BitchyVeganSoundtrack

Lots of class in today’s selections… get it? Because they both have class in their names? Yeah, I know. I am witty as shit.

Needless to say this is a day for pretending it is anything but a Monday, it is instead a day for shaking your booty in your cubicle and looking at the 2nd day of spring through your tiny window (or the window you barely see over all the other cubicles). Both of these bands will have you suddenly feeling a bit sexier… even in pleated khakis! That’s right, office boy, you too can be the hotness. Put these jammy jams on that iPod and play them just loud enough to be heard at the water cooler and I bet someone will want to have the sex with you.

Speaking of sex, my weekend was filled with learning that this whole, “boyfriend” business is nonsense. It’s filled with expectations and permanent weekend plans… ew. I instead opted for suggesting we just keep it, “casual”… ladies… this is like a permanent booty call while maintaining a social life. Fucking brilliance…. I think.

Either way… yay for sex (the safe kind) and yay for music that makes you want to have some. Now go, office boys and girls, dance like everyone is watching… because they are.

Class Actress is up first with her dancey jams. The girl is sexy without being a gidget… which is a rarity in the dance-pop world. She brings a sass in the lower bass notes that are like nothing I have ever heard in something that made me want to shake it… I heart her. Listen!

And now… boys you might already be familiar with due to their kick ass ability to remix something delicious into something even MORE delicious… which is harder than you think. I often hate the world of remixes unless I hear the remixed version of a song FIRST. Then I usually end up disliking the original… it’s a catch 22. These boys, however, manage to win me over with their stuff every time. Their little diddy, “I’ll Get You” is delightful and will make you happy in your pants.

Happy Monday betches.

Today is a day for mellowing the fuck out. I have 22 students with some serious learning disabilities and a science fair that I have to oversee happening in a week. My brain is DONE-ZO. Done done done. Amongst nearly making my boyfriend run far, far away and talking at 500 miles a minute, I have been listening to music that calms. Luckily the SxSW list does not disappoint with a number of delectable mellow options on the list. For today we have the glorious and new favorite I have found in Cheyenne Marie Mize and the upbeat Mexican indie rock outfit known as Chikita Violenta. Both will feed your need to take a breath or two without going into a full panic attack… ya know, assuming you are in the EXACT same mental state as I am right now.

So listen and breath and think about puppies and maybe sex or something… whatever works.

Let me first address a concern that a fellow blogger mentioned yesterday. No, I will not stop my quest simply because SxSW is this week and I only got to the letter C. I will finish what I started damn it… even if it brings me all the way to SxSW 2012.

The truth is that there are so many great bands and my little brain can’t keep up with the awesomeness in the world, so I will continue to adore the music that this project has opened up to me… deadlines or not.

Today is no exception… I am instantly in love with two more additions to my collection.

Chappo. I don’t like the name as it sounds like a superstore for chapstick. They make up for it by sounding like a party that Jesus and Will Ferrel would attend. They have the formula for making it as an uber successful indie band as they hail from Brooklyn, they were featured in a Mac ad, and they all look like they could appear in an American Apparel catalog. They will make millions, don’t second guess it.

Now for some sexy times. Charlie Mars isn’t having a hard time in Hollywood as he has the formula for mass success… enlisted the help of one of John Mayer’s boys, a few from other super successful pop acts and … oh yeah… Mary Louise Parker as a girlfriend. Once you get in the tabloids, you are in. It also helps when you make music that makes people want to have the sex. I wish I could have shown his, “Listen to the Darkside” video but the punk has embedding disabled… go look… MLP is all up on his junk and at one point I swear she’s two seconds from jumping his emo little bones. Either way, yums. I will listen to him like I listen to John Mayer… with shame and a tinge of sexuality. (I feel you MLP, I feel you)

Also, Tuesdays are pretty lame… they don’t get as much shit as Mondays… but they should. I’m ready for the humpity hump of tomorrow.

Look kids! We made it to the next letter of the alphabet. I blame this mainly on my lack of sleep (blame Ra Ra Riot and a grueling early teaching schedule) for my inability to “like” most everything today. At one point today I told a student, “You make me so mad sometimes I want to tear off your limbs… I want to go T-Rex on you”. The student laughed, assuming I was joking. I was not.

Not having a minimum of 8 hours of sleep does weird things to me. It also created an urge to purchase and learn the violin, until I learned how utterly complicated that is and how utterly old I am. Blerg.

For today, we are left with two bands that had to overcome my shitastic mood. It’s apparently possible which is uplifting, if only to me. At this point even a unicorn holding a baby laughing wouldn’t do the trick, so I am impressed.

