Z12IT
how many bottles of Wodka do this bandits drink every day?

Victor Podolsky
Hmm.. probably 1/2 of  the Vodka-per-day dosage? Just to make sure I got you right Wodka = 2*Vodka ?  

deathtokoalas
wodka is the west slavic term for vodka.

rap news 24

deathtokoalas
it's actually not apartheid, which most people don't understand the meaning of. the west has chosen to use the term apartheid due to positive association with the so-called victory in south africa (which has not really ended racial separation there at all, it's just created a small black upper class) and due to concerns about the possible offensiveness of accusing an israeli state of genocide. but, if it were apartheid then the goal would be to convert gaza and the west bank into factories to produce goods for israelis, which sadly was actually proposed by the americans recently as part of a "peace plan" to "improve the palestinian economy" but was rejected outright by the israelis, who want to ethnically cleanse the area. the proper terminology for this is not apartheid but genocide.

...and this marketing strategy to make bds and other actions seem less "anti-semitic" has unfortunately failed. i think it's time to backtrack and be more graphic about the truth of the matter.

stop calling it apartheid. start calling it the genocide that it is.

archi2a
So every company that has factories abroad is evil? Or does that only apply to the ones owned by jews?

deathtokoalas
that depends on whether you've stopped beating your wife or not. have you, archi2a?

it's capitalism itself that is "evil" due to the reduction of human labour to a commodity. whether the model is being applied to asian workers being beaten to make electronics for westerners or palestinians forced into wage slavery for israeli luxuries, we're talking about the same fundamentally horrific situation.

however, that's not what is happening. the israelis do not want the palestinians as slaves. they simply want them removed from the planet. this is not apartheid; it's genocide.

fwiw, i don't have enough faith in markets to think that bds has the potential to be successful. nor does the israeli government seem to take it seriously. netanyahu is just using it as a prop to raise campaign funds. but that's not particularly relevant to pointing out the nature of the situation on the ground, how the apartheid designation is drawing attention away from the genocide that is continuing and drastic steps that ought to be taken to counter it.

archi2a
If the Israelis want the Palestinians "removed from the planet", why does Israel supply electricity, and medical aid to the Gaza strip? Why does it allow palestinians to be treated in israeli hospitals?  If there's a "genocide", where are the piles of corpses of Palestinian civilians(that's what happens in a real genocide). Why does the Palestinian population have one of the highest ratio of growth if they're being mass murdered?

deathtokoalas
your questions are talking points - propagandistic in nature - and not worth answering directly. further, you probably work for somebody that is paying you to post this and i probably don't have a legitimate chance of convincing you, because you're not actually thinking about the things that you're posting. however, for the benefit of other people reading this, i'll talk around your talking points.

israel can't simply snap a finger and be done with the palestinians in a moment. if it was that simple, they indeed would have done so. there are some boundaries that they have to adhere to so as to maintain a working relationship with their allies, which include arab governments in the region who are concerned about how continued israeli colonization of the region may destabilize their own governments. so, it has to carry out a long and slow process of colonization and replacement. the current stage of this long term process is related to eliminating the possibility of a future palestinian state. that is a type of genocide. if you look up what the word means, you'll see that. but, you're not interested in doing this, you're just pushing nationalist propaganda.

archi2a
I stated facts, go ahead and check them for yourself, or come visit Israel or Gaza and see for yourself, I've got nothing to hide. 2) I can actually get paid for exposing biased BS about Israel? Who should I sign with?

deathtokoalas
i doubt i'd be allowed into the highly contained open-air prison that is gaza. from the israeli perspective, this is an effective way to contain the palestinian population in the short run. it's admittedly not entirely clear what the long term plan regarding gaza is, but the foreseeable future is for israel to continue to run it as a prison.

archi2a
Gaza is not controlled by Israel. There are no israeli soldiers there. And anyone can come and go through the security checkpoints. Furthermore, Gaza also has border with Egypt, which is too in a war against Hamas and also strictly controlls its border to prevent weapon smuggling.

deathtokoalas
see, this is so outlandishly absurd that it's more worthy of laughter than any kind of response.

as rap news once said, many years ago,

"people, please, research the truth. nowadays, it isn't hard to do."

archi2a
What is absurd? The fact that Gaza has a border with Egypt? Check a map for G-d's sake. That's exactly what I'm telling you, research the truth. I've only stated facts, which you can verify yourself. Or, as I said, come visit, see for yourself and draw your own conclusions.

deathtokoalas
mmmhmmm. like the fact that gaza is no longer under israeli occupation?

archi2a
Exactly. Do you have any picture of Israeli soldiers stationed in Gaza after the disengagement in 2005?

deathtokoalas
these lines in the sand are based around these arbitrary technicalities, like kids playing dungeons and dragons. as though moving a few feet past some arbitrary border has any meaning to anybody except professional propagandists. and this is something israel has utilized quite loudly: move the soldiers back ten feet, then claim you've withdrawn. the united nations isn't buying it. independent media observers aren't buying it. really, nobody is buying it at all.

you're lucky i've got a headache and am hungry, because i want to be recording guitar tracks right now, but am waiting until midnight for a check to clear to get something delicious to put on my spaghetti...

i've got some pictures of some people being prevented from delivering food & medical supplies. that almost seems like a blockade of some sort. and when you can blockade somebody from all angles that's the same as occupying them.

but, wait, let me guess - that was unnecessary because israel runs a generous welfare stare that provides them with everything they could possibly need. that was a previously stated fact. so, they must have been smuggling in weapons. qed. those terrorists!

archi2a
Yes, of course there's a blockade by sea, to prevent Hamas smuggling weapons from it's main backer: Iran. Anyone who wishes to donate to Gaza can do so through the Red Cross, Israel, or Egypt, but not by sea. And like I said, Egypt controlls its own border with Gaza in the same way.

You can answer when you think more clearly, if you wish.

deathtokoalas
i see. so, gaza is not occupied by israel, israel just controls all movement in and out of the area through direct military force, by means of it's own interests in the region. got it. the difference is absolutely meaningful and abundantly clear.

archi2a
Yes, both Israel and Egypt. And if Hamas didn't rocket israeli population, this blockade wouldn't be necessary. In fact, if there hadn't been for the constant suicide bombing in bars and buses, there would be no security fence either (at least not in the Israeli border).

deathtokoalas
mmmhmmm. so, you would embrace the right of return, then, if the palestinians would only denounce violent tactics?

archi2a
I would embrace a Palestinian state coexisting in peace with the State of Israel.

deathtokoalas
indeed. it's easy to state that once you've built security fences around the area. separate and unequal. but, does that mean you would support an immediate moratorium on settlements in the west bank, to ensure that this theoretical state can exist somewhere in the physical world? do you realize that existing government policy is to eliminate the possibility for such a state in the west bank by cutting into the area piece by piece?

also, supposing that the state of israel continues to refuse to accept the palestinian right of return, how do you propose that palestinian families regain the land that was stolen from them besides using force?

deathtokoalas
obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" track.

rap and hip-hop have never been my thing; i've always preferred the energy and musicality of punk to the more club-oriented hip-hop/rap approach. but, i'm not one to arrive at a conclusion without trying it out first.

ain't nobody ever called me a nigga, but loser has been a consistently applied accusation and/or adjective. i kind of identified with that, without being able to identify with that. know what i'm saying? so, that's a shout out to nwa....

