want to hate you but then I kiss you, want to kill you but then I’d miss you – you drive me crazy but I love you

Edit: PAGE OF THINGS FOR SALE HERE!

I feel absolutely dreadful today. I think I contracted a cold overnight, and that, mixed in with my allergies today, means I just feel physically miserable. So I dug up a photo of a nice view from a very happy day, and just thought, oh take me back there!

Taken in San Francisco back in last November – I can’t believe it’s been ten months since I was there – I really, really want to go back there again. I’ve got to! One day, when we can afford it, I’m going to twist the boy’s arm and make him come with me. Not that I think any arm-twisting is actually necessary… that is, once the “when we can afford it” part is sussed. Speaking of going away though, we have another trip (this time overseas!) brewing in the works, for Christmas/New Years – just have to book the flights and suss it out. It’s going to be absolutely amazing.

In case you hadn’t noticed, I love traveling. And I’m currently using happy thoughts and memories of it as a means to feel less miserable. I REALLY cannot afford to be sick right now, what with uni resuming again on Monday (I have a test that very day!), and the Rugby World Cup starting on Friday night – which means a big night out, I’m certain. The good news of the day is that the job interview I had yesterday was successful, and now I have part-time/casual work that will pay fairly well. No doubt the funds collected from that job will go towards traveling elsewhere again. I swear, I’m more than happy to empty my entire bank account into two things: travel and fashion – and to be honest… it seems that’s all I’ve been doing since last year.

Which brings me to the next bit – I think I’m going to start trying to sell some of my old stuff on here for cheap. Because Trademe/Ebay and the like are honestly far too much effort, so selling directly here only seems to make sense. My life has changed so much in the past year, that I guess it’s only fair enough that my wardrobe should too. Since it’s been a constant “in with the new” in both life and attire, I guess it’s about time I get on with the “out with the old” part as well. My friends and the boy only know too well how much difficulty I have with letting the past and old things go, so… well this might be a small step towards that. I swear, I often “test” myself by thinking about the worst things possible from the past, just to see how much I can bear it. Like, what the hell is wrong with me?!

Sooo, playlist time:

1. Take Off Your Cool – Outkast with Norah Jones
I love how this song opens with acoustic guitar that sounds nothing like Outkast, and then the crooning comes in… and you know it. Norah Jones is sexy as always though. I remember being a 12-year-old and singing along to her album that mum would play in her car.

2. Crazy For You – Best Coast
Uhh, pretty much how I feel about the boy. Ref to title. That’s all. Oh yeah, except for the bit where I really am, for sure, definitely crazy.

3. Heart in Your Heartbreak – The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
I remember hearing this album for the first time and thinking, oh my god, I swear I’ve heard this before! It’s just a really familiar-sounding album for me, and I mean that in an endearing way. This song is retardedly sweet and painful and all those silly things that I adore.

4. Blindside Kiss – Neon Indian
A couple of hours ago the boy txted me saying that I should listen to Neon Indian’s new album, because he thought that I’d like it. And I do. No more, will I get them confused with Ariel Pink. This album is much more shoe-gazey-and-hazy, and this song is a prime example. I need a lot more listens. The link doesn’t go to Youtube, but goes to some place where the album is streamed, by the way.

5. Strangers – White Lies
Is it fair on White Lies to say that this song is the epitome of what I think of them as? A running bass line, recurring melodic idea on synth, same old deep vocals… I’m making this sound awful, but I swear it’s not. It’s nice. That’s why it’s on here. I’m rambling now. Because I just had to blow my nose three times in a row and now my ears are under pressure, my head hurts, my throat hurts, and the point is, I lost my place as to what I was going to say about this song, dammit!

6. Clinging On For Life – The Hoosiers
This song seriously makes me want to cry.

7. Rome – Phoenix
Because Phoenix are fucking awesome! And listening to them makes me think of the film Somewhere (that they largely hogged the soundtrack of, obviously…), and it’s funny because I had watched that film right after I got back from California, and it was so surreal going “woah I drove down that street too”, or whatever. Who’s the boy you like the most?

