Thursday, November 30, 2000
You think you're special? God is not an Israelite! God is coming! I'm here, and I'm going to baptize everybody, with fire!
Get the song. Audiogalaxy Satellite.
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Thursday, November 30, 2000
You think you're special? God is not an Israelite! God is coming! I'm here, and I'm going to baptize everybody, with fire! Get the song. Audiogalaxy Satellite.
Saturday, December 09, 2000
Next year is going to be an excellent year for music: Tool, Garbage, Orbital, The Crystal Method, Radiohead, and Massive Attack are all slated to release new albums.
Wednesday, January 10, 2001
PJ Harvey in Concert. Granted, it's Houston, and it's a Monday night, but oh well. Why don't they have the timer on windshield wipers connected to the speedometer? That way, when you go faster, the wipers go faster. When you slow or stop, the wipers go slowly. Seems like a no-brainer to me. Then what's with the word speedometer? I mean, c'mon. It looks like some invented 50s product, the amazing Speed-o-meter! It's such a silly word.
¶ 43 Posted at 09.35 AM ⇒ No Comments ( ideas | music | pedantic ) Tuesday, January 16, 2001
El song of the day: Chemical Brothers - Hey Boy. Hey Girl. Superstar DJs, here we go!
Wednesday, January 17, 2001
Some guy has a Pearl FX 725C for sale for $500. I'm soooo tempted. But that's $500 I don't have, and a garage I also don't have. Phooey.
Friday, February 02, 2001
I've noticed a lot of people missing the point when they talk about the Internet as a tool for sharing music, how it will be a brave new world where music can easily be distributed to listeners without cumbersome obstacles like music stores and record labels. But an important point is being missed here. It's not a question of technology. It's not a question of fairness. It has to do with the unwillingness of Those In Charge to give up control. Control means profit. That is why they are unwilling to embrace the Internet as a distribution mechanism. It's not because the record companies would make no profit, just that they would make less profit. Right now they're sitting pretty; they've spent the last century (in the US) slowly accumulating legal and means for getting more money (ASCAP, BMI, taxes on cd burners, etc.) and they're not going to let that go. A perhaps melodramatic analogy. In the 80s, there was famine in Ethiopia. The starvation wasn't caused by an absence of food in the world; on the contrary, the US government pays farmers to not grow food. The problem was that the Powers That Were in Ethiopia perceived that they could gain more by denying these grain shipments to their citizens. It was never about enough food; it was about surmounting the self-interest who have something to gain by denying others. Similarly, it's not about whether the Internet is better or worse as a distribution mechanism. The record companies have something to gain by maintaining the status quo, which is why they will never embrace change.
Monday, February 05, 2001
Can't wait for more Tool. I've acquired a fascination for events in threes. This isn't one of those "everything happens in three" things. It's just a way of attaching significance. Once is a fluke. Twice is an odd coincidence. Only with three data points does the possibility of a broader trend become credible. Einstein was a genius. He had the requisite three things: his explanation of the photo-electric effect (for which he got the Nobel Prize in 1921, not for his other work), and his theories of special and general relativity. Similarly, Newton had calculus, his theory of gravitation, and his law of motion. You need to make the triple threat before you've cemented your status. You're not a programmer until you've written three programs (at least). And so forth.
¶ 70 Posted at 04.35 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | deep thoughts ) Monday, February 12, 2001
Napster's going down. While this court did not explicitly shut down Napster, they effectively did by clearing the way for a lower court to do so shortly. The future looks dim. American courts are loath to contradict each other when it comes to determinations of fact, and even on determinations of legal interpretations (though there is less reluctance in the latter case). So it is highly unlikely that any court will disagree with the assertion that Napster does not constitute Fair Use, nor is it covered by the Audio Home Recording Act. In short, the trading of copyrighted materials using Napster is now explicitly illegal by these courts' decisions. At least in the US. While I'm dissatisfied with Napster as a solution for my music acquisition needs, I'm very unhappy to see this precedent set. As soon as the new injunction comes out, there will be a fresh blizzard of cease-and-desist letters to Audiogalaxy, Spinfrenzy, CuteMX, etc., except these new ones will refer to these decisions. In plain English, they'll say: "We took them to court and won. If you push us, you too will lose." The legal issues regarding Napster and Audiogalaxy are identical. A loss for them is a loss for us. Somehow I don't see Audiogalaxy moving to Russia or China, or some other country with notoriously lax copyright protection. This is the beginning of the end for all of us.
