1 May 2003
I have successfully merged Bob Dylan's and the White Stripes' versions of "Lovesick", and Audacity helped.
2 May 2003
Mid-term break has begun. If I'm lucky, I will only have one radio show this weekend between the hours of 10pm and 7am.
Black market, stock market.
I will be visiting the Walker Art Center to see Wilco and Fog after school lets out.
4 May 2003
I have seen De La Soul and it was good. I didn't attend last year's Spring Concert, but this year's didn't seem too rambunctious or debauched as these things go.
I also did a miniature Bandemonium tonight while filling in for absent DJs. I played Velvet Underground for 65 minutes. I even got a delightful call from someone who thanked me for doing so. Hooray for the pioneers of underground/alternative/indie rock music!
Death of the cassette.
My favorite album right now:
Keith Fullerton Whitman: Playthroughs
What a dick, and Terry Jones strikes again.
7 May 2003
The news show reached previously unfathomed heights of splendor today with the help of Alice Gorel, post office employee and local college radio magnate. Suffice it to say that we rocked our listeners without even having to resort to music. Booyah.
8 May 2003
The Love-cars rocked the Cave tonight even harder than my news show rocked last night, and they played an amazing indie-rock cover of Bjork's "Hyper-ballad". I am now the proud owner of their 1999 album I'm Friends With All Stars. The crowd was as enthusiastic as I've seen at the Cave for a while. That may have something to do with the fans who apparently came from Minneapolis, but not necessarily.
Here is a helpful hint: If you have added hot water to your cup of ramen noodles and need something to make sure the lid stays closed, do not use a plastic CD case. The case will become elliptical in shape due to the heat. Mine appears to have returned to it's normal dimensions.
In which the International Space Station is discussed and the Simpsons are referenced, by the Guardian nonetheless.
If you have the opportunity tomorrow to sign a petition to get KRLX proper funding, please do so.
10 May 2003
More than 300 people have signed the aforementioned petition. Tomorrow morning will bring the first of up to three appeals for KRLX to obtain the funding it needs to be a decent radio station. I also managed a pretty good radio show with one mistake that could only have been noticed by me. Maybe next term we will be streaming online for the whole world to hear. [Actually, this will occur near the end of Winter Term 2004.]
11 May 2003
I know, maybe the Iraqis can fill up on freedom this year, instead of food. I can only imagine what sort of "help" the Bush administration is going to provide. They'll probably be too busy attempting to find some weapons of mass destruction. Oh wait, the US has those, not Iraq, I forgot. In addition, the story about the lizard in the salad in Iowa City is almost frighteningly disgusting.
I attended my first concert at 7th Street Entry today in Minneapolis. Clair de Lune, the first band, was solid. I've heard Nirvana described as punk-metal; I guess if it were an entirely different mix of punk and metal, it might sound like this band. They were loud but not overbearing. I'd compare them to Trail of Dead with a lighter touch with appropriate bits of Metallica thrown in here and there.
The second band, The Shazzam, rocked us like it was 1977. Their sound was reminiscent of AC/DC, Kiss and Cheap Trick with punk speed and ferocity thrown in to the mix.
Wesley Willis headlined the event and was suitably bizarre. He took an eternity to get to the stage once announced and proceeded to sit at his keyboard for a while. He led off with hits like "Osama bin Laden" and "Jeffrey Dahmer". He also managed to play "Jesus is My Lord" and "Suck a Pig's Dirty Asshole" back to back. The highlight must have been "Cut the Mullet" only a short while after praising The Shazzam who violently disagree on that issue, as evidenced by two impressive haircuts showcased during their set.
Here is an interesting companion piece to the article about prison food I used for the news on Tuesday.
The White Stripes will be playing St Paul on July 3. Tickets become available this Saturday, May 17. Oh yes. I could make some sort of clever reference in addition, but I won't because I have style and sophistication.
13 May 2003
Tonight's newscast will feature a cricket update as requested.
14 May 2003
"KRLX's budget for next year, at over $5000, is the largest it's ever been."
And then there's this, which will be incredible.
I assume we've all heard bad commercial radio and/or read awful newspapers recently?
Room draw was a success; I will by myself next year live in Evans 101 sharing a bathroom with the lucky occupant of 103. I will share zero walls directly with another person which means that I should be able to play music at an appreciable volume at any time of day or night.
16 May 2003
This evening was rather interesting. I went to the Rueb with one Jack McGrath in search of a KRLX fan. We searched in vain and after discussing various matters for a while we decided to give up our search. A few steps from the door we ran into our patron, Tristan Cox, a young teacher at Northfield High School, accompanied by none other than ex-Moustache Club President and radio personality Hans Wietzke. We discussed KRLX, Hans's mom and other matters over complimentary wings and two pitchers of a malted beverage. Our search for a "mistake" pizza afterward in the Domino's dumpster was thoroughly fruitless and so we ordered one instead. We then adjourned to Central Park to consume the pie which we did in short order. Needless to say, good times were had by all.
