3:03 PM
I just got my first-ever (for this apartment) noise complaint today,
except that it wasn't quite one really. One of the property owner's
agents was I think showing the next door apartment and came by to bang
on my door and say "noise complaint." I've never actually had complaint
from any of the tenants all year, though - or the on-site super.
3:02 AM
The weird thing about this, which is something akin to
a pet idea of my own, is that the bits are in the form of "X recommends
you listen to Y when in Z," but a lot of the Y's are only connected
to the Z's because the X's listened to the Y's in the Z's (the "emotional"
association the page cites). But then why listen to these songs rather
than any of your own favorite music, when wherever?
2:54 AM
Numbers it is.
2:27 AM
These are some things I listened to today.
Burning Airlines. J. Robbins' voice is in a great range for me to sing along with.
In Utero, due to Kathleen's discussion of the recommended bass and treble levels, which I had totally forgotten about as I haven't looked in the liner notes to the album for years. I didn't get to try the settings, though, because I was using my portable CD player. Sounded just fine to me.
The guitar parts at the beginning of "Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge on Seattle" sound very particular, very definite (despite apparent tunlessness-noisiness).
The girl who's on before me's radio show. Last week it made me fall asleep - IN A GOOD WAY - but this week I was too hopped up on caffeine or something.
Keith Jarrett at La Scala, the second part. The more I listen to this the more the fast runs of the first however many minutes of it hang together as part of a larger sequence of development. It takes time for the initial holy-shit-will-you-listen-to-that-thing-he's-doing to wear off (some).
The Rachel's/Matmos split. Gave me the impression that being an Electronic Musician would be a joyously laissez-faire sort of deal.
Charle Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra with Carla Bley (I have to say "with Carla Bley" to make myself feel better since part of the reason I bought it was that it had a female jazz musician on it) - the "generals" track, whatever it's called. The production makes the music seem even more drunkenly woozy.
1:38 AM
These are some things I listened to today.
Old Green Day records. The signs are already present on the earliest stuff but even by Dookie they betray (in the sense of "let the cat out of the bag") actually having fairly standard musical goals: check out the tiny cymbal flourishes post-guitar at the ends of some songs. Also, that album sounds hopelessly trebly now.
Daydream Nation. I hope there are plenty of girls out there who want to be like Kim Gordon when they grow up.
Couple of Stones songs. "Rocks Off" and "Ventilator Blues" in particular made me swagger a tiny bit maybe walking. Went exploring, found a tunnel under the train tracks - unfamiliar enough to remind me of walking in Minneapolis, made me look forward to walking there in the fall and seeing what music sounds like.
Hard to walk to new Mogwai.
I'm actually starting to like the whole of Bringing It All Back Home. I hadn't noticed before but besides the best-of comp the deli has been playing this, so maybe it's had extra opportunity to ingratiate itself to me while I'm in my just-relax-and-enjoy-whatever frame of mind (also cf. instrumental mixes of the Deltron 3030 album, though "Things You Can Do" still on the annoying side). The talking blues stuff is the most ace but I've even warmed to the Dylan-intones-(out-of-tune)-w.-acoustic songs; similar songs on Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde on Blonde were not early favorites, to be sure, but for those I had the added help of their being more anomalous on electrified albums, and also I think Dylan's voice was less grating on them.
If I had a CD burner I would burn a comp of all Dylan-talks-the-blues tracks.
Picked up the Byrds best-of a while back since I had previously erred with (Untitled) / Unissued and figured I should give them a fairer chance - blissy but nowhere near as cacophonous as I was expecting (i.e. 12-string chime). "Tambourine Man" is so obviously a Dylan tune, the phrasing is so much more distinctive than a lot of the Byrds' own hippy mumbling.
Nothing playing now, been quiet for a couple of hours. If I can gather together the gumption maybe I will play the first Burning Airlines.
When in doubt, just write something stupid.
3:08 AM
When I play Chopin loud the lyricism is more apparent; when quiet, the
odd harmonic changes.
2:03 AM
The Tonal Centre
(oh ha ugh) provides some interesting and helpful explanations of
basic harmony theory concepts (along with some more handwavy metaphysical
junk here and there, but not much).
12:51 AM
Mathematical
music theory FAQ which contains this interesting statement:
If a certain set is cadencial, then every set containing it is cadencial, too. So the really interesting things are minimal cadencial sets.
(Interesting because I'd never heard it put that way before, in terms of minimal sets and containment, which is a) a very math-jargon thing to say, and b) thus more automatically comprehensible to me than the usual music theory jargon.)
