I'm starting to feel we stayed together out of fear of dying alone....
NEW DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE!!!
Narrow Stairs is fantastic. Simply beautiful. It's their sixth album and my favorite by far of the ones I've heard. They've taken a new direction (more instrumental, less poppy mass appeal) with their new album, and have matured incredibly as a band. Narrow Stairs is peaceful, rhythmic, reflective.....but still upbeat and hopeful. It's the kind of album you put on a week after a really bad breakup, when you've shed your share of tears and are ready to move on to better things.
http://www.deathcabforcutie.com/tours/
I've Had Enough
All right. I thought I could handle it. I thought that the pros outweighed the cons. But finally I have to say FUCK IT!!!!
Twitter blows. Just a little.
First of all, people, Twitter is supposed to be used in moderation. I had to turn my phone off for an hour today because it was on the verge of dying and kept chirping at me. When I turned it back on, I had fifteen tweets! All but two were from....the same person. All contained some semblance of "Hm. I'm feeling THIS way at the moment". C'mon now. Every thought that passes through your head needs to be mini-blogged?? I know, the easy answer is "Turn off phone updates from people that annoy you!" My easy response? "I'm too lazy, so I'm going to sit here and passive-aggressively blog about it".
Second, over half the tweets I receive contain links to other websites or online photos. I'm poor. My phone doesn't even have a camera much less the ability to follow links. So I can look longingly at your tiny URLs all I want...but I'm never going to know what it was you wanted so badly for the world en masse to see. And no, I'm not spending $150 a month to check them out.
Sometimes, everyone decides to Twitter all at once. OR, two people start a conversation and all you get is their "@" back-and-forths for an hour. This is when the phone updates get REALLY annoying. I could turn the phone updates off altogether, but then what would be the point of even being on Twitter? No one wants to look at a website to see that Lisa was running late three days ago. I get to my computer probably twice a day if I'm very very lucky, and that's generally only for 15 minutes at a time. I'm not going to spend those precious moments of wireless bliss looking through everyone's old-news tweets.
Twitter's got a real dilemna. The whole POINT is so that you can see updates in real-time....i.e., text messages. But what happens when the updates get too annoying/overwhelming? The site loses its whole appeal.
Also, their propaganda how-to video really bothers me. Thanks, Nabisco's Hideway, for giving me additional ammunition.
The truth is.....I AM Iron Man
"I'm just not the hero type, clearly. With this laundry list of character defects, mistakes I've made - largely...public...." Tony Stark, "Iron Man"
With all the power and influence that prominent public figures wield, to what extent to they actually TRY to be “heroes”? The music and entertainment industries particularly reach a large audience of impressionable youth, and often in interviews with rock/movie stars the question of influence as a role model pops up. If you’re talking to Beyonce or Britney, the answer seems to be (strong Southern accent) “You know, I just try to be happy and be a good person and have a positive attitude”. TRY being the operative word here. If you’re talking to Avril Lavigne, it’s “Being true to myself and not letting haters make you feel like you have to suppress who you are” (even if you’re a posing emo wanna-be ‘hardcore’ rocker….oh sorry, does that count as hating?). 50 Cent would probably just straight up kill you for asking then stand over your lifeless body yelling, “How’s THAT for being a role model foo??”
Paris Hilton would be too drunk to understand the question, repeating “that’s hot” while intermittently puking.
Either the music and entertainment industries attract the morally questionable in the first place, or it makes them that way. I’m leaning towards a combination of both….kids that have musicians or movie stars as role models don’t know whether that person’s character is actually admirable. They’re attracted to the fame, obscene wealth, and power. Kids don’t tend to realize that many in the music industry are starving artists, scraping by on construction/waitressing jobs while they wait for someone to notice how brilliant they are.
On the other hand, do stars even HAVE a responsibility to be role models? They didn’t become famous for their upstanding character qualities. Mass marketing one’s own creative talents is the hardest business there is, especially when the products are solely aesthetic. There is no real USE for music or art of any kind. It's a high demand for a very abstract and subjective idea….and either you’re born into the industry or it takes years of struggle and hard work to make it anywhere. Once they DO make it somewhere…sometimes they go a little crazy. Perhaps too often they lose sight of what they learned on their way to the top. But should they be expected to behave well in public just because young kids look up to them? Musicians and movie stars achieved success in a business that rewards cutthroat, underhanded, unsightly behavior to get ahead. Only the most vicious survive. They should almost be congratulated.
