I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve Googled the lyrics to a song I just heard on a TV show. There’s something about the combination of music and show that I enjoy more than music alone, even long after I’m done watching the show. There have been songs that I would not have liked otherwise, that I enjoyed because of this. It’s not necessarily the visuals or anything great about the show. I remember I liked a song by Seal for a while because it was used in a commercial for Law & Order. A commercial for goodness sakes… and to make it more bizarre I can almost categorically say that I don’t like music videos.

Anyway, I was happy to run across TV Show Music while looking up “Daddy’s Gone” by Glasvegas which showed up on Chuck near the end of last season. It was also handy while I watched the fantastic and equally doomed, Jericho. Amusingly, I already had a copy of one of the songs I wanted, but had never listened to it. Paul had given me his copy of Third Eye Blind’s self-titled album a while back of which I only listened to a couple of tracks. I am now thoroughly addicted to “Narcolepsy” which I think was used in the one episode of Jericho because it mentions a train. Sadly, the site is somewhat limited, as it doesn’t cover Psych which is another good source for music. They used Bloc Party’s “So Here We Are” and David Gray’s “Say Hello Wave Goodbye” for a couple of Shawn and Juliet moments.

I leave you now with a few of the better songs used in Jericho:

[Joe]

Let’s see, right now in the car CD player I’ve got Celestial Harmonies – Responsories and Antiphons by the Oxford Camerata. Dad downloaded it using the downloads I got from eMusic recently. The only problem is that when listening to it in the car, the volume ranges from almost inaudible to nearly painful.

Also in the car, I’ve got Drunken Lullabies by Flogging Molly and Deja Entendu by Brand New. Both were eMusic downloads. Flogging Molly is punk/Irish music which I got into after hearing Drunken Lullabies and What’s Left of the Flag. According to last.fm, Brand New is Indie Rock/Emo/A bunch of other stuff which I suppose fits. I bought the album for Okay I Believe You, but My Tommy Gun Don’t and The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows, but it’s filled with great stuff like I Will Play My Game Beneath the Spin Light and Sic Transit Gloria… Glory Fades

Rounding out my recent eMusic selections, though I haven’t gotten around to burning it to CD, is a split EP with songs from Alkaline Trio and Hot Water Music. What’s interesting is that the version of Radio on this album is done by Hot Water Music as a cover of the Alkaline Trio song. I like the song if for no other reason than the first line is quite possibly my favorite lyric ever, but it’s explicit so I don’t recommend trying it out at work.

Also on my computer are several songs by Golden Death Music. I found out about the solo project when I got a recommendation from, I believe, the artist himself. After listening to Chantepleure, I was hooked, probably because parts of it reminded me of Brambles from the Donkey Kong Country 2 soundtack. Futile, Hopeless, Beyonder and Hegira are all very good and available, along with a few more songs, as free downloads from last.fm. I obviously recommended downloading them all.

As people know, YouTube is a great place to find music. A little while back I was able to find a few songs by the Irish singer that I heard at a pub in Seattle.

As for music that I’ve gotten through more traditional means, I bought a copy of Start Something by lostprophets. I think I got it mostly for Sway, but Last Train Home, Last Summer and Goodbye Tonight are all solid.

I also picked up Tell All Your Friends by Taking Back Sunday. I’m just guessing, but I don’t think they’re going to find much of an audience from the people reading this.

Now that I think about it, I also picked up Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not in the past year or so. I got it for Mardy Bum, but really haven’t gotten into anything else on the album.

The other day Techcruch was talking about a new music recommendation engine called Mufin, which they think does a pretty good job. The reason this sticks in my head is that they used The Darkness‘ I Believe in a Thing Called Love as an obscure song test. And yes, that video is creepy/funny. I’ve never watched the whole thing. As for Mufin, I’m still waiting for my beta code.

One last note, over the summer I heard Buckcherry’s Sorry a lot. I don’t know if it got as much, or any, radio play because I’ve pretty much stopped listening to music on the radio, but I think Everything is, by far, the better song.

