NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

I decided to do something a little different today. I'm going to present my first playlist within a playlist: 2021+. When my friend Stephen Barry  chooses his top songs of a given year, he gives two years of wiggle room for the records he missed. My format is not like Mr Barry and his Orchestra , but I thought that it would be interesting to make a playlist of the best songs I blogged about about last year that fit within a two year time frame. I'm going to stick to one entry per artist as usual and leave links for the posts. Today's song, "Counterfeit" by Wolves at the Gate, comes from a 2019 album, so it barely makes the list. First, I will post the Spotify playlist: The songs listed on this playlist: 1. " Cold Air " by Acceptance. The lead single from 2020's Wild, Free  is a song about a community torn apart by prejudice. Also check out " Wasted Nights " and " Dark Age. " 2. " Counterfeit " by Wolves at the Gate fro

I've written a bit this year about how I'm a Coldplay apologist. I believe that the London-based band is very good at what they do. Though so many artists accomplish their sound, both musically and lyrically, better, there's something uplifting about a new Coldplay album. Earlier this year, I talked about the band's first single from their ninth studio record,  Music of the Spheres, " Higher Power ." The album was released on October 15 this year, but after "Higher Power" the band released the promotional single, the 10:17 track "Coloratura," which was praised by critics for its composition and production, and the second radio single "My Universe" featuring the South Korean boy band, BTS. The song shot straight to number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming the second Coldplay single to top the Hot 100, the first being "Viva la Vida." I JUST WANT TO PUT YOU FIRST .  The reviews for Music of the Spheres  were quite low. M

  Ah! The weekend: a time when many of us can breathe that collective sigh of relief, leaving our forty hours at the office, forgetting about the boss, and maybe making some time for Number 1. Before I read into The Weeknd ’s 2015 hit, the upbeat track reminded me of catching a fresh cup of Guatemalan iced coffee before catching a bus to meet friends for a weekend in another city. One weekend, I was in a cafe in Hongdae that was playing covers of hit songs and I heard a female version of " Can't Feel My Face " playing. I can't be sure if it was Andie Case 's version . However, after adding Case's version of The Weeknd's #1 hit, I think it gives an interesting, mellow take on the normally, upbeat song. It's the alternate perspectives that makes YouTube cover artists and interesting addition to your music library. SHE TOLD ME 'DON'T WORRY. ' The Weeknd is known for his melancholy, self-destructive tunes. Earlier this month, I covered his new

  Berlin 's 1986 light rock hit " Take My Breath Away " in its somewhat cheesy ascending scaled-note chorus speaks to the common human experience of falling in love with someone. The old aphorism, "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away," speaks to the times when life surprises us so much that if the shock of the good surprise were to kill us, we would have died happy. In other words, I may feel "so happy that I could die." We can say that these moments are breath-taking, like when you see a Van Gogh in person, see a beautiful woman, or experience new life.   Perhaps this is what The Weeknd intended for his latest single "Take My Breath," but in typical Weeknd fashion, the video and the lyrics hint at a darker side of those breathtaking moments. YOU'RE OFFERING YOURSELF TO ME LIKE SACRIFICE. Since   Beauty Behind the Madness brought The Weeknd to the forefront of popular musi

On February 7, 2021, the 55th NFL Super Bowl sent mixed signals from a divided nation. You all know the story of March and April and May of 2020. There was a virus. There was a lockdown. There was a brutal murder that everyone saw. There were riots. There was a demand for change. And there was push back. As many ordinary white Americans became aware of the realties of the hardships of people of color, companies scrambled to be on the right side of history. The revolution of 2020 brought light to the realities of racism, but in many cases it seemed to be an attempt to pass the buck. Cancel culture aimed to scrub pop culture of its racist history, while companies that had first targeted white audiences started to think about incorporating diversity.  I'M GOING THROUGH WITHDRAWALS. Abel Makkonen Tesfaye is one of the biggest artists today. Better known as The Weeknd , Tesfaye has been called as the Michael Jackson of this generation. He is the most streamed artists on Spotify. While

  Back in 2010 we learned that yes, a pickle can get more likes than Nickelback , a band that had become the most hated "butt rock" band in the mid-'00s. In fact, the conclusions of the social media study found that a pickle had more likes than Oprah Winfrey or other beloved figures. It turns out that internet users' hate outweighs Internet love, or the terrible outweighs the good. In 2014, the most hated rock band would become U2 after their release of Songs of Innocence was forced into every iTunes users' library. People tried everything to scrub the songs from their shuffle. Today, people have mostly forgotten about Nickelback, and Apple Music no longer comes standard with that U2 album, so people have other musical axes to grind. Justin Bieber has grown up and is no longer blaring in our cultural continuousness. So who is the most hated band these days? After the 2019 Super Bowl it was Maroon 5 , for taking to the stage when the NFL was in the middle of rac

This is one of the most cringe-worthy stories from my teaching experience. And of course all names have been changed. Five years ago the first grade middle school students put on a program. In Korea, first grade middle school equates to seventh grade. The show consisted of presentations for special English classes the student did that semester. Then the English singing class came to stage. A student started playing some stiff piano music and five students started singing in unison. The song was "Love Me Like You Do." Two girls took turns singing the verses and three boys awkwardly joined in the chorus. When they all sang, it reminded me of when the Peanuts kids sang "Hark the Herald Angels Sing!" at the end of Charlie Brown Christmas  and of Cartman, Kyle, and Kenny putting on a highly inappropriate South Park style musical. As Tina* (not real English name or Korean name) sang "I'll let you set the pace, 'cause I'm not thinking straight" my for