#storybook album countdown

[daisyswift3]

“You held your head like a hero on a history book page. It was the end of a decade but the start of an age.”

Saw an interesting video related to the hourglass. ​I don’t agree w her entire analysis like w the dorothy scene being debut (it makes more sense for the first scene to be debut/lover bc of the butterflies) but I agree that she seems to be flipping thru different chapters of her life like a storybook or turning back time. Maybe this is why she’s been using so much flipping/upside down imagery lately like in the folklore eras tour visuals, fearless tv, etc. Some ppl pointed out that all the re-recorded album covers seem to be inverses of the originals.

I think this imagery started w fearless maybe to indicate that fearless tv was the start of this countdown to midnight/karma; and the end of this countdown marks the beginning of a new chapter in her life. Maybe this is what the lavender vinyl is meant to represent since it’s the first quarter of the clock, perhaps representing the first few hrs after midnight/new years day after this chapter of her life is finished (I made a post w a more in-depth analysis of the vinyls).

The butterflies and moonstone vinyl at the beginning are both a symbol of rebirth and new beginnings. Also, the swirls are giving “deep portal time travel” which makes sense since we’re traveling back in time to her past eras.

This is interesting considering all the references to Greek mythology in this mv.

Artist of the decade; new beginnings in lavender.

“The hourglass is symbolic to time's inevitable passing. The hourglass is a symbol of death, the end of time on Earth, but also a symbol of rebirth and new beginnings when turned over.”

[poetunias]

day 8 - gray christmas

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

After nearly a year of living in LA, Jon and I returned to Illinois to celebrate Christmas with our families. It was a long-awaited holiday. Surely, we thought, the brick library and rickety diners would bring back the relief of childhood: careless snowball-tossing and crooked snowmen-smiles and eager icy footprints in freshly fallen snow. California, annoyingly warm, was no longer satisfactory. We longed for bitter cold.

We flew there imagining the nostalgia, the short days doused in hot chocolate and cold eggnog. My parents picked us up from the airport in their sedan. It gleamed silver and smelled like my mother’s lemony lotion and cinnamon. The windows were foggy, the car was just warming, my parents were happy. We were happy, too.

We stayed in the spare room and unpacked our things into the empty dresser my mom had set up. That was weird, already -- the spare room usually collected dust and random items which didn’t fit anywhere else. Nobody stayed there except my grandfather, once a year, who slept with the door open and snored loudly and left his dentures lying by the kitchen sink. We woke up late for breakfast, the sun prying at our eyelids, before we traipsed downstairs groggy and disillusioned.

It had snowed while we slept. In the backyard, white blanketed the dry grass and crowned the bare branches. I peered out at the view for a while, nursing a plate of eggs and a cup of hot cocoa, playing footsie with Jon. My dad was cheerfully burning pancakes on a warped pan that clattered against the stove. We finished and washed the dishes and put them away. Our slippered feet shuffled about the kitchen, weaving around each other in a dance we somehow all remembered.

I left, eventually, to peek out the front, which was where we’d all compete to build the best snowman until the sidewalks were cleared and we’d slide off to school. The sun would be just barely sparkling in the icicles hanging off our roof. At some point snowman-building would devolve into snowball fighting, house against house. Lucy and I were never the friendliest of siblings, but we were determined and ambitious enough to put aside our grievances and make a fantastic team.

I tugged open the blinds with zeal. But there were tire tracks across the road, churning the white snow into a streaky gray. The ice was frozen over unevenly, marked with muddy pockets. The tree outside our house, achingly bare, shivered in the wind. Jon came by and we stared, together.

“Should have woken up earlier,” my mom said, when she noticed us looking out silently. But that wasn’t the point. The snow piled against our front door was merely a nuisance, now. All we could see was the murky gray covering the streets. It was weird. Uncomfortably weird. I tugged the blinds shut and we began the holiday tradition of my childhood nightmares: jigsaw puzzles.

I guess this happens a lot. You leave home and you come back, expecting to find the dirty gray sneakers you’ve had since high school by the door. You expect it because they always used to be there, but they’re in your new home in LA and you didn’t pack them because why would you? The snow is gray and Christmas is gray and you can’t quite remember what box the outdoors wreaths are supposed to be in.

I guess, after so much rumination on childhood, there’s room for a little more: song number 8, about the bitter bits of nostalgia, the times when memory just isn’t satisfying enough.

see all the posts here!

[patricksilverrose]

My Top 10 Favorite Albums of 2019

It's that time of year again! I'm gonna use the same introduction on this post like I will on the other for the most part, so don't get scared about reading the same post twice. Today we're gonna be looking at my Top 10 Favorite Albums of 2019! I did a video on my music channel where I just talk about the favorites, but here you will see them AND ALL the honorable mentions! I want to give a few disclaimers: 1) I am a metalhead, so most of the releases you will see are metal releases; 2) this is all based on my personal tastes and opinions as to what I found to be the best.

Before we get into the countdown, let's see the honorable mentions! How I rank them is if the release has ** following it then it means that I enjoyed the release, but if it has *** it means that it had the potential to make it into the rankings. So here they are!