12:32 AM
I am listening to Chopin's op. 9, nos. 1 - 3, three nocturnes played
by Daniel Barenboim (who looks creepy). I listen to this a lot as sleep
music, but I have listened to it more intently before. Despite
that, focusing on it tonight a surprising amount of it sounds, well,
surprising - as if I've heard bits and pieces of the melodies in other
places, especially in the case of no. 1, but at the same time it all
feels very new to me.
Gets a little rowdy at times for a nocturne.
6:15 PM
Before I left on Friday I found the
Music to Erik Satie's first Gymnopedie and started poking away at it.
Though I played trombone in high school, I found even the bass clef notes slow to figure out (er, start figuring out), as my ability to turn dots on the paper into sounds was sort of inextricably tied up with my body - see a note, arm moves the slide out to about here, mouth puts this kind of pressure on the mouthpiece of the trombone, lungs blow this much air through mouthpiece - sometime more than seven or eight years ago. Now I can't even simply read the notes and translate them into the proper keys on my keyboard, as it's been that long since I played trombone and had the constant associations going between staff lines, note names, and how to make the right sounds; now I occasionally have to go through the rhymes I learned when first learning how to play piano as a kid - "all cows eat gas" (I changed it because I thought "gas", from "all cars eat gas", made it more memorable than "all cows eat grass" - such a clever boy), "every good boy does fine", etc. This makes figuring out the treble clef parts even harder, because it's been even longer since I had even a rudimentary command of its layout (having given up piano long before I started trombone).
So the Gymnopedie is coming along slowly. Still, and even on this cheap keyboard (I really would like to find a piano so I can hear the sounds hang in the air properly), it's a marvel to hear it come from what I'm doing, rather than out of my speakers. I am having thoughts similar to Douglas Wolk's, despite having actually been able to produce some music at some point in my life, music that I actually also liked.
6:05 PM
My apologies for being quiet. Last week I didn't have much to say
for a while, though the new Missy Elliot album and the Johnny Cash
best-of I listened to will be the source of some future comments.
Then I went to Minneapolis for the weekend and barely listened to
any music at all, at least not music of my own choosing (apparently
the bar we played pool at Saturday night owned four CDs: Lenny
Kravitz, Dave Matthews, Moby, and Pearl Jam - ugh). It was a pleasant
time.
11:52 PM
I have been wanting some country music lately - the old timey stuff, yo,
the sad stuff - and it occurred to me tonight that I still own this
Freakwater album that I never liked before. So I'm listening to it
now and it's... better.
A cool thing about reviews of music that's done in very tightly-constrained genres is that they have a much easier time being explicit about this or that thing in the music, since everything is so much more rigidly codified. (Cf. Tom's comment - Thousand passim, yo - about not being able to tell whether a spacerock record was good or not.)
9:35 PM
Low and the Dirty Three, In the Fishtank
The short amount of time in which this was recorded is apparent - the songs are sort of half-there, and while the performances are tentative in something like the way both bands' are at their slowest, it feels more like the fumbling uncertainty of two people out on their first date, both falling back on what they know best and not showing it all at the outset - but it's still pretty and comforting, which is better than a punch in the face. In fact it's quite a bit nicer.
11:16 AM
Maura sez: *.
11:09 AM
Margo Timmins sounds like she's slumming.
6:30 PM
I've repeatedly read the bass drum part in this described as a "house
thump". I'm perfectly capable of figuring out whether there is a "house
thump" in my music, but I don't think I ever would've made that association
with this song if not for the reviews I read.
May 20, 2001
9:26 PM
9:22 PM
Also try
this.
Fred tells me that Merritt has affirmed he and his posse are friends
with Blake and that he's the inspiration for the song.
3:44 AM
3:38 AM
3:35 AM
11:04 PM
12:40 AM
Listening today I wondered if perhaps music like this - it's their
most minimal record yet; as
Mark writes in his review, you can basically count all the
components of each track on one hand (not that you can't do that with,
say, a Shellac record, but to say it means something different here) -
if music like this is better understood in relation to the rest of
the artist's catalog. Mark says in an
earlier review that there are artists out there doing this kind of
thing much better than Labradford. I can see why he might have said
that, not having liked any of their earlier CDs. Hearing Fixed::content
today I thought to myself that it wasn't all that accomplished or special,
as far as droney music goes. But it all feels more meaningful and
particular in the context of Labradford's other albums.
