What's your band name?

I have zero musical talent - but if talent existed I would go by the following stage names:

Fictitious EP cover

Dance Music DJ: DISCO'TINUED
Singer/Songwriter: Cassanova Jones
Indie Rock Band: Beautiful Noise Rock
Radiohead Tribute: Karma PD
Beardy Folk: The Plurals
Techno Pop: Keystroke Anarchy Epiphany
Vegas Lounge Act: Max Thomas
Crappy Suburban Cover Band: Heart to the Shot
Comedy Hip-Hop: T&A
Jam Band: Kick Ass Summer

Is it a New Era?

Back when I blogged on MySpace I wrote a post titled, "I Am A Golfer Today" (I moved it over to Blogger, but it was originally written on Sunday May 4, 2008).   I'm now in my fourth year of golfing and have made more progress in the four weeks of this young season than I have in the previous three years.  In the spirit of assigning credit where it's unwarranted, I present to you a history of my golfing headwear:

obviously not a golfer (Straw Hat 2008)

I really loved getting my Straw Hat.  I wore that hat for every round of golf in 2008 & 2009.  Yes, it was a joke - as was my game.  But I wasn't trying to make a joke of myself out there - on the golf course.  I've always been a huge fan of activity based haberdashery.  I like to wear a headband during basketball, a cap for softball, visor for poker, and I thought a straw hat for golf.


In 2010 I ditched the Straw Hat.  It had deteriorated to a significant degree, but I no longer wanted to be known as the guy in the straw hat.  Because I feel most comfortable playing cards, I went with the visor route.  My game continued to struggle.

unchecked aggression (Visor 2010)

This past March, in Las Vegas, for the first time I played cards without my usual costume armor of visor / shades / earphones and had the greatest success of my career.  Call it what you will: Being more comfortable and confident / maturing / accumulated experience finally retaining what I've been learning...  The same rules apply to why I decided to ditch the visor for golf as well.

While watching The Masters I noticed an overwhelming majority of the golfers wore caps.  I thought to myself, why not? and picked up one of the finest golf caps money can buy.  I'm not sure what it's called but it's one of those Titleist by New Era Tour Sport Cap Flex Fitted models.  It's the most comfortable hat I've ever had on my head by a huge margin.

Golf Hat 2011

A friend, who had been golfing with me for over 2 years, quickly commented that it looked very odd to see me with clubs in a cap.  I told him that it was a new year and I'm trying something new.

This is also the first golf season when I decided to not sign up for more golf lessons.  And I also won't be buying any more clubs (like how I bought that expensive Driver everybody wants to have two years ago).  But I did splurge for the fancy cap, and I've never had buyers remorse like I've had with every other golf related purchase.

No golf scores will be posted until I only need two digits to type them, however I'm more than happy to share scores verbally when asked.  It's been a very soap operatic relationship: Golf and I, but it's one that's going to continue.

What are the opposite ends of the "hipster music" spectrum?

A friend and I  had casually agreed that "hipster music" (for lack of a better term - for instance you may prefer "the indie scene") has a larger scope that is interpreted from the outside.  He defined the spectrum by amount of Organic sound.  I like this theory, and have decided to label the far end, or most Organic, by the NPR label "Beardy Folk" and the opposite end by the pseudo Lebowski quote of "Techno Pop."

Check out Infantree for an example of Beardy Folk:


Ah who am I kidding?  I can't talk about Beardy Folk on the same week of a new Fleet Foxes album and not post a song from them too:


The sound that actually started this conversation was from Twin Shadow (although it's not nearly as far on the Techno Pop end, it's a song that's been in heavy iPod rotation recently):
16-Twin Shadow — Shooting Holes (Live) by hyperlame

Finally, a video from Holy Ghost!:

Holy Ghost! - Wait & See from DFA Records on Vimeo.

Maybe I should've posted a sample from Cut Copy, but those Aussies have already gotten a ton of play on here in posts past.

It's just a theory, what's yours?  And if you're wondering what sound I would place at the center of this Spectrum - probably Arcade Fire.

How did you hear the news?

Had I known, I would've stopped tweeting momentarily starting last Friday.  How huge would it have been if my 1,000th tweet would have been a retweet of the official news of Osama bin Laden's death?  Instead, I just simply tweeted that joining Twitter was a good decision as my 1,000th tweet.  Then late on Sunday, my opinion was forever justified as my Facebook feed was full of newly posted pictures of pets and laments for the end of the weekend while Twitter was erupting.