(relevant tracks: unintelligible)

marshaul

Musicality of punk? Best joke of the week!

deathtokoalas

punk is supposed to be catchy...

hip-hop tends to lack things like chord progressions, polyrhythms, syncopation, harmonies and melodies. that is not true of punk.

Jay Townsend

If you want harmony then listen to bone thugs

deathtokoalas

i'll grant you this overlooked point - there's a non-trivial intersection of hip-hop with gospel that has very rich harmonic content. it's contextual to the culture, though. not the easiest thing for an atheist middle class white kid from canada to understand.

the harsher side of it actually makes more sense than the gospel side of it, in the context of it being a type of electronic music and electronic music being the musical zeitgeist over most of my life. i listen to all kinds of stuff that's heavily influenced by hip-hop (autechre, say - or nine inch nails). i've just found that getting into anything with the word "hip-hop" explicitly attached to it is almost impossible.

obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" track.

there's not much i listened to as a kid that i'd claim i "grew out of". conversely, i think i grew up so fast that it's acted as a handicap on my social skills. it's hard to relate to your peers when you....can't relate to your peers. that makes it very hard to live, generally, whether the topic is getting along with people at work or trying to network academically. as a teen, i wasn't able to relate to much of what was marketed to me because it all seemed so vacuous and childish. so, i mostly spent the mid 90s exploring music from the 80s that people ten or fifteen years older than me were into. the little bit of contemporary rock music i did like is largely looked at as classic rock at this point, leaving me with little to really be actively embarrassed about. but, korn is the one glaring exception of something i cannot understand why i liked, but did like, and did connect to, despite being mostly appalled by it now.

nor can i think of much of anything else that i dropped so quickly or comprehensively. billy corgan hasn't done anything i actually like since roughly 2000, but i still check out his new releases. in contrast, i haven't heard a new korn record since "follow the leader". like, honestly. a song here or two, sure, but haven't bothered to sit down and listen to a full record. it was almost like i had some kind of  epiphany: this actually sucks. there's literally no trace of korn in anything i recorded after about 1997.

there is, however, a noticeable guitar influence in my earliest demos. it doesn't come entirely from korn. nirvana did the same kind of riffing, as did white zombie. i'd learn later that it ultimately comes from swans, mostly via melvins and/or black flag. at the time, though, in my fifteenth and sixteenth year, it was those three sources that defined the chugging style: korn, nirvana and white zombie.

there's a secondary influence in the flanging, but that itself is more reasonably pulled out of something like nin, specifically the fixed ep.

(relevant tracks: fire, several tracks on the first two punk/emo/industrial/noise demos that are available at bandcamp but are not uploaded to youtube)

obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" post.

again: i'm trying to avoid linking to the old stuff, but there's really a deficit of material that draws a direct influence from the stuff i really grew up with.

this is on the fringes of my tastes, and about as heavy as i'd ever get. the thing about stuff like white zombie, ministry, melvins and some of the other stuff from the same time and place (including korn, actually) is that it was never really metal. it was punk musicians trying to be metal musicians that were trying to be punk. or something. i think that subtlety has been lost to history. but it let people that were normally into punk get into it a bit more.

i was actually listening to the remix disc, supersexy swingin' sounds, quite a bit at the time. that remains one of the most outright fucking weird pieces of music ever released. the camp appeal was a big part of this.

but those that are willing to strain their memory this far back will recall that there was a brief moment when the guitarist for white zombie had a column in guitar world. white zombie was never particularly challenging, but the guitar style (regardless of who was playing) has always been pretty creative. the guitar parts on this disc were a lot of fun to play along to. now, i was mostly learning blues at the time, which got me more interested in thayil and corgan (as periphery to the lesson material, which was hendrix, clapton, page, zappa, srv), but i've always had a taste for noise, so i took the time to explore this idea of "skronking" a little and am pretty glad i did. you can hear it from time to time, not just on this old stuff but moving forward....

(relevant tracks: mosh pit song, unintelligible, first two punk/emo/grunge/industrial/noise demos in general.)

obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" post.

again: i'm trying to avoid linking to the old stuff, but there's really a deficit of material that draws a direct influence from the stuff i really grew up with.

i'm not making a comparison. i yell at people when they do that. but you can tell i was listening to novoselic's bass playing.

this is a much more creative record than nevermind and had a much bigger influence on me. in utero > incesticide > nevermind, but none of the earliest really noisy stuff made it up to youtube, for various reasons. there's some later stuff. it's all at the bandcamp site, at the very bottom.

(relevant tracks: mosh pit song, unintelligible, first two punk/emo/grunge/industrial/noise demos in general. also, my guitar style is heavily indebted to kurt cobain's noise-first approach to the instrument; even if that influence gets lost under more direct influences from sonic youth and billy corgan that had a bigger effect on me when i was older, it was nirvana that opened my brain to the possibilities of chaining effects pedals together and feeding them through an amp.)

obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" post.

again: i'm trying to avoid linking to the old stuff, but there's really a deficit of material that draws a direct influence from the stuff i really grew up with.

i'm not making a comparison. i yell at people when they do that. but you can tell i was listening to novoselic's bass playing. the rhythm section is really the best part of the record.

(relevant tracks: mosh pit song, unintelligible, first two punk/emo/grunge/industrial/noise demos in general. also, my guitar style is heavily indebted to kurt cobain's noise-first approach to the instrument; even if that influence gets lost under more direct influences from sonic youth and billy corgan that had a bigger effect on me when i was older, it was nirvana that opened my brain to the possibilities of chaining effects pedals together and feeding them through an amp.)

obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" post.

again: i'm trying to avoid linking to the old stuff, but there's really a deficit of material that draws a direct influence from the stuff i really grew up with.

back in '94, when i was 13, this video was pretty much the coolest thing ever.

(relevant tracks: mosh pit song, first two punk/emo/grunge/industrial/noise demos in general)

obligatory "influential on song of the next few days" post.

again: i'm trying to avoid linking to the old stuff, but there's really a deficit of material that draws a direct influence from the stuff i really grew up with. so i'm going to have some fun with the silliness...

i played my stupid songs and wrote my stupid words in a basement rather than a garage. yet, that's easily glossed over. and this is really a universal teenage anthem, isn't it?

(relevant tracks: mosh pit song, unintelligible, first two punk/emo/grunge/industrial/noise demos in general)

i just came across an economics textbook written by ronald macdonald.

now, it's from the 70s. the poor bastard's parents had no idea what they were inflicting upon their helpless son. that's a "if you could go back in time, would you" worthy dilemma. legitimately.

yet, could you imagine now....? do you think there's even one kid with this name? well, one that doesn't have abusive parents....?

i got tricked by the abridged version having more hits and coming up first. i want this here, not there.

i forgot to list this as an influence on a track of the day from a few days ago. it's sort of glaring, as the track in question is actually very much a post-punk reworking of the end riff of this. it's a simple riff, but it was always a lot of fun to play.

echoes - and the idea of the side-long track, in general - was also a big influence on the longer pieces (i call them 'symphonies', with tongue somewhat in cheek), going forwards. the merging of blues riffs into larger, quasi-symphonic and sort of electro-experimental pieces is something more specific that i do fairly often, and that stems directly to floyd.

