I'm sure it correlates with youth, but one of the biggest crimes of music (and movies) is being almost emotionally manipulative and making you think it's capturing some Big Important Feeling, or perfectly encapsulating a moment, a period in your life, some transcendant at the time relationship, etc. Maybe I wouldn't be so mad if I didn't feel completely manipulated into liking music that sucked. To wit: in 1997, my first boyfriend made me a mix CD with Semisonic's "Closing Time" (for the lyric "I know who I want to take me home") and Dave Matthews's "Crush" (for the general message that the dude is overwhelmed with love) and the Goo Goo Doll's "Slide" ("put your arms around me/what you feel is what you are/what you are is beautiful"). Despite my knowing better than to like this Ryan Seacrest's DJ favorites shit, I totally ate it up. See also, Coldplay.
Better "Crush" than "Crash," which always struck me as a strange makeout song for any couple that doesn't have a voyeur/exhibitionist fetish:
Oh I watch you there
Through the window
And I stare at you
You wear nothing but you
Wear it so well
I don't like Coldplay trying to be romantic so much, but I did like "Viva la Vida" -- it's only emotionally manipulating megalomaniacs, and I'm disappointed "Kings" is getting canceled before they can use it.
I nearly vomited when I first heard "Jane Says" in a commercial.
On the other hand, Led Zeppelin has never let Brock Samson or me down.
Bob Mould?
What about him?
My brother is a Bob Mould (and Husker Du) fan, but I've never gotten into him.
Bob Mould used to take off his shirt so that chicks would dig his band?
my first boyfriend made me a mix CD with ... Ryan Seacrest's DJ favorites shit,
I don't know if it reflects well or poorly on my that I could never do that. If I put together a mix CD I am trying to impress people with my taste (and ability to sequence a mix) not trying to communicate some obvious, simple idea.
There is a time and place for obvious and simple, but I'm not good at it.
I hold a grudge against Nirvana because of the girls my sister's age who at age fourteen, moped about Cobain's death when they were only fans of songs that featured on Lambchop's Play-Along at the time given that they were four.
I hold a grudge against the producers of the terrible Julia Roberts movie Runaway Bride, for using the U2 song "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" in the opening scene as she flees a wedding.
I hold a grudge against the estate of Janis Joplin for letting Mercedes-Benz use her work in a commercial.
I hold an especial and carefully considered grudge against the legislators, lobbyists, and activists who have contributed to the perversion of copyright laws such that situation #2 above could even be possible.*
*Yea, though it would make more situation #1s possible, still do I hold it.
There was some ridiculous car commercial in the early nineties with some ridiculous teenager in it who ranted and raved about "punk rock" and how Car X was "punk rock" like the Buzzcocks. Horrifying.
Hahaha, though. That was at about the same time that the very, very worst and unforgivable sin that a band could commit in my eyes was "to sign." Oh Jawbreaker, I actually like that last record now, but couldn't see my way to it back then. All apologies!
10 brings up the phenomena of bands that you used to hate that you now think are okay because, hey, your (usually) highschool standards were kind of stupid reasons for hating bands.
There's also the bands, or at least songs, you like but are kind of ashamed to admit it, sometimes even to yourself.
I hate listening to music during sex for a lot of reasons (distracting, sometimes irritating, a certain humorless romance to it), but the worst thing of all is accidentally hearing some music I once listened to during sex and having to relive the whole thing again. Sometimes, this is a surprising, pleasant experience. Sometimes it is embarrassing (as in, embarrassing to and for myself). And when it is a particularly happy memory, sometimes it's unbearably sad. What's weird is, it's sort of like walking past someone who wears your previous partner's perfume, in that I can't at first place the origin of the stimulus; all I know is that suddenly I feel overwhelmed by some affect I don't at first recognize.
Truly horrible. I avoid reading old diaries or looking at picture albums for the same reason. So I try not to listen to music during sex because I know I'm going to end up recording that moment, however it goes, into my Pavlovian affective associations for ever.
Look at me, switching blithely from second to first person!
I still listen to the mix CDs my ex-girlfriend made for me.
I couldn't listen to Whiskeytown (band Ryan Adams came from) after one of their songs was in the horrid Sandra Bullock/Harry Connick vehicle Hope Floats. But that was more a case of the scales falling from my eyes re: Whiskeytown, than of actually feeling betrayed by the band. I used to like the shit out of ABC back when I was a kid, but I'm more embarrassed to have liked Whiskeytown than to have liked ABC.
... the phenomena of bands that you used to hate that you now think are okay because, hey, your (usually) highschool standards were kind of stupid reasons for hating bands.
Michael Jackson
12: And on that score... He was the rebound guy after a deeply serious (in what I now see to be frivolous way) long distance relationship. This was the first time we'd hooked up. We were listening to his friend's radio show and his friend, knowing we'd left the party together, played Tori Amos, Crucify, with a shout out to me and the dude. God help me, I have no idea what the significance of the song was supposed to be. But I still get sentimental everytime I hear it.
I hold a grudge against the estate of Janis Joplin for letting Mercedes-Benz use her work in a commercial.
Word. That may have been the moment I realized that all was lost.
I hold a grunge against my friend Gideon for telling me, in eighth grade, that my then girlfriend and I made him think of the song "Sometimes When We Touch." It didn't justify my recruiting him to deliver the message that I wanted to break up with her, but seriously. Fuck off.
I'm old enough that, while I've made a mix CD for someone, all anyone has ever made for me is _mixed tapes_. (In some ways you can get a better effect with a tape, though, for blurring one song into another, or even over-laying them.)
12: Ha. I just now finished listening to an album that I associate very very strongly with one particular moment of fooling around in college (with the woman my failure to have sex with is my only serious regret in life). This was and remains one of my favorite albums, and I have listened to it in whole or in part literally thousands of times since then, but it's rare that this one stretch of 3 songs doesn't send me right back to my dorm room in September 1993.
