New Tattoo/New Listenings

Hi ya'll. Well my first week of uni is over, it's amazing how quickly you settle back into a routine; feels like I've never been gone!

Yesterday I had a new tattoo which you can see a picture of above. If it looks perhaps a little strange on its own, I plan to encorporate it into a sleeve over time. What do you think?

With all the new music I recieved for Christmas, I've devised a short list of essential songs. Who knows, maybe you'll discover a new favourite artist!

1.) Mumford & Sons. Album: 'Sigh No More'. Track 11; Dust Bowl Dance.
This track adds a new dimension to the already great foot-stomping folk on this album. The album is very much noticably lacking in drums, and relies on the lead singer's feet; left foot strikes a tambourine with a foot-pedal and the right-foot strikes a kick drum, all whilst singing and playing the guitar. The energy in the final third of this track is massive; a huge drum pattern emerges which is soaked in reverb and just shits on everything else in the mix but is completely what the song needs. If you listen to it and don't nod your head, you best check your pulse.

2.) Jace Everett. Album: 'Old New Borrowed Blues'. Track 7; Greatest Story Never Told.
I discovered Jace Everett as he did the sound track for sexy vampire-flick True Blood and this album is a little different. It's recorded in his front room with two other guys; and together they make up two acoustic guitars, an acoustic bass, harmonica, howling, shouting and general acoustic-greatness. This track is a lighter touch on the album; a haunting ballad which oozes raw emotion and is an undeniable hidden gem.

3.) Sugarland. Album: 'Live on the Inside'. Track 4; Sex on Fire.
As a live album, this encorporates more covers than originals, but when I saw that these included Sex on Fire and Nightswimming I had to hear for myself. Sex on Fire is a huge, somewhat over-played rock anthem that propelled the Kings of Leon to the dizzying heights of Radio 1 superstardom and turned them into a household name. I'm not a fan of their older stuff but love Only by the Night. However, hearing the deep Southern Nashville female drawl on this vocal is a highlight for me on the album; Kings are themselves from the deep South and Jennifer Nettles' wicked country vocals provide a cool left-turn.

4.) John Mayer. Album: 'Battle Studies'. Track 5; Perfectly Lonely.
Unfortunately Battle Studies doesn't in any way live up to its predecessor Continuum, but it would have had to have been one hell of an album. Perfectly Lonely is, I think, one of the better songs on the album; an easy-listening blues-pop number on an album that really acts more as background listening than something which really grabs your attention. The backing vocals are great and guitar work is, as always with John Mayer, sublime, but I'd have to loved for him to have gone to town more, epsecially on the solos. I hope he's not running out of ideas, but the first single, Who Says, sounds far too much like Stop This Train; so much so that he started playing one live, intending to play the other!

So hopefully you might decide to Youtube/Spotify a song or two here, or you might have your own opinion, in which case, leave me a comment below!