New Music

At work, I spend my day surrounded by insurance policies and listening to various podcasts. I get my Bill Moyers fix, my daily update on what I need to know about the economy going wrong (Planet Money), a short burst of politics (The Political Rewind), a longer burst of politics (It's All Politics), national news (Talk of the Nation), and other random stuff (like This American Life and Addicted to Race). But what I've really become insanely addicted to are music podcasts. I've been loving Musicheads and All Songs Considered (and Second Stage). This is bad, both for my coworkers and my bank account, because I have been falling in love with music like woah for the last two weeks now. I've also become slightly infatuated with a guy who happens to favor the same Ryan Adams record I do (Heartbreaker), but that is a different story.

What I really love is when bands are mentioned in both of the main podcasts about music I listen to. I'm looking forward to Paul McCartney's new release, for instance, because it was mentioned favorably on both shows; released under the band name "The Fireman", it is McCartney's venture into electronica. His newest album with this project - from the brief snippet allotted on All Songs Considered and Musicheads sounded incredibly interesting. And unlike most of my impressions of electronica, it sounded warm - as if there was an actual human being creating the music I was listening to. The closest thing I could equate this to would be Madonna's "Ray of Light", and even though I love that album it still seems like a weak comparison.

The band whose album I impulsively bought off of iTunes, though, is another find I credit with its cross exposure. I'm From Barcelona is a band I first heard of on All Songs Considered. The band sounded interesting, especially the song Headphones. One of the podcasts, I think it was Musicheads (and it could have even been the guy who appreciates Heartbreaker), mentions that the song is practically begging to be made into an iPod commercial. And it is true. It is catchy, and probably my favorite song on the album. The other songs are well worth a listen as well. Oddly modern while sounding at the same time vaguely seventies, the music works. It has a full sound and strange lyrics. And it makes me insanely happy. So, for that reason, I thought I'd talk about them here. And show the one video I could find, their single "Paper Planes":