One or More Things I Did Today (Trip to Grandma's Edition)

And Let It Be Known, that on July 24th, in the year of 2 thousands and 11, I was up to this:

• There we go. See? This whole keeping up with the bloggin' thing ain't so hard.
• And on this Sunday, I awoke at 6am, bright eyed and bushy tailed*.
• And it had come: the visit to Grandma's.

Stock photo: Christmas 2008

• This drive to Cleburne, TX, home of Grandma (not to be confused with Cleveland, a common misunderstanding of my childhood), is unusual, for I opt to stay awake the entire 3 hour or so drive from Austin**.
• This, in my estimation, is one of the prime times of the year to be in that part of Texas. While the heat is on, everything is still quite lush.
• After a meal of Buffalo Creek, Mom, Kelly, and I make to investigate a curious object we notice on the mudflats from our perch on the hill.
• Is it animal, mineral, old rotted tire?
• Not a one.
• Turns out it's a tree stump.
• I plank the tree stump.
• Turns out it's got some pretty sharp vertical points for a tree stump***.
• "Well, Grandma, it's about time to go."
• A Texas-day trip, complete: 3 hours each way.
• Some things in life are not meant to be: Robertson's is close, so my turkey sandwich comes from Schlotzsky's****.
• Alright.
• We arrive back in town in time for a free show at Antone's with my pal Dani: Lost Mountain Bayou Rambling Old Time Boys Revival.
• And it is a good one.
• Picture of the day: Please see above...*****
  

As they say, "It was a Day".

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*And far more bushy-tailed than my activities the day prior should have allowed, though I maintain that the unusually early nights that daytime drinking often lend themselves to also provide the length of sleep to ameliorate the day's work and put you on fresh feet in time for Sunday brunch. History would not lie!
**I love sleeping in cars. Actually, it's not so much a love as it is an inability to stay awake while being anywhere in a moving car other than the wheel. So comfortable.
***An artist sacrifices all for his art.
****And with that, WIDWINW has stooped into the "what I ate for lunch yesterday" realm of blogdom. Huzzah! And they said it wouldn't be done.
*****... for a picture taken 3 years prior.

Recommendation: Hype Machine

This post is provided through a joint effort of Recommendation Foundation and Song Corner*.

Ok, check it.

Sometimes, you come across a new website, the introduction of which shares all of the most salient qualities of love at first site, a sort of effervescent chemistry that sparks an immediate reaction and possessing of a ferocious and unyielding craving for your next taste.

For some, that was Facebook.

For others, it was What I Do When I'm Not Working.

For myself of 5 years ago, it was discovering Wikipedia**

For myself of one year ago and up to this keystroke, it was and is Hype Machine***.

Oh, man, is this a good recommendation. I'm stoked I'm able to share it with you****.

Assuming you haven't already clicked on the hyperlink and aren't currently knee deep in sampling the site yourself, here's the jist:

Hype Machine is a music blog aggregator. What I find most compelling about it is the simplicity of adapting it, and its purview of wonderful remixes and otherwise obscure songs, songs that I otherwise wouldn't come across without trawling music blogs for hours a day, is unparalleled.

So, check it out if you haven't already done so. Here's a link to the tunes I'm jamming on the site.

Fin.

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*The John T. and Catherine D. McArthur Foundation ain't got nothing on us.
**Credit due to Thomas Friedman, for writing about the site and foundation in "The World is Flat", and for publishing the book before I came to realize how I really felt about Thomas Friedman.
***Credit due to Marshall Ball, a guy who was on Facebook back in 1997, for the introduction to Hype Machine. I owe you a debt that can never be repaid, M-Beezy.
****Although, chances are you've already heard of it. If that's the case, give me a break - I'm trying here. Also, got any new leads on things I should know about?

Song Corner: Neko Case

Welcome back to Song Corner. Cue the drums:

Neko Case: This Tornado Loves You


This is a particularly relevent Song Corner, because, as you'll see from the "One or More Things I Did Today" that I have yet to write (July 3rd, 2011 edition*), we caught a free show at Stern Grove in SF on Sunday. And who should be performing at this free show? Why, Neko Case.

Get outta town!!!

While it's a good suggestion, I can't and won't be doing that.

But what I will be doing is writing the rest of this Song Corner installment. Lucky me.

So, back to my point:

Neko Case is pretty swell as a whole, but this song it the jam. As I was trying to describe it to Brian** at Stern Grove yesterday***, when it comes to music, it seems that people I've spoken with often describe themselves in terms of being particularly drawn to either the vocals or the orchestration in a piece of music, but skewing towards one or the other. In that sense, I realized, I can analyze a song as being 30% lyric-driven and 70% orchestration, or any other distribution. Why do I bring this up? Because I think this song I'm writing about here is a pretty perfect mix of the two: 50/50.

