Tag: music
-
Mark Twain on the ‘glory-beaming banjo’
Courtesy of the Steve Martin-narrated documentary Give Me The Banjo about “America’s Instrument”, here’s Mark Twain on the banjo: The piano may do for love-sick girls who lace themselves to skeletons, and lunch on chalk, pickles and slate pencils. But give me the banjo. … When you want genuine music—music that will come right home to…
-
Hear Ye! Listening to ‘The New Analog’
“Noise has value.” So goes the thesis statement of The New Analog: Listening and Reconnecting in a Digital World, a wonderful new book by musician Damon Krukowski. He reckons with how digital media has changed how we consume music and what we’ve come to expect from it. New technologies have begat new ways of listening, but…
-
Little Women
I was a good amount into a post celebrating the 1994 film Little Women when I discovered I was basically writing Alissa Wilkinson’s appreciation of the film at Vox from last year. It’s one of many movies I watched a lot with my sisters as a kid, in rotation with other female-focused ’90s films like Ever After, Never…
-
Favorite Christmas song lyrics, ranked
I’m terrible at remembering lyrics. Even for favorite songs I’ve heard dozens of times. It’s an annoying deficiency when I try to sing along as so often I end up having to mumble certain lines. But now, my yearly Christmas music binge in progress, I’ve started paying attention to the lyrics that have peaked my…
-
In praise of wedding reception air drumming
I didn’t realize I had a reputation. At a wedding recently, the bride and groom told me one of the things they were looking forward to the most was my air drumming. They had seen it in action at a previous wedding and had enjoyed it so much that they decided they would make time…
-
My Mount Rushmore of Singers
At this moment, anyway: Sam Cooke, Frank Sinatra, Julie Andrews, Whitney Houston With a runner-up trophy for Marty Robbins.
-
Media of the moment
I want to do more to account for what I read and watch. I do use Goodreads for tracking books, Letterboxd for movies, and my Logbook for all of them in one place. But between occasional reviews on the blog here and there, a lot of other noteworthy pieces of art pass through my consciousness almost without comment.…
-
I heard them on the radio
How often do you listen to honest-to-goodness radio anymore? Usually I go to it only if I’m not in the mood for podcasts, audiobooks, or my own music collection. I’ll spin through my station presets to see if I get lucky, though most often I get bad songs and ads. But not the other day. I…
-
In the Mood for a Melody
The other day I came upon Brian Eno’s article about singing with other people: There are physiological benefits, obviously: You use your lungs in a way that you probably don’t for the rest of your day, breathing deeply and openly. And there are psychological benefits, too: Singing aloud leaves you with a sense of levity…
-
Sgt. Pepper’s Magical Mystery Tour
This article comparing The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, both released in 1967, got me thinking about what one hypothetical album that combined the best of both albums would look like. So as part of my Better The Beatles project, I’ve determined a track listing for Sgt. Pepper’s Magical Mystery Tour. Thirteen…
-
Love I’m Oh Know Baby Got Yeah
In my wiki-browsing I was led to the page on Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Songs of All Time and saw this fun tidbit: Love is the most frequent word used in the songs’ lyrics, with 1057 occurrences, followed by I’m (1000 uses), oh (847 uses), know (779 uses), baby (746 uses), got (702 uses), and…
-
Make ‘The White Album’ Great Again
The White Album is too long. Everyone knows this. As a public service I have trimmed down the bloated double album into one cohesive record, leaving the order unchanged but the musical integrity restored: Back in the U.S.S.R Dear Prudence Glass Onion Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da Happiness Is A Warm Gun Martha My Dear Blackbird Piggies I Will Birthday…
-
Respect Yourself: Stax Records and the Soul Explosion
Not sure what drew me initially to Robert Gordon’s Respect Yourself: Stax Records and the Soul Explosion, but it quickly hooked me. The vibrant cover maybe. I’ve been a casual soul fan for a while and had vague notions about Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, and Motown, but I didn’t know anything about Stax or its incredibly American…