I got to DJ last night from 3.30-4.30 am because the regular DJs decided to let me. How nice of them. It rained today if you didn't notice.
Pitchfork interview with the irascible Jim James.
18 May 2003
My Morning Jacket concert:
Today started off at the post office as Saturdays always do. After work I did laundry that needed desperately to be done. At that point we (Max & I) left for the Twin Cities. I managed to find parking so I could purchase a ticket to the White Stripes concert at a savings of eleven dollars over Ticketmaster. Eleven dollars. That's 30% off the Ticketmaster price. What a bunch of fuckwads.
After that we proceeded to park for twice the amount we paid last time (seven dollars today) because the honky-tonk son-of-a-bitch show or something was at the Target Center and all the cowboys within a 45-mile radius were required to show up. We finally worked our way to the Ascot Room in the Quest Club. The Quest Club thinks it is a good idea to have two shows playing simultaneously; I'm not sure about that. At any rate, it had some odd decor but nothing too distracting. The Detachment Kit, the opening act, was decent: sort of hardcore, very loud, some screaming, talented.
After a second round of idiotic background music, Jim James and My Morning Jacket took the stage. They had more hair than any band I have seen live. They were also possibly better than any band I have seen live. The intro-verse-chorus-verse-chorus... bits of the songs were good, but the beautiful-yet-cathartically-noisy jams that came afterward were outstanding. They built to an absolutely blistering climax on almost every song and it never got old. After a keyboard-turned-drum solo to end the main set, Jim James played and sang three acoustic numbers and was rejoined by the rest of the band for "Phone Went West" as a finale.
James's reverberating voice was a great instrument itself; I agree that the sound and vocals lie somewhere between the Flaming Lips and Neil Young. The guitars had that terrific 70's power-pop-esque distortion and often a flavoring of country-rock. They also used delay and reverb to create an echoey, atmospheric sound that somehow worked with the very loud and crunchy guitars and the pounding drums. Though the acoustic songs were solid, I thought they might have been too much for what was a decently long set. Overall, however, it was one of the tightest and greatest live sets I have witnessed yet.
It is my greatest hope that someday soon my brain will feel under-utilized.
The Guardian has an impressive and wide-ranging number of stories in its three-part report on food.
Apparently there exists a man named Richard Blow (there is an article on Salon.com attributed to him). I think my life would be infinitely weirder and more interesting if my name was dick blow.
20 May 2003
Tuesday is news-day.
Sadly, I didn't discover this in time to broadcast it.
I discovered that the .aac (advanced audio codec) format utilized by the new apple music store is markedly more efficient and better-sounding than .mp3. I managed to download the new version of CDex and the codec itself, but even after a painfully slow ripping process, I realized I can't play the file, even with Quicktime. Hopefully I can somehow listen to this file to prove to myself how wonderful .aac is.
22 May 2003
The Pentagon's own inspector general recently admitted that the department could not account for more than a trillion dollars of past spending. A congressional investigation reported that inventory management in the army was so weak it had lost track of 56 airplanes, 32 tanks, and 36 missile launchers.
The Pentagon budget currently accounts for half of all the US government's discretionary expenditure, and is nearly twice the defence spending of the next 15 of the world's military powers combined.
23 May 2003
Tonight I have record libe hours, a concert (my last Singers-related activity, hooray) and a radio show. In addition, I need to get ready to leave tomorrow morning. Hopefully there will be anywhere from one to many exciting things to see and/or do and/or eat this weekend. It is a shame I have to do homework while at home, but it seems that I will have no time to study for my linear algebra test after I get back, unless I return early; but that would also be a moral defeat.
Dismemberment Plan will return to First Avenue 17 June. Tickets are available nowhere at the moment. Hopefully I can again avoid the convenient wiles of Ticketmaster and secure a place at the show for a reasonable cost. Apparently Travis Morrison does not feel as I do on the issue of media monopoly. This is not surprising.
"He was a thief and he was a disturbed man. If we learn anything from him, it's do not steal and don't be disturbed."
27 May 2003
Trip to Iowa:
Saturday morning I traveled to Iowa. I stopped on the way for pie and ice cream (1). I also looked for The Apartment for film class, but it was nowhere to be found. Pizza had just been picked up when I got home, so I partook. After playing catch for a while, I attended my brother's baccalaureate service where I filmed him introducing my dad as the speaker along with various other bits and pieces. From there we traveled to Bethel Mennonite church for my brother's graduation party. I walked around with a sign. I ate cake and ice cream (2) and pretzels. I played kickball in the basement with my cousins. We cleaned up and went home. I told my brother he could have five Burger King bucks for a present if he wanted. He declined them wisely. I also looked through eleven rolls of film recently developed from 8-12 years ago.
