The Jeff Hostetler of Blogs

I find intense discussions like these (1, 2, 3) thoroughly intriguing, though most others will probably find them mind numbingly dull and pointless. Of course, game design theory isn't exactly water cooler talk.
- posted by Shane @ 1:19 AM
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The new Flaming Lips album isn't as immediate as The Soft Bulletin. I'm not sure if it has anything to do with my version of the album being the unmastered one, but the songs don't sound as vibrant as on the last album. There isn't as much clarity in the instruments and it's sometimes difficult to discern what exactly is going on in the supporting musical lines beneath the vocals, guitar, and drums. It all just sounds like one big blend of sound. This is kind of weird since I didn't feel that I had much of a problem listening to that early Japanese version of "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1" a couple of days ago. I'll have to listen to the album on headphones to see if all my complaining is just a matter of "early leaked album sound quality loss" or something like that. Forgetting about the muddled sound for a second though, I will say that these songs do seem interesting upon first listen. The rhythms found in many of them are a little bit unexpected when you consider the grand, flowery pop songs that the Lips were writing just a few years ago. I'd even go as far to say that they sometimes have a bit of an IDM flavor to them. That should be your first clue that the new songs weren't really designed to carry that big, uplifting feel that much of The Soft Bulletin had. The change in Wayne's vocals suggest this as well, being that he's gone all Sparklehorse on us, leaning more towards the "subdued guy with a high-pitched voice" persona rather than the "highly excitable guy who loves life" one. Personally, I'm still undecided how well these changes work. It all depends on whether or not the songwriting is now strong enough to make up for the loss of positive emotional energy that surrounded the music previously. Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots could end up being a real grower, but at this point, I'm going to guess that it falls short of reaching the "masterpiece" status that most fans have bestowed on The Soft Bulletin. Call it a hunch.
- posted by Shane @ 12:11 AM
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Looks like the new Flaming Lips album is done downloading on my ultra slow modem connection. I need to get this thing burned as soon as possible, so there won't be any real blog update tonight. Aside from the new Lambchop album, I think this is the first of this year's releases that I've been REALLY excited about. Hopefully it does not disappoint.
- posted by Shane @ 12:09 AM
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"I just saw this kid named __________. He’s from the University of __________, and he’s the best passer I’ve seen in I can’t remember how long, except for maybe Dan Marino. I grabbed my wife and said, ‘Watch this kid’s footwork. Look at him throw."
-Hall of Fame Quarterback Joe Namath

Can't fill in the blanks? Go here to find out who this man is, along with other comments that were made back before he was drafted.
- posted by Shane @ 5:57 PM
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"We were on the clock. We went up there with our card, trying to get Sims in before, because we know the rule. We told Leo (Lewis) and the guys there to turn the card in. We turned the card in, and they (the NFL) said, no, no, Kansas City is here first, they’ve got preference. They weren’t going to give us a shot. No big deal because we just went the way we had it rated on the board. We had it Sims, McKinnie, actually we had it (Mike) Williams, Sims, McKinnie, (Quentin) Jammer. Those were the four players. Like I said, we don’t want to make a big deal out of it. What I don’t want to do is distract from the fact that we’ve got an excellent pick here and make a kid feel like you’re not the kid we wanted. That’s not fair to him. This is a moment he has worked for his whole life. I’m an offensive line coach. Obviously I am as excited as anybody in the building or anybody in the city right now."
-Mike Tice, Minnesota Vikings Head Coach

Watching "smilin' Dennis Green" hype up his picks was always a bit of a draft day tradition for me. Fortunately for Vikings fans, Mike Tice has turned out to be pretty entertaining as well. How many other head coaches would actually reveal the top section of their draft board? Perhaps Tice hasn't yet perfected the art of the evasive spin-job.
- posted by Shane @ 10:44 PM
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"If we're sitting here thinking we're going to come out of this free agency, this draft, the college free agency and the second wave of free agency in June with good players at every position, then we're smoking dope."
-Mike Tice, Minnesota Vikings Head Coach
- posted by Shane @ 7:23 PM
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I was able to find an mp3 of the new Flaming Lips song, "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robot", but it's sung in Japanese. Odd. Anyway, I was afraid that after The Soft Bulletin, the Flaming Lips might try to pull a Mercury Rev and choose to up the melodrama at the expense of kookiness. I really should have known better. If there's one thing you can count on from the Flaming Lips, it's that they aren't going to take themselves too seriously.

