Music
Listened in 2008
The top 25 artists in rotation for 2008 as recorded by Last.fm, the website that tracks my listening habits in iTunes on my computer and iPod*.
High Five Session 1
high-five session #1 from Jonathan Igharas on Vimeo. With friend and classmate Jon Igharis. The goal of our sessions: learn something new, fun and creative in a few hours with available tools to produce something worth showing. Tonight: an Arduino, some LEDs, a Sony HVR-A1U HD camera, a couple MacBook Pros, and Final Cut Pro. We messed around with...
Farm Bent
Farm Bent from Jeffrey Werner on Vimeo. First circuit bending. I watched this Make Magazine circuit bending video blog entry about it. Then I bought an old childrens toy for €0.80 at a used store in the Netherlands. I unscrewed the back, put in three AA batteries and started messing around for the first time in front of the...
Three Theremin Tracks by Pamelia Kurstin
Recorded in 2002, theremin virtuoso Pamelia Kurstin posted on TED this February 2008: Also: for convenience, the three tunes played in this video (sans talking sections) for download: 01 Autumn Leaves.mp4 02 Listen the words are gone.mp4 03 Lush Life.mp4...
Song Names
Taken from the slogans on t-shirts in Matahari department store in Bali.
Faith in Numbers
An outlaw faith healer with sock monkeys for the kids Was the status message on Cat's gChat and I thought to myself I like the sound of that. Google brought me to In/Words 5.2, a Carleton U. student publication and prose by Rich Terfry. I read the whole thing and there was that same line. And more. And I asked...
Listened in 2006
Like Kottke's recent post, the following are my 25 most played artists for 2006 as recorded by Last.fm, the website that tracks what I'm listening to in iTunes on my computer: Neko Case Thom Yorke The Postal Service Ted Leo and The Pharmacists Jon Brion M83 Aphex Twin Silver Jews Final Fantasy Brian Eno Casiotone for the Painfully Alone Sufjan...
Before and After Science: Personal Deviations
Brian Eno's 1977 Before and After Science. Funny, it's been years since I've listened to Eno's Before and After Science and now that a friend and classmate got me rotating it again I'm realizing how possibly funny (even anachronistic) this album is relative to its chronological position in Eno's discography. Before and After came out, well, after what can...
Whiskey and Jazz
Homework and I talked tonight. We're taking a break. I fixed a drink, a fire, Paolo Conte and Duke Ellington. No one else is home and the hi-fi is on 25. It is good to have a home....
Current Culture
The last three months have featured lots of good (and legal! mostly) musics, reads and views.
Melody Meme (Musical Baton)
Seems every design blogger I subscribe to has been receiving and passing on this web chain, or meme. This month it's music listening habits. And oh I was sorely left out until Nixlog invited me into the sacred (and ballooning) circle. Total volume of music files on my computer: 16.2 GB (3457 songs) The last CD I bought was: I...
Tag Your mp3s Properly
It's not so hard people. I'm talking to you, recording artists and labels and online music distributors. Properly ID tag your mp3s, please, otherwise it's hard to know what I'm listening to and even harder still to actually buy music from you.
Classical Guitar Concert
My brother performed in his second solo concert at the Conservatory of Music in Victoria on April 1 (but no fooling). Photos are now posted.
Meme Theme: Most Popular Music in iTunes
Meme Theme: MY Most Popular Music in iTunes As started by Michael of Binary Bonsai in his original Flickr post. The rules: 1) Sort by 'Play Count'. 2) Take screenshot of the top and upload to flickr. 3) Link back to where you first saw this meme. 4) And leave a comment so they know where to look. 5)...
Girlfriend Mix CD
Answering a long overdue request, I made another mix CD for the girlfriend. My goals were consistency in sounds, relaxing to semi-relaxing in mood--such as for listening to alone in bed or doing homework--and to (hopefully) introduce her to a number of new artists/bands that I like.
Robert Fripp is Still Cool
Achewood makes mention of Robert Fripp today. The title text (hover mouse over comic) is pretty good: "Robert Fripp is the kind of guy who makes the hardest chord possible when getting his picture taken." Ya, Fripp is that cool. Take him any day over, say, Joe Satriani....
Streets: A Grand Don't Come For Free
I relate well to white rappers. I really liked the debut Streets (Mike Skinner) release and at first I was a little uncomfortable with his latest release, A Grand Don't Come For Free. It sounded, well, like a draft work for a final product, less pumped and fat (well, except maybe "Twat" and "Fit"), more stilted, slow, burnt. But it's...