Also, the first time AB & I ever had sex, right after we were done, "The Donner Party" by Rasputina came on, which was and is pretty funny.
I guess I always assumed The Killers were Republicans b/c of their feud with Greenday regarding American Idiot and, well, the fact the lead singer is Mormon. I never actively thought about it though, and I guess that's kinda stereotypical of me.
Er, I mean, stereotyping of me. I hope that stereotypical Ile behavior does not consist of never actively thinking about something.
Wait, if the copyright law were unperverted, wouldn't that make the use of "Mercedes Benz" in Mercedes Benz commercials easier? Ie, both situations #1 and #2.
If I put together a mix CD I am trying to impress people with my taste (and ability to sequence a mix)
Hey, me too!
Tori Amos, Crucify
Bad Old GF made me a mix tape comprised of that album and then a bunch of older punkier stuff after we first hooked up but before we started dating. I still occasionally pull it out, even though Tori Amos is problematic, and Bad Old GF is super-problematic. It's not even that it evokes early, good days of our relationship, because I spent those days working very hard to date and sleep with other women (see 21.1).
Maybe I've just attached what good times we had, whenever they happened, to that music.
24.1 is correct.
I also want to mention that the Google autocomplete search box has transformed in recent days from suggesting "site:unfogged.com phimosis" to "site:unfogged.com internalized woflson."
%!&$#%!($^!%, "internalized wolfson."
A textbook-perfect typo.
CURSES. The internet beguiled me into forgetting that I had not yet turned the heat down to a simmer, and I have irrevocably burned this week's pot of beans.
Husker Dü were the worst, if best-named, Hüsker Dü tribute band.
There is not even any music to blame for the scent of burned beans currently wafting through the house.
I had a specially cringeworthy young sexual escapade to the soundtrack of U2's "One" on repeat. That feature of the escapade is certainly cringeworthy in itself, and the nature of that cringeworthiness is symptomatic of the whole.
I only make love to the sounds of Magma.
I lost my virginity to The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. The irony of having my innocence taken advantage of by an older guy who had no intention of being sexually faithful to me while listening to an album that warns young ladies about men who want to take advantage of their innocence and then cheating on them was not lost on me at the time. Don't be a hard rock when you really are a gem, baby girl.
re: 32
In a strange coincidence my wife and I were discussing Magma earlier. This is because we were watching snooker on TV.*
I did once bring a girl home and hit play on the tapedeck [with no conscious thought about it, it was just what was in there already]. It had Bitches Brew in it. I suspect for about 30 seconds she was reminded of the In-a-gadda-da-vida bit in 'Manhunter'.
* the chain of reasoning here is obvious but obscure, especially to non-Brits.
33 is making me feel quite incredibly old ...
27: %!&$#%!($^!%, "internalized wolfson."
internalized flos now.
max
['Flo snow works too.']
12: Thus have I ruined "The Rainbow Connection" and "Kashmir". The same evening.
* the chain of reasoning here is obvious but obscure, especially to non-Brits.
All I can figure is something to do with Mitchell and Webb.
38: Wait, what? Tell me there's a version of The Rainbow Connection not sung by Kermit the Frog!!
36: I was a late bloomer. Don't feel old.
Of the set ( Sex, Drugs, Rock and Roll), only the latter two really go together.
re: 39
Steve Davis -- world no.1 player all through the 80s -- was so into Magma he set up his own promotion company to bring them to the UK for a group of gigs. True story. Mildly amusing if you are aware of Davis' TV persona at the time, which was of a slightly robotic red-headed nerd with no interests other than snooker, and an incredibly boring personality even when doing that.
Davis was a huge star in the UK at the time, but I'd imagine totally unknown elsewhere. His Magma connection would be pretty obscure even here, though.
I can't recall any music I associate with having sex. Undoubtedly because I've always been too focused on you...laydeez.
40: There are plenty, but this was the original. To tell the truth, it was not during the act itself, but was the linchpin of the seduction.
I have an iTunes playlist called "Ruined Songs for H" comprising about 100 fantastic songs that I would have drawn from to create a mix for her except I'd already given them away to other girls.
At the core of it is this mix, which contains the doubly-ruined songs I emailed to my ex, one mp3 per night for the entirety of June, beginning a month after she moved out. Those songs are pretty shot to shit.
I don't think I have any songs that were ruined by the band, though. My trust-the-tale-not-the-teller bias runs too deep.
Operation Ivy for Sound System being in that Matthew McConaughey movie
my first boyfriend made me a mix CD with Semisonic's "Closing Time" (for the lyric "I know who I want to take me home") ... Despite my knowing better than to like this Ryan Seacrest's DJ favorites shit, I totally ate it up.
One of the things I love love love about that song is that it lays bare the design of pop music for you. It has these soaring, affecting dramatic touches that are very clearly about drunken sex between people who don't know each other's full names. It is shit for the eating up of.
10 brings up the phenomena of bands that you used to hate that you now think are okay because, hey, your (usually) highschool standards were kind of stupid reasons for hating bands.
For me, this is a lot of late 60s California rock and Boomer music generally. In high school in the mid 90s, I inherited the opinions of those who thought that this was all guitar wankery or hippie nonsense. These days I like a lot more music from '67 than I do from '77.
Tell me there's a version of The Rainbow Connection not sung by Kermit the Frog!!
Okay.
AWB's comments made me realize that I never have purposely had sex to a soundtrack. I mean, to drown out sounds for the sake of a roommate, sure. But not on purpose "to set the mood" or whatever Wow. I feel like I've missed out on some rite of passage. But after reading her comments I'm now glad I never did. I have enough negative associations with music/movies/places, and I tend to be unable to shake those associations, so maybe better not to.
Ryuichi Sakamoto tried to ruin Okinawan folk music for me (this song specifically), but I wouldn't let him.
Doesn't anyone else think Carrie Brownstein is being extremely tongue-in-cheek in her post? Still, the suit against Aerosmith actually seemed somewhat reasonable if the people who bought tickets were left with financial damages.
