Things have, once again, gotten really busy. This weekend was actually super busy. But fun. Well, half was fun. I spent Saturday flying from Beijing to Wuhan for a meeting, then back to Shanghai, and so I didn't celebrate Halloween. But then Sunday was great. I made dumplings for a friends birthday, went to a good meeting for this conference I'm volunteering with and had a nice dinner. For once I was actually out of the house all day, which is unusual. I left at like 10am and didn't come back for like 12 hours! I love that. Oh, and I got a massage! Good Sunday.
But that means I haven't had time to write, so today you just get two quick songs. Cause I've got a bit of a backlog. The first is Miss You, by Oh Malo. Great great song off of a decent album, by a band from (I think) Rhode Island.
And the next one is Blinding Light, another great great song. This one is by Canadian artist Andrew Judah. He's put out like 5 EPs in a series this year, all titled Metanoia (parts I through V) and Blinding Light is by far the best track on any of them. There are some other good ones, but there's also some not so good ones. Very hit or miss. But this song is a hit. Reminds me of Other Lives at the beginning, which might be why I like it so much.
It's only Tuesday, and it has been a very long week. It was a fantastic weekend, though. I met a bunch of new people and made some new friends, which as we all know I've been trying to do lately. And I ate some delicious brunch on Sunday. But then Monday came along and I feel like this week is already kicking my ass. First, I didn't sleep well Sunday night, which never helps. And then Monday was just super busy, as usual. And work is getting in the way of life this week. Which would be fine, if life weren't also getting in the way of life. I have no passport at the moment because I'm renewing my visa, which means of course it's the perfect time for me to lose my debit card. Right? I can't think of a better time. Luckily I will get my passport back tomorrow (but only temporarily), which gives me time to leave work early so that I can go get a new card and buy a train ticket, then go to all these meetings on Thursday before taking a train to Beijing to spend a couple nights. And Saturday I'm flying from Beijing to Wuhan for an afternoon meeting, and then back to Shanghai very late. The plan is to just go out and celebrate Halloween, but I'm pretty sure I'll just be in a really bad mood and come home and pass out. At least I'll get to see friends in Beijing on Friday night.
And in the meantime, at least there's good music. Up first is Your Friend, the moniker of one Ms. Taryn Miller. She put out an EP (Jekyll/Hyde), and then an album (Gumption). The EP is pretty good, and the album isn't bad either. But there is one song in particular which I think is fantastic, and that's Tame One off of the Jekyll/Hyde EP.
And then there's LIV. LIV has just put out their first single, titled Wings of Love. It's a solid track, with a great throwback, soulful sound. But it would not necessarily have caught my attention on its own merits. The reason it has, though, is because LIV is a new supergroup made up of Lykke Li, two of the guys from Miike Snow, Bjorn from Peter Bjorn and John, and some Swedish producer guy named Jeff Bhasker. With a lineup like that, this is definitely something worth paying attention to. There is no album yet, or even an album announced, but I did read an article that says they've made enough content as a band for more than one album. So that's worth looking forward to.
I have two fantastic songs and no stories to share with you today. It's Friday, it's been a very long week, and I want my brain to stop for a bit before I head out for the evening. So no long blog today.
The first song is from Rhode Island-based band Arc Iris. I just heard them for the first time today, when Kaleidoscope came on a playlist I was listening to. It's the opening track from their second album, Moon Saloon, that came out in August. Which I now need to go listen to because Kaleidoscope is really great. Such a beautiful chorus. And it has the same producer as FKA Twigs and Caribou (but sounds nothing like FKA Twigs or Caribou). And it's got a pretty sweet video, so you're watching that.
Then there's Totemo. She's from Israel, and has an EP Desire Path, that came out in July. On said EP, there are some tracks that are a bit too poppy and sugary for me. But then there's also some really great tracks. The best of which is Hits. This song is absolutely incredible. There is nothing that I don't like about this song. So fantastic. And you're also going to watch the video, because after a bit of googling I learned that the video is made up of a collage of videos that her friend started shooting of her when she was diagnosed with cancer and started chemo. So listen to an incredible song and watch an incredible journey. All good things.
