Be Easy

This past week was hectic: midterms, papers, homework, meetings... I'm not even gonna get into specifics. What probably made everything even more difficult than usual, is the fact I went to Big Island the weekend before (where I did absolutely NOTHING school related.) So coming back to school after a (short) weekend of straight up cruising on an outer island, put me in a "do I really have to do this?" mood. I was on Spring Break mode and Spring Break doesn't even official start until tomorrow. It was all psychological; I was making it harder for myself than it actually was, so I seriously needed to "just relax, lay back, and be easy."

Which is exactly how "Be Easy" by Radical Something became this week's song. There have been so many times in my life where I think of or hear a word, and a song pops up in my mind. This time the word was "chill," which is pretty much the same as relax, so this song came to mind. Anyway, Radical something in general has some pretty chill songs, so I had their music on replay all week as I did my work for school.

My cousin introduced me to the group this past winter break. The first song I ever heard from them was "Sun Down" and is my favorite song from them. There are three members in the trio: 

Big Red, Josh Cocktail, and Loggy.

These guys have such great music. It's hard to pinpoint what their genera is. I'd say it's a mix between chill, hip-hop, pop, acoustic, reggae, rock, and alternative. All I could really find about them on the internet is that they knew each other awhile before they became a trio. Each were striving to become a solo artist when the world-renowned photographer Bruce Weber said they should form a group. As for their name, Loggy and Big Red wanted to be Radical _________. They knew they wanted to be something radical, so they became exactly that: Radical Something. They've released two Albums so far: We Are Nothing and No Sweat EP; and have a ton of singles that you can look up on Youtube.

Be Easy is a part of the album We Are Nothing (which is the album I had on replay all week). They paired up with song writer Kinetics (Jeremy "Kinetics" Dussolliet) and created the following lyrics:

Yeah

Feelin' fantastic...c'mon

Man a group like this you never could've expected:

Cocktail mixed with some Loggy and Kinetics

So just relax

Lay back and Be Easy

Take your time, let it go, live freely

And Be Easy (You know)

Palm trees, palm trees where we sit 'n' write

Strong drinks, strong drinks what we sippin' like

Their on me, on me cuz we're living right

And who's sayin' that some new love can't begin tonight?

Well I didn't, and neither did you

And only got essentials, yeah reefer for two

And now you got me goin' mental, ain't a thing I can do

You're sinking deeper in my chest as I'm thinkin of you

And so the sun melts with a unified brilliance

I find words to describe you in the millions

Sweet sublimals but your a villainous

A sweet criminal stealin' all my feelings for yourself

And watch the shadows stretch across the pavement

And when the coastline wonders where the waves went

My thoughts surface, crept up from the basement

Giving me a hint that you know im gunna take with

So just relax

Lay back and Be Easy

Take your time, let it go, live freely

And Be Easy

I watch the sun travel over the sky

See how long I can survive without a phone at my side

And in this moment I can flashback back to my youth

Imagine a BlackBerry and fathom an Apple as actual fruits

Speakin' of apples, I love the city I reside

But why these people kill themselves over their 9 to 5s?

All these items that are gilded aren't gold inside

How much lifestyle must you buy before you feel alive?

Those dreams covered in glitter couldn't be hollower

Even without a Twitter you're still considered a follower

So if I was starry-eyed, sorry, I apologize

I just hit up Loggy for a collie ride

And we took a pair of headphones from the east coast (Kinetics)

And a little Cali bud from the west (yo it's Loggy)

And stirred it up inside a cocktail (yeah)

And then we ended up with this...be easy

So just relax

Lay back and Be Easy

Take your time, let it go, live freely

And Be Easy (You know)

Lay back and be easy

Just take your time, let it go, live freely

Be Easy

Just relax, lay back, Be Easy

Take your time, let it go, live freely

The lyrics coupled with the following music, gives it a feel good vibe that just sang to my mood this week. So take it easy everybody, shoots.

This week's playlist:

Be Easy

Sun Down

Long Hair Don't Care

Lookin' For Love

Puppy Love

Radio

No Lovin'

Gonna Be Good

Come With Me

California

Freedom

We Are Radical

Wahine Holo Lio

It’s kind of a given that I’d write about a Song Contest song this week, since it was just this past Friday. With all the Song Contest statuses, pictures, videos, check-ins and songs streaming down my newsfeed, it was hard not to listen to 2011 songs and reminisce along with my class. It’s hard to believe it’s been a year since one of the greatest nights of our lives… It still feels as though it just happened yesterday. For my readers who have never heard of Song Contest, feel free to read the following paragraph, for those of you who have, you may as well skip over it. 