Friday, March 09, 2001
Songs of the Century, as compiled by the RIAA and the NEA. Hmmm.... #94: The Bee Gees - "Stayin' Alive" #119: Van Halen - "Jump" #122: Cyndi Lauper - "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" #148: Abba - "Dancing Queen" #201: M.C. Hammer - "U Can't Touch This" #203: Ricky Martin - "Livin' La Vida Loca" #214: Kool & The Gang - "Celebration" #246: Celine Dion - "My Heart Will Go On" #258: Billy Ray Cyrus - "Achy Breaky Heart." #293: Shania Twain - "Still the One." #301 - Bobby McFerrin - "Don't Worry, Be Happy." #326: Amy Grant - "El Shaddai." #337: Will Smith - "Men in Black." #348: Steve Winwood - "Higher Love." #363 - Destiny's Child - "Bills, Bills, Bills." All those songs were ranked higher than Jimi Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower" (#365). Hello? What are we smoking here? These people should not be making decisions. Of any kind. These are the people who control the music industry today. Just from this list it's clear you should do everything you can to take that control away. No song is there just for artistic merit; they're all commercial. It's so blatantly self-serving.
Tuesday, March 20, 2001
This morning I ironed my jeans. Sounds excessive, doesn't it? I mean, it's not like they were fancy jeans. No sir, just plain old Gap jeans. Not only did I iron them, I ironed them inside out. I decided I liked the color inside better than the outside color. For a half second, I seriously considered wearing my jeans inside-out. What does that say about me? I've decided it would be genius to mix the Moloko club remix of "If You Go Away" by Shirley Bassey into the Quivver remix of "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You" by Led Zeppelin. But that's just me, and I'm not a DJ.
¶ 110 Posted at 10.04 AM ⇒ No Comments ( music | me | weird ) Wednesday, March 28, 2001
John Digweed is amazing. I cannot recommend anything more highly than "Global Underground 019: Los Angeles." It is magnificent. If you are a fan of saccharine-sweet, synthy, euro-pop progressive trance, this is not for you. If you are a bit more open-minded, this will speak to you. Over the course of two CD sets lasting 140-some minutes, Digweed builds the tension. Higher and higher until you think you can take it no longer. It builds with an oppressive, ominous force like a thunderstorm coming on a hot summer day. The very air presses down on you, filling you with dread. It is unrelenting in its darkness, pushing and pushing at you. He even manages to make Way Out West's "The Gift" dark and sinister. Only about 11 minutes from the end of the second set do the clouds finally break, the relief washing over you and highlighting the tension that you had only been dimly aware of before. It isn't a return to the shiny happy music of "Heaven Scent," for example, but just by contrast, the bouncy, slightly upbeat of "One" pulls you out of the dungeons of the previous two hours. But you don't get the bright blue sky, because that would be too easy. A dim sunlight shines down, filtered through clouds that are only now melting away, and yet, weak as it is, you still squint at the change. Buy this record. Buy it for me. Buy it for yourself. Until you love it, you are just a dabbler, a dilettante in electronic dance music. If you spend your time listening to happy, fluffy music, you will find this boring or scary. This is not for you; you are not worthy. If you look for music that will resonate, listen to this. Really listen to it. Appreciate it. Savor it. They rarely come this good. This is a masterpiece.
Wednesday, May 16, 2001
So I've had Lateralus for 32 hours now. I don't know what to think. I really wanted to like it. I wanted to like it a lot. And I do. It's just that.... it doesn't hit as hard. It doesn't push envelopes the way Aenima did. For any other band, this would have been a very good album. For Tool, it's just short. I think. I don't know; maybe it will grow on me. Maybe I haven't been listening to it in the right contexts. Maybe this isn't my sort of music anymore. But Aenima just felt like it had a greater impact. The album fit together better as a whole. It had a more epic scope, like a good DJ mix or a concerto. And that, it seems, is lacking here. The steps from Opiate to Undertow, and from Undertow to Aenima were much more significant in terms of the band exploring new things and growing more capable and refined. This is more of a lateral (haha) step than anything else. Give it time, I guess.
