200 posts - and that's it

So, let me redirect you to confoundyous.tumblr.com. I'm going to be writing there from now on. Maybe more regularly. Maybe not. Maybe more interesting content. Probably not.

South Bronx is Akihabara is Damascus is South Bronx

DJs are clearly the geeks of hip-hop culture. Between operating behind electronic instruments and spending endless amounts of time searching for the best tracks in crates, these are guys who, like other geeks, are meant to live in many different forms of obscurity and contemplation. It's a perfect contrast, naturally, to MCs. There's an obvious affinity between the charismtic poet and the syncopated technician.

Both DJs and MCs also frequently rename themselves when they become a real musical act. This has also happened throughout history. The first canonical re-naming that I can think of is St. Paul, who was re-named from Saul by God. In turn, his mission was changed from one who persecuted Christians to the most Catholic of Catholics. This phenomenon of re-naming permeates culture, including hip-hop culture. This kind of rebirth leads to the creation of a "character" in music. It isn't the actual person who is saying these things or making these rhymes, it's the character. Does anyone think that Afrika Bambatta is really that crazy? That there truly exists a "Method Man?" Eminem, obviously, has explored this theme to perhaps overkill.

At one time, a DJ would thrive by playing tracks made by influential black artists like James Brown. Using James Brown today would be a throwback, but wouldn't really be considered creative in any way. However, it seems that music on the level of James Brown isn't being made today and so many DJs subsist on the detritus of pop culture, hoping to find a beat that nobody else has ever exploited. Other DJs have exploited the most popular beats they can find, mixing melodies and rhythms that are already widely known. This, to me, is what is most amazing about Greg Gillis. He takes the principles of hip hop culture, the beats, cutting, everything, and applies them to indie rock (aka white kid) culture. A great fusion and also one side of a widely diverging road - that between navel-gazing nostalgia and computer-centric beat-making, aka electro.

Forgotten Hereoes: Laura Ingalls Wilder

I've never read any books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Little House on the Prairie always seemed a bit too girly to me as a kid. It fit in the genre with that other three-named girly author Louisa May Alcott and their English counterparts, the Brontës (whom I have come to thouroughly enjoy) and Jane Austen (whom I still disdain).

I recognize that this was probably due to proto-mysogynism at the age of 11. But anyway, I would now like to publicly repudiate an active dislike of Laura Ingalls Wilder. I mean, she started writing at the age of 65. Not everyone, in fact, hardly anyone, can pull off that sort of total reinvention in old age and fewer can be really, really great at it. I'm 25 and I already think I've peaked. My memory is getting worse and my mind is like a block of cement. Not so for Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Emo Diaries: The Appleseed Cast

The Appleseed Cast is pretty weird for an emo band. The first album, The End of the Ring Wars, aside, most of the material strays widely from the accepted turn-of-the-millennium formula for emo exemplified by Saves the Day or Alkaline Trio. Instead, these guys take their cues from U2 and Godspeed! You Black Emperor (but in a good, wholesome emo way... I actually don't really like those two bands). That's an awkward way of saying that the Appleseed Cast uses a lot of drone in long songs that typically have the vocals deep in the background.

I saw Appleseed Cast in DC recently at a show that was cut short because there was an after-party for a Ladytron show starting at 11pm. Whatever. The show itself was definitely enjoyable, but it made me think a lot more about the band. These guys just seem beaten. And not only because they were battling illnesses and were almost run over by a tornado recently, but through their songs and performances too. The vibe they give is different from most emo bands - there's a strong sense of doom in a very unironic way. Instead of writing catchy, easy songs for teenage kids, these guys went the opposite direction and paid the price for it. Here they are, coming up on 15 years of existence, and still being booted off stage by some English electro pricks.

It might be the Kansas thing that throws me off. But there's something much more authentically emo about these guys. No flash, no theatre, just pain and resignation. Nobody will be singing the lyrics at these guys' shows, there will certainly be no "whoa-oaa" moments, and if there's anything even remotely like a breakdown, it's hidden under eighteen layers of reverb. Yet their music still speaks, and powerfully so.

