Category: entertainment

  • The Reverse of Happy

    I tried to follow up yesterday’s exercise with the opposite. The same rules apply except for the techno one, with one fudge. I honestly can’t remember putting Teardrop on a mix cd, but the way I love that song, I can’t believe it. Maybe I just never shared it with anyone.

    A couple other things I realized while compiling this list:

    • I don’t have a lot of depressing music in iTunes. I know I have more at home that I haven’t ripped yet, but it wasn’t handy to grab right this minute.

    • A lot of stuff I thought was depressing really isn’t. Morphine? Except for a couple notable exceptions, they’re not depressing at all. The songs are sometimes, sexy, other times ironic or cynical, and sometimes just plain bouncy.

    • Ben Folds and Phish both throw some great woe-is-me classics in between the happy poppy stuff. Evaporation on Whatever and Ever Amen is amazing, as is Dirt from Farmhouse

    Here it is, a CD I whimsically call Depressed as Hal:

    Title

    Artist

    Album

    II\. Lento E Largo – Tranquillissimo

    Henryk Gorecki

    Symphony No. 3

    Everybody Hurts

    R.E.M.

    Automatic For The People

    Dirt

    Phish

    Farmhouse

    I Grieve

    Peter Gabriel

    Up

    Trouble

    Coldplay

    Parachutes

    Sour Times

    Portishead

    Dummy

    Don’t Change Your Plans

    Ben Folds Five

    The Unauthorized Biography Of Reinhold Messner

    Gone For Good

    Morphine

    Yes

    Teardrop

    Massive Attack

    Mezzanine

    Evaporated

    Ben Folds Five

    Whatever and Ever Amen

    Passacaglia/Bud And A Slice

    Joe Jackson, feat. Brad Roberts – voice, Judy LeClair – bassoon

    Heaven & Hell

    Sweetness Follows

    R.E.M.

    Automatic For The People

    My Head Sounds Like That

    Peter Gabriel

    Up

    Maybe I’ll Come Down

    Soul Coughing

    El Oso

  • Happy Schmidt

    Taking a break this afternoon, I decided to create a happy mix CD (for no good reason, titled Happy Schmidt). I gave myself a couple rules:

    • I couldn’t use any songs that I’ve put on another mix cd (that I could remember)

    • no techno (electronica, trip hop, etc)

    • avoid stuff I listen to all the time.

    Here’s what I came up with:

    Title

    Artist

    Album

    In The Days Of The Caveman

    Crash Test Dummies

    God Shuffled His Feet

    Ain’t Goin’ to Goa

    A3

    Exile On Coldharbor Lane

    Count ’em Up Queek

    2NU

    Ponderous

    Underground

    Ben Folds

    Ben Folds Five

    Short Skirt/Long Jacket

    Cake

    Comfort Eagle

    Rudie Can’t Fail

    The Clash

    London Calling

    Brick House

    Commodores

    Millennium Funk Party

    Tripping Billies

    Dave Matthews Band

    Crash

    You Better Be Doubtful

    The Housemartins

    The The People Who Grinned Themselves To Death

    **updated** Rotten World Blues

    Eels

    rotten world blues EP

    Glamour Boys

    Living Colour

    Pride

    Penguins

    Lyle Lovett

    I Love Everybody

    Birds Of A Feather

    Phish

    Story Of The Ghost

    Boll Weevil

    The Presidents of the United States of America

    The Presidents Of The United States Of America

    Shiny Happy People

    R.E.M.

    Out Of Time

    Stay Up Late

    Talking Heads

    Sand In The Vaseline (Disc 2)

    What Is Hip?

    Tower Of Power

    Millennium Funk Party

    Jack-Ass

    Beck

    Odelay

    Once In A Lifetime

    Talking Heads

    Sand In The Vaseline (Disc 1)

    **updated** That’s Not Really Funny

    Eels

    Souljacker

    updated I was listening to the CD in the car and realized that I Wanna Be A Witch, while really happy and bouncy, contains some profanity. This wouldn’t normally bother me, but the CD had to be Max-friendly too, so I’m making a new copy. I dropped that song, and added Rotten World Blues and That’s Not Really Funny, both by Eels. Good, jangly, rocky stuff.

