26
Sep
2008
England Wrap Up and Arts News
I’ve been back in the states for over a week now. There are days it feels like I never left in the first place. There are always a little bit of the blues whena trip ends. That’s how you know I had a good time.
There’s not much to say about the trip back other than I completely wrenched some muscles in my back. I have no idea what my bag weighed going out, but I looked a the weight at the check-in at Gatwick airport and when I converted from kg to lbs, it was around 43lbs! I believe a small child stowed away in my bag somewhere. With compliments to my pack, when it was on my back I didn’t feel it, but everytime I hefted it up there, I did. It felt heavier to me and I still don’t know how. I swear I did NOT bring much back beyond the odd fridge magnet and assorted very trivial and tiny souvenirs. I brought back freaking carved rocks from Mexico that didn’t weigh me down as much. I’m sticking to the story that a small child (or midget) made their way to the states unbenowest to me. It took nearly the week since for my back to sort itself.
Oh, I was frisked more than once and had my carry on luggage searched at Gatwick. I have never gotten through Gatwick without being singled out for a frisking. On the happy column (not the frisking), the plane had a lot of empty seats. Bad for Delta, great for me. The row of 5 seats I was on had three people. I got to stretch out and read and read (9 hours of reading with maybe a half hour nap).
Anyway, quite settled back in here and I’ve had just a little time to edit some photos. This trip’s gallery is here: England September 2008 Travel Photos
A few of my favs so far:
London Underground Sign and Big Ben
Churchill Statue And Big Ben
Stonehenge Beneath Moody Sky
Fyi – all of the above are available as prints.
Last update for the moment is that this weekend I’ll be in Montezuma for the annual Beaver Creek Festival. I’ll have a vendor booth again this year but did not have time to enter the art contest. The vendor booth was a lot of fun last year. I’d been to the festival many years before and you run into a few people,but if you sit in one spot the whole day, it feels like you see everyone you’ve known. Hope to see some of you there!
I’m also participating in the Oakhurst Arts & Music Festival on October 11th. The Atlanta Photography Group is sponsoring a tent and I am taking part and will have work available there. Looking forward to attending!
17
Jun
2008
Long Awaited Updates – From DIY to Entertainment
Okay, I can only guess at how long they’ve been awaited, but I have been very MIA of late. Nothing super exciting, but I suppose I should do a bit of updating here.
The biggest thing of late has been re-doing my kitchen. I moved in to my current abode nearly 8 years ago. The kitchen at that time was little changed from 1988, when it was built. All the same appliances, but the burgundy paint was probably not so original. That was the only thing I changed then. Repainted the walls and moved on to the rest.
Over the intervening years, for one reason or another, I’ve replaced everything save the 1988 over-the-range microwave. That’s next… And I replaced all the cabinet hardware sometime ago with something that was, if nothing else, not brass and worn out. But the kitchen looked tired. The counters were worn out. The sink was dingy. And the paint colors I picked on the fly were less and less cheery.
A month ago, I decided it was time to move on with my long delayed plans to do something about that room. I don’t enjoy working on kitchens and baths because if you dawdle at all it’s inconvenient. But at least I have more than one bathroom. Not having a completely functional kitchen for a month, even for some one who cooks minimally, is a nuisance.
At any rate, in a month, I ripped out the old counters and replaced them with stone-look laminate counters from IKEA. I put in a new cast iron, porcelin enamel sink. I put up a new subway tile back splash, repainted the walls (and ceiling and trim for that matter but not new colors), and added halogen spot lights under the cabinets. It’s a marked improvement. It’s not the same as a complete remodel, but the cabinets are in solid shape and the next owner will have to decide if they want to dump those. I’ve got a new album for these diy projects for any one who wants to see the kitchen progress. I don’t feel like digging up the old photos, so the before and after is lost on anyone who hasn’t visited before.
Next up is probably a little freshening up of the dining room which has been beige for 8 years now.
As always, I can never have just one project going. The secondary project being the continuing digital evolution of my life. It began as previously reported with converting every CD to MP3 and emptying 3 shelves of CDs into two albums in the bottom of my wardrobe. The next step has been a similar purge of the shelves of DVDs. Now, DVDs take up a lot more space digitally and even though terrabyte drives are out there, I think it will be a little bit before I go entirely digital, but I did decide that I didn’t really need all those cases. I’ve kept (for the time being) the boxes my box sets came in, but all the rest I pulled the covers and put them in an archival box and dumped the cases. The DVDs are arranged in a couple of hanging file boxes for CDs/DVDs. I am digitizing some of it. I’ve ripped my entire Doctor Who collection (I am so geeky) in full resolution. Hence the need for a terrabyte drive in my media center PC. I’m also ripping selected others and some of my more watched will probably be ripped to xvid. That’s an ongoing task as I get the energy to continue with it. But in less than a year, an entire shelf emptied and moved out.