You don’t own the green pines, The blue sky, or the smoke. You don’t own the dust in your Big brown eyes when you keep them closed

I’m just itching to make another playlist right now, but I really should go and cook dinner. I’ve been indulging in lounging around far too much and pretending to myself that these two weeks are an actual holiday when they aren’t… I really need to get started on the two tests I have next week, as well as memorising the 40 songs I will need to know in 7 weeks’ time. Damn. In the meantime, it seems the whole country is either in a buzz (or downbuzz) over the fact that the Rugby World Cup starts in just FOUR DAYS, and we are hosting it. I used to follow the rugby avidly, but after so so sooo many disappointments (mostly at previous World Cups), I’ve sort of given up hope. I don’t want to over anticipate it this year only to be disappointed again – so I’m hoping my keeping a low profile in my head when it comes to rugby will make us winning it this year that much sweeter. Here’s to hoping…

The boy accompanied me on a large excursion around town the other day. I had an appointment on the North Shore, which prompted us to pay The Department Store a visit, where the boy ended up buying this Vanishing Elephant coat for a very good sale price – and it’s so super nice that I rather want to steal it. Speaking of stealing his jackets though, I’ve discerned that I can pull off wearing pretty much all of his jackets. Now the tricky thing is to con him into actually letting me wearing them outside of his bedroom, hmm.

The weather was amazing. I’m not usually a sunny-day person, but who can complain about this?

I thought this photo was funny because usually it’s me wearing a silly grin whilst he has a weird almost-smile thing going on – but it’s reversed here, haha.

Anyway, the exciting thing about our wander around several central spots in town was that I’ve finally picked out something amazing that I’m going to wear in just under a month’s time. It cost me an arm and a leg, but I think it was well worth it considering what a timeless piece it will be, and that I might even contemplate wearing it to my 21st birthday party next year – that’s how amazing I think it is. It even came in pretty packaging too:

Mystery item, haha.

And lastly, I started this painting about three months ago, but hadn’t touched it until yesterday. It was a whole lot of textured black and white until now… It’s still far from finished, and I know the owl isn’t 100% realistic or anything (I was not about to attempt that), but I have a whole heap of work left to do on it that will hopefully make the whole thing a lot more abstract and layered – which is pretty much my kind of thing to do. Also, the poor cat has been in a buster collar for the first time in his life because his leg is still infected from a cat bite that happened a while back. It had only healed on the outside last time and started bleeding again, so the vet had to give him an anti biotic shot, and I’ve had to clean the wound twice a day, as well as stop the scab from healing up too quickly. A rather cringey and painful task for both him and I. Physically painful for him, and heartily painful for me.

True and everlasting that’s what you want, True and everlasting that’s what you want. Do you remember when 21 years was old?

It’s finally mid-semester break, signalling the long-awaited two weeks of pseudo-holiday that we’ve been longing for – before this semester even began. The boy and I just got back from our half-secret trip to Rotorua yesterday, and it’s no surprise that I’ve taken hundreds of photos that took forever to sort out. It’s been three of the most relaxing, beautiful and unforgettable days of my life, spent with the most unforgettable person I know. I can’t wait to get my films developed so I can see the rest of my photos! And I also can’t wait to do something like this again… summer, please don’t be too long.

Photo diary with chronological commentary:

We stayed in a log cabin for the first night. Since I accidentally (stupidly) revealed to Daniel a couple of weeks ago as to where we were going, I’m glad I’ve managed to keep the more special parts secret – where we are staying, precisely. It was definitely worth the effort just to see the delighted look on his face as we drove up to the cabin and stepped inside – we’d been talking about wanting to stay in a “log cabin” for a while now, so I’m glad that it’s turned out to be exactly what we were after. It was the coziest, cutest thing – perfect.

The boy setting the GPS, before we had quite figured out where things were in Rotorua.

Luggage. Mostly consisting of towels and cameras.

We decided to visit the Polynesian Spa first, and this was the view we spent our first afternoon with. A worthwhile $21.50 for the Adult Pools, albeit the all rude staring men (and some asian girls that followed me around with their eyes). Where Daniel exercised territorial glances and I translated the ridiculous conversations of self-righteous Chinese tourists who decided it would be okay to include me in their conversational topics, without realising that, yes indeed, I may just understand every single word.