You could probably make a case for this kind of thinking about all
kinds of music, but I think the standards of judgment become even
more difficult to apply than usual in the case of ambient-drone stuff,
so judgments like this are more personal (which fits in with benefitting
from having the additional context of the rest of an artist's catalog).
12:22 AM
3:43 AM
3:37 AM
3:05 AM
The production makes the album needlessly difficult. Musically
the songs are marked by a return to the blue album style - driven
more often by chugging, repetitive guitar-bass-unison riffs. But
the production puts the vocals much deeper in the mix than on the
blue album, and it was partly their relatively higher position
on the blue album that helped make the chuggier songs on it (excepting
here of course stuff with more hooky guitar riffs - I'm thinking
of the later album tracks in particular) "successful" enough (oh
god I'm referring to songs being "successful," I was just reading
some completely unrelated reviews last night that used that kind of
talk the whole time and found them despicable) to accompany the
more obviously catchy ones. The higher vocal placement helped
in lots of ways - more audible words, harmony singing, more audible
hooks (more than the chug-guitars, at least, though lots of the
vocal melodies were also fairly flat).
That being the case, repeated listening is helping me a lot
with this album, which I barely took notice of first listen through.
It being very loud is also quite useful.
As was noted in the interview I linked to below, Pinkerton
is much more focused than the blue album. But both had a discernable
emotional unity to them, and that unity was important. Here the
album does feel somewhat album-like - pacing and running order, etc.,
have obviously been paid attention to - but I can't tell what ties
the songs together (it could be the lyrics, which I don't know yet,
but I don't think that would be enough - but where did I get the
unities for the first two albums, then??) aside from the production
and similar arrangements.
Also, the production makes the record sound very boomy on my poor
old stereo speakers - it sounds much better through my good headphones.
More to come as the days unfold no doubt.
1:33 AM
Oh look, two posts about high school in the same hour.
1:03 AM
We were then asked to analyze the song's deep commentary on the
plight of the homeless, and our relationship with them as privileged
members of society. Wait. No. We were just told to write about it
or something. Nobody did.
Do not send your children to school.
11:09 PM
10:36 PM
It's a discipline. You have to learn how to do it. You have to know
when you're actually feeling pleasure, and then you have to be honest
with yourself and look into yourself until you figure out why it is
exactly that you like it.
Amazing because it seems to sum up so well part of what I am trying
to do here. Josh Blog is the above, but with all the inards showing,
maybe.
Tom will probably offer something about how coming up with
an interesting reason for liking something is actually quite a good
way to write criticism. I am still undecided on that one.
Link gotten from Badger.
10:01 PM
6:10 PM
6:07 PM
7:20 PM
3:51 AM
Over the sound of the faucet at times I could hear nothing more
than the main (?) beat of each song. Even though one can always
focus in on this beat when listening, it's a very different
experience, being able to hear only the main beat. Give it a try.
1:43 PM
(I checked more carefully later - turned out I was right, he was
playing on that track.)
The ability to pick out individual styles in jazz is important to
understanding the genre (or even just music from the genre), I think,
but sadly that requires a lot more listening, to a lot wider range
of music, than newcomers are prepared to commit to.
3:24 AM
So, the disappointing thing about the review is that it stopped
there, with the obvious. LeMay chalks it up to something mysterious,
rock overpowering pop, or maybe just Bill Barbot leaving. What if
it was partly intentional? What kind of relationship with the rest
of the Burning Airlines / Jawbox corpus does it have? The playing
sounds traditional enough, to me, in relation to what I'm used to
hearing that it makes me suspect there's a good reason for it.
All this remains quite revisable upon hearing the album a decent
number of times.
2:55 AM
For example, Pole's 3 is spacious music. It creates its own
space, it comes with the music. (I might say: the music isn't just
music, but rather the sounds of a certain kind of space, only with
dub basslines.)
That's rather different fom this MOM album, which often seems to
me to play like a miniaturized, alienized take on dance music.
Cf. track 5, where the mimicry is complete enough that the
electro-house-disco-something-or-other beat is eventually adorned
by tiny-sounding cheesy synth string stabs. Only it doesn't just play
like that kind of house track, done small or whatever. If I were
to hear such a track for "real" I don't think I would like it. But
here it's fucking excellent. I don't think this is because of any
sort of ironic distancing, or anything like that. Perhaps there's
an element of defamiliarization. As the song starts and moves forward,
its nature is somewhat masked - by the squelchy, crittery noises
that seem to be MOM's calling card, by the noisier bits where a
normal house song would have something more proper (not so fidgety).
