Some Musings [Part 1: "Feelin' Fine"]

[I've had a lot on my mind recently, and i haven't written in a while. Halfway through writing this post i realized that it was getting way too long. So i'm breaking it up into a series; maybe one post every day or two for the next week.]

Part 1: "Feelin' Fine"

Ever since CULX, it seems like a lot of things have been coming together for me. I mean, my once-a-year visit with my awesome friends back home (love you guys!) is always a huge boost, but there's more going on. Partly it's the timing of various things (more on that in Part 3), but i think it's mostly my own attitude. Reflection of things that are good for me right now, as well as things that have the *potential* to be good. Add to that the promise of a kickass summer filled with concerts, weekend trips, and hitting my (long overdue) backlog of local activities and personal projects. And my fledgeling music project which enjoyed a major confidence boost from all of the wonderful encouragement and positive feedback on my first youtube video. Seriously, you guys, it means a lot to me, so thank you.

Out of the dozen or so songs on my "work-in-progress" list, i have two candidates for my next video. Both are songs i've loved ever since high school, and both translate well to a stripped-down acoustic setting. I'm keeping them under wraps for now, so lets call them songs A and B. I've been working on song A for several months now; it's still choppy, but coming along nicely, i think. Song B is much more difficult (almost entirely barre chords!), and i only started to learn it this week. I reeeally want to release this one next because it's so awesome, but it's going to take me a long time to get it up to scruff. So looks like song A will most likely be next. Although i have been working hard on song B, so we'll see what happens in the next couple of weeks.

As with many of my projects, i cycle through phases including (but not limited to) energized/encouraged, mellow, demotivated/bummed out, frustrated, apathetic, stoic. Right now i'm definitely energized (seriously, i *love* this song, barre chords and all). So far i've noticed that i usually hit my highs when i start learning a new song, because fresh material is always exciting, and i can quickly get from "sucks" to "choppy-but-doable". It's much harder to go from there to "stable" - clean up my guitarwork (and vocals) to the point where i can actually play the song reliably. Progress is much slower in that phase, and i often feel like i'm stuck in the same spot for a long time. I usually offset this by working on a few other songs in parallel - sometimes shelving the song in question for weeks (or even months) at a time because i'm so frustrated and don't like the song anymore. I did this with Free World more times than i can remember. And with song A. Seeing the results of those efforts makes it easier to stay positive even through the frustration. "All we need is just a little patience."

Rockin' In The Free World

Neil Young's legendary song "Rockin' In The Free World" has been one of "mine" for a long time now. I've heard so many different versions of the tune over the years, and spent countless hours on youtube watching covers and live performances. I thought i'd share a few of my favorites.

Facebookers - again, the notes app is going to kill the embedded video when it imports this; please go to my original post.

First, of course, the original - studio recording from Neil Young's 1989 album "Freedom":



Next, Pearl Jam & Neil Young playing the song together at the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards. Incredible performance! An encore airing several years later is what first drew my attention to the song (and to Neil Young):



Pearl Jam again - i burned myself a Pearl Jam mix cd when i was in college, leading with a live version of Free World i'd downloaded from somewhere. That recording, i think, had the heaviest influence on the way i sing the song myself. I used to blast it in the car *all the time*, belting out the vocals at the top of my lungs; wonderful feeling. This isn't the same recording, but one of the better ones on youtube:



While working on my own cover, i studied many home recordings on youtube. This one is by far my favorite; i wish i could sing like this guy:



An acoustic performance by Neil Young himself (song starts at ~0:30):



And last, but the opposite of least, Neil Young's performance on Saturday Night Live in 1989. Considered by many to be one of his best performances of the song, and one of the most intense live tv performances ever. (Even now, watching the video makes me want to smash something.)

Link:

Neilam's new music project

Over the past year, some of you may have heard me make references to a personal project, or seen cryptic status messages on Facebook about making progress or being frustrated. Maybe you asked me what i did over the weekend, and my reply was a vague "Oh i just worked on some stuff; caught up on a few things". All of those things were actually about this:

After many years of thinking/talking about it, i finally started taking guitar lessons last year. I decided to keep this project secret (except for a select few friends) until i'd proven to myself that i'm serious and sticking with it; at that point i'd post a video and surprise everyone. I am excited to report that i have reached this point. Kindof.

Sitrep: I have a handful of songs in the works (all covers), and i think this one in particular is really coming along. But i'm having trouble getting a clean recording of it. It's like as soon as the camera goes on, my voice goes out, or something else goes wrong. I've recorded over a hundred takes in the past few weeks, but none of them came out as well as i'd like. So i picked out the best take from the batch to share, because i don't want to wait any longer.