There were a lot of seagulls as the Spas looked out over Sulphur Bay.

The stunning view that the 41C spa had – if only that spa had been cooler, we wouldn’t have had to sit on the edge the whole time, whilst I got chilly shoulders and mozzie bites!

The golden, hard-to-pry-for-a-photo smile.

He took a photo of me, taking a photo of him.

The aforementioned spa. It was the most crowded one, as it had the best view.

View from where we bought burgers and fries for dinner.

Eating dinner, lakeside, with the last fading rays of sunset.

Lake Rotorua.

Back inside the cabin, where we devoured Shingle Peak Reisling and chocolate biscuits.

Feeeeet.

We woke up the next morning to a shock score of Arsenal losing 8-2 to Man U. And spent much of the next couple of days returning to “OH MY GOD I CAN’T BELIEVE THAT HAPPENED!!! EIIIGHT-TWOOO!!!”

We brought a pot of dumplings to cook for breakfast… but the fridge kind of froze the pot.

Locking up the cabin.

This was an absolute failure of a stove. Several attempts and a change of stoves later, we finally cooked the dumplings.

Back to the cabin we go…

…with rather destroyed-looking dumplings.

Trying to eat with a plastic spoon.

The dumplings were all mushy and stuck together because they had been sitting in warm water for far too long, before the stove decided to heat up enough to achieve boiling point.

Teeth brushing.

All packed up and ready to leave. I miss this cabin already.

At Hell’s Gate Thermal Reserve.

Kakahi Falls, “the largest natural hot waterfalls in the southern hemisphere”.

Unsuspecting photo by the generous camera-bag holder.

The landscape was so desolate and other-worldly and we loved every minute of it. Also, thanks largely to my photographing ways and knack for pointing out and staring at every nook and cranny, we stayed much longer than the prescribed 45-ish minutes for the walk.

At first we complained that it was cloudy and the weather wasn’t great, but then we decided that it made everything look far more volcanic and appropriate.

Another unsuspecting photo taken by the boy.

Black mud. Really, really hot stuff.

More hot stuff. Haha.

Caught-off-guard photos.

I think I like this one the best.

And then I attacked with a flick of the scarf.

The “steamy photo” of the boy. We had a bit of a misunderstanding about that phrase later on… haha. I made this photo black and white because I think it makes it look far better. I also took photos on black and white film, but I won’t get to see them for a while yet. Well worth paying $30 to enter the reserve, just to get this photo.

Apparently this mud volcano is still growing…

Hand holder.

Playing with the grey mud that we were allowed (and recommended) to touch. It felt really good on the skin, too.

Instead of visiting the Red Woods, we hit up Hamurana Springs instead – where the water was clear and purely amazing!

Makes me think of the Forbidden Forest. I’ve always preferred “forests” over “bush”, but New Zealand is mostly covered with bush – that’s why I enjoyed this so much. Although it was largely a blend of the two.

Yet another unsuspecting photo of me and my red scarf.

Self timerrr.

One of my favourite photos ever. It looks really constructed and cropped, but that’s just how the camera happened to drop onto the tree stump that I set the self timer onto.

The head of the spring, which is the largest in the North Island. It’s approximately 15m deep, and can you believe this thing has about 4,500,000 litres of water flowing out of it every hour?!

Don’t fall in.

Pleaase.

View from above.

Ferns.

Reflections #1.

Reflections #2.

Late lunch at Thirty1Five Restaurant.

$10 Beef Nachos – sooo delicious and incredible value for money. I think for the first time in my life I had more ingredients than I had chips to scoop it up with!

King Spa Deluxe Room I got a deal for at the Rydges Hotel. The boy looking pretty pleased with himself…

…and pretty pleased with the fact that we then got to watch the football highlights on Sky Sports.

Post-swim complimentary drinks at the Mezz Bar in the hotel. The bartender had just shut down the bar and was delighted that we made his job easy with 2x Monteiths orders.

Wreckage.

Indulgence.

More indulgence.

The next morning we rocked up to our free buffet breakfast at 10am, only to discover that the buffet shuts at 10am. Luckily they let us fill our plates with as much food as possible, before they cleared the buffet away. Won’t make that mistake next time!