Really all of the annoyances I've had with bands were either of the "They were really great for their first couple albums!" or the "Why can't I time travel to one of their shows?" variety. I tend to wear a lot of band t-shirts, and somewhat see buying merchandise as a minor obligation for the types of bands I support. This has led to a closet with some t-shirts I no longer feel like wearing much after the second, third, etc. album (or in the worst case, the first) comes out and ends up sucking.
51: It's really icky, imo. Like gravy spilling into peas.
48: that's why the lead singer Dan Wilson (who fronted a really neat band Trip Shakespeare), is such a good songwriter and has gone on to do better as a songwriter (he won a grammy for "Not Ready to Be Nice"). I confess that of all the tracks on the Mix Tape From Heck, I actually still like that one. The song "If You Could Only See" by Tonic? Not so much.
Sarah Maclachlan also sang The Rainbow Connection.
I'm old enough that, while I've made a mix CD for someone, all anyone has ever made for me is _mixed tapes_.
Random question, is the anyone here who picked up a copy of one of the mix CDs that I sent to the original unfogged meetup? I don't have much of a sense of how many people ended up with CDs, but I'm curious if any of them are still reading and commenting at unfogged?
Hey, me too!
I'm still impressed by I Need a Way to Say You're Scorching.
54 is right. Don't do it. Spilling gravy in peas isn't that bad, but what if every time you had gravy afterward, you tasted peas?
I'm still mad at Bruce for cutting those albums without the E-Street Band, a while back.
50: The links are down, but here's a list of Rainbow Connection covers. I'm fond of the Loxly one.
51: I'd generally advise against, though if you do, the less apprehensible the lyrics, the better. Electronic music is all right. Chemical Brothers and Caribou have both worked out well.
28: You and AWB commenting lovingly about them finally convinced me to order some beans from Rancho Gordo. Wow, those are good beans. I made a pot yesterday (I've forgotten the name of the variety -- spotty black and white beans), and I had them for dinner, breakfast (with a n egg poached on top) and dinner again.
She is such Rancho Gordo pusher. We bought some too. I have not quite learned how to cook them well, yet.
I was having sex recently and had the radio on WFMU (in case the roommates came home), and the odd choices of music provided come comic relief in the middle of the event. I recommend freeform radio as background music for lovin'.
Reunion tours, concerts, & records.
That is all.
I've not really had the sex-music connection ruin much stuff for me yet. Pretty much the only music that I can think of which ended up irrevocably tied to specific making out / lovin' is the Depeche Mode's singles collection, which was part of a very small intersection between the music tastes of myself and my high school girlfriend. Even there, it's really the particular opening sequence of the songs on that collection. The individual songs were mostly untouchable because I'd damn near worn out my parent's tape of Violator as a kid.
I think the key is that most of the music I listen to has plenty of history with me. If I've seen the act in concert, or it's dancey music that gets played at the parties/nights I go to, or just if it's been with me long enough that no one night could really override pre-existing connections, it tends to be fine for sex. For example, there's quite simply no way that "The District Sleeps Alone Tonight" (which just happens to be playing now) could get associated with a particular woman by this point.
I think the bigger danger with music during sex tends to be "oh shit, this is not a good song... if I reach for the skip button will she be offended?". Pre-vet your playlists, people.
61: Vaqueros? Yeah, beans and an egg are pretty much the best breakfast possible. Add a little cheese, salsa, and tortillas, and I am in heaven.
In college, my roommates would have sex to the Gipsy Kings, which, god bless 'em, was never loud enough to drown out the enthusiasm. My other roommates somehow took to referring to any world music played over sex as "Guantanamera", resulting in the ruination-by-snicker of that particular song. It was never actually played in the bedroom, but the two copulators would dance to it at our partys. Nort nort.
if I reach for the skip button will she be offended?
I would submit that if you're thinking of reaching for the skip button during sex, ur doin it wrong.
67: That was it, Vaqueros. The gravy, or whatever you call it, bean liquid... wow that's good.
And I'm not good with beans generally -- I love them, but I've served Buck a lot of bowls of unfortunately crunchy beans over the years. I boil them for hours and they never get soft (even after I learned that you can't salt them until they're done). These were like velvet.
In college, my roommates would have sex to the Gipsy Kings
I also have a strong association between the Gypsy Kings and memories of sex in the early 1990s.
66: Violator is ruined by a teenage relationship for me.
Perhaps I've been going about it all wrong. One of the reasons songs get ruined is because I only know them from the particular context of that relationship. I don't tend to play music for other people, especially during sex, because I don't like music during sex. So the musical choices end up being made by my partner. When, years later, somehow I end up with Chet Baker on my iPod and think, "Oh I like Chet Baker! I will listen to him while I work in the library" and then suddenly find myself inexplicably choking back Pavlovian tears at school, it's because almost all of my Chet Baker experiences are evil-boyfriend Chet Baker experiences.
With some selections, I've decided to listen to them repeatedly until the effect disappears. I can listen to Stevie's Fulfillingness' First Finale without weeping now, which is good.
70: "Pot liquor." Just the thought of the ayocote morado pot liquor is making me want to go put some on to soak right now.
I have not quite learned how to cook them well, yet.
Alas! Are you finding them underdone?
Tricky's Maxinquaye will forever be the album I first had anal sex to.
There is a time and place for obvious and simple, but I'm not good at it.
upon reflection, 7 should be amended to say that I am not good at communicating the sentiment "I think you're hot" in an obvious and simple way in any medium. That is a far stronger trait than my approach to mixes.
I am also not good at simple and obvious in mix selection, but that's really secondary.
I have no memory of ever having had music on while having sex. It must have happened sometime, but not that I recall.
re "Closing Time"
One of the things I love love love about that song is that it lays bare the design of pop music for you. It has these soaring, affecting dramatic touches that are very clearly about drunken sex between people who don't know each other's full names. It is shit for the eating up of.
