Tag Archives: Music

Rainy Weekends

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Sitting in Zoka, eating a piece of blueberry coffee cake, drinking a split chai (half sweet, half spicy), and watching the rain out the window. Kings of Convenience is playing, and it’s a good way to spend an afternoon. Looking around, I can spot a number of the regulars, and even several of the weekenders (regulars were it not for that pesky 9-5 job), which is a sign that I’ve become something of a regular myself, even without being accepted into the greater social group.

I’ve been thinking, which is ever the deadly activity. Let’s explore them a little bit, though: love continues to be a bone I chew on, turning it around, thinking about it, what it really means, its value and significance, and why it’s so hard to explain or truly define. It’s simply used in so many situations and circumstances that we allow the context to define its meaning. But that’s unfair to the concept, and to those we are involved with: it hinges upon a subjective, personal experience, and all parties essentially guessing right. Sometimes we’re able to broadcast strong, direct clues to meaning, but to assume our intentions even then is begging for trouble. I’ve been accused in the past of using “love” too freely, of devaluing and diluting its meaning — I can’t disagree strongly enough. There is never a moment where I am not saying it conscientiously, with awareness for the power and weight of the word. To dilute the concept would be to say it and not mean it, or to not say it when you so dearly do. It’s a dishonest behavior, which is intrinsically counter to the idea of love. By necessity, honesty, understanding, and love are intertwined and related. To truly understand someone, to grok them, honesty and love must be present.

I’ve been thinking about where I live, and what I’ve been doing with my life, and the flailing around I’m involved in. I feel blurry, diffused across a great many grand ideas and projects and interests, such that no one thing is able to hold my attention for long, and thus, the clarity and acuity necessary to excel in any of them remains scattered. There is nothing wrong with being a generalist (or in a romantic moment, a “Renaissance Man”), but it does require a greater degree of practical skill in these fields to be truly effective. As mentioned before, my theory is strong, but my practicum is weak. It is well beyond time for me to sit and concentrate on the common threads throughout most of my interests — as near as I can tell, that is writing. My essentials are good: my grammar is generally good (though full of my own idiosyncrasies, like opting for commas where I could probably drop them, and too many parenthenticals), my spelling is good (though if I have a doubt, I check via the Dictionary widget on my Dashboard, which I also use to make sure I’m using a word appropriately). Realistically, I simply need to start sitting down and churning work out and submitting it. Everywhere, and all the time. That is by far the most effective way to hone your craft (any craft): fucking do it. I’ve been living in a world of theory and philosophy and intellectualization, and unless I suddenly have the money pop up to go get a grad degree and start teaching this shit, that simply isn’t enough to go on.

I need to stop over-thinking and over-planning. So many grand ideas and dreams and goals… but what good are they if I never actually do them?

Music reviews resume Monday.

Dr. L’Ling by Minus the Bear

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Today’s song was discovered via Chris, who linked me to Drilling P.O.S. REDO by Minus the Bear over at Suicide Squeeze Records. While a good song, it got me curious about the band, so I ended up browsing through the site, and found a song that I ended up liking more: “Dr. L’Ling”, which is from their new album, Planet of Ice, which is due out in mid-August.

“Dr. L’Ling” starts out quiet, with an undulating, droning guitar, then adding a staccato drum, before kicking up to full volume with another, lightly distorted guitar that is vaguely reminiscient of “Creep” by Radiohead’s heavy pre-chorus thrash. The vocals aren’t entirely my cup of tea, but don’t really detract from the overall mood of the song, which mixes a sense of urgency with a vaguely ethereal, “space-y” vibe. (“Space-y” is perhaps a bit hard to describe, but you know it when you hear it, much like ProjeKct Two’s Space Groove.) The guitar work in particular really explores the space of the song, mixing melodic long notes with a rapid, abrupt progression that reminded me heavily of “Discipline” by King Crimson. The song finally winds down with more undulation fading into the distance, which gives the total song a mental image of a space patrol, idling along, called to duty, and then returning to its long quiet patrol.

Overall, it’s an engaging song, and I really don’t mind adding it to my musical library. I’ll look forward to hearing more from this band, and see where their musical evolution takes them in their latest album.

[Dr. L’Ling by Minus the Bear]

[Minus the Bear at Suicide Squeeze Records]

Invisible by Modest Mouse

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I think it will come as no surprise to most folks familiar with both me and the band that I’m a fan of Modest Mouse. I was initially turned on to them fairly late in their career, with their album Good News for People Who Love Bad News, notably their one-two punch of “World At Large” followed by “Float On,” which when combined, served as a personal mantra and definition through a very trying period in my life. I quickly rounded out my collection of their prior albums, and eagerly anticipated their latest album, We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank. The new album, while not exceeding my preference for Good News…, does not disappoint, with its frenetic, impassioned songs. Needless to say, I was glad to see one of these songs, “Invisible”, show up on KEXP’s Song of the Day Podcast.

