NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

  As we wind down on “love month,” I thought I’d share one of my favorite albums  filled with love songs,  Paper Route ’s sophomore record  The Peace of Wild Things .  I’ve written about many of the tracks before, but here I’d like to give a home for future posts as well as give a brief reflection on each song. As I’ve discussed,  The Peace of Wild Things  takes its name from a poem by poet, farmer, and conservationist Wendell Barry whose themes discuss the importance of people returning to nature and reducing reliance on the industrialized world. However, Barry’s more radical themes do not seem to impact the record.  The songs that I’ve written about before will have a link.    1. “ Love Letters ” starts the record with the imagery of Adam waiting for Eve in the Garden of Eden. The song isn’t quite a straight-forward love song, with singer  JT Daly  claiming, “This time I’m different.” The rhythmic drums also distract listeners from thinking in terms of genre—is it rock or is it pop? 

  As we wind down on “love month,” I thought I’d share one of my favorite albums  filled with love songs, Paper Route ’s sophomore record The Peace of Wild Things . I’ve written about many of the tracks before, but here I’d like to give a home for future posts as well as give a brief reflection on each song. As I’ve discussed, The Peace of Wild Things takes its name from a poem by poet, farmer, and conservationist Wendell Barry whose themes discuss the importance of people returning to nature and reducing reliance on the industrialized world. However, Barry’s more radical themes do not seem to impact the record.  The songs that I’ve written about before will have a link.  1. “ Love Letters ” starts the record with the imagery of Adam waiting for Eve in the Garden of Eden. The song isn’t quite a straight-forward love song, with singer JT Daly claiming, “This time I’m different.” The rhythmic drums also distract listeners from thinking in terms of genre—is it rock or is it pop?  2. “ Tw

In April 2012, five months before they released their second album,  The Peace of Wild Things ,  Paper Route  performed a concert in an art studio, which was filmed and aired as the third episode of Brigham Young University Television's music show,  Audio Files .  The show only lasted for two seasons, but the first episode featured then up-and-coming band  Imagine Dragons .  Paper Route performed songs from their first album  Absence ,  but also indulged listeners' expectation by performing several songs from their upcoming album and shared stories about the songs and the recording process. WE WELCOME YOU THIS EVENING.   The entire performance used to be up on the show's now defunct website, but now we can only watch " Wish " and " Tamed ," on YouTube, the latter being a short eerie duet with singer-songwriter  Cacie Dalager , lead singer of the indie band  Now, Now , and harpist  Timbre . I don't remember all of the songs Paper Route performed on th

You never know what to expect when you get a new Paper Route album. The protean band has evolved from a quartet of multi-instrumentalists playing indie rock Americana to a pop group with a fetish for synthesizers by the EP Are We All Forgotten , which proceeded their major label debut, Absence . The band's sophomore record, The Peace of Wild Things , the band became even more of a pop group. So when listeners heard the choral " Intro " on the band's third record, Real Emotion , immediately followed by the dirty, distorted guitars of " Writing on the Wall ," we wondered, are we getting a rock Paper Route record?   I FORGAVE YOU ONCE/ THEN AT TWICE/ I TOOK CONTROL.   But Real Emotion was Paper Route's most diverse record. "Writing on the Wall" is arguably the closest to a straightforward rock song that Paper Route has ever performed. Much of the record reverts back to the solid pop tracks on The Peace of Wild Things. But Real Emotion 's sixt

Today we have another piano-based slow opening track. However, unlike Acceptance ’s Phantoms , promotion for Paper Route ’s debut record Absence was mostly word of mouth from the band’s existing fan base and getting on major tours with Paramore , Mutemath , and others, despite the band being on a division of a major label. The band’s established fan base, curated through touring and social media, had already been introduced to the band’s evolving sound on the Are We All Forgotten EP released on 2008 from the folk-electronic sound of their early efforts. Absence though was full electronic progressive pop. HE STOLE AS BEST HE COULD. The disorienting intro to the song " Enemy Among Us " is a reverberated piano. In the living-room-filmed album promotional performance video (see below) shows a drum set a top the electric piano as Chad Howat plays the song. I have no idea how the band recorded the song, but Absence is an album that I would like to know more technical specifics

In April 2012, five months before they released their second album, The Peace of Wild Things , Paper Route performed a concert in an art studio, which was filmed and aired as the third episode of Brigham Young University Television's music show, Audio Files . The show only lasted for two seasons, but the first episode featured then up-and-coming band Imagine Dragons .  Paper Route performed songs from their first album Absence , but also indulged listeners' expectation by performing several songs from their upcoming album and shared stories about the songs and the recording process. WE WELCOME YOU THIS EVENING.  The entire performance used to be up on the show's now defunct website, but now we can only watch " Wish " and " Tamed ," on YouTube, the latter being a short eerie duet with singer-songwriter Cacie Dalager , lead singer of the indie band Now, Now , and harpist Timbre . I don't remember all of the songs Paper Route performed on the show; how

Industrialization has come at a major cost. Kentucky-born-and-raised author, poet, activist, and farmer Wendell Berry critiques modern life as being disconnected with nature and thus a root cause of the climate change we see today. One of Berry's most beloved poems, " The Peace of Wild Things ," shows how nature can free the speaker from existential anxiety. With modern life unrelenting and with the anxiety of financing an indie band after their record label folded, with the passing of loved one and a divorce, Paper Route dug into raw emotion lyrically, and yet something held the band together. Taking the title of the album from Berry's poem, Paper Route's The Peace of Wild Things   is a romantic album with a few dark undertones. EVERY CIRCLE WAS A LINE JUST CONNECTED BY DESIGN. The second track on The Peace of Wild Things,   " Two Hearts " builds the themes of love and marriage from the first track, " Love Letters ." The songs are convincing

Taking long breaks between albums in order to self-record in old mansions around Nashville, Paper Route has only produced three full-length albums in their fifteen years active. Whenever they announce a new album, it's met with delays. Their sophomore album, The Peace of Wild Things , is no exception. After the departure of guitarist/co-vocalist Andy Smith , the band didn't have a permanent lead guitarist, and wouldn't until Nick Aranda joined the band before recording Real Emotion .   The Peace of Wild Things is a more pop-friendly album than their etherial debut, Absence . Peace builds the band up lyrically and contains some memorable choruses. But songs like " Sugar ," " Rabbit Holes ," " Tamed ," " Calm My Soul ," and today's song, " Glass Heart Hymn ," the otherwise straight-forward pop album down an artistic journey. MY FEET HAVE LED ME STRAIGHT INTO MY GRAVE. Named after a poem by farmer and environmentalist We