I think I still need to finish writing about Sri Lanka. After Rei showed up we spent another week together. When we started planning I basically had her pick what she wanted to do, and one of her top choices was Sigiriya, cause she'd seen something about it on TV. So she met me there after landing at the airport, and the next morning we climbed it. Sigiriya is this complex of ruins that's built on top of a very distinctively shaped mountain. It basically looks like a giant boulder. It's still debated if it was a palace or a monastery, but after seeing it I think it was a palace. I saw other monasteries while I was there, and there were some pretty major differences in the layout and design. So I'm glad I was able to solve the mystery for everyone. Anyway, the mountain looks like a giant boulder and you basically climb up the steps that have been put along the side. This is after climbing a spiral staircase right up the side of it (which is basically a cliff) to see some cave paintings. It sounds pretty terrifying, but it was surprisingly ok. Even with my fear of heights I was pretty fine. The whole time actually. One of the best parts of the climb are these giant lions paw carvings that straddle what remains of the original staircase, before you start the main climb to the summit. They're massive, and apparently were part of the entire lion statue whose mouth you had to walk through to summit the mountain. I wish that part was still around. Then once you get to the top there are really great views of the surrounding countryside.
That afternoon we were supposed to go have lunch at this fancy hotel built by Geoffrey Bawa, Sri Lanka's most famous architect, which has gorgeous views of a nearby lake and national park, and then see cave temples in Dambulla. But after the hotel our guide suggested we do the cave paintings the next day since it was too hot in the afternoon. So we did. We just hung out, I worked a bit, Rei napped, we watched some TV, had a nice dinner at the hotel, and went to bed. This was pretty standard for us. Evenings were generally spent with dinner, a bit of tv, and early to sleep. And then up early the next day. Every day.
Once up, it was on to Dambulla, which turned out to be one of my favorite places in Sri Lanka. It's a series of 5 caves, all of which are Buddhist temples, with every inch of their walls and ceilings covered in Buddhist paintings. They're also packed with statues of the Buddha and Boddhisatvas and the kings who funded them (some of whom apparently also had to use them to hide out so they wouldn't get killed). It doesn't take long at all to see. Even with a guide it only took about 30 minutes, but the caves were awesome. After that, we spend the next few hours heading out of the ancient capitals and into the Tea Plantations in the highlands. We were going to be having our splurge night that night, staying at a fancy hotel that had been converted from a tea factory. The place is gorgeous, as is the surrounding countryside, but sadly the hotel itself was pretty shit. We had a horrible night's sleep. I won't go into it, but there are terrible reviews of it from me all over the internet now. But, the service was amazing and the food was good and we had a fancy high tea in the afternoon, which is always fun, especially in a tea plantation. And we got to pick tea leaves the next morning. Rei hated it. I loved it. Point being, if you go to Sri Lanka, definitely visit the Heritance Tea Factory, but do not waste your money to stay there.
I think I'm gonna stop here. I think I'm gonna turn this into a 3-parter. So now I'll just tell you about The Seshen, an amazing band I just found. They're not new, but they just put out their first official album, Flames & Figures. They had an EP back in 2014, and an album in 2012 that was self released, but this is their first album on a label. It's an awesome album, but actually so is all their old stuff. So we'll start today with Other Spaces, which is my favorite track off the new album so far. Especially at the end. Though that might change. I love these guys already, but I see myself liking them even more the more I listen.
So if you can't figure it out after that, part of the reason I probably love them is because they sound a lot like Little Dragon. Who I love. So much. As mentioned, their old stuff is also fantastic. So instead of playing you one of the new singles or something, I'll just play you what is maybe my favorite track off of Unravel (their last EP), Shapes. This might actually be my favorite song by them.
Look at that, there's a new song from Daughter. It's a bonus track called The End off I think the Japanese release of their last album, Not To Disappear. And it just came out last week. Considering I had them on my blog 6 times last year (and also multiple times prior to last year) you could say they need to be here. And they're one of my favorites, so anything they do is noteworthy.
Another quick one for you. I started a 2017 watchlist playlist, and there are currently two artists on there. I'm not actually sure I have to wait until 2017 for music from them, but each of them recently put out music, and only has a few songs available. Which makes me think that by the time an album actually comes, it'll be 2017.
The first is George Cosby, with the track Juliet. This was the first single off of his new EP, A Savage Kiss, which came out yesterday. This is his second EP, still no album, but despite that all I can seem to find out about his is that he's based in London.
And then we have Lo Moon. I have very little info about these guys, except that they are a trio from LA and have a beautiful debut single called Loveless.
I wanted to write a blog earlier, but then I didn't have time. But I'm just gonna put this song here. It's fantastic, so it should be here. It's called Breaking Myself Up by the band CuckooLander. It's really nice at first, but just wait until the end. Reminds me of Feist a bit. Really soulful. Sadly their others songs are not nearly this good. The other songs are more like a mediocre version of Chairlift, maybe. But this one is great. Maybe because Rostam was involved on producing it.
