Mixtapemotions

  • “Chemical Love” by From the Airport, Friday, July 8, 2022

    Today we dive back into the Korean Indie wave with another song of From the Airport‘s. After releasing several singles and promoting themselves in the Hongdae club scene, the duo released several singles before their first EP, Chemical Love in 2014. The duo mixes rock and electronic sounds on this EP, mostly sticking to a formula of uplifting and sometimes inspiring melodies and lyrics. However, like on their prior singles “Everyone’s All Right” and its B-side “Raining” (which is also included on Chemical Love) and “Timelines” (also on Chemical Love), the cover art and some of the songs on Chemical Love evoke a dark side to the otherwise ebullient electro-pop rock duo.  

    FLOCKS OF BUTTERFLIES TRAVEL TO LOOK FOR ANSWERS AND QUESTIONS. Many of the tracks that finally made it onto the band’s debut record, You Could Imagine were the singles and the tracks from the band’s EP. Today’s song, “Chemical Love” is a discussion in metaphysics–what is real and what is perceived and how chemicals play in ideation, or how ideas are formed. It’s a pretty deep concept that comes from simple concrete lyrics that sound like, on a cursory listen, they were just a pat edition to an electronic jam session. While the lyrics of From the Airport may not be very strong, they always seem born out of the emotion of the song and that makes their lyrics sincere. On their second record, The Boy Who Jumped, the band experiments with writing in Korean and is able to express their emotions more fluently and poetically in their native language, the pure emotion that comes from somewhat “on the nose” writing actually emphasizes the instrumentals which seems to be what the band is really about.  

    THE STELLAR ROMANCE OF REACTION CHEMISTRY. Today a professor from a local university came to my school to talk to some students about the field of spreading Korean culture around the world. This sparked an interesting discussion in my office about if culture spreads intentionally or unintentionally. The professor’s presentation talked about hallyu (한류) or the Korean wave, which first spread to Asia and later to the West. This is a topic I’ve discussed before in my blog. I would argue that Korean culture has spread by paying excellent attention to detail of what has been successful with world trends in terms of production. For example, looking a film scenes and plots that were successful around the world, finding hooks and dances that were easily sung and imitated. But the comment in my office after the lecture was, “Did some rapper in New York say, ‘I want to start Hip Hop culture and spread it to the world’? or did some surfer dude in California say ‘I want to start surfer dude culture around the world’? No, but it spread unintentionally.” I don’t have any real takeaway from this discussion, and I don’t want to assert that one culture is more valuable than another. I find it interesting, though, as Korean culture continues to rise, spreading Korean language and an insight into a modern capitalistic, developed society. This is a country that loved English and spent a large percentage of their GDP to learn English, and now it seems that the country is reducing its focus on English. What I find fascinating is while the mainstream of K-culture explodes, Korean Indie groups are writing in English. How does culture spread? Authentically with a good product. Let’s start creating!

    Read the lyrics on Musixmatch 

  • "On My Mind" by Ellie Goulding, Thursday, July 7, 2022

     

    After her major breakthrough hit, “Lights” in 2010, Ellie Goulding became an international star. The UK singer has had a slew of hits following “Lights.” In her two singles with Calvin Harris, “I Need Your Love” and “Outside,” Goulding shows her radiance, singing bright EDM. While “Lights” remains her biggest Hot 100 hit, Goulding’s second biggest song was released prior to her third record Delirium. While that song appears as track 9 on the eclectic record, it was the film Fifty Shades of Grey that “Love Me Like You Do” is associated with, not Delirium. 

    WAIT, I COULD HAVE REALLY LIKED YOU.  In 2015, I thought Delirium was a great record, on par with Carly Rae Jepsen‘s Emotion. But in the years since its release, I certainly haven’t revisited Delirium as much as Emotion. Both records are long, but Emotion seems more cohesive and in retrospect. Delirium feels long listening to it in 2022. From the disorienting “Intro” leading into “Aftertaste,” listeners are introduced to an almost Middle Eastern sound that blends with synthesizers. This darker-sounding electronic music starts one theme of record. But then the third track “Something in the Way You Move” the album begins another musical theme of super-sweet, euphoric pop music. Goulding’s third record would benefit by trimming some of the redundant tracks and the ones that lyrically go no where. The problem with listening to the entire album is sometimes the sweetness is overbearing on tracks like “Around U” and the tracks start to blend into each other. 

