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read between the lines
jazzed by jamie i think this is like the 2nd time i've been online, wireless, on my new (read: one-year-old, rarely-used) hp tablet. it's a lazy sunday and i made it for service today before the sermon started...yay.-great, my internet connection just got lost, and my tabbed browsing history just got wiped out. hmm, guess the public wireless service here is really unreliable. a pity since i was listening to jamie cullum on youtube.- yes, i recently discovered jamie cullum, through the most unlikely source (in my opinion): a colleague whom i'm not even close to. she just shoved me her external hard drive and went, here, take whatever music you want. and so i took whatever caught my eye, and that happened to be jamie's twentysomething [UK special edition] -- the one with the extra set of songs. it was so good i actually went and bought the CD, as well as jamie's later album catching tales shortly after. yes, unlike most people i still own (proudly) a discman. jamie's music has been so soothing, like a healing balm for my tired, troubled soul. when i listened to his songs, my first reaction was, i can't believe i could've missed such good music all this while (for it has been, after all, 6 years since twentysomething came out). i mean, of course i'd heard about the jazz hobbit and saw his promotional trailer when he was interviewed locally a few years back on a business network's morning show. and sure i'd heard bits and pieces of his music whether on the radio or in a film. but i'd never actually heard any of his songs in their entirety and i found that, when i finally did hear them out, i really liked them. it is a big plus for me as well that he plays the piano in a jazz crossover-to-pop kind of way, because it is exactly the kind of stuff i aspire and try to play whenever i'm jamming on the piano (an exceedingly rare pastime i get to carry out in recent years due to inescapable constraints). and i must say, his songs are just a joy to play on the piano. especially the re-interpretations of covers he does by the bands i dig, like radiohead. i dare say his music has helped my productivity at work to a certain extent, which was unexpected because as a general rule, i find that playing jazz or slow songs when i work slows down whatever i'm doing and relaxes me too much. but that wasn't the case here. it kept me at a moderate, yet comfortable pace...and i realised that is something i really need right now: to calm down. and i obviously connect with the lyrics in his songs, be they covers or originals. it helps too that they model a bright outlook on life. one small bone of contention though, is that his music videos don't quite capture the spirit of his music. some even look cheesy, like the animated shadow figurines in photograph, which is actually a beautiful song to sing, especially the chorus. on another note (pun intended), i also tried sampling michael bublé from my colleague's music collection, but found i had an adverse reaction to the music. what's more, i am more familiar with bublé's music! haha. the only song i ever really liked of his was crazy love, probably because it was the only original. i really hate covers when they're done in the almost exact same way as the original, because more often than not, the original sounds better. i think that's enough of me waxing lyrical about my comfort |
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