Okay, I suppose I’ll try this again. I had spent about an hour earlier typing out a post only to have hotmail crash on me and eat what I’d written. So here I am, about as tired as an ‘Isobel’s arse’ joke, banging out another version of that post. Oddly enough, despite it being a bit early in the season, I’ve found myself going through my cd’s and mp3's for Christmas songs. When I was younger I always had a strong dislike of Christmas, sometimes even a hate of Christmas, but in recent years I’ve mellowed quite a bit, and I have to admit I’ve come to enjoy the season. I dig the gaudy decorations, and the lights, and the snow, and the Christmas carols. Christmas for me isn’t really Christmas, it’s Santy Claus day, and Santy Claus day isn’t even really about presents and such. It’s about what I mentioned before; lights and decorations and hot chocolate and rosey cheeked girls singing Christmas carols. “Fairytale of New York” is the greatest Christmas song ever written. It’s a song to be sung with a grin on your face, a pint in your hand, and your other arm wrapped around a friend or lover. Oh, don’t look at me like that, even the punky boy gives in to romanticism sometimes. I’m feeling quite happy because I finally made a big decision that’s been bugging me for the past several weeks. Instead of going to grad school, I’m going back to my first love, the medical field. Next semester I start on my Associate Degree in Radiologic Technology, which is a fancy way of saying I’m going to become an x-ray tech. After I get my certification and start working at a real job, I may or may not go back for Nuclear Medicine, which was what I had originally been going to go to college for. Yesterday my best friend since kindergarten announced him and his wife were having a baby. It’s brilliant because I can’t imagine any two people being better parents. The odd thing is, some of our other friends kept asking me; “So, you must really be feeling old, right?” Huh? I have to say that I’m not. I think it’s funny how people say or ask that at birthdays and weddings and such. Actually, it seems like the older I get the younger I feel. I think being happy and enjoying oneself is the secret of youth, and I’ve manage to learn how to enjoy myself quite a bit over the years. I think the whole age thing (as far as mentally ‘feeling’ it) is pretty subjective, and speaking of subjective things... In my last post I talked about a few bands I didn’t like, and I made sure I mentioned it last time, but I’ll do it again before I start in, this is just my subjective, personal opinion. This is the answer you’d get if you walked up to me in a pub and said; “Jim, what do you think of Magnetic Fields/White Strips?”. If you think it’s too harsh or unfair, fair enough, but understand that I don’t mean to offend anyone, I’m just giving you my honest, very subjective, opinion. Ken said; “I don't think I've ever thought the Magnetic Fields were geniuses BECAUSE they did an album with 69 love songs in it, but rather that did an album with wonderfully written songs” Well, I do think there are some nice enough songs on 69 Love Songs, “All my Little Words”, “Absolutely Cuckoo”, and “Come back from San Francisco” are decent enough songs, and many of the others are nice enough tunes, and some are even fun, but the problem I have with Magnetic Fields is similar to the problem I have with the White Strips. My problem is that Merrit acted like an ass and a pretentious lout at the live show I happened to see awhile back, and from hearing from others, that’s his *thing*. Not only was he a complete dick to the audience, and was obviously working it to put forth an image of aloof pretentiousness and talking shit about how brilliant he is, he sang the songs in such an utter aloof deadpan that he sucked any fun the tunes originally had right out. My real problem is that the tunes are just pastiches, which is fine in itself, pastiches can sometimes be fun and Mag Fields do drop in some clever lyrics here and there, but it doesn’t take a fucking genius to knock out pastiches, and quite frankly pastiches bore me for the most part. But hey, fair enough, like I said pastiches can be fun if they’re done with a sense of humour. But acting like an ass and being a dick to your audience whilst talking shit about what a fucking genius you are and being a miserable bastard in general is not conducive to a kind view from me. I’ve had friends (hell, I’ve gotten emails from list people) tell me; “Oh, yeah, Merrit’s an asshole, but that’s his *thing*” Well, fuck that, I don’t have time for assholes in my day to day life so why should I go ga-ga over some twat who thinks he’s a brilliant !Artiste! and acts like a dick to his audience? Some mildly cleaver lyrics and pastiches of tunes does not a genius make. With the White Stripes it’s a bit different, I’ve only ever heard their albums, but my problem as far as the music goes is pretty much the same. They’ve got some songs that I really dig, “Hotel Yorba” is