Aimless Ideas: Musical Litter Box and...

I figure if I just pretend I'll do something, it'll eventually happen. Yet it's never the case, unless I end up losing interest. It's not really a active way of getting things done, but it's just a cycle that I can't break unless I need to.

Lately, there have been two things I've wanted to finish, or at least get a start on.

One of these is my strange and mundane solo music project thing, if you could call it that. Initially, I'll admit I began to start on it seriously when I was faced with an apathetic band ideal, sure my previous fling was one that was pretty fun and exciting, at the time there was nothing better to do than play in front of people and just think for a second, it was entertaining to them as it was to me in some way.

Obviously, things grew weary for the rest of my bandmates, and schedules, stress, and my stubborn way of saying "fuck it" when I realized I did everything and there was no appreciation, well it was bound to implode on itself. After that, I wrote all the ideas I would have shared and instead drew them out in sketches, soon after I got it all together and had a handful of songs.

But there's always something to halt production, my homemade 'studio' of sorts consists of a lone Rock Band microphone and a guitar stand, and it shows. If that wasn't enough, doing it all by yourself isn't exactly exciting, and I've seem to have fallen under a sore throat, and when you aren't the greatest vocalist, it makes it that much worse. This all together makes me long for the days when I could jam it out with the band and get it done in a day, instead of the average three songs a month thing I've been cranking out.

I want some interaction, a reaction of what is being played right there and then, and a sense of "hey we could add this, why not?" It's a weird brotherhood thing, the best kind of feeling, but maybe I took it too personally, I don't know.

I guess it's a sense of "I did this all myself, what have you done?" attitude that has stopped me from bringing up the idea of some sort of get-together after so long. But either way, I want to finish up this lo-fi broken music, perfect or not.

The second thing, well let's say the second thing is one that I'm unsure of how to approach. For a while, I've pondered if I treated this situation too casually, if I'm missing some big point of it all, or if I insist too much.

Maybe I daydream too much of what I would like to do, but then when I fall out of it, I realize it's just that, a daydream. Hopefully daydreams are some sort of indication of what can happen.

Slowly, yet surely is the saying.

I drag you down I use you up!

One of the many highlights of the NIN concert, seems fitting to lots of things.



Watch this in HQ and get blown away.

There is a place that still remains

Sincerely Amazing show.


Nine Inch Nails
01. Now I’m Nothing
02. Terrible Lie
03. 1,000,000
04. Heresy
05. March of the Pigs
06. Metal
07. Reptile
08. The Becoming
09. Survivalism
10. Mr. Self Destruct
11. The Fragile
12. Gone, Still
13. The Way Out Is Through
14. Wish
15. Echoplex
16. The Day The World Went Away
17. The Hand That Feeds
18. Head Like a Hole

Jane's Addiction
01. Three Days
02. Whores
03. Ain’t No Right
04. Pigs in Zen
05. Mountain Song
06. Had a Dad
07. Been Caught Stealing
08. Ted, Just Admit It
09. Ocean Size
10. Summertime Rolls
11. Stop
12. Jane Says

Aimless Ideas: The Great Nostalgia

At times, I guess everything seems so at peace, I start to disbelieve it and eventually ruin it by running around in circles about what I'm supposed to do next. I imagine it's a normal thing, but it's why things happen, usually exaggerations if you will.

So far, there is no direction to really run to, sure there's events, and some very nearby (tomorrow) but even after they pass I wonder where some of my thoughts will end up. "Will you say the right thing?", "How soon is eventually?", "What's the point of anything?", "Wasn't It Like this before?", "Probably should have taken advantage back then"

It's nothing new, nothing ever is, but at times the direction less method is one that often will grow tiring. At times, I look back and glance at the things I merely took for granted and often sulk a bit on the things I never got to say, and maybe will get to proclaim in the future, but regardless, it feels as though it would have been best to say back then.

Time travel is often a subject that flows in and out, but the standard "everything is fine now" way of thinking is one that prevents this from manifesting an obsession, but regardless its difficult for one to not fall into a state of pure what-if thinking and then slowly regretting everything ever done.

