NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

  After a hugely successful album cycle with X , Ed Sheeran began writing his follow up. On X, many of Sheeran's lyrics focused on the lifestyle a pop star falls into when he comes to fame. Personal songs about life on the road, drugs and alcohol, and relationships and flings with other stars were mostly absent on the singer's story-centric first record + . As far as relationships, X offers us an insight into his long-distance relationship with Nina Nesbitt in " Photograph " and heartbreak with who is rumored to be Ellie Goulding in " Don't ." Then there was the ballad " Thinking Out Loud ," a song about his girlfriend at the time, Athina Andrelos. The song shows a Sheeran thinking about the days after his youthful fame and the person he would share that post-fame world with. WE WERE JUST KIDS WHEN WE FELL IN LOVE. But when Ed Sheeran found love, it wasn't with a movie star or a fellow singer-songwriter. The first track that Sheeran wrot

Stephen Christian  under the appellation of  Anchor & Braille  released their third record,  in February of 2016. Stephen Christian said in an interview that he imagines a movie scene for his Anchor & Braille projects, and the title  Songs for the Late Night Drive Home is descriptive of that movie scene. The electronic sounds imagine an urban setting--New York's " Lower East Side ," Los Angelo’s’ Silver Lake, Orlando--anywhere that, during the day cars would fill the streets. But the late night drive home is peaceful. You're in your car driving past the empty office buildings for 34:23 seconds past midnight. KISS ME LIKE YOU STILL BELIEVE.   Songs for the Late Night Drive Home is a kind of closing of the Stephen Christian electronic era, which started with Anberlin 's Vital   in 2012. In some ways, Vital was like the band had just discovered synthesizers. The band had scarcely used keys or synthesizers on their five records prior to Vital. Christian cite

Formed when the lead singer of Korean rock band Eastern Sidekick 's lead singer Oh Ju Hwan (오주환) started working with Zee (지) of From the Airport to produce a synth-based solo project, ADOY the project quickly turned into band with drummer Zozo (조조 or Cho Sang Yeon/ 조상연) and Ju Hwan's high school friend Jang Da Young (장다영) joining the band. In an interview with Arirang  (see below), Ju Hwan explains that the band got the name for the band by reversing the letters of his cat Yoda's name, hence ADOY is simply Yoda backwards. He goes on to explain that Yoda played a pivotal role in determining the band's sound.   ALL THE COLORS LOOK BACK. ADOY formed in 2016 and their  debut EP  Catnip   was released in 2017. The album's name relates to the role that Yoda played in helping the band determine their sound. When the band wrote their first songs, they determined which songs would go on the album by how Ju Hwan's cat Yoda responded to those songs. If Yoda liked the s

  If you namedrop   Jimmy Eat World   in a casual conversation, people might look at you funny. The name sounds like its origins: two little kids teasing each other. Though fronted by   Jim Atkins,   he is not the "Jimmy" who "eat[s the] world," but rather it was an insulting picture guitarist Tom Linton 's little brother, Ed, who drew a picture of his slightly older brother  Jimmy looking so fat that he was "eat[ing]the world." Jimmy Eat World is a band's band. They are responsible for influencing everyone in punk, pop punk and even hardcore punk in the last 20 years. Best known for their song " The Middle ," a top 40 pop hit, the band spun several singles throughout the years, even today. Their most commercially successful albums have been   Bleed American   (2001),   Futures  (2004), and   Chase This Light   (2007). ARE YOU DIZZY YET?    I've talked about the burnout I've experienced as a teacher. Burnout is very common with te

  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