Songs on Repeat: I'm Awake, At Last, Awake

It's weird writing a music post on a day like today, but since I don't actually listen to Michael Jackson on repeat (sorry, big guy), I don't feel too qualified to talk about his impact on my life, which is limited mainly to several disastrous attempts at moonwalking and being freaked out in general by his nose.

I will say one thing, however. The man could dance.

Moving on.

I was going to start off with something along the lines of "there are few songs that make me want to burst into spontaneous dancing," but this is not true. There are hundreds of songs that make me want to bust a move on subway platforms and such, but Bishop Allen's "Rain" is high at the top of that list.



Obviously, that lovely little bongo-drum-thing going on in the background has a lot to do with the whole dancing thing, but I am embarrassingly obsessed with Bishop Allen for a reason, and that's largely because all of their songs have a very carpe-diem kind of quality to them. It's why I play them when I'm trying to wake up in the morning and when I'm heading out to random indie shindigs and when I'm driving with the express purpose of getting lost. More than almost any other band I know, they manage to capture the sort of excited uncertainty that comes with being young and broke and in the middle of a massive city, which is more or less my summer right now. In short: well done, boys.

Songs on Repeat: Had A Lot of Things to Say

Like many children who grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia, I have spent most of my life relentlessly pretending that I actually live within the city limits, because trying to explain to people that you live in a town that is too small to possess a zip code is just too depressing.

With anyone who lives outside the Philly area, this usually works. But good luck trying to fake street cred in State College, where at least half the population is also trying to pretend they're from my gleaming metropolis.

Thus, the fact that I will actually be living in a city this summer -- I have an internship with MSNBC in New York -- makes me ridiculously, irrationally excited, to the point where I have accumulated a small playlist of songs that remind me of my impending summer adventures.

This includes:
- Pretty much every song ever written by Bishop Allen, for no apparent reason
- "Song for Myla Goldberg," by the Decemberists, which includes the admittedly blindingly obvious line "I know New York, I need New York, I know I need unique New York"
- "Gates of the Old City," by Looker, which reminds my former roommate Heather of Mary-Kate and Ashley and reminds me of Bishop Allen. Double win.
- "You Can't Hurry Love," by the Concretes, which readers of this blog will remember from a past Songs on Repeat post
- This song:



I have no idea why this particular song ("Wires," by Jason Schwartzman's solo effort Coconut Records) makes me think of dashing around New York, but it does. And yes, the band is another gimmicky project of an actor-turned-musician, which usually frightens me (see: Duff, Hilary), but Coconut Records has proven to be appropriately indie enough for me so far.

And there's no denying that "Wires" is catchy as hell, at least in my book. After all, it features punchy guitar chords and a xylophone, which is pretty much all I require of a song. There's also a great part that involves what I think is a Wurlitzer towards the end where everything just sort of soars upwards, and it's lovely. So: cheers for this song, and for New York, where I will be blogging from the Village in t-minus nine days. Score.

Quick blog note: Next up will likely be a LOST review, which I haven't posted yet because I am still attempting to wrap my head around the season finale, which was mindblowing and brilliant and almost made me cry. Stay tuned.