i have a romantic attraction to records. i suppose i'm a hopeless romantic in many idealistic ways but there is really something to listening to music on a record. (eventually i'll put a picture here but my computer died so i'm doing this like Strong Bad on an older computer)
Those who know me know i'm attracted to round, circular objects. The bigger the better. i find it hard to get romantic with a cd (some people enjoy just a hand full)... but a record (of any color) can lead to an evening of dimmed lights; soft, low humming; and lots of flipping.
The first time you listen to a record is the best, most organic way you will ever hear a song. Granted it may decrease in quality with every listen after that but it's all worth that first listen. Who wants to live forever? i find some comfort in knowing that like me, my records have a finite lifetime.
This romance may link back to the fact that my earliest memories of music are days spent listening to records as a child. It's how music was introduced to me and i will never forget that. The convenience of having most of my music collection on a tiny iPod serves my now full-blown music addiction well, but gently holding those large, round, vinyl disks like some fragile lover and laying her down on a turntable, sleeves cast aside, warms the cockles of my heart.
All right... back to listening to my record collection...
Oct 20, 2006
Oct 16, 2006
Groceries
Tonight i went out for a quick grocery run. Not a full fledged grocery shopping event where i wear my iPod so that no one tries to interact with me and deter me from my mission: get food, get kleenex, and get out. This was just a quick stop to get what i needed for lunches this week so i left the iPod at home. Woah nelly...
i was perusing the dental floss selection. There's something about grocery store floss displays and convenience store beverage displays that leave me perplexed. Maybe it's the myriad of choices or all that bright colored plastic but i can never make a quick decision when faced with either.
All of a sudden i hear someone singing horribly high pitched bad hip-hop. i look over to find a Backstreet wannabe rounding the corner to come up my aisle fully pretty-boyed out with blonde moused up hair, matching chin-strap beard thing, white sweater, baggy tan Abecrummy cargo pants and big white sneakers.
There i am in my Dickies (filthy from post-work yard clean-up), black hooded sweatshirt, and shaved head staring this cat down with lowered brow partially in a look of bewilderment, partially hinting 'what's your story'. Backstreet doesn't even miss a beat. In fact, he turns it up to ELEVEN as he stops at the hair-care products belting it out now at the top of his lungs. No head phones mind you, just a-capella. Stunned, i quickly just grab whatever floss first catches my eye and high tail it through the mid-aisle break in the beauty products aisle.
My hasty exit into the next row startles a mother and her two daughters who scatter in three different directions. i seem to have disrupted their deodorant selection process. A cosmic game of grocery store pool. What a suburban exemplar of the butterfly effect. What chaos theory equation could possibly have predicted that series of events?
It took George Lucas and Stephen Cobert having a light saber duel to snap me out of my shell-shock from having experienced such randomness during what should have been a simple errand. Whoa nelly indeed.
i was perusing the dental floss selection. There's something about grocery store floss displays and convenience store beverage displays that leave me perplexed. Maybe it's the myriad of choices or all that bright colored plastic but i can never make a quick decision when faced with either.
All of a sudden i hear someone singing horribly high pitched bad hip-hop. i look over to find a Backstreet wannabe rounding the corner to come up my aisle fully pretty-boyed out with blonde moused up hair, matching chin-strap beard thing, white sweater, baggy tan Abecrummy cargo pants and big white sneakers.
There i am in my Dickies (filthy from post-work yard clean-up), black hooded sweatshirt, and shaved head staring this cat down with lowered brow partially in a look of bewilderment, partially hinting 'what's your story'. Backstreet doesn't even miss a beat. In fact, he turns it up to ELEVEN as he stops at the hair-care products belting it out now at the top of his lungs. No head phones mind you, just a-capella. Stunned, i quickly just grab whatever floss first catches my eye and high tail it through the mid-aisle break in the beauty products aisle.
My hasty exit into the next row startles a mother and her two daughters who scatter in three different directions. i seem to have disrupted their deodorant selection process. A cosmic game of grocery store pool. What a suburban exemplar of the butterfly effect. What chaos theory equation could possibly have predicted that series of events?
It took George Lucas and Stephen Cobert having a light saber duel to snap me out of my shell-shock from having experienced such randomness during what should have been a simple errand. Whoa nelly indeed.
