Eclecticism

Seems the Facebook app does not do what it's supposed to. Never mind, I shall content myself with the (better) Wordpress interface. Maybe I'll look into writing a Facebook app which interfaces with my RSS feed. That would be cool.

I thought I would write a music related post, since I found a couple of things on YouTube which piqued my interest. First an entirely serious one:

{% include youtube.html video="vIhJC2-UNZA" %}

When I first heard this on the radio I thought it sounded so fresh they must be a new band. But no, they've been around quite a while, I even knew other songs by them. Unfortunately I don't like many of them, but you can't have everything. Apparently.

Next, something quite different. Helen played me this at a dinner party on Saturday night for the comedy value. I went looking for it on YouTube, mostly out of curiosity regarding the identity of the female singer, and found a live version. Promise me you'll listen to at least some of it, and not just hit stop as soon as the guitars start. It might make you smile.

{% include youtube.html video="nAR4ieUrxUM" %}

I think I genuinely like this. It helps that I actually like ABBA. I think they wrote really good songs. I also love cross genre covers, and this is definitely that. The female singer's voice really works for me as well. I had a look for some of their other stuff, but it's really not good, not good at all. It seems they split and formed two entirely new bands, both of which are a slight improvement, though.

Told you I had eclectic taste. Here are a couple more for your edification:

{% include youtube.html video="OyZqpRxnHWg" %}

A soft one to start off with. Dido is so much better live. In my opinion her voice is perfect, but sounds overly processed on her recordings.

{% include youtube.html video="YgrMfRYCRgw" %}

Bit of a heavier one, there. This is about as heavy as my taste in music gets. I love the singer's voice, though. If you're confused by this wait for the chorus. If you don't have the pertinence for that, try this one by the same band:

{% include youtube.html video="wAfRW_RMK4M" %}

See? The band, if you're interested, are called "In Flames". Look up a song called "Dead End" if you want to know what happens when a Swedish metal (death metal? pop metal? disco metal? death pop disco metal?) band collaborates with a Swedish pop singer song writer...

How about another soft one? Okay, but I'm going to get it from an unexpected place:

{% include youtube.html video="Waw61eE9FyY" %}

Yes, that was Slipknot. Bet you didn't see that coming.

I'll skew a bit heavier again, but not too far.

{% include youtube.html video="hiHBiRRB1Mw" %}

I'm a little disappointed that YouTube couldn't supply "Father's Daughter" from "Like a Bolt of Lightning", but this will do.

I'm tempted to throw in a bit of Massive Attack, a bit of Evanescence, a bit of Killswitch Engage... but this post really could go on for ever, so I'll stop it here.