Watch This! (October 2019)

So glad I made no solid promises as to how often I would make these posts. Between my job, my internship, and my podcast, I haven't had that much extra time this year, and my blog has really gotten neglected. I've made a few good posts, trying to catch up on pictures etc, but these simple, "Sharing" posts have totally fallen by the wayside. I think I've done two so far this year? We'll see if I can make it to four by the end of the year. 😆

Either way, as I haven't been sharing as often, these videos are a lot more curated than they have been in past years. I used to share just about everything from artists that I really enjoyed, but with so much time between posts, I'm not going to give you a hundred videos in one post to catch up. I watch a lot of YouTube, (overnight job at the hotel 😉) so I'm filtering out the best of the best.

Let's start this out with an old favorite, Alaa Wardi. No idea what the song is, I just love the way he sings it.



If you'll recall from several posts both this year and last year, I was eagerly anticipating a forthcoming release from LSD (Labrinth/Sia/Diplo) and I finally got my wish this spring! I just love their sound, and their music videos are so bizarrely creative!



Walk Off the Earth is always putting out great music, but this collab with Sarah Silverman was just so simple and fun. I loved it.



One channel that I don't usually share on my blog, but I still love, is the Valleyfolk. This is a sketch comedy group that started out on SourceFed back in the day, ended up going their own separate ways for a few years, and then came back together to form one of the funniest channels on YouTube. Now their content is not always the most family friendly, hence my decision to not share it here, but they recently performed on (and WON!) NBC's Bring the Funny, a new comedy competition show, and their sketches were some of the funniest things they've done yet! And since they were [moderately] family friendly, I thought this would be the perfect way to share them!

Now, because of self imposed space constraints, I'm only going to share one of the sketches, but this one is by far the funniest. I about died laughing. And that's almost literal. Stifling laughter hurts, but for some reason I decided to watch Bring the Funny at work, instead of at home where I could ugly laugh in private. Sometime we don't always make the wisest choices in life. Anyway, here's the Valleyfolk's funniest Bring the Funny sketch.



And speaking of Bring the Funny, JK Studios, the new sketch group comprised of the original Studio C cast, were also on the show! They didn't end up winning, but they did make it to the semi-finals! This was my favorite of their sketches.



Anthony of 10 Second Songs is always so creative and talented, so having him work with Peter Hollens just magnifies the talent exponentially. This video they did to coincide with the release of the new live-action version of Disney's Aladdin is just pure fun.



So you know how you sometimes just stumble down a YouTube rabbit hole? Not the kind of YouTube hole where you end up believing the lizard people put fluoride in our toothpaste so they can harvest our chemtrails, but the ones where you end up discovering music and talent that you've never heard of before. That happens to me semi-frequently, and during one of those rabbit-hole journeys I discovered the Hong Kong Ballet. Apparently Hong Kong has a ballet and I REALLY want to go see them perform now.



Over the summer, a couple YouTubers I've watched for years (I'm sure I've shared their videos here at some point) were cast together in a Broadway Musical, and they made a video to announce it. And this is just their own personal video, not Broadway's. Todrick does not go halfway with anything.



Lindsey Stirling never ceases to astound me with the work she puts into her music videos. I love the dark, 80's-esque distopian sci-fi fantasy vibe in this video. It's like Doctor Who Meets Tron meets The OA.



Another channel I don't share much of, for the same reason as the Valleyfolk, is College Humor. However, they have been stepping up their game recently and some of their stuff has been downright, die-laughing hilarious. They recently did a parody of the science fiction series Black Mirror, which, from what I've heard, is like a dark, depressing, version of the Twilight Zone about the potential dangers posed by new technology. And from what I've been told, it usually ends with some kind of disturbing twist. I don't actually know this first hand, I still haven't brought myself to actually watch it, I just don't like being depressed and disturbed. But, the College Humor parody of Black Mirror was hilariously funny, and since it was a lot more clean than some of their other stuff, I had to share it.


As you may recall, Avi Kaplan left Pentatonix in 2017 to make his own music, and even though he doesn't release music that often, his work is always worth waiting for. His latest video gives me feelings I didn't know I could feel. It's like nostalgia, but for something I've never even experienced.



As I alluded to above, Studio C is currently undergoing a change of cast. Of the previous members, only Tori and Dalton are left, and while I'm still on the fence about whether the quality will still be as funny as it has been with almost entirely new people, I'm still hopeful, especially after they released a few preview videos of the upcoming season, including this absolutely hilarious parody of Downton Abby. Do the Academy Awards cover web series? Because if they do, Dalton Johnson deserves a best actor nod. Either him or Dalton Johnson, and if possible, maybe even Dalton Johnson. They're all amazing. 😆



And if you'd like a taste of some of the new cast, this has been my favorite sketch so far. 😆



I think that's all I'll do for now, I have lots more I could share, but I think I'll try to do another post next month as well. We'll see. Either way, I have more blog posts coming, I just need to actually finish them. I'm shocked I finished this one. 😆

Watch This!

