koganbot

Relativism: So What? (Part Three)

edcasual@earthlink.net — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 18:40:09 GMT

I read an anecdote years ago - think it was from Erik Erikson, probably set in the 1940s. A young man walks into the student rec center, sits down in an armchair, rubs his chin thoughtfully, and says, "Life is strange." A pretty young coed snaps back at him, "Compared to what?"

If "relativism" were the name for a useful attitude rather than a quagmire of inarticulate concerns and projections, that would be the attitude, a way of jogging the intelligence: e.g., when I'm saying something that doesn't seem to be getting across to people, then maybe I need to be precise about what it is that my statement is trying to counter (and by doing so I'll see how to make my idea better); and if other people's words and actions seem inexplicably stupid or strange, maybe I need to ask myself what it is the people are trying to counter or forestall, rather than assuming that they're countering or forestalling what I would be countering and forestalling if I were using their words. I'll point out that this just makes self-conscious what we try to do normally. When we say or do something, we think there's a difference between saying and doing it and not saying or doing it. And when we observe other people we project behind their words and deeds a landscape of reasons and possibilities that sets their behavior off by contrast.

So "relativism" in this sense is the normal state of affairs. There is a line of philosophers who find this state of affairs problematic, but unless I'm dealing with such philosophers I have no reason to assert my "relativism" any more than I need to point out that, like everyone else, I breathe and have a mouth.

So, in order to think that relativism is any kind of a big deal, you have to come up with a different relativism, one that somehow includes this normal relativism but makes it seem threatening or liberating, in any event at odds with the worlds we know rather than a facet of them. You can't do this without making several basic mistakes. You convince yourself that the philosophical ideas that relativism runs counter to are themselves embedded in everyday life, though they're not. You forget that "relative" is itself a relative term. You confuse the meaning of terms; e.g., what I said yesterday: "As a relativist I can say, 'Nothing exists in isolation,' and two minutes later say, 'I grew up in an isolated village,' without contradicting myself, since the standards for isolation are different in the two sentences." So you make the former statement as if it referred to the latter "isolation," to the village's isolation, to the isolation that matters. I don't think it's possible to believe that relativism (or pragmatism or deconstruction) plays a significant role in the world unless you make this sort of mistake.

Future posts will detail the mistakes (so far I've been making assertions rather than arguments). But I'll reiterate that what's at issue here isn't an intellectual mistake, but why smart people make such a mistake. They could just as easily not make the mistake. So what do people gain by making the mistake? The consequences of the mistake don't result from the mistake; rather, the mistake is the result of a desire for such consequences.

Relativism: So What? (Part Two)

edcasual@earthlink.net — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 01:09:02 GMT

My guess is that someone who derides "relativism" would consider me a relativist if he knew my philosophical views. But my intuition here is to call the conversation - relativism, pro or con - a stand-in issue. That is, my relativistic views have no bearing one way or another on whether or not in a specific instance I feel that I need to learn more about someone's context, or whether I think an accepted truth needs to be reexamined or a truth that's under attack needs defending.

In my book I say, "As a relativist I can say, 'Nothing exists in isolation,' and two minutes later say, 'I grew up in an isolated village,' without contradicting myself, since the standards for isolation are different in the two sentences." My point was that the philosophical position addresses nothing of concern to the village, i.e., addresses no human concern.

But actual villagers - actual humans - do say "nothing exists in isolation" and other relativistic equivalents, even if I think the isolation the sentence addresses has nothing to do with the isolation that concerns them. They think otherwise.

I'll go back to what I said in last week's post: People who talk about relativism think that they're taking care of something by doing so. So, my eye on the prize, my trick is to find out what it is they think they're taking care of. The problem is that people who discuss relativism don't really know what they're trying to take care of. That's how stand-in issues work. People jump to the stand-in issue in order to feel various concerns without actually thinking about them.

Questions to ask might be: what are the social or institutional situations where relativism is called forth as a justification or a bogeyman? What are you trying to justify, and whom are you trying to justify it to?

Details to come in later posts.

Long Meme Shortened To Its Essence

edcasual@earthlink.net — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 17:58:09 GMT

53. WHAT CD ARE YOU MOST EMBARRASSED TO HAVE ON YOUR SHELF?
The concept of "shelf" is alien to CDs, which exist scattered about or in piles.

