#69: "Wake Me Up When September Ends" - Green Day Release Date: 2004 Director: Samuel Bayer Fun Fact: The main actors are Jamie Bell, who famously played as "Billy Elliot", and Evan Rachel Wood, who was in "True Blood" and the film "The Wrestler"!
Green Day did a lot of good videos for the American Idiot album but this is the only one that makes the list. You'd have probably expected a different one but I don't know why, but I just prefer this one the most.
Maybe it's just because I like the double perspective of the message of the video. Most videos tell the perspective of one person or one view; there's only so much you can do in a music video from 3-7 minutes, so it's usually an isolated view.
This video doesn't do that. It shows you a lovely young couple who are madly in love, who promise to stay together forever no matter what the issue. The young lad then goes to join the US Marine Corps. He does this to prove his love to his girlfriend and obviously to start a promising career. The girlfriend takes it badly because he'll be gone for long periods of time, and may even die on a battlefield.
The video is just beautifully acted, and the band performance is also top notch to look at. This video is definitely worth a watch in its entirety if you've not seen it before.
Here's the video for your enjoyment!
Click here to see #68 on the list or here for #70!
An inspiring soundtrack, one that follows the blueprint for a TV series soundtrack perfectly.
True Blood hit our screens (not literally, although I wouldn’t be surprised too far down the line) in 2008, following Twilight and The Vampire Diaries as the newest breed of vampire themed television series' and movies to pave way. The difference between True Blood and the aforementioned two however is the grimy, sexy and very gory Southern state atmosphere, with the makers deciding not to aim for the young teenager audience but would rather give us a TV series that adults would be more accustomed to. It’s been very successful, not in the vein of Twilight, but it’s received critical and commercial acclaim, so much that it has three series’ under its belt. The thing that stands out most for me about True Blood however, is the music, it has a tremendous soundtrack, one that it’s quite obvious a lot of thought has been put into.
I’ve heard both this soundtrack, and the first series soundtrack. The first series also had some fantastic stuff in the programming, with Jace Everett’s now cult classic “Bad Things” paving the way for country music to be cool again. Also on the programme were songs by Marilyn Manson, The Eagles of Death Metal, and Lynyrd Skynyrd. That’s why when I got the actual CD, I was most disappointed. None of the previously mentioned artists feature, bar Jace Everett, and none of the songs on the CD I can actually remember as part of the great background music heard in the show. I think Gary Calamar, the music supervisor, really missed the ball with the first soundtrack.
However, I got the second series soundtrack roughly the same time as the first, and I’m telling you, there’s a huge difference in the quality of the soundtrack for both series’. Let’s start my review on the second series soundtrack.
The album starts off with "Howlin' for My Baby" by M. Ward (who has worked with Zooey Deschanel in the past), a track full of rock ‘n’ roll nostalgia. That is, until the fantastic riff comes in at the end of the bridge, a riff Jack White would be proud of. It really sets the tone for the album and is actually the album in a nutshell – a mixture of modern alternative metal, country and rock ‘n’ roll.
The second track, “Evil” is a very different sounding Jace Everett working with C.C. Adcock and does possibly one of the most dirty sounding songs of all time. It’s fantastically raunchy, with a mucky baseline behind the chorus of kids saying the title track. It's not the same country artist who's signature song has become a global cult hit.
The third track is a song by the ever-ambiguous Beck, doing one of his most diverse songs, full of electronic guitars and a thudding base. Beck’s voice is scarcely heard through most of the track, with the singer preferring his music to do the singing mostly.
After the three opening tracks, the album takes it down a notch with "Clairvoyant" by Robbie Robertson, a song that Lionel Ritchie would be proud of. This change in genre and sound really shows Gary Calamar's diverse album collection, choosing to continue this trend of new and old music, with track five, a proper jazzy and soul number by Jr. Walker and the All Stars. Track six is the fantastic Screamin’ Jay Hawkins at his best with Frenzy, the sleeper hit from the fifties. So that’s three newer artists followed by three older artists.
