Archive for the 'recorded music' Category

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12
Apr
07

Tax Rap

By Colin 1 Comment
Categories: contests, recorded music and video

I saw this in the Boston Metro (a free newspaper distributed at public transit stations). TurboTax is sponsoring a competition where people rap about taxes and using TurboTax. The contest is “hosted” by Vanilla Ice and involves a $25,000 prize for the winner. Anyway, I took a look at some of the submissions and some of them are painful to watch. However, there are some that are really good. In the Metro article, they recommended “Keep Your Refund FATTER” by 401Cakes & Samuel L. Taxin’. I think it’s really good, so take a look:

If you want to peruse all the entries, look here. If you want to see the contest home page, check here. Some of the stuff is really good, but don’t be surprised if you find something that is both embarrassing and painful to watch. You’ve been warned.

27
Feb
07

Connections between music and place

By Colin 3 Comments
Categories: recorded music

The other day Heather and I were watching TV and a PBS promotional ad came on.  The music in the background was “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness” from the Smashing Pumpkins’ similarly titled 1995 double album.  I haven’t listened to this album in a long time and hearing it again made me remember my history with it, which is intimately tied to geographical location.

During high school, my indie purism prevented me from my buying any of their albums – they were just too mainstream.  However, during my year in Germany after college, I bought this album at a used record store in Cologne just before I moved from Cologne to Wilhelmshaven.  I listened to this CD a lot when I lived in Wilhelmshaven.  Because I listened to the album so much while living there, any time I hear it, it brings to mind images of the place.  Vertigo by Jump, Little Children is another album that is linked in my mind to Wilhelmshaven.  My friend Jeff sent it to me for my birthday just after I had moved there and I listened to it all the time – particularly while I was on the bus or train.  So, whenever I hear that album, it conjures up images of bus and train travel through northern Germany.

I have a similar connection between the Pixies’ Come on Pilgrim and a driving trip through England that my family took in the 90′s.  Now, whenever I hear songs from that album, I remember getting out of our car at Stonehenge and driving down the left side of the road through the English countryside.

It’s funny how our brains make these sorts of connections.  Does anyone else have these sorts of connections?

08
Feb
07

Say “Yes” to Mike Schmid

By Colin Leave a Comment
Categories: purchases and recorded music

To echo a recent post by my esteemed blogging colleague Pat Bird of the famed Urban Saddle, I thought I, too, would sing the praises of an album that I recently downloaded from eMusic.

My friend Jeff Miller, an excellent musician himself, introduced me to Mike Schmid while they were both students at Boston’s Berklee College of Music. I got a copy of a demo CD from Jeff and subsequently bought Mike’s debut album. A few years passed and I lost track of Mike, who had ostensibly taken a hiatus from recording. Anyway, not so long ago he came out with a new album titled “The High Cost of Living (A Love Story)”. I’ve listened to it quite a number of times now and I really like it. The album is full of great melodies and clever, thoughtful lyrics. It’s a little more on the electronica/trip-hop side of the rock and roll spectrum than most of the stuff I have, but the songwriting is excellent and the instrumentation works well with the songs. There are a number of really excellent songs on the CD and all the tracks are solid.

Anyway, if you’re an eMusic subscriber and you’re trying to figure out what to get this month, you owe it to yourself to check him out. If you’re not a eMusic subscriber, you can get his latest album at CDBaby. I know he would appreciate your support because in November, while he was on a tour through the southern US, his tour van and trailer caught fire and everything was destroyed – instruments, clothes, money, everything.

11
Jan
07

1 X Bad News; 2 X Good News

By Colin 3 Comments
Categories: cars, Pittsburgh, purchases, recorded music and weather

First, the bad news:

  • It is now officially cold in Boston. The warm weather was nice while it lasted

Next, the good news:

  1. I got a pleasant surprise recently when I logged into my eMusic account. After a few months on the eMusic Lite plan ($5/month for 20 songs) my subscription automatically upgraded to the Basic plan. Since the new pricing structure is in effect, I expected that it would only get me 30 songs. However, I was wrong. My account page says I have 40 songs to download. So, evidently, the fact that I remained a member with a subscription that was going to automatically upgrade to the Basic plan locked me into the old, better rate. That was a pleasant surprise.
  2. I got an envelope from some LA law consultants the other day concerning the bankruptcy proceedings for the now-defunct Independence Air. Normally, getting a large envelope from a law firm wouldn’t be a good thing, but in this case it was. My wife and I had bought two tickets for impromptu travel back to Boston after our car was written off during a trip back to Pittsburgh in the Fall of 2005. However, we ultimately decided not to use the tickets; we bought a car in Pittsburgh and drove it back to Boston instead. We couldn’t get a refund on our tickets but we did get flight credits with Indepedence Air worth over $300. When they went out of business, I figured our money was gone. However, this was an erroneous assumption. It turns out that we’ll be getting some of that money back as part of the airline’s bankruptcy proceedings. Unfortunately, we can only get back money that was for personal travel and since my trip was for business I can’t get a refund for my ticket. However, we can claim for Heather’s ticket, so we’ll be getting more than $150 back! That said, since these legal proceedings have a tendency to drag on and on, we might not actually get this money until after we retire.
30
Nov
06

Most Annoying Christmas Song Ever?

By Colin 7 Comments
Categories: holidays and recorded music

I’ve been listening to Songs for Christmas by Sufjan Stevens lately and there are lots of good songs on this collection.  There are even a few great songs.  However, there is one song that I cannot stand: “The Little Drummer Boy”.  It’s not that Stevens does a bad job with the song.  It’s just that the song is terrible in its very nature.  I have not ever heard a good version of this song.  The song is so repetitive and gimmicky that I think it would be impossible to record a good version of this song without completely changing it.  I submit this as my candidate for the Most Annoying Christmas Song Ever (MACSE).  Does anyone have any other candidates for this dubious distinction?  Let me know.

25
Nov
06

In search of good Christmas music

By Colin 4 Comments
Categories: Christianity, holidays, purchases and recorded music

Now that Thanksgiving has come and gone, many families will be putting up Christmas decorations and getting out their collection of Christmas music, which they will play non-stop between now and Christmas. Unfortunately, much of the Christmas music that is played in people’s homes is pretty bad. However, I do have some good Christmas music, so I thought that I would let you know what it is. Plus, I’m soliciting Christmas music recommendations from my readership.
Continue reading ‘In search of good Christmas music’

17
Nov
06

Be Still Please

By Colin Leave a Comment
Categories: purchases and recorded music

When I was in high school, I was really into the North Carolina (read: Chapel Hill) indie rock music scene.  In fact, for a while I seriously considered going to UNC for college just so I could see lots of good concerts.  During my infatuation with the Chapel Hill scene I was really into Superchunk and a side project of the lead singer of Superchunk, Mac McCaughan.  His project, Portastatic, was sort of an outlet for slower, more introspective songs that didn’t fit the mid-’90s Superchunk mold.  After his 1997 album The Nature of Sap, I lost track of Portastatic and we went our separate ways.  I traded my indie rock for book learnin’ and hours listening to music for hours studying in the library.

Fast forward 9 years.

Two months ago, in a hurried attempt to use all my eMusic downloads before they expired, I downloaded Portastatic’s 2005 release Bright Ideas, which, it turns out, is pretty good.  With my renewed interest in Portastatic, the following month I downloaded the newly released Be Still Please, which is an outstanding record.  I have been listening to it a lot today and I love it.  I think its appeal extends beyond the devotedly indie, to people who were brought up on straight-ahead rock.  I think it’s just a very solid album, with something to offer every type of music fan.  You should check it out, even if my pastor didn’t mention it by name in his sermon last week.

16
Nov
06

Sordid Sentinels

By Colin 2 Comments
Categories: purchases and recorded music

I got an email today from eMusic about some albums they just added to their catalog. One of the new titles is Pavement‘s Wowee Zowee: Sordid Sentinels Edition. The appearance of this CD was news to me. I’m not surprised by it, since Matador released anniversary editions of Slanted and Enchanted (:Luxe and Redux) and Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (:L.A.’s Desert Origins), but I hadn’t been aware that one was in the works.

Basically, these anniversary editions consist of the original album plus a bunch of extra material from the period during which the CD was written and recorded. This can involve B-sides from singles, Peel sessions, songs from obscure compilations, and, of course, some live tracks. On average, these anniversary editions contain about 35 songs in addition to the original album, which is generally in the vicinity of 15 songs. Finally, in addition to offering many previously unreleased or rare tracks, these CDs are priced for the miserly among us – the new album can be had from Amazon for a mere $13, though if you head to your local Borders, you might end up having to pay the $19 list price.

If you’re still not sure and feel you need a little further motivation to buy this CD, you might be interested to know that the pastor of my church used the phrase “Wowee Zowee” from the pulpit in last Sunday’s sermon. You may interpret this as you see fit.

