Happy Blogiversary
So, this is the one year anniversary of my starting this here blog. I thought I would observe this day by compiling some thoughts from the last year--kind of a “Best of Sic Semper Tyrannis.”
Thanks for reading, those of you who read this stuff. I don’t really know why you do. And I’m also not sure why I write it. But thanks, anyway.
11/08/05When I was in high school, the basic unit of time was a day. All of our responsibilities and appointments revolved around asking ourselves “what do I have to do today?” Every new day brought the same basic schedule-go to this class, then
this class, and then
this class… And when I went to college, it seems the basic unit of time was expanded out to a week-“Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I do
this and then on Tuesday and Thursday I do
that.” On Sunday nights I would organize in my head what was coming up for the following week.When I say “the basic unit of time,” I suppose I really mean “the amount of time that passes without our really being aware of it.” Since I’m out of college, it seems that I make plans and keep a schedule in my head for about two weeks out. So, I think that two weeks is now my base. Maybe when I get to be my parents’ age, it’ll be a month or two. Maybe if I get to be my grandparents’ age, it’ll be a year or two.
11/11/05One of my favorite smart-sounding words is “dialectic.” I know it involves the tension of opposites. Hegel used it in describing the evolution of ideas-how a synthesis is formed when faced with the truth of one idea (thesis) and the truth of its opposite (antithesis.) And my musical thought-life has a big dialectic at its center, kind of like how scientists say there is a giant black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy. For you see, I’m no musical purist. I don’t believe that punk rock’s simplicity and attitude are the only way to do rock n’ roll. Nor do I think that music should only be complicated.
11/18/05I’ve read a little bit of Karl Marx in my life, and the vast majority of it kind of went over my head. But I do remember one of his ideas that got stuck in my head. It relates to value or worth. Here’s the question: how do you determine the value of a particular object? For instance, how do you determine what an ounce of silver is worth? Well, economically speaking, our market-based economy says that an object is worth whatever anybody will pay for it. On the other hand, Marx says that an object or product is worth the sum total of work or effort that went into its creation. I like his way of thinking on this. It’s not messy and nebulous. For, in the first answer, value is an idea. The consumer pretty much brings the concept of value to the object. I don’t like that. I don’t like to rely on people. We’re all fickle and unreliable. We’re messy and muddle-headed at times. With Marx, the value is a little more inherent in the object. Value is material. It is fixed. It is not
affixed.
11/21/05(On Frank Zappa)
It was brave music with no regard for commerce, or marketing, or developing an audience or any of the trappings of the music industry. This was the sound of a guy creating whatever he wanted to and daring people to like it or to take the time to try to figure it out. Something about that boldness impressed and inspired me. Like I said, this Zappa entry is about much more than a mere album. Discovering his confidence in who he was helped me to learn about individualism-finding your own voice, not just creatively, but personally as well. A fierce individualism like his could serve someone well when they don’t feel like they fit in. I swallowed Zappa’s music like a comforting medicine. In my head, at least, someone else knew what it was like. And rather than feel bad about being uncool, or depressed, I could be confident in my uncoolness, bolstered by this artist who used his intellect as a weapon. I wanted to be that guy. (Although I never became that guy, Zappa certainly made it easier to deal with myself and with other people.)
12/08/05(On Steve Reich)
I liked this music for several reasons: 1) It was tonal. I had heard all kinds of modern music that became increasingly hard on the ears. The dissolution of modern music in the early 1900’s made conservatory music less of a belle arte and more of a puzzle. But Reich’s music was a wonderful bridge. He was modern, (requiring lots of patience from his audience), yet his music also sounded pleasant, usually working in the major and minor modes. 2) This was music you could either
listen to and try to figure out what was going on, or you could ignore it like audio wallpaper. 3) I went on to hear just about everything he wrote and I learned that his music was often times very rhythmic, unlike the music of the total serialists, who left the determination of note values to mathematical processes. Reich’s primary instrument was percussion and he wrote for all kinds of drums and mallets, as well as the other usuals, like strings and brass and vocalists. 4) I also came to learn from reading that Reich was a very spiritual, philosophical guy, rediscovering his Jewish heritage well into his adulthood, after traveling the world and studying Indian drumming. And his Jewishness is easily found in the texts that he chose to score and his philosophical bent is also apparent in his works. There’s something I like about the idea of a cutting-edge, avant-garde artist also being a person of faith.
