God Bless the USA

/ / Opinion, rantings

As my wife and I were watching Monk on Netflix tonight, my wife was surfing her phone and started screaming, “WHAT?!” I immediately whipped around to look at her and asked, “Umm … what “what?” Then she said the words I just wasn’t expecting to hear:

“Osama bin Laden is dead!”

At first, my mind couldn’t quite grasp exactly what it was she had just said. I had to actually stop and re-play her words over again in my head to make sure I had actually heard her correctly. After a few seconds of rewinding and replaying, sure enough, the message was the same: she really did say exactly what I thought she said.

It goes without saying that we flipped over to regular TV to see if anything was on the news about it, and there it was–emblazoned across my TV on CBS, breaking news item: Bin Laden is dead and his body is in the possession of the US.

We listened to President Obama’s address to the nation, and really to the world, as he gave some of the details of how bin Laden was taken down and his body taken into custody.

People are gathered outside the White House, chanting “USA! USA! USA!” Words cannot express how desperately want to join them and add my voice to the pride that swells within me. I’m an American, and I am proud to be so. I’m proud of our country, I’m proud of what we represent, I’m proud to say that I AM SO GLAD THAT BIN LADEN IS DEAD. I praise the ground troops who have put in the tireless and countless hours to culminate in this singular moment in the war on terror.

September 11, 2001 was a hard day for me. It was for all of us who live here in the US. But for whatever reason, the night after–September 12–was infinitely more difficult for me. I sat at my computer as my wife was at work on an overnight shift for her position as a caregiver for an autistic girl, and I was overcome with a terror and fear that I never knew was possible. I literally shook with fright as I tried to grasp exactly what had happened, and more importantly why.

As I reflect back on the events of the last 9+ years, and in some of the monumental achievements that we as a country and as a world that desires peace have accomplished, I stand in utter amazement at those who serve in the armed forces. Perseverance, dedication, and love of country … what role models.

Congratulations, USA. Congratulations world. bin Laden is dead. We can rest a little easier tonight, if for just a little while. I mean, I’m a realist; I know that there’s probably a very well-organized hierarchy that will immediately replace him. It does not matter. We will hunt them down. We will root them out. We will find them. We will take them down.

God bless the USA.

Brush Away Loose Ground

/ / Blah-ness, Opinion, rantings

There are some things that I’m dealing with that are really taking a toll on me emotionally and mentally. I didn’t realize to what extent until Saturday afternoon when my family had an Easter gathering. All the kids went outside to play, and we–the adults–sat in the living room and chatted. The conversation gravitated towards the situation under which I’m laboring arduously to overcome and put behind me and move on. The conversation somehow got … unpleasant, for lack of a better term. No harsh emotions towards any family members, just a lot of pent-up frustration and inability to understand exactly how this situation even came to be, much less WHY we’re having to go through this.

In the end, I felt like I just couldn’t take it another day. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not suicidal by any means over this whole thing, but I mean to tell you that this is something I wouldn’t wish on anyone. No one deserves to go through this … especially my wife and me. Yet we are, and it is what it is.

As I sit here today, still trying to wrap my head around this whole situation, I have my iPod on shuffle, as I typically do. What song comes on? Alice in Chain’s “Private Hell.” The coincidence of it all made me listen to the words a lot more closely this time through.

“Give away a love and then remove another too,
Painted words adorn the walls, echoing untrue.
I feel cold.

Promises abound you rarely find it to begin
Maybe I’m afraid to let you all the way in.
I guess so …

I excuse myself; I’m used to my little cell.
I amuse myself in my very own private hell.

Lately I’m beside myself, pretending unconcerned.
Standing on a corner, where I threw you for a turn.
I’ll move on.

Flowers on a cross remain, mark an ending scene
Damn it all if blood you spill turn the grass more green.
Life is short.

I excuse myself; I’m used to my little cell.
I amuse myself in my very own private hell.”

I won’t go into details as to what we’re going through. It *is* very private, and very, very personal, yet I feel compelled to vent and get some of this off my chest, even if it is in vague terms and generalities.

