29Aug2007 1834: Inexorable Obscurity
This post is mostly about giving in to the future, like when I bought this TV last night. At press time it's on super-sale to the point that Morgion was quite disgusted. With my semi-recent change to all-downloaded TV and the new wave of game consoles, HD resolution is kind of important. Letterboxed content is especially difficult to make out on my current set, so yay for widescreen format.
[Crisantes - Nuevo Mundo] misses out on four stars for the oft-repeated Spanish problem. It's rock lite in a form I can imagine as the OP for an average schoolgirl anime. I'll probably tire of it two months from now, but it stays for now.
[Ledisi - Alright] is diva-centric R&B. Pretty much every line ends with "alright" and that kind of song is NO LONGER FUNNY okay?
iTunes surprised me this week with two songs that are very similar in intent. [Bruce Springsteen - Radio Nowhere] is still Springsteen, so there you go. He mumbles, he plays guitar, and you already know if you'll like this song. [Paul McCartney - Nod Your Head] is another data point on Paul's slide into complete insanity. It's a weird feedback-driven rap-rock ditty with a terrible batch of rhymes and a mercifully short playtime. If it wasn't by an ex-Beatle it would have been buried in some forgotten corner of the iTunes Store. It doesn't help that the subject of heads and the nodding thereof has already been covered in depth. Both Bruce and Paul are doing what they do best ("heartland rock" and "make me pine for the Beatles", respectively) and are in the unenviable position of fighting a rearguard action against tomorrow.
I mean, sure Elvis is a legend, but I can't remember the last time I actually listened to one of his songs.
24Aug2007 2354: About Goddamn Time
This is absolutely not the rum talking: this trailer feels like Jesus came to Earth and gave me a high-five.
22Aug2007 1813: Taft Punk
Ran across this list of W's most aggravating crony appointments on Fark the other day. Even cutting out all the partisan name-calling -- as a mere list of facts -- it is a frightening look at the current administration. I want one of these made up for each president. This can't be a new problem, even if the scale of it is unprecedented. If we knew that Taft had given federal managerial positions to the entire 1910 Chicago Cubs lineup it would be...not reassuring, exactly, but it would help give perspective on the incompetence on display in this list.
[Kany Garcia - Esta Soledad] is a little bit wonderful, and a good thing too. These other two songs are getting deleted before I even finish this post. [King Wilkie - Wrecking Ball] is uninspired and uninteresting bluegrass. [Fields - Song for the Fields] displays a level of self-referential narcissism that I approve of, but ruins the solipsism by singing "You're not the only one" repeatedly. And by repeatedly, I mean the last 20% of the song.
15Aug2007 1915: Last, Best Hope
Emergency sci-fi knowledge: season box sets of Babylon 5 are on sale at Best Buy for $20. That's 66% off of list price, and a very reasonable rate for some of the best scifi in the past couple decades. I don't know when this sale ends, but you should pick up at least the first four seasons right now.
The War of the Feeder continues, with Edmond coming down firmly on the side of "give me more kibble" and myself on the side of "you'll be a fat kitty". My makeshift door lasted all of two days before he figured out he could claw it off. My countermove was to replace the door and turn the feeder ninety degrees, placing the bowl under the overhang of a cabinet and putting his slot-pawing at an awkward angle. His latest sally was to somehow turn the feeder back around, in the process of which he bumped the power switch (inconveniently located on the bottom of the unit). I came home to hungry angry cat that day.
I feel confident that I will eventually break him of his snacking. Be strong, fellow humans!
[Jeremias - Promesa de Amor] began with some funky guitar that got me all revved up for Scissor Sisters, but then it collapsed back into some uptembo Rob Thomas-like pop rock. It's not quite offensive, but it's not quite listenable. DELETED because it's in Spanish.
[Midnight Juggernaut - Road to Recovery] is certainly something. Something electronic in nature and good enough to stick around, though just barely. The vocals and rhythm guitar sound 70s but the beat and synth are more 80s, and for all the noise the song is just barely there for six and a half minutes.
[A Fine Frenzy - You Picked Me] plays on my love of piano pop, counting, and redheads. I may offend fans of either group by saying this, but based on this song and this one other song I heard once I'd have to say this band sounds a lot like Regina Spektor.
08Aug2007 1855: Feeding Time
This morning I awoke to the sound of Edmond scratching something. It wasn't any of his usual targets (the furniture)...I found him paw-deep in his automatic feeder. At some point in the past couple of days he worked out that if food comes out of this slot then maybe I can go up the slot to get more food. I'm sorry to say that he is correct. The water-wheel mechanism that dispenses exact quarter-cup portions has slats that are rubber rather than plastic, so poking them causes them to flex and dispense a few bits of kibble at a time.
This is unfortunately classic pet-training positive feedback; if I didn't do something fast Edmond would do nothing but paw at the feeder. I fashioned a ghetto food door out of one side of a cereal box and some duct tape. It doesn't hang straight enough to cover the slot but it makes digging one's paw up there a bit more difficult.
[Halfway to Hazard - Daisy] is country music in the traditional Ë "I tamed a woman and then she died" form. DELETED and then downloaded again and then DELETED A SECOND TIME.
[Hip Hop Hoodios - Viva la Guantanamera] started off on the right foot by presenting me with a giant pufferfish and singing in English. Quickly enough they started flowing between English and Spanish to make their phat rhymes, and then I realized that it was rather uninspired rap. DELETED.
[Bat for Lashes - Horse and I] is a more difficult decision. If you are iTunes-deprived, imagine if you will an epic sequel to [America - Horse with No Name] performed by Debbie Harry. Yes. It has a syncopated synth beat, female vocals falling somewhere between "breathy" and "ethereal", and is about a horse. The horse and her. Now that I've listened to it a few times I think I'm going to keep it. I look forward to exploring Bat for Lashes' deep discography, including such hits as Cat to Chair and Blowfish with Autumn (featuring guest vocals by Hip Hop Hoodios).
You know, maybe this song is about Atreyu and Artax.
04Aug2007 1152: Entanglement
I wish news like this would explode across all nations as a landmark of human understanding, but on the other hand I know that news like this is very disturbing for our worldview. Quantum entanglement gets a little neater every time I hear about it, but I fear it will ultimately lead to some hippie notion of universal connectedness and yadda-yadda. The weak subatomic force of karma.
01Aug2007 1807: Tank!
I'm not ashamed to say I enjoyed Legally Blonde -- a side-effect of my love of all things courtroom. But I think [Legally Blonde: The Musical - Omigod You Guys] is a bit overboard. You can use the 5:46 song to replace the first ten minutes or so of the movie, but I have to recommend the movie's lack of rhyme scheme. DELETED
[B-Side Players - Alegria] is more Spanish ska, fairly soon after the last one. I'm keeping this one as well, if only so that this week isn't a total bust. The last track, [Matthew Good - Born Losers] is tame light rock with a voice I've heard before in better songs. This is radio rock from somewhere in the early 90s, lost in time from its rightful place between the GooGoo Dolls and Hootie. DELETED.