a cool little piece of pop, and “Pretty Good Looking for a Girl” amuses me every time I hear it, but they’re still fucking pastiches!! I’m listening to “Fell in Love with a Girl” and there’s Black Francis’ breathless gasping as the song tumbles into the babely-poppy chorus and I’m thinking; fucking pastiche! It’s okay, but it’s still a pastiche! They have whole albums of pastiches and it’s annoying as hell. I’m not saying pastiches are automatically bad, but as much fun as they can sometimes be, they’re just disposable. I just can’t get all that excited over artists who aren’t giving me much more than pastiches. There’s a different between using a style and just making a pastiches. Belle and Sebastian may be grooving in the style of 60's San Fran flower-pop in their recent work, but they’ve got their own vibe and are bringing new things to the table and actually borrowing elements of style rather than lifting whole parts. Ken said; "69 songs about fucking with knives" That’s the new Angelina Jolie album, isn’t it? Ian said; "desmond has a barrow in the market place molly is the singer in a band desmond says to molly 'girl i like your face' and molly says this as she takes him by the hand.... -" if you know the song, you're already singing it” Yup, just pasting that in put that song back into my head immediately. But it’s a great song, eh? It also has the name Molly in it. Molly is the best girl’s name ever. I love all girls named Molly, especially Irish girls named Molly. Ian also said; “well, vive le difference, my friend” Well, that’s the whole point isn’t it? Pretty fucking boring if we all had the same tastes and opinions. ian then said; “i think tori appeals to those of us who would like to visit the moon in a big green snow-shoe” Ahhh, that explains it then. See, I don’t want to go to the moon, I want to go to Venus or Mars, and I want to go in one of those old gilded Edwardian science fiction rocketships, the kind that used to grace the covers of those old pulp magazines back from the 20's and 30's. You all know those old pulps, the kind of magazines that had cover blurbs like “Jimmy Jack versus the Madman of Mars!!!” and were filled with stories like “Jimmy Jack and the Amazon Women of Venus”. Because Pulp = Punk and that is a Good Thing. ....... Well, actually, the Amazon Women sound like a Pretty Damn Good Thing too, but that’s beside the point... Rachel said; “I have a close friend who is trying to tell me that I have to love myself first and I think he's really smart about these things.” He is smart. I think that being able to love oneself and be happy in those quiet moments when you’re alone with yourself is one of the most important things in life. There’s an old saying I like; “Life delights in itself” The problem is, in the words of the wise old poet (courtesy of Jack Kerouac), the secret of life is; “There’s a lot of bastards out there”. It’s always a trick to know when to keep your guard up or let someone get close. There’s a lot of users out there, and sometimes they don’t even know they’re doing it. Just like a catapillar tearing through a leaf they keep plowing on and don’t pay attention to the damage they left behind. Rachel said; “I also thought that the Strokes sound like Elvis Costello meets The Clash.” Hmmm, if they had sounded a bit more like that I might have liked them better. To be fair, I’ve been listening to the Strokes quite a bit lately and they’ve grown on me. I still think they’re in danger of being Oasis for this decade, but they’re got energy and you can tell they give a damn. It’s going to be interesting to see how they grow, if they keep using recycled sounds or if they start breaking new ground. One last one from Rachel; “I also just want to thank LL for uncovering Jimmy G's secret about making a swell record in the 1950's...” Oh yeah, my old heartthrob days back in the 50's before the drink, drugs, and dames took their toll. Kirsten said; “none of this is very interesting” Which is funny, because I’ve always thought that Kirsten’s stories are the most interesting of the lot, usually for the slightly odd beauty of them. I’ve never been to Milwaukee, but from Kirsten descriptions I can only picture it as an oddly surreal mix of Oz, Narnia, Chicago, and Batman’s Gotham populated by a collection of strange and colourful individuals. Interesting to say the least. Much love to the lot of you, and special shouts to...oh, they know who they are... ...... ............ Oh, okay, just to make them feel special; shouts to Elise, Sean, Lovely Laura Llew, Rachel Fruitloop, Amy Longapplecorejacks (who I owe an email), and the whole Great Lakes area crew. A special PUNK ROCK! To ~stine, who deserves to feel a lot toadier than she has lately. Jim “Incidentally, children: every time you say "bring the Rock"...the Rock dies a little bit. And when you saw "rawk", it coughs blood” - Warren Ellis _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. 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