and if you think twice then the moment will pass....

i am a self-professed John Nolan fangirl. he was my favorite thing about TBS, and when all of that drama happened and he started his own group, i was in love with straylight run before i even heard a note. i mean, honestly, isn't Existentialism on Prom Night one of your favorite songs ever? i know its one of mine.

so all this is to say that when i heard Nolan's solo album, Height, i was beyond disappointed. its just not a good album. Ive tried to suffer through it a few times hoping that i can find a bit of sunshine amidst all the gook, and theres just nothing special about this project. all of the songs sound the same, and that is to say, they all sound like a crap track from straylight, who we all know got worse with every album they put out. well, you may disagree with me on that, but i LOVED the original demos, but by the time we got to the last album, i didn't even care enough to bother listening.

i figured that id give his solo stuff a shot, because like i said, nolan was my favorite part of all of the bands that he'd been a part of, (OMG i about had a heart attack the day i saw that picture that confirmed the rumors that had been floating around for some time, that the original TBS lineup was getting back together) but nothing even sticks out enough to allow me the opportunity to comment.

I'm actually listening to the album right now, and its more or less background noise or filler until something else pops up. i even attempted the acoustic disk thinking just maybe there would be something there (i am a sucker for anything acoustic...) and i just cant find it. i cant find that spark that made me fall in love with john so many years ago.

and he ruined a song that I've always had a soft spot for...Primitive Radio God's "standing outside a broken phone booth with money in my hand." you know the tune, right? "I've been down-hearted babe, I've been down-hearted babe...eeeeeeeever since the day we met...." you can find john's version on youtube and make your own decisions about it, but I'm not impressed.

basically, this is just a huge rant to say that I've tried to like this album, but i cant find anything to like. ill be deleting it from my itunes, though ill keep it around on CD just in case i get a frontal lobotomy and decide that i like it.

"no more airplanes or speed trains or freeways, there'd be no distance that can hold us back..."

on thursday i hit the road for a few days. i went to visit a friend of mine, see the new harry potter movie with him, and just hang out and do a whole lot of nothing. one of my favorite parts of any road trip is the music in the car on the way there and back. both parts of a trip have specific feelings attached to them, and there are some Cd's that are perfect for the heading there or the heading home leg of the trip.

however, there is one CD in my vast collection that is perfect for ANY part of a road trip. Transatlanticism by Death Cab for Cutie is the most perfect CD for travelling that i have ever heard, and is a big part of any trip that i take. with lyrics like "and every thursday i braved those mountain passes and you skipped your early classes" from the song We Looked Like Giants, or "with my feet on the dash, the world didn't matter" from the song Passenger Seat, the scene is set for a perfect drive.

honestly, hearing the song We Looked Like Giants makes me want to jump into a car and take a long drive, and if I'm already doing that, the gas pedal may be pressed a little harder.  from the first note, i just want to speed through mountain passes and look down over the guardrail at the trees and farms flying by below me at 75 mph.
if Mr. gibbard and company set out to write the perfect driving record, i believe that they were successful. from the first tones of "the new year" to the last notes of "a lack of color" (which, incidentally, are the same notes...), this album has everything needed for a perfect trip packaged up in one little red plastic disk.

what are some of your favorite driving records?