Music

Music is a necessity. Though I focus mostly on alternative/industrial/EBM/electronic styles, my tastes are eclectic and wide-ranging.

iTMS = IotY

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Apple’s iTunes Music Store has been named “Invention of the Year” by Time Magazine!

Other inventions this year may have more altruistic intentions (like Dean Kamen’s water purifier) or be more visible on street corners (like those ubiquitous camera cell phones). But for finally finding a middle ground between the foot-dragging record labels and the free-for-all digital pirates and for creating a bandwagon onto which its competitors immediately jumped, Apple’s iTunes Music Store is Time’s Coolest Invention of 2003.

Lizette&: This Is

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Lizette&, an excellent band from Sweden whom I’ve mentioned in the past, has finally finished their debut album! The release party is scheduled for December 2nd. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to attend — a small matter of me being in Seattle, and the party being in Stockholm, Sweden — but I’ve been looking forward to this album for a while, and will be snagging a copy as soon as it’s available to be ordered.

They’re an alternative/industrial band that I discovered a few years back via the Internet, somewhere along the lines of the Kidney Thieves (who opened for KMFDM on their last tour). Well worth checking out, I’d say, and you can get a few samples of their sound from their MP3.com page.

LISTBlog

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My friend D has just gone live with her newest project: LISTBlog.

The objective here is simple – compose lists based on the topic chosen by the post’s author. Feel free to leave your list in the comments or on your own blog with a link and/or TrackBack to the particular list you’re participating in.

List #1 — Songs you hate to love.

I am so going to lose what credibility I have for my taste in music with this list. The majority of the time, my musical tastes focus on the goth/industrial/alternative side of things, though I listen to a wide range of different styles, and I’m not sure there’s a genre out there that I don’t enjoy something from.

I do, however, have a weakness for well-crafted “pop” music. What used to be a perfectly acceptable genre — “pop”, or “bubblegum pop” — has of late become the realm of such quality acts as Britney Spears and her ilk, and overall isn’t nearly as listenable as it has been in years past. However, occasionally, a song will come along that, even when voiced by an artist that will cause most sane, rational people to run screaming from the stereo, I find myself liking. It rarely, if ever, has anything to do with whatever flavor of the week is providing the voice for the song. Instead, what will catch me is the hook, the production values, and the writing. Even if it’s a hideously dumb song, if it’s assembled well, it’ll often work its way into my brain.

Here, then, are five songs destined to cause me to hang my head in shame and forever regret publicly admitting that I actually enjoy them. ;)

  1. Spice Girls: “Wannabe” (And, incidentally — as long as I’m damning myself — the Spice World movie was far more entertaining than I expected it to be, and is solidly in my “guilty pleasure” movie list. Pick it up sometime, try to ignore the fact that it’s “THE SPICE GIRLS”, and just watch it for the zany British humor.)
  2. Britney Spears: “Oops! I Did It Again…” (I can’t explain it. I really can’t. But this song makes me laugh every time I hear it.)
  3. Los Del Rio: “The Macarena” (Back when I was DJ’ing and the Macarena was at the height of its popularity, it got played about weekly, and [since I have no shame] I’d get up onto a stage area by the DJ booth and do the dance. It didn’t take long before I’d end up with a group of girls watching me — apparently, in their words, I “do good things for the Macarena.” I’m still occasionally tempted to break into it in the middle of a Sisters of Mercy tune at The Vogue, though I haven’t been that crazy/tipsy yet….)
  4. Ricky Martin: “Cup of Life” (I actually think Ricky gets short shrift much of the time. While the more “American” pop-oriented tracks I’ve heard from him generally fail to impress me, the songs with a stronger Latin feel aren’t bad at all.)
  5. Kid Rock: “Wasting Time” (Actually, any Kid Rock song off of Devil Without a Cause. I was just berating myself for this the other day. I know I generally have decent taste in music. I know I shouldn’t like Kid Rock in the least. But for some reason, every so often, his blatantly ridiculous pot-smokin’, 40oz-drinkin’, wife-beater wearin’ white trash attitude is just what I need. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go kill myself.)