    Photo of Ed Sheeran with arm tattoos. Photo by
    Eva Rinaldi. Source: Wikipedia Commons.

    YOU WANTED MY HEART, BUT I JUST LIKED YOUR TATTOOS. “On My Mind” was one of the bigger singles from the record, though nowhere a big as “Love Me Like You Do.” The song tells a story about a misunderstanding between two romantic partners, the speaker just wants something casual, and the listener falls for the speaker; however, by the chorus, though, the speaker starts to think about the listener romantically. Music critics have read “On My Mind” as a response to Ed Sheeran‘s 2014 song “Don’t.” Although neither Sheeran nor Goulding have confirmed that their songs are about each other, tabloids have shown a romantic link between the two stars and the details in “On My Mind” and “Don’t” seem to give more evidence to this relationship. Both songs paint the girl as cold and calculating, but “On My Mind” shows Goulding’s ambivalence. Furthermore, from the attitude presented in “On My Mind,” Goulding doesn’t sound like she was trying to fool the listener, but he misread the signals, expecting more. Of course we may never know the true story. But just a friendly reminder: make your intentions clear up front, and you might avoid being the subject of a break up song.

    Music video:

    Live on Jimmy Fallen: 

  • “Da Vinci Riot Police” by George Ezra, Wednesday, July 6, 2022

     

    Put on George Ezra‘s Wanted on Voyage, and you hear a modern folk-rock record with some pop appeal. Ezra immediately draws listeners in with “Blame It on Me.” Throughout the record, we hear sparse rock ‘n’roll electric guitars and rhythmic acoustics, but Ezra isn’t afraid to add keys or synthesizers for effect here and there. But while the instrumentation is good on the record, what stands out most is Ezra’s deep voice. Coming from a time in the ’00s when a high voice was everything for pop and rock music, George Ezra’s bass-baritone range reminds listeners of old-time music, sung by old-time singers who are either elderly or who have died long ago. 
    A statue of Paddington Bear at Paddington Station, London. From
    Flickr. Photo by Martin Pettitt.

    IN EVERY SONG YOUR FATHER SUNG. But then watch the music videos or catch a live performance from George Ezra’s first album cycle, Wanted on Voyage, and you see the source of that distinct, sexy, old-sounding voice coming from a baby-faced blond-haired, blue-eyed (and tall) kid. In 2014, when Ezra released Wanted he was just 20 years old. He began a year before, playing at Glastonbury Festival and releasing an EP, but Wanted on Voyage was his major breakthrough with the lead single, “Budapest” charting internationally, including in the United States. The title of the record comes from children’s book series Paddington Bear. Paddington has a sticker on his suitcase that says “Wanted on Voyage” when he turns up at Paddington Station in London. Like Paddington, Ezra’s album is inspired by his travels. For Ezra, his voyage included buying a European train pass that allowed him to wander all over the continent, exploring Berlin, “Barcelona,” Amsterdam, “Budapest,” and in today’s song Milan, where he witnessed something strange when looking at a statue of Leonardo da Vinci.  

    Statue of Leonardo da Vinci in Milan,
    Italy. “Photo by CEphoto, Uwe Aranas”
    Source.