Almost.
If you’re looking for a role model, perhaps you should choose Barack Obama. Or Iron Man.
On Life, Love, and Really Bad Decisions
I rarely use this blog for personal reasons but tonight I feel the need. I just got home from work (yes, I'm aware it IS 3 a.m.) and I'll be right back there in five hours for another glorious ten-hour day.
Ever have those times where you sit back, look at your life, and question every big decision you've made? Two years ago I scorned the University of Colorado as somewhere that all the dumb and unmotivated people went to school. I decided I didn't want to be a doctor because I thought it was something my parents wanted for me more than I did. I went to Notre Dame a solid Catholic who was majoring in Psychology, Political Science, and Russian, with dreams of becoming a lawyer.
Now, I'm turning down a $30,000 a year academic scholarship to the University of Notre Dame in favor of CU. Which, by the way, is giving me no money. I'm rethinking my career choice AGAIN because I think I can do a little more good in the world through the medical profession. I've lost religion, for good this time I think. My life no longer has a certain direction, which is scary and frustrating. I feel like I've lost nearly as much emotional ground as I've gained.
An attractive and charismatic guy asked for my phone number today. I turned him down because I'm in a happy and committed relationship, but wondered - just for a second - what life would be like if I had decided differently. What if I had never met Ian? What if my parents had decided to let me return to Notre Dame after only one semester off? What if I had never TAKEN time off school? What would I be doing with my life? Would I be content?
I'm seeing my life as a choose-your-own adventure novel, except this time I don't get to cheat and see all the alternate endings. I don't get to pick which one would make me the happiest in the end. This moment is a photon in a light spectrum of alternate and parallel universes bouncing around a roomful of mirrors...intersecting and colliding and curving away.
I hope I've picked the right thing.
Grand Theft Auto IV and Russian rap...among other things
Throughout this whole blog I've been stressing the influence of international music and the importance of broadening one's musical horizons. I've finally found one genre where that's not true...I don't think you can relate if you don't speak the language.
It all started with some research I was doing on Grand Theft Auto IV. One of the artists on the soundtrack to the game is Seryoga, who's an immensely popular Russian rapper. He's won gold and platinum awards; supposedly every man, woman, and child in the Soviet Union knows who he is; and he's been compared in fame and popularity to Eminem. He even looks kinda like him...
Anyway, I'm a fan of Eminem and I like rap/hip hop in general, so I thought I would check out Seryoga's music. Here are some of his most popular songs:
In rap and hip hop, the lyrics carry the song. How talented a rapper you are depends on not only your ability to keep rhythm and maintain a flow but how cleverly you rhyme, relate concepts, and create complicated word structures. Which doesn't exactly work if you don't know what the rapper is saying....all I hear from Seryoga is a bunch of meaningless language with a repetitive beat. Disappointing!
The thing I don't understand is that I don't feel the same way about MC Solaar, another foreign rapper. Although I don't speak French, I still feel like I know what he's trying to convey in his songs. I don't get that with Seryoga, even though I DO speak some Russian.....maybe because he's more mainstream gangsta' rap and it's hard to pick up any emotion other than "GRRRRR"?
Any insight here?
Everything
I haven't blogged in a while. I know. I'm full of excuses for it, too: Working 50+ hours a week at my REAL job. Struggling and developing through new stages of an intensely wonderful and fulfilling but sometimes draining and confusing relationship. Moving out of my apartment and back to my parents' house till I get a new apartment in two months. Taxes. Transferring schools and wading through all the phone calls and online work that comes with it.
One of the musical constants that has stuck with me through my stresses over the years is Radiohead's "Everything in its Right Place". This is the one song that will get me to just calm down and chill the fuck out when I'm neurotically worrying about everything in my life and everyone else's life too. This morning I was standing alone in a messy room full of my belongings - waiting to be packed up into boxes that I didn't own, in the time I didn't have. I was thinking about how I'm possibly going to get along with my parents for two months, how I'm going to stand sleeping alone for two months when that's the only time I even get to SEE my boyfriend, how I'm going to get all my shit packed, moved and the apartment cleaned in one day.
