Goomiey – Dickens of a Blog

Well, Space Pilgrims, sometimes it happens but for a person like me who listen to a lot of indie, alt, rock, and pop stuff from Japan, today was just a full on storm of new music by artists whose music I have really enjoyed in the past.

We’ll get to “Spotlight” but first let’s consider Leo Ieiri’s “Echoes” — probably my favorite song by her since “Ame Kaze Sora Niji” — komsume’s “OK”, and Takeshi Yamada’s “At the Edge of the Voyage”. All three are strong contenders. komsume possibly hurts the most to skip, so take that as you will.

Let’s take a look at the song that I went with for today:

In my review of For as a whole, I mentioned that I felt it was an afternoon album perfect for bouncing off bricks and bookcases. I think “Spotlight” and its video help to demonstrate what I mean.

My Music Video Picks [MVP] is a series of posts highlighting various music and dance videos from Youtube (usually). No particular schedule (sometimes lots, sometimes little). It might not even all be music or dance videos. Absolutely picked by me, though. Usually I have to like both the song and the video, but we’ll see.

You can see the most recent songs here: [Doug’s] Music Video Picks [Youtube Playlist]. Size of that list will change as the mood strikes. Playlist might contain spoilers for unpublished posts. Just enjoy.

Goomiey’s For came out today and I figured that I’d give a quick review and some thoughts. I really, truly suck at reviewing music outside of a few general comments — trust me, I know that “I really liked this part…” and “It is interesting…” sounds repetitive to me, as well — but music reviews or something that I wanted to add more to this blog so here we go…

First off, I’ve now listened to it probably five times. A couple of times with headphones (once while working out because sweating adds verisimilitude to reviews :wink:).

Once over speakers with pretty “deep listening” and taking notes.

Twice as general background. Let me set the scene: it’s a warm-ish summer day in Belgian, bordering a bit hot. Windows are open and a fan is blowing. Overcast. A bit windy. Birds and such are out because yesterday’s rain helped kill the long weeks of dry we were having.

Picture that? Well, it is in the last form that I think fits the album the best. A bit of loud and creativity against an otherwise calm, nice day on the way to louder days. It’s music that bounces nicely off brick walls and bookcases. An album for drinking a sweating beer and staring at canals. Quite lovely while doing so.

There is a sincerity to the music that is nice. It is music for an afternoon.

Looking over my notes, not sure if I have much to add that I haven’t already written. Several songs have a transitional moment. “Spotlight” is a great example of this, as does the album ending “180.” I love a good transition/bridge and the ones here fit well.

I think “Naive” and “Samenai Natsu” (“Unending Summer”) are probably my favorites but I appreciate quite a few of the songs.

I would probably have recommended separating “Naive” a bit from “180” because they are both good songs but have a slightly odd way of fitting together. A similar sort of “the same but not” kind of happens early on with “After Sign” and “Spotlight.” Not sure I can explain it. It is ultimately a minor quibble.

The third iteration of Doug Bolden's various thoughts and musings.

Tag: Goomiey

In a perfect storm of new videos for me, let’s look at Goomiey’s “Spotlight” [MVP #11]

Goomiey’s For