we're reimaging. that's fine. it will be quick, there's nothing to play with this time, i didn't really alter anything.

i remember when i skipped grimes at the babylon in ottawa, although i almost went to see the opening act (born gold), and would have if i wasn't broke, although i was considering leaving early...

"it just sounds like madonna. this isn't going anywhere. it's just all hype."

and, i don't step away from that analysis. grimes is overrated.

but, it is a show i regret missing,

on second thought....no. 

this is what i had:

type='audio/flac; codec="flac"'

i thought i had dropped the ' after the flac, and changing it to:

type='audio/flac'; codec="flac"'

did actually get it to work in the chrome browser, but now i'm concerned that it's going to be broken in firefox, because it should actually be wrong, and i don't have a soundcard...

these finicky browsers, huh? fuck...

i'm convinced that my hard drive is fine, so i'm going to turn the hd audio chip on in the bios and take my chances. i may have to reimage. whatever. i need sound. when i come up in the laptop next week, i'll need to add hardware components back in one at a time - including my new wired usb keyboard.

but, it's hard to understand how it could be a driver issue if it boots fine and is fine for a day or two. that doesn't add up.

i'm also going to copy over all five options for inri003 and test them thoroughly in the chrome os to see if i can figure out a pattern.

i think i want:

type="audio/flac"

...i.e. i should drop the codec specification. that seems to be what's confusing things. but i need to make sure it actually works.

so, let's try to get the audio up on the desktop, here we go....

to be clear, it's just the html5 frontends that need the update. the pdfs & docs are fine, so the stuff at noise trade can stay, and the music journals are ok, too.

it's just the zip files in each of the liner note packages...

and, then i'll have to redownload everything again and replace it on the external.

this is a pain in the ass. absolutely. but, it's just time consuming, it's not hard.

*sigh*.

i had only previously tested in firefox, and everything worked perfectly. so, i was a little surprised to realize that flac wasn't playing back on the chromebook.

it turns out i dropped a ' in the controls, and i did it consistently - hundreds of times.

so, i have to go back and fix everything. 

that should take the rest of the night.

to be clear: it's very minor. but i have to do it.

it will give me some time to listen, and there's maybe more going on this month than i thought, after all.

i can tell you that i can relate to the feeling of being surrounded by zombies, alright. this would appear to be a bit of a tongue-in-cheek-commentary, and so maybe they had no choice but to tone it down a little, but it sort of defeats the point.

so, i wish this was a bit more complicated....but, then, all of the zombies would probably get confused, right?

https://toomanyzooz.bandcamp.com/

this is a little more lively, and a little more up my alley, but it's still only leaning towards something more exciting, and has a lot of slow moving sections. 

i wish there was something else happening this night, and i could drop in.

https://peeldreammagazine.bandcamp.com/

i've bumped into him before, and i do find the record pleasant in a kind of belle & sebastien meets the sea and cake sort of way, but i wish it was just a bit less "chill" and a bit more engaging, for the purposes of enjoying it in a live setting.

https://jfernandez.bandcamp.com/

i mean, my rejection of sanders is not about some broad moral principle. it's neither deontological, nor is it consequentialist, although i would usually lean more towards consequentialism, and i agree that colin powell is infinitely worse than joe rogan.

rather, he's made it clear to me that it would not be in my self-interest, as a trans person, to support him - because he'd throw me under the bus as soon as it's expedient to do so.

and, yes - this is frustrating, because he's the only mainstream candidate with anything approaching a political program that i'd even consider supporting. warren has made attempts to court voters like me, but i don't support her politics, and i'm not going to pick appeals to identity over economic self-interest.

i need to retreat back to the far left, which is where i came from.

joe rogan is not on the ballot.

but, he does have the inalienable right to cast one, and what the rest of the world thinks about that doesn't actually matter.

i think there's a difference between talking to joe rogan - which didn't bother me much - and accepting his endorsement, which leans more towards shrugging off his politics. but, bernie sanders has already established a pattern with this, and this doesn't surprise me.