The musical trip Gary Calamar wanted us to go on with this soundtrack was never going to be easy or steady. This roller-coaster ride then starts to take another twist in the direction of some alternative country with Lucinda Williams, Buddy and Julie Miller and Chuck Prophet, with the latter also using funk and soul in his music. It’s a tremendous selection of songs, chosen in an order that really makes sense. 13th Floor Elevators is next with a Rolling Stones inspired song called “You’re Gonna Miss Me”. Eels, being the ever odd band, make an appearance with the gothic sounding “Fresh Blood”.
After these tracks however, we start to really enter the obscure, with a lot of references to the actual series. Track twelve is a tribal dance track quoting from the series (“I know what you are…”, “What are you?”) over and over again to mesmerising Indian music. A very odd track follows called “New World in My View” by a DJ named King Britt, accompanied by Sister Gertrude Morgan. In this song, Gertrude rambles on about Christianity, she talks of an inspiring story how her religion will fit in a modern day world. This is not directly part of the series, but the concept of religion, and more emphatically, the potential corruption of Christianity is evident in the series. The album finishes with a nice step back into normality with Bob Dylan doing a decent track named “Beyond Here Lies Nothin'”. What a rollercoaster eh?
And rollercoaster is definitely the right word for this album. It’s got some fantastic stuff on this CD, and it covers all the bases for what a soundtrack to a TV series should – songs from the programming, songs inspired by the series, songs that have reference to the storyline, everything. However it falls short towards the end, with some of the songs, albeit working for the TV series, just aren’t good enough quality tracks. But the beginning, definitely the first half, is chock-a-block full of ditty and dirty licks. It’s a vast improvement over the first soundtrack, and if you want to listen to some American bands that you may or may not have heard before, past and present, I’d recommend you get this. It’s an inspiring soundtrack, one that follows the blueprint for a TV series soundtrack perfectly.
Rating: ****
Stand out tracks: Bad Blood by Beck, Evil (is Going On) by Jace Everett and C.C. Adcock, You Did (Bomp Shooby Dooby Bomp) by Chuck Prophet
As you can see, I haven't been posting lately, but it is mainly due to the festive period, but that doesn't mean I'm not working hard! I've got my list complete for my major new project but I haven't really discussed more about it. I'll do that now.
"Noughtie" is the name of my new project. I've compiled a list of all the major songs from the last decade, from the year 2000 to 2009 and am narrowing it down to reveal what I consider the 100 most important songs are of the decade. That's the outro to the series. Yes, it's a series. I'll be doing loads of work to do with those songs and the artists that performed them, and my list should go something like this:
Overall Favourite Artists (Listing)
Best of 2000 (Mixtape)
Overall Least Favourite Artists (Listing)
Best of 2001 (Mixtape)
Where Are They Now? (Listing)
Best of 2002 (Mixtape)
Best New Artists (Listing)
Best of 2003 (Mixtape)
My Guilty Pleasures (Listing)
Best of 2004 (Mixtape)
My Favourite Riffs (Listing)
Best of 2005 (Mixtape)
Underrated Artists (Listing)
Best of 2006 (Mixtape)
My Favourite Albums (Listing)
Best of 2007 (Mixtape)
Best Videos (Listing)
Best of 2008 (Mixtape)
Most Important Artists (Listing)
Best of 2009 (Mixtape)
100 Favourite Songs of the Decade (Listing)
100 Most Important Songs of the Decade (Large Listing)
Yes, large listing. This will be a hundred day job. Each day I'll reveal the song and put up a video of that song. I hope you'll enjoy the list. If you disagree with it, that's fine, it is an unbiased list (the biased one is to be posted before it) and if people convince me that a particular song deserves entry into the list then I'm not afraid to change it. I'll start posting each and every one of these posts in the series starting from the new year.
But wait! There's more! Before the series gets under way, I'll be doing a review on the second series of True Blood, and a GameFAQ listing. I might even do another article if I have the time.
Any questions? Comments? Let me know if you don't understand anything in this post.
Hey everyone, just a quick few things that I'll sum up in a
quick blog.
