kottke.org posts about music
Jay-Z is banning Cristal champagne in his clubs after some “racist” comments by the champagne house’s managing director in The Economist. I think Jay-Z is confusing race with culture here; I can’t imagine two cultures that are more different from each other than American hip hop and French champagne production. Despite his hesitancy about discussing a culture unfamiliar to him, I thought the director essentially said that they aren’t worried about the bling lifestyle association because it’s ultimately good for business. (via bb)
Names of books + band names. Charlie Daniels and the Chocolate Factory, Motley Crusoe, The Natalie Merchant of Venice, and J-Lolita…you get the idea.
“Dude, it’s time. Girls, you too. Time to pack up the whole in-your-face, raw, hyper-sexualized, porno, skater, white trash, open wounds, self-effacing, Jackass, loose ethics, 80’s bar mitzvah disco, and party-till-you vomit movement, aesthetic and attitude. Go on, scram. Beat it. We don’t want you hanging around anymore.”
My new favorite song ever for the next 20 minutes is Smiley Faces by Gnarls Barkley (album @ Amazon). Can’t get enough. Thanks to Greg for turning me on to the GB.
Long ago, I signed up on last.fm and downloaded the AudioScrobbler plugin for iTunes, which plugin listens to what I’m playing in iTunes and sends a report of it the last.fm web site. Then I promptly forgot about it. A year and a half later, it’s compiled quite a musical dossier on me: 10,300+ tracks listened to (that’s about 18 per day), my most listened to track is A Dream by Cut Copy, and my 10 most listened to artists are Ladytron, Boards of Canada, Fischerspooner, Bloc Party, John Digweed, Daft Punk, Royksopp, Pixies, Radiohead, and Sigur Ros.
Even longer ago, I used the dearly departed Kung-Tunes to place a list of my recently played music on kottke.org. Thanks to the last.fm API and a gently modified version of this PHP script, that list is back; you can find it on the front page of kottke.org.
Cloud Cult has been Pitchforked, Clap Your Hands Say Yeahed by Gothamist, and is already the last next big thing, but that’s not going to stop me from recommending them to you. Here’s their latest album (which was instantly good and still so after a week), befriend them on MySpace, or download a few free mp3s. Minnesota represent!
Old 70s song about the subway from Sesame Street. This went totally over my head as a kid, but as a NYC resident, it’s awesome. On the subway. Subway!
In 1962, Arthur C. Clarke was touring Bell Labs when he heard a demonstration of a song sung by an IBM 704 computer programmed by physicist John L. Kelly. The song, the first ever performed by a computer, was called “Daisy Bell”, more commonly known as “Bicycle Built for Two” or “Daisy, Daisy”. When Clarke collaborated with Stanley Kubrick on 2001: A Space Odyssey, they had HAL sing it while Dave powered him down.
A clip of a 1963 synthesized computer speech demonstration by Bell Labs featuring “Daisy Bell” was included on an album for the First Philadelphia Computer Music Festival. You can listen to it (it’s the last track) and the rest of the album at vintagecomputermusic.com. (via mark)
Update: A reader just reminded me that HAL may have been so named because each letter is off by one from IBM, although Arthur C. Clarke denies this. (thx, justin)
A fan site on MySpace for the hot UK band Arctic Monkeys reportedly sold for $2000+, although it’s unclear (because they took the auction page down) if eBay allowed the transaction to go through. Mena, how much for Ready Steadman Go?
Olympic snowboarders competed while listening to their iPods. The goal? Effortless concentration. “It enables you to focus on what you’re doing without actually focusing, if that makes any sense. You’re not over-thinking, and that’s the best way to perform the harder tricks and maneuvers.”
Unknown (relatively speaking) indie rock bands are turning down large sums of money from GM for licensing their music for Hummer ads. “It had to be the worst product you could give a song to. It was a really easy decision. How could we go on after soundtracking Hummer? It’s just so evil.” (via rw)
The fashion industry doesn’t try to control its creativity the way that the music and film industries do. “The fashion world recognizes that creativity cannot be bridled and controlled and that obsessive quests to do so will only diminish its vitality. Other content industries would do well to heed this wisdom.”
Presenting the Bible’s Book of Genesis in rap songs. For instance, the song for Genesis 21 — which tells the story of Isaac and Ishmael — is Big Poppa by Notorious B.I.G.
The Song Tapper: “search for music by tapping the rhythm of the song’s melody”. This works amazingly well.
Some of the worst selling DVDs on Amazon. Looks like the Hammy the Hamster DVD series isn’t doing so well. See also books and music. (thx, josh)
Andreas Pavel was the inventor of the portable music player (aka Walkman). “I was in the woods in St. Moritz, in the mountains. The snow was falling down. I pressed the button, and suddenly we were floating. It was an incredible feeling, to realize that I now had the means to multiply the aesthetic potential of any situation.”
Newer posts
Older posts
Socials & More