There are many things that appeal to me about chess, and perhaps in some future post I’ll list them all, but one of the most important is the way that it creates a whole new sophisticated language, with inflection and shades of meaning, that doesn’t map to English (or whatever human language you care to […]
Thursday, February 12, 2009
In which I take all the magic out of one of my favorite songs by analyzing it to death. “Levitate Me” is from the Pixies’ first record, the EP Come On Pilgrim, recorded and released in 1987. If you want to follow along I recommend this live performance. It’s by Black Francis so who knows […]
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Wednesday, February 4, 2009
I thought it would be fun to write about some of the songs I’ve written. (I should point out for those coming to this cold that I’m the principal songwriter for Honest Bob and the Factory-to-Dealer Incentives). I’m going to start with songs from our latest record, Third Time’s the Charm. If you don’t have […]
I just finished watching Bruce Springsteen perform at the Super Bowl halftime show (and I’m not a big Springsteen fan, but that was a pretty great halftime show). Anyway, it got me thinking: Bruce Springsteen has sold millions and millions of records, and he has a ton of cred as an Important Artist and all, […]
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I discovered Robert Pollard (the guy behind Guided By Voices) around 1996. His music seemed boring at first, but after a few tries I recognized his genius and since then have acquired most of his recorded output (I own 67 CDs of his by a quick count). I discovered SF author Jack Vance a few […]
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
In a comment to my last post Matthew Amster-Burton asked me what I thought of Shudder To Think. The only album I have of theirs is Get Your Goat from 1992 (Matthew has since informed me that he doesn’t think that’s their best, but it’s what I have), so I gave that a listen for […]
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My recent chronological voyage through the XTC back catalog, and excitement at hearing many early songs I hadn’t listened to in ages, got me thinking about some aspects that much of my favorite rock music has in common. I like to think of myself as having pretty varied tastes, but it’s true that a certain […]
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