Jason Webley Deathday 2003

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Last night was Jason Webley‘s Deathday concert. Incredible, beautiful, fun, funny, and moving — everything I’ve come to expect from Webley’s shows.

The show was held at the Town Hall, which is just kitty-corner across the street from my apartment building. Just a little after 6pm, Prairie glanced out my kitchen window and noticed that something was glowing outside of Town Hall. Curious, I opened the window and poked my head out. The glow was easy to identify as a Jack O’ Lantern. What I hadn’t expected to see (though perhaps I should have) was the line that was already starting to form. Hoping to get good seats for the show, we decided that we’d go join the line, bundled up, and headed downstairs and across the street.

We found a spot in line right at the corner, and spent the next hour or so watching people play, identifying costumes, and chatting with the people in front of us — a cute girl with red dreadlocks and her boyfriend. We never did catch their names (even after mentioning at one point that we didn’t know each other), but they made for a fun way to pass the time as we waited, talking about everything from lemmings being thrown over cliffs to whether or not I liked artichokes (I don’t).

Eventually we made it inside, stood in line for a while longer waiting for the doors to the auditorium to open, and finally getting in and finding seats. We ended up getting great seats — the auditorium has a staircase in the center of the hall leading down and out, and we were just one row back behind the stairs, with a perfect view of the stage. Town Hall was perfect for the show, too. Huge (around 900 seats), and I’d guess the audience was between 700 and 800 people, primarily “alternative”/punk/goth kids in their late teens and early twenties, but a sizeable number of adults, also. One of the things I’ve always liked about Jason Webley is how well he attracts a wide range of fans, and that’s always obvious at shows such as these.

Not long after we all filed in, the musicians took the stage, and the show began…

The empty stage

The lights went down, and the auditorium went silent. A door opened on the side of the stage, and Jason entered — in puppet form. As a gorgeously done Jason Webley puppet, controlled by two puppeteers wearing all black, he walked to the front of the stage, guitar case in hand. He sat down, pulled out the guitar, and played the first song (recorded…as good as the puppet was, its fingers weren’t quite that dextrous).

Once the song was done, he walked back offstage, and the black clad assistants came back onstage. There had been a large box covered by a sheet at center stage, and they proceeded to remove the sheet to reveal a large trunk. They unlocked the trunk, opened the lid — and helped Jason (the real flesh-and-blood Jason this time) out of the box, clad only in loose yellow pants. As he came to life, he was given his trenchcoat and hat, and finally, his accordion, and the main part of the show began.

Emerging from the box

The show was incredible. The accompanying musicians were expanded this year to include a string quartet of two cello and two violin, in addition to the brass band, drums, and Jason switching among accordion, guitar, and piano (and occasional shovel). The addition of the fuller, more orchestral background was wonderful, filling out his songs and allowing for some beautiful background music for some of the more performance-art sets of the show.

Because Town Hall presented a more formal setting for the show than some other venues, like last year’s Deathday show at the Paradox, after the first few songs Jason took a moment to break the ice and loosen things up again by leading us all in a rousing sing-along of “My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean,” with everyone either standing up or sitting down again at every word that started with a “B”. This was fun, and got a good deal of giggles going through the audience, but apparently that wasn’t enough for Jason, as he decided to teach us another dance — the Gnomie.

Now, the Gnomie is quite easy to do. Inspired by those little lawn gnomes seen in the front yards of homes, all you have to do is get a sheepish grin on your face, pull your shirt over the back of your head, and then wiggle your arms (now pulled up a bit by the shirt) as you bounce around a bit. Have you ever seen a crowd of 700-some people doing the Gnomie? We almost didn’t, as there’s always some people a bit too shy to do something quite this silly. But Jason implored us to get everyone involved. After all, one doesn’t get too many chances to do the Gnomie, and so he asked us all to turn to anyone we could see who wasn’t joining in, look deep into their eyes, and sing to them, “If you don’t Gnomie by now….” The general mood loosened up a lot after that!