Top Singles And Albums, First Half 2008

edcasual@earthlink.net — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 07:00:48 GMT

Ashlee whips Xtina, Amy, Duffy et al. at batshit retro showbiz blues, and about five of us notice. Also, I don't care about batshit retro showbiz blues nearly as much as I care about the struggle and beauty and teeming social detail of her previous music. Bittersweet World's two great singles will probably remain near the top of my singles list, while the alb is holding its place as something of a placeholder. (But I'm playing it a whole shitload for a placeholder.)

The story of the year is r&b putting forth gorgeous gobs of harmony. Danity's batshit polyphony keeps leading to these harmonic gobs; so does Vanessa Hudgens' multi-tracking, so does Rihanna's "Disturbia."

Wikipedia has promised that "Bad Girl" is going to be the next Danity Kane single. If it's not, I may never trust Wiki again.

Top 31 Singles First Half 2008

1. Rihanna "Disturbia"
2. Ashlee Simpson "Outta My Head (Ay Ya Ya)"
3. Ashlee Simpson "Little Miss Obsessive"
4. Gwen Stefani "Early Winter"
5. Heidi Montag "No More"
6. Robyn "Be Mine!"
7. Robyn "Who's That Girl?"
8. Britney Spears "Break The Ice"
9. September "Cry For You"
10. Buraka Som Sistema "Kalemba Wegue Wegue"
11. Taylor Swift "Should've Said No"
12. The Knux "Cappuccino"
13. Vein f. Pitbull "Get Up Stand Up"
14. Ashley Alexandra Dupré "What We Want"
15. Danity Kane f. Missy Elliott "Bad Girl"
16. Paula DeAnda "Marching"
17. Scooter "The Question Is What Is The Question"
18. Santogold "L.E.S. Artistes"
19. Wiley "Wearing My Rolex"
20. Booka Shade "Control Me"
21. Girls Aloud "Theme To St. Trinians"
22. Mz Bratt "What Would We Do?"
23. María Daniela Y Su Sonido Lasser "Pobre Stupido"
24. Sway f. $tush "F Ur X"
25. Jordin Sparks f. Chris Brown "No Air"
26. Madonna f. Justin Timberlake "4 Minutes"
27. Gabriella Cilmi "Sweet About Me"
28. Cherish f. Yung Joc "Killa"
29. Ne-Yo "Closer (Fuzion remix)"
30. Flyleaf "Breathe Today"
31. Buraka Som Sistema f. M.I.A., Saborosa, Puto Prata & DJ Znobia "Sound Of Kuduro"

Top 7 Albums First Half 2008

1. Danity Kane Welcome To The Dollhouse
2. Ashlee Simpson Bittersweet World
3. María Daniela Y Su Sonido Lasser Juventud En Éxtasis
4. Willie Nelson Moments Of Time
5. Vanessa Hudgens Identified
6. Keak Da Sneak Deified
7. Lil Wayne Tha Carter III

Subjects for further research:
Lil Mama VYP (Voice Of The Young People)
Santogold Santogold
Mariah Carey E=MC²

Country Singles First Half 2008

1. Taylor Swift "Should've Said No"
2. Willie Nelson "You Don't Think I'm Funny Anymore"
3. Brooks & Dunn "Put A Girl In It"
4. Lost Trailers "Holler Back"
5. Ashton Shepherd "Takin' Off This Pain"
6. Willie Nelson "Gravedigger"

(Obviously I've barely listened to any country so far this year.)

We're defying gravity, somewhere in the galaxy [new Vanessa Hudgens]

edcasual@earthlink.net — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 06:23:21 GMT

Vanessa Hudgens is a Nice Girl type so she's not going to get all sassy and slutty like Danity Kane, but on three of the songs on Identified she multi-tracks her voice into harmonic blobs like the Danitys', and the results are beautiful. Search for "Identified," also "First Bad Habit" and "Amazed"; in addition there's some of the retro-show-biz blues that everyone's doing and that she has to work too hard at to get fun out of, but she does get there. More immediately fun is club track "Hook It Up," where she goes through the motions of being tuff and electro. "Party On The Moon," a song about partying on the moon, is surpassed in outer-spaciness by a synthy bonus number called "Set It Off," about a guy who triggers her alarm circuits and she encourages him to continue. Second half of the album is duller than the first, Vanessa never achieves persona or character, but there's a good amount of good sound.

Year In America June 26, 2008

edcasual@earthlink.net — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 16:19:21 GMT

Billboard was late posting the Hot 100 yesterday, so this was pushed back a day.

