Hebdomadal Affinity for Mellifluence

[I don't mean to sound so pretentious with my titles – I just wanted something a little more interesting than "songs that got me through the past week"]

A few days ago, the shamelessly-executed feat of egoism that was being my own publicist and sharing this blog to "the masses" led to the shocking –yet obvious– revelation that I was advertising nothing more than an archive of material, all of which had been written a matter of months ago. The curse of writers' block, in all its ambiguously-perennial glory, has been known to ail me for disconcerting periods of time, and it may well be here to stay until a seriously contrived prompt makes itself apparent and results in prolific bouts of creative writing.

So, in order to compensate for this frustrating situation, and keep my posting on this blog (somewhat) regular, I've decided to voice my preferences in areas about which I am a complete dilettante, i.e. music. Below are a handful of songs that, for the past seven days, I have either found myself repeatedly listening to, tunelessly singing, or pervading my head in the form of incessant loops and dubiously-ascribed lyrics:

1. Dead Sea by The Lumineers

I've only recently started listening to this band, but what little music of theirs I've been exposed to I thoroughly enjoy. Their songs are musically and lyrically simple, but poignant and charismatic nevertheless.

2.Can't Help Falling In Love (Elvis cover) by "Fleet Foxes"

Life is full of countless aesthetic pleasures, and the subdued timbre of indie folk music is certainly one of them. I use inverted commas for a reason: the name "Fleet Foxes" is actually the alias created by a group typically known as Fleet Foxes Sing, who have recorded wonderful covers of a number of songs. Said recordings can be found here.

3. England by The National 

To me, The National's music is synonymous with "haunting melodies with equally haunting lyrics, both of which are capable of provoking enough nostalgia to make listening to them more than once a highly masochistic venture."

4. Liarbird by The Growl

For want of a more original statement, I can only describe the singing voice of frontman Cam Avery (who also happens to be the new bassist for Tame Impala, a member of Pond, dubious acquaintance of Alexa Chung's, and general overachiever)  as being "like melted chocolate," a statement I recall reading on Tumblr some time ago. The music video is strangely entertaining too; if I'm not mistaken, the general consensus is that Nick Albrook deserves an Oscar.

5. You're The One That I Want (Grease cover) by Angus and Julia Stone

As if one cover wasn't enough, here's a song that left me rather deluded with the conviction that I had mastered the art of harmonising, or at least singing along to Angus's part. The Australian sister-brother duo hit it out of the park with their acoustic rendition of this classic musical number. I would say that this can only be expected of them, but my prejudice that a less-upbeat version of the song would be unlikely to work rendered me initially skeptical. It goes without saying that their original material is worth a listen too.

6. R U Mine? by Arctic Monkeys

It was a job of terrible indecision trying to discern which song from AM should make it to this playlist (here's a link to the full album anyway). Admittedly, the first few listens AM (or rather the song-by-song leaks) were a little disheartening, as I'm sure was the case for many loyal fans of the Northern four-piece; their sound had undergone stylistic evolution, to a degree that isn't there when you compare their previous albums with each other. They've experimented significantly genres in this album, particularly in numbers such as 'Why D'you Only Call Me When You're High?' and 'Knee Socks', both of which show strong RnB influences. Having said that, I am fully converted as a fan of this album, and for those who aren't quite so convinced, closer listening does provide the occasional, comforting reversion to their former style. The raunchy, distorted guitar part chords, as well as the lyrics and tempo, of 'R U Mine?' are a prime example of this.

The Old Man Visits Solitude - IV

The rain had stopped now, or at least to the point where it only made a sporadic splay of minuscule drops against the windowpane. With fingers shaking and warped with arthritis he opened the door, just wide enough to fit his frail, raincoat-clad body through. There was a silent fear about him as for the first time he was aware of his own dementia. Even I, for all my lack of intuition could tell that I was not wanted in seeing him out. I remained frozen by the seat as my eyes saw him to the door.

He was gone, both indefinitely and never. I clenched my temples with near-fisted hands and gritted my teeth in a bracing grimace, allowing for sharp draughts of air in surging palpitations. Absolute anger forced my eyes shut till they forged wrinkles across my face. They were the inglorious wrinkles of a man aged by his own seclusion and repression, of a man who needs the hand of another to smooth them out, just when he has warded everyone else off.

I felt an unbroken streak of some fifteen years coming to an end; my tear ducts no longer ran dry as anger, grief and remorse in its most ceaseless form flooded the entirety of my face, leaving me frozen in the most incurable, shameful of stupors. With an outlandish swell of romanticism I longed for the far-flung day that my face, without the blatant contortion of self-induced neurosis, could show the fragility of tears and the resilience of a smile all at once, just like my father had mere minutes ago.

For the past 28 years I had been living in a state of perpetual nihilism, using my Oxbridge degree as a lifelong pass to do absolutely nothing with it. I had belittled a past accomplishment whilst using it as the only thing to define myself, giving me the perfect excuse to enhance my snobbery with fancy words and become an armchair critic in the presence of others, bringing up the biggest name-drop in conversation so that they could feel my superiority for me. I was consumed with nothing but the urge to scream, but ultimately immense fear held me back, for I knew that I would either keep the scream inside of me, or hear it in perpetual ricochets around the walls in which I was to live alone.