Here are twenty selections from Twitter in perhaps the most intense four or so hours of my tenure (for lack of a better term):

 

It may be different for you.  Personally, I choose to not customize my Facebook feed at all.  I want to see that world in its most ugly grimy version.  Nobody gets hidden and I'll only consider defriending you if you steal my kidney.  Additionally, I have not "liked" many news pages - the ones that tend to break news.  My Twitter feed is usually in constant flux as I list and unfollow accordingly.

Can you rescue an out of focus picture?

Delorean @ Lincoln Hall. April 2011

For the most part, I don't understand why people spend money on a concert ticket to watch more than half of the show through their cell phone camera (or video camera).  It's a fault I too am somewhat guilty of because I just want one picture of my own per show (often leading to multiple attempts to try to get the right shot).  At almost every venue, there are multiple professional photographers taking high quality pictures with more skill and with better equipment.  For example, I always hope there's a representative from Lost In Concert present whenever I happen to be.

The iPhone, at least my 3GS model, is an overrated camera.  It's primary benefit is that it eliminates having to bring another electronic device to concerts.  But one of the following usually exists to make my pictures unsuccessful: I'm a long distance away, the tight crowd around me limits my ability to stabilize, the subject is not a statue.

The National @ UIC Pavilion. April 2011

Which is why I've come to throw any picture I take at a show through crazy filters on my Instagram app.  It's a free app for anybody too cheap to spend $2 for Hipstamatic.  A lot of photographers (for example ones from Lost In Concert) loathe these apps.  Their disgust is very reasonable and understandable.  However, to argue in favor of these apps, I don't think it's a threat to their livelihood.  At least from my pictures there isn't any competition from me.  Nobody is going to rely on an iPhone for any important event in which a professional photographer is needed.  These gimmicks, while they are certainly such, are increasing the interest in taking photos - which is a good thing.

Of course, I can't imagine how insulting it must be for any film taught photographer who spent a career crafting compositions and distorting images though tedious and careful developing techniques.

Arcade Fire @ UIC Pavilion. April 2011

Did I say "Thank You" humbly enough?

Last Sunday I typed a very bragging post about how I had a social life to be envied.  Standing upon my pulpit of blogisicsm shouting to as many as 6 followers that I'm hip and cool.  This week was very humbling, and allow me to bore you by bringing you up to date, because I do have some rather sincere sentiment I'd like to bury in this post.

Here are Monday's highlights: Called in sick, slept for over 12 hours, leaving the condo only for a trip to the grocery store where I bought a gallon of milk, 2 cartons of Orange Juice, 1 box of Oreos and 1 box of Fudge Stripes.

Very Thankful

On Tuesday I finally wrote Thank Yous to an incredible amount of people.  (Some of you who may have received them and have already complimented me on either the humor or class of it.  Since some donations are still coming in, I don't want to spoil what was enclosed in those envelopes.)  If you don't know what I was thanking people for, you might want to check out a post from February.  And if you happened to read the post many people thought was the better story, I'm happy to tell you that I did write a personalized note to Nolan.  This whole thing is becoming more real by the day... Many are asking if I'm getting excited but I'm kinda nervous.  This is my one good deed for my life and I don't want to blow it!  By the way, nothing made my life feel as full of friendship as seeing the large stack of envelopes I had to shove into a post office box.

On Wednesday I polished off whatever milk and cookies were left from Monday's self medication purchase.  That's the rough thing about living alone - You look down into a grocery cart of many cookies and realize that every single cookie will be devoured by only one person: yourself.  Later in the week I humbly bragged to a coworker that I could empty a gallon of milk faster (in the non Jackass sideshow method) than any normal person.

Thursday was supposed to be a running day.  Yeah, I'm trying to run again. (Last year around this time I started training for a 5K - completing it was one of the highlights of my 2010, but I promptly stopped running immediately after the race.)  I won't go into the reasons why I'm running again, mainly because I'm not sure I know myself.  By the way, I ended up crashing asleep before 7 pm on Thursday and never got out there to run.

Friday night was my first non profitable day of poker in 2011.  Thankfully it was also the lowest buy-in of 2011 as well.  Most importantly, the money was lost to a struggling artist who's music I enjoy.

