Posts filed under 'Music'
Call me crazy. But this week I decided we will be going to the Austin City Limits Festival. Sure, I’ll be 8 months pregnant, and September in Austin is sweltering. But how could I not? I asked the ladies at AustinMamas their opinion, and it went 50/50. We’re going to play it by ear - we can always sell the tickets if we decide not to go. But come on. With having a baby, when is the next time I’ll actually be able to see:
The Decemberists, Bob Dylan, Björk, The White Stripes, The Killers, Wilco, Arcade Fire, Bloc Party, Damien Rice, Lucinda Williams, Spoon, Regina Spektor, Kaiser Chiefs, Ben Kweller, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Andrew Bird, Ghostland Observatory, Reverend Horton Heat, Pete Yorn, Yo La Tengo, or any of the others.
I just don’t want the opportunity to pass by and then regret it.
In other news:
I’m 18 weeks pregnant now. According to our scale, I still am the same weight I was in December. My boobs and belly tell otherwise (as does the doctor’s scale).
We own our house. Too bad we don’t move for another two months. At least that gives me plenty of time to decorate in my head. Like I haven’t been doing that the past two years.
Today calls for mini golf, swimming, and sno-cones. And plenty of pictures, thanks to my birthday present.
May 12th, 2007
Now that Thanksgiving is drawing to a close, we all know that Christmas isn’t too far behind. We’re not crazy enough to go out shopping tomorrow (we’re going to a write-in instead) but at some point we’ll need to brave the stores. But maybe we won’t have to. We already have some gifts, thanks to a few early purchases online. And this weekend is the Victorian Christmas Festival down on 6th Street. There’s bound to be something there our families would like.
My biggest problem with Christmas is that I really like giving gifts. No, really, this is a problem. Every time I see something great and think of who it would be good for, I have to kick myself back into reality because I can’t get gifts for everyone I know. And while I can’t think of anything to put on my own wish list, I can th ink of approximately 127 things I’d like to send out to heatherica and her son.
This Christmas will be a little different. We snatched up cheap tickets back to Minneapolis, so we’ll be there for a few days. And so will my mom. Well, she’ll be there for more than a few days - this weekend, she’s moving to the Cities and into her very first solo apartment. I’m extremely proud of her, and I can’t imagine how nervous and excited she must be right now. Hopefully she’ll be able to handle it OK. And if not, well, my brother lives in the same neighborhood.
And speaking of the holidays, my copy of Songs for Christmas arrived at my doorstep exactly 24 hours after I ordered it from Amazon. While I like Christmas (hey, I was raised in America, right?) I don’t believe in the Christian Jesus stuff, but dang it, I still like those holiday songs.
November 23rd, 2006
Every once in a while I get into this mood where I must listen to all the very depressing music I have stored on my iPod. The other day, when I was doing this at work (Yes, I listen to my iPod at work. At least half the people do. Copyeditors are pod people.) I realized I was getting very angry at the music I was listening to.
Yeah, angry. While this is a change from the usual emo-funk it puts me in, I wondered why I was getting mad at all these songs I felt a connection to. And that was the answer. I was mad because I was connected to these songs, these lyrics. I was pissed off that people I had never met and most likely never would meet were able to put my feelings about whatever into a song while I, as a writer, have not been able to properly express myself in quite a while. It was like a Jerry Springer episode in my head. “You don’t know me! Who the fuck are you? You don’t know me!”
But then again, isn’t that why we listen to these artists in the first place? Somehow we see ourselves in “The Bagman’s Gambit” or “Swimmers” or, hell, even whatever poplet is big among the kids these days. So what makes these songs better than others? Why do I care what Elvis Costello says but not Justin Timberlake?
I suppose it’s all in the perception. I like to think of myself as more of the quirky person whom people respect than the purported sex symbol. The songs that I listen to and give me pause are those I feel I could have written myself (so to speak). I’m never going to find meaning in “Butterfly Kisses”, no matter how many other people seem to, because that wasn’t my life.
When it all boils down, of course, every artist writes about the same things. Love. Sex. Politics. Religion. Vices. And we embrace it all. I think the people who are adults now, maybe those people 25-35 or so, are so much more involved with the music they listen to than before or later. OK sure, there were the amazing music movements in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. But in the 80s we had MTV. They’re the butt of many jokes now, but MTV really did change how music was perceived. You didn’t have to go to a concert to see a band, they were right on your screen. But people didn’t stop going to concerts. They didn’t stop holding their breath when the lights dimmed and the first few notes were played. And then there were iPods. We could fall into a reverie at any point, and keep ourselves trapped within our musical selections for hours on end, absorbing nothing but the notes. Somehow, these three elements combined and produced the people I know. It’s been said before, but music really is the closest many of us get to having a religion, and I don’t see anything wrong with that.
Or as Sapphire says in Almost Famous:
“To truly love some silly little piece of music, or some band, so much that it hurts.”
October 28th, 2006