So, I've decided to retire my "Last Month Online" series. I've discovered with all the different things I have been doing online this past year, that unless I am only focusing on one thing, I function better, and am more productive without deadlines. If I have a lot of things to do, it is far less stressful to just not have them. I still want to share the best of the internet, but I don't want to force any arbitrary rules on myself.

So I'm starting a new iteration of my content sharing series, that I think I'm just going to call, "Watch This!" I will still try for one a month, but I will not sweat it if I miss one here and there. I am so busy with everything else I am doing online and in the real world, that I don't want to make myself dread making a post, and that's kind of how I felt last month. I have been so busy between my IRL job(s), and my YouTube channel, and getting ready for Christmas, that I haven't even wanted to think about my blog. It would nag at the back of my mind, but I didn't do anything about it, because it was lowest on my non-existent priority list. I thought about doing one last one, since I hadn't done one for November, but I didn't. I didn't even get a Christmas video post done, so I'm just moving on.

So, from now on, any videos I share will just be under the title of "Watch This!" And in future posts, I'll probably include the month of publication. This first post has just some random videos from the past few months, some Christmas stuff too, since there was some great stuff released that I thought deserved to be shared, but mostly just random videos that I liked. As usual.

I'm also going to use this series as an excuse to practice my graphic design skills, and experiment with Illustrator, and I am going to try to make a different logo for each post. Here is the first one.

We'll start this out with a new song from Tessa Violet. I could just listen to her voice/music on a never ending loop. I almost hate myself for what I'm about to say, but her music is, as the kids these days say, "A bop." Urgh. I feel so old using teen slang, but it's just so fitting in this case. :p



Lindsey Stirling released so many great Christmas songs this year, and I hate to skip any, but since the first draft of this post was inching toward 20 videos, I need to cut back to just a couple, so I'll start with this cinematic marvel for "I Wonder as I Wander."



And speaking of artists who put out a lot of content in the past few months, Peter Hollens did even more than Lindsey! I definitely can't include all of his, but I wanted to highlight his best, starting with this collab with his wife and Mike Tompkins.



If you need a little diversity in your holiday playlist, here's a Hanukkah song from Walk Off the Earth! :)



And, not to bring down the mood, but in case you were a fan of Walk Off the Earth, and you hadn't heard, they recently lost one of their members, Mike, affectionately known as Beard Guy. They released this video in tribute to him.



To bring things back up, I have something completely different. Gus Johnson is someone who came across my radar last year, and he is hilarious. His brand of comedy is not always 100% family friendly, but this one was so hilarious, I had to share it. I love a good subverted expectation, and he just nailed it with this one. :D



Next up is another song from Peter- I mean... Ashland!? Ashland Hollens! I remember when Peter and Evynne announced their first pregnancy, and now the kid is old enough to sing! And he's actually pretty great! He is of course joined by his parents, but he really holds his own!



Ugh... I just need a full LSD album already! Sia was already one of my favorite 'mainstream' singers, but this project with Labrinth and Diplo just adds something so different and catchy! I've loved just about everything they've released together so far!



One more Peter Hollens song, this time in collaboration with The Hound + The Fox, and it is amazing!



And one last Lindsey Stirling song to round this out, her original Christmas Song, Warmer in the Winter.

Last Month Online (August 2018)

We've got a great variety of videos this month!

Let's start this off with a collab I never knew I needed, Pomplamoose and Tessa Violet!



And speaking of Tessa, this dance video for Crush was amazing! I subscribed to this guy's channel immediately on principle alone. I hope he does more. 🙂



Next we got another Lucas the Spider video, and I loved it so much! I hope he does more music like this, maybe even full-length songs? 😊



I've always heard of Cher, but I've never really actually listened to her. However, this song she just put out for her upcoming ABBA cover album came across my radar and I LOVED it! It helps that I already love ABBA, but this was such a great cover. I may have to look into getting her album...



Next we have a great video from Peter Hollens, again, still haven't seen this movie, but I loved this ridiculous video. 😆



Next we have another amazing Steven Universe remix from VGR, with their cover of Ruby Rider!



Studio C has been putting out a bunch of great stuff as always, but I about died over this one, and I had to share it. 😆



And finally, I am absolutely in love with this new song from Sia! Or rather, from LSD, the collaboration project between the three artists Labrinth, Sia, and Diplo. It is so gorgeously weird and creative!!!