55 kinds of gets at this, but have you listened to the rest of that album? "Closing Time" is the opener, followed by "Singing in My Sleep" (which I put on this mix), which is about making a mix tape for someone you've just met... and the rest of the album describes the rest of the arc of a relationship. It's awesome.
||
Back from May Day festivities for a disco nap, then off to a party in a blacksmith shop. One of the best May Day Parades evar. So cathartic. Brilliant. Real community. Radicalizing the neighborhood. Told the mayor he better keep them cops in check. Tears streaming down my face for much of it. I love Minneapolis.
||>
I have no memory of ever having had music on while having sex. It must have happened sometime, but not that I recall.
Yeah, me neither. Music is for listening to while you're hanging out enjoying the afterglow, not the act itself.
Of course, I've never had sex anywhere where I cared if other people heard me. Music-while-having-sex people, how much of the motivation is/was audio camouflage?
I think the bigger danger with music during sex tends to be "oh shit, this is not a good song...." as in, likely to produce giggles?
Music during sex is barbaric and horribly insensitive.
I have never ever.
Televised basketball games are what you watch during sex.
82: Sex during the summer is an abomination in the sight of the Lord.
purposely had sex to a soundtrack
It's been a long time since I did that. Wow, memories. I'm sure I should be embarrassed. Um, Pat Metheny, As Falls Wichita, ... backed with something else Pat Metheny, I think? Miscellaneous other things at other times, but that was an intentional sex tape at least once, with my partner's assent. Wow.
At that time in my life, I might as well have put Paul Winter on the other side of that tape. You guys remember tapes?
Once back during the days of the 3 CD changer, I was having sex to the first two CDs of the K&D sessions, and then... to Nena's greatest hits. So. Dramatically. New wave. We laughed and thought it was novel at first, but really couldn't go on then without changing the CD.
Music-while-having-sex people, how much of the motivation is/was audio camouflage?
None of it.
81: I think this is a more appropriate link. (You have to listen in to at least the 4:05 mark though.)
You guys remember tapes?
The last mixtape I got had utterly brilliant transitions. I though about half the songs were kind of dumb, but the transitions made up for it.
I've mentioned it before, but here seems like a good place to re-recommend the book Love is a Mixtape. I don't know when the last time was I tore through a book like that.
Televised basketball games are what you watch during sex.
Discovery Channel>And if you do it right, both partners can watch!
Let's try that again:
Televised basketball games are what you watch during sex.
And if you do it right, both partners can watch!
I would submit that if you're thinking of reaching for the skip button during sex, ur doin it wrong.
Quite possibly. I wouldn't be the one to ask about that, I suppose.
Playing music during sex sometimes happens as audio camouflage, other times it just happens because I remember to put some music on before we get around to each other. I tend to find musical accompaniment pretty pleasant, but still somewhat rarely get around to putting anything on.
81: Some of the problems can definitely be of the giggle-inducing sort. The more common dilemma these days is the fair amount of rap which has fairly questionable lyrics but great beats. It can be fine for dancing, listening, etc., but actually being inside someone makes it far more uncomfortable to hear lines like:
"I pull up, let her get in
She know from the beginning
She added to list of them chicks that I done been in
Her head spinnin' and my head spinnin'
Mine from juice and gin-in, hers from neck and chinin'
I'm a winner, man"
(pulling yet another example from my current playlist)
K&D sessions
Do you have good taste, or have mssrs. kruder and dorfmeister been "sold out", or both? I adored them in the late nineties/early this, which is about the last time I paid serious attention to music.
Luckily, almost everyone I've been involved with has different musical taste than I do, so not only have we avoided music during sex but I don't really feel like I've lost any music through break-ups. There was a whole three year period where about half of Elvis Costello's work was impossible, but it was really only albums from after 1985, so I didn't mind.
I do regret that making mix CDs results in having the track listing forever....so that right now if I were so inclined I could listen to the mix I made for someone who appears, alas, uninterested. (The Pop Group, Arthur Russell, early Scritti Politti, Anne Hills). But no amount of romantic failure can spoil early Scritti Politti. ("Hegemony, hegemony, you are the foulest creature that ever I did see...you can generate, anticipate but only very stupidly, from common sense and common sense is things just as they are"....See, isn't that incredibly romantic?)
97: Frowner, you have read, Rip It Up and Start Again, yes? If not, please do so. Thank you.
("Hegemony, hegemony, you are the foulest creature that ever I did see...you can generate, anticipate but only very stupidly, from common sense and common sense is things just as they are"....See, isn't that incredibly romantic?)
Frowner, I am so fond of you. The thing about the romantic/sexy music, though, is that it's not necessarily the music you listen to every day!
Do you have good taste, or have mssrs. kruder and dorfmeister been "sold out", or both?
Oh, probably both. The incident happened somewhere around the "late nineties/early this", when you couldn't go anywhere in Germany without hearing that damned CD set. An acquaintance actually threw a 'no Kruder and Dorfmeister party', objecting to the common practice of just throwing on that album for instant party soundtrack.
My possession of the Nena's greatest hits CD might controvert any claims to good taste though.
98: I've seen it but not read it...I think we have it at the store where I volunteer.
In googling around, I see that there's a revised edition of England's Dreaming, a book that pretty much totally revised my life because I devoted several years to collecting most of the discography listed in the back.
99: The music I find romantic is music that can only be appreciated by....by radical nerds with a sentimental streak a mile wide, I think. I do listen to a lot of my "romantic" music every day, but it maintains its luster since I never meet anyone else who likes any of it--it doesn't get tarnished by actual romance. If I ever become involved with someone who likes the Art Bears I will never be able to leave him or her because I can't give up The World As It Is Today.
100: I have the Nena double-CD set. It's better than you'd think without being so good as you'd hope. I also have a small collection of covers of "99 Red Balloons", partly because I really like the 7 Seconds version for hopping up and down and partly because I am endlessly amused by the idea of red balloons surviving a nuclear firestorm. And the idea that the singer needs something "just to prove the war was here". In addition to the rubble, corpses, radioactivity, etc etc.
