It is what it is

Most of my friends
are musicians in the subway stations
Making amends with a dark and different world
Paying their dues like a faulty underwater mortgage
Taking the cues from a nonexistent fantasy girl


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Gold Motel's latest, brimming with good summer vibes, as always. As if one needs a reminder that we're right smack in the middle of the hottest season of a calender year. Currently living under the oppression of a colossal heat wave, one which I can barely walk straight in.

Time's passing quicker than I could have ever imagined, which is strange, because the days seem fuller as compared to the past academic semester & I'm wondering why my weeks fall through my fingers faster than I can flip through my daily planner. Just came back from church camp a couple of days ago, which was an amazing but mad tiring experience, one I'm sure to blog about if time allows (great worship, lovely people, 3am nights). Then there's the endless parade of paperwork for Sweden, decorating up the studio for our acoustic sessions that's launching in July, time with family & friends & of course, church stuff. There's always something to do.


Everyday's an adventure; I'm wondering when things will finally slow down, slow down enough for me to catch up.

A backseat kiss

A Summer Playlist

All of the noise, all of the heat.

Cold Shoulders - Gold Motel

Violet - Thao With The Get Down Stay Down

Let The Record Go - The Mynabirds

Movements - Rend Collective Experiment

She Moves In Her Own Way - The Kooks

Saw You First - Givers 

We Bought A Zoo - Jonsi

When I'm Sixty-Four - The Beatles

Cape Town - The Young Veins

Blow Away - A Fine Frenzy

In The Sun - She & Him

Wouldn't It Be Nice - The Beach Boys

Tongue Tied - Grouplove

MFEO Part 1: Made For Each Other - Jack's Mannequin

Daylight - Matt & Kim

We're On The Run - Gold Motel

Life on the Nickel

Things that have made me very very happy of late

1. Heaps of books: Shakespeare, Whitman, Eugenides, Kundra and Edgar Allan Poe

2. Long lunches at nice restaurants with people I've missed.

3. Live music at interesting places

4. Naps.

5. Eight seasons of Grey's Anatomy and four of 30 rock

6. Jones the Grocer and their multitude of teas

7. She & Him's Christmas album

8. My Tumblr dashboard

9. My Gold Motel Package that traveled across the world thrice in six months. It's no longer summer, but the tunes are still good

10. Exams are over, school is out for six weeks!

In an exceptionally good mood. I can take on the world! Happy thanksgiving and turkey gobbling to everyone!

Lights

Le Weekend! (has been quite wonderful)

On Folk & Indie

Sigh No More - Mumford & Sons
Sea Lion Woman - Feist
Blow Away - A Fine Frenzy
Rambling Man - Laura Marling
Holland, 1945 - Neutral Milk Hotel
Cold Shoulders - Gold Motel
Sun Giant - Fleet Foxes
The Girl - City & Colour
Paper Aeroplane - Angus & Julia Stone
I Found A Reason - Cat Power

I love it when things are simple. Like how they should be.

1 2 3 4

A PLAYLIST
(For when you're stoked about your worst nightmare
called A levels ending in a little over 12 hours)

Phantom Punch - Sondre Lerche
Music when the Lights go out - The Libertines
You only live once - The Strokes
I Feel it All - Feist
The Bomb - New Young Pony Club
Blender - The Pretty Reckless
Hysteric - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
The Rollercoaster Ride - Belle & Sebastian
Rock and Roll Party - Iggy Pop
We're on the Run - Gold Motel
Dance into the Night - the View
Animal - Neon Trees

The time of wine red

In spite of Gold Motel's summer-y pop tunes, I can't help but miss the quartet. WHY HUSH SOUND, WHY.

All of the noise, all of the heat

'GOLD MOTEL doesn’t exist, but if it did, you’d find it on a winding road somewhere in the sun-drenched hills of Southern California'

Lauren Henry

The slow decline of The Hush Sound under the pretense of a 'hiatus' was devastating to watch; no one could be more gutted than I. For someone who has followed the band through the makings of their debut album So Sudden (Dorian Gray, anyone?), to Like Vines and finally, to the brilliantly-decadent Goodbye Blues, it was unlikely anything better could exist.

And then Greta Salpeter made Gold Motel.

It started from one of their first singles that appeared on a five-song EP, back when Greta was believed to be pursuing a solo project. 'We're on the Run' was featured on the Indie Rock Playlist, which is, by the way, an invaluable site for lesser-known genius. Greta's amazing vocals and inspiring lyrics caught me immediately. Hook, line and sinker. The amazing thing was that the rest of the band was made out of a mish-mash of musicians from This Is Me Smiling and The Yearbooks, particularly the notable guitarist of the former, Dan Duszynski. The chemistry of the five musicians was obviously too hard to resist, and thus, Gold Motel was born.

First things first, Gold Motel sounds near nothing like the Hush Sound. Granted, the Hush Sound may have been magnificent in its own right, but Summer House creates a whole new sound altogether. Greta's California-inspired summer lyrics filled with heartwrenching nostalgia will surprise a THS listener, but pleasantly. The ten-track playlist features simple and clean (but lovely, none the less) guitar riffs as compared to the signature distorted jarrs of Bob Morris, an absence in morbid lyrics and noticeably less keys by Salpeter. All in all, a light-hearted album dedicated to living life at it's fullest.

More than an album, it is a story. A story of road trips, love, and finding solace in summer houses. Something, pretty much incredible :)

So here's to you, Greta!


Side note: It will still be extremely sad if The Hush Sound never writes and plays together again. Bob Morris is still a guitar king. The Days of Chris Faller may be over, but hopefully, that will change! The Hush Sound <3