Tuesday, January 22, 2002
Hot diggity! Yahoo! Internet Life has awarded "Best Download Site" to my chronic and relapsing employers, Audiogalaxy (link). I'd like to think I played some small part in it. A very, very small part. Ah well. I can bask in the glory.
Tuesday, February 19, 2002
NYTimes: Record Labels' Answer to Napster Still Has Artists Feeling Bypassed. Record labels gyp artists. Napster gyps artists. Napster gets shut down by record labels. Record labels gyp artists.
¶ 289 Posted at 03.08 PM ⇒ No Comments ( news | music ) Monday, April 01, 2002
So the Queen Mother died. I wouldn't normally have cared. Except one, tiny, niggling detail: they cancelled the Essential Mix and replaced it with less happy music. Yes, that's right. Because of the death of a woman who spent none of her 101 years doing anything for anyone's betterment, not even her own, as she was born into such privilege. And due to the deep sorrow we all feel at her passing, apparently we cannot listen to music faster than 80 beats per minute. This the same Sasha and John Digweed Essential Mix for which I had been waiting with great anticipation since I first hear it was coming over a month ago. The monarchy is such a waste. I think the Brits should pass a law abolishing the monarchy and all nobility. Grandfather them out. Anyone born after 2005 is born common. Personally, I'd make it retroactive to 1215 (the year of the Magna Charta), but somehow I don't see that happening.
Tuesday, May 14, 2002
Eminem disses Moby on new single. I saw Moby on "The Daily Show" last night. He's a quiet but interesting interview. He seemed to think it was funny that Eminem named him.
Monday, June 17, 2002
I get to be unemployed again. Here's the RIAA crowing about it.
¶ 383 Posted at 09.29 PM ⇒ No Comments ( (un)employment | music | bummer ) Thursday, June 20, 2002
So, this is the way pay-for-play music should work:
Naturally, in that last case, there would be restrictions on redistribution. I have no problem with that; my problem today is that the record companies aren't giving me what I want no matter how much I'm willing to pay. They're not serving me, their customer. And of course there would be bulk options. Buy 10 songs and get 10% off; buy 20 and get 15% off. If you buy 50 or more songs, there should be a minimal additional cost option to have them instead burn the songs to a CD or DVD and mail them to you (saving both sides the bandwidth). With a dozen distribution centers around the US a la Amazon, your songs would come to you in a day or two, and they'd be exactly what you wanted. Or they could partner with Best Buy and similar retailers to do this packaging, but it would be difficult to get the more obscure music that way. As you can tell, I miss my Audiogalaxy. I watched "The Bourne Identity" (boring, generic) yesterday. A couple of the songs during the movie interested me, but I knew there was no way I'd be able to get ahold of them short of buying a soundtrack that I knew would have no other songs on it to interest me (as I'd just heard it during the movie). If any of them were on any albums, then I would have to buy a whole CD of material when I only had verified that one song on it was something I wanted, an even worse case than the soundtrack.
¶ 385 Posted at 09.46 PM ⇒ No Comments ( ideas | music | movies ) Wednesday, July 10, 2002
From Moses Avalon ("Confessions of a Record Producer"): the Royalty Calculator.
Wednesday, October 16, 2002
This morning I woke up to see my computer in windows setup mode. It had rebooted when my primary hard drive spontaneously self-destructed sometime in the middle of the night. I have spent several hours reinstalling windows and basic applications to restore my basic configuration. Luckily most of my data was on another drive. Most. Because I'd run out of space on my main mp3 drive, I had spilled some overflow onto my main drive. I had put all the best songs there. All the vinyl rips that I had spent hours tracking down, and then listening to up to a dozen versions of each song before finding the one without any glitches, and then naming and tagging them properly. And now it's all gone. I am majorly bummed. And I'm employed now, which means I won't have the time to track them down again. Sad sad sad. To relieve some of my frustration, I am disassembling one of the many extra/broken hard drives I have lying around, as a twisted form of catharsis.