And the purge continues, I have a stack by the front door to go to Goodwill soon. It’s really a struggle sometimes. I am from generations of pack-rats. I pick things up and they bring back memories. It’s very hard sometimes to separate those memories from those objects, but I find more and more that I can win and empty a few more shelves or a few more boxes.
The hard drives continue to fill, though! 2007 alone was 40 gig of photos. And the music collection continues to grow – 30 gig right there (and I doubt I’m up there with massive music aficionados).
Speaking of music, I probably have a lot of albums I should talk about, but the most recent will win out for the moment. Last week, two new albums came out.
One I had been looking forward to for ages, the latest from The Fratellis, a band hailing from Glasgow, Scotland. The funny thing was I was supposed to see them at the street party on New Year’s Eve at the conclusion of 2006, but there was bad weather. I went to Scotland having heard nothing of them. I left having heard bits and pieces of their first album on the radio and having stood in a music shop on Princes Street and listened to the CD before purchasing it. That CD, Costello Music, was in heavy rotation on my return, along with the Automatic’s Not Accepted Anywhere. The Fratellis sophomore album, Here We Stand, is of a similar vein, a lot of fast tempo, fun songs. I’m still digesting the the songs, but already genuinely love it. Other than the first single, Mistress Mabel, the song I find myself already singing along with is Acid Jazz Singer. Ask in a few weeks and that may have morphed to other tracks.
You can listen to most of the new Fratellis album online.
The surprise album last week was a solo effort by Jakob Dylan (lead singer/song writer for the Wallflowers, and, yes, son of Bob Dylan). I have long been a fan of the Wallflowers. Bringing Down The Horse (1996) went through many road trips with me, and each subsequent album has pretty much been an instant purchase. For me, some albums have had more fav songs than others, but none of the Wallflowers songs were stinkers. That said, it wasn’t until 2002’s Red Letter Days that I found an album from the group with as many favs as Bringing Down The Horse. Anyway, I digress, just setting things up a bit. I had heard nothing of the upcoming solo album from Jakob. I found the bulk of the album could be previewed on myspace and after a couple of listens, I went ahead and downloaded the album. I’m very impressed. I drove home for Father’s day this past weekend, and on a 2 hour drive, both ways, Seeing Things was my only choice of things to listen to despite an ipod crammed with options. I don’t do that with many albums, but I could for this one. As much fondness as I have for the Wallflowers, and I do hope there’s more to come from this band, this new album has the song writing I love pared down to an acoustic format, a very awesome side bar if not the first of more solo work for Jakob. So far, the single song on this album that I enjoy the most is All Day And All Night, no good explanation of why, just the first song I really latched onto, but the next strong second place song is This End Of The Telescope. I found out Jakob Dylan will be playing at the Variety Playhouse tomorrow night, so guess where I’ll be.
Okay, where else can you go for photography, DIY projects, and music? I ask where?
Ha – I’ll try for more focused rambling next time. Hopefully I can soon get more focused on photos again!
22
Mar
2008
INXS – More Of The Rose Colored Glasses
I’ve documented elsewhere that I recently went all digital. All my music is now in the form of ephemeral bits and bytes on my hard drive (and backed up elsewhere). And my three shelves of CDs have been compressed down to a couple of binders.
Although a freeing experience, I’m still dealing with the effects to some degree. I ended up choosing J River’s Media Center to handle my virtual library of music, and have been steadily working my way through the catalog to rate all these years of music on a 5 point scale. Feels like both an un-ending process as well as a trip down memory lane. The point of rating them, of course, is so that I can build play lists of my fav stuff. My 5 point scale is 3 – okay, not a super fav but a song I don’t mind hearing; 4 – wow – great song; and 5 – ohmigod, I could listen to this over and over.
