I Was Emo Before It Was Easily Mocked
Oct. 22nd, 2005 05:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jakebe
When I felt like being melancholy and soulful in the past (what all of you young folks now like to refer to as 'emo'), I've had a wide range of artists and albums to choose from. Back in Baltimore, during and after my senior year of high school, Hootie and the Blowfish's Cracked Rear View was my absolute go-to choice. Everyone said that Hootie was a feel-good band, which I didn't understand at the time. With songs like "Look Away," "I'm Goin' Home," and "Not Even The Trees," it was pretty clear to me this was a band that could sing about hurt and mean it. "The Earth Stopped Cold at Dawn" from Fairweather Johnson is another gem that I can really get into when I'm feeling low.
In my brief stint in college I went through a few albums, but the ones I can remember most are Third Eye Blind's self-titled album ("God of Wine"? One of my ten favorite songs ever), Matchbox 20's Yourself or Someone Like You (Favorite Song? "Hang," hands down) and Radiohead's OK Computer. "Let Down" is most often my Favorite Song Ever, when I feel like having one. The combination of alienation, sorrow and hope blows me away, every time, and the song builds to such an awesome climax in such a lovely way I get shivery just thinking about it. I can safely say I've never identified with a song quite so much as I have that.
Oh! And I almost forgot another great album. Everclear's So Much for the Afterglow.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
arrowtwolf will disagree heatedly, but everything they've done before then was rehearsal, and everything they've done after is just rehashing. Solid, strong album from start to finish, with angst about everything from having no money ("I Will Buy You A New Life") to the too-classic "My daddy never loved me." ("Father of Mine"). If you want to hear quintessential angsty Everclear, this is the set you should go to. :)
Now when I'm feeling blue...or just wanting to sing 'the blues' without singing the blues, I jump back and forth between a lot of things. Etta James, Nina Simone, almost anything Motown (The Four Tops are R+B's Kings of Emo), Jimmy Eat World, Patsy Cline, Dwight Yoakam (This Time is a brilliant album), and most recently, Sigur Ros and Norah Jones. Why Norah? Because "Humble Me" is the best melancholy song I've heard in a really long time, that's why.
Anyway, just wanted to get these thoughts down on paper, I suppose.
Hey, the World Series starts tonight! Both Chicago and Houston are really surprising teams most people wouldn't have banked on to make it this far. My personal picks were Boston and St. Louis, but Boston just limped until they couldn't any more late in the season and St. Louis...well, really, I don't know what went wrong with them. Injuries, maybe?
I'm going to have to go with Houston for the series, just because I think they want it more and damnit, I really love Roger Clemens. Godspeed, Rocket. :)
In my brief stint in college I went through a few albums, but the ones I can remember most are Third Eye Blind's self-titled album ("God of Wine"? One of my ten favorite songs ever), Matchbox 20's Yourself or Someone Like You (Favorite Song? "Hang," hands down) and Radiohead's OK Computer. "Let Down" is most often my Favorite Song Ever, when I feel like having one. The combination of alienation, sorrow and hope blows me away, every time, and the song builds to such an awesome climax in such a lovely way I get shivery just thinking about it. I can safely say I've never identified with a song quite so much as I have that.
Oh! And I almost forgot another great album. Everclear's So Much for the Afterglow.
arrowtwolf will disagree heatedly, but everything they've done before then was rehearsal, and everything they've done after is just rehashing. Solid, strong album from start to finish, with angst about everything from having no money ("I Will Buy You A New Life") to the too-classic "My daddy never loved me." ("Father of Mine"). If you want to hear quintessential angsty Everclear, this is the set you should go to. :)Now when I'm feeling blue...or just wanting to sing 'the blues' without singing the blues, I jump back and forth between a lot of things. Etta James, Nina Simone, almost anything Motown (The Four Tops are R+B's Kings of Emo), Jimmy Eat World, Patsy Cline, Dwight Yoakam (This Time is a brilliant album), and most recently, Sigur Ros and Norah Jones. Why Norah? Because "Humble Me" is the best melancholy song I've heard in a really long time, that's why.
Anyway, just wanted to get these thoughts down on paper, I suppose.
Hey, the World Series starts tonight! Both Chicago and Houston are really surprising teams most people wouldn't have banked on to make it this far. My personal picks were Boston and St. Louis, but Boston just limped until they couldn't any more late in the season and St. Louis...well, really, I don't know what went wrong with them. Injuries, maybe?
I'm going to have to go with Houston for the series, just because I think they want it more and damnit, I really love Roger Clemens. Godspeed, Rocket. :)