Valcata - Valcata** (symphonic power metal / metal opera) The End of Melancholy - Paradox Intention** (alternative metal) Autumn - Stacking Smoke** (atmospheric gothic metal) Shokran - Ethereal** (djent / progressive metal / ambient) My Propane - Antidote** (djent / alternative metal) Celestivl - TenTimesTwo** (symphonic metal) Diabolical - Eclipse** (black metal) Degrees of Truth - Time Travel Artifact** (progressive metal) Ardours - Last Place on Earth** (gothic metal) Devin Townsend - Empath** (progressive metal) The Agonist - Orphans** (progressive death metal) Battle Beast - No More Hollywood Endings** (heavy metal) Verite - New Skin** (indie pop) Porselain - Duende** (avant-garde) Vetrar Draugurinn - Hinterlands** (gothic metal) Scarlet Stories - Necrologies** (dark metal) Port Noir - The New Routine** (alternative / prog rock) We are the Catalyst - Ephemeral** (alternative metal) Tarja - In the Raw** (symphonic metal) Kobra and the Lotus - Evolution** (hard rock) Rage of Light - Imploder** (trance death metal) FKA Twigs - Magdalene** (trip hop) Cellar Darling - The Spell** (progressive metal) The Dark Element - Songs the Night Sings** (power metal) Voyager - Colours in the Sun** (djent / progressive metal) Arcane Ritual - Witch-Heart** (gothic metal) Metalite - Biomechanicals** (power metal) Gone in April - Shards of Light** (melodic symphonic death metal) Pencey Sloe - Don't Believe, Watch Out** (shoegaze) The Murder of My Sweet - Brave Tin World** (symphonic metal) Symfobia - The Smog of Tomorrow** (symphonic metal) Ianwill - One Credit Left** (metalcore) Visions of Atlantis - Wanderers** (symphonic power metal)

Sharks in Your Mouth - Sacrilegious*** (symphonic deathcore) Glasya - Heaven's Demise*** (symphonic metal) Lacuna Coil - Black Anima*** (gothic metal) Lighthouse in Darkness - The Melancholy Movies*** (trip hop / sad Hollywood music) Banks - III*** (r&b) Saor - Forgotten Paths*** (folk death metal) Plague of Stars - Daedalus*** (gothic metal) Hecate Enthroned - Embrace of the Godless Aeon*** (symphonic black metal) Dorian Electra - Flamboyant*** (experimental / queer pop) Beast in Black - From Hell with Love*** (power metal) Shadow of Intent - Melancholy*** (symphonic deathcore) Leprous - Pitfalls*** (prog rock) Cathubodua - Continuum*** (symphonic metal) Reism - Dysthymia*** (gothic metal) Starset - Divisions*** (cinematic rock) The Lust - Lustration*** (gothic metal) Neverlight - The Quiet Room*** (progressive gothic metal)

And now let's look at the big boys!

10. The Offering - Home [progressive metal]

I would like to label these guys as "progressive power death metal", but prog is good enough since it rounds it out perfectly. Amazing production and very interesting riffs and song-writing. A bit chaotic, but there's structure to the chaos. The singer's voice is absolutely insane and he has an incredible vocal range.

Favorite songs: 1. Failure (S.O.S.) 2. Lovesick 3. Glory

9. Infected Rain - Endorphin [modern metal]

I wasn't expecting to love this as much as I do. Epic production and full of epic songs. They really have evolved a lot over the years, but this album is still very much true to who they are. It's a very diverse album that experiments with different directions, but keeps its direction.

Favorite songs: 1. Black Gold 2. Earth Mantra 3. Passerby

8. Lindsay Schoolcraft - Martyr [symphonic gothic metal]

I've said this once and I'll continue to say it: this album is like a love child between Within Temptation and Evanescence. It's very dreamy and absolutely beautiful. This album was definitely worth the wait. And if you got the storybook edition (like I did), then you know the exclusive bonus tracks are absolutely wonderful.

Favorite songs: 1. Stranger 2. Into the Night 3. Remember

7. Muna - Saves the World [indie pop / queer pop]

This album is so much fun, but also very sad. These queens really know how to make good sad music, but then turn around and make it upbeat and fun. This album I feel isn't as dramatic as About U (which I LOVE), but instead is more from the heart and personal. It's a very touching album.

Favorite songs: 1. Stayaway 2. Who 3. Pink Light

6. Swallow the Sun - When a Shadow is Forced into the Light [gothic doom metal]

When I first heard Upon the Water, I knew right when they mentioned "nightingale" that it was about Aleah Stanbridge and had a strong feeeling that the whole album would be dedicated to her, and it very much is. It's definitely a very deep and hard album to listen to if you're someone, like myself, was very fond of Aleah. It's full of so much beauty, raw emotion, and heartbreak.

Favorite songs: 1. Firelights 2. Upon the Water 3. Never Left

5. Imperia - Flames of Eternity [symphonic metal]

I feel this album is very different from what they've done in the past, but still very much an Imperia album. Helena dove deep into her heart for this album just like the previous album, but it's not as heartbreaking which makes it easier to take in. I love the unique directions they went in with the song-writing to really make this album different.

1. Fear is an Illusion 2. The Scarred Soul 3. Book of Love

4. Fleshgod Apocalypse - Veleno [symphonic technical death metal]

This album is both very chaotic and well structured. It's pretty whimsical at times which helps it stand out compared to previous releases; not to mention they experimented with their sound a bit in general with this album. I really love the orchestrations and choirs on this album in particular since they don't sound like they have on previous releases.

Favorite songs: 1. The Day We'll be Gone 2. Fury 3. Monnalisa

3. Within Temptation - Resist [symphonic modern metal]

This is how you rebrand yourself. It's still very much true to who they are, but a very solid and different evolution. It really reminds me a lot of their older stuff, but with a modern twist to it. The production on it is absolutely amazing and the storytelling is done so beautifully. This is my new favorite album from them, and I haven't had one since The Heart of Everything.

Favorite songs: 1. Raise Your Banner 2. Trophy Hunter 3. Firelight

2. Starkill - Gravity [symphonic power death metal]

They really stepped their pussies up with this album. It's absolutely amazing. The production is light years ahead of that of Shadow Sleep (which was my biggest gripe with that album). I love the sci-fi feel to a lot of the songs off the album and just how dramatic and intense it gets.