So when the synth stabs come in, it's like a contextual cue -
suddenly, I'm aware of the beat, and the structure of the song,
and oh holy shit look, I'm listening to what is basically a house
song and digging it like a mother.
The All-Music Guide smacks a "post-techno" label on MOM and I think
it's actually pretty apt. What's going on on this album is a synthesis
of a number of disparate threads in 90s (and earlier) dance-derived
music. What's more, it's really quite apparent when you listen - and
it doesn't sound awkward. Mark says in the intro to the interview below
about this album being "hectic" and maybe there is a bit of that, but
I think it can manage to be that without being awkward.
Tracks 2 and 3 are officially (I checked with my local music critics
union handbook) "horn-driven" "pop". I listened to them on repeat
today and I would have kept doing it too but Damon came and made
me stop, to like leave the house or something.
I know it looks like I was gearing up to say something general about
the German post-techno scene but I don't actually know much more about
it. I have to go start trying to listen to my lone Oval album now.
By the way, read Mark's
interview, it's good.
5:17 PM
Later, listening to the remix disc from Ninja Tune Xen Cuts
comp because of a question Jordan asked me. Get to the John McEntire
Tortoise remix of "More Beats & Pieces" without knowing so.
Think, "hmmm, this sounds kind of like Mouse on Mars, only not as good."
Look at CD box, see credits. Everything makes sense.
2:49 AM
12:20 AM
On the new one, Ease Down the Road, though, the funny old
words and usage stick out more. The music is peaceful enough that
I can hear it and associate it with all kinds of similar experiences
in my own life - relaxed ones, relieved ones, contemplative ones.
The identification with I See a Darkness was more
like the identification that goes on when watching a movie, perhaps
- the feelings are real, in a sense, but also not, in a sense.
(I hope you know what I mean by saying that, so that I can not
try to explain and get all tangled up.)
11:01 PM
6:37 PM
2:45 AM
Here are a few scattered thoughts on some things I've listened to
recently.
I picked up the new Unwound (my first exposure to them) on Brian's
enthusiasm, and so far have enjoyed it. But it feels strangely nondescript.
I've read comparisons between Unwound and Sonic Youth, but at the
moment Sonic Youth's music seems to me to have a lot of personality
(you can tell that it's those specific musicians behind it), whereas
Unwound's has not much at all. (Probably the most distinctive thing
about it is the drumming - Sara Lund has what I'll bet is a recognizable
penchant for a busy sort of omnipresent backrhythm.) I expect this
impression to change with more listening, though.
Inspired by reading some Simon Reynolds (and more importantly, the
realization that it seemed a perfect moment to do so - Sunday afternoon,
sounds of cars sluicing through the rain outside, me just in from
being caught unprepared in a cloudburst) I listened to Kid A
again this afternoon. I've still not listened to it that much but
I'm becoming more and more entrenched in my thinking that there's
good reason not to. That's not because the album is bad, but because
it feels natural to listen to it rarely. It presents me with a
peculiar complex of sounds and emotions that I would rather encounter
irregularly, when the moment seems to suit. And what's more, every
time I listen to it, I then feel somehow naturally compelled to let
it end, and not listen to anything else for a period of time (as
I did today, for a few hours afterward).
I've been enjoying the Pixies' BBC Sessions disc. I prefer
the production on Surfer Rosa to that on Doolittle
and Bossanova, and their live sound is pleasingly similar
to their first record. Lovering's cymbals sound both more ringy
and more cutting, if that makes any sense.
After making a suggestion to Glenn about the
religious content on Secret Name I went back to listen to
it - it's been a little while - and have ended up listening to it
quite a few times in the past however many days. At the time of its
release I really was not as fond of the album as Low's previous ones,
but I've come to accept it more. When I listen, though, I tend
to try to get in more of an 'album' listen, as opposed to the
first three albums, which I can more easily interrupt or repeat
or pay less attention to (despite my thinking that The Curtain
Hits the Cast has excellent qualities, qua album). So, for
example, unless I don't mind hearing it again, I will usually
stop the album after one play through, because I know that if it
repeats I will prefer to let it play completely through again.
It has more internal logic than their others. Perhaps my current
reaction to this album bodes well for Things We Lost in the Fire,
which I like even less well than Secret Name upon its release.
To complement that, I finally found my copy of the Transmission
EP and listened to it a few times, something I've not done much of
since getting the EP (at the same time as Long Division,
filling out my Low back catalog). Enjoyed the Joy Division cover
much more than ever before (I really should hear the original sometime).
