sooooooo last century

so once again i attempt to get down wid da kidz and lissen to sum cuttin' choons.

or something.

Today?
Today I bought Isaac Hayes' Chocolate Chip and Michael Jackson's Off the Wall and Thriller.

OK OK you're thinking that this is no way for a mid-thirties Oirishman to discover his 'soul'. That's unfair! I have soul. I have a heart! True, even my heartbeat can't keep a steady rhythm, but....

[ahem]

Now I'm listening to "My heart is in the Highlands" as set by Arvo Part.
ahhhhhhh..... !

Next week read again how someone who really should buy the new Artic Monkey's album gets waylaid and buys somethng from another century. again.

where to start..?

so - as usual I join the 'hip' world far, far too late. I bought a Nano at the moment I'm sure everyone else is about to buy the "micro" or "weeny" or whatever.

Also, as is my usual way with technical things, it didn't work as soon as I plugged it in (though to get around this I didn't resort to the printed manual as a friend believed I would have to... but what's the shame in that!??).

[ahem]

However, the important question is this:

how do I choose 8GB of music out of the 28GB of music that I have????

suggestions welcome...

New music you say?

Needed to buy some new music. You know, something by a thrusting new artist, with new ideas and a irreverant disrespect for the old guard.

something.... vital. Of the moment. Risk taking.

something to connect me with the streets.

I bought Spem in alium by Tallis.
16th century choral music - great (his greatest) but... something tells me the streets aren't listening to this...

push the boat out and push the button...

Now, the other person who asked me to whitter on has now made me listen to more Sugarbabes than I have done in a very long time. Ever actually. I kinda liked the singles but their site really goes through the hits....

To say I like the mu

oohhhh NO! NO!! NOOO! - THAT'S WRONG!!!!!!! They're butchering the Beatles' "Come Togeher"!

Right up to that point I was ok with them and was gonna wax lyrical about their fine production and some good use of melodies and stuff but that has finished me right off.

urrrRRggHHH [shiver]

Now without that horrible sound I can concentrate on the task at hand and I have to say that my favourite is Heidi.

But I'm not buying the album.

Or even the calendar.

radiohead rocks!!

or..... marches??

both??!!?

social networkalising... while i do other things

Ripping these albums is taking ages.
While I've been doing it I've been listening to the new Candi Staton album (a housemate had it). Not very good I'm afraid.

Though Lastfm will now tell me about all my new friends who happen to be women between 30 and 40.
yippee.

dammit! - that's why my music was getting stale

Recently I've been getting bored of the music I had on my shuffle iPod and was surprised that it wasn't as varied as I'd thought my tastes were.

The tonight it struck me when I thought - "That's odd; Paris Texas never comes on my iPod..."
So I checked and found I hadn't put it on. duh!
Now, I knew that I'd never got round to putting a few of my albums on my computer but I thought it was mainly the jazz stuff and some of the more ropey compilations and stuff that kind of turns up in one's collection like barnacles.

Well, I've just found forty albums that I haven't put on my computer. and that was without looking hard.
four-zero.

bollocks

And they're not ropey. They're not even the jazz albums. No, this is stuff like:
Pixies - Surfer Rosa and Doolittle; Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream; Buffalo Tom - Birdbrain; The The - Mind Bomb; Blur - Parklife; Pulp - This is Hardcore; Billy fucking Bragg for christs sake (how the hell had i not spotted him not being played??);
And this ain't mentioning stuff like the Fatima Mansions, Gallon Drunk, Willie Nelson, Hank Williams, Sex Pistols and collections of James Bond, Sly and the Family Stone and James Brown. I'll ignore the fact that i didn't put Elvis Presley and an opera collection on.

Ok, I can see that this would have been the end of the stuff that I wouldv'e put on my computer when it was new a year ago, and that it would've taken ages (and shit - I've only had browdband for a few months, and I'm not typing track names!)

so, I see how it happened but still, this is good stuff I've been missing out on....

awww just spotted Dr. John - Gris Gris and Pet sounds and New York by Lou Reed... and the Mars Volta!

actually that's less of a surprise that I hadn't put it on.....

watchyalisseninto?

maybe i said this before but I'm now dissapointed how narrow my musical tastes are.
I used to gain some satisfaction for myself that friends would either not know of the stuff I was listening to or said I had "savage" taste or whatever, but looking at my Lastfm stats my musical tastes are somewhat obvious.
And that ain't good.
Or at least - that ain't what I thought they'd be.
Not that I hunted out the weird or odd. Its just that I like interesting music. Music that makes me think. That throws switches. "Think" is perhaps wrong.
"Makes me react in a positive way" whether that is in that it makes me think or tap me foot or both.
So Daniel Johnston and the Fall are obvious bedfellows. as is Can and Flaming Lips and the Smiths and Hugo Largo and Radiohead. Bjork, Bowie, Buzzcocks is simply alphabetical. I thought tuvan throat singing was exceptional but there's probably an entire community extolling its virtues. And why not?
As I say I wasn't trying to be "different". Or I hope not anyway.........

