03 Feb 2012
Trying to Throw Your Arms Around the World - U2
I keep thinking the first U2 album I experienced was Rattle and Hum. For some reason I forget all about Achtung Baby. I forget it until I put it on and roll into the B-sides, and then it all comes back. This album became part of my nightly cool-down repertoire. I would put on some music, read, and make the transition towards sleep. There’s just this relaxed wall of sound going on here that really works for me.
Seasons - Chris Cornell
I didn’t see the movie Singles until many years later, but I had access to the soundtrack at this point. Actually, it was the first soundtrack I listened to. It provided exposure to so many different artists and sounds. Many of them were challenging to my palate, and I spent a lot of time unraveling its layers.
It was full of firsts. This was the first time I really experienced Jimi Hendrix (weird, I know). There’s a Led Zeppelin cover on this album that I couldn’t stand at first but later grew to like (also, I had never really listened to Zeppelin, what’s with that?). And then there’s the Smashing Pumpkins song that became a bridge to this girl I had a crush on. But I’m getting ahead of myself…
I picked “Seasons” as the takeaway from this album. It has the always excellent voice of Chris Cornell and a clean acoustic guitar sound. There’s a drive to the song that really moves forward so naturally. With the musical history that I had, and combined with my growing relationship with the guitar, this song was perfect for me.
All I Want Is You - U2
My first crush happened in the 7th grade. And it happened shortly after I discovered my brother’s copy of Rattle and Hum (which I devoured - huge unexpected influence). I have memories of playing this song loudly on the living room stereo in the evening when no one was around. At the same time I would contemplate the full force of my love for this girl that I knew nothing about. This was one of the easiest and earliest pick for this list, because the memory around it is so clear and so strong.
Seriously, I was (and am) such a hopeless romantic, and this song is just so damned sweet. And good. It goes on this intense journey. There’s the song, and then there’s this whole emotional instrumental progression for two minutes that has always left me completely drained. After all these years it still works for me.
In these Feel-a-Thon sessions I would sometimes also play “Drown” from the Singles soundtrack sampled above. The girl I was crushing on was into this band I’d never heard of called The Smashing Pumpkins, and this was the only song I had access to (I would later score Siamese Dream, as you’ll see). “Drown” had the problem of being a great song, right up until the point where it goes into crazy distortion masturbation land for an additional three minutes. The radio edit removes this, but I didn’t have that luxury. So I’d listen to the song, be enjoying myself, and then have to rush back to the stereo and shut it off before it drove me crazy.
Numb - U2
This is one of those songs where people don’t know the lyrics. It’s completely monotone, there are a lot of words, and the music mostly plays over them. So naturally I tasked myself with memorizing all of them. Middle school age kids are so weird.
I hear this song and I’m instantly transported to the school computer lab in the library. I’m transcribing the lyrics from memory and putting them into some imaging program so I can apply some weird coloring effect. I remember the program having terrible text layout, and having to retype things many times. I also remember a girl (Lisa) commenting on how weird this all was. Many years later we would become friends, and many many years later she would be one of people I most enjoyed at my high school reunion, although I’m sure she doesn’t remember this library encounter.
Thankfully I don’t remember the lyrics anymore. My brain reallocated that space at some point.
Hummer - The Smashing Pumpkins
I found out that my first crush liked the Smashing Pumpkins, but I had no idea who they were, so I found out. I had to ask my brother. And then somehow I got a copy of Siamese Dream on cassette. It was unlike anything I’d heard before, but “Hummer” was one that really rose above the rest after repeated trips through the album. This song goes through controlled distortion and feedback to a beautiful place. The sound is full and raw but somehow gentle. And I love the place it goes to for those final two minutes.
My crush eventually faded. I never asked her out. I barely even talked to her. She was just cute and to my undeveloped self that was enough for me to completely obsess about her. But then she didn’t follow to the same high school and then that was that. Despite the crush expanding for so long with basically no reason, it died without even a whimper as soon as the target out of sight. But here’s the thing, this girl introduced me to some great music that has lasted me well beyond that awkward, awkward time.
Odd side note: In going back and fitting songs to the timeline this is one place where I’ve reached an internal inconsistency. I have a memory of trying to play along to “Soma” from this album with a thoroughly out of tune guitar. As in this would occur in the timeline right after I found a guitar but before I’d tuned it properly and learned any songs. That puts us somewhere around 1991. Siamese Dream came out in 1993, and according to my memory of how I got to the album it’d more be around 1994 when I was listening to it. These memories are incompatible. By the time I was listening to this album I was no longer friends with the person who I remember playing with on a happily self-tuned guitar. My memory is provably wrong here, and I don’t know how to reconcile that.
02 Feb 2012
Played on Xbox360
I feel compelled to write about Bastion. I mean, I could just say “it’s good, you should play it”, which is totally accurate, or “it’s so good I played it twice”, which is also definitely true, but I think the game deserves more than that. It deserves some gushing.
Bastion is a downloadable game for the Xbox (PC too, although I played it on the Xbox). I guess I’d describe it as an 2D action game with RPG elements, although that’s about as descriptive as filing music under the “rock” genre. It’s got an overhead perspective, you run around and take down the baddies while progressing through levels. That’s how it plays… but that part is pretty irrelevant. I mean, it plays well, but that’s not the point. The point is that Bastion is a thing of beauty.