Do the Gnomie

This year, love, the heart, and flight were the running themes of the show, and the thematic elements of the performance were nicely woven between the more upbeat, sillier moments. Three stories were told during the course of the show: The Boy With Wings on His Heart, The Boy With A Ball of String for a Heart, and The Boy With A Balloon For A Heart. Each story was about our relationships with love — for each other, for home, for what we see in this world. I’m really hoping that someone who was taping the performance was able to catch these stories on tape, they were wonderfully written and performed.

During the last half of the show, red balloons were occasionally tossed into the crowd. Small heart-shaped balloons, larger round balloons, and a couple really large round balloons (easily two feet in diameter). These would fly around the audience, bouncing from one person to the next. They’d disappear for the quieter songs, then as the energy ramped up again, they’d reemerge from underneath seats or more would be brought out, and the air would soon fill with red balloons again.

Big red balloons

For each of Jason’s stories, he used a small doll (the child’s doll with a soft body and plastic head, arms, and legs) to illustrate the story as he told it. For The Boy With A Balloon for a Heart, the story told of a boy who’s heart would expand each time he saw something he liked, each time he saw something that made him sad — anything that made him love. This doll had had its body replaced with stocking fabric around a balloon, and each time the boy’s heart grew, Jason blew the balloon up a bit. Eventually, as the story ended, he had a (truth to tell) somewhat disturbing looking swollen baby doll, which he handed to the audience. Seeing as how we were already batting large red balloons around…well, the baby just got added into the mix. I’m not entirely sure if that was Jason’s intent or not, but for the rest of the evening, you’d see three or four balloons fly in front of your face, followed by a balloon baby careening through the audience.

Eventually, after a good collection of old Webley standards and some new songs (perhaps there’s a new album in the works?), a mass audience tickle fight, and everyone “getting wasted” for the Drinking Song by pointing at the roof, looking at their fingers, and spinning in circles twenty times or so, the show started to wind down.

Jason took off his coat and hat, and one of the assistance appeared in the audience with a doll version of Jason hanging from a pole with wings strapped to his arms, flying around the room, and eventually onto the stage. After a few flights around the stage, the doll Jason descended into Jason’s arms. Gently cradling the doll in his arms, Jason stood there, the auditorium dead silent — when the crack of snapping wood filled the hall, and the wings, shattered, fell to the ground. Anguish washing over his face, Jason gently reached into the doll and removed its heart.

Removing Jason's heart

Two white-clad pallbearers came on stage, bearing a small coffin between them. Setting it down on the stage and removing its lid, they reached up and coaxed the doll from Jason’s arms, laying it to rest within the coffin. One then turned and took the heart from Jason, placing it back in the body of the doll. They then stood back up and slowly left the stage, bearing the doll away and out of the auditorium down the central staircase, leaving Jason collapsed in grief on the stage. The two black-clad assistants then came back, gently picked Jason up, put him back into the trunk, closed and locked it, and covered it with the sheet again. The band played gently as we all got up and quietly left the auditorium, filed outside, and gathered in the rain outside of Town Hall, waiting to see what would happen next.

Eventually, someone caught wind of the next part of the night’s activities (for Jason’s big shows are never entirely done just because we’re no longer watching him onstage), and everyone started walking a block down the street to the closest entrance to Freeway Park. As we all entered the park we passed people with large bunches of balloons, handing everyone a single balloon. We got ours and continued on into the park, following the paths until we got to one of the large plaza areas next to the Convention Center. Here, the two pallbearers were standing next to a small stone cairn, still bearing the coffin with Jason’s (doll) body in it.

We gathered in a circle around them, each of us holding the balloon we had been given, talking quietly, reliving the show we had just seen, talking about prior Deathdays, and waiting to see what would happen next.

