As many of you already know - Holiday Mountain is moving to Austin Texas in September. I'm not able to make this move with them because of commitments I have in the Boston area, but I have great faith that this is the right move for them and that their music will continue to inspire and groove like there is no tomorrow. It's been a very fun year playing, hanging, and recording with them and I am truly thankful for all of the time that I was able to be a part of this amazing group of people and musicians. I won't be playing the rest of their gigs in Boston area this Summer as I previously thought - which was initially a difficult thing for me to deal with since I was really looking forward to playing these shows, but know in my heart that it is for the best as they are preparing for their move as a trio to Austin. I still invite you to go and dance your ass off at the CD release show at the ICA on August 16th and all the other shows they have this summer. I wish them nothing but the best on their journey knowing that the future has great things in store for them.
Last summer I started to get into "hint-fiction" (stories that are under 25 words) and became inspired to start writing really short songs. My initial idea was I would write an album of songs that would all be under a minute and under 25 words (although I've bent this rule with some of the tunes). I've got a good amount of them in the works and the album should be done sometime this summer. Here's a couple of the songs that will most likely be on that album:
About an hour into the show Tuesday night Thom York introduced "Lotus Flower" with a Steve Reich reference saying, "It's gonna rain, it's gonna rain, it's gonna rain, it's gonna rain" and then he (or more likely Johnny I guess) briefly created a loop of it which began phasing. This was about the point of the show when I re-realized that Radiohead are in my opinion the greatest thing happening in pop music today.
The week leading up to the show I prepared by listening to Radiohead's entire discography from beginning to end. For some of these albums it was the first time I had heard them in years. I can honestly say that I hadn't sat down and actively listened to "The Bends" in almost five years prior to last week. It's crazy how as you get older you relate to music so differently - you tune in to things you didn't notice when you were younger, or you can connect to the lyrics differently with life experiences you've had since the last time you have listened to the song.
Musically I noticed more how much they draw from 20th century classical composers - such as the use of rhythmic phasing associated with Steve Reich (Who is debuting a piece based on "Everything in it's Right Place" and "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" in March of 2013), or with Johnny's Penderecki inspired orchestration (whom he recently collaborated with for an album they released this year). But also having absorbed much more pop music since my last Radiohead phase (thanks to having to learn lots of tunes for music therapy) I also was able to have a new found appreciation for how accessible and relatable their music is to a mainstream audience (despite the depth and complexity of it).
Speaking of music therapy, since the release of "The King of Limbs" there have been multiple occasions where participants have requested Radiohead songs for sessions. The first time was during my internship at Shattuck (an inpatient psychiatric hospital) and I remember having a conversation with my supervisor Carylbeth about Radiohead's lyrical content and which of their songs would be appropriate for the session. Most of this conversation was me trying to convince her that Radiohead didn't just make weird dark music...which at times is something Radiohead's music can be - but I feel like even some of their darkest lyrics/songs can be very therapeutic as well. I know for me at times, hearing some of these "darker" songs validated my emotions and experiences I was going through. Songs like "How To Disapear Completly" and "Let Down" I found extremely cathartic and not only validated what I was going through at the time but brought insight. This conversation came to mind Tuesday night - with some of their songs that are extremely positive and inspiring with themes such as reawakening and love. The most recent song of theirs that jumps to mind is "Seperater", the closer their most recent album "The King of Limbs. Lines such as "Like I’m falling out of bed from a long and weary dream/Finally I’m free of all the weight I’ve been carrying" seem only too fit for a music therapy session in that setting, especially with the ending repeating line of "Wake Me Up" which on Tuesday night felt like mantra to me.
But also some of the older songs like "Lucky" and "Airbag". I dig this quote from Ed talking about how "Airbag" is “about the wonderful, positive emotion you feel when you’ve just failed to have an accident; when you just miss someone and realize how close it was and stop the car and just feel this incredible elation. There’s something joyous about it- life suddenly seems more precious.”
Anyway, I could ramble on forever about how inspiring and awesome Radiohead is. But if you haven't found this out for yourself already - I can't recommend checking them out enough ("In Rainbows" is a great place to start). Or if you want to get an idea of what they're up to now live check out this video "The King Of Limbs - Live from the Basement":
Here's the Setlist from the show on Tuesday night (May 29) at the Comcast Center :
01 Bloom
02 15 Step
03 Airbag
04 Staircase
05 The Daily Mail
06 Myxomatosis
07 The Gloaming
08 Separator
09 Pyramid Song
10 Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
11 Morning Mr Magpie
12 Identikit
13 Lotus Flower
14 There There
15 Feral
16 Idioteque
—-
17 Supercollider
18 The National Anthem
19 Lucky
20 After The Gold Rush/Everything In Its Right Place
Check out this sweet video for the Berklee Summer in the City Series at the ICA that Holiday Mountain is playing in! We're the first band in the video (but there are some other really cool bands that are a part of this as well).
