Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Foster the People - Helena Beat

iBlog brings you a current radio hit by the name of "Helena Beat" from the recently popular band Foster the People. Foster the People is a band comprised of lead vocalist (among many other things!) Mark Foster, bass and backing vocals Cubbie Fink, and Mark Pontius on drums and extra percussion. Mark Foster, then struggling to make ends meet as a jingle writer, founded Foster the People, which led to several musical successes.


It is quite hard to place Foster the People in even just a few classifications because their music really runs the generic gamut. Indie pop and rock seem to crop up a lot as one of the best ways to describe this band, but such genres as dance, electronica, and more make frequent appearances in their music. At any rate, their music is much lighter and upbeat, with very subtly dark undertones.

Helena Beat is not the only hit by Foster the People -- in fact, it's not even their biggest hit. This band is actually more well known for their first chart-topper, "Pumped Up Kicks." Pumped Up Kicks took many high positions ranging from three to one on the charts all over the board, showing the world that they were not only here to stay, but they were here to change music a little more.

Today's feature song has more than just a catchy tune behind it -- in fact, there is a lot more than just a catch tune. The lyrics explain a pretty important life lesson: that life is tough, and you may go through a lot of difficult times, but keep your head up and soldier on. Helena Beat, when listened to in both lyric and beat, is a pretty uplifting song, great for those times when you are down and need to get back up.

Of course, a song like Helena Beat just could not go without an interesting music video, and so we have the above video. The video starts off as the band's lead man, Mark Foster, is driving away from a burning, post-apocalyptic city as he discovers a carriage on the road. Going to investigate it, he is ambushed by a bunch of children, who subdue him and take him to their base. They proceed to break everything, and then strap up Foster to a chair device, where he is then electrocuted alongside another, older man in a similar device. As the procedure slows to a halt, we can see that Foster is a young kid as well.

1 comment:

  1. I think Foster the People is nice example of how a really good indie band can become popular. I wish that this kind of music would be played in radio stations/tv more often:)

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