Tag: music

After listening to Tim Barry’s newest studio album the other day I lamented that felt like I no longer had as significant a connection to new, individual albums like I once did. I figured this had something to do with getting older and lamer.

Then while listening to Episode #128 of the Future of What podcast, the host, Portia Sabin, shared a couple of tidbits — which might be apocryphal — that would help to explain my earlier lamentation.

First she recalled a presentation by the head of Tommy Boy Records in which he pointed out that there were more albums released in 2007 than in the previous 20 years combined. One would imagine that this has only gotten “worse”.

Saban then quoted a study/article — too lazy to go back and listen for the citation — that found that most people stop listening to new music after age 28. Thankfully I fell well outside this statistic for 10 years (ages 28-38) but have probably started to slide into it over the last 10 years.

Matt Pryor was in the Get Up Kids (among other bands) and I just came across him podcast, Nothing to Write Home About. It’s really engaging — I’ve torn through ~ 6 hours of episodes in a day and half — mostly because he’s a great host in the mold of Terry Gross, et al., who guides the discussion with great, but infrequent questions. It really is more like an extended conversation between friends than an interview. I also love there’s a lot of interesting discussion about work — whether it’s tour managing, running a print shop, booking shows or being a touring musician.

I guess I underestimated how hard it might be to purge stuff with a little 2-month-old gobbling up all free time. Just have to repeat “It’s a process, it’s a process…”

Still excited, long-term about finishing those dangling projects. Someday. I came across The Little Red Workshop’s 365 Things declutter project (via C. Glass). Made me think of the Do Something Awesome Everyday 2011 project that i only got about 1/3 of the way through and this new burst of ideas.

In getting ready for the week I came across some new music and figured I’d put it here.

Civil War Rust — via Rocket Fuel podcast — Good punk rock, kind of reminds me of Lawrence Arms. Look forward to hearing the full album, maybe I’ll borrow it from Jeff Rocket Fuel as we discuss his new podcast project that I might pitch in on.

Shores “Weak Trees” — via Alt Press — their half of the Record Store Day split 7″ with Creepoid. Less atmospheric and more full-band sounding than their earlier stuff. Fun to see how this band keeps evolving.

State Lines “Win Free” — Just more really good, heartfelt music on Tiny Engines. Will have to go back and listen to their full-length.

Fantasy sports are more ubiquitous now, but I’d guess 80% of that growth is in Fantasy Football, 15% baseball and 4% hockey and other sports. Fantasy Basketball people are the nerds of the nerds, no one plays Fantasy Basketball. And an even smaller coterie of geeks are in two 20-team dynasty leagues, like me. That said, who knew Janet Weiss (Sleater-Kinney, Wild Flag) was a fantasy basketballer? Woot! (Edit: But wait she “hates” the Celtics, BOOOOOOO! She and the host said they’re “entitled”. Yeah, 17 (en)titles maybe! At least she likes the Blazers not the Lakers.)

Somehow The Constantines popped in my head and I searched for what their lead singer was up to since they’re on “indefinite hiatus.”

Baby Eagle & the Proud Mothers “Old Punks” — I was less enamored with Steve Lambke’s vocals for the Cons, but his stuff with Baby Eagle & the Proud Mothers is nice full band stuff — somewhere in the overlap of Neil Young and Wilco’s quieter moments?

Bry Webb “Rivers of Gold” — I was much more in love with Bryan Webb’s vocals for the Constantines, it was the thing that grabbed my ears and wouldn’t let go. Here he sings stripped down, quiet-bare songs. Interesting that 2 of Webb and Lambke’s songs are “Old Punks” and “Ex-Punks”…. a sign they’re getting older. Evidently Webb moved to Guelph and is raising a family.

Bry Webb “Sad Man’s Song” (video), “Ex-Punks”, “I Will Give You Everything” and “Viva” — at his site Bry Webb Was Here — Really stoked to hear more of Webb’s solo stuff. Can’t get enough of his voice.

Feist “The Bad in Each Other” — via Grooveshark — Bry Webb sings backup; Have never listened much to Feist, but good to know she know’s good singing when she hears it.

Listcore 001 (link to come) wasn’t my first obsessive, semi-meaningless, soon-to-be unfinished project (that one, c. 1988, will be properly discussed in Listcore 003…someday) but it was the first that I tried to really document & record as a Listcore project. I built a database, had raw files in Excel, even tried butchering some HTML to release it into the world. Of course that was 11 years ago and counting.

After reading through some of Justin’s 500albumreviews today I got a bit nostalgic. At lunch I pulled up the old Listcore 001 file I created and scrolled through the 722 database records. What a great, insane project. And after some more coffee, I decided that I wasn’t gonna give up: LC 001 will not go unfinished! Hell, I even came across a new addition to the madness. I’m going to have to go back and make some changes under the hood, tweak the database, revise some rules and check my math but it’s got some great bones, a good solid foundation.

It’s fitting in some ways because I feel sort of the same way now that I did in 1999 when I started LC 001: a bit worn out on my own music collection, but ravenous about sounds new and old. So much so that I’d actually started to make plans for a new, equally ambitious LC project that will now go on hold until I two of 001, 005 or 010 are finished (or forever like so many before it).