I heard “Blue Umbrella” for the first time a few weeks ago in my friends car, and was instantly captivated by it. I don’t know what it is about the song that intrigues me so much, but once I heard it I couldn’t think about anything else until the song was over. The music is the score for a short film called “The Blue Umbrella,” which was released with the opening of pixar’s film “Monster’s University.” The main instruments of this song are a guitar, and music box, (or some sort of pitched percussion instrument that I don’t know the name of), and strings. (There are also some synth sounds thrown in here and there).

The song starts out with the light and playful sound of the tuned percussion. Something about these sounds makes me want to smile every time I hear it. In a way it makes me feel like a kid, and I love it. Next, the acoustic guitar and vocalization come in. (The aren’t any words, just vocalizing, so I like to think of it as just another instrument.) For a while this really pretty and light theme continues, until suddenly music takes a turn in the opposite direction, and it becomes very dark and evil sounding. A lot of dissonance and lower muddy tones being played all at once, until as quick as the darkness came, it stops, and the bouncy theme is back, but I bit quieter than it was before, as if it’s still a bit frightened from what happened before. But as time goes on, it becomes more and more confident, until the magical theme is back full force, maybe even more powerful than before. Finally, the song ends a bit more similar to the intro, where it just had the music box and a little guitar, and fades out.

The “Blue Umbrella” is about two Umbrellas that comes to life on a rainy day, and in a sea of similar black umbrellas, the Blue Umbrella spots a pretty looking Red Umbrella. The exchanges glances, and are immediately captivated by each other. But unfortunately their owners continue on their separate paths, and all the while the umbrella are desperately trying to get back to each other. In desperation, the Blue Umbrella flies free of it’s owner and floats in the wind into the street, where it is saved by other magical objects. The story ends with the blue umbrella being found by it’s owner, and then reuniting with the red umbrella as the two owners sit down for coffee. Now, if I hadn’t known what the short was about and I were just able to listen to the music, then my interpretation would be slightly different. Listening to the song, I have the feeling like something is started, like a feeling of magic – a spark. And this “feeling” keeps growing as more and more instruments are added on, and then it hits the point where the mood turns foul; something very bad has happened. Eventually the pretty theme comes back, letting the listener know that there’s still hope, and it continues growing, finally ending with the same happy feeling the song started with, so the listener knows the story has a happy ending.

I would recommend this song to anyone would enjoys simple instrument music, something that has a clear theme repeated throughout. There isn’t anything that complicated about the notes or the instrumentation, but it still makes me feel something nonetheless, which is amazing. Definitely listen to this.

“Enchanted” by Taylor swift is definitely not one of her popular or well known songs, but needless to say one of my favorites. The first time I heard the song was when I heard I cover of it by Adam Young, (Owl City), who was dedicating it to Taylor after they met at some sort of event; I immediately loved the song. From there, I decided to look up the original version of the song–Taylor Swifts version. This version was a bit slower and more acoustic sounding than Adam Young’s version, which I really liked. I’m not really a huge taylor swift fan, but I really do enjoy some of her songs, and really respect her as a singer and as a songwriter.

There’s a pretty story told by the lyrics in this song; Taylor (or some girl) met someone for the first time at some sort of event or just by chance somewhere and had an instant connection with them. Everything just seemed to fall into place so perfectly, just like a cliche love story. The rest of the night was magic; everything seemed so amazing and surreal that never wanted to let it go. But, like all good things, the night came to an end, and that’s the end of the magic. She wishes that she would have said something or told the person how she felt, but she didn’t. I think we’ve all had some sort of experience like that where we look back on something so great and wonder why we didn’t do everything in our power to try and extend that euphoria. But maybe some things are best left unsaid in a way, at least in my opinion. I think that part of the magic is that you know you’ll probably never see that person again, but you still play out everything that could possibly happen in your head. There’s something really special about that feeling you get when you meet someone and have that deep of a connection right off the bat. The butterflies, the involuntary grinning like you can’t contain your excitement. It truly is enchanted.

