30-Day Song Challenge, Day 3 - a song that makes you happy

I've spent the last five hours traversing downtown Seattle and Capitol Hill, aglow in that rarest of Emerald City joys--a sunny, mild(-ish), beautiful March day. And as clouds drag across the clarion blue sky, I've been listening to one song on repeat all afternoon.

Seattle band Curtains for You are making a bit of a splash lately, most recently in a City Arts magazine poll that picked them as one of the region's Best New Bands (plug alert: Yours Truly was asked to contribute a sentence or two extolling the band's considerable virtues). Curtains craft un-jaded, unapologetically heart-on-sleeve pop blessedly free of indie-poseur airs; packed with gorgeous harmonies and songwriting that carries on the tradition of pop classicists like Harry Nilsson and Village Green-era Kinks. It's music tailor-made for a day like today.

"Licorice Skies" closes out the band's (great) 2009 CD What a Lovely Surprise to Wake Up Here. It's a loping, joyous account of an extra-memorable Fourth of July, delivered with vivid lyrical imagery and the kind of exhuberance that only youth and happiness can produce. Music nerd that I am, I could produce a phone-book-sized list of songs that provide potent pick-me-ups. But in this moment, this burst of sunny pop makes me happy to be alive.

I'm far too much of a Luddite to be able to upload an MP3 of "Licorice Skies" to this humble blog, but if you go to the band's MySpace page, you can hear it in its entirety. Do so, and c'mon, get happy.   

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