You guys all know I get really bored a lot of the time. But only my friend Grant knows that I spend a lot of my time being bored listening to samples of guitar effects, amps, and guitars in general. These things are endlessly entertaining, not so much for the pleasure of hearing the actual effects, but for how completely goofy the music often sounds. There's a term called guitar wanking, which, if you've ever been in Guitar Center, you've probably heard. That's about what happens on these equipment samples.
And if you're really lucky, Johnny DeMarco is the guy playing the samples and talking about them.
It's really goofy stuff, and obviously not indicative of any type of music that is actually popular in the world outside of people who really dig guitar virtuosity (of which there are few, and most of them only listen to Paul Gilbert and these clips).
Anyway, I mess around on guitar a lot when I'm bored of listening to other people play in a wank-tastic fashion during effect samples, which is already a result of boredom. So I'm doubly bored when I start playing guitar, which means I get sidetracked a lot.
I know, who would expect me to get sidetracked? I have such a straightforward blog that never goes on tangents.
Today I tried to record a surf rock-style song, but got too annoyed at my laptop microphone's inability to make things sound good. I was also bored, so my attention span was short, so I stopped trying to get it right.
The problem is, though, that I decided I as going to post a bit of music on this here blog. I figured it'd be a time to live up to the title of my blog in forcing myself to do things I relaly don't like.
And I hate showing any music I think of to anyone.
Alas, I still lost this round for the most part, because my combination of perfectionism/short attention span made me give up. But I decided I was still gonna do something musical for the blog. So I decided I would just try to emulate some of the wankiest-wanking I could think of.
I took a stock loop from garage band, laid down a rhythm that is my best approximation of something I might hear on Smooth Jazz 98.1, and then solo'd with all of the wanktitutde I could muster.
All in all, it took about 30 minutes, and I thought it was douche-y enough for me to share without feeling self-conscious about. It's supposed to be kind of bad, which means I still didn't totally do something I like, putting creative work I actually care about out for anyone to see, but I'm taking baby steps by showing the internets that I play music a lot.
Anyways, here's The Jazz Wank, as I hastily named it. Please God don't judge me. Or do, be brutal, I think it'd supposed to be made fun of for you to enjoy it.
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Saturday, February 26, 2011
I Can't Tell Anymore
I honestly have no idea if celebrities or nascent celebrities are just blatantly fucking with the general public at this point.
Last night, I had to process Twitter photos of Tyler, the Creator, rapper/producer/filmmaker on the up-and-up whose main claim to fame was a lot of gross imagery and lines about rape in his songs*, chilling with Justin Bieber on a tour bus and being legitimately excited about that. If that was all, I probably would have thought about something smart to write today about being young and recognized for hard work and artistic risk and junk.
But then that whole Charlie Sheen tirade had to derail that idea. How does that guy manage to say that many crazy words together with a straight face? My brother tried to explain it to me, something about drugs and lack of a superego or something, which probably would've made sense, but I just couldn't process things anymore.
And what sucks is that if I expressed this concern to Sheen himself, he'd just call me a loser that can't comprehend how awesome his life has been.
And you know what? That's an infallible argument. I don't have that money or freedom of lifestyle and choice of words. I probably never will.
And in my mind, that's fine, because I don't want to be like that guy. But maybe that means I really am just a loser.
Probably not, but I'm putting way too much halfhearted thought into this. I think this Friday has short-circuited my brain's ability to apply intricate thought to anything. I'm only good at Minesweeper for the rest of this week.
I think I'm going to watch Hall Pass.
*Which honestly shouldn't have been his claim to fame; it should have been that he is an artistic polymath that does basically everything with a high level of quality. Lines about rape in his raps are probably the least interesting thing about him, honestly.
Last night, I had to process Twitter photos of Tyler, the Creator, rapper/producer/filmmaker on the up-and-up whose main claim to fame was a lot of gross imagery and lines about rape in his songs*, chilling with Justin Bieber on a tour bus and being legitimately excited about that. If that was all, I probably would have thought about something smart to write today about being young and recognized for hard work and artistic risk and junk.