[Joe]

Never close your eyes

I got an email the other day telling me that the Counting Crows have another new website, Livecountingcrows.com:

Livecountingcrows.com is designed with both the serious collector and new fan alike. Each show is available in FLAC files for those of you who want the ultimate in audio quality, and MP3 for those of you who want easy files that you can listen to from the moment you download the files. All downloads come with CD booklet and labels for you to print in the comfort of your own home. For those of you who want us to do all the work, you can purchase a CD option which will send the disc, complete with artwork right to your doorstep.

I have to say that I love the fact that they have FLAC as a download option, even if it does cost a bit more. The email goes on to say that they’re putting up every show from now on and some shows from their archives.

I was trying to figure out who in their right mind would want to buy copies of the same songs over and over again. Admittedly the Counting Crows will occasionally change things up for a live performance, but I don’t think they really do much different on this type of tour. It would be more understandable if they were doing some of their more obscure tracks that never made it on to a “studio” album, but I don’t see anything like that available yet. In the end, I’m guessing that they’re trying to market this to the people who went to a given show. So if Adam Duritz screws up and starts singing the wrong song (This is called improvisation and is very artistic – Ed) at the concert you go to, then you can have a permanent copy of it as your souvenir. I kinda wish more groups would do this. I mean, sell a copy of their live performances, not screw up and call it art.

Coincidentally, my PAX 2007 DVDs should be here soon. I’ll finally be able to see the beginning of Wil Wheaton’s keynote that I missed because I went to my advisor’s lecture. Sadly I don’t have an excuse to be at this year’s show, but PAX is coming to the East coast in 2010.

[Joe]

The Counting Crows are releasing a new album on March 25 and decided to give away a couple of tracks for free. 1492 feels like a departure from the usual, which in and of itself is not a bad thing, but I don’t like the direction they’re going with it. When I Dream of Michelangelo is so similar to their previous work, as to not cover much (if any) new ground. It feels like a companion song to Angels of the Silences, though admittedly a bit less of a downer. I didn’t like it much at first, but it’s growing on me. I’m just hoping these are filler tracks.

Last.fm hasn’t been giving me very good recommendations lately (though they’re better than the ones I get from Netflix), so I’ve been mining my neighbors’ top artist lists for ideas. I’ve found some good stuff, plenty of crap, and some unusual stuff. Dick Brave & The Backbeats doesn’t so much fall into that third category, as it dives head first into it. It took me a minute to figure out what I was listening to.

As I was putting the links together for this post I noticed that Last.fm has made on-demand playing of full-length tracks free, sort of. Full-length tracks and albums are free to play three times, after that they hit you with an ad for their subscription service. It’s an improvement, as long as they don’t do away with their playlist feature that lets you listen to full-length tracks of your choosing, just always on shuffle. They haven’t released details about their subscription service, but if it’s cheap enough, I may go that route.

Since signing up for Netflix, I’ve really gotten away from the idea of owning content. For a majority of the movies that I’ve gotten from Netflix, I’m particularly glad that I didn’t buy them. Most recently I rented 3:10 to Yuma, and since it’s a cowboy movie, I thought Dad might want to watch it. I may never be able to get him to take my movie suggestions again. On top of that, you don’t really own movies, so much as rent them for the rest of your life. Add to that the format changes, and I’m ready to rent just about everything. As long as they don’t try to bleed me, which they will.

Wow, I got really off topic.

[Joe]

One of the really cool surprises for me at PAX was Jonathan Coulton. I went to the concert Saturday night to see the acts after him, as I had never heard of him before. I don't know how to describe him, he does sort of folksy rock about, well… living on Skullcrusher Mountian, creepy dolls that follow you wherever you go, fractals and programming. Well, not all in one song. That would be silly. You can check out his music on his site. I think a lot of it plays better in concert, but 'Mandelbrot Set' is good regardless. You can actually see the PAX07 performance of 'Re: Your Brains' on youTube. That was fun.

I left in the middle of MC Frontalot's act. There's only so much hip hop I can take, even if it is Nerdcore.

We're not unreasonable, I mean, no one's gonna eat your eyes…