Drunk Machine - Fogg Future

Wow, this is so good- the drums, the guitar riffs, the singing-it all sounds like it was made from the guts- just like rock music should be. It's hard to explain how this loud music makes me calm but after a long and frustrating day (make that month) this is just what I need to relax. On another note, it's Student Day! There's definitely a festive atmosphere in the air and it's great to put everything aside and have a mini vacation. The performers were voted by the students and this year's lineup is pretty impressive with Infected Mushroom, Shalom Hanoch, Idan Raichel Project, Aviv Geffen, and more but I really wouldn't mind seeing something new and fresh like these amazing guys-who I'll make sure to catch live when the chance arrives. 

http://drunkmachine.com/

I Got the Hotties - All the Reasons

This is one of those songs that you hear in the morning and it stays with you all day. And although it's quite melancholic you don't really mind because it's such a good song. I Got the Hotties better known as Kol HaChatichim Etzli (כל החתיכים אצלי) are known for their energetic "we don't care" attitude and candid lyrics. This is much more mellow, but it still has painfully honest lyrics. And everything about this song just clicks. This is the unofficial video part of a same freeze shot project to battle the band's biggest enemy-ADHD (translated from the youtube description). There's something very therapeutic about just sitting in place for so long without doing anything. It's just as therapeutic for the viewer. Personally, I felt that I had to give them a little respect for their huge effort (it must have been freezing!) so I just sat still watching the waves and the sunset and it made me really listen to this great song. They just released their official video and it's also great. It has a plot and everything but whenever I hear the song I think about this one- it's just so more real.

I gave her a twenty shekel bill
She's sitting screaming and cursing
To the air
And about this country
I gave her twenty shekels
She won't buy with it teeth for her mouth
But I bought myself a good conscience

I don't need to go very far
To know
That I have all of the reasons in the world
To be happy
How is it that I'm not there yet
I think

Gillian left to study French
She's wasting her time because she'll never get
How crooked her teeth are
Gillian left to study French
At 45, she doesn't have a husband, nor kids
And how she's so dumb
I'm trying not to laugh

But I don't need to be so smart
To know
That I have all the reasons in the world
To be happy
How is it that I'm not there yet
I think

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KAzB9MYKFM&feature=youtu.be

http://www.igotthehotties.com/

Asaf Avidan-Different Pulses

So beautiful. This is much more than a video clip and really a work of art directed by the very talented Vania Heymann (remember the name!). The song itself is also great and goes perfectly with the video. Avidan rose to fame with the Mojos- I still enjoy listening to their first album except for Weak which got on my nerves because it was played so much. I only heard a few songs from their later albums, but I liked the fact that they were trying out new things even if it didn't always guarantee success. Now Avidan is flying solo and he's off to an amazing start. He has such a unique voice that it's so easy to make it a gimmick but here it goes wonderfully with the music and it's just right. You can really feel that he's matured as a singer and songwriter. He amazingly manages to sound so relevant and at the same time so different than everything else out there.

My life is like a wound I scratch so I can bleed
Regurgitate my words, I write so I can feed
And Death grows like a tree that's planted in my chest
Its roots are at my feet, I walk so it won't rest

Oh, Baby, I am Lost...

I try to push the colors through a prism back to white
To sync our different pulses into a blinding light
And if love is not the key. If love is not a key.
I hope that I can find a place where it could be

I know that in your heart there is an answer to a question
That I'm not as yet aware that I have asked
And if that tree had not drunk my tears
I would have bled and cried for all the years
That I alone have let them pass

Oh, Baby, I am yours...

http://www.asafavidanmusic.com/

http://www.youtube.com/user/vaniaHey

Five in the Morning - Roni Yedidia feat. Kobi Oz

What a great song to open the month with. After the wave of Passover and national days, there's an "after holidays" feel and it's a bit hard to get back into routine- especially with summer just around the corner. I'm so used to opening the day with Ynet- checking what happened while I was sleeping and usually something happened. It's always so surreal when I go abroad and don't hear hourly news updates on the radio and there's no main evening news program that the whole country watches. It would be nice if everyone would take a break during the summer. Nothing bad would happen, there would be nothing to report, and everyone would just chill and do whatever they please. Of course, that's unrealistic and everybody would probably just talk nonstop about how nothing ever happens. Or become obsessed with the weather. But there is always the hope of just for a bit living in a normal world where not much happens. This song is part of a project by Roni Yedidia of new versions to Nathan Alterman's wonderful poetry. I really like what he did with this song. It's so energetic and nostalgic for early Israeli music and the video is so bright and creative. 

Five in the morning, chilly
A lantern flashes light on the frozen main road
A star left is still shining on the city
Singular in his point of view

A man opens his window to the horizon
And takes out his dreaming nose.
His nose flies like a dove returning and informing
The world is still safe and sound.

On this night nothing happened
No continent in the oceans sank
No political map switched its skin
No republic busted

The history skipped over this night
And the newspaper writers overlooked in the shade
The man slowly gets dressed as if he were a hallucinator
And thinks, thank God.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Alterman

another song by Yedidia: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I31SaZwHhzY

Kobi Oz was the leader of the very popular 90's band Teapacks, known for their positive pop oriental style. Oz later went on to a solo career with more acoustic and religous songs.

http://kobioz.bandcamp.com/

http://teapacks.bandcamp.com/