Regina Spektor, Uncoventionally Amazing

Regina Spektor is a very quirky musician who doesn’t really fit into any specific musical genre, as each of her songs have their own distinctive styles. She has a broad vocal range, using different vocal techniques such as beat boxing flourishes in her ballads, titular sounds, accents, and most notably, glottal stops (like uh-oh, uh uh uh, hah uh uh eart). Her songs show influences from folk, punk, rock, hip hop, jazz, and classical music.

I love Regina Spektor. Why? She’s not your conventional music artist for the reason that her lyrics are brilliant, funny, weird, poetic, and meaningful. These are some of my favorite snippets from her songs.

On the Radio
No, this is how it works
You peer inside yourself
You take the things you like
And try to love the things you took
And then you take that love you made
And stick it into some
Someone else’s heart
Pumping someone else’s blood
And walking arm in arm
You hope it don’t get harmed
But even if it does
You’ll just do it all again

Ghost of Corporate Future
He also said,
“Imagine you go away
On a business trip one day
And when you come back home,
Your children have grown
And you never made your wife moan

The Calculation
So we made our own computer
Out of macaroni pieces
And it did our thinking
While we lived our lives
It counted up our feelings
And divided them up even
And it called our calculation
Perfect love

Didn’t even know
That love was bigger
Didn’t even know

Laughing With
No one laughs at God
When the doctor calls after some routine tests
No one’s laughing at God
When it’s gotten real late
And their kid’s not back from the party yet

But God can be funny
At a cocktail party when listening to a good God-themed joke, or
Or when the crazies say He hates us
And they get so red in the head you think they’re ‘bout to choke
God can be funny,
When told he’ll give you money if you just pray the right way
And when presented like a genie who does magic like Houdini
Or grants wishes like Jiminy Cricket and Santa Claus
God can be so hilarious

Fidelity
I never loved nobody fully
Always one foot on the ground
And by protecting my heart truly
I got lost in the sounds

If you’re still not convinced, I’ll have you know, she also sang, played the piano, and beat a CHAIR at the same time during her performance of Poor Little Rich Boy– it’s the stuff of legends. So go check her out. Go go go go!