On nights like these
I could fly up to the sky above me.
Like Superman
I would change the course of earth below me.
Through the world I am wandering, wandering,
A soft breeze blowing, I am wandering now.
Through this world I am wandering, wandering.
These are the days I live now.
I can see
The planets are aligning for me.
And I dare not breathe for then
The clouds will come and then deny me.
I occasionally check the website for my favorite band, Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers, for information about upcoming shows and CDs and such. They put some cool new t-shirts in their store, but I also noticed that they're offing a hell of a deal on their music: The Whole Enchilada, or all eight of their CDs for only $50.
Eight CDs for $50 is damn good, but eight damn good CDs for $50 is the kind of deal you can't pass up. It's got six out of the seven RCPM full-length CDs (there are two digital downloads you can't get there, but you can score them on the site easily enough if you're a completest; the newest album isn't in the deal yet.) The package includes the full versions of their two live CDs and four of their five studio albums, as well as the two studio Refreshments CDs.
I have followed RCPM/The Refreshments (as they were once known) since I was a junior in high school, and will go to their live shows whenever I get a chance. It's honest, good-hearted southwestern Rock and Roll with more than a little 'salsa' feel to it. This deal will also score you 107 songs - that's only $0.46 a song! - or about 7 hours and 5 minutes worth of music - that's only $0.11 a minute!
Seriously, if you're into the Peacemakers casually and held off buying their CDs, this is your chance. If you're a dirty pirate that would steal from small independent bands, this is your chance to do right. If you've never heard of the Peacemakers before reading this post, I suggest you maybe listen to some of their stuff on YouTube - keeping in mind a lot of it is recorded by fans at shows - or listen to some samples on iTunes.
This is a great deal. Don't pass it up!
One of my only complaints about Apple and the iTunes / iPod format (aside from the shitty, shitty hardware - "just works" my ass) is the DRM'd music you "purchase" from their store - not that I want to share it, but because it locks me into buying Apple products so I can continue to play my purchases. I love my iPod, but I can imagine a day when another company makes a viable alternative and my brand loyalty only goes as far as what's most functional in my life. But Apple was smart, because the couple hundred dollars (at least ) of DRM'd music I've purchased from them must be played on Apple devices until the end of time. Considering that includes at least one exclusive Peacemakers album, I'm loathe to switch.
But today, Amazon.com launched their own MP3 online music store. What's the difference? A slightly smaller selection than iTunes, a crummier search function (it never was Amazon's strongest point), but DRM free, 256KBS MP3s. Often for the same price (and many times cheaper) than iTunes' DRM'd songs.
And I can just drag and drop them into iTunes, and they're good to go. Or into whatever other future service I might want to use, on a future player that hasn't been released yet.
iTunes just lost a customer today. Congrats, Amazon.
Also, the other thing I don't like about the iPod / iTunes? No multiple genre tags. That, and the crappy quality of the hardware that has necessitated the replacement of the device even though I'm hardly what I'd consider a "hardcore" user. But man, those iPod Touches are sexy.
During a long weekend of camping, I can lose myself in thought about things I don't normally get to think about during work. This weekend, I've been turning over something about art and creation that I read on SA last week. In the thread discussing Inland Empire, someone commented that Lynch's latest movie was nothing more than "masturbation" - a charge I've often seen leveled against art in many forms, be it movies, poems, abstract sculpture, whathaveyou. It's also something wielded in more academic circles (and those Puppeteers who run in such circles have a much better concept of this than I do, to be sure), with the label "academic" or "intellectual masturbation."
This label is something used almost exclusively as an insult, as it was originally used in the SA thread about Inland Empire. But this got me thinking about something near and dear to my heart as a writer, and one working in a creative field: what does "artistic masturbation" mean, and why is it an insult?
Masturbation has a lot of negative connotations, and this post isn't designed to be a discussion of sexuality and whether those connotations are deserved or not, so I'll leave it at that. But it's a selfish, solo action designed (most of the time, I'll grant you) for the pleasure of the person doing the deed. It's for no one else; it's (again, usually) a private affair and one that specifically pleases the individual nature - likes and turn-ons - of the masturbator.
So what is a movie created as "artistic masturbation?" Read the definition again, but instead of imagining some scary guy with his hands down his pants, imagine a painter standing in front of an easel, and replace a couple of sexually charged words. "It's a selfish, solo action designed (most of the time, I'll grant you) for the pleasure of the person doing the deed. It's for no one else; it's (again, usually) a private affair and one that specifically pleases the individual nature - likes and taste - of the artist."
Isn't that what we want from our artists? How many times have we heard the refrain "well, he's sold out. George Lucas sold out with the Star Wars prequels. Billy Corgan sold out when he released the new Smashing Pumpkins album without two key band members. Cormac McCarthy sold out when he went on Oprah to promote "The Road."
