Author: BoxSpeaker

Star-Crossed Fuck Buddies: “Lost Kitten” by Metric vs. “Red Light District” by Midi Matilda

Here’s another song comparison: “Lost Kitten” by Metric vs. “Red Light District” by Midi Matilda

The topic of comparison: Being More than Fuck Buddies

While walking to the BART station to get to work last week, “Lost Kitten” by Metric shuffled on. The “I was looking for a hooker when I found you” part stuck out and immediately made me think of “Red Light District” by Midi Matilda.

“Red Light District” by Midi Matilda

As I explained before, I feel as if “Red Light District” is about fake love affairs in the form of rebound flings and fuck buddy-ing. The singer basically describes a prostitute but also states that he could fill the supposed void in her heart by being her lover. He, however, also immediately contradicts the power he initially claims to have in this “relationship.” His power being that he can be the one to offer (or withhold) his love to this woman. The contradiction occurs when the line “hold me ’til the next one at least” reveals he is actually bargaining to get what ever he can from this woman. This prostitute (assuming because it’s the “red light district”) is supposed to be a strictly sexual partner, but the singer seems to want more.

Then again, the singer could be a lover scorned – with the woman accused of acting in a whorish manner. (Hence the prostitution extended metaphor.) In fact, the singer states “She is a woman, and a woman won’t bring my spirits down” as if reminding himself that this woman and this situation cannot and should not hurt him emotionally.

“Lost Kitten” by Metric

“Lost Kitten” relates to “Red Light District” both in the surface level through their respective mentions of prostitutes and through their discussions of deeper relationships (with prostitutes and potential prostitutes).

“I was looking for a hooker
When I found you.

You’ve got my eyes. You’ve got my eyes.
You’ll never be mine, but you’ve got my eyes.

When you lie, I’ll cover it up.
When you hide, I’ll cover it up.
When you cry, I’ll cover it up.
When you come undone, I’ll cover it up.

So pent up, I was coming home to you.
Happy in the nighttime, howlin’ at the moon,
Sippin’ on a cocktail, drinking in the loo
There’s something about you I hold on to.

You’ve got my eyes. You’ve got my eyes.
You’ll never be mine, but you’ve got my eyes.”

The prostitutes/hookers in both songs are most likely just metaphorical ones – with both singers meaning that they were just looking for a hook up but found more. Or… In Midi Matilda’s case, looking for something more but being okay with just a hook up.

Both singers display an initial acceptance of their searches for these sex-only relationships (for lack of a better word) with their songs’ respective audiences. However, as each subsequent lyric is placed in its track, the relationship builds as “something more” for each singer. The initial glance – the originally intended sexual encounter develops into something with more substance for each singer.

It’s no longer just sex.

Emily Haines can’t look away from the “you” she’s found. In fact, she progresses toward such a caring relationship with “you” that she wants to protect “you” despite the lies, disappearances, sadness, and vulnerabilities.

Emily Haines even goes as far into this “relationship” that she’s “coming home to you.” However, there’s something holding her back from realizing this completely through her repetition of the bridge “You’ve got my eyes. You’ve got my eyes. You’ll never be mine, but you’ve got my eyes.”

Midi Matilda’s Skyler Kilborn shows that his stereotypical “rough exterior” of just wanting sex from this woman (prostitute or his scorner) is, as cliche as it is, a facade. It hides that he is wants a feeling that is more than just sex, even for one evening (“hold me ’til the next one at least”).

Makes me wonder if Emily Haines and Skyler Kilborn (or at least the people [characters?] they represent in their respective songs) would’ve fallen in love had their lyrical paths crossed.

Whether to Wake Someone Up or Not: “Dreamers” by Savoir Adore vs “West Coast” by Coconut Records

Today, I was being a sappy dork and linking my friend Shahla to “West Coast” by Coconut Records because I never got to visit her in the East Coast and then never got to see her when she was back home on the West Coast before going abroad.

While listening to the song again, I noticed the part that goes “So pack up my bags to beat back the clock. Do I let her sleep or should I wake her up?”

This instantly reminded me of a part of “Dreamers” by Savoir Adore. In the bridge, Deidre Muro sings “You can stay where you are. I will wake you. I will wake you in the morning. You can stay where you are, so don’t you worry. Don’t you worry. Keep on sleeping.”

New Hoodie Allen song – “Hey Now”

Hoodie Allen just dropped a new track called “Hey Now”!