Waiting with our balloons

Eventually, people came back through the crowd, gathering all the balloons together again. We each tied our balloon onto one of the bunches, then all the bunches were gathered together in the center of the circle. Not long after that, the balloons started to rise, with Jason (in doll form) tied to the bottom of the bunch, to let him fly away into the night. Unfortunately, here the night hit a slight snag, to the amusement of the gathered fans. As there was a light rain that evening, the balloons were becoming slightly weighted down with water, and couldn’t get enough lift to fly away!

Jason floated gently above our heads, but wasn’t able to get much lift beyond that, and our cheers of encouragement as he floated above us quickly turned into laughs as he drifted first into one of the park lamps, then into one tree, and then into another. Each time, someone would extricate Jason from his predicament, knock some of the water off of the balloons they could reach, let him go again, we’d all cheer — and then watch him find another tree. After the third time, someone pulled the bunch of balloons down and those of us closest to the bunch, laughing and cheering, jumped up into the balloons, doing what we could to knock as much rain off as possible.

One last launch. Cheers and cries of encouragement. “Go, Jason!” “Fly away!” And fly away he did, finally rising above us, floating away over downtown Seattle, to wherever Jason goes during these long winter months.

And so Jason Webley has died. Until next spring and his rebirth…we’ll all miss you.

“Goodbye forever, once again…”

Goodbye forever, once again...

Update: More Webley links…

Metadata is a good thing

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Phil and I got into a conversation this morning (which he’s already mentioned) about the iTunes Music Store and the metadata (ID3 tags such as Artist, Year, Track #, Composer, etc. that are included with each song in iTunes) that they provide.

While I’ve played with it a bit, I don’t see myself becoming a big user of the iTunes Music Store for one very simple reason — their metadata doesn’t meet my standards. Specifically, the “Year” field is often wrong (for instance, Meat Loaf‘s ‘Bat Out of Hell’ is tagged as 2003, when it was re-released, rather than 1977, when it was originally released), and for the majority of the tracks on the store, the “Composer” field is empty — the Classical genre is the only time the Composer field seems to be used consistently.

Now, I fully recognize that for 95% (at least) of the population, this isn’t going to be a major thing at all. As long as the Artist, Album, and Track Name are there and correct, we should be happy, right? Well, sure, for most people. I’m just in that 5% who are picky (ahem…anal) about this (and it’s certainly not limited to my music, as I tend to be quite meticulous about keeping my books and movies alphabetized, and sometimes broken down by genre).

Part of why I like having all that information available is just the amount of different searches that can be done when it’s all in and entered correctly — and when you’re dealing with a music library that is upwards of 80Gb, emcompassing over 10,000 different tracks from around 1,200 CDs, that can be important!

To use one of the examples I gave Phil, Al Jourgensen has been active in a ton of different industrial groups over the years, including Ministry, the Revolting Cocks, Lard, and many, many others. As long as I have the Composer field entered correctly, then I can do a quick search through my library for “Jourgensen” and instantly I’ve got a list of every track in my collection that he’s worked on.

Another example: Bob Dylan has written an incredible amount of music, much of which has been covered by many different artists over the years. Suppose I felt like listening to all the covers of Bob Dylan tracks I had in my collection. Without good metadata, it’s not happening — but with the metadata, I can set up a smart playlist using the terms “Arist does not include Dylan, Composer includes Dylan”, and I’ve got a list of Dylan songs performed by anyone but the man himself.

As far as the Year field goes, I like to keep smart playlists for each decade — I touched on this briefly earlier this month — or just be able to sort a listing of songs chronologically. Having the correct year in the metadata is necessary for this, and years that are off can be pretty jarring (for instance, listening to a modern music playlist and suddenly having 25-year old rock could be a little odd).

