Got 3 days to learn some power metal and classic rock songs:
Dream Theater - Scene Two: Part I. Overture 1928
Black Sabbath - Heaven and Hell
Mr. Big - To Be With You
Sonata Arctica - The Wind Beneath My Wings

I’ve always felt my relationship with metal to be something of an uncomfortable truce. I love the batshit crazy riffs — the strings on the Sonata Arctica cover are surprisingly catchy — but the whole sound tends to be formulaic and overdone.

Overture is going to be wizard though.

Obligatory introspective later — Russ is supposed to pick me up for GUITARRRRRR HERO

HULLO 2009 HERE’S TO NOT JACKING ME BIG TIME

edit: listening to the album and 4207 gets worse with every new recording :< the earliest one I stole off myspace is pure wizard (was it on their self-titled?), then there’s one which I labelled as album but it sounds more than just a different mix — and it has the now quintessential one-two breakdown which I dare say was the tipping point where I fell in love with their sound, and in that tiny, tiny space where the guitars suddenly disappear and everyone cries out I can’t remember who I am or what we’re shouting for but it feels like everything is going to be alright –

and now this one just sounds like they were trying too hard to get the song “right” and forgot to kick ass.

where is russy poo

Me and Russ watched Cicakman. It was exactly the lame low-budget comedy superhero movie I expected. I had fun.

Pride and Glory’s pretty decent if you like dreary cop family dramas about honour and loyalty and duty and pride and glory. It was probably a bit touching too but we were busy eating ROAST DUCK PIZZA yes we brought a whole pizza box in. At Timbre the bartender requested our IDs and asked another guy if ‘88 was ok. Duuuuude.

P.S. cbf to fix the !#%@^# gap in mp3s
P.P.S. play them all together for lulz

N.B. I have no 13-digit ISBNs in my reading list so it’s really not my problem.

P.S. I could settle for second-best, which would involve either chucks or a MIDI keyboard (semi-weighted with pitch(spring-loaded)/mod wheels + aftertouch + MOAR SLIDERS N KNOBS!!).

Download theme source. For a live demo here’s my Tumblr.

Then I hear Amateur Takes Control at one of their early gigs and pretty much went home and recorded every song they had off their MySpace and put them on repeat.

I hadn’t heard anything like them before, and with all the Google-fu in the world I couldn’t find anything like them after.

I still don’t know what exactly I’m looking for — post-rock with a touch of math? Instrumental new prog? Clean tones, sometimes multi-layered and ambient, sometimes tearing up a prog riff; complex rhythms and a powerful low end; tasteful, sparing use of electronics and synths. But above all a strong motif, a melody, a reason for being that so many post-rock bands forget to include in their pieces, too caught up going through the same crescendos and diminuendos and wailing, triple-delayed, feedbacking guitars. Maybe I just don’t have the patience for it, but every EITS or Mono song sounds the same to me. It’s definitely not the length — I know every nook and cranny of A Change of Seasons. I guess they’re just dreadfully boring.

So in my quest for more prog/math/post-rock I’ve easily doubled my library to 20 gigs, and I’ve found some sounds I like enough to pass on:

• Saxon Shore - The Exquisite Death of Saxon Shore and Be a Bright Blue. This was the first glimpse of light after The Album Leaf, American Analog Set, Tristeza, and half a dozen other bands (not that it was all bad, but mostly I got bored quick).
• The Samuel Jackson Five. A bit of jazz thrown into the mix. I’ve heard Easily Misunderstood and I’m looking for their other albums.
• LITE. Math rock is often just some smartasses who’re too cool for prog metal trying to give you a headache, but these guys have some softer pieces I really enjoyed, like Re and Solitude.
• Maybeshewill hit the spot. Sometimes they try to be a bit metal and shit, and it makes me want to strangle a (particularly cute) kitten, but otherwise there’s just the right balance between ambient texture and a kickass lead guitar, plus brilliant use of vocal samples. Both album and EP versions of The Paris Hilton Sex Tape are genius, if you’re looking for somewhere to start.
• Honourable mention goes to UpCDownCLeftCRightCABC+Start, for having great guitar tones and the coolest name ever.

N.B. I guess post-rock is really an evolution of psychedelic, space rock with some modern alt rock sensibilities, but personally I’ve discovered the genre as a breakdown, or distillation, of the complex sound and structure of, say, Paranoid Android or Hell’s Kitchen. Just in case any fanboys take offence with my associating post-rock and prog or metal.

It’s probably a good thing I don’t write much, or often, about music.

1. edison chen
2. olympics
3. facebook
4. iphone
5. f1
6. google map
7. htc
8. maps
9. wiki
10. beijing olympics

and the global list:

1. sarah palin
2. beijing 2008
3. facebook login
4. tuenti
5. heath ledger
6. obama
7. nasza klasa
8. wer kennt wen
9. euro 2008
10. jonas brothers

I see it as a failure of the URI and modern browser that people have to search for Facebook and Google Maps. How long more will we have to wait for natural language URLs? It’s been a decade since .com was cool.

And Edison Chen? Really?

The tee got some nice compliments when we were out running about town, and it’s another testament to God’s favour. I certainly don’t think everything I touch turns to gold but sometimes it’s easy to pretend it does, and He’s the only way I want to resolve my internal struggle with giftedness and elitism and the weight of my own expectations, so if I ever get the slightest bit arrogant please hit me.

I kinda enjoyed being away from the Internet for a couple of days, too, but now I’ve got bugs to fix and more bugs to create.