Happy New Year from First Aid Kit!

Back in 1788, poet Robert Burns wrote an anthem that's still more ubiquitous than Montell Jordan's "This is How We Do It" at New Year's. The lines to the kazoo-friendly "Auld Lang Syne" have summed up the "drinking to forget" philosophy ever since.

What came in ensuing years is more complex. Now, we not only have to forget the shitty year that we just experienced, but also an even shittier collection of wall-to-wall saccharine Christmas music. So, the end of one year and the beginning of another has its perks. It's a brief window of time when countless serious songwriters put down their sidecars, nog, and newborn babies, and pick up a pen.

New Year's is loaded with the stuff songwriters ache for -- reflection, redemption, introspection, apologies, resolutions, and, naturally, mournful chord progressions. Sapped of the wild commercial potential of a season just finished, these are songs mostly tucked into albums released throughout the year that are about things bigger than just a gift-giving season. (Although Prince and U2 turned these sentiments into massive hits.) They hint at the concentrated power of a 48-hour period -- concentrated even further into a couple of minutes.

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