Music is just so powerful. It has the ability to evoke emotion like no other sense can. Sight is close, but I still challenge that sound is more powerful. At least it is for me. I can hear a song and immediately relate to it on some level. It can be a melodic Enya-like song, or it can be as hard and edgy as old Metallica … on some level, I know I’m going to be able to relate. I’m grateful for that, especially in times like these where I feel like the weight of the world is bearing down on me. I *need* something to take my mind off of it all.

Much like heroin to Layne Staley, music is my drug of choice. Period. It helps me “brush away loose ground.”

New Music: NHL Playoffs Quarter-Finals Edition

/ / New Music, Opinion, rantings

So it’s fairly obvious that there’s been a massive drop-off this month in posts. I cannot promise you that this is going to change any time in the foreseeable future. The Buffalo Sabres are in the hunt for the Cup that bears lord Stanley’s name, and I’m LOVING this post-season. I go in to work early so I can leave early so I can watch the games. We have expat WNY friends come over for the game. We make it a party. Even my wife, who has gone so far as to say that she actually does not like hockey, has gotten caught up in it. She pays more attention. She knows the stakes are higher. This is it, folks; it’s do or die time! And the Sabres aren’t dying!

Most of the time when I post, it’s after I get home from work, have dinner and relax for the evening. With the playoffs being played every other night, it gets tough to make the time to post. I can’t promise that I’ll get back to the “post a day” pace, but I’m sure gonna try!

Meanwhile, took some time to head over to Graywhale yesterday and chat with Kyle about what it takes to get an in-store performance for an artist. I had a purpose in mind, though to be perfectly honest, I don’t know if it could be pulled off. It’d be great, but I don’t know what time constraints the artist has, I don’t know if this artist is even interested in doing a performance … but ya never know if you don’t ask, right? So I’ll throw it out there for consideration and see what happens!

And of course, I took some time to pick up some new CDs. Can’t let that chance slip by, right? What a great haul. As always, it was a grab-‘n’-go day: pick up a bunch of CDs and hope they’re good, though like I’ve mentioned before, I’ve only been let down once. Picked up what looks to be a Family Crest-style CD, a CD in the vein of Alele Diane and Samantha Crain, some Wilco-style stuff … overall, a great haul! Here’s the list.

  • Langhorne Slim – When the Sun’s Gone Down
  • Langhorne Slim – Be Set Free
  • The Spinto Band – Moonwink
  • Jessica Lea Mayfield – Tell Me
  • Tiny Vipers – Life on Earth (LOVING this CD! It’s more mellow than a couch with a good book on a dark, stormy, rainy day. This CD makes Suzanne Vega look like a metal-head. Seriously that mellow.)
  • Smoosh – Free to Stay
  • Snowpony – The Sl0w-Motion World of Snowpony
  • Setting Sun – Fantasurreal
  • Mary Larson and Saint Low – Tricks for Dawn
  • Good for Cows – Audumla
  • Rahim – Ideal Lives
  • Norfolk & Western – The Unsung Colony
  • Holopaw  – Quit +/ or Fighting

I have Holopaw’s self-titled CD, so I was familiar with their stuff, but still good stuff. The Langhorne Slim material is a luck-out since I’m not familiar with his works but we’re seeing him with Samantha Crain. It’d help to know what he sings, right?

Snow Pony, Good for Cows and the Spinto Band are

Metallica Albums

/ / Opinion, rantings

Today at work, I had an interesting email debate with a buddy about which Metallica CD is the best. His argument is that Ride the Lightning is the best because Cliff Burton was at his best. That’s a good argument simply because he’s right; Cliff was at his best on that CD. He also mentioned that “One may be the best Metallica song ever, but that doesn’t make Justice the best album ever.” And again, he’s right there too. However, what does make … and Justice for All the best Metallica album of all time is the fact that they took it to the next level for Cliff. They knew what they had lost in him: he was not only an incredible bassist, but he was also a very large contributor to the music of the band. His loss was enormous on so many levels, and to the end, the remaining members (and of course Jason Newsted) knew they had to put out THE BEST music they ever had. And they did.

