Hope Springs Eternal, By One Hour

It's leap day today, but not February 29th -- today is the day, the Monday in which we all have to recover from LOSING ONE HOUR OF OUR DAY TO DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME. This year in particular, I feel more angry about losing an hour. In my day job, I work a lot of hours between January 1 and May 15, including most Saturdays. So, when my measly one day weekend is also shortened by an hour, I'm pissed.

Thankfully, in extremely shortened weekend, I made a few musical discoveries that just may rekindle my intense love for this art form so not-as-passive-as-watching-TV-when-I-get-home. That's right -- I'm going cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs for a few musical artists. And since music is a topic so infrequently touched upon these days in the Blogulator, I thought today, the day in which we all have to suck it up and go back to the office at 7:00 am but the clock says 8:00 am, your day can be immensely brightened by some nuggets of beautiful music.

Now, Grand Archives and The Most Serene Republic really have nothing in common other than the fact that they played together at the 7th Street Entry in Minneapolis on Friday night, which I attended (with Brigitte, Chris, and Lady Amy -- a regular Blogulator convention! Nerd alert!) But holy wow, what a show. Grand Archives is sure to show up on SNL or Letterman in the next six months -- they are the new hypester band whose debut record was scooped up by some tiny indie label called Sub Pop. Sure, their pedigree is a little obvious -- the lead singer / songwriter Mat Brooke is an ex-Band of Horses and Carissa's Wierd member. But the more times I listen to "Torn Blue Foam Couch," the more I melt a little inside. The harmonic vocals, pulled off exquisitely in concert by three of the five members of the band, are essentially the equivalent of chocolate chip cookies for my musical soul. Yes, if you liked Band of Horses' new record, you'll like this, too. (I'm looking at you, Paal.)

Meanwhile, The Most Serene Republic, a former Blogulator Top 10 entry with their 2005, was not so great when I first saw them live back when they released their incredible debut album Underwater Cinematographer. This time, as the headliners, the band came off with an incredible edge of maturity in their sound. All seven (seven!!!) members fit on the 7th Street Entry stage, barely. And, while each member seemed in total control of their own assignments, they also melded as a band like nothing I've seen since The Dismemberment Plan dismembered. And when they referenced the fact that Travis Morrison from The D-Plan was going to play live, it all made sense to me. This kind of disconnected togetherness in music has been missing from my life since The Dismemberment Plan broke up!! Now I hope that my life is more complete again.

Which leads me to ask the question, Why? No, just kidding -- that was a little joke regarding my most hotly anticipated new record of the year, the new outing by Why? titled Alopecia, due March 11 (that's THIS TUESDAY!) Now, I've only had a cursory listen to a few select tracks from this album, from listening to Radio K at my aforementioned job on Saturday morning. But, like their 2005 Blogulator Album of the Year, the tracks sounded incredibly straight-forward, yet lyrically more biting than anything I've heard in a while. Standout tracks like "Good Friday" again splice Yoni Wolf's once-in-a-generation vocal stylings with instrumentation that is both hip-sounding and timeless. And while their MySpace page currently only offers one song from their new record ("The Hollows"), it is getting me excited to actually experience a new musical album for the first time the day the album is also properly released.

In short, I love music again. Can I blame daylight savings time for it? Sure, why not. I mean, there are also other things, like the eminently enjoyable Vampire Weekend showing up on Saturday Night Live this weekend, and a new great Hot Chip album out there. And when October comes, and we gain that hour back, spend it on this new awesome music that has been released.

This entry was posted by Unknown, on Sunday, March 09, 2008. You can leave your response.