WEEK 89: Kristen (I Love You)

Happy Valentine etc!

This MP3 is taken from the same show as Week 77, which was a Trouble's Afoot duo show at Goodbye Blue Monday, with regular Sally drummer Will Kastner. I can imagine a lot of people have no idea what that sentence says.

Anyway, this was a little song I wrote for my girlfriend Kristen. In the spirit of the Valentine I'm posting it here today. The lyrics are self explanatory, I love Kristen (our 2 year anniversary is this weekend, and we now live together with our dog Penny and every day is the best day ever) and anyone who thinks I don't love her is dumb.

You can hear the surprise in the audience and from Kristen and her friends as I start this song. Not for those sensitive to intensely personal awkward things. Please enjoy.

Download the MP3 by clicking here

or preview it:

See you soon!

-Jordan

WEEK 88: And I'm Gone ALBUM PREVIEW!

Hey everyone!

This is an insanely special MP3 OF THE "WEEK", a preview of my first ever album!

My band Trouble's Afoot disintegrated a while back but we had started work on two (!) albums, doing the drums and bass. For the past year (or more...it's been a long time) I have been working in a studio on the first collection of songs. I have no idea when the album will be done (I am out of money and lack time), but for now I am enjoying the results.

There are lots of great things to share, but I am particularly happy with "And I'm Gone", one of my stranger and harder-to-classify songs. It came out as interesting and strange as I wanted, but I still consider it very catchy and accessible all the same.

I don't exactly want to talk about what the song "means", because this is one of the rare tracks where I DON'T quite know what it means, in a literal sense, though I certainly know the feelings it's based on. I'd rather talk about the production, since that's what I spent the big bucks on:

I love the super stereo mixing of the drums and bass. Drums on the right, bass on the left. Another Beatles-esque touch is the plodding piano that comes in at the end section of the song, my favorite thing on here. I love the heartbeat-like bass line that my buddy Dave Fox is playing during the choruses (uh, I think they're choruses?), and Chris Roberts on drums really gave the song a surprising danceable groove, something I had never intended, but makes complete sense.

The best thing? FOOT STOMPS. The foot stomps during the choruses was thought of in the studio and track after track of stomping (ow my feet) on a wooden floor really adds to the heft of the beat. Love it love it love it.

I am also proud of the production idea to have a subtle ambient noise hiss fade in on the verses and fade out before the chorus. It gives the chorus a clarity of sound that is almost subconscious.

Anyway, enough of that, check it out!

Download it by clicking here!


Or preview it!




See ya whenever!

-Jordan

WEEK 77: The Usual Way (live with drummer)

Hey everyone!

This week's MP3 is a live version of one of my favorite songs, The Usual Way.

Instead of going into the whole background of the song, I'll mainly talk about this live mp3. Took place on May 13th of this year, at Goodbye Blue Monday in Brooklyn.

That's Will Kastner on drums, from my band Sally. This is officially a Trouble's Afoot performance. Will was a superhuman drum man for this show, learning around 15 Trouble's Afoot songs in like 2 days. This was a new song for Trouble's Afoot, but will probably stick around. Also of note is that we had no bass player for this show.

Also of note is that yes, people are talking about french fries at the start of the MP3. That's the nature of a live recording, folks.

Briefly, the song is about feeling like a disappointment in a relationship, and thus in your relationship with yourself. Enjoy!

Lyrics:

So what if I write a message down?

Not like I can say it outloud

I express myself in the usual way

So what if I wait a day or two?

Not like I'm in charge of when I get to see you

I express myself in the usual way

I'm running out.

I'm running out.

So what if I'm feeling sorry?

Not like you can get it out of me.

I express myself in the usual way.

I distress myself in the usual way.

Download it here!

or:

Sample it!

-Jordan

WEEK 62: Halloween (live)

Long time no see!

I took a break from this blog for-reasons-that-are-known-to-me-and-me-alone, BUT NOW I'M BACK. Let's start things with a BOO.

This week's MP3 is a really nice soundboard recording of my band Trouble's Afoot (currently in need of a drummer) performing my song "Halloween", at the Sidewalk Cafe in August 2009.

