I keep buying music I used to have (or trying to buy music I used to have only to discover it’s out of print or so obscure it’s never even made it to CD – but that’s another post) and feeding it t0 my iPod.
This album, Healing, I bought originally in high school. I used to live with my dad in Gresham, Oregon, and there was this room built inside his two-car garage out of 2x4s and plywood. That was my room. No windows. Dark as a tomb. I let my friends put graffiti on the walls with my extensive permanent marker collection. When I put an album on the stereo and turned out the lights, it was like being in one of those sensory deprivation tanks they have in Altered States. (Remember that movie? I fucking love that movie.)
The B side of this album (Healing I, II, and III) was really fun to listen to in the absolute darkness of my teenaged sanctuary. It’s like a guided meditation. I usually fell asleep listening to it. It’s really cool.
Mostly I re-purchased this album, though, for the track Shine. I love this track and decided yesterday I absolutely had to hear it. (Thank God for Amazon and 1-day shipping!) It’s your typical weird Todd track: exuberant, strangely engineered, wild, electronic, sweeping genius.
I like something positive once in awhile, too, and even though this track is a little more New Age-y than I’d typically like, it’s still an amazing and uplifiting performance. And the vocal during the outro is typical inspired Todd insanity.
Yes, I realize no one else will like it except other Todd-heads, and this matters to me not at all. Do leave your opinon in the comments, if you bother to listen to it.
Now, please excuse me while I go make a strawberry daquiri in my blender.
And this little ivy-growing-on-a-telephone-pole guy already knows it:
Not that I needed yet another IM application, but I downloaded Google Talk today anyway.
It’s adorable. If you have a gmail account, you can use it too. (It’s still in beta.) My gmail addy is mushmook@gmail.
If you need a gmail account, let me know, I’ve still got invites.
The only thing I’ve ever wanted my TiVo to record was the final episode of Six Feet Under.
It failed to record it.
It recorded every other episode this season with no problem, it just forgot the final freaking episode of the whole show.
Dumb thing.
Luckily, Shigeki put the episode up on his site and let me eat up his server space and bandwidth downloading all 716MB of it. Thank you so much, Shegeki!
Okay, it’s official. Google has a crush on me.
I added a gallery to my site last week (old pics of our 2004 trip to the Telluride Blues ‘n’ Brews fest). THREE DAYS LATER, I was third for the search string “Telluride Blues 2004.” Third!
That’s just crazy! Do you know how they do these search ranking algorhythms? Successful click-throughs! Links! Relevance! None of which my gallery has! Do you know what people pay for that kind of rankage?!?
Google is clearly in love with me. Which is fine, because I’m soooo in love with Google.
A guy in Support transferred a call to me, saying, “Angela was on hold for you regarding a personal matter?”
“Uh, okay,” I said. He clicked off and I said, “Thank you for holding, this is Michelle. May I help you?”
“Is this Michelle?”
“Yes.”
“Michelle Mook?”
Ah. I know that style. This is a collections call. “Yes. Now who are you, and what do you want?”
It was a woman from Capital One’s pre-legal department, calling to collect a debt.
Continue reading »
There was a meme going around in which you’d post ten MP3s that you were listening to a lot lately, regardless of genre. I was going to do it… two weeks ago.
List ten songs that you are currently digging … it doesn’t matter what genre they are from, whether they have words, or even if they’re no good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying right now. Post these instructions, the artists, and the ten songs in your blog. Then tag five other people to see what they’re listening to.
Here’s what I came up with tonight. In no particular order. This is just some what I’ve been spinnin’ lately. I’m not going to tag anyone ’cause I wasn’t tagged myself.
