entombed in the shrine of zeroes and ones

2022 in music

2022-12-31T18:10:40Z

In vaguely alphabetical order:

Baby Velvet, Please Don't Be in Love With Someone Else — Hannah Crofts from All Our Exes Live in Texas has her solo debut. Lovely, sightly neurotic pop.

Andrew Bird, Inside Problems — What more can i say? Bird always brings the goods.

Dead Engine, Brake — (EP) Another small set of power trio rock.

Guilhem Desq & Sébastien Gisbert, Storm — Desq's manic electric hurdy gurdy is joined by Gisbert's thrumming percussion.

50 Foot Wave, Black Pearl — (EP) There was always a clear stylistic break between her two bands as well as her solo work, but the latest Throwing Muses, 50 Foot Wave, and Kristin Hersh releases sound very similar. Sludgey, abrasive, sometimes it feel like i'm still listening out of inertia.

Florence + the Machine, Dance Fever — A fuller and broader work than her previous album. Her voice is still a marvel to behold.

Grieflines, Fathoms — (EP) Electronica side project for I Like Trains guitarist Guy Bannister.

Imogen Heap & Dan O'Neill, Chordata Bytes I — Heap has taken a library of oceanic sounds from marine biologist O'Neill and turned it into electronic music.

Jean-Michel Jarre, Oxymore — Jarre had been collaborating with Pierre Henry, musique concrète pioneer, but he died in 2017. That work is now finished. It's a... grimier work, but still very Jarre.

Zola Jesus, Arkhon — Spooky, haunting vocals are her bread and butter.

Rokia Koné & Jacknife Lee, Bamanan — Malian pop, a Bandcamp suggestion that hit me right away.

Midnight Oil, Resist — My album of the year, everything the Oils are known for, a massive comeback album.

Sea Power, Everything Was Forever — Their soundtrack to Disco Elysium (an amazing video game that is accessible to any level of gaming skill) piqued my interest. A few of the DE tracks resurface here with lyrics.

Tears for Fears, The Tipping Point —Another comeback album, this one where an old rift between the band members was repaired. It's a lovely work.

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d.j.t.

2022-11-18T06:15:14Z

He's the hack from Mar-a-Lago
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
told his workers, "No te pago"
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
He thought big, he was optimistic
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
They didn't know he was narcissistic
Little Donald rants on the big stage
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
What he says doesn't make no sense

Sometimes people can be oh so dense
He didn't want it but he won it anyway
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
Little Donald stands in the White House
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
What he says don't make sense
What he says doesn't make no sense
(Little Donald, Little Donald)
Little Donald stands at a rally

Oh Donald John Trump I see you behind
The barred door of federal prison

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the ballad of apartheid clyde

2022-11-07T19:03:47Z

I heard that Twitter's dead
Well, I don't care about it
I heard that Twitter's dead
But I don't care about it

It happens anyway
It happens anyway
Thought i'd just buy Twitter
I thought i'd just buy Twitter, oh

I said no fake accounts
Just mark them "parody"
I said no fake accounts
And then I changed my mind
And then I changed my mind
And then you heard me say
"Well, that's the way I like it
Well, that's the way I like it
I like it too much"

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2021 in music

2022-02-09T03:47:08Z

Hello? Is this thing on?

I did one of these for 2020 elsewhere. More or less in order of acquisition:

Rodrigo y Gabriela, Jazz: a 3-track EP of covers. The "Lingus" cover in particular is a marvel.
Mogwai, As the Love Continues: i knew of them but this is their first listen for me. Solid post-rock.
Ben Babbitt, Kentucky Route Zero- Memory Overflow: odds and sods from the KRZ soundtrack. I must insist again that you give the game a shot.
St. Vincent, Daddy's Home: a pitch-perfect pastiche of `70s rock that somehow feels flabby.
Mdou Moctar, Afrique Victime: more Tuareg rock guitar wizardry.
Jean-Michel Jarre, Amazonia: at the intersection of Zoolook's sampling of folk melodies and Waiting for Cousteau's ambient drone.
Garbage, No Gods No Masters: my album of the year. They're so good.
James, All the Colours of You: more of their bright pop with the occasional unexpectedly sharp lyrics.
The Joy Formidable, Into the Blue: a bit of a disappointment; a lot of their music club singles and demos were really good but they didn't make it into the album.
Venus Hum, Kindness Rages On: they collect their five previous singles and more than satisfactorily flesh out the album.
Takénobu. Always Leave a Note: Nick and Kathryn are married now and the new direction shows throughout the album. Lovely melodies and lyrics.
José González, Local Valley: González finally adds Spanish and Swedish to the lyrical repertoire of his acoustic guitar tracks.
Maybeshewill, No Feeling Is Final: optimistic post-rock. They came back after a long hiatus and i believe this is their best album, easily.
Adele, 30: not fond of some of the backing vocal arrangements, but it's Adele. More mature, more polished, all the quality you're used to.
Dead Engine, Mantis: a San José band! Old school power trio rock.

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don't fence me in

2020-04-13T02:17:29Z

In a cosmic bit of coincidence, i have room for approximately six more albums in both my 60 GB MP3 USB stick and my 500-case CD rack.

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the year in music

2019-12-24T20:29:01Z

In alphabetical order, 2019 releases:

Battles, Juice B Crypts— The band's down to two members now. Bleepier. Vocal collaborations like Gloss Drop.
Andrew Bird, My Finest Work Yet— He's not kidding. He keeps getting better.
Ioanna Gika, Thalassa— She had a guest appearance on Stumptown, where she played an amazing cover of "One Thing Leads to Another", so i looked her up and yeah, sold.
The Joy Formidable, Y Falŵn Drom— The band reissued their debut mini-album A Balloon Called Moaning for its 10th anniversary, but also recorded new versions of the songs with Welsh lyrics.
Juan Luis Guerra 4.40, Literal— He remains a force, so very good at what he does, and barely looks like he's aged since he came across my cultural radar 30 years ago.
Mdou Moctar, Ilana: The Creator— Tuareg Nigerien rock. Recommendation from a friend, another instant buy.
The New Pornographers, In the Morse Code of Brake Lights— Another TNP album without Dan Bejar, which is fine by me. Doesn't feel as good as its predecessor.
Rodrigo y Gabriela, Mettavolution— Fabulous. They stretch by adding more multi-track work, electric guitar, and vocals. Their arrangement of Pink Floyd's "Echoes" is epic.
Takénobu, Conclusion— Nick Ogawa is joined now on violin by his fiancée Kathryn Koch; here, they re-record some older tracks and add new ones. They're great together.
Tool, Fear Inoculum— It's good but... the tracks lack separation. The overall feel is too similar. And their ultra-deluxe CD packaging ($45, if you can find it) feels like a cash grab from their legion of slavering fans (i bought the MP3 album).

There was also Sleater-Kinney's The Center Won't Hold, but it was super disappointing and, alas, prophetic.

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howe's law: everyone has a scheme that will not work

2019-09-14T01:01:23Z

One does not simply listen to music. Sure, you can listen to a whole album at a time, old-school, or just throw everything into the shuffle blender, but the vicissitudes of statistics lead to things getting neglected. In addition, one wants to listen to new stuff, and listen to it more often in order to become familiar with it. How to balance listening to neglected stuff with the need to listen to new stuff more often?

After various attempts that were eventually unsatisfying, i developed a Fibonacci-based approach; songs are added to a list according to how many times they've been played, and each list has a backoff value where a song isn't allowed to show up until it has been F_n days since it was last played. These lists are aggregated into a master list. Another list is created for songs above a minimum number of plays that have not been played for a number of days that is larger than the largest value from the previous lists. The value varies in an attempt to balance the amount of tracks in the latter list with those of the former aggregated list.

As it stands now, I have lists for tracks played up to 11 times, aggregated in the ‘lessthan12’ playlist, which itself is bound to the ’Not Recently Played’ playlist in ‘listen’. I recently ran through the entire playlist, so I am back to playing my entire catalog on shuffle, in order to allow the lists to repopulate.

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drool britannia

2019-04-04T17:48:06Z

Hey, Brexit's not going all right
Hey, Brexit's not going all right
What's that floating in the Thames fog?
It's that bellend, Jacob Rees-Mogg

I believe in Mr. Grieve
Bercow's yelling out, "ORDER!"
Northern Ireland's got no border

I believe in Mr. Grieve
Do we have another division? Yup
Do we have another division?

Lalalala, lalalala
Lalalala, lalalala
Got Gove, got Corbyn
Got even ol' Boris Johnson

I believe in Mr. Grieve
Do we have another division? Yup
Do we have another division?
Do we have another division?

May can cry, May can mope
But can she swing for a third vote?
Oh, I believe
In Mr. Grieve
Hey, Brexit's not going all right
Hey, Brexit's not going all right

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they stole from the rich and gave to the criminally insane!

2018-12-22T01:58:10Z

(inspired by this spectacular bit of branding)

All kids love WALL!

What runs through your land
by bigots' demand
And over your nearest mall?
What breaks up a park
And generates snark?
It's Wall, Wall, Wall

It's Wall, it's Wall,
It's big, it's metal, it's slats.
It's Wall, it's Wall,
We've rolled up our welcome mats!

Nobody wants the Wall
You're gonna get the Wall
Come on and see the Wall
Everyone hates the Wall

Wa-wa-wall, wa-wa-wall

Wall, by MAGA!

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nobody talks anymore

2018-10-09T15:34:49Z

With the imminent death of Google+ predicted, and me being put in Twitter jail because of this,

it's hard out here for a social media gangster.

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trumpage people

2018-10-01T14:30:21Z

NAFTA
you're a Clinton treaty
i said, NAFTA
from the past century
i said, NAFTA
you're not all about me
there's no need for you today

NAFTA
it's time to let you go
i said, NAFTA
i want people to know
i said, NAFTA
that this time it's my show
so i'm going to rename you

your name is now Us-M-C-A
your name is now Us-M-C-A
yet much to my chagrin
i could not work "Trump" in
but we know who did all the work

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the meter's a mess

2018-07-31T23:33:57Z

a young lass of origin Fijian
with long legs and hips callipygian;
her lashes unfurled
eyes of mother o'pearl
framed by hair of a color Stygian

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does this make ivanka irulan?

2018-07-28T05:28:39Z

I've been mulling for the last two years the idea that the GOP's Southern Strategy was like the Bene Gesserit's Kwisatz Haderach breeding program and Trump is Paul Atreides fucking it up for them and they don't know how to put the sandtrout back in the qanat.

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i'm just as surprised as you are

2018-02-01T19:37:26Z

Who has two thumbs and just had two teammates thank him for being the voice of calm reason for inter-team relations at work? This guy!

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state of the rone

2018-01-13T19:23:11Z

As demanded by rbarclay, and really, six months is too long, or something.

2017 bullets:

Started working part-time on Feb 1, full-time Mar 1. Went to Portland office in late March and again in late July. Started working in Oakland office 2 days a week in August. Work is good.
I had ditched the wheelchair in Dec 2016; i stopped using the walker full-time in April, and altogether by June. I was finally able to jog a tiny bit in November. I still can't do a single sit-up, but i did 6 pushups a couple of days ago. I had a small relapse in February after a cold which caused numbness in my feet, which has not cleared (and my hands are still numb).
In late 2016, we'd gotten an accessible plot at the community garden to accommodate me, but i was well enough in November to get kicked out of it and into a regular (and larger) plot.

What does 2018 bring? Well, i quit Twitter (again). Maybe this time it'll stick and won't give me another shitty autoimmune disease.

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our own penal colony

2017-07-04T01:45:17Z

<dem> idaho is being bitchy hot. grr. weather. <todd> Outlaw weather by executive order. <todd> It'd be totally cool, but those damned activist judges.... <todd> And how. <rone> i have a hot activist judge in my pants <lb> rone, did you finally rename your manpart from Judge Judy? <rone> i think it still bears the name i gave it in high school <lb> so, Judge Wopner, then? <rone> Fapner <lb> Nice. <rone> time to go pound the gavel <lb> honorable mention: "I'm holding you in contempt".

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i suppose i should use this darn thing

2017-07-02T06:59:16Z

Today marks one year since i came home after ending up in the hospital with GBS. At that time, I couldn't stand or sit up in bed. I couldn't lift my arms farther than 45°. These days, i can lift my arms almost straight up, and i'm able to go up and down stairs. We got rid of my wheelchair in December, and i stopped using my walker all the time in April.

Memo was with me almost every day at the Walnut Creek nursing home. He's two years old now.

Despite not being compelled by law to do so, Renew Financial extended my benefits for four months once i got sick, and held my job for the 53 weeks I was out sick, and i have been eagerly working for them since February, because it's rare to find a company that displays this sort of values.

So far this year, we've seen Sigur Rós, Jean-Michel Jarre, and Midnight Oil in concert. So, really, things this year has been quite good so far, despite the nationally-induced global calamity that needs not be named.

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and here we are now

2017-01-03T06:50:09Z

This'll have to do until i set up my own publishing platform. I mean, i could write a Note on Facebook, but that site is pure evil. Google+ is the Democratic Party analogue to Facebook's GOP; it has a real chance to do things right but settles for not shitting itself or setting things on fire. This site doesn't exactly cover itself in glory; this posting interface doesn't seem to have been updated since DW was founded and no evidence of a mobile app exists.

Anyway, for the few who are reading this and didn't already read it elsewhere, i'm three weeks away from my 1-year anniversary of the onset of Guillain-Barré syndrome. I had a particularly shitty case of it and am now finally getting around to walking. My hands are still not able to touch-type due to weakness, stiffness, and impaired sensation. Parts of my face are still paralyzed. I'm going back to working from home part-time on Feb 1.

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