Shameless Self Promotion: Beauty in the Rise

This is one of the guys I manage, Ben Baxter. He wrote this original during a backpacking trip/acoustic tour we did last Christmas break through Indonesia and Thailand. If you are curious you can check out our travels here: http://benbaxtermusic.wordpress.com

"All together now,
our friends are all around.
We sing and we dance
as the world turns around.
We all believe,
There is beauty in the rise"

The song is about how simple and carefree our lives were over there. We never really got use to the 12 hour time change so we would end up being awake at weird hours. For some reason, no matter what time we went to bed, we would wake up before sunrise. Some of the time we just stayed out so late that the sun would be coming up when we were still out and about. I saw more sunrises on that trip than the rest of my life as a whole. They really are beautiful and I've always taken them for-granted.

This is my summer song pick of the day, because right now I am wishing I was still over there. Our biggest worry of the day would be finding a bar that would let Ben play music and give us free drinks. Other than that we were basically treated like celebrities all day. Where as here I have way to much going on. I definitely haven't been able to sit back, relax, and enjoy the simple things in life like sunsets. UGH.

Be Easy,
Phil

Driftin'

My Summer song of the day is "Driftin'" by The Dirty Heads.

The Dirty Heads are a great band that mix acoustic/surf/rock/rap. I saw them for the first time about three years ago at an inside show at Stubb's BBQ opening up for The Expendables. At the time it was just the two of them on stage playing over a Momma track of beats. It still caught my ear and I bought an album from them after the show. They have been on my iPod and a constant on my playlists ever since. No one ever knew who they were if I played them, but anybody who likes surf rock stuff typically enjoyed them. Then all of a sudden last summer they finally got picked up by a record label. They re-released a song with Rome from Sublime singing the chorus, "Lay Me Down". MTV picked them up as a featured band of the month and BOOM. They were popular. Not quite mainstream, but they definitely have a solid following.

I got the band I manage to open up for them at Red 7 last Spring. It was pretty awesome. The Dirty Heads did basically the same set I had seen three years earlier. They were super cool even though we were singing along to their songs during the sound check...

Anyways, Driftin' is one of their more stripped down songs. It is about finally settling in somewhere after being a rolling stone for some time. It is basically the opposite of how I feel right now. I'm in between apartments, about to be done with school, and have no solid idea what I will be doing 7 months from now. The song is serving as encouragement that eventually it will all be worked out.



Be Easy,
Phil

R.I.P. Amy Winehouse

Rome from the new Sublime is making me eat my words a little bit. He came out with an Amy Winehouse tribute that is really well done. Amy Winehouse was one of my favorite artists. I had my fingers crossed that she would pull her act together. Anyways, here is Rome's tribute to Amy.



Be Easy,
Phil

My Favorite Song/Video of the Hour

My summer jam of the week is "5 Years Time" from Noah and the Whale. It isn't a surf rock band, but the Sublime with Rome album still has me a little frustrated with the genre right now.

This fun-loving song is the PERFECT summertime jam. It fits well with almost all happy summer time things. It has some common summer themes like sun, love, fun, drinking, and ukuleles. It also has a hilariously awkward and fun video to go with it. I almost have all of the dance moves down already.

Ugh. They disabled embedding of the video, but here is the link: http://youtu.be/T8YCSJpF4g4
For you lazy kids that are never going to go through the trouble of copying the link. Then dragging your mouse allll the way to the top of the screen, here:
Noah and the Whale - Five Years Time by bejeebus

The basic sentiment of the song is that right now the guy is in a relationship that he is really enjoying. He fantasizes about some cute things they could be doing together in 5 years. Then acknowledges that this might not be true, they might not even know or talk to each other in 5 years. It then ends positively and states that no matter what you will be spreading love, love, love. Where ever you go there'll be love love love.

I love the optimism of the whole thing.

Be Easy,
Phil

The New Sublime Album

First off, it is a Sublime with Rome album...................................................................

I feel like I am required to review this album because it is supposed to be a Surf Rock blog. Everyone knows Sublime is the biggest and most influential surf rock band to ever exist. Some new bands might say this isn't the case, but they are just lying to themselves. Without Sublime there would be no genre. I love Sublime.

That being said, I didn't even want to listen to this album. Sublime without Bradley is like Journey without Steve Perry. Just because they found some random Filipino guy who sounds a lot like him does not mean they are still Journey! It is the same way with Sublime. Rome is good. I have nothing against him, but HE IS NOT BRADLEY! So change your name or something! COME ON!

This bastardized version of Sublime is clearly just a marketing ploy from the record label to make money. If they had any real faith in the group they would have let them create a new name, still promoted the fact that it is 2 of the original members of Sublime, and then let them start putting out new albums. This vote of no confidence from the record label is transparent. I guess it worked though because I did actually listen to the album for the sole reason that they have the Sublime tag.

As for what I actually thought about it: Shmeh.

I probably wouldn't be so critical if they had just changed the name. I did kind of like this jam with stoner rapper Whiz Khalifa.
Sublime With Rome - Can You Feel It (Feat. Wiz Khalifa) by DJ DECK 5

Be Easy,
Phil

Long Hot Weekends

I just finished up a fantastic weekend, only to wake up this morning and discover the upstairs AC(where I live) is broken :(. ITS HOT. Anyways, aside from that, I got into turntable.fm this weekened. Have you seen this thing? It is pretttty neat. For those of you that don't know, Turntable.fm is a new interactive way to listen to music with your friends or random internet strangers. You create a digital little club, then you have the opportunity to jump up and spin some records for the digital avatars in the room. If they like your music they can hit the "awesome" button, and their avatars suddenly gets bobble-head syndrome. If they don't like your music they hit the "lame" tab. If you get to many "lame"s then your song is skipped. If that happens more than once you get kicked off the 1's and 2's strait up Apollo style(they really should add in a big hook thing to pull you off stage). It is a fun way to chat and hear some new music. If you live with more than one person or happen to have two computers it is a pretty awesome way to stream music for free. I feel like pretty soon it is going to be subscription based or super ad heavy. Right now it is free and glorious so take advantage of it while you can.

My summer song of the weekend is an older one I forgot about, but heard on turntable.fm from a buddy.



YUP! I love this version. I think it is better than the original. For some reason the idea of this huge Hawaiian sitting on a beach and staring off into the distance with his little tiny ukulele playing this song just makes me all warm and tingly. Yes, the fact that he is huge and Hawaiian makes the song better. That is science. If you don't enjoy this song you might as well never read this blog again.

Well I'm going to go sit and sweat in my room for a while.
Be Easy,
Phil

Mission Statement

This is going to be a blog dedicated to songs of the summertime with a heavy bias towards Surf Rock. I am a lake bum in Texas and live in a constant Summer mindset. I am always looking for songs that fit summer themes. Songs for the boat. Songs for driving through the countryside. Songs for raging at a house party. Songs for walking in the insane heat. All kinds of stuff. I'm going to take a very loose interpretation of what a "summertime" song actually is. To me they are generally upbeat. I have always had a bit of a Surf Rock fetish. It is awesomesauce. Bedouin Soundclash, Pepper, Sublime(duh), The Dirty Heads, The Beautiful Girls and G. Love work themselves into just about every playlist or mix CD I have ever made. I branch out of that, but they are my staple. I feel like surf rock stuff doesn't get that much coverage from the blogosphere. Maybe because all of the fans are busy surfing or just stoned and lazy. I am going to take this duty upon myself and spread the word of what is known as surf rock, dub rock or reggae rock.