Redartz: Happy Tuesday, everyone! The week is (fairly) new, the lines are open, and the options available to you are limitless! Okay, perhaps a few limits, but you get the idea. What element of Bronze age life are you eager to discuss? There was quite a bit going on during the 70's and 80's, so those limits we spoke of are pretty loose...
And, for the sake of pump priming, I'll toss out another "Follow the Leader" extra bonus topic. The back story:
This past week, I decided to treat myself to a tablet upgrade (selling all these comics should have a reward or two, after all). In the course of transferring my files, images and music, a glitch occurred: all my playlists vanished into the ether. Therefore, every couple of days I reassemble another playlist from the voluminous mass of tunes on my computer. It's fun work, but still work; and leaves me a bit bleary eyed from scrolling. So, to the question: how do you enjoy organizing your music? What kinds of playlists do you put together? Do you simply stream, or do you take a more active hand? Do you go with genres (rock, classical, jazz, or whatever)? Or do you get more specific (say, all songs from a given year)? And what thoughts do you have regarding the ready availability of all that classic vintage music?
Okay, the table is set: one pre-set question and another impending topic. Let the discussion begin!
16 comments:
Oh MAN, Red-!
When you chose a career path in the professional art world, it was CLEARLY a blow to the Library Sciences-- ! (I say that as an affectionate rib AND with admiration, of course---)
I'm thinking, "Organize my playlists and something-about-streaming and WHAT, now?"
My catalog of personal music is exclusively on CD's. . . organized in the IKEA Rack Method with Teetering Piles Stacked Around Them. The Jenga-Tower method, I suppose one could call it.
To be fair, though--- XM/Sirius is the service that has my ears most of the time (at the shop for 10+ years, now). It is tough to find stations that my cohort and I can agree upon, though, so the default stations are generally the 70's, 60's, and 80's channels, First Wave, Spectrum, and maybe Classic Vinyl or Classic Rewind. If I'm there on my own? BEATLES CHANNEL, baby!! (As well as maybe the classical channel and the big band channel--)(Radio Classics tends to be a major default before I go to music, though---)
Ol' Pandora also gets streamed through my laptop a lot in the kitchen at home, as well as when we're working in the theater space itself. Pandora is sort of like a loopy relative or quirky Sitcom Next Door Neighbor-- where you just accept her, flaws and all. If you don't make at least a minimal effort to give her playlist-feedback as she goes along, she will take you down the most tangled tangential listening roads that you NEVER wanted in the first place. Example: My BRIDGE OVER RIVER KWAI channel-- I got it well-tailored to playing largely epic/adventure movie themes, marches, "big" film scores-- that sort of thing. One day I wasn't paying attention for a solid couple of hours, left the room, and came back in to the jarring strains of Liberace Playing His Greatest Polka Hits. . .
Oof!
HB
Here's my secondary question - it has nothing to do with Bronze Age nostalgia but I thought it might make an interesting topic:
What is your opinion of tattoos? Have you got one? Have you considered having one? Why? Why not? What's the point of tattoos?
To the first topic, I pretty much just listen to internet radio, mostly the FIP channels out of France, and don't have much in the way of personal music. I'm just lazy that way, I guess.
To the questions of tattoos, when I was younger I entertained the thought, but when I became a student of Classics we learned that in antiquity, tattoos were the mark of the slave. Masters tattooed their slaves as way of marking them as property, and sometimes as punishment. So the thought of walking into a convention of classicists with a tattoo, and having them automatically think that, was kind of non-starter.
Not long ago I took my nieces to the pool near their house and I saw a great many people my age with tattoos of various sorts and they all looked to be rather sorry and blotchy. Yes, that intricate Aztec calendar on your back may have looked fantastic when you were 23 and weighed a lean 130 pounds, but 25 years and 25 pounds later, it's showing your age but in an ironic and not very good way.
Cheers!
Personally, I don't care for them at all--- not a bit. (Tattoos, that is--) I think they distract and detract from the simple beauty that is inherent in any person's body (of any shape or type). The same with most piercings and ornamental body-mods you see. HOWEVER-- I would never say that I disapprove of them outright or would ever deny someone the choice or option to use their body as a canvas--- or as a means of self-expression. I have 'way more than a few friends and associates who are DEEPLY passionate about their body-art, and their emotional/spiritual connection to it cannot be understated. And for a sub-set of those folks, the tattoo represents an existential touchstone in their life, and having that piece of art there with them is a wonderful reinforcement and comfort. I totally get that. And so, for that reason alone, I'm happy to toss away my more superficial aesthetic qualms.
Another subset that I think is GREAT is when tattoos are used to transform scars or areas of injury into little works of art all their own. Optical creatures that we are, our focus is inevitably drawn to things that are unexpectedly different from the norm-- like damaged bodies, for instance. If lingering examination (let alone staring) is inevitable, how much better that the focus be upon a bit of whimsy, rather than on the more obvious reminder of pain and trauma?
HB
I love the availability of music online nowadays ... way better than sitting next to the radio all day, hoping they'll play that one song you like. I'm kinda old school with music (I don't even have an MP3 player), so I have a lot of burned CDS. My playlists, like my musical tastes, tend to be eclectic.
