I'm in a transition phase of my life where I've made a singular major change, and at the same time I am ill-prepared for other major changes in my life. There are things that are very important for me to do while I'm here on Earth. I want to have a job I love, a woman I love, children I love, and a city I love, not in order of importance by any means. My current situation is a necessary phase in my life that isn't particularly compatible with my pursuit of those things that are so important to me (I guess I could live in my dream city while getting an education, but Harrisburg is not my utopia). With where I am in life, I would rather hold off on finding that perfect job, perfect woman, perfect children, and perfect city until a later time.
But I'd like a guarantee that they will be waiting for me when I'm ready.
Monday, January 31, 2005
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
Shehab Ahmad of Basra
"I said before that I wasn't going to vote in this election because I was opposed to it happening at this time, when the country is so clearly unprepared for it. But now after this violence I will vote and I know who I'm going to vote for, not for a party list but for a good candidate who I know will be right for Iraq. It's the only weapon I have."
Sunday, January 23, 2005
The First Guy is Hypothetical
The man with lots of money but nothing to invest it in is at risk of wasting it. Then the man loses some of that money available to him, spends the remainder of it on a wife and kids rather than getting another suit for himself, and now he has infinitely more to show for it. He doesn't have as much money, but he's far wealthier, and far happier.
The man with lots of free time but nothing to do with it is at risk of wasting it. Then the man loses some of that free time available to him, uses the remainder of it to learn a new language and write music rather than sitting on the computer, and now he has infinitely more to show for it. He doesn't have as much free time, but he's far more free, and far happier.
The man with lots of free time but nothing to do with it is at risk of wasting it. Then the man loses some of that free time available to him, uses the remainder of it to learn a new language and write music rather than sitting on the computer, and now he has infinitely more to show for it. He doesn't have as much free time, but he's far more free, and far happier.
Tuesday, January 11, 2005
2004 Music Awards
Top 5 Non-2004 Albums (Heard first in '04)
5. Fountains of Wayne, Welcome Interstate Managers (2003). If all you know is "Stacy's Mom," you're missing out on one of the best power-pop bands out there.
4. Jeff Buckley, Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk (1998). He drowned before he could finish his second album, and still he leaves us with a powerful, eclectic, passionate album. Oh, what could have been.
3. Dave Attell, Skanks for the Memories (2003). I'll never look at egg nog the same way ever again.
2. The Shins, Chutes Too Narrow (2003). I need to ramble a little bit about The Shins. My new favorite band. Got better on their second album. Natalie Portman says in the movie Garden State that listening to The Shins "will change your life." Best live show of 2004. Anyone who likes them automatically gets 1,000 cool points in my book, with a 100-point bonus for knowing more than "New Slang." James Mercer (lead singer and songwriter) stood off to the side and never said a word for the entire concert, letting the other band members speak and then just started strumming when it was time for the next song. Ok, I'm done. Ah, The Shins...
1. Mos Def, Black on Both Sides (1999). An amazing mind who looks skeptically but optimistically at social reform and pays tribute to jazz, soul, and rock in his beats. This is my idea of what hip hop should be.
Top 3 Surprise Albums of 2004
3. Jamie Cullum, Twentysomething. His choice of jazz-pop covers goes all across the board, but his original material fits in and measures comparably to the old classics.
2. The Vines, Winning Days. Their 1960s psychadelic side shows surprising depth to a band known mostly for Craig Nichols' disturbing, angry, violent antics.
1. Green Day, American Idiot. Ten years ago they played 3-chord riffs about masturbation on an album named after shit. Now they write rock operettas that could potentially translate to the stage. And somehow they still sound like the same band.
Top 3 Letdown Albums of 2004
3. The Thrills, Let's Bottle Bohemia. What starts out so promising erodes into repetitious filler that's little more than the rejected material from their previous album.
2. Wilco, A Ghost is Born. Sorry folks, I just don't get all the hype. The instruments, the vocals, the musical progressions... they all sound sterile to me. This album got tons of "takes a couple of listens" reviews, which I translate to mean " we demand you listen to this until you accept our overblown hype. One of us! One of us!"
