Ain't No Rest For the Wicked: Song Review

This song was also a lost treasure that I found late one night while browsing the Alternative genre top 150 charts. The Caged Elephants have made so much music that I love still to this day. And they are still coming out with new stuff!! Right now, I can’t stop listening to their latest hit song “Cigarette Daydreams”. But let’s save that one for another time. Right now I want to talk about one of the greatest songs by The Caged Elephants ever made called “Ain’t No Rest For the Wicked” and what my interpretation of the song is.

To me, each verse represents something that could completely take control of you. The street he's walking on represents the course of his life.

In the first verse, the narrator encounters sex or lust. When he says, "You're such a sweet young thing, why do you do this to yourself?," I think he overcomes his temptations in search of a deeper form of love, though not completely.

I like to picture the person that the narrator encounters in the second verse as a drug dealer. I think that the whole verse vaguely talks about the risks and struggles associated with drugs and drug deals. I think it takes a while for him to overcome his temptation for drugs, contrasting the fifteen minutes that passed after his first encounter and the couple hours after his second encounter.

In the third verse, the narrator finally gets off of the street and into his house, as his life is winding down. He encounters religion, as a lot of people do towards the end of their life. He witnesses the corrupt bullshit that can take place behind the scenes of a church. He ends the verse in understanding because he has confronted these different temptations and he understands how easy it can be to get lost on the street of wickedness, even when you're subscribed to a religion that is meant to be pure.

These social issues exist as a result of our flawed capitalist system. Money fuels impurity and everybody is looking for their next thrill. It is sad that the world has come down to money and doing anything just to make a quick buck. I think that’s the main reason the group sang the song the way that they did. With anger and “wickedness”.

A Fault in Our Stars: Movie Review

I had been wanting to watch A Fault in Our Stars since the day I saw the trailer for it. Unfortunately, I was too stubborn to watch it until I could watch it with a close group of friends. So, I didn't end up watching it until two days ago which was about seven months after it came out. Yeah yeah I'm that pathetic.

So, since it had came out that long ago, the group of friends I watched it with had all already seen it at least once. One person had seen it seven times!! So of course when it came to all of the extremely sad and emotional parts, I was the only person with tears running down my face. Most everyone was either laughing, laughing at me, or only slightly tearing up.

The whole movie is pretty much based on the acclaimed novel by John Green, The Fault in Our Stars evades teen romance tropes to embrace more mature conventions. Instead of surviving high school, Hazel struggles with lung and thyroid cancer. Her love life is an afterthought... until she meets the perfect guy. Cancer survivor Gus (Ansel Elgort) disrupts Hazel's malaise with an intoxicating swaggerish attitude. Fault's not a corny high school movie, but it's still dream-fulfillment with a GED. 500 Days of Summer writers Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber and director Josh Boone indulge in whimsical fluff only to burn it down with grief. Cancer is their dramatic trump card. Tears will flow, one way or another.

It was mix of emotions all the way through the entire movie. The parts where the two, Gus and Hazel, are just hanging out and especially the parts where Gus does surprising and special things for Hazel and makes her smile always made me smile and feel truly happy. But, on the other side, I felt extremely sad and actually teared up during the parts where they were in the hospital and the death of Gus and his funeral (hit me very hard). But the one scene that hit me the hardest, was the scene when they were on the bench. That was the first time and one of the only times during the movie wear I had tears pouring down my face.

All together, A Fault in Our Stars was on of the most nerve racking, emotional, and amazing movies I have ever seen.

Stay With Me: Song Review

Sam Smith is by far one of my top favorite artists right now. The way he portrays his music and message the he wants to get through is enthralling. In this song, I don’t feel like he is singing about a lost love, rather an addiction of some sort. 

Right now the song means a lot to me. I feel it is about a relationship that just didn't work, they weren't in love. But he doesn't want to girl to leave because he isn't ready to be alone. So until he finds someone who he truly is in love with, he wants the girl to stay around to fill that empty void.

"Guess it's true, I'm not good at a one-night stand. 

But I still need love 'cause I'm just a man. 

These nights never seem to go to plan.

I don't want you to leave, will you hold my hand?"

The one night stand portrays an addiction of some sort. This "love" he needs could come from various sources, man, woman, drugs, alcohol. He can’t leave the addiction, he doesn't want it to go away or leave. 

"Why am I so emotional? No, it's not a good look, gain some self-control. And deep down I know this never works. But you can lay with me so it doesn't hurt

Addiction causes emotions and usually no self-control (the mind is powerful in many ways) whatever the addiction is, he doesn’t want it to leave, it needs to stay by his side. He can’t control it.

I just love this song and the meaning of it. I can’t really relate to it right now because I’m not currently in the relationship. But, I’m sure if I found someone that I truly fell in love with, I’d feel the same way as Sam Smith.

