With that corny shit out of the way, can you believe what a year this has been? It was the year of Obama, we said goodbye to the great George Carlin, I actually participated in NaBloPoMo, and I got laid off! What I haven’t told you about yet is how I had to cram for one of the hardest tests I’ve ever taken in only three weeks (and I still don’t know whether or not I’ve passed), I was accepted into the Masters program for my dream job, I moved into a beautiful new apartment with two of my closest girlfriends, I’ve reconnected with some of my old friends that I’ve missed terribly and didn’t think I would ever see again, and have started to learn that when you begin to surround yourself with positive people, things, and ideas, positive things start to come your way much more easily than you ever could have imagined. I’m feeling more myself than I have in a really long time, and I know that it is only the beginning of what’s to come for me.

I’ve been celebrating this first blogoversary by browsing through the past year’s archives. I was interested in getting an update on all of the artist’s I’ve featured in my Music Bytes:

• The Morning Benders: “Talking Through Tin Cans” has been released for a little over a year now, and the band is still touring like crazy and even made an appearance at this year’s SXSW.
• Coldplay: Duh.
• Katy Perry: Well now she’s lasted a lot longer than I originally gave her credit for, and while her songs are getting really annoying and I think she sucks live, I’m pleasantly surprised she’s considered “headliner” material.
• Adele: Go girl! Adele’s since won two Grammy Awards, for Best New Artist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. Love her!
• Gaslight Anthem: They just seem to be snowballing into bigger and better things, opening for both Bruce Springsteen AND Dave Matthews this year. Holy!
• Sikamor Rooney: They’re still doing their thing and could use some more exposure, so go check them out again and give them a chance!
• Natalie Portman’s Shaved Head: I can’t get enough of these guys, HA! They were featured on Perez Hilton and they’ll be the supporting act for Lily Allen’s North American tour this year. So much fun!
• Rachael Yamagata: Those who love her, love her dearly.
• Leslie Hall: Since this wasn’t technically a music byte, I don’t technically have an update, but it’s still hilarious so go take a look and enjoy a chuckle on me.
• Kings of Leon: Ahhhh, by far my favorite music byte and favorite band of the whole year. They’re just huge. I almost had a heart attack when they arrived on the cover of a recent Rolling Stone issue. I can’t say enough.
• Zee Avi: Her album still won’t be released for another four days, but if you were lucky enough to check her out at SXSW, I’m sure you’ll agree it won’t be long before we hear much more about her.

Make sure to send me any ideas for Music Bytes you might have! I sure as hell can’t keep up with everything, what do you think I look like?

In pure Mamba style, I’ve decided to end this Happy One Year Post by listing my top eight posts of the year. Because I love the number 8. So I picked 8 posts. Out of 71. I don’t think 71 is a lot at all, so I made sure to write that here so next year I can make sure the number is much higher. Anyway, enjoy.

• My Most Romantic Moment
• A Moment in Time: The Best Worst Date
• Why Brett Favre Will Never See My Tits
• The Shoes Don’t Help
• Commuters Are Fucking Crazy
• Justin Should Be A Regular on SNL
• Saturn Has Returned With a Can of Whoop Ass
• Advice: Don’t Try This At Home

Now I’m going to drink right out of the bottle pour myself a glass of wine and congratulate myself on one year of blogging. Thanks to all you fuckers who’ve stuck with me. Air cheers!

Gossip Girl

I had to take a look. The cutie emerged from YouTube fame, and hails from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Rolling Stone calls her music “brunch friendly acoustic swing” which is pretty spot on if you listen to it and imagine yourself sitting outside on a sunny Sunday afternoon drinking bloody marys and having eggs florentine. I’m becoming somewhat addicted to her voice. Usually this is where I start to tell you cute little quirky things about the artist I’m writing about, but she was smart enough to do that herself so I figured there’s really no better way I could introduce her to you. Here she is:

Isn’t she super cute? Her self-titled debut album is being released on Brushfire Records, but unfortunately not until May 19th. HOWEVER, you can get more acquainted with her by checking out her YouTube channel here. OR you can listen become her friend and listen to the first single titled “Bitter Heart” here. If you like it enough you can even by it on iTunes here. Already a fan? Check her out on FaceBook here. Her official website is here.

I know you got a little taste of her sound in the above clip, but the following is one of the songs that originally got me sucked in. It’s taken of a live performance, but her voice still sounds great and the song is just well, fitting. Enjoy!

I should note that I could not find any chart or report anywhere proving this newscaster correct, so I probably didn’t hear right in the first place.  I did find this, which is almost as bad, but it doesn’t matter.  I was disgusted just at the thought of this actually being true.  Once the shock went away I wondered if this is what “rock” is supposed to be these days?  Nickelback isn’t fucking rock!  They’re not even worthy of being anywhere in the vicinity of the label of “rock.”  I shudder to think that this is what the kids these days are listening to. 

Hence this Music Byte.  I thought I’d try to remind you all that there are still good rock bands out there, even if they don’t play them on Z100. Although they might play Kings of Leon on Z100 – I wouldn’t know because I don’t listen to that crap. My point is that Kings of Leon could TOTALLY kick Nickelback’s ass.  Any day.

If you can’t tell yet, I love these guys.  I could listen to their newest album, Only By The Night, over and over and over again and never get sick of it. Seriously.  And I do.  Often.  You can’t help but become mesmerized by lead singer Caleb Followill’s voice, and the songs just transform you to another place and time and, well, that’s what I look for in my music.  To be swept away.  The band is made up of four relatives, three brothers and a first cousin, and Only By The Night is their fourth full-length release.  While they come from Nashville, the three brothers (Caleb, Nathan, and Jared) are the sons of a traveling preacher and were home-schooled by their mother.  Because of the way they grew up, they’ve reported that they were very much sheltered from music, and therefore are only finding their true musical influences in recent years.  That fun fact just makes them all the more talented in my opinion.  I bet fucking Chad Kroeger grew up listening to the classics, and he still sucks.  So there.  Another fun fact?  Each band member goes by his middle name and they all share the same surname (Followill).