(relevant tracks: idiotic, all symphonies)

obligatory "influential on track of the day" post.

i'm trying to avoid linking to these ancient demos from the mid 90s, recorded when i was 15 or 16 (and demoing tracks i wrote when i was 13 or 14). i mean, the stuff that's up is up because i like it. but there are objective problems with some of it (the vocals on some of it give the term lofi a whole new level of depth).

i've always loved this record and have never really understood why it tends to be separated from the other pumpkins masterpieces. i'd even go so far as to say you can't really understand siamese/pisces (which corgan should really re-release as a double record) without getting into this first. it's a pre-req.

it was the psychedelic portions on the second half of the disc that i found really imaginative. you can hear a very direct influence on the guitar playing....

(relevant tracks: the boogeyman, screwed up, wish, nope, teenage jesus, stress, others)

deathtokoalas
sort of head-scratching. there will always be morons, but the russians can't honestly be so cynical that they think westerners will take their propaganda in uncritically or otherwise entirely ignore western media. conversely, he's actually been doing a good job of softening the western rhetoric. if i was the kremlin, i'd let him be. he's actually giving them quite a bit of credibility.

there's three caveats to this.

1) an escalation is being planned, and they want him out of the region before it happens.
2) there's some thought that they may be able to convince him to change sides, as well.
3) things aren't quite as they seem.

i couldn't imagine his life is in danger.

specifically, i think it's important for the russians to realize that nobody with critical thinking skills is going to be surprised by any kind of smoking gun regarding russian troops in the region. it is blatantly obvious that there are special forces operating in the region. no amount of propaganda is going to reverse this obvious truth. nor were these images necessary to demonstrate as much. you're not hiding anything. we already know.

nor would confirmation of such an obvious truth change anybody's opinion on the situation, if our opinion is meaningful in the first place. nobody in the west sees russia as an uncorrupted good guy. at best, russia is a lesser evil with a huge array of substantial corruption problems.

westerners that will intellectually argue in favour of russia's position will rarely be taking an actively pro-russian position, and more often taking an actively anti-american position. the propaganda has some value in seeding that resentment. yet, conflating that with legitimately pro-russian opinions is a gigantic error.

there's consequently really nothing to lose by letting the footage out, and much to lose by holding the journalist.

George
Are you calling Vice a pro-Russian propaganda? That's just..funny.

deathtokoalas
no, that's not what i'm suggesting.

i am, however, suggesting that perhaps what vice was looking for was not a proper reflection of what was occurring on the ground, and that the act of merely sending back images of what was actually happening was helping to counteract the narrative from washington. he may have been sent as a pro-american propagandist, but he wasn't able to find evidence to back up that perspective; instead, he often sent back evidence that countered it.

it may not have upheld the russian narrative, either. but that's a non-starter to begin with.

i mean, he was sent to send back images of russian troops invading the region and terrorizing the population. instead, we're getting pictures of ukrainian soldiers being disarmed by civilians. he can try and talk around that, but it's precisely the opposite of what he was sent there to send back.\

that being said, i must once again point out that it is blatantly obvious that russian forces are orchestrating the situation, and evidence demonstrating it (if it does exist, and he has captured some of it) would be akin to evidence demonstrating that water is wet. the idea that a substantial number of ukrainians would spontaneously organize to join russia out of fear of ukrainian nazis is itself rather comical.

i point this out in relation to american propaganda all the time: if you want people to believe it, make it credible. these cartoon narratives don't really sway people, they just foster cynicism.

rr0b0
wow finally there's someone with a weighted opinion here

holyteejful
I agree with your opinion that he is actually really unbiased and has just been digging for the truth. Sad that the Russians see him as interfering, clearly not provoking anything, just asking questions-- being a reporter and all; you're right when you say that he has actually been way more lenient towards Russia than, say, FOX news LOL...  I sincerely hope he is not in any danger, they are probably just trying to intimidate him and throw some false agendas at him to mislead him.

deathtokoalas
i'm not suggesting he showed up without a bias, but his perception does seem to have softened over time as the evidence unraveled in front of him. he may not have been able to confirm his bias. importantly, he doesn't seem to have allowed his bias to prevent him from sending back images that contradicted it. evidence-based reasoning is hard to find in the modern press.

...and that might have actually pissed his boss off.

holyteejful
After watching all the "dispatches" evidence does point to heavy "covert" Russian operations and that the surges of violence is propagated by extremists on both sides of the political spectrum ... That makes it so much easier for undercover "Spetznaz" (call them what you will)to do their job; I almost guarantee they pose as regular people, Ukrainian soldiers AND "regular" Russian troops as well. Nothing he has reported has really contradicted the rhetoric being spewed by Washington, although I am not much of an avid listener to the mainstream media myself.. He is probably one of the few reporters from the USA who speaks Slavic, so Vice sent him over there (or he volunteered). I personally think that he has been doing a good job. I have watched several other Vice reports and his boss, Shane Smith, seems like a fairly overall truly liberal guy with a sense of ethics that wouldn't allow strong bias on the part of being Pro-American everything. I mean, most mainstream media has almost nothing negative to say about Israel, but Vice has a report from the Palestinian perspective that is almost anti-Israel. I always love to hear both sides of every story to get the full context; I feel it is very important for making informed decisions in future conversations and possibly for elections.... also not sure if anyone knows, but Simon, the reporter,was released from detention in Slovyansk today after being held for a couple of days.

deathtokoalas
i guess you're not aware that the funding for vice's recent delve into news reporting has been coming from no less a source than rupert murdoch, himself.

===

nice to hear he's safe.

deathtokoalas
would you expect the army to take pleasure in massacring it's own civilians on the order of international bankers?

this is why they need foreign contractors. it's an age-old problem. the romans needed to do the same thing. put simply, it's not easy to convince people to murder members of their own community. soldiers tend not to like doing that...

i suppose if you were seeing images from hungary or tienanmen square, you'd be praising their discipline?

"the reason i signed up for the army was so i could massacre my fellow citizens because they rejected foreign-imposed austerity packages that will throw them into abject poverty."

J Gates
if I work in a bank, am I a banker?

deathtokoalas
what are you getting at?

J Gates
just trying to figure out what you define as a 'banker'

deathtokoalas
in context? imf. world bank. prominent shareholders. etc.

J Gates
i just work at a big bank

deathtokoalas
well, did you order the crackdown from your cubicle?

into your headset?

while your colleagues stared at you?

J Gates 
well no, but I do work in an international bank. Isn't that what 'international banker' implies?

deathtokoalas
well, it depends. i'm not talking about the janitor.

J Gates
I'm not the janitor

deathtokoalas
i legitimately don't think you are, but somehow my attempt to derisively make it clear that it is obvious that people that merely work for some international bank (perhaps as a teller) aren't responsible for violently pushing through imf reforms isn't getting through.

if you are actually a decision maker at the imf or world bank, and you are responsible for setting "market reform" policies, what are you trying to get across?

there may be some missing context necessary here.

- the imf is demanding austerity reforms.
- this is driving the instability, as it is elsewhere in europe.
- while that doesn't produce a banker sitting in brussels barking orders to the ukrainian military, the crackdown is a part of the process of pushing the reforms through.
- it follows that the military crackdown in the region is in order to ensure that austerity measures are put in place.

