I’ve had an insane couple of weeks. I learned a very big lesson about overextending myself!! That’s about the best I can say about the whole experience.
When I did manage to grab the occasional five minutes to relax, it was (as it turns out) usually five minutes devoted to listening to The Head and the Heart’s (self-titled) album.
I wrote previously that I had recently started listening to this band, and that I was really liking them. I can verify now that THEY ARE SO ADDICTIVE.
When I first heard them, my first thought was that they were interesting. Their sound, more specifically, was interesting to me in that it was very “full.” They harmonize a lot and they use guitar and drums and piano in a very full-on way, with additions of tambourines and violins (and probably other instruments as well; I’m not musical enough to be able to pick everything out by just listening to it!) To be honest, I thought it might be a little too full for me to listen to with much regularity (though I liked it.) It was catchy though, and pretty good lyrically (which is pretty much the most important part for me.) I just didn’t foresee it being something that I would end up listening to to quite the extent that I have!
These are just songs that really stick with you. I mean, I defy anybody to listen to this album without tapping a foot to it! And then when you’re done tapping and you finally turn it off, you’ll find that the songs are sticking in your head – and as they do, you’ll grasp nuances to the lyrics that you missed at first. And that just makes you listen more, and harder – until suddenly you realize you haven’t played any other music in a week! Such is my experience with The Head and the Heart. I haven’t played an album this repetitively since Mumford and Sons’ Sigh No More.
“Cats and Dogs” might be my favorite track. It’s a good example of this “catchiness” I’m talking about…and I really like the lyric, “My roots are grown but I don’t know where they are.” I also like “Couer d’Alene” a lot. It’s very hard to choose a favorite from this album.
This is a nice live performance of “Cats and Dogs” and “Couer d’Alene.” Worth a listen/watch!!!
I noted previously that I’d be updating my running “Favorites” section piecemeal from now on (as waiting and updating all categories at once was resulting in not-very-many updates!) So this one is (obviously!) for “Music.”