however.

i sometimes feel like we get this backwards.

i reject claims that being critical of islam is "bigoted" or "racist", especially due to the fact that so much of the criticism is due to islam's own inherent racism and bigotry - and homophobia and misogyny. it's a false equivalency. while it's important to recognize that humans are individuals, and wrong to prejudge them based on their background, it nonetheless remains the case that standing up against prejudice means standing against islam, rather than with it. you can't pretend to stand for equality if you're standing there endorsing islam - it's preposterous, and that kind of hypocrisy needs to be called out loudly. i'm wiling to do that openly, and i'm willing to take flack for it.

so, i reject the idea that i'm in any way promoting oppression - i insist that i'm consistently fighting against it, and my critics are deeply confused as to what the right side of this debate is, or actively supporting oppression, themselves.

but, i recognize that a lot of people might not want my endorsement, either because they legitimately disagree with me (in which case they're wrong, and need to be convinced of it) or because they just don't want to engage in as subtle a debate as this is. they don't want the controversy...

but, i'd basically tell them to fuck off if they told me that, because politicians don't pick voters, voters pick politicians.

i've decided i'm not endorsing sanders, i'm going to support the greens. the greens might not exactly like my endorsement - i would hope they'd see where i'm coming from, and there are issues that for me are not ballot issues where we'd disagree (such as iran. i'm not voting on iran.), but they might make the choice to say "we don't want this", and that's fine. but, that doesn't change where my self-interest is...

if my ballot issue is about health care, and the party that best represents my interests in health care (speciously) thinks i'm a racist, that doesn't change where my interests on health care are. i'm still going to vote and support the group that is best for me, whether they like it or not.

i think a lot of the disconnect with this comes up with the concept of identity voting. if voting is about joining a club, i'm willing to acknowledge that i'm certainly not in the democratic club, and that i'd no doubt have a lot of disagreements with anybody in the green socialist club. i'd want to join the insurrectionary anarchist club, but that would be a very small club. i completely reject this, though. voting is not about joining a club, it's about advancing one's self interests. i consequently don't really care about these identity issues. but, i abstractly grasp where people are coming from with this, too.

so, should sanders reject rogan's endorsement? i think that if you were expecting him to, you haven't really been paying attention - that wasn't an expectation that is supported by the evidence built up over the last few years. i think he might not realize that it's in his self-interest to say something about it, and that, if he doesn't, it might hurt him with key demographics that he's likely to do poorly with, anyways. he seems to have a flawed concept of the demographics that he needs to win; this is a broad strategic problem, and we'll see how it plays out over the next few weeks. i think he's going to regret the decisions he's made, and his uncritical acceptance of rogan's endorsement is just one example of this.

but, it's ultimately not his place to pick his voters, it's ultimately the place of voters to pick the candidates that best represent their interests.

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/1/27/21081876/joe-rogan-bernie-sanders-henry-kissinger

ok.

so, i think my initial perception that this is just shallow capitalism was actually spot on. you can say i didn't get the joke, i guess, but it's less that i didn't get it and more that i just saw right through it - it's more like when a comedian walks into a club and says something she thinks is absolutely hilarious, and then just gets dead air instead. it's more stupid than it is funny, really.

so, if i thought there was nothing to this besides an attempt to maximize profit, i guess i was right. and, this video here would appear to be the decryption matrix.

i dunno. i still might want to get out of the house. put some makeup on. have a few beers. let's see what else i can line up for the month....

chic chick is kind of nicely cheeky, but there's not really anything worth taking note of here, either. it's just generic, period pop.

so, this new record is really out of nowhere.

hrmmn.

yeah, it's not hard to understand why this didn't blip across my radar, at all. it's just regurgitated madonna. again.

i hadn't seen the name "poppy" in years.

it looks like a slow month, though.

and, if i scratch out most of the rest of the month off early, i may find myself wanting to get out of the house on saturday night.

i think i have grounds to expect a show at least.

i might give it a chance to redeem itself as performance art. maybe....