My solution, of course, was to stress until I thought I was going to pass out and then put on Radiohead.
Two seconds into this song and all my tension vanishes. I'm in a meditative, peaceful state of mind and I know things are going to be fine.
My mind turns from
to
Because everythings in its right place....
International weapons trading turns to Craigslist
You'd think the Best of Craigslist would be funny stuff, like the letter "to the guy doing my wife". Perhaps the weird and slightly disturbing "personal ads". Maybe other people's weird junk you definitely don't want chilling in your living room.
Personally, I think this one murders all of them: recently, undercover government officials decided to take a little cruise around Craigslist and eBay and discovered dozens of "sensitive military items" for sale.
- Night vision goggles? check
- Body armor? check
- U.S. military-issued Army combat uniform? check
- Authentic military MREs (Meals Ready To Eat)? check
- F-14 jet antennas? check
- F-14 Converter/Receiver Control? check
Oh and by the way, Iran is the only country that uses F-14s anymore. Comforting.
These items were sold to the highest bidder. Naturally, our government decided the best allocation of its citizens tax dollars would go towards buying back its own shit.
I wonder how much the F-14 parts went for...
Funnily enough, there are no laws against selling sensitive military equipment in such an anonymous online exchange. BUT, eBay DOES prevent the resale of previously used cosmetics. I'm glad we have our priorities straight here, people.
Of course, government officials are all in a tiff about the idea of former soldiers, forced to buy their uniforms with their own money (making them their property), reselling them indiscriminately to strangers. Really...what are they supposed to do with them? Have them hanging in your closet for a constant chilling reminder of your last tour in Iraq? Hey, if you can make a couple hundred bucks so some nobody can have a cool Halloween costume, I say go for it.
So now, the government's working on a law against selling any authentic military items less than 50 years old. Way to go, Congress.
Twitter Me Kaybee
After months of working at this technology-focused bloggging group with a bunch of internet freaks, I was finally coerced into joining Twitter. For those of you as generally web-app retarded as I am, Twitter is a social networking site where you slap up a profile that consists of a miniscule blurb about who you are/what you do, and a picture. That's it. No fluff about your favorite movies or about how your hero is white paint or your favorite quote from Socrates. Pretty much the bare essentials.
Next, you start following people. No, really. Following. Which is kind of creepy in the sense that "Joe Nobody (Read: complete stranger) is following you" but not so paranoia-inducing in the sense that "you have 127 followers" (Yes!! I am a GOD!!).
The whole idea of Twitter is that you post updates of yourself - what you're doing, random epiphanies, etc. AND you get updates to your phone or email every time someone you're following says something new as well. It's like a giant social gathering where you get past how someone looks and their awkward social eccentricities and it's cut down exactly to how they communicate themselves in 140-character clips.
Now, I'll admit it...when I first started twittering, I would try to carefully compose clever little excerpts to demonstrate my formidable command of the English language. Then reality set in. I don't really speak English.
Just kidding. I actually demonstrated myself to be remarkably absent-minded with regard to text messages. I would be chatting with some friend over text message, someone would twitter at me, I would hit "reply" and text the entire twittering world whatever message I ACTUALLY meant to go to whomever I was talking to. Awkward and weird? Yes. Everyone got to know how I was guilt-tripped into actually GOING to my parents' house for my mom's birthday. Even scarier? The little box that pops up when you remove a twitter from your profile that tells you "There is NO undo". Once twittered, never undone. SHIT. Also, I would attempt to reply to some clever twitter at 6 am when I was still 96% asleep and text some completely nonsensical run-on fragment to reaffirm how illiterate I am when unconscious.
Thusly, I decided it was probably better for everyone if I just didn't twitter anymore. But I couldn't bring myself to completely burn the bridge. It's a little heartwarming when you wake up to six text messages describing what your friends are thinking/feeling/doing at the moment. I really like getting updates of the goings-on....it's the laziest way ever to still feel like you're "in touch" with someone while not actually speaking with them.
So if you're lazy, have unlimited text messaging or spend all your time in front of a computer screen, and would like to experience a false sense of popularity, maybe Twitter is for you.
No, really, it's cool.
Unlimited iTunes for life?