1. Incubus, A Crow Left of the Murder. Suckfest alert! Band in identity crisis takes two steps backward alert! Abort! Abort!
Top 10 Songs of 2004
10. Sondre Lerche, "Two Way Monologue". One time I stayed in my bathroom for a solid ten minutes until I had mastered the air guitar version of the ending. I guess now's the time to mention that I have a cd player in the bathroom so I can listen to music while I do the 3 sh's: -it, -ower, and -ave.
9. William Hung, "I Believe I Can Fly". Great comedy albums make you pull off to the side of the road because you're laughing too hard to drive. It takes a special song to do the same thing. William Hung is special.
8. Kasey Chambers, "Paper Aeroplane". I better die before my wife does because if I ever heard this song as a widow, I'd cry too much for anyone to bear.
7. Rufus Wainwright, "The Art Teacher". Gorgeous, sophisticated, honest song about a "girl" recalling a crush on her former art teacher. Finding out at the end that the recording is live makes the performance all the more remarkable.
6. Jamie Cullum, "All at Sea". That is one sexy piano opening for a pop song.
5. Green Day, "Jesus of Suburbia". All nine minutes are infectious, flow marvelously, rock solidly, and end too soon.
4. A.C. Newman, "Miracle Drug". He was TIED to the bed with a miracle drug in one hand! In the OTHER, a great lost novel that, I understand... was returned... with a sta-a-a-amp... that said "Thank you for your in-ter-est, young man."
3. Mos Def, "Sex, Love & Money". Holy shit how I love that beat! Top rap track with a yazz flute background of all time.
2. Jimmy Eat World, "Drugs or Me". This band's even-softer side is seriously overlooked. One of those songs that's tragic and real enough to elicit a physical reaction from the listener.
1. Sam Roberts, "Don't Walk Away Eileen". I could listen to that rockin chorus blasting through my car speakers all day! Actually, I have. Many times. Many.
Top 10 Albums of 2004
Honorable Mention: Nellie McKay, Get Away From Me. I put this one here because I don't own it yet (it's in the mail) and have only heard it once, but what I heard was so off-the-wall in influences, so scathing, so mocking, and so enticing that I know it'll be somewhere around the Top 10. The album name is probably her way of saying, "Don't be ignorant and only compare me to Norah Jones you f****er!"
10. Sondre Lerche, Two Way Monologue. I had my mom make me a sweatshirt just like the one on this album cover because I want to be Sondre Lerche, one of those dudes who writes mature baroque pop, listens to old jazz on the side, keeps a cool online journal, and speaks with a Norwegian accent.
9. Branford Marsalis Quartet, Eternal. He's a way better jazz musician than his overrated little bro Wynton, and he proves it again with 7 tracks of subtly gorgeous soprano sax. He's also way nicer than his grumpy dad, Ellis Marsalis, whom I've played with (that's the only time I'll name drop here).
8. Keane, Hopes and Fears. I tried to think of a way to summarize Keane without the word "Coldplay," but that's like trying to describe Wilco without the word "overrated": you could do it, but it wouldn't be as fun (or accurate). Here's my best description of Keane: piano-driven rock that mixes the sounds of Coldplay with the melodies of early Rufus Wainwright. My album of 2002 was by Coldplay. My album of 2003 was by Rufus Wainwright. Was it possible for me to not like this band?
7. Mos Def, The New Danger. Ok, so it's no Black on Both Sides, and that rap-rock track #2 almost me slice a permanent scratch on that part of the disc, but Mos is still an amazing lyricist and an eclectic talent. And I had to get that yazz flute on here somewhere.
6. Jamie Cullum, Twentysomething. He's a twenty-two year old who uses his rock-trained voice to create gorgeous jazz-pop that talks about more than jumpin, jivin, n' wailin to go along with covers of everything from Broadway to Jeff Buckley to Hendrix to The Neptunes. So there goes my backup plan.