Crazy kids.

The morning after.

We decided to go for a walk around Sulphur Bay – the bay that the Polynesian Spas had looked out on.

Sort of didn’t exactly “stay on the footpath” as signs had warned. The idea of DANGER DANGER was too exciting. Plus, how often to you get to check out boiling pools of water in the ground?!

The whole bay was steaming.

Marbled sulphur.

At the Government Gardens.

Me being ruining a perfectly good photo, haha.

Sweetness.

Car ride home.

The corrugated iron sheep at Tirau.

Fucking amazing trip. The End.

You know that something inside of you, Still plays a part in what I do, Always I’m here for you. I think that if we were all we had, That’s more than most people ever have, anyway, Oh anyway, you can stay here

PORTISHEAD IS COMING TO NEW ZEALAND!!! And I think I am going to cry/die a slow and painful (but beautifully painful) emotional death when I hear them on November 10th. This Friday, 9am, I know where I’ll be – logged on, buying 2x tickets to guarantee the boy and I a sentimentally-charged evening in three months’ time – whilst simultaneously trying to finish my composition. According to my Last.fm account, I’ve listened to Portishead 369 times in the past seven days. It’s largely been driven by sleepless nights and the constant urge to dip into the pool of feeling that they bring me.

I really need to get out of this blogging-a-huge-post-once-a-week pattern, but it’s been really hard to break when my week days just seem to run into one another. And then there’s the Sundays, where it feels like my entire week has caught up to me. Today I woke at 1pm and then proceeded to nap the rest of the day, to a soundtrack of TV-noise and cooking going on in the kitchen. I wish my composition assignment that is due 30% of my Arranging & Composition paper would just write itself. And that these songs I’m meant to have memorised by Wednesday would miraculously wire themselves into my brain, electronically. If only.

Stressful rantings aside, this is turning out to be quite a photo-clogged post. Things I have done lately:

My sister was cleaning out the depths of her “stuff in storage” at the back of her wardrobe, and I found some of our old toys. Beloved animals, in varying ages of sentimentally old, or detachedly new.

Earlier this month, Liv took these photos of Flakey and I when I was napping on the couch. I didn’t know these existed until I caught her looking at them a few hours ago!

Isn’t he cute, squished up against me, aww.

A very talented fellow-female-bass-player friend of mine invited me around for dinner the other night. She cooked amazing lamb racks and even made delicious dark chocolate and banana tart that was served hot out of the oven and accompanied by ice cream. Divine, just divine. So this is how amazing she is “before”, and hopefully we’ll soon find out how good her cooking will get as she leaves in two days’ time to attend Le Cordon Bleu in Paris!

The beloved, tucking in my oldest, oldest beloveds.

A “before” shot of my hair. Then I dyed it. And ran out of hair dye. And had to use many, many more bottles.

Tequila shot, courtesy of an old friend.

The “after” colour of my hair. I think once the roots come out I’ll change the colour up again. I don’t know why I haven’t dyed my hair in the years since my blue/purple tints or red streaks phase. Oh wait, that’s because 1/ I’m too lazy and 2/ I’m terrible at dealing with my hair. Thus I never brush it. Ever. And it miraculously looks fine.

Liv and I, outside dear old jazz school at about 3am, after Friday night turned into Saturday morning.

Following this, I froze outside as my feeble knocks on the boy’s door took far too long to wake him up at 4 or 5am as I was seeking a warm bed. And for the sake of my obsessive documentation, the rest of Saturday happened as follows:

– Won my hockey game 2-1, after we were scored against, we worked doubly hard to bring the score back to our side; I didn’t play very well offensively, which isn’t very helpful for a left winger (at one point I got sandwiched by the goalie in front and two defenders slamming into the back of me), but I did better than usual defensively which was good.

– Went to a friend’s house for Hell’s pizza, wedges, Saporo and far too much fizzy drink and ice cream. It was good catching up with everyone, what with all the changes we’ve gone through, yet seeing how little we’ve all changed underneath it all.