I’ll post a well-deserved, longer post about how and why Hoodie Allen has been a positive influence on me for the past two years beginning with my first accidental discovery of “You Are Not a Robot” while searching for blogs discussing “I am Not a Robot” by Marina and the Diamonds and I guess what that has to do with my career and my love life at that point in my life.

Anyway, more later. Listen to this track right now first:

Friday I [Think I’m Fine]: “When My Time Comes” by Dawes

Let’s start with a couple days ago to what got me listening to this song again and the jump back to where I had been when this song impacted me so much.

A few days ago this girl was looking through my iTunes. There’s that dreadful feeling I get when people look through my iTunes library. I’m afraid they’ll judge me on my music tastes (or possible lack thereof). I’m sitting on my bed as she’s looking through my iTunes library. I’m afraid she’ll scoff at one of my favorite bands. (I’ve been severely judged and insulted by someone on my music library before.) I don’t know if she’ll be happy or be grossed out by all the Passion Pit and Passion Pit remixed tracks. There’s even the moment when she keeps scrolling and scrolling and it’s just a seemingly endless list of practically every Rilo Kiley song in existence. (Yeah, they’re my number 1, all time, forever and ever favorite band in the whole world. Almost a 10 year and counting love affair.)

Normally, this would just make me consider what music I listen to and their artistic merits or just think that the person judging me is a total asshole. However, I was really nervous because she’s the coolest person I’ve ever met (and my inflated ego makes these comparisons to myself who I think is really damn cool). “Oh mannnn, is my iTunes library cool enough for her to respect?”

She stopped in the D section and said that she loves Dawes especially that song. (“Yesssss!” runs through my head because that’s one of my favorite songs.)

Today, she GChatted me a link to the video above saying she loves the song and that particular performance. I tell her that it’s one of my quarter-life crisis songs. I listened to it a lot back then. This song ends up on my mind all day and also makes me think about my quarter-life crisis.

[Here’s a jump to right now.]

I’m starting to pack up my things that aren’t already in boxes (read: still in boxes from the last time I moved. To be honest, I only really unpacked maybe half or three-fourths of the boxes I brought into my current apartment).

I’m moving again. I feel like these last couple of moves have actually signified, in a really corny way, the ends and beginnings of different chapters of my life.

In this case, situations haven’t completely changed as much (at least I hope not because I’m currently liking and appreciating my life right now). It’s not the situation so much this time as the mindset I’m in, I guess.

I feel as if I moved from Oakland to San Francisco for a reason, and now I’m moving back to Oakland (literally just a few blocks away from my previous Oakland apartment). Well, there are multiple reasons, but the biggest part deals with priorities – or in this case my change of them.

[Now a jump to August 2011.]

In August 2011 I was quarter-life crisis-ing, not knowing what was going to happen after November 2011 election, not knowing what I wanted and where (literally and figuratively) I wanted to be. I just knew that I wanted to figure it out along the way and that I really enjoyed where I was at the time. I was content with my life balance.

But is that what’s supposed to happen? I always thought I’d be following some life plan and that I’d have a clearer idea of where I’d be down the line.

I also felt a little torn because I couldn’t decide if I wanted to stay in the Bay Area (and if so, for how long?), go back to LA, or maybe even venture out somewhere else (I’d been eyeing New York for a while). All the possibilities were overwhelming. I didn’t know what I wanted.

I decided to just go with some advice my friend (who’s also my boss) gave me: I was going to just do what was fun at the moment and then when it stopped being fun, I’d move onto something else. That helped out a lot.

I got more involved at work and decided I needed to move to San Francisco to be closer to the office and be more available.

[Jump back to right now]

As much as I love my job and as much as I am always down to give 110% to what I do and to make it top priority, I’ve also felt like something was lacking. I realized that I had completely ignored my favorite hobbies. I began to really feel off because I hadn’t been as involved with the music and art scene lately.

That’s why once opportunities to get back in touch with the music and art scene (both in terms of moving back to Oakland and also in terms of taking part in friends’ projects) began presenting themselves, I took them. That’s why I’m trying to be more in this mindset of making more balance between all my passions and responsibilities. That’s part of why I’m moving back to Oakland. As stupid as it seems, proximity really has a big effect, especially in terms of the circles of people I’ve ended up spending my time with. I’ve been thinking that maybe by being closer to where I want to be (literally and figuratively), I’ll be more motivated to spend the extra hours needed to be more involved.

I guess I’ve just really been spending more time trying to figure out but also just realizing what exactly I want and then working toward those things.

