I told myself that the next time a freebie topic rolled around, I would talk about music since the only time that I have was when the topic was favourite music albums, and so here I am to list my favourite bands and artists. In alphabetical order. For some reason. And I was planning on putting playlists or links to YouTube in this post, but that was just way too much effort and my internet just didn't want to do that.. And I've also experimented with a new graphic style. Yes, they're animated. Would you expect any less of me?
If you were one of those people wondering "who the hell is Beck" when he got the Grammy for Album of the Year (which he rightfully won, imo) then don't worry, because I'm here to help you. Beck is an absolute genius. None of his albums are the same (maybe his first four are, but three of those are out of print so they don't count) and he constantly switches up genres so you never really know what he's got in store. I'd definitely recommend Morning Phase to everybody (Album of the Year 2015!) because that's probably the easiest to get into. I'd said in my favourite albums post that it can be hard to get into Beck because it really depends on what you want, and also his stuff in the 90s that made him famous can get a bit weird at times. But I like weird stuff, so that suits me just fine! If you're wondering why I've said that I was "14, then 18" when I got into Beck it's because when I was 14 I used to watch a lot of VH1 and he was on a "best artists of the 90s" lists and one day I downloaded his entire discography, but I didn't listen to any of them so I deleted them. Then in 2013 I remembered him and went out and got all of his available albums in CD form. If only I had the patience and trust to get those out of print albums from eBay.
Favourite songs:
Loser | Fuckin' with My Head (Mountain Dew Rock) | Beercan | Woe on Me | One Foot in the Grave | Devil's Haircut | Hotwax | The New Pollution | Jack Ass | Novocane | Sissyneck | Where It's At | Inferno | .000.000 | Clock | Runners Dial Zero | Broken Train | Hollywood Freaks | Get Real Paid | Mixed Bizness | Nicotine & Gravy | Sexx Laws | Little One | Lost Cause | Qué Onda Guero | Emergency Exit | 1000 BPM | Blue Moon
I really don't remember how I found Bjork, but she's one of those people whose names I've always just known. During my first year at sixth form I was looking through the album charts to see what was popular at the time, and I saw that she had a new album out. Then I looked on her Wikipedia page and then looked up some of her videos. From that point, I was completely hooked and managed to get all of her studio albums in the space of about 2 months. I even wanted to see her actually play live, but the only date available was the day after I came back home from a holiday, and the tickets were over £100 each. I ended up going to see the movie of that show instead, and it was awesome. Seeing the movie version of a live concert is a strange experience because people treat it as a movie. People sit and listen rather than singing along and dancing. And I haven't got her new album yet, because I'm waiting for it to come out physically, but once I've got it I probably won't be able to stop playing it.
Favourite songs:
Human Behaviour | Venus as a Boy | Big Time Sensuality | Violently Happy | Play Dead | Hyperballad | The Modern Things | It's Oh So quiet | Enjoy | Isobel | Possibly Maybe | I Miss You | Hunter | Jóga | Unravel | Bachelorette | Alarm Call | All Is Full of Love | Hidden Place | Cocoon | Pagan Poetry | Aurora | Sun in My Mouth | Unison | It's in Our Hands | Who Is It | Earth Intruders | Innocence | Vertebrae by Vertebrae | Crystalline | Virus | Mutual Core
If you're American and were around during the 90s, you might know about this band. But how do I know about them? There used to be a show on Nickelodeon that I loved called Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide, and Art Alexakis (Everclear's lead singer) guest starred as a music teacher and "performed" one of their songs in an episode. I looked up the song and then discovered Everclear, who I have treated as my own little secret ever since them. They've never played in the UK, or really released any of their albums here, so the fact that I managed to find them in a physical shop was the biggest miracle of my life. But now I can't find the rest of them, so it's back to iTunes I go :/
Favourite songs:
Your Genius Hands | The Laughing World | Fire Maple Song | Pennsylvania Is... | Malevolent | Sparkle | Trust Fund | Loser Makes Good | Invisible | Queen of the Air | The Twistinside | Strawberry | Summerland | Santa Monica | You Make Me Feel Like a Whore | Electra Made Me Blind | 1975 | Detroit | Like a California King | White Men in Black Suits | Amphetamine | One Hit Wonder | Normal Like you | Halloween Americana | Rock Star | Babytalk | Slide | Now That It's Over | New Blue Champion | How to Win Friends and Influence People | Volvo Driving Soccer Mom | Local God
Let's be real here, I pretty much came out of the womb listening to Madonna, and I have my parents to thank for that. Especially my dad. Thank you, Dad, for showing me that I can listen to whatever I want to and that nobody can judge me for that (really, my dad listens to whatever he wants and just swats away any judgements he gets about it). Anyways, Madonna is my absolute hero in life and she never fails to amaze me. She came from nowhere, got kicked down quite a few times, then built up a career for herself from the ground almost all by herself. And I can honestly say that the day I started to build up my collection of Madonna albums was the day that I stopped being so snobby about what I listen to. And not being such a snob helped me to enjoy things so much more.