So that’s why I have some of the habits I do (well, ignoring the deep-seated childhood psychological trauma), and why I’m not likely to use the iTMS for much more than occasionally grabbing a track to replace a scratched section of one of my CDs. I may use it for expanding my classical collection — I just bought a great collection of Bach‘s Brandenburg Concertos last week — but that’s probably going to be the extent of it for now.

What to do to fix that (and send more of my money Apple’s way)? Well, Phil and I batted this one about for a couple minutes. I’ve looked into this a bit in the past, and it seems that Apple doesn’t really have a lot of control over what metadata is and isn’t present for the songs in their store. If I’m remembering correctly, all encoding and tagging is done by the studios themselves, then provided to Apple for inclusion in the iTMS. So sniping at Apple isn’t likely to do much good, and it would likely be a bit beyond my ken to start harassing each of the various studios to pay attention to these little details (especially when, as I stated before, most people couldn’t give a flying fig about things like this).

The best case scenario, I think, is one that Phil mentioned: if Apple treated the iTMS library’s metadata in a similar fashion to the Gracenote CDDB (this is the service that iTunes connects to in order to automatically discover album information when you put a CD into your computer). With the CDDB, all information in the database can be updated by the users — if you put a CD into your computer and notice that some of the information is incorrect, you can make the edits and then re-submit the updated information back to the CDDB, essentially creating a self-updating and self-correcting public service.

If Apple could implement something like this for the iTMS, I’d be thrilled. Logistically, it’s a bit of a quandry, though, as it would likely need to include some sort of moderation to prevent someone submitting information for an album with every track titled “tHIz ALBum SuXX0Rzz!!!!!” or something equally intelligent. That extra added overhead creates more work for Apple, and as the iTMS is currently running in the red, Apple probably isn’t going to be anxiously looking for ways to put more money in for a feature that only 5% or less of its users are going to care about.

My suggestion, then, would be to create something akin to an “iTMS Pro” service. For, oh, \$5 a month (billed directly to the credit card already registered with the iTMS), an “iTMS Pro” subscriber could edit and submit information on tracks in the iTMS library, correcting information that might have been entered badly the first time (I’ve already noticed the occasional dropped space or inconsistent naming conventions), or adding information that wasn’t included, such as the Composer field. The information would still probably need to go through some sort of moderation process at Apple, but limiting the editing ability to people who were willing to pay the slight extra bit of money would weed out casual pranksters, and provide a few extra dollars to Apple to pay for that moderation process.

Is this going to happen? Oh, I seriously doubt it. But if it did, I’d be sure to sign up.

I like my metadata.

iTunes and iTMS for Windows

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Well, the rumors were true — and then some! Here’s some quick highlights of today’s Apple Event:

Hell Froze Over

  • The iPod is the number one .mp3 player on the market, with a 31% market share.
  • Two new accessories (for 3rd generation iPods with the Dock Connector) have been introduced:
    • The Belkin iPod Voice Recorder, which allows you to record voice memos on-the-go and then sync them to your Mac or PC when you’re back home.
    • The Belkin Media Reader, which allows you to move photos off of a camera storage card (Compact Flash, [Type 1 and 2], Smart Media, Secure Digital [SD], Memory Stick, or Multi Media Card [MMC]) and onto the iPod for later import into iPhoto. Never have to worry about running out of space on your camera again!
  • The iTunes Music Store has been upgraded:
    • There will be over 400,000 tracks available by the end of the month.
    • Over 200 independent labels have joined with the iTMS for distribution.
    • Integration with Audible now allows for to be purchased directly through the iTMS interface.
    • Gift Certificates can now be purchased for family or friends through the iTMS. Choose how much you want to give, send it off, and the recipient gets an e-mail. One click, and they’re in the iTMS with credit in their account.
    • Parents can now set up Allowances for children — \$10 (or whatever amount is chosen) per month in downloads charged to the parent’s credit card. Essentially an automatically-renewing gift certificate.
    • Celebrity Playlists — recommendations of songs from popular artists.
  • iTunes for Windows is now available.
    • Runs on Windows 2000 and Windows XP.
    • Complete feature parity with iTunes for the Mac.
    • Rendevouz music sharing over local area networks works between Macs and PCs.
    • iTMS access is built in to iTunes for Windows, just as it is on iTunes for the Mac.
    • Each track purchased from the iTMS is authorized for play on up to three computers — this can be a mix-and-match of Windows PCs and Macs.
  • Two big promotional partnerships were announced:
    • America Online: AOL’s music store now integrates directly with iTunes.
    • Pepsi: 100 million songs will be given away through redemption codes under the cap of select Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, or Sierra Mist bottles. 300 million bottles will be printed, with a one in three chance of winning a free download.