I would submit that if you're thinking of reaching for the skip button during sex, ur doin it wrong.
Time back way back I used to constantly have my thoughts sidetracked while making out when songs changed because I would start wondering what was playing. Even though many times the player would be working through a queue that I had myself selected.
I have never had any musics ruined by sex, though.
100: This is perhaps mere prejudice, but I tend to consider virtually all German rock music to be crap. UNG adores Westernhagen and Fury in the Slaughterhouse. The worst was German "rap" music.
I do own a Nena CD, though.
103: The Scritti Politti chapter is very good.
106: Die Toten Hosen!!! I had a good friend in college who had "Hier kommt Alex" on his answering machine (ah, those dear dead days!) and perfect strangers on campus would call up in the hopes of listening to it, mostly hanging up if he answered but occasionally asking to be allowed to call back.
I have never had any musics ruined by sex, though.
Ditto. Nor sex ruined by musics. You just turn it off (the music) if that's going to the case, surely.
104: The double-CD set! I've only got the single disc. Oh god are some of those songs cheesy. I frikkin love "Irgendwie, irgendwo, irgendwann." We're riding on wheels of fire, toward the future, through the night!
106: Lots of German rock music is crap. There are some silly, super poppy bands from recent years that I like. And Kraftwerk of course, I think the only band Sifu and I had in common between our iTunes libraries when we met.
109: I dated a guy who had been in a band that once opened for Die toten Hosen. I asked him what instrument he had played in the band and he said, Uhh, I was the guy who hit a railroad tie with a sledgehammer.
Sifu had no Neubauten?
When I was taking classes at the Goethe-Institut in Berlin we occasionally were made to listen to popular music, among which was Tocotronic's "Letztes Jahr im Sommer", which I kind of like. I hypothesize that it is sung from the perspective of someone currently imprisoned looking back on the days of his freedom.
Uhh, I was the guy who hit a railroad tie with a sledgehammer.
I have never had any musics ruined by sex, though.
The fruit, the fruit, it hangs so low.
I think the only band Sifu and I had in common between our iTunes libraries when we met
Total exaggeration.
114: That song is very popular with a local theater company and featured largely in the recent hit "You're No Fun", sung by a chorus of green anarchists and accompanied by most of the audience. In that instance, though, it was given a sort of country twist and a peppier tempo.
114: I thought of that exact video.
the only band Sifu and I had in common between our iTunes libraries when we met
Someone should do a study of the relationship between musical taste and longterm compatibility. I cringed every time UNG put one of his CDs or cassettes on. I am really intolerant, generally, of listening to other people's music.
113a: None!
I could never get into Tocotronic. But 2raumwohnung is a guilty pleasure, and I like Stereo Total, which at least partly qualifies as a German band. We're dancing in a square!
120: that is my favorite song to run to!
111: Sifu had no K&D? A disgrace on his (former) profession.
But no amount of romantic failure can spoil early Scritti Politti.
Heh. I was specifically thinking of Scritti Politti when I wrote comment 11. I had a good female friend in highschool who was totally into them and I thought they were way too wimpy to possibly be any good. Several years later I had a good friend and roommate with all of their albums, and I had (mostly) gotten over my adoloscent need to be all hard and manly in my musical tastes, and waddya know, great band!
Say, perhaps you-all are the right audience for Scritti Politti's "Jacques Derrida", which has some truly appalling ersatz-rap passages but which is, none the less, great. And I don't even like Derrida. I would pay very, very good money for a song about Frederic Jameson, though.
Upon reflection, the literal claim in 111.2 may be basically true. But only because our music libraries are so miraculously complementary.
123: eh, never my style, really.
Although come to think of it I do have one of their CDs around here someplace. Unless I lost it?
127: No, it wouldn't be. Not enough funk, I suppose. But for funkless Germanic types, I like them. Of course, I liked fila brazilia too, so what do I know.
This is perhaps mere prejudice, but I tend to consider virtually all German rock music to be crap.
This makes me weep. Four of my favorite bands of all time are German: Popol Vuh, Amon Duul II, Tangerine Dream, and Ash Ra Tempel.
/From the 70s, though.
Are those really rock music, in the central meaning of "rock music"? Certainly Zeit and Atem aren't.
There is no possible way Tangerine Dream could be considered "rock music".
Despite the name, I'm not even sure how much Krautrock should be considered German. But I guess that's partially because I first learned about the genre due to modern-day non-German artists, so it doesn't seem as uniquely German to me as, say, Nena or the Kompact records minimal techno schtick (which doesn't even rely too heavily on German artists anymore).
But really, I just don't want to put Can into any "foreign music" bucket.
131: I declare. There is a German band (from the 70s, though) called Popol Vuh? Hrmph.
132, 133: To be fair, CB was responding to my denunciation of German rock, in which I am quite sure I did not use the term "rock music" with technical precision.
Stereolab isn't Krautrock, in the central meaning of Krautrock.
Great silly super poppy Germans.
The last song that can legitimately be called "rock music" is Rocket 88 by Ike Turner.
nosflow's gonna drive you all into the ground, with his central meanings.
134: Kompakt doesn't rely on minimal techno that much anymore, either, oddly enough.
140 -- but do you mean that within the central meaning of ground?
I'll drop the "silly" from mine if you drop the "super poppy" from yours.
There's a lot to be said for the directness and simplicity of these lyrics.
Stoned sex with Morphine's "Cure for Pain" on repeat = awesome, would do again.
Stoned sex with L7's Bricks are Heavy = album ruined, never bought another of theirs (still love the previous albums though).
137: But pretty much anything with a driving motorik beat got described as krautrock-y, and that's somewhat common in 2000s indie rock.
On a vaguely-related note (from searching YouTube for "Motorik"), there are a surprising number of covers of "Warm Leatherette". And they pretty much all sound just like the original.