This is not to say that I don’t love everything about Puppets and Lightning—quite the opposite. I think they’re phenomenal works in their own rights. One of the reasons I think that “Justice” is their best is because for as great as Masters and Lightning are, they poured a TON more energy and anger into Justice because of Burton’s death. They had a lot of reason to be angry, and that album is pure rage, whereas on Puppets you have songs like “The Thing that Should Not Be” which is supposedly about Cthulu, and “Battery,” which for all its energy, isn’t all that angry of a song. With Justice, every single song has a focus of the rage: “Blackened” about destroying the earth; “Dyers Eve” about James’ confusion and loathing of trying to cope with what his parents taught him vs. his real-world experiences; “Harvester of Sorrow” about child abuse; “Frayed Ends of Sanity” dealing mental anguish; “Shortest Straw” dealing with social injustice; and of course “One”—the quintessential anti-war anthem and raging against the personal fall-out of war. That album has a focus like none of their other CDs, and it never gets boring. I can listen to that on repeat pretty much all day, whereas with Puppets or Lightning, I’ll flip to something else after a couple of spins through.

I’m not sure how we ended up on that topic today, but I’m glad we did. I listened to those three today. Good stuff.

Music by which to Chill Excessively

/ / Opinion, rantings

There are two artists that I turn to when I *really* need to mellow in an extreme manner: Anael and Enya. Both of these two have incredibly penetrating, haunting voices that really smooth out any rough spots to any given day. I swear, they perfectly hit that “resonance frequency” that puts me in tune with their sound, and I calm down almost immediately. Or if I’m already semi-calm, I hit a zen-like state and couldn’t care less about the outside world.

I find this to be extremely helpful when I’m at work and the stress hits a particular level. New job, wanting to make a good impression, sometimes feeling like I fall short … their music in particular puts me at ease and actually helps me focus better and get more accomplished!

The odd thing is that I used to listen to stuff like Tool, System of a Down, or Metallica at work to “calm down.” And yah–I could work with that playing in the background, but lately … no. Before any of y’all jump to the inevitable “old man” conclusion, let me just say that I can hold serve with Serj and Maynard on any of their full-on screams. “Streamline” by SOAD, “Eulogy” from Tool … I can nail ’em both no problem. So no, it’s not a matter of “wimping out.” That music has its place, like when I’m in the car heading to or from work, at home doing housework, shower, etc. But for being at work and needing to stay mellow and on-task, I go for the mellow stuff. Enya and Anael are far and away the queens of relaxation.

Happy National Record Store Day

/ / Opinion, rantings

I wish I had thought to post this earlier in the day. Today is National Record Store day. Tragically, I didn’t even make it out of the house. However, in honor of the day, I have been listening to some great music on and off all day. All of the music I listened to was purchased at Graywhale, our best local record store by a long shot. Here are some my favorite CDs purchased from them so far:

  • Underwater Cinematographers
  • Danielle Howle and the Tantrums – Do a Two Sable
  • Nina Nastasia – The Blackened Air
  • The Early November – For All of This
  • The Apples in Stereo – Pretty much everything of theirs
  • Orenda Fink – Invisible Ones
  • Scout Niblett – This Fool Can Die Now
  • The Raveonettes – Whip It Up
  • The Caribbean – Plastic Explosives
  • 1090 Club – Shipwrecked
  • Land of Talk – Applause Cheer Boo Hiss
  • Samantha Crain – Songs in the Night
  • Alela Diane – To Be Still
  • Death by Chocolate – Death by Chocolate
  • The Dears – Gang of Losers
  • Beep Beep – Business Casual
  • Beak – Beak>
  • Plasticines – LP1

Independent music stores are definitely the way to go. I can’t stand places like FYE or whatever because they’re ridiculously expensive AND they’re practically useless when it comes to asking questions. My boys Kyle and Jon at the U of U Graywhale know their music inside and out in just about every genre. It’s great talking with them and picking their brains for new music. You just don’t get that at national chain music stores. “Hey, I’m looking for the latest CD by Beth Orton. Do you have it?”

