Preface
I've eaten my way through a box of Cadbury Favourites. I'd like to say I'd shared them, but 'share' is a word the single person does not have the luxury of using. And thus the vicious cycle continues...
Anyhow, I was quite disappointed. I don't really like the changes they've made. It's all very bland and pastel and mushy. Where's the hard raspberry caramel that gives you jaw-cramp? Where's the caramel barrel that bursts into your mouth with gooey runny goodness? And they've added Cherry Ripes. Any candy based product based on coconut seems like a rip-off to me. Coconut is what Mum would sprinkle on the top of perfectly good chocolate slice to make it seem 'grown-up'. Ptooey to coconut, says Kate.
I digress.
In my chocolate eating haze I have been cruising the internet in a leisurely fashion. Leisurely in that I have no more senior classes to teach. So I'm not having to look up new and interesting stuff on wrestling or the newspaper industry. I can be totally frivalous and have no agenda! Bliss.
You will also note my blogging output has a correlation to school workload. Less work = more blog. Blogging is thinking. It's trying to formulate an opinion on something, or retell an event, in a cohesive way. I find it therapeutic. Am I allowed to call it a hobby? Will the people who produce solid, practical things from their hobbies laugh at me? Can I call it a hobby if I actually never get any better at it?
Anyhow, to have time and mind energy to blog is a good thing.
What I Like
I accidentally caught the end of Jools Holland tonight. I have decided to make a point of flicking onto Rialto every now and then, since for about the past 6 months I've forgotten it exists (I tend to go up to 9, then cycle back down - my world is limited).
And there was a girl on there that I liked. She is Imelda May. I actually only really liked the second song she did (which is later in the clip at 3mins12secs). Jools accompanies her on piano. It's jazzylicious.
I also like Colin Hay. I have decided to seek out some actual albums from him. I stumbled across him when I was being a pirate and getting songs from the Garden State sound track. He's done a lot of work on Scrubs.
I came across this song, which is one of my favourite post-break-up songs ever. I just like the sentiment of it. I like this song too, which is a bit more upbeat (a bit).
I like the sound of his voice (I have a thing for gravelly, story-telling singers) and I like the acoustic sound, and I also really like the lyrics.
I used to sing this song to myself back when I used to play guitar (that has been on hold since my flatmates put in enough barbed comments to make me self-conscious about playing - I have lost my callouses).
I like tangible, specific lyrics. I hate hyperboles too generic to mean anything (=Celine Dion).
Beck's lyrics are like poetry. I can't quite figure out what it means, but it sounds nice how it's all put together.
4 comments:
It's because the chocolate is AUSTRALIAN!!! stoopid cadbury and their aussie chocolate. I coped with getting rid of Snifters and Tangy fruits but getting rid of NZ made caramello was a bridge too far.
Try any Men at Work album for more Colin Hay stuff. He was the lead singer and songwriter. The MAW material is patchy and some of hit horribly dated, but there is some nice stuff in there.
Blogging easily qualifies as a hobby, if you mean an activity you pursue for the relaxation or pleasure rather than more important imperatives. I think you're good and improving at it. Improvement is not fundamentally necessary though. From someone who makes solid impractical things as a hobby.
Hobbies is what you do for your own enjoyment - you don't *have* to get better 'cause it's not like you have to have a performance review about it.
Which isn't to say that looking to improve your performance won't increase your enjoyment of it. But also not to say vice versa.
This also applies to guitar playing, not just blogging. I'm sure there are ways to shut your flatmates up. Give me time to think of some...
Okay, the following is just blurting on about music, because your post got me all excited on the topic. Sorry. Maybe I should be blogging myself instead of cluttering your comments...
Beck's lyrics are fascinating: he said in an interview when Odelay came out that he was inspired by ESL speakers, which would at least account for the lyrics on Mellow Gold and Odelay. I've lost touch a bit with his this-decade stuff but what I've heard he's still got the chops.
I also like David Byrne's lyrics (Talking Heads days at least) for tangible and specific - like "Don't Worry About the Government" where he sings about how much he likes where he works, in very matter-of-fact terms (I especially like these lines: "take the highway, park and come up and see me/ I'll be working, working, but if you come visit/ I'll put down what I'm doing, my friends are important to me"). That's a long way from "my heart will go on"...
Oh yeah, and re "gravelly, story-telling singers", Byrne had a really good line when people complained about his voice - he said he prefered non-"perfect" voices because songs are like a form of drama and you need to be able to suspend disbelief in the singer. Kinda like Edward Said reviewing Jessye Norman in the opera Erwartung, where he said her singing was so perfect she ruined the opera (her character was meant to be terrified and possibly insane; what she conveyed was confidence and assurance...)
I don't think I'm improving. I read my archive stuff a while ago and thought it was much better than more recent stuff :) And that's fine. I think I only have a finite amount of ideas and good anecdotes in my head and the good ones all came out straight away.
I liked your music ramble, Andrew.
I read somewhere that Beck recorded some songs where he made the band wear paper bags on their head or something, so that they wouldn't play as perfectly. He wanted some bung notes in there.
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