I think there are stronger songs on the EP, though.
The new Mogwai, Rock Action, is beautiful. On the day it came
out I sat out on the patio of the Union, listening while I stared
at Lake Laverne and the storm developing overhead and the pretty
girls walking by. "Their earlier albums were better" fans would
probably prefer to save their money on this one, but they would
be wrong, too. I'm thinking about a review for Freaky Trigger,
so more later maybe.
2:37 AM
Whatever. You know, I get to invoke the intentional fallacy to dismiss
artists when they think they didn't succeed, too.
Have they stopped to think that possibly the charts themselves were
not as receptive ca. Pinkerton?
1:35 AM
But it doesn't.
What a fucking disappointment.
Labradford, "Up to Pizmo"
Hmmm.
Don't you miss Mike's web page? Me too. He sent me this.
"Let's Pretend We're Conceptual Artists"
A favorite example of static-as-age-signifier - the "One More Kiss, Dear"
song from Bladerunner.
I notice "prove mother nature wrong" and the AIDS-gay community
connection pointed out to me by
Fred becomes even more immanent in "Let's Pretend We're Bunny
Rabbits", pushing joyful-tragic split even further.
Re static -
makes an appearance on the new Labradford, probably more to the "tactile
audio properties" end of things. And of course there's the radio-static
of He Has Left Us Alone yadda yadda yadda on which I've previously
commented (where? uh... passim, as Mr. Ewing is so fond of saying
lately).
walk or runnnn tothebus
walk or runnnn tothebus
walk or runnnn tothebus
walk ar rahn to-the-bus
walk ar rahn to-the-bus
walk ar rahn to-the-bus
I told Ally
that the new Labradford album (new like two months ago) had big silent
places on it, so she thought it would be cool - as in, ha ha, fuck
you radio listeners, I am playing this music with deliberately
silent parts in it on the radio - if I played it during my show,
which I then proceeded to do. Unfortunately, I was tripping, apparently,
the few times I had ever played the album in the past, as there
aren't any parts that were silent as I was thinking. I never noticed
this until not because the album is one of those ones that doesn't
always play properly on my broken CD player, so I've barely played
it. I will play it plenty now, though, because after hearing it
in the studio (where I always have the volume very, very loud)
I'm entranced.
I've been listening compulsively to two albums recently, Shellac's
At Action Park and Wilco's A.M. This is the first time
I've really enjoyed A.M. (their first album), and I like it
a lot now. I think that at first my reaction (over a year ago) was bored
indifference at the album's traditionalism. Now that same traditionalism
seems a virtue. In the past year I've been listening to more riff-driven
rock music than I had been in the two years before getting the album,
so that may have something to do with it - but I don't think it's
enough.
But songs about John Brown kick ass.
Also the record is very short. Comparable to Pinkerton
I think but it feels a lot shorter.
Today I purchased the new Weezer album, somewhat against my better
judgment (I didn't really feel like being disappointed by an album
from a band responsible for two of my favorite albums). I also
received a tasteful promotional poster for my trouble. No wait it
is the same as the album cover. Oh that green. Here are some
scattered thoughts on the album so far.
We played (badly) a pep band arrangement of Light My Fire in high
school. Just about every other note we (the trombones) played was
accidentalled in the key signature or the measure itself. Result:
awful squall.
In high school we had an unfortunate day planned for which I did not
unfortunately skip school - homeless day, or whatever. It consisted
of a string of poorly conceived and executed activities with our
pretend "homeless families" that were supposed to enlighten us as
to the plight of the homeless. This mostly involved everyone sittng
on the floor and also pretending to build a house in the science
lab out of a cardboard box (recall: high school). Also involved
walking all the way around the block and then receiving the day's
lunch, one below the usual high standards (note sarcasm), delivered
in a paper bag, from the loading dock of the school. The climax
of the day (an informational video was also played) involved
sitting in our lab and listening to the principal hold a tape
player up to the school PA system - playing Phil Collins' gripping
masterpiece about an encounter with the homeless, "Another
Day in Paradise."
Hmmm. Otie sez (Cf. end)
Rockwriters I'd like to read porno by: Byron Coley, Steve Albini,
Kris Srinivasan, Ally Kearney, Tom Ewing, Chuck Eddy, Josh
Kortbein. If I'll read them writing about bloody music, of course
I'll read them writing about sex. Richard Meltzer's porno in Forced
Exposure was really good.
I don't know that much about Christgau
because I've never followed the music press very well, but usually
when I read something of his I find something to dislike about it.