J Gates
wait, but ukraine isn't implementing any austerity, it borrows money from russia

deatrhtokoalas
for an international banker, you seem badly informed. ukraine is in the process of being put through the same shock treatment as greece, and the east is going to be badly affected by it because it has high unemployment and low wages.

that's not to suggest that the russians aren't organizing events on the ground, because they clearly are. but, these sorts of things can't be successful unless they're tapping into a level of existing resentment. one of the reasons russia seems more attractive than ukraine is that russia has a more generous social system - better welfare payments, better pensions, etc. if i was standing in donetsk, with absolutely no employment possibilities and a family to feed, i'd be far more attracted to the russian welfare state than the imf-driven ukrainian austerity packages, too.

which, incidentally, is why russia will not annex the region and will continue to push for an internal solution. that's not going to stop them from wasting resources and money on these covert operations, though.

they fell for it. they can't get out of it, now. this is going to be a headache for russia for the next decade.

J Gates
huh? greece went through the shock treatment from borrowing money from the EU. Ukraine is going through a political protest and divide. I think you're the badly informed one here buddy.

deathtokoalas
well, the precise problem in greece is that they can't deflate their currency because they gave away their monetary sovereignty. if they could just devalue, they'd mostly be out of the mess. but, instead, they've been forced to sell off their assets to foreign investors, cut pensions and whatnot.

i live in canada. we have a confederated system of provinces, where wealthy provinces send "equalization payments" to less wealthy ones. this could be roughly equivalent to the "bailout packages" if they were enforced on a regular basis, as they are here. it's a necessary consequence of a centralized currency across a country with vastly divergent economies. yet, that's not politically palatable in germany. and, in fact, it's very unpopular in some areas of canada (alberta, especially). we've developed a terminology of "have" and "have not" provinces. besides abandoning the euro, that's the only civilized way out of the mess in greece.

while ukraine is not dealing with the same problem of a lack of monetary sovereignty, the imf prescription is the same: privatize everything and sell most of it off to people outside of the country. but this itself is less of a kick in the gut than cuts to basic services, which are what is driving the protests in the east of the country.

don't let those fucking hippies trick you with their crypto-conservative nostalgia for the "good old days" and "simpler times" of the 60s. their concept of history is highly selective. please seek the opinion of outside observers.

our culture has not declined since 1970; it was shit to begin with.

what's amazing is how little has changed.

midinotes
Mellotron magical intro!  I believe its a combination of 3 violins and Brass (Mk2) from the tape based Mellotron. 

Señor Patroclo
That's great! I needed to know that. Now to get a Mellotron.

midinotes
I did a pretty close cover of this song. For the intro I used the Nord Electro 4D on two tracks, one with the Strings (3 violins) and another with the Brass mellotron patch. I ran them through the Electro's leslie and a bit of reverb/eq/compression. Sounded pretty awesome!  However nothing beats the original mellotron, though I don't think it would be quite as easy to maintain and change sounds as a modern keyboard!  Rick Wakeman uses the Memotron (a new digital version of the mellotron keyboard). I heard him playing it at the weekend for his Journey to the centre of the earth tour in Cardiff, really nice too!

Señor Patroclo
Unfortunately, all I have right now is a Roland Juno G-i. So yeah, I don't know how much I can do with it, but that Memotron sounds AMAZING.

deathtokoalas
mellotrons are kind of ..... hard to find. your best bet is a vst emulator....

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

this i something else i was listening to huge amounts of in 99/00 and had a huge influence on me, insofar as the idea of merging guitars with electronic music is concerned. it's a shame that the live dynamics are a bit weak...

(relevant track: book it!, entropy, ignorance is bliss, curious george, gravity's rainbow, a commercial break, all symphonies, all tetris material)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

this was in the changer most of the fall of '99 and had a big influence on what i was doing for the next little while. it's partly the synth tones, and partly the atmosphere...

outstanding record, btw. i can't count how many nights it was coming through the speakers around 3:00 am. perfectly atmospheric. i just wish i hadn't lost my certificate of provenance...

(relevant track: book it!, entropy, gravity's rainbow, ignorance is bliss, curious george, rabit is wolf, all symphonies after 1)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

i actually wrote the guitar riff to book it! by jamming over this while it was going on loop, creating a sort of tangerine dream effect. it's something i do quite often for fun over all kinds of electronic music. sometimes, it releases emotion...sometimes it creates songs....

(relevant track: book it!)

might i dare?

i don't claim much influence from the beatles, despite the absurd amount of time i've spent listening to them. it was just always so clearly before my time. i mean, i listen to the beatles the same way i listen to debussy. it's music from a past era....

here, though, the ending chord is sort of an obvious nod.

(relevant track: book it)

deathtokoalas
obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

this is a sort of a landmark of electronic music that all the kids should know about and that was a big influence on me around the turn of the century.

well, the story is that my dad bought a record player some time in mid 99. my step-mother thought it looked ghetto (she didn't want people to think we were that far behind the times) and wouldn't let him set it up in the living room. he wasn't happy about that for a long time, but the record player ended up in my bedroom (along with his drum kit, i might add). she was half-right: he never used the kit or the record player and was never going to, he was just being silly. but i did...

thankfully, he knew what he was doing regarding which records to pick up. oldfield. floyd. jarre. tangerine dream. heavy string and analog synth driven stuff where the harmonic distortion really justifies the older technology.

so, i went on a 70s synth kick that summer.

(relevant track: missed connection, book it!, all symphonies)

Since1987

wtf?!?!?!?!?!?

deathtokoalas

i'm not entirely sure exactly why you're so surprised.

daniel payne

Well it is one of those universal tracks i remember Dj-ing one night on the Decks playing oxygene IV  at 45 instead 33 But worked on the dance floor 

But strangely worked on the dancefloor Btw it was accident that it got played at the wrong speed 

nick ashmore

are you for real mate (Dj-ing) lol where and what have you really done that was yours. do you produced

deathtokoalas

indeed. we should all stop dancing to our favourite songs at bars because it threatens nick's perception of his penis size.

it's really the bar owner you need to blame, you know. could he not have found a nice bluegrass ensemble, so we could all marvel at their musicality while not getting smashed and singing along to bon jovi?

nick ashmore

that's fair i did not read what daniel said right in the first place. I thought he was saying the song was crap. and i bet a koala would kick you arse lol :)

geoff hill

Ohh so true

brianboru62

You should listen to Tangerine Dreams Halcyon more often in one ear and lip up fatty by Bad Manners in the other ear a trip in a trip

ubiquitous saturnine pics to lure one into a false sense of 'being there' stuck in the Jarre

lorne mcneil

well said/ it was a land mark in synthistsers /faze varience ,and imagination :)

Warris

im a bit jealous, i would love to have a record player so i could buy vinyl my favorite artists make :)

Luis Alberto Deveaux

Ferry good:-)