Favorite songs: 1. The Real Enemy 2. Until We Fall 3. Castaway

1. Ex Libris - ANN (A Progressive Metal Trilogy) [progressive symphonic metal]

If you want to learn the stories of three Ann's throughout history and love super dramatic, powerful, gut-wrenching music, then this is the release for you. I know chapter 1 made it on my favorite EPs last year (and placed number 1 at that), but since the last two chapters were released this year, it makes since to just include the whole album here since that's what all three chapters make. Dianne and the guys really went above and beyond for this album and Joost did such an incredible job at helping them make this album as perfect as it is. I especially love how much Dianne emulated all three of them and how she channeled them perfectly.

Favorite songs (in no particular order): 1. Chapter 1 - Anne Boleyn: The Beheading 2. Chapter 2 - Anastasia Romanova: The Exile 3. Chapter 3 - Anne Frank: The Raid

And that's it for the albums! I highly recommend these EPs for those of you whom are interested. Follow this link to see the post all about my favorite EPs of the year!

[themuppetmasterencyclopedia]

Count von Count

PERFORMERS

Jerry Nelson 1972-2012

Matt Vogel 2013-present

DEBUT 1972

PATTERN Large Lavender Live Hand

Count von Count is a mysterious but friendly vampire-like Muppet on Sesame Street who is meant to parody Bela Lugosi's portrayal of Count Dracula. He first appeared on the show in the Season 4 premiere in 1972, counting blocks in a sketch with Bert and Ernie.

The Count has a compulsive love of counting (arithmomania, an affliction of legendary vampires); he will count anything and everything, regardless of size, amount, or how much annoyance he causes others around him. In one song he stated that he sometimes even counts himself. When he finishes counting, The Count laughs and announces his total (which sometimes appears on screen). This finale is usually accompanied by a crash of thunder and a flash of lightning, even on sunny days. (According to The Sesame Street Bedtime Storybook, the Count has a personal cloud that hovers over his head and provides the thunder and lightning.)

Many of the Count's songs, including "Counting Is Wonderful" and "The Batty Bat," are in the style of Roma music.

The Count lives in an old, cobweb-infested castle that he shares with many bats. Sometimes he counts them. Some of the pet bats are named, including Grisha, Misha, Sasha, and Tattiana. He also has a cat, Fatatita, and an octopus named Octavia. He also plays a large pipe organ, and in some illustrations he is seen playing the violin. In recent years, the Count has appeared on each episode to announce the Number of the Day, playing notes on his organ to count up to the featured number.

The Count's most recent girlfriend, Countess von Backwards, is known for counting backwards. He had previously been linked to Countess Dahling von Dahling and shared a brief romantic tryst with Lady Two. His brother and mother have appeared on the show, and he also has an Uncle Uno.

The Count's profile on Sesame Workshop's website does not use the word vampire but does suggest that he may be a distant relative of Count Dracula. However, the book Sesame Street Unpaved describes the Count as a "Numerical Vampire." In contrast, the 2001 Sesame Street Muppets Drawing Guide insists "The Count is not a vampire."

Nevertheless, the Count resembles Bela Lugosi's portrayal of Dracula in voice (speaking in an Eastern European accent and pronouncing his Vs as Ws), appearance, and sometimes mannerisms. For example, in early sketches, the Count waves his hands to exercise hypnotic power over other Muppets and holds his cape over the lower part of his face while moving. In addition, an early skit revealed that the Count shows no reflection in a mirror. Unlike vampires as traditionally depicted in legend and motion pictures, however, the Count often relaxes in the sunlight (as seen in "Counting Vacation" and "Coconut Counting Man," among others).

EARLY DAYS

The character was created by Sesame Street writer Norman Stiles. Performer Jerry Nelson recalled his immediate enthusiasm for the character in a 1999 interview:

“ Norman told me he was writing this piece with this new character who's called the Count... He's a vampire, but not a real vampire... He just has a jones for numbers. He's obsessed with counting things. So I went, "Oh, cool," and I went to Jim [Henson] and said, "You know, Norman's writing this new character called the Count." Jim said, "Let me hear it." So I went (in my Count voice), "Yes, I vould love to do it!" and Jim said, "Yes, you can do it." ”

The Count is now a friendly, non-threatening figure on the Street, but his early appearances in 1972 had a more sinister edge. He had hypnotic powers, and was able to stun other Muppets by waving his hands. After counting, he uttered a villainous laugh as lightning flashed in moody colors. He was often accompanied by creepy organ music. As the character matured, the sinister aspect of his personality was toned down, and his laugh became a throaty, Lugosi-style chuckle.

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APPEARANCES

He made cameo appearances in The Muppet Movie (in the finale) and The Muppets Take Manhattan (in the wedding), and has also been featured in the Sesame Street movies Follow That Bird and The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland. He also appeared in The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years and A Muppet Family Christmas.

The Count made a special appearance on episode 518 of The Muppet Show, emerging with his Sesame co-stars from the Three Bears' cave when Ali Baba shouts, "Open Sesame!"

On November 14, 1988, Count co-hosted The Today Show with Meryl Sheep.

On December 11, 2008, the Count was interviewed on More or Less, a BBC radio show about numbers.

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NOTES

The Count's New York license plate number is "12345678910" in the movie Follow That Bird. However, in Count All the Way to Sesame Street, a book based on Follow that Bird, the Count's license plate number is simply "123."

The Count was a DJ for his own radio station on the album The Count's Countdown, and hosted a music video show in Count It Higher: Great Music Videos from Sesame Street.

In a Number of the Day segment for 0, The Count stated: "Oh hello, it is I, The Count. I'm called the Count because I love to count. Err, that, and I inherited my father's royal title." Despite this claim, the title of Count is one of nobility rather than royalty. (sesamestreet.org) Thus, The Count's claim to royalty might rest on his having inherited a lesser title of a royal ancestor.

