Music

Let’s Talk, Let’s Talk About Gold Lions

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Now that I have revealed where I download free MP3s, I figure I should highlight some more cool MP3s I’ve found lately.

First up, thanks to The Prettiest Pony (and today Big Stereo) is “Caller” by Codebreaker. I loved this track so much that I purchased their album What Is This Earth Love? this weekend from CD Baby.

Also, I have to digress and say that CD Baby is probably the cutest place I’ve ever purchased music from, ever. Look at how they write their emails:

This is just a happy automated email to let you know a real person will email you as soon as your package is sent, and you will also receive a paper receipt with your order in the mail.

and

CD Baby loves jason
Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow.

A team of 50 employees inspected your CD and polished it to make sure it was in the best possible condition before mailing.

Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over the crowd as he put your CD into the finest gold-lined box that money can buy.

We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party marched down the street to the post office where the entire town of Portland waved ‘Bon Voyage!’ to your package, on its way to you, in our private CD Baby jet on this day, Sunday, February 12th.

I hope you had a wonderful time shopping at CD Baby. We sure did. Your picture is on our wall as ‘Customer of the Year’. We’re all exhausted but can’t wait for you to come back to CDBABY.COM!!

How cute is that?!?!?! Seriously, it makes me want to order from them again (if for no other reason than to give the fine folks over there another party and march to the post office!!).

Next up in the downloads department are remixes of Coldplay’s song “Talk.” This song was my instant favorite when I got X&Y last summer. I love the way it samples Kraftwerk’s “Computer Love.” I read a review once that called it X&Y‘s version of “Clocks” (my favorite from Coldplay’s A Rush of Blood to the Head), which is totally accurate. Anyway, last week they released an iTunes-only Talk EP, featuring remixes by Thin White Duke, Junkie XL, and François Kevorkian. So far I’ve only picked up the Thin White Duke and Junkie XL remixes, and they are awesome.

The Thin White Duke remix definitely speeds the song up and makes it more club-friendly, but doesn’t feel as predictable as his other remixes are getting to me (now that I have somewhere around 15 or so). The Junkie XL remix is a remix for people who love the song so much they just want to hear it longer. The album version of “Talk” is 5:11 — Junkie XL expands it to 11:45. As I said, “Talk” has always been my favorite from X&Y, but these remixes have only made me love the song more. For whatever reason, the lyrics stand out more and the song has more meaning to me. I highly recommend paying the $2 and getting at least these two remixes.

Finally (and I’m saving the best for last), Salon.com’s Audiofile directed me over to Diplo’s Optimo remix of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ new single “Gold Lion.” This song totally rocks. I don’t know too much about Diplo, but that should change shortly. He’s worked a lot with M.I.A., I know, but that’s about it. And he’s remixed Beck’s “Go It Alone,” Gwen Stefani’s “Hollerback Girl,” and Kanye West’s “Golddigger.” I’ve always been impressed with remixes of Yeah Yeah Yeahs songs (iTunes has “Y Control” remixes for sale), mostly because they seem like one of those bands that is just un-remixable — so when someone does a good remix, it’s like a big accomplishment. For comparison, iTunes is also selling the album version of “Gold Lion.”

I know some of these aren’t free, but they are all worth it. And don’t forget that when you download music you like, it’s really much better to go ahead and actually purchase the music (like I did with Codebreaker) than give the RIAA reasons to go around and sue people. Especially when it goes to an independent seller like CD Baby.

Computers

Podcasts Are (Maybe?) Dead To Me

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Although I still have yet to see why podcasts are “the next big thing,” within the past few months I have regularly listened to four podcasts:

  1. The Majority Report (on Air America Radio)
  2. Pop Is Now King (PINK)
  3. The Official Lost Podcast
  4. The Transmission Enhanced Podcast (an unofficial Lost podcast)

This morning, I learned that two of the four podcasts I listen to are either ceasing to exist or charging for content.

The Majority Report (and other Air America podcasts, I assume) are now requiring a premium subscription in order to listen to the show. This one really discourages me. I’ve started listening to The Majority Report on my iPod before the whole podcasting craze happened. A day or so after an episode aired, I downloaded the entire mp3 (for free) from a website, the imported it into my iTunes library. The Majority Report was great to listen to at the gym — it was entertaining, kept me up on politics, and kept my mind from wandering too much while doing my workout. Alas — no more. I typically only listen to the first 45 minutes of the show, and I can hardly justify paying for just that.

On a sadder note, Jen and Ryan over at The Transmission, which I fell in love with after I started watching Lost, decided that they were going to give up the whole podcasting thing due to personal reasons. I totally understand where they are coming from, but it’s still too bad.

