Category Archives: personal

A bit of listening

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The one downside to listening to new things this early in the year is often that there isn’t anything new out to listen to.  So I’m often bouncing around my music collection, throwing on whatever happens to pop into mind at the time.

As usual, I’m writing this just before my evening writing/editing session, and I was in the mood for a bit of Porcupine Tree — a band I’d discovered while at HMV (their 1999 album Stupid Dream had just been released) and one that would often be a go-to for my writing sessions during the early 00’s.  In this case, 2002’s In Absentia came to mind, so I popped it on.  It’s a lovely album, recorded at the point where they’d decided to morph from dreamlike, guitar-based prog rock to a more prog-metal influenced sound.  [Note: lead singer/band leader Steven Wilson would be the first to slap me for labeling them prog, as he quite loathes the term.  But I digress.]

I’ve posted numerous times before about some of the key album releases over the years that influenced, or at least gave a soundtrack to, the Bridgetown Trilogy.  This album, Dishwalla’s And You Think You Know What Life’s About, Mansun’s Six, Beck’s Sea Change, and so on.  They’re all great albums that I’ll still throw on now and again while I’m writing or editing.

Does music distract me from my work?  Well, yes, sometimes it does.  Especially if I hear a song like Silversun Pickups’ “Panic Switch”, which often sends me across the room to pick up my bass to play along with it.  But more often than not, just as it has since I was a scruffy teenager first attempting to write novels, it serves a dual purpose: it’s background noise to help me focus on the task at hand, and it’s also a sound that, if I choose correctly, influences whatever it is I’m working on at that moment.  I’ve listened to music for so long, and for such long stretches, that if I don’t have anything playing while I’m working, I kind of feel naked in a way.  The silence makes me self-conscious.

But you know, that’s why I have such a large collection as I do, and why it’s 99% digital now.  I have a library of sound that helps me through the day, in whatever I’m doing, whether it’s writing, editing, or the Day Job.

And I wouldn’t want it any other way.

 

Fly-by: Q4 Madness

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Seriously, Q4 would be a lot better if it wasn’t so damned busy.  Then again, it wouldn’t be Q4 if it wasn’t.

Sorry for a lack of update today, folks!  I’m attempting to dig out of an avalanche of Day Job inquiries, as well as catching up on Book 3 editing and preparation.  I should have some tunage-inspired posts for you next week.

*deep breaths*

Do I really listen to that much music?

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The new 4TB external doing its thing on top of my dusty PC

So yesterday I started to move my mp3 collection to my new external hard drive.  Originally I thought, hey, why not just do a block copy-and-paste all at once? and tried copying bands A through M.  After about twenty minutes the status said ‘5% done; time remaining, 11 hours.’  That lasted until Depeche Mode, when the PC went to sleep last night.  That was easily rectified of course, and I’m now going via small blocks of letters (it just finished N through P a few seconds ago).

So why am I doing this?  Well, I think my externals are just getting worn out.  Currently the collection is on two smaller 1TB externals and I’m starting to have issues with the PC reading one of them.  It’ll work, but if the PC happens to go into sleep mode for any reason, the connection will get all wonky.  No fear, though!  Every mp3 is also copied to a third 2TB external whose sole purpose is to simply be backup storage.  Nothing has been lost!

But seriously, though…why 4 terabytes?  Isn’t that a bit excessive?  Well, no.  It’s a very comfortable amount of space for a collection that’s slowly been expanding for almost forty years.  It gives me space for what I have already and an equal amount of space for any future purchases, rips, or downloads.  [Especially now that I rip my cds at the max bitrate of 320 kbps.  I’m not too snobbish about bitrate, but the higher it is, the better, clearer and louder the sound quality.  And I usually stick with mp3 format instead of FLAC or anything else, simply because it’s space saving and I don’t hear too much of a difference.]

But that still begs the question: do I really listen to that much music?

Well, I don’t listen to every single song in my collection on a daily basis, no.  That would be impossible.  It’s more of a library than just a collection, anyway.  I use it not just for entertainment but for background while I’m writing.  I use it for reference with my music-related writing.  And I share it with a few people on my Plex server so they get to listen and enjoy my tunage as well.  A. likes to listen to stuff occasionally via that route while she’s working.  Not everything gets heavy rotation play, but my library is big enough where I can shift that rotation and keep it fresh.

But yeah. I really do listen to that much music.  If I don’t have a streaming radio station going, I’m probably listening to a certain batch of albums.  Currently I’m going through a bunch of the 2016 albums in preparation for my eventual Best Of list next month.