¶ 439 Posted at 12.29 AM ⇒ No Comments ( music | geek ) Wednesday, January 08, 2003
Sign up for your share of the proposed settlement in the music industry's price-fixing case. Hmm... 22 days between posts. I wonder what I was doing.
¶ 478 Posted at 11.38 AM ⇒ No Comments ( news | music ) Friday, January 31, 2003
Audiogalaxy, we hardly knew ye. Wait, I did. Pretty well, actually. Just go to the article. Found by a forlorn Tom.
Wednesday, February 26, 2003
This is a really awesome journal by a guy working as a sound engineer in Hollywood. It's not well-edited or anything, but it's really interesting and the guy's got good flow. It's long, but if you've got the time, read it. My poor, poor neglected web site.
¶ 496 Posted at 02.52 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | interesting ) Sunday, March 02, 2003
Second part of Mixerman's diaries. They're a little tough to find.
¶ 498 Posted at 01.32 PM ⇒ No Comments ( linkage | music | interesting ) Tuesday, April 22, 2003
To go on a little more about "Sex and Lucia." When Hollywood thinks "sexy," they think "sex." Very direct, these people. It may be appealing, but it's not particularly satisfying. You can't eat sugar all the time. I put "Sex and Lucia" in the same category as "Secretary" and "Out of Sight." As far as I can remember, the latter two movies barely show anything physical. "Out of Sight" might not even show anything at all. The sex in "Sex and Lucia" is, though it may be cliche to say, part of the story. It is certainly secondary to the plot and characters. The sexiness these movies is derived not from actual sex, but from well-developed characters, plausible plots, excellent tone, and a romantic mood that you will never get from a Meg Ryan movie. They prove once again that it's not what you do; it's how you do it. I need to find more movies like these; I don't know where to look, but I do know where not to look: Hollywood. If you haven't seen those movies and have an open mind, I would suggest you see them. "Out of Sight" is the most mainstream (and was actually produced by a Hollywood studio). I consider it the only good movie Jennifer Lopez has ever made. She's actually good in it. "Secretary" is a bit out there, while "Sex and Lucia" is Spanish, and we all know what that means!
Tuesday, April 29, 2003
Now that Apple has announced their digital music service, they are closer and closer to having a complete music product line. One glaring hole, however, is the absence of a good automobile music solution. Sure, you can use a cassette adapter, but many cars don't even have cassette decks anymore (mine doesn't). I think Apple should join forces with a company (or companies) that manufactures car stereos to create the iPod Cardock. It would be an ordinary car radio/CD player, but would have a physical dock for an iPod. You would be able to play the songs on the iPod, manage them, and recharge your iPod from this dock. It would be physically integrated so your iPod is securely mounted to the stereo unit. I don't know whether I would prefer a cartridge-like loader or a more external mount. The former would be like a cassette loader; you would push your iPod in horizontally and eject it when done. The stereo would have integrated controls for accessing the iPod music. The latter would mount the iPod vertically outside of the stereo unit, and you would use the iPod's controls to access the music. The loader method has the advantage of integrated controls and a lower profile, while the external mount has the advantage of being less intrusive and requiring less of a design shift for the stereo. Either way, though, this is a logical next step for them to take to make music ubiquitous.
¶ 542 Posted at 11.46 AM ⇒ No Comments ( music | geek ) Thursday, July 10, 2003
There is a new PJ Harvey album coming out this year, according to Ananova. To paraphrase her comments on it: "It's really pretty ugly. I'm quite happy with it."
Wednesday, October 01, 2003
LL Cool J and Chuck D square off in hearings on RIAA tactics to stop file sharing. There were a couple of noteworthy quotes. '"P2P to me means power to the people," said Chuck D.' That's clever. 'The subcommittee chairman, Minnesota Republican Norm Coleman.... referred to the rappers as "Mr. Cool J" and "Mr. D."' That's just funny.
Wednesday, October 29, 2003
Every now and then I get sick of my "all electronic, all the time" musical rut* and go back to my CD box for a forgotten old favorite, and rediscover how good it is. This time it was "Tidal." A few weeks back, it was Pearl Jam's "Ten." Do you realize that album is 12 years old? That blows my mind. It's just as good today as it was then. Probably better, actually, since I was 13 when it came out. Four years and counting. Usually my phases don't last this long. Maybe I'm getting old.