I just got back to China from Sri Lanka last night. I went for October Holiday, where everyone gets a week off to celebrate the establishment of the Communist Party. I took an extra week and spent 2 weeks around the island, the first week on my own and the second with my friend Rei.
I started out in Colombo, the capital. I wasn't actually planning to spend much time there because everyone says there's really no point, but I have 2 friends that just moved there, so ended up staying with them a couple days. And everyone (including my friends who live there) are right - as a tourist, there isn't much to do. But when with friends, it can be lovely. We did pretty much nothing. Just had a little wander around, ate, drank afternoon cocktails, watched sunset at the ocean... It was pretty fantastic. Good weather, good company, cold (not so good, sadly) beer, good people, good food. What more could you want? And as much traveling as I've been doing lately (pretty much nonstop since my family came on June 1), this is the first time I've felt like I was on vacation. Every other trip has been super busy or super short or just non-stop, and this was 2 days in Colombo of really doing next to nothing. It was exactly what I needed, actually. It was also lovely to spend time with my 2 friends there. They're actually friends of friends who I've met 3-4 times over the years, and they are a lovely couple, but I've never really gotten to know them that well. It's always just been a dinner or a day together in a group, but we had like 3 days with just the 3 of us, and it was really fantastic. Hopefully I'll get to see them again soon.
After Colombo I was out on my own to explore some ancient capitals. I hopped a 6 hour very local bus with no A/C up to Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka's oldest and most famous ancient capital. This place was first established as a capital in pre-Jesus times (that's a technical term. PJT for short), and then was moved a few times around the 10th century, then came back, and then moved again never to return. Now, it's full of ruins. But having been a royal capital, there are very few palaces. Most of what you find are these enormous (and some not so enormous, actually) stupas. They're mostly still in use, with active Buddhist temples attached to them that manage the upkeep. A lot of stuff in Anuradhapura (and the other locations I went) were pretty much lost to the jungle and only rediscovered by British colonialists in the 19th century, which is when they started rebuilding some of the sites. The Lonely Planet makes Anuradhapura sound like a huge complex of temples spread over a plain, so it had me thinking of Bagan in Burma before I went. Sadly I think that got my expectations up too much, because while the stupas are pretty impressive, it really is just a bunch of stupas, not a whole massive complex of temples or palaces. And it's also not that many temples, just a handful spread across the plains. There are a couple areas with some nice ruins in the forest, but for the most part it doesn't even feel that ancient. Also I got really dehydrated because Sri Lanka is SO HOT!
I had left myself 2 days in Anuradhapura, which ended up being too much. So on the 2nd afternoon I took a tuk-tuk to Mihinthale, a neighboring town which has a temple on top of a mountain. This was actually quite nice for a few reasons. First, tuk-tuks are awesome so it was fun to sit in it for like an hour. Plus the driver stopped at this random bodhi tree on the way that was massive and beautiful and impressive, and which I would have known nothing about if not for him. The temple itself was also great, first because it's on a mountain and has great views of the surrounding country. Also I got a guide who explained a bunch of stuff to me and made it much more interesting. But in the end, it was still just a couple of stupas and a ton of monkeys, plus a bunch of foundations for other ruined buildings.
Since my tuk-tuk ride was so nice the day before, I decided to have the driver take me 3 hours to Polonaruwa the next day. Polonaruwa is another ancient capital, which the guide books make less of, but which I thought was much more interesting. It's still just a bunch of ruins, but there's a much wider variety of ruins here. You have a couple of big stupas, but you also have ruins of palaces, Hindu temples, monasteries, cave carvings and more, all in a very small area, which makes it easy to get around and see in an afternoon. Plus the artwork and carvings here are also much more impressive than in Anuradhapura. If you go to Sri Lanka and only have time for one, don't listen to the guidebooks and go to Anuradhapura, go to Polonaruwa instead.
So that was just a quick stop off since it only took an afternoon. I actually expected it to take the afternoon and the next morning, but I was wrong. So then I hopped another tuk-tuk the next day to go to Sigiriya, my next destination which was 2 hours away, where Rei would be joining me. She was only going to arrive late at night and I got there around lunch time, but the only thing to do in Sigiriya is climb Sigiriya Rock. I had to wait for Rei to do that though, so I was wandering around town looking for something else to do and saw a bunch of jeep safaris advertised, which I ended up signing up for. There's a bunch of wildlife in Sri Lanka, but the most famous are probably elephants. I hadn't intended to go see them because I've seen plenty of wildlife and didn't think I'd have time, but in the end I did, so rather than sit in the hotel all afternoon watching TV, I decided to go. I went with this French couple and we took off for Mineriya National Park, just a half hour away from Sigiriya. This is one of the best places to find elephants, and now is apparently the best time to see them because they all gather in the area at this time of year for some reason. It has to do with the change between wet and dry season (wet season is just about to start) and the abundance of grass or something like that, but it means there's hundreds of elephants in the national park. And since it's not high season in Sri Lanka, there's not a million tourists (but there are still a lot of other jeeps around). So we spent a couple hours in the park looking at elephants (and we even saw one just randomly decide it didn't like the jeeps and charge at one, ramming head on into it. I thought it was going to tip over. It didn't. Luckily it wasn't near us, cause that shit was freaky). After that, it was back to the hotel to wait for Rei and continue with the trip, which I'll talk about later.
