NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

We've talked about the demise of the band Yellowcard three days ago , but today we're going to delve into Yellowcard's lead singer William Ryan Key 's solo career. Although during his tenure in Yellowcard, Key was known on stage by his middle name, Ryan, the singer wanted to craft a solo career in his own right without relying on Yellowcard's popularity. With two EPs released in 2018, first Thirteen and then Virtue , Key's solo music career went on pause until his EP earlier this year, Everything Except Desire . During the the gap between these projects, Key worked on reimagined Yellowcard songs and wrote and recorded with an ambient electronic side project called JEDAH along with fellow Yellowcard guitarist Ryan Mendez. Bowery Street (in pink) in  Manhattan, photo Wikipedia WHO DO I THINK I AM? Listening to Yellowcard and William Ryan Key's writing, we get a nostalgia for home. But where is home for Key? Yellowcard is famously from Jacksonville, Florida, ...

Everything  Switchfoot has done musically rests in the shadows of their 2003 album, The Beautiful Letdown . While Letdown was sonically superior to their prior albums, the once surf-rock band still needed to finish evolving after their commercial blockbuster record. I'm biased to think that Nothing Is Sound is lyrically and musically superior to Letdown, but that may be because of how Letdown lost its novelty over the countless plays on youth group trips, on Christian radio, then on rock and alternative radio, and finally on pop radio and in some TV shows. Subsequent Switchfoot releases garnered less attention. LAST WEEK SAW ME LIVING FOR NOTHING BUT DEADLINES. Two albums after Letdown, Oh! Gravity. attempted to bring Switchfoot back; this time with an experimental album with a flair for the avant-garde. The poppy second single stalled on the adult contemporary chart and was never released to pop and alternative radio as planned. But Switchfoot's fidelity to their Christian ...

The changing of seasons will fascinate me until climate change renders the seasons one blur of erratic weather. I always long for the year that I sit in nature drinking in the subtle changes of each day. I've never been one for grandiose ambitions, and there is some spark that ignites in my heart whenever I read nature. The semester that I took British Lit. II in community college, I felt so taken by the Romantics and their descriptions of the Lake District. When I listened to the speech with Wendell Berry in preparation for my Paper Route post , I felt that spark as well. WEARY EYES. Listening to Wendell Berry's speech reminded me of a dream I have had that I've never actually committed to writing. I had a fantasy about taking a full year off from modern life with all of its stresses and working on a farm--maybe my grandparents' farm--and then writing a book about what I learned over the course of one year. In this fantasy, I'd do all of the chores to keep the far...

In 2016 ,  Yellowcard  called  it quits, echoing many other bands in a changing music industry. Best known for their fourth album, Ocean Avenue , Yellowcard headlined Warped Tour and were at the top of the genre thanks to MTV 's Total Request Live  and placements in video games. But the band that had once been played on pop and rock radio, soon saw waning promotion, particularly in their later years. With albums underperforming and internal conflict in the band, they released their self-titled final album in 2016. They have only reunited in a controversial lawsuit against rapper Juice WRLD , which the band later dropped after the rapper died in 2020. YOU TOOK MY EDGE, SHARPENED IT IN CASE. My experience with Yellowcard was much like most of their fair-weather fans. Ocean Avenue was novel and fun. It was a time when bands could experiment with the format of a rock band to include something like, say, an electric violin on every track substituting for guitar leads. Th...

Last Wednesday, Tooth & Nail Records posted a teaser on social media listing " Gasoline Heart , Anberlin , Blenderhead , Dogwood , Spoken in Tongues , Freeto Boat , Relient K , Noise Ratchet " along with the title "Love Is the Answer" and Japanese characters. Then on Friday, they announced that there would be a new Watashi Wa album, People! Like People! coming in May, the first new album since their  Eager Seas   project. IT WAS WRITTEN IN A LETTER TO ME. Watashi Wa  was a band signed to Tooth & Nail Records in the early '00s. The band was formed in 2000 when the members were still in high school. After releasing two albums on Betty Rocket, a small label, the band signed to Tooth & Nail in 2002. The next year, they released their LP  The Love of Life .  The band broke up two years later and singer Seth Roberts went on to form the band  Eager Seas . Roberts negotiated with the label to fulfill Watashi Wa's contract with his new band; however,...

On Valentine's Day, Taeyeon released her third full-length album, INVU .  This album included her single released last summer " Weekend ," a song about feeling great and enjoying life amidst the everyday hectic routine. Sleeping in late, indulging in coffee and/or cheese cake, and generally "doing whatever I want," "Weekend" is a bubbly K-pop single that welcomes the best two days of the week. And out of a lazy afternoon in bed with my boyfriend singing this song, I chose to be extra lazy and post this track as an excuse to convert my Spotify Friday Vibes  playlist into an AppleMusic Weekend Vibes playlist. Hope you enjoy it! Original tracklist (before future updates): 1. "Weekend" by Taeyeon (the song of the day) 2. " Forest " by Number One Gun 3.  " Take it All Back 2.0 " by Judah & the Lion 4. " Typical " by MUTEMATH 5. " Rings & Roses " by Dabin ft. Conor Byrne 6. " Hymn for the Wee...

