Its been a good week for music for me.  Two albums that I’ve been really, really looking forward to were released this week.  The first comes from the more than slightly kooky and hard not to love Imogen Heap.

I first heard about Imogen Heap when she was part of a short lived side project known as Frou Frou.  Courtesy of: Garden State – Music From The Motion Picture I first heard Imogen via Frou Frou’s song “Let Go” which is still one of my favorite tracks off that album.

Then several years later I was listening to Kidd Kraddick talk about this crazy song that was recorded a cappella on the finale of “The OC.”  The song was Hide And Seek by Imogen.  Its one of those songs that you that is so unique and memorable that when you hear anything similar in the future you’ll say “That reminds me of that Imogen Heap song.  Man that was such a cool song!”  If you haven’t heard it yet then you should definitely spend the 99 cents and support a really talented and genuinely nice person.  And a special thanks to Chop Shop (they put music in TV Shows) for introducing people like me to awesome music like Imogen.

I should also say that the rest of the album (Speak For Yourself) is also spectacular and is one of my favorites for rainy day driving.  All that to bring us to this week… which is brings us a new Imogen Heap album!

Speak for yourself came out in 2005 and I’ll let you decide if it was worth the wait… no I won’t.   It was.  If you wouldn’t classify yourself as someone who likes “electronic” music then you should buy her new album so you can join the “I like electronic music, I’m now 5 points cooler” club.  If you don’t care about electronic music, but you like good pop music, then you should also buy this album.  If you don’t care about music then you should buy it, so then you will care about it.

I could go on and on about how great Imogen is and the hours and hours she spends crafting her lyrics and soundscapes or how great she is at including people in the process along the way.  But I won’t.  I also won’t talk about how she uses Ableton Live in her live performances, which through the transitive property of the internet… Imogen Heap = Awesome, Imogen uses Ableton Live, two seconds away uses Ableton Live, two seconds away = Awesome

NEXT – MUTEMATH

Since I’m old now ( the ripe old age of 27 ) I don’t attend shows as often as I would like.  MuteMath is the first band I ever saw that officially blew my mind.  A quick list of reasons why:

1. They’re all insanely talented musicians and craft incredibly interesting yet listenable music

2. Darren King (the drummer) had to duct tape his headphones to his head before starting the set because of the intensity with which he plays

3. Paul Meany (lead singer) was bouncing around the stage with wild abandon, a keytar, and the atari (not the video game system)

4. They were the opening opener and blew the other two bands out of the water… and the other two were good.  And we drove 5 hours from Manhattan, KS down to Oklahoma to see the headliner.

They added a permanent bass player shortly after that show I attended and since then the foursome has really solidified, with each member becoming an indispensable part of the group.

I’ve seen them four or five times now and they are still my favorite live show, although Sufjan Stevens is a close second for completely different reasons.  Which reminds me… MuteMath is playing at the Beaumont Club in Kansas City on October 16… hope to see you there!

So its been five years since MuteMath had a full blown album release and since then they’ve been touring their butts off.  You might not have heard of MuteMath, but maybe you’ve heard of this little thing called “Twilight.”  Thank you again to Chop Shop (they put music in movies) for bringing more deserving music to the masses.

Too many words.  Synopsis: Imogen Heap and MuteMath = new albums = awesome = support them.  Long list of links below for your pleasure…

Heap Links:

Website, Twitter, Amazon

MuteMath Links:

Website, Twitter, Amazon

Other:

Chop Shop Music Blog, Twitter, Facebook

Goodwin Films (vids for MuteMath)

Ableton Live

The Autumn Film (they have free music!), twitter

Each song so far has been…  different, which has made this process really fun.  This song is no exception.

A couple weeks ago Tim was working on a different song and recorded all of the random percussion (whisk, wooden spoons, acoustic guitar drum thing) for it.  That song was scratched because it wasn’t taking shape very well, but Patrick had been working on a separate song independently, which happened to have the same tempo as the first.  So we pieced them both together and videoed the process. Enjoy!
-Tim and Patrick

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Read more for lyrics…

“In the Way”

lyrics by Patrick Largen

You are in the way, in the way
I don’t want to be a bother
Don’t get bent out of shape

You see me