June Playlist

Hello!

It is absolutely crazy that July starts on Thursday, like seriously?! I just embraced June for all its worth and we’re moving on to another month fast as lightning! I have to say, June was pretty good. The temperatures have been fairly high lately but I have figured out a system to hang out with our cats in the evenings. I think they enjoy it just as much as I do because they are super lazy around 5-7pm and they all want to love and I’m here for it! I’ve also found out that my cat Stormy isn’t the only one who enjoys belly rubs: Oscar and Nelson loves it too!

For music though, I have sort of shifted from like this dark pop aesthetic I’ve been in since the middle of March, to suddenly for the last couple of weeks, all I want is rock music. I’ve been listening to Sirius XM Octane like crazy and I’ve heard a lot of really good music on there to the point I have been sharing some of my favorites as part of my “Song Of The Day” Instagram stories in the evenings. And then recently, I decided to use my iPod again and I’ve been bringing back the good old school Kelly Clarkson and rediscovering symphonic metal as a whole, so I’ve been keeping things interesting, that’s for sure!

As for the monthly playlist, especially for this post, I really tried to shorten it but honestly there are a lot of tunes I was thoroughly obsessed with that I couldn’t take them away, although they are included in the Spotify playlist. I ended up creating a Top 30 because of my inability to choose my ultimate favorites for June.

Gettin’ Even by Seasons After
Thinking Out Loud by Ed Sheeran
Macaroni Salad by Niia
Muscleville by Kai Wachi
WYGD by Empara Mi
Peaches (Remix) by Justin Bieber featuring Usher, Ludacris & Snoop Dogg
Dark Side by Blind Channel
Ruthless by Nonpoint
Remedy by Savage After Midnight
Pure Evil by Like A Storm
The Devil by BANKS
Girls by Zella Day
A Girl Like You by Machine Gun Kelly x Travis Barker
Time Warp by Apashe featuring Sami Chaouki
I Care by Paul Hernandez
Parachute by Saint Chaos
Believer by Lea Michele
Your Betrayal by Bullet For My Valentine
Warrior by Atreyu featuring Travis Barker
Only Love Can Save Me Now by The Pretty Reckless
Deal With It by Ashnikko featuring Kelis
Papi by Isabela Merced
Drivers License by Olivia Rodrigo
You Thought Wrong by Kelly Clarkson featuring Tamyra Gray
Astronaut In The Ocean by Masked Wolf
Talkin’ Bout by Loui featuring Saweetie
Right Now by Fire From The Gods
Didn’t Know Love by Celine Dion
Adios by EVERGLOW
MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name) by Lil Nas X

I know I might be a little early making this announcement but I have already started keeping track of various songs to include in my Summer 2021 playlist in September. There are some that wouldn’t surprise you at all, but they are a couple of special tunes that I think will make themselves known in the next three months. Have you already discovered your summer anthem for the year yet?

There have been some albums and EPs that I’ve listened to lately, that I thought I would share with you today. If you still enjoy the occasional dubstep genre, you should look into Kai Waschi as they have released a brand new EP a few weeks ago called “MUSCLEVILLE” and even though it only contains five tracks, it is really good! I don’t listen to a lot of dubstep and/or trap music anymore but I keep Kai around for those ‘once in a blue moon’ kind of days. The other artist you should consider is Tommee Profitt, although Tommee isn’t the main artist, he did produce every song on the album, so he is listed first before any of the guest singers. I’ve been thinking of doing a review of the new album: Cinematic Songs Vol. 7 but I already have a tight schedule for July so we will have to see what happens.

What were you listening in June?

February Playlist

Hello!

I’m sorry about last Friday, I tried my hardest to come up with a post but nothing would work so I thought it was a good idea to scrap it altogether and focus on this week’s content for you instead.

February was full of various music.

I am still surprised because usually it can be pretty boring but there were a lot of new albums and singles during the early parts of the month so that really helped start off the second month of 2021 off on the right foot.

Hard rock and heavy metal were the genres I was interested the most. Honestly I think I just craved anything that would stir me mentally and emotionally. I thought I would be depressed for the first two weeks because of Valentine’s Day; I wasn’t shockingly but I still wanted it like a security blanket. Thankfully, I was using all of my resources to keep those genres steady and in the end, I think I surprised myself on how my taste for heavy metal has improved even more and I was looking for the gruesome and unique music in a while.

Here are the Top 25 songs of the month. If you would like to check out the rest of the playlist, click here.

Trouble’s Coming by Royal Blood
Living The Dream by Five Finger Death Punch
Everything We Need by A Day To Remember
Mercy by Ayron Jones
You’re Going Down by Sick Puppies
This Is Gonna Hurt by Sixx:A.M.
I’d Rather See Your Heart Explode by Slaves
25 by The Pretty Reckless
Use My Voice by Evanescence
Last Resort (Reloaded) by Jeris Johnson x Papa Roach
Dark Love by Sullivan King featuring Aaron Gillespie
Monsters by All Time Low featuring blackbear & Demi Lovato
Talk To Me by Apocalyptica featuring Lzzy Hale
Love Bites (So Do I) by Halestorm
Love Is Madness by Thirty Seconds To Mars featuring Halsey
Finally Free by Stitched Up Heart
Yorktown by Butcher Babies
Crawl by Breaking Benjamin
Come For Me by New Years Day
Scarlet Cross by Black Veil Brides
Right Now by Fire From The Gods
In My Hands by Zero 9:35
Your Misery by Archetypes Collide
Just Like Me by Dragged Under
All My Life by Attack! Attack!