“Invisible” starts with a muted drum and guitar build up, which then explodes into a sonic crescendo as the singing starts. Build-up and release seems to be a recurring theme within the song, with several points where the melody builds a sense of urgency before a staccato release of heavy, directed drums and guitar, with a bassline running throughout acting as a glue, bonding the elements together.

In short, the song rocks, and rocks hard. It engages the ear on several levels in a way that could be overwhelming if not prepared for it, combined with a pacing that can’t help but encourage a frenetic mood in the listener. “Invisible” is an excellent example of Modest Mouse’s musical style, and would be a great way to introduce the band musically to a newcomer.

[Invisible by Modest Mouse]

[Subscribe to the KEXP Song of the Day Podcast.]

Apple Pie by The Bastard Fairies

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“I’m the life of the party, I’m always smiling. On the surface, I’m as happy as can be.”

You all know the people “Apple Pie” (off The Bastard Fairies’ Memento Mori) is talking about: they seem upbeat and cheerful (much like this song), but the reality is that they’re fairly shallow, and avoid dealing with their emotions, or anything too heavy or serious. It describes an individual who is shallow by choice. The mood and melody of the song encourages this image, with a relatively simple tune running through it, with only the chorus having more complexity and layers: for most of the song, it is simply a synth and lo-fi vocals. With each cycle through the chorus, however, they add more and more instruments, until the final chorus is a diverse cacophany of sounds that works well in a sonic fashion. This ties really well into the metaphor of the song, since you never run into these sorts of people alone.

I like this song, for several reasons. First and foremost, it’s a catchy tune, with a simple rhythm and lyrics that are easy to sing along to — it’s easy to end up nodding your head with the beat or even singing along. In particular when I was first introduced to this song via KEXP, I was dealing with several individuals that I found I was immediately identifying with the song: not bad people, but emotionally shallow, who’d rather sweep things under the rug than address the issues at hand. This gave it enough weight that I ended up tracking down the band online, where I discovered that they were offering their entire album available for download, free (links below). I’d definitely recommend looking them up, and giving the album a few listens, to see if it’s something you might like: especially for the price, it’s worth your time.

[“Apple Pie” [Free MP3]]

[The Bastard Fairies Website]

I Should Really Start Bringing Headphones

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Not, mind you, to shut out the music. It’s just that there ends up being a lot of songs I recognize that I want to be sure I’m getting the song and artist right in my head. For instance, there’s a song playing right now that I’m 90% sure is X’Hal by Aphex Twin (one of his ambient works), but it could also be a song off, say, Purified, which is a gamut of “chill” electronic work.

…or I can just wait, because the next song makes it clear that we’re listening to Selected Ambient Works 85-92. This is fine by me, I’m a fan of Aphex Twin myself. (Not like I just dug the album name out of my iPod, no no.) I’ve been thinking about what I want to do with this blog, and I’m still not entirely sure. I know I’m sick of non-posts that fulfill no purpose other than to inform you of the mundane day to day details of my life. If I’m bored writing them, I can only imagine how you feel. I don’t really expect that those posts will entirely go away, but I do want to start putting in something a bit more substantive, something folks can read and say “Damn, this site is worth keeping in my RSS feeds.” The question, of course, is what. My game centric blog (Critical Games) continues to sit in idle, having never really gotten past first gear. I should be working more on that, but frankly I’ve just not been thinking scholastically about games much lately. The hum-drum of day to day life has been occupying a lot of my mental cycles, notably in figuring out how to pay rent. So, to some extent, that topic is too big for me right now, in terms of finding ways to function within a 15-30 minute timeframe.

So, I’m thinking music. There is a wealth of music that I’m exposed to out here that I think people would really enjoy, and a lot of it is free and available for download in a variety of ways. Notably, I was thinking of doing quick “readings” of KEXP’s Song of the Day each day. That means that there will never be a day without something to write about (excepting weekends, since the podcast only updates on weekdays), no flailing about trying to come up with something rewarding for my readers to enjoy (and hopefully something I enjoy writing as well). I was once told that if you do something every day for twenty nine days in a row, it will become a habit. So, the question then is when to start the twenty-nine days of this experiment. Perhaps July 1st would be a good bet. Thoughts?

