Monthly Playlists

Listen up! Quite literally.

This year, I plan to create a different playlist each month on Spotify that will contain all the songs from that month which have created a memory, I have rediscovered or I have simply fallen in love with.

I want to share these playlists with you all as I see them as a different form of blogging, letting my emotions out through song in a way. It would be great if you could let me know what you all think and if you have any playlists you think I should be following (this is the perfect chance for a sneaky little plug for yourselves).

January 2015 ❄️

February 2015❤️

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A Little Bit Of Very Big News

Okay, okay, let's all just calm down for a second.

I am starting a new blog. But wait! Before you leave! I'll still be running Offbeat, my love for writing has come back because of this blog and the posts on the new blog will be as and when the opportunities come through.

The new blog will be a music-orientated blog about all things rock, punk, pop punk, indie, alternative, maybe even some dance and pop etc thrown in from time to time.

I attended the Social Media Conference in Manchester before Christmas and I got talking to a guy (funnily enough I think his name was Guy) and he had gotten into his job in social media through interviewing some really high profile bands just as a blogger. He had met My Chemical Romance, Panic! At The Disco, basically loads of people I love and I got rather excited.

After some deep thinking and not being able to concentrate in work, I decided I need to be able to do this myself. After a few texts with my amazing best friend (who is now weirdly my assistant) we have decided to go on a new journey, open up a lot of new doors and work on this new project together so I don't have to leave Offbeat behind.

The posts will be coming back, I promise. Blog neglect is wrong and I need to up my game, so I'll be writing more content than ever over the next couple of weeks.

I hope you can all get behind this new project and maybe even suggest a few names for me? I'm flagging!

Thanks guys, I love you all, and have a great anti-Valentine's today!

Christmas #1- One X Factor Victory Too Many?

I think we all saw it coming, no matter how much we didn't want it, The X Factor have (yet again) scooped the Christmas number 1 spot, and it's actually gone quite unnoticed.

The thing is, since The X Factor came along, churning out squeaky clean pop songs into the British charts at Christmastime, the Christmas number 1 single doesn't seem to matter as much anymore. Yes, the first few years that Cowell decided he would personally choose the number 1, the anticipation as still there. And in 2009, when rather a lot of us decided to boycott the charts and Killing In The Name by Rage Against The Machine was number 1.

The year was 2004, the man was Steve Brookstein. The first winner of the X Factor anywhere in the world, and it was guaranteed the show would become a phenomenon after the winner's single reached that all important Christmas number 1 spot. The years kept coming, and so did the X Factor winners. After 11 years and now 7 top spot singles, it's getting so boring, and I presume I'm not the only one who feels like this.

In the years before the X Factor (I know, it's hard to believe there was a time when it wasn't here), actual festive songs were topping the charts during the holidays. It wasn't happening every year, but since the 1950s, Christmas songs were claiming that important spot every few years. Ironically, the last Christmas song to hit number 1 was Band Aid 20, in 2004. That was 10 years ago, and alright, we've had other acts like the Military Wives and Justice Collection who were both spreading the word and raising money for a good cause, lovely. Women singing to their husbands who were at war and reminding them that they love them. It was cute.

So Simon, if you;re reading, pack it in. We want to be able to celebrate family and festivities during this time of year and not fund your expensive habits. Either put off the winner's single until after Christmas or just air the show at another time of the year. Give us a well deserved break.

Picture Sourse: http://images.nymag.com/daily/entertainment/20090630_simonmoney_250x375.jpg

Those Crazy Women

I'm not the biggest fan of Taylor Swift or her music, but when I heard a little bit of an uproar in the feminist community, I decided to check out her video for her new song 'Blank Space'. After being branded as 'crazy' by a few guys in the past, I completely understood where the feminists were coming from.

If you haven't seen the video, it features a relationship between Taylor and a very attractive man which has major ups and downs which lead to them shouting at each other, Taylor Swift destroying a beautiful car (I almost wept) and at one point I think she was stood on a horse? Yeah, it was a bit weird.

Now I don't know if she was trying to show men that their girlfriends aren't that crazy and they shouldn't be branding women as crazy because this is how they behave, or if she was saying that this is how women wish they could behave and, in fact, are nuts. Either way, the video portrays women in an awful light and actually makes me think, why have I been branded 'crazy' in the past.

Most of the time, the guys who have called me crazy weren't even my boyfriends? There was one guy who couldn't decide between me and my best friend. He told me to kill myself (that's another story) and still to this day calls me psychotic to my best friend (it happened literally 2 days ago).

If this is anything to go by, are people just calling women crazy to cover their own tracks? Let me know your thoughts because I'm still a bit confused. Email me at emily.ware96@gmail.com and I'll compile all the answers in one post.

Thanks guys!