A moist, quivering, succulent blog about stuff.

Why musicians should piss each other off more often

So. Matthew Friedberger of The Fiery Furnaces (a band I love) took a potshot at Radiohead (another band I love) and their tribute to the British airman Harry Patch. Only he mistakenly(?) thought it was actually a song about the avant-garde American composer Harry Partch.

Later, he explained the Patch/Partch mixup was a deliberate joke, and in the process managed to also insult Beck (yet another artist whose work I like) and his Scientologist faith. You can read a nice sum-up of the proceedings at Pitchfork: http://pitchfork.com/news/37147-beck-writes-song-about-harry-partch/

But wait, it gets better. Rather than declining to respond as did Radiohead, instead Beck wrote a 10-plus-minute musical response (appropriately enough, titled “Harry Partch”), which somehow manages to lampoon/celebrate the cut-up musical approach of The Fiery Furnaces AND pay tribute to the microtonal/American gamelan style of Harry Partch, resulting in one of Beck’s strangest, coolest and most adventurous tracks in years. Oh yeah, and he’s giving it away for free. Check it out here: http://stereogum.com/mp3/Beck%20-%20Harry%20Partch.mp3

So…I guess….thank you, Matthew Friedberger?

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Kids say the most disturbing things

  • Me: What's black and white and red all over?
  • My 6-year-old: A nun in a blender?
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Awesome New iTunes 9 Feature: Automatically Add to iTunes
After you install iTunes 9, you should see a new folder pop up in your default music folder, titled “Automatically Add to iTunes.” And, just like it says on the box, any audio file you place or download into this folder gets automatically added to your iTunes Library and moves the file into the proper Artist/Album hierarchy. Sweet!

Awesome New iTunes 9 Feature: Automatically Add to iTunes

After you install iTunes 9, you should see a new folder pop up in your default music folder, titled “Automatically Add to iTunes.” And, just like it says on the box, any audio file you place or download into this folder gets automatically added to your iTunes Library and moves the file into the proper Artist/Album hierarchy. Sweet!


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Recent favorites from my Fake Band Name list

Monster Map of Lavaland

Lizzie Boredom

The Keytards

Dreadful Moisty

Beaver Rainbow

The Schaudenfriends

The Homosensuals

Sunshine Bubblewand

Balalycra

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“Sovereign Scarlet”

In digging through my various sequencer files the other day, I found this slightly King Crimson-influenced (okay, majorly King Crimson-influenced) musical rough sketch. Needless to say, I’m no Robert Fripp, so kindly excuse the dodgy guitar work.

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
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Cutting the cord

Just as a quick follow-up to my previous post, I was thinking it might be fun (and perhaps educational) for me to document the steps I take along the way in replacing my cable TV  service with a Mac mini-based entertainment setup.

Just curious what people would like to see—blog posts? Step-by-step videos? Both? If you have any ideas, please leave me a comment.

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Old folks review indie rock

Just discovered Breakfast at Sulimay’s this morning. It’s a funny Web series that features three senior citizens at a diner in Philadelphia, weighing in on the latest indie releases. Cute, raunchy, hysterical and definitely worth checking out.

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