I already mentioned that while I was in Sri Lanka a bunch of good music came out, and one of those excellent releases was 22, A Million, the new album from Bon Iver. I put them on the blog earlier this year and talked about how excited I was they were making new music, so no need to go into that. But now that the album is out I can tell you about my favorite songs. One of them is the 2nd single off the album (well, 3rd song released, but 2nd single as the 1st single had 2 tracks), 33 "GOD".
Great track. And great album. I'm not sure everyone agrees, though. Well, that's not comletely true. I think everyone agrees it's a great album, but some people are not 100% happy with it. Which I disagree with. People feel like it's a new voice or something, but I don't feel that way at all. People said the same thing when Bon Iver, Bon Iver came out, saying that it was so different and that it took getting used to. I actually think that what Bon Iver has done with both Bon Iver, Bon Iver and 22, A Million is they have successfully managed to evolve, something many bands try and fail to do. So many bands try something new and end up losing themselves and making crap music, but Bon Iver has somehow managed to add new elements and layers to their music, use new tools or instruments or styles, without losing the core of who they are, in my opinion. I feel like pretty much every song on 22, A Million is distinctly Bon Iver at the core. There's still so much of the style and musicality and base layers in each track, and it's just everything that goes around that which has changed, taking in new influences and staying extremely current. But you can still hear the core in there, and it's still very Bon Iver.
Take, for example, 715 CREEKS. This is probably my favorite track on the album. At the beginning, one of Bon Iver's signature characteristics was the layering of the vocals, but there was always a distorted element to it. He's been doing this forever. You can hear it on Woods, off of the Blood Bank EP, and even in The Wolves off of For Emma, Forever Ago. With 715 CREEKS, rather than building up the layers like he used to, he's used autotune (probably better than anyone has ever used autotune) to create a similar effect, keeping one of the most basic Bon Iver characteristics, but updating it. So that's my 2 cents. I think the album is fantastic. I think it's a very clearly organic growth for the band, and the only thing I'm not happy about is how short it is.
I'm not gonna write anything long. I'll tell you about Sri Lanka when I'm back in China. I mean, I have had a lot of down time, so I could totally write something long. But I don't have a lot of downtime right now I guess. Anyway, here's a couple songs.
First one comes from River Whyless. They're from Asheville, North Carolina, which is a fantastic city. It also supposed to have a very good music scene. These guys are quite good. I can't help but think they're a Christian band when I listen to them, but I don't think they actually are. Maybe it's just the new album title, We All The Light. They do the whole male/female vocal thing that I love, and they have a generally good sound, though nothing breakthrough. I do very much like the song Kalangala, though. I had to google it to find out what Kalangala is, and according to Google it's a place in Uganda. No clue if that's what they're talking about, but I like how it sounds.
And since I haven't shared frequently this year, I feel like I can't just leave you with one song. Plus a lot happened in music this last week. There was the new Bon Iver album, which deserves it's own post. There was the new Banks album, which is good, but definitely not as good as the first. Not sure if I'll put anything from there on the blog. Also a new Moses Sumney EP, which is very very pretty, and for some reason ends with a song called Incantation which is basically him chanting Jewish prayers beautifully. And, last but not least, Regina Spektor's new album, Remember Us To Life. If you've read my blogs about her before, I'm not as obsessed with her as many others. Some people think this woman shits gold. I think that, on average, she's fine. But when she's good, she's really fucking good. This new album is definitely on par for her, and much better than the last one, which I found pretty disappointing. I'd say my favorite song on the album so far is probably Grand Hotel, so I'll also throw that in here for good measure.
Also for good measure, let's just throw in that Moses Sumney track Incantation, from the new EP Lamentations. I love the guy, I think traditional Jewish prayer melodies are often really beautiful, I think he made a really interesting and beautiful track that also confuses me a lot. And now I just want to know if he's Jewish or what the hell.