According to the book Sesame Street Unpaved, after Jon Stone read the first script of a Count skit, he sent it back to the writer, Norman Stiles, with a note scribbled atop: "Good character, bad bit". That skit was never produced.

In Count it Higher: Great Music Videos from Sesame Street, The Count says that his favorite song is "Count it Higher". However, the book Sesame Street Unpaved states that his favorite songs are "Born to Add" and "Count on Me." Sesame Workshop's "Muppetbook" page also includes the song "99 Red Balloons."

The Muppetbook page also states the Count's favorite TV shows are 24 and 60 Minutes.

The Count's car is the Countmobile.

According to the 1998 book Sesame Street Unpaved, the Count is "written to represent an adult with the psychological age of someone who is 1,832,652 years old -- and still counting".

According to Sesame Street Stays Up Late!, the Count knows the exact time, and therefore knows when the new year arrives.

In Episode 4109, the Count states that he used to be a professor of counting from one to ten at the Institute of Technology at Moldavia.

In a few appearances (including The Street We Live On, episode 4109 and "Five By"), the Count sports a purple cape instead of his usual green one.

In Jerry Nelson's later years, Matt Vogel took over the puppetry of the Count while Nelson continued to provide the voice. This lasted until Nelson's death in 2012; Vogel debuted with his first vocal performance of the character in the 2013 video "Counting the "You"s in YouTube."

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FILMOGRAPHY

See Count von Count Filmography

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VIDEO GAME APPEARANCES

Sesame Street Countdown

Numbers

Get Set to Learn!

Search and Learn Adventures

Elmo's Number Journey

Count TV iPhone app

Elmo's Musical Monsterpiece

Kinect Sesame Street TV

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BOOK APPEARANCES

Books starring Count von Count

The Sesame Street 1, 2, 3 Storybook (1973)

The Sesame Street ABC Storybook (1974)

The Sesame Street Book of Fairy Tales (1975)

Big Bird's Busy Book (1975)

See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Smell No Evil (1975)

Bert's Big Band Paint-with-Water Book (1976)

The Sesame Street Postcard Book (1976)

Cookie Monster and the Cookie Tree (1977)

The Sesame Street Block Party Coloring Book (1977)

Sesame Street Goes West (1977)

The Sesame Street Mystery Coloring Book (1977)

Who's Who on Sesame Street (1977)

The Sesame Street Bedtime Storybook (1978)

The Exciting Adventures of Super Grover (1978)

A Day on Sesame Street (1979)

Down on the Farm with Grover (1980)

Early Bird on Sesame Street (1980)

Look What I Found! (1980)

Molly Moves to Sesame Street (1980)

The Sesame Street Dictionary (1980)

The Sesame Street Pet Show (1980)

Special Delivery (1980)

The Tool Box Book (1980)

What Did You Bring? (1980)

Oscar's Rotten Birthday (1981)

Prairie Dawn's Upside-Down Poem (1981)

The Sesame Street Circus of Opposites (1981)

The Sesame Street Sun (1981)

What Do You Do? (1981)

City (1982)

A Day at School (1982)

[poetunias]

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the 1st - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

day 1: ice cream and daydreams

This project started when I was going through old diary entries in preparation for the interview circuit. It’s hardly been a year since we started working on the album, but reading through my own words felt like reading a whole other story. The album’s theme - as you might expect from its title - is a story itself. But really, there are three stories to this album: the one we told, the one you hear, and the one we’re still writing. That last one is what I hope to share with you over the next two weeks - the story of our lives. The story behind the story.

I think you will discover that I am both very blunt and very opinionated. Our manager (my sister) was initially hesitant to approve this idea because she was convinced it would only turn people off purchasing the album. But as much as I dislike cliche, I do think that honesty is the best policy. Giving you a look at how we write these songs will hopefully give you better insight into their meaning. Even better, they might inspire you to write your own.

Because Jon and I were - and, honestly, still are - the kinds of people who scrabble the internet for interviews with our favorite artists. We’ve always been desperate to know how music came to be. People say you have to separate art from the artist, but I don’t think you can. Music is a very human thing. 

We did most of this research snuggled in a tiny booth at an ice cream parlor in LA. It was a family-run place, a bit grimy at the edges, with tiled floor and neon signs and swirling tubs of ice cream. It reminded us of home, a small town called Candlewood in Illinois. There was something both grounding and exciting about sitting in this homey, retro diner and looking out at the great buildings and busy people. We started writing the lyrics to the very first song we ever released there, in a corner booth we still sometimes visit for nostalgia. Something about that place or that view or that ice cream, maybe, made it seem very possible, with a lot of hard work, to “make it big.”

We were ultimately very fortunate. I don’t want to demean the incredible things that have happened to us. I can’t claim that we’re not happy. But the funny thing was that while we were gallivanting across the country and touring and living our dreams, our daydreams darkened. Instead of hopeful, they were frightening. It seemed like the only way forward was down or that every choice was only an opportunity for a terrible mistake. We explored the idea in our EP, daymeres, the success of which only worsened our fears. There is nothing more simultaneously fulfilling and frightening as praise. People told us that we were great, to which we alternately thought “we are!” and “are we?”

It is very easy, when writing a story, to wrap everything up in a nice bow and present it to people with a smile on your face. It’s like a performance: people applaud and you bow and the curtains close and everyone is happy. Jon and I were adamant to avoid this sort of thing, because we’ve got hardly anything figured out and neither does anybody else. And so, as we revisit the idea in this new album’s opening track, we renew our fears and lay them out for you to see. Yet at risk of jinxing our hopes and dreams, I think we are in the headspace to reapproach the topic with a more optimistic perspective - or at least a less pessimistic one. This first song is about fear, but also about dreaming again, rediscovering the wonder of what we do and the excitement of nervousness and the joy in adrenaline.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 4 - primrose

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

I guess, after embarrassing my baby sister yesterday, it’s fair that I embarrass myself.