This new song sounds a lot less grand than the poppier numbers on The Soft Bulletin. That isn't to say that it sounds underwhelming or anything, it's just that the instrumentation is definitely more low-key. Instead of gongs and harps, we now get weird squishing noises and a vibraphone (??). I think it works, as the song still maintains that all-important goofball Flaming Lips feel. While I can't actually understand the lyrics, I'm pretty sure that Wayne is back to his old ways of reciting some crazy, off-the-wall story, but singing it in such a way so that it sounds pretty and lighthearted instead of overly clever. It's all really very nice. These guys rarely fail to put a smile on my face. Definitely can't wait for the new album.
- posted by Shane @ 12:32 AM
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Song of the year? I know that offering downloads is against everything I believe in, but this is worth it. While this particular song wasn't actually released this year, it has made a bigger impression on me than just about anything I've heard in quite some time. Give it a go. I guarantee you'll thank me afterwards.
- posted by Shane @ 12:50 AM
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"Lord Can You Hear Me?" is one of my favorite songs off of Let It Come Down, so I thought it would be interesting to go back and listen to the original Spacemen 3 version. The contrast in the overall sound of the two versions is extreme, with the Spiritualized version sounding richer and far more dense. However, the thing that stood out most for me was the change in the vocals. First, I must say that the vocals do little to affect the basic message of the song. In both versions, the speaker understands that the actual answer to his question is relatively unimportant. The opportunity for him to honestly and openly express his feelings of discontent, even if it all falls on deaf ears, is what truly facilitates his own personal healing. However, the difference in vocals does significantly alter the circumstances and mindset behind the message, as well as the general mood of the song. The Spacemen 3 "Lord Can You Hear Me?" is "prettier" and comes from a more realistic point of view. The singing style is quiet and reserved, showing just a small hint of resignation. Ultimately, these vocals serve only to reinforce the overriding sense of melancholy dictated by the song's sparse musical backdrop. They never extend beyond the limits established by the framework of the song, but in all fairness, it isn't at all necessary for them to. The newer Spiritualized version of "Lord Can You Here Me?" contains vocals with a greater sense of desperation and confusion. They also carry more weight in the mix, making them a greater focal point than before. Some critics have accused recent Spriritualized material of being too overblown and obvious. I can't argue favorably for the band in all cases, but for this particular song, I think the loss of subtletly in the vocals is outweighted by the increased sense of passion and sincerity. This version of the song is by far the more uplifting of the two.

Tangent:
I guess this kind of goes back to why I find lyrics to be an overrated component of songwriting. The lyrics remain completely unchanged in these two songs, but variations in the way in which they're sung, as well as differences in the surrounding musical context (which I didn't really discuss), play significant roles in establishing the underlying meaning of the song beyond that of just the plain literal interpretation of the words. For me, emotion is more effectively conveyed through the music than the lyrics.
- posted by Shane @ 1:43 AM
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I would have liked to respond to some of the ideas presented at the Conference on World Affairs, but unfortunately, the panel discussions relating to the arts have been totally devoid of confrontation so far. It seems the political issues are the only topics that stir up any kind of disagreement, and even with those, nobody is really given an opportunity to directly respond to someone else's argument. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping that tomorrow's events will be different. I don't know if I can tolerate another group of panelists with the consensus stance that rap=bad because "it glorifies violence and desensitizes youth". I mean, WTF? I thought this was Boulder.
- posted by Shane @ 1:07 AM
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I was thinking about writing about the Judgement spoiler, but I wasn't really feeling that.
- posted by Shane @ 12:41 AM
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Someone needs to have a talk with "Lobster". James Bond 007 in...Agent Under Fire wasn't developed or produced by Rare, who was the original developer of Goldeneye 007. It's EA all the way baby. Please call his ass out.
- posted by Shane @ 11:49 PM
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I don't have much to write today, but this is pretty damn funny.
- posted by Shane @ 11:00 PM
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Add N To (X)'s "The March Of Pure Mathematical Evil That Ends And Results In War" is ace. For me, this song always evokes weird imaginary scenes of 70's style sci-fi TV robots forming a jam band or something. At the outset of the song, the "guitarist" (and I use the term loosely) stumbles upon a catchy little riff while playing whatever the hell a 70's style sci-fi TV robot would play in order to create such goofy analog synth sounds. From there, his mechanized cohorts join in, establishing a rhythm section with some methodical, low-key drums, rudimentary bass, and a perpetual squeaking noise quite obviously fashioned by little Johnny Robot, who has somehow been duped into wiping down the inside of the front window when the stain, unfortunately, is on the outside. This continues on and on, almost mind-numbingly so, with only a few slight variations throughout. Despite maintaining an enduring repetitiveness that only a machine could love, the song develops into a sort of lazy epic, inspiring in it's simplicity, yet still utterly confusing, as it's difficult to truly understand what it is exactly that they, the robots, love about it so much. Somewhere halfway through, we get a spoken word bit (French?) that just SOUNDS so completely irrelevant that you just know the robots are dicking around now. This lapse into "experimentalism" continues on to the end of the song, where the robots attempt to inject some honest-to-God human emotion (!) through the most customary means possible. They add the good old organic sound of the flute, which spasms in and out of the music as if they know it belongs but are unsure of how it's supposed to be implemented. Best of all, the song closes with the most pathetically weak pseudo synth choir you will ever hear in your life. Incredibly lame, while at the same time charming, because shucks, those kooky robots sure did try their darndest.
- posted by Shane @ 12:17 AM
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"You know, I really like the whole Gorillaz thing-- the animation. Even though we're not supposed to like Damon Albarn because Mogwai is in our gang and they have a feud with that guy. We like all the Gorillaz except for him."