    : http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/books/ “Apple – iTunes – Audiobooks”
    And those are all the key points. Pretty damn impressive! I’ll be playing with iTunes on Windows as soon as I get to work today…

(Much thanks to MacRumors live coverage of the event!)

Rebecca, ecce! tantae clunes isti sunt!

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‘quislibet’ has translated Sir Mix-A-Lot’s ‘Baby Got Back’ into Latin, and given an English re-translation that gives some idea of how sucessful his translation efforts were. What follows is merely the beginning…here’s the rest!

Latin English (re-translated)
mehercle!
Rebecca, ecce! tantae clunes isti sunt!

amica esse videtur istorum hominum rhythmicorum.
sed, ut scis,
quis homines huiusmodi intellegere potest?
colloquuntur equidem cum ista eo tantum, quod scortum perfectum esse videtur.
clunes, aio, maiores esse!
nec possum credere quam rotondae sint.
en! quam exstant! nonne piget te earum?
ecce mulier Aethiops!

By Hercules!
Rebecca, behold! Such large buttocks she has!

She appears to be a girlfriend of one of those rhythmic-oration people.
But, as you know
Who can understand persons of this sort?
Verily, they converse with her for this reason only, namely, that she appears to be a complete whore.
Her buttocks, I say, are rather large!
Nor am I able to believe how round they are.
Lo! How they stand forth! Do they not disgust you?
Behold the black woman!

(via Cory Doctorow)

Apple poised for big music push

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More and more, Apple is making a huge push into the music industry — and if the rumor mills are right, this week just may be their biggest foray yet.

Already having made a name for themselves over the past couple years with the one-two punch of the iPod and the iTunes Music Store, recently Apple has been exploring various exclusive promotions, such as live performances by bands at Apple Store locations that are later released exclusively through the iTMS.

Latest case in point: Thursday and Thrice, a pair of new rock acts from Island Records, are hyping an upcoming tour Wednesday (Oct. 15) with Apple in-stores on two coasts.

Thursday will take the stage at the Apple Store SoHo in New York. On the West Coast, Thrice will play at the Apple Store Third Street Promenade, located in Santa Monica, Calif. Each performance will be at 7 p.m. in their respective time zones.

The shows kick off a highly anticipated double bill — presented by Alternative Press magazine and MTV2 — which begins Oct. 17 in Pennsylvania.

The music performed at the events will be available exclusively for purchase at the iTunes Music Store.

Already, Apple Store performances can be found at the iTMS from Less Than Jake (iTMS link) and The Rising (iTMS link). I think this is a fascinating way to co-promote both the bands and Apple’s brand.

While it’s been known that Apple has a major event this Thursday that has a 90% or better chance of featuring the introduction of iTunes (and the iTMS) for Windows, according to both MacRumors and AppleInsider, there may be some nice surprises in store for Mac users, too. Possibilities include iTunes 5 (released for both Windows and Macintosh) featuring more encoding options, .wma support, and the ability to “borrow” tracks and albums from the iTMS before purchasing them; and iPod peripherals, perhaps featuring an add-on to allow recording directly to the iPod (touted as being aimed at students for recording classroom lectures).

Lots of fun toys coming down the pike, from the looks of it…