I've been back in Denver visiting my family for the holidays since Christmas, and, as almost everyone knows by now, it's been more than a little snowy this week in the Mile High City. The sheer volume of precipitation has, in fact, made getting around the city a major ordeal, and somewhat limited my inclination to leave my parents' house during my stay. Still, uber-dedicated documentarian that I am, I spent several hours last night wandering around my parents neighborhood with my camera and a tripod in several feet of freshly fallen snow. I think I got a few good ones.
Now, if only clear weather will hold up overnight, I should be heading home tomorrow...
I won't beat around the bush with a friends only post here, I'll just come right out and say it: people have really been getting me down lately. Whether it's the perennial asshole at a party, or the shady Internet entrepreneur who is currently exploiting my little brother's design talent. Let's face it: these people are running the world.
Fortunately for me, I recently discovered the hidden track on Jarvis Cocker's wonderful new solo album. Every time some asshole gets me down, I fire it up and feel a whole lot better.
Smash the system!
[Warning: Chorus lyrics may be offensive.]
I had planned to post this song awhile back, only to restrain myself when the post I wrote about it came out a bit too snarky. Lately, however, I've been mentioning it to so many people as we discuss people we know in San Francisco that I thought I might as well put it up.
It's kind of an unusual song for Arab Strap, a band most people probably associate with a more cynical view of male/female relations, since it's essentially a diatribe against supposedly "open-minded" swingers and a celebration of monogamy and romance. I think the first verse/chorus section puts it best (especially when paired with a thick Scottish accent):
The ugly tattooed swingers euphemise and call their mucky hobby "trysts," but if I saw another man touch you, I'd break his fucking wrists. Monogamy's not natural, we can't survive, that's what he'll say. He loves to swap, he's open-minded, just don't dare suggest he's gay. And maybe we're just lucky, maybe our connection is unique. And if that's really just what normal people do, aren't you proud to be a freak?
Indeed.
I just figured out another good use of Vox: bringing exciting photos of me from Flickr to the attention of the citizenry. For example, I think this one, taken by the lovely Joyce Kim at the Laughing Squid 11th Anniversary Party Saturday night, is just the sort of Buzz Andersen action shot that deserves a wider audience. Joyce's title for the photo on Flickr ("what?!?! u want this wig? well, come and GET IT!") is hilarious but somewhat misleading--I was actually imitating Michael Jackson's macho posturing in the "Beat It" video, not trying to start a fight (although the "Beat It" video is pretty much about starting fights, so you could be excused for thinking that).
Longtime readers may also be reminded of "Norton Defiant."
The Squid party itself was good fun, mostly because it gave me an opportunity to cut loose a bit and see a lot of my favorite people (and meet a few new ones) after being in heavy work mode for so long. It's nice to know that I can still dance menacingly like Michael Jackson 'till 3 AM when the occasion demands it.
Well, it took long enough, but those of us in the Bay Area are now fully in the grip of the rainy season (what those of you in less Mediterranean climes refer to as "winter"). For me, this usually means terrifying white knuckle commutes on 280, a general retreat indoors, and a sudden fondness for Northern English music of the late 80s and early 90s. Courtney did a nice post about rainy day music, and, while I'm frankly too tired to come up with a more thorough list of my own, it did inspire me to post this song by DJ Muggs, who left behind the empty-headed stonerism of his popular rap group, Cypress Hill, to produce a moody, atmospheric solo album no one could have expected. I love the dark atmosphere and dusty production on this track, and the children's choir at the end.
Nicole posted her own "question of the day" about the names people use for their shared iTunes libraries. My own names tend to be pretty prosaic ("Buzz's MacBook Music," etc.), but, since I happen to work for probably one of the only large companies in the world where literally everyone uses Macs, you can imagine that I see a hell of a lot of shared libraries when I open iTunes. As you can see from the partial screenshot I took below, the share names found on Apple's corporate network run the gamut from simple ("Nik's Music") to amusing (my co-worker and personal colloquialistic hero Iroro's "iO's rotating jammer jamz!! rrrrrrrrrespect!!!") to bizarre ("Ethan's Meow") to, perhaps, overly honest ("WESLEY'S FIVE FINGER DISCOUNT SUPER CENTER").
Somehow I think Google misunderstood my query for Indian restaurants who deliver to Silicon Valley. Just to clarify, Google, I'm looking to have Indian food delivered--not actual Indians. Thanks so much.
Shack, a wonderful Liverpudlian folk rock band, is pretty obscure even in their native Britain as far as I can tell. This is surprising to me, because Mick Head and his brother John have been producing album after album of wonderful, twee guitar pop (in various incarnations) since 1986. It's a wonder that, with the exception of some limited notoriety for their 1999 album H.M.S. Fable, the britpop guitar renaissance almost completely passed them by.
The song "Cup of Tea," off this year's album ...the Corner of Miles and Gil, immediately grabbed me with the explosion of harmony during its chorus (I love soaring, Beach Boys-style vocal harmonies), and its funny lyrics about a man who suspects his lodger is spiking his tea with LSD ("my cup of chai doesn't taste the same when she's with me").
Inspired by Chris Wetherell's post about amusing himself using the ultra-nifty Google Code Search, I decided to do a quick vanity search of my own. I was surprised to see myself relatively well represented with 8 distinct results, including my fairly popular NSString+Templating and NSAppleScript+HandlerCalls Objective-C categories and the Video Desktop code sample I wrote for Scott Knaster's Hacking Mac OS X book. A search for my "other" name (Laurence Andersen) reveals another 10 results, mostly from Cocoalicious.
Kind of vain I know, but it is nice to feel that I've contributed something to the world.
Sometimes a song will impress me with the cleverness of its elaborate chord progressions. A good example would be the Calexico song "Bisbee Blue," whose harmonies seem to me very architectural and carefully selected. Often however, a song will impress me even more when it manages to be interesting despite a very basic structure. This is what I've been thinking about Hot Chip's last album, and it's exactly what struck me the first time I heard Joseph Arthur's "Slide Away." The chords seem to be basically the classic, "Knocking on Heaven's Door," G-D-C, 1-5-4 progression, and yet it somehow manages to be so much more than the sum of its parts. It's gets by on sheer feeling alone.
An interesting side note: I only became aware of Joseph Arthur about a week ago, through his guest appearance on the new Twilight Singers song I recently posted. I immediately thought he'd be great to see live, and wondered when he was coming to town. Before I could even look it up online today, I was walking down Haight Street and noticed a poster for a Joseph Arthur at Cafe du Nord this evening. I just got back from it and can vouch for Arthur being a fantastic live performer (even if he and his band have a somewhat regrettable sense of style).