With that, here's my rough-cut/work-in-progress cover of the Neil Young classic, "Rockin' In The Free World":




(I'm pretty sure Facebook will garble the embedded video when it imports this post; if you don't see the player above, please go to my original blog post or directly to YouTube).


Feedback would be much appreciated, especially from you musicians out there. Again, this is just a rough cut. I *know* i can sing better than this, and i can see other areas to work on. I want to continue to learn and improve, so if you have any pointers, i'd love to hear them. General comments are also welcome ("You rock", "You suck", "Neil Young is going to find you and kick your ass" - toughen me up for the YouTube community).

Huge thanks to the few of you who held my secret (or figured it out and didn't say anything). Thanks, of course, to my guitar instructor. And an extra-heartfelt thanks to you, Em, for your awesome support and tips and help with quality control <3

29 Albums That Defined My Life

With all of the Facebook memes going around this year, here's one that actually hits home. Music is the driving force of my life. My journal is full of entries concerning the bands and albums that have impacted me, and indeed that is the basis of how i manage my music collection.

[boilerplate]
Think of 20 albums that had such a profound effect on you they changed your life or the way you looked at it. They sucked you in and took you over for days, weeks, months, years. These are the albums that you can use to identify time, places, people, emotions. These are the albums that no matter what they were thought of musically shaped your world. When you finish, tag 20 others, including me. Make sure you copy and paste this part so they know the drill.

My original plan was to write up a short blurb about each of these albums, but (not surprisingly) it quickly started turning into an autobiography. So here's the naked list for now; maybe i'll post the full writeup to my blog later.

Oh, a few other points:
- List is roughly in chronological order (by first impact, not release date) and items are grouped by context.
- Items in bold hold extra-special significance
- I've been hacking on this for like a month now (see also - Rob from High Fidelity). This rev is not perfect but it'll have to do; i'm tired of arguing with myself.
- It's impossible to cut down to 20 albums; 29 is the best i can do :-)


METALLICA
(i can't pick a single Metallica album; narrowed down to these 4)
- The black album
- ...And Justice For All
- Master of Puppets
- Ride The Lightning

Aerosmith - Get A Grip
Van Halen - Balance
Stone Temple Pilots - Core
Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream
Pantera - Far Beyond Driven
White Zombie - Astro-Creep 2000

The Verve Pipe - Villians

Ozzy Osbourne - Ozzmosis

Les Miserables - Original Broadway Cast Recording
Rent - Original Broadway Cast Recording
Cradle Of Filth - Dusk And Her Embrace

DREAM THEATER - Images And Words

Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Once More With Feeling - Original Cast Album

EVANESCENCE - Fallen

Garden State - Music From The Motion Picture
The Cure - Disintegration

Lamb Of God - Ashes Of The Wake
Shadows Fall - The War Within
Killswitch Engage - The End Of Heartache

Avril Lavigne - Under My Skin

Trivium - Ascendency

Bullet For My Valentine - The Poison
All That Remains - The Fall Of Ideals

James Blunt
- Back To Bedlam
- All The Lost Souls


And...bugger it. The following bands didn't quite fit on my list, but it just doesn't feel right to ignore them entirely. Special mentions:

- Nirvana
- Pearl Jam
- Alice In Chains
- Soundgarden
- Jurassic Park soundtrack
- Megadeth
- Fear Factory
- Queensryche
- Slipknot
- Madonna
- Collective Soul
- In Flames
- Dark Tranquillity
- Hungry Lucy
- The Birthday Massacre
- Lacuna Coil

Spoiler paranoia

So i've always disliked spoilers and extraneous preview material when it comes to films or tv shows i'm looking forward to. I've had too many awesome experiences going into certain kinds of films completely cold (e.g. Matrix, Sixth Sense, Primer, Watchmen). And i've had enough viewing experiences diminished from knowing too much about what was going to happen. So over the years i've turned into "that guy" - you know, the one who exclaims "ZOMG DON'T TELL ME ANYTHING I HAVEN'T SEEN IT YET!@#$"

And now that i'm watching through Battlestar Galactica from the beginning (for the first time), i seem to have ascended to a whole new level of spoiler paranoia. I am terrified that someone will let slip that so-and-so is a Cylon, or mention something that happens later in season 2, etc. Last weekend i went to hulu to watch an episode of Friday Night Lights, but i had to kill my browser because they had the BSG finale up and i didn't even want to see the screenshot. In fact, when the BSG finale aired, i avoided several of the newsfeeds i follow for a few days out of fear of spoilers (even in just the article titles). I also avoided Twitter and kept my guard up on Facebook. Yesterday i was watching an episode of American Dad (i'm not a huge fan of the show, but i catch a few eps here and there, mostly for Patrick Stewart (he voices Stan's boss)). At one point in this episode, Steve and his friends were being pursued by an anti-nerd lynch mob; cornered, Steve suddenly said "Wait, remember your Galactica! The best way to kill a Cylon is--" Me: "NOOOOO!!!" *stops playback* That was a close one.