Some people love vintage cars.  Some love special edition books.  Some love collectible figurines.

Me?  I love music.

Angry

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I’m not going to sugarcoat it.  I’m not going to avoid talking about it.  Yes, I am still angry that the Fuckwit is pretty much our next President (barring any Hail Mary play by the Electoral College in the next few weeks — I’d love dearly for that to happen, to be honest).

Is Walk in Silence going to turn into yet another political wanking blog?  No.  I’ll still talk about music here.  That isn’t going away.  Same with my writing blog.  But I’ve decided I’m going to…loosen the rules here a bit.

As a child of the 80s, I was well aware of the Reagan and Bush I years.  I understood what the GOP tried to do not only to the Democrats but to pretty much anyone who didn’t toe the company line.  I saw how conservatives tanked the economy.  Hell, I even saw how Thatcher ruined the UK.  Granted, I was a teenager and didn’t really have much idea what to do in response, and I lived in a stable household and made do without a lot of extravagant things (because that’s what you do when you’re a good Roman Catholic American — starving kids in China and all that).  I found my solace in college radio.  The rebelliousness of its sound was enough to validate my irritations.

Now I’m 45 and I’m trying to figure out how the hell to combat anything the Fuckwit and Shithead Jr (his veep, natch) will try to do to curtail the standards of life for those who aren’t White, Hetero, and Rich.  And how to respond to the ‘oh, it was just a joke, we didn’t mean it’ gaslighting.

I mean, other than going onto Twitter and venting.

As much as I hate to use the phrase, I’m thinking of the long game.  I’m thinking not of what we can do now (not that I’m avoiding it — I know of countless other people who are already calling representatives and writing emails and letters and going on marches), but preparing what we can do if that fails.

In a weird way, I’m still somewhat inspired by college radio here.  I’d commented on Twitter a few days ago, in a rare lighthearted mood that day, that my approach was like alternative rock.  Think of it this way:  back in the 80s, college radio was considered weird and stupid and you were a weird outsider if you liked that sort of thing (and maybe even taunted or beat up because of it).  And ignorant conformists cannot handle the square peg.  But it sang to you, knew exactly what you were feeling and thinking at that time, and that was your own vindication, however small.  Then, in 1989, Love and Rockets’ “So Alive” hit the Billboard Top 5.  And then two years later, Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” hit the charts and HOLY SHIT did that change things.  Mainstream radio was never the same.

Point being — you may be that outsider.  You may be the one who feels disenfranchised by the bullies and the ignorant jackasses.  But you know who you are.  And in this day and age, you know there are others out there just like you, hurting but holding on through sheer stubborn will and self-preservation.

Focus on that.  Fight back.  Focus on remaining true to yourself, and fuck everyone else if they can’t handle that.  Feed on it.  Expand on it.  Be what and who you are, not what they want to make you.

And make that the mainstream.

 

 

[NOTE: Yes, I know calling those two names is petty. Give me that — it’s just me vocalizing just how much I detest the two men, and I’d rather not use c**t in my blog if I can help it. Furthermore, please do not try to argue with me that ‘it was a democratic vote, they won, get over it.’  Say that to all the people who couldn’t vote because of the GOP’s obvious system-gaming and voter suppression.  Say that to all the women who now fear that their health care is threatened.  Say that to the LGBT who feel threatened by Pence’s bigotry.  Say that to the Muslims and the Mexicans and the immigrants who now feel that their country’s leader and his growing cabinet don’t give two shits about them.  And then look at those who are reveling in the Fuckwit’s win and are now spraypainting swastikas, tearing off hijabs, beating people up, and telling others ‘go back home’ when they are home.  And then explain to me how that’s a fair system.]

Streaming: Amazon Music

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Believe it or not, I’ve tried numerous streaming apps and sites, and I’ve pretty much found them all wanting.

I know, I know…I’m picky about what I listen to if it’s not my own music collection.  I’m not including streaming radio stations here, like those provided by Sirius XM or the numerous terrestrial stations out there that offer the ‘listen live!’ button at their website.  I’m talking about sites and apps that are built for streaming music: Spotify, Groove Music, Tidal, and so on.  I mean, they’re just fine for what they do best, and they have their own fans, but they’re not for me.