April the Ninth

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Nabil 4/9/2007

I seem to be running in radio silence on weekends (generally speaking). I couldn’t tell you why that is, per se, but it does seem to be a trend. I decided this weekend to go back to being cleanshaven, and got a haircut today (picture is included to the right). Sometimes it’s nice to just have a change, and this is something I have control over. I’ve been fairly upbeat the past few weeks, which is good, but the general socialization has been wearing me down (I am still an introvert), and I finally just sort of crashed on Friday night, after drinking far too many chais (when I crash from caffeine, I get really depressed, which is why I usually limit my intake). I spent the weekend holed up at the apartment, only going out long enough to find a mailbox to mail out some bills, and I’m feeling much better for it.

Tomorrow is my birthday, and I’m trying to decide what I’m going to do with it. My birthdays generally speaking have been pretty lousy, often dealing with snow and rain, getting abandoned by friends, spending all of it driving and getting pulled over (though thankfully not ticketed) (and a week later having my marriage fall apart), and just in general being kind of lame and oft-forgotten. Considering how few people I know in this area, I’ll probably be spending it alone as well, so I’m trying to think of solo things to do on a likely rainy day to “celebrate”. Maybe spend the day at the movie theater, or something.

Chris gave me some good advice for my resume, so I’ll probaby be doing a minor revision of it to better highlight a few things (namely my work on the Applegeeks column… incidentally, my interview with Wil Shipley is now up). I sincerely hope that it all results in at least some interviews, if not full job offers (one step at a time, after all, though I can’t really afford to wait much longer). While I’m on the mercenary tack, I’ve been also working on updating and revising Be My Patron, though the updates aren’t up yet. I figure I have the time now, I may as well get that a bit more up and running, actually post some projects looking for patrons. It’s frankly been a placeholder for the past several months while I dealt with the moving and life — a good idea that stalled out.

Listening to the new Panda Bear cd again at the coffee shop, and it’s still good. I’m pulling different things out of it this time, however, and nearly mistook one of the songs for a song off Smile by Brian Wilson ne Beach Boys. (Not that it’s a bad thing… that is also a good album.) Life is cluttered with new music, nowadays, between Zoka and KEXP. So many new bands, like Under Byen, Peter Bjorn and John, Beirut, and a slew of others. Some I’ve been able to collect via free downloads (ala Bastard Fairies who put up their album for free, and the KEXP Song of the Day podcasts), but being the collector that I am, I’d really like to go pick up full albums, even if it’s via iTMS. It’s a good lesson in patience, and in learning to write down albums and band names, rather than simply hoping I remember later.

Unbelievably Nice

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UW Library

It is currently 75 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. Everything is greening up quickly and wonderfully, and it’s just spectacular. I am once again at Zoka, drinking an iced chai and getting my daily writing done. I also grabbed the pictures off my camera from last evening… I only took a few, but they’re kind of fun in an abstract sort of way. It’s warmer and clearer out tonight, so I’m actually planning to head back this evening with my tripod, and see what I can pull out. (I’m still pretty proud of myself for getting the shots that I did get as clear and steady as I did via handholding… it helps that I tossed on my 50mm f/1.4, which made for speeds that were as short as possible. (1/5 of a second at 11:30 at night? Not too shabby!) Using the tripod, I’m planning on doing some long duration shots instead. Hmm.

They’re playing the new Panda Bear album here at Zoka, and I’m definitely digging it. It’s a nice coincidence that the honorable Mr. Ellis was mentioning them not too long ago. Panda Bear, for those not in the loop, is one of the core members of Animal Collective, a fantastic band for those not familiar with them. This is one of his solo albums, and musically it’s got some Animal Collective flavoring, while remaining relatively unique, intermixing more ethereal, electronic influences into the work. Something to add to my rapidly increasing list of albums and artists I’d like to pick up.

Chatting with Dad earlier today, and going over some of the photos I uploaded yseterday evening, it seems one of my perennial problems is cropping up again: it’s pretty noticeable, in, say, this photo. Do you see it? Yeah, my horizon line isn’t level. For whatever reason, a lot of my shots have a 1-2 degree drop on the right side of the horizon. It looks level to me when I take the picture, and one theory I have is that since I tend to have my head cocked slightly to the left a lot of the time, my brain is compensating by adjusting what I see to be “level”. Dad thinks it may have something to do with my posture and grip on the camera. Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was some combination of the two. Thinking about it, even shots I take on a tripod tend to have that drop, so the notion that it is movement from pressing the button down, or a cockeyed method of holding it I don’t think would fully explain it. It’s certainly not an insurmountable problem, even in post, but it is something I need to be more aware of happening.

So, a question for readers: do you like me adding thumbnails and pictures to my posts? Is it a worthwhile habit, or would you rather I just link to the gallery if I want to point out an image? I’ve been opting to use thumbnails mostly, out of deference for those on dialup, and will likely continue that trend, but I would like to know whether people like the break from my text-heavy posts.