5. Rufus Wainwright, Want Two. Second straight year Rufus is on the list. Also, second straight year I have a completely pink cd on the list.
4. Sam Roberts, We Were Born in a Flame. I missed this the first time it was released in 2003, so maybe they should keep rereleasing this record until people get it that Canadians aren't all evil and that Sam Roberts is a Godsend to rock.
3. A.C. Newman, The Slow Wonder. Check out what AMG said about him: "In a better world, he would be our Elton, our Todd, our McCartney, and Slow Wonder would be on everyone's iPod, rotating on M2 hourly, and his name would be on the lips of everyone from aged Royalty to teen-aged girls." Ok, so AMG also gave Britney Federline 4.5 stars, but they got it right on Newman.
2. Kasey Chambers, Wayward Angel. My runaway favorite country singer is not from Tennessee but from Australia. Kasey writes intimate autobiographical lyrics that she releases with her gorgeous, childlike voice. Truth is, she could be singing the dictionary and I'd love it, but she supports her voice with a wide range of Americana music that covers so many emotions and colors it could never grow boring. Also gets the 2004 award for most times giving me physical chills from a lyric, chord, or note.
1. Green Day, American Idiot. If you had told me a year ago-- shoot, if you had told me 4 months ago-- that my favorite album for the whole year would come from those 3-chord-knowing punks with fake British accents, well I really don't know what I would have done, but it certainly wouldn't have been to nod in agreeance. But Billie Joe and the gang really won me over with this mix of punk-rock angst and Broadway flamboyance. It flows like one big story; you couldn't successfully argue that any track should be placed anywhere but in its existing spot. Most importantly, the gamble of having not one but two nine-minute punk-operettas on the disc is what turns the album from merely solid to undeniably spectacular, as these are far and away the best 18 minutes of the album. If there was ever an album that personified the "whole is greater than the sum of its parts" theory, here it is. If black eyeliner is what it takes to make albums this bold and fun, hopefully we'll see more musicians in the cosmetics department.
5. Fountains of Wayne, Welcome Interstate Managers (2003). If all you know is "Stacy's Mom," you're missing out on one of the best power-pop bands out there.
4. Jeff Buckley, Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk (1998). He drowned before he could finish his second album, and still he leaves us with a powerful, eclectic, passionate album. Oh, what could have been.
3. Dave Attell, Skanks for the Memories (2003). I'll never look at egg nog the same way ever again.
2. The Shins, Chutes Too Narrow (2003). I need to ramble a little bit about The Shins. My new favorite band. Got better on their second album. Natalie Portman says in the movie Garden State that listening to The Shins "will change your life." Best live show of 2004. Anyone who likes them automatically gets 1,000 cool points in my book, with a 100-point bonus for knowing more than "New Slang." James Mercer (lead singer and songwriter) stood off to the side and never said a word for the entire concert, letting the other band members speak and then just started strumming when it was time for the next song. Ok, I'm done. Ah, The Shins...
1. Mos Def, Black on Both Sides (1999). An amazing mind who looks skeptically but optimistically at social reform and pays tribute to jazz, soul, and rock in his beats. This is my idea of what hip hop should be.
Top 3 Surprise Albums of 2004
3. Jamie Cullum, Twentysomething. His choice of jazz-pop covers goes all across the board, but his original material fits in and measures comparably to the old classics.
2. The Vines, Winning Days. Their 1960s psychadelic side shows surprising depth to a band known mostly for Craig Nichols' disturbing, angry, violent antics.
1. Green Day, American Idiot. Ten years ago they played 3-chord riffs about masturbation on an album named after shit. Now they write rock operettas that could potentially translate to the stage. And somehow they still sound like the same band.
Top 3 Letdown Albums of 2004
3. The Thrills, Let's Bottle Bohemia. What starts out so promising erodes into repetitious filler that's little more than the rejected material from their previous album.
2. Wilco, A Ghost is Born. Sorry folks, I just don't get all the hype. The instruments, the vocals, the musical progressions... they all sound sterile to me. This album got tons of "takes a couple of listens" reviews, which I translate to mean " we demand you listen to this until you accept our overblown hype. One of us! One of us!"