Oh yeah, and i really like the BSG theme song so i watch it with every episode on the DVDs, but i have to shut my eyes for the last 10 seconds when they flash through scenes from the episode. Like, what the frak?? I'm watching the episode *RIGHT NOW*; why do you have to ruin it for me?

In related news (warning, spoilers circa mid/late season 1), i am so over Miss Six; yes she's hot, but she's also mean and kindof abusive. My new Cylon crush is Sharon (the one from Caprica, not the one from the ship). *swoon* <3

Frak

Most of the time i don't give much thought to language. I generally use whatever words come naturally for a given situation, pick up new terms and phrases from books, media, and my peers. But i have had the "1984" discussion concerning Newspeak a few times, as well as the discussion on why curse words are curse words. I mean they're just words, right? Isn't it the intent behind the words that matters? Oh right, the words you choose indicate what your intent is. But i'll save the larger discussion for another time and move on to the point of this post.

So i've started watching Battlestar Galactica (i'm only midway through the first season so please, no spoilers!! (No joke spoilers either, sil vous plait)). As you BSG fans out there know, their expletive of choice is "frak". Contextually it is a minced oath for (obviously) the word "fuck", and is proving to be just as versatile and hilarious, in my opinion. "Don't frak with me", "Oh, frak!", "We need to get off this *frakking* planet". And so on.

At first i thought it was just a lame attempt to get around the censors, but the word is so well-integrated into the dialogue; my compliments to the actors for embracing the term and making it sound natural. So natural, in fact, that it seems to have bled into my own vernacular; i've caught myself using the word quite a bit over the past few weeks. And this isn't like back in the 90s when i intentionally adopted a handful of British curses because they sounded so cool coming from Spike. No, it's reflexively the first expletive out of my mouth when something happens. Of course as soon as i hear it, it makes me laugh, so whatever pissed me off doesn't seem so bad anymore. So maybe this is a good thing.

Anyway, i have to go and file my frakking tax returns.

i live here

In the pilot of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, station commander Benjamin Sisko spends some time kicking it with the aliens who live in the nearby wormhole (known to the Bajorans as the Prophets). The Prophets are not confined to an existance in linear time, and don't understand concepts such as past/present/future, life & death, etc. They speak to Sisko by taking on forms of people he knows, and flash him around to various points of his life (a la A Christmas Carol), trying to learn about him.

One scene they keep flashing to is the moment when his wife, Jennifer, died (two years prior, in the battle against the Borg at Wolf359). The Prophets keep saying "You live here", and Sisko keeps trying to explain that no, this happened in the *past*, and that he lives in the *present*. He grows increasingly agitated because they keep forcing him to relive the most painful experience of his life. Finally, out of sheer frustration, he cries "Dammit, why do you keep bringing me back here? You assholes!" They calmly reply "We are not bringing you here. *You* are bringing *us* here". Lightbulb. Sisko finally understands, and agrees, "I live here."

I've been giving a lot of thought to this idea recently; considering some of the scenes where i "live". Even when you've accepted things, moved on with your life, it can be incredibly difficult to stop going back to those places that had such an impact.

That's all, i guess; just wanted to share my little analogy. It's funny, even though i liked the story when i first saw that episode of DS9, i definitely appreciate it on a new level now.

On a related note, i was hanging out with a friend when he was in town a few weeks ago. During one of our discussions, i referenced the TNG episode "Tapestry". (I'll save that topic for another blog post). I later mentioned my usual comment of "Yeah, since i have a permanent tan, some people don't realize that i'm actually a suburban whiteboy from Michigan." He assured me, "Dude, seriously? You're a cracker. You just referenced STAR TREK to illustrate a point..." :-)

Seriously, though, Star Trek is a goldmine of reference material. I remember dring my summers home from college, i developed a tradition with one of my friends: We'd settle in at a local coffee house (usually the Caribou Coffee in downtown Birmingham, for those of you from back home) and spend the afternoon playing chess and arguing philosophy. He was well-read in the field, so for any topic he'd reference books by actual philosophers, schools of thought, etc. I, on the other hand, would back up my points with Star Trek references. Episodes, story arcs, choices that characters made and their consequences. Alternate realities and the space-time continuum (of course). It worked surprisingly well, and i enjoyed those discussions very much.