Stormy Winter: Vakili Band and How to Care for Flowers

How to Care for Flowers – In A New Light

Similar artists: La Dispute, Counterparts, mewithoutYou, Joy Division, The Smiths

Genre: Post-Hardcore, Screamo

How to Care for Flowers’ songs of woe and despair sound as natural as Summer rain falling on a green meadow. That’s quite an achievement for artists with such an interest in opening up the most troubling aspects of modern life. 

Most songwriters have formulas to rely on. Blame the aridity of modern pop music on that, first of all. It’s the experienced musicians who know exactly where each piece should fit that rob us and themselves of the joy of being surprised by music. And, since we’re not offered any revelations, it’s also hard to care about them. 

But after all, that’s the way most things work in life. Most people are just either trying to get by while following a set of instructions. The ones that have the luxury to be ambitious, also follow a code that is set to bring them to the top. There’s little room for spontaneity in our world. And, everything feels just a bit unnatural. 

How to Care for Flowers’ “In A New Light” sounds like someone’s emotional breakdown. But if that’s what it is, the recording and writing come through as a seamless, unforced act. The flowing poetry is certainly the focal point, a kind of frenzied confession. But there’s hope at the end of the tunnel, the kind we wouldn’t be able to feel if this song were done while merely calculating a formula. 

Vakili Band – Yves Calls Her Betty

Similar artists: New York Dolls, Patti Smith, The Velvet Underground, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Pretenders

Genre: Psychedelic Rock, Alternative Rock

Vakili Band takes inspiration from daring artists who didn’t know any better and ended up playing in groundbreaking punk bands. 

U.S. and U.K. punk bands are the most famous groups belonging to this style and period in music history. However, the general opinion about just what it all meant is very different on either side of the Atlantic. 

If you ask the English, the punk bands were revolutionary, sure. They were born out of the three-day working week and a growing frustration with the welfare state. But the musicians couldn’t really play. They were hacks zapping their way through simple three-chord songs. 

Now, if you ask the Americans, they’ll tell you that their brand of punk rock came out of the art scene. Most of the people that ended up in bands were already well-regarded writers and visual artists. Punk-rock was just another medium that they could use. Playing three-chord songs was a choice, not proof of their ability. 

Vakili Band’s “Yves Calls Her Betty” is a song written with all matters of hope and faith in the kind of artsy, theatrical punk rock of the 1970s. This is a recorded performance where the poetry takes center stage, and where vocal and guitar histrionics are used in the same way that a less imaginative band might use a guitar solo. It’s music from the time when gifted kids still used to gamble anything they could on creating art for art’s sake.