Formed in Chico, CA, in 2002, Number One Gun released an EP and an album on Floodgate Records, a now defunct Christian record label, before signing to Tooth & Nail Records  in 2005. The band split apart after recording their Tooth & Nail debut with lead singer Jeff Schneeweis forming the band The North Pole Project, and bandmates Christopher Keene and Jordan Mallory forming the band Surrogate . In 2007, Schneeweis changed Number One Gun's name to The North Pole Project as all the original bandmates had left the band; however, what would have been The North Pole Project's debut record was released as The North Pole Project by Number One Gun.  I’VE DONE IT ALL, BUT NOT THIS. Schneeweis built a touring band to promote  The North Pole Project, but when it came time to record the follow up, he decided to go at the recording alone. Number One Gun released To the Secrets and Knowledge in January of 2010, originally including a tenth closing track, a cover of Journey...

In the '70s Alternative Rock was a distinguishing term to separate mainstream classic rockers from experimental, independent rock bands. Sometimes called College Rock in the '80s and the '90s, it can be difficult to distinguish between mainstream rock and alternative rock of the '90s and '80s. More recently, the genre has been split between Alternative Rock and Alternative. But at the heart of Alternative music however its classified is genre-blending. Judah & the Lion had been cultivating a folk rock hip-hop sound from their inception, blending bluegrass instruments with modern sounds. However, the band's sophomore album they defined the style of music they were making: Folk Hop N' Roll .  HEY, MY LIFE IS REAL GREAT. Founded by lead singer and guitarist Judah Akers when he met an eclectic grew of musicians at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, Judah & the Lion started out as a Christian Rock act though started to distance themselves from...

Tracking the career of Aaron Marsh reveals a musical diversity rarely seen in artists today. Educated at a performing arts high school, Marsh learned horns and strings. He went on to form Copeland , which was a guitar-based rock band in their early days, taking influence from groups like Gin Blossoms and post-grunge bands. The band's trajectory strayed from rock to experimental electronic music, and Marsh took on other musical ventures, featuring on several projects for bands like Underoath and Anberlin and producing other artists, such as The Myrid, Anberlin , and This Wild Life .   I FOUND YOU DARKER THAN THE SKY ABOVE. In 2017, Marsh provided the sung chorus on the politically-charged Propaganda track, " Cynical ," a song that lambastes American Christian white nationalism. However, a month before Propaganda's Crooked Ways was released, Aaron Marsh released a new project,  Rabbit in the Snare ,  with indie rapper Ivan Ives under the moniker The Lulls in Tra...

We all have a past and we are all measured by the mistakes and accomplishments that we've made in our past. And just because we want to turn over a new leaf doesn't mean that others see the new us as we want to be seen now. Take for example, today's band, an indie rock band from New Orleans. After the demise of the Christian Rock band Earthsuit , several members went on to form an experimental rock band call  MUTEMATH .  I'VE WORKED IN THE BLAZING SUN.  Earthsuit gained acclaim both in and outside of Christian circles. Members of dc Talk and delirious? and Rebecca St. James all proclaimed that Earthsuit's artistic, experimental yet well produced record  Kaleidoscope Superior was what the future of Christian music looked like. But Earthsuit departed from Sparrow Records and released an independent album, The Rise of Modern Simulation ,  that failed to reach the level of success of its predecessor. By 2003, the band that came "from '98 to '99, 2000 a...

Dabin  is a melodic EDM music producer from Toronto who currently lives in Colorado and  Conor Bryne  is an Irish singer-songwriter known for his YouTube covers. I first heard this song last week when Apple Music played it as "music you may like based on the artists you just played." It's probably the most surefire way for me to discover music these days.  Based on the nursery rhyme, "Ring Around the Rosie," " Rings & Roses " explores the career path of someone, a friend or a lover, who is pursuing fame. That person has become too popular for the singer, who warns that in the end "they all fall down." Simple enough.   WAITIN' ON THE DREAM YOU BEEN SOLD. Pursuing a dream takes work and sacrifice. There's something in our youth that makes us believe that anything is possible. But somewhere along the way, the novelist in us, the future basketball player, or the rockstar gives way to the backup plan. Of course, thanks to the Internet ...

It's pretty easy to think of only the frontman or front woman when thinking about bands like Coldplay . Chris Martin is featured prominently in the band's music videos. He is certainly the most charismatic during the band's live performances. He's kept himself in good shape and is arguably the best looking band dude in Coldplay. However, this didn't give the band's fearless leader complete creative reign for their seventh studio album, A Head Full of Dreams . When Martin presented the idea for a late-night club hit "Drinks on Me," influenced by Flo Rida , the rest of the band shot Martin down. LIFE IS A DRINK AND LOVE'S A DRUG. Every February or March, the first full-moon day of spring according to the Hindu lunar calendar, cities and towns in India shutdown for a very colorful celebration that lasts two days. This festival is called Holi, or The Festival of Colors and this year it was celebrated on March 18 and 19. During this festival, everyone,...