And Offered Him A Doughnut

Apparently in addition to bloggining and refreshing good taste in music, Scott Spiegelberg of Musical Perceptions and I also share our alma mater of Lawrence University. In fact we even both took advantage of the whacky two-degrees-in-five-years program. However, in the words of one of my professors: "Chemistry is physics without understanding." (That's not going to help me in the next list.)

Elsewhere on the Internets:

Darcy James Argue is in the middle of braving the entirety of the Bang On A Can Marathon, and liveblogging it to boot.

A decent answer to eternal question "Beatles or Stones?"

And in honor of National Doughnut Day (two days ago, alas) here's a map of everywhere in Boston proper to score yourself some doughnuts. No word yet on how many of those are Dunkys.

Geographic Coincidence

Life as any sort of "academic" above the undeclared level is inherently a transient sort of existence. This is an overly poetic way of explaining away my poor blogging as a result of the fact that I am back in Wisconsin. But where to go for your Boston concert related needs? Assuming that Lockhart doesn't continue to stir his audiences in a furor that attracts the national press, I have a couple suggestions.

fullermusic: She doesn't post very often and I have no idea who she is, but it was the first Boston concert music blog I started reading. History is good for something.

Soho The Dog: In the beginning my blog just parroted Darcy James Argue, but he's shifting away from blogging to do his career. So now I just parrot Matt Guerreri. However, I think that most of the concert music blogs in the world are doing the same thing.

visionsong: I came across this blog via Ethan Iversen of the Bad Plus (P.S. Buy their new album. Hawt.) so its focus is more on the city's jazz scene, which is awexome. I really miss playing jazz but can't imagine that being next to the world's largest concentration of guitarists is going to help me break into the scene.

My blogging will continue (and hopefully pick up) over the course of the summer, but may be a bit more abstract. Likely focusing on things I discern from the æther instead of my own witness.

I'm Not Dead Yet

This month has been pretty embarassing, that's how the end of academic years go. Some shrapnel to keep you from de-subscribing. (Because you're subscribed, right?)

1) Rostropovich died today, joining the ranks of Menotti and Ligeti in the category of People I Thought Were Already Dead. I hear he was pretty good.

2) The AFM, which I still haven't joined, has lifted their boycott on Delta Airlines. I mentioned it in one of my first posts, so it's fun to see that this sort of technique works in the Moderne Age. However, Delta has yet to make a statement about being a piece of shit airline, so I will continue to avoid when possible.

3) Sockgate is gripping Boston, and may be the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Never before have I seen sports journalists actively trying to ruin baseball.

4) Bonus Round: Stephen Hawking in space! (sort of)

5) Have I already used this as the title of a post?

6) Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day is tomorrow, and I'm considering attending an event in the North End. However my jury is later than evening so I may be occupied with preparations for that. This will be the first year I'm throwing down a picture, but my dad (an Expert In The Field) has actually been organizing the shindig for the past couple years.

Labyrinth + Pippi Longstocking + Wing + Drag Queens = Quality?

Sure, it's not the most obvious combination but that's what being avant-garde is all about. Another list in lieu of a real post.

• Gentleman and scholar Matthew Guerreri of Soho the Dog added me to his blogroll on the sly, what a swell guy. I return the favor (see right).
• Dan Willis has returned to the blogosphere, posting his Lawrentian articles of pretension and wit.
• I have long harbored the secret fear of my various culinary heroes being totally incompatible, but I can finally sleep: Anthony Bourdain is cool with Alton Brown.
• Twelve-tone funk? Impossible, you say. Nay, I (and Dial M) respond.
• Unlike most other weeks, considering that these are the goddamn finals the plan all along was to let this vote run two weeks. I implore you, even if you ignore your state and local elections, to vote.
  

Tonight I'll See The Light

When successful blogs don't post for two weeks they have all their bloginista friends do guest posts. I am neither successful nor do I have bloginista friends. (Post to your blog, Dan.) I now plan my march back into triumph.

1) Get Technorati shit done, embarassed at having not done this yet.
2) Post next round of annoying song contest, also embarassing
3) Post answers to Do The Math's questionnaire, hope for a link
4) Post, just do more posting

My research on Four Organs has reached the end of its current formation, term paper submitted. It's not very poetic, but maybe someday it will be. Right now I'm turning my attention back to a theoretical Reich concert, and perhaps a reconstruction of Pulse Music. Daring! Mega-genius Bryan Teoh is reconstructing the Phase Shifting Pulse Gate using magick, we'll see how it works.

And now, some links:

Judaism ∞ Billion - Richard Wagner 0

One of the last great men of the record industry leaves the building

God damn do I love Will It Blend

Consistency is Difficulting

I have a real grinder of a weekend/week/following weekend coming up, hence the not posting so much. Sorry about that.

Jeremy Denk finally admits it.

Will It Blend finally achieves its destiny.

I got nothing.

Two Months In

I've been in Boston only 60 days or so, so now's is when shit's going to get happenin'! Right? In seriousness lots of cool stuff has happened already and I'm looking forward to the rest of what's going on. Even the blog is taking off, traffic doubled in October as compared to September. This is even according to my AdSense stats, which I assume are on the conservative side. (I could put up a counter, but that's tacky.) Speaking of AdSense, no protested to its addition and I've made almost three dollars! Thanks for those eight clicks.

Hopefully as my writing continues to gain coherence we'll continue to see more popularity. Thanks for putting up with this, and tell your friends and neighbors. Onto a wee bit of content before I head out for the BMOP concert:

I've got two spots still open for the Annoying Song tournament. I want to get this started soon so if I don't get anything the top two seeds are just going to get byes, or something.

Worst Thing Ever.
Best Thing Ever.

A Further Necrology

CBGB's is dead, but there are a list of other things.

1) Dream Evil is dead. Not really, they have a new album out with another rediculous lead single (Evilized's "Made of Metal", and the eponymous Book of Heavy Metal has been followed by "Fire! Battle! In Metal!") complete with video. Yeah, but I don't know, you know? If they are to continue being the archtypical Gothenburg band they must now enter their "totally amorphous lineup" phase. I can't feel good about a band where every single member has quit between this album and the last.

2) Night After Night is not dead. In fact has won some sort of award, huzzah! Tardy congratulations to him, especially since I feel much the same way about things. Por ejample:

During the years that I've been active in classical music journalism and especially criticism, I've often been stricken with an envy of peers whose grasp of the canon is deeper than mine. Many are the times that I've felt an encyclopedic grasp of all things King Crimson, a nearly complete collection of Art Ensemble of Chicago recordings and a working knowledge of the differences between Swedish death metal and Norwegian black metal might not be traits as desirable as a comprehensive familiarity with the complete Bach cantatas, Haydn string quartets or Donizetti operas in my line of work. What gives me the courage to continue raising my voice in public is the conviction that I'm capable, given proper preparation, of perceiving what there is to be perceived and feeling what there is to be felt in any music out there -- and so is anyone else who cares to invest in that same preparation.

3) King Koopa is dead. Only you can make it happen. This is also late since National Bosses's Day was yesterday (Monday the 16th), but the Phoenix celebrates with the 20 greatest video game bosses of all time. I do take minor issue with the ordering near the top, but my main question is where the fuck is Lavos?

4) Fullermusic is not dead. She started posting again, neat.

5) John Mayer must be stopped. I've been wary of him (Do The Math has an opinion on his trio album, which I didn't mind so much) but mainly because I have a friend who is obssessed with him. His blog proves that he probably wouldn't enjoy said friend's company, and that he is totally batshit insane.