Favourite songs:
Lucky Star | Borderline | Burning Up | Material Girl | Angel | Into the Groove | Dress You Up | Open Your Heart | White Heat | Live to Tell | La Isla Bonita | Like a Prayer | Express Yourself | Till Death Do Us Part | Cherish | Oh Father | Vogue | Fever | Bye Bye Baby | Secret Garden | Secret | Bedtime Story | Drowned World/Substitute for Love | Swim | Ray of Light | Nothing Really Matters | Frozen | The Power of Good-Bye | Mer Girl | Beautiful Stranger | Music | Runaway Lover | Don't Tell Me | What It Feels Like for a Girl | American Pie | Love Profusion | X-Static Process | Hung Up | Get Together | Forbidden Love | Jump | Isaac | Push | 4 Minutes | Incredible | Devil Wouldn't Recognize You | Girl Gone Wild | Turn Up the Radio | Give Me All Your Luvin' | I Don't Give A | Falling Free
I haven't listened to RHCP in a very, very long time (I didn't complete my collection until Christmas just gone), but they're very special to me. When I was in school, I used to perform on stage and the very first song that I sang on stage at school was one of their songs. They're definitely not for everybody and when I was either 12 or 13 my uncle gave me an entire lecture of how he thinks they're total trash (I really do not care about what my uncle thinks of anything. He needs his head to be deflated), but I will always continue to listen to them because I love them. Oh, and as for me not being able to see them live being a sad story, here's my sad story: they played at the stadium in my town about 3 years ago now, and I didn't even know until people I went to school with (and I didn't even know liked RHCP) were posting about how excited they were to be going while I sat there in complete total disbelief because I was completely out of the loop. I'd never been so crushed in my entire life.
Favourite songs:
True Men Don't Kill Coyotes | Get Up and Jump | Jungle Man | Freaky Styley | The Brothers Cup | Fight Like a Brave | Backwoods | Higher Ground | Knock Me Down | Stone Cold Bush | Punk Rock Classic | The Power of Equality | If You Have to Ask | Suck My Kiss | Give It Away | Under the Bridge | Aeroplane | Love Rollercoaster | Soul to Squeeze | Around the World | Scar Tissue | Californication | Dosed | The Zephyr Song | Can't Stop | Warm Tape | Fortune Faded | Dani California | Snow (Hey Oh) | Charlie | C'mon Girl | Desecration Smile | Tell Me Baby | Hard to Concentrate | Storm in a Teacup | Look Around | Dance, Dance, Dance
Now I'm going to get even realer here: The Smashing Pumpkins are my absolute most favouritest band in the entire world. Even though the only original member left is Billy Corgan and he's slowly becoming more and more insane every year. Anyways, do you ever have one of those bands where you love them so much that not only do you lack the ability to put it into cohesive words, but you can't remember how you found them in the first place? That's what I'm like with the Pumpkins (the watermark on my gifs is inspired by one of their songs, and is going to be my new blog name when I finally get around to changing it). My early teen years (year 7 and year 8 if we're going to put it into school terms) are kind of a blur to me (only because I choose to forget a lot of stuff that happened then, nothing else) so the only thing I remember about starting to get into the Pumpkins, is that I got their album Zeitgeist for my twelth birthday, and my mum tried to get it without me knowing. My mum doesn't know much about bands that I like and she always gets names wrong. She ended up asking the shop assistant in HMV if they have anything by "The Pumpkin Seeds" *facepalm*. Yeah. That's pretty much all I can remember. And even though they're my favourite band ever, I don't have all of their albums yet, but that's okay because I'll have a complete collection some day.
