So I was trying to help people with their Internet problems today and, well, despite everyone’s best efforts, some of us just got on each others’ nerves a bit. I got a bit of a headache. Riding my bike home, this dry wind was blowing dry bits of leaves around and behind my glasses and into my eyes. (Since I got glasses, I swear they create some weird airflow that sucks in particles of stuff.) The cat meowed hello and came inside with me and I looked forward to a little sociable patting and purring time, but he immediately meowed to go out again. And I burned my dinner. Oh help and bother!

I could really use a soft, wistful, quirky and amusing song. I bet you could too.

Hey, I’ve got one right here!

Annie Hayden:
Starring in the Movies

[ratings]

Ahh, much better.

Annie’s Web site

I adore music videos that tell a story. Bonus points for fairytale elements. And super bonus points for exhortations to love our fellow humans. Looks like Eugene Francis Jnr is a winner!

Video below the fold, and here’s an mp3 Eugene has made available:

Eugene Francis Jnr: Kites

Eugene Francis Jnr on MySpace

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The Shins make me grin wide and scratch my befuddled head at the same time. What do these lyrics mean?

Frozen into coats,
White girls of the North,
Fire past one, fire the one,
They are the fabled lambs,
A Sunday ham,
The ancient snow.

I still don’t know exactly what the whole song is about, but this video provides some vivid stories to illustrate it.

Can anyone suggest an interpretation?

Video below the fold…

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Why I like it, a lot:

Even though all the songs basically sound the same, they still manage to be catchy.

I like their vocal harmonies. It probably helps that they are twins.

The perspective they communicate on heartbreak: painful honesty, taking responsibility for your own feelings.

I think of it as a kind of anti-country song. The typical country ballad lashes out and blames the erstwhile lover for the singer’s broken heart. “You took away the love we knew, you wrecked our happy home.”

Tegan and Sara look inwards instead and tell you of their grief/anger/need/shame/regret in strangely fascinating detail, while admitting their own failures. “I listened in, yes I’m guilty of this, you should know this.”

If I had to pick one line to summarize the album, I’d use the same one highlighted in the CD booklet: “Make a map of what you see, direct pain effectively.”

Sometimes you wonder if some of their pain comes from picking at old wounds, but still, just like scab-picking, they make it all strangely enjoyable.