141: Yeah, they've definitely branched out. I'm still not sure how to describe the sort of poppy stuff coming out of Supermayer and the such. My main experience with Kompact remains The Field, Gui Boratto, Immer 1 and 2, and a few of the Total collections.
61/67/70: I'd hadn't heard of these but am now intrigued. Any recommendations (other than the Vaquero)? I might just order a sample pack.
149: These are the ones I've tried:
Vaquero
Midnight Turtle
Yellow Eye
Christmas Lima
Rio Zape
Ayocote Morado
Negro Criollo de Hidalgo
Yellow Indian Woman
Flageolet
Vaquito
Of those, the Rio Zape and Ayocote Morado are the most chocolate/coffeish beans, both producing a thick dark pot liquor. The Negro Criollo are the best black beans I've ever had, though the Midnight Turtles are also nice. The Christmas Limas are enormous and beautiful and taste like sweet chestnuts. The Flageolets are beautiful for spring, very bright and vegetal-tasting. The Vaquitos are little brown beans, perfect for Mexican food without being overwhelming. Vaqueros are lovely and bigger, with more flavor. Yellow Eyes are like really nice big fat black-eyed peas. The Yellow Indian Woman ones are just a nice soft go-with-anything bean.
This thread makes me feel, yet again, like my musical tastes are unusual (though I appreciate Frowner mentioning Anne Hills).
I also reflect that none of the bands on my list of 15 most significant albums were recommended by.friends (except, of course, the band that includes two old friends). For all of those bands I was either introduced by a family member, discovered them on my own, or investigated the band because of some sense of general critical opinion. I feel a little sad at all the stories of musical people's musical tastes being formed within a group of friends because that has not, generally, been my experience.
RFTS swears by the Eye of the Goat beans, but I haven't had them yet and I don't know if they're in stock now. All of them are seasonal, so I don't know what's available currently. I got the Desert Island Sampler the first time, which is just five pounds of whatever beans they have on hand that are especially nice, and it was great.
Oh, and I should mention that the ayocote morado beans are huge and purple and really impressive, in addition to being ridiculously yummy. I've got half a pound soaking in my kitchen right now.
148.2: I'm pretty sure I heard this variation before hearing the original.
Following links from 148 reveals that Peter Murphy, Trent Reznor, and TV on the Radio have shared a stage.
It just occurred to me that "Leatherette" might be an actual word, not made up by whoever wrote that song.
And let me pipe in on the bean talk and say that the Good Mother Stallards I got from them were seriously the best bean I've ever had. (I suspect just exceptionally fresh). But all of the ones I've made from Rancho Gordo have been good.
"Leatherette" refers to a kind of fake leather, I think.
"navy wildlife"?
Not only is there no real navy-blue leather, there's no real navy-blue wildlife. At least not mammals. Am I wrong?
109: I went to a summer camp dedicated to international understanding. My apogee, along those lines, was swapping a Dead Milkmen tape for a Toten Hosen tape.
Fuck you all for making me need Mexican food; not available in proper form here for love or money.
Mmm. So I decided to stay up late, put on the pot of ayocote morado beans with various dried peppers (chipotle, arbol, piquin), take half an hour to caramelize a red onion sliced very fine, then add garlic, three ears of corn kernels and scrapings with some habanero salsa, and a bit pot of white rice with butter. It all finished at 2:45am and it was worth it.
I once knocked boots long ago while listening to one of the NPR drive-time shows, All Things Considered, I think. It wasn't on purpose, I just had it on while puttering around at home when the bf popped in and we had a oh-hi-hon-missed-you-today-omg-let's-fuck-right-now moment. Afterward, he declared it lame that we'd been listening to news the whole time (and that we'd left our socks on) but not only was I not bothered by either, I found the radio to be pleasant attentional filler during the brief moments here and there when my mind wandered. I've always kind of wanted to try it again but fear being cought orchestrating it on purpose.
I like, in theory, having music on during sex, especially a few things that I think are especially sexy. But since I seem always to date guys with shitty taste in music (and movies too, dammit) it hasn't generally made for happy times. After my last bf once stopped midstream when some Miles Davis was on to say, "um, can I turn this off? it's kind of distracting me" maybe I just give up. In general, I'd rather it be something instrumental cuz singing makes me feel like there's someone else in the room. And I'm shy.
151: NickS, am I inferring correctly from your blog that you actually know people in Trenchmouth? ZOMG!! I remember reading an interview with them in a fanzine while riding the bus on a bright sunny spring or autumn day in St. Paul in maybe 1993....and in that interview, one of them talked about really, really liking Sandinista. So I went home and listened to it again even though I basically thought it was boring and didn't get dub and from there was born pretty much my entire serious interest in music.
It's really icky, imo. Like gravy spilling into peas.
Not only is this wrong, but it also makes me want to cancel tonight's dinner plan to roast a chicken, make some gravy, and put it on the peas.
if I were so inclined I could listen to the mix I made for someone who appears, alas, uninterested. (The Pop Group ...
Please tell me that you put "We Are All Prostitutes" on that mix.
I reserve my grudges for the musicians I don't like: Pink Floyd, for example, or Eric Clapton. Musicians I do like are free from my wrath.
171: Sadly, no--although I once got a mix tape from a feller who had included "We Are All Prostitutes"....just one more missed opportunity for whatever he meant that to convey.
Only "Thief of Fire" and "Savage Sea" on this mix.
169: It is a different Trenchmouth (I don't even think they knew about the previous Trenchmouth when the selected the name). The two friends of mine had sailed on tall ships together and they wanted something with nautical associations that sounded punk. Personally I'm not fond of the name but ...
More information here.
My little Frowner was born on a ray of sound.
174: A housemate of mine got very sick of that song after a while and decided to start introducing me to people by saying, "This is Frowner, she's beyond good and evil."
151: my list of 15 most significant albums
Re: your annotated list, I can say that Ziggy Stardust played a very similar role in my life (a couple of decades earlier than you, I presume). It was my go-to album during a pretty bewildering post-college period, but rather than listen with headphones, I would often juggle to it. Nothing fancy, but I did work towards juggling with my eyes closed, and the thought of listening to that album (even especially "It Ain't Easy") with eyes closed and the juggling balls plopping gently into my hands remains a comforting memory to this day.