    EUROPEAN SONIC BOOM, ELECTRIC CHAPEL / BOOK A ROOM. George Ezra tells the story of the penultimate song from On Voyage, “Da Vinci Riot Police” while on tour in New Zealand to Vikki Anderson. Ezra recalls looking at the statue of da Vinci and suddenly a riotous parade started marching down the street with “flares and shouting.” The police showed up, and Ezra said that “da Vinci looked after me for a bit.” Besides being envious of how seemingly easy it was for UK citizens to hope on a train to Milan like New Yorkers can just drive to Florida to visit their grandparents, the story behind “Da Vinci Riot Police” reminds me of my non-European travels–particularly when I’m alone–and something weird happens. One minute you find yourself off the beaten path and the next you meet a stranger or you see a ritual that seems unreal. You struggle to think about how you would describe it. And after it happened, if you were alone, you wonder if it really happened or if it was a hallucination or even a dream implanted later? If you were with a friend, you recall it together, but when you tell the story, you can see the disbelief in the listener’s eyes. You’ve gotta be there to see it, I guess.   

    Read the lyrics on Genius.

  • “Crazy” by The Cinema, Tuesday, July 5, 2022

    The Cinema released two albums: 2011’s My Blood Is Full of Airplanes and 2014’s Talking In Your Sleep. The band formed when Indie rock group Lydia took a hiatus after their keyboardist and co-vocalist Mindy White decided to leave the band and form another project with Copeland‘s Bryan and Stephen Laurenson under the appellation States. Lydia’s lead vocalist, Leighton Antelman formed The Cinema with Lydia’s producer, Matt Malpass. 
     

    I WON’T TELL IF YOU DON’T ASK. On The Cinema’s second record, Talking In Your Sleep, the band features former Lydia bandmate Mindy White on the song “Punchline” and Copeland’s vocalist Aaron Marsh on the second track “Turn It On.” The Aaron Marsh feature is how I found this band when I was going through AppleMusic a few years ago looking for songs that featured Marsh or bands that were produced by him. On the audio commentary for Talking In Your Sleep, Matt Malpass explains that “Turn It On” is about how moments appear pristine in a photograph, but the real story isn’t quite as perfect as the moment is remembered. The music video for the song is strange, featuring what appears to be a lesbian relationship and its highly stylized, like an advertisement. At one point in the video, one of the women bites into a raw onion. When talking about track three and today’s song, “Crazy,” Leighton Antelmen said that most of the songs were written when the two band members were on “opposite sides of the country.” Malpass would write “over the top” pop hooks and Antelmen would try to ground the song in the band’s Indie Pop foundations. Antelmen also says that what sounds like it could be an effect on the chorus is actually three children singing on the record. 

    THAT CRAZY LOOK IN YOUR EYE / I’M JUST SAYING YOU GOT ME. Lydia’s hiatus was short lived, but the band didn’t return to being a full time band right away. Between 2010 and 2015, the band released some singles and deluxe editions of their previous albums, and toured occasionally. Since the promotion of Talking In Your Sleep in 2015 with release of the “Turn It On” music video and the Spotify audio commentary of the record, the band hasn’t released anything since. They did tweet a photo of demos from sessions labeled “LP3” in 2016, but perhaps Lydia obligations have caused the duo to go onto a hiatus about the same length as the Lydia hiatus. Today’s song is about what love looks like from the outside. It looks crazy. What others see as red flags, you see as red roses. In most cases “love is blind” wears off, and you start to see clearly what your friends and others see. But on the rare occasion, everyone else could be wrong. Either way, it’s always fun to play music journo when discovering an obscure band. Enjoy!

    Read the lyrics on Genius.

  • "Lonely Nation" by Switchfoot, Monday, July 4, 2022 + American Dreams: Hope for a Better Future Playlist

    The Beautiful Letdown was the peak of Switchfoot‘s career. When lead singer Jon Foreman was reflecting on his career on The Load Out Music Podcast last year, he said that the band decided to follow up their most successful pop record with one that critiques the American Dream, a somewhat controversial topic with Christian listeners. The opening track, “Lonely Nation,” warns listeners about consumerism and how it just creates social fragmentation and a desire for more. “Lonely Nation” is the representative song for my Independence Day mix called American Dreams: Hope for a Better Future. This playlist is far from perfect. Certainly it needs more diversity in style and artists’ voices. But I hope that the songs on this playlist offer an alternative to blind patriotism. After all, patriotism shouldn’t be blind nationalism, but rather a peaceful discourse between conflicting ideals. In a world where everything seems to be falling apart, it’s so much easier to stand like the Danish King Canute who was said to stand by the shore, willing the tides to change. Maybe putting our hopes in music seems as futile as standing Canute-like along the shores, but we have to put our hopes somewhere! We can’t solve all the problems, so for now, please enjoy this playlist.