I know exactly why: my tastes and listening habits tend to vary widely, and most of these places just don’t offer enough music that would capture my interest.  I’ve tried many, and with each of them I find myself constantly hitting the ‘next track’ button.  [And even worse, if I have the low-end or free subscription, I have to wade through commercials every five or six songs.  Don’t get me wrong — I grew up with terrestrial radio on every waking moment of my youth, so I’m used to the ads.  It’s just that getting them after skipping too many songs pretty makes me like the app or site even less.]

Recently, however, I signed onto Amazon Music, and I think I finally found what I’ve been looking for.  It’s essentially a rebooted, much more refined version of Amazon Prime’s music streaming, and it’s well worth it.  It features streams of numerous complete albums available digitally at Amazon’s website (and where I buy most of my mp3s nowadays), across numerous labels and distributors.  I get to listen to the entire album before deciding if I want to download it.  It also offers curated playlists if I’m so inclined.  I’m not one for listening to a randomly generated playlist — for that I can just listen to a regular radio station — so this really works out well for me.

The price isn’t that bad, either.  It’s $9.99 a month ($7.99 for those already signed up for Amazon Prime), about the same as most streaming apps and sites.

Yes, yes, I know…giving more money to The Man by signing up with Amazon, but when the product provides exactly what I’ve been looking for and wanting, it does feel kind of silly to not use it on principle.  [Noted, I’m a frequent visitor of local brick and mortar stores for all kinds of things, enough that I rarely use Amazon for ordering things on the regular.  I also use other music downloading sites for my collecting.  So I don’t necessarily feel guilty for using Amazon for this sort of thing.]

Has anyone else used it yet?  What do you think?

Fly-by: On break for a few weeks

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Hey gang! Sorry to let you down, but both blogs are going on a brief vacation for a few weeks. This next week is probably going to busy, between Day Job stuff and preparing for an actual trip (we’re heading back to New England to visit friends and family).

We’ll be back fresh and ready to go in November! Until then, don’t eat too much Halloween candy!

See you soon!

Is That Freedom Rock, Man?

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Somehow I fell down another retro rabbit hole and have been listening to the Sirius XM Classic Rock Party station over the last few days.  I’m fifteen again and listening to WAAF and WAQY in my messy bedroom, cranking up the 80s stylings of Twisted Sister, Billy Idol and Whitesnake alongside the classic 60s/70s hits of the Stones, Yes, and BROOOCE.

This was the music I grew up with.  I was too young to understand punk and post-punk back in the early 80s (at least not until that fateful evening in early 1986), and as much as I enjoyed the pop of American Top 40 and American Bandstand, it was the music of rock stations that stuck with me most. I was a nerdy, spotty kid that was completely obsessed with music and radio and would be just as happy sitting alone in front of my boombox as I would be outside roaming the neighborhood on my BMX with my buddies.  This was Diver Down and Pyromania playing on my sister’s boombox while we played touch football in the backyard.  This was me completely blown away by 90125 and Synchronicity and So.  This was my growing obsessions with other bands aside from the Beatles.  This was our state capital’s own honored rockers in the forms of Aerosmith, the J Geils Band and Boston.  This was where I learned to appreciate bands before my time like Jimi Hendrix and Cream and The Rolling Stones.

Decades later and here I am, hitting middle age and living on the opposite coast, listening to the still-epic “Born to Run”, still impressed by the guitar solo freakout of the back half of “Freebird”, still feel that “Layla” is a decent song but is about 3 minutes too long.  Living in a city where Janis and Jerry lived, where Steve Miller recorded the sound of the foghorn going past the Marina for the opening of his Sailor album, where the classic Frampton Comes Alive! was recorded just three miles away at a long-departed ballroom in Japantown.  Where Journey the Doobies and the Dead and the Airplane lived and recorded and became local heroes.

The playlist has its moments of amusing embarrassment.  All that LA glam metal of the 80s is still goofy, doofy, simplistic fun, just like I remember it.  All the prog rock of the 70s is still full of nerdy math and fantastical imagery.  All the arena rock bands are still full of that bombast.  Some of it’s kind of corny now, but you can’t help but have fun listening to it.  The playlist is also going to be a lot of the same heavy-rotation classics that you can’t escape, even after all these years.  It may even have its share of “oh, that song!” moments.

Sure, most of it’s a good three or four decades old now, but it’s still a hell of a lot of fun to listen to.

More on the 90s

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So yeah, I’ve still been contemplating expanding the Walk in Silence series to include the 90s.  I’ve started listening to the decade chronologically, much as I did with the original series and going through the 80s, and once again it’s been an interesting ride.

