My birthday has come and gone. Feeling older, got stuck in thoughts about nearing 30 and wondering if I'm doing what I should be. The quarter life crisis has happened to me too many times I don't even want to think about it.
With observations done and the sem winding down there's time for writing. I'm also looking forward to some serious DVD viewing. I've been making an effort to buy those discounted original DVDs as of late. But then after going shopping this weekend I was made well aware of the severe limitations in title selection offered by chains like Astrovision and Odyssey. I was able to pick up a number of titles. I had no plans of buying any of them, I mean to say I never went around looking for them at stores and the like, but once the chance to buy them came up, I could not resist and got whatever could fit my meager budget. Here's to not eating out because I overspent on DVDs. Toast! and the flicks:
1. Nosferatu
2. Infernal Affairs
3. The Omega Man
4. Touch of Evil
5. Soylent Green
6. Some Like It Hot
7. Tarkovsky's Solaris
8. Yojimbo
9. Cape Fear (Original)
10. Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid to Ask
11. Zelig
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Friday, September 5, 2008
What Is Music? A playlist and a disaster
The past two weeks have been rather difficult. Leading up to my birthday, they have had me questioning what I'm doing, where I am at this point. It didn't help that I've had doubts about teaching thanks to the observations that have been conducted these last two weeks.
In the hopes of amending some mistakes in a past meeting and starting a provocative discussion, I decided to make a playlist based on the essay I am discussing, an excerpt of the chapter "What is Music" from Levitin's This is Your Brain on Music.
I spent the night picking through my iPod for the ideal tracks to include based on the paragraphs I would discuss, checking different resources to make sure I was picking songs from appropriate periods, etc, and then downloading something from West Side Story because it's on the list.
The following morning I packed up my big old speakers and lugged them to UP so that I would have a good sound system that would help the students hear and appreciate the music, in all its variety and richness.
I went to the room early to set up the speakers and make sure everything went well. I couldn't find an electrical socket. Then, in one corner, there was this plastic thing that resembled an outlet. I plugged in, and nothing. Nothing.
I spent the first quarter of the class time running around trying to find an extension cord so I could hook up to another classroom. The one time I try to utilize some AV materials, my own, and there was nothing. Playlist, speakers, all of it a waste. And there was I, sweating and distraught, the lesson as I envisioned dissipating as this panicked situation set in. I didn't know how to start, how to fix it. The connections between discussions was so clear in my head that not I had no way to transition. And worst of all were the senior teachers sitting there waiting for me to start. I was still trying to catch my breath.
needless to say, things did not go well.
in any case, I think that this playlist is very interesting, especially since it is asked within the context of what is music? how do we define music? I'll list the songs here:
First Levitin says that for some, "music" is the masters:
Track 1: Beethoven's Symphony Number 5
Track 2: Mozart's "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" Allegro
For others it's Busta Rhymes, Dr. Dre, or Moby:
Track 3: Busta Rhymes' "Where's My Money?"
Track 4: Busta Rhymes "What's it Gonna Be!?"
Track 5: NWA "Fuck the Police"
Track 6: Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg "The Next Episode
Track 7: Moby "Go"
For others it's jazz
Track 8: Miles Davis"Seven Steps to Heaven"
In the 60s parents were afraid of the evil influence rock beats from the likes of the Monkees would have on children
Track 9: The Monkees "I'm a Believer"
Track 10: The Rolling Stones "Satisfaction"
Track 11: The Beach Boys "Good Vibrations"
Bob Dylan was booed for going electric
Track 12: The Times They Are A-changing
Track 13: Like a Rolling Stone
For a time the Catholic Church banned polyphony
Track 14: Handel "And the Glory" from Messiah
Track 15: Happy Mondays "24 Hour Party People"
The Church also banned tritones because they were found to evoke the devil and were called Diabolus in musica
Track 16: West Side Story "Maria"
Track 17: Mishka Adams "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"
Track 18: The Simpsons Theme
If you take the time to listen, this is an immensely provocative list that asks us to question many of our beliefs about the parameters of music and the many ways that music has been judged in the past.
At least there's that list, and maybe I can pull off that lecture some other time, in some classroom where I can get it played.
In the hopes of amending some mistakes in a past meeting and starting a provocative discussion, I decided to make a playlist based on the essay I am discussing, an excerpt of the chapter "What is Music" from Levitin's This is Your Brain on Music.
I spent the night picking through my iPod for the ideal tracks to include based on the paragraphs I would discuss, checking different resources to make sure I was picking songs from appropriate periods, etc, and then downloading something from West Side Story because it's on the list.