Wednesday, December 31, 2003
I'm currently listening to Tom Jones's "Reload," an album of covers. It may surprise you to know that from time to time I like to listen to Tom Jones and Barry Manilow. This one, though, is mainly for the weirdness factor. The cover of "Burning Down the House" with the Cardigans is well-known, but there are other, stranger things. For example, Tom Jones singing "All Mine," a song originally written and performed by Portishead. I'm nervously waiting to hear what the "Lust for Life" cover sounds like. And I need to track down his cover of EMF's "Unbelievable," which was only included on some versions, and so might take some doing.
Thursday, January 01, 2004
I managed to get all of the songs from Tom Jones's "Reload" album as well as two more from the Japanese version. As far as I can tell, neither version was ever sold here in the United States, which is just unfortunate. I do have the whole thing now, though, so let me know if you want a taste.
Friday, January 16, 2004
I look back, and I'm amazed, that my thoughts were so clear and true, that three words went through my mind endlessly, repeating themselves endlessly, like a broken record. "You're so cool. You're so cool. You're so cool."I think that's the first time I've ever seen a movie because some of its dialogue was sampled in a song I liked. Those would be "True Romance" and Solar Stone's "Solarcoaster" respectively.
Thursday, May 27, 2004
I used to think that even bad musicians generally had good taste in music. I guess I was wrong. There are several choice quotes from Alice Cooper, Michael Stipe, and Avril Lavigne.
¶ 758 Posted at 02.11 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | stupid people ) Wednesday, June 16, 2004
You scoffed when I predicted the iPod Cardock. Behold, unbeliever.* * Yeah, I know nothing's official, but still...
¶ 784 Posted at 02.20 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | geek ) Sunday, June 20, 2004
Can you believe it's been almost 13 years since "Ten?" Man. That's crazy. It's almost half as old as I am. I don't think I even listened to the album in its entirety until college. Every now and then I put it in my CD player and am blown away all over again. Every single song on there is better than most bands put out in their whole careers. People will talk all about "Nevermind" and Soundgarden and Alice in Chains, but in my mind, there is only "Ten." Dig up your old copy and play it again.
Friday, June 25, 2004
Ishkur's guide to electronic music (Flash) has been updated. Check it out. This is the authority, as far as I'm concerned.
Tuesday, July 20, 2004
While driving on Vancouver Island to Victoria, we heard on the radio a "Top 91 of the 90s" countdown. It turns out the Canadians have a slightly different "Top 91" than we might have over here. I can just imagine the confusion and bewilderment ensuing when an American and Canadian discuss this era:
American: I heard "Zero" the other day on the radio. Man, I haven't heard that song in years. In a related story, I will post a more complete report on the trip later this week.
Monday, August 16, 2004
Massive Attack's "Angel" has to be one of the best album openers ever. If you don't already own Mezzanine, you should go buy it. Conveniently, now that we are one soul in two bodies, we have an extra.
Monday, November 01, 2004
Do you know about Jandek? I don't know when I first heard about him, but it was a while ago. Only recently have I acquired some of his music to listen to. A reclusive, anonymous musician from Houston, Jandek has been making weird, haunting music for over twenty-five years, while eschewing any spotlight and remaining frustratingly (to some) elusive. It's a fascinating story of a veritable anti pop star. Read more about this mysterious man odd music. He's been an enigma for a long time, but that may have changed.
Friday, December 31, 2004
Jessica somehow heard of this band Franz Ferdinand and wanted the CD, which she got for her birthday. I've been listening to it lately and it's really good. I don't usually pimp music in broadcast, but that's because I understand my tastes are particular. Not this time. It's good, catchy pop rock. Not lowest-common-denominator, just quality. A little Blur, a little Beatles, a little Blondie, a little of the Clash, and a lot of other flavors mixed together. It's good, good music for everyone. You should buy it. Sing: Find me and follow me through corridors Refectories and files you must follow Leave this academic factory You will find me in the matinee, the dark of the matinee It's better in the matinee The dark of the matinee is mine, yes it's mine
Friday, May 20, 2005
Who among us hasn't listened to hip-hop and thought, "well, that's ok, I guess, but it could use a little country?" Well, Cowboy Troy is here to fix you up. Be sure to listen to "I Play Chicken with the Train."