Scott Mantooth

one of the many amazing albums i have of this artist...was thought to be really weird in high school (decades ago) since i loved classical and music like this...of course Vangelis, Tomita, and Kitaro were also fairly included in that select group 

deathtokoalas

i find the more explicitly "new age" stuff tends to kind of drift off into a sort of aimless ambience, whereas the prog stuff (like elp) tends to get aimless in the opposite direction. what i like about the stuff i cited (tangerine dream is an exception, as their discography is spotty) is that it hit a good middle ground in integrating the synth aesthetics into more developed writing styles. you get those awesome synth sounds and developed musical structure, rather than one or the other. put another way, i think i can't really get into stuff like vangelis for the same reason that i can't really get into rossini.

i know a lot of it was not well received at the time by "serious music critics" who largely interpreted it as pop music masquerading as classical music, but i think they really missed the point. what is currently called the classical (or neo-classical) music of this period is really pretty boring because it tries to stop the development of music about the year 1850. i mean, maybe the stuff is a little harder to play. but it exists in a vacuum. it's not trying to create a 20th century artform, so much as it's rejecting the industrial revolution.

i think that future generations will reject the critics of the period, and conclude that the actual "classical music" of the mid-to-late 20th century was being created by a motley collection of jazz fusion, minimalist, post-punk, experimental, industrial, electronic and progressive rock musicians. this is the serious music of the era. the neo-classical stuff is not.

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

well, it's a remix of it. there's a long story at the bandcamp page. short story: i know the track has a highly personal aspect to it and i'm sort of missing the point, but, after five years (which saw me go from pre-teen to young adult), i was expecting something a bit more substantial than a few power chords and some reverb floating around in the back, idiosyncratic verses or not. i'm not falling into the "writing for me" fallacy - i know it's absurd - but all the delays and marketing and projections of genius made it...

...anti-climactic. to put it lightly.

but i was encouraged by people at alt.music.nin to remix it, and consequently took the position that the best thing to do would be to approach it's flaws, as i saw them. i didn't really want to reinterpret it outside of the context of the full record (which actually hadn't been released yet); rather, i wanted to exaggerate it to what i felt it could have been. so, it's the same basic concept, it's just taken to a greater extreme....

(relevant track: the day inri messed the world up)

no, you don't understand. this is what the cool people like. it says so in the title. it's a cool song. really. if you don't like it, you're therefore uncool. qed.

also, the barrett-goes-mopey thing was done to death in the late 70s. probably the best known act to develop out of the aesthetic is the cure, which is a more obvious influence - except robert smith would be loathe to release something this bland and boring.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsHvEOH60HU

well, i was going to say that this is evidence that the russians don't control the crowds.

that they're driving shit behind the scenes is totally fucking obvious.

....just like it was totally fucking obvious that western forces were running things in kiev.

i still can't fathom an actual invasion. and i still think they're wasting precious time. who controls a few factories in the east of ukraine isn't going to matter once those missiles are hovering over moscow.

conversely, if the americans are being smart about this, what they're doing right now is negotiating base rights in the baltics. and, indeed, where's mccain been over the last few days?

it's exciting footage and everything, and it's provocative to consider, but it's symptomatic of the horrifically shitty military tactics that have plagued the russians since....

....since stalin killed everybody that could have posed any threat to him, and centuries worth of russian military genius along with them.

they had me for a minute, they really did. i was thinking russian resurgence. but, this fool's errand is perhaps moscow's last hurrah, on the pivot of a historic shift in dominance in the slavic speaking world to nato-backed warsaw.

put bluntly: this is exactly what the americans wanted.

"imperial treachery!"

but it only works over and over, for thousands of years now, because the barbarians are idiots.

this could be byzantium tricking the bulgars into getting attacked from behind for the twenty-third (who is really counting?) time. are they *ever* going to figure it out? or is this worked into the unfolding of history?

second time as farce, ok. but this is more like being stuck on the wheel. egads....

i'm not going to even try to enumerate all the things wrong with this. it's not worth it.

i just wanted to point out that this is yet more clinton redux. hillary was wearing the pants, secretly in charge and ultimately a lesbian. except that wasn't silly youtube blather, it was on cnn. i don't know why they're using the same script. it wasn't very successful on clinton...

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

there's some really interesting sampling on this disc.

(relevant track: liquify, symphony 5)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

bass/drums in the instrumental section.

(relevant track: liquify)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

out of the hundreds or thousands or even tens of thousands of records i've consumed in my life, very few are in the same category as this one. it's a song structuring influence on this particular track, especially in the instrumental second half of the track.

(relevant track: liquify, the day inri messed the world up, all symphonies, more)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

the melody is borrowed. it's tongue-in-cheek. i do this often.

(relevant track: liquify)

deathtokoalas
obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

you can hear it in the short section that features piano mashing and feeding back guitars.

(relevant track: liquify, first movement, others)

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
the song structuring is early queen, the atmosphere is david bowie (c. aladin sane) and the pick harmonics are all eddie van halen. also, the solo is vintage king crimson. you can maybe pull something post-punk out of the vocals....

like, honestly: if you like that layered guitar sound on mellon collie (which is what makes this track), go pick up the first three queen discs.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
the pumpkins were a punk band at their core, but this particular track is a fine piece of mid 70s glam metal, mixed with a bit of progressive rock.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
if forced to pick between grunge and punk, it's more like grunge than it is like punk, but there's a number of stylistic qualities associated with grunge that it doesn't have. the guitar tone is very bright, caused by rolling up the treble - grunge is generally associated with an exaggerated low end. nor do the vocals work well in a grunge context.

“alternative rock" has never been a real genre, and to the extent that it was it applied more to stuff like rem (which corgan certainly dabbled heavily in). the pumpkins fit well into "alternative culture" for a while, but they were generally not considered to fit into that aesthetic in the 90s. they were usually cut out into psychedelic pop or progressive rock, and viewed as more of a 60s/70s retro act.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
it's really not, though. you'd really never hear any grunge bands or personalities talk like that. politically, it was mostly a left-liberal movement with an undercurrent of christian morality (in the love your brother sense, not the kill the gays sense). corgan's always been somewhat of a hippie.

there was a strain of that kind of misanthropist thinking in some of the alternative culture of the early 90s, but it came more out of goth and industrial subculture. it's something you'd hear from trent reznor or nivek ogre, not kurt cobain or mark arm.

it's maybe a bit emo, though, which is another thing the pumpkins dabbled in.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
the pumpkins fit into a lot of overlapping genres, but there was never anything "independent" about them. this is big budget stadium rock in any era.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
people are assholes. it'd be nice if we could just set them all on fire, but there's laws and stuff.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
it's not because you hurt my feelings, it's because your views deserve to be incinerated along with everybody who shares them.

beyond there being laws against setting assholes on fire, the historical record is also clear: oppressing assholes just makes them come back stronger. look at russia. they tried to ban the christians, and a hundred years later the country is teetering on the edge of a fundamentalist state.

so, we have to argue with assholes, somehow. educate them? maybe their kids, but not too harshly, or they'll kneejerk.

really, i think it's better to just resign ourselves to the reality that assholes will always exist and there's nothing to be done about it.

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
there's a little button on the thread that says "disable replies".

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

there's a more in depth explanation at my bandcamp site. but, over that summer, i was sorting through some old guitar magazines and came across a version of most of this worked out in tab. i had very fast fingers back then; i picked it up pretty quickly. so, it worked it's way into the track for that reason...

(relevant track: liquify, first movement, others)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

raided for samples...