1. Incubus, A Crow Left of the Murder. Suckfest alert! Band in identity crisis takes two steps backward alert! Abort! Abort!
Top 10 Songs of 2004
10. Sondre Lerche, "Two Way Monologue". One time I stayed in my bathroom for a solid ten minutes until I had mastered the air guitar version of the ending. I guess now's the time to mention that I have a cd player in the bathroom so I can listen to music while I do the 3 sh's: -it, -ower, and -ave.
9. William Hung, "I Believe I Can Fly". Great comedy albums make you pull off to the side of the road because you're laughing too hard to drive. It takes a special song to do the same thing. William Hung is special.
8. Kasey Chambers, "Paper Aeroplane". I better die before my wife does because if I ever heard this song as a widow, I'd cry too much for anyone to bear.
7. Rufus Wainwright, "The Art Teacher". Gorgeous, sophisticated, honest song about a "girl" recalling a crush on her former art teacher. Finding out at the end that the recording is live makes the performance all the more remarkable.
6. Jamie Cullum, "All at Sea". That is one sexy piano opening for a pop song.
5. Green Day, "Jesus of Suburbia". All nine minutes are infectious, flow marvelously, rock solidly, and end too soon.
4. A.C. Newman, "Miracle Drug". He was TIED to the bed with a miracle drug in one hand! In the OTHER, a great lost novel that, I understand... was returned... with a sta-a-a-amp... that said "Thank you for your in-ter-est, young man."
3. Mos Def, "Sex, Love & Money". Holy shit how I love that beat! Top rap track with a yazz flute background of all time.
2. Jimmy Eat World, "Drugs or Me". This band's even-softer side is seriously overlooked. One of those songs that's tragic and real enough to elicit a physical reaction from the listener.
1. Sam Roberts, "Don't Walk Away Eileen". I could listen to that rockin chorus blasting through my car speakers all day! Actually, I have. Many times. Many.
Top 10 Albums of 2004
Honorable Mention: Nellie McKay, Get Away From Me. I put this one here because I don't own it yet (it's in the mail) and have only heard it once, but what I heard was so off-the-wall in influences, so scathing, so mocking, and so enticing that I know it'll be somewhere around the Top 10. The album name is probably her way of saying, "Don't be ignorant and only compare me to Norah Jones you f****er!"
10. Sondre Lerche, Two Way Monologue. I had my mom make me a sweatshirt just like the one on this album cover because I want to be Sondre Lerche, one of those dudes who writes mature baroque pop, listens to old jazz on the side, keeps a cool online journal, and speaks with a Norwegian accent.
9. Branford Marsalis Quartet, Eternal. He's a way better jazz musician than his overrated little bro Wynton, and he proves it again with 7 tracks of subtly gorgeous soprano sax. He's also way nicer than his grumpy dad, Ellis Marsalis, whom I've played with (that's the only time I'll name drop here).
8. Keane, Hopes and Fears. I tried to think of a way to summarize Keane without the word "Coldplay," but that's like trying to describe Wilco without the word "overrated": you could do it, but it wouldn't be as fun (or accurate). Here's my best description of Keane: piano-driven rock that mixes the sounds of Coldplay with the melodies of early Rufus Wainwright. My album of 2002 was by Coldplay. My album of 2003 was by Rufus Wainwright. Was it possible for me to not like this band?
7. Mos Def, The New Danger. Ok, so it's no Black on Both Sides, and that rap-rock track #2 almost me slice a permanent scratch on that part of the disc, but Mos is still an amazing lyricist and an eclectic talent. And I had to get that yazz flute on here somewhere.
6. Jamie Cullum, Twentysomething. He's a twenty-two year old who uses his rock-trained voice to create gorgeous jazz-pop that talks about more than jumpin, jivin, n' wailin to go along with covers of everything from Broadway to Jeff Buckley to Hendrix to The Neptunes. So there goes my backup plan.
