book and music reviews
Mar. 31st, 2009 02:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sub_dividedPost on last weekend's mini-vacation at the other livejournal. Includes a review of Glasvegas, who weren't really worth coming back into town for, but at least now I know that. *g*
Finished a book on the train from Boston to NY - The Myth of the Paperless Office by Abigail J. Sellen (an anthropologist specializing office cultures - very cool!) and Richard H. R. Harper (an economist). This was groundbreaking when it came out...in 2003, which is probably why it was only $3 at MIT bookstore. ^^; Interestingly many things the authors claim paper does better have since been implemented electronically - like this desktop application which tries to imitate physical workspaces, or this site which supports annotation of webpages. Reminded that close reading is best accomplished with lots of highlighting and notetaking, I signed up for an account there. We'll see if this will help me to read online material less superficially.
Also finished Pattern Recognition. Hadn't realized that all of William Gibson's books are set in the same universe. See what![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
petronia meant about a single narrator being hard to work with - I don't think everything that happened while the protagonist was in Tokyo was in-character. Wonder if more knowledge of systema - the Russian maritial art practiced by the KGB - would make the least interesting of the three protagonists in Spook Country more interesting. Speaking of Spook Country, diigo's web-annotating function really reminded me of the "geospatial" digital art in that book: an invisible world that intersects with ours in ways that only the properly-equipped are able to detect. Pattern Recognition also has that alternate-world thing going on, only this time the world is marketing. The protagonist, a coolhunter who is the daughter of a security expert, resists being drawn any world she won't be able to discuss over dinner. (I know how she feels.) She's investigating the source of a cult movie on the web. I really liked the footagehead angle, it felt familiar. XD; Lots of people in fandom who also have day jobs!
Biiiiig post on blip.fm and music fandom coming up. In fact it is so long that I've decided to put some reviews of bands here first:
The Whigs at Bowery Ballroom March 7: The Whigs are a garage-rock band from Atlanta with a drummer, a bass player, and a singer/rhythm guitarist. This was an excellent show - there is nothing like the bassist also doubling as the lead guitarist to really get the crowd moving. XD; And pretty colored lights! I went alone and met a few people I really liked, including Ryan, a corporate lawyer - his advice, don't go to law school - whose friend had gone to their previous show, where an amp fell on the bassist (!!). The was nothing like that this time - no one was bouncing around the stage, they were just kind of vibrating in place.
Almost better than the leads, though, was opener Dead Confederate. This is a band that takes its name very seriously. XD; As in, everyone had Southern facial hair - the guitarist had a Ted Kaczynski beard - except for the lead singer, who was whip thin and slouched across the stage like something just risen from the grave. HUGE voice, all out of proportion to his appearance. The stage totally dark except for a single spotlight, organist sustaining long tones, keening vocals, it was like being in a crypt. (A haunted one.) Yay goths!
Should mention that the lead singer of the first opening band (Trance Arc?) was Asian American. Talked to him at the merch stand. Nice guy. His guitarist and the Whigs drummer are related.
Mark Olson and Gary Louris CD came in the mail. Thoughts after listening to the whole thing:
1. With lyrics like "Our black eyes go out into the world" and "Slip or trip you'll never walk away," this is not the reunion CD Jayhawks fans have been waiting for. (Or maybe it is.)
2. This was practiced for 7 days and recorded in 4. Some songs are 15 years old. The album is one third bluegrass, where upbeat songs about troubled relationships are traditional (and live recordings, without headphones, with mistakes left in, are also traditional).
3. The remaining 2/3 are either quiet intense songs (sung like trauma survivors...) or a mixture of other folk styles.
4. Too much emoting! ...wait, what am I saying, there can never be too much emoting! But if there was ever any chance of this finding a wider audience, the emoting definitely has killed it, I think.
5. Channeling Bob Dylan on Bicycle, tracklisted #2, which I like. It is FULL OF METAPHOR XD.
6. Channeling Neil Young on My Gospel Song for You. This is my favorite song because, I think, it sounds like something from Rainy Day Music, only it's got Mark Olson singing harmony (the one thing that was missing from that album).
7. I also like Bloody Hands. In an alternate reality where Gary Louris and Mark Olson wrote songs on topics other than each other...XD. (This is a traditional murder ballad. Those interested in such things are advised to check it out. Though perhaps if you were interested, you'd say that's it's typical of the genre. I'm no murder-ballad expert.)
