Break : Some Heavy Reading

Reddit is a site that features content and commentary to go with it. There's a section where uses say "IamA...." followed by a detailing of who they are. It may be someone famous, it may be otherwise. A commentary and conversation ensues.

This weekend, two threads caught my eye:

IamA Man with 51 hours left to live 
A man who has fought cancer for a long time and has lost. His thoughts on dying and commentary.

IamA Man who is killing himself on Monday 7/3/2011
A man who due to constant depression and anxiety, has decided to end his life.

It's extremely heavy reading so I've decided to quote what really, really struck me. The man dying of cancer was asked about what he would tell the man who has decided to end his life and he said;

"I would tell him that it's not living that's failed him, it's life. We can always change our life as long as were living. He's addressing the wrong issue."

Pretty incredible reading. Reddit is now a regular visit.
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Day 16 - Yours views on mainstream music

Mainstream is an odd one. Some music is designed to be mainstream and is good (Lady GaGa, Madonna, Prince, Michael Jackson) and other music simply becomes mainstream because of its often deserved popularity (Radiohead, Muse, The Cure). There's music that I like as well as music I dislike on both sides of that fence.

The question is really - Are you enough of an elitist to dislike music solely because of its popularity? To which the answer is no. Though I understand the desire to discover new music once you feel something you enjoy is beginning to become overplayed.What I don't understand is the concept of 'selling out' all too often spouted as the rationale for that behaviour.

"Selling out" does not involve becoming popular. The act of selling out is, in my opinion, when an artist compromises their integrity or desires as a musician/individual and does something purely to make money instead of doing what they want to be doing. If an artist releases a track with vocals from Katy Perry - maybe that's what they've always wanted to do. It does not mean they have sold out.

Changing sound, style or taking a new direction don't indicate a band or artist has sold out either. All too often, fans of music seem to be under the impression that musicians should want to produce exactly the same kind of sound as before. I can't think of anything more boring. When someone releases music I enjoy, the money I send them in exchange for their albums, t shirts, gig tickets or anything else are simply a token of my support for their expression. Whichever direction that may take them in the future and whether or not I am a fan of it.

I hate the term 'fan'. All too often fans seem too self-entitled. I consider myself more of a supporter of bands, individuals, movements or genres that I enjoy either forever or for a short time only. I think the world would be a better, more expressively interesting world if others were the same.

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Day 15 - Your Favourite Tumblr

Too easy.

http://pebblesoup.tumblr.com/

Some people are simply able to seek beautiful things. This Tumblr says all sorts of incredible things about it's owners soul.

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Day 14: Your earliest memory.

I'm not sure it's the earliest, but I remember back in the house I grew up in - my parents were having a loft conversion done. I headed up there and there was a floor with beams laid accross it - creating a grid of  holes about 2 feet deep. I had been told not to fall in the holes, but I totally did.

I also remember going to school dressed as Robin Hood, and riding down my friend Samuel's stairs on a mattress.

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Day 13: Places you'd like to move or visit.

I'd like to see the Northern Lights and the bright lights of Tokyo's computer city. Also, that giant robot statue in Japan but I feel like naming specific places I would like to visit to contravene the idea of spontaneous adventure. I would to travel all over, but with a purpose of some sort. There are some possibilities I can't blog about.

I think I'm in love with London, it's convenient that the hub of the industry I work in is also here, though I think for a good while it's going to be an immovable base of operations for me. I want to venture out a fair bit more though. At some point I need to let go of the routines lifestyle I have obsessively created and be a nomad for a little bit to appease my self concerns of being boring.

