If you've ever followed a link to YouTube and found yourself looking back on an hour that you wish you could get back then I hope to be of some assistance with the occasional YouTube escape. These will be spontaneous trips to YouTube for things that are worth your time.

Today's escape started with the official lyric video for Death Cab for Cutie's first single from their upcoming eighth studio album Kintsugi. The song is titled "Black Sun" and it makes me excited for what's to come on the new album.

From there I found the intro to a YouTube playlist of music videos and performances that Ben Gibbard and Nick Harmer had created in anticipation of their 2011 album Codes and Keys. In it, Harmer mentions The Decemberists at the same time that I noticed an NPR Tiny Desk concert with The Decemberists in the watch next sidebar and jumped over to it.

This little acoustic set featured three songs from their then-new album The King is Dead which is my favorite Decemberists album to date. The three piece ensemble's pure talent is showcased in three songs.

"Down by the Water"
"Rox in the Box"
"June Hymn"

From this Tiny Desk concert I jumped into Iron & Wine's appearance on the concert series and was amazed at how quickly 17 minutes can go by. Sam Beam is an amazing and engaging singer and songwriter with a humility that comes through in his awkward but honest talk between songs.

Iron & Wine played 4 songs in the set:
"Half Moon"
"Big Burned Hand"
"Tree By The River"
"Naked As We Came"

All three of the videos are worth your time even if you've never heard of these bands. I would encourage you to take 35 minutes to catch some great music from truly talented artists.