When I say beauty the first thing that probably comes to mind is its visual presentation. Art direction, graphics, whatever. That’s all strong, but that’s not what I’m talking about. This game is a treat for the ears. It’s an auditory delight. Turning down the volume on this game is a punishably criminal offense.
The first thing you’ll notice is the narrator. You’re dropped in the game with some quick description of your surroundings by some gravelly old timer. Nothing else happens, you just sit there, seeing what is presumably your avatar lying down. Eventually you try to press some buttons and the kid will stand up. As he does the narrator describes what just happened. You continue moving around and this narrator follows describing things as you do them.
It’s a subtle but hugely important addition. It’s like in Mass Effect how they let you select your dialog responses before the other person is finished speaking. It’s about the rhythm of the experience. Having the narrator in Bastion respond to what you’re doing makes it feel like you are living out a story. As if what you’re doing is important, noteworthy. And most importantly, the language, vocabulary, cadence, and tone of the narrator firmly plants you in this world more so than any visual ever could.
The narrator from Bastion has been much applauded in the game’s critical reception. But reducing Bastion to a game that is only interesting because of its narrator is selling it short.
The music. Oh my god the music. There are few games that have caused me to go track down the soundtrack. This is definitely one of them. It feels simultaneously old yet modern, western but eastern. It feels like a future that is firmly grounded in the past. It’s Firefly. It’s steampunk. It’s extraordinarily intentional and extraordinarily good. Again, more than any visual element, the music places you in a fully realized world.
Reading the notes from the composer, apparently he was aiming for “acoustic frontier trip-hop”. Yes! That! OMG yes that!
It’s not my intention to sell the visual presentation or gameplay short. They’re both very strong. The visuals are vibrant, interesting, and unique. The gameplay is simple but tight, and builds in a way that gives you plenty to master. It’s a holistically enjoyable package. But it’s the sweet sounds encircling my brain that make me love Bastion. It’s good. You should play it.
01 Feb 2012
Sweating Bullets - Megadeth
We just went through a rather cohesive set of grunge influences, where’s this Megadeth thing coming from? It’s certainly true that I never ended up a metal-head, but it’s not as if I wasn’t exposed to these things. We’re entering a period here where there’s a lot of divergent influences coming in from my brother and my brother’s friends. I remember this song specifically. Something about the hardcore music combined with the funny voice just stuck with me. That and “Symphony of Destruction”.
Nuthin’ But A ‘G’ Thang - Dr. Dre
I’m guessing when most people hear this song they don’t think of stop motion LEGO movies. Yeah, didn’t think so. Well my brother, his friend Justin, and I made a movie that had something to do with… time travel? I think. Damn I wish I could get a copy of that. It had an awesome driving sequence set to this song, with special effects that make seeing the strings seem professional. And then there were stop motion LEGO-men walking sequences. And then live action sequences of our awesomely awkward selves. Seriously, anyone have a copy of this? I need to see it again.
Take Five - Dave Brubeck
This is what adolescence looks like. From metal to rap to jazz; all of the sudden I’m absorbing all these extremely different things at the same time.
This one in particular is associated with making chili with my dad. It was a company picnic, and there was a chili cook-off. We made an entry and somehow won. I think it’s mostly because people took some extremely creative interpretations on what chili is and I just stuck to tradition. I remember one of the chili competitors having fruit in it, for example. Anyway, winning made me feel kind of weird, because I was the bosses son. I mean, the voting was anonymous, but it still felt odd.
The chili was cooked entirely while listening to jazz on the public radio station, and as a result “Take Five” by Dave Brubeck still sticks out in my head as a song for cooking chili.
Fluffhead > Fluff’s Travels - Phish
In 7th grade I made a new friend named Kevin who conveniently lived just down the road from me. He introduced me to this band named Phish.
As you can see from everything leading up to this moment, this came at a time when I was sorting through a lot of varied influences and trying to find my own tastes. Phish was obscure and weird enough to give me that much needed middle school individualism that we all seemed to crave. The song I remember clicking for me first was “Fluffhead”.
I remember the moment I first heard it pretty clearly, actually. Well, I think I do - I might be collapsing two evenings into one in my head. Details. It was a sleepover at Kevin’s with me, him, and this guy Zach who also rode our bus. Kevin said he wanted to try smoking a cigarette and drinking a beer. I thought he was joking; it turns out he wasn’t. He was the only one to partake, and the evening ended with Kevin falling asleep and Zach vandalizing him with some aerosol cheese. It was not cool, and Kevin and I stopped hanging out with Zach after that.
The point, however, is that Kevin had a Phish tape on during the evening, and it was interesting and different. I followed up later and bought the album, Junta, which ended up being the first album I bought for myself. I proceeded to follow through their discography as money allowed and eventually catch up with current day, which at the time was Hoist.
I have fond memories, but I can’t listen to Phish now like I could then. But they represent a couple things to me. One, as I said, was individuality. I was listening to something completely different from what everyone else was. Sometimes even at the cost of quality.
Phish’s music was as much about the process as the end product, which appealed to me as someone who was diving into playing the guitar. But mostly it was about the moments. Their songs ramble and at times edge on dissonance, but sometimes the band just comes together in a magical way that wouldn’t be as good without the parts that came before. They really rode out the whole musical journey, embracing contrast tones and free exploration. Mixed results, sure, but it sure provided an interesting range.
But I think the most important thing is that Phish will forever be associated with my first real friend, Kevin.