One Direction - Little Things

Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Liam Payne, Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson all together formed One Direction – a British-Irish boys band - in 2010, in London.

By the time of the 7th series of The X Factor, the 5 auditioned as solo candidates but failed to pass to the “Boys” category at “judges’ houses”. After a suggestion by Nichole Scherzinger (a guest judge) they formed a band at Wembley Arena during the “bootcamp” stage and qualified for the “Groups” category. They end up finishing in the third place.

After the success in this contest they signed with Simon Cowell’s record label Syco Records and later on signed with Columbia Records in North America.

The debut studio album was released in the same year and it’s called Up All Night and made them popular everywhere, mainly due to their pop-hit What Makes You Beautiful. This year they launched their second album, Take me Home. They are basically what we can call a 'money machine'.

So far they won a BRIT Award and 3 MTV Video Music Awards.

This song is not like the ones most known from them. Little Things was written by Ed Sheeran (
Get to know more about him in another post we made one year ago: http://www.fymstories.com/2011/10/ed-sheeran-lego-house.html).

It was written about the best things about someone, kind of like the things you wouldn't expect. (…) Those 'little things' include all those seeming imperfections and idiosyncrasies, like the 'crinkles by your eyes,' and 'that you talk in your sleep'.

Your hand fits in mine

Like it's made just for me

But bear this in mind

It was meant to be

And I'm joining up the dots

With the freckles on your cheeks

And it all makes sense to me

I know you've never loved

The crinkles by your eyes

When you smile

You've never loved

Your stomach or your thighs

The dimples in your back

At the bottom of your spine

But I'll love them endlessly

James Vincent McMorrow - We Don't Eat

James Vincent McMorrow is an Irish folk singer and songwriter. James released his debut album called Early in the Morning, two years ago in February.

The sonority of the album can be easily compared to Bon Iver's style.

I discovered James Vincent due to his cover of the very well know song Wicked Game (link) and also due to another cover for a charity album called Higher Love (link).

We Don't Eat is the 5th song of the album.

So we don't eat until your father's at the table

We don't drink until the devil's turned to dust

Never once has any man I've met been able to love

So if I were you my friend, I'd learn to have just a little bit of trust

Lisa Hannigan - What'll I Do

When I found out that Florence and The Machine had to cancel their gig at Alive’12 I was very disappointed because it was the show I was most expecting to see this year (and of course the only reason I bought the ticket). Instead of selling the ticket I decided to go and discover new bands. A few days before I made my homework and while hearing to Lisa Hannigan I decided I had to be at 5pm on Palco Heineken to hear her.

Lisa Hannigan was born in 1981 – I swear she doesn’t seem to have 31, I would say she was in the early 20s – and is an Irish singer and songwriter. Before beginning her solo career in 2008 she was a member of Damien Rice’s band (during 6 years). In 4 years she released two albums: Sea Sew (2008) and Passenger (2011).

Her music can be considered a mix between indie and folk while her songs are very melodic, calm and can actually be called “sweet” due to her angelical voice.

During her performance at Optimus Alive she was always smiling probably due to being very surprised with the whole support the public was giving to her. In the middle of the show she asked how many Irish people where there and let me tell you they were a reasonable number and I saw at least 3 flags.
The show was way better than what I was expecting, she showed a lot of confidence even though she seemed a bit shy at the beginning.
After this performance, and the receptivity of the ones hearing her, I have no doubts she will come back – at least she said she will! Let’s wait.

This song is the second single taken from Lisa Hannigan's album Passenger:

What’ll I say without you to talk to, 
no one to serve or volley the ball to,
you write the words but I miss the volume,
what’ll I say without you. 
Oh I don’t know what to do with myself 
now that I’m here and you’re gone.