The Kamehameha Schools Song Contest is a signing competition between classes, grades 9-12 at the Kapālama campus. It’s held at the Balisdell Arena, televised statewide, and streamed online nation wide each year. There are three different categories in this competition: Men’s, Women’s, and Co-ed, and each song is conducted by a student director. Grades 10-12 compete in all three categories while the freshmen compete solely in the Co-ed competition. The freshmen only sing one song because it’s their first year and they have to learn mass numbers as well. By mass numbers I mean school songs that all four classes open and close the competition with (the entire night is pretty much a performance.) After every song has been sung, something called Ho’ike begins while the scores from five judges (which change every year) are tallied up for the awards ceremony. Ho‘ike (to put it simply) is a hula production performed by selected students who have auditioned to be a part of it. It is just as much a part of Song Contest as the songs are, and just as much a big deal. It is also a GREAT distraction while everyone is waiting for the scores. There are six different awards/trophies: The Louise Aoe McGregor Award for Outstanding Student Director; the Richard Lyman, Jr. Trophy or the ‘Ōlelo Makuahine Award; The New England Mothers’ Cub or the Girls’ Competition Award; the George Alanson Andrus Cup or the Boy’s Competition Award; the Helen Desha Beamer Award for Best Musical Performance; and last but not least, the most important award, the Charles E. King Cup for the Combined Class Award. (This is the most important award because wining as a class is the most rewarding.)

Now the reason WHY last year’s Song Contest was one of the greatest nights of the ℅ 2011ʻs lives is because that year, my class won ALL SIX awards AND tied for the ʻŌlelo Makuahine Award WITH OURSELVES. That’s seven out of six awards; a clean sweep and more. We are the only class in the history of Kamehameha Song Contest that is able to say we won that many in a single night. It’s a feat that we are overjoyed and proud of. (And honestly just a tiny itsy bit surprised of.)

None of us expected to sweep. We didn’t want to go into the competition thinking like that. During rehearsals, whenever a teacher or administrator went up to talk to our class about one of our songs, we would hush them from saying anything that would jinx us (due to a previous experience our class had that I rather not mention). I honestly believe that we swept not only because we spent hours practicing each song, not only because it was our last Song contest, but because we dedicated our songs to a classmate who was (at the time) fighting cancer. His name was Keaton Wong. It’s no secret either; it was in the paper and all over Facebook after that night. So I have no problem sharing this with everyone. He motivated and unified our class that year by simply being there to sing with us. All the emotions we were experiencing that night came through our voices and into our songs, pushing us toward victory...

Okay, so I didn’t think I was going to go into the full story (in a nut shell) about Song Contest last year, but then again NONE of my posts so far have JUST been about the songs. They’ve been about everything that surrounds the song as well! So now to the point of this blog… 

Even though I believe that our senior Co-ed song, “E Maliu Mai” was THE most important performance we sang in our career, I can’t help but feel that “Wahine Holo Lio,” our Junior Co-ed song (which we did not win with) is my favorite. It originates from a chant composed to honor Queen Emma and her expertise as an equestrian. Here is a picture of her followed by the words to this song:

He wahine holo lio ʻoe la

Maluna o Kīnaʻu lio la

Ahe lio hula haole la

Pau nā holo ʻewalu la

Ka piʻina a ʻo Maʻemaʻe la

Oni ana o Emalani la

Haʻina mai ka puana la

No Emalani he inoa

You are a lady who likes to ride

On the horse named Kinaʻu

This horse does a strange dance

Called the figure eight step

Going up to Maʻemaʻe

Your ribbon flutters in the breeze

The story is told

To honor the name of Queen Emma

Huh, I didn’t realize our song only contained eight lines… our senior Co-ed song did too. There is, of course, more words to this chant, but these are the only lines we sang in our song… huh. Well I learned something new.

ANYWAY, I actually JUST discovered that this was my favorite Co-ed song this week in fact, because it’s pretty much been on replay for days leading up to this past Friday. I don’t know if I’m saying that just because I’ve missed it or what, but I always thought the arrangement was AMAZING(ly difficult, lol… which just made it more amazing!) The song's arranged as if there are multiple songs composed into one.