It's funny though, at times (maybe it's just me) I miss the thrill in being miserable about certain things, the kinds of things that made it worth to wake up in the morning and not give a shit about anything around you, but eventually these things wither away and you're left with a new environment.

This gave a sort of sense of privilege, at best though, we must look ahead, make the most of what is at hand, and use the knowledge gained now for later endeavors with past or completely new subjects.

Aimless Ideas: Anti-Bad

Since it seems to be occurring that easy writing is the new good, so be it.

Saturday was a strange day, hosted with a barely conscious sense of ideal, I awoke late but still had enough in me to get out of bed and take a quick shower. Picked up Mark on the way and went to Airsofting, once there I greeted everyone and was given a penis-shaped pancake. Pretty Good.

Afterwards, I accompanied Mark to a soccer game that was memorable in the surroundings, got together with Berlin and she bought us drinks. Later on, I challenged two young men at a duel in the basketball court with Mark as my right hand man, we lost terribly. Then I met Denielle's younger brother who looks like a total badass and what not.

Confusion ensued, but I remained calm and whatever. Mark and I waited on the street as Berlin was getting picked up, noticed we were standing around like pimps. Laughed about it, and headed to my house for a few drinks and TV watching. Thought about what the NIN concert will be like.

Once he left, I didn't do anything. Ever. Wrote some weird songs, and watched iCarly, Miranda Cosgrove is my favorite Nick person ever. Yeah.

Sunday began with my ongoing church complex, it's a love hate thing, and either way I feel like I'm being judged everytime I get up or sit down. After that I went to Sam's Club and saw Girl Scouts and had the most mundane feeling seeing their shitty car wash next to Office Depot. I went inside and saw an old man who seemed to hate his life for working there, I gave him my silent sympathy for his fate. I got out and walked back, got home and wrote some more songs.

That's about it.

Aimless Ideas: Yes it Is Obvious

Stop being a magnet, and goddamn this blister on my finger.

Track Review: Blur - No Distance Left To Run

A band like Blur probably has the musical elasticity of a rubber band, from their early shoegaze days, to the Britpop middle years, and then later experimentation that resulted with some of their finest work, it's hard to really pinpoint what sort of genre Blur is actually a part of. While this is all true, in 1999's 13, Blur would be in that latter experimental period of musical output, but while most of the album was a blend of many musical styles, the utterly somber swan song "No Distance Left To Run" was a conclusion to Damon Albarn's recent break up.

Armed with a quiet yet unsure guitar line by the ever brilliant Graham Coxon, and a sparse arrangement of drums and bass with some quiet backing vocals, Albarn bares all of his soul in the direct and simple lines "It's over/You don't need to tell me/I hope you're with someone who makes you/feel safe in your sleeping tonight/I won't kill myself, trying to stay in your life/I got no distance left to run".

Although Blur alienated alot of their fans with abrasive music at the time, they still knew how to capture the strongest emotions in simple arrangements.

Blur - No Distance Left To Run

Aimless Ideas: Blant Exception

When you get traditional reasons for doing things, instead of the fabricated bullshit that people love to spew out of their filthy mouths, you get this sense of respect in a person, and it's refreshing in areas of the sort. Unfortunately, it's most of the time always the latter, maybe I'm too old-fashioned.

Regardless, when an exception comes along, whether good or bad, its as if the value of said exception is increased ten-fold.

Aimless Ideas: Dragging a Dead Horse Up a Hill

I have come to accept that one of the greatest curiosities that ever enter a person's mind is what exactly is entering another's. Although this is not new, I can only imagine if there's anyone who ever actually dedicates so much time to it that they hit insanity.

But this does seem to fit human nature in some form, it comes as common knowledge that at times, we might have some sort of preference to an object that isn't on the same level of interest to others. And in the process of trying to see if there are any other people who enjoy the same things, you will possibly get denied and depending on your sensitivity and magnitude of importance, crushed.

This would make anyone want to know if they have similar interests without actually risking to be rejected, of course this also seems to have an effect of not even daring to put out any sort of indication of common ideals and never knowing if they were there or not in the first place.
So it remains as; Is it worth the risk to find out if there are common ideas with other people regardless of the possibility of rejection?

For me, you might as well because the worst that can happen is often exaggerated to the fullest extent.