But he said something in the interview that I found amazing:
Kids ask me, "How do you write a good record review?" I always say,
"The first thing is to know what you like and the second thing is to
know why you like it." The temptation is to like what you should like
-- not what you do like. You have to resist that temptation. And then
once you know what you like, another temptation is to come up with an
interesting reason for liking it that may not actually be the reason
you like it. That's not a good way to write criticism.
Old interview
with Rivers Cuomo which illuminates Weezer's music quite nicely.
Scroll down, note
reference to Iowa late-night Weezer CD sale. Hm. I never knew.
I don't like "Survivor" but yay Ian all the same.
Fred told me that Stephin Merritt considers "Let's Pretend We're Bunny
Rabbits" one of his saddest songs, and I hadn't thought of it that
way, but now every time I listen it gets sadder and sadder, without
seeming any less ebullient, so there's more and more tension.
The abrupt ending cinches the sad angle though.
Tonight I washed dishes and listened to Autechre. Autechre make
good dishwashing music.
Yesterday, listening to Giant Steps, "Naima" in particular,
I said to myself (this is out loud here, do it with your own voice
at home to get the full effect), "this doesn't sound like Tommy
Flanagan - I wonder who the pianist is." So I look at the back of
the album - sez Tommy Flanagan, Cedar Walton, Wynton Kelly. "Ahh,"
I say to myself, "so its Wynton Kelly."
I'm a bit disappointed that basically all this review of the new Burning Airlines had to say was exactly
what I picked up from listening to the record once: namely, that
this is a rock record. It's pretty obvious upon listening; the first
album was often bass-driven, and moreover, driven by a bassist who
moved to the bass from guitar (makes for busy basslines). This
one sounds like it's driven by a guitar player. A somewhat
surprising guitar player, in that J. Robbins' past guitar parts
have seemed a lot noisier or less riffy or at least masked by lots
of noise (in Jawbox, e.g.). This record is the sound of J. Robbins
playing rock guitar.
I've found Niun Niggung to be surprisingly addictive so far.
It's interesting that Mouse on Mars are related, in various ways,
to both Pole and Oval, because their music seems so different. All
three groups obviously share something besides their citizenship
and the fact that they make chinstroking electronic music. But what
that thing is, exactly, beyond some vague ties to dub, is hard for
me to put my finger on at the moment. It's because of the vast
differences, I think.
Yesterday, bought Mouse on Mars, Niun Niggung. Liked. Thought,
hmmm, reminds me of Tortoise's electronicy bits, only better. Must be
where Tortoise stole their ideas from.
Sigh. This turntablist stuff, it's supposed to be really great,
right? Kid Koala, outstanding, etc. etc.? On "Drunk Trumpet (Live
at the Metro, Chicago)" from the Xen Cuts comp, he runs
a plain-vanilla swing backing (slowwwww as hell ride cymbal mostly)
and then uses a solo (from the same record or a different one, I don't
know - but it doesn't matter) to scratch out his own solo. Problem
is, the resulting solo - still vaguely trumpetlike despite the
distortion introduced by the scratching, so kind of like an odd mute -
sucks ass. We're talking like junior high jazz band, first time
ever played a solo that wasn't written out quality. Maybe his studio stuff
dooesn't sound so much like novelty records? I hope?
The archaick dictione on Will Oldham's first Bonnie "Prince" Billy
album seemed appropriate, or at least unintrusive to my listening
experience, maybe because of the darker music. Some of the things
he sings may sound slightly silly at times, but that's OK because
it all feels slightly dramatic - deliberately exaggerated, unreal -
anyway.
Let me know if my toying
with the design disturbs or pleases you. (Anticipating "disturbs"
emails from: Tom - "why is the font so small you cockfarmer", Jon -
"what's with this pussy-ass oh-I-am-a-webdesigner trendy design
bullshit, you sellout?", and that is all.) I stole Nick's stylesheet, though the only
way you would be able to tell is that the line spacing is larger
than normal and now the font doesn't look like ass on Windows machines.
Also, I moved the links to a separate page. Their presence was beginning
to get on my nerves for some unarticulated but visually-relevant reason.
Hey, I never
said it was not fun. Though it's not "fun" exactly - a good experience,
though, for the most part.
So, yes, I have "returned" from my "vacation".
'Screw up'?
There's a spot in the allegretto to Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 9
in E-Flat Major Op. 117 where it sounds like the violin is going to
break into the theme from the "Lone Ranger".
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