“Wahine Holo Lio” starts off with an eerie sort of tone, integrating the melody into the middle of it. The song then turns into a waltz that almost makes you want to get up and sway to the music. Then a horse comes trotting in (holo peki, holo peki), and the song changes into a country type of dance only for a moment, and then goes back to that eerie tone in the beginning. As the song comes to a closing, we sing as though we are mourning Emma’s death, but by the end we raise our voices to honor her name. The changes in “movement” throughout the song are similar to the changes in movement on a horse, which is what this song is all about. Everything about it has significance. Just listen to it and youʻll hear exactly what I’ve just described:

On a side note, hoʻomaikaʻi e ka papa o koʻu Kaikunāne, ka papa 2013, no ka lanakila ʻana i ka palapala hoʻokō no Nā Kāne, ka palapala hoʻokō no Ka Mele Huipū, a no ka pa'i a pa'i 'ana no ka palapala hoʻokō 'Ōlelo Makuahine. Hoʻomaikaʻi pū i ka papa 2012 no ka lanakila ʻana i ka palapala hoʻokō no Nā Wāhine, ka palapala hoʻokō Mele Lawelawe ʻOi Loa, a no ka paʻi a paʻi ʻana no ka palapala hoʻokō ʻŌlelo Makuahine. 


Congratulations to my brother’s class for winning MEN'S! CO-ED! and TYING FOR LANGUAGE!!! Congrats also to the class of 2012 for winning women's, best musical performance, and tying for language too. (And congrats to the the freshman director, though it's very unlikely anyone from that class will ever see this post.) You all deserved it :)

We Are Young

If you’re a “Gleek” (Glee + Geek) you already know from reading the title of this post that Glee performed this song a few episodes ago (well, maybe more than a few.) If you didn’t know that, and you’re now thinking to yourself, “Not another Glee post!” I’d just like to say that this post isn’t about Glee, it’s about how awesome this song is...... and that Glee just happened to sing it (lol).

I will admit that the first time I heard “We Are Young” was the night the episode aired on TV. I was visiting my parents one Tuesday, and like every other average family, they have their share of favorite television programs that they watch during dinner. That night was Glee. (I’m not an adamant follower of the show, but I do enjoy watching it every now and then for the music.) We caught the second half of the episode during dinner, and when in the end they performed this song, it instantly became one of my favorites. I’ve YouTubed it on multiple occasions since.

It’d been awhile since I’ve listened to it though.... up until a few days ago. Someone posted on Facebook a status about catching up with Glee on Hulu the other night, and I automatically thought of this song. It didn’t really stick with me until the next day though, when I thought about the song again and decided to listen to it a few times on YouTube. Then, a pretty common thing happened. That night, I went to a wedding reception and the original version of this song started playing! (This tends to happen to me a lot. I’ll be singing a song, and next thing you know, it’s playing on the radio.) After my (drunk) co-workers and I started singing to it, I decided that I HAD to write about this song this week. I mean, it pretty much followed me around begging me to. And anyway, it’s just one of those feel good songs. I mean look at the lyrics and just listen to the way they sing it at the end of this post: 

Give me a second I,

I need to get my story straight,

My friends are in the bathroom getting higher than the Empire State

My lover she’s waiting for me just across the bar

My seat’s been taken by some sunglasses asking bout a scar, and

I know I gave it to you months ago

I know you’re trying to forget

But between the drinks and subtle things

The holes in my apologies, you know

I’m trying hard to take it back

So if by the time the bar closes

And you feel like falling down

I’ll carry you home

Tonight

We are young

So let’s set the world on fire 

We can burn brighter than the sun

(x2)

Now I know that I’m not

All that you got

I guess that I, I just thought

Maybe we could find new ways to fall apart 

But our friends are back

So let’s raise a toast

’Cause I found someone to carry me home

Tonight

We are young

So let’s set the world on fire 

We can burn brighter than the sun 

(x2)

Carry me home tonight (Nananananana)

Just carry me home tonight (Nananananana)

Carry me home tonight (Nananananana)

Just carry me home tonight (Nananananana)

The moon is on my side

I have no reason to run

So will someone come and carry me home tonight

The angles never arrived

But I can hear the choir

So will someone come and carry me home

Tonight

We are young

So let’s set the world on fire 

We can burn brighter than the sun

(x2)

So if by the time the bar closes

And you feel like falling down

I’ll carry you home tonight

Aren’t the words invigorating? (. . . okay, maybe not the first verse, but the rest is!)