This week, an onslaught of singles from Camp Rock, most of which will fall off the charts after the initial download flurry, since they'll get little airplay beyond Disney. Results are middling: lyrics are rote self discovery with no discernible character, a contradiction I don't find charming, especially given all the Taylors and Alys and AJs (not to mention the Ashlees and Britneys and Lindsays who used to dominate the genre) who do have character and are much more deserving of attention. Demi Lovato has potential as an actual Avril Lite, if she were given better settings, and I prefer "Our Time Is Here" to the charting singles. The Jonas Brothers had a fine moment several years ago where they turned "Anarchy In The U.K." into Hanson-style bubbleboy pop, and they're generally not terrible but haven't matched that moment since. So, a lot of tracks are on the borderline this week. Oh yeah, and buried amidst all this is a song I've currently got penciled in as my number three of the year and that could rise, by someone who's not much older than the mediocrities hanging out at Camp Rock.

Miley Cyrus "7 Reasons": Miley sings well - blares roughly in the blarey part without being grating - but so far I find neither melody nor lyrics even passably interesting. NO TICK.

Demi Lovato & Joe Jonas "This Is Me": Plenty of musical accompaniment to give this heft, the result actually weakening what might be flashing and alive in Demi's singing. There's enough flash and melody to justify a BORDERLINE TICK.

Rihanna "Disturbia": Delicious, joyful, agonized, made me laugh, made me cry - well, to be more accurate, made me smile, made me bop, made me furrow my brow in thought. Bright glaze and deep passion. How does she do it? My only reservation is that the words are abstractly and poetically strange rather than genuinely disquieting. While this track may not be as striking as "Umbrella," it's just as good. GIGANTICA TICKIA.

The Jonas Brothers "Play The Music": This would be nicer if it weren't so relentlessly nice, but even then wouldn't be a tick, since the song isn't worth much in its own right. WON'T TICK YOUR MUSIC.

Joe Jonas "Gotta Find You": A pensive song: "I need to try to get to where you are/Could it be you're not that far?" Indeed, it develops that "You're the voice I hear inside my head/The reason that I'm singing/I need to find you/I gotta find you." Uh, look inside your head? But Joe, I'm not the voice inside your head, or if I am, you don't seem to be listening. Well, enough of this chit chat. What does this sound like? Sing-alongable, not bad, would be better with someone who could do more than force the words out in thin blue lines. NONTICK.

Cast Of Camp Rock "We Rock": Weak performance of gang-shout pop-rock that's a distant descendant of Gary Glitter and the Runaways. Likable. BORDERLINE NONTICK.

Flo Rida f. will.i.am "In The Ayer": Been consistently so-what on this guy. Southern hip-hop; somewhat catchy pronunciation set in a somewhat doomy setting; strong, slow groove. Does a good job, the groove, the mood, would be nice to move to in the deep A.M. of a dance club, but leaves nothing. NONTICK.

"The nonsense in this debate makes me want to shoot someone in the face"

edcasual@earthlink.net — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 13:47:17 GMT

While "listening" to all the songs streamed on the Camp Rock MySpace (so far, they're mostly borderline: disappointingly weak performances of somewhat catchy material), I've been reading Paul Krugman's blog, where he's been posting a lot recently about the relation between oil speculation and the rising price of oil. Basically, he says there's no relation - no evidence that the current price of oil has anything to do with speculation, since the only way speculation can cause a rise in actual oil prices is if someone is withholding inventory. And there's no evidence of this. Here's an excerpt:

Imagine that Joe Shmoe and Harriet Who, neither of whom has any direct involvement in the production of oil, make a bet: Joe says oil is going to $150, Harriet says it won't. What direct effect does this have on the spot price of oil - the actual price people pay to have a barrel of black gunk delivered?

The answer, surely, is none. Who cares what bets people not involved in buying or selling the stuff make? And if there are 10 million Joe Shmoes, it still doesn't make any difference.

Well, a futures contract is a bet about the future price. It has no, zero, nada direct effect on the spot price. And that's true no matter how many Joe Shmoes there are, that is, no matter how big the positions are.

Any effect on the spot market has to be indirect: someone who actually has oil to sell decides to sell a futures contract to Joe Shmoe, and holds oil off the market so he can honor that contract when it comes due; this is worth doing if the futures price is sufficiently above the current price to more than make up for the storage and interest costs.

