NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

On   December 4, 2015,  Troye Sivan  released his wildly successful first LP,  Blue Neighbourhood .  Building a large Internet fanbase,  Blue Neighbourhood   peaked at #7  on the Billboard Hot 100 charts. The standard edition of  Blue Neighbourhood  contained  3 of the 10 songs from the previously released  Wild  EP . The LP, though, gave Sivan his first US Top 40 single, " Youth ." Four of the ten songs on  Blue   were singles, starting with "Wild," a remix of which was rereleased with guest vocals by Alessi a   Cara as Sivan's fourth single from the album, which was a major hit in South Korea.     TRUTH RUNS WILD.  The final single, " Heaven ," was released on October 17, 2016. The  Jack Antonoff -produced single features a second verse from fellow Australian pop star,  Betty Who . After Sivan came out in a YouTube video in August of 2013, he became an LGBTQ+ icon, as he processed his sexuality in the lyrics of his music. Part of the promotion for  B

2017's  After Laughter   is arguably the best  Paramore  record both lyrically and musically. Musically, it's a pop album borrowing synths from the '80s, interesting drum arrangement, and some pensive guitars here and there. And although most songs are in major keys, lead singer and lyricist  Haley Williams  masterfully disguises some of the band's darkest lyrics with smiles and summertime vibes. The most telling track is  "Fake Happy,"   but also songs like  "Pool"  and  "Rose-Colored Boy"  show this beautiful confusion between  being the life of the party and dealing with other things inside. The name of the album itself is telling. Williams explains that the meaning is the expression the faces of a room full of people stop laughing. Smiles start to fade, maybe some tears are wiped away. While you may debate whether this band fits into their emo punk rock sound, the lyrics are an unadulterated emotional roller coaster. I CAN'T CALL YO

When I was reading   about   NEEDTOBREATHE for the first time , I couldn't help drawing parallels between another band with a raspy-voiced lead singer, Kings of Leon . Both bands have Southern, faith-based roots. Both frontmen were raised by pastors who were involved heavily in ministry. Like the Killers, the record label of both bands tried to break them in the UK before taking on the American charts. Both bands were composed of at least two family members. In Kings of Leon, the band is composed of three brothers and their cousin. For NEEDTOBREATHE, the band's line up originally consisted of brothers Bear and Bo and their friends. But before they could release their 2015 record,  Rivers in the Wasteland,  a sibling rivalry nearly ended the band. LIKE A BULL CHASING THE MATADOR.  NEEDTOBREATHE's breakthrough hit "Brother" topped Billboard's Christian Songs and was the band's first entry on the Hot 100, peaking at #98. It also rose to #8 on Billboard's

On   December 4, 2015,  Troye Sivan  released his wildly successful first LP,  Blue Neighbourhood .  Building a large Internet fanbase,  Blue Neighbourhood   peaked at #7  on the Billboard Hot 100 charts. The standard edition of  Blue  Neighbourhood  contained  3 of the 10 songs from the previously released  Wild  EP . The LP, though, gave Sivan his first US Top 40 single, " Youth ." Four of the ten songs on  Blue   were singles, starting with "Wild," a remix of which was rereleased with guest vocals by Alessi a   Cara as Sivan's fourth single from the album, which was a major hit in South Korea.          TRUTH RUNS WILD. The final single, " Heaven ," was released on October 17, 2016. The Jack Antonoff -produced single features a second verse from fellow Australian pop star, Betty Who . After Sivan came out in a YouTube video in August of 2013, he became an LGBTQ+ icon, as he processed his sexuality in the lyrics of his music. Part of the promotion for

No, that riff is not "(Don't You) Forget About Me" by Simple Minds in some alternate, extended drumming version. Today, we're listening to a San Diego-based Worship band's rendition of the classic Christmas hymn, "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing." Formed with former members of indie/Christian Rock bands Reeve Oliver, Something Like Silas, and Future of Forestry  and named after a pub near Oxford University where J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis met to discuss their writing and their ideas, The Eagle and Child have released several albums and EPs on Tooth & Nail's worship music imprint, Gospel Songs. "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" comes from their first Christmas EP, O Christmas. BORN TO GIVE THEM SECOND BIRTH. Christmas covers have to be excellent in order to take my attention from a traditional arrangement. While I listened to several Christmas songs today, the moody saxophone and the drums on this version stuck out, even after listening to

