Story Archive (Page 127 of 202)

I bought it a while ago. Listened to a couple of songs once. And forgot about it again. To listen to the whole CD in one sitting seems to me like a heroic act of futile masochism. But deep in my heart I know that I should give it a chance again one day.

I first heard Trout Mask Replica in early 1970, when I had just turned six.

By the way can anybody tell me which tracks are on the four sides of the two records? Next time I'll have a go at this mythical beast I'd like to program the four sides successively on my CD player to take advantage of the three record flipping/changing pauses.

Dream Chimney: Track of the Day is a collective mp3 blog featuring lots of goodies. Recent tracks by among others Eno, The Cure, Linda Thompson, Pavement, Beatles, Penguin Cafe Orchestra.

Ich liebe lange Winter. Meinetwegen kann das mit dem Schnee und der Kälte noch ein paar Wochen so weitergehen. Die Sommer werden nach so einer langen Frostperiode dann meist besonders heiß. Und heiße Sommer liebe ich natürlich erst recht.

Continuum - 33 1/3 is an interesting new book series on acclaimed albums of the last 40 years. Each book covers 128 pages. I am not quite sure where to start. The following albums (authors in brackets) would probably make my top 100 list of all time:

Via Kingblind: The full translation of what the director of the whiskey spot is saying to Bill Murray and what the interpreter is saying to the director in Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation:

DIRECTOR (in Japanese to the interpreter): The translation is very important, O.K.? The translation.

INTERPRETER: Yes, of course. I understand.

DIRECTOR: Mr. Bob-san. You are sitting quietly in your study. And then there is a bottle of Suntory whiskey on top of the table. You understand, right? With wholehearted feeling, slowly, look at the camera, tenderly, and as if you are meeting old friends, say the words. As if you are Bogie in "Casablanca," saying, "Cheers to you guys," Suntory time!

INTERPRETER: He wants you to turn, look in camera. O.K.?

BOB: That's all he said?

INTERPRETER: Yes, turn to camera.

BOB: Does he want me to, to turn from the right or turn from the left?

INTERPRETER (in very formal Japanese to the director): He has prepared and is ready. And he wants to know, when the camera rolls, would you prefer that he turn to the left, or would you prefer that he turn to the right? And that is the kind of thing he would like to know, if you don't mind.

DIRECTOR (very brusquely, and in much more colloquial Japanese): Either way is fine. That kind of thing doesn't matter. We don't have time, Bob-san, O.K.? You need to hurry. Raise the tension. Look at the camera. Slowly, with passion. It's passion that we want. Do you understand?

INTERPRETER (In English, to Bob): Right side. And, uh, with intensity.

BOB: Is that everything? It seemed like he said quite a bit more than that.

DIRECTOR: What you are talking about is not just whiskey, you know. Do you understand? It's like you are meeting old friends. Softly, tenderly. Gently. Let your feelings boil up. Tension is important! Don't forget.

INTERPRETER (in English, to Bob): Like an old friend, and into the camera.

BOB: O.K.

DIRECTOR: You understand? You love whiskey. It's Suntory time! O.K.?

BOB: O.K.

DIRECTOR: O.K.? O.K., let's roll. Start.

BOB: For relaxing times, make it Suntory time.

DIRECTOR: Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut! (Then in a very male form of Japanese, like a father speaking to a wayward child) Don't try to fool me. Don't pretend you don't understand. Do you even understand what we are trying to do? Suntory is very exclusive. The sound of the words is important. It's an expensive drink. This is No. 1. Now do it again, and you have to feel that this is exclusive. O.K.? This is not an everyday whiskey you know.

INTERPRETER: Could you do it slower and ?

DIRECTOR: With more ecstatic emotion.

INTERPRETER: More intensity.

DIRECTOR (in English): Suntory time! Roll.

BOB: For relaxing times, make it Suntory time.

DIRECTOR: Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut! God, I'm begging you.

Anyone interested to go to see Mono in Darmstadt tomorrow? My I Love Music thread doesn't really kick off:

"Almost nothing on this Japanese instrumental quartet on ILM yet. They will play near where I live in the tasteful setting of the Oetinger Villa in Darmstadt tomorrow and after what I heard on their site I think I will go. Post-rock somewhere between Mogwai and Godspeed with a calmer more classical impressionist sound on their forthcoming release Walking cloud and deep red sky, Flag fluttered and the sun shined according to two of the three samples. Does anyone know more about them and their live performances?"

I don't care whether you leave me or not, but don't you be around when you can't be nice to me any longer!

Nusi to András in Vizinczey's In Praise of Older Women

This sounds like an über mp3 blog without annotations: Webjay. Listener-created playlists of music on the web (via obscurantist who created a playlist of one of my fave bands: Giant Sand and spin-offs)

Bert Jansch & John Renbourn - East Wind from their 1966 album Bert and John (see said the gramophone). 85 seconds of heavenly duo acoustic guitar play. It starts off like a flamenco. But it's not. The repetitive guitar part is like liquid gold. The second guitar playing the lead (I guess it is Jansch's steel guitar) is pure magic. Amazingly fast chord changes. It is fascinating what you can do with a simple instrument like a guitar. Or two.

He dreamt that the phone was ringing. This happened quite often to him. Usually he woke up and the telephone really rang. This time it was different. When he opened his ears there was absolute silence. A second later he was back to sleep. And dreamt of the phone again. He remembered that he had dreamt of it before, that he had woken up, that there was no phone ringing at all and that he had dozed off again. So this time he convinced himself that it wouldn't be worth it to get up. And he let the phone in his dream continue ringing until it stopped. When he woke up there was a message on his answering machine...