November 29th, 2006 3:00pm
Dreaming Of An Awesome Girl
The Specific Heats “Are You For Real, Mehgan O’Neill?” – I have never dated a musician, but I reckon that hearing the words “I wrote this song about you” from a significant other must be one of the more nerve-wracking musical experiences that a person could have. The odds that the song will be awful are very, very high, and even if the song is good, what if the lyrics about you are just totally creepy or steeped in unrealistic expectations or maddeningly vague or sort of inaccurate, as if they just don’t know you at all? Also, God help you if you’re dating an emo boy.
Mehgan O’Neill, who is proven to be “for real” and closely connected to the Specific Heats if you run a cursory Google search, has kinda lucked out in this area. This song isn’t mindblowingly great, but it’s solid and smart and above all else, totally totally sweet. It’s charming and cute in an old-fashioned sort of way, but not over-calculated, and though the singer hides his words and his chords behind a wall of reverb and distortion, the effect is closer to blushing shyness and discreet sentimentality than embarrassed evasiveness. (Click here to buy it from Total Gaylord Records.)
Elsewhere: Preview two songs from the forthcoming new Au Revoir Simone album on their MySpace page. I am especially fond of “Fallen Snow.”
Also: Said The Gramophone’s Jordan Himelfarb ain’t too proud to beg.