– After some debate over the situation I watched the football with the boy in the end, seeing Liverpool off to a clear 2-nil win over Arsenal. Don’t even get me started on how obsessed with Liverpool the boy is… I’ve been a bit of a fickle football watcher over the years, but maybe I’ll settle my alliances in the end. In the meantime, I’m disappointingly glad that I didn’t stay up til 5am watching the All Blacks’ defeat. Damn I’m nervous about the Rugby World Cup. Most especially because it is going to be happening RIGHT HERE, very, very, veeeery soon.

And now, for the playlist. I can’t stop making them, seriously.

1. Rock On – Love Inks
A cover of David Essex’s ’70’s hit… and actually, now that I listen to the original, it’s not bad at all! The song is definitely growing on me (both versions!) but the problem is, I feel like it’s a buildup to essentially nothing. I think the good contrast is that Love Inks’ version is obviously more contemporary, without the cheesy backing instrumentals. I love the bass hook though. Damn, caught out bass-line-lovin again.

2. Atlas – Battles
Bring back the memories, baby. It’s becoming more evident with each and every new playlist what my “3 playlist habits are”. Or perhaps more like “3 music affinities” are. Those being: bass lines, duos, and sentimental connections. The last in particular, for obvious reasons, has lately been especially evident in my subconscious choices of songs that are “relevant” to the boy and I. And I don’t tend to notice until I get to this part of the playlist making process where I write a little about each song. Anyway, about the song itself, it’s old (by that I mean 2007, I think) and it’s what people liked to call “math rock” – a label which I have never understood because there are resemblances to other bands or songs that wouldn’t be classified as “math rock”… so what the heck. Also, this song rather reminds me of Animal Collective, both sonically, and memory-wise.

3. Scared – Albert Hammond, Jr.
I haven’t listened to Hammond’s solo stuff for ages, but had a random urge to, today. And for the first time, this song stuck out to me, although I’m not really sure why. You can definitely hear his distinct Strokes guitar sound on this song, whilst the song itself doesn’t as such. I just think it’s a really sad, sweet song, and the lyrics are so lovely that I crammed some of it into this post’s (very long) title!

4. One More Empty Chair – Blood Red Shoes
I think I’ve discovered what my subliminal theme to this playlist is – sick, sad love songs, or something like that. It started with the last song and runs through for the next few tracks too. I’ve loved this band for years, but I haven’t listened to them very much lately – until this week. It started off a desperate need for some good old familiar music to sing to in the car, and from then on I’ve virtually driven to them all week. 148 plays in the last 7 days, Last.fm tells me. This song is off their album, Fire Like This, that was released last year. What I’ve always loved about them that’s been consistent throughout their backlog of EPs and this album also, is their handful of stylistic distinctions: 1/ they’ve kept their accents, rather than sing in an “Americanised” way; 2/ they have a knack for repeating key lines of lyrics in songs which makes it really memorable, without getting old; 3/ for a duo, they’re pretty melodically and harmonically busy – it’s not just here’s the melody, with guitar and drums underneath – they both take turns singing and harmonising over one another, and I’m sure on the record they’ve dubbed in extra vocal tracks too; 4/ I just like their lyrics. Whilst it’s mainly nothing too deep and terribly simple, it’s the simplicity that makes it all very blunt and snappy – straight to the point. A very precise and painfully relatable point.

5. Gladhander – Stripmall Architecture
The only reason I ever listened to Stripmall Architecture is because Ryan and Rebecca Coseboom are two-thirds of the force that was Halou. I most especially love love love Halou’s “Stonefruit” and “The Ratio of Freckles to Stars”, and wondered what the heck they were up to these days. Apparently making very similar yet very different music. Although it’s no Halou, dreamy vocals are still there, and so are the thoughts and sentiments behind the songs. Isn’t it sweet that they have the same initials, now that they’re married?

6. Be Brave – Love Inks
It’s a cute song! I know that “vox, gat + drum machine” doesn’t sound particularly promising, but just think of what lads with macs have been doing these days, haha. So I’m looking forward to when their new EP comes out, which is soon.

