From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V16 #43 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Sunday, February 11 2007 Volume 16 : Number 043 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Colin Meloy ["Aaron L." ] Re: the truth is framed with lies [2fs ] Re: Colin Meloy [Benjamin Lukoff ] Re: Colin Meloy [Jeff Dwarf ] Re: That's enough guitars (ed.) ["Lauren Elizabeth" ] Re: That's enough guitars (ed.) ["Lauren Elizabeth" ] Re: Colin Meloy [Tom Clark ] Re: the truth is framed with lies [ken ostrander ] NEW on LMA: Robyn Hitchcock Live at Fletcher's on 2003-10-28 [wojbearpig ] Some numbers are more equal than others ["Lauren Elizabeth" ] SXSW [tanter ] Re: solos ["Gene Hopstetter, Jr." ] Re: My Portland days [Capuchin ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 14:34:10 -0600 From: "Aaron L." Subject: Colin Meloy I want to like The Decemberists. I have tried to like them time and again. I think that if I could hear the songs sung by someone else, I might like some of them very much. I just canNOT get past Meloy's whiny, nasally delivery. It grates. I can't ever get through more than two or three songs before having to switch to something else. Worst. Voice. Ever. I can't really explain it, but I just can't listen to it. That is all. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 15:41:32 -0600 From: 2fs Subject: Re: the truth is framed with lies On 2/10/07, ken ostrander wrote: > > >there is no "pi" just floating free out there in the universe > > > from http://imdb.com/title/tt0454876/ > After a shipwreck, Pi is found adrift in the Pacific Ocean on a 26-foot > lifeboat with a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a 450-pound Bengal tiger > named Richard Parker, all fighting for survival. har. >> even within the relative certainty of mathematics, there are > >> mysteries. the exact value of pi can only be approximated. > > > >there's no "mystery" about its value at all > > i'm sorry; but the fact that no one can write it all out is pretty > mysterious. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than can be written out in your alphabet. That doesn't make them mysterious. Describe your toothbrush, exactly: the words will be only an approximation of the object, no matter how good a writer you are. I suppose you could argue that in fact your toothbrush *is* a fount of mystery...but then, if everything's mysterious, nothing's mysterious. > > and pi is transcendental. there's some wild weird stuff out there > connecting pi with the capstone of the great pyramid and the star of > bethlehem: Put enough numbers together, massage the data enough, and you'll come up with concordances and correspondences between any two things. (See the whole _Wizard of Oz_/_Dark Side of the Moon_ thing for one example - not necessarily re numbers - and incidnetally, I took a movie and a CD at random, started them simultaneously, and came up with several more intriguing correlations than the Floyd/Oz ones...) Humans seek (and find) patterns. Doesn't mean the patterns *mean* anything. - -- ...Jeff Norman The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 13:44:39 -0800 (PST) From: Benjamin Lukoff Subject: Re: Colin Meloy On Sat, 10 Feb 2007, Aaron L. wrote: > I want to like The Decemberists. Why? ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 14:20:44 -0800 (PST) From: Jeff Dwarf Subject: Re: Colin Meloy "Aaron L." wrote: > I just canNOT get past Meloy's whiny, nasally > delivery. It grates. I can't ever get through > more than two or three songs before having to > switch to something else. Worst. Voice. Ever. I > can't really explain it, but I just can't listen to > it. Meloy sings like a three-year-old on the verge of throwing a temper tantrum. "I believe in the marketplace of ideas even if the other guy doesn't have any." -- Keith Olbermann . ____________________________________________________________________________________ Cheap talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. http://voice.