★Alternative Music

˚ ready now, thank you  

Posted on 29/03/2009. Last edited on 22/07/2016.

I am not sure just how much ‘alternative music’ I have been exposed to… Though share some and refresh my understanding(: Know any great tunes in this category?

Wow! I am gonna have to confess, I’m not quite sure what qualifies as alternative these days. I used to consider The Gin Blossoms and Toad the Wet Sprocket and Crash Test Dummies alternative, but I’m not sure if that qualifies anymore. Anyway, that’s the kind of stuff I’m gonna post ‘cause that’s what I like. I know Lee with have some good recommendations here that are of a different flavor than mine. I really got into some of the stuff he posted in another thread that I would consider a more modern alternative music. Stuff like Schpongle and Mogwai. Also That Three Libras comes to mind. Nice.

Train – Calling All Angels
I love Train. May all my friends here at bMindful find their Angels near always. :)

I have a great love for Toad the Wet Sprocket. Powerful moving music with intensely beautiful lyrics.

Toad the Wet Sprocket
Pray Your Gods

I will give the secrets you request
And you will be the one to sacrifice
So lay your olive arms upon my breast
And sing the poems, free the butterflies

Pray your gods who ask you for your blood
For they are strong and angry jealous ones
Or lay upon my altar now your love
I fear my time is short
There are armies moving close
Be quick, my love

I feel my body weakened by the years
As people turn to gods of cruel design
Is it that they fear the pain of death
Or could it be they fear the joy of life

Pray your gods who hold you by your fear
For they are quick and ruthless punishers

Or lay upon my altar now your love
I fear my day is done
There are armies moving on
Be quick, my love
———————————-
Whatever I Fear
———————————-
I Will Not Take These Things For Granted

One part of me just wants to tell you everything
One part just needs the quiet
And if Im lonely here, Im lonely here
And on the telephone
You offer reassurance

I will not take these things for granted

How can I hold the part of me that only you can carry
It needs a strength I havent found
But if its frightening, Ill bear the cold
And on the telephone
You offer warm asylum

Im listening
Flowers in the garden
Laughter in the hall
Children in the park
I will not take these things for granted
Anymore

To crawl inside the wire and feel something near me
To feel this accepting
That it is lonely here, but not alone
And on the telephone
You offer visions dancing

Im listening
Music in the bedroom
Laughter in the hall
Dive into the ocean
Singing by the fire
Running through the forest
And standing in the wind
In rolling canyons
——————————
Before You Were Born

How can it happen that every time
You ask us this question the answer seems like a lie
You know what were saying and you know what it means
And its always sincere God knows
But it never gets through to where you need

Before you were born someone kicked in the door
Theres no place for you here, stay back where you belong
Before you were born someone kicked in the door
You are not wanted here, stay back where you belong

God damn the people who left you in pain
God damn the father without face, without name
And God damn the lovers who never showed up
And God damn the wounds that show how deep a word can cut

Before you were born someone kicked in the door
Theres no place for you here, stay back where you belong
Before you were born someone kicked in the door
You are not wanted here, stay back where you belong

And how can it happen now that you know the cause
That nothing is changing and everythings wrong
But pain is the healing and the tears sting like alcohol
Just keep on there breathing
Well bring you down the long, long road back home

Another of my favorite alternative bands is Crashtest Dummies. Another group with a unique, beautiful, moving sound. Also great lyrics. I’m sure you will enjoy them.

God Shuffled His Feet
Here is another link to the same song, not the same video, but better audio on this clip.
God Shuffled His Feet

After seven days
He was quite tired so God said:
“Let there be a day
Just for picnics, with wine and bread”
He gathered up some people he had made
Created blankets and laid back in the shade

The people sipped their wine
And what with God there, they asked him questions
Like: do you have to eat
Or get your hair cut in heaven?
And if your eye got poked out in this life
Would it be waiting up in heaven with your wife?

God shuffled his feet and glanced around at them;
The people cleared their throats and stared right back at him

So he said:“Once there was a boy
Who woke up with blue hair
To him it was a joy
Until he ran out into the warm air
He thought of how his friends would come to see;
And would they laugh, or had he got some strange disease?

God shuffled his feet and glanced around at them;
The people cleared their throats and stared right back at him

The people sat waiting
Out on their blankets in the garden
But God said nothing
So someone asked him: “I beg your pardon:
I’m not quite clear about what you just spoke
Was that a parable, or a very subtle joke?”

God shuffled his feet and glanced around at them;
The people cleared their throats and stared right back at him
——————————————-
Afternoons and Coffeespoons

What is it that makes me just a little bit queasy?
There’s a breeze that makes my breathing not so easy
I’ve had my lungs checked out with X rays
I’ve smelled the hospital hallways

Someday I’ll have a disappearing hairline
Someday I’ll wear pyjamas in the daytime

Times when the day is like a play by Sartre
When it seems a bookburning’s in perfect order -
I gave the doctor my description
I tried to stick to my prescriptions

Someday I’ll have a disappearing hairline
Someday I’ll wear pyjamas in the daytime

Afternoons will be measured out
Measured out, measured with
Coffeespoons and T.S. Eliot

Maybe if I could do a play-by-playback
I could change the test results that I will get back
I’ve watched the summer evenings pass by
I’ve heard the rattle in my bronchi …

Someday I’ll have a disappearing hairline
Someday I’ll wear pyjamas in the daytime

