This week’s YouTube Live comes to you from a land of crisis and turmoil. A land where people have to be careful on the streets from renegade cops and racist leaning mural deface-ists. A land called: Arizona. Phoenix, Arizona, to be specific. On a car of their light rail system to be double specific. There on that car we find an amazing up and coming Phoenix band called, Andrew Jackson Jihad (Greatest. Band name. EVER.).
The video is for a website called TheTrainTracks.org, a website where local bands submit information to picked to perform for the website. All the groups picked perform on a train car on the Phoenix light rail system, and the subsequent video is posted for all to see. The videos are then voted on to see who wins each quarter of the year and then the year overall. This song did not win for some unknown reason, but regardless it’s an amazing song.
Andrew Jackson Jihad consists of two gentlemen, Sean and Ben, on guitar and upright bass respectively, and a whole slew of rotating musicians. They formed in 2004, and play an energetic and whip-smart brand of folk rock. Or folk punk. Folkish punk rock? Either way it ain’t your average folk music. There is a lot of angry in these boys, and like The Mountain Goats before them, they deliver their angst with some of the jolliest and damn catchy melodies you can find. You should keep an eye out for these guys.
The song they are performing from this train car is a slower, and less electric than the album version, song called “Heartilation”. The fantastic lyrics take a basic emo idea and make it fun, enjoyable, and…not 16 years old. As they play in a section of seats, you see some folks on the train tapping their feet along and some very confused passengers trying to board. As you watch it try to resist the urge to tap your own foot. It’s fantastic and fun music. One of their more tame songs, but still incredible. Watch the video and then go find all the songs you can. I promise it to be worth it.
