my top five favorite: albums

Even before itunes and ipods and spotify I used to prefer building my own playlists (with mixtapes!) to playing an album start-to-finish, but there are always some albums that I think are so perfect that I happily play them uninterrupted, the way they were intended to be heard.

First up is Power, Corruption, and Lies by New Order. One of my all time favorite albums, although I tend to play one side more than the other and I tend to go over and put the needle back on "Your Silent Face" over and over again.



This post could have easily been five Killers albums but I wanted to limit myself to one and give some room to other bands/artists. And narrowing it down to one was VERY DIFFICULT.  But ultimately Day and Age has my heart. Honestly whatever album "Dustland Fairytale" was on was going to get my vote, but when you add in "Spaceman" and "Human" it's basically a shoe-in. (Runner up would probably be either Sam's Town or Battle Born.)



This is the soundtrack for the movie Borsalino. It's just a super fun jazzy '20s-'30s inspired album and I put this on all the time when I need to get some pep in my step for the day. If I need to clean up or get dressed for a late shift at work after I'm already done in, this does the trick. It also reminds me of the movie (which I love!) and that's always a fun bonus when you listen to soundtracks :)



I first heard this when I was staying at The Polynesian in Disney World two years ago and I ended up downloading the album to listen to on the plane home, and then I found an LP on ebay to listen to on my record player. My favorite song on the album is "Pineapple Princess" followed closely by "Hawaiian Love Talk." It's just so fun and bubbly and, especially in the winter, it's nice to be transported to Hawaii (or a Disneyesque version of Hawaii, I guess, lol!)



Last but not least, my favorite Frank Sinatra album -- Moonlight Sinatra. This has spun around my turntable so often that sometimes I think I should buy a backup. Whenever I decide to put this one on, I just can't stop. I keep flipping it over, playing, flipping over, playing, until it's time for bed. My favorites on this album are "Moonlight Serenade" and "Oh, You Crazy Moon."

blue saturday

Saturday night I saw New Order in concert in Philadelphia! I can't even begin to describe how amazing it was, definitely one of the best experiences of my entire life. Hearing your favorite band perform your favorite songs in person... actually feeling the music, your heartbeat changing to match the beat, it's overwhelming in the best possible way. When my favorite song (Your Silent Face) started I randomly jumped in the air, I was so excited! I watched through watery eyes, my brain kept jumping back and forth between being in the moment and enjoying the song to thinking "oh my god, that is New Order right in front of me, they are right there playing my favorite song, how is this POSSIBLE, how am I this lucky"

They played a perfect mix of old standbys and songs from their new album (which is outstanding, by the way) A lot of their new songs have already become favorites of mine, so I was really excited to hear them in person (Singularity, Academic, and Restless were all on the set list. You can listen to their new album on youtube here btw.) For the encore they played two Joy Division songs; Atmosphere and Love Will Tear Us Apart. (At the end the words "Joy Division Forever" appeared on the screen behind them. Excuse me while I go sob for eternity.) I knew they had played Atmosphere at the Radio City show a few days earlier, and I was really unsure whether or not I wanted to see them perform it at the Philadelphia show. It's one of my absolute favorite songs, but a huge part of why I love it is Ian Curtis' painful vocals. But any trepidation I felt about that was erased immediately when I heard the song start at the show. Bernard Sumner did an excellent job with the lyrics and they projected the 1988 music video that paid tribute to Ian Curtis while they played. Goosebumps.



Okay, onto my outfit! Pretty much within minutes of securing tickets to the show, I came up with this outfit idea. The cover of my favorite New Order album, Power, Corruption & Lies, features the painting A Basket of Roses by French painter Henri Fantin-Latour, with a colored code that represents the title & track listing in the upper right corner. The painting has a creative commons license, so I found a high quality image online and had it printed onto a dress. Then I got square wooden beads and painted them to match the color code from the album cover. My mom (who is basically super-woman when it comes to... well, everything, but especially working with jewelry supplies) turned the beads into a necklace for me. I don't know if I've ever been more thrilled with an outfit before! It came out even better than I imagined. And I love that the dress just looks like a normal floral dress, the necklace just looks like a geometric piece of jewelry, it's not super obvious that I'm theme dressing unless you're a fan of New Order.

dress and necklace - DIY | shoes - bait footwear
sweater - f21 | purple rug - amazon

music complete

New Order released a new album, Music Complete, in September and I'm a horrible fan who just got around to purchasing it. But I'm beyond obsessed with it already (I may have a few songs memorized and I just got the album on Sunday, oops) My favorite songs are Singularity (you can listen on youtube here) and Superheated (you can listen on youtube here.)

Brandon Flowers from The Killers does the vocals on Superheated and SOMEHOW I wasn't super familiar with them beforehand, except for Mr. Brightside. But I loved Superheated so much I ended up binge-listening to their songs on youtube and then buying all of their albums on itunes. I have a somewhat large itunes library (mostly due to me acting impulsively like I just did with The Killers) but my actual listening habits tend to be very focused on one single song or artist. I'll listen to one song on repeat for weeks sometimes. I don't end up trying to find new music too often because I get so compulsively attached to the songs I'm already listening to.

Maybe that's why whenever I do find new music that I love I fall completely head over heels. Music just makes me happy in a way that few things do. It reminds me of Leslie Knope's quote about taking risks ;) "Amazing. Tingling sensation throughout my whole body. I feel flushed. My muscles are relaxed yet I feel awake. Just waves of pleasure. I wish there was something physical that could make me feel this way."

ps. If you're like me and were somehow unaware of The Killers, these are my favorites so far -- Human, Spaceman, Change Your Mind, Read My Mind, Joy Ride and All These Things That I've Done. Go forth and listen!! :)

dress - asos | cardigan - old navy | shoes - bait footwear