Apple's currently discussing a plan involving music subscriptions for iTunes. Although no specific parameters have been set, the general idea is that the consumer pays more for a new iPod and in return gets unlimited streaming/downloading access to iTunes for a year. After that (here comes the catch) you either lose all that glorious music that you got for free OR pay a subscription fee to 1) keep all your current music and 2) get more.
Which would you choose?
....duh. The rumored price for the monthly subscription is something like $7, which is a waaaay better deal than that 99 cents-a-track bullshit that they have going on now. Supposedly consumers also have the option of a lifetime subscription...which would be something like $100 for unlimited music FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!!!! Well...your iPod's life anyway....which after further consideration actually caps out at around 3-4 years if you're lucky.
But still, this is a good move on Apple's part in a lot of ways. Illegal downloading, even with the recent RIAA prosecutions, is at an all-time high. More and more Gen Y-ers are staunchly unwilling to pay out the nose for their DRM-loaded iSongs when they can download anything they want for free elsewhere...and put it on any device they want. One of the ONLY ways to lure our fickle consumerist generation back would be to offer unlimited access for a reasonable price. The subscription fee would be just like another bill that we pay every month in order to still receive things we take for granted: a place to live, water, heat, music.
Some foreseeable problems:
iTunes still doesn't have a considerable amount of important music. No Tool, only a couple Beatles songs, etc.
Why pay $7 for unlimited iTunes songs (which you supposedly LOSE if your subscription lapses, forcing you into paying this monthly fee forever) when you can get unlimited (albeit illegal) access online for FREE and KEEP your music however long you want to?
This is a brave and valiant attempt, Steve Jobs, I'll give you that. But dealing with our generation sucks for people like you sometimes....and we'll just have to see how this pans out.
A History of the Music Label
Record labels have played a vast role in the music industry since the early 1900s. Like all behemoth companies, their power waxed to a daunting pinnacle...but they are now faced with the possibility of certain death as bands have started flexing their independent muscles and appealing to fan support to survive and thrive without their label contracts.
This is a documentation of the growth and expansion of music labels, as well as their involvement in DRM media and their decline due to the advent of online music piracy.
The Role of Music Labels Defined
Music labels are essentially promo companies that enter into contracts with up-and-coming artists. They agree to produce and market the artist's music in exchange for royalties on the selling prices. Already-established and influential artists are sometimes able to negotiate contracts to their best advantage....but often, struggling but talented bands sign on to a label just to survive, end up becoming immensely popular, and eventually get screwed over by their record labels because of the restrictive terms of their original contracts. Often the relationship between labels and artists is disagreeable and combative. Record labels edit songs, change album artwork, and do whatever they feel will boost album sales - regardless of what the artist originally intended for his/her work. They also tend to charge vast amounts of money for their services, leaving even successful artists with not much money, because until very recently they believed that it was impossible for artists to survive in the harsh and jaded music world without them.
But let's back up a little.....
History
Music labels (surprisingly) found their origin in the inventions of Thomas Edison. In 1877 he created a recording device for the telephone (invented one year previously by Alexander Graham Bell), which basically functioned as an answering machine. Edison then set up the American Gramophone Company in the 1880s, which first sold dictating machines and then phonographs, which played music. Their popularity was unprecedented, and by the 1890s every major U.S. city was home to its own phonograph company.
Edison's original products were cylinders, which had audio recordings engraved on the outside metal. But in 1900 competitors began selling disc-shaped records (the beginnings of vinyl), which were 1) cheaper, 2) easier to store in bulk, and 3) a more efficient and less problem-ridden method of playing music. Edison's sales began to drop as the two companies selling discs (Victor and Colombia) steadily gained popularity.
In 1913 Edison succumbed and produced the Edison Diamond Disc Player. But by this time, most of the decades-old patents copyrighting record machines had expired, and dozens of smaller independent companies producing the same product sprang into existence. Throughout a swift couple years of founding, buying, and acquiring in the 1920s, these first record labels mostly focused on producing jazz and blues on discs. Edison was forced out of business shortly after Black Friday in October of 1929, mostly due to his refusal to produce jazz records because of his personal distaste for it....despite that fact that jazz was by far the most popular music of the time period.