So. When I was three or four, I was obsessed with my doll. Her name was Primrose.  I used to always play piano with Primrose by my side. Her short arms would reach futilely to the keys as I banged away. While practicing, I'd imagine myself performing, a giant crowd looking on as Primrose and I played a duet only we could hear. I would never perform without her, I promised myself. I would never leave her, stained frock and scratched-up hands and tangled ponytail and all. Giving up on her, to my seven-year-old self, meant giving up on imagination. On our friendship. On us.

(If you have never been to one of our shows: I've apparently disappointed my young self and given up on this dream. But the lovely person I do duet with more than makes up for it.)

Primrose and I were Best Friends Forever, and the whole maintaining-that-friendship thing seemed pretty easy. We simply wouldn't forget each other. We'd simply never disagree. We'd simply always be in the thrill of youth and everything would be great until we died, probably. And if things did get hard -- that unfounded possibility -- it’d be no match for our bond. How could you sever something that had dictated over half of my young life?

It turns out that if even maintaining imaginary friendships is hard, maintaining real relationships is even harder. And as we’ve been living our dreams in places where Candlewood just sounds like a combination of things that start a house fire, the threads that have tied us to our hometown have unraveled and loosened and sometimes torn apart. 

I used to think that relationships fall apart because of problems, but I don’t know about that. Just because two people aren’t right for each other doesn’t mean that either of them are wrong. But I think there’s also some important introspection here. The loss of some of our closest friends has forced Jon and I to reevaluate the sacrifices we’ve made.  All the while, we wonder: maybe people who love you are supposed to be there for you. Maybe you’re supposed to be there for people you love. 

Primrose is sitting somewhere in my parent’s attic. Nobody plays that old piano anymore. I haven’t slept in my old room in years. Where do you draw the line?

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 3 - paint splatters

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

My sister Lucy, when she was three or four, was resolved to be a painter. In true Lucy style, after showing skill for painting of the finger variety, she committed to it. Every day, my mom would set up a miniature easel and Lucy would paint with the determination of a second Leonardo da Vinci. 

Not all of her art was a success. Occasionally, her zeal carried her away, staring at a messy swirl of brown. This was usually accompanied by a variety of revelations. She was never going to paint again. She was never going to look upon the easel again. She was going to smash it to the ground. She was going to drop it from the second story window. She was going to resort to crayons, instead.

Lucy, in the height of her creativity, was an experimental artist. On one tragic day she discovered the paint flick, which quickly ruined her new brushes and covered her paper in a myriad of color which washed into brown. I remember that Lucy came to me first, the crumpled, teary paper at arm's length as if it repulsed her. I must not have been sufficiently sympathetic, because she turned to my mom with the same spiel.

My mom was more graceful. "See? It's paint splatters," she said, sticking the art to the fridge. “Very artistic.”

"Plaint spatters," Lucy echoed, seriously. Her artist dreams were renewed. There was paint on everything -- papers, walls, flooring, ceiling, random items of clothing I forgot to lock up -- for weeks.

(The sacrifice of my favorite white sneakers was even in vain, because Lucy didn't become an artist. She got a better job: bossing her older sister around.)

For some reason, the old plaint spattery paper stuck around on the fridge for a while. I saw it all the time. I love symbolism, but I cannot lie and claim that it looked nice. It looked bad. But it was symbolic: of mistakes, of art, of maybe restraining yourself once in a while and not destroying your sister’s closet.

I digress.

My family was also in the habit of sticking report cards on the fridge. Lucy, always a better student than I was, was also more excited about this than I was. I was just okay at school, which was fine, for a while. But then, high school hit. Suddenly, I had to be thinking about college, and after that, the rest of my life. The C that I got in geometry, hanging on the fridge right next to the now very stained plaint spatters, suddenly wasn’t okay.

Because here’s the thing. You grow up, for a while, learning that it's okay if you make a mistake. But then. High school is hard. College is harder. And you look up, and a million people are watching, and it's really not okay to trip up, and your eyes blur and your knees wobble and you think about what might happen if you toppled to the ground while everyone stares.

And that’s the third song. It’s the only song on the record that I wrote the lyrics for alone, which sounds angstier than it is. I wrote the lyrics. I threw them into the trash. Jon fished them out and then wrote the melodies. It’s the song we have the least answers about, so if you’re an interviewer reading this: don’t ask about it. I’ll tell you what we’ll say: I don’t know. So save yourself the time.

(Lucy, in all her nosy managing glory, has suggested that I end on a happier note. So have a good day, or something. If you figure out the answers, let me know.)

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 5 - do you remember

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

When we hit a roadblock in writing, Jon and I spend a lot of time with do you remembers. Do you remember old Mrs. Taylor who bought ten bunches of bananas at the grocery store every Friday? Do you remember the chocolate shop on the corner of Fielder and Parkway that used to give out free cordials if you got an A? Do you remember that time our school mascot accidentally started doing his old school’s cheer, which also happened to be the team we were playing against?

You know, the good old days. 

Jon and I went to school together our whole lives. I mean this genuinely. We grew up in the same tiny town. We went to the same tiny school. We were in the same tiny classes. People, when they find this out, immediately begin referring to us as “high school sweethearts.” Which is sweet, I guess, but isn’t true.

In high school, we thought we were very different people. I was sharp-tongued and blunt and competitive. Jon was quiet and reluctant and emotional. I was ambitious and adventurous. Jon was meanderingly thoughtful. Jon made music because it allowed him to speak. I made music because it helped me not to. It wasn’t until we found ourselves lost in the Big City of college that we turned to the familiarity in each other.

