Halcyon Days of My Youth

Just watched some Britpop videos from Oasis, Blur, and Pulp. Oddly enough, although the only one of those bands from which I never bought an album is Oasis, it was actually Oasis that first got me into contemporary pop back in high school - I had recently read an article in Newsweek about how they were copying the Beatles, which intrigued me, and then, whilst flipping through channels on the TV, I ran into the "Wonderwall" video on VH1, which did look as though it was copying the Beatles. I liked it enough to continue watching music videos, eventually wound up seeing the "Common People" video on the Canadian music video channel a year or two later, and the rest is history.

Anyway, it's funny to watch a bunch of different videos from the different bands and compare. The Gallagher brothers tend to look as though they're copying the Beatles. Damon Albarn has a tendency to look completely ridiculous (I mean, clearly intentionally so, but still - maybe it's a preview of the aesthetic of something like "Clint Eastwood"?). And Jarvis. . . it's hard to explain, but regardless of what he's doing, he just seems to be doing it with vast quantities of charisma. Watching the "Common People" video again, I can still remember the feeling of seeing him for the first time and falling in love almost immediately. He's just as ridiculous as Damon, if not more so, but he takes it to another level. It's like the opposite of bathos - what is the opposite of bathos? And I still think that "This Is Hardcore" is a fabulous video. Jarvis is still awesome, but in a pretty different way.

How to Read Hitherby Canon

I've decided to reread all of Hitherby canon - which is just one of those things that happens. This might lead to me blogging about Hitherby, but, unfortunately, due to the way Hitherby canon is, anything I post might well have spoilers for all of Hitherby. So if you want to read these posts, I would recommend that you read all of Hitherby canon too. It is a good idea, I promise you! Jenna claims that it is a good idea to start reading Hitherby canon at the beginning; my own experience is that this is not the case, since, as with many serial works of art, the beginning is somewhat less polished than later on, plus it makes so little sense without any context that it's very difficult to get into.

My own personal recommendation is to start reading at "The Flower (I/IV)", which makes more sense and is much more engaging and also has Maya! And things with Maya are good. And then you can read the next three - they kind of get across what some of the premise is. Then read Tantalus (I/IV)" and the next three - they are somewhat more bizarre than the first set I told you to read, but they are very entertaining, and convey another rather important chunk of the premise.

Then. . . ummm. . . read these, and then this, and then this, about Mylitta and Nabonidus and Belshazzar, and then the canon entires in the Buddhism category, and then, at least if you are me, you will be sufficiently hooked so as to want to read as much canon as possible, and you will not need my guidance any longer.

Then we can talk about the key important question of why Jesus and Prometheus (and my inner Paul Fry is telling me to add Satan, but I'm not sure he's a key important question) are missing, and how creepy Martin is (look, I'm sorry, but he is creepy), and what is really going on with Mei Ming (I had this dream about Mei Ming once. . . it's a little hard to describe), and the AMAZING AWESOMENESS that is anything touching on Ink Catherly. And you can tell me who your favorite characters are. Mine are Ink because she is awkwardly similar to that character I want Rebecca Mader to play, Maya because she is Maya, the veil of illusion, and Mylitta and Nabonidus because it is awkwardly similar to my favorite extremely private id-story of all time.

Riddle-Master Trilogy

I was just thinking that one of the best parts of Patricia McKillip's Riddle-Master trilogy (which I. . . read and/or skimmed for the first time at the beginning of the year) is the part where Mordion challenges Deth and Deth is like, "Okay, so maybe I am not just completely awesome in the way I have been up to that point but am actually completely awesome in multiple ways." I like that about Deth.

I Will Post Something in March So There Hah.