I generally think tattoos are cool, although I don't think I'm really suited for one, so I'll probably never get one. I personally find women with tattoos hot (no, not just tramp stamps), so maybe that's why I have a favourable opinion of them in general :)
Online is useul for checking music out, but I'm even older school and listen on vinyl if I can (theres always one, eh?). I never sold my old records when cds came in, but even so there was a point when it was difficult getting anything new. These days you can get a lot of stuff on lp; and if a record costs too much ... well, thats a sign I probably won't listen to it much anyway.
Tattoos? Like a lot of things, it depends on how they're done. Some look good, some very much don't.
-sean
Sorry, that third word above should be "useful". Duh.
-sean
I just go to "Tunein" and, between listening to Talksport from the UK, find an 80s station, whilst driving in the car. O/wise I may turn the dial and see what the stations are playing. I do not seek out new music. If it hits me, by chance, when I'm tuning the dial, I'll listen to more on Youtube. E.g. that's how I discovered Foster the People a few years back.
Regarding tatts...
As George Amberson Minafer, heir to a vast fortune, said in 1919, “I don’t want to do something! Rather I want to be somebody!”
Me thinks that 95% of humanity would rather not face the struggles of study, practice, and toil to “do something” like try and become a doctor, piano player, or a comic book artist. Rather, we opt for the “be someone” approach of displaying a tattoo, "my" music, chic clothes (i.e., “look at me!”) which requires no study, practice, or toil to acquire at all!
HB- Yes, ol' Redartz has a bit of obsessive/compulsive in him. Periodically rearranging my cd's, from alphabetical by artist to genre grouping, to chronological and back again. Same with my playlists; always tinkering with them. My tablet has become almost an extension to my arm; I'm closing on on becoming a cyborg (which is only fair, I kid my wife about being one as she is hooked up to an insulin pump). Oh, and Liberace's Polka Hits sounds...... memorable......but your epic theatrical soundtrack channel sounds excellent!
Colin- as to your question, I find tattoos pretty cool if well done. Some are rather, shall we say, unappealing. Both my sons have tats, and they invited me; I politely declined. If I ever did, though, it would be something small and subtle, like Spiderman's spider symbol on a shoulder...
Selenarch- interesting historical take on the tattoos. Thanks for sharing that info!
Mike W.- being eclectic in your musical tastes is a great thing! Open ears, open mind. Anyone listening to my music player could encounter anything from Gregorian Chant to Sinatra to Dr. Demento to James Brown. And yes it is much better today; no radio dial scrolling necessary.
Sean- listening to vinyl nowadays may not be so much 'old school' as qualifying you for 'up there with the hottest trend'! Would you believe even cassette tapes seem to be staging a comeback?
Charlie- "I don't want to do something! Rather I want to be somebody!" Does that not sound like the whole story of the Kardashians?
Growing up in America in the 60s, like my dad said, "only convicts, gangsters, and sailors have tattoos. It's also against our religon (Catholic)."
I suspect the only real reason for a surge in tattoos that started in the 90s/00s is just another way to say "look at me" after the novelty of "watch me play my boom box loud" wore off, lol.
There are exceptions, like exceptions to anything.
Now, we have cars with loud mufflers, boob jobs, social media, and I'm sure other things to say "look at me."
My playlists are always "Greatest Hits" packages of artists I love, or once loved. This week, my playlist is Eddie Money, The Cars and ELO. The first two are probably obvious (the deaths of Money and Ocasek, and ELO because I just watched its concert on Showtime.
Rick- yes indeed, spotlighting a particular artist makes a great playlist. I was listening to the Cars yesterday as well.
I do playlists by genres.....rock classics, soul/funk, blues, jazz, Cajun/zydeco, reggae, surf. Since I like blues a lot, I do break it down by subgenres......soul-blues, blues-rock, Chicago blues, West Coast blues, Texas blues, Swamp blues, etc.... I also have a few playlists devoted to artists that I like a lot. I've got about 10,000 songs on my iTunes account that I've collected over the years, so I'm always adding and removing playlists. It's something to do, I guess. :)
Tattoos.......don't have one, don't want one, don't care much for them. Never have. I see somebody with one, I picture them when they're 75 and where it will be on their body in proportion to where it is now.
My poor shop-associate is a pretty big Cars fan, and Ocasek's death hit her rather hard. We had to choose Sirius/XM stations that almost certainly would NOT have any Cars tunes on their playlists, 'cause she knew it would bum her out. (WORST tribute, IMO, was on the Beatles Channel, where the host found a weird-and-not-particularly-euphonious mash-up of the "You're Just What I Needed" vocal track played over-top of the "Hard Day's Night" instrumental track. Yarks!)
And Colin J, I'd go so far as to say that big facial tattoos-- ESPECIALLY the psychopathic HATE-themed ones that you mention-- could just about be exempt from the conversation entirely. 'Cause man, you cannot edge past the fact that there is a MAJOR personality disorder or illness or fracture driving a decision like that. (Well--- or near-terminal immaturity, maybe. . . )
HB
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