Presently I’m listening to Living Colour’s sophomore album Time’s Up, which came out in late August 1990.  It was the back end of summer, and I’d chosen to take the last two weeks off between my summer job (second year at the DPW) and starting my sophomore year at Emerson.  Chris and I got together to reform the Flying Bohemians as a duo, and recorded a few tracks in my parents’ garage.

I spent those last two weeks doing not much of anything: made a pretty decent compilation that I still listen to in 2016, did a bit of poetry, lyric and journal writing, a lot of Solitaire playing, and met up with all my friends who’d come home for a brief time.  For the most part, most of them had taken root in their college towns and gotten local summer jobs or were taking summer classes, so there was only a narrow window of time that we could meet up.

Me?  The only reason I’d come back home for the summer was that I hadn’t prepared myself for any summer position or an apartment to sublet for a few months.  It had crossed my mind, of course, but I hadn’t the time or the money to plan it out sufficiently.  I figured the summer of 1991 would be when I’d stick around.

That, and I’d wanted to spend more time with T, as well as distance myself from the frustration of freshman year.  Summer 1990 was time to start over again.

Hey Wait I got a new complaint

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I don’t use the Sirius XM radio on my own PC as much as I should, so today I thought I’d put it on.  I chose the Lithium channel, primarily because the song playing at the time was Nine Inch Nails’ “Down In It”.  And now I’ve been listening to the 90s all morning.

Yes, I know!  Me, the guy who’s posted about 80s college rock for far too long, finally moving forward in time?  Heh.

Seriously, the 90s was an interesting decade, looking back on it now.  I tend to think of it as a decade where we crossed a lot of lines that had drawn in the sand for so long that we kind of forgot why they were there in the first place.  A lot of interesting chances were taken in the creative world; some fell flat, but some were welcomed and became the norm.  College radio became modern rock became alternative rock became chart-topping rock.  It didn’t help that the 80s chart rock had become a sad caricature of itself, full of hair metal spandex and arpeggios, and bar bands with very few actual hits.  Something had to take over eventually, and alt.rock had been waiting in the wings since the early 80s.

The music of the 90s for me felt sort of like a light was finally turned on.  More to the point, it felt like I’d exited the dark cave of my bedroom and its 4AD/Cure gloom and entered the sunshine of the wider world beyond.  I could easily say that Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was in fact the point of change, as it probably was for many others.  It wasn’t the first alt.rock song that broke through to chart radio (I’d like to think that honor actually belongs to Love and Rockets’ “So Alive”, which hit #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart two years earlier), but it was the most important one.  Rock radio wasn’t the same afterwards.

Yeah, sure, there were also the bands that weren’t grunge, weren’t Britpop, and didn’t quite fit into the already-standard ‘alternative’ format.  In retrospect they were chart rock’s New Breed.  They were melodic, catchy, and just mainstream enough to be played on pretty much any commercial rock station without scaring the parents.  They were just edgy enough that the kids loved them anyway.  You probably wouldn’t hear them on college radio (that avenue was being filled at that time with No Depression, math rock, slowcore, and the other decidedly noncommercial subgenres), but you’d hear them on the burgeoning Modern Rock and AOR stations.

These are the songs you’ll hear on Adult Alternative stations nowadays, tracks by Collective Soul and Tonic rubbing shoulders with James Bay and Elle King.  The slightly harder stuff will pop up on the alt.rock stations that have survived this long, sneaking in as ‘classic tracks’ next to new tracks by other 90s bands that have miraculously stayed together this long (Weezer, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blink-182).

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I can pretty much divide the 90s into two distinct personal eras: the college/Boston years (1990-95) and the HMV years (1996-2000), with the yearlong entr’acte of ennui and deadend jobs of 1995-6.  Despite the personal ups and downs I was contending with at the time, I rarely missed an opportunity to follow the latest trends.  I may not have had the money to buy it all at the time, but that didn’t stop me from making radio tapes, dubbing cds from friends, or keeping my boombox set to the local alternative stations.

Or spending most of my hard-earned pay at the record store I worked at, for that matter.

Despite my personal and emotional ups and downs in that decade, I found it to be a lot more enjoyable than the previous decade when I was dealing with my gawkish teenage self.  My twenties certainly had their extremely frustrating moments, and I did make a lot of really stupid decisions, but by the back end of that decade, I had my shit together and knew exactly what I wanted to do.  That’s when I knew for a fact that I’d be a writer.  It’s also when I knew that this infatuation with music was going to be a lifelong thing and I was perfectly fine with that.