I’m Alone. That’s Okay. July 20, 2009

I am now 4 down on the big 1001 albums before I die project, 997 to go. I scribbled notes about everything under the moon while listening to those 4 records. I will hopefully get them in a coherent order and blog about it. After all the scribbling of the notes, I was mentally spent. It was like I opened my head and shook out all of my thoughts, which was fairly good.

What I figured out early on was that there are so many things I have always wanted to learn and know and research about music in general and the role it plays in our lives, I am especially interested in the gender politics in music, of fans and artists. I hope it will make an interesting read for the two people that read my blog and maybe make some sort of step towards school and maybe researching this topic in depth.

Meanwhile, my yarn stash has gotten a bit more out of control since the last time I attempted the stashbust. So I have gotten way more serious about it and am trying to crank out easy, quick projects. My favorite so far is my Malabrigo Morrissey button hat (thanks Dani for the pic! I take horrible pictures).

I made another one like it and will attach my peppermint White Stripes button. When I get pics of the other stuff I have made in the last week, I will post and probably create a separate page for all of it since I am journaling what I am knitting while listening to the 1001 albums of doom.

Current Listening: Elliott Smith (It’s gloomy outside and I am gloomy on the inside. Thanks last night’s dream. That was cool of you.)

A Plan July 19, 2009

I have a plan. I have loved music so much since I was a young child and me and my dad would watch MTV. Last year I got the insane idea that I would go album by album through the book 1001 Records You Must Hear Before You Die. I listened to a couple I already had (see repost below) and kind of got too intimidated by it. I AM GOING TO COMMIT TO DOING THIS IN THE SHORTEST AMOUNT OF TIME POSSIBLE. I have been in a rut lately music wise. I listen but haven’t really felt much and it’s upsetting. The one record this year that I absolutely adore above any other is the Dead Weather’s “Horehound.” It kicked the cobwebs out of the part of my brain that hearts the music and shook it alive. I want to figure out why I love the music I love and discover some music I may have missed out on.

The way I am going to slowly walk into the water (instead of jumping off the high diving board) is by going backwards, starting with the 2000s. I have plenty of the albums listed but am missing quite a few too. It will give me a chance to revisit some of those albums and find the reasons why I love them/hate them/nothing them.

I am going to let the experiment begin and detail it between here and probably Indie As. Plus it will give me something to really focus on while I am knitting mindless projects with stash yarn. More on that later since I actually am starting to make progress.

First album up on the EXPERIMENT: The White Stripes “Get Behind Me Satan”

Spinning Machine, I will be. July 6, 2009

With the change in my medication, I have been having a hard time focusing on anything for longer than 15 minutes. Needless to say, I am pretty frustrated. I tried to gauge swatch for a couple of things, tried watching Daily Show online, tried watch a movie, tried reading (and actually did finish a book and half way through two other books but mostly though I spent a bulk of my 3 day weekend just bouncing from room to room in my apartment frustrated.

Saturday was the beginning of the Tour de France meaning it was the start of the awesome Tour de Fleece. Spinners (and non spinners like me trying to be a spinner) spin everyday during the Tour to eat up stash, set personal goals and such. It’s pretty fun. My dear friend Daniella Marie bought me a spindle a month back and taught me how to spin. I have been slowly learning but still focusing on my knitting. During my vacation, I completed two pairs of socks and afterwords, picked back up my massive Girasole blanket (pattern by Jared Flood). I was trucking along, having tinked back 640 painful stitches while watching the Michael Jackson coverage, and finished a couple of the charts, only two have my two cables (separately) break on me.

I finally got back to the spinning on Saturday while at Dani’s house. We listened to a couple of records and recorded a podcast for Indie As, our music blog, about the two records we listened to and it slowly descended into our regular argument about Karen O and being “bigger than the sound.” I spun a little bit but not much since I was frustrated with my spinning not progressing fast enough. Dani spun a ton of stuff and will be adding to her shop what she spins and drum cards. Anyway, all the babbling leads to this…IT CLICKED this morning. I did a ton better today, not perfect but way better. I feel pretty good about it and cannot wait for the almost pound of roving I ordered last week to get here. Spinning machine, I will be!

Current Listening: MSNBC

New Page/Leaf/Start Over June 25, 2009

Okay. I haven’t been posting and have had a hard time coming up with things to say. Now that I have two joint blogs with Daniella Marie Indie As F*** (music blog) and Mouthy Maries (feminist rant blog) I can just focus on my knitting projects and overall “gracefully stumbling towards 30″ here.

I saw Wilco last Friday night at the new Joint here in Las Vegas and it was amazing. It really made me quite happy and inspired to try to live life again. It is really cool what a good rock show can do for me. All I can say is that if Jeff Tweedy says clap, you best clap.

That’s all for now. More tomorrow for sure.

Current Listening: Wilco “I am Trying to Break Your Heart”

New Blog June 4, 2009

Me and Daniella Marie have started a new music snob blog.

Indie as Fu*k

We write about what we love, hate, annoyed with and mildly like. Check it out or not.

In my own sick way… February 17, 2009

My favorite song in the world is “There is a Light that Never Goes Out” by The Smiths. There is no doubt about it and if I never heard another song ever, I would be happy. It is the song I stole my alias from and it is the song I cry to when I see Morrissey perform it live. The first time I saw him sing it live was the week my grandfather died. It was such a long, hard week and I had tickets to see Morrissey two nights in a row. When he sang that song as an encore, I couldn’t move except to wipe the tears from my eyes.