As I've tried to point out, there just isn't any evidence from the inventory data that this is happening.

And here's one more fact: by and large, futures prices over the period of the big price runup have been slightly below spot prices. The figure below shows monthly data from the EIA; as the spot price shot up, the futures price (that's contract 4, the furthest out) actually lagged a bit behind. In other words, there hasn't been any incentive to hoard.

As I've said, I don't have a political dog in this fight. But the nonsense in this debate makes me want to shoot someone in the face.

(He points out elsewhere that conservatives, who normally are ready to praise markets out of hand, are wanting to blame "oil speculators" because otherwise they'd have to admit that demand will continue to increase in relation to supply unless we make an effort to find alternative sources of energy and to cut back on energy use.)

So, Frank, what do you think of Metro Station's "Shake It"?

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:48:08 GMT

As we wait for Billboard to post this week's Hot 100, confirming the ascendancy of the loathsome Katy Perry, many of you are probably wondering to yourselves, "What does Frank Kogan think of Metro Station's 'Shake It'?" Many more might now be asking yourselves "What is Metro Station?" No matter. Enquiring minds want to know, and the rest of you will find out anyway, assuming you click on the lj cut.

Metro Station "Shake It" (commentary by Frank Kogan): Well, first off, "Your body's cold but girl we're getting so warm" is appallingly lame as a supposed paradox. There are two singers: the canny logic chopper who emitted the aforementioned pearl; and an emo emoter who adds tune and feeling.

Evaluation: This track would be more appealing to me if sung in Serbian, as that is a language I do not understand. Even in Serbian, the logic chopper's vocals would just kind of sit there without the edgy perspective they're supposed to connote. However, the touch-of-emo tuneful guy is nicely tuneful without his passion sounding as if it were elicited by devils pushing hot pokers at his genitals. So, a pop-rock track that's nice in its slightness, would probably garner a TICK, depending on how much I end up thinking its tuneful OKness overshadows the logic chopping.

I have no idea which of the singers is Miley bro and which is Oliver bro.

(Perhaps a motive for this post is that the comments on my only continually successful google-bait thread - see Bµsted Vs. The J0n4s Brothers - are unrelentingly tiresome, and this post may be an opportunity to find out if Hannah-related web commenters can do better.)

"Relativism: So What?": So What?

edcasual@earthlink.net — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 14:32:21 GMT

I keep telling myself I'm going to write a series of lj posts called "Relativism: So What?" but I keep putting off beginning this. I think a major reason for my block is that, though I can lay out the "intellectual" issues surrounding "relativism," my true goal is to get at "what are people's underlying reasons for thinking there's an issue here?" or to put it better, "people wouldn't bring up the issue of 'relativism' if they didn't think they were taking care of something by doing so, so how do I get them to think and talk about what it is that they think they need to take care of?" A subsidiary question might be, "Frank Kogan thinks he's taking care of something when he tries to get people to think and talk about what they think they're trying to take care of when they raise the issue of 'relativism,' so what is it that Frank Kogan thinks he's trying to take care of when he does this?"

Anyhow, four questions:
(1) What do you mean by "relativism," when you use the word (assuming you use the word)?
(2) Does the issue of relativism matter to you? If so, why does it matter?
(3) What do you think other people mean when they use the word "relativism"?
(4) What do you think they think is at stake?

Don't let your answers by overconstrained by the questions. I want to hear your ideas before giving mine.

By the way, someone on my flist (though I'm not on his) used the term the other day, clearly believed that "relativism" was a potent force in the world.

Shining Like A Chandelier That Decorated Every Room Inside The Private Hell We Built

edcasual@earthlink.net — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 14:11:09 GMT

My new Muxtape:

Shining Like A Chandelier That Decorated Every Room Inside The Private Hell We Built

Daveigh Chase "The Happiest Girl In The Whole USA": In the context of its time - a 1971 of feminism and war protests and illegal drugs that, while hardly new to the world, were coming like a wave of change in the popular consciousness - Donna Fargo's original was so unremittingly square that it must have been motivated by desperate defensiveness, but it sure sounded self-satisfied and bland. This new version, ripped from Big Love, a TV show I know nothing about, is all desperation and yearning, as if the bliss of the lyrics could hardly be believed.

Mylène Farmer "Désenchantée": The sound is a mix of melancholy and energy, giving conviction to the lyrics' existential kitsch.

Rihanna "Disturbia": Rihanna shimmers with anxiety and passion. How does she do it?