This also lead to my semi-regular rediscovery of the awesomeness that was INXS. They were one of my fav bands in the day. Although I had a few of their later releases on CD, for the most part it, was cassette, and I thought that I probably had the best of the best on Shine Like It Does, the box set
Now, I had copied a fair chunk of my cassettes to mp3 last year, and the INXS stuff I included in my library (unlike most of the rest) despite it’s dubious quality. I’m so glad I did. I started working my way through it last week. And although I haven’t yet finished, I already re-purchased two of the albums in digital format. Go Amazon, you’re lucky I’m on memory lane this week!
My introduction to INXS was probably when most of the rest of the US caught on to them, with the release of Kick.
I also waded through Listen Like Thieves
The re-purchased albums so far are Kick
I’ve listened to these two over and over the last few days, and I just fall in love again to the sound of this band and feel much sadness that I never saw them live (and the bands I make the effort to see live are not a huge number). And I feel sorrow again that Hutchence is gone (a decade later this year). Maybe his best work was already behind him, or maybe we missed out on the genius that was yet to come. We’ll never know.
I know technically INXS is still out there making music, but I loathe reality TV and the stunt with picking the new lead singer soured me such that I never have listened to any thing post-Hutchence.
It’s interesting to re-tread these steps again. I’m not prone to doing it. Although I often obsess over past decisions, second-guess myself, etc., music has always been one space in which I moved forward. I hardly have any greatest hits collections. Even moving into the world of CD’s, I purchased maybe 4 or 5 CDs that I had previously owned as cassettes. I sometimes forced myself to stick a few older CDs in my car changer just so I didn’t lose sight of a band that no longer was or wasn’t producing anything I enjoyed anymore. I have never been a fan of radio stations that only play music from certain decades And I’m always shocked and dismayed when I hear someone say they don’t make good music anymore. The music a decade or two decades ago or what have you was so much better. Statements like these just floor me. I wonder if they really listen anymore.
Anyway, that said, I’m going to go listen to Kick Again…
6
Mar
2008
Roger Clyne – Turbo Ocho
First, I have to explain, because many may have no idea that my favorite band is a little band from Tempe, Arizona. Roger Clyne led a band in the mid 90’s under the name, The Refreshments. They had one big hit that most people who listened to music at the time would recognize if they heard it but I’ve yet to deliver the title and had Joe Public recognize it.
The Refreshments released two albums, and then had studio issues and split. I never forgot the band, but I didn’t keep up with them for years. I listened to those two albums and enjoyed the hell out of them. Several years would go by and I would discover Roger and some other band members had put out two indy albums as Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers. Not only that, they were coming to Atlanta for a show in two weeks. I bought the albums without having heard more than a sample and got to listen to one before attending my first RCPM show.
I don’t consider myself a mega-fan. I’m comfortably in the middle somewhere. I’ve seen them at one of their twice yearly shows in Mexico. I’ve followed them to South Carolina when they skipped Atlanta on their tour and I’ve seen them in Athens as well. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen them play at Smith’s Olde Bar. I clearly like the band, but I haven’t followed them over half the country as some have.
That said, this past January, when I was engaged in my Lawrence of Arabia re-enactment, they got together in Rocky Point Mexico and recorded their latest album, Turbo Ocho. At the end, they had a sold out show with the new work for those lucky fans who were able to go.
The album doesn’t actually come out for a bit yet. The CD release party is in a week. The album isn’t due to hit stores until April 29th. The band is following in the footsteps of other bands, however, and the album is available for download and you can name your own price.
A great opportunity for someone who wants to give them a try. I’m listening to the album for about the third time now. Still don’t have a review to offer. I can say it’s familiar for those who are fans of the band. I don’t know how to describe RCPM otherwise. Southwest USA… Mexico meets American Rock… Just go listen!
9
Feb
2008
A Vampire Weekend Out of Season
I spent the day doing some website maintenance. Funny, I thought I was going to do some house cleaning. Coincidence or procrastination? Hmmm….
Anyway, while I was chained to the laptop, I finally caught up to the latest podcast at Have You Heard – a fairly new but swift growing local podcast. The folks doing it are local, the music calendar is local, but the music, is diverse in location and taste. There have been several bands added to my myspace friends list to keep up with, but today I made my first purchase as a result.
I pretty much suck at music reviews – I just know when I like something, and the song played on the latest podcast for a band called Vampire Weekend, appealed to me. I popped by their website and listened to some more and then splurged the $7.99 for the album at amazon.
Give the band a listen, and give Have You Heard a listen as well – even if Vampire Weekend isn’t your cup of tea, I think you’ll find something along the way that does it for you.
