One-Man Metal Band

It's close enough to the end of the year, right?

So, here are my top 5 albums of 2011. Of the dozens of records I bought this year, just ten were from 2011; so finding a top five wasn't much of a challenge.

1. Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Mirror Traffic
   
   (check out Jack Black and Gary Cole (the boss from Office Space) in the video!)

   Malkmus and Jicks records always take a while to grow on me. I think it's because Malkmus so dominates everything that it takes time to get past the initial "Hey, there's that Malkmus quirk again," and "Now what a Malkmusly clever lyric!" reactions and start to appreciate the songs as more than just ways for Malkmus to do his thing. This one doesn't really sound or feel a lot different than any other SM&tJs record, but I think the stand-out songs are a notch or two better than usual.

2. Wye Oak - Civilian
   
   This is a solid follow-up to their awesome previous record, "The Knot". It trades some of The Knot's raw immediacy for a cleaner, and more modern sound - which makes this one a bit less interesting to me. There's less of the sing-song whisper/explosion/whisper dynamics here. But, there are plenty of great songs. So, this spends a lot of time in my car's CD player.

3. Gillian Welch - The Harrow & The Harvest
   
   They spent many many years on this, writing, rejecting, selecting songs (hence the title). They took so long, I was seriously starting to doubt they'd ever do another record. So, it was great news when this came out. The verdict: it's not as grand as "Revelator", but I think it surpasses their last, "Soul Journey", and fits in nicely with their first two records. They stick to their tried-and-true tradition of slow, and sometimes sad songs, simply done. And there are a couple of likely classics on here. There are also, sadly, a couple of really awkward lyrics; and when I hear them, my reflexive wincing throws me out of the song briefly. But, overall, a good record.

4. Adele - 21
   No need for a link. You all know what Adele sounds like.

5. Sea & Cake - Moonlight Butterfly.
   
   I think they've made a slight turn back towards their classic sound here, and I deeply approve. What really hooks me with this is when they use (intentionally or more likely, not) bits which remind me of songs from other bands I really dig: Unrest, my own songs. So, for example, in the song linked here, Sam Prekop is playing a rhythm part which is almost identical to a song I wrote in 1991 for the woman I'd eventually marry. Sounds like faint praise, and maybe it is; but I've given the S&C a lifetime pass, so anything that isn't trash is welcome.

How about you? What did you like from this past year?

As i was crossing the bridge, i noticed a car stationary on Cheadle bridge. At first i thought it was a queue of cars to the traffic lights at the Parrs wood Complex but after closer inspection, i noticed there were no cars in front of the stationary one. Then i noticed the driver looking sidewards out of the window.

Thats when i saw him.

A tall guy staring down onto the traffic on the M60 in the lashing wind and rain. I thought something must have happened on the motorway and he was simply watching what had happen. But then i noticed that he was standing on the far side of the barrier with nothing protecting him from falling onto the busy wet motorway. He was going to throw himself off.

The Azolla Event

cos(pi*x)*tan(x)

As the cast and crew hurried to prepare for their 7:30 p.m. curtain call in Connecticut's Norma Terris Theater last month, patrons filled the house and prepared to get lost in the production of Hello! My Baby.

For some, that meant powering on their smartphones and iPads and telling all of their Twitter followers about the musical with the hashtag #hmbmusical.

A growing number of theaters and performing groups across the country are setting aside "tweet seats," in-house seats for patrons to live-tweet during performances, including the Carolina Ballet in Raleigh, N.C., and the Dayton Opera in Dayton, Ohio.

Rick Dildine, the executive director for Shakespeare Festival St. Louis — an outdoor theater festival that began using tweet seats two years ago — said tweet seats have "become a national trend."

Fuck Twitter.

Unless one actor literally murders another on-stage, there's really nothing about a play that the world needs to know about immediately. It can wait 90 minutes until you get out.

In fifteen words or less, can somebody sum up the latest in US political drama?

Boldly non-linear, morally ambiguous; lavishly detailed, wildly different settings nevertheless designed with a visible but non-distracting self-similarity; possibly 30% larger than it really needs to be but gorgeous nonetheless; giant sections where you just gape at the beauty of it all while wondering why so little happens there; lens trickery confuses distances; the basic plot is simple but the telling is encrusted in endless asides; incredible attention is paid to structure; some of the characters seem a bit two-dimensional; in the fictional universe viewing the titular media will destroy your mind; will take me a long time to get through.

Nonetheless, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is an awesome game.

Why do I need a username and password in order for me to program my fucking TV remote ?

Atari 2600 Game Reviews