No. Normally i fall into self deprecation but this is serious.

This is music.

What I like is that moment of feeling. Of being touched. of reacting. of not disliking something!!
And I get this from the artists mentioned and others like Arvo Part and Reich and Durrutti Column and.... nah. about to say "abba" but I ain't got any of their stuff. I like it, but its radio music - when i don't expect it its fantastic - i've never tried a whole album!!

So, slightly more parochial in my tastes than I thought. I guess I'm dissapointed as I love music and think that as my breadth is narrower than I believed it means I'm missing out on something.

bollocks

blimey! read the previous entry first!! (below "Broadband was invented to read music reviews

No - really. This only makes sense after you read the previous entry.
well, go on.


No, really - READ IT! The one below.....

jeezus........

** this entry begins now, but read the earlier one first - have you got the hang of this yet?**

My GOD!!!
There are NO bands called "Broadband" on All Music Guide!
Not one. Not even as someone's name like "Johnny Broadband and the glut of shite".

nada.

I'll try Google.....

OK not a smart move. Quite a few pages have the word "broadband" but I tried "Broadband band name music" and got no actual bands (you try something better and let me know)

I tried Amazon and got nothing under Popular music.

where else..??

If not if you're in a band CALL YOURSELF BROADBAND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

broadband was invented to read music reviews

I may very well have to update this entry later but I've had a couple, was reading stuff online, and thought I'd jot this down.

This started by looking for the lyrics for Free Will and Testament by Robert Wyatt. Its brilliant. Honestly. Desert Island disk brilliant (yeah - you narrow down a handful of choons you'd live the rest of your life with).
Found them here. Its to the album's entry and you'll have to scroll down 4 or 5 songs (jesus just how lazy are you?) but you really ought to listen to the record properly first (can't be arsed linking to amazon and buying it for you and coming round and putting headphones on your head and pinning you to a chair - I ain't done that in years).
Anyway, also on that page are the lyrics to another absolutely no-argument brilliant song - Shipbuilding by Elvis Costello. Again if you don't know it, buy it on whatever album you next see it on (as sung by Wyatt or Costello) cos its worth the price of an album alone. The 'full' price. Yeah I know, I ain't spent 15 quid on an album since I bought my mates!

Anyway, while searching for these things I found reviews etc and went and read and thought "bugger! I've discovered and forgotten you before!" So here is a good site I've found before, but forgotten about (the reason I may be back to this entry is if I find the reason I forgot it was cos its rubbish elsewhere). Its called trouserpress and is a site of reviews of music or as they elaborate:
"Trouser Press was a New York-based rock music magazine that specialized in a number of genres — British Invasion history, new wave, progressive and independent-label releases — during its existence, which was from 1974 to 1984. In 1983, the editors of the magazine authored the first of a series of record guides. Those books are the basic content of this site."

I'm mentioning it here as they point out the brilliance of the lyric:
"What kind of spider understands arachnophobia?"
and just how often do you get a review of Elvis Costello with the statement "(just what the world needs: another Randy Newman)" or the word "peregrinations".

oh. a lot? well that's cos I hardly ever read review magazines.



By the way - how many bands have called themselves "broadband?"
You'll either have to Google yourself (!) or come back later (oooooh I'm such a tease....)

I hate 80's music

I hate 80's music - berk

I used to say (actually i still do) that I hated 80's music. What I meant was I hated the stuff I heard growing up at the time (mainly). This is shown in the fact that I was into Dire Straits. I stumbled across some interesting stuff in the late 80's but tend to remember the floppy haircutted ToTP stuff (follicle envy?). I also became a muso snob, hating "popular" stuff and preferring 'unusual' stuff (like all adolescents?) but couldn't find enough of the bloody stuff!

Why am I telling you this? because Fopp is saving me from a lifetime of stoopidity with its £5 CDs. So, I'm getting into bands i didn't know at the time. Currently its Talk Talk. and right now its Spirit of Eden I've got on. Jeezus its good.

I'll be honest - I can dance

Went dancing in a bar. Very very good fun. I now enjoy dancing more than ever and have realised (too late too late!!) that I'm actually quite good. damn. now its too late and like tonight i end up dancing with 3 gay eastern european guys (isn't it always the way?). One of them became enfatuated with my female friend and then got very ill. I don't think these things are related, but still. I tried chatting up a very good looking girl who worked at the bar but she was busy clearing tables and was being held in check by management, otherwise I'm sure I was in there.... lots of sideways glances... smiles... unless that was simply to see where me hands were..? but the chastest kiss on her cheek reduced me to a (very sophisticated) 15 year old.

me mates' album

listening to my mate's album. yes 'album' - a bona fide, i-bought-it-in-Fopp, album - not some weird specialist store. and I'm happy to say its really good!
and growing on me. Kinda early 80's soft electronic (Japan, vince clark - probably coming from the same place as Beta Band). though my mate's description is better.