My Newest Musical Obsession

A huge amount of my time now is spent listening to music -- my life at work should be an advertisement for the Zune (an under-rated music player, for sure, although one of my coworkers did look at it, smirk, and say incredulously, "Is that...a Zune?"). A couple of weeks ago, my brother's girlfriend Laura sent me to this website of music casts, since she and I like the same music and I have a minor obsession with mixtapes. I got really hooked on the 37th mix, which led me to a new band.

Technically, I had heard of Stars before. I remember that there was a Stars cd in the box of stuff I used in my research in 2005, obviously left there by some prior student. I remember thinking, "Is that a band?" and never looking into it. Which is definitely too bad.

The song "On Peak Hill" is on the mix, and it was immediately a stand-out song for me. A "What is this song, who sings it and ohmygod I'm in love with it" song. Hopefully, you know the sort.

So, after listening to that song obsessively for the last 2 or 3 weeks, I finally acquired a lot of the Stars discography, and I've been listening to Nightsongs for the past few days. Love it. Love it. Love it. The music is really mellow, but the lyrics are all so solid. The writing is REALLY good, in a way you rarely see in songs (Death Cab is another stand-out on this front, which may be why I like Stars so much).

Some runaway favorites from my first few listens:

The Very Thing:

("And even though I tried I couldn't make her see

I wasn't quite the man she thought I'd be

And even though I cried I couldn't make her be

the very thing I needed")

Tonight:

(I know this is a live version, and kind of hard to hear, but I definitely love the way he grasps the microphone and looks like he really means what he's singing...here is a fan video where you can hear the album version. Also, anyone who can get me piano tabs to this song will win something awesome. Like, my undying love and affection.)

On Peak Hill (my still-favorite):

("You're gonna make me wish for a time right before I was born,

when every living breath was another new dawn,

like the time I was five on the top of Peak Hill

and the wind almost took me away...")