Heh. Funny.

TOD interview here.
- posted by Shane @ 10:50 AM
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Listening to Boards of Canada Music Has the Right to Children and loving it. I find music like this difficult to talk about just because it's somewhat beyond my capacity to properly articulate what it sounds like. Some IDM (for lack of a better term) that I listen to tends to contain sounds that are either direct samples of or at least recognizable approximations of things one might normally hear in the real world. Even without these kinds of associations, I can usually find some other aspect of the music to focus on and process, such as the nature of the instrumentation used or maybe even just the music's general atmosphere. Boards of Canada is different. I can't even try to express how the music makes me feel, because it doesn't really make me feel anything. I suppose I can say that it does emanate a strange kind of subtle warmth, but alone, that's definitely not enough to generate any sort of firm, identifiable emotional response from me. I think I'm finally beginning to understand the angle that most people take when discussing this group. I always thought the whole "childhood nostalgia" connection was just a lazy critical crutch, some music journo buzzword that people were continually propagating in order to avoid having to really think about what they were hearing. Now I'm beginning to realize that however abstract that comparison is, it seems to be just about the only type of description that anyone can draw any real meaning from.

By the way, the track "aquarius" is EXACTLY what I would expect to hear if I were watching Sesame Street in a dream.
- posted by Shane @ 11:05 PM
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Well, at least the helmet looks a little bit better...
- posted by Shane @ 6:46 PM
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As I've stated many times before, my love of music isn't based heavily on an appreciation of lyrics. I normally see lyrics as being completely supplemental to the actual music, something to enhance the general mood or message of a song without ever being the true defining element. While I'll often have a general awareness of what is being said in a song, I'm usually much more interested in how the words are delivered, ie. vocal inflections, syllabic stresses, voice timbre, ways in which the presentation of the lyrics interact with the other song structures, than I am with the meaning of the words. What I should make clear though, is that this particular listening strategy isn't a result of some adopted abstract philosophical stance on what music is or how it should be appreciated. My downplaying the importance of lyrics is more a preference than a rule. To quote Kevin Costner in "The Postman", "It doesn't have to be this way". Not always. The reason I'm bringing all this up is that I'm currently listening to Smog's "Dress Sexy At My Funeral", a rare song in which I think the lyrics hold up their end of the bargain. The title is pretty self explanatory, the speaker telling his wife how she should act at his funeral, how she should "wink at the minister", flirt with his grieving brothers, and wear her "blouse undone to here" and "skirt split up to there". The words are clever, funny, and tongue-in-cheek. It's not a gimmicky joke type deal, as it's more something that you smile about than laugh at. In my estimation, the song is lyrically quite good. Anyway, I guess the main thing I'm trying to work out is why exactly the lyrics in a song like this strike a chord with me, while the words of most other songs pass me by. Right now, all I'm really certain of is what I don't like in lyrics. I think generally, the more an artist tries to imply that his or her lyrics are something that I should take to heart and look upon seriously, the more unessential they become. I tend to ignore most anything that's designed to be "thought-provoking" or tries too hard to communicate some sort of grand message about who we are and why we're here (kind of like my opinion of movies). I dislike when artists use vague or confusing imagery as an illusion to cover up the fact that they have absolutely nothing to say. I'm sure I could go on, but this little rant is beginning to look a bit too negative from my view, so I'm just going to stop here. Instead, I'm going to think about what it is that I see in the lyrics that I do like and determine whether or not there's any kind of rhyme or reason to such preferences. To be revisited at a later date (hopefully)...
- posted by Shane @ 1:37 AM
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