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 17:59:48 -0500 From: "Lauren Elizabeth" Subject: Re: That's enough guitars (ed.) Hi Fegs, Mike Godwin says: > * Sorry, Lauren. I was just trying to divert things a bit from the > interminable Broome-bashing... Oh, I was exaggerating. I'm a non-interventionist at heart. Rock on. > * Yes, but that symbolic logic is just a meta-language which doesn't > solve the problem of communication. And if you took it seriously, then > you would need a meta-meta-language behind that, and so on. Well that's true. I don't think it or I was claiming it solved the problem of communication. As far as the meta-language, that's a problem, but it's also an acknowledged problem. And it's a proven problem on top of that - Kurt Godel proved it in his incompleteness theorem which (my words) says that any axiomatic system for natural numbers that is interesting enough to say anything will contain statements that can not be proven within that system. Some people saw Godel's theorem as tragedy (logic has inherent weaknesses) and some as liberation (there are some things which escape mechanization.) Sorry to drone on...I'm currently completely fascinated with Godel's theorem and am happily studying it more in depth after being interested in it for years. > > From: "vivien lyon" (snip) > > http://www.newyorker.com/printables/critics/051121crat_atlarge Wow, I didn't know about The New Yorker archives! Great stuff...I was trying to find this old article about these two nutty Russian guys who had this homemade computer in NYC that computed pi to like a billion digits (when the movie "Pi" came out, I thought it was about these guys - I think in some ways it might be "based on" these guys.) At any rate, I couldn't find it, but was thrilled to find this article about Einstein and Godel that talks a bit about Godel's work: http://www.newyorker.com/printables/critics/050228crat_atlarge xo Lauren - -- - ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "People with opinions just go around bothering one another." - The Buddha ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 17:11:25 -0600 From: 2fs Subject: Re: That's enough guitars (ed.) On 2/10/07, Lauren Elizabeth wrote: > > > > > > From: "vivien lyon" > (snip) > > > http://www.newyorker.com/printables/critics/051121crat_atlarge > > Wow, I didn't know about The New Yorker archives! Is there any link to them from the main page? Because I can't find it... Going up to everything up to "printables" brings nothing. - -- ...Jeff Norman The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:35:47 -0500 From: "Lauren Elizabeth" Subject: Re: That's enough guitars (ed.) Hi Fegs, Jeff says: > Is there any link to them from the main page? Because I can't find it... > Going up to everything up to "printables" brings nothing. That's odd. At any rate, for the article I posted the the url for try: http://www.newyorker.com/search/query?query=mathematician&page=1 It's currently article #9. or perhaps just www.newyorker.com and search if that doesn't work? xo Lauren - -- - ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "People with opinions just go around bothering one another." - The Buddha ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:22:41 -0800 From: Rex Subject: Re: fishbowl honey On 2/10/07, ken ostrander wrote: > > > 'paris 1919' is my favorite solo cale. and yes. i am a casual > fan. robyn should do a cover of the title track perhaps in a medley with > 'the ghost in you' and 'surfer ghost'. It's certainly a great song for Halloween mixes, often overlooked due to its not-that-obviously spooky title. I've kinda wanted to do a more rock-ish cover for a while. Not TOO rockish, but less stringy. You know what I mean.... - -Rex ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 21:06:10 -0800 From: Tom Clark Subject: Re: Colin Meloy On Feb 10, 2007, at 1:44 PM, Benjamin Lukoff wrote: > On Sat, 10 Feb 2007, Aaron L. wrote: > >> I want to like The Decemberists. > > Why? I wish I had thought of that response. Namaste. - -tc ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 04:33:35 -0800 (PST) From: ken ostrander Subject: Re: the truth is framed with lies >I suppose you could argue that in fact your toothbrush *is* >a fount of mystery...but then, if everything's mysterious, nothing's >mysterious.< well, who knows what's growing there? if everything is nothing, then why bother with anything? there is a way of looking at the world with awe and wonder that imbues a sense of appreciation at the wondrous complexity of everything around. isn't mystery (hysterically) subjective? >There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than can be written out >in your alphabet. > >That doesn't make them mysterious. check out a dictionary and then get your (other) monkey to type you up the complete works of shakespeare, because a wink is as good as a nod to a blind man. i think that the limitations of the alphabet have been established. isn't that the point? and doesn't this apply to mathematics as well? aren't there problems that cannot be solved (at the current level of human understanding)? >Humans seek (and find) >patterns. Doesn't mean the patterns *mean* anything.