Favourite songs:
Rhinoceros | Bury Me | Crush | Tristessa | Cherub Rock | Today | Hummer | Rocket | Silverfuck | Frail and Bedazzled | Hello Kitty Kat | Obscured | La Dolly Vita | Tonight, Tonight | Jellybelly | Bullet with Butterfly Wings | Muzzle | Where Boys Fear to Tread | Bodies | 1979 | Stumbleine | Tales of a Scorched Earth | We Only Come Out at Night | By Starlight | The End is the Beginning is the End | Ava Adore | Appels + Oranjes | Shame | Doomsday Clock | Tarantula | That's the Way (My Love Is) | United States | Pale Horse | The Chimera
Oh, look! A metal band that I like! I will admit that for the longest time I wasn't a fan of metal and just considered it to be "noise" (even though "noise" is actually a real genre of music and is pretty credible in art circles). I'd sort of remembered SOAD from when I listened to a very select collection of metal songs in my early teens (I had an incredibly embarrassing goth phase, which is why those years are blurry to me. I was obsessed with Evanescence, but I just cringe whenever I hear them now), because I knew the song 'Chop Suey'. Everybody knows that one, it's their most favourite song. I didn't actually listen to them properly after binge-watching WatchMojo.com lists on hard rock and metal songs (that channel is a black hole, it literally sucks you in), and then going through the Wikipedia pages for their albums, and then I bought their first two albums. And then the next three, and then voila! New favourite. Since listening to SOAD so much, I'm starting to listen to more metal bands, as I'm going to go on to say below.
Favourite songs:
Suite-Pee | Sugar | Soil | Peephole | CUBErt | Darts | Needles | Chop Suey! | Bounce | Forest | ATWA | Shimmy | Toxicity | Bubbles | Mr. Jack | I-E-A-I-A-I-O | Fuck the System | Thetawaves | B.Y.O.B. | Cigaro | Radio/Video | This Cocaine Makes Me Feel Like I'm on This Song | Violent Pornography | Question! | Lost in Hollywood | Hypnotize | Stealing Society | Vicinity of Obscenity | Lonely Day | Soldier Side
More bands/artists I like:
- Pearl Jam, Jane's Addiction, Feeder, Lana Del Rey, Foo Fighters, Green Day, U2 (I've seen them live!), Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, The Prodigy, Robyn, Katy Perry, Kate Bush, Hole, Freezepop, Charlotte Martin, Billy Joel, Alanis Morissette.
Bands that I want to get into:
- Nine Inch Nails - I've been wanting to start listening to NIN quite a lot, but I'm a little bit intimidated! I'm also too scared to watch one of their music videos (it's not the video for 'Closer'. I'd have no problem watching that one. If you're curious, search on Wikipedia for 'Happiness in Slavery' and you'll see why I'm too scared to watch it), but I really want to start listening to them. Once I have the money, I'll probably download Pretty Hate Machine from iTunes, because the beginning is always a good place to start. I'm not going to watch the Broken movie, though. No way, no how.
- Metallica - For years and years and years, a guy I know has been trying to get me to listen to Metallica, but I didn't really start listening to metal until recently (I was all about nu-metal in my early teens, but didn't venture into anything heavier and then went off it altogether), and Metallica have released so many albums that I have no idea where to start.
Who are some of your favourite bands/artists? Is there anybody you want to get into but just don't know where to start?
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