7. Pagan Poetry – Björk
I saw Björk live in 2008, and she absolutely blew my mind. At the time, I had tried really hard to get into her music but just really didn’t know where to start. Call it musical maturity, perhaps, because earlier this evening when a hopefully-soon-to-be-musical-collaborator told me to listen to her Verspertine album, I “got it” straight away. And funnily enough, all the songs that they had said to be their favourite off this album were also the ones I was immediately screaming, screaming in my head and then outwardly raving about. Where the hell were my listening ears, all these times I had on and off tried to listen to Björk?! This song starts off rather Japanese-sounding (to me, anyway; its the instrumentation and the intervals chosen, but I’ll spare the musical analysis), and then goes on in growing intensity until she breaks out with “I love him I love him” repeatedly, followed by the heart-breakingly whispered, almost chanted, “She loves him she loves him” and “This time I’m gonna keep me all to myself/She loves him, she loves him/And he makes me want to hand myself over”. Ahhhhhh! I just die a little in every way. It’s so beautifully written and sang. It’s so subtle yet intensely powerful. And it really fucking hurts listening to this song, because it so precisely portrays a very particular feeling that I have felt and been through, and it’s like a bittersweet punishment to listen to it. Sweet because it is so goddamn beautiful. But bitter because of the half-healed wounds that her voices seemingly just peels at, like a continuous, scrutinising scratch on a scab that’s neglected to heal completely. And I fear one of these times it will come right off. For the record, those other favourite tracks off this album are: Cocoon, Undo, Sun in My Mouth and Unison.

8. The Worst Taste In Music – The Radio Dept.
A dreamy, bittersweet song (note: recurring theme of this playlist, right?!) with lyrics that basically suggests guy likes girl, but so does some other guy, said other-guy happens to have “the worst taste in music”, and if the guy “didn’t know this [he’d] lose it”. Yup, that’s about it. Dreamy, swoony layers over a subtly-relentless beat. Oh what love does.

9. Silence – Portishead
I’ve said it once but I’ll say it again – PORTISHEAD IS COMING TO NEW ZEALAND!!! Okay, I think I can breathe now. I can’t fucking wait. It also means summer holidays for me. This song is just a killer. The boy decided to point out the obvious one day (alright, that might be a bit unfair, I did ask what particular reasons he had for liking this song, because, you know, I like to ask things like that…) and point out the unexpected elements of this song. Like say, the end-

This one goes on to you, All the reasons I know. This one goes on to you, I never had a clue.

Meet Kevin Bacon – he’s the award that the player of the day in my hockey team gets to take home for a week. Said player is then also entrusted with the duty of bringing a box of half-time oranges to the next game. So that was me, last week. Although I finally got a goal on Saturday, I’m kinda bummed it wasn’t the cleanest of goals… but I’ll live. I was all too happy to pass Kevin Bacon onto a teammate for her tough efforts in defense this week though. We only drew 1-all, but hopefully it will do the trick we want it to do on the points table.

Isn’t Kevin Bacon cute?

I’ve actually just gotten back from the boy’s house where I was helping him out with his honours presentation that he has to give tomorrow. At first I felt a little picky, pointing out “things to improve” and getting him to re-order and re-structure some things but I’m glad he actually found me helpful rather than annoying. And I feel like I gave him some good points that’s helped to set off some major improvements which can’t hurt. I’ve got so much work I still need to do for my transcription due on Wednesday, which is going to be tough, but in the meantime, I certainly don’t envy being the boy. Which is worse? A 50minute presentation on a hard topic for which ten thousand words is due in a couple of weeks’ time, OR a 64-bar transcription, bebop composition assignment complete with a shout chorus, improvisation playing test, and a jazz combo recital? All of which is really… daunting. Anyway, pointless non-comparisons aside, what’s getting us through these grueling two weeks until our two week mid-semester break is a 3-day trip that I’ve planned for us to take on the 28th-30th August. To be more precise, “I’ve planned” it in the sense that the boy has no idea where we are going, except for the few hints I’ve given him. Two nights away at some mystery spot somewhere south of Auckland, within 5 hours’ drive away. I’ve also told him that we’re staying at two contrasting places for each night, that are only (according to Google Maps) within 6 minutes of driving time from one another. And that we need to bring bedding for the first night. It’s going to be amazing. I’m so crap at keeping secrets and surprises to myself that this is really proving to be quite the challenge, but I’m sure the look on his face will pay off. I think I’m going to end up asking him to drive so that I can take photos along the way. So it will go something like “keep driving, turn here, hold on, are we going the right way? I hope so, because you don’t know where we’re meant to be going”, haha.

