Today Is My All-Time Favorite Day!

I woke up to weak sun shining through my window. I blinked, content in the knowledge that I had a day off, until my evening Music & Poetry class, at least.

And then, I started smiling like a five-year-old on Christmas, because I realized today is the day that Coheed's fifth studio album Year of the Black Rainbow comes out. Of course, I pre-ordered the deluxe package months ago, and I was eager to see if it arrived on time, forwarded to my dorm from my house.

First, I finished all my errands and homework like the dedicated college kid I am (no, but really!) and then I all but sprinted to the mail room. To be honest, I didn't expect the package to be there, but when the mail lady showed it to me I think I almost fainted with joy. I kept thanking her and I told her how much I hoped it would come today and she laughed at me good-naturedly. And then I went floating happily back to my dorm, paced around my room in a frenzy for a moment, and finally opened it.

The deluxe package is beautiful. I won't go into detail describing the artwork and all, but it includes a full-color, hardcover lyrics book, a "Making-Of" DVD, the full-length prose novel co-written by Claudio Sanchez, the Black Card pass, and (of course) the album.

That's when the squealing and the excited jumping-for-joy began on my part.

Finally I calmed down enough to load the disc onto my laptop and my iPod, and then I laid down on my bed, closed my eyes, and put my headphones on. I stayed that way for a full hour, just absorbing the songs, occasionally looking at the lyrics book.

I still haven't fully absorbed the album because I only had time for one full listen so far. I was not disappointed with the album on the whole, but it is very different from Coheed's previous work. But hey, it's meant to be a prequel, so of course it's a new style. My two favorite songs off the album right now are "Far" and "Made Out of Nothing (All That I Am)." I'm very pleased with the album; I think it really shows the progress of the band.

And if that weren't proof enough of Coheed's success, today MTV announced that they won MTV's Musical March Madness Trophy! (Of course, I voted for them all the way - and apparently I wasn't the only one!) They beat out My Chemical Romance in the final round. The article can be found on MTV's site here.

Congratulations to Coheed and Cambria - now everyone go buy Year of the Black Rainbow!

Happy Tuesday!
Emily Noel