William Shatner's New Album
"More than 35 years after the release of his debut solo album, William Shatner teams up with Ben Folds to create Has Been, a surprisingly pop-driven, lyrically potent collection of songs written by the duo. With the exception of "Trying," co-written by Folds and novelist Nick Hornby (High Fidelity, About A Boy), "Real" by Brad Paisley, and Pulp's "Common People,"...
Chad Vangaalen
Chad Vangaalen has spent the last ten years making music by himself in his Calgary, Alberta bedroom.
A review in tabs: Nick Hornby's Songbook
This review is more like a summary of my response to passages I recently tagged with little coloured sticky notes in Nick Hornby's pleasant Songbook (2002, McSweeney's Books)---short musings of some of his (the author's) favourite pop songs and the genre in general.
Current Tracks
Bob Dylan - The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan Brian Eno - Music for Films Neil Young - Decade CSNY - So Far Crash Test Dummies - God Shuffled His Feet Note: Everything's on actual store-bought CD, playing in my stereo....
Current Tracks
Morrissey / Smiths - Various Various Artists - Clap Mix Pixies - Live in Victoria April 21 Hot Butter - Popcorn MC Hawking - More Science Tenacious D - Various Tito Puente - Various DJ Danger Mouse / Jay-Z - Grey Album Note: Want the new Morrissey album You Are The Quarry... seven years in the waiting....
PIXIES tonight
Ya, Pixies, tonight at the Victoria Curling Club! I lined up for these tickets early one morning like two months ago with two friends of mine. We braved the chill and sleep deprevation (I believe we had done some socializing the night before) with venti-sized coffees at 7:30am with a hundred other shivering fans. Tickets sold out in like five...
Current Tracks
Nirvana - Smells Like Teen Spirit King Crimson - Starless and Bible Black Radiohead - Hail to the Thief; Amnesiac R.E.M. - Reveal Pixies - Doolittle Led Zeppelin - III In an effort to free up some memory for my current graphic work I've resorted to shutting down all non-essential operations in WinXP incl. SETI screen saver, the XP GUI...
Current Tracks
Boards of Canada Dan Bern - Fifty Eggs Evaporators - Ripple Rock Crash Test Dummies - I Don't Care That You Don't Mind Elliot Smith - Figure 8 Kevin Shields Soundtrack to Lost in Translation...
Jay-Z-Beatles
Friend sent me some tracks last night by DJ Dangermouse and his latest work "The Grey Album." Album should be doubly in quotes here because it's really a full length, unauthorized promo remix of rapper Jay-Z's "Black Album" and The Beatles "White Album." Making headlines (Yahoo News) for copyright infringement as well as mass online circulation. Estimated to be the...
Current Tracks
Weird Al - Eat it Yo La Tengo - Nuclear War; The Sounds Of The Sounds Of Science Interesting note to Tengo's SoSoS: it's a 78 min. album designed and performed as a cinematic soundscape to a series of undersea doc film shorts by what appears to be one of the more under-rated founders, avant garde champions and prolific authors...
Current Tracks
Tom Waits - The Piano Has Been Drinking J. Dowland (1563-1626) - Lachrimae J.S. Bach - Suite No. 2, BWV 1008 in D minor...
Current Tracks
Ween: Quebec Tom Waits: Nighthawks at the Diner Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass Joan Baez: Sings Dylan Andre 3000: The Love Below Aesop Rock...
Nardwuar and The Evaporators
I just got back from seeing Nardwuar and his punk band, The Evaporators. Friends of mine came by totally unexpected at like 9:30 tonight. Came onto my half-completed porch and banged on my kitchen window, a big chunk of which fell out (not their fault really), while I was doing dishes. Hopped into the Toyota and went to Lucky Bar...
Current Listening
OK, wanted to revise and expand this entry to include albums/artists I don't skip over in Winamp over the last few days, weeks and months (in no particular order, missing many, listed by Artist: Song/Album (and my comment on it)): Aesop Rock - (highest impact and most alluring, intelligent rap voice, ditto lyrics to boot) Squarepusher: Tomitto, My Red Hot...
Philip Glass in Victoria
P. Glass performed on the Island for the first time tonight and it was hard to know what to expect from the guy. I mean what was he going to wear for starters? Small ads in the local weeklies had listed Glass with a little photo in their calendars along side next week's rock and punk acts at the local...
A man may be very industrious, and yet not spend his time well. There is no more fatal blunderer than he who consumes the greater part of life getting his living.—Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) Copyright © 2002–2012 Jeff Werner, Creative Commons (Some rights reserved), Login