This Christmas Online (2017)

This is basically a last month online post, but with only Christmas videos. So I did the only logical thing and made an entirely new logo for it.

I will warn you in advance, that this is going to be another rather long post. I follow a lot of artists, and quite a few of them decided to release Christmas albums this year, (Or deluxe versions of last years' albums) so there was a lot of new music! I've tried to whittle it down to only my favorites, but, you know, I can only whittle things down so far... :p

We'll start with a Lindsey Stirling one, because she started early. Like, in October.



But then, so did Pentatonix.



It's still sad to see them without Avi, but they're still as good as ever.

And of course Peter Hollens did a bunch of new music as well.



As did the Piano Guys.



And Taylor Davis



And Voctave



Even Sia released a Christmas album! I absolutely loved this video, and it might actually be my favorite video this year. I was not expecting that many cameos, and I just loved that it featured Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard. :) The only thing that could have made it better would have been to have Kristen actually singing with Sia, instead of just lip-synching to her vocals. Oh well, I loved it anyway. :)



I don't normally care much about Hollywood marriages, but there's just something about Kristen and Dax that I love. :) Side note, wouldn't he be perfect for a Mr. Rogers bio-pic? Just look at him in that cardigan! They're practically twins! :p

Blimey Cow recently put out a Christmas themed video with some of my favorite brand of satire. :p I especially loved that they were picking apart of that awful "Christmas Shoes" song, and I about died laughing at the "Happy Holidays" segment. Sadly, I know too many people like that.

Let's do another Lindsey Stirling one, because I have several of those to share. I may even save the least Christmas related one for the next Last Month Online post, because I just have so many.

And another Peter Hollens

Another Piano Guys.

Walk Off the Earth did a great version of Deck the Halls! I love the creative, different ways they do all their videos! How cool would it have been to randomly be on that plane with them!

Nick Pitera recently put out a Christmas EP, and I just loved this song he did with Susan Egan.

And Mike Tompkins did a great Home Alone Medley.

Studio C has put out a few Christmas skits this month, but this one about killed me. XD

The "Missionaries" scene is even funnier when you remember that the Studio C team are Mormon themselves. I love that they keep a sense of humor about things like that. :)

Lets do one more Pentatonix before we close this. This was one of my favorites of all these Christmas songs. It's still sad that Avi has left the group, but they seem to have found a great replacement. I'm looking forward to hearing what else they do with him.

And we'll close the way we opened, with a Lindsey Stirling song. One of my favorite Christmas songs, and I love her spin on it. :)

TIIA 26 (The Internet is Awesome)

Let's start this post out right with one of my all-time favorite Pomplamoose songs, Bust Your Kneecaps. Yes, it's about exactly what the title says. :p



Evynne Hollens is back with another classic Disney song, this time from one of my recent favorites, Tangled. With her son Ashland as my favorite Disney animal sidekick, Pascal the chameleon. Too cute. :p



One of my favorite songs, by one of my favorite artists, covered by one of my favorite a cappella artists. I love it when things come together like this. :)



This I'm sharing just because it made me laugh. :p



This next song is currently a very popular song, that I don't particularly like. EXCEPT for this version by Walk Off the Earth. There's just something about their version that sets it apart from any of the others that I've heard. It's probably the kazoos. :p



A cappella science is back with another amazing science song!



In my last post I shared a weird video by the artist Poppy, which you can find HERE, but I thought maybe you'd like to see a video where she wasn't being unnaturally odd. Or at least, what she does for a career. Which is also weird in its own way. She's just weird all around. Which I'm totally fine with. :p As you can tell, she is just as much of a parody of celebrity culture in her music videos as she is in her shorter, weirder videos, like the one I posted previously.



We'll end this post with three videos from my personal YouTube trinity of awesome, Pentatonix,



Peter Hollens,



and Lindsey Stirling.

The Internet is Awesome 25 - Year End Extravaganza!

It's my last post of the year! And as such, I decided to make it almost twice as long! No special reason, except that I still have a ton of videos saved that I need to use in posts. :p

Let's start off this final post with another Hollens Disney song. They are just magical together. :)



Leave it to Kurt Hugo Schneider and Kina Grannis to come up with something like this. I already loved this song, but this unique spin on it is just so good.



This next video is an utterly amazing rendition of Danny Elfman's Spiderman theme done spectacularly by Lindsey Stirling and Lang Lang. It is so incredible. It makes me nostalgic for the days when we actually had memorable themes and scores in movies.