Afternoons will be measured out
Measured out, measured with
Coffeespoons and T.S. Eliot
(2x)
————————————-
In The Days Of The Cavemen

When you go on camping trips youre stuck right out in nature
Foraging the forests like a primate
Using sharpened tools instead of hot plates

Your tumb and forefinger supposed to show youre not a wilke beast
You can hear their noises at night time
They dont have to keep a certain bedtime

See in the shapes of my body
Leftover parts from the apes and monkeys

Sometimes when I lie awake I hear the rainfall on my tent fly
I think of all the insects that are sleeping
And wonder if the animals are dreaming

In the days of the caveman and mammoths and glaciers
Bugs and trees were your food then; no pyjamas or doctors

And when I finally get to sleep, I dream in technicolor
I see creature come back from the ice age
Alive and being fed inside a zoo cage
—————————————-
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I dig Barenaked Ladies too, the group AND the real thing! I also happen to like Almost Barenaked Ladies! As a matter of fact, I like ALL kinds a’ ladies!!!

I couldn’t find much on youtube, but they are a great group. They also do a lot of “kid friendly” stuff. Those of you with children might wanna’ check ‘em out.

Wind it Up

Another of my top Alternative bands is Counting Crows. You have probably heard some of their stuff, if not, check it out. Real gems these guys.

Big Yellow Taxi
Joni Mitchell lyrics

They paved paradise and put up a parkin’ lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique, and a swingin’ hot spot
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you got till it’s gone
They paved paradise and put up a parkin’ lot

They took all the trees, and put em in a tree museum
And they charged the people a dollar and a half to see them
No, no, no, don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone
They paved paradise, and put up a parkin’ lot

Hey farmer, farmer, put away your DDT
I don’t care about spots on my apples,
Leave me the birds and the bees – please
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you got till it’s gone
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot
Hey now, they’ve paved paradise to put up a parking lot
Why not?

Listen, late last night, I heard the screen door swing,
And a big yellow taxi took my girl away
Now don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you got till it’s gone
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot
Hey now now, don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you got till it’s gone
They paved paradise to put up a parking lot
Why not, they paved paradise
They put up a parking lot
Hey hey hey, paved paradise and put up a parking lot

I don’t wanna give it
Why you wanna give it
Why you wanna givin it all away
Hey, hey, hey
Now you wanna give it
I should wanna give it
Cuz you’re givin it all away, no no

I don’t wanna give it
Why you wanna give it
Why you wanna givin it all away
Cuz you’re givin it all givin it all away yeah yeah
Cuz You’re givin it all away hey, hey, hey

Hey, paved paradise, to put up a parking lot
la,la, la, la, la, la, la ,la ,la ,la ,la
Paved paradise, and put up a parking lot
———————————
Mr. Jones
——————————-
Mrs. Potter’s Lullaby
another one with great lyrics

Well I woke in mid-afternoon cause that’s when it all hurts the most
I dream I never know anyone at the party and I’m always the host
If dreams are like movies, then memories are films about ghosts
You can never escape, you can only move south down the coast

well, I am an idiot walking a tightrope of fortune and fame
I am an acrobat swinging trapezes through circles of flame
If you’ve never stared off in the distance, then your life is a shame
and though I’ll never forget your face,
sometimes i can’t remember my name

Hey Mrs. Potter don’t cry
Hey Mrs. Potter I know why but
Hey Mrs. Potter won’t you talk to me

Well, there’s a piece of Maria in every song that I sing
And the price of a memory is the memory of the sorrow it brings
And there is always one last light to turn out and one last bell to ring
And the last one out of the circus has to lock up everything

Or the elephants will get out and forget to remember what you said
And the ghosts of the tilt-a-whirl will linger inside your head
And the ferris wheel junkies will spin there forever instead
When I see you a blanket of stars covers me in my bed

Hey Mrs. Potter don’t go
Hey Mrs. Potter I don’t know but
Hey Mrs. Potter won’t you talk to me

All the blue light reflections that color my mind when I sleep
And the lovesick rejections that accompany the company I keep
All the razor perceptions that cut just a little too deep
Hey I can bleed as well as anyone, but I need someone to help me sleep

So I throw my hand into the air and it swims in the beams
It’s just a brief interruption of the swirling dust sparkle jet stream
Well, I know I don’t know you and you’re probably not what you seem
But I’d sure like to find out
So why don’t you climb down off that movie screen

Hey Mrs. Potter don’t turn
Hey Mrs. Potter I burn for you
Hey Mrs. Potter won’t you talk to me

When the last king of Hollywood shatters his glass on the floor
and orders another
Well, I wonder what he did that for
That’s when I know that I have to get out cause I have been there before
So I gave up my seat at the bar and I head for the door

We drove out to the desert just to lie down beneath this bowl of stars
We stand up in the palace like it’s the last of the great pioneer town bars
We shout out these songs against the clang of electric guitars
You can see a million miles tonight
But you can’t get very far
Oh, you can see a million miles tonight
But you can’t get very far

Hey Mrs. Potter I won’t touch
Hey Mrs. Potter it’s not much but
Hey Mrs. Potter won’t you talk to me

And yet another great band is the Gin Blossoms.

Til I Hear It From You
Found Out About You
Hey Jealousy
Until I Fall Away

I love Lila Downs because she is so different. She mainly sings in Spanish but was born and raised in the U.S. and went back to Mexico. She plays a powerful guitar and is very lively. Looks a lot like Frida Kahlo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fx9dbLhndrQ&feature=related

Peace,
Mary