12/12/05I’ll never forget what he whispered at that moment-“That guy’s looking for music for his funeral.” Somehow, at that point, our time with this guy became holy. Oh, we didn’t really do anything different, but the time that passed as he was in the store seemed to be
heavier time.
1/17/06(On Bob Dylan’s
Freewheelin’)
Can I explain to you the simple beauty of
Freewheelin’? I doubt it, but I’ll try. Coming at this album 40 years after its creation is quite a trip. You see, we live in a musical world of bells and whistles. There is no sound imaginable that can’t be created on a computer and reproduced and tweaked and futzed-with in all kinds of ways. Our musical technology these days allows us to build up great complex castles of sounds and instruments. I think around the time I first heard this album, Cher was on the radio with her robot-voice “Believe” song.Contrast all of that with the sound of a single guy singing while playing an acoustic guitar- basically, a box of wood with metal strings stretched across it. And in 1963, there wasn’t such a thing as pitch-correction to make Dylan’s voice sound more agreeable. But man! Something about the organic-ness of the sounds on this album made me feel human again. I can hear the grime on the strings, the capo squeaking, the pick striking…It’s such a warm, inviting, REAL sound, like being in the same room.
1/31/06Coming out of that horn were some of the most horrifically bad and yet, terrifyingly funny sounds I’ve ever heard come from an instrument wielded by someone this side of sixth grade band class. It was as if he hadn’t been working on those pieces over and over and over for the last semester or even for the last year. There were all sorts of dry-mouthed piccolo trumpet poots and squeaks that in my head today, sound like Harry Dunne on the toilet in
Dumb and Dumber.
2/07/06The idea of a few days on the road all by myself was both exciting and scary to me at the same time. On one hand was total freedom to do whatever I wanted to,
whenever I wanted to, without having to entertain anyone. (That’s a big pressure for me, “is the person I’m with bored?”) On the other hand, I had never spent that much time alone in my whole life. I wasn’t sure that I wouldn’t go insane without someone around to distract me from my thoughts. I seriously thought that I might go nuts with that much time to myself.
2/16/06It’s a pretty lonely image, my friends, being the only one on the road at dusk, with only the mountains on the horizon to your right and left and the gray-white sand dunes to keep you company. When it gets to be that time while driving, I imagine a whole nation of people safe at home with their families and TV trays and watching the nightly news after a long day of work. And I wonder why I force myself into these types of nomadic feelings…
2/23/06And I know deep within me there is an aesthetic response to seeing vast amounts of uninhabited creation. I love the idea that there still might be some part of God’s green earth that hasn’t been sullied by people and their wants and needs and shortsightedness and general ugliness. Virgin, untainted land is a fantastic idea. But that’s pretty much what it is- just an idea in my head. For, if you can see it from a road, chances are, you’re not the first and only person to have ever spotted it.Listen, I’m not a very spiritual guy. Sometimes I wish I were. But I sound like what I’m searching for is a kind of Garden of Eden, Take 2, where it’s just me and God and the natural creation. And I’ll tell you one thing for sure. I wouldn’t go near that damn apple tree.
4/25/06I was reading Francis Bacon’s
Essays recently, and came across this amusing quote:“Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god.”--Aristotle
Politics I.2
5/26/06The being of truth stands in a primordial connection with Da-sein*. And only because Da-sein exists as constituted by disclosedness (that is, by understanding) can something like being be understood, only so is an understanding of being possible at all.-Martin Heidegger
Being and Time I.VI[*“Being there,” or “existence,” if I even understand that. (My notes, not his.)]And that’s two of the easier sentences.
6/13/06Freddie Mercury had weird teeth.
7/24/06It’s my belief that the simpler life of wasting time like this with friends should actually be the
destination. So, often, though, we’re running and scurrying, from this obligation to this diversion to this expensive entertainment. But to me, none of that busyness can compare to slowing down enough to look someone else in the eyes and
relate- to share stories, share time, share the unspoken pain and joy of existence. I get a little caught up in it sometimes and ruin the moment by saying something trite like “It doesn’t get any better than this.”
8/21/06(The funniest thing my Grandpaw ever said)
“You know I’m still hunting for that German-the one who shot me in the war. Every time I meet a German who’s around my age, I ask him if he’s the guy. They always say the same thing-‘Russian front. I was in the Russian front!’”“I’m still hunting for him.”
...And Justice for All by Metallica (1988)
A Random CD Review from the Stutzman Memorial Library
…And Justice for All by Metallica (1988)
There’s always been a certain stigma to Metallica fans. They’re the bad kids in high school- usually dressed in black t-shirts, greasy jeans, usually long-haired social misfits. At least that’s always been the image in my head.
