hullo hallo

take it easy

2010-02-16T18:25:00.004-05:00

i made this playlist in the heart of cold, cold january. it's the first i've ever posted on hullo hallo; i started making it with someone in mind but then thought i'd share it with the few people who come here... yes, there are some! many of the songs i've posted before, but why not take another chance to listen to them? i hope you enjoy it!

take it easy

1. feather - little dragon
2. islands - the xx
3. ceremony - new order
4. untrust us - crystal castles
5. overnite religion - kurt vile
6. first song for b - devendra banhart
7. nobody's baby now - headless heroes
8. you came along - joel plaskett emergency
9. sunshine blues - bahamas
10. twice - little dragon
11. 5th ave - gold panda
12. faking the books (dntel remix) - lali puna
13. let her dance - the bobby fuller four
14. should have taken acid with you - neon indian
15. quitters raga - gold panda

photo: julia galdo, via recordis photography

you will slip from my mind

2010-01-26T17:50:00.014-05:00

in a matter of time.

beach house - walk in the park

i'll take care of you, if you ask me to.

beach house - take care

here it is

2010-01-19T12:19:00.006-05:00

"It always fascinated me how people go from loving you madly to nothing at all, nothing. It hurts so much. When I feel someone is going to leave me, I have a tendency to break up first before I get to hear the whole thing.

Here it is. One more, one less. Another wasted love story. I really love this one. When I think that it’s over, that I’ll never see him again like this… well yes, I’ll bump into him, we’ll meet our new boyfriend and girlfriend, act as if we had never been together, then we’ll slowly think of each other less and less until we forget each other completely. Almost. Always the same for me. Break up, break down. Drink up, fool around. Meet one guy, then another, fuck around. Forget the one and only. Then after a few months of total emptiness start again to look for true love, desperately look everywhere and after two years of loneliness meet a new love and swear it is the one, until that one is gone as well.

There’s a moment in life where you can’t recover any more from another break-up. And even if this person bugs you sixty percent of the time, well you still can’t live without him. And even if he wakes you up every day by sneezing right in your face, well you love his sneezes more than anyone else’s kisses."

2 days in paris, julie delpy

the bobby fuller four - let her dance

we could connect or we could not

2010-01-16T22:44:00.002-05:00

i came home last night to find you in the bath. walked in to a humidifier. you've got your drinks, your smokes, you've got your memories all stored up in the brain box that quietly scans each piece of data, compresses, stores, with reassuring hum and beep. you've got these thoughts you take out and look at when it's been time enough, when time enough has passed. sometimes i come in to where you're not. it's not you there, or if it is, it's a you i never met, being so young whenever it was. you tell me, i was crazy.
you tell me, i was crazy about her.

neon indian - should have taken acid with you
gold panda - quitters raga

photo: youknow505
(music via fantastic weapon and tsuradio)

i am yours now

2010-01-08T17:07:00.002-05:00

spent my days and nights before searching the world for what's right here.

the xx - islands
julian casablancas - glass

photo: youknow505
(via of paper and things)

rather be a bandit than a lover

2010-01-05T10:19:00.002-05:00

this song is terribly addictive.

trust me.

little dragon - feather
(via golden bloggen)

photo: hrystia kaminska

train, train, come and gone

2009-12-23T11:59:00.006-05:00

your trick pony, he don't know me, he don't know me at all.

charlotte gainsbourg - trick pony
via this recording

photo: lili forbes (via of paper and things)

she got sunset on her breath

2009-12-18T16:44:00.001-05:00

i inhaled just a little bit; now i got no fear of death.

edward sharpe & the magnetic zeros - 40 day dream

photo: hrystia kaminska (via nadinoo)

gold and warm

2009-12-11T09:38:00.005-05:00

if only! i left the house today wearing two pairs of socks, tights, leggings, a dress, two sweaters and a coat, hat, scarf, etc. sigh. this is how it begins... soon i won't be able to go outside without feeling like my face is going to fall off with cold. i'd enjoy winter a lot more if i didn't have to go out into it so much.

in the meantime, however, i've also put on a seasonally inappropriate song from benjamin davis and sebastien schultz, aka bad veins. i'll always hold dear the time that i've spent here. i want to hear your heart beating loud. and i want to see you stand up proud. as we go where sunlight is gold and warm.