The verses of the song musically are much quieter and reserved than the choruses are, both instrumentally and vocally. The songs starts out with some sort of synth pad in the background laying down the chord progression in a pretty mystical sort of way. Then the guitar comes in, and the singing starts, and it keeps building until the first chorus, where she finally says how she feels about this person. I really like how the chorus instrumentals and vocals are different than the verse because it creates a really big impact moment. It’s like she was holding in all these feelings the entire time, until she couldn’t keep it in any longer and she exploded (metaphorically, of course). Only it was too late–the night was over and she never have the chance to confront her one night lover again. In chorus I feel like there’s a hint of regret, because she’s begging herself in the past not to let the night go.

This kind of music is not necessarily unusual for taylor swift in general, but it’s definitely a little less “pop”py than her more recent music, and much less synth instruments than her couple albums, which is a breath of fresh air, and where I think she fit’s in the best in regards to her comfort zone.

I wouldn’t really recommend this song to everyone, but I definitely think that if you like country or pop than you would enjoy (or at least appreciate) this song. I’m not a big country fan (or even a big pop fan at that), but I do find song now and again that I enjoy regardless of any genre bias. This would fit best in a love song playlist. (I don’t think I need to explain why).

It’s also a really great song to sing in the shower.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/taylorswift/enchanted.html

I was first introduced to the song “Can’t Complain” when I was over my friend’s house, and I asked him to show me new music; I instantly fell in love with the song. There was something about the song that just captivated me from the first note. The song is by a group called “Nickel Creek,” and if you haven’t heard of them, well, that probably makes sense because their most popular song has about 1 million views on youtube, compared to the songs you usually hear on the radio which can easily have 200 times the amount of views. The genre of the song is what I’d call a mix between bluegrass and folk (and some other stuff in between). What I really love about this song is how well it tells a story. Listening to this is like going on a journey through the person’s life, and it really is portrayed so beautifully. (I know it sounds cliche but it’s only way I can really describe how this song makes me feel). In the song you’ll hear many different instruments and sounds, including (at least) two different guitar tracks, a fiddle, what sounds like a cello, a bass (probably upright), and a church bell or gong of some sort.

The lyrics and the instrumentation fit together so perfectly in this song. As much as the lyrics tell a story, the music itself tell maybe an even more compelling story. Working together, the lyrics and music show the reader something incredible. Musically, the story starts out simple, with some long tones (playing the chords) in the background and then guitar, panned all the way to the left. Almost the whole time, the plucking guitar part has this one note that it keeps going to, which adds a lot of tension, and then it resolves, only to come back again in the subsequent chord. I love this so much and I really think it represents how the story follows a sort of rise and fall pattern, going from good to bad (and back to good) in the blink of an eye. As the story progresses, more and more instruments begin to come in, first another guitar part, then vocal harmonies, string parts, etc. As more and more of the plot of the story is revealed, more and more musical parts are added, which works so well. Just like chapters in a book, the song is split up into different sections, by key changes (in the first 4 minutes the key changes 4 times) and by dynamics. The song builds and builds and builds until it hits a wall and starts to fall back down again with the line “I cheated on her with a friend of mine.” and then my favorite part of the song happens about 30 seconds after that, when it fades out to the same long tones it started with (kind of like that the story went full circle; the lovers started out separated and disjointed and now they’ve come around to the same spot again, and then all of the sudden the singer says “No she can’t…” and everyone comes back in full blast, making the end of the song the most intense part.

The singer of the song uses the word “I” a lot, giving the impression that he’s talking about his own life and personal experiences, but you can never really know for sure, unless the writer releases what the song is actually about. This kind of music is not unusual for Nickel Creek, but it is definitely a bit less blueglass-y then some of their other songs (I’ve only heard a few others though). One line that I really like is “I guess we just kidnapped each other’s minds.” This really speaks to me because I know it feels to kind of lose yourself in someone, almost be like a prisoner to them.

