(insert more interesting title than ‘A-Z of Music @ the Start of 2010′ here)

I thought it might be interesting to document my music taste at the start of 2010 and see how different it is by the end. (I did say might be interesting… it might not)

So, 1 song for every letter of the alphabet to represent my musical taste at the start of 2010 (to make it easier, the letter could be the first letter of the song title, artist, or album title)…

A – Angels & Airwaves – The Adventure

B – Bublé, Michael – Haven’t Met You Yet

C – Cash, Johnny – In My Life

D – Dreams – Fleetwood Mac (I like this more after hearing the story behind it)

E – The Empyrean – John Frusciante – Song to the Siren

F – Fly Me To The Moon – Frank Sinatra (Pete Allen Jazz Band concerts with fish & chips included are what all concerts should be like)

G – Gramercy Arms – Looking at the Sun (first heard this on Chuck)

H – Hey There Delilah – Plain White T’s (played and attempted to sing along to this A LOT)

I – I’m Taking You With Me – Relient K

J – Jason Mraz – Lucky (feat. Colbie Caillat)

K – Kings of Leon – Beneath The Surface (shame about the A-side to this song)

L – Lille – Lisa Hannigan

M – McFly – That Girl (again, played & sung along A LOT. sorry housemates.)

N – Now You’re Gone – Basshunter – Angel In The Night (just heard this a couple of days ago for the first time in ages)

O – Oopsy Daisy – Chipmunk (don’t know why I like this, but it’s had quite a few listens)

P – Paramore – My Hero

Q – Queen – Save Me

R – Röyksopp – What Else Is There? (classic Alphabet Soup)

S – Swift, Taylor – Hey Stephen (I may have had green hair, but Taylor thinks I look like an angel )

T – This Is Your Life – The Killers

U – Undisclosed Desires – Muse

V – Venice Queen – Red Hot Chili Peppers (I watched the Slane Castle DVD many many times before I realised the point of the intro to this song)

W – Weezer – (If You’re Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To

X – You Me At Six – The Consequence (There’s an x in their name, that’ll have to do.)

Y – You Really Got Me – The Kinks (hearing this as someone’s ringtone reminded me what a great song it is)

Z – Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs! – Hellogoodbye – Baby, It’s Fact

That’s a fair amount of time I probably should have spent revising, and if you’ve got this far, the same probably goes for you… unless you don’t have exams coming up. You probably still could have spent your time better though.

So Exciting You Might Wee…

That’s right, it’s time for the Raps Then Jives Top 5 Christmas Songs.

No. 1: Rage Against The Machine – Killing in the Name… just kidding…

In no particular order:

This is a great singalong (once the song starts, at around 2:36) that says it’s ok to get still excited about Christmas, even if it is “too commercial these days” (and it is, but that’s so clichéd it was painful to type, get over it):

This is random, but I love it:

Ok, you might get some presents that don’t fill you with joy and surprise, but don’t feign that you despise Christmas, you know you love it really.

Not sure why, but I think this song’s pretty cool too:

Finally, much as I don’t want to like a Mariah Carey song, this is an undeniably great Christmas anthem:

To be honest, I like pretty much any Christmas song, as long as it’s not Slade’s hideous Merry Xmas Everybody.

While we’re on Top 5′s, here’s my Top 5 2009 albums; I only bought 8, so maybe not saying a whole lot, but here we go anyway. (Clicking on the album covers will take you somewhere you can listen to them for free.)

Again in no particular order, except this is well out in front, and I think it’s quite popular among you lot too. Only Michelle Dessler is a more popular search term for this blog:

The 4 runners up:

In case you hadn’t noticed (and you probably hadn’t, especially if you’re reading this via facebook), the cover of John Frusciante’s The Empyrean is the image that appears at the top of my blog page.

:(

John Frusciante has left the Red Hot Chili Peppers. This makes me sad.

…and intrigued to know who’s replaced him, rumours suggest Josh Klinghoffer, who I only know as the guy the Fru called his favourite drummer and recorded a few albums with, and additional touring member of RHCP.

I’ve been Spotified

In case you haven’t already discovered it, Spotify is the best thing since Amazon MP3.

The downsides:

Occasional adverts, but nowhere near as frequent or annoying as any radio station I’ve ever heard. (I usually wake up to Radio 1, which obviously doesn’t have adverts, but A LOT of talking between songs).

Streaming rather than downloading means I can’t listen on my iPod.

The upsides:

Unlike radio, you get to choose every song.

You get to hear whole songs for free.

So I can listen to whole albums, not just 30-second previews of songs, before I buy. (YouTube is also useful for this, but a pain for listening to more than one song at a time/making playlists)

So I can listen to all the albums I’m not sure if I want to spend money on yet. (So far these have included albums by Fleet Foxes, Maccabees, Parliament, Graham Coxon, Relient K, Polly Scattergood, Damien Rice, Empire Of The Sun, Adele, and John Frusciante.)

Then there’s the ones I can’t quite bring myself to actually own (like Kate Voegele, Taylor Swift, McFly, Kelly Clarkson and Christina Aguilera).

Let The Good Times Roll

How did I only just find out about this?!

George Clinton & the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Come on guys, it’s been almost 3 years since Stadium Arcadium, surely it’s time to at least start the next one?

Please.

Pointless Rants #1 & 2

1. Why can’t things just work?

I’ve now had my laptop for 2 months and Dell has finally given up trying to tell me how to fix the problems with it myself, they’re gonna collect it and do it themselves.

I have a Studio 1537 Laptop.

The initial problem I had was that when I tried to watch movies, the disc drive seemed to get tired after about 1/2 an hour and would start skipping. That was fixed by some download, can’t remember what it was exactly, but now the drive keeps ejecting for no apparent reason, there’s not usually a disc in the drive, so it just makes a lot of noise trying to eject nothing. Their solution was to send me a replacement hinge cover (with the eject button on it), but rather than fix the ejecting, there’s now the added fun of the volume going up for no good reason.

This leads me to wonder why things don’t just work, but I guess some things do, it’s just that I only notice the things that go wrong.

2. Murphy’s Law*?

It’s winter, so it’s gonna be cold outside, but the sky is blue, so I think I’ll wear my nice suede coat that’s warm, but not rain-friendly.

I don’t know how many times I thought that as I looked out my bedroom window before leaving the house over the last few months. I’ve learnt not to trust British weather, cold but clear conditions do not last. I don’t think I’ve worn the coat once this year without it starting to rain. Yet when I wear a more waterproof coat because it’s grey outside, it very rarely seems to rain. Maybe this is just another case of me only noticing when things go wrong.

A couple of Sundays ago was a good(?!) example of this, my grandad commented on the beautiful day as I gave him a lift to church. I had decided to wear the aforementioned coat, but said that I doubted it would last, hoping I would be wrong. I wasn’t. It was in fact so wet within a couple of hours that my hosts for Sunday lunch gifted me an umbrella.

Now, less than two weeks later, it’s too warm to walk around outside in more than just a t-shirt.

Rant over. I love this song.

*Murphy’s Law states that whatever can go wrong, will go wrong. As an engineer, I’m also interested in Grave’s Law: Whenever you make something idiot-proof, the world will produce a better idiot.