Playlist of the evening:

1. Dawn – Kordan
I stumbled upon this band and fell for them only a month ago. I remember so clearly when I found them, because I was just about to go over to the boy’s house, but a link had brought me to their band’s website and the video for “Closer” (the song below) was on autoplay and made me sit down and really listen to them. I wish this song was longer. There’s a weird, almost dissatisfying feeling about this song, because I feel like “something” ought to happen in it, but does not. Anyway, I think this is a great album opener, thus a great playlist opener.

2. Closer – Kordan
Probably my favourite song by this band. It’s right up my alley with its dreamy, shoe-gazey sound that is coupled with sweetly endearing lyrics. It’s the sort of music I like to listen to at night either alone or tucked up with the other half.

3. Boxcar – The Embassy
The boy acquainted me with this artist, and I was saying to him the other day how undated and “relevant” this album still sounds, even though it was released almost a decade ago. I can’t think of anything else in particular from 2002 that I would label as having a “fresh” feel even today. It’s a deceptively cheerful-sounding song that actually has rather sad undertones in the lyrics, and is also where this post’s title comes from.

4. All We Ask – Grizzly Bear
I’ve had this album sit on my computer for two years now, and never really gave it a chance until a couple of nights ago. For some reason this song almost sounds-waltzy to me, and it’s really just so soft, soft, lovely. I’m such a sucker for romance.

5. Say Something Say Anything – Blood Red Shoes
I might have even put this song in a much older playlist but I don’t remember. I just have a faint recollection of having blogged about this song at some point, I’m pretty sure. Yeah, yeah, I wouldn’t say this song is musically amazing or anything, but once again it falls under “songs/bands I love for un-obvious reasons”. One might hazard a guess that I like this band because it’s a male/female duo (as I mentioned a couple of playlists ago of my affinity for them), but that’s never a good reason to like a band. They just have songs that snap at me and makes me want to listen and keep listening. They do their style so well, I don’t even care about listening to “similar artists”. To be honest – and anyone who’s been in my company whilst I’ve screamed along to this song in my car will have been told this many times – I really only listen to this song for the line that kicks in about three quarters of the way in, during the bridge, repeated all the way to the end: so tell me, how long, how long, how long can you miss someone?

6. Neat Little Rows – Elbow
Apparently this band is amazing. So I gave them a listen. And they’re not bad. I haven’t quite fallen for them yet though, but they are pretty good. Although, when I went on Youtube to acquire the link for this playlist, I couldn’t sit through the video since… well I am not a fan of seeing fat men sing passionately in a set-up situation, and would rather let the sonic merits of his voice (and the band) shine through, unaffected. That sounds bitchy though. But I always think that if you are going to spend that much money making a video… Regardless, I like their new album, Build A Rocket Boys!

7. Lovely Allen – Holy Fuck
Holy Fuck is definitely one of those bands that I started liking twice as much (if not more) after seeing them live. I especially like bands that can pull off instrumentals, and they definitely do. I have no idea if this song has or not, but I always feel as if it must have been used in a movie or something. It starts and ends so beautifully, too – a well rounded, happy-ending kind of song, thus, bringing this playlist to a close.

And oh yeah, in a spout of madness on Friday, I bought these shoes from Topshop. I had been waiting for them to come out online for soooo long and had checked daily for months – but then they happened to be released on the two days that I didn’t turn my computer on at all and were sold out immediately. They’re now being scalped off ebay and the like for around twice the price. Yikes. So maybe there is an upside to The Department Store now having Topshop after all. I know, I know, they’re incredibly sparkly and to be perfectly honest, little over a year ago I would never go near them, but I think my shoe-thing all began with infamous patent aqua Dr. Martens. I was tossing up between the black glitter and these silver ones, but then thought, oh heck, if I’m going to do glitter I may as well really sparkle. Plus I have black boots anyway.

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