5 posts tagged “music”
What's something you bought, knowing it was a total waste of money?
Most things that most people buy at most times are total wastes of money. Most people I know have too much stuff and an impulse to collect it. Since having to move all my stuff, I've tried to purge myself of that impulse.
But lordy, how I still want Pullip dolls and Re-Ment miniatures.
I have Pullip's "Greggia" model, which is a pretty doll with rich auburn hair and creamy skin; she wears a little "sheep" hat and has a pet lamb and some knitting supplies. There are a few other models I would like. I also like her new rival, Dal. I used to like Blythe, but I think Pullip has a prettier face sculpt.
I have just a few Re-Ment things: the cheese shop from Natalie's French Goods and a set of strawberry cakes from some pastry shop line. Aside from the Dish In Fairyland or Fairytale Dishes set which I am considering ordering (update: received it today!), I also want several items I don't have from Natalie's French Goods, especially the set with the typewriter and records, and the set with the sewing machine.
Anyway, is something really a waste of money if it makes you happy every time you look at it? I didn't pay for my Pullip doll - she was a gift - but I enjoy having her around. I can't justify things like the miniatures (and the hundreds of other little things like them that I've collected over the years), because I don't get as much enjoyment out of them. I mean, they aren't even toys for me! They're toys for my Pullip! Actually, I am also interested in miniatures - the environment kind - as a hobby and art form.
FWIW, to me, after having collected piles of this stuff, some of the most pointless things you can buy these days are CDs and movies. I still get my favorites, or things that the library doesn't have, but for the most part they don't seem worth owning - I can always borrow them if I want to hear them, and I can only listen to one at a time anyway.
I bought a lot of cds because of free, illegal MP3 downloads in the late 90s and earlier part of this decade. I got to try a lot of things in a format that worked for me (in a way that the samples on Amazon, etc really don't), and I tended to buy new stuff I discovered. I haven't bought much since I quit downloading & started using my fantastic local library... most things that would interest me turn out to not be of much interest once you've heard the whole album a few times, but I still pick up a cd or two every few months. A few I've gotten in the last couple of years that I do listen to frequently and don't think were a waste of money are Interpol's Antics and Kate Bush's Aerial - but your mileage may vary, as they say on the interwebs. (I also like the Klaus Nomi collection that I got for Christmas, but I don't know what it's called!)
What's your favorite music for a Sunday morning?
I think this largely depends on the season and weather. On warm days, maybe something like Stan Getz with Joao and Astrud Gilberto.
On cold days, maybe the Chet Baker Sings compilation, or Kind of Blue, or Ella Fitzgerald's The Best of the Song Books, or compilations of similar music by various artists (I have a nice, cheap three-volume set called The Velvet Lounge). I like loungey jazz.
Also, I always like the Tallis Scholars or Cambridge Singers or Anonymous 4, and the Mediaeval Baebes are usually decent as well.
But most of this stuff is just as good for evenings as for mornings.
If I'm active on a Sunday morning, I'm usually doing housework, so I need something energetic... beyond that, it's pretty open, though there's a passable chance it will be one of the options I just mentioned.
What song makes you rock the karaoke mic?
Apparently, from very little karaoke experience, Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill." She's the pop musician whose voice is most like mine.
I'm a soprano. I don't have a pop voice: my voice is choral/operatic and I can do some mid-century jazz. I've developed a lot in my lower range since I stopped taking vocal training in college, but when I was younger, the A below middle C was the lowest note I could reliably hit, even though I had around three octaves above middle C. I took voice lessons throughout junior high and high school and started college as a voice major, but various life circumstances made me drop out. I'd pick up singing again, but I really don't know how to go about it... if you're deeply in a groove of "what you plan to do with your life," don't drop out of it to "take a break," because it's very hard to get back to anything once it's not a regular part of your life anymore. I can't fathom getting up at 7AM to do sight-singing and class piano exercises again.
So I have a lower voice now, but a lot of pop songs are still too low for me. I need things sung either by a woman with a high voice, many of which aren't as high as you'd think (example: Tori Amos does not sing in as high a range as most people think; her songs often go down to F or G below middle C, and rarely above high C), or things sung by a man with a middle-to-high voice. The other song I've done pretty well with is The Smiths' "This Charming Man" - but I sing it an octave higher than Morrissey does.
I tried to sing "Tenderness" by General Public the first time I did karaoke (the same night I did the Kate Bush song), and bombed because it was just too low for me. This is my experience with most songs... they're so low that I wouldn't even try them.
The next time I karaoke, it'll be with a song from either Sarah McLachlan (either "Sweet Surrender" or "Adia", probably) or Sarah Brightman. I could probably also handle something from Pat Benatar or Gwen Stefani, though Gwen's vocal tics really aren't that great for your vocal health.