“Uhhhhhh …. whuuuuuu … buuuuuuuh ….”

“Right. Thanks. Tell ya what: I’ll bring you a bottle of formula if you can just tell me if you have it.”

“da ba ma ma ma ma baaaaaaaa ……”

*smack*

At least that’s been my experience with those kinds of stores. Not at Graywhale. They know what they’re talking about!

Support your local music shops! They’re where the real action is.

 

Fun Music Site

/ / Opinion, rantings, software

Okay, this is cool. Check out this site. Isn’t this FUN?! If you know enough about music theory and time signatures, you can have a lot of fun with this little site. I love it. If there were an “export to mp3” button, i’d seriously be in lurve. Good enough that there are progs out there that will record sound from the desktop.

Sorry that’s all I have for today. It’s been a rough, rough day, and I’m “flying solo” cuz my wife went to a conference with a friend. Watching after our two kids is tiring. So much so that I’m going to go to bed now. 🙂

CD Review: Azam Ali – From Night to the Edge of Day

/ / New Music, Opinion, review

About four years ago, a co-worker asked me if I had borrowed her Vas CD In the Garden of Souls. I had never even heard of Vas at the time, so no–I hadn’t borrowed it. Being curious, I hopped on Amazon and picked up a copy. Once it shipped, I listened to it a few times, then as a gift turned it over to my co-worker.

After a few days, I found myself *really* wanting to listen to it again. She let me borrow it for a few days, during which I became absolutely enamored with Azam Ali’s voice and style. Then I started doing my homework …

I know I’ve mentioned this in other posts, but for the love of all that is holy, that chick is PROLIFIC. Not only did she have 3 other CDs with Vas, but she had a CD with her side project Niyaz, 2 solo CDs, and a bunch of collaboration projects, one of which was a single with Serj Tankian of SOAD and Buckethead. GREAT song.

That was an expensive Amazon day. I bought everything she had that I could find in one fell swoop. Over the years, I’ve kept tabs to see what else she had going on. She released a new CD with Niyaz a few years ago. Then her website started hinting at a new solo CD.

That CD was released today. From Night to the Edge of Day is a compilation of her takes on various children’s lullabies from her native Iran. 10 tracks of not understanding a single word she sings, but feeling every neuron respond to the pure musical magic of her incantations.

Some of her music is incredibly energetic, though in a subdued, refined way. I point to Elysium for the Brave for a few tracks, such as “Endless Reverie,” “Abode,” and “Forty One Ways.” There’s an energy to these that’s so … different. Not the “I can get up and dance to this!” kind of energy. No … this energy is different, and I just figured out what it is: it reminds me of the “energy” that Sarah Fimm creates in her music–one of a very strong … “amorous” energy. Yah–that’s it.

However, that energy is nowhere on this new CD. Like I said, it’s a collection of re-invented children’s’ lullabies, and every track does its intended job. There is a dreaminess and trance-inducing quality to these songs that is only hinted at on her other works.

Stand-out tracks:

“Tenderness” is absolutely ethereal. There is a I could listen to this one track on repeat pretty much all day. The deep, almost rumbling sounds of what may be a synth, layered with her breathy, luring vocals, mixed with various sounds, slowly mixing in another layer of synth a couple of octaves above the bass synth … it’s just an incredibly relaxing track.

“Neni Desem” starts similarly, but then a string instrument sounding suspiciously like a dulcimer kicks in. Gah … I wish I had the liner notes with me for this. This is a much more stripped down song than “Tenderness.” It really is just the keyboard synth, some string instruments, and her layered vocals that mesmerize and hypnotize.

“Dandini” uses percussion to keep the flow of the song moving, though I’m sure it would sound just as incredible without. This track is similar to “In the Garden of Souls” in that you can hear similar percussion, used in a similarly slow, burning, yearning way.