    1. “Lonely Nation” by Switchfoot.

    2. “Dead American” by Anberlin is another song that calls into question the idea of the American Dream. The idea about being a rock star and having a big house and all the toys is less not a reality, at least anymore. 
    3. “Cold Air” by Acceptance. A song about a community torn apart by prejudice, the song offers solace for all who “don’t belong here.”
    4. “Winning It All” by The Outfield. Although they are a British band, their influence from American sport makes them seem quite American. “Winning It All” is the kind of song that screams of American pretension, without actually being American!

    5. “exile” by Taylor Swift ft. Bon Ivor
    6. “Fourth of July” by Sufjan Stevens
    7. “Hero” by Family of the Year
    8. “Born in the U.S.A.” by Bruce Springsteen
    9. “My Favorite Place” by Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers is a song about being content wherever you are because of who you are with. Kellogg is included on this list for his contribution to performing for the troops overseas. 
    10. “A Horse with No Name” by America
    11. “Looking for America” by Lana Del Rey

    12. “Merry Go ‘Round” by Kacey Musgraves. It’s a bit of an existential crisis for the young singer as she grapples with the meaning of life in a small town.

    13. “Firework” by Katy Perry
    14. “American Idiot” by Green Day
    15. “Cynical” by Propaganda ft. Aaron Marsh and Sho Baraka. It’s a song that looks at America’s past and gives a bleak look for its future, but it’s certainly not unmerited. 
    16. “Great Divide” by Lovedrug is a song about bridging the gap between two polar opposites. 

    17. “Futures” by Jimmy Eat World
    18. “Dead Man’s Dollar” by Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness

    19. “Brother” by NEEDTOBREATHE is a song about reconciliation.
    20. “American Clouds” by Paper Route is from their electro-Americana EP Are We All Forgotten. Ending with a harmonica, the song gives the listener images of racing on a train or flying on a plane, looking at the vast clouds in the midwest. 



  • “Cool Out” by Imagine Dragons, Sunday, July 3, 2022

     

    The rise of Imagine Dragons‘ popularity coincides with my first musical famine–a time when I was so disinterested in music that I stopped keeping up with it. I can’t blame the ex-Mormon band for causing that musical famine because there was a lot going on in my life at that time. Like many college graduates entering the workforce, music gets demoted in terms of priorities. There are also shifts in musical tastes about every five years, and the music that was the soundtrack to some of the best years of your life isn’t relevant to the next half-generation. It’s how you go from a 23-year-old kid in your dorm room discovering progressive-shoegazer EDM with pop leanings to “everything sounds generic, and I think I hate music now.”


    I LIVE MY LIFE IN BLACK-AND-WHITE. Still, many crotchety music critics agree that there was a musical drought in the ’10s, and they cite Imagine Dragons’ status as the biggest rock band of that decade as proof. From the band’s first single “Radioactive,” they heralded a genre-less future of music. In the ’20s, we’ve had many examples of genre-bending to the point that many are calling genre a mood rather than a fixed style of music. I’ve highlighted many great examples of this from Thirty Second to Mars to Lana Del Rey to Gorrillaz to Anberlin‘s recent music. And for better or worse, we have to credit Imagine Dragons for the musical risk it took to be promiscuous with genre in the early ’00s. However, unlike the artists I’ve listed above, Imagine Dragons tends to support desultory listening. In 2012 and 2013 when I first listened to “Radioactive” and its parent album Night Visions, it certainly didn’t inspire me to go seek out what else I was missing out on in rock and pop rock but rather to listen to only the groups that I liked the most, and ironically, start listening to K-pop as I was acclimatizing to life in Korea.

