I have been wanting to compile this list for a while, but laziness or forgetfullness have usually gotten in the way and left me with an unorganized jumble of musical greatness in my head. No more. I sat down today over a cup of coffee (and at my cubicle) and decided it was time to hunker down and get my top 10 albums decided upon because, well, I don't exactly know why. I like the thinking and internal debating that goes along with making a list like this. It was a struggle, no doubt. What makes a great album? Do 6 phenomenal songs and 6 mediocre songs equate to 12 good songs? Do you place more importance on the flow and consistency of the album as a whole or do you look for those high points? For this list, I tended to error on the side of including an album that lacked weak spots and was good from start to finish. I want albums that pass the "record player test." What is this test, you ask? Let me enlighten you.
When you listen to an album on a record player, you're forced to listen to every song straight through without pausing, rewinding, skipping ahead or putting anything on repeat. This, in my opinion, is how an album should be consumed and it is how most artists would have you listen to their music. There is a rhyme and a reason to song order and including a short instrumental song in between a couple more classic, four-minute songs. This should not be ignored. So...if an album passes the "record player test," then it is one you would want to play from the beginning, listen through to the last second of the last song and not want to skip anything along the way.
As I look at the following list, they all pass the record player test with flying colors. The honorable mentions below the top 10 were ones that I wanted badly to include, but just didn't feel like they were strong enough from start to finish.
Two other notes about this list. One, it is in alphabetical order because I think it's almost silly to try to distinguish between what is your #6 and #7 album. In reality they are both awesome if they're in your top ten and from one day to the next the order might fluctuate. Two, I didn't want to include more than one album from any artist (apologies to The National and Sufjan, who each had a second album under consideration). Without further ado:
Top 10 Albums
Bullet by Mat Kearney
Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga by Spoon
Gorilla Manor by The Local Natives
High Violet by The National
The Age of Adz by Sufjan Stevens
The Flying Club Cup by Beirut
The Head and the Heart by The Head and the Heart
The Midnight Organ Fight by Frightened Rabbit
The Suburbs by Arcade Fire
The Wild Hunt by The Tallest Man on Earth
(Honorable mentions: Alligator by The National, Come On Feel The Illinoise by Sufjan Stevens, Fleet Foxes by Fleet Foxes, Sigh No More by Mumford and Sons)
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Why Do People Blog?
I was having a conversation at lunch today with my friend, housemate, and potential blogger about why people blog. Tim said that in a conversation he had with someone recently, they trashed the idea of blogging. We didn't get into a lot of the reasoning behind why this guy hates blogs, but it got me thinking about the concept of blogging and why people do it, and why people read them.
In today's world, everyone has a chance to be heard, and a lot of people like to take advantage of this opportunity. People in their twenties, like myself, have been raised in a world in which twitter, facebook, blogs, and a 24/7 media cycle are an integral part of our daily lives. Newspapers are virtually obsolete because by the time the morning paper comes (if anyone actually still had newspapers delivered to them), we have already processed the news and read it from various media outlets on the internet, and have gauged the reactions of our friends on facebook and twitter.
We are used to a world in which, if people have an opinion on a certain topic, they can express it instantly through a variety of avenues. Ten or fifteen years ago, when a controversial issue arose, you would discuss it with your friends, your family, your co-workers or classmates over the course of a few days. Now? Write a blog post about it, pose a question on your facebook status, or tweet it. Then check back every 15 minutes to read others' comments. You can have the entire discussion with everyone in your social circle without actually seeing them face to face or having at least a phone conversation.
Steering back to the question of why people blog, I think part of it is because so many people do it, that we want to try our hand at it. It is so easy to set up and get people to read, why not give it a shot? After all, everyone and their mother are voicing their opinions online these days, aren't we worthy of being heard as well? I don't think it's so much "Hey, look at me, I have great things to say, this blog will change your entire perspective on blah blah blah," but rather "Hey, if this schmuck from my class or my office has a blog and people read it, why shouldn't I have one?"