Another reason we didn’t become friends then was because Jon was famous. He was as much a legend in the town’s history as you can be when you’re eighteen. When he left the city, it wasn’t because he needed the escape but because other people wanted him. His entire class -- myself included -- would stay after school to make oversized posters welcoming him home, crafted from drying markers and brown packing paper.

Strangely, Jon has similar stories about me. He says that I had perfected the don’t-bother-me walk and knew it. That I sauntered through school hallways (his words) like I was looking at goals nobody else could see. That when we first started talking, he was convinced I hated him, because all of my text messages ended with periods. I like completion. 

When I tell people that part of the story, they always think it’s bizarre. How could we, two people with such similar interests in such a small space, have never truly met? Isn’t it weird to be married now, after all that? But no, not really. Our acquaintanceship melted into friendship which melted into romance, natural and easy, and nothing about it felt weird. We’d hang out for lunch, and I realized: I like Jon. After years of friendships and shared dinners, I started thinking: maybe I really like Jon. And by the time the thought, the big one, occurred to me, I’d forgotten all about the oddity of our relationship’s beginnings.

And so, after so many growing pains, the fifth song launches into the miracle of love. I can’t reconcile the intimacy we share now with the indifference we held for so long. But there’s something magical and mind-blowing about this idea, that love was waiting for me for so long in the locker five doors down from mine.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 14 - valentine

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

By this time, you are probably thinking that there are not many songs about love in this Valentine’s Day album. Particularly sharp readers might recall that there’s been only one - day 5, if you’re wondering.

But if you are thinking this, you would be wrong. This album is born from love. Of music. Of each other. Of writing together. Of dreaming. Of childhood, siblings, old dolls, new revelations. Of trying to learn new things and of sometimes discovering that it’s harder than you’d think. Of nostalgia and opportunity and winter buds and living life. Of realizing how little you know and how little you can do.

Maybe that doesn’t sound romantic, but it is. There is love in date nights and weddings and roses. But there is also love in life. There is love in failure and impossibility, in climbing mountains with someone by your side and falling with them, too. There is love in revelations, good and bad. It doesn’t depend on dewy summer mornings or blankets of untouched snow. Love transcends feeling and circumstance.

When people ask us about “our love story,” we tell it shrouded in lacy veils and breakfast in bed and red petals. The real story is much more boring. We fell in love among the ice creams we shared in that old booth at the diner, talking about what we wanted of the future and how we’d felt in the past. We fell in love while floating in a little boat at Disneyland, wondering at the worlds we might someday discover and the one we began to occupy ourselves. You sit on the couch together after a long day, legs sore and head hurting and eyes burning, and you look over at someone else and you are in love. So there are few songs about love, but love underpins every song we write. 

The ancients saw art as the key to everlasting life. They’re not wrong. So I won’t say “the end,” because my wildest dream is that these songs stick with your forever, but I hope you enjoy our story.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 13 - snowflake songs

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

Jon and I used to say that we wanted to write snowflake songs -- each unique, forming from a fleeting moment and disappearing on your tongue, biting yet satisfying. We’d try to reduce the songs we wrote to this template, judging them by such questions: what flash of time were we trying to capture? how piercing was its theme? how universal was its imagery? how complete was its story? The perfect snowflake song could answer all of those questions. We went down them like a checklist.

I guess we were less picky as young artists, because today I’m not sure how we thought the perfect snowflake song was possible. How can you say something that has never been said before? How can you capture a dynamic moment of life in the static image of art? But then again, how can you expect people to listen to you if you don’t say something new?

It’s arrogant, really, to think that you can do any of those things. To think that any music you make can be completely original. To think that your expression of your experiences can resonate with everyone. To think Because your music is made by you in all of your facets. Things that influence you necessarily influence your music.

The first concert I remember going to was with a husband-wife duo, the Kelseys. When I think of why I fell in love with music, their voices always appear in my head. They inspired me to pursue song with unwavering passion. Years later, I have a career much like theirs: playing piano and singing in a duo with my husband. I didn’t start playing music -- or I didn’t think I did -- with the intention of following them so specifically. But I wonder a lot whether or not that was really intentional of me, whether their inspiration has subconsciously led me here, whether if I looked a bit harder I would find more of them in my songs today. 

Art isn’t really about the artist. The real snowflake songs don’t come from the writer. They come from the listener. Because I can write a song. In my hands it is one story, harvested from a million inspirations and by no means original. But when it leaves us, becoming the listeners’, they interpret the song. And suddenly, it is a snowflake song -- different for everyone, piercing not because of our words but because of your experiences. I mention my old friend Primrose, locked up in the attic somewhere, and it’s meaningful not because my doll is meaningful, but because you imagine your own Primrose locked up in your own attic.

So song 13, for me, is about releasing art into the world and the way it is suddenly transformed by interpretation. It’s magical for me. But for you, maybe it means something completely different. I feel an unexplainable power, a magical relief, to this phenomenon. But maybe it makes you feel out of control, unable to fully understand even what you yourself make. I guess I’ll take a line from yesterday’s post: I don’t know.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 9 - gold leaf

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

When we had just started to make a name for ourselves as songwriters, a new friend of ours invited us to dinner at a fancy restaurant downtown. Eager to build such relationships, we agreed and arrived at the place half-an-hour early. The building was buzzing with soundless energy, respectfully clattering silverware and gliding waiters.