bad veins - gold and warm
via this recording

photo: erica hoffman (via of paper and things)

i did not want to let you go

2009-11-24T22:25:00.009-05:00

but i knew i had to.

the drums - submarine

photo via heartbeast/wolfgang

hold me close and tell me how you feel

2009-11-20T10:24:00.008-05:00

tell me love is real. mmm, darling when you're near.

jessica lea mayfield - words of love (buddy holly cover)

art: roberto calbucci (via of paper and things)

the brain is a slow wave

2009-11-17T14:29:00.009-05:00

i could be so happy if i just quit being sad. i could be so happy if I just quit being a drag. i could be so sweet if i just quit being sour. i could do all these things. oh, i have the power. i'm gonna see what tomorrow brings.

heartless bastards - be so happy
heartless bastards - new resolution is my resolution too.
heartless bastards - hold your head high
heartless bastards - the mountain

photo: octavian dogariu (via hello bauldoff)

i like the time i spent with you girl

2009-11-16T16:50:00.007-05:00

cold cave - life magazine & the trees grew emotions and died
delorean - seasun & deli
jj - things will never be the same again & ecstasy

photo: sandra croft

all i want

2009-11-05T14:22:00.038-05:00

Myrtle
by John Ashbery

How funny your name would be
if you could follow it back to where
the first person thought of saying it,
naming himself that, or maybe
some other persons thought of it
and named that person. It would
be like following a river to its source,
which would be impossible. Rivers have no source.
They just automatically appear at a place
where they get wider, and soon a real
river comes along, with fish and debris,
regal as you please, and someone
has already given it a name: St. Benno
(saints are popular for this purpose) or, or
some other name, the name of his
long-lost girlfriend, who comes
at long last to impersonate that river,
on a stage, her voice clanking
like its bed, her clothing of sand
and pasted paper, a piece of real technology,
while all along she is thinking, I can
do what I want to do. But I want to stay here.

sarah blasko - all i want
sarah blasko - we won't run

photo: nathalie daoust (via of paper and things)

it's never the same way again

2009-10-15T15:02:00.019-04:00

for the past few months i've been thinking about my friends. my old friends, whom i've loved for years on end and who now live in cities and countries across the ocean. those old friends who may or may not come back to this country, the ones who might leave this city in a matter of months. i've been thinking about those ones, because i miss them, because i miss being around the people who know me as well as they do.

friends like that, the best kind, they make you feel safe. like your favourite clothes, the ones you've had forever, the ones you've worn in and lived in, they don't make you feel old or boring when you wear them. they protect you, and you can be anyone you like in them. i miss that feeling, feeling safe.

i've been thinking about my friends, and i've been thinking about home. i don't feel like i have a home here. when i mention this to people, especially people who are older than i am, their sympathy comes with the slightest bit of exasperation, because everyone has a time when they feel like they have no home. i don't particularly like zach braff or garden state but even his movie makes this point, because it's a feeling we all get. i don't have a home here because my friends aren't here, or they are but they're already living their own lives, and back at the ancestral seat i have a room in my parent's house with some of my things, and in the city my apartment is a wasteland.

i spend a lot of time at your place. i remember the first time i went back with you, to your house. it was november and it was raining. i had to pee, we had been downtown drinking and i had to pee, and by then everything was closed and we stood in the subway and i stumbled with indecision, i watched my train go by, and we took a cab back to your place so we could watch television and i could pee. on the cab ride i half-closed my eyes and lolled back onto the seat, the drunkard's choice to check out, momentarily, and you put your hand on my hand. your hand was warm and dry. sometimes the booze strips off a layer of protection enough to give your insides a shock. you can put your hand on someone's leg, on their knee, around their shoulders, you can put your hand in your pocket. you put your hand on my hand. i don't remember getting to your place, i don't remember going in. i remember laying on the couch and watching tv with eyes half closed, and you put a blanket over us, and i looked at you and you looked happy. i forgot about that, but now i remember.

i miss my friends and i miss the home that i had with them, but i don't feel it all the time, i feel it sometimes, i feel it less when i'm with you. i've decried, loudly and often, people who fall into relationships for the bonds of built-in friendship, to escape loneliness and sadness and the coldness of winter. what i suppose i never understood is that it doesn't have to be sullied with fear, that when you get love, from the ones you love, the ones who love you, you get a blanket, the best kind, that you carry with you in your heart. you get to go home and sleep in the bed that's yours.