Over the next few decades, business continued as usual with independent labels springing up/major labels buying out smaller ones/technology slowly but surely advancing. Two major labels (Colombia and RCA) first introduced vinyl records in 1948. In the 1950s, there were five major record labels: Colombia, RCA Victor, Decca, Capitol, and Mercury. Their stock plummeted during that decade as the independent labels began producing rock and roll/ R&B records while the "old fogies" stuck with jazz. But eventually they caught on and the labels rode the waves of musical evolution for the next four decades.
The cassette tape was introduced in 1963 and the CD in 1981. Cassettes were the most popular music configuration in the 1980s, until CDs finally ousted them from glory in 1992.
DRM
The idea of "Digital Rights Management"-controlled media became popular with labels by the late 1990s. The concept was, in theory, going to be used to limit consumption of audio and visual media solely to paying customers and reduce the amount of online piracy. Illegal downloading, the labels argued, would drop profits, limit creative input, and decrease overall quality of the media being produced - which would lead to a decline in the industry as a whole. In 1998 President Bill Clinton signed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which criminalized the production and use of any technology which could circumvent the securities surrounding DRM-protected media, and also raised criminal penalties for Internet copyright infringement. Companies like Napster, Kazaa, and MP3.com were essentially shut down as a result, and pay-to-listen sites like Pressplay and Rhapsody were set up. In 2003 the CEO of Apple (Steve Jobs) created the iTunes music store, which offered legal music downloads for 99 cents a song.
Now
Today, the four major music labels are: Warner Music Group, EMI, Sony BMG, and Universal. Despite recent declines, they still hold a considerable amount of power and will not hesitate to sue millions of Americans for illegally downloading their copyrighted music. In 2007, Jammie Thomas was the first to go to court out of over 26,000 people sued by music labels for copyright infringement. She was found guilty and ordered to pay $220,000 to six labels for 25 songs she was found guilty of downloading illegally.
However, several bands have finally tired of being kicked around by their boorish labels and have started to stand up for themselves....led by three of the most famous artists in recent history: Radiohead, Madonna, and Nine Inch Nails.
It remains to be seen how well these artists will function without any ties to a label. After all their label-free hype, Radiohead ended up negotiating a short-term contract with XL Recordings to distribute physical copies of their newest album In Rainbows. Nine Inch Nails dropped Interscope, but has experience numerous problems and glitches with their self-distributed album Ghosts I. Madonna, of course, has yet to release any new material since she left Warner Music, but has signed with a concert promoter (Live Nation), which will allow her to keep 90% of her concert revenues.
Some say it's too early to tell, but most people agree....the death bell for traditional music labels is tolling. It will take a couple years....but more and more artists are jumping ship to prove that they can make it on their own. Labels won't die off completely, but their role is going to be dramatically revamped within the next decade.
Probably for the good of everyone.
If you're a fan of Radiohead....
....or Massive Attack, Hot Chip, Nine Inch Nails, Bjork, Mew, and Smashing Pumpkins then chances are you'll enjoy the music of Home Video. (They list the above music as a few of their influences). The band is composed of two Brooklyn natives - David Gross (a classical pianist) and Collin Ruffino (a goth kid), and their music is a mixture of hypnotic electronic/rock/ambient sound. The absolute best comparison I can draw is that Home Video sounds like a synthesized Radiohead. Both band members were film and philosophy students in college and their dark creativity flows like art throughout their music.
Their first album, No Certain Night or Morning, came out in October of 2006, but Home Video hadn't gained national notoriety until relatively recently. Now they're doing small shows around Brooklyn and New York, as well as playing in SXSW 2008 (South by Southwest, a huge film and music festival held annually in Austin, TX).
Unfortunately, they're not big enough yet to be featured on any of the music hosting sites I know of, and they've only come out with the music video for their first single, "Sleep Sweet" - so that's all you get to listen to at the moment! If you feel like putting up with iTunes, there's always those 30-second clips that give you those frustrating and tantalizing glimpses and then demand money. I bought the full album (the only one I've paid real money for in years, besides In Rainbows), so I guarantee that they're great. Home Video's awesome for meditative driving music, as my personal recommendation.