Lastly, I would definitely recommend this song to anyone who likes tangy bluegrass type music, and even those who don’t, because it’s just a great overall song. For me, it’s a great song to just sit down, close your eyes, and listen to – but for others it may offer something different, who knows. Regardless of what the song could potentially mean to anyone, I think that it’s something that everyone should at least listen to once, just for the sake of expanding their horizon of musical knowledge and appreciation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxrHURemzIg

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickelcreek/cantcomplain.html

“Heart’s A Mess” is definitely a song that I always find myself going back to listen to time and time again. It doesn’t necessarily have the catchy melody or guitar riffs, but it’s an extremely unique song with many amazing qualities. The song is by the group Gotye, who are primarily known for “Somebody that I used to know, and what I love about the group is how unique each song really is, always having interesting instrumental arrangements and percussion parts. The song “Hearts a Mess” was featured in the soundtrack of the big screen adaptation of “The Great Gatsby.” When performing, live the lead singer Wally De Backer has all the percussion instruments in front of him and alternates between singing and playing the intricate interlocking percussion parts.

The lyrics in this song tell a pretty clear story. Whether it’s about the lead singer himself or someone else I don’t know, but my interpretation of the song is this: It’s a story about love, but really a traditional romantic love song. This tells story of a man who has fallen in love with a woman (or a man it doesn’t say in the song, but I’m just going to assume it’s a woman), but she has been hurt so many times in love that she has given up on love and locked her heart away. She blocks everyone out of her life, because she feels like the only defense for getting hurt is to not let anyone into your life at all. (I can definitely connect to this on a personal level) So the entire song is really about the man’s struggle with trying to get this woman to give love another chance and to take a leap of faith, but she is adamant in “throwing away the key” to her heart. The recurring words “Your heart’s a mess, you won’t admit to it. It makes no sense, but I’m desperate to connect, and you can’t live like this.” He’s trying to show her that the way she is living isn’t healthy and that she has to open herself up to people like him, who are “desperate to connect” with her. As he sings these lines, he goes up the octave and it almost sounds like he’s screaming the words “desperate to connect” which really gives life to the lyrics. The instrumentals in this song are particularly interesting because they seem to not necessarily fit the theme of the lyrics. You’d expect the song to have an angsty sort of sound, but it doesn’t. It has a more relaxed sound, with string with legato string parts and funky percussion and synth sampling in the background. It makes for a very intriguing song, and makes you wonder even more what the meaning of the song is.

This kind of music is definitely not unusual for Gotye. Gotye is always putting interesting spins on the instrumental parts of their songs. This probably fits in with the meaning of the entire album, which is called “Making mirrors,” but I’m not exactly sure how at this point. It seems like both the song “Heart A Mess” and “Somebody That I Used To Know” are both about a love interest (or a former one) of his. But musically, it fits in with the theme of using samples to create new interesting music, which I really like, because it’s like taking something that you never really thought much of before, and then looking at it in a completely different light, which I think is really neat.

Finally, I would absolutely recommend this song to anyone. I certainly don’t think that everyone who listens to it would like it, but I think that anybody who listens to this song (or anything by Gotye for that matter) would appreciate how unique and different their music is, and how it is really unlike anything created before. This song would fit in with a mellow playlist, something that you can listen to when you want to relax.

I am hoping to learn and experience new ways to look at and think about music. I feel like a lot of people (including myself) get stuck on a certain way of listening to music, and until we are shown other ways and interpretations of songs, then we will never be able to open up to other possibilities. I am hoping to be introduced to different styles of music and form a greater appreciation for all genres, not just the ones I listen to most often.

Hello sir, my name is Eli! I live on 147 Granny rd. Farmingville NY, where I’ve been my entire life. In High School I participated in many music ensembles and groups, such as wind ensemble, pit orchestra, jazz band, marching band, etc. Music has always been an very important part of my life, and hopefully will continue to be. Some hobbies of mine include working out, playing piano, playing clarinet and writing music. I am currently undecided on what major I want to pursue over my next few years at college, but I know that I want to at least take a few music classes and maybe get a minor.

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