the smiths - there is a light that never goes out

photo via hello bauldoff

hey mr. afie jurvanen

2009-10-15T01:35:00.004-04:00

you charmed the skinny pants off of everyone tonight.

seriously! so good.

bahamas - southern drawl
bahamas - sunshine blues (highly recommended)
bahamas - already yours
bahamas - till the morning

photo: bahamas myspace

we live half in the day time

2009-10-07T13:50:00.017-04:00

we live half at night.

the xx - vcr

photo: lina scheynius

run every day

2009-10-01T16:24:00.011-04:00

I dreamt that I was sick. I dreamt you too,
a face that moved over sounds. Comes a time
I'll wake, I know, but for now you'll keep as mine.
Love's a sickness that I dreamt. Love finds you,
or you it. You always said a messy room
would make itself a messy mind. Something like.
Love's a mess I meant. Comes a time the night
will bring no more to light, or nothing new.

Time is always falling back on its youth.
Everything slides from end to start, from age
to the past for a shine; an easy wage
to look on the never was and find truth,
to clear the mess into neat piles of dust.
I woke up tired, and licked away the rust.

new order - age of consent

photo: coquinete

you know that i could use somebody

2009-09-30T16:35:00.007-04:00

you know that i could use someone like you. and all you know and how you speak. countless lovers undercover on the streets. you know that i could use somebody. i hope it's gonna make you notice someone like me.

bat for lashes - use somebody (lo fi)

photo: héctor pozuelo

under the weather

2009-09-21T10:56:00.023-04:00

"I lose you in the subway. This trip, it's been long. Two flights, a train, and now this. Before this there was a wedding. I didn't know them, the wedding people. But they looked at me, standing next to you, and they said, I like you two, together. I looked at you then and I look at you now and I wonder if that's true. I kiss you, stand up, get off the train, wondering. You tell me you love me and I wonder.

You'll never tell me you love me, I'll never wonder if you do, again.

I always meet you in the fall. You're always gone by spring. Sometimes you don't know this until the winter. Sometimes you tell me you love me when it's over."

by meredith chamberlain

why? - berkeley by hearseback
why? - eskimo snow
why? - this blackest purse

it's not what you thought

2009-09-17T11:13:00.015-04:00

what are the reasons for believing, believing. a body heads south. cause your mouth on my mouth, a fire i just can't put out. it's a fever i just can't stop what i start. apart from believing, it's the leaving. the leaving. my body heads west.

amy millan - lost compass

i'll hold you close under these skies

2009-09-15T11:43:00.019-04:00

there's nothing going wrong in the city tonight.

rural alberta advantage - barnesyard

(more from the raa's september daytrotter session.)

photo: sandra croft

all these things about me you never can tell

2009-09-10T16:16:00.015-04:00

this dream is in a telescope now.

the joy formidable - the greatest light is the greatest shade
the joy formidable - whirring
the joy formidable - austere

more songs free to download here. and don't miss the unofficial video for "austere," banned by youtube for its sexy times! kinda nsfw, but i watched it at work. shh.

photo via the joy formidable facebook

this is how our summer ends

2009-09-09T10:18:00.017-04:00

elastica - nothing stays the same
wave machines - you say the stupidest things
new order - ceremony

photos: coquinete; hector pozuelo

back to school

2009-09-01T11:49:00.009-04:00

"i got out of bed today, staring at a ghost."

check out this recording of kids singing wintersleep's "weighty ghost," from cbc radio 3's 2008 school of rock special. it is super catchy and sweet! at one point the teacher prompts the kids to do the "na na na" part. adorable! all i remember from grade-school music classes is fighting over who would get to play the triangle in kindergarten. "na na na" > the triangle.

if you shake her hard enough she will appear

2009-07-30T13:53:00.016-04:00

from the gent who saved latin. coconut records - west coast

plus, the video for the song is of mark gonzales skating around a german museum; according to we love you so, they'd "asked him to do an art show there and instead of hanging art he did this."

last one awake

2009-07-29T16:52:00.014-04:00

memory cassette is weird tapes is memory tapes.