Ashton Shepherd "Whiskey Won The Battle": Her voice climbs while her spirit crumbles.

Najoua Belyzel "Gabriel": More cosmic kitsch from France.

Lindsay Lohan "Bossy": She's as needy and self-involved as ever. Indomitable, somehow.

Da Wonda Twinz "Who Cares?": A producer's demo. Just some anonymous r&b sorrow and self-assertion, floating through the zeitgeist.

María Daniela Y Su Sonido Lasser "Dame Más": She wants more, will slap you around to get it.

Melissa Mars "Apocalips": Whispering lips launch a thousand ships. French, of course.

Willie Nelson "You Don't Think I'm Funny Anymore": Funny song about the death of fun.

Matia Bazar "Ti Sento": Mile-wide love ray shoots into interplanetary space, snares alien spacecraft.

Mariah Carey f. Young Jeezy "Side Effects": Storch sets her in a swamp groove, where she's a chandelier, seeking truth.

And the blood will flood and the blood will run, blood uptown and blood downtown and blood roundtown

edcasual@earthlink.net — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 06:35:49 GMT

Haven't redone my muxtape yet, but here's Luc's, which is a killer, starts with reggae DJ tracks from the days of the original dread.

I introduced him to "Get To Poppin'."

Luc's liner notes

Year In America June 19, 2008

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:26:46 GMT

My old flames Banner and Flyleaf both fizzle rather than sizzle, Estelle shows promise, and Three 6 Mafia bust one through off-tackle for a score.

Three 6 Mafia f. Project Pat, Young D & Superpower "Lolli Lolli (Pop That Body)": This has everything you expect from the Dirty South: ominous tones, hauntingly pretty keyboard tinkles, tough voices, silly novelty syllables, salacious lyrics. And I still manage to be surprised by these elements all combining, that "fun" has such a dark and moody palette. DARK AND MOODY TICK.

Estelle f. Kanye West "American Boy": Didn't reach me when it hit in Britain, and it still doesn't. Her timbre is excellent, showbiz lounge soul, control and motion in quick syllables, this gliding dance of excitement as she overlooks the new boy in her New World. But the voice and the bottom beats never find their common dance, so the electric excitement never really happens. Borderline NONTICK.

David Banner f. Chris Brown "Get Like Me": Pretty plinks wobble into strangeness. Vocals go minimal and dry, the watchful tones bumping into the prettiness. Chris does his turn, sounding incongruously sweet. Then David gets emphatic while the rest of the music hides in shock. Except for David's rap, it all feels uncommitted. NOT A TICK.

Flyleaf "All Around Me": Blood covers the video walls, while Lacey Mosley layers on the ache - except the blood and ache might as well be wallpaper, they're so inactive. Disappointingly NOT TICKABLE.

Yesterday Ain't Over Yet (Expiration Date)

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 06:10:50 GMT

I will be taking down the country songs from my muxtape in a few days, so this is your final chance to listen to them:

Love Goes To Building On Fire: A Treasury Of Modern Country Music
(just click on the first track, and the tape will play forward from there)

Let the weak be strong
Let the right be wrong

Liner notes are here.

Promo Listening Experiment Day 7

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 05:46:32 GMT

Calico Horse "Happy Placebo Syringe Day": The song title is impossibly clever, isn't it? This is like singing "Happy Birthday" or "Merry Christmas" or something, except it's Placebo Syringe Day, not Christmas. The singing is annoyingly arch, in a blankly postpunk manner. Deadpan humor. If it is humor. Normal-voiced girly singing that fakes you out by starting as a round (like "Frere Jacques" is a round) but then arriving at harmony. "We lay side by side in wooden boxes." The lyrics seem to be snippets from a pair of lives, starting in childhood, ending in death. This would be half pretty if (a) the song had a pretty melody, and (b) the singers weren't so deadpan and normal. Which is to say I have nothing in principle against intricate arrangements with false rounds and wandering guitars. This is not ending in a tick, however.

Promo Listening Experiment Day 6

edcasual@earthlink.net — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 12:24:08 GMT

The Acorn "Goonies R Good Enough": Wavering voice, not expressive in its waver - not intending to be expressive; in fact I think Rolf is going for a direct tone. Still, he needs more resonance in his throat. He varies or, in spots, altogether abandons the melody of the Cyndi Lauper original, using slightly dissonant "classical" chords. Doesn't strike them propulsively, so the rhythm is static. The track is interesting enough to be a potential grower, but he didn't have to create the flaws he needed to grow from in the first place. Borderline NONTICK.