WARNING: Do Not Pinch Without Apple's Permission
Steve Jobs, in his infinite wisdom, is working on patenting the iPhone's interactive "pinch" motion. As you may (or may not) know, the pinch is used to zoom in and out on photos and is just one part of a medley of flicks, taps, pulls, and double-taps that make up Apple's "multitouch" feature.
Even though I don't own an iPhone (I would rather pay my bills), I still know how to use it and - in the future, were I to purchase said interactive media device - I would fully expect to be able to pinch and pull any way I wanted to. But say...in the next three years or so....Apple wins this patent lawsuit. Nokia later comes out with its own version of the iPhone ("only better") for half the price! I buy it. But lo and behold - no pinching is allowed!! In order to zoom, I instead have to swirl my right pinky in a counterclockwise motion three times.
If Apple wins, this will be just the first in hundreds of similar patents that put a copyright on interactive media screen "gestures". What started with flicks and taps and pinches will degenerate into swirls and double-fingered drags and zig-zags, because all the simplest motions will be patented. If you own multiple interactive media devices, you would have to remember which motions go with which actions for each of them.
Obviously Steve Jobs has been plotting the demise of other companies' aspirations for years, because Apple has been filing patent lawsuits regarding the iPhone multitouch motions since 2004. According to Wired.com, Apple currently has 200 pending patents filed for the iPhone alone - including a patent on the term "multitouch". And if the patents are awarded...Apple will have virtually wiped out any competitor's ability to come up with a similar device that is even remotely user-friendly. No one will have a chance to develop a new and exciting add-on that builds on the same technology outside of Apple. The pinch patent is the first step, which will lead to an eventual stifling of most creativity outside of Apple concerning multitouch technology. Not to mention that the super-cool technology that already exists will double in price.
I really like Apple....but sometimes it makes me feel like the blowfish in this mass grave:
Sad.
Soundtrack to an Election
We're still six months out, but already the 2008 Presidential Election seems to be between three candidates: Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and Barack Obama. I can't think of anything that would go together better than politics and music, so I've taken it upon myself to dig up a couple quotes from the candidates for a side-by-side comparison, and suggest a couple theme songs that seem to go well with their campaigns…
Hillary Clinton
"Maybe we should ask Barack if he's comfortable and needs another pillow" - during a debate with Barack Obama, referring to a Saturday Night Live skit as evidence of a pro-Obama media bias
"I could stand up here and say, 'Let's just everybody get together, let's get unified, the sky will open, the light will come down, celestial choirs will be singing and everybody will just know that we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect" - mocking Barack Obama
Voters like Obama better? “Well that hurts my feelings”
I'm undaunted in my quest to amuse myself by constantly changing my hair."
Barack Obama
"Get involved in an issue that you're passionate about. It almost doesn't matter what it is ... We give too much of our power away, to the professional politicians, to the lobbyists, to cynicism. And our democracy suffers as a result."
"When you focus on solving problems instead of scoring political points, and emphasize common sense over ideology, you'd be surprised what can be accomplished."
"Today we are engaged in a deadly global struggle for those who would intimidate, torture, and murder people for exercising the most basic freedoms. If we are to win this struggle and spread those freedoms, we must keep our own moral compass pointed in a true direction.”
"It took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to where we are today, but we have just begun. Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today."
John McCain
"President Bush has talked about our staying in
"The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should. I’ve got Greenspan’s book."
"Only the most deluded of us could doubt the necessity of this war."
"I’m sorry to tell you, there’s going to be other wars. We will never surrender but there will be other wars"
“Bomb
I don't think there are any songs entitled "I'm an ignorant asshole", but if there were I would put them here.
Carry on, candidates!!!
Smoe Dman Gdoo Rmexies......
I recently discovered the wonders of the Hype Machine, and in my adventures through its territory I've come across a couple great remixes.
First: Feist "I Feel It All", remixed by Britt from Spoon. The original version has more of a bang-up, poppy, feel-good air to it (which I love), but this remix has a slower, deeper groove to it. It definitely emphasizes the subtler aspects of the original song.
Second: Hot Chip "Ready for the Floor", remixed by Midlake. The original song is typical of the groups new style off their freshest album "Made In the Dark": heavy electronics, fast beat, high energy. The remix, by Midlake, is slower, sexier, and more ambient. I actually like the remix way better than the original.
Hot Chip - Ready for the Floor (smooth R&B Remix)
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