01
Nov
06

Act Now! Before it’s too late!

By Colin 1 Comment
Categories: purchases and recorded music

I have posted before about how eMusic is a great place to get music from non-major labels. They have music from many popular indie labels like Matador and Merge and they have a lot of other music on more obscure jazz and folk labels. They’re also always adding new stuff – recently they added some of the enormous Smithsonian Folkways Recordings catalog. Not only can you find tons of great stuff on eMusic, it’s cheap. However, I got an email recently informing me that they are changing their pricing structure on November 21st. Before Nov. 21st, their prices are as follow:

eMusic Basic: 40 songs/month for $10.00 ($0.25 per song)
eMusic Plus: 65 songs/month for $15.00 ($0.23 per song)
eMusic Premium: 90 songs/month for $20.00 ($0.22 per song)

However, after Nov. 1st, the pricing structure will be as follows:

eMusic Basic: 30 songs/month for $10.00 ($0.33 per song)
eMusic Plus: 50 songs/month for $15.00 ($0.30 per song)
eMusic Premium: 75 songs/month for $20.00 ($0.267 per song)

Even after the new pricing structure kicks in, eMusic will still be MUCH cheaper than all the other online music stores, not to mention the fact that their music comes in the form of high bit-rate MP3s with no DRM. However, if you subscribe before Nov. 21st, you can lock in the cheaper, old pricing structure. So, if any of you were contemplating subscribing, this might give you the motivation you were lacking.

If you do decide to join up, send me an email or leave me your email address in a comment and I’ll send you an invitation email. If you sign up using the link in the email I send you, I’ll get a bunch of free downloads, which would be oh-so-sweet.

23
Sep
06

It’s that time of the month…

By Colin 4 Comments
Categories: purchases and recorded music

That’s right, tonight my 90 eMusic downloads would have disappeared if I hadn’t used them.  However, I got all my songs downloaded in time and I actually changed my subscription.  I was finding that there was no way I could digest 90 songs a month.  I like to listen to an album a lot of times in a row to get acquainted with it before I move on to the next one and having to download the equivalent of 8-9 albums a month was just way too much.  In fact, I still have a backlog of albums I haven’t really listened to from the last few months of eMusic downloads.  I initially tried to cancel my subscription, but to prevent me from cancelling, they offered me their “eMusic Lite” plan, which gives me 20 songs/month for $5.99.  That I can manage.  After 3 months it gets ramped up to the 40 song/month for $10 “basic” package.

Anyway, here are the albums that I downloaded:

  • Jose Gonzalez: Veneer
  • Denison Witmer: Are You A Dreamer?
  • Denison Witmer: Philadelphia Songs
  • Half-Handed Cloud: Halos and Lassos
  • Half-Handed Cloud: We Haven’t Just Been Told, We Have Been Loved
  • Portastatic: Bright Ideas
  • godspeed you! black emperor: Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
  • godspeed you! black emperor: f#a#infinity
  • Sufjan Stevens: “The Friendly Beasts” from See You On The Moon!

Lately, I’ve been listening quite a lot to Half-Handed Cloud and Denison Witmer (both of which were impulse buys last month), so I decided to get more of their stuff.  Also, I was flipping through the channels tonight and I saw the last 45 seconds of a Jose Gonzalez video on MTV.  I had heard some of his stuff by way of Adrian and I liked it pretty well.  We’ll see how I feel about this album.  Portastatic is an old favorite of mine from the mid-90′s.  I had lost track of them at some point so I got the most recent non-soundtrack album to reconnect.  At this point I had 8 downloads left.  It turns out that you can download 2 entire godspeed you! black emperor albums using only 7 downloads.  The tracks are like 20 minutes each.  This makes up for the fact that Half-Handed Cloud songs are like 1 minute each.  Trying to figure out how to use my last track, I decided to look for songs that people had put on compilations.  Fortunately, I found a Sufjan Stevens song that I didn’t already have.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to listen through all of these albums soon.  The fact that my 4GB iPod mini can’t hold my whole music collection at once is really starting to bug me.  Whenever I download new music, I have to clear out space on it so that there’s room for the new stuff.  This makes for difficult decisions about what to delete.  The difficulty of the decision often delays me putting new music on my iPod for awhile, which makes it difficult to listen to new music.  Maybe I need to get a 30GB iPod.  If they had come out with a 12GB Nano, I might have wanted that instead, but the 8GB Nano is still not going to solve my problem.

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