Promo Listening Experiment Day 5

edcasual@earthlink.net — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 06:01:31 GMT

Seun Kuti and Fela's Egypt 80 "Many Things": Rolling African rhythm, but it's tense and compacted, as you'd expect from a band that drew lots of its style from James Brown. Seun Kuti's voice isn't as flexible as his dad's was; the strength of this is the general push of the music, horns massing forcefully on top, saxophones playing riffs beneath. Dark mood from the winds, blasts of funk and fury from the horns. TICK.

Year In America June 12, 2008

edcasual@earthlink.net — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 21:40:35 GMT

A day late again. Five tracks new to the American Top 40 yesterday. I'm awarding two of them ticks.

Pussycat Dolls "When I Grow Up": Deep voice, cutesy voice, sassy voice. Forceful rhythm with hunks of affect on top. Who cares? NO TICK.

Keyshia Cole "Heaven Sent": Subtle balance of wail and melisma that doesn't lose the sense of a voice speaking directly to a listener. Unfortunately the song isn't worth such skill. RELUCTANT NONTICK.

Young Jeezy f. Kanye West "Put On": Slow voice against slow mood. Unfolding drama. Great drifting mass. TICK.

V.I.C. f. Soulja Boy "Silly": They say "silly" a lot but this is remarkably noncatchy compared to the previous two Souljas. Producer Collipark packs a lot of sounds in without their tripping over each other, but the sounds are surprisingly uninspired. NO TICK.

Ne-Yo "Closer": The music pushes underneath while the voice tries to stay sweet. I think I'm finally getting this guy. A smoothy poised above a volcano. ERUPTING TICK.

Interesting song bubbling under: Flyleaf's "All Around Me" climbing after a long time to 43. Flyleaf are sort of Nirvana and Rage Against The Machine going Avril, live-wire screeching and emoting and growling, getting the Evanescence vote, I think. They were hitting the rock stations with "So Sick" back in 2005 when Ne-Yo was hitting the pop stations with "So Sick." Thing is, "All Around Me" is from the same album as "So Sick," making it as old as Robyn's "Be Mine!" Is a ballad, and is anemic compared to Flyleaf's better singles such as a more recent one, "Breathe Today," which barely got noticed.

Promo Listening Experiment Day 4

edcasual@earthlink.net — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:51:28 GMT

System and Station "The Magnetic North": Indie fuzz and vocals that are high and strained undermine an interesting composition, sort of McCartney or Davies going progressive. After hearing the initial guitar distortion, I was surprised this wasn't terrible. It ain't no tick, but it's promising, would be better if they'd trusted their retro tastes.

OMFG! Taylor goes ghetto and girly and tuff in one breath.

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 20:48:11 GMT

Finally saw a clip of Taylor Swift at the ACMs, and the staging is astonishing. She starts acoustic, with a wicked strum, in a hoodie and jeans, and then she jettisons the guitar, her homies join her, and then OMFG.

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 14:26:29 GMT

In his blog, Paul Krugman links to William Rapaport's search for the various sources of grammatical, intelligible (if you already know what the person is trying to say) sentences made entirely of the word "buffalo." Rapaport created this one in 1972:

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo

It works along the lines of:

"Mice cats chase eat cheese"; i.e., Mice THAT cats chase eat cheese.

In Rapaport's version, "Buffalo" when capitalized means the city in western New York State, "buffalo" can mean either the noun "bison" or the verb "to buffalo" (which is a transitive verb meaning either "to intimidate" or "to baffle and bewilder"), and "to Buffalo buffalo" some creature is to buffalo that creature in a way that's unique to Buffalo buffaloes. (According to Rapaport there are bison in the Buffalo zoo.) "Buffalo" (meaning bison) in the plural can be spelled "buffalo," "buffalos," or "buffaloes."

So, Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

Meaning: buffalo from Buffalo that are Buffalo buffaloed by Buffalo buffalo, in turn Buffalo buffalo other Buffalo buffalo.