I have a bit of a confession. I have never really liked the song Danny Boy. I've always thought it was way too schmaltzy, and even years ago when my favorite artists like Charlotte Church or Celtic Woman covered it, I just wasn't that impressed. I don't think it's a bad song, I just never cared for it. I actually cared so little for it that when Peter Hollens announced he was starting an email newsletter and giving away an exclusive track to anyone who subscribed, I was so disappointed and actually did not subscribe when I found out that it was Danny Boy. Then he released a video. I couldn't believe it. For the first time in my life, I LOVED a version of Danny Boy. How foolish I had been. I immediately went and signed up for his newsletter to get the track. :p



Pentatonix's Scott Hoying and Mitch Grasi, who have been best friends since they were little kids, have had their own YouTube channel for years now, Superfruit, on which they normally post vlogs and challenge videos, but lately they've been putting out some great stuff, including this cover of a Katy Perry song. Hopefully they keep this up! As entertaining as they can be when they aren't busy as part of Pentatonix, they are at their best when they are singing.



Recently there was a Disney movie called The Queen of Katwe released in theaters. It is about a girl from Africa who becomes a chess champion. It sounded really unique, and I wanted to go see it, but I pretty much never have time to go to the theater. However, Disney released a song from the movie on their Vevo channel, and it is amazing. I was tempted to buy the soundtrack based on this song alone. I didn't, because I like to see movies before I start buying their merchandise, but still, how great is this song!? Now I need to see this movie!



A couple months ago I discovered a British show called Yonderland. It is about a 30-something mother of two that gets sucked into a portal in her pantry to a magical land where she has to fight monsters and save the world. And also it's full of songs and puppets. It's like they made it for me. :p This song was one of the best parts of the show.



Pogo has been one of my absolute favorite electronic remix artists for years, and this video is everything I love about him.



I heart Tessa Violet.



I love it when my favorite things collide into one giant mashup of awesome! Twenty One Pilots, Kurt Hugo Schneider, and VoicePlay!



This song is literally everywhere, but thankfully everyone seems to put a new spin on it, and the Piano Guys are no exception. :)



Technically Pentatonix did this song for their new Christmas album, but I've never thought of this song as a Christmas song, so it didn't go in my Christmas post. Either way, they killed it. :)



Everything that Bad Lip Reading does is incredibly stupid. But for some reason I can't help but love it anyway. This song was one of my favorite things they have done in ages. It's so dumb, but so catchy. Also, I almost died laughing at "That log had a child!"



We'll end this with another amazing video from Lindsey Stirling. And she's themed it around Alice in Wonderland. This video is everything! :D

Let Me Introduce: Puddles Pity Party

I was putting together one of my TIIA posts and I suddenly realized that I've never shared any videos of Puddles on my blog! Who is Puddles you ask? Well, let me tell you, you are in for a treat. Unless you hate clowns. If that's the case, then you are better off just slamming your laptop closed as hard as you can, or frisbee-ing your iPad across the room through the nearest plate glass window, or kicking your computer monitor off the desk and running out the door screaming, because if you hate clowns, it's about to get all sorts of freaky up in here.

I should preface this by telling you that these are all Postmodern Jukebox videos. Postmodern Jukebox is always awesome, but when they team up with Puddles they transcend awesomeness. Especially when they cover Lorde.



Which they've done twice.



They've also covered Sia.



Among others.



This cover of Mad World is one of my absolute favorites. I just love the understated little dance.



Their latest video is a cover of a Twenty One Pilots song, one of the ones that just totally gets stuck in your head. :)



Can you see why I'm obsessed? No? Well, that's your loss then, isn't it?

Anyway, now that you've been enriched, go forth and spread the joy of Puddles. Or... well... the melancholy. Go forth and spread the melancholy of Puddles.

TIIA 18 (The Internet is Awesome)

Let's start this off with a wonderfully weird video from Karmin. I LOVE this take on Pure Imagination!



Next up is a video from Ellen. She recently had Adele on her show and together they pulled off one of the funniest pranks I've ever watched. This is just one more reason that Ellen is one of my favorite people. :p



Sia is currently one of my favorite mainstream artists. She has such a unique voice, she writes all her own songs and music, and her videos and performances are all completely unique. Like this performance of Cheap Thrills, my favorite song from her latest album.



As I've said before, PBS was a huge part of my childhood, and one of the shows that was such a big part of my life back then was The Joy of Painting, with Bob Ross. So this video about him by Mental Floss was really interesting to me.



I love how two (or more) artists can take one song and go in two completely different directions with it. Example: Megan Trainor recently released her song, No, And Pentatonix did an amazing cover of it!