memory cassette - 50 mph
memory cassette - last one awake (friend version)
weird tapes - summer of worship
memory tapes - bicycle
memory tapes - green knight

for more, check out we're tapes. oh it's so good! i love memory tapes.

the past is tense, the future perfect

2009-07-21T13:52:00.013-04:00

tunnel vision, strange decision.

here we go magic - tunnelvision

we have abandoned all resolution

2009-06-23T13:50:00.015-04:00

you said, this will be a better year. make a little money, take a lot of shit. feel real bad then get over it.

harlem shakes - strictly game
harlem shakes - tfo
harlem shakes - a night
(harlem shakes sxsw daytrotter session)

photo: marla warner

all the arms around you now

2009-06-17T14:45:00.022-04:00

someone had a party downtown and i knew the crowd. and everyone was strange, looking sideways at my funny sounds. so I toasted to the weekend and i drank a little more than i should. so i said a few things, i got sick like i knew i would. oh brother, lay a hand on me. i haven’t been in a fight in years.

arms - shitty little disco
(more arms.)

but it didn't

2009-06-12T14:57:00.025-04:00

i've always liked the way that the 1999 version of mansfield park ends. as director patricia rozema explains,

"I had written these tableaus at the end of the film in which everyone in the scene would suddenly become still, slip into reverie, stare off into the middle distance at exactly the same moment, and then, altogether, slip back into the day-to-day. When I wrote those moments in, I knew I'd never be able to explain exactly what they meant...[but it felt] like a filmic way to do what Austen was doing in the book."

it's a neat effect. a second of considering what might have been, how things could have gone, but didn't. a brief wide-angle view. and here in the big smoke where the days are stretching out like afternoon shadows, it's hard not to think about the things that have and haven't changed since the last time round. for a moment the music stops, the characters go still, and the narrator says, "it could have all turned out so differently i suppose. but it didn't."

sweet for your heel

2009-06-09T20:08:00.015-04:00

kiss your mouth to shut you up.

red red meat - gauze

photo: piers morgan

nothing is ever as good as it was

2009-05-11T19:54:00.021-04:00

what you know you have or what you think you want, it's never perfect.

jenny lewis with the watson twins - melt your heart

now i don't hardly know her

2009-02-22T19:08:00.007-05:00

prada the cat is officially in heat. her first time. my first time too, seeing a cat in proper sex-me mode. she keeps rubbing her little cat face against the floor whilst sticking her little cat bum in the air and chirping. so for prada, joan jett's cover of crimson and clover: "i want to do everything, what a beautiful feeling." ba-da-da-da-da-da.

joan jett and the blackhearts - crimson and clover

i don't care where you go as long as it's with me

2009-02-21T17:25:00.006-05:00

i hate the feeling of losing something. however, since i usually live in complete squalor, this feeling is not uncommon to me. my things are constantly swallowed up by the mess that is my room, surfacing on occasion like regurgitated pearls. i have almost no control over their reappearance — they show up when they feel like it, perhaps when the tide of my shit (metaphorical, not literal) has receded from the floor of my room, perhaps not. yet from the time that i realize i can't find something to the time that it reappears, i'm obsessed with the thought that it is gone, possibly forever.

makes my brain hurt. seriously.

last month i realized that both of my born ruffians albums are missing. i thought only one had disappeared but no, they're both gone. did i loan them to someone? did someone with a penchant for born ruffians but a shortage of loose cash steal them from me? i have no idea and really, it matters not, because the simple fact is they're not here and i miss them. fare thee well, born ruffians albums. good luck and godspeed. i play for you an appropriate song.

born ruffians - little garcon

don't be afraid, love is simple

2009-02-01T14:23:00.027-05:00

i kinda like valentine's day. i mean i don't despise it, and i like valentines themselves—they're really quite cool, combining as they often do bad puns with a certain style of artwork. last year i spent ages trying to find proper old timey valentines to give out but eventually i gave up and printed off a bunch of the red beret-ed rabbit and then cut them all out, which gave me scissor claw from holding the scissors for so long.

now one crappy thing about valentine's day is getting scissor claw from cutting out valentines for people and not getting a single one back. not even from your mother. like what the fuck.

and then of course the biggest crappy thing about valentine's day is having to see couples doing special coupley things and holding hands and going out for dinner and shit, because they think they have to, or whatever, or maybe they really do actually love each other and if you think i dislike couples being all coupley affectionate because i am secretly envious of their love well you'd be dead wrong. this is not a secret at all.