Promo Listening Experiment Day 3

edcasual@earthlink.net — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 00:48:07 GMT

Yusa "Haiku Du Paz": World music today, from Cuba. I'm listening to a singer-songwriter sing in a language I don't understand. Starts with acoustic guitar harmonics, then vocals in massed harmonies, making me fear this'll head to "Kumbaya" Land. Fortunately when Yusa is in the forefront herself, she follows a darker melody. So, a touch of virulence, done with restraint. Maybe in her subtle way she's taking little flips over the dark top? I can't tell. I'm not excited, which may be owing to my ignorance or to the performer's quiescence. I wouldn't tick this, but since I'm hearing moments of potential nonplacidity, it's worth a link: scroll down a little and it's streamed on the left.

Promo Listening Experiment Day 2

edcasual@earthlink.net — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 05:35:27 GMT

Matt Bauer "Don't Let Me Out": Murder song that's lo-fi and quiet; so, understatement, or false understatement. Organ is on a half-accordion setting, gives the feeling of sound pushed through a strainer. First line: "I killed you and thought that was that/But right away your ghost comes back/And I can't get my hands around it/No, I can't get my hands around you." A haunted, restless murderer, his monologue being the impetus for expressionism: "The air was cool and the pines were long and draped down from the blackness." At the end, she takes a hammer and knocks the nails out of his coffin, but he doesn't want her to let him out.

The mood is set by gentle repetitive guitar picking; sounds nice for a moment or two but the cumulative result is mundane and mediocre. And the murder premise is a cliché, gives a sense of something dark and deep at work, but there's actually nothing much at work, even if it does produce some nice images and OK prettiness. Not worthless, but not a tick.

The Great Promo Listening Experiment

edcasual@earthlink.net — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 06:33:37 GMT

In an experiment to see ~~if I can bore myself to death without actually dying~~ ~~if I can earn a living doing what music critics normally get paid to do~~ if I can approach the world with curiosity and wonder, I've decided that every day this week I will download or stream or follow the link to one of the songs being pushed at me by promo email. I normally get about eight or ten of these emails a day, mostly for indie or world music; usually what I do with them is shunt them off into a "Music Contacts" folder with the intention of looking at some of them and possibly listening to the music on a day when I get around to it. But I never get around to it.

So the idea is that five days this week and five days next week I will listen to at least one of these promo tracks and briefly write up the results (but music I would listen to anyway, such as Donna Summer or Lady Tigra, won't be part of this experiment).

Today already being tomorrow, I think I know where this experiment will lead. But here we go.

Plushgun "Dancing In A Minefield": Plushgun are a pop-rock band with electro beats that seem superfluous to what is mainly going on, which is pretty melody plus rock guitars fronted by a blandly affected singer. The melody isn't bad at all, and I suppose the blankness of the voice helps the melody to shine through on its own merits. And the instrumentation has an OK sheen. But I don't like this. The voice gets more emphatic when the guitars and synths get louder; this adds strain to the blankness without making it less blank.

Taylor Swift Takes A Bow

edcasual@earthlink.net — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 16:30:22 GMT

Gets painfully out of tune in a few spots, but still, I'm feeling the words a lot more in this version than in Rihanna's. The thinness of the voice and of the woman give an emotional whipcrack to the sarcasm and hurt.

The Man Who Brought The Groove

edcasual@earthlink.net — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 00:25:05 GMT

Mark, you need to listen to this! (Lex too.)

Don't know if there'd been a lot of tracks that were primarily groove - i.e., that didn't feature a melody that developed over one or more chord changes - that hit on the r&b charts before "Bo Diddley" did in 1955. In any event, Bo's grooves reached beyond to a broader, whiter audience, were seized on by Buddy Holly and the Rolling Stones, for instance. So what's taken for granted as an option in popular music now - that a groove can be a container for a whole bunch of stuff, that a track doesn't have to build itself around an individual song, doesn't have to follow the demands of the melody or the harmony - had this guy as its main exponent until James Brown went funk in the mid '60s. Also, Bo was a pisser: funny, happy to take the music almost anywhere from flamenco to noise as long as the beat was moving. I think the YouTube clip is from Let The Good Times Roll, a film of an "oldies" concert in 1973. But it seems as much ahead of its time as from an earlier one, given the music that the Velvets and Stooges had also been doing and what a lot of the noise punk bands that formed after them only wished they could do.

And Bo was probably the first rock star to employ women guitarists, Lady Bo in 1958 followed by The Duchess in 1962. The Big TNT Show, 1966:

On Ed Sullivan, 1955:

(According to Wiki, Sullivan thought Bo Diddley was going to perform Tennessee Ernie Ford's "16 Tons," but Bo crossed him up by playing "Bo Diddley.")