NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

  In a few days, I'm heading to London for a quick trip. I thought I'd share a playlist to get myself even more in the mood for the trip. I've included songs by bands and artists who have sung about the city or close associations with the United Kingdom capital. A quarter of my music is probably associated with the UK. It would be interesting to see how much of all music, whether American or global, is British. It's my first trip to England, so I am still determining what to expect. It's a journey so many Americans romanticize, and I'm no exception. I'll be pretty busy in the coming two weeks. I'll try to post every day--mostly reposts. See you when I get back!

Spotify Wrapped probably flooded your social media right last month. Two years ago, I got jealous, so I subscribed to Spotify. Apple Music started Replay in response to that Wrapped jealousy, but I still don't see many people posting their Replay stories on Instagram.  I never stopped listening to Apple Music, though. I have different habits for listening to Spotify and Apple Music, and today I'm going to discuss the differences between those two listening habits. HONESTY WAITS HERE FOREVER .  I started using Spotify last year. I decided to start linking the artist, album, and songs on Spotify if available because it seems that Spotify has more listeners than Apple Music. Last year, I used Spotify mostly for my blog and didn't listen to it much. I listened to Apple Music on my own time, and whenever I was in the middle of writing my blog and needed to listen to a song, I listened to it on Spotify. This year, I listen to Spotify for my blog but I also switched to Spotify at

  OneRepublic had finished recording their second album, Waking Up , but had two more days with the studio. But the band’s bassist/cellist Brent Kutzle told lead singer Ryan Tedder that he wanted to stay in the studio to flesh out an idea he had. That night, Kutzle wrote the band’s biggest hit from the album, “ Good Life .” Waking Up’ s singles paled in the shadow of OneRepublic’s first hit “ Apologize ,” which reached number 2 on Billboard’s Hot 100 . “Good Life,” the album’s third U.S. single, reached number 8 on the Hot 100. The album’s first two singles, “ All the Right Moves ” and “ Secrets ” failed to reach the top 10.  Besides radio play, “Good Life” was played in many television shows and commercials. This upbeat song has optimistic, sincere lyrics, making it refreshing among often negative or trite optimism in pop music. SOMETIMES THERE’S BULLSHIT THAT DON’T WORK NOW. I remember a time in the early ‘00s when so many bands and artists on the radio were Christian or Christia

The ‘90s in rock music started quietly. Hair metal was still around, but vibey New Wave tracks had gained traction in the late ‘80s. It was an eclectic time without a clear direction for a musical style. Of course that all changed in the fall of 1991 when  Nirvana  burst onto the scene and Alternative and mainstream rock listeners determined that grunge would be the collective musical trend. Just as disco didn't die in 1979, the New Romantics sound of the late ‘80s carried over into the early ‘90s. In fact, in the early ‘90s,  New Order ,  The Smiths ’  Morrisey , and  Depeche Mode  enjoyed their peak success. For Depeche Mode, that success came from a dark pop song, which crossed the Alternative Rock band over to the pop charts with the single from their seventh album  Violator , “ Enjoy the Silence .” ALL I EVER WANTED, ALL I EVER NEEDED IS HERE IN MY ARMS.  Produced by the now legendary Mark Ellis, better known as  Flood ,  Violator  was years of dark electronica in the making.

  My Christian school took an annual mission trip in the spring to Chattanooga, Tennessee. The school had partnered with a church in the inner city that had a Habitat-for-Humanity sort of outreach. It was one of those "I feel more ministered to" type mission trips. We ended up doing a lot of grunt work for ongoing projects, but we were made to believe that we were of some use. Of course, this was before I learned that most of the churches built on mission trips overseas have to be torn down the minute the  missionaries  step on the plane because of course unskilled builders don't know how to build--but I digress. DO YOU HAVE THE TIME TO WASTE AWAY THE DAY?  One of the rules of the mission trip was that we were only allowed to listen to Christian music. It could be any genre, but it became a time for some of us to show off our CDs of the hard rock, metal, punk, and Emo-Christian records that made their way to the Family Christian bookstores. Sometimes we'd listen to Gr

Rather than reposting U2 ’s “ New Year’s Day ” for the fourth year, I started the year with my Top 23 Songs 2023. I stuck to one song per artist, and the order is in flux. I’ve blogged about some of these songs, and some of them not yet. I’ll briefly describe the song and link to the original post if I wrote about it before. This isn't a list like Paste or Billboard; it's purely subjective. These songs I found myself listening to a lot this year. 23. “ DJ Play a Christmas Song ”  by Cher . I'm not sure if this is going to be a novelty song or a perennial classic, but one thing is sure--it's going to sound dated. Maybe it was the anthem we needed after several socially-distanced holidays. 22. “ Over ”  by Chvrches . Last year, I started listening to the Scottish synth-pop band. Their 2021 album Screen Violence was an excellent concept album. "Over" feels like an extension to the already extended album . 21. “ Take Me Home, Country Roads ” by Lana Del Rey . In r

In Chinese, the word 小心 (xiǎo xīn) translates to careful. Anthony Green proposed the name to a band he was fronting, choosing to spell the Chinese as Saosin instead. But the band wouldn’t record their first record with Green, though, who stepped down due to a battle with depression and feeling homesick. Anthony would later form the band Circa Survive and would rejoin Saosin for their third album. In the meantime, Saosin hired 19-year-old Cove Reber , who would sing on Saosin’s Capitol Records eponymous debut and their Virgin Records sophomore record, In Search of Solid Ground .     CONFUSED BY THE LIES SHE’S BEEN FED. When Cove Reber submitted his demo to sing for Saosin, guitarist Beau Burchell thought that Anthony Green had submitted his own demo as a prank due to the similarities in Reber and Green’s voices. With a similar-sounding lead singer, Saosin headed out on the Taste of Chaos Tour with The Used, My Chemical Romance, Senses Fail, and Killswitch Engage, among others. The