    I DON’T THINK I’M THE ONE FOR YOU. I can’t write off Imagine Dragons completely, though. After college I started going through my hard drive deleting old files and albums I just could not get into. I do that from time to time with my AppleMusic collection too. Even though there are probably ten Imagine Dragons songs I can list by name because they are so annoying, think “Thunder,” “Demons,” and “Radioactive,” occasionally the band decides to forsake their bombastic, repetitive song structure and sound like, well, music. Today’s song, “Cool Out” is a love song about lead singer Dan Reynolds meeting his wife. Highlighting a more chill New Wave vibe, this isn’t the most standout track from the band. This song wasn’t a single from the record, and it’s the kind of song that shows why better third or fourth wave new wave bands like White Lies aren’t popular. So is today’s song the best song ever? Nope. It’s passable. And in Imagine Dragons’ discography it’s certainly one of their better tracks.

  • “Cold War Transmissions” by Anberlin, Saturday, July 2, 2022

    Anberlin starts to establish themselves as a potentially heavy band. The production on the track sounds reminiscent of the early-’00 sounds of Trapt or Trust Company, when having a hard rock song was the key to Alternative Rock success. Until Cities, Anberlin was on the path to becoming a harder and hard rock band, but with New Surrender and Dark Is the Way, Light Is a Place started to embrace a more ambient sound, with some notable exceptions. However, with the band’s planned final album Lowborn and on their upcoming release Silverline on July 29th, Anberlin is back and heavier than ever!
    SIDE BY SIDE WE FACE EACH OTHER. Stephen Christian has talked about how feedback from Anberlin’s fans helped him to become a better lyricist. There is a significant improvement on the band’s next record, Never Take Friendship Personal as some of the lyrics on Blueprints for the Black Market feel vapid.  I’ve felt that about “Cold War Transmissions” in my experience of listening to Anberlin over the years. When the song first came out, in 2003, I was 16 years old. The Soviet Union had dissolved in 1991, when I was 4, so I had no memory of the it, but I remember seeing old maps and globes which included the Soviet Bloc rather than the modern countries. However, Stephen Christian, born in 1980, would have been more familiar with the Soviet Union, being 11 in ’91. Christian has talked about this song being inspired by his memory of playing Risk with his brother. Christian said that his brother would always try to conquer The United States, but Christian would try to defeat the Soviet Union. 

    YOUR SPIES COME CLEAN/ THEY TOLD ME EVERYTHING. Still, “Cold War Transmissions” feels like the rough draft of a song lyrically. Stephen Christian would go on to write “Someone Anyone,” a song inspired by the Arab Spring revolution in Egypt. He studied and was involved with humanitarian aid in college and just before Anberlin signed to Tooth & Nail Records and even started a humanitarian organization while in Anberlin called Faceless International. But in 2003, nobody was talking about Russia like they are today. Former Soviet Union intelligence officer Vladimir Putin had been elected the second president after Boris Yeltsin served, who had transitioned Soviet Russia into a democratic state. But under Putin, it started to be apparent that Russia was only democratic in name only. Putin served eight years from 2000-2008, then Dmitry Medvedev took the presidency from 2008-2012. Putin, however, came back to power in 2012 and has served as president ever since. Russia under Putin made international news for the country’s oppression towards religious and sexual minorities, which continue today; however, when Putin commanded the annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, it wasn’t hard to see history trying to repeat itself. However, while the annexation in 2014 was condemned internationally, that didn’t stop Russia from going to war with Ukraine earlier this year. And with Putin now teasing nuclear war action against Ukraine and those who don’t agree with Putin’s decisions, it feels like the Cold War never really ended.  