The following morning I packed up my big old speakers and lugged them to UP so that I would have a good sound system that would help the students hear and appreciate the music, in all its variety and richness.
I went to the room early to set up the speakers and make sure everything went well. I couldn't find an electrical socket. Then, in one corner, there was this plastic thing that resembled an outlet. I plugged in, and nothing. Nothing.
I spent the first quarter of the class time running around trying to find an extension cord so I could hook up to another classroom. The one time I try to utilize some AV materials, my own, and there was nothing. Playlist, speakers, all of it a waste. And there was I, sweating and distraught, the lesson as I envisioned dissipating as this panicked situation set in. I didn't know how to start, how to fix it. The connections between discussions was so clear in my head that not I had no way to transition. And worst of all were the senior teachers sitting there waiting for me to start. I was still trying to catch my breath.
needless to say, things did not go well.
in any case, I think that this playlist is very interesting, especially since it is asked within the context of what is music? how do we define music? I'll list the songs here:
First Levitin says that for some, "music" is the masters:
Track 1: Beethoven's Symphony Number 5
Track 2: Mozart's "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" Allegro
For others it's Busta Rhymes, Dr. Dre, or Moby:
Track 3: Busta Rhymes' "Where's My Money?"
Track 4: Busta Rhymes "What's it Gonna Be!?"
Track 5: NWA "Fuck the Police"
Track 6: Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg "The Next Episode
Track 7: Moby "Go"
For others it's jazz
Track 8: Miles Davis"Seven Steps to Heaven"
In the 60s parents were afraid of the evil influence rock beats from the likes of the Monkees would have on children
Track 9: The Monkees "I'm a Believer"
Track 10: The Rolling Stones "Satisfaction"
Track 11: The Beach Boys "Good Vibrations"
Bob Dylan was booed for going electric
Track 12: The Times They Are A-changing
Track 13: Like a Rolling Stone
For a time the Catholic Church banned polyphony
Track 14: Handel "And the Glory" from Messiah
Track 15: Happy Mondays "24 Hour Party People"
The Church also banned tritones because they were found to evoke the devil and were called Diabolus in musica
Track 16: West Side Story "Maria"
Track 17: Mishka Adams "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"
Track 18: The Simpsons Theme
If you take the time to listen, this is an immensely provocative list that asks us to question many of our beliefs about the parameters of music and the many ways that music has been judged in the past.
At least there's that list, and maybe I can pull off that lecture some other time, in some classroom where I can get it played.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Lyrics and Noise
I've long been an advocate of the literariness of a song, that the lyrics and music should match but also that the lyrics should be very well written. While this is a topic of possibly endless debate, where I do find myself arguing with various of my own points, I do champion the importance of good lyricism, of good songwriting. So it's always interesting to find a jumble of words that, when written on the page, don't really make much sense, but fit perfectly with the music that they go with.
Case in point here is The Verve's carrier single from their new album, Forth, entitled "Love is Noise." While Richard Ashcroft has been hailed as one of the great songwriters (by Chris Martin, not sure by how many other people) he has a tendency to try to be metaphysical without really having a point. This isn't to say that I don't like the man's songs, far from it. The Verve are probably one of my favorite bands, if not my favorite from 90s britpop. Ashcroft has the gift for pretty lines, and also for finding a good line and repeating it in variations that give meaning when coupled with The Verve's music, particularly that airy guitar sound and the general feeling that you're someplace else when you're listening to them. And thus we have these lines from "Love is Noise" :
Will those feet in modern times
Walk on soles made in China?
Will those feet in modern times
See the bright prosaic malls?
Will those feet in modern times
Recognise the heavy burden
Will those feet in modern times
Pardon me for my sins
Love is noise
Come on
One might think that the song might be going somewhere. The rest of the lyrics are some variation on those in the lines listed above. And so, in trying to make sense of them, in any kind of literary way, one is left saying, "Huh?" And still, when you hear that chorus, "Love is noise/Love is Pain/ Love is these blues I'm singing again/" with that irresistible vocal hook and propulsive guitars, you can't help but be drawn by it, the head bopping to the dance/trance beat.
I've been trying to look for other examples. I think a good one is U2's "Bad". It sounds beautiful, the lush, warm melody that develops and really makes you swoon. Giving that song its rise is Bono's powerful delivery of some lines like:
If I could throw this
Lifeless lifeline to the wind
Leave this heart of clay
See you walk, walk away
Into the night
And through the rain
Into the half-light
And through the flame
When Bono sings them one line at a time, these lines seem so powerful, so rich in meaning. And yet when we look at it on the page it doesn't really aspire to a level anywhere near poetry. And still it fits perfectly within the context of the song.