5. Rufus Wainwright, Want Two. Second straight year Rufus is on the list. Also, second straight year I have a completely pink cd on the list.
4. Sam Roberts, We Were Born in a Flame. I missed this the first time it was released in 2003, so maybe they should keep rereleasing this record until people get it that Canadians aren't all evil and that Sam Roberts is a Godsend to rock.
3. A.C. Newman, The Slow Wonder. Check out what AMG said about him: "In a better world, he would be our Elton, our Todd, our McCartney, and Slow Wonder would be on everyone's iPod, rotating on M2 hourly, and his name would be on the lips of everyone from aged Royalty to teen-aged girls." Ok, so AMG also gave Britney Federline 4.5 stars, but they got it right on Newman.
2. Kasey Chambers, Wayward Angel. My runaway favorite country singer is not from Tennessee but from Australia. Kasey writes intimate autobiographical lyrics that she releases with her gorgeous, childlike voice. Truth is, she could be singing the dictionary and I'd love it, but she supports her voice with a wide range of Americana music that covers so many emotions and colors it could never grow boring. Also gets the 2004 award for most times giving me physical chills from a lyric, chord, or note.
1. Green Day, American Idiot. If you had told me a year ago-- shoot, if you had told me 4 months ago-- that my favorite album for the whole year would come from those 3-chord-knowing punks with fake British accents, well I really don't know what I would have done, but it certainly wouldn't have been to nod in agreeance. But Billie Joe and the gang really won me over with this mix of punk-rock angst and Broadway flamboyance. It flows like one big story; you couldn't successfully argue that any track should be placed anywhere but in its existing spot. Most importantly, the gamble of having not one but two nine-minute punk-operettas on the disc is what turns the album from merely solid to undeniably spectacular, as these are far and away the best 18 minutes of the album. If there was ever an album that personified the "whole is greater than the sum of its parts" theory, here it is. If black eyeliner is what it takes to make albums this bold and fun, hopefully we'll see more musicians in the cosmetics department.
Monday, January 10, 2005
10 Days Late
Some 2005 Resolutions:
- Improve my Spanish
- Focus on some form of songwriting
- Discover 10 new great musical artists/bands
- Be less standoff-ish on the phone
- Develop my Master's Thesis
- Attend a boxing match
- Find a vegetable I like
- Talk more to strangers
Friday, January 07, 2005
Set For Life
I have this idea that one day I'll be daydreaming about a mysterious being telling me about someone who would hypothetically be the perfect girl for me; then I look at the girl I have my arm around, look back, and reply in my head, "No thanks. I'm set." And that's when I'll know.
Wednesday, January 05, 2005
3 Weeks in the City of 5 Flags
For almost three weeks now, I've been on Christmas break, away from Penn State and safely back in my hometown of Pensacola. Up to the time for Christmas break I wondered how I would handle that long a stay in Pensacola: 3 weeks. That's 21 days, 21 days in the city I called home for 18 years. Check that-- I've called Pensacola my home for the past 22 years and will do so until my death, but everything beyond that eighteenth year has been mere visitation, periodic checkup-slash-reunions to make sure everything is exactly how I left it. It felt that way for about two years, but much as I've grown without the city, the city has grown without me.
I told my friends during the days leading up to my trip that I would most likely go crazy from the suffocation of Pensacola after about Day 10. This was based on data from my return trips home from college, when I would always feel this nagging need to escape Pensacola after a little over a week there. This time around, I didn't feel the need to escape. Honestly, I've had a great time here. It's been a comfortable stay. Really.
By my first weekend here, I was staying out until 3 am on a nightly basis, taking breaks occasionally for things like exhaustion and Christmas Eve. Old friends would call, I'd meet them in my sister's Chi Omega-mobile, and we'd enjoy each other's company over the stupidest of conversation topics. That's how you distinguish friends from the past from friends in the past: if you can hang out for an hour without resorting to the standard updates and reminiscing for more than 10 minutes of the conversation, they are friends from the past that are still friends of the present.