Although that does leave two podcasts left (if PINK were to go away [which I do sometimes worry about since I don’t think the guy pays to license the music], I would be totally devastated, since it’s inspired me to start doing my own DJ mixes), I wonder if this is a sign of things to come? Podcasts take a lot of time and resources, and would predict that the smaller, DIY podcasters are going to fade away while the larger podcasts start requiring a subscription. As iTunes and various other websites have proven, users are starting to warm up to the idea of paying for content on the Internet, and I bet podcasts will go the same way.

Seattle

PI Article on Seattle Transportation

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The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has a pretty thorough article on “alternative” (i.e. not just one-passenger cars) transportation in the Seattle area: “A drive toward fewer cars.”

I wouldn’t say that the article has anything terribly profound, but it was an interesting read, nonetheless, especially for someone like me who uses only non-car methods of transportation.

Highlights:

The Pike-Pine neighborhood also is interested in turning one of its side streets into what is known as a “living street,” similar to Pike Place, where there are no curbs, and cars and people mingle in the street. The city has resisted the idea, Levinger says.

… personally, I would love this. The Pike/Pine neighborhood (where I live) is very up-and-coming (I once heard someone refer to “Pike as the new Melrose” [or something ridiculous like that]).

Since then, the news has only gotten worse, says Victor Obeso, who is in charge of service planning for Metro [bus transit]. The recession kicked in and projections for added service hours are even lower. Instead of the 165,000 additional service hours projected for the six-year period, Metro now projects 99,000 hours — about a half a percent per year growth. And Seattle is entitled to only 20 percent of that increase.

… this is a drag. I love the busses and it’s unfortunate that they can’t get all the funding/growth needed. Damn that Tim Eyman! (“Metro’s budget was clobbered by Tim Eyman’s Initiative 695, a $30 car-tab initiative passed by voters in 1999.”)

Music

Destroy Rock & Roll

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Mylos Destroy Rock & Roll
In October 2005, I was searching for remixes of songs by Annie and came across the Mylo remix of “Chewing Gum” (despite the fact I was really looking for remixes of “Heartbeat”). I was so impressed with Mylo, however, I ended up doing some searches for his stuff on LimeWire and was pleasantly surprised.

(For the record — I ended up buying the “Heartbeat” single which included the Mylo remix of “Chewing Gum,” so I now own it legitimately. It’s a great single, and includes remixes by Röyksopp, Alan Braxe, the Phones, and others. But this post is about Mylo, not Annie, so I’ll continue…)

The first song I managed to get was the Tom Neville remix of Mylo’s “Destroy Rock & Roll.” I was totally blown away, and ended up getting the original version and the Headman dub version, as well. Then I found a Mylo remix of the Killers’ “Somebody Told Me.” Again, I thought to myself, “This Mylo guy rocks!”

Next I stumbled upon the Felix Da Housecat remix of “Drop the Pressure” and followed that with the Rex the Dog remix of the same song.

At that point, I figured enough was enough, and I needed to own some Mylo. Unfortunately, the album where all of these songs were taken from, Destroy Rock & Roll, hadn’t yet been released in the U.S. So Instead, I could only stock up on the singles: “Destroy Rock & Roll,” “Drop the Pressure,” “In My Arms,” and “Muscle Cars.” In addition to the remixes I mentioned above, I also got remixes by artists like Linus Loves (a new recent favorite thanks to The Prettiest Pony), Tiga, and Riton, Sander Kleinenberg, and Justus Köhncke (!!!), among others.

The good news is that Mylo’s full-length album Destroy Rock & Roll finally comes out in the U.S. today. I’m still not sure whether it will include bonus/extra tracks (when an album is released overseas far in advance before it arrives in the U.S., it typically includes bonus tracks so that people will buy it again or wait until it comes out), but I’m still planning on getting it tomorrow after work.

The intro to “Destroy Rock & Roll” is great. It’s a speech or something that sounds like it comes from the Tydings Committee:

All perversions of the third eye through distorted and exaggerated images, perverted movements of the body and breakdancing,
and other forms of dancing, and we especially call for the judgment in this hour and the destroying of rock music directed specifically against children through the videos that were portrayed, and working specifically through these individuals, for whom we call for the judgment of the sacred fire of this hour, before the throne of almighty god

Then the speaker goes on to list a bunch of rock and roll bands that are “evil”:

Michael Jackson, Prince, Bruce Springsteen, Tina Turner, David Bowie, Van Halen, Madonna, Huey Lewis & The News, The Cars, Herbie Hancock, Bonnie Tyler, Stevie Nicks, Men At Work, ZZ Top, Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson, Weird Al Yankovic, Cyndi Lauper, Pink Floyd, The Pretenders, Billy Joel, Billy Idol, Elton John, Neil Young, Sheena Easton, Patty Smith & Scandal, Fashion, Big Country, Morris Day & The Sign, John Lennon, REO Speed Wagon, David Gilhorn, The Rolling Stones, Pat Benatar, Hall & Oats,
Wham, Randy Jackson, Adam Ant, Bananarama, Christine Lavin, Queen, U2, Spheres, Fleetwood Mac, The Alan Parsons Project,
Bruce Springfield, The Thompson Twins, Missing Persons, Duran Duran, Breathe, Eurhythmics, Culture Club including Boy George, Band Aid, Relax …

I just love the who’s who of rock/pop bands that goes on and on until the song gets stuck in a loop of “Missing Persons, Duran Duran” for a while.

Despite the fact I haven’t listened to it, I think it’s safe to say that Destroy Rock & Roll is going to be a great album, and I’ll recommend it prematurely. If nothing else, checkout the remixes of Mylo’s songs and the remixes of other songs that Mylo has done (I’m still trying to get my hands on his remixes of Kylie Minogue’s “I Believe In You” and Scissor Sisters’ “Mary”).

Books, Movie Reviews

The Ice Storm

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The Ice Storm
I just finished watching Ang Lee‘s The Ice Storm and it reminded me of a lot of other family-oriented dramas — and it especially reminded me of plays from the 1950s.

I know it’s hardly profound, but I really like it in movies/plays/etc. traverse into the negative zone (as the movie calls it, borrowing from The Fantastic Four), where everything is sort of different and after the characters enter, everything changes. In The Ice Storm, about half-way through the movie there is (surprise, surprise) an ice storm during which pretty big events happen.

The setup is pretty common among literature. Like I said, it reminded me of 1950s plays such as “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” and “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” When I studied “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” in college (I wrote a paper titled “Searching for Reality: How Drugs, Self-Deception, and the Influence of Family Help Mary Tyrone Find Her ‘Self’ In ‘Long Day’s Journey Into Night'”), I remember my professor commenting on the fact that a major theme of 1950s American drama was family and drinking.

Ever since then, I’ve noticed that lots of literature includes a structure where somewhere around the middle (or Act II), there is either some sort of natural disaster and/or the characters become very intoxicated, and the truth comes out. More recent examples of this setup include Magnolia (raining frogs), Anniversary Party (ecstasy and a lost dog), and Judy Berlin (eclipse), and Short Cuts (earthquake). Likewise, I’ve noticed the theme in older works of literature. Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer’s Night Dream” comes immediately to mind — once the characters enter the woods, everything changes.

Despite the fact it’s a frequently used trope, I think it works. I think all of us can relate to those strange times or places in life when events compound on top of each other, and then some surreal bigger-than-life phenomenon takes place (or appears to), and for whatever reason, we gain some new insight into life and grow as a person.

Politics

Is Abortion Bad?

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Over on Slate, there was recently a debate between William Saletan and Katha Pollitt about whether abortion is “bad.”

I won’t do any sort of thorough analysis or dissect the argument, but I will say that William Saletan’s arguments about abortion continue to piss me off (despite the fact he’s pro-choice, he still has some moral hang-ups that irk me — he looks at the issue as the ends, not the means, which may be wise politically but I’m not sure it’s the best/only way of maintaining legalized abortion).

What the debate reminded me of, more than anything, is that I don’t necessarily think abortion is bad. It seems that most people who are pro-choice still think abortion is bad and make some sort of moral judgment about people who have them. Numerous times I’ve heard pro-choice people say, “I think it’s a woman’s right, but I wouldn’t personally have one.” What is missing is the next clause in the phrase, which probably goes something like, “Because I’m not one of those people” (or something less obvious and more concealed).

The way I see it, abortion should pretty much be considered a medical procedure like surgery. People don’t get all morally worked up over the removal of a tumor, and at the time of an abortion, whatever is inside the woman is basically similar to that. I know people consider this type of talk to be crass or whatever, but a tumor is an unwanted growth. Language-wise, they are the same thing.

Instead, though, we create this complicated and unnecessarily stressful drama around the idea of an abortion and imply that it should be a tough and grueling decision and that after the procedure the woman should feel sad for her loss and maybe throughout her life cry when she sees a baby and always have a lingering “what if” in the back of her head. A long time ago I read a great article on Salon about this “abortion narrative” (but I cannot find it now, unfortunately).