For maximum pretentious cred: The first time ex and I made love (as opposed to fucking) it was to Beethoven's Ninth, which as actually pretty damn good for the purpose. It was quite some time after the divorce before I could listen to it without feeling a sense of deep loss.
Ziggy Stardust played a very similar role . . . [T]he thought of listening to that album (especially "It Ain't Easy") with eyes closed and the juggling balls plopping gently into my hands remains a comforting memory to this day.
Thank you, that's a nice image.
The album really works well for that mood.
179: I am fond of dropping Nadsat lingo into casual conversation. Perhaps I'm subtly influenced by exposure to A Clockwork Orange at a tender age.
I cringed every time UNG put one of his CDs or cassettes on. I am really intolerant, generally, of listening to other people's music.
Di is the person I have been afraid of for all of my music-listening life. This keeps me from even turning on music when other people are around, and the thought of the level of judgementalism possible with music during sex is nearly phobic.
the thought of the level of judgementalism possible with music during sex is nearly phobic.
"Is it on yet?"
Two background-to-sex stories:
1) Having baseball on in the background is generally a fine idea, although I'll never look at Doug Mirabelli the same way again ever since the wife reached orgasm just as he went yard. I'm not sure who was more excited, her or Don Orsillo.
2) This didn't happen to me, but a college friend tells me of a boyfriend who, for their first makeout session, put his own a capella group's album on repeat. How she didn't break down in giggles I will never now.
"Is it on yet?"
"It's John Cage, baby. We've got 4'33" of beautiful silence coming up."
Having baseball on in the background is generally a fine idea
Depends on where the TV is. An ex told me that she once was going at it, um, the canine way*, and looked back to see her boyfriend watching the game.
*I just hate the expression "doggie-style".
187: Hmmm. Not really doing it for me.
Ziggy Stardust played a very similar role . . . [T]he thought of listening to that album (especially "It Ain't Easy") with eyes closed and the juggling balls plopping gently into my hands remains a comforting memory to this day.
I was reading this thread from the bottom and the full context for this excerpt makes it clear that no sex act with the inevitable urban dictionary entry for "ziggy stardusting" is involved at all.
75: EVERYONE WANTS A RECORD DEAL EVERYONE WANTS TO BE NAKED AND FAMOUS. Not quite the right vibe...especially the bit about German Jamaicans with twisted faces same as it ever was.
190: I somewhat gratuitously inserted "juggling" even though the context was already established to specifically thwart that reading. But of course I realized it would only delay it a bit; the urge to genitalia joke is inexorable.
From NickS's link in 151:
My favorite live album is Bill Withers Live at Carnegie Hall. It is pretty amazing.
Some guy at Amazon gives a good description:
That reminds me:
Q: How do you make a duck into a soul singer?
168:(and that we'd left our socks on)
Bill Withers Live at Carnegie Hall
Hell. Yes. Awesome.
Surely 193 violates local norms for linking/blockquoting.
197: Cook it in the microwave until its bill withers.
199 and 197 are better if you read the thread from the bottom and just stop at 197.
Bill Withers Live at Carnegie Hall
Hell. Yes. Awesome.
Okay, I'll get a copy, but you should listen to Curtis/Live!.
is the anyone here who picked up a copy of one of the mix CDs that I sent to the original unfogged meetup?
Yep. I have the one with Uncle Tupelo, Nina Simone, and others. I just listened to it the other day while making dinner, actually. It's a good mix.
The link in 202 created a popup. Safari is so effective at blocking popups that I'm always a bit shocked when one does get through.
Hmm. It didn't for me under Firefox.
181: If it helps at all, I am intolerant, but not judgmental. Other people's music frequently annoys me, but I never delude myself into thinking that's because my taste is better.
205: Truth be told, I see a lot more now than I used to ("a lot" being "any;" I don't recall ever seeing popups the first couple years I was on Safari, whereas now I see them every month or two). I wonder if this will improve when I upgrade to 4.0 (I know that people recommend Firefox, but it doesn't do much for me, and I'm not the type to use the myriad plug-ins).
Having baseball on in the background is generally a fine idea
mrh is Meat Loaf?
Having baseball on in the background
I would do anything for love, but I won't do that.
207: Firefox is superior, JRoth. I'd explain why, but I have to pick up the girls at school. Maybe someone else can tell you why you should switch. It's super-easy, though, because you can import your history and all from Safari.
||
And since we're marginally on the subject, iPhone users: is there any way to use Wifi to get out of the AT&T data plan? The Internet suggests no, but what the hell does the Internet know?
|>
Firefox is superior, JRoth.
On OSX? They both suck. You can either choose to have the browser consume vast amounts of system resources, drag your box to a halt, and take 10 minutes to actually exit after you click "Quit Firefox", or you can deal with a browser so dumbed-down that you can't even choose to add certain sites as exceptions to the popup blocker or automatically expand to fill the screen when you click the "+" in the window bar.
Yep. I have the one with Uncle Tupelo, Nina Simone, and others.
Thanks. I'm occasionally curious what happened to those, and if anyone listens to them, so it's nice to know that they're still around.
Jeremy Davies: punk Subaru commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLhfxI8T2cU
was from the mid-grunge era.
But modern heros like Benny Benassi or LCD Soundsystem would never sell out.
I love the idea that Benny Benassi was ever not sold out. That dude was born with a limited edition Smirnoff Ibiza Party House official spoon in his mouth.
On the other hand, the whole thing about artists "selling out" is ridiculous. Yeah, Benny, you should make all your money selling vinyl to DJs. That's how you should make a living. That's an easy way to make a living. Lots of people make a living that way, by selling 12"s to DJs. Really! Honest!