You may or may not have heard of them, as they’ve been more successful over in the UK, but they seem to be doing quite well here also.  They’re headlining Madison Square Garden on January 29th, and when I searched for two tickets “No tickets could be found.”  Bummer.

Anyway, I like these guys so much I’ve decided to do something CRAZY and give you two introductions.  The first, one of my favorite songs on the album:

Kings of Leon – Use Somebody

And the second is a bonus.  But really more for my benefit than yours since I think the singer is so fucking delicious looking I really really just want to BITE his ribs. This song is just too sexy, I’m sorry.  I mean, read the lyrics yourself if you don’t believe me:

Sex On Fire

Yummy.  

If you’d like to become friends with Kings of Leon, you can go here.  If you’d rather become a fan, go here.  If you want to read their Wiki page, go here.  Here’s their bio.  And if anyone has an extra ticket or two to the show at the Garden, ummm yea email me.  STAT.

Mom: “But there’s nothing wrong with these gem sweaters!!!”

Mamba: “Yea, except they are totally fugly!”

Mom: “You’re so unappreciative!”

I wonder if she would feel the same if I asked her to take them back after all these years.  Probably not.

I’ve embedded this particular video just so you can have a bit of an introduction. Please feel free to browse the archives of her YouTube channel for more goodies.  

I think I just may have found my Halloween costume for next year.

Oh, and I think I’ve found a serious contender for Blurb’s “Biggest Glasses” Champion.  Leslie’s even got variety.

It’s broken down into two parts, with the first nine songs on Elephants and the last five on Teeth.  As a whole they seem to encapsulate an entire life circle, from happiness to heartache.  Here’s a good article from Spinner on the whole thing.

Since I’ve been a fan for a while, I won’t try to bring you over to the darkside.  I’ll let Rachael do that.  I picked this Jay Leno performace only because I’d rather have an upbeat song to post than put you guys to sleep with the slow stuff.  Enjoy:

You can become friends with her here and here.  Or check out her Wiki page here. Her main website is here.

Oh and if anyone wants to buy me tickets to see her play in NYC, go here for the info and that would TOTALLY ROCK!

I have to admit that when the five of them took the stage I was a bit skeptical, but it could have been because I was practically blinded by the amount of neon clothing I saw them all wearing.  They hail from Seattle, and even though they claimed it was their first time ever in NYC, I could’ve sworn that they walked right off Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg.  As soon as they started playing, the crowd went wild and it was nearly impossible for me to stand still.  I was overwhelmed with the need to dance my ass off, and jump up and down screaming for a band I’d heard about forty seconds of.  As I looked around me I noticed that I wasn’t the only one; everyone was into it.  I remember feeling relieved that there were a lot of other people making total fools of themselves.  It was FUN.  

Here’s one of my favorite songs of the night, “Sophisticated Side Ponytail.”  I feel the need to point out that the girl, Clare England, is not the lead singer of the group.  But her emergence from behind the synth bass was super refreshing and a healthy dose of comic relief:

I agree with the Village Voice that there really is only so much of these guys you can take, as I learned the hard way by listening to the entire album on repeat for three days after seeing them.  However, I think they’d be good to have in your pocket in case you ever need to liven up a boring party or you want to dance around your apartment should you be so inspired.  Of course, if you have the opportunity to see them perform live you will not be disappointed.  

Their debut full-length is titled “Glistening Pleasure“.  They say it’s “because it glistens and is very pleasurable,” but I like it because it reminds me of an old friend of mine who always pronounced words that started with “l” like “gl.”  It makes the play on words that much funnier to me.

To become friends with Natalie Portman’s Shaved Head you can go to Facebook or MySpace.  To read their blog, go here.  If you want a little background on them you can go here.  Unfortunately they don’t divulge how they came up with that awesome name, so if anyone has any theories or insight, please post them in the comments.

Luckily, I caught this diddy over the weekend, and since my last Music Byte didn’t contain any videos, I thought I’d share this with you, because it is fucking awesome!  The duo, Rodrigo Y Gabriela, is just amazing.  So amazing in fact, that I don’t want to ruin it for you by typing. The song is inspired by a rollercoaster ride called Diablo Rojo, and it couldn’t be more on point if it tried.  Just watch:

Rodrigo Y Gabriela – Diablo Rojo

Sick.

You may remember I told you I attended the release party for Sikamor Rooney’s self-titled record at the Mercury Lounge.  If you don’t, just scroll down a bit and I’ll remind you.  Anyway, I showed up a little late, thinking I had some time before the band of the hour started their set, assuming they would be the final band to play. Well, I was wrong.  They played first.  Is it customary for bands who are having record release parties to play first?  Everyone knows people show up late to everything, shouldn’t that band play last?  Oh well, I guess it doesn’t matter. Because of all of this, however, I only was able to listen to a couple songs of their set, kicking myself the entire time for not getting my ass in gear a little sooner. Fortunately, I know people, and was able to get my hands on a CD. Good thing, too, because I’ve been having a lot of fun with these guys.  

To have a listen go here.  There were no YouTube videos that had decent sound quality, so you’re going to have to not be lazy about this and just click the damn link.  You’ll have fun, I promise.

PS – Thanks to the sis and her super-cute-but-WAY-too-young-for-me-friend!  I had a blast!