- I've begun recording again, and I've found some suh-weet (and FREE!) limiter (it's the W1, for the recording-minded) and compressor plug-ins.
- No lie, I have lost 13 lbs. in 40 days on the sadistic slice of evil known as the Wii Fit. You'll lose weight, but you will never curse more at a piece of plastic, ever. Actually, in the balance-board's defense, it's that snide SOB digital trainer that'll really getcha.
- After finishing A Day In the Life of Ivan Denisovich, I'm starting Dostoyevsky's Notes From Underground. I don't know what it is about Russian literature... There's a certain plain-spokenness that never seems condescending, just factual. Even in Tolstoy's short stories, which in lesser hands could be simple moralizing, there is a... reality that I can readily identify with. I read The Picture of Dorian Gray, and it seems to me that Oscar Wilde (through the mouth of Lord Henry Wotton) really hammers home his almost nihilistic worship of beauty even as he presents the horrendous eternal consequence of Dorian's actions. It's came off (to my ears) as heavy-handed preaching. But maybe that says more about me than it does Oscar Wilde...
Wow. Didn't think that would happen...
- Big Star's only rival in the Most Underrated Rock Band of the Century debate is Cheap Trick. I would put #1 Record/Radio City up against the Trick's 1977 self-titled debut any day of the week. September Gurls is transcendental, while He's A Whore is the best song about a (metaphorical) gigolo you will ever hear in your life. Srsly.
- I made scones last night. Me = win.
So yea, there's a game tonight. I may feel motivated to expound on that later, I may not. But hey, at least Nuke Laloosh is on our side. (from Puck Daddy)
My, he looks happy.
3 comments:
A few responses;
- It is ungodly cold.
- You record? What kind of the Music?
- I see your point about the plain-spokenness in Russian literature. It's never moralistic or overcooked or pretentious. "Notes from Underground" is awfully good, and I heartily recommend any and all of Fyodor's longer novels, especially "The Idiot" and "The Devils/The Possessed."
- Picture of Dorian Gray isn't really the best representive of Oscar Wilde (one of my heroes and favorites). Not really the best book in my opinion. Try his crazy play "The Importance of Being Ernest" instead; it's ridiculous Lewis Carroll-esque nonsense poetry in Victorian drawing rooms and gardens.
Best of all, though, are Wilde's essays and dialogues. Try "The Soul of Man Under Socialism" and "The Decay of Lying." He makes his whole philosophy of beauty much clearer in those. And they're a delight to read.
- Big Star is indeed criminally underrated. One of the finest American bands ever, in my opinion.
- Scones rock.
Sorry, I know that's longer than most blog proprietors want.
Ooh, ooh, one more thing.
If you dig all this plain-spoken Russian business, you ought to check out Anton Chekhov's Stories. Beautiful stuff, and the ULTIMATE in non-moralistic.
And you also might want to check out the Odessa Stories by Isaac Babel, which center around the fellow in the design in my profile: violent but noble Jewish gangster and dandy Benya Krik. Babel is great, great stuff. Killed by Stalin.
Russian poetry is full of glories as well: Pushkin, Mandelstam, Ahkmatova, Pasternak, Brodsky, etc.
- I play pretty simplified american rock music. some country inflection, mostly straight-forward stuff. Dylan, Springsteen, Petty, with a slight 16 horsepower twist, I like to think.
- Read "The Idiot" and got most of the way through "Karamozov" before being interrupted. Dostoevsky is really intriguing to me as a person - the Eternal Conflict kind of stuff.
- I did "Ernest" in high school theater, but have yet to reread it now. I always like essays.
- the secret to scones is freezing the butter.
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