Tonight I feel like I should just destroy myself
Tonight I feel like I should just explode myself
Myself

Tonight I feel like I should just destroy myself
Tonight I feel like I should just explode myself
Myself

There's someone calling my name
But there's nothing to respond
I lost so much in our collapse
Man, what little hope is gone

The voice said, "Don't worry, friend
The darkness is just a suggestion
No, don't worry, kid
The darkness is just suggestion
No, don't worry, Kevin"

Tonight I feel like I should just destroy myself
Tonight I feel like I should just explode myself
Myself

There's someone calling my name
But there's no one to respond
I lost so much in our collapse
Oh, what little hope is gone

The voice said, "Don't worry, friend
This darkness is just a suggestion
No, don't worry, kid
This darkness is just suggestion
No, don't worry, kid"

Tonight I feel like I should just destroy myself
Tonight I feel like I should just explode myself
Myself

I'm allergic to the world when we are separated
There's nothing in my heart that's worth a beating
Feeling like a Styrofoam prop ennui is eating
Oh, sure, we talk and talk and talk
But nothing worth repeating

I feel defeated
I feel defeated
I feel defeated

Now I'm OD'ing on your cocksucker blues
You make me uptight when you just don't work right
You painted my prison, now something's wrong
And I never, ever, ever wanted to write this song

I'm killing myself but it's not suicide
I'm killing myself
I'm killing myself but it's not suicide
I'm killing myself but my friends will never know
Because I've never been
Because I've never been honest with anyone

Always pulling faces from the unprepossessing places
Of the universal mind
I'm crippled by the world when we are divided
There's nothing in my heart that's worth the creaking
Feeling like a Pamplona bull that's finished kicking

Although we try to break the loop, it's always stuck repeating

I feel defeated
I feel defeated
I feel defeated

Now I'm OD'ing on your cocksucker blues
You make me uptight when you just don't work right
You painted my prison, now something's wrong

And I never, ever, ever wanted to write this song
I always thought things would change somehow
And we would start getting along but it's hopeless
Hopeless

And I never, ever, ever wanted to write this song
I always thought things would change somehow
And we would start getting along but it's hopeless
Hopeless

And I never, ever, ever wanted to write this song
I always thought things would change somehow
And we would start getting along but it's hopeless
Hopeless

And I never, ever, ever wanted to write this song
I always thought things would change somehow
And we would start getting along but it's hopeless
Hopeless

And I never, ever, ever wanted to write this song
I always thought things would change somehow
And we would start getting along but it's hopeless
Hopeless

Kevin Barnes (of Montreal), "No Conclusion"

Passion Pit's Best Song That You Have Ever Heard

On Passion Pit's MySpace page, you can also listen to their song, "Better Things," which is at least as good as "Sleepyhead" if not better. I particularly like the part with the gods and the glory and the stories, and the part with the lipstick and the lipstick.

Revisionist Christian Mythology Lyrics

To be honest, I don't think that Franz Ferdinand's You Could Have It So Much Better is all that good an album - I don't intentionally listen to it very much and never have. At this point, my favorite songs from the album, and the two that I think about with the greatest frequency, are "Walk Away" and "Outsiders." I don't think of the other songs, including "The Fallen," all that often.

But when I first heard the album, the song that caught me right away and impressed me was "The Fallen." And in listening to this concert today, I was reminded of just how much I liked that song the first few times I heard it. I don't know if this particular live version is a little different from the album version, though I suspect it is, but it really sounds forceful and powerful. And the song has those revisionist Christian mythology lyrics for which I've already mentioned my fondness. I would say these lyrics are somewhere in between those of "The Fall" and "The Repudiated Immortals" - they're not particularly sketchy, but there's still something missing from the story (evidently Alex Kapranos revealed some extra-textual background when he explained that the song was imagining a specific friend of his as the reincarnation Jesus).

Spinner's Best Songs of 2008

I spent some time this week listening to Spinner's top 25 songs of 2008. Most of them were pretty boring to me on a first listen, some of them were okay, but there were two that I liked quite a lot:

-#17: "Sleepy Head" by Passion Pit - I really like the weird noises in this song (some of them may be backing vocals, but it's hard to tell) as well as the jagged part of the instrumental. It's otherworldly.

-#22: "I'm Not Going to Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You" by Black Kids - This song is almost literally a Cure song with more female backing vocals and people screaming "Dance! Dance! Dance! Dance!" But, to be honest with you, I think that is TOTALLY AWESOME and ENTIRELY TO BE ENCOURAGED!