< and it doesn't mean they don't. this thread started way back with jung's idea that "neurosis in the modern world is caused by our attention being directed solely to the objective, scientific, and rational". all of that unconscious archtypal muck will bubble to the surface despite all efforts to keep it down (just like someone on the other extreme might get hit by a bus crossing the street). like it or not, intuition and instinct guide much of what we do. there's a very deep drive to find some kind of unified field theory. you might compare it to the drive to find god. and there's the rub. no one can prove any of it. but provability and truthfulness are not necessarily the same thing. it boggles the mind. then again, meaning is (mysteriously) hysterical. ken "i don't know why the sun don't shine -is it because of me?" the kenster np david crosby 'if only i could remember my name' - --------------------------------- Get your own web address. Have a HUGE year through Yahoo! Small Business. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 13:00:06 +0000 From: hssmrg@bath.ac.uk Subject: Re: solos ad. naus. (sorry Lauren) Quoting fegmaniax-digest : > On 2/9/07, Michael Wells wrote: >> Re guitarisms: I was interested in MRG's earlier definition of a good >> solo, finding myself in general agreement with his criteria...after >> putting a bit of thought into it, it seems like my all-time faves >> matched up pretty well. >> Limelight (Rush - Alex Lifeson) >> Fight the Good Fight (Triumph - Rik Emmett) >> Rock and Roll (Zep - Jimmy Page) >> Aqualung (Jethro Tull - Martin Barre) >> Just about anything by Les Paul >> Wabash Cannonball (Doyle Dykes version) >> All Along the Watchtower (Hendrix) >> Tightrope (Stevie Ray Vaughan) >> I Don't Know (Ozzy - Randy Rhoades) >> Comfortably Numb (Pink Floyd - David Gilmour) > > From: Rex > Subject: Re: Step aside, Peter Green > I don't think there's any way could I create a list like this, since the > kind of solos we're talking about-- at least the kind I get the impression > we're talking about-- are improvisational in nature and change each time a > song is performed. Perhaps I could list my favorite "original as recorded" > or "studio" solos, but even that would be tough. My tendency is to believe > that the best iteration of a guitar solo, or (especially) lead vocal, or > whatever, is more likely to occur when the artist has had more time to > explore and "get to know" the song in question than the first time out of > the box. > Of course, it probably also occurs before the song becomes a boring, rote, > autopilot exercise for the artist, so who knows. * Yes, agreed. Very occasionally you see Chuck Berry on form when he belts out one of his classic solos, but basically he doesn't care any more. That 60th birthday film shows him (and Clapton, and KR) all really trying, wonder of wonders. And to my mind 'Watchtower' is over-prepared to count as a guitar solo: there are at least 3 guitars in there, one of them a slide. I prefer Hendrix things like 'Crosstown Traffic' and 'Roomful of Mirrors'. > There are a lot of variables-- some solos are written to be played the same > way each time of course, and sometimes the take closest to the spark of > inspiration might be the purest. I just tend to think of songs as things > which evolve with each performance, and while the initial studio version of > a song might be "definitive" in that it's usually the first one everybody > hears, and the most frequently heard thereafter, it's sometimes left in the > dust by subsequent versions. Almost anyone who's been in a band that's > recorded material early on has probably had the experience of revisiting > early recordings and thinking, man, we ended up playing that so much better > 2/3rds of the way through the tour... > - -Rex * Get back in the studio, Rex! > From: Tom Clark > Subject: Re: Solos > I often think about putting a list like this together, but the > thought usually fades after the song is over. There are a lot of > Steely Dan songs that fit here, be they Becker, Baxter, or Dias leads > I don't know. * Da da DA DA, da da DA DA da da diddly diddly diddle do Da da DA DA, da da DA DA da da squiddly diddley squiddley diddle is surely the one. 