- Wait Til You See Him (De-Phazz Remix)
Ella Fitzgerald
Verve Remixed
JAZZ/AMBIENT – This track is just plain gorgeous. And the remix is lush, just like I like it. - Northstar Robert Fripp feat. Daryl Hall Exposure
ROCK – This track is off of Robert Fripp’s obscure and weird solo (i.e., non-King Crimson) album Exposure, which I used to own on vinyl. I love this chart for Fripp’s layered, textured guitar tracks and Hall’s killer vocal. Kinda reminds me of Abbey Road. - I Can’t Give You Anything But LoveElla Fitzgerald At Newport
JAZZ/SWING – Ella impersonates Pops. This is a stunning virtuoso jazz voice performance by a superlative artist at the absolute very very tip-top of her form. Plus it’s funny. - Skylark George Benson & the Basie Band Big Boss Band
BIG BAND/SWING – I love Skylark – it’s one of my favorite real book charts ever – and I love this rendition particularly because the horn arrangements are so incredibly lush. And the swing is so wide you could drive a truck through it. - Still In Love Ben Folds feat. William Shatner Fear of Pop: Vol. 1
POP – This song is for men everywhere who are sick of being shredded to pieces by psycho bitches from hell. It should be the masculinists’ anthem. Yes, Shatner’s on it, but he nails it. - Liar Todd Rundgren Liars
ROCK – In which TRi tells leaders of both sides of the conflict (the ones who send young men off to die) to go fuck themselves with a rusty wire brush. (‘And you send them to their deaths / with your every lying breath’.) - Drawing Curtains Buck 65 Secret House Against the World
RAP – This smooth, clever track is just plain sexy-dirty. I love it. Plus the French accent, OMG. - You’re Still a Young Man Tower of Power Live and in Living Color
JAZZ FUSION – Tower at its peak. Hot, hot, hot. Listen to those lip-splitting lead trumpet lines! This band swings like a BIG dog. - Pass The Peas Prince feat. Maceo Parker Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas
JAZZ FUNK – This track is off of the Live At The Aladdin Las Vegas DVD. This groove is so deep in the pocket it’s got lint up its nose. Go buy this DVD, I’m so serious. - Next Lifetime Erykah Badu Baduizm
R&B – I saw her perform this chart as a guest on Chappelle Show and had to have this album because I was intrigued by the depth of groove achieved with such restraint. Oh, and plus: her hair. It fascinates me.
I’ll upload and link to the actual MP3s tomorrow so you can check them out. I’ll also link to the albums so you can buy them. You should be able to play these files in iTunes or Winamp. If you have problems, change the extension from m4a to mp4.
(I just noticed that Skylark and You’re Still A Young Man are encoded. Also, I can’t find In Love on my external hard drive. I’ll add those links tomorrow.)
God, I miss coffee.
I love coffee. I used to drink a cup every morning. I love the smell of coffee, the ritual of making coffee, and the nice buzz I used to get from drinking it.
I don’t drink it any more, of course, because I now function in a state of constant ampedness due to having developed this stupid panic syndrome, but I still love coffee.
Walking into a coffee shop makes me faint with desire. Getting up on misty, cool mornings makes me long for a hot cup of something bitter and rich, with cream and sugar. Seeing a bottle of Bailey’s makes me wish I could still toss a shot of it into a hot cuppa joe.
Oh coffee, coffee, I still love you so! Don’t forget me!
“This is the new America. Our crazed sense of entitlement, our nearly rabid desire for easy access to mountains of bargain-basement junk has led to the upsurge of soulless big-box shops which has, in turn, led to a deadly sense of prefabricated, vacuous sameness wherever we go. And here’s the kicker: We think it’s good. We think it helps, brings jobs, tax money, affordable goods. We call it progress. We call it choice. It is the exact opposite.”
The San Francico Chronicle’s Mark Morford tells it like it is in Bring out yer dead — plague is already here.
Read it. And weep.
A gallery of Random Pics in which I learn to use my old Cannon Elph APS camera to take non-flash long exposures. Circa last winter.
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Instagram has become unusable crap, so please click the icon below to see my latest pics.
4 random books from my Library!
