Youtube :D

Hi everyone. This is just a short blog post to tell you about my Youtube channel - 

http://www.youtube.com/user/JohnathanPianoMan

I cover mostly pop songs on piano, but take requests. I can do pretty much anything of any genre, as long as I can put it on an iPod... (ha, I'm so modest too... o.O). 


But yeah, my first update of the summer, I'm hoping will be next week and is going to be E.T. by Katy Perry - an awesome song if I do say so myself.

I also take requests, and would happily help out anyone wishing to learn the covers of my songs by providing the chords for them - as worked out by me...

So yeah, look forward to it...? I guess :D

(I even managed to embed my most popular video in my blog... How's that for technical wizardry?! Also, I'm an ashamedly good self-promoter it seems... ¬¬) Thumbs up for outstanding production values. The new stuff won't look like this... :|

Summer - Not all sugar and rainbows...

This blog post centres around my plans and ideals of my forthcoming summer vacation.

I'll be honest - I likely have a somewhat "different" view of what most people would consider "fun." My interests span to:-

1. Playing video games... 8)
2. Playing piano. 
3. Blogging now, apparently.

All of these activities require me to not leave the house (unless there's some outdoor piano somewhere... or I took my laptop outside and blogged from there - but those are technicalities... -_- ) and also, coincidentally, can all be executed alone. Does this therefore mean that I'm "wasting" my summer holidays? Can you call me a "geek" for staying indoors and owning the masses on COD, or working on piano covers for my youtube account? You could... I suppose. But where others feel the need to be outside, "making the most" of our paltry British summer, I find myself more inclined to cut out the middle man. It's more in my nature to act like a hermit all year round, regardless of the weather. 

What exactly are the benefits of being outside? "Fresh air" you say? Fresh air is overrated... 

This cat is a metaphorical representation
of how I intend to spend the majority of my
summer... I can't wait... :'D

I should point out, when I say "hermit," I'm not exactly an unsociable person. In fact, quite the opposite. I like spending time with my friends, and undoubtedly have more fun playing co-op RPG's with them for days at a time... ahhh TOV... you will have been missed... :') It also means I won't be seeing my friends any less than I normally would... but most of the entertainment that can be had with them can be achieved inside - going outside is, more or less, superfluous when it comes to attaining optimum levels of... FUN. 

But I'm not going to go out of my way to do something I don't particularly enjoy with my free time, to do something more "socially acceptable..." Like... having WILD house parties, or crazy road trips to completely arbitrary seaside destinations... those things would only appeal to me if they were "Xbox House Parties..." or if the seaside destination in question had some form of arcade...(wow, I can sense the geekiness in my words just seeping out into the interweb... :| ) 

This is NOT my ideal summer... these kids may have learnt to defy gravity, but can they do a 
Britney Spears mash-up on piano, or get a flawless FFA match on COD? ... Point proven.
(also, the ones on the left and right look in pain...) 

I guess what I'm trying to say is - if you hear about my plans for summer and start judging how "lame" they may seem in comparison to yours... you needn't bother. If your "warped" view on summer involves frolicking through fields of flowers, with overhanging rainbows, and picnics under a tree with friends, (or, seemingly more appropriate for people of my age-band, messy nights out getting drunk...) then all the more power to you. 

I'm as excited for my summer holidays as you are, and they can't come quick enough... :D 

Pop music - I love it.

My taste in music has been called into question on a number of occasions. So for all the "haters" out there... this one's for you.

(Pah! I don't really use the word "haters..." I just figured I'd act all independent and sassy for a change... ¬¬) *clicks fingers*

This is me.

This is completely irrelevant... I just thought it was funny. 

People often assume that, because of my degree choice (Music - in case you didn't already know from my previous two music-related blog posts...- three if you count when I briefly mentioned it in this post) that either a) I have somewhat "superior" opinion of music and will only like eclectic music of "artistic integrity," - which translates to generally mean anything that hasn't appeared in the top 40. Or b) that my taste is limited to classical music.

I can safely assure you, my musical tastes fall into neither category. I like pop music. The cheesier the better. But... having said that, my musical taste isn't limited to pop music specifically. I judge music, not just by genre, but by it's playability (i.e. how easy it would be to cover on piano - check out my Youtube channel - or not... whatever), and by how "interesting" I find the chords. If a song uses the same four chords throughout... it begins to bore me. In fact, it's fair to say that I'd appreciate the musical ingenuity of a Cascada song as much as a Killers song, provided they both have an interesting musical basis. It's not a case of: "oh wow... you listen to *insert token "pop artist" here* ?! How lame!" I'm not thinking about the artists in terms of their perceived cultural standing. I'm not concerned either with whether you deem them to be any less an "artist," than "real musicians" (i.e. those "band" bands that feature live instruments... :O), when both their music, ultimately, consists of the same chords, repeated ad infinitum. 


Regrettably, there are very few artists these days that are doing anything in terms of "forward-thinking" music. No one artist in the current charts are doing anything more "musically intriguing" to me than another (not, at least, in terms of their musical structure). 

LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE!
She may be bald... but her musics not bad. 

I think people nowadays are too quick to make assumptions on artists by what they read about concerning their personal lives. Why should Britney Spears shaving her head make her any less of an artist? (bald people are artists too y'know...)



So the next time you might shudder in fear at the thought of me listening to a Britney Spears song - just remember - It's not a case of whether or not I like Britney Spears... for whatever reason (I personally think she's a danger to herself and everyone around her...[ I kid, of course... ] ), it's more a case of liking her music than anything else. 


(by the way, if you happened to have stumbled upon my Youtube channel, be wary of the fact I WILL be uploading new videos in the summer... You have been warned... o.O)