Postponed
This entry has been preempted as George Lucas is currently on the Cobert Report... please stay tuned.
Oct 15, 2006
Just A Boy Band
Politics, bosses, SUV's, there have been a lot of mentions on this page that may have upset certain types of people at different times. Here comes, possibly, the most blasphemous, controversial, and instigating entry to date, if not ever.
The Beatles where nothing more than a boy band. That's right. i said it. The Beatles mean nothing to me. They are a cheesy, pop, boy band milking the formula from day one.
Here we go, right from the start: they all got the same outfits, the same haircut, and bopped around playing simple, sing-along pop songs that made teenage girls scream. Clean-cut, TV friendly, and easily marketable putting them right into the spotlight.
Times changed and, like Madonna after them, they changed. Their audience was growing up, growing their hair long, and doing drugs. So what did The Beatles do? They continued to write easily accessible music but altered it to fit in with their new look and lifestyle, matching that of their audience. Go to India. Get a Guru. Make some rebellious comment comparing your band to Jesus. Write a song easily interpreted to reference LSD yet say it was based on a child's drawing. Yawn...
The White Album? If they can supposedly make art if given a tuba why couldn't they come up with a better album name and cover concept? Sergeant Pepper's as a response to Pet Sounds? Isn't that like the Jackson 5 and the Commodors having a dance off or N'sync and Backstreet Boys having a video showdown? Silly pop bands competing and people trying to call it art.
My favorite part: the break-up leading to the solo career. This is as humorous as Jutin Timberlake trying to pretend like he was never in a boy-band, or better that he was too good for his boy band. i have to admit, the crazy, out-of-her-mind wife route was a unique twist. The inequitable treatment of his offspring shows how songs like 'All You Need Is Love' and 'Image' were probably just lip service. Megalomania posing as salt of the earth.
i could go on but i won't. If they are the best band ever and if those where the best times ever someone please shoot me because that doesn't say much for music or humanity and the world we live in.
i know that people's favorite bands are a point of personal preference but as a society we have to acknowledge what is just sugar that many people enjoy and what is sustenance. Coltrane, Davis, Mussorgsky... these are timeless feats of music that deserve our respect, even if you don't regularly listen to them. Admit it... The Beatles are just sugary pop and we need to stop pretending that they are anything more.
The Beatles where nothing more than a boy band. That's right. i said it. The Beatles mean nothing to me. They are a cheesy, pop, boy band milking the formula from day one.
Here we go, right from the start: they all got the same outfits, the same haircut, and bopped around playing simple, sing-along pop songs that made teenage girls scream. Clean-cut, TV friendly, and easily marketable putting them right into the spotlight.
Times changed and, like Madonna after them, they changed. Their audience was growing up, growing their hair long, and doing drugs. So what did The Beatles do? They continued to write easily accessible music but altered it to fit in with their new look and lifestyle, matching that of their audience. Go to India. Get a Guru. Make some rebellious comment comparing your band to Jesus. Write a song easily interpreted to reference LSD yet say it was based on a child's drawing. Yawn...
The White Album? If they can supposedly make art if given a tuba why couldn't they come up with a better album name and cover concept? Sergeant Pepper's as a response to Pet Sounds? Isn't that like the Jackson 5 and the Commodors having a dance off or N'sync and Backstreet Boys having a video showdown? Silly pop bands competing and people trying to call it art.
My favorite part: the break-up leading to the solo career. This is as humorous as Jutin Timberlake trying to pretend like he was never in a boy-band, or better that he was too good for his boy band. i have to admit, the crazy, out-of-her-mind wife route was a unique twist. The inequitable treatment of his offspring shows how songs like 'All You Need Is Love' and 'Image' were probably just lip service. Megalomania posing as salt of the earth.
i could go on but i won't. If they are the best band ever and if those where the best times ever someone please shoot me because that doesn't say much for music or humanity and the world we live in.
i know that people's favorite bands are a point of personal preference but as a society we have to acknowledge what is just sugar that many people enjoy and what is sustenance. Coltrane, Davis, Mussorgsky... these are timeless feats of music that deserve our respect, even if you don't regularly listen to them. Admit it... The Beatles are just sugary pop and we need to stop pretending that they are anything more.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)