(relevant track: liquify)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

(relevant tracks: liquify (first section), all symphonies.)

in the early records, rob sounds a lot like jim thirlwell.

in the later records, he sounds exactly like al jourgenson.

i have a lot of opposition to your concept of personal freedom. capitalism is a shitty way for people the world over to live because it abolishes personal freedom - both at the worker/slave level and at the consumer/bot level. a replacement order should be one where personal freedom is truly maximized. in fact, that was the whole point of the socialist program - we needed socialism precisely because industrial capitalism made liberalism impossible. but, i get your point. it just applies more to the co-modified capitalist ideal of "personal freedom" than it does to actual freedom.

besides that, i like your analogy. unfortunately, there isn't much to add to the debate. the thinking is long done. it's a question of action.

basically, oscar wilde said everything worth saying here:
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/wilde-oscar/soul-man/

1) civilization requires slaves. even engels admitted that this whole dictatorship of the proletariat thing was the best compromise available relative to nineteenth century technology. we need slaves, but if we make the slaves and the bosses the same thing then the slaves will hopefully be mistreated the least. that's communism, and it's not surprising that it hasn't worked (for all marx' talk of contradictions in capitalism, his solution was merely another one).

2) it's not the nineteenth century anymore. we can actually start building a lot of this stuff. we don't even have to talk about automating luxuries at this point. how about automating food? might it be the best way to solve the food crises we're facing, anyways?

3) we've consequently functionally eliminated the barrier to liberalism that marx and engels pointed out. if we can replace socialized production with automation, we can get on with building a free society.

but there's two reasons why this is going to require something as drastic as nuclear war or secretly starting a colony on another planet or something:

1) scarcity in food production is a weapon in the hands of the ruling class. they demand that breeding be roughly linearly proportional to productivity and the food be rewarded as compensation for forced labour. so, we get scarcity continually enforced as austerity, instead. they start off with this axiom with all the force they have, and they know they cannot maintain the existing system should the lie be exposed as what it is.

2) hierarchical socialism, which would cease to exist.

solution? eventually, the technology to abolish the contradiction between liberalism and industrialization will be cheap and easy enough to produce that it cannot be suppressed. it's all in the mode of production. it's all driven by technology. that's something marx was right about.

until then, the anti-capitalist (anarchism is the only real anti-capitalism) needs to adopt a strategy of avoidance. this is a highly personal thing. what does the individual despise about capitalism? how would the individual live on the other side of it? is there a way to scheme a path to an approximation of this existence? can small, shifting spaces be claimed temporarily so that it's migratory inhabitants can move from bubble to bubble? there's no way to overturn this, to reform it or to revolt against it. it's not a social choice, but a function of the technology. resistance is truly futile, until the technology is innovated upon. so, innovation is possible, but avoidance is the only real means of breaking free.

mass avoidance could raise awareness and temporarily bring the system down, but it can't change it. so long as the technology remains the same, what we call capitalism will recreate itself - because it is a function of the technology. avoidance as a revolutionary strategy could only bring us back to the dark ages, or further back. there's a primitivist strain of anarchism that understands and promotes this.

but if you're opposed to that, you're stuck waiting for the technology that can truly democratize production.

deathtokoalas
the language is edgy, but that only means "racist" to people that lack any sort of critical thinking (i.e. the pc crowd). it's actually starkly anti-racist; it's a sort of an allegory of sin through a sheltered white perspective. the burning is an allegory of hell, and he's burning with them for sinning with them - sleeping with them, which is the ultimate sin in a white patriarchal system that forbids any kind of genetic mixing.  he's not separating himself or the listener out, he's putting everybody on an even level with what he's describing. in the end, we're all on fire.

some kind of white guilt? maybe, but i think it's more of a literary device. he's stated repeatedly that he's just fucking with people. but you can pick up a lot of pynchon in thirlwell's work. i don't think an australian working in london and new york really has anything resembling a first hand understanding of these things, but if you read pynchon you'll get the perspective spot on.

that's how i've always interpreted this, anyways. really, this could very easily be one of pynchon's scattered tunes...

GaussRifleGrunt
Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?

deathtokoalas
i'm split between trying to interpret that and calling you on trying to confuse me.

NeuroProctologist
Well said. Though I wouldn't say it's only racist to people who lack critical thinking. It is racist. Period. He's using this wording, wielding the power of it, and some still are/would bb very rightly justified in criticizing him or anyone who would fit his profile, of wielding that power for any reason. Some would say he's not justified in making use of that imagery/wording, and I say they're just as if not more correct as he is in attempting to effigize his targets here.

But still, I enjoy the song, and intent behind it, while also recognizing he's kind of stepping over an edge.

deathtokoalas
no. words are meaningless without context.

NeuroProctologist
Just because you don't possess that context doesn't mean others don't. We do not speak/act in a vacuum. If you think there's nothing to criticize about him, I think you're getting starstruck a bit too much. I've always seen it as being his intent to walk that line and be target for as much for critique as he is for praise. His persona at the time was meant to provoke, good intent or no.

deathtokoalas
he's certainly trying to provoke, but his aim was always quite clearly to ridicule various *isms. he focuses pretty strongly on racism, but he ripped down misogyny and homophobia just as strongly. it was a common tactic in punk rock ("kill the poor" isn't a request, it's an explanation) and probably hit it's apex in industrial music with all the authoritarian imaging and in your face performance art. it's true that a lot of people aren't going to get it, but that doesn't give the messaging a meaning it doesn't have, it just means people aren't understanding it.

i mentioned pynchon, and i really think it's a huge influence. when pynchon starts exploring american racism (or south african racism after this was released), he gets very in depth. he uses a lot of language and imagery designed to explain various types of thinking that have defined how society has operated in the past (and that still linger, socially). but it's not racist to do that. if you want to really rip something apart, you have to understand it. not using certain words or just ignoring the whole thing  isn't going to eliminate institutional racism or the kind of racism that defines social ostracism. if you really want to get to the core of it, you have to talk openly about it by exploring and exposing it.

so, are some people going to get offended by this? probably, yeah. but anybody that takes a song that's meant to ridicule racism and calls it racist is just not understanding the song. it's not the artist that deserves to be criticized, it's the people that don't understand the art.

really, the best way to ensure that nothing changes is to never talk about it. and, whether the pc crowd realizes it or not, i really don't think it's an accident that political correctness is so heavily enforced by interests that don't want anything to change at all.

actually, i want to rephrase this a little: it's meant to be provoking and offensive, so being offended means you do understand it. it's the reaction of condemning him for it that is misunderstanding it. he's throwing it in your face, telling you it exists, because he wants you to do something about it. that's what separates it from being racist, and it's also what allows it to function as art.

...and it's the precise thing that defines the art movement that he was a part of.

i also just want to get in before somebody starts talking about agitprop, because i really made an attempt not to. sure: it's propaganda meant to agitate. but, it's subverting the idea of agitprop, by just throwing it in your face. somewhere, it derives from it, but industrial music really took the idea somewhere else entirely...

NeuroProctologist
I agree with much of what you say, except for where you begin to draw this line in the sand where people who become offended "don't get it". Being non-minorities, this is a common refrain. But in listening to people who are part of the marginalized groups being addressed with this type of language, a common notion is that it is not our place to take up and brandish these words/ideas. This isn't "not talking about it", It's simply avoiding the idea that "I, an outsider know what's best for you".