But then Nataly Dawn and Kina Grannis took it and did something completely different with it.



And then Kurt Hugo Schneider and Sam Tsui took it and put their own ridiculous spin on it as well!



Peter Hollens is always amazing, but some of his best work is when he does music from and inspired by the Lord of the Rings series. Like this video for Misty Mountains.



And we'll end with a video from Peter's wife, Evynne. She recently finished a video that she's been working on for ages, and I think it was worth the wait. :)

TIIA 13 (The Internet is Awesome)

Let's open with something so beautifully weird that must must be experienced. There is nothing to set up except to say that Aardman Animation recently joined up with an SFX company, Nathan Love, and this was their way of announcing it.



This Studio C sketch is hilarious. Especially when you find out what's really going on. :p



This video by Stuart Edge is great, not just for the awesome costumes and dancing, but looking at it as an editor, I'm just in awe of how perfectly it came together.



Sometimes when an artist releases a particularly great album, you fear that their next one might not be able to live up to the standard they set for themselves. That's what I worried about Sia after her amazing album, 1000 Forms of Fear. I had nothing to fear. This is the main single off her new album, This Is Acting. It's just as amazing as the last one.



Mike Tompkins everybody. He's too good.



I can guarantee that you've never heard the Star Wars theme like this before.



CoCo Jones is someone that my cousin and I really liked when she would show up as a guest on different Disney Channel shows, and she's very funny, but I think she's even better at singing! She's amazing!



Let's end this post on a blast from the past, I don't think I ever shared any of their videos on my blog, I think their biggest viral hits were going around before I ever started writing, but back in the day a few member of my family and I were captivated by the amazing vocal stylings of a group called the Voca People. They say that they are an alien race that communicate exclusively through song. Whatever they are, they're beyond amazing. Can I say that they are... "Out of this world?" I apologize. :p Anyway, they recently released a new video, and it could be their best yet. But it's Disney, so I'm biased. :p

TIIA3 (The Internet is Awesome)

You know the drill, the internet is awesome, here are a few examples.

Lindsey Stirling recently covered a Hatsune Miku song, and it was amazing.



Next is a song by Sia. Sia has become one of my favorite artists, but I have hesitated to share some of her videos, because of their controversial nature. This performance of "Elastic Heart," from Ellen, was awesome, and, as far as I know, completely uncontroversial, so I'm sharing away!



Speaking of Sia, Alaa Wardi recently covered Chandelier, and it was just as awesome as the original!



Peter Hollens just released his cover of The Hanging Tree from the Hunger Games, and it was amazing.



Next is the first musical outing by YouTuber Brittani Louise Taylor who is know for her skits, vlogs, and occasional musical parodies. She has never tried her hand at writing her own song before, and I think she did pretty good for a first try!



I recently discovered a new acapella group called VoicePlay, and if you know me, you know I love me some good acapella. And VoicePlay is good acapella. Here they are covering Lana Del Rey's version of "Once Upon a Dream" from Maleficent.



Let's finish this off with another Peter Hollens video, Song of The Lonely Mountain, from The Hobbit. If you're a Lord of the Rings fan, you should totally check out Peter's covers of the songs from all the movies. They're all so great.



That's all for now, hopefully it won't be another 3 months before I do one of these!

The Internet is Awesome 2

I know I've already done one video compilation post this month, but with as much as I wasn't blogging, I had plenty built up for a second one. And a third one later on, but that'll be just Christmas videos.

First up, we have the music video for my favorite song from the new Annie movie, You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile, performed by Sia.



Great movie by the way, I highly recommend it for anyone who likes musicals.

Next up is a cover of Taylor Swift's Shake it Off, by Alex Boye.



I love the original twists he puts on songs.

Now for someone I haven't featured in awhile, The Piano Guys. I would have featured them awhile ago, but the video they did that I was planning to post, a Batman themes medley, was blocked by some...Well, I probably shouldn't get into that... Anyway...



Awesome as always. I love how they always mix classical music with more modern songs.

Next is a channel I have never featured before as they are relatively new, it's another piano channel but totally different than the piano guys, Player Piano. This time doing the theme to one of my favorite childhood (and adulthood) video games, Tetris!



Their videos are consistently awesome, and always with an awesome custom designed piano.

Next we have the incomparable Lindsey Stirling who can make even a sponsored video amazing.



I've never played Dragon Age, but the video is amazing.

Last but not least, Peter Hollens and... Jackie Evancho?! Really?! It was just last week that she was making headlines as this tiny little girl with a huge, powerful voice! How did she grow up so fast!? In all seriousness, she's amazing, as is Peter, and the video is awesome.