I also met some new people. Some were cool, some were mean, some were sexy. But that's for another time. Back to the story at hand. Where was I? Oh yeah, having a good time in Pensacola...
After two weeks passed with my sanity not only intact but at its finest, I wondered why I wasn't getting tired of Pensacola this time. Instead of checking the calendar for the days it would take for me to get out, I ignored the calendar and didn't want to think about leaving. Something was very different about my stay this time. The difference was obvious and simple: in comparison to my past 4 months in an alien city and the start of graduate school, I was having more fun in the familiar, responsibility-free confines ("confines" being used in its least suppressive form) of Pensacola.
But this is not a life I can get accustomed to; this has been a vacation. One by one my friends returned to their other lives, until I became the lone survivor, the only one walking freely in the ever-annoying 70 degree Florida winter breeze. The 3 am nights are over, and I've spent the closing days of my stay here watching home videos (as I transfer them to DVD) and listening to music my sister hates (Nellie McKay at the moment). The friends are gone, and I'm the only one still on vacation.
You want everything to stay the same when you're on vacation. The life seems like a better and suddenly feasible alternative to your real situation. We've all had that feeling at the close of a great vacation, the one where we could see ourselves in that scene forever, intending to keep in close touch with the people and the things we've met along the way. That's not how it works, though. This time I've had away from everything is not the way best-suited for me to live my life. It's not even really a life; rather, a break from it. I'm ready again for a normal routine, to regain responsibility, and to move in a positive direction rather than remaining in a positive standstill. With this break, I've been again taught a valuable lesson. Enjoy all of life: the big moments, the little things, even the breaks from it.
I told my friends during the days leading up to my trip that I would most likely go crazy from the suffocation of Pensacola after about Day 10. This was based on data from my return trips home from college, when I would always feel this nagging need to escape Pensacola after a little over a week there. This time around, I didn't feel the need to escape. Honestly, I've had a great time here. It's been a comfortable stay. Really.
By my first weekend here, I was staying out until 3 am on a nightly basis, taking breaks occasionally for things like exhaustion and Christmas Eve. Old friends would call, I'd meet them in my sister's Chi Omega-mobile, and we'd enjoy each other's company over the stupidest of conversation topics. That's how you distinguish friends from the past from friends in the past: if you can hang out for an hour without resorting to the standard updates and reminiscing for more than 10 minutes of the conversation, they are friends from the past that are still friends of the present.
I also met some new people. Some were cool, some were mean, some were sexy. But that's for another time. Back to the story at hand. Where was I? Oh yeah, having a good time in Pensacola...
After two weeks passed with my sanity not only intact but at its finest, I wondered why I wasn't getting tired of Pensacola this time. Instead of checking the calendar for the days it would take for me to get out, I ignored the calendar and didn't want to think about leaving. Something was very different about my stay this time. The difference was obvious and simple: in comparison to my past 4 months in an alien city and the start of graduate school, I was having more fun in the familiar, responsibility-free confines ("confines" being used in its least suppressive form) of Pensacola.
But this is not a life I can get accustomed to; this has been a vacation. One by one my friends returned to their other lives, until I became the lone survivor, the only one walking freely in the ever-annoying 70 degree Florida winter breeze. The 3 am nights are over, and I've spent the closing days of my stay here watching home videos (as I transfer them to DVD) and listening to music my sister hates (Nellie McKay at the moment). The friends are gone, and I'm the only one still on vacation.
You want everything to stay the same when you're on vacation. The life seems like a better and suddenly feasible alternative to your real situation. We've all had that feeling at the close of a great vacation, the one where we could see ourselves in that scene forever, intending to keep in close touch with the people and the things we've met along the way. That's not how it works, though. This time I've had away from everything is not the way best-suited for me to live my life. It's not even really a life; rather, a break from it. I'm ready again for a normal routine, to regain responsibility, and to move in a positive direction rather than remaining in a positive standstill. With this break, I've been again taught a valuable lesson. Enjoy all of life: the big moments, the little things, even the breaks from it.
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