So which is it? Do we want artists to create art solely for themselves, or do we want art that "sells out?" This was a conflict I ran into at WizKids quite a bit: what role, if any, did the marketing department play in game design? On one hand, I heard game designers claiming that marketing interfering with the game design process ruined the process, the "purity" of it. On the other hand, if a game failed, it wasn't because of bad design, it was marketing's fault for not selling it correctly - even if marketing raised some serious concerns about the game.
I suspect the answer lies somewhere in the middle, for a multitude of reasons. You may not be "selling out," but you have to pay your bills. You may not be "selling out," but if you're working for a game company, it makes sense to work with marketing to make a game that will sell so you and the fine folks over in marketingland will both continue to work for said game company. Should you write exclusively to pay your bills, or design exclusively to sell? No, because that invites a kind of cynicism that ruins the "spirit" (for lack of a better term) of what you're creating. Something designed only to sell will sell, but it's the Backstreet Boys compared to the Smashing Pumpkins. Seven years later, which would you rather listen to?
And to loop it back to David Lynch, making movies like A Straight Story, Dune and The Elephant Man give him the leverage to make the movies he wants. True artistic "masturbation" is a luxury afforded only by the rich (or the financially sound), the absolutely principled, or those too poor to give a fuck. For the other 95% of us, we have to continue to ride that middle road. But just as the principled and the rich should consider that we're putting food in our mouths when we work, so too should we consider that the principled and the rich are doing what the fuck they want. Neither "sell out" nor "masturbation" should be wielded in weaponlike fashion as they are; both can be compliments, or at least signs of respect.
Update: Roger made an excellent and informative post in the comments worth repeating here, both for context and fact:
A fellow Allit sent this poem to me this morning, and it reminds me of the song beneath it.
One Need Not Be A Chamber To Be Haunted by Emily Dickenson:
Another one to add to the "I should have done it when I had the idea" bin. In college, I thought mashing up TS Eliot reading his own poetry with electronic music would be awesome. Apparently, so this this fellow. Via MeFi.
An old pal (who has no website) linked me to a YouTube video by "Sad Kermit" - a cover of Nine Inch Nails' Hurt, in the same style as the Johnny Cash cover. Slightly NWS for lyrics and, well, an odd puppet, well, thing.
From the guy who reminded us that some people don't know their asses from a hole in the ground comes "A Few Words in Defense of My Country." If you're not offended by at least some part of this song, be you liberal or conservative, then you probably weren't paying attention.
Liz got the idea to start painting the second bathroom today - a waste of perfectly-good goof-off time - so I felt compelled to do something around the house. The first bathroom was getting kind of moldy, so I busted out the Zap, or Zep, or whatever the concentrated bleach nonsense they sell for 8 bucks a pop is called. I put the iPod on random and stepped into the bathroom, ready to do battle.
The first song the iPod decided to play on random was "Highway to the Danger Zone." Somehow, it fit perfectly.
A long December and there’s reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last...
...[t]he feeling that it’s all a lot of oysters, but no pearls
All at once you look across a crowded room
To see the way that light attaches to a girl...
..I guess the winter makes you laugh a little slower...
...And it’s been a long December and there’s no reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better that the last
I can’t remember all the times I tried to tell myself
To hold on to these moments as they pass.
There's a lot of lists floating around at the moment (it's the end of the year, after all), but here's a great and different one: the 100 best cover songs of all time. Many of them have videos or MP3s you can download. Check it out, you won't be disappointed.
This weekend I embarked on a cinematic voyage into unexplored (for me) territory, by renting one of the finest films I've ever seen. By "renting," I mean "got from Netflix," and by "finest films I've ever seen," I mean "This is Spinal Tap." Yes, it's true, Spinal Tap is in that era of movies where stuff came out that was Rated R and I didn't see it at the time because I had parents who actually gave a shit what their kid was up to (a good thing, mind you), and haven't gotten back to since.
All I can say is, that movie goes up to eleven. It's pretty unusual that I finish watching a movie and think, "yeah, that's pretty much one of the best movies I've ever seen," but that's certainly what happened this weekend.
So what did you do with your extra Daylight Savings Time hour?
I've been listening to videos for the Guitar Hero 2 songs all day through the YouTube links in my other post, and I decided to search for some of my favorite music videos from when MTV actually played music. Here's possibly the best video made during the 1980s, "Take on Me" for A-Ha.
Ladies and Gentlement, now that the entire Guitar Hero 2 tracklist has been released, I can start assembling the next custom playlist for my iPod.
Almost forgot: my old iPod has finally withered and died. It gave me a three-year run. Not too shabby for something I probably used 30 hours a week.
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