'Reelin' in the Years' performed by Elliot Randall. . And of course it's an example of a 'written' solo. Better than that drivelling 'Bodhisattva' thing, anyway, which is surely improvised beyond all hope of structure. > Too many Zep songs to list, but despite it being > played out, the Stairway lead is still fantastic. Yes. And 'Since I've been loving you' is a good one. > Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 01:29:26 +0000 > From: michaeljbachman@comcast.net > Subject: Re: Solos >> Ah hell - I've always been a large-scale air-mover of the long solo in the >> studio version of "Marquee Moon"...builds beautifully. > I'll agree with Jeff on the building power of "Marquee Moon" Here are > some of my favorites, they may not be the most popular chocies, but > the get me, > Phoenix ( Andy Powell and Ted Turner - Wishbone Ash) > Baby's On Fire (Robert Fripp - Eno's first album) > Wooden Ships (Jorma Kaukonen - Jefferson Airplane) > In A Different Place (Andy Bell - Ride) > Walking On A Wire (Richard Thompson - Shoot Out The Lights) > Mountain Jam (Duane Allman - Allman Brothers Band) > Dover Beach (Vicki Peterson - Bangles) > Why Does Love Have To Be So Sad ( Eric Clapton - In Concert : Derek > and the Dominoes) > Come On In My Kitchen and many others (Robert Johnson) > Oh Well (Peter Green - Fleetwood Mac) > Michael B. * Well, if Michael is allowed to mention Wishbone Ash twin guitar solos on this list, then surely I can get in at least one of the twin guitar solos on (you've guessed it) 'If only for a moment' by Blossom Toes: Probably 'Wait a minute' is the best one, but 'What we need is a Love Bomb' is good too. * My favourite Robert Johnson is 'Preaching Blues' I think, but of course as KR points out, he plays lead, rhythm and bass all at once so doesn't count as a lead guitarist like B B King, who doesn't play chords at all. * That D and the D song is called 'Why does love got to be so sad' totally ungrammatically, I think. - - Mike Godwin n.p. 'Buzz Me' by B B King ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 16:24:33 +0100 From: Sebastian Hagedorn Subject: My Portland days Hi, the next two days I will see two bands from Portland in a row. First, tomorrow, come the Decemberists. I can see why people might dislike Colin Meloy's voice, but even though I'm usually picky about voices and have in the past dismissed bands based just on that one criterion, in this instance it does not bother me a lot. I also note that he varies his style of singing, so that his voice isn't as nasal on each track. On Tuesday I will see the Epoxies. I haven't really heard any of their music, but based on the comments here I already wanted to check them out last time around, about a year ago. I didn't make it after all, but a friend of mine did and she was pretty excited as well. So this time I will definitely catch them. It's amazing how many shows they are plaing here in Germany and in what unusual locations! Their tour plan is on their MySpace site: The place they're plaiyng at here in Cologne is tiny. It's basically a punk bar. There isn't any stage to speak of. I'm curious what it's going to be like. - -- Sebastian Hagedorn Ehrenfeldg|rtel 156, 50823 Kvln, Germany http://darkstar.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/ "Being just contaminates the void" - Robyn Hitchcock ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 10:34:27 -0500 From: wojbearpig Subject: NEW on LMA: Robyn Hitchcock Live at Fletcher's on 2003-10-28 Robyn Hitchcock October 28, 2003 Fletcher's Baltimore MD *** THIS IS A 16-BIT FILESET INTENDED FOR AUDIO CD *** SOURCE: schoeps mk4v > schoeps vms02ib > modSBM > sony tcd-d8 PROCESSING: Conner CTD8000R-S > dat2wav 1.2 > soundforge 8.0 (tracking, fades, resample) > flac 1.1.3 DISK ONE 01 intro 02 I'm Only You 03 [no transformation involved] 04 I Got the Hots 05 [this was a radio hit] 06 Balloon Man 07 [richard butler] 08 The Ghost In You [Psychedelic Furs] 09 [coffee supplied by ryan carey, leo] 10 When I Was Dead 11 [false start / tuning] 12 [a lot of life consists of trivia] 13 1974 14 [Ronald Reagan] 15 You Remind Me Of You 16 [folk-rock moment] 17 No, I Don't Remember Guildford 18 [self-annhilation] 19 Uncorrected Personality Traits 20 [another song on the phantom album] 21 Keep Finding Me 22 Sleeping With Your Devil Mask 23 Full Moon In My Soul 24 [pre-encore crowd] 25 [buzz] 26 Raymond Chandler Evening 27 [underway a railway line] 28 I Often Dream of Trains 29 [tuning] 30 [circumstances like