If I decide to make a statement using swaztikas, and a holocaust survivor takes offense a my delivery, or decides that my message is drowned in the delivery, I don't see how you, me, or thirlwell, can tell them they are wrong.  This seems a pretty plain and intuitive notion to me, and dressing any defense against it in "But well...art" is mostly just self-serving and tone deaf in my opinion.

Goes hand in hand with the belief I've been sticking to for a while that offensive art does not need to be defended, and shouldn't be. The moment we successfully do so is the moment it begins to lose it's impact/significance.

I can see arguing that there are two equally valid and mutually exclusive sides to this issue, but saying that it's definitively one way or another basically equates with saying "My lived experience is valid, yours is not".

deathtokoalas
but, there's an objective intent and it overpowers the subjective reaction. interpreting something is not the same thing as analyzing it. ultimately, the question of whether it's racist or not is a true/false binary that has nothing to do with how it's interpreted or what the sum of the person who's interpreting it's life experiences are. you can't force your experiences on to reality - and, really, trying to do so is completely tyrannical. i'm really not in line with this critical race theory stuff, i find it fundamentally anti-scientific and in direct contradiction with any kind of post-enlightenment thinking. that doesn't necessarily mean rejecting experiences, it just means enforcing them as subjective and, quite possibly, completely wrong.

in this case, because he's trying to piss people off, you can't really disagree with people that get offended. but, in a more subtle situation, if you had somebody who wasn't trying to be offensive and accidentally offended somebody? i'm going to tell the person that's offended that they've misunderstood, not that the sum of their life experiences is a more important metric and the person should consequently be silenced. that's bullshit...

fwiw, i think thirlwell would agree with you that there's a line, and he recognizes it. i've read interviews where he claims he wouldn't walk through a jewish neighbourhood with a swastika, because there's no "irony" in it. but i think he's not expressing himself as well as he'd like to. what he's trying to do is separate between a hateful act or message (which he'd reject) and a type of violent art that's meant to agitate people into a reaction (which defines the bulk of his work). you're drawing the line in terms of an audience reaction rather than the artist's intent, which is missing the point of what art is.

there's a lot of contradictions in the crt approach, and i don't want to sit here and list them. i've read more than enough essays by people of colour to come to the understanding that those contradictions are understood by some people of all colours, genders and orientations and that it's enforcement by academics in the last quarter of the twentieth century and the beginning of this one is going to be a temporary phenomenon. it's just intellectually unworkable.

but, it's contradictory to say "it's not our place, as members of the majority, to take the lead in the struggle" and then say "it's not my place to educate you on your oppression" and then say "it's not the majority's place to construct tactics to deal with racism within the majority itself". there may be valid reasons underlying each of these positions, but when extrapolated to full generality they are just not consistent with each other, and they consequently need to be more carefully defined. nor is there any logical reason why the people defining them ought to be of any specific racial or gender type.

i don't, personally, see anything wrong with what thirlwell has done over his career in trying to get certain ideas across to what is overwhelmingly a white, male audience and i don't see anything contentious with explaining the tactics to people that might otherwise be confrontational about it - because i think that, once it's understood, the core of that anger will mostly alleviate.

i mean "you don't understand" isn't meant to be a statement of superiority. it's meant to be a prelude to an explanation that will help people understand. and, once it's understood, there's not a reason to be angry, there's a reason to stand in solidarity.

NeuroProctologist
I would disagree that I am drawing that line. I think both the artist and the listeners perspective are valid, and that neither overrides the other. My very point is that each of us get to draw our own lines. It's sort of a paradox, as many areas of life are. Extrapolating to a generality doesn't work in this case, sure, but that is usually the case with most things.

Pretty sure I read that same interview! and again I do agree with much of what you say. I don't see anything wrong with his work according to my own values, I'm just not about to try to argue against someone who's personal experience dictates he did step over a line. Slurs don't hit me the same way. I'm not a target.

To put it flatly, the nuance here is highly likely to be lost on a black person. Why? Because they don't get? Or because the effigy he's trying to create is already too real to them, and there's nothing empowering to be found in someone shoving it in their face more? I don't think they would care if it's ironic. Nor should they really. This particular exploration of the subject is not likely to be funny or empowering in any way for them. I see that as valid. It works for you or me, because we get to laugh at and distance ourselves from this cartoonish representation of our own culture/demographic. That is empowering.

Make it more real: if you play this around a black friend, and they take offense, you gonna argue with them? Or just say "Sure whatever, we can listen to something else". It's not a matter of being silenced, it's just being friendly and recognizing that intent isn't magic.

BTW, cool conversation. Not often you get this quality of discourse on youtube of all places ;)

deathtokoalas
see, the thing is that i think it's a little dismissive to deduce a black person would get more upset about it because they're black. and that's kind of exactly the criticism of crt that you hear coming from minorities - all this "woah. wait a minute. just 'cause i'm black doesn't mean i can't like pink floyd or beethoven, or dislike hip hop or miles davis.". it loses the whole basis of an individual with individual perspectives, in favour of a group identity. this is another contradiction that is right as it's core, because it's supposed to be about experience. but it would reject the kind of individual experience that doesn't uphold it's values.

i've met some black people that i feel i could have a conversation with this about and that i think are entirely willing and able to get their head around it. and, the "irony" may even be more real to them. but, i mean, the art scenes foetus was involved with in london and new york were both overwhelmingly white scenes....that was the audience, and this was meant for it....

this kind of thing is actually pretty common in hip-hop, too. it might come from a different perspective and mostly be directed at a different audience, but it's really the same thing when you break it down.

you're opening a can of worms about art that i'm maybe at fault for leading the conversation to, but have ranted about all over youtube and don't really want to revisit. but an artist can't be producing art to satisfy an audience's concern, otherwise they're merely catering to a market and producing a commodity. art must challenge it's audience.

NeuroProctologist
All I can really say, is you seem to have a sense for nuance, but you also seem to be really insistent to drive each point of nuance into some expanded generality. Of course anyone can defy any stereotype that is placed on them, and most people often do in one or more ways. The majority of the time I'd say.

This started with "the language is edgy, but that only means "racist" to people that lack any sort of critical thinking",  and to loop back to that, the only real point I think I contend is that people can not "get it" while still being fully aware of the artist's intent. Non racist people can still do racist things. Under a persona, for art, or not.  And racism, in general, is not some clearly defined thing with neatly identifiable borders.

Saying "I'm not okay with him ironically dropping n-bombs" is not censoring, or being anti-art, or small-minded, or generally anything.  Whether the producer or the consumer is right or wrong is sort of irrelevant, and it need not be expanded into how art should be produced, or for what reasons...trying to even go there would be absurd I think.

But then again, I'm not really of the opinion that everything must reduce into a collected set of neatly reconcilable facts. These two things can be at odds with each other. One doesn't need to be more correct the way I see it. Perhaps I won't convince you of this, but I at least appreciate the good faith discourse.

And if you ask me, art must'nt do anything, aside from be observed. But I'm sure that could get broken down easily enough if dissected ;)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

the assignment topic reminded me of this song, and i conceptually had it in mind for the 'global warming' section - although it sounds nothing like it.