Furthermore

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Tulips at the Bellevue Botanical Garden

I spent the afternoon photographing in Bellevue, first at the Botanical Gardens, and then from the rooftop of the mall parking garage, of the skyline as sunset approached, and then finally down by the lake, looking out at Seattle as the sun set. I’ll be getting pictures up in a bit [Update: Pictures are up, 22 new shots.], but I did want to share something.

A little while back, I posted a random thing I heard on KEXP on my LiveJournal (usually one-liners and quizes and stuff like that goes there… feel free to add me, but you’ve been warned). It was about two ducks in the road, a female duck dead, and the mallard standing near her, looking at her like “I can’t believe she’s gone.”

When I was down at the lake, there were two ducks, a couple, swimming around, heckling the kids who were there. Another mallard showed up, looking lonely, and was shunned by the couple, until finally he just sort of paddled off by himself. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was the same mallard who lost his mate in the road. Felt bad for the guy, if I knew how to speak duck, I wanted to pull him aside and tell him it’d be alright, maybe buy him a duck beer or something.

Just needed to share.

Sunny, Beautiful

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Before I continue: Happy birthday, Dad! I hope it’s been a good day!

It’s currently just under 70 degrees and gorgeously sunny here in Seattle, which is in stark contrast to the snowfall most of the northeast has been getting hit by. While I can sympathize, I’m frankly just grateful for the nice weather where I am. I’ve grabbed my camera and my tripod, and I’m planning on taking some twilight shots this evening, which should be fun (still need to decide exactly where, though… we’ll see), and in general I’m feeling alright. I was sitting in my apartment earlier, fiddling with files and sorting things (still planning a full clean “soon”), glanced out the window and checked the weather and said “Fuck it, I’m going out.” And here I am.

I didn’t really mention it here, but I had a “date” last night with Avital, a cute barista here at Zoka. (I’m saying it as “date” because I’ve never really done the dating thing before. I asked her out, which sounds like a date, we had dinner together, which sounds like possibly a date, but we spent more time geeking than flirting, which sounds more like friends? Beats the hell out of me!) It was a nice evening, and it was especially nice to get a chance to spend time with someone on a one on one basis, considering other than a few brief occasions with Mickey (which I am likewise glad for), I really haven’t had that since I moved out here. I’m generally pretty quiet, but when it’s been a long while like this, I find myself talking people’s ears off, for better or worse. I was definitely worn out by the end of it… even when I’m a geyser of babble, I’m definitely still an introvert at heart, and it wears me the hell out even if I want to be there.

Animal Collective’s Feels is playing here at Zoka at the moment, and while it’s truly an excellent album and well worth my time to talk about, instead I want to mention this catchy little tune called “Young Folks” by Peter, Bjorn and John. There’s a music video for it up on YouTube (which is linked on their site), and it’s just an amazingly fun little song. The whistling is unbelievably infectious, and since it’s been getting radio play on KEXP, I find myself humming or half-whistling it getting out of the car pretty often. Go look it up, go listen, and then try and tell me it’s not good.

March of Rainy Days

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Yesterday was my brother’s birthday: Happy Birthday, Uri! (I know this post is late, but in fairness, I did actually call him and wish him a happy happy yesterday.)

Today? Today it rains. It’s cool and rainy and I’ve chosen to spend it getting some things done around the apartment. Laundry, cleaning, unpacking, nothing spectacular, nothing pressing or momentous, and that seems to me to be a good use of a rainy day in March. I stocked my cupboards and fridge last night, so there’s actually food in the house (great opportunity to inaugurate the cookware I picked up last week), and… well, yeah, things are pretty good.

Across the board, really. The new Baha’i year started on the 21st, and really since then, I’ve been having a really good period. Sure, I’ve been going to sleep at 3-4am (even when I got to bed at 1 or 2) and sleeping all morning, but regardless of that, I’ve been pretty productive, and I’m feeling good about where things are at for me. I’ve started actually talking to people at Zoka, which is excellent (more on that later), and I found a job I really really hope I get (how often do you actually see an entry level position available for game production? Or any entry level game gig, to be honest, but production is the path I want to take). I finished my revised resume last night, and sent it and a cover letter to the company right after.

I got a call from a certain Fruit-based company this morning, though sadly not to offer me a job or a free computer, but still helpful for a project nonetheless. I wish I could say more, but decidedly not yet. If nothing else, it’s useful to start being known (and hopefully in a positive light).

I’ve been listening to KEXP podcasts since I woke up. I’ve already gone through their Song of the Day podcast backlog, and currently am listening to their Live Performances podcast. Let me just say, I <3 KEXP. I like their music, I like their mission, I like their services. It’s a damn great radio station, and I wish other stations elsewhere would get on board the cluebus and start offering broader ranges of music, and less commercial pap.

This disjointed post brought to you by the letters A, Z, and K.