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September 06, 2005
Disturbing sex, Japanese electronica, and the decline of liberal democracy
I’ve been recording a new song, I wrote the drum part and recorded the guitars and have spent the last hour coming up with a bass part, my fingers hurt. The bass guitar is a physically demanding instrument; I really needed a break, both for my fingers and my ears. You can only listen to the same song so many times in a row before you want to start killing things, even if you did write the song yourself. I’m cleansing my aural palette with some Cornelius; hi-fi Japanese electronica at its finest.
You many not know this but the Japanese make some of the best sounding records in the world. In the 80’s when American studios began converting all their analog gear to digital the Japanese, crafty buggers that they are, began buying up all the analog equipment that we Americans no longer deemed relevant. We are very dumb. Cornelius, Pizzicato Five, and Buffalo Daughter are shining examples of why. If you have the opportunity I highly recommend giving these artists a listen, they’ll blow your mind.
On another note my self imposed Buffy hiatus lasted all of 16 hours, I’ve already watched the first two episodes of season 7 and am clamoring for more. I may have to go into some sort of slayer rehab when this is all done. One positive effect might be that I’ll stop writing about it in my blog all the time, then again I might not; she does leave a lasting impression that Buffy.
So, what else is new? Oh yeah I finished mixing another song for Eric and as soon as possible will be making it available for download. The song is pretty kick ass; I had a really hard time mastering it though. For whatever reason I just can’t wrap my mind around the mastering process, it really is an art, one in which I have little experience or ability.
I should probably update you on some of the books I’ve finished recently. John Irving’s new book Until I Find You was absolutely fantastic, in my opinion the best book he’s written in a long time. The whole time I was reading it I kept saying to myself “I can’t believe how freaking good this is.??? This book is probably the most autobiographical he’s written, and deals with some pretty heavy and at times disturbing sexual situations. But anyone that’s read any of his other books probably won’t be all that surprised, disturbing sex is kind of a staple of Irving’s writing. He was recently interviewed on the Daily Show where he briefly talked about the similarity between himself and the main character Jack Burns and related a very amusing story about his teacher and mentor Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
I also recently finished a collection of writings by Kevin Smith which was super funny, he kind of gushes about Affleck a lot, but it’s still pretty cool, and there’s an interview with Tom Cruise which is pretty neat once Cruise stops talking about Scientology.
Before I read the Kevin Smith book, I read a book called The Future of Freedom by Fareed Zakaria. This book was positively brilliant. If you’re at all interested in political theory you should read this book. The basic premise of the book is that freedom is not necessarily the product of democracy but usually other way around, and that more democracy can actually begin to limit and degrade already achieved liberties. Key to the book's argument is the concept of liberal and illiberal democracy, and the differences between the two. An example of a liberal democracy would be our very own country The United States of America (although by the end of the book he makes it quite clear that our current pattern of government is leading us away from liberal democracy.) An example of an illiberal democracy would be Zimbabwe, a country that is technically a democracy, but deprives its people of freedoms through crooked elections and violent tyranny. Mugabe is an elected leader, but he is a terrible one, and without the freedoms of press, speech, and trade Zimbabwe will never achieve a liberal democracy. Nazi Germany is also an interesting example of how a highly democratic society can become a brutal dictatorship, not through force, but by manipulating a system that was, for all intents and purposes, too democratic. My over simplified explanations hardly do Zakaria's work justice, and without the book in front of me it’s hard to give more specific examples, so I would implore you to read the book yourself.
Speaking of books, I should probably do a little promo for the Quills awards, which you can vote on up until the 15th of September by visiting www.quillsvote.com. I mention it mainly because the one volume edition of Jeff Smith’s Bone has been nominated for best graphic novel. Dave let me borrow it sometime during the winter, and I read almost the whole thing in one day. I couldn’t keep myself from reading it, it’s really one of the best fantasy stories I’ve ever read, and I’d like to see Jeff Smith get some props for writing such an astounding piece of work. Graphic novels rarely get the respect they deserve and it’s nice to get the opportunity to show some towards a work I so highly regard. There are also some other pretty swell books up for awards including Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian, and Stephen King’s final installment in the Dark Tower saga, which are some of my favorite books in the whole world. Once again great fantasy that I feel has been overlooked by some who write King off as a one trick pony, when it’s so drastically the opposite.
Well I really should get back to work on this song and record the stinking bass part, although I might cop out and go play a game of PS2 baseball. It’s very close to the end of the regular season and my digital Red Sox are poised for a championship.
Peace y’all
Rold
Posted by harold at September 6, 2005 03:52 PM
Comments
Posted by: Captain Squiqqle at September 9, 2005 10:52 AM