As is often my habit, I was playing music videos on YouTube yesterday. I was looking for a new one that I knew had been posted, and came across another couple of recent posts from bands I enjoy. This got me thinking back to when I had first started playing their music, and it seemed a good idea to give you a little something for the weekend: the three new ones, plus the first from each that I had played.

I have often said that one of my favourite video bands is Walk Off the Earth (WOTE). Their videos – both of their own songs and the many cover versions they do – are often very inventive and funny. Their latest is played straight, but as it is a song from one of the all time greats I thought it worth playing for you:

As I said, they play that as a straight cover, but it highlights for me that they have a lot of musical talent within the band, and their harmonies are great. I’m not alone in liking them – they have 4.15m followers on YouTube and that video, which was posted yesterday, is already past the 90k views mark. I’ve been following them for a long time, ever since the first video of theirs that I saw. Yes, it was THAT one:

That was posted in January 2012, and I think I first saw it a few months after that. I’ve been a fan ever since, and have probably watched most of their output – which is vast! That one became an internet sensation, and now stands at over 191m views. Not bad for a band that isn’t a mainstream chart act. They do have a loyal fan base, though, and when pandemics permit they sell out concerts wherever they go around the world. I had a ticket to see them but it was at the time my illness first hit me, and I wasn’t able to go: one of my great regrets.

The song I was looking for was the new one from a musician I have been following for a while – about eight years in her case. Nina Nesbitt isn’t a household name here or anywhere else, but is another with a loyal following. I follow her Facebook page and am always impressed by the humorous, natural way that she interacts with fans: in effect, she is just being herself. This new song, which I recall reading was prompted by personal circumstances, is beautiful:

Nina is 27, and has the maturity at that relatively young age to write a song which speaks profoundly to so many of us. She released her first record at 17, and her first album, Peroxide, in February 2014, when she was still only 19. That reached #11 in the UK, and her follow up album The Sun Will Come Up, The Seasons Will Change, came out in February 2019, and made #21 here. I have featured her a couple of times before – as part of a post on one of the oddest social crazes – with this song, which was the first of hers I can recall hearing, and have loved it ever since:

I think that shows a lot of the personality she also shares in her Facebook interactions, and the social comment in it is quite cutting. She isn’t afraid to poke fun at herself, which is for me always a good trait for a popular musician to have, though I guess it helps to get away with it if you are stunningly beautiful! Looking back through my archives, it seems I have posted this song three times before in various guises, so I apologise to anyone who has already seen it. But if you are a newish reader, or just want another chance to see me having a mild rant, you’ll find the most recent post here. A fun fact about Nina: she was for a time Ed Sheeran‘s girlfriend, and his song Nina, on his album x, was written for her.

The final new video is from a band I first came across a couple of years ago, from one of YouTube’s more successful recommendations. They are a covers band who, like Nina, started off when they were young. They are very prolific, posting a weekly song plus many others at various times, including their acoustic sessions – which are opened up for interaction with fans. This is their latest, which came out on Thursday:

Go on, own up: who’d join the queue to take up Audra’s kind offer? First To Eleven are a very talented bunch, and are well worth following: more than 1.3m have already subscribed to their YouTube channel, and that video has nearly 79k views in its first two days. Three of them (i.e. not the bass player) have recently branched out into a new band, Concrete Castles, who write their own songs. Their debut album, Wish I Missed U, was released last September, and is very good. The original version of this song dates from 1998, when Sixpence None The Richer had a massive worldwide hit with it, reaching #2 in the US and #4 in the UK, and many other top tens too.

First to Eleven are from Erie, Pennsylvania, and the first of their videos I can recall seeing is this one, in which they hosted a street party in their home town:

I love the way everyone is having so much fun in that, though I’ve still to work out how it suddenly became night time around the 4.50 mark, and Audra had a complete change of outfit! The video was posted in June 2019, a couple of weeks before she turned 18 – she is the youngest member of the band, two of whom were school students of the fourth member when he set it up. Audra joined a couple of years later, at 15, when the original vocalist left. I think I first saw this one not long after it was posted, and have been a fan since then: you may recall them from a couple of previous plays in my Advent Calendar.

I’ve had fun putting this piece together, and hope that you have enjoyed the music as much as I have. Unless anything earth-shattering happens in the meantime you can expect to see me again on Tuesday, when another day of the week will be featured for its tunes. Until then, have a great weekend and I hope Monday is passable, too 😊🤘