That being written, the lyrics are pretty astounding. I recommend listening to the words (thankfully, Neko's delivery is super crisp, making this easy to do), even if you're a "I'm not to into the words" kinda person, because this is one worth listening to. So visceral, palpable, impressive. Neko is basically a tornado chasing after a lover. Powerful stuff. Check it out!

If you're interested, here's more.

Thanks for reading.

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*Don't fret - I'll go back and hyperlink you to it after the fact. Ah, the joys of editing a blog. I'm bigger than linear time, guys!
**Like more and more things I'm saying these days, I seem to be articulating points via conversation that were prior to a bit nebulous in my mind, but that spring forth fully formed like Athena from Zeus's dome when I'm chatting. Fun stuff!
***Note: if you are reading this post and it is not July 4th, 2011, "yesterday" is not really "yesterday". Remember, that whole "time" thing. If you are reading this post and it is July 4th, 2011, please contact me immediately, because I've been trying to be bigger than this whole linear time deal, and you apparently have some means of time travel that you should share.

I've Landed

I'm not a huge Ben Folds fan.

By that I mean I don't know much about the guy*, so I can't say I'm a huge fan- I'm sure his music is grand, just grand. But my knowledge of his catalogue is pretty much limited to that "Brick" tune, some song I think might be about angry dwarfs, and that thing he ripped off from that other dude involving Chat Roulette**.

All that being said, somehow I encountered this track recently - if vaguest memory serves, I might have picked it up via Soundhound - and after seeking it out, my thoughts were confirmed. The verdict?

Damn catchy.

This is a prime example of a song that's been stuck in my head for more than five days, one that I feel compelled to get my fix for, and one that I will almost certainly burn out in short order (only to rediscover in the future to great delight).



Check out this alternative version that features a orangutan.****

Hope you dig it.

By the unrelated way, sun's still out in San Francisco. Have a great Friday.

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*Or the eponymous band. Given there's a 25% chance you're heading to dictionary.com right now to check our what this "eponymous" is all about, consider that one free of charge. Hm... new idea: 10 Cent Word Corner. Am I writing this all down? So many good ideas...
**HYPERLINK PARTY, y'all!!!
***Case in point: while writing this post, I had a tab playing the video open, and I was repeatedly distracted by the music, causing this post to take far longer than it should of to write. Catchy.
****See that? Options. That's what we provide here at WIDWIMW. You're worth it.

Song Corner: Beirut

This song fairly accurately sums up how I'm feeling right now.*

Beirut: Scenic World


Do with this song what you will, but know that it's one of my favorite tunes of all time. In my 28 year old mind, I'd find it appropriate if they played this song at my funeral.


Like it? Here's more.**

Thank you for joining me for Song Corner.

Until next time.

*Disclaimer: to be fair, I can't quite determine the exact words at certain points during the song, so don't entirely hold me to what I wrote there.

**Important: if you're reading this, make sure you read the "early years" portion of the Wikipedia entry. Here, I've hyperlinked it for you. Now you have no excuse, now you can't miss it.

***(****) Bonus addition to Song Corner: I've added a picture this time. Nice, huh? Don't expect one every time.

**** Note: I tried to add an asterisk to the picture, but couldn't figure out how to work it. Please accept this footnote as a substitute, explanation, and additional footnote (I'm telling you, people love footnotes).

Song Corner: Bonnie Prince Billy

Alright, I've settled down a bit. Time to start posting for real*.

One of the finest feelings of my life is sitting in a coffee shop / friend's living room / my bed when I've got a moment, high on coffee, and vibing on a wonderful song.

There's a lot of time for that now, so it would seem this is an excellent forum to share some of those songs I've loved.

Here's the first one:

Bonnie Prince Billy: I Called You Back

One of my favorite artists, I'm sure we'll see more from Bonnie, né Will Oldham, on Song Corner** going forward.

Listen to the tune. One of the most tender songs I've ever heard. Moves me every time. The simple, almost droning beat that sets the table for the tiny flourishes, the vulnerability, and Oldham's shaking voice.

I hope you enjoy.

Like it?*** Here's more.

Until next time,

Song Corner.

*I realized that I don't have to keep a particular voice or tone throughout this entire blog. I can dabble, I can experiment. I can write whatever I damn well please (case in point - I would never say that in real life). And here's the kicker, what compelled me to go ahead with it: the more I write, the more of a sample size we'll have. And then we'll be able to take this body of work as a whole, rather than a outlier from one particular manic, lonely, inspired, or hungover morning.

Minor epiphany.

** Going to have to think about this name. Might need to go back and change these at some point, but for the immediate future Song Corner will work just fine.****

***Everything in red here? Not a formatting mistake, though that's a good guess. No, this is all of the text I thought I had lost to the Angel's Share of blogging (see "Getting Over It" post). Turns out it hadn't been lost to the ether after all, but rather just made invisible! Wonderful news. My day has been made. And best of all? Yep - an opportunity for another footnote! God, I love this blog.

**** I love footnotes. So much fun. Expect these to be a mainstay on WIDWINW.