anyways, i give out valentines because i think it's nice and they're nice and there's always the hope that one year someone will remember to give me one.

so here's two songs for you and me and st. valentine on st. valentine's day. because love's simple, isn't it, just like the akron/family says.

akron/family - don't be afraid, you're already dead
the futureheads - hounds of love

smothered in hugs

2008-12-22T17:42:00.041-05:00

today i ran into my friend claire on the street, but since she was headed in the opposite direction we basically just said our hellos and goodbyes and i gave her a hug, with like an extra squeeze at the end. which apparently i do a lot, as claire then noted, and marla (who was with me) followed by describing as "creepy." granted, i think she was speaking of hugs in general, but the fact is that i do enjoy a good hug with a friend and don't always let people go easily. it's like, you think you're getting away? oh no, there'll be at least five more seconds of hugging, and then i'm probably going to nestle my head into your neck too (varies depending on height of course; if my head comes up to your elbow you may get a few pats on the back instead). in any case, i like hugs and once put serious thought into considering whether i'd rather get a hug or a kiss at the end of a first date.*

so, yes, what others find creepy and smarmy (perhaps justifiably) i find comforting and welcome. what is particularly ironic and annoying to me is that all of my dearest friends take marla's stance on hugs. and, of course, these are really the only people in the world that i want to hug and be hugged by, save perhaps britney spears in her downward spiral... that girl just needed a friend. anyways, so unless my mom comes to visit i am rarely hugged for months on end, leaving me so starved for this affection that i love that i end up drunkenly hugging people at parties, like a sozzled cat.

but the thing is, sometimes just beeeeeeee-ing yourself, like the genie says to Aladdin in the 1992 animated film of the same name, means coming off as slightly creepy or cheesy or corny or foolish to some people, and there's really nothing you can do about that. so to all those i love, i shall NOT apologize for hugging you! i love you. ergo, hugs. hugs for you.**

also, this is kind of a perfect opportunity to post a song by a band called smothered in hugs (like the guided by voices song) that i like called "young flare." so i will.

smothered in hugs - young flare

* barring considerations such as attraction, compatibility, and how the date itself went, my conclusions were basically as follows: hugs — comforting, yes, but perhaps a tad dispassionate. kisses — potential for passion certainly, but also for awkwardness and herpes.

** unless you like, really, really hate them and they make you hideously uncomfortable. in which case, i will respect your wishes and NOT hug you. just so you know.

then suddenly you're puking out the door with your pants around your knees

2008-12-15T20:55:00.021-05:00

i was thinking about my theme song today. i've had this song (jason collett's "almost summer") as my theme song since i first heard it in 2006, and the truth is it's no less true to my life today than it was three years ago. or ten years ago, if it would have been possible to have heard a song from the future when i was seventeen. another truth is that, really, it should have stayed the theme song for a seventeen-year-old girl, but for some reason even though i've aged, and moved, and gone to school and worked at jobs where i don't have to wear a name tag, i'm still kinda seventeen, relationship-wise.

so you know, like occasionally i'll wonder if it's finally become time to move on from this song, if it's stopped applying to my life, if i even like listening to it anymore... and then i'll remember that incident during the summer of 08 (say) when i got way too drunk, told someone i liked them, and then promptly walked into a telephone poll.

so the song stays. or, like the dude, abides.

jason collett - almost summer

photo: marla warner

garance doré

2008-12-14T19:00:00.006-05:00

i have to admit that my style is pretty generic. as much as i love clothes and spend a lot of time thinking about how i should dress, the truth is that i usually play it pretty safe, clothing-wise. however, in my fantasy life (or maybe i should say in one of my fantasy lives, for i have many), i'd have the great skin and style of the people featured on une fille comme moi, which is a really lovely blog from french illustrator garance doré. she posts a mix of fashion illustration and street style photos, and i think if you like clothes, or you like pictures, or if you like clothes and pictures, you should check it out. it used to just be in french, but now the posts are also translated into english. which is helpful, seeing as i took french in school for about twelve years and yet can barely speak a word of it now.

i've included some of my favourite photos below. as i'm always impressed by/secretly, corrosively jealous of people who can pull off a look that is, in essence, pretty simple without also looking boring, i would happily knock over any of these people and steal their style and their no doubt delightful parisian lives. i like croissants.

all photos property of garance doré, from www.garancedore.fr

harmonica

2008-10-30T19:50:00.019-04:00

i have a certain fondness for the old mouth harp, for a number of reasons. here are two of them.

bob dylan - most of the time (alternate version)
(you can listen to more of tell tale signs here.)