But then that whole Charlie Sheen tirade had to derail that idea. How does that guy manage to say that many crazy words together with a straight face? My brother tried to explain it to me, something about drugs and lack of a superego or something, which probably would've made sense, but I just couldn't process things anymore.
And what sucks is that if I expressed this concern to Sheen himself, he'd just call me a loser that can't comprehend how awesome his life has been.
And you know what? That's an infallible argument. I don't have that money or freedom of lifestyle and choice of words. I probably never will.
And in my mind, that's fine, because I don't want to be like that guy. But maybe that means I really am just a loser.
Probably not, but I'm putting way too much halfhearted thought into this. I think this Friday has short-circuited my brain's ability to apply intricate thought to anything. I'm only good at Minesweeper for the rest of this week.
I think I'm going to watch Hall Pass.
*Which honestly shouldn't have been his claim to fame; it should have been that he is an artistic polymath that does basically everything with a high level of quality. Lines about rape in his raps are probably the least interesting thing about him, honestly.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
An Odd Future Filled with Wild Things
I was going to dedicate this whole blog post to Odd Future, a precocious group of folk that what may well become my newfound obsession after two of them tore shit up on Fallon last night, but I realized that was the easy pitfall for a bored blogger to blog about today.
They're young, nuts, provocative, whathaveyou, Wu-Tang comparison, punk rock rap hybrid, do a whole lotta rape lyrics. Ponderings follow, opinion.
There; I just summed up what most people will write about them today, or have written about them already. I'm kind of late on this game, so eff it.
What I will say is that it's almost annoying at how precocious their leader, Tyler the Creator, is. It's not annoying, just almost. He's a pretty interesting producer, an alright rapper, and apparently alright at graphic art. But the fact that he seems like he could be a pretty neat visual filmmaker or music video director, as evidenced by the video in the first link on this post (Note: it's kind of gross, on both visceral and thematic levels, just as a warning), makes me feel quite inept. But like most of this blog, that's more about me, and less about this dude.
On that note, I'm not writing much about them because I just found out that Where the Wild Things Are is apparently playing on HBO now, meaning two things: 1) I'm gonna have to make sure my parents don't catch me getting misty-eyed over giant monsters traipsing about and 2) watching it got me sidetracked on my blog again today.
I've written about it before after I first watched it, so I don't wanna repeat myself, but I will say that for as divisive as the movie is, I think it's probably the most accurate and perfect coming-of-age story you could ever make. Spike Jonze made more sense out of monsters on an island being a realistic metaphor for what growing up means than John Hughes or John Hughes high school flick-imitators ever could*. Imagination, confusion, and sadness-without-knowing-why all balled up into one flick about finally being able to reflect on what one does and how it affects others and how the world actually works versus how you want it to work is really an amazing thing, even if you think it's a bad movie. And plenty of people do think it's bad.
I think they're wrong, but mainly because this transformation is what I spent so much of my life going through. It's not unusual that Spike Jonze makes a movie that caters (in my mind) specifically to me. I walked around with my imagination taking precedence over what the physical world provided me, and when people weren't in on my games, I got sad for no reason, and pissed people off for reasons unknown.
I'm rambling too much about a movie that deserves not to be rambled about, but experienced and quietly reflected upon, so I'm switching the emphasis of this to my point. People seemed to not like it because they figured it should be a childrens' movie that kind of ended up catering to, well, me, or adults in general.
So what would it be like if I had watched this movie as a kid? Back when I was feeling those things, would I still feel a kindred spirit in Max and Jonze's flick in general, or would I hate it?
It's a question I'll never be able to answer, and I don't know how to feel about that: glad I'll never know and love it the way I do, or sad that maybe I could've figured out a little bit quicker that people kind of get what was happening in my crazy mixed-up brain of mine as a kid.
Alright, sentimentality over. I'm off to go download some mixtapes of strange shocking rap by precocious kids.