     

  • "Closer to the Edge" by Thirty Seconds to Mars, Friday, July 1, 2022

    Thirty Seconds to Mars exploded on Alternative Rock radio with their second album, A Beautiful Lie. The album produced four singles, including the number 1 hit “From Yesterday.” Fronted by actor Jared Leto, who was then known for playing supporting roles in movies like Fight Club, Alexander, and American Psycho, and the lead in Requiem for a Dream, the singer was not yet a household name. But once Leto won an Oscar for best supporting actor in Dallas Buyers Club, Jared Leto the actor far outshone Jared Leto the frontman of an Alternative Rock band. Just before that success, though, was the 2009 Thirty Seconds to Mars record, This Is War.
    THE BIRTH OF A SUN, THE DEATH OF A DREAM. This Is War is a concept album that plays on several lyrical and musical themes. Nothing in the lyrics of the record is specific about the actual or metaphoric war the band is fighting. But behind the scenes, Leto and his band, composed of his older brother Shannon on drums and guitarist  Tomo Miličević, had been in a dispute with their record label, Virgin Records. The label eventually sued the band for $30 million, claiming breach of contract. The lawsuit was later settled and the band signed to EMI Records, all the while filming the recording process of the record and sharing their story about the underbelly of the recording industry in a film they would release in 2012, Artifact. The documentary film features Thirty Seconds to Mars and their friends–producers, members of other bands, and others in the music industry–talking about their experiences with the predatory practice of record labels. And while the record labels tend to bully smaller artists, Thirty Seconds to Mars wielded Leto’s celebrity status to draw attention to their cause. 

    I‘M NOT SAYING I’M SORRY. “Closer to the Edge” is the band’s third single from This Is War. And like A Beautiful Lie, the singles from this record were radio hits. “Closer to the Edge” even brought the rock band onto Adult Alternative stations. The anthemic synth, guitar, and drum loops make the song quite addictive along with the chorus of fans that make the song sound almost like it was recorded live–a musical motif that appears on this record on many of the tracks. The video features fans talking about how music got them through a hard time. One fan even says: “Some people believe in God, I believe in music. Some people pray, I turn up the radio.” Elsewhere on the record, notably on “100 Suns,” Leto testifies that he “believe[s] in nothing / Not in sin and not in God.” Yet, the battle cry throughout the record sounds like a U2. It sounds like the Christian Rock of a worship service. While Leto and his fans may not believe in God, there is a spiritual quality to the sound of the chorus singing along with Leto as he screams out the higher notes. The spirituality of connections and the spirituality of having a common enemy (though not defined in this record) lifts This Is War to anthemic greatness. 

    Music video:
     

  • "Communicate" by Jonezetta, Thursday, June 30, 2022 (Updated Repost)

      Jonezetta‘s Popularity brings back memories of being 21. Although the album had come out the year before, I had been hesitant to buy it. But after tours with Anberlin and MuteMath, I decided to buy the album and put it into the CD player of my 2001 midnight blue Toyota Corolla S, my second car, and the car I had paid for with my own money. This album is one that is forever linked to the hot black interior, the red night-driving display, the drivers licenses-less friends and the friends of my little sister that I had to tote around. It was also the summer that I decided it was time to go to Cornerstone.

    I’VE BEEN DRIVING ALL NIGHT. My friends don’t always vibe with my musical tastes and that’s ok. I’m a little scared of people who like the same music as me. It makes me wonder when someone’s going to hand us a big cup of Kool-Aid. However, Popularity was quite a hit among my friends. It’s dancey and just ’80s retro enough to be put in your playlist sandwiched between Journey‘s “Separate Ways” and Def Leopard‘s “Pour Some Sure on Me.” I saw them at Cornerstone twice in 2007. They had a set in one of the bigger tents. Then miracle of all miracles happened. Relient K‘s band burned down, pushing Skillet and Anberlin to close the night, and a slot opened up for Jonezetta to play main stage. When they played “Communicate” they dedicated the song to Anberlin, their good friends who took them out on the Cities tour and helped them achieve they success they had so far in their career.