The next day featured church and lunch (no ice cream). It also featured commencement where my brother successfully obtained his diploma. The speeches were lackluster and there were the usual catcalls and whatnot during the presentation of the diplomas. It was short. After that I went to the park with my cousins where we played baseball and a little basketball. I then deposited a check into my oddly empty checking account (the matter is being looked into) and went to my great uncle and aunt's house where, with many relatives, we ate pizza and ice cream (3). I then attended the baccalaureate service for my high school, Iowa Mennonite School, where I saw a number of friends and acquaintances. I attended two graduation parties with Mr Mitchell Rowland, whose cost-efficient car has get-up-and-go but no interior lights. At one of the parties, I consumed a quantity of ice cream (4). After viewing a solid amount of Beavis and Butthead Do America I headed home.
For Memorial Day I got up late to a breakfast of sausages and sweet things. After playing Jet Moto with a cousin and taking pictures with the rest I left for graduation parties. On a side note, my car has basically dried itself out. I hit the first one late but in time to eat a sandwich and see a number of people I know. The second involved Joel Koerner and Kyle Yoder, the latter of whom will next year be attending Macalester College. There I also greeted Mr William Leichty by stealing and eating his cookies. There was no retribution. I ate ice cream (5) too. At the next party I met Mitch Rowland again and ate ice cream (6). At the fourth and final party, at which Willie Nelson was playing, I had various salted snacks and hot banana-and-pineapple topping for my bowl of, you guessed it, ice cream (7). I spoke to a teacher who had been at my school for senior year but she failed to recall me. I found that rather amusing. There were a high number of recognizable people there as well, and the weather was, just like the rest of the weekend, gorgeous, so I stayed and chatted for a long while. As I was leaving I said hello to Brian Rumsey, but the time had come for me to return to Carleton so the pleasantries were few.
It seems that after putting on 730 miles this weekend I have graduated a sibling, graduation-partied with approximately 20% of the IMS class of 2003, in addition to running into a high number of other distinguished students, alumni and faculty, obtained my golf clubs and shoes for the summer, watched most of a game of Slamball on TNN and an inordinate amount of Disney Channel programming, probably fucked up my second linear algebra mid-term, and eaten far, far too much ice cream. It was a fabulous and worthwhile time, but left me quite upset that I am still in school even though others have been out for more than four weeks.
The driving, by the way, was entirely uneventful.
Even though I generally disdain the listing of such things, I will state that I listened to, in the following order:
The Kills: Keep on Your Mean Side
Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
The Smiths: The Queen is Dead
Schneider TM: Zoomer
Iron and Wine: The Creek Drank The Cradle
Pavement: Slanted and Enchanted: Luxe and Reduxe: Disc 1
Air: 10,000Hz Legend
Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks: Pig Lib
Yo La Tengo: And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out
Bob Dylan: Blonde on Blonde
Interpol: Turn on the Bright Lights
I hope the CD over-pricing lawsuit settlement doesn't bump me into a higher tax bracket. [I have yet to receive any of it.]
Finally, a review worthy of the subject:
Pedro The Lion: Winners Never Quit
Defining music by genre often entails the application of a prefix to the word "rock," like "indie-rock," "emo-rock," "stoner-rock," and so on. That sort of shorthand is an inevitable yet inherently dicey proposition, especially when you get into the realm of so-called "Christian rock," which brings to mind the likes of Stryper, yet could ultimately cover every act that's ever sung to, for, or about Jesus. It gets trickier the less explicit the reverence is: No review of, say, Soul-Junk (see also: "indie-rock") or Supertones (see also: "pop-ska") would be complete without mentioning Christianity--it's addressed explicitly in every song--but what about the acts who tend to leave it in the margins? Seattle's Pedro The Lion, which now consists solely of singer and multi-instrumentalist David Bazan, is frequently noted as a Christian act first and a musical act second, a generalization that does a disservice to Bazan's beautiful songs. References to God, morality, and self-denial are scattered throughout Pedro The Lion's gorgeous new eight-song mini-album, but Bazan is sharp enough to shroud them in morose ambiguity, shading them with minor keys and palpable melancholy. And, though "To Protect The Family Name" delves too far into dreariness, the rest of Winners Never Quit virtually sparkles with pop craftsmanship, from gently barren ballads ("Slow And Steady Wins The Race," "Bad Things To Such Good People") to more amped-up pop-rock songs like "A Mind Of Her Own" and the lovely "Simple Economics." In all, it's essential, regardless of whether you consider Bazan's Christianity a selling point or a red flag.
--Stephen Thompson at The Onion AV Club
Everybody loves Avril.
As far as I can tell, there is no way to get tickets to the Dismemberment Plan show in June even if it is currently scheduled to happen.