Now a little about the song: “We Are Young” is a “grandiose alternative number, built on theatrical orchestration and a propulsive, immediate chorus that beams with inspirational effect” (huh? lol, jk). It was originally composed and performed by the band Fun, featuring Janelle Monae. Fun is an American Indie Pop band from New York that was formed by Nate Ruess, Andrew Dost, and Jack Antonoff. They’ve released two albums so far: Aim and Ignite in 2009 and Some Nights in 2011. At first, “We Are Young” only received online media attention. But after airing on the show Glee, the song gained popularity, propelled the band into mainstream success, and peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100.

Now for the video: I was debating over whether or not I should put the Glee version or the Fun version as the main vid in this post, because I really do like both. In the end, I decided to put the Glee one up only because I absolutely love the harmonies in it... it’s where I first heard the song from... and it’s nice to hear female vocals rather than just male vocals too. Makes it even easier for me to sing along :)

I guess this post turned out to be about Glee more than I thought it would... I stand corrected :P

Pretty Wings

It’s Sunday night and I’m having a hard time trying to figure out which song was consistently stuck in my head all week. There are a few of them that kept popping up every now and then throughout the last seven days, but none that really stuck out like last week. So I’m gonna go with what’s fresh in my mind right now: Pretty Wings by Maxwell. I remember humming the tune for a few days and singing the one line that I know, “Pretty Wings, your Pretty Wings around” over and over and over again. (Like so many other songs that stick to me, I don't know all the words to this one.)

Although this song is sung and written by Maxwell, I’ve never actually heard his rendition of it. The first and only version I’ve heard was from this guy:

His name is Leroy Bejarano, and this boy can sing... seriously. I can't remember exactly how I found him, but he’s apparently all over tumblr (which I don't have) and has popped up on Facebook a little here and there since I’ve discovered him. The first song I ever listened to him sing was Love On Top by Beyonce. He absolutely blew me away with this song. Key changes? No sweat. He’s not even tying in his video; he’s totally just playing around and having fun. The link is right there for you to listen to (if you want to) so you'll see what I mean.

But let’s get back to Pretty Wings. After looking around on the Internet, I found out that this song was written and produced by Maxwell and Hod David. It won a Grammy Award for “Best Male R&B Vocal Performance” and was nominated for “Song of the Year” and "Best R&B Song." Maxwell described Pretty Wings as “a bittersweet love song about meeting the right girl at the wrong time.” Like almost all the love songs in the world, his inspiration came from a relationship with a girl that didn't really work out, but whom he still respects. Here are the lyrics:

Time will bring the real end of our trial

One day they'll be no remnants

No trace, no residual feelings within ya

One day you won't remember me

Your face will be the reason I smile

But I will not see what I cannot have forever

I'll always love ya, I hope you feel the same

Oh you played me dirty, your game was so bad

You toyed with my affliction

Had to fill out my prescription

Found the remedy, I had to set you free

Away from me

To see clearly the way that love can be

When you are not with me

I had to leave, I have to live

I had to lead, I had to live

If I can't have you, let love set you free

To fly your Pretty Wings around

Pretty Wings, your Pretty Wings

Your Pretty Wings around

I came wrong you were right

Transformed your love into light

Baby believe me I'm sorry I told you lies

I turned day into night

Sleep till I died a thousand times

I should’ve showed you

Better night better times better days

I miss you more, more

If I can't have you, let love set you free

To fly your Pretty Wings around

Pretty Wings, your Pretty Wings

Your Pretty Wings around

Now that I’ve learned a little more about the song, I feel obligated to add Maxwell’s version to this post. So here’s the link if you’d like to listen to it:

Maxwell - Pretty Wings

But this post isn’t about Maxwell’s version of Pretty Wings being stuck in my head all week. This is about Leroy’s.

From what I’ve found, Leroy Bejarano grew up in Spain in the city of Vitoria. After watching so many people around the world singing and sharing their own versions of songs, he decided to give it a try. He did it for fun; he wanted to find out what people thought of his music. After a few uploads, watchers began to noticed how talented he was and he became a YouTube sensation. His videos reached the U.S. and he got a call from Beyonce’s producer about the possibility of recording an album. Leroy is now 20 years old and is due to record that first album soon. 

So look out for his name and listen for this voice. Here’s Leroy’s rendition of Pretty Wings: