updates (yes, in the same song). Song four was his single, a bit forgettable in my opinion. And song five was a sweet sing a long about having hope in our hearts (though I got confused with his accent and accidentally sung about having holes in our hearts). Amongst all this Passenger was joking about his life and career and being in New Zealand. Yes, all very, very confusing – from the performance to the mash up of emotion I was left with, I was mystified.

Right, so if I didn’t like his performance so much, why dedicate a blog to him? Because I kind of liked him too – he amused me and got the crowd enthused in his own way. I would love to see him in a pub over a few beers with some mates. There’s a great market for singing stand up comedians and I wish Passenger toured the world doing this, because I would pay to see it. This has stumped me even more though – how do I love and hate something at the same time!

This is music though: the amazing, the terrible and the utterly confusing. 

By The Way

“Standing in line to see the show tonight,
And there's a light on,
Heavy glow.
By the way I tried to say I'd be there,
Waiting for.
Dani the girl is singing songs to me,
Beneath the marquee,
Overload.”

By The Way – Red Hot Chili Peppers

I’ve written some rather big confessions on this blog, but this could be the most shocking.

I used to hate the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I hated their music, their style, their place in society and their chopping and changes of band members. I didn’t get them and I didn’t understand how they had become so famous. Despite numerous friends tying to get me into them, their songs made no sense to me. Five years ago I wouldn’t have a bite of the Chili’s.

Then I started to find over the years I was picking up on a song or two which I didn’t mind listening to. I liked The Zephyr Song and enjoyed the chorus bits to By The Way. Eventually Scar Tissue became a bit of a favourite, Snow (Hey Oh) gave me a reason to sing along, and Dani California and Californication grew on me more and more. It was a year or so ago when I succumbed to the Chili Peppers, bought one of their Greatest Hits albums. And then, a few weeks ago, I went to their concert (albeit on a free ticket) and sang along to the songs – and loved it when the crowd got in on the lyrics in Under The Bridge. Though most of their songs still make little sense to me, or hardly relate to things I know about – after all, I am not one to go by drugs under the bride, or ‘fly’ away on my zephyr, I have a lot more time and respect for the Chili’s.

I find it rather interesting how our music tastes change over the years. I have noticed many people have a ‘moment’ in their mid to late teens when they realise how good classic rock music and it becomes their new old favourite. Some people change genres all together; I know someone who spent their entire time as a teenage listening to the heaviest rock music and playing bass guitar, and then became a trance music DJ in their early twenties. It seems as we grow and mature in our lives our music choices reflect our changes, influenced by friends and family, and what we see in media and society. I have also found I have a lot more time for other genres nowadays. As a teenager, I was determined only to like that pop rock genre; now I can switch from Taylor Swift to fun. to Bon Jovi to the Lion King soundtrack in the space of about ten minutes. I still stick by my childhood bands for a bit of nostalgia now and again. After all, it’s getting the more out of the best of the music industry.