We sat down with our host, finally, our jittery legs disappearing under draperies of white tablecloth. There were salads of greenery scattered across plates like paintings. Clear broths shining placidly in the middle of large bowls. Shiny chocolate domes topped with gold leaf, waving in the restaurant’s A/C like flags of riches. Conversation between courses floundered around the weather (you can only remark on California’s sunniness so many times, it seems) before we hit on a shared interest of niche family bands from the 80s. By the time we left, our wallets were lighter and our stomachs not quite full, but we felt hopeful. It seemed like the glamorous world was opening to us, or at least allowing us a little peek, and we weren’t wholly disenchanted.

You know where this is going. Jon and I tried to write a lot of songs about this kind of thing: the shiny ambiance of fame, the way it pulls you into a limousine with shaded windows until all you can see is the colored lights burning your eyes, even when they’re closed. But let’s be real: it’s hard to write about that while you’re in the limousine, because then you’re a hypocrite.

I’ll put my self-awareness aside for a while. Sometimes I don’t like my life. It feels like everyone cares so much, too much, x-ray binoculars pointed at our windows. It feels like we’re made of gold leaf that could drift away or be scraped off at any moment. It feels like the music is too loud and the lights are too bright and the car is too fast. 

Is this song the result of petulant indulgence? Spoiled self-pity? I’ll answer that for you: yes. Most of the time I love this. I’m grateful for it. But I don’t think we could tell this story without this chapter. What protagonist doesn’t have flaws?

I suppose stories have resolved endings, too. I’m still working on that.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 7 - it’s a big world, after all

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

Shortly after we got married, Jon and I scrabbled together the funds for an overpriced day trip to Disneyland. It wasn’t our honeymoon -- that was a road-trip from LA to San Francisco, which we were supposed to do for work anyways, dining lavishly at Wendy’s on the way there -- but it felt like it. Neither of us are roller-coaster fanatics, but we piled on sunscreen and watched with contentment and expensive corn dogs as people stumbled from the rides.

We did brave the lines to enjoy “It’s a Small World.” Bright voices sang “it’s a small world, after all” at us, and amidst the placidly dressed dolls and the softly ripping waves, this seemed true. Not that we had anything to judge it by. At the time, neither of us had ever left the country. While Jon had done some cross-country touring already, I’d grown up sheltered by the chilly breezes of Candlewood, Illinois. My family, a big fan of the “staycation,” never ventured from our home state. LA, still new to us then, was freeing in a terrifying way. In the melting pot we lived in, the world did seem small. It felt manageable. It felt like we could conquer it.

Our first forays into songwriting soon allowed us to meet artists from around the world. It introduced us to sounds of music we slowly adjusted our ears to. With input from our new friends, we began experimenting with new scale patterns and tones and ideas. Even then, though, our cultural exploration was through a narrow view. We traveled the world on a keyboard tucked in a crevice of our kitchen, the LA sun slowly fading through an uncurtained window.

The first shinings of success broadened our view, but only a little. After our first EP, we received messages from eager Brazilian fans begging us to visit. Months later, a song of ours made radio airplay in England. Our first world tour proved the “small world” thing...only because we didn’t visit much of it. We flitted by London and detoured to Latin America before returning to our college stomping grounds of Boston, Massachusetts. We were entranced by our new discoveries, even as thousands of you lamented that we were not on a world tour.

People love to romanticize travel, but it’s frightening. Sitting on a plane to a place you’ve never really seen is terrifying. You feel small, the clouds suffocating you above and below, while you stare with a mixture of hopefulness and hopelessness at the last glimpses of the ground. On the streets of a foreign land, you feel like you have to learn everything before realizing that you still know nothing. 

So there’s song number 7. Halfway through the album. Stuck in roughly chronological order, the back half of the album deals with adult insecurities -- of family, friends, and fame. The intro to that chapter is this song, a tribute to discovery that doesn’t shy from its drawbacks.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 11 - all the world’s a stage

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

A good friend of Jon and mine was an avid performer in high school. I remember the first time I met her, when I knew her only through Jon's excited descriptions -- and back then, I barely knew Jon, either. She lived in New York, so Jon and I drove up from college in Boston for a much planned visit. That was our first trip together. The two of us crammed in a car filled with empty soda cans that we'd borrowed off of my roommate in return for five days' worth of homework. I guess my longing for independence overcame whatever morals I had.

When we stood outside her door, waiting for her to appear, we heard a bright soprano floating through the walls. Jon told me, "that's her!" with more enthusiasm than I'd ever heard from him at that time, more than when he'd successfully solved a Rubik's cube at 2 am after three days. She burst through the doorway singing "I could have danced all night," and I was immediately enchanted.

Growing up in choir, I guess I was used to the sudden bursts of song on casual walks, vibrato cutting through echoey hallways. I never personally partook -- something to do with high school self-consciousness and my tendency to get lost even in familiar buildings if I'm not totally focused on where I'm going -- but sometimes I felt like I should have. Like bursting into song as if I played the starring role in the musical of my life was expected of me. People have similar assumptions now that I do this professionally -- like that when I knock my fist against watermelons at the grocery store, I'm imagining the percussion for our last song, or something. Or, even more common now, that I walk down the street in an elegant bubble of performance, ready to sing a bit of an old single or drop a few finely tuned jokes at my leisure. Like all the world's my stage and I'm supposed to always be acting on it. The truth is that, off stage, I'm just really tired. And really normal. And really bothered by the idea that I have to be always on.

I admired this friend of ours a lot for the way she effortlessly performed through life, the way she could be happy and serious all at the same time. I like her even more now, having known her intimately. I've seen her cry. She's seen me cry. The curtain of modesty between us has been torn by years and chance scenarios and desperate phone calls. I've gotten to know her: the girl who belts Wicked in her own hallways, who fights for her beliefs with the heart of a lion, who runs towards her dreams with determination I can only dream of. I think we've taught each other that there's something special about vulnerability and about imperfection. I think we've learned that even if the world's our stage, the performance doesn't have to be perfect.

