I can't think of a title right now. Seriously.

No posts in a while. Hmmm. Everyone's busy "working" I guess. I'm not.

Another trip. More records. You know the drill.

Nirvana (greatest hits). Found it cheap. Got it for original version of "Been A Son" (on Blew EP). The tracklisting is a bit predictable, but hey, it's greatest hits, not best of. Then again, if you want Nirvana's "greatest hits," just buy Nevermind. If you want "best-of" Nirvana, get In Utero. It's just plain sense.

Pod, The Breeders. One of Kurt's favorite albums. Engineered by Steve Albini. Girl from Pixies (Kim Deal) plays guitar and sings. She has a pretty voice. I think Kurt said something about the album long the lines of "it'll never let you forget your ex-girlfriend." Don't quote me on that. I've never had an ex-girfriend. It's probably fun though. Kidding.

Bug, Dinosaur Jr. "Freak Scene" is a masterpiece. Don't care about rest of album yet. Just listening to "Freak Scene." J Mascis is a great guitarist. And I'm not just saying that.

Heart-Shaped Box (Single), Nirvana. Only supposed to be available in Europe. Found it here. Yay. Very collectible.

Bandwagonesque and Grand Prix, both by Teenage Fanclub. They're very good. I'm a teenage fan of... forget it. So far I like Gerald Love's songs the best.

Out of Time, R.E.M. I couldn't find anything else. I heard "Losing My Religion" while I was in the store, so that might have influenced my decision a bit.

2 other CDs. Watch your mailbox.

I'm satisfied. I found everything I was looking for except the albums I wanted the most. Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash (the Mats) and anything that Steve Albini plays on. There was nothing in the Shellac area, and I couldn't even find Big Black or Rapeman (I'm not surprised about the latter though). Apparently a deluxe edition of Quadrophenia is going to be released soon. I might get that, seeing that the album itself is very, very good. It has some songs that I'm pretty sure that Han might even like. Then again, maybe he wouldn't. Y'know, he probably wouldn't. He still listens to Pokemon songs.

Then again, some of those aren't bad. Still listening to "Freak Scene."

WIN

Maybe "our show," rather than "my show," but this is still awesome.

Recorded, not produced

Steve Albini is a genius. That is all. Well, not really. But he is. He produced-wait, sorry, "recorded" In Utero. He's would be awesome for that reason alone. But I also really like listening to his stuff from all his bands; they're mostly noise, but it's really, really good abrasive noise. Steve's three bands are Big Black, Rapeman, and Shellac, and they're all very similar (he plays guitar and sings in all of them). Listening to mostly Big Black, especially songs from their last studio album, like "The Model," "Bad Penny," and "He's A Whore." What? It's a Cheap Trick cover! Don't be so uptight.

Turns out that Shellac has 2 concerts in Oakland this October. And they're both on the weekend. And they have a cellist for the opening act named Helen Money. Shellac is the awesome band with songs like "Squirrel Song," "My Black Ass," and "Steady As She Goes" (not the stupid one with Jack White in it, although I'll admit that one isn't bad either). I really want to go to one of these. And since it's at a small club, it'll be intimate than a big, indulgent arena show. Just hope I can go.

Disappointed with Pandora

Who in the right mind would categorize Chopin with SCARLATTI?! There is a reason why I started my Chopin station separately from my J.S. Bach and if the database is combining a Scarlatti piano sonata with Chopin's piano work, I don't know what to say. Perhaps I'm being overly picky, but I think this is a pretty serious problem. On the "similar composers" part of the description, J.S. Bach is included. I think one should at least be able to tell the musical difference between Romantic and Baroque. It's actually pretty simple, polytonality in Baroque with rather strict time signatures and less rubato. Romantic utilizes the waltz 3/4 feel with much more harmonizing, along with an extensive use of rubato and phrasing. Those two should be fairly easy to spot; I don't understand why Bach even shows up on the similar composers page. I don't know about you, but this made me pretty unhappy.

I guess for other genres of music, Pandora does a rather good job of categorizing most things, but the classical section definitely needs some work.

