Thursday, 20 July 06

The agenda for today's session was:

* Pearl Jam's new album
* Dixie Chicks
* Keane
* Linkin Park
* Sleepless in Seattle soundtrack


I began by asking how many people in the class (there were 14 today) know Pearl Jam's music. My question was met with blank stares. One person (Joan) is familiar with the band. Another person (Victor) has heard of them; to him they are an old band.

I thought, "This can't be right -- one of the biggest bands from the 90's?!?" I played a bit of "Alive" for them. Then "Jeremy". No reaction. No familiarity, no interest. Ok, fair enough, but what a surprise! The grunge phenomenon has officially fallen off the world radar screen.

I had made copies of the latest Pearl Jam album reviews from the Seattle Times and Seattle P-I and passed them around, but I realize now that the students must have received the copies with puzzlement.


We moved on to the Dixie Chicks. The two Ukranian girls who have been travelling through the US for a few months brought in the album "Taking The Long Way". They had never heard of the band before coming to the US and it was their host family who had turned them on to the Dixie Chicks.

In preparation for the class I had printed out part of the DC biography from Wikipedia about the political controversy around them a few years ago and passed the copies to the class.

We played the songs "Long Way Around" and "I Hope". The girls explained how the songs are the soundtrack to their travels around the US, both in terms of the content (theme of travelling while friends are settling down in "Long Way Around") and in terms of style of music, which is very American.

There was some talk about how typically American the band is, in terms of music and lyrical content. One student said they strike him as conservative and that they sing about typical American themes.


Our next song was Keane "Somewhere only we know" (lyrics). The girl who brought it in said she likes the melancholic melody. We discussed whether the singer is singing about the past, present or future.


We ran out of time to listen to a Linkin Park song or to talk about the Sleepless in Seattle soundtrack. Those will be our first two topics for next Tuesday's session.

The songs for next Tuesday are:
* Linkin Park (song to be determined)
* Sleepless in Seattle
* James Blunt "Beautiful"
* Green Day (song to be determined)
* Aerosmith (song to be determined)