    WILL IT EVER FEEL THE SAME? I talked a little about the demise of Jonezetta when I talked about Corey Crowder last year. In November, after Cornerstone, some friends decided to drive to Charolette to see Family Force 5‘s Halloween themed tour with openers The Secret Handshake and Jonezetta. Going to the concert was more fun than the concert. It was a small club venue and we were used to the the bands having more space for their show/theatrics (think FF5). Main stage at Cornerstone earned them another on main stage. It didn’t go so well. It seems that the crowd was not into their new songs and the band didn’t have the energy they once had. Something was off.  As all good things must come to an end, so do most bands after 1 or 2 albums. The music industry imploded with the housing crisis of 2008/2009.  Just as the bands of young adulthood break up, we too move on. I sold my car to my dad when I came to Korea for student loan payments. Friend groups have splintered–some moved away, some have stopped being friends. Cornerstone ended in 2012. Life is full of sad goodbyes, but it’s better to have the sad goodbye than to never have had it in the first place. What’s left is a few Apple Music shuffles and memories of being 21 with keys to car and driving to Illinois for a dusty concert.

  • “Burning in the Skies” by Linkin Park, Wednesday, June 29, 2022

    When a rock band gets as big as Linkin Park got, it becomes trendy to hate the band. I must admit that during their career, I wasn’t in line with every step the band took–mainly because of the band’s usage of profanity from their third album throughout the rest of their career. However, I could never understand critics and listeners who casually compared the band to butt rocks like Nickelback. Yes, Linkin Park’s music is formulaic at times, and the band knew how to write a song to get on the radio. The comparison between Linkin Park and any other rock band seems like comparing Nickelback to Nike because Linkin Park was a brand more than band, complete with a consistent audio and visual aesthetic. The band didn’t simply create records, but told stories.

    I’M SWIMMING IN THE SMOKE OF THE BRIDGES I HAVE BURNED. Linkin Park’s fourth record, A Thousand Suns, is a multifaceted concept record. The band intended for album to be listened to in one sitting, inviting listeners into the post-apocalyptic world of the record. Although, A Thousand Suns is not a direct sequel to their third record, Minutes to Midnight, both records reference the doom of the human race. Minutes to Midnight is a reference to the Doomsday Clock, which calculates the impact of human action that could bring the end of civilization, midnight being the end. A Thousand Suns refers to the blast of nuclear weapons that could end humanity. The album explores the darkness of human nature which could cause the bombs to drop. Short interludes build classical or operatic themes throughout the work, drawing most attention to the penultimate track “The Catalyst,” the album’s optimistic theme “Waiting for the End,” and today’s song, the album’s true opener “Burning in the Skies.” The album opens with two tracks that function as an overture: “The Requiem,” which is the hook of “The Catalyst”sung by a heavily autotuned childish female voice and “The Radiance” which is a sampled recording of J Robert Oppenheimer describing the first test of the nuclear bomb. 
    I’M LOSING WHAT I DON’T DESERVE.  Both tracks set an eerie tone for the record, despite the somewhat serene “Burning in the Skies.” A Thousand Burning Suns certainly has a hierarchy of catchy songs with “Waiting for the End” and “The Catalyst” being polar opposite in mood. The third most memorable track would be “Burning,” which follows a Linkin Park formula: both Mike Shinoda and Chester Bennington sharing vocal duties, electronic sampling loops, and a guitar solo based on the melody of the chorus. It’s the lyrics that bring this song to life, especially in the context to the rest of the album. The song describes when the bombs fell, which given the speaker’s ability to editorialize the event, seems to have happened long before this song is sung. There’s an acceptance to the fault–is it Bennington who caused the bomb to drop? Is that the guilt born by one soul? Or is it a realization that all humanity could have made that decision? The music video further visualizes the events, which seem to have happened on night when people gathered together for small parties, it kind of reminds me a small New Year’s celebration. In 2011, a song like “Burning in the Skies” sounded like bad Emo, like a church kid who grew up with terrible self esteem and never got past the “I’m a piece of shit” theology. Eleven years later, the album starts to feel more and more relevant as the fears of climate change seem ever present and world leaders have itchy fingers when reaching for their nuclear weapons. The question is will humanity “lo[se] what [they] don’t deserve”?