"this is another new one."

neil young - heart of gold

faster than the speed of night

2008-10-17T20:15:00.013-04:00

so tonight i waited in the cold at a bus stop where bus after bus would pull up, let off all of its passengers, change its sign to read "out of service," and drive away. after about half an hour (6 buses) of this bizarre bus behaviour i gave up and decided to go home rather than figure out another way to get to the bar where i was already supposed to be, ages ago, so i condensed all of the relevant information into a text message for my friend — "transit fucked, going home" — and hit send. but the explanatory nugget would not be sent. MESSAGE FAILED, MESSAGE FAILED, the phone beeped. i tried again. MESSAGE FAIL. again. MESSAGE FAIL. then i tried calling, but (perhaps unsurprisingly) CALL FAIL, CALL FAIL said the phone. so i went home to call her, and now i'm in our "living room"* eating a bag of chips and listening to songs on repeat while my roommate's cat kneads the tender inside of my arm until it turns red. it's friday night. i have no plans to go back out. could this be LIFE FAIL? it is a big bag of chips.

*current contents of "living room":
me
cat
giant television, sitting on floor
mattress and box-spring, also on floor
assorted chairs
fan
dead plant
one winter boot
empty bag of chips
jenga

fortunately, it is for moments such as this that "faster than the speed of night" exists. the video is pretty amazing too, even though it cuts out the epic last third of the song.

i'd say the dancing guitar man is worth it though.

plaid flannel shirt

2008-10-14T19:11:00.017-04:00

i like plaid flannel shirts. my father had one that i borrowed when i was 13 and never returned. i still have it.

when i was 13 grunge was really popular and wearing a giant man's shirt perfectly normal. i have a bad feeling i might have even tied it around my waist at times. (last halloween i went as myself, aged 13 — i wore my father's shirt; a poor-boy cap (turned backwards); high-waisted, baggy, tapered black jeans; and an oversized t-shirt. it was a dreadful experiment; i felt really strange and awkward all day.)

men who wear plaid flannel shirts and have a beard make my small heart beat faster. i know that that makes it sound like i'm attracted to lumberjacks.

last fall my friend rachel threatened to attend our friend tasha's paris send-off party not in the old hollywood glamour attire we were supposed to wear but in "glamorous grunge." i actually quite like the idea of glamorous grunge and think it looks really nice when i see it on other people, even though i've yet to pull it off. it appeals to my 13-year-old self.

my 13-year-old self also really loved my so-called life (not that the 27-year-old self doesn't). since it was 1994 there was a lot of plaid flannel on that show.

oh plaid flannel shirt: nostalgic, cozy, and kind of a turn on.

bon iver, for emma, forever ago

2008-10-09T18:35:00.010-04:00

i've been listening to this album a lot lately after it was recommended to me by a friend. it's rather mopey (come to think of it, so is the friend) but such music is always helpful to have on hand, especially when you're prone to days and nights of melancholy. i usually put a song on repeat and lay curled up on my bed. then later on i reset the play count in itunes so that no one will know that i listened to one song 50 times in one night. we all have our hobbies.

you can listen to the whole album here; my favourite song is "re: stacks," and it's right here.
bon iver - re: stacks

there's also a really cute video of bon iver accompanying lykke li on her song "dance dance dance" if you'd prefer something less gloomy.

you're swinging around in the evening, humming someone else's tune

2008-10-06T23:14:00.004-04:00

two hours traffic are an indie band from charlottetown who play lovely, sunny, perfect pop. i really like them.

i chose this video because it has the most close-ups of their adorably awkward lead singer, liam. i got to shake his hand once after a show. this was really exciting for me as i have a small (huge) crush on him. in addition to his musical talents he has really widely spaced eyes, like a hammerhead shark, or peter sarsgaard.

my favourite song is "sure can start," and you can listen to it here if you like.
two hours traffic - sure can start