(relevant tracks: symphony 0, swim, teenage jesus, liquify, first movement, others)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

an aesthetic influence, mostly...i could pull a lot of things out, but i specifically remember listening to large amounts of this record...

(relevant tracks: symphony 0, happiness is a harsh gun, weed in the yard, medicated to the one i love, others )

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

an aesthetic influence, mostly...i could pull a lot of things out for that, but i specifically remember listening to large amounts of this record...

(relevant tracks: bach goes loopy, symphony 0, pop music, missed connection, jesus gets fucked on robitussin, tribute, others)

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post...

i could pick a few different things, but i think this goofy parody of the drums of war is the closest to what i was thinking.

(relevant tracks: symphony 0, war)

so, it looks like colbert's personality just died in his promotion to late show.

...and chances for a republican president in the next cycle just doubled.

i suppose a new white lung record was released recently? i really liked the last one; i'll have to check that out.

this is where my obligatory "influenced by song of the day" post belongs.

it's maybe not entirely obvious, but i was listening to a lot of this record at the time. it's in the structure and atmosphere, if not the genre or writing.

(relevant track: inverted, symphony 3)

this is where my obligatory "influenced by song of the day" post belongs.

the track was a remix, but you can't really tell that now. it was sort of a sarcastic joke aimed at the remixee.

(relevant track: inverted)

today's obligatory "influence on track of the day" post...

the track was always sort of a joke, but i was definitely trying to emulate coil.

(relevant: medicated to the one i love, jesus gets fucked on robitussin, symphony 1, spontaneous combustion, others)

humans are idiots.

it's not afraid of the leaf. the wind (combined with his snorting) has confused it into thinking it's a moving animal. to a dog, a moving animal is food. because dogs kill living creatures by crushing them in their jaws, then eat them.

yet, the leaf isn't reacting. no chase is about to happen. so, the dog is really confused that the leaf isn't expressing any kind of fear, and doesn't really know how to go about killing it.

but, idiot humans would rather anthropomorphize scooby-doo in than deal with the homicidal nature of their pets.

the dog would have reacted very similarly to a dead mouse.

how about hipster boy-band pop-star metal?

isn't it what happens when justin timberlake starts a metal band?

similar act:

deathtokoalas
well, now we know what stp would have sounded like if they were more of a punk band, like the one that did this cover. that thrashy slayer update to the tune is way more punk than the initial wussy meat puppets vibe. punk is about playing loud and hard, and also about playing fast solos.

i also want to bring specific attention to the vocals. this vocalist is probably a cyborg, because the notes are hit absolutely precisely. this is very punk, unlike weiland's uncontrolled howling. i bet weiland never even took a single singing class - very unpunk.

deathtokoalas
some people might suggest that this is an overproduced pop cover of a punk classic, but they're probably all gay.

....and retarded.

Grace Petry
You sound so intelligent making assumptions about the mental capacity and sexual preference of an individual solely based upon his or her opinion towards a song that came out 20 years ago. Well done. I applaud your flawless deductive reasoning.

deathtokoalas
grace is clearly gay and retarded.

Grace Petry
Oh wow! I never even knew, thanks for appropriating my identity for me. I'll rest assured knowing that I am infinitely inferior to a great mind such as yourself. Would you like to go out sometime?

deathtokoalas
you missed a few corporate logos in your video, fearless records. where's brawndo? it's got electrolytes!

this song used to be really fun, in a self-depraved way. way to ruin it, shitty corporate hair metal band i've never heard of

Connor Brady
im not sure if you're just ignorant or dumb, its not "corporate bullshit advertising" it's telling people who dont download where to get the album you angsty fuck. like it much be hard to be as br00tal and edgy as you.

deathtokoalas
you're right. supporting independent labels isn't very punk rock, that's wussy gay shit for retards. real punks shop at walmart.

ah, that's better. needed to cleanse my ears...

deathtokoalas
well, this is awful, but who expected otherwise? i'm more interested in what the comp's title suggests, which is:

1) asking alexandria are a punk band,
2) who are going back to before there was punk,
3) in the 90s,
4) to punk it up.

that's right, everybody.

as the 90s were before solid punk bands like asking alexandria, we need all these real solid punk bands (like asking alexandria) to go back and punk it up for us.

year zero, indeed.

conversely, when do we get to hear some classic rock bands like black flag cover some real punk from the 00s and 10s?

i'd love to hear rollins lace into some of this shit. and jello'd just be fucking priceless if let loose on it...

omg there's a punk goes 80s with a rod stewart cover on it. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Die Younger
they're not punk, not the sound or the motifs to be a punk band 

deathtokoalas
pfftt. gay and retarded. they're clearly punk. they're:

1) white
2) male
3) suburban and/or upper middle class

plus, they obviously have punk stylists. punk is really all about the hair...

(deleted post)

deathtokoalas
yeah. i really hold almost all of his conceptual/instrumental work in an extremely high regard (although the ghosts concept was maybe beaten a bit hard, and it's time to move on) and am continually frustrated by his perpetual interest in being a pop star. you'd think he already has everything he could ever want, so now's the time to write the most fucking epic thing ever created. and there's bits and pieces of it. like, the tetsuo theme. i want an hour of music that draws itself out of the tetsuo theme, not generic-nin-dance-song-#37.

shrug.

or, whatever happened to the original version of the fragile? i think we got parts of it on still (which is fucking surreal and haunting and beautiful). but, it's known there's more to it...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS1KjVL6d7M

obligatory "influential on song of the day" post.

this record (and it's other version, which is a bit more experimental) had a ridiculous amount of talented people involved in creating it and the result is very much the sum of it's parts. i can't say i ever came close to emulating this monstrous masterpiece, but the aesthetic on the song of the day is ultimately derived from this source (as well as halo 9).

(relevant tracks: medicated to the one i love, jesus gets fucked on robitussin, symphony 1, curious george, others)

and, this is where i put my obligatory influenced by post for the day, due to the track being a remix of this one. it was done for a fan comp on the glu list way back in the day and meant to take the track in a more experimental direction.

i got a very terse email from david reilly a few weeks or months later:

"i am aware of what you did to my song."

i'm not sure if we all got that kind of personal response or not. to a point, i can understand his revulsion. despite the nature of the backwards section, evocative or not, this is a pretty personal track, and i went to town with it in ways that i can understand a negative reaction to.

that's partly why i speak of the track, today, as influenced by this one, rather than a remix of it. and, that's actually closer to the truth. it's really barely recognizable.

but, fans of 90s nin remixes and/or the weirder reaches of experimental trip-hop might get something out of it.

as for the track itself, i found something strangely subversive about it. there's about twenty minutes of a minimal bass beats that follows the version on record, climaxing in a wash of noise. i don't really understand addiction, but the picture he paints (especially in the context of the full track, and the state of mind that the ambient bass section represents) is pretty distressing and hard not to react to.

(relevant track: medicated to the one i love)

Lon Milo DuQuette
RIP Donald Michael Kraig

Alan Barber
Yes, very much so.  I wonder, did he ever listen to Mozart?  To paraphrase Karl Barth, "When the angels make music to praise God, they play Bach.  When they make music for their own joy, they play Mozart."

deathtokoalas
heaven's been in need of regime change for an eternity...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPlhKP0nZII