like i say: i want to pull something out of this, i just really don't like the metallic imagery. i wish it was less system of a down and more bjork...

i had to sleep.

those thoughts were rambly and unorganized. so, let me summarize.

poppy is not a metal singer, but she has appropriated the aesthetic of metal in a very shallow and surface manner. i initially reacted by comparing her to marilyn manson, but manson himself was essentially just 80s hair metal, and this is an idea that is maybe better rooted in something like van halen. her music is essentially a series of strung together cliches, which the kids today call "memes", but which music critics still can't like, even if it's currently hip and trendy to be unoriginal.

i have a longstanding aversion to the aesthetic she is shallowly appropriating, stemming from my upbringing in 90s anti-rock iconoclasm. my initial reaction was exceedingly negative, as would be expected from anybody coming from that background.

her music has a certain level of elaborateness to it, though, and i can't help but be drawn to the complexity underlying it, and sort of want to find some underlying value to it. i can often sort through a bad surface image to try to get through to something more worthwhile underneath. however, i find the surface heavy metal aesthetic to be singularly too unappealing to be able to do this in any substantive way, and i'm not convinced that there's actually much there, anyways.

i've mentioned that i'm at least pleasantly surprised by the more serious nature of the younger generation of pop musicians, and this might fall into that category, eventually.

but, my opinion is that this walk down the road of heavy metal imagery is a decidedly wrong turn, and if that poppy is going to write substantive pop music in the future then she'll have to drop the 80s metal cliches, which are just simply artistically irredeemable.

so, it might seem like i should know all about this. i might have commented on her videos when she was just getting started, even. but, that wasn't reflective of genuine interest - i was just trying to game the commenting system for personal benefit, to draw attention to my own music.

stated tersely, i'm actually too old to even be commenting on this.

it makes me wonder, though. that's the last slant on this, before i move on. i was at one time a weird internet personality trying to get somewhere over youtube (before they shut me down). i write guitar-focused electronic music. my music is not as pop-oriented, and i don't want it to be; i would rather prevent myself from being the centre of attention, etc. i'm not a natural pop star like this girl obviously is. and, my guitar style is psychedelic, experimental, blues, punk - but never metal, ever. that said, i also mentioned in the 1000 gecs video that what i do is not that far from it. and, it's not outside of the realm of possibility that i could have been producing music quite similar to poppy's, if i was a completely different person. i know that that's a weird statement - i would never write music like this. but, i could have, potentially. or, somebody could have potentially remixed some of my tracks this way....

i doubt this is the last i'll hear from her. i do hope that she shifts her aesthetic a little to something i can engage with a little better.

just to finish up on the poppy.

iirc, she dated pewdiepie for a while in like 2016, right? i guess i cared a little bit about what was trending in the youtube community back when i thought i could use the commenting system as a means of marketing my own music. so, i would go on to these popular videos and make dozens of comments for the purposes of trying to drop links back to my own music. and, yes, i was trolling, but i was trolling in a way that was very consciously designed to maximize reactions. 

i would literally go to the youtube trending site and just click the top link and go to town.

i didn't otherwise care remotely about pewdiepie or taylor swift or whatever else i was commenting on. and, i probably wouldn't know who she is at all if it hadn't been for that tactic i was using...

they shut me down in a dozen different ways. i got shadow banned. they ruined the trending page. they changed the status updates. they broke the commenting system. i just got completely shut down.

how much does she owe to pewdiepie? that's a question, i don't know. i know i tried to figure out what she was, but i'm not sure i remember it clicking that she was a musician. i think i might have thought she was a blogger.

there are components in her music that, if taken in a different direction, might be more interesting. i think my reaction is mostly a function of my broad aversion to the culture of heavy metal, and the extent that she's dabbling in it is maybe too shallow to justify it - she might be co-opting the imagery of it more than anything else, but even that is enough to make me cringe. it's partly a function of my own gender identity crisis. i legitimately don't like anything about metalheads, but what i dislike more than i dislike metalheads is being mistaken for one. i've had long hair and an effeminate outward appearance since i was about 12 or 13, but i've often been mistaken for a metalhead rather than a transwoman, and i really don't get it. so, i've developed this kneejerk hate-on for anything that remotely reflects heavy metal imagery, even if it's doing so in the most shallow and transparent way possible.