California Wives are anything but. They are instead a group of boys hailing from Chicago that make delicious pop music and deserve all the recognition that they will surely get at this years SxSW. Try and tell me that you don’t enjoy it and watch as I tear your limbs off… or something.

Then we have someone who manages to trump my own language barrier. True, I have NO idea what she’s singing about unless she says, “Quero” or “Me llamo es Amanda”… which is all that I have managed to retain from 3 years of Spanish. What she does is that good. The fact that she makes all this noise, alone, and live… makes her my heroine. She could be singing about dogs eating sticks… I don’t care, it’s lovely.

If I survive to see tomorrow, and still retain employment, it will be a miracle. I am officially too old for going out on school nights. Guess I better just propose to the boyfriend of one month and buy a moomoo.

Yummy yum yum… not only are today’s musical selections making me stupid happy, I am also facing a 4 day weekend in the Keys, a date night with the boy, some debauchery with the little brother after work, and a work day in which I have accomplished all my goals and lesson plans by noon and my boss stated that he can’t think of one thing that I have done wrong. Boom. All wonderfulness. I really hope SOMETHING bad happens this weekend just so I don’t sound so fucking cheerful all the damn time. So much sex starts to seriously fuck with your understanding of bad stuff… everything just becomes lovely.

Boy & Bear will ease you into your weekend with the kind of indie-rock that was deemed good enough for Rolling Stone’s band to watch this year. They have the perfect formula for a band that blends into any iPod flawlessly. They are enough rock for the rock and are indie enough for the indie. They fit the genre with fluidity and delectableness. Get at them!

Brandi Emma… I am not going to lie. It’s VERY Jenny Lewis without all the Troop Beverly Hills nonsense. She’s lovely and an easy listen. I want very badly not to forget her in the sea of emerging heartfelt female singer/songwriters but I do fear she’ll get lost in the shuffle. Here’s hoping that’s not the case…

Today is a weird flashback. Both of these bands make me feel like I am watching a Wes Anderson flick and hitting myself for not knowing whatever classic band is playing in the background. Only neither are old… not even one dead band member. They make music like this… right now.

Birds & Batteries offer up the vocal quality that instantly reminds me of what I love about Okkervil River. Most people compare them to the times of Tom Petty… but that makes me think I stole an LP from my mom’s bedroom, which is weird. Anyway, they are fun and not classic to the point of trite. They steer far clear of any coverbandness and prove you can take your moms music and your own and play them at the same time. whoa.

The Black. Man, their name is so fucking cool. I REFUSE to pretend I wasn’t instantly drawn. Not, “The Black “something-something”" … just THE BLACK. Fierce.

Oh, and they sound awesome and stuff too. Now we get into the music your grandma and grandpa probably jammed too. Oh yeah, this is assuming you are around my age/not old as fuck. Anyway, they are jamtastic and make me want to go buy super vintage knee length, no cleavage dresses and a pair of black mary janes. Yeah, this song is THAT good… makes me want to decade jump. whoa.

Sadly, there is no video that I could find for these guys so you will have to just rock the track and I dunno… picture your grandparents having sex to it. Boom.

The Black- Throwing Away

Oh yeah, and tomorrow is Friday! Oh yeah, and I called in sick today! Oh yeah, and I am not really sick! Oh. Yeah.

Totally distracted today by stupid amounts of awesome. To start the awesome day my Biology class asked if they could listen to their music while we did a worksheet and I said that was fine. Sam the resident “oldie” lover puts on Grover Washington Jr. and within moments I am singing along with my 5 other students who have forgotten for the moment how cool they are supposed to “act” all the time. It was definitely in my top 5 awesome teacher moments. Then a student comes in during my planning period with an oreo and is ecstatically stating, “I can give you this because it’s veeeeegan!”.

Of course… all of this good moodness might have something to do with catching onto the goods of this whole “relationship” thing. Whoa… regular sex? I am never leaving. Glassy eyed and happy is how everyone should be at work. Fuck, I think I haven’t even raised my voice at a kid today. Even when one of my autistic students who suffers from a repetitive disorder got, “Let the bodies hit the floor!” stuck in her head… I just smiled.

Fuck, relationships make people SO LAME. I sound like a gross Hallmark card. But ok, after 28 years, I get it… the hype, anyway. This shit is pretty delicious, even if it does turn me into a little bitch.

Ok on to other more important things… music love making.