If this becomes your first Azam Ali purchase, may I congratulate you for taking your first steps into a larger, more musically mature world. Unless you are fluent in Farsi or native Iranian dialects, odds are you won’t understand a word on this CD. that will have literally zero impact on your ability to flat-out enjoy this new offering.

Feel free to file this under “shiver” because this is almost guaranteed to give you goose bumps.

Review: Alela Diane – Alela Diane & Wild Divine

/ / New Music, Opinion, rantings, review

FINALLY made it back to Graywhale on Thursday. As I was upstairs scanning the indie CDs, this familiar voice drifted over the in-house stereo. Of course, just like any store, when you want help, it’s never around. I patiently waited until someone came back upstairs, which surprisingly took about half an hour. Upon his return, I asked, “Hey, so … a while ago, you had a CD playing that sounded  a lot like Alela Diane. Could you find out who that was?”

Well, ha ha. Guess who just released her newest CD on Tuesday. Guess who bought that very same CD. Guess who’s listening to it right now.

This is the 3rd pass through this new marvel of hers. It gets better and better with each listen. That is by no means to indicate or imply that the first listen was by any means boring; I do not buy boring music. I do take risks from time to time and buy the occasional CD on a hunch, whim, or for no reason at all other than I simply want to buy one. This CD was none of those. Having owned To Be Still for well over a year and The Pirate’s Gospel for just about a year, I was positive that her new CD would be no let-down. As almost always, I was right.

The immediate difference I noticed on this CD is the fact that percussion plays a *much* larger role than on her previous two CDs. about 80% of the tracks on her new CD use drums, as compared to To Be Still, where drums appear on maybe 25-30% of her tracks. It’s a different sound, but it is definitely and uniquely HER. There is just no mistaking that voice. Much like Joana Newsom or Samantha Crain, or Geoff Tate, Geddy Lee … all of whom have incredibly distinctive voices, Alela’s voice shines through as a uniquely polished gem that leaves me begging for more.

Having said all that, the other thing I noticed even while standing around Graywhale was that her voice has grown stronger. Or maybe she’s just using it in a stronger manner. Either way, she has risen to new heights with this new offering.

I love her writing style. Her songs explore her thoughts, feelings and experiences, and she tells them through not just the words, but also through her vocals and how she uses her voice. You can feel the emotion and feeling in how she presents her music. She bares her soul, and you get to live her music–not just hear it.

This is one of those CDs where I have a difficult time picking out stand-out tracks because ALL of them are amazing and beautiful. I can pinpoint “Elijah” as the story-telling track about a woman she meets in France. I love “The Wind” for its incredible ability to relax me even more than the CD does on its own. There’s kind of a Margarita-ville feel to it in that it’s just so … breezy? I can imagine listening to this while sitting on the deck of a boat and staring out at the setting sun off the coast of some place like Pensacola Florida. I dunno. It’s just that easy-going. Love it.

So here’s what you do: find this CD as soon as possible. Amazon has it, as does iTunes. Pick up this new CD, and if you don’t have her other material, pick it up too cuz it’s all awesome.

 

New Death Cab for Cutie Single

/ / New Music, Opinion, rantings

Their new website owns. I love the Red Laser barcode thing, even though all it does is pull up a page that says “Tune In to Death Cab for Cutie’s ‘You Are A Tourist” Video Event, which was today at 5. YouTube has the new video though!

I’m digging the new song. Truthfully, it sounds similar to their older material, though this is definitively more upbeat musically. The CD comes out May 31st and is entitled Codes and Keys. I’m going out on a limb here (not really), but I’m betting this CD is amazing. Name one piece of music that Ben Gibbard has been involved with that’s sucked. Can’t do it, can ya? The man is amazing. Look at his projects:

  • Death Cab
  • Postal Service
  • All-Time Quarterback

    • These are not light-weight projects (though Postal Service will probably never see a 2nd CD …). Anyway, looks like we have some DCFC happiness on the horizon!

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