Then again, this all feels like a description of an extremely cliche indie movie about growing up or being in your 20s. At the very least, at least commend me for being sincere about the situation/experience?

Koalacaust in an SF Art Place’s Basement

I can’t believe I completely forgot about the time I saw Koalacaust in a basement show.

I was hanging out with a friend of mine, and she suggested checking out this show in some art gallery / art space in the SOMA neighborhood of San Francisco.

I wish I could remember the name of the space. There was an art installation of various old televisions playing videos captured in various street corners and along different sidewalks. No (noticeable) direction – just capturing (supposedly) exactly what was passing by and going on in front of the cameras wherever they were set up.

Then up a flight of stairs was a basement area with a small bathroom and an even tinier window through which people took turns smoking.

Down in the basement was where the concert was. It was really fun, and the singer from Koalacaust got in the crowd, used the whole space as his stage, and even hung from the rafters! I forgot all about this until I found some photos from old computer folders I haven’t looked at in literally over a year!

Here’s one of my favorites. Seeing this photo made it all come back to me. Even just taking this shot was fun!

Singer of Koalacaust hangs from the rafters at a San Francisco show.

Oh yeah, and they’re originally from Santa Monica – much LA love to them. 🙂

Missed the Metaphor in “My Boots” by Lights

I’m going to have to admit that “My Boots” by Lights has been a guilty pleasure for a year and a half.

It’s way more pop-y than I usually prefer, and Lights (AKA Valerie Poxleitner) is a little more post-scene than I’m usually into for a musician. But I have to admit, she is cute even if she’s not blonde, probably mostly because I can never say no to a cute girl with tattoos and a captain hat.

Anyway, my super dykey side that also completely overlooks metaphors in art is the reason this song became a huge guilty pleasure for me.

I don’t even remember how I first heard this song, but I do remember that some of the lyrics seemed really lesbianic (“When I’m in the summer I forget how much I love her when she’s in the groove. Oh it’s a love hate romance ’cause I could watch her dance if I got my boots”), which definitely led to a second listen.

I was soooo sure that it was all about Lights being into some girl who dances very sensually and inspires her to look hot and sexy to impress her (“Something in the way she comes gliding makes me need to fix up the hair. She gets me to come out of hiding and find something decent to wear”).

But then…

Reality set in…

And I had to come to terms with the fact that the song is actually an extended metaphor of Lights’s love of the winter time…

Besides, the line “When she comes you’ll ask her to stay” seemed a little TOO double entendre to really be what I thought it was about…

Bye Bye “Friday I’m in Love Songs” – “Turning Into Stone” by Phantogram

I think that I’m over the “Friday I’m in Love” weekly song theme. If I hear a song again after not hearing it for a long time and really feel as if I should share the “story” behind it and what it means to me in terms of dating/romance/love/etc., I will.

However, I am shifting BoxSpeaker Fridays to alternating “Friday, I Will Fuck” and “Fashion Show Friday” song features – I mean, it works, right? Songs that I would have sex to are also songs that just happen to really be great for runway events.

To start off this alternating series, I’d like to feature “Turning into Stone” by Phantogram as a Friday, I Will Fuck song.

The first eleven seconds of the song make you think that it isn’t something you would want to have sex to due to how high-pitched and abrasive it is – like an out-of-tune marching band. But once the twelve-second mark hits, the heavy bass beat comes in alerting you to the possibility of sensuality in the song.

At the 25-second mark, Phantogram brings in their signature eerie synths. Then, 43-seconds, Josh Carter come in almost monotonously haunting the listener about loneliness and dying.

At the 1:15 mark, Sarah Barthel‘s vocals come in for the signature Phantogram harmonies as the song sounds airy and relaxing. Then, you end up back in the rough reality of the 1:47 mark when the quick 8-bit style synths begin to layer upon each other. Building up and building up just in time for Carter’s tortured, distorted vocals to come back in.

And everything just sounds like and and feels like an aural explosion.

“Enjoy the Silence” by Depeche Mode – Covered by Sonos

If you’ve read this blog long enough, you’ll know that I love covers, especially covers that are done in a style almost completely different from the original.

That’s why I was instantly drawn to the Sonos cover of “Enjoy the Silence” by Depeche Mode that my friend Kirsten posted on Facebook. I know it’s usually dorky, but Sonos makes a capella covers of songs that are really spectacular. And to be completely honest, as a Cal alum, I have a special place in my heart for Cal a capella groups.