Monday, May 23, 2005
I get mad at sites that gratuitously use Flash and only Flash. Musicians seem to be especially bad about it. At least one other person agrees with me and compiled a list of five mistakes band and label sites make. As a corollary to that, splash pages are stupid, especially ones that you have to click through every time you visit. Someone else followed up with a couple more. I think Franz Ferdinand's web site is basically unusable because it doesn't follow the rules.
¶ 1096 Posted at 12.17 PM ⇒ No Comments ( internet | music ) Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Man, I code like a maniac when I listen to psytrance. John '00' Fleming is the new favorite. That man is mean. You probably have to have a sadistic streak to be a psytrance/hard trance DJ. The beat is so insistent and relentless. You have to build up a tolerance to psytrance because it's so unrelenting. You start at the clubby, radio-friendly dance music, and over the years, slowly strip away the vocals, tighten the beat, and speed it up. I used to listen to other kinds of music. Now, I only listen to music when I'm working (or goofing off). Trance is ideal for that. It's fast, but not too fast. It's repetitive, but not too repetitive. And you can get it in continuously mixed slabs an hour long or more, so there are no jarring transitions, just hours and hours of digital perfection.
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Released today are Fiona Apple's "Extraordinary Machine" and Franz Ferdinand's "You Could Have It So Much Better." In three weeks, Civilization IV comes out. Not sure how I'll find the time to play that, though.
¶ 1173 Posted at 01.47 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | software ) Friday, October 21, 2005
I've seen the trailer for the upcoming Johnny Cash bio-pic a few times now. I'm usually highly skeptical of trailers, figuring that they represent the movie inaccurately 1 . I don't even know anything about Johnny Cash. I just like the idea of listening to his music, so I downloaded some to check it out. There's something in the popular gestalt about Johnny Cash. Everybody likes him, but not in a Raymond sort of way. It's more like "now there was a man, and he sure could make music."
1
If you haven't already, I highly encourage you to track down the new "Shining" trailer, or email me and I'll send it to you.
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
Many musicians reject licensing their songs to advertise Hummers. Those commercials will be silent, I guess, assuming they get the rights.
Monday, April 24, 2006
Sometime last September, I passed my ten thousandth day. "10,000 Days" is also the title of the new Tool album. I don't know what the title means, only that it appears to be of some personal significance to the lead singer, who happens to share my birthday, though he preceded me by just over 5,000 days. It has not been released officially yet, but that doesn't mean anything anymore. have been listening to the album for the last week. Initially, I was disappointed, but now I am not so sure. I think that you need to listen to something at least 10 times before forming an opinion of it, unless it obviously sucks, so I persisted. It is definitely growing on me. It is less obviously sophisticated than the previous album, "Lateralus." It is also more personal and less abstract than either that album or the preceding "Ænima." Given that those albums were each separated by 5 years, it is understandable that there will be some progression. The official release date is May 2, 2006, which means I have 8 days to decide whether to buy it or to delete the MP3s forever. Those are my rules. We'll see which way it goes. As an amusing side note, the September 2005 edition of the band's newsletter claimed that they had spent a year recording a decoy album to leak, knowing that leaking was inevitable. It would be pretty amazing if this is in fact not the intended release. I guess I'll find out in a week.
Monday, September 25, 2006
The singer is off key and the drummer is off beat. The acoustics are bad and the speakers are too loud. The songs are different from the well-worn groove in your head from listening to the CDs hundreds of times, and rarely in any interesting way. When they talk to the audience, it's obvious why they get paid for their music instead of their speaking. They play none of the songs you like. The band members either stand around dorkily or dance around dorkily. It's boring watching someone play a guitar. Your back hurts from standing for hours and you can barely see anything anyway. The air is smoky and foul. When your obnoxious fellow fans aren't singing along badly, they stumble into you, spilling $5 cups of Bud Light all over your clothes. You paid way too much to be there. Live music sucks.