However - you don't have to wait till then to see us. We're playing at Yes Oui Si this Saturday for an awesome zombie themed show!
So I've been messing around with playing songs I learn for music therapy the way I'd want to play them if I was just playing them for me. I've half jokingly kicked the idea around in my head about creating a album of mathy/folky covers of some of these songs (such as Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Akon, and so on).
Here's a video of me playing (one of those songs, "We Found Love" by Rihanna) that I recorded last night. Not the greatest (or most sober) performance of it, but I had to stop after this take since it sounded like my guitar was going to crack more (at the end of the video you'll be able to hear what I mean).
I'm always hesitant to explain the backstories behind Koala songs since it is instrumental music and I think everyone should be able to create their own meaning to the songs. And I realize in writing what I am going to write may make it more programmatic for whoever reads this…so if this is something that you feel will take away from the music for you feel free to stop reading now.
In giving the backstory of this song I feel I need to give a little information about the album name, Xibalba. You may already be kind of familiar with this (especially if you’ve seen the film “The Fountain”), but in brief: it is the underworld of the Mayan religion and was believed to contain the tree of eternal life (which is what I interpreted the artwork that Kenyon’s grandfather made to be). In the city of Xibalba there were six houses which all served as tests or trials for visitors. Each of these six songs on the album were sparked from events that were happening/happened that served as rites of passage or I grew from in some way, and were then brought in and fleshed out with the other Koala dudes. These experiences were all kind of about growing up or dealing with/accepting the realization of the mortality of everything. Even though each of the experiences were mine, they became ours and we tried our best to get into the mindset of each of these events in recording them.
"Hope I Live Before I Get Old" is the closer on this album. It was written during the Winter of 2009 after a near-car crash. Raena, Bill, and I were driving home from a party on a night that there was a storm and the roads were pretty terrible. Bill was was the designated driver, he had just dropped Matt, off. Bill was blasting The Who’s “My Generation” and as we drove over the bridge near Stoney Lane, Bill belted out the line “hope I die before I get old” with Daltrey, and as soon as he did, we hit a patch of ice. We skidded from side to side down the bridge and then at the bottom of the bridge we slid off the road. We were all screaming obscenities and freaking out and barely missed a few trees. Luckily no one was hurt and we just ended up in a ditch that we were able to push our way out of.
This song is this experience in reverse: starting with me in bed trying to go to sleep reflecting on what had happened. Then rewinding back to getting out of Bill's car as he dropped me off and lying on the grass in my front yard watching the stars. Then rewinding back to me and Bill driving back to my house as the adrenaline stopped pumping and we were able to talk about what had just happened. Then rewinding back to dropping Raena off and seeing her house for the first time since high school (4ish minutes in here). Then rewinding back to pushing the car out of the ditch. And then the last section is us skidding and nearly crashing and all the thoughts that were running through my head (6:15ish to the end).
So in this section what we (Koala) tried to do, is stretch these 10 seconds into two minutes - since this is how it was perceived. There were a lot of different thoughts, a lot of different memories, but the main thing that burned in my mind at this time was that I was going to die a virgin, along with the only girl I had ever been in a relationship with. A part of me realized that I had partially shut myself off from a part of life after this relationship, and that I had filled the void that was being created with music. Music became my addiction (and still is to some extent). I made a promise to myself in those ten seconds that if I survived that I would try to figure out how to fill this void with something else.
Listening to this song always kind of made me relive this experience to some extent and kind of served as a reminder of the realization I had in those moments. Two years later, after working on filling this void, I can't really explain how the experience of listening to this song and what it conjures up for me is different for me now in words in a way that sounds right. But I guess that's why there's always music to say what words can't.
I know this is the second time in a row I've posted old music - I promise that there are plenty of things that are in the works that will be posted shortly including more music from Koala.
Today we celebrated my grandma's 83rd birthday and Mother's Day with my mom's side of the family - Even though this was recorded a few years ago now, I was thinking of this song today that was written by my grandma in the third grade that she shared with me and I recorded/accompanied/orchestrated for her and wanted to post it:
Vocals: Anna Taglione Flute: Rachel Young Trumpet: Tom Ker-Vanderslice Trombone: Ryan Simonelli All other Instruments & Orchestration: Mike Simonelli