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Day 12 - Bullet your whole day

• Awoken by the choral singing of "hallejujah" followed briefly by the Thundercats theme. The latter ends with quite a deathly scream which I am sure was ignored in the innocence of my youth. It made me laugh to myself though. Slowly, the process of awakening begins.
• Make toast, take medication (another story) and prepare for work. I leave shortly after.
• The awkwardness of seeing girls you fancy on the tram is ridiculous. I simultaneously hate British society for making it rude to approach her whilst traveling almost as much as I am thankful that she is at least spared my cumbersome advances, saving me the embarrassment.
• I arrive at work early. Look up to the sky and say goodbye to the grey sky. I enter the basement to find that I am alone.
• I leave for lunch and meet a friend, who is extraordinarily busy with work. I take a step back and observe their frantic blackberry messaging for a while before she can give me some attention, which I squander by waffling about rubbish and being generally nihilistic. I save some face by making some sexist remarks which she laughs at.
• Returning to work, I once again confront the problem that there is nothing to do and yet I am still getting paid. I resolve to create some work for myself that will serve as beneficial to the incoming project. Eventually I just download and play Minecraft.
• Still playing minecraft, pleasantly discover an old server is back where I look to be getting admin rights. Noobs be afraid.
• I've spent most of my day playing minecraft now. Time to go home and stop writing. Today has been almost entirely free of epiphany or interest. When the surface of life is this smooth, even my critical eye has trouble latching its barbed tentacles into anything from which to create meaningful commentary. I worry that I am a boring person.

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Day 11 - Put you iPod on Shuffle and write the first songs that pop up

1 - Put a Banana in your Ear : Jason Steele
This is a song from I believe, the second episode of Charlie the Unicorn. I had totally forgotton about it and am a little surprised that a copy has made its way on to my iPod. There was a time when I couldn't stop singing the chorus aloud around the flat, and I fear that time may be seeing a resurgence as of this evening. The catchiness level on this one is quite phenomenal.

2 - Sehnsucht : Rammstein
Ahhh, another blast from the past from the pyromaniac german industrial metal fellows. When I was 18 or so I saw Rammstein twice and was entertained both times. There's something addictive with the driving guitars with complimented by the ambient synth.

3 - Kicking and Screaming : The Presets
I was listening to these guys very heavily about 2 years ago. Sort of depeche mode meets Pet shop boys, driving rhythms define this almost indie electro. I still like their music today.

4 - Please do : C418
I first heard of C418 via Minecraft, he's the guy who composed all the beautiful music that plays occasionally during the game. This track, from his album 'life changing moments seem minor in pictures' is one of several peaceful, beautiful and somehow knowing peaces of ambient music that is always a pleasure to listen to.

5 - Dried up, Tied up and Dead to the World : Marilyn Manson
From the album; Antichrist Superstar which was the first of what would be many Marilyn Manson album purchases. I've always liked the end of this track, with the chugging guitars punctuated with an end of bar squeal as Manson speaks the title lyrics over the top.

6 - The Four of us are Dying : Nine Inch Nails
From their free album, The Slip. NIN are one of the bands that I started listening to almost as soon as my musical tastes developed and they are still a regular listen today. Their recent Oscar win for The Social Network was a little vindicating. Ranging from Shouty guitar anthems to foreboding ambient. I love Nails.

7 - Symptom Finger : The Faint
Another band who I feel like I've been listening to forever. Again, a band that betray a taste for electronic music mixed with another medium. I'm sure the source of this will be revealed all too soon.

8 - Headstrung - Distance
Almost. Some heavy and rather doomish dubstep courtesy of Distance, who I discovered the War of the Worlds dubstep retelling (Skeleton Grin is used). I owe the same re-telling as the reason I got into Dubstep. Though I've enjoyed Electronic music since I started developing any musical taste. Bands like Nine Inch Nails and Marilyn Manson were joined by Chemical Brothers and the Prodigy. I remember when I first heard Block Rockin' Beats (is it even called that?) Blew my mind.

9 - Dumb - Nirvana
Nirvana are, although it's cliche to say it - the first band I ever really started listening to. I used to close my eyes and fall asleep to Nevermind. Eargasming to the sound of the Smells like Teen Sprit guitar solo. I still love Nirvana though often avoid at risk of over-playing. I think they are mentioned too often because they're actually rather brilliant.

10 - Pathogen - Made of Hate
Some rather heavy technical metal, Which is, interestingly quite a recent thing for me. People unable to discern one kind of guitar music from another will insist I've been listening to this kind of music since the dawn of time. They are wrong!