Friday, June 15, 2007
Before you watch this video, be warned that it will ruin the end of "Once Upon a Time in the West." I don't like Arcade Fire's new album as much as I like "Funeral," but "My Body Is A Cage" is a great song, and making it the soundtrack of this scene is pure genius.
¶ 1484 Posted at 08.10 PM ⇒ No Comments ( movies | music | video | good stuff ) Monday, July 23, 2007
A true classic...
Man, Michael Jackson could have been huge. Bigger than Elvis and the Beatles put together. Am I the only one who thinks that Zombie Michael Jackson is less scary-looking than modern Michael Jackson? Also, enjoy the obligatory Bollywood ripoff:
¶ 1512 Posted at 12.30 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | video | india | genius ) Thursday, August 02, 2007
Whenever I recommend something that fits into a genre to someone who isn't a fan of the genre, I always feel obligated to tack on an... acclaimer 1. Placing something in a genre always seems too limiting, and it's something I bump up into because most of what I read, watch, and listen to falls into a genre of some kind 2 . It's not enough to say that Tool is a metal band, or that "His Dark Materials," is a young adult fantasy trilogy, or that "X-Men 2" is a super-hero movie. It's not because any of those things are untrue, but rather they aren't sufficient to convey their qualities. Labelling is restrictive 3 . The label becomes the most prominent aspect of the work, when the message I want to convey is about the work's quality. That's what happens when you're on the outside looking in; you see the superficial similarities between the bad and the good, but can't see the deeper differences that make the good good. 90% of everything is crud 4 , but in unfamiliar genres we only see the 90%, while we're able to see the 10% in familiar ones. That 10% transcends the genre, whereas all the 90% has going for it is the genre. I'm not sure how to get around this. I can't avoid using those labels, because they're useful. It's a useful starting point for checking stuff out 5. Furthermore, we use different standards for different genres; I know I ask a lot more from comedy movies than I do for action movies 6 . It's not just a lowering; I think I (now) have higher standards for fantasy and science fiction than I do for "general" fiction. The labels provide a handy shortcut, where collaborative filtering (either formally through something like Amazon, or just conversationally) requires much more overhead. Maybe there's nothing to get around, and that's just the way it is.
1 What's the proper antonym of disclaimer? Acclaimer works well enough for me.
2
Strictly speaking, everything is a genre of some kind, but there are certain defaults that are sort of non-genres, the general body of works that we put genre works into in the first place in order to distinguish them. For books, it's "general fiction," novels set in contemporary or near contemporary times in our familiar environment, without fantastic elements or a mystery. For music, it's "rock/pop." I don't think there's anything like that for movies, but "comedy" and "drama" come pretty close.
3
Not just in media works; the standard "what do you do?" question when people meet has the same feel.
4
Sturgeon's Law, which was apparently a response to critics trashing science fiction because much of science fiction is trash.
5 Nobody can reliably say "if you like X, you'll like Y," but "if you like X, you should try Y" is still far more useful than trying to find things you like on your own, given how much people are cranking out these days.
6
I willingly watched "The Transporter 2."
¶ 1523 Posted at 12.05 PM ⇒ No Comments ( music | books | movies ) Saturday, October 06, 2007
Not new, but new to our CD collection.
Uma claims to like Mastodon. For some reason, I don't believe her, but if it means I can listen to what I want instead of the "Animals" song on infinite repeat, I don't really care about her credibility.
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
A recent headline in the local newspaper 1 claimed "Most Radiohead Fans Decline to Pay," referring to the band's experiment in digital music retailing. The headline should instead read, "Most Radiohead Downloaders Have Not Paid Yet." Just because they downloaded the music doesn't mean they're a fan; they could have just grabbed it to see what the hype was about. Secondly, the album will be released on CD in a couple of months. I would rather not pay for a digital download now and then pay full retail later. I am ethically at ease with downloading the music now without paying and buying the CD when it becomes available. I am not, in other words, declining to pay, but rather waiting to pay. Is it a terrible error? No. Does the distortion conform to the conventional narrative of music downloaders being thieves? Yup.
1 No doubt a reprint from elsewhere
Friday, April 11, 2008
Wholly Kruppe! A new Portishead album! I thought they broke up or died in a plane crash or converted to Jesusism. But what's with that horrible effluent in the Severn Estuary?
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