One thing that I am starting to notice and I’m really sorry I am just seeing it now, is that whenever I focus my attention on a specific genre like with this post, I automatically list a bunch of songs outside of that genre… I feel like I need to make a point of giving you a playlist written out like above of whatever I’d said in the beginning I have been into lately. Hopefully I will remember this when it comes time to do March’s playlist, however, knowing my luck I will probably be back to listening to various music like normally!

What were you listening to this month? Send me your recommendations!

Guest Post | Carolee Part 1

Music and art have a lot of similarities. They’re both creative outlets, take away your stress after a hard day, and make you very happy! If you’ve read my older posts from say 2011 or 2012, you may remember my Linkin Park drawings I did in 2010. When I got into Linkin Park in mid-2009 I did not think I’d get so deep into the whole rock/metal phase as I did. That year it was my senior year, I had one last art class and I thought I’d go into a mini retirement from my drawing days. So I drew the whole band of LP. I used their music as my inspiration to get me through those days sitting on the cold floor of the art room. They have been a big hit in my family! Anything I basically draw is a hit, but these portraits are my babies!

In 2012, while watching livestream of a LPU chat. I met a girl that I kind of meshed well in the chat. At the end of it, we gave out our Twitter names and we instantly followed each other. At this time, I was still using Tumblr and I remembered her Twitter username at the time was the same as her Tumblr URL. I loved her edits on there of the band! I thought she was a genius! I also thought she was older than me! Nope, she’s the same age as my sister! Carolee is her name. She’s a big LP fan, she loves to draw. I always talk about her to my nana, she really is a genius. When she was in high school, she took physics, chemistry, and calculus. Music and art were our only common areas. I love seeing her new artwork on Facebook! She mostly does anime of characters in The Legend Of Korra. I’ve never watched the show, but she does a great job on these sketches. After thinking about it for months, I finally asked her to collaborate on a blog post with me. This is a two-part edition.

Carolee and I have another common ground as far as genres of music goes. It’s not just rock and metal music, oh heck no! We have to add some EDM and dubstep to it! I used to do these “Top 3 Thursdays” and I asked her to give me three favorite EDM artists that she loves! After she gave her written out post (which I’ll include at the end of next week’s installment!) she talked about maybe including some of her artwork too! She said that she had some that was actually created while listening to two of the artists she picked out! I actually wanted to save those two artists until next week. So that’s why I’m explaining a little bit about my friendship with her and just letting her personality come out in the rest of the post! All I’ve asked from her are her favorite EDM and dubstep artists and why she likes them so much. I hope you enjoy!

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When it comes to electronic music, my needs are like the next person’s: I want to hear music that makes me feel like I’m having a good time. However, there’s also another thing I look out for: I’ve always been interested in music that’s different-stuff that really stands out. Something that gets my imagination going or that leaves me feeling like I just woke up after having a really long and weird dream. This is mainly due to the fact that I’m an artist. I like music that gets my brain going. Some people might argue that this is an element hard to find in electronic music, but I don’t believe that’s the case.

I’ve been listening to EDM and dubstep for 5 years now. I’m in no way an expert, but this is a genre that has become second nature to me,  just how rock music has been with me since I was a child. And along the way I’ve discovered some amazing artists.

KOVEN:

If you haven’t heard of these two yet, you need to right now. I feel like they are one of the most underrated duos out there on the scene right now.  Some might say it’s not “real EDM”, that it’s “too different”, but that’s actually the best part! These are people who I feel may have started to take the genre in a new direction! Their own direction. You listen to something they make and think ‘wow, I didn’t think about a song being made that way’  but you fall in love so hard anyway. This duo consists of a DJ/drummer and a vocalist. They are fairly new but the music they’ve released lately is incredible in the way it really challenges what this genre should sound like. I feel like there’s a lot of elements in their music that I wasn’t used to hearing, but that now I wish more people used.

1. I love the vocals on their newest tracks. They add an amazing vibe on the music that you’ll be wanting to experience again and again.
2. I seriously love how different their stuff is! They like to experiment with different sounds and yet the quality of the music is really high. There’s almost like a cinematic sound when I listen to Koven, like I could be listening to them in the movies. You’ll think “how does everybody not know who they are yet?”
3. Koven’s music is really good for me to listen to when I need that spark to bring the inspiration flooding. It’s also very meaningful, deep, and feels complete. There’s some electronic music that will feel like more could’ve been done, leaving you feeling incomplete, but that’s not the case with these two and that’s probably why I love their music so much.

*I’ve only used spell check to fix my parts, Carolee’s words are her own.

SoundCloud Dreams

Everybody knows I like to find new and old stuff. I’m really big in the whole rock and dance genres. I like other countries music as well. So, I like to mix and match a lot. I’m really happy I’ve gotten to the point where I’m judging music by how it sounds instead of how the members look like. I’ve had that problem before, sadly I can’t get myself to listen to now anyways. So it really sucks. I’ve recently been listening to tracks on SoundCloud. I listened to one earlier, I loved it. So I’ve found some others and thought you’d enjoy them too. If you like dubstep then you’ll love these as well.

http://soundcloud.com/noisia/noisia-tommys-theme-loadstar

http://soundcloud.com/numbernin6/real_steel

http://soundcloud.com/noisia/noisia-stigma-neosignal-remix

http://soundcloud.com/noisia/noisia-tommys-theme

Dubstep Songs. (Part 2)

I’m back on my Dubstep addiction. I literally almost bought some Dubstep songs last Friday but I didn’t know how my ears would really be able to handle it. Especially since I already keep my bass up on my iPod anyway. I knew if I put it on my stereo system it would sound pretty awesome, but I might break a window or my floor might cave in. One of these days I will. Well here are some videos I’ve found of some good remakes of Pop, Hip Hop, and Rock songs that have been tranferred into Dubstep. Enjoy!