there are some tracks that remind me a little bit of a really watered down take on early queen, but early queen never fell into cliches like this. i just can't connect to the guitar style. in fact, it makes me irrationally angry to hear it. 

you could compare this to the 1000 gecs record, which i gave moral support to, despite writing off as stupid. this isn't really that different - it's a little more metal, a little less experimental, but broadly in the same genre. why did i react better to that than this? the answer is that i didn't get that angry kneejerk to the metallic imagery produced by the guitar work, however shallow it really is.

sometimes, a specific concept will set me off like that....

but, i'm never going to react well to music with this kind of aesthetic, and i hope i've done a little to explain why.

if i were to provide a little bit of critical advice to poppy, it's that she should drop the stupid rebellious metalhead slant and focus more on being a pop star. all of that pointlessly abrasive guitar work is just ruining what might otherwise be moderately interesting pop songs.

you might imagine i'd like this, but i was actually always the kid that thought marilyn manson was stupid and his fans were retards. they weren't misunderstood. they weren't deep in a strange or subtle way. they were just actually the dumbest kids at school, straight up. i was 15 in 1996, and i never bought a single manson record.

i'm basically having the same reaction to this - this is stupid. it's not even pretentious. it's just dumb. and, you're dumb if you're falling for it.

now, that said, i did try to suspend a critical analysis for long enough to see if the music stands up if you strip it from the underlying idiocy, and it really doesn't. it's interesting for a few seconds, until you realize it's just a series of overdone cliches...

somebody's making a lot of money, here. there's nothing else to it than that.

there is a show listed at the leland club from 10:00-4:30 with this band playing, and they insist there will be music until 4:30.

i've been, err, phished a few times by that club. and, i wish this was a little bit more abstract than it is. 

that said, i'm sure they'll go until at least 2:30, so if you're a little less hardcore than i am, it's no doubt long enough. and, if it was just a bit more abstract...

that said, i haven't completely ruled it out yet, either. 

https://stormychromer.bandcamp.com/album/12-31-2019-nye-jam-ann-arbor-mi

so, i've got the list built up, but i'm actually mostly going to be listening to classical music for the next however long.

i told you this was coming.

i like ravel, but i couldn't imagine going to one of his operas. the "debussy and ravel" night the week after is more likely. and, then they're doing beethoven's sixth the week after that.

as for rock shows, it is very likely that i'll hit man or astroman at the end of the month - that's actually a kind of a bucket list show, for me. that's the only thing i'm taking seriously, right now.

there are a few shows in march, but it looks like april is particularly stacked. i may find myself wanting to save up, instead.

so, i'll be spending the day listening and testing.

and, is vivaldi "classical", strictly?

well, that particular piece sure is.

as mentioned, it almost sounds like beethoven....

vivaldi is in the pile of stuff that i generally write off as robotic and trite, but this is a surprisingly dynamic, if somewhat fruity and bourgeois, little piece that i probably would have enjoyed, in the right context.

i don't want to let him off the hook entirely. it toys with you - being that it was written when it was, it's neither the gutwrenching renaissance piece that it hints at, nor is it the proto-romantic romp that it perhaps should be. it is, in a real sense, exactly what's wrong with the "classical" period, which i use here in the strict technical sense.

but, it's also particularly good, for what it is; i don't expect to hear pieces this interesting from this period, and would be curious about exploring pieces similar to this one. maybe there's some music from the classical era (strictly speaking) that's worth holding on to, after all...

on second thought, i found a few things near the end of the month that are pretty high probability.....

i'll get a list up in a bit.

i'm going to be analyzing shows in detroit for the next month, but i don't expect to attend many, if any at all.