I'm sure that is oversimplifying the reasons for blogging, and probably only applies to a portion of the bloggers out there, but I think it has some merit. I'm not really sure why I have this blog, expect for the fact that a few of my friends have one, and I think I'm just as capable as them of keeping an interesting blog. That's kind of a dumb reason, though, so if I can't come up with better motivation to keep this blog going, it might be over before it ever really began.
In today's world, everyone has a chance to be heard, and a lot of people like to take advantage of this opportunity. People in their twenties, like myself, have been raised in a world in which twitter, facebook, blogs, and a 24/7 media cycle are an integral part of our daily lives. Newspapers are virtually obsolete because by the time the morning paper comes (if anyone actually still had newspapers delivered to them), we have already processed the news and read it from various media outlets on the internet, and have gauged the reactions of our friends on facebook and twitter.
We are used to a world in which, if people have an opinion on a certain topic, they can express it instantly through a variety of avenues. Ten or fifteen years ago, when a controversial issue arose, you would discuss it with your friends, your family, your co-workers or classmates over the course of a few days. Now? Write a blog post about it, pose a question on your facebook status, or tweet it. Then check back every 15 minutes to read others' comments. You can have the entire discussion with everyone in your social circle without actually seeing them face to face or having at least a phone conversation.
Steering back to the question of why people blog, I think part of it is because so many people do it, that we want to try our hand at it. It is so easy to set up and get people to read, why not give it a shot? After all, everyone and their mother are voicing their opinions online these days, aren't we worthy of being heard as well? I don't think it's so much "Hey, look at me, I have great things to say, this blog will change your entire perspective on blah blah blah," but rather "Hey, if this schmuck from my class or my office has a blog and people read it, why shouldn't I have one?"
I'm sure that is oversimplifying the reasons for blogging, and probably only applies to a portion of the bloggers out there, but I think it has some merit. I'm not really sure why I have this blog, expect for the fact that a few of my friends have one, and I think I'm just as capable as them of keeping an interesting blog. That's kind of a dumb reason, though, so if I can't come up with better motivation to keep this blog going, it might be over before it ever really began.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
LWRS
I mentioned LWRS in my last post, and I wanted to expound a little upon what it was for those of you who were not in it with me. The acronym LWRS stands for "Leisure Writing and Reading Society." Does that name sound a little pretentious? Yes. Were the members of LWRS a little pretentious at times? Also yes. So it seemed to fit. Charles, Evan, Tyler and myself would meet once a week and we alternated discussing a great book that we were reading or share a piece of our writing. Usually this took the form of a short story, but we got into writing a little poetry, a short play, a random narrative, chapters of a potential novel, etc.
Everyone writes from time to time, I am pretty confident in that. And if you don't, you should. I know I have kept journals and written on certain topics in the past that I was very embarrassed to share with anybody. Then I got to talking to one of my friends, Joe, who is pursuing writing as a career. He would go to readings where he would read his works and I started to realize that it was okay to put yourself out there in your writing. What is the worst that could happen? Someone doesn't like it or think it's not worth anything, perhaps. Who really cares? How are we every going to know if we have a skill for something unless we put it out there for others to see. That was part of the motivation behind LWRS. I had been writing things for no one to read for a couple years, then I started to wonder if I was any good at it, or if it was just something I like to do. I have yet to answer that question, but I can say that it feels good to get more comfortable with people reading things that I have written and give me feedback. I now have a better idea of what works in my writing, and what doesn't.
I would encourage everyone who reads this (yes, all 3 of you) and enjoys writing to get together with a couple or a few friends and share some writing with each other. Once you get past the initial awkward stage (for our first meeting, we sat around for about a half hour chatting about nothing, looking nervous, and delaying the inevitable of the others reading our piece) then it is really rewarding and exciting.
You don't need a pretentious name for your group, or a name at all, but I think it might be more fun that way. I may post some of the things I wrote for the group on here or at least excerpts of some of the longer ones. That's all for now.
