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Music in a bad mood

 Leftovers & links


♦ What follows is my understanding of music. I’ve given it not much thought, but more than enough.

There are three kinds of music:

Real music is mostly pop ditties, after they've been heard so many thousand times that every note and vocal intonation is memorized, and listening becomes so rote that you can listen without listening. For me, this includes most of the Top 40 hits of my childhood, when rock’n’roll existed and was good. It also includes most folk music, rhythm & blues, plenty of soul, electronic, and classical music I’ve heard often enough that it’s familiar, many movie scores, and a surprisingly deep repertoire of showtunes. There’s no country music, as that’s an oxymoron.

Interesting music is when you say, ‘That’s cool’, when musical notes and/or lyrics flow along an interesting route, doing something you hadn’t expected, or doing it in an unusual way, or simply doing it well. For me, Interesting music is largely hypothetical, like a five-leaf clover, because when I hear it, I’ll seek out a recording to hear it again, so it soon migrates into either the first or third categories.

The third kind of music is Shut that shit off. This is by far the most common category of composition, and includes opera, rap, boy bands, and virtually all pop music recorded commercially since the 1990s.

You may disagree if you wish, but you’d be wrong.

Also, do I need to explain that I'm 60% kidding about all this, that it's mostly me in a bad mood? Having said that, please shut that shit off.

♦ Here’s an interesting five-minute briefing on some islands in northern Scotland with an unusual but enviable problem — they’re generating more power than they need

In addition to the video itself, I love that it doesn’t open with a theme song, and doesn’t end by pleading for you to subscribe to Tom’s channel. That's why I’ve subscribed to Tom’s channel.

♦ At least five South Florida police officers died from COVID-19 over the course of just one week.

Here, watch my knee jerk: Most cops are politically conservative, or farther to the right than that, and a great many on that side of the stupid-spectrum don’t believe in COVID, won’t wear masks, and refuse the free vaccines.

It stands to reason, then, that cops and other conservatives will continue dying of COVID, more quickly and more often than the rest of us, because they choose to. I feel we should respect their choice.

♦ I may have been a bit too harsh about Jeff Bezos, earlier. A million intestinal worms is excessive and unnecessary, when a few hundred thousand would be sufficient. Mostly Words regrets the error.

♦ "Fans who went to Giants-A's game at Oakland Coliseum faced parking nightmare." Well, I’d rewrite that headline and insert the word “stupid” once or twice.

There was a big crowd at an Oakland A’s game, which admittedly doesn’t happen often, and stupid fans had trouble finding parking. Have y'all heard of BART, the regional transit system? There's a BART station at the Oakland Coliseum. You can park your car just about anywhere in nine counties, and ride BART to the ball park, with no worries about parking.

♦ Facebook has spent more than $23-billion on acquisitions over its short history. I scrolled down the long list, just to make sure I’m not somehow doing business with a Facebook-owned business, and I’m not.

For what little it’s worth, my favorite local news aggregator switched to a Facebook subsidiary on Monday, so I unsubscribed. Ain’t much that one person can do to make the world a better place, but I’m trying not to voluntarily make the world worse.

Overdue apologies: “I’m sorry, treasured spouse, for ways I’ve been critical of you.  It’s an honor to be close to you and be your family member.  I never want to treat you with the mean demanding harshness I sometimes treat myself.” 

♦ Guy moves in with his parents, as he’s going through a divorce. Then he moves out, moves to a different state, and asks his parents to ship his stuff to him.

Everything arrives, except a dozen boxes of porn. Guy asks his parents, and his father replies, “Frankly, David, I did you a big favor getting rid of all this stuff.”

So, guy sues his parents. Guy wins $30,000, plus $15,000 in attorney fees.

♦ Looks like bastards have stolen the late Bob Ross’s image, paintings, archives, and soul.

Parole for Sirhan Sirhan, Robert F Kennedy’s assassin? I wouldn’t object, but it needs the Governor of California’s approval, and I'd be astounded if Gavin Newsom has the backbone. If he's recalled, Newsom's Republican successor absolutely won’t.

♦ Possibly the stupidest question I’ve seen on r/NoStupidQuestions.

♦ Here’s an interesting video, especially the first half hour or so, detailing the creation of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Two main takeaways for me:

① Wesley Crusher was almost Leslie Crusher, a teenage girl, which in my opinion would’ve been far more interesting.

② The original script for the pilot episode had no Q, a character I always found very, very uninteresting. Q was added by Gene Roddenberry himself, one of the Great Bird’s dumbest mistakes. 

♦ “Don’t ever call me ‘your drummer’ again.” Adios and auf wiedersehen, Charlie Watts of the Stones.

♦  Mystery links  — Like life itself, there’s no knowing where you’re going:

—①—
            —②—
                        —③—

 
 
Sincere tip 'o the hat to Becky Jo, Dave S., BoingBoing, Captain Hampockets, and One of the Butt Sisters but definitely not the other.
 
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 8/28/2021

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15 comments:

  1. >Also, do I need to explain that I'm 60% kidding about all this, that it's mostly me in a bad mood?

    I knew that, but still - country music since Garth Brooks became popular is the worst fucking garbage out there. THE WORST, particularly the last ten years. It's fucking painful. Worse than the worst fucking Lil Pump mumble rap or whatever. Take two Q-tips, light them on fire, stick one in your ear and one in your urethra. THAT is modern country in a nutshell.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know next-to-nothing about Garth Brooks, so I'm not even criticizing him, just a memory triggered by his name...

      When the first (first of many) Gulf War started, and I was out protesting against it, my boss and her husband went to a Garth Brooks concert and she couldn't shut up about how much she'd loved it. Next day her husband was called up from the reserves and sent over there somewhere to kill or die for nothing. Garth Brooks and that war are forever commingled in my mind.

      Delete
  2. Tom Scott is pretty cool. In a different vein, you might (or might not) like Atomic Shrimp. He does three types of videos - gardening/cooking, eating weird commercial products, and baiting scammers. He's pretty fun.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Doing anything other than public transportation to either the Coliseum or Oracle Park (I think that's the current name of the Giants ballpark, maybe not) is dumb as shit. You and I BARTed to a few Dollar Wednesdays back when the As were terrible, post-Bash Brothers era. Jesus, there were DOZENS of fans at those games.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dollar Wednesdays! Dollar tickets, dollar hot dogs, dollar beers. I'm amazed the A's are still in Oakland, cuz I figured if so few people came for Dollar Days they were doomed.

      Delete
    2. Also, everyone should take public transit everywhere, if they're living in a city where it's possible and plausible.

      Delete
    3. The A's have been playing great for a few years, and still don't draw diddly squat.

      https://imgur.com/cGN2ZCg

      Delete
    4. Interesting numbers, thanks. I love stats, which is mostly why I love(d) baseball.

      Not an expert or anything, but I suspect the gate and concessions and parking aren't any team's dominant source of income. The big money is in the national TV contract, isn't it?

      Delete
  4. >Possibly the stupidest question I’ve seen on r/NoStupidQuestions.

    HAHAHA! I saw that, and in fact, posted it to /r/shitpost:

    "Pretending to be a moron apparently gets you upvoted on /r/nostupidquestions"

    https://www.reddit.com/r/shitpost/comments/pcexgs/pretending_to_be_a_moron_apparently_gets_you/

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I haunt your posts on Reddit, so you're probably my source for seeing it. I have thus added a genteel hat-tip.

      Delete
    2. I assume you're completely non-posting there? If you have a new secret persona, let me know.

      Delete
    3. I set up a new account at Reddit a month ago, but haven't posted anything yet ....

      Whenever there's an interesting post or question or factoid, the top replies are jokes, and usually predictable jokes, and entire subthreads of jokes and more jokes, rarely funny. It annoys me, always has, but I'll probably be back sometime.

      Delete
  5. Star Trek has its moments but Roddenberry has always been overrated, especially by himself. He must have had some good ideas for the original show, but he contributed nothing but confusion to TNG. almost alone he is responsible for the sucky first two seasons.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was a big fan of the original series when I was a kid, which made me a big fan of Gene Roddenberry. But yeah, by numerous accounts he was kind of a schmuck.

      Then again, so am I.

      Delete

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