  • Crazier Days Documented

    I was on TV. It was a long time ago, but still, I was on TV. I had a show. It wasn’t my show; it was our show. Jim, Di, Kris, Brain, Brian and me (with recurring guest stars, like the gaysian). It was called TechX. Every Saturday night at 10pm, we took phone calls on Tucson’s excellent Public Access station, originally about tech support, but eventually about just about anything (we got bored with the tech support angle – it wasn’t as funny as the rest of the stuff we talked about). It was a blast.

    My role on the show was Otto the Head. I was originally supposed to be a robot, but that died really early on. I wrapped myself in a blue sheet, and was a disembodied (round) head for 50 minutes every week, cracking wise and trying to keep up with Jim and Brain. I loved it. I was young, stupid, and ready for anything (OK, I wasn’t ready for anything, but I was willing to try almost anything).

    I keep thinking of ways to get that back… the feeling of doing something completely unscripted and silly. I’d love to do another public access show, but there’s no one here I feel like doing a show with. Plus, public access is non-existant in Loudoun country (as far as I know). I was talking to a coworker today about the show, and I realized that I don’t have any crazy friends (they know what I mean, it’s good crazy). In Tucson, I was the straight man. All of my friends were crazier than me, did crazier things, lived a lot freer than I did. Now, I’m the crazy one. I don’t have crazy friends. I’m not sure I have many friends here at all… and the people I do consider my friends are all normal… really, really normal.

    Just as proof that, once upon a time, I was involved in something crazy, unexpected, spontaneous and alive, I give you: Hed’s Favorite (Real Player – sorry). It’s a clip from a reunion show we did, I think in 2000 at Christmas time. I was already sane… so it’s not as crazy as the shows I mentioned as my favorites: the Halloween show, and the show where some drunk chick thought I was hot. Those were the days…

    The clip is courtesy of Jim, who promises more. If he gets around to the Halloween show, I’ll definitely share it.

  • Putnam Investments Commercial Music

    I love it when I can pick out the songs used in commercials. You know that new Putnam commercial with the picture frame flying around the office? The commercial’s fairly forgettable, but the music isn’t. It’s from Lemon Jelly‘s great In The Bath, which is on their peachy-keen Lemonjelly.ky.

    I have two of their albums, the one mentioned above, and Lost Horizons. I can’t recommend them highly enough. They’re loopy, happy, goofy fun. Definitely check them out.

  • I Would Refute It, But It’s True

    Guess who’s number one on Google for “greatest pot roast“? Yup, me again. And unlike the last time, I’m not refuting this one. Not only is it true, it truly is the world’s greatest pot roast. Really, no kidding.

    The best part is that the recipe, with minor alterations, works for pork and chicken too. Just modify the bouillon used to marinate and baste. Oh, and if you don’t own a crockpot, you should.

  • Tired, But Full of Music

    I’ve been too tired to do much of anything. I think I’m worn out from all the travelling, and it doesn’t seem to matter how much sleep I get, I’m still tired. My birthday was fun. I’m twenty-nine now. Yep, so it goes.

    I got a ton of new music in Austin, and I’ll tell you all about it some other time. For now, go buy Zero7‘s latest: When It Falls. It’s fantastic. An earlier album, Simple Things is also stellar. Why? It’s laid back trip hop with beautiful voices, gorgeous songs and great lyrics. Let it wash over you like a hot shower.

    Oh, and go give Scott Andrew some money. Not only does he write beautiful songs, but he makes great yearbook picture faces too!

  • Max’s Bouncy Stuff

    I’ve been on a mini-quest to create the perfect mix CD for Max. When we go out, we always listen to music, always have a CD in, and Max isn’t shy about expressing his opinion about what’s playing. So, for the past year, I’ve been making mix cd’s trying to find songs that he’s never heard before that he’ll flip over (and always leaving in some of his favorites from past cd’s). Here’s the latest version (he loves it so far):