The eleventh song, about the pressures of daily life and the beauty of failure, is the most experimental on the album. Jon and I tried our best to put away the perfectionist side of our brains and simply let go. We considered, for a while, releasing this as a standalone single (or burying it in piles of files and never listening to it again, either) because its sound is quite different from the rest of the album. But I think that's kind of the point, so here it is.

see all the posts here!  

[poetunias]

day 10 - hyacinths

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

My mother has always hated the fall. It’s her least favorite season. I know this about her because I hear about it every year. If she hasn’t mentioned it by August 20th, I am usually concerned.

She hates it because the gentle warmth of late summer begins to fade away to biting breezes. Because bright green leaves flutter down as harsh yellows and reds. They clog everyone’s gutters. They turn brown in the street. The trees are left as blunt, naked angles. And because my mother, an avid gardener, cannot grow anything in the winter. 

I hesitate to say this is a matter of ability, because she is truly the most talented gardener I have ever witnessed (not that I am in the practice of gardener-watching). But everything my mother has attempted to grow as soon as the days grow short - Christmas cacti, crocuses, camellias - they all wilt and die within weeks.

I bought my mother a hyacinth this past fall. She pessimistically watered it and set it on a window sill, mostly out of love for me than for gardening. She texted me daily updates of its nonexistent budding progress, lamenting that if she couldn’t grow anything meant for winter in winter she wasn’t going to be able to force something to bloom that wasn’t supposed to. But eventually, contrary to all her expectations, the bulb flowered.

She loved them.

She still hates fall, though.

I’m not just telling this story as part of my ongoing quest to embarrass every member of my immediate family. My mom’s utter disdain for the autumn times is metaphorical, I promise. Because when Jon and I started to make it big, as they say -- and even long before then -- my dream was to make something truly admirable. I mean by that: it seemed possible, with the right amount of skill, to write a song that everyone could appreciate. A far off goal, sure, but an achievable one. So it hurt when the reviews for our first EP came out and far from everyone loved it. It seemed like the whole universally-admired thing was harder than I’d thought. 

Here’s track number 10 for you: the tricky and wonderful part of art. We’ve realized in years since that you can never please everyone with your art. Not only because it’s subjective, but because that’s the nature of things. People hear your song in the department store and they tap their toe to it, but they’ll never care enough to listen again. People can dislike everything you write with a burning passion and they’ll never change their minds. Your mom can pot a very beautiful hyacinth in the fall and still hate the fall. It doesn’t mean the song’s bad. It doesn’t mean the hyacinth’s ugly. It doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with the guy toe-tapping by the changing rooms. Or with your mom.

My mother has always hated the fall. But every year, now, she’ll water her hyacinth bulb and set it on our window sill. It was sitting there when I visited over the holidays last year. It’ll be sitting there when I come home for the holidays this year. So there’s really two revelations here: that someone will always dislike your art, but that doesn’t mean you should stop trying.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

day 6 - hello, world

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

When I was twenty, I attempted to take a programming course. Promotions for the class were splashed across every bulletin board across campus, promising improved job prospects and logical skills. I couldn’t imagine what I could specifically do with such superpowers, but according to the advertisements, the answer was everything. I tried to convince Jon to take it with me, but he asked, “why?” and then continued fashioning butterflies out of his music history notes. I figured I’d show him when I was off designing a beautiful website for us.

If you were to unearth our very first website -- as I know some of you have -- you would realize that I fell short of this goal. Poorly designed, even with the help of a website design template, it’s an eyesore I’d rather you not see. Truthfully, I stuck through the class out of determination for a taxing five days before quitting. The only thing I learned was that I do not have a computational brain.

I remember, as a kid, dreaming of sitting on my couch, watching a French television program or listening to a neuroscience podcast while crocheting a fluffy sweater for a dog I’d adopted. As it turns out, it’s not that easy. What I’m really doing is spilling hot chocolate over my keyboard because I was distracted by a bird screeching in my chimney. (Maybe we should get that cleaned.)

As I’ve written before, Jon was a celebrity from a young age. He met up with brilliant minds of all ages from around the country. He thought, when he was grown up, he’d have it all figured out. Constant gigging with the option of taking breaks. Devoted listeners and a devoted family. Innovation flowing from his fingertips without a second thought. I’ve also written before that melodies flow from his fingers, but I suppose writer’s block discriminates against no one.

The sixth song, written in the wee hours of the morning at our most sarcastic, plays on ambitious childhood dreams and adulthood realities. I thought I’d be building websites and designing new music players, while I barely figured out how to open a terminal and print “hello world.” Jon thought he’d be effortlessly performing with groundbreaking new ideas. We’re both currently snowed in with a modem that won’t stay on for longer than half-an-hour. You can only reboot so many times before you lose your sanity. Ingenuity has failed us all, but hopefully it will survive long enough to post this.

see all the posts here!

[poetunias]

storybook album countdown - masterpost!

It's February 2017. The world...well, it isn't great, but at the very least world-wide pandemics are confined to the history books. We live in a blissful state of ignorance, but mostly everyone is excited for Valentine's Day, when renowned musical duo (and iconic couple) Jana&Jon release their second studio album, Storybook.

As part of the lead-up to release, Jana's blogging every day, starting on the first - fourteen blog posts on fourteen days for fourteen new songs.

Relive yesteryear! Build your excitement! Storybook is coming.

about the wip // about jana

day 1 - ice cream and daydreams

day 2 - a very good place to start

day 3 - plaint spatters

day 4 - primrose

day 5 - do you remember

day 6 - hello, world

day 7 - it’s a big world, after all

day 8 - gray christmas

day 9 - gold leaf

day 10 - hyacinths

day 11 - all the world’s a stage

day 12 - do you know?

day 13 - snowflake songs

day 14 - valentine