Tongue Tied: Song Review

Almost every night I have a set schedule. I get home from school, get some chores done, finish up my homework if I have any, check some instagram, try and make plans with friends after realizing its probably way too late to try, then sit around and watch netflix and text people. But one part of my night always stands true. At one point or another, I end up going on itunes and going through music of different genres. Usually it consist of casually browsing through the Alternative and Electronic categories. I'll look for songs in the featured section and the top one fifty in the genres chart.

This weekend I found several songs that I instantly fell in love with. But one in particular stuck out to me. The song "Tongue Tied" by Grouplove was a song that I had heard years and years ago and had completely forgotten about. It was honestly like finding a lost treasure.

I think this song is about a guy, who loves this girl, who he is addressing in the song, and he's saying let's go back in time, to your best friend's house, to that party, where I messed up. I got too high, I made out with some girl Marmalade that I don't like like I love you. And him being tongue tied is a double entente- he's tongue tied as in the literal sense, busy making out with that girl and caught in the act, but also tongue tied as in he doesn't know what to say to explain himself to her, the girl he loved then, the girl he still loves now, even after a meaningless makeout.

I'm pulling some of this meaning from the music video, which plays backwards like Coldplay's 'The Scientist'. You see him eat a brownie as the last shot, and working backwards (as in forward, if that makes sense), he makes out with some girl, the girl's part comes in and she looks annoyed as she sings, he looks distressed as he washes his face in the bathroom to 'sober up' and while he sings 'I love you now' you can hear the desperation in his voice, and then he runs away from the party escaping 3 masked men that watch him and chase him. Maybe symbolic of his regret.

I just love this song. It makes me feel alive and get away from my life and worries. I highly recommend this song for your playlists to listen to while chilling with friends or by yourself.

Youth by Daughter: Song Review

One of my really good friends showed me this song, I instantly fell in love with it. Youth by Daughter is probably one of my all time favorite songs.

Generally, I think this song is about growing up and the pain this brings along. It's a scream of pain directed to all those adults who think that young people have nothing to worry about and don't take youngsters seriously. She is opposing strongly to this general illusion of a carefree youth.

"We are the reckless we are the wild youth" to me is meant in an ironic way and is the bottom line of the song, cause clearly this person doesn't feel reckless and wild. At least not in a carefree way as young people are generally supposed to be. 

She is painting an image of her generation: young people who have no clue where to go and how to live life.
They (want to) die before they grow old (be it by suicide, traffic accidents, drugs,...). 
They set fire to their insides for fun (literally by smoking cigarettes, but also metaphorical by revolting and experimenting with extreme opinions)
They don't understand love.
They are just trying...and hurting. The way of life doesn't seem to make sense. 

I don't know about you, but for me the most intense lyric is "And if you're still bleeding, you're the lucky ones". Such a powerful way of saying that if you are bleeding, it means that you are still alive. Maybe only for a few seconds... but always remember: the unlucky ones are already dead. Be grateful for every second in your life.

She lost her home (childhood or feeling of safety) and some particular event or person caused it. She blames this person for it. 

No matter how dark the song is, somehow I feel she knows this is just how life goes and that's why she is not keeping the song on a strictly personal level, but is also reaching out to others with sentences like "if you're still in love than you are the lucky ones". She does know love or a feeling of home is possible, but at this moment she just doesn't believe it is meant for her, because she is aching too much.

The emotion and intensity of this song is too surreal. I can't really describe the feeling it gives you besides that it makes me want to keep listening over and over again till you really find out the true meaning of it.

Rangers Apprentice Book Series: Review

If you're a fan of fantasy and action books, you'll love the Ranger's Apprentice series by the author John Flanagan. In the book series, Will (who is an orphan and ward of the castle Redmont) becomes an apprentice to the master Ranger named Halt. Rangers are secretive warriors who use their intelligence, courage, ability to move around unseen, and skills with bows and knives to protect the kingdom of Araluen. After training under Halt, young Will is off on a series of adventures to save Araluen from the evil Lord Morgarath.

At first, you meet the main characters and learn about their skills and personalities in the first book of the series, Rangers Apprentice: The Ruins of Gorlan. Will, a ward at Redmont Castle, had hoped to become a knight just like he thought his father was before he died, but his small size was not suited to that path. Instead, he learns that his stealth and intelligence, which has been observed by from the ranger Halt from the first day he had the idea to sneak off, would serve him well as a Ranger. He's placed as an apprentice to Halt—the ultimate teacher. Despite Halt's grumpiness and constant demands, Will admires his master and soon considers him a father figure.