    1. Jerry Lews (not by Jerry Lewis) from Ska the Third Wave: Instrumentals

    2. The People Who Grinned Themselves to Death by The Housemartins from the album of the same name as the song.

    3. The Song From The Kill Bill Trailer: You know the one I mean.

    4. La Unda from that Ska instrumentals album in \#1.

    5. Sheep by The Housemartins from London 0 Hull 4

    6. Back on the Train by Phish from Farmhouse

    7. Hit the Road Jack by Mo’Horizons from Remember Tomorrow

    8. You Keep it All In by The Beautiful South from Carry on Up The Charts

    9. Cat Juide from that instrumental ska album

    10. The Mango Song by Phish (running out of time, find your own albums)

    11. Particle Man by TMBG

    12. Back in Black covered by Living Colour

    13. It’s The End Of The World As We Know It by You don’t know?

    14. Hey Baby by No Doubt (Max loves them)

    15. Deeply Dippy by Right Said Fred (their album is underrated. there’s some quality stuff on it)

    16. Watermelon Man from the ska album

    17. Woo Hoo from Kill Bill

    18. Istanbul (Not Constantinople) by TMBG

    19. If I Had A Boat by Lyle Lovett (I think this is the first song Max knew all the words to)

    20. We Are Each Other by The Beautiful South

    I don’t know why I like making him mix cd’s so much. I just do.

  • The World’s Greatest Pot Roast

    Because someone asked how I made my perfect roast, I figured I’d share my recipe. This recipe is for a 5 quart crockpot. If you have a smaller one, use enough to fill up your crockpot and that’s it. If you don’t have a crockpot… why not? Go get one, now! So, here goes:

    Ingredients:

    • 1 \~5 pound beef roast

    • 5 – 6 medium sized potatos

    • 12-18 mini carrots

    • 5 large stalks of celery from the outside of a celery bunch (don’t buy the celery hearts, get the real stuff. The stalks on the outside have a stronger flavor.

    • 1 smallish red onion

    • 1 smallish yellow onion

    • 2 beef boullion cubes

    • 1 vegetable boullion cubes

    First, dissolve one cube of beef boullion and the vegetable cube in two cups of boiling water. In a glass baking dish or large bowl, put the roast in, and pour in the two cups of broth. The roast shouldn’t be completely covered by the broth. Now, cover the top in a healthy dose of salt, pepper and garlic powder. Cover the dish and put in the fridge for at least two hours (mine was in overnight).

    While your roast is marinating, let’s do potatos. Wash them, and then chop them up into 2-by-2 inch chunks (cubes are for the French… rest assured, they’ll be yummy no matter what the shape). Then, take the long celery stalks, wash them, and then cut to fit in the bottom of the crockpot (I just had to break them in half). Skin your onions and chop off the ends.

    Dissolve the last beef boullion cube in one cup boiling water, set aside for now.

    In a large skillet pour about two tablespoons of olive oil and turn on to high heat. When the oil just starts to smoke, take the roast out of the marinade and drop it in the skillet (then step back). Turn heat down to medium high, and brown on one side for five minutes, then flip and brown it for five more minutes. Turn off the heat and let the roast rest for a minute.

    Here’s the fun part. line the bottom of the crockpot with the celery stalks, then enough carrots to cover the bottom. Now, take the roast out of the skillet and plop it into the crockpot on top of the carrots and celery. Cram your two onions between the roast and the side of the pot, and then dump in your potatos. Your potatos shouldn’t be so high they’re overflowing (your top should fit snugly). Right before you turn your crockpot on and put the lid on, pour the beef broth over the whole thing.

    Turn your crockpot on high, and leave alone for no less than 5 hours (I think mine was in for 7 or 8). When it’s done cookin’, plop the whole mess, minus the celery on a big platter and serve. You’ll freakin’ love it.

  • Best Albums of the Nineties?

    Michelle picked Pearl Jam and Soundgarden. Sorry, but nope. The best albums of the nineties are…

    • Lyle Lovett’s Joshua Judges Ruth: The album that made me listen to Country – Ok, I only ever listen to Lyle, but that counts, doesn’t it?

    • Massive Attack‘s Mezzanine: How many other bands (that are still around, unlike the grungers who all traded in their flannel and went electonic) have been as copied as Massive Attack? How many bands, with such a small library of albums, have shown up in as many soundtracks over the last decade (Coldplay doesn’t count – yet)?

    It’s so hard to pick two. My first inclination was to go with Morphine‘s Cure for Pain, but that’s just because I love it, not because it actually started anything. Pearl Jam and Soundgarden weren’t even the first grunge bands to hit it big.

  • Jumpin’ Dreadlocks, Batman!!

    How come nobody told me that Living Colour released a new album?? Huh? Two demerits for everyone who didn’t tell me.

    The only person who doesn’t is Anil, who’s daily links feed informed me of the news… the rest of you, I can do without, thank you.

    Oh yeah, there’s an interesting discussion on labels going on over at nonDependant. Really, there is.