...and yet, how many bands have "sold out" and then died! Has Kathleen Hannah done a stroke of good work since Le Tigre signed? I admit that this used to be a more significant question to me than it now is, and it may be more germane to directly political and/or abrasive-in-an-odd-rather-than-macho-way bands than to others.
And, now that I think about it, I don't have the same standards for jazz. I can think of labels I like, but I don't know anything about them, whether they're offshoots of bigger companies or not. I also wouldn't turn down a copy of 'A Jackson In Your House" because it wasn't indie. So some inconsistency there.
On the other hand, Chumbawamba signed to a major label, weren't marketed or backed in any significant way, got dropped and went on to release some fairly good stuff. "The Boy Bands Have Won", their most recent, is much much better than the title would indicate.
Chumbawamba signed to a major label
I remember thinking when that happened, "Oh sure, this is going to work out *great*."
Josh in 212: On OSX? They both suck.
Firefox crashes on me a lot, and I have to force quit it very slowly.
When I used to comment on unfogged using Safari (on one particular computer), I always double-commented. I'm not sure why.
Since Chumbawumba, as far as I can tell, were always pretty third-rate, I don't think selling out did much either way.
The link between Scritti Politti and Doctor Who is the Oxford University zoology department.
219: I don't know how broad the problem was (what OSes or if limited to systems with certain add-ons or settings) but per the Release notes, the recent Firefox 3.0.10 upgrade, "Fixed a major stability issue." I saw stability issues specifically with 3.0.8 & 3.0.9 on some systems with Vista.
I've always put Chumbawumba in the same category as Tallulah Gosh. It's a small category called "Bands who would probably be better Chief Regulatory Economists at the Office of Fairl Trading than they are at doing pop music".
I wonder if there's anyone in the reverse category, of Chief Regulatory Economists who should probably be playing bass in a band.
Presidents who should have been drummers.
220: Noooooo! "A Toast To Democracy" is a fantastic song! And what about "Whitewash"? That song about the Sandinistas is both terrible and depressing, yeah, but honestly "Pictures of Starving Children Sell Records" covered almost all the main points of a "Development and Democracy" class I took my senior year only in thirty minutes. And "tax cuts and platform shoes/for every small businessman" is funny. And Alice Nutter doing her Thatcher impression! And "the wasteland between leisure and the grave"! And "though they broke my legs, they gave me a crutch to walk"!
It's all appallingly sentimental, of course.
And I don't think "El Fusilado" is an inspiring song--it's about one of Pancho Villa's soldiers who survived a firing squad, and all it makes me think is that it's silly to cheer for one person who survives as if that means anything when so many don't. Many thousands gone!
But on the whole I'm pro-Chumbawamba.
I've always put Chumbawumba in the same category as Tallulah Gosh. It's a small category called "Bands who would probably be better Chief Regulatory Economists at the Office of Fairl Trading than they are at doing pop music".
Yeah, I suppose that this really sums up why I like them.
I've always wanted to do some kind of basics-of-international-trade-as-taught-by-pop-music-and-science-fiction project.
And my goodness! Heavenly used to be Tallulah Gosh, more or less. Who knew? Well, lots of people but not me.
Firefox is superior, JRoth. I'd explain why, but I have to pick up the girls at school. Maybe someone else can tell you why you should switch. It's super-easy, though, because you can import your history and all from Safari.
Eh. I used it for years on PCs (indeed, I was the one who installed it; they were still using IE), and it never made me think I should install it at home on my Mac. If it's a resource hog (per Josh), then it's out of the question.
My browsing needs are very simple, so Safari suits me fine. Every browsing-related plug-in I've ever added (on either platform) I've promptly uninstalled, so....
212/219: what do you recommend?
Google's Chrome browser seemed pretty solid to me, but I haven't really gotten out of the habit of using Firefox.
I liked that Tubthumping song, but then I found out they were all political, and I was like, I don't need musicians telling me what to think.
I've only used PCs, but Chrome has a lot of things about it that annoy me. I tend to use firefox, although (heresy!) the more recent versions of IE seem perfectly adequate to me. My first mac will be here in about a week--I imagine I'll give safari a try and see how that goes. I'd assumed I'd be using firefox if I didn't like safari, so it's troubling to hear the negative reviews for firefox on mac. We'll see.
228:And my goodness! Heavenly used to be Tallulah Gosh, more or less. Who knew? Well, lots of people but not me.
I knew. EotAW posted on a Britpop compilation the other day, and I didn't recognize most of the bands, and don't like Oasis or Blue. But I like Sarah, who weren't represented by one soinf.
TG => Heavenly is an example of how Sarah wasn't all extreme twee. Thee's a lot of light rock in the catalogue, and even some a little harder, like Boyracer. It was DIY, without producers or marketing.
Socialism can be so romantic.
negative reviews for firefox on mac
It works fine for me, but I have a fairly new iMac with a crapload of RAM in it, so it's up to handling a resource hog. But then, I don't have any real complaints about Safari or Chrome either, so maybe I'm just a cheap date.
re: 235
It memory leaks on windows, and freezes more than it should on my work Mac. And I have a pretty fast Mac with a lot of RAM, also.
I still use it, because I am used to the UI, but, for me, it has been fairly unreliable for quite a long time.
I have the same problems with Firefox on Mac, but I use it because I watch a lot of streaming video that isn't made to be compatible with Safari.
Having baseball on in the background is generally a fine idea, although I'll never look at Doug Mirabelli the same way again ever since the wife reached orgasm just as he went yard. I'm not sure who was more excited, her or Don Orsillo.
Charlie Peters recounts an amusing tale in his autobiography about listening to a baseball game on the radio during an amorous encounter with a girl in her family home (this would have been in NYC in the 1940s). The father came home unexpectedly, and finding the young couple there alone, accused them of engaging in hanky panky. Peters protested that they had just been innocently listening to the baseball game. The father then demanded to know what had transpired in the game so far, and Peters was able to recite a pitch-by-pitch account of the game. Thus did he get out of trouble with the father, and into even bigger trouble with the girl.