I've just hit 4000 page views on this site, in under 4
months, I'm flabbergasted yet chuffed to bits with that statistic. I've been
talking about different forms of media, which makes it more remarkable, I don't
have one topic to juggle, I have about four. So to keep people interested in my
writing about four different forms of media is going to be difficult, but I'm
going to do my best to talk about these, and keep myself busy, and hopefully
interest you further! I also broke my daily pageview record when I revealed the
Top 10 in my Top 50 Greatest Catchphrases, Past and Present listing, when I hit
217 pageviews two days ago. That's just ridiculous for me, but once again,
thanks for showing the interest I want you to show in my work!
In wrestling news Smackdown sounded similar to previous
weeks, which is average to slightly above average. The Kane/Edge feud started
off intriguing, with the "monster" being tamed by Edge by taking the
only thing Kane loves in his life away from him, that being Paul Bearer. It
started off quite fresh in terms of WWE storylines of late, but every week has
been the same, Kane runs after Edge and Paul Bearer and when Kane thinks he's
got Paul back it's a dummy. It's been this way for weeks and weeks now though
and it's boring. But it seems like it's come to an end now that Kane has
accidentally "killed" Paul Bearer for mistaking him for a dummy again,
but it wasn't this time. Hopefully that's the end of it, although I'm
disappointed Paul Bearer didn't get used properly, he's a great manager, one of
the best of all time, and deserved to be used better than he way. Nay'mind.
The other big news really in wrestling was the great match
between Tara and Mickie James on TNA. Not only is it rare for the women to main
event a show, but these women put their (very nice) bodies on the line in a
cage match. Neither made it out of the cage injury free but put on a great
match. Tara has ligament damage in her elbow, she did it roughly half way
through the match and continued. What a woman. Anyone who says wrestling is
fake is stupid. It's just frustrating that a match as good as this won't happen
now for a good 3 years or so, the last time I can remember a match being
considered as good as this in the women's division was probably Trish/Mickie or
Trish/Lita. They were ages ago.
In football, Liverpool produced an inconsistent display
yesterday which has pretty much summed our season so far. We got off to a bad
start, went a goal down, then made up for it with some decent football, got a
goal back, then lost concentration and conceded two. But Liverpool never make
it easy for themselves do they? It's a shame, we were actually on a decent run
as well. We need to recuperate and give it another bash. It's frustrating that
we can't get a longer period of momentum at the moment, we always have to slip
on a banana skin, it's happened so many times this season its frustrating.
Let's hope we can give a decent display midweek in the Europa League, and maybe
get a few kids to have a good run out as well. Come on Pacheco, score a goal!
In video games, well Laguna has been announced on the new
Dissidia game, which is awesome, but the PSP is broked. Bummer. I'm really
disappointed that Dissidia is remaining on the PSP because it's a great game, I
was hoping they would port it to the PS2, or at least the PS3/Xbox 360, but
there's no news on that so far.
Site news, I'm also doing a review on Peggle, that should be
up soon. I'm also doing a review on the soundtrack for the second series of
True Blood, that should be up this week too. I'm also doing another listing, a
short one this time, which will also be on GameFAQs, which is the "Top 10
Underappreciated Games in Major Franchises". Should be interesting. I'm
also working on a massive project long term, but I don't want to reveal much about
that yet, but it should be very interesting that's for sure.
That's it from me today, I hope your weekends have been
good, and that you're all ready for the week ahead. Take care.
For the latest updates on my work, follow me on Facebook and Twitter here!
Hey everyone, I've had a ridiculously busy day today, I was going to write my next album review, which is the soundtrack to the second series of True Blood, but my brain is nearly as exhausted as my body.
I have however just dug up another mixtape I did a good 4 years ago, this was a band mixtape, for Nirvana. A Mixtape is a playlist of a certain genre, band or era. The list is generally 80 minutes long, the same length of a blank CD, with further recommendations if some of the songs aren't to your taste. Remember kids, downloading is wrong! We all know of Nirvana's great singles, but they did some great work on all of their albums, which in some cases are actually better than their singles. I collected my favourite non-single Nirvana tracks and came up with this list. Remember this was 4 years ago, not that I'd change much of it now if I did it again anyway.
I usually have 5 extra songs that you can use as alternatives for the mixtape but for this list I've lost it unfortunately. Do you want to suggest me a mixtape theme? Let me know what you're interested in and I'll think about it.