Will and Halt team up with Halt's former apprentice, Gilan, to battle a group of beasts, the Kalkaras which are intelligent beasts born to hunt and assassinate for shiny objects, dispatched by the evil Morgarath . Fifteen years ago, Morgarath, a former baron of Araluen, tried to overthrow the king of Araluen, but was defeated by Halt in a huge war/battle and sent into exile on Mountains of Rain and Night. Will's newly learned skills—and his ability to use them under pressure—are put to the test.

After this book, the series goes on, telling stories and showing the characters experiences and growth in skills and character over time.

I enjoyed this series because its filled with action and excitement. The author included so many vivid details that I felt as if I was at the front line of the battles. Each of the characters seemed human and realistic. For example, even the heroes had flaws. In addition, each of the books ended with a cliffhanger, making me eager to read the next in the series. I highly recommend the Ranger's Apprentice series to any fan of fast-paced fantasy and action books.

The Interview: Movie Review

When I went to see this movie, I pretty much got what I expected from it to be honest. I mean, it has James Franco and Seth Rogen in it and the whole movie is about making fun of North Korea and killing Kim Jung Un. Now this movie stirred up a lot of fuss, so much that North Korea actually threatened the United States with a terrorist attack that (and I quote) “will be worse than Nine Eleven”. But, as Americans, pretty much the greatest country in the world, didn’t care what so ever. We could easily destroy them if they tried anything on us.

But we weren’t going to be completely stupid while making this completely rude movie. Sony Pictures has already digitally altered the uniforms on the actors playing North Korean soldiers so that they are not identical to the real-world military. The studio is now also in the midst of the ramifications of a massive hack that may be related to the film. It’s much ado about a movie whose central characters have their watches perpetually set to 4:20.

This movie is basically about the character Dave Skylark (James Franco) who is the face of Skylark Tonight, a celebrity gossip show that prides itself on the revealing of deep, shrouded secrets of the Hollywood elite. Although, Skylark would nothing without his producer and best friend Aaron Rapaport (Seth Rogen).

When the team is offered the surprising opportunity to interview Kim Jung Un, the CIA recruits them to assassinate him. Once in North Korea, Kim Jung decides to trick the men into thinking all is well in North Korea and all the things that America has said about it like starving people are all lies. He manipulates Skylark not really caring about Aaron. He makes Skylark relate to him in many ways to force him into not wanting to do the assassination and say good things about North Korea instead of the bad things he was supposed to say.

Now I won’t say anymore just in case you viewers out there haven’t seen this yet, but this is one of the funniest craziest movies I have ever seen and let’s just say you won’t want to miss it.

How to Train Your Dragon 2; Movie Review

I must say, this movie far exceeded what my initial expectations were. Set five years after the first film, How to Train Your Dragon 2 boldly ages its characters from teenagers to young adults. Our hero Hiccup is now 20 years old, has picked up a lot of new tricks since we last saw him, and he's acquired a slick new arsenal that includes a custom wing suit, a duel-purpose prosthetic leg and, most notably, a telescoping fire sword.

Now, looking less like Harry Potter and more like Luke Skywalker, the older Hiccup is a natural adventurer, always on the lookout for new and exciting places to go. As Hiccup puts it in the movie, "With Vikings on the backs of dragons, the world just got a whole lot bigger."  However, Hiccup's father Stoick (Gerard Butler) has nobler plans for his son and hopes that Hiccup will take his place as Berk's Chief.

Naturally, this idea doesn’t sit too well with Hiccup. All the while, Hiccup has been trying and pushing Toothless, his dragon, to new heights and distances. Everyday Hiccup and his dragon will ride out to lands undiscovered by their village yet to see if there is anything else out there to be seen or needed by his people.

But, in all stories like this one, when exploring for things that haven’t been seen before, you usually find something. In one adventure out into new lands, Hiccup finds himself in front of a huge iceberg unlike any he’d ever seen before. It wasn’t natural. It was tall, thin, and had many spikes coming out from it. While looking at this ice, he is spotted by men that seem to be dragon hunters that try and capture Toothless. Hiccup finds out this man capturing dragons is Eret and he is doing this to give them over to Drago Bludvist. This man is a typical bad guy, wants all the dragons to himself, thinks he is the only one who can control them, wants to rule the world. Pretty much ripped from the pages of Bad Guys 101.

But one thing from this movie that is the most memorable part has to be Hiccups discovery of his long lost mother Valka. Now I don’t want to spoil too much, but let’s just say  she plays an important role in Hiccup’s fight against Drago and shares some emotional amazing scenes with her husband Stoick that fleshes out both of the characters.

With saying all of that, I don’t want to spoil the entire movie for all who have not seen it, but let’s just say, in my personal opinion, How to Train Your Dragon 2 is far better than the first and is a must see for all ages.