The fourth track on Kye Kye 's sophomore record, Fantasize , " Glass " continues to build the atmosphere on this Chad Howat -produced record. Back in 2014, there was still hope that Kye Kye could be the next big Christian band. Their 2011 debut, Young Love  landed them a feature interview in Relevant Magazine  and their follow up was well-reviewed in several Christian publications, including CCM Magazine . The band's story was fascinating for the Christian market. Siblings Tim and Olga  Yagolnikov grew up in a conservative Russian churches in Estonia before moving to the United States. In the Relevant article, Tim explains that the siblings' religious upbringing wasn't "really grace-centered, it’s really kind of more legalistic." Tim explains that their religious culture was "not for salvation, it’s for blessing or right-standing with God." TO HOLD ONTO AN IMAGE OF SHADOWS YOU REMEMBER. According to my Apple Music's "Replay '21

Muna 's 2017 record About U takes listeners on a rollercoaster of emotion. Unlike their 2019 Saves the World record, About U focuses on the positive and negative of being in love and breaking up. About U doesn't enjoy the near universal acclaim that their follow up has, but album helped to establish the three-piece band of queer musicians on the scene of Alternative dark synth pop. Today the sadness, desperation,  and loneliness of " If U Love Me Now " resonated with the bleak December day. The song explores the theme of mental illness and suicide. The singer explores options before telling someone that that person should "just let [her] leave."  IT'S JUST A HYPOTHESIS I TEST THAT I SHOULD NOT EXIST . A large proportion of the LGBTQ+ community struggle with thoughts of suicide. When singer Katie Gavin sings on this melancholy track, her voice sounds weak and wounded, as if the singer of this song has resigned after her last hope has been dashed. The f

A little over a month after their self-titled album was released, Deas Vail released a Christmas EP, titled For Shepherds & Kings.  The EP contains four Christmas classic hymns, performed in a way that is true to Deas Vail's sound. Of the four Christmas songs included, I was least familiar with "Coventry Carol." I had heard it by other artists and it was on some of the Christmas CDs I grew up with, but it wasn't immediately identifiable. It wasn't in the Seventh-day Adventist hymnal like "O Come O Come Immanuel" or "What Child Is This?" and it hadn't been recorded by enough artists to make it recognizable. HEROD, THE KING IS RAGING. "Coventry Carol" wasn't a standard Christmas Carol until 1940. From November 14 to 15, the Germans reigned terror upon city, and during the blitz Coventry cathedral was destroyed (pictured to the left). But on Christmas day, the BBC broadcasted a message from Coventry. Ending the broadcast, si

YouTuber Todd in the Shadows makes a yearly list of what he deems as the worst songs of the year, and last year Justin Bieber bookended the list with "Lonely" at #10 and "Yummy" at #1. Todd's frank commentary on the 27-year-old singer seemed a bit mean to put in my blog, and I realized that there was a reason Todd is in the shadows. There are several reasons why I chose "Friends" as the song of the day. First, the Tyler Ward version was stuck in my head, and it wasn't until I watch Ward's video on YouTube that I realized that the song was a Bieber song. When I watched the Bieber music video, the snow in the video made me think that it made the song fit in on my December playlist. I realized that the Bieber version wasn't half bad. It was melodic and the electronic production was a kind of song I would listen to, although I'd still prefer the Tyler Ward cover (see below). LIKE I GOT ULTERIOR MOTIVES. Regardless of whether it's the T

Sleeping at Last is a band that almost made a song of the day two days ago for their cover of " Chasing Cars " until I made time to listen to the Snow Patrol version and their music, eventually settling on " You're All I Have."  Like Snow Patrol , Sleeping at Last came to fame, albeit not Snow Patrol-level of fame, from a well-placed appearance in Season 3 of Grey's Anatomy . The indie-rock band turned solo project of singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Ryan O'Neal has had many songs included in the ABC drama and its spin-off, Private Practice . Their cover of   "Chasing Cars" was used to add a dramatic counterpoint in the series, as the audience had already heard the original in the Season 2 finale. O'Neal stays busy producing lots of music, composing albums based on larger concepts, such as the solar system, the Enneagram, emotions, land, oceans, and many other topics.  WAR IS OVER, IF YOU WANT IT. In the band's large scop

