She and him

I, Julia, will admit to something. After being agaisnt Indie music, I started to like it when I saw "Juno" and got the soundtrack. Thus, my love for indie continued to grow after that. I'm still a newbie when it comes to this genere but I will admit that I like it!
A new band that I'm really enjoying is called "She and him." "She and him" is comprised of M. Ward and actress Zooey Deschanel. Now, zooey's no stranger to singing. She sang for us in "Elf" and was very charming doing so. She still is charming us!
M. Ward was Zooey's musician neighbor and they both share a love of older music. Their cd, entitled "She and him:volume one" explores that old sixities soul sound but reinvents it with modern sounds. My itunes classifies it as 'baroque pop.' The cd starts off with Zooey's beautiful booming voice singing "Sentimental heart," a song about the good times and memories that she's had. I can hear influences of the Beatles within the string section and it almost sounds like a velvet underground song. It's an artsy song that draws you in and peaks your interest to want to listen to the rest of the cd. The next few songs sound the same until we get to "Change is hard." It has country and western folk roots and Zooey sounds like June Carter mixed in with Dusty Springfield. It's more a retrospective song. After this song, we move on to a favorite song of mine called "I saw your face today." It's a jazzy, uplifting song that Zooey sings with perfect blues tone! The next song, "Take it back" is very similar. Then we move directly into the sixties girl group sounding "I was made for you." This is another standout song to me that's just brillant and you just want to sing along and dance with it.
The rest of the cd is pretty good and there is a GREAT cover of "Swing low sweet Chariot." It's a bit call and response with it's delta-blues feel to it. I could see the share croppers or those that worked on the fields in the south, mainly the blacks, singing this, for they were the real pioneers that started rock within the blues sound. It's mostly acapella with a haunting, simple guitar faintly heard within the background.
I think the most exciting part for me was that there were 2 Beatles covers on this cd, "You've really got a hold on me" and "I should've known better." I thought both were brillant but I did like "You've really got a hold on me" a bit better. It was very bluesy/jazzy and it's a duet as well. This is one of the only instances were M. Ward is ever heard singing in the whole cd. It has a vulnerable spirt to human love, like almost obsessing about someone so much it hurts but you can't leave them because you can't break free of them and don't know what you'd do without them.
Now "I should've known better" was a little cheesy because it had hawaiin slide guitar and it just sounded like bad elevator music or something you'd listen to while sipping pina colada's by the pool side with the cabana boy in a bad hawaiin shirt. Needless to say, Zooey's vocals are really well and yet again, another duet. It just sounded a little bit out of place on the cd, I wish they would've left it like it is in the Beatles version. Honestly, the song makes me think of like "Spongebob Squarepants" and I don't think that's what they were aiming for.
All in all, it's a brillant cd that I can't stop listening to and singing along to. Go check it out! I really hope that they make a volume 2 because I really loved this one and it shows that Zooey can not only be an actress but a singer who's for 'real' unlike Scarlett Johanson, Miley Cyrus, or Lindsey Lohan. I also think her voice is very unique which is great because it's like when you hear artists like that with a distinctive voice, you know who they are!
Here's the link to their myspace page if you want it:
http://www.myspace.com/sheandhim

*Edit*=I orignally said that "You've really got a hold on me" was a Beatles cover. It actually is not! It's a cover of Smokey Robinson and the Miracles. They were the original writers of the song and the Beatles did a cover of THEIR version. Sorry for the confusion and bad research! I had no idea.

George Harrison on Muchmusic.

I found this video on Youtube and had never seen it before. This was done after the success of "Cloud Nine" which is one of my favorite Harrison albums.
I like George's honesty in this video and it's weird because he talks about the Rock n' Roll induction ceremony from 88'. Now it's become well-established and it's a place that you MUST go take a trip to if you are a music fan.
I think George is funny in this video. My favorite part is when the interviewer asks him about "Give my regards to Broad Street." He saw it and liked it and remebered the "Ballroom dancing" scene. I love that movie as cheesy as it is. The funny part though is when the interviewer asks George what he thought of the 'new' versions of some older Beatle songs in the movie. He said that he didn't realize they were 'new' or notice any difference. That made me bust out laughing and I agree with George, there wasn't much of a difference. They seemed more soft rock but they were still the same.
Also, George, just to let you know that Paul DIDN'T run out of his own songs and has made more albums since. I was surprised to hear that he would even want to touch John's songs. John's songs are perfect the way that they are.
Ah well, I thought this interview was good and I had never seen it before.