*That is not a knock on either of those groups; I love those movies, but they don't exactly provide the best template for what growing up should be, says the bitter late bloomer.
They're young, nuts, provocative, whathaveyou, Wu-Tang comparison, punk rock rap hybrid, do a whole lotta rape lyrics. Ponderings follow, opinion.
There; I just summed up what most people will write about them today, or have written about them already. I'm kind of late on this game, so eff it.
What I will say is that it's almost annoying at how precocious their leader, Tyler the Creator, is. It's not annoying, just almost. He's a pretty interesting producer, an alright rapper, and apparently alright at graphic art. But the fact that he seems like he could be a pretty neat visual filmmaker or music video director, as evidenced by the video in the first link on this post (Note: it's kind of gross, on both visceral and thematic levels, just as a warning), makes me feel quite inept. But like most of this blog, that's more about me, and less about this dude.
On that note, I'm not writing much about them because I just found out that Where the Wild Things Are is apparently playing on HBO now, meaning two things: 1) I'm gonna have to make sure my parents don't catch me getting misty-eyed over giant monsters traipsing about and 2) watching it got me sidetracked on my blog again today.
I've written about it before after I first watched it, so I don't wanna repeat myself, but I will say that for as divisive as the movie is, I think it's probably the most accurate and perfect coming-of-age story you could ever make. Spike Jonze made more sense out of monsters on an island being a realistic metaphor for what growing up means than John Hughes or John Hughes high school flick-imitators ever could*. Imagination, confusion, and sadness-without-knowing-why all balled up into one flick about finally being able to reflect on what one does and how it affects others and how the world actually works versus how you want it to work is really an amazing thing, even if you think it's a bad movie. And plenty of people do think it's bad.
I think they're wrong, but mainly because this transformation is what I spent so much of my life going through. It's not unusual that Spike Jonze makes a movie that caters (in my mind) specifically to me. I walked around with my imagination taking precedence over what the physical world provided me, and when people weren't in on my games, I got sad for no reason, and pissed people off for reasons unknown.
I'm rambling too much about a movie that deserves not to be rambled about, but experienced and quietly reflected upon, so I'm switching the emphasis of this to my point. People seemed to not like it because they figured it should be a childrens' movie that kind of ended up catering to, well, me, or adults in general.
So what would it be like if I had watched this movie as a kid? Back when I was feeling those things, would I still feel a kindred spirit in Max and Jonze's flick in general, or would I hate it?
It's a question I'll never be able to answer, and I don't know how to feel about that: glad I'll never know and love it the way I do, or sad that maybe I could've figured out a little bit quicker that people kind of get what was happening in my crazy mixed-up brain of mine as a kid.
Alright, sentimentality over. I'm off to go download some mixtapes of strange shocking rap by precocious kids.
*That is not a knock on either of those groups; I love those movies, but they don't exactly provide the best template for what growing up should be, says the bitter late bloomer.
Friday, January 14, 2011
Overload
Before falling asleep last night, I fantasized about what my day would be like. It went something like this:
You know what? I saw that "Louie" was on Netflix, so I think I'm gonna watch a lot of that. Man, that was a really interesting show; I really wanna watch it again because I suspect that the ratio of melancholy to funny is actually skewed a lot more in melancholy's direction than funny, and that's pretty bold for a comedian to do. He's doing short Woody Allen films as delivered by someone really really angry.
But you know what else? I haven't watched "Northern Exposure" in forever. God, that show is good. I keep saying I'm going to re-watch that show and I still haven't. Maybe it's for the same reason I haven't watched the Lord of the Rings trilogy again, it'd just be so time consuming to get through all of it. But screw it; maybe I can get through "Louie" early in the morning (there are only 13 episodes, after all), then I can get on "Northern Exposure."
Oh shit, wait, I already have the third and fourth seasons of "Chuck" on my plate, too. I kept saying I'd get caught up before Monday. Gotta stay on that regiment. So I'll watch that after "Louie."
