Beaches, waltzes, finals

Summer draws closer and, in the nick of time, Beach House's new album, Devotion, presents itself as even more beautiful than its predecessor. Home Again sounds like a waltz on a breezy, seashell-encrusted seashore (preferably on the west coast, because the beaches have cliffs and bluffs over there). Victoria Legrand's voice echoes like an aquatic ghost trailing liquidy satin through the whole song.
"Home Again" on Savefile

But we should not forget it's still spring. Here in New York City, the blossoms are looking more spectacular than ever and it seems like the collective bad mood of Manhattan-and-Brooklyn-ites has melted with the snow. Jonathan Richman wrote about this phenomenon: in New York, spring truly puts itself on its most beautiful and romantic display.
"Springtime in New York" on Savefile

And now, it's back to work for me:

whats that? Oh it's a giant plastic bag monkey.

Witnessed by lucky lucky folks in New York.

dynamic subway current/plastic bag street sculptures by Joshua Allen Harris

found this stuff on Wooster Collective along with many other lovely things.

Oliver Triumphant

This is my dog, Oliver. He lives in the hills and forests of Georgia, with my Mom and Sister, and is the cause of much glee and frustration. While the ladies are out, he ravages furniture and unsettles the cats. He is often discovered glad eyed and beaming, incongruently sat amid a wasteland of twisted soggy destruction. I miss him pretty bad.

Brownie Mcghee - me and my dog blues (savefile)

tense and nervous? yes.

sparrow legs!!

Physical excercise is a great reason for a radical and ludicrous shift in musical taste. Excuse me, Nick Drake and Vashti Bunyan... these are my friends from the future, here to get me pumped up!

Metronomy - Heart Rate Rapid
White Williams - New Violence
Can - I'm so Green (actually from the past)
Battles - Atlas
Animal Collective - Fireworks
MIA - Paper Planes

Special Friend Grant put together this delicately abrasive
mixtape, play it for your kids as you pour sugar in their breakfast cereals, then fill their schoolbags with action figures and comic books.

Also worth proclaiming:
This music video shines most mightily.

the MGMT - Time to Pretend

Roy Smeck, the wizard of the Strings!!!

I can't wait for the dudes at Cern to invent time travel. then Andrew Bird and I can surf through the backlog of decades to 1929, and present this mastermind with a well deserved loop machine.

note: that wouldn't actually work, as You could only go forward in time...presumably you would need an existing time machine to arrive at, otherwise...quantum leap.

Mind the Gap!

swaying to and fro, its the only way to go, on the subway.

-To childhood too sweet to be left alone by the corrosive influence of the modern world. Coming to America at a young age meant looking to the idiot box for signs of identity. In Hindsight, I see how dangerous this could have been. But thanks in part to my rudimentary knowledge of programming schedules, and the ease of my delightability, I became completely engrossed and founded my dreams on the backs of the muppets. Leave it to Humans to viciously poke, prod and taunt a good thing into a clean unoffensive corner. Today, the muppets are ludovico treated pc saps, and the dvd release of the old shows come with a dire warning: Showing these to children may induce pillaging/ and or punk rock sentiments...

this article sums the carnage up rather nicely...

Hot Chip - One Pure Thought (Supermayer remix) (savefile)