When I was reading about NEEDTOBREATHE last month, I couldn't help drawing parallels between another band with a raspy-voiced lead singer, Kings of Leon. Both bands have Southern, faith-based roots. Both frontmen were raised by pastors who were involved heavily in ministry. Like the Killers, the record label of both bands tried to break them in the UK before taking on the American charts. Both bands were composed of at least two family members. In Kings of Leon, the band is composed of three brothers and their cousin. For NEEDTOBREATHE, the band's line up originally consisted of brothers Bear and Bo and their friends. But before they could release their 2015 record, Rivers in the Wasteland, a sibling rivalry nearly ended the band. LIKE A BULL CHASING THE MATADOR. NEEDTOBREATHE's breakthrough hit "Brother" topped Billboard's Christian Songs and was the band's first entry on the Hot 100, peaking at #98. It also rose to #8 on Billboard's Rock/Alternativ

In March, I talked about Kye Kye's 2014 single, "I Already See It"   and gave a brief history of the band and their connection to the Christian music scene. Since their 2014 release, the 4-piece band, originally composed of siblings Olga, Timothy, and Alex Yagolnikov along with Olga's husband, Thomas Phelan, now is a duo of Olga and Timothy. They broke their six-year hiatus last year, releasing an eerie single titled "A Forest," an electronic rhapsody incorporating singing and spoken word and scary sounding electronic tones. Then, in June of this year, the duo started releasing a series of two-track singles that would be part of their July 30 release of the 16-track Arya. But with Kye Kye's hiatus and without a record label, the album is quite under the radar. One listener on Twitter called the album, " an ode to Bowie and Brian Eno ," and that sounds appropriate. Much of the tracks are not catchy--they don't often follow a pop-song formula

Electronic Dance Music (EDM) is the disco of the day. These days, pop charts are filled with DJs and features; however, in the age of disco, the featured singers often went uncredited. Today, though, in the age of powerful pop singers, a feature for a DJ can be mutually beneficial. It can either boost an up-and-coming DJ or boost and up-and-coming singer. Today's song is not one of the most popular DJs or features. The song hit number 20 on the US Hot Dance/Electronic Songs in 2019. It was featured on the second To All the Boys Netflix film. ILLENIUM and Bahari are not household names, but there is something intoxicating about this smooth, repetitive pop jam, problematic lyrics and all. IT'S LIKE CHAMPAGNE/ FEEL IT POURING IN MY VEINS. When I came to Korea, I found a very conservative environment with the other missionary teachers. Just like when I chose "the most conservative (accredited) Adventist university," I had taken a leap of faith in coming to Korea. It was

Kye Kye released two albums in the early 2010s. My earliest memory with this indie-electronic band was their single "Broke" on RadioU , which took a while to grow on their listenership, failing to beat the other singles of the week on their " Battle of the Buzz " program. However, when the single was finally released to regular rotation, it quickly topped their " TMW " (Ten Most Wanted) program. That summer, I saw the band perform at Cornerstone in the Come & Live tent before or after Showbread. Lead singer, Olga Yagolnikov Phelan, seemed a little shy when talking to the audience, but the band sounded great when performing. The band's strength lies in their atmospheric sound rather than their spiritually cryptic lyrics.  TAKE YOUR TIME; I ALREADY SEE IT. One Saturday night in college some of my friends and I were invited to one of our professor’s homes. That night the professor taught us a game involving classic issues of National Geographic and

In 2019, I rediscovered Wolves At the Gate band from the Labeled podcast. Labeled is a podcast about the history of Tooth & Nail and Solid State Records. As I get older, my tolerance for hard music is decreasing. Of course, when I was a teenager Post-Hardcore was king. Everyone used screaming in their music, but musical genres started to become more defined c. 2006 and there was hardcore and rock. And a lot of rock went more electronic and pop.  Still, even after the murky time, hardcore bands still liked to take a break from screaming and sing a ballad. When I picked up this record, though, I found less screaming and more of the type of music I liked before the rock/hardcore split. This group sounds more like New Medicines era Dead Poetic than Define the Great Line era Underoath. This album made me miss intense rock. Guitars and bass and drums and passionate singing spiced with some well-intentioned screaming.  YOU WON'T MAKE ME INTO YOUR PAWN. "Counterfeit" was th