EDIT: Wacky conspiracy theories: let's go!
Finished a book on the train from Boston to NY - The Myth of the Paperless Office by Abigail J. Sellen (an anthropologist specializing office cultures - very cool!) and Richard H. R. Harper (an economist). This was groundbreaking when it came out...in 2003, which is probably why it was only $3 at MIT bookstore. ^^; Interestingly many things the authors claim paper does better have since been implemented electronically - like this desktop application which tries to imitate physical workspaces, or this site which supports annotation of webpages. Reminded that close reading is best accomplished with lots of highlighting and notetaking, I signed up for an account there. We'll see if this will help me to read online material less superficially.
Also finished Pattern Recognition. Hadn't realized that all of William Gibson's books are set in the same universe. See what
petronia meant about a single narrator being hard to work with - I don't think everything that happened while the protagonist was in Tokyo was in-character. Wonder if more knowledge of systema - the Russian maritial art practiced by the KGB - would make the least interesting of the three protagonists in Spook Country more interesting. Speaking of Spook Country, diigo's web-annotating function really reminded me of the "geospatial" digital art in that book: an invisible world that intersects with ours in ways that only the properly-equipped are able to detect. Pattern Recognition also has that alternate-world thing going on, only this time the world is marketing. The protagonist, a coolhunter who is the daughter of a security expert, resists being drawn any world she won't be able to discuss over dinner. (I know how she feels.) She's investigating the source of a cult movie on the web. I really liked the footagehead angle, it felt familiar. XD; Lots of people in fandom who also have day jobs! Biiiiig post on blip.fm and music fandom coming up. In fact it is so long that I've decided to put some reviews of bands here first:
The Whigs at Bowery Ballroom March 7: The Whigs are a garage-rock band from Atlanta with a drummer, a bass player, and a singer/rhythm guitarist. This was an excellent show - there is nothing like the bassist also doubling as the lead guitarist to really get the crowd moving. XD; And pretty colored lights! I went alone and met a few people I really liked, including Ryan, a corporate lawyer - his advice, don't go to law school - whose friend had gone to their previous show, where an amp fell on the bassist (!!). The was nothing like that this time - no one was bouncing around the stage, they were just kind of vibrating in place.
Almost better than the leads, though, was opener Dead Confederate. This is a band that takes its name very seriously. XD; As in, everyone had Southern facial hair - the guitarist had a Ted Kaczynski beard - except for the lead singer, who was whip thin and slouched across the stage like something just risen from the grave. HUGE voice, all out of proportion to his appearance. The stage totally dark except for a single spotlight, organist sustaining long tones, keening vocals, it was like being in a crypt. (A haunted one.) Yay goths!
Should mention that the lead singer of the first opening band (Trance Arc?) was Asian American. Talked to him at the merch stand. Nice guy. His guitarist and the Whigs drummer are related.
Mark Olson and Gary Louris CD came in the mail. Thoughts after listening to the whole thing:
1. With lyrics like "Our black eyes go out into the world" and "Slip or trip you'll never walk away," this is not the reunion CD Jayhawks fans have been waiting for. (Or maybe it is.)
2. This was practiced for 7 days and recorded in 4. Some songs are 15 years old. The album is one third bluegrass, where upbeat songs about troubled relationships are traditional (and live recordings, without headphones, with mistakes left in, are also traditional).
3. The remaining 2/3 are either quiet intense songs (sung like trauma survivors...) or a mixture of other folk styles.
4. Too much emoting! ...wait, what am I saying, there can never be too much emoting! But if there was ever any chance of this finding a wider audience, the emoting definitely has killed it, I think.
5. Channeling Bob Dylan on Bicycle, tracklisted #2, which I like. It is FULL OF METAPHOR XD.
6. Channeling Neil Young on My Gospel Song for You. This is my favorite song because, I think, it sounds like something from Rainy Day Music, only it's got Mark Olson singing harmony (the one thing that was missing from that album).
7. I also like Bloody Hands. In an alternate reality where Gary Louris and Mark Olson wrote songs on topics other than each other...XD. (This is a traditional murder ballad. Those interested in such things are advised to check it out. Though perhaps if you were interested, you'd say that's it's typical of the genre. I'm no murder-ballad expert.)
EDIT: Wacky conspiracy theories: let's go!