Acoustic Ballads

According to Tommy, the acoustic ballad that he wanted me to find is one that doesn't include piano, doesn't have any drums, and includes a voice. On top of that, I had to find one that I liked. Eventually, I got it, but that was only after much google searching. I guess I don't enjoy many songs that have only an acoustic guitar and a voice. (This isn't very surprising, if you take into consideration that I my two favorite genres of music are heavy metal and classical) I think it took me 3 days to find one that met all the requirements, sadly, I don't have an eidedic memory like Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation, which explains the "I think" in this sentence. When he (Tommy) asked me to name an acoustic ballad, I said "Laguna Beach" by Black Sabbath, but apparently, that doesn't work because it needs vocals. So, naturally, I picked "About a Girl" by Nirvana, the obvious choice, but he asked for another one, probably because it was the obvious choice. After that point, it just got hard. So if you're interested in the song that I actually did pick, it's "More than words" by Extreme. I do, however, enjoy many ballads that are electric. Here are a couple that I find enjoyable:

-Stairway To Heaven - Led Zeppelin

-A Little Piece of Heaven - A7x (Metal ballads exist)

- I Don't Want to Miss a Thing - Aerosmith

- Soldier of Fortune - Deep Purple

- Dying For Love - Black Sabbath

- Androgynous - The Replacements

- Hey Jude - The Beatles

- The Spirit Carries On - Dream Theater (YES! The new album is coming out in September and after this song, I am DEFINITELY contemplating buying it. Y'all should listen to both the original and the version that a cover band put together internationally, it's called On The Backs of Angels)

That's about it, I guess the last one is kind of borderline, but it's still quite a bit slower than the stuff I usually listen to, so perhaps it works. Wow, psychology is taking over my brain, the second I wrote "borderline" I immediately thought of the borderline personality disorder. Great. Speaking of psychology, did you know that coprophilia, a paraphilia that means sex with feces, was labeled one of the most common paraphilias? Pretty gross, isn't it?

Losing What's Left of My Mental Sanity...

I'm pretty sure that there's something wrong with staying at home all day in pajamas in front of the computer. Just saying. I've been stalking The Strokes for the past few days because I've been regretting not going to see them at Shoreline (Why did I have to study for finals? WHY? The Strokes are so much better. It was a WEEKEND too for goodness sakes....Sometimes I really wonder about how I can be so stupid.) The Strokes....I think I love them even more as everyday passes. The good news is that they have a 5th album in the works so maybe, just maybe, they'll finish by next year and tour again and swing by San Francisco? This is all wishful thinking that I really really really really hope comes true. So far the only thing that has been holding me over until the 5th album comes out is the 4th album, Angles. I love every single song on the album. No joke. And that's rare, really rare. I mean, even on most Green Day albums there is at least one song that I don't like too much. Angles is an AMAZING album that I just can't stop listening to. I swear, I cannot fall asleep until I've listened to the album at least 2 times through. Sigh. So, for all you people who are wondering whether or not to get Angles, do it. You have not lived until you do. When I first started listening to The Strokes, I thought it was just good, you know, nothing amazing. It really doesn't hit you until you think about it and listen carefully that you get all the nuances of their music. I probably sound crazy, but whatever. I've lost what's left of my mental sanity.

Ballads?

When I saw Tommy's post, I could not resist posting my own. Leonard (And yes, it's not pronounce Ba-llaud) ...Ballads are sometimes the most insightful songs because they are so contemplative. Idk, maybe it's because I actually grew up listening to mostly ballad-ish music. See Elton John and Simon & Garfunkel ("Sound of Silence" - good song). Seriously. My parents love Elton John and Phil Collins and my dad had this phase where he was learning guitar and he would play ballads like "Bridge Over Troubled Water". Maybe it's because I was so little and I mainly listened to mainstream at the time, but it really made an impression on me I guess. I mean, apparently, Julian Casablancas listened to stuff like The Doors and Phil Collins inspired music. (See Wikipedia) It's translated into my love of The Strokes and alternative music, and of course, Piano driven ballads (yes it is possible). I think I have a pretty loose definition of a ballad, but mostly, ballads are pretty slow, tell some sort of a story-ish and are not very upbeat. My favorite ballads are probably a little outside some of other peoples definitions of a ballad, but I think in general they are pretty good songs and are not too radically different from what is traditionally considered a ballad.

So, some good ballads:

"Whatsername"- Green Day (This is pretty much a ballad....just listen to it. Probably, one of my favorite songs ever if not my favorite song. It has HUNDREDS of plays on my iPod. Seriously.)

"Bridge Over Troubled Water" - Simon & Garfunkel (Eat your heart out, the piano part is so beautiful)

"Dream On" - Aerosmith (Yes, it is a ballad.)

"Home" - Michael Buble (Yeah, shut up. I like this song.)
"Androgynous" - The Replacements (I KNOW you like this song Leonard. And yes, it is a ballad. For sure.)

"Last Day On Earth" - Green Day (One of their few true ballads. Nice classic love song-ish ballad.)

"Sound of Silence" - Simon & Garfunkel (Leonard , listen to this one. I mean it. It is SUCH a good song. To describe it in familiar terms, it sort of reminds of "Shadowplay". It's sort of iffy as a ballad, but still fantastic)

"A Change Is Gonna Come" - Sam Cooke (haha...A Julian Casablancas interview made me listen to this. And I liked it.)