Currently listening to
Simone by Peirson Ross. Take a listen, really beautiful tune.
Jeremy Warmsley
Thanks Ben for sending me this site.
Take a listen to Jeremy Warmsley. Maybe the name doesn’t quite roll off the tongue, but guaranteed the music will warm your ears. He’s a singer-songwriter from London signed to Transgressive Records. His music is a little more complicated than what the last sentence may indicate. Again, maybe its something that might fall into that folktronica bucket? Maybe a mix between Clap Your Hands and Final Fantasy?
You decide.
You can stream a bunch of his tracks from his homepage, or head on over to myspace and hear them there. ‘I Promise‘ is a lovely mosiac, ‘I Believe In The Way You Move‘ sounds like it belongs in a musical.
And ‘I Believe In The Way You Move‘ has a really interesting video as well. Kind of sad, I guess we’re supposed to assume the male gymnast outlives the female. I’d love to see the old guy and the girl pull off some of those moves!
Rockton World’s Fair
This is not a post about a band, more like a snapshot into a way of life.
Every year for the past four I’ve spent at least one night of my Thanksgiving weekend at the Rockton World’s Fair. Originally started in 1852 in the tiny town of Rockton as just an agricultural fair, the event has grown over the years to host more than 100,000 people visiting every October.
I think there are a lot of people (including me) who come for the demo derby. I’ve got to say, there is nothing quite like watching 25 cars smash into each other. Familiar sounds are the popping of exploding radiators, the sirens of officials clearing the track of ‘hazardous’ wheel and axles, and the roar of the crowd tightly wrapped in sleeping bags and blankets.
The derby went three heats, two consolation rounds and a final. I couldn’t even really tell you who won. I do remember the roll over competition though.
Before the final heat, we were introduced by the announced to the roll over competition. Here the goal is to drive a compact car up and off a one sided ramp, flipping the car in the air. Points are awarded for how many revolutions the driving completes, as well, if the car keeps running.
Example, Jimmy John goes off the ramp, rolls over one complete revolution and drives away. 2 points for each side (2 x 4), 2 for keeping the engine running, 10 points total.
There were six competitors, all of which travel from fair to fair competing all season for points. I was interested in the pink car (see below), the only female competing in this event. She had never successfully completed a roll over before this night.
Jump 1. A dud. She broke the ramp and landed back on four wheels.
Jump 2. Another dud. She slid up the ramp on the under belly of the car and again broke the ramp.
Jump 3. Classic. While heading up the ramp, she hit the brakes and stopped in the position you can see below. Up on two wheels, with one perched on the jump. The ground crew (under pressure from the announcer) walked over to her car and pushed it over, upside down! Then right over again, back on to the wheels! You could see her bounce around in the drivers seat.
Brilliant. Don’t think I’ll ever see that again.
Adem
Take a good listen to Adem (pronounced AR-dem).
I’ve had his (real name Adem Ilhan) new record ‘Love and Other Planets’ going all weekend.
He sounds like what wikipedia calls nu-folk; folk music mixed with technology and mixed disparate styles. Or maybe his myspace description is better. Adem ‘writes pastoral pop that’s augmented by eclectic instrumentation and wistful and irreverent lyrics‘.
I heard his music months ago while downloading some tracks from a music blog. His track ‘You and Moon‘ went on the old iPod, got a bunch of play, but I never heard any more of his record. Maybe if I had heard ‘X Is For Kisses‘ or ‘Something’s Going To Come‘ (both of which can be streamed from his myspace page), I would have gone out and bought the record. Thanks Leila for letting me know about his show this past week and reminding me about this artist.
He’s just added a new track on his myspace page called Spirals, very nice. Hit play, hold significant other. If that’s not possible, think of someone.