Saturday I took down my holiday lights.  For those of you scoring at home, the date this past Saturday was April 16 (well beyond the accepted 12 days after Christmas / Epiphany deadline).

Finally, I ran today.  Completing the 3rd week of my "Couch to 5K" program. This past week was the first week I ran to non Girl Talk music - instead opting for Delorean, for I'll be seeing them this Tuesday at Lincoln Hall.  On the running playlist for the upcoming week: Arcade Fire, who I'll be seeing a week from Monday!

Will April Shows bring May Lows?

Tuesday April 5: The Mountain Goats w/ Mega Fun @ The Vic
Thursday April 7: Todd Barry w/ Brendon Walsh (Stand Up Comedy Show) @ The Hideout
Friday April 8: Cut Copy w/ Holy Ghost! @ The Riv
(Bonus After Party Show: Holy Ghost! (DJ Set) @ Smart Bar
Saturday April 9: Park Ridge Chorale @ St. Luke Church

Most of you have realized that this blog is more of journal that I'm just too lazy to make private or too conceited not to share.  Weeks like the one that just ended are the kind that I need to document for myself.  It's going to make me smile down the road when I remind myself just how my crazy April 2011 began.

I don't think I'll ever have as socially diverse of a week.  Each one of the 5 above listed events required a purchased ticket - for reasons almost as random as the acts:

The Mountain Goats

A friend on Facebook was staring down the idea of attending a concert solo.  Having done it once, I know it's a tough proposition.  Although this friend is easily strong enough to carry out such an idea (I'm sure she's done it before), I think my gesture was appreciated.  The Mountain Goats didn't exist on my iPod when I bought my ticket (although that quickly changed when Amazon listed their latest album on their 100 albums for $5 this month).  The highlight of the show is when they brought out the opening band to join them for a song at the end of their set.  This is an act I wish every headliner would do more often.

Karma quickly came back around in the positive two days later when a different friend agreed to attend a comedy show at The Hideout.  Especially seeing how the early show had sold out, I know I wouldn't have driven into the city through that night's rain to attend the late show.  I had seen Todd Barry's act not too long ago, but the opening comic (Brendon Walsh) had left a great first impression on me from a Conan routine.  When we had left the venue that night, we saw Mr. Walsh just outside the door smoking.  After a quick pause (to make sure it really was him in my mind) I complimented his set.  Even though this man is a professional comedian, his snap response of "Thanks" sounded sincere.

Cut Copy

I've now seen Cut Copy three times - and I'm especially happy I saw them this time seeing as how I will be elsewhere when they are in Chicago next for the Pitchfork Music Festival.  Cut Copy also holds a very important role in my "concert going lifestyle" because when I saw them previously The Metro I made a pledge to myself that I would wear earplugs at every show going forward.  Some dufus lady made a snide remark before the encore to me saying, "Is it too loud for you?" while pointing at my earplugs.  Maybe the old saying is true for me, but one of the first things my friend said to me when we exited was, "I won't ever hear that frequency again."

The wristband from The Riv show got us into Smart Bar for just $7 more to see the Holy Ghost! DJ set.  Of everything that I experienced in the past week, the revelation of just how much I like Smart Bar might be the most significant.  And I'm saying that even after knowing full well how large my bar tap was at the end of the night.  Now stick with me on this next statement: I enjoyed Smart Bar to a level that makes me happy I live in the suburbs... If I lived a CTA card dip away I would spend way too much time and way too much money down in that glowing basement of fun.  (By the way, there's a track from the new Holy Ghost! album available for free download on iTunes)

Finally, I found myself sitting in a Lutheran church listening to a choir sing (among other selections) show tunes.  It was the perfect Week of Shows capper.  For a week that started helping out a friend who wanted to see a show, I was at a show to support a friend who had auditioned for the Park Ridge Chorale and was excited to be performing with them for the first time.  In a week that included some extremely foul language and worse subject matter for the purposes of invoking laughter, I also saw a show that was suitable for a newborn (although the Father felt otherwise, I didn't think bringing a crying baby into a choir concert was a good idea).  Then, of course, there's the fact I sat quietly and respectfully composed in a church pew just 17 hours removed from being a sweaty dancy mess.

There are at least 3 more shows I plan on seeing before this awesome month ends.  The second half of the month will have a tough chance matching this first half in diversity, but it does have a chance because not included in those 3 shows is a birthday party for a five year old girl and a poker night with six dudes all younger than I.

I can't wait.