What song best describes your current mood?
"Waiting for the Moon to Rise" by Belle and Sebastian is usually a safe bet for whatever happens to be going on in my head.
However, at the moment, I'm pretty tired. I thought maybe "Sing Me To Sleep" by The Smiths, but if anyone recalls the lyrics of that song, it isn't about wanting to go to sleep, it's about wanting to die in your sleep. (!!)
Um, no.
So, how about... um, something sleepable... um... "Let Go" by Frou Frou (HULK SMASH! I HAD THAT ALBUM BEFORE GARDEN STATE EVER CAME OUT!)... or... um... "Unicorn" by Bel Canto or... or... I'm too tired to think... "Cherry-Coloured Funk" by Cocteau Twins, which is a good song for going to sleep to, among many by that group.
(Foo Fighters' cover of "Baker Street"? Most Kate Bush tracks? "Night Visions" by Suzanne Vega? There's a great compilation cd you can buy called Open All Night: In the Shadows; most of it is by artists to whom I'm pretty indifferent, like Ms Vega, but for some reason the mix is amazing and perfect for late-night chill-out sessions. It also includes a track that is one of the most heartrendingly lovely I've ever heard, Autour de Lucie's "Au Large Deja". There's probably something good for this category by Madeleine Peyroux, Jolie Holland, or Jill Tracy, as well.)
What's your favorite radio station, past or present?
WTKS 104.1 in Orlando, FL in the mid-to-late 1990s.
They are a Clear Channel station, playing talk shows during the week (though this has changed on and off over the years). On weekends, however, they are a modern rock station. They play a mix of whatever is on the alternative charts and what is actually a little more obscure. The best show is an alt-80s and modern synthpop show called Sunday Night Vinyl, which is mostly requests and plays some rare stuff that you don't hear anywhere else. Essentially, they're like a good college station, but slightly more mainstream. I moved from FL three years ago and this may have changed since then. I think they were already playing music after 4 or 7 PM on weeknights when I left. Until maybe 1997ish, there was an "Independent Playground" type of show on later on Sundays, where I discovered artists like Stereolab, but it was cancelled.
CD 101.1 in Columbus is sort of similar, in terms of the more mainstream stuff they play, but not quite as good, although CD101 is an independent station. The fact that they run all week (hey! stuff to listen to!) means a lot of repetition and that they tend to play stuff that used to be considered "alternative" (but only because studios marketed it that way) and that is now considered a joke, like Candlebox. Mostly they play the big name hitters of alt rock, from The Pixies (but not that much - they played "Bam Thwok" a lot when it first came out) to Pearl Jam to The White Stripes. They also play whatever is new and hot - a new Yeah Yeah Yeahs track always gets a lot of play, as did Bloc Party, the Kaiser Chiefs, Franz Ferdinand, She Wants Revenge, OK Go, etc. But once that song is no longer super-current they won't be playing it very often.
My fiance complains about this channel a lot, but he's never lived in an area that truly didn't have much like it - and Columbus radio sucks otherwise, partially excepting the two stations I'm about to mention. Orlando radio literally had nothing I wanted to listen to during the day on 104.1's "talk show" days, so I think he should appreciate what Columbus has. OTOH, the Wikipedia article mentions CD 101's most irritating feature: they are the "flagship station" of the Columbus Blue Jackets. That means that at least one or two nights per week, all winter, they play hockey commentary through the evening hours. I think there may be one other sport they occasionally cover (minor-league baseball?) but it's hockey that is the most noticeable. And I think that kind of thing belongs on AM radio.
There's also a station here in Columbus that I'm starting to like, called TED 103, whose motto is "We Play Everything!" They aren't quite a Jack station; they play mostly alternative 80s and 90s. Lately they have started to play a lot of 70s stuff, so I'm not listening to them as much as I was, in the car. I alternate between them, 101, and 105.7, which is called The Blitz and plays older rock and metal (Yes, Kiss, Queen, Poison, The Who, Def Lep, Journey, etc - basically any kind of rock you can imagine, but not "Classic Rock" of the Crosby Stills Nash & Young / Creedence / Hendrix variety).
(No, I don't lump Hendrix in with them, I'm just trying to point out that they seem to start with 70s prog-rock and don't play hippie metal, country rock, Southern rock, or anything like that. They may or may not play Led Zep, I don't know.)
There's a great DJ, Buzz Fitzgerald, on 97 in Columbus, which is sort of 80s and adult album alternative with some adult contemporary. However, while I've heard him spin in a club and he was amazing, he really has to play the station's program when he's on the air, so you rarely get to hear what he's capable of. And I only like maybe 1/3 of the songs they play.
I'm not appending "internet radio" to this - to me, streaming music is not a "radio station" per se.
