Friday, January 11, 2008

Heavy Rotation



For me, more than anything, bands are like friends. I met alot of my best friends/bands in high school and to this day they remain the same - just for the record, I am 28.

When I was 14 I was introduced to Pearl Jam for the first time. It was not Ten that initially blew me away - it was instead the outrageously strong performances of "Animal" and "Rockin' in the Free World" that Pearl Jam performed at the MTV Music Video Awards in `1993 which sucked me in. I remember recording both of these songs from the TV onto cassette tape and playing them to death. As a 14 your old - it all seemed too perfect. I bought Vs the next day and since then I have never looked back.


I use the friends/bands comparison not without some background or merit. In high school I met my best friends, and to this day we still remain that way, and I met my favourite bands at the same time. Take a look at my mp3 player, the artist list reads like a who's who of 90's rock, Pearl Jam, Rage Against the Machine, Alice in Chains, Counting Crows, Nine Inch Nails, Ben Harper, Tool and the Smashing Pumpkins all take pride of place.

Like friends, nowadays it takes alot for a new band to enter my circle. I have my core group of everyday "connections" and anything else seems to get in their way. No-one will ever replace them, and there is always a high bar to reach. In saying that though there are exceptions. It takes a lot more than a catchy riff though to make the rotation.

In recent years there have been a number of bands who have cracked the playlist. Either through releasing a sublime album, catching my ear at a live performance, or somehow magically conjuring their song into my head, a number of artists have cracked my "top friends" list.

Just for the record these include the likes of Ryan Adams, Jimmy Eat World and Jeff Buckley, just to name a few.

The inspriration behind this blog comes from Heather Browne. She writes a blog called "I am Fuel, You are Friends". The blog bug certainly "dropped" as a result of this site.





1 comment:

heather said...

welcome to the blog world and thanks for the link! good job on this post, too....
:)