Things I Miss The Most

I miss not seeing advertisements for drugs on television.

I miss caring about award shows like the Grammys and the Oscars.

I miss being younger than the major players in pop culture.

I miss hearing the world without the persistent hissing of tinnitus.

I miss Sour Cream & Onion Doritos and Dr. Pepper with cane sugar in glass bottles.

I miss people understanding science.

I miss thinking that blogging would matter.

I miss laughing with Jim Watkins as we read the script of Star Wars in different voices.

I miss running and jumping.

I miss spiking my hair into asymmetrical shapes.

I miss the scarcity and mystery of record buying before the Internet.

I miss Jack Nicholson.

I miss putting my toes into the Atlantic and the Pacific, although not at the same time.

I miss Happy, my first dog.

I miss looking at my sister's daughter and seeing the futures I wanted for her.

I miss ignorance, because there are times I'm not sure I can bear knowing...and there's so much more to know.

Comments

"The Silver Gun" by Robert Palmer (1983)

I mean...Urdu? Seriously, Urdu . On an already eclectic and worldly album -- Pride , from 1983 -- "The Silver Gun" closes a chapter in Robert Palmer's career by singing a song about a horse in a language spoken daily by over 100 million people. The liquid bass line and propulsive electronics set out a bedrock for Palmer to ping phrasings rather out of place in Western music, askew astride even the peripatetic minimalism of the rest of the record. Somehow, in the middle of Michigan's Appalachia, I had this on vinyl a few years before the CD era officially commenced. It was an album of effort -- even the cover, a pointillism-and-bronze work, had Palmer's head barely above the water -- but the stitches didn't show to my pre-adolescent eyes and ears. In a career marked by zigs and zags, Pride and "The Silver Gun" were most certainly Other, and for a kid that felt like he didn't belong much of anywhere, it was nice to have those discrete feeling...

Some 2024 Listening Pleasures

It started with a gift of two JBL Control 25 speakers, and by "gift" I mean "borrowed" -- a.k.a. "will never return" -- from an obsolete tech detritus pile at work. I may have snagged more than two gifts, of course, but the raw footage proving such a claim remains elusive. And after installing the JBL speakers into the upper corners of the music room, and after installing speaker stands for the rear speakers I already had, and after making the hard choice between a big-ass bean bag and a comfy leather recliner to properly center myself in the audio field (R.I.P., big-ass bean bag), there was only one missing piece: the Apple TV 4K unit. So for me, 2024 was the year I streamed a lot of music in Atmos through Apple Music, surrounded by new tunes and old bops in thrilling new dimensions. Some might say you don't need surround sound, 'cos the two ears + two speakers modality has been dandy for a while now, but that's like saying you don't need ...

Some Stuff Wot I Done Listened To, 2015 Albums Version

Everyone loves year-end lists. Piecemeal and subjective as they may be, it's always a quick and easy route to jog the memory for moments of pleasure and empathy. Back in the record store days, it was a time that I looked forward to most of all, so let's continue with the tradition here in my little corner of the blogosphere, such as it is. Father John Misty – I Love You, Honeybear From the hairiest ersatz lothario this side of 1975, Josh Tillman's delightful creation lists between cynical takes and hopeful stabs with verve and swagger and just a slice of I-can't-even exasperation. One of the best adult love albums of this or any year. FFS – FFS It’s always nice when expectations are exceeded, and this amalgam of Franz Ferdinand and Sparks was greater than the simple sum of parts at almost every turn. In fact, there are times when the hybrid vigor is such that the songs take flight to a new and uncharted land that is FFS alone. Artful hooks, witty tur...

THIS is a CLOSE-UP?

Search This Blog