since everyone's sounding off... this was something i posted to the
official bulletin board a while ago:
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i'm a huge fan of sunny day real estate, have been since diary. i've
seen them a bunch of times, have tons of their posters and cds and vinyl
all over my bedroom, and i listen to them practically every day. my ears
perk up when i overhear people talking about sunny days or real estate,
even when they have nothing to do with the band. when i found out they
were getting back together i screamed and cried and called everyone i
knew. diary changed my life before i even put it into my cd player, just
thumbing through the lyrics on the drive back home from the record store
(i was 14 or so at the time) made me want to just break down and cry and
scream and i listened to it every night for two months to the point
where i had to beg a friend to take it off my hands for a few months
just because i couldn't sleep anymore. of course, i was in a point in my
life where i was very depressed (over a girl, of course) and that's what
made me click with the album so much in the first place. i've bought
diary three times. the first copy got stolen, the second copy got
scratched from me taking it everywhere, and the third copy a got a few
weeks ago. to this day i call diary my favorite album. but, i can hardly
listen to it anymore. not because it's emotionally overwhelming for me
like it when i was 15, but because i'm not at that point anymore. i have
a girlfriend and we've been together for a year. i'm out of school and i
have a full-time job. i'm rarely ever depressed. although "how it feels
to be something on" and "the rising tide" don't sonically and
emotionally blow me away like diary and lp2 *DID*, they are more
well-crafted musical works of art then the past two records are. sunny
day has moved on from that era, just as i have. and although i still pop
diary into my cd player every once in a while (and i still can't wait to
see them play more older stuff live), i listen to the rising tide almost
every day (not including in-store play). something as simple as the
rolling bassline at the end of "tearing in my heart" capitivates me more
than the passionate wails of "48."
-----
and that still holds true to this day (except i split up with my
girlfriend). so, maybe i'm one of the few... but i'm an old school sdre
fan that totally understands (at least, i think i do) the direction they
are going... i absolutely adore the rising tide. sure, i have a few
problems with it (just like everyone other sdre record, and every other
album i own for that matter), a few of the lyrics are "awkward,"
"television" (although i do like it) reminds me way tooo much of pearl
jam's "jeremy" (although supposedly the band didn't even realize it)...
but for the most part it's an amazing, well-crafted album with just
enough production. whereas diary was about blowing you away with
distorted guitar and screaming, and hiftbso was about proving that their
music could be just as emotional without much of either, TRT has just
enough diary-style rocking and hiftbso-style mellowness and superb
vocals. the lyrics are a departure from the earlier records, and i
think a lot of people get confused by that... but i like them. at
first, it was almost kind of shocking to hear jeremy sing lines like
"let's say you found a gun... how would your bad side burn?" and that
kind of made it cool. to me sunny day has always been more about the
way the words are sung then the actual lyrics... diary has a few lyrics
that sound like bad high-school poetry, but the passion in jeremy's
vocals communicates so much more. just like in TRT, although one's
"everything and everyone..." is tremendously cliché, you get a feeling
that the band means way more than that. every song on TRT communicates
a specific feeling or message and i love them all.
what the hell do i listen to besides sunny day, you ask? i listen to my
fair share of the emo/indie stuff out there: cursive, juliana theory, at
the drive-in, death cab for cutie, mineral, modest mouse, built to
spill, pedro the lion, elliott smith, etc... however my music collection
contains albums by people from garth brooks to snoop dogg. in fact i
listen to a lot of hip-hop like wu-tang, jurassic 5, black eyed peas...
and yes, even eminem, more "mainstream" rock like deftones, smashing
pumpkins, and even (gasp!) foo fighters, neo-punk shiznit like nofx,
h2o, 88 fingers louie, millencolin, afi... white-boy funk like dub
narcotic, soul coughing... "fun" stuff like the presidents, weezer, nerf
herder... and since i'm from seattle, i have my fair share of nirvana,
pearl jam, and soundgarden records... basically i listen to everything
but sugar pop, techno, limp bizkit-type bands, and so-called "easy
listening." but my favorite band of all time continues to be sunny day
real estate... they have yet to let me down.
i just have this crazy feeling that their fifth album is going to be
their best yet... and will unite all of the subscribers of this list in
sunny day love. who's with me?
np: del the funky homosapien -- "both sides of the brain"