When I was in junior high school, the one kid who wore a Metallica t-shirt frightened me. He was scrawny, so any other kind of clothing and he would have just been a regular kid. But something about that black t-shirt with the skull on it represented all that I wasn’t--rebellious, angry, wild. (So, it was a miracle that one day in the school cafeteria when we both sat together, eating pizza and fries.)
Fast forward about ten years and I actually heard this music that all these scary kids were into:
…And Justice for All. I had read in guitar magazines that these guys were respected musicians. At some point I’m sure that this album was compared to the prog rock of the 70’s because of its ambitious, multipart song structures and extended instrumental sections. I needed no further reason to investigate.
In general I like this album, for a lot of the same reasons I like prog rock. But here’s where the departure begins…
I think this album is dumb. It’s also brilliant. Confused yet?
Once again, I’m stymied by contextual expectations. To one set of expectations—rock n’ roll in general, hard rock specifically and metal super-specifically—the music contained herein is exemplary. Every guitar solo on here is a tour de force of pre-Nirvana Eddie Van Halen-esque, off-the-scale technique and flash. The rhythm guitar parts are just crushingly heavy and primal, yet the drum parts are, strangely, a little more cerebral and complex, almost melodic, (certainly not to the extent of Neil Peart or his ilk, but still impressive.)
On the other hand, compared to other styles of music you could easily say that this is the sound of a one-trick metal pony—aggression personified in James Hetfield’s snarl and barbaric power chords. Just one song by any of their 70s prog forebears probably contains more harmonic movement than this whole album. It can seem almost formulaic: play eighth-note power chord riffs, sing toughly about something dark and philosophical, let Kurt Hammett loose for a weedly-weedly solo and end it.
But to say that this album is one-dimensional would be a gross exaggeration. In fact I was drawn in from the beginning of “Blackened,” (probably my favorite song of theirs), with the cello-like electric guitar swells. There is actually a fair amount of clean electric and even acoustic guitar sounds.
Have you noticed no mention of the bass? Jason Newsted’s playing is invisible on this record. I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t play on it at all. In fact, the overall production choices they made are fascinating to me. There is really no low-end to speak of. Even the kick drum is mostly the clicking sound of the beater against the drumhead more than any sound resonating from the drum itself. It’s obvious that they wanted a very tight, controlled close-mic’d sound on everything. It’s a very interesting aesthetic to me- mostly guitar and vocals way up front.
Anyway, the only thing left to discuss is lyrical content, and actually- I have no real comment in this area. I know Hetfield talks about ugly things, which fits the dark musical content like a glove, but I really have no interest in that side of Metallica.
After getting to know this album as my intro to the band, I went back a step to
Master of Puppets and was a little underwhelmed. Haven’t bought any since.
P.S. Did anybody see M Ward on Letterman last night? Very cool!
Electrical Nerdville Part II
Well, I didn’t fry my brain or any other organs last night while biasing my amp. But there is a somewhat interesting twist to the story…
So, I was all set up--the back of the amp removed, tubes glowing red, the only thing I had left to do was measure the voltage hitting the tubes and adjust the bias accordingly. Wouldn’t you know it, my brand new multimeter didn’t work. So I just plugged my guitar in and adjusted the bias by ear, listening for early distortion or lifeless sound.
Checked it with a new multimeter this morning—I was right on! Perfectly within specs. (Actually 4mV lower than I wanted to be, which is really
nothing in the grand scheme of things.)
Now I know I’m a nerd.
Electrical Nerdville
Sorry if you’re a regular reader and you’ve been disappointed in the lack of new stuff to read here. But I’ve been unexpectedly busy up here at work as of late.
Tonight I’ve prepared to enter into total nerdville as I attempt to bias my tube guitar amp. With digital multimeter in hand, (that’s the really nerdy part), I will expose myself to potentially dangerous levels of electrical current as I open up my amp and tweak stuff.
So, if you haven’t heard from me in a couple weeks and/or there’s a funnier smell than usual coming from my house, then you’ll at least know that I died while performing an interesting project…
For those not in the know, tube guitar amps are fairly universally acknowledged as having better tone than their solid-state brethren. (The difference being that tube amps basically have light bulbs incorporated into the electrical guts.) Only problem is that tubes go bad over time. Since this is my first tube amp and I’ve never had to change tubes before, I’ve researched up on biasing the amp after changing tubes and I figured I would save myself some money.
Hopefully I won’t fry my brain tonight.