The Uncanny Absence of Idioms in Subtitles

I've never translated anything except the most basic sentences from foreign language textbooks, so I can't totally sympathize with their conundrum, but I feel for those tasked with writing subtitles for foreign films. I think a big reason why foreign films are often considered aloof or incomprehensible has to do with the crevasse between the words as heard uttered from the actors' mouths and the words as read on the screen. There's a lot of alienation going on there and it is reasonable that it puts off most people.

The weirdest thing, though, for even experienced subtitle readers (anime, foreign films, very-very-quiet screenings) is the total lack of idiomatic language in many subtitles. It's difficult, because even if what the actors are saying basically means something equivalent to an idiom in American English, the translator can't really use that idiom. It would sound really bizarre if Marcello Mastroianni said someone was a "dead ringer" or a "flash in the pan." But idiomatic language is an essential element of almost all communication in English and probably is everywhere in the dialogue of most foreign films. Just one of those layers of meaning that I'll probably never be able to unravel...

Rocketboom Concerns

So Rocketboom has a new host and it makes me very unhappy. I absolutely adored the former host, Joanne Colan. But she's gone, and the new host is this girl Caitlin Hill. The way I said that sounds kind of dismissive or contemptuous... and it's mean to be, kind of. She's not as beautiful as Joanne and even though she also has an English accent, it isn't quite the same. Somebody who knows much more about English accents could probably tell me exactly where Joanne's comes from and where Caitlin's comes from and could tell me all about what kind of a horrible person that makes me.

I also know that I shouldn't judge right after her very first appearance and give her time to ease into the chair and endear herself to me. And I will. I guess I just imagined Elie Rountree taking the seat and was unhappy that she was passed over too.

Great moments in post-punk/hardcore/whatever

Milo's creepy rapist laugh doesn't appear in this live version... which is unfortunate.



Ian MacKaye has my ideal life story.



Still can't believe I missed the two Rancid shows at Black Cat in 06.

Fiona Apple is my real guilty pleasure

I have a lot of guilty pleasures. My Chemical Romance and Gilmore Girls are two that I've talked about before to a lot of people. One I don't think I've discussed at length to anyone is Fiona Apple. The thing about Fiona Apple that makes her, probably, my most guilty pleasure is her legitimacy. A lot of other guilty pleasures, like campy movies (by far the most acceptable form of "guilty pleasure," to the extent that it shouldn't even really be considered one), ABBA, or Food Network can be justified in various ways. MCR hearkens back to my emo or Smashing Pumpkins days. ABBA is a derivative of my Stephin Merritt fetish and is ridiculous/outlandish enough to be acceptable. Food Network is utilitarian.

I should have no real connection with Fiona Apple's music. It's undeniably effeminate in more profound and robust ways than MCR or ABBA. She has little to no indie cred; her first album was probably her most popular and came out when she was 19 or something. There's really no reason why I should like her. That's why it makes no sense - there is no justification. For all my other guilty pleasures, there's some sort of 'out' - a reason why I like it. That doesn't exist for Fiona Apple.

Yeah, I mean there's the basic truth that the music is incredible. Tidal, beyond its 1996-esque cred, has about eight really, really good songs. The other albums get a bit more experimental, and that's even better. Her lyrics, also, are some of the very few outside of hip-hop that I actually listen to and care about. But beyond that, as far as image is concerned, there's no justification.

Wait a sec, here's a classic fall-back criterion to vindicate me - she's hot. I'd be all circa-1999-P.T. Anderson with her. I just wish she would come out with more than one fucking album a decade.

Fiona Apple |MTV Music

"Sleep to Dream" is probably the hottest Fiona track ever. You should listen to the drums from the first few seconds on at least mp3; this video fucks them up.

Fiona Apple |MTV Music

"Fast As You Can" is a latter-day Fiona banger that you might not have checked out.

Fiona Apple |MTV Music

A Fiona ballad; I wasn't able to get the video for any of the songs I really like from Extraordinary Machine. This song is pretty good too, though.