The Notes of Glitch the Hamster
Alexey Gerasimovich's blog about books, music, Cyprus, and everything else
Today, I’m featuring the song “Lonely” by Palaye Royale from their album The Bastards.
The band is relatively young, and I discovered them thanks to my eldest daughter. It’s an interesting time when your kids start recommending music to you. Back to the song—it’s got a fantastic music video that perfectly aligns with the lyrics, and the song itself has a lot of energy.
Interestingly, the song is based on the lead singer’s personal experiences, as he mentions in the comments.
Many people discovered the band “AnimatsiYA” through their song about the homeland. Then it turned out that they write a lot of interesting music in general.
Here’s a song that’s not exactly new, but one that both my wife and I still enjoy playing in the car—”Ilyich”:
I’ve decided to start a small music section on this blog, where I’ll occasionally share songs I like—either found online or heard somewhere. I’ve dabbled in this before, but now I’m giving it a bit more of an “official” touch.
And for the first post: a very recent song by the band Splean. It’s quite fitting, as I’ve finally decided to read the Harry Potter series. The song is called Pass This to Harry Potter If You Happen to Meet Him:
The song is already four years old and has even been performed at many official events in Belarus. Nothing particularly special, but it somehow resonated with me. I came across it thanks to the new (third) BSU team in KVN.
If there were a bit more Belarusian language in the lyrics, it would hit even harder.
There’s also a cover by children from Brest:
I write a lot about books, but I’ve decided to turn my attention to life and music videos—songs that have intertwined with my sense of self in surprising ways.
Age brings interesting changes to how we perceive the world. I’m sure I’m still far from the wisdom of the elders, but even at 42, I can see how different I am from my twenty-year-old self.
We start to enjoy books we once thought were boring, while the ones we once loved now seem odd (how could I have liked that?). The same goes for songs, even from artists I never listened to before—they suddenly feel relevant.
But deep down, you still feel like the same young guy, thinking not much has changed. Then you catch your reflection in the mirror or look at your kids and realize that others no longer see you the way you feel. And you don’t even have to look far. At work, you see all these truly young people, full of energy and just beginning their careers.
Read moreAbout a year ago, I asked on my Facebook about a song that had a big influence during childhood or adolescence. The question wasn’t about what you were listening to, but what became your anthem or influenced you in some way.
For example, I was a fan of “Laskoviy May,” and I had all their albums on cassette (my wife still loves to remind me of this fact). But after them, I switched to the band “Kino,” and it was their song that helped me in life for a long time, specifically the words “You must be strong,” etc.
But today, I started thinking about something else. We live, we grow, and we listen to different music for different reasons. Sometimes we just like the melody, sometimes the lyrics. Even now, in most songs, I perceive the voice and lyrics more as another instrument in the song. For me, the melody is more important than the words.
However, there are still songs where it’s the lyrics that truly stand out. My example is Pink’s song “Dear Mr. President.”
And even more rarely, the lyrics not only stand out on their own but also deeply resonate with your mood and sense of self during a particular life period. Recently, for me, this song unexpectedly became Pavel Volya’s “Mama, We Are All Getting Older.” Before this song, I didn’t even know Volya wrote and performed music.
Here’s the song on YouTube, though this is a slower version performed with “Gorod 312,” while I prefer the more energetic solo version. But the music video was only made for the joint version:
What songs have become “age-related” for you?