Everyone writes from time to time, I am pretty confident in that. And if you don't, you should. I know I have kept journals and written on certain topics in the past that I was very embarrassed to share with anybody. Then I got to talking to one of my friends, Joe, who is pursuing writing as a career. He would go to readings where he would read his works and I started to realize that it was okay to put yourself out there in your writing. What is the worst that could happen? Someone doesn't like it or think it's not worth anything, perhaps. Who really cares? How are we every going to know if we have a skill for something unless we put it out there for others to see. That was part of the motivation behind LWRS. I had been writing things for no one to read for a couple years, then I started to wonder if I was any good at it, or if it was just something I like to do. I have yet to answer that question, but I can say that it feels good to get more comfortable with people reading things that I have written and give me feedback. I now have a better idea of what works in my writing, and what doesn't.
I would encourage everyone who reads this (yes, all 3 of you) and enjoys writing to get together with a couple or a few friends and share some writing with each other. Once you get past the initial awkward stage (for our first meeting, we sat around for about a half hour chatting about nothing, looking nervous, and delaying the inevitable of the others reading our piece) then it is really rewarding and exciting.
You don't need a pretentious name for your group, or a name at all, but I think it might be more fun that way. I may post some of the things I wrote for the group on here or at least excerpts of some of the longer ones. That's all for now.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
A Typewriter and a Violin?
Hello friends. You might remember me from my previous blog (TO:Bilbao). Or maybe not. I think I had a total of 7 people read that, and I might have less this time around. But my goal here is not to boost my readership numbers, so I'm not worried about it. I'm not entirely sure what my goal is, actually, but here I am anyway.
First off, let me offer an explanation. The name for this blog is based on a lyric from The Felice's Brothers song "Love Me Tenderly." The song has the sound of some loony drunk banging on the piano at a saloon back in the wild wild west. There are glasses clanging and people talking in the background, and he sings a line about "a bottle of gin, a typewriter and a violin, wouldn't you like that?" Yes, yes I would very much like that. Here you will find a link to the song, in case you were curious:
Love Me Tenderly
Furthermore, two of my biggest interests are books and music, so it just seemed to work out pretty well. I've always wanted a typewriter so I could rattle off a bunch of nonsense but feel sophisticated and old school while doing it. But alas, here I am at a computer and on a blog. Oh the irony.
As for what will be the content of this blog, it is a fluid concept. I have a few ideas, but we'll see how it all turns out. I see it mainly as a place to rope in my thoughts and try to put them down in one coherent piece. I've enjoyed writing more and more over these last few years, but as LWRS faded into a memory (more on that in a later post), I found myself lacking a forum to write. Pretty much whatever I want the three or four people who will likely read this blog to check out, I will post it here.
I leave you now with a quote:
"There are those who are writers, and there are those who simply want to express themselves." -a guy named John (I think) who wore white tennis shoes, khaki pants, a blue blazer, and spoke this to my friends and I a couple of years back at an event for a college class.
Which one am I? Almost certainly the latter, but I'm attempting to increase the frequency with which I am the former.
First off, let me offer an explanation. The name for this blog is based on a lyric from The Felice's Brothers song "Love Me Tenderly." The song has the sound of some loony drunk banging on the piano at a saloon back in the wild wild west. There are glasses clanging and people talking in the background, and he sings a line about "a bottle of gin, a typewriter and a violin, wouldn't you like that?" Yes, yes I would very much like that. Here you will find a link to the song, in case you were curious:
Love Me Tenderly
Furthermore, two of my biggest interests are books and music, so it just seemed to work out pretty well. I've always wanted a typewriter so I could rattle off a bunch of nonsense but feel sophisticated and old school while doing it. But alas, here I am at a computer and on a blog. Oh the irony.
As for what will be the content of this blog, it is a fluid concept. I have a few ideas, but we'll see how it all turns out. I see it mainly as a place to rope in my thoughts and try to put them down in one coherent piece. I've enjoyed writing more and more over these last few years, but as LWRS faded into a memory (more on that in a later post), I found myself lacking a forum to write. Pretty much whatever I want the three or four people who will likely read this blog to check out, I will post it here.
I leave you now with a quote:
"There are those who are writers, and there are those who simply want to express themselves." -a guy named John (I think) who wore white tennis shoes, khaki pants, a blue blazer, and spoke this to my friends and I a couple of years back at an event for a college class.
Which one am I? Almost certainly the latter, but I'm attempting to increase the frequency with which I am the former.
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