I hate the political atmosphere where pro-choicers are having to turn into anti-abortionists just to ensure that people have the right to decide what they want to with their bodies/lives. In the short term, we may maintain the necessary rights, but I fear what we sacrifice by continuing to moralize the situation and increasing the amount of guilt a woman feels with implicit language and assumptions. This is yet another case where I worry about the ends justifying the means.

Computers, Music

Where I Get Free MP3s

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I know I may be slow to the trend, but I’ve recently discovered the joy of mp3 blogs. Now, every day, I check two sites and load up on promotional songs and rare remixes. It’s been great.

My current favorite is The Prettiest Pony. From this blog, I’ve managed to get a whole bunch of really awesome remixes (from the likes of MSTRKRFT [the guys in Death From Above 1979], Thin White Duke/Jacques Lu Cont/Stuart Price, Linus Loves, and many others). I have no idea where this person gets the tracks, but they are great. I’ve discovered bands such as The Knife, Shit Robot, and Services. Some of my recent favorites from The Prettiest Pony are:

In addition to The Prettiest Pony, the other site I check daily is bigstereo. This site doesn’t have as many remixes, but it does have promo tracks by up-and-coming artists. I’ve learned about bands like The Tough Alliance and Infadels from bigstereo. Also, and this is what endeared the site to my heart, it posted the Simian Mobile Disco remix of The Go! Team’s “Ladyflash.” Though it didn’t give us the Kevin Shields remix (I’ll buy the single just for that), it’s cool to get an interesting sneak peak.

For Salon.com premium subscribers, there is also Audiofile, which provides a download-a-day as well. There is lots of great music here (and well worth the cost of a Salon subscription!) such as Cat Power, Death From Above 1979, the Eels, Belle & Sebestian, Animal Collective, etc. A lot of the stuff is from bands I haven’t heard of, so this is potentially a great place to discover new music. Also, not all of these mp3s are Audiofile exclusives, but it saves the time of searching the web. My “best find” here has been “Grass” by Animal Collective (since I still haven’t bought that album…). Salon’s favorites are at The Best Downloads of 2005.

Another place to find free MP3s, though not daily, is the Vice Records (Bloc Party, Annie, Death from Above 1979, The Streets) blog Up Your Jaxxy. According to the site, new songs will be posted every two months. I highly recommend checking out the first submission, Bloc Party’s “Two More Years” (MSTRKRFT remix). The song is already somewhat of a rarity (only available on a two-song single), so it’s cool to hear the remix.

And finally, if you are still hunting for MP3 by bands that haven’t released albums yet, My Space can be your friend. After hearing The Young Sportsmen on kexp a while ago, I’ve been trying to find their song “Under the Rocks and the Stars.” Lime Wire wasn’t helpful, nor was Amazon since they didn’t have an album out yet, but when I checked out the The Young Horsemen My Space profile, I was able to download songs from the My Space music player.

Hopefully these sites, and others I’m sure (comment with your recommendations!) will keep your iPods full and cravings for new music satisfied. I know they have helped me.

Music

Death From Above

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I am a huge fan of any remix by The DFA (which is basically LCD Soundsystem/James Murphy + Timothy Goldsworthy). I’ve managed to buy or download pretty much every remix they’ve done using LimeWire or other methods.

Hence, I was sort of excited, sort of disappointed to see the tracklisting of the DFA remix compilation, chapter one, due out in April:

  1. “Deceptacon” by Le Tigre (own the Le Tigre remix album — which includes two versions)
  2. “Mars, Arizona” by The Blues Explosion (downloaded)
  3. “The Boxer” by The Chemical Brothers (own the “The Boxer” single)
  4. “Another Excuse” by Soulwax (own the single)
  5. “Dance to the Underground” by Radio 4 (own the single)
  6. “Emerge” by Fischerspooner (downloaded, though I really should buy the single since I have every remix from it)
  7. “DARE” by Gorillaz (downloaded — and damn did it take a long time!! this is by far the gem is the album)
  8. “Orange Alert” by Metro Area (downloaded)
  9. “Just Like We (Breakdown)” by Hot Chip (own the supposedly “limited edition” CD single)

At least chapter two, which will supposedly come out in the summer, will include the Nine inch Nails “Hand that Feeds” remix from the “Only” single (one of my favorites) and Goldfrapp’s super-rare “Slide In” (which I have already downloaded, but oh well…).

Computers, News

Stock Market and Spam

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Has anyone else noticed that ever since the stock market hit 11,000 the other week the amount of spam has gone way up (esp. for things like “Rising Star Stocks” and “MicroCaps” and “Wall Street Insider” and “Penny Stocks”)? Either that, or Gmail‘s spam filtering algorithm has changed. Either way, it’s rather annoying.