this] 31 You and Oblivion ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 11:53:39 -0500 From: "Lauren Elizabeth" Subject: Some numbers are more equal than others Hi Fegs, Jeff says: << There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than can be written out in your alphabet. That doesn't make them mysterious. Describe your toothbrush, exactly: the words will be only an approximation of the object, no matter how good a writer you are. I suppose you could argue that in fact your toothbrush *is* a fount of mystery...but then, if everything's mysterious, nothing's mysterious. >> IMO, it's not a valid analogy. What you say is can be said be true of any word or idea. You arbitrarily choose "toothbrush" and, agreed, there is nothing particularly special about "toothbrush" in this manner. Pi, on the other had, is a highly unusual number. If you treat it in the way you used "toothbrush", there's nothing special about it. It's an object or an idea and it transcends description just like any any object or idea. But compared to other numbers, there's something quite unusual about it. In fact, there are a number of unusual things about it. It probably even has its own Wikipedia entry. Take that, "toothbrush". That pi is called a "transcendental" number always seemed appropriate to me. I'm amazed by it and not for any crazy voodoo reasons. It's a really fascinating number. In fact, I was kind of in awe of looking at those one million digits - I never saw anywhere nearly as many digits of pi (and if I should tire of those, there's http://www.lulu.com/content/283069 ). Trivia - apparently not everyone likes the 22 / 7 approximation that Ken mentioned: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Pi_Bill xo Lauren - -- - ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "People with opinions just go around bothering one another." - The Buddha ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 11:31:13 -0800 (PST) From: Jeff Dwarf Subject: While I like the album a fair bit and can see myself liking it more with more time, I do have to say that The Good, The Bad, & The Queen is the worst band name in aeons. Maybe ever. "I believe in the marketplace of ideas even if the other guy doesn't have any." -- Keith Olbermann . ____________________________________________________________________________________ Finding fabulous fares is fun. Let Yahoo! FareChase search your favorite travel sites to find flight and hotel bargains. http://farechase.yahoo.com/promo-generic-14795097 ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 13:22:51 -0600 From: tanter Subject: SXSW Does anyone know where Robyn is playing and what time? We've been looking and can't find the info. None of the bands we're interested in have venues posted for that week. Marcy ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 14:26:31 -0600 From: "Gene Hopstetter, Jr." Subject: Re: solos On Feb 10, 2007, at 2:21 PM, fegmaniax-digest wrote: > Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2007 01:29:26 +0000 > From: michaeljbachman@comcast.net > Subject: Re: Solos [snip long list of guiter solos] The best solo ever is Dan's Smith's on Tintern Abbey's "Vacuum Cleaner." Looks like he played it on a Tele: . ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007 13:44:48 -0800 (PST) From: Capuchin Subject: Re: My Portland days On Sun, 11 Feb 2007, Sebastian Hagedorn wrote: > the next two days I will see two bands from Portland in a row. Yay! > First, tomorrow, come the Decemberists. Always a pleasure. > On Tuesday I will see the Epoxies. Excellent! These guys are totally underrated. Roxy Epoxy is an unbelievable vocalist. She also really knows how to front a band. I saw a month ago in one of the smaller venues in town and it was packed with folks of all ages; from the aging punk set to a surprisingly large high-school contingent in the all-ages area. > Their tour plan is on their MySpace site: > Also, www.theepoxies.com. > The place they're plaiyng at here in Cologne is tiny. It's basically a punk > bar. There isn't any stage to speak of. I'm curious what it's going to be > like. The show can be all about slam dancing and stage diving, so it's kind of a shame there's no stage. Soaking up my last days in Stumptown, J. - -- _______________________________________________ Capuchin capuchin@bitmine.net Jeme A Brelin _______________________________________________ ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V16 #43 *******************************