It is a happy song for me and always can turn a day around even just for those 4ish minutes. It is a dark song about dying next to someone in a car accident and being ecstatic about it.  Morrissey’s vocals get me every time. The best part is when he sings “to die by your side” with such joy and energy. It punches me in the heart and makes my wrists hurt.  The song is perfection and I don’t care if this entry makes any sense. I just had to babble and it’s still Morrissey day.

Are we ready to rant and rave? February 17, 2009

Morrissey day is upon us again. The new record “Years of Refusal” is out and I will be picking it up on my lunch break. For some reason, I haven’t been too excited about it. Maybe because there is no tour coming to Vegas in the immediate future? I am getting older and have bigger priorities than my Morrissey fandom? Maybe it’s such a one sided relationship that I just have finally put distance? Did the last batch of fans I encountered kill it for me?

I will be thinking about that while I listen to the record today and probably blog all about it tonight.

Anyway, Happy Morrissey Day. Listen to some good music (not necessarily Morrissey or the Smiths) but something that puts a smile on your face and your heart burst with happiness. I believe that’s what music is about: to make you feel something.

Now My Cold Black Heart is Full… January 20, 2009

I have been rather quiet on the blog front the last week plus. I got sick and was insanely stressed over some medical issues I have been having and life in general so I have been focusing on living in a stressfree zone (or as close to it I can get). I am on the mend and things are hopefully looking up. 

Today was the inaguration of President (finally) Obama. I wasn’t sure if today was ever going to come. It seems that so much time since November 4th has passed and that today would never come but it did and it was awesome to listen to it all happen on NPR. After it was all said and done, I am now listening to Arcade Fire “Funeral.” This record is so…moving and it is uplifting. I have been trying to put words to how I feel about it and I can’t. I do know that it is the perfect record to listen to today. A good day.

Current Listening: Arcade Fire-Funeral

Current Project: possibly maybe socks and mouthy mitts

Current Reading: ugh. I can’t seem to focus on anything.

Chatter Chatter Chatter January 11, 2009

So I am a raging narcissist and check how many hits my bloggg gets and such. I want to see how many people check out my babble. Yesterday someone clicked on my blog post about Courtney Love from the Huffington Post site. Um. I am a bit weirded out.

I chose not to break up with knitting and crochet. I was being a bit over dramatic a couple days ago and regret doubting my relationship and how much I truly need it to maintain an acceptable level of sanity. Yesterday me and Danicast on the Endpaper Mitts by Eunny Jang (or I am calling them “Mouthy Mitts”). It will be my first real colorwork project and I am super nervous. I am using a chocolate brown from Knit Picks Palette and Dani’sModern Romance sock yarn for the fair isle part. I am pretty jazzed and inspired so hopefully I will be able to crank them out. Also, I am making a huge effort to work down my stash so I am also always going to have a pair of socks going. I have wayyy too much sock yarn in my drawers and I need to make with the socks. Last year I bought 30 Palette balls from Knit Picks for $55 or something so I think with any palette that I won’t be using for various projects and baby socks (so the ugly colors) are going to be used in the most obnoxious, ugly knee high socks EVER. Next winter, I will be a bit slimmer (thanks wii fit!) and will return to my short skirts in the winter and I will have the knee socks (at work) to complement them.

Okay, time to work. I have 90 minutes to work to make my 48 for this week.

Current Listening: Smashing Pumpkins-Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (that record is like 90 minutes long right?)
Current Projects: too yummy socks and mouthy mitts
Current Reading: Manifesta

We’re Gonna Rise Above January 10, 2009

I love tetris. I can’t get enough. I turn into one of those crazy people who go on a bender and play for hours and tell myself it’s a good way to listen to music. So when I go to play brain challenge or tetris, I pick a song and let itunes genius do its magic. I started with Tori Amos’s “Yes Anastasia” and went from there.

One of the songs picked was “But Julian, I’m a Bit Older than You” by Courtney Love. I was thinking while trying to get the little guy to the goal how disappointing “America’s Sweetheart” was and ended an era for me. I felt the record had so much potential with “Mono” as the lead song and single from the record. I love love love that song. It’s so ferocious and powerful and strong and makes me want to punch a guy in the face. I can and do listen to it over and over and I do believe that she was so much better than most of the other artists out there. That song was a spit in the face to shitty standard rock bands getting airplay. But then you listen to the record and it’s a train wreck. I tried several times to listen to it in its entirety. I can’t. I am one of the mass of girls that “Live through This” changed their lives. I have not listened to music the same after. At the age of 14, to hear this woman scream and yell “fuck you” and play the guitar powerfully and with meaning was an eye opener. I grew up listening to rock music and didn’t hear that many woman artists. Even with the whole backlash against her since day 1, I know that those were her songs and her words. “Celebrity Skin” was a good solid record too. Courtney still had shit to say. “Awful” = fucking awesome. I put so much faith in her and was let down time and time again since Celebrity Skin. Whether it was her public incidents, blogging with her misspelled words and non-sentences that didn’t make sense (she is extremely intelligent-come on!), calling out people for “stealing” money from her while she was a drug addict saying that they are actually stealing from her daughter. It just got to be too much.

Then I was thinking, who am I to put so much stock in her? Why do I hold her to a higher standard than other artists? I expect that kind of stuff from douchenozzles like Fred Durst and company but not her. It has really made me examine myself. Maybe because I am lacking faith in myself or because she was saying in her music everything I have felt and wanted to say and screaming it loudly and saying fuck all to everyone/everything else that is in the way?

Okay had to rant or word vomit that onto the internets. Back to tetris before heading to the yarn store to hang out and get inspired.

Current Listening: Rufus Wainwright “Rebel Prince”

Current Project: Nothing

Current Reading: Manifesta