Today we conquer The Belle Brigade, a brother and sister duo who mostly sing about shutting up the part of your brain that kind of picks on yourself. I can’t blame them as they are both redheaded, seems like a lot of those types get angry at themselves for their DNA from time to time. Anyway, it’s good stuffs. Mellow, which after yesterday’s beat party, might not be a bad thing. Listen and let me know if I am just in love with the whole, “self esteem” theme….

Ben Sollee…. ok, I have to admit, this is NOT something I would probably have given more than 30 seconds worth of listening… but when you see what this guy can do to a fucking cello?! RIDICULOUS. His voice sometimes wins me over and other times makes me cringe… I was left completely perplexed by my admiration for his crazy talent and my own feelings towards the styling. This is another one you might have to listen to and then either encourage or slap me out of my “serious like” filled trance

And this one is just for the kiddos… should they one day google their slightly cool teacher, I want them to find this… aw.

ps- how is it only Tuesday?! Total crap.

I am beginning to LOVE everything about the B-section of the SXSW list. Today does not disappoint with two location-named bands… locations of course that have no affiliation with either band. How indie rock of them?!

One from Seattle and one from Toronto, it seems these boys are itching for some warmth. They will not be disappointed with what they find in Austin I would imagine… yummy sun, no beach, but it’ll do.

Bahamas instantly fed into my current disgusting mood of being in “like” with a new boy. That wispy trail of singer/songwriter vocals that are instantly read as sincere and adorable. He pitter pats on the drums and makes your heart do the same. He exists solely to, “make music about sunsets, love affairs, and making out with crooked smiles.”

I love him.

Barcelona with it’s exotic loveliness is nothing like the lumberjack tundra that is Seattle. The band itself doesn’t exactly stray from the sounds of Seattle either, a band that to me sounds like Death Cab had very awkward nerd sex with The Fray and made a baby.

The first 25 seconds of this track I could have sworn I was listening to DCFC’s Transatlanticism. It has the dripping pianos that make you want to slow down everything. It’s delightful, albeit heard before, but what in music is truly anything in its own right? I will take their delightful recreations and words about lovey dovey grossness and enjoy every second. His voice is angelic and when he states, “Please don’t go”… I don’t want to.

And look! Fishies!

For the first time since starting this blog a few months ago, this post will include all points. Music. Sex. Vegan.

Last night was the first time I have had a valentine since middle school… and you can scoff about your hallmark holiday all you want, I liked it and I don’t care how severely uncool I am because of that. Sure, I have had “guys” on valentines day before… but none that I like enough and none that were cute enough to make surprise reservations at a vegan place on the beach (I know, it’s so cute I just threw up in my mouth a little writing it).

The place turned out to be a RAW place which, even as a vegan, I will attest to being the most disgusting food movement EVER. The food tasted like gray. Yes, the food tasted like a COLOR. Horrific. We laughed the whole time which made it completely worth the $60 price tag to be able to say you consumed gray sand.

The sex part I will leave out for the most part suffice to say that there was no other option but to pay him back for pretending to enjoy the worlds worst meal.

This nonetheless has left me tired and happy and in a mood to listen to these next two bands who are the first of the, “B bands”! That’s right kids, we made it to the next letter in the alphabet… and I am hardly halfway exploring it and can tell you that the letter B does not disappoint.

Babeshadow is a first listen for me and although it is tirelessly happy, I am ok with that. Normally I need a little mix of mellow, but fuck it, today is a good day and I am going to blare these boys in my classroom whether my students like it or not. The music is about love-y dove-y grossness and until this new thing ends in ultimate heart break, I am going to listen and be giddy and enjoy the shit out of this crack love stuff everyone else has been enjoying for so long (if only for brief moments in time). They are a non apologetic band who sing songs because they are fun to sing… shouldn’t that always be the case?

I give you, Babeshadow.

Next up, a band that really needs no introduction… ok, so they aren’t The Beatles, but in the indie world, their blowing up might have likened to them on a smaller scale. Give them a listen and you will instantly understand as they are likable to any ears. The vocals brought me to The Bravery references (at least in this song) but I am ok with it… it’s delightful. They are an unclassifiable band as far as genres go and I think it’s better that they stay that way… more bands should try to break this many boundaries, it’s yummy.

From time to time, I am a girl. A girl who likes the idea of a boy who likes to hang out in my room while I sing songs about cats and robots. Whatever.

Jenny and Johnny are about the most adorable duet to exist. Ever.

It helps that they are both stupid talented and actually date one another. Maybe that is why She & Him seem just a little less genuine… we all know they don’t actually like one another. Lame.

For my ooey gooey insides, I give you… Jenny & Johnny.