NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

  The model for Boyce Avenue 's success was simple: choose a current top 40 track and release a cover in their own style. YouTube would list their videos below the original song and suggest more of their songs on the side banner. Starting their YouTube channel in 2007, they were on the ground floor of the viral marketing. And with international tours and constantly releasing content, the band continues to have a large following on streaming services. The band hasn't released a full-length project since 2020's Cover Sessions, Vol. 6 ,   but have been releasing singles in 2021 and 2022, including today's song, a cover of Rihanna 's 2012 hit, " Diamonds ."  Image captured from the James Webb Space  Telescope from NASA's Flickr account. Source . PALMS RISE TO THE UNIVERSE. It's difficult not to think about the children's song " Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star ," particularly the line: "like a diamond in the sky," when I hear any

Olly Murs is an English pop star who got his start in 2009 by coming in second place on the sixth season of the British music talent show, The Voice. Since then, all but one of the singer's albums have topped the UK album charts. But it wasn't until his third record in 2013, Right Place Right Time that the singer scored a Hot 100 hit in the United States. The song " Troublemaker " features rapper Flo Rida and peaked at #25 on the the Hot 100. Murs released an American version of Right Place Right Time which featured another U.S. hit: " Heart Skips a Beat " featuring Chiddy Bang .  THE ANIMAL INSIDE ME WANTS TO TASTE YOUR LOVE. The follow up to Right Place Right Time, Never Been Better   featured guest performances by Demi Lovato   on the hit " Up " and Gym Class Heroes ' Travie McCoy  on the song " Wrapped Up ." But none of the songs were hits in America. In the '10s, Murs songs were played outside of the UK. Korean English ra

  This July, as many American have celebrated Independence Day, I think it's important to look at different versions of the American Dream. Lana Del Rey 's 2012 record Born to Die examines " the dark side of the American dream " at times. While America is starting look more like it's Puritanical heritage with a little too much Flannery O'Connor and Homer Simpson pseudo-religiosity, the Northeastern secular world that Del Rey paints on her debut album seems like a world apart from a neo-conservatism. Del Rey's America is the America of Hollywood. It's New Yorkers who vacation Upstate in the summer and attend cocktail parties on the weekend. If they go to church, it's infrequent and not an evangelical version of Christianity. It's the America of the Jazz Age and the fifties. ALL MY FRIENDS TELL ME I SHOULD MOVE ON. But it's also the America of Mad Men.   Del Rey has been criticized for sometime avowing an opposition to feminism. In 2014, the

If you listen to Third Eye Blind 's A Collection, the band's greatest hits compilation, half of the songs on the compilation come from the band's first self-titled record. The San-Francisco-formed rock band scored their biggest hits in the late '90s, taking alternative rock stations by storm with their edgy lyrics and pop-rock that sometimes flirts with hip hop influences. The final single, " Jumper ," from an album full of songs about sex and drugs is the story about a friend of the band's manager who committed suicide when he was in high school. In an interview with Songfacts lead singer Stephan Jenkins talks about how the song transformed from a lament to a song of empowerment. ICING OVER A SECRET PAIN.   In the Songfacts  interview, Jenkins talks about how "Jumper" was originally "a noir about a guy who jumped off a bridge and killed himself because he was gay." But the song doesn't sound like a dark tune. Like most of the son

At this point, you probably know a little about the story of how a song from 1985 became a number 1 hit in 2022 thanks to being featured in a key scene in the Netflix series Stranger Things . When one of the biggest shows on Netflix returned in May after nearly a three-year hiatus, a key scene featured the opening track to Kate Bush 's fifth record Hounds of Love , " Running Up That Hill" (A Deal with God) . The song never topped the charts during its original promotion, peaking at number 3 in the UK in 1985, and was even banned in some European countries for mentioning God in the song. Today, you'll hear countless covers of the song and hear it in TikTok and Instagram videos constantly. UNAWARE I'M TEARING YOU ASUNDER. Kate Bush is a name I should have been more aware of given how influential the singer-songwriter is on modern electronic dance music and modern pop. I think I first came across her name as influence when reading the music section of Attitude se

Today we dive back into the Korean Indie wave with another song of From the Airport 's. After releasing several singles and promoting themselves in the Hongdae club scene, the duo released several singles before their first EP, Chemical Love in 2014. The duo mixes rock and electronic sounds on this EP, mostly sticking to a formula of uplifting and sometimes inspiring melodies and lyrics. However, like on their prior singles " Everyone's All Right " and its B-side " Raining " (which is also included on Chemical Love ) and " Timelines " (also on Chemical Love ), the cover art and some of the songs on Chemical Love evoke a dark side to the otherwise ebullient electro-pop rock duo.   FLOCKS OF BUTTERFLIES TRAVEL TO LOOK FOR ANSWERS AND QUESTIONS. Many of the tracks that finally made it onto the band's debut record, You Could Imagine were the singles and the tracks from the band's EP. Today's song, "Chemical Love" is a discussion

  After her major breakthrough hit, " Lights " in 2010, Ellie Goulding became an international star. The UK singer has had a slew of hits following "Lights." In her two singles with Calvin Harris , " I Need Your Love " and " Outside ," Goulding shows her radiance, singing bright EDM. While "Lights" remains her biggest Hot 100 hit, Goulding's second biggest song was released prior to her third record Delirium . While that song appears as track 9 on the eclectic record, it was the film Fifty Shades of Grey that " Love Me Like You Do " is associated with, not Delirium.  WAIT, I COULD HAVE REALLY LIKED YOU.  In 2015, I thought Delirium was a great record, on par with Carly Rae Jepsen 's Emotion . But   in the years since its release, I certainly haven't revisited Delirium as much as Emotion. Both records are long, but Emotion seems more cohesive and in retrospect. Delirium feels long listening to it in 2022. From th