I'm so happy that my DAVID won!

In the battle of the David's on "American Idol," David Cook won!
I had been rooting for David all-season long since he just seemed so down to earth and a true rocker. The finale of the show last night was so good! My favorite moments were when Brooke White sang with Grahamn Nash, David Cook sang with ZZ Top, and of course who can forget BIRDMAN!
I loved that guy so much on the bad auditions show. He was the best. It was great to see some of the other idols who didn't quite make it to the end meaning Carly, Brooke, and Michael Johns who got totally jipped this season.
I honestly didn't know if David Cook was going to win because David Archuleta did so well, he really peaked and was at his best. Simon also said that it was "a knock-out." I don't know why but Archuletta bothered me all season. I felt like he was just too sweet for the music biz even though he had a lot of talent. I see him doing something for Disney.
Now Cook, I loved him so much and I thought he had so much originality and talent. I was shocked though that Cook beat out Archuleta because I thought for sure Archuleta was going to win due to how many fans he had. It was pretty close though, 44 to 56 million votes. I did like that Simon said it wasn't so clear cut as it seemed and he would be happy if either David won. I felt that way too but I still wanted my David to win. I knew even if he didn't, he would still be a big star, like Daughtry. He got voted off quite early a few seasons ago. I said that I hadn't been this nervous since Clay vs. Ruben, which was really the last season I watched until this year. I think that it was the best year EVER and I did like the fact that they got to play instruments. It really added to the overall show.
The worst thing this year was the Beatles week. Ewww. Then they did the second Beatles week, double ewww.
I only liked about four performances from that show. Brooke's "Let it be," David Cook's "Daytripper," and both of Michael Johns songs "A day in the life" and "Across the Universe."
I'm not even going to get into Krisy lee Cook's versions of "Eight days a week" and "You've got hide your love away." In a word, horrible. Oh yeah, I also liked David Cook's "Eleanor Rigby" but I thought that it was too similar to Godsmack's version and I wanted to hear something a bit different.
All in all, I think the right David won and he was so cute too! My boyfriend was so funny though, he said, "I'm glad that the hair man didn't win."
Me too Chris, me too. He was refering to Jason with the dreads. Jason was good for like songs he knew and he managed to screw up and forget the words to Bob Dylan AND Eric Clapton in one night. That's a record that's not even funny.

Online music radio

Hello! Okay, so I'm excited that this is my first post EVER. There should be like celebrations in the streets. It took me a few days to get a post up because somehow my blog was locked due to how blogger thought I was a spam blog. Nope, not this cute stuff.
Lately, I have become obsessed with an online radio station. If any music junkies like me are getting sick or bored of their same old music, try pandora!
Just go to pandora.com and sign up. Once you become a member, you can put in your favorite artist and it'll make a station out of that artists and similar artists that sound like them. My first station, of course, was Beatles radio. It gave me such artists as Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Queen, Cream, and the Doors. I also made stations for the Doors, Frank Zappa, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, and the Who.
The other way to add stations is to go looking through the different generes. I picked classic rock, electric blues, and indie/alt. My FAVORITE station, however, is one that I share with my brother Matt. It's a rock n' roll station that plays all of this obscure music from like the 60's and stuff. There's lots of Velvet Underground. When you share a station, you can take it over as your own or keep it shared, which I did. It's cool because my brother picked some of the music that plays.
When you create any station, you can vote if you like it and it'll play that artist and similiar artists to that. If you don't like it, it won't play that SONG again.
Now it's terrible because I can't stop listening to it and my musical tastes are becoming more expansive than they were.
Go check it out at www.pandora.com
It's so much fun!