It's been a busy, unpredictable, delightful and confusing year so far. I'm lucky to have wonderful friends and coworkers and no shortage of delicious things to eat and drink.
It's been a busy, unpredictable, delightful and confusing year so far. I'm lucky to have wonderful friends and coworkers and no shortage of delicious things to eat and drink.
Whenever I'm reading a book about music, or a novel that has a character in it who talks about music, there's a high likelihood that X will be mentioned. Last week's mention was in Rock On: An Office Power Ballad by Dan Kennedy and today's mention is in Everything I'm Cracked Up To Be by Jen Trynin.
I think that's called cultural significance.
If I were in the office today, I would lead an impromptu dance party to this song I just found on art's blog. As it is, I will have to settle for an impromptu dance party in my home office.
Today would have been my dad's 74th birthday. He passed away so long ago that I no longer think about him every day like I used to, but sometimes days like this can be tough.
My posting pace ground to a halt while I was in SF, but here's an update of what happened on AITNR in the second half of January.
First of all, huge thanks to one of my favorite human beings John who linked to AITNR on his MySpace and spiked my traffic for two crazy days. That was really exciting and flattering - truly a high compliment!
Also, thanks to vanity searches on Google I've gotten comments from some of the people I've written about, including nice words from a CBC Radio 3 Reporter/Producer, someone at My Damn Channel and the author of the Rahsaan Roland Kirk bio I mentioned. This is also really gratifying. My post about Wainy Days still ranks on the first page of Google search results - thanks TypePad!
And now for the roundup:
1/14: Record Shopping
My sad little boombox finally died, so I hooked up my portable record player and fell in love with my vinyl collection all over again. It also gave me an excuse to check out some record shops in Austin.
1/15: Wherefore Bill Withers?
Proving once again that you can never know what people are really going to respond to, this post about Bill Withers garnered the most comments I've gotten on AITNR - perhaps ever - ringing in at 9 comments so far. I think that sad little prawn threw everyone over the edge.
1/17: Speaking of Engelbert Humperdinck...
Another record I picked up on a whim during my record shopping excursion. You have to watch a few moments of the video I posted because it's simply unbelievable. Warning: you will not be able to un-see any of it.
1/18: Tonight's Showalter
I went to see Michaels Ian Black and Showalter at Mohawk in Austin on a night when it was 36 degrees out. It was an outdoor show. A big part of both of their acts was making fun of how poorly prepared the venue was for the weather and the turnout. Also, Michael Ian Black had a whole bit on Texas pride that was really spot on. He gets it. In this post I don't review the live performance I went to, I just link to Showalter's own internet interview show, specifically to the episode featuring Zack Galifianakis whose last name is harder to spell than my own (but only one letter longer).
1/21: Cut Copy
I know as a general rule that if I want to keep people coming back to read my blog, I should update about five times a week. But often I just work late and don't have time. This post is a half-hearted effort to post something anyway, and there's really no there there. Cut Copy has a new record coming out -- see, now you don't have to click through to read this post. I think I'm going to go back to the rule of thumb that if I'm not inspired and/or I don't have enough time then I just won't post. Which explains why I didn't post at all during my trip to SF.
1/31: Hallucinating to The Mars Volta
I have a ton of respect for this band, but they might have pushed past the point of no return for me.
2/1: Bright Moments (In the Key of W)
The Mars Volta got me to thinking about Rahsaan Roland Kirk and why I love him so much. The fact that we can watch videos of Kirk on demand makes up for a lot of the meaningless crap on YouTube. Bonus: the author of the Kirk bio that I linked to commented! So I'm promoting John Kruth's book here too.