If you like, first check out the very rough and very quaint (read: "bad") demo of this song in this previous MP3 of the Week entry.

Once you've listened to that (or don't listen to it, what do I care?), you can see how AWESOMED UP it got once I brought it to my band. Dave's bass is crazy during the "party freak out" section, the drums are completely loose and fun and somehow holding this Frankenstein song together, and my guitar is...well, it's doing it's job. By which I mean ROCKING. HARD. REAL HARD. AND TOUGH.

Mostly because the amp at the Sidewalk Cafe only had one setting -- "ROCKING HARD AND TOUGH", which made the song sound a bit odd, but I like it.

This was always a song I considered a b-side, a little oddity nobody would ever hear. But my drummer LOVED it, and the more we practiced it the more we realized how much more interesting it made our show. All year round, not just in the Fall. I gotta write more like these.


Download it here!


Or preview it!




Hope you enjoyed. See you next week,


Jordan

WEEK 54: Held Her In My Arms (live)

Hey everyone

This week's MP3 is a cover of the great Violent Femmes' song, "Held Her In My Arms," played live by band Trouble's Afoot on November 2nd, 2009, at Niagara Bar. As usual, Dave Fox on bass and Chris Roberts on drums.

This was our drummer's last show. We prepared this Violent Femmes cover very fast, then PLAYED it very fast, as you can hear. It was fun. Please enjoy it.


Download the MP3 here

or preview it:





-Jordan

WEEK 21: All I Ever Wanted (live, solo)

Hello! This is the first mp3 of the week from MY NEW HOUSE THAT I LIVE IN. I moved two neighborhoods over to Rego Park. First time I've ever moved in my life. FREAKY.

I had a nightmare about stepping on baby turtles and squashing them (a friend of mine was doing it, not me, and I was screaming for him to stop), and outdoor toilets flooding everywhere. It was awful and disgusting!



On to the, ahem, Mp3 of the Week: This week I think it would be apropos to put up "All I Ever Wanted", a song I wrote about my fear of never moving out. I'm not super crazy about some of the lyrics, but the focus is more on the ROCK and the ROLL if ya know what I'm saying, kids. Here are the lyrics anyway. Note: The old lyrics were about a town flooding ("my block is flooded and drowned", but then Katrina happened, and I changed it ("My block is shakin' around"), but still kept the flooding motif at the end ("my block is drying out.") Whatever.

My block is shakin' around
Ringed out, upside down
Everyone but me falls out
Halfway through that last song
I felt so BAD and that's cause
I...can't be trusted

When I was 9, and then when I was 15
and then when I was 18, and then when I was 19, and well

All I ever wanted was a chance, chance to get out of here

All I know comes through the phone
All I own is this moan
All I know is my home
That's the doorknob that I hate
That's the floor that hurts my feet
When it's COLD. When it's COLD.
When it's dusty and cold.

Back in the day when things wouldn't go my way
I'd temporarily stay inside my room all day and well

All I ever wanted was a chance, chance to get out of here

AhhhhhAhhhhhh

My block is drying out
Wrinkled up and flattened down
Everyone but me feels proud

It's bigger than you and it's bigger than me (x4)
And that's what they say when you can't speak up for yourself


There is a full band version on my website, www.jordancooperlalala.com (check it out!!!!!!!!), but here it is in all of it's solo show glory, possibly it's very first performance (which I'm basing on the fact of how slow I'm playing it), from a show at the Sidewalk Cafe on 2/2/05 :

Download it HERE HERE HERE!


Or preview it THERE THERE THERE:





At the end of the mp3 you can hear me tell the audience "I don't have too many moody songs like that, so that's my one moody song," then my friend Yoko proclaims with enthusiasm, "I liked that one." This whole show was very moody, as my girlfriend (who was in the audience) was slowly breaking up with me at the time (three cheers for that!) Just like last week's was clearly They Might Be Giants inspired, I feel like this one is obviously Violent Femmes inspired.

Maybe next week I'll put up the instrumental I made that inspired the song! Ah? AH?!? WOULD YA LIKE THAT BOYS AND GIRLS??


-Jordan