This then begs the question, how can I accept and love these songs, and yet despise "Umbrella" or anything by Soulja Boy and mock the undying absurdity of Akon? Is it the purpose? Is it in the expression? When I hear the song that goes "It's too late to apologize" it seems that it's just such a bare and unbearable outpour of emotion, unmitigated by any artistic sense, much like "I-e-I-I will always love you-hu-hu-hu". And still these songs do, in some way, adhere to the principles of music composition. So how then do we define, do we judge? On what are we to base our aesthetics?
Lyricism seems still crucial in terms of whether I like a song or not. I suppose that this calls for a constant repositioning in the demand that we make of a song. But how is it acceptable for me to like "Love is Noise" when, for much the same reasons people will cite other songs and say, "E gusto ko yung beat" even if they don't know what the songs mean? I could appeal to The Verve's shamanistic tendencies where they invoke a kind of trance with their music and have these weird lines floating above it all. Then that brings along more problems and questions of the demand which we make of music. That would then say, so as long as you're making this kind of music you have a right to write drivel?
How do we define drivel and nonsense verse from plain nonsense? What makes "Come Together" or "I am the Walrus," both of those songs playing on sound-driven (and I'm inclined to believe acid-driven) verse, different or superior to contemporary pop music, much of the lyrics of which are nonsensical? I'm still trying to find an answer to this.
Case in point here is The Verve's carrier single from their new album, Forth, entitled "Love is Noise." While Richard Ashcroft has been hailed as one of the great songwriters (by Chris Martin, not sure by how many other people) he has a tendency to try to be metaphysical without really having a point. This isn't to say that I don't like the man's songs, far from it. The Verve are probably one of my favorite bands, if not my favorite from 90s britpop. Ashcroft has the gift for pretty lines, and also for finding a good line and repeating it in variations that give meaning when coupled with The Verve's music, particularly that airy guitar sound and the general feeling that you're someplace else when you're listening to them. And thus we have these lines from "Love is Noise" :
Will those feet in modern times
Walk on soles made in China?
Will those feet in modern times
See the bright prosaic malls?
Will those feet in modern times
Recognise the heavy burden
Will those feet in modern times
Pardon me for my sins
Love is noise
Come on
One might think that the song might be going somewhere. The rest of the lyrics are some variation on those in the lines listed above. And so, in trying to make sense of them, in any kind of literary way, one is left saying, "Huh?" And still, when you hear that chorus, "Love is noise/Love is Pain/ Love is these blues I'm singing again/" with that irresistible vocal hook and propulsive guitars, you can't help but be drawn by it, the head bopping to the dance/trance beat.
I've been trying to look for other examples. I think a good one is U2's "Bad". It sounds beautiful, the lush, warm melody that develops and really makes you swoon. Giving that song its rise is Bono's powerful delivery of some lines like:
If I could throw this
Lifeless lifeline to the wind
Leave this heart of clay
See you walk, walk away
Into the night
And through the rain
Into the half-light
And through the flame
When Bono sings them one line at a time, these lines seem so powerful, so rich in meaning. And yet when we look at it on the page it doesn't really aspire to a level anywhere near poetry. And still it fits perfectly within the context of the song.
This then begs the question, how can I accept and love these songs, and yet despise "Umbrella" or anything by Soulja Boy and mock the undying absurdity of Akon? Is it the purpose? Is it in the expression? When I hear the song that goes "It's too late to apologize" it seems that it's just such a bare and unbearable outpour of emotion, unmitigated by any artistic sense, much like "I-e-I-I will always love you-hu-hu-hu". And still these songs do, in some way, adhere to the principles of music composition. So how then do we define, do we judge? On what are we to base our aesthetics?
Lyricism seems still crucial in terms of whether I like a song or not. I suppose that this calls for a constant repositioning in the demand that we make of a song. But how is it acceptable for me to like "Love is Noise" when, for much the same reasons people will cite other songs and say, "E gusto ko yung beat" even if they don't know what the songs mean? I could appeal to The Verve's shamanistic tendencies where they invoke a kind of trance with their music and have these weird lines floating above it all. Then that brings along more problems and questions of the demand which we make of music. That would then say, so as long as you're making this kind of music you have a right to write drivel?
How do we define drivel and nonsense verse from plain nonsense? What makes "Come Together" or "I am the Walrus," both of those songs playing on sound-driven (and I'm inclined to believe acid-driven) verse, different or superior to contemporary pop music, much of the lyrics of which are nonsensical? I'm still trying to find an answer to this.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)