Saturday, August 9, 2008

for cydde, and those who share our love of winter



christmas day 2007 chicago ill. south side.






downtown louisville march 2008

7 comments:

cydde said...

i love calvin and hobbes. i did used to wish we got snow like that - i've never been anywhere that has enough snow to build anything!

johnking said...

i wished i was clavin when i was little. my dad bought me c&h book every christmas
when i was a little boy. and bloom county too, if you know that one. i even carried around a stuffed opus doll.

johnking said...

cydde, did you see the comment i left for you under the "john's girls" post? i'm wondering what you think of/what you know of 'songs:ohia/electric magnolia co.'?

cydde said...

well like you john i avoided electric magnolia co though often read about them. it fits a bit with my approach to music in more recent years, where i tend to deliberately opt out of 'the hype' which i'd say has been to my peril. i am sure i've missed some fabulous music. the few times i have bought into something that's catchy or someone has burnt me such a 'fad' thing, i've often felt disappointed and sometimes even dirty! i think i expect too much.

of course now because of your taste which i trust, and what you say, i should go to the local record shop and do a little bit of purchasing. when it comes to full albums i do tend to want to buy the physical cd if it's going to be a keeper. i think i told you that i could never ever sell any of my albums or CDs, and i only ever destroyed one cd because of the message it was trying to cram. i think if you're a full-on music collector though, it would probably get too overwhelming and you'd have to cull the collection of things that really aren't that good.

did i share with you yet the theory that my taste in music and thus the small collection i have is like a web? i did once sit down to try and draw it, showing the links between everything (a bit like 'six degrees' - i could find some kind of link even between the most unexpected bands). i might bet back to drawing that and scan it in to send. i'd love even more if you or leo would do something like that! in fact that's probably how i'd find out about a lot of other great music that i've been too closed-minded to embrace.

johnking said...

yes, you should do that! i think it would be a good homework project. it's alot like the idea i have about a genre cd, to show what bands were infulenced by whom, and so on. i once tried to put my record collection in chronological order of when i got them and under what circumstance(girlfriend of summer '96, or got obsessed with 80's garage rock in 2004" and to see which record lead me to another, it was often wild, like kicking giant-the gores-glaxy 500-jesus and the mary chain-black tamborine-diamonda galas,john lee hooker, nina simone,ect-
let's do it! tell more more on how you see it.
i finally bit the bullet and ordered this record player today iv'e been salivating over, so now i don't have to listen to all my records in sub par conditions.it'll be fun to try to remember the reasons and time i got what when. i'll have to pick and choose what i list becouse i have over 1000 lp's.

maybe i'll make you a "introduction to" songs:ohia with stuff from different albums. alot of his stuff is eps and such. or let me think of a few titles that i'd recommend. they have like a million albums. someone else should really be in charge, i am admittedly new to their music. i did have a songs ohia/mmj split years ago jim j. gave me that was good, but i immediately lost after a party and soon forgot about.
i've missed out on tons of music becouse i came up with some reason not to listen to them. but without these unjust bias, we'd be overwhelmed with trying to keep up.
i missed out on portastatic for years due to that, i wish i hadn't wasted those years not listening to heartbreaking songs like "skinny glasses girl"

cydde said...

oh a record player. i have a broken one and a few lps but waiting for my folks to kick on so i can inherit their collection! my sister and i chipped in a few years back to buy dad a new turntable. he always talked about how good dual turntables were, and i managed to find one - it is good quality. when he opened the paper he cried and then got all nostalgic. it's one of the best feelings i've ever had giving something material to someone. too bad we couldn't afford a whole new stereo system for him - years of cat piss on the speakers left them rather low quality!

portastatic is another of the bands i've treated like songs:ohia and emc. boy i've obviously missed out. i'd of course love to know what hits your buttons from them, because often when there's a back catalogue it's rather hard to know where to start that'll give you the best chance of falling in love!

for the web, i tried to fit everything i owned into the schema, so it really is like a spider web. sometimes it did work that i listened to something then through that became aware of another band or artist. in other cases it has been by pure accident that links existed.

johnking said...

portastatic is only an example of bands i ignored on purpose and regretted later. i only really heard the first 2 records. both good. it was during the time the bass player left the singer and the songs were fueled by honest and severe heartache. the town where superchunk lives is close to here, so growing up we all loved them and knew all their personal bits. the guitarist and the bass player where a legendary couple(like an indie rock elvis and percilla), living together, playing together singing about each other. everyone loved them. i loved them. then she left him. i remember being told about the break up the day it happened at skool as if it was a couple i knew and not musicians in a band i never saw. everyone was heartbroken for him. i was too. everyone hated her for it and prosumed she had killed the band and then the band released 'foolish' (she didn't play on it of corse. she did though paint the cover picture of a woman skinning a rabbit. very symbolic).
it was the most perfect and honest breakup lp i'd ever heard. it was the first time i had to ponder, what would have been better? to have spared him the heartache and the 2 lived happily ever after and this wonderful record never have been written, or let him go through hell so he could produce this incredible work of genius? to have loved and lost, or to have never written 'driveway to driveway'?
which reminds me of my "high skool crush" theme cd idea i once proposed. it would beon there for sure.
i went to a diner tonite to get pancakes and pick up a box of lucky charms to send you. they were sold out! i have to be very sneaky sending it 2 you as it is illeagal sending food products across international lines.
i say once the cd swap club is back in order we should start working on our cronological music webs! your a genius cydde!