It wasn’t until Modest Mouse’s fourth album (Good News for People Who Love Bad News) that lead singer Isaac Brock figured out how to fully combine his pensive lyrics, warbled vocals and catchy hooks into one beautiful mess of positivity. “Float On” is the album’s signature song and it was a big departure from the band’s previous work. From the song’s wiki page, Brock had this to say:
“It was a completely conscious thing. I was just kind of fed up with how bad shit had been going, and how dark everything was, with bad news coming from everywhere. Our president is just a fucking daily dose of bad news! Then you’ve got the well-intentioned scientists telling us that everything is fucked. I just want to feel good for a day.”
Franz Ferdinand burst on the scene in 2004 with the second single from their self-titled debut.
The meaning of the song has long been debated. Some believe it to be about a sniper that’s about to kill his target while others believe it’s about romantic love.
Whatever it’s about — it’s a great, rocking tune. I love the guitar throughout and the shifts in tempo. The latter is tough to pull off, but the band does it well.
Is it too early to be nostalgic about music from the ’00s?
I heard this song in the car today and I thought it might be the start of a new feature — the quintessential songs of the noughts. Maybe in ten years, some twelve-year-old kid will stumble across this blog and get exposed to some good tunes. Who knows, maybe it will be my boy (who just turned two).
The song is known for its underlying riff, which plays throughout most of the song. Although it sounds like a bass guitar (an instrument the group had famously never previously used), the sound is actually created by running Jack White’s semi-acoustic guitar (a 1950s style Kay Hollowbody) through a Digitech Whammy pedal set down an octave. The riff was composed at a sound check before a show at the Corner Hotel in Melbourne, Australia.
According to White, “Seven Nation Army” is what he used to call the Salvation Army as a child.
Italian football fans and ultras picked the song up when Roma played in and against Club Brugge for the UEFA Cup. [8] They often chant the song’s signature guitar riff ever since, most notably during Italy’s campaign in the 2006 FIFA World Cup. About 10 million Italians, all across the nation, were supposedly singing the song during celebrations following the final victory.
This, along with the rest of [Elephant], was recorded on analogue equipment that was over 50 years old at Toe Rag Studios. Toe Rag Studios were set up in Hackney, east London in 1991 as a strictly analogue enterprise using only pre-1960 studio equipment. The success of Elephant established Toe Rag as a trendy antidote to digital music-making.
According to White neither the labels in America or in the UK wanted to put this out as the first single. They eventually relented and it became the White Stripes’ first Hot 100 hit in the US and Top 10 entry in Britain.
The song is called “There Goes My Love” by The Blue Van, a Danish blues-rock van. The commercial has been all over the airwaves lately, but if you’ve been living under a rock (or are just really good with the 30-second skip button on your DVR remote), take a listen:
The song is from the band’s third album, Man Up. I reviewed their first two efforts, The Art of Rolling and Dear Independence and enjoyed them both. Here are a few highlights from their first two releases:
Truth be told, I haven’t gone to many concerts recently since becoming a father almost two years ago. But when I heard Tom Petty was going to be playing Summerfest during an upcoming trip to Milwaukee, I had to buy a pair. Here is how Ticketmaster is currently bending music fans over…
Ticket Price US $105.00 x 2
Facility Charge US $12.00 x 2
Convenience Charge US $15.20 x 2
Tickets/Items US $264.40
Order Processing Fee US $5.20
TOTAL CHARGES US $269.60
Wow, $59.60 in fees to print two tickets. This never ceases to amaze me. There is no way that Ticketmaster is that fat or inefficient. A good portion of the money goes back to the venue in the form of an exclusive contract with Ticketmaster, which allows Ticketmaster to have a monopoly…which allows them to raise prices without consequence. And they’re going to merge with Live Nation?!?