Dude, thinking of TV makes me think of the True Grit commercial I saw today. Good to see it's number one at the box office. Should I see it a third time? I kind of want to, but that seems silly, like something I'd do in middle school. And I'm not in middle school anymore.
Ah crap, I just realized I still haven't seen Blue Valentine either. And call me nuts, but I feel like I'm committed to seeing the Green Hornet, just because I'm so damn curious about that pairing of Seth Rogen and Michel Gondry for a movie like that. I should see Blue Valentine first though, because that'll probably leave theaters quicker.
So maybe after watching all of "Louie," then a few more episodes of "Chuck," I can go see Blue Valentine tomorrow*. That'd be a pretty good day, even though the end of it would involve me admittedly seeing a pretty heavy movie almost certainly by my lonesome, which probably wouldn't put me in the best mood in the evening, but oh well. Good art is good art, I guess, and if I have a crummy night after a good day of media-watching, that's probably alright. I can blog my opinions of these things too, which will be helpful, as I'm really quickly running out of ideas to write about.
Tomorrow should be awesome.
...As it stands, I watched two episodes of "Louie" and got my oil changed, which took like an hour. Luckily, my oil change was free, so that was good.
Regardless, though, I think I need to temper my multimedia intake, and also take a long hard look at what I believe constitutes a "Good Day."
*Oh, and I should also listen to "The Wild Hunt" again by The Tallest Man On Earth. That'd be a good thing to do to take a break or do while blogging. Also, I should really try to steal more devices from the fifteen pages of David Foster Wallace stuff that I've read. It makes me look a lot cooler, I bet.
You know what? I saw that "Louie" was on Netflix, so I think I'm gonna watch a lot of that. Man, that was a really interesting show; I really wanna watch it again because I suspect that the ratio of melancholy to funny is actually skewed a lot more in melancholy's direction than funny, and that's pretty bold for a comedian to do. He's doing short Woody Allen films as delivered by someone really really angry.
But you know what else? I haven't watched "Northern Exposure" in forever. God, that show is good. I keep saying I'm going to re-watch that show and I still haven't. Maybe it's for the same reason I haven't watched the Lord of the Rings trilogy again, it'd just be so time consuming to get through all of it. But screw it; maybe I can get through "Louie" early in the morning (there are only 13 episodes, after all), then I can get on "Northern Exposure."
Oh shit, wait, I already have the third and fourth seasons of "Chuck" on my plate, too. I kept saying I'd get caught up before Monday. Gotta stay on that regiment. So I'll watch that after "Louie."
Dude, thinking of TV makes me think of the True Grit commercial I saw today. Good to see it's number one at the box office. Should I see it a third time? I kind of want to, but that seems silly, like something I'd do in middle school. And I'm not in middle school anymore.
Ah crap, I just realized I still haven't seen Blue Valentine either. And call me nuts, but I feel like I'm committed to seeing the Green Hornet, just because I'm so damn curious about that pairing of Seth Rogen and Michel Gondry for a movie like that. I should see Blue Valentine first though, because that'll probably leave theaters quicker.
So maybe after watching all of "Louie," then a few more episodes of "Chuck," I can go see Blue Valentine tomorrow*. That'd be a pretty good day, even though the end of it would involve me admittedly seeing a pretty heavy movie almost certainly by my lonesome, which probably wouldn't put me in the best mood in the evening, but oh well. Good art is good art, I guess, and if I have a crummy night after a good day of media-watching, that's probably alright. I can blog my opinions of these things too, which will be helpful, as I'm really quickly running out of ideas to write about.
Tomorrow should be awesome.
...As it stands, I watched two episodes of "Louie" and got my oil changed, which took like an hour. Luckily, my oil change was free, so that was good.
Regardless, though, I think I need to temper my multimedia intake, and also take a long hard look at what I believe constitutes a "Good Day."
*Oh, and I should also listen to "The Wild Hunt" again by The Tallest Man On Earth. That'd be a good thing to do to take a break or do while blogging. Also, I should really try to steal more devices from the fifteen pages of David Foster Wallace stuff that I've read. It makes me look a lot cooler, I bet.
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