On a side note, ever hear something you swore you said before, is plagiarism really the greatest compliment?

Track Review: Interpol - Specialist

This outtake track off of 2002's Turn On the Bright Lights is for lack of a better term, an underrated gem among many who often overlook Interpol's deeper cuts and head straight for the singles. (looking at you "No I In Threesome") Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, by far Interpol has some fine singles, but the overlooked tracks often show a side of the band that isn't discovered much too often.

"Specialist", clocking in at 6:40 is a showcase of some of the band's finest attributes, the bass growls lowly in a catchy and cool tone, while Paul Banks lowly sings "You make me lose my buttons, oh yeah you make me spit/I don't like my clothes anymore" as if just disgusted with a constricting lover, and then the sparse guitar kicks in. Now you are hooked. The song builds up as the drums kick in a tight groove that merit one of the band's finest rhythm sections, slowly and surely the song starts to lift off as Banks howls "well I am speckled like a leopard/just like a leopard/trust will get you down/I love the way/you put me in the big house."

Throughout, the song drifts in and out of slowly speeding up and quickly slowing down as if the controlled paranoia would burst. Thankfully, Interpol knows its dramatic dynamics well enough to control and maintain a listener's interest through the whole song. If a song ever needed a modern take on unstable lovers and uneasy decisions, Interpol knew how to do it.

Interpol - Specialist (Live at Koln)

Track Review: Sunset Rubdown - The Taming of The Hands That Came Back to Life

Sunset Rubdown has always had a sort of quasi-mystical, distant feeling in their music. Since they released Shut Up I Am Dreaming back in 2006, this was prevalent in almost all the songs. But there's something in 2007's Random Spirit Lover's track "The Taming of the Hands that Came Back to Life" that recalls time periods of the past that swell under Spencer Krug's voice.

The song's narrative that drifts in and out from a vague conversation to metaphors that will travel in your mind bit by bit, all while Krug's lyrical foreplay will have you guessing at whether he's reminiscing on a friend's wise words "She said: My sails are flapping in the wind/ I said: Can I use that in a song?/She said: I mean, The end begins/I said: I know, can I use that too?" or a repressed paranoia "Don't get too close; you reflect the west coast air in my chest and the way I hold it in there."

Either way you take in the lyrics, from the ascending keyboard and guitar riff, the hooray-the-king-is-here chanting, and crooning vocals, "The Taming of the Hands That Came Back to Life" is a pristine example of Sunset Rubdown's mature and mythical song craftsmanship.

Sunset Rubdown - The Taming of The Hands That Came Back to Life

Aimless Ideas: The Pilot

Well first entry of this new series, where I'll just spill thoughts out like a cracked and old watering can.

One thing that's been on my mind lately, which was brought up recently in some murmuring conversation that I can't pinpoint or don't want to, was the idea of permanence.

Honestly, how permanent is permanence? Is the feeling of being in a certain area at a certain time so fascinating that it seems to creep up at various points in the day? It certainly doesn't happen while any event is happening but when I look back it always gets confined in one way or another in some lost cube of images.

Whether this is just the puzzling first chapter in this series or just the beacon of what is to come is beyond me.

Track Review: Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks

Not to follow the hype of every single indie hispter who just happened to fall for Grizzly Bear's latest single from their forthcoming album Veckatimest, I at first tried to dissuade myself from being the same. But once I got past my own bias, I realized that sometimes a catchy and infectious song can be a good one.

Although this is no new feat, and neither is "Two Weeks", it captures everything that is needed in smart pop song songwriting, from Ed Droste's simple yearning vocals, the simply old time-y keyboard riff, groove tight drums, and "Oh ah oh ah woah-oh" backing harmony vocals, what Grizzly Bear have accomplished is a pop song that still falls in their usual style of making experimental folk songs, but is completely different in approach.

Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks (Live at Letterman)

Redemption? Maybe.

It's been a long while, and not the normal kind that would be expected of. Since this used to be a album review blog (that no one read), I guess I'll try to revive it and